google ranking for keyword phrase which includes word "new"

Hi all,

I've been lurking and reading and learning for some time now. I could probably write a book on the all the neat things I have learnt here - so my first post is a big thank you for all the information. And also to ask my first question....

I created a community web site for our town (New Norfolk) and have managed to get a google ranking of 4 for the keyword phrase "derwent valley" but try as I might, I cannot get a ranking for "new norfolk" or even "new norfolk tasmania". Our town is only small (less than 5,000 people) and it is located on the little island right at the bottom of Australia - so the keywords I am targetting are not exactly in high demand by the rest of the world, which got me to thinking. Is there a problem with the word "new" when used as part of a keyword phrase? Thanks for any light you can shed on this peculiarity...

 

1.960.000.000 search results for "new"

- Heavy competition out there

and wellcome to dp from Copenhagen, Denmark

 

Maybe I have misunderstood - obviously new is very popular, and there is Norfolk in England and Norfolk Island in the Pacific. But I thought that the combination of "new" and "norfolk" in the keyword phrase "new norfolk" was considered a separate word as far was google is concerned? Also adding "tasmania" to make "new norfolk tasmania" narrows it down considerably. There is a Derwent Valley in England and yet I rate no 4 for the phrase "derwent valley"

This is the website - www.newnorfolk.org

Maybe someone else taking a look might be able to pick up something I am doing wrong? Thanks for any help you can give me.

 

Results 1 - 10 of about 692,000 for new norfolk tasmania. (0.20 seconds)

new norfolk tasmania 4.0 /day
lunatic and mental asylum - new norfolk tasmania 3.0 /day
new norfolk karate club tasmania 3.0 /day

seems like it'd be a waste to try and place well with those search terms anyways...

 

You're #1 for allinanchor:new norfolk but I can't find you anywhere for inanchor:new norfolk. There's a theory that using a single keyword phrase can lead to a penalty. Try mixing your keywords up a bit, i.e. new norfolk information, new norfolk travel, new norfolk australia etc etc.

 

MattUK - re the single phrase keyword, is that the keyword density in the text, or do you mean I should get people linking to me to use varied anchor text - for example the keywords you suggested? I actually have several keyword phrases that I am trying to use on the page - derwent valley, new norfolk tasmania, new norfolk accommodation and new norfolk on its own, but just about all my incoming links use "New Norfolk - Capital of the Derwent Valley - Tasmania - Australia". Maybe this is where I am going wrong....

BrianK - I don't quite understand what those figures mean (the 4.0 / day part) - how did you get those figures? One of New Norfolk's claims to fame is that we have the oldest mental asylum in Australia. It has closed down now and the whole site is being developed as a tourist site. Certainly the karate club would be something I would not feel too disappointed not to rank highly....

Luckily the page ranks no 1 in the pay-per-click and it doesn't cost so much... But it would be nice to come up in the first 100 listings under New Norfolk. I can't imagine there are really 692,000 pages about New Norfolk! That is 140 pages for every man, woman and child - I guess we aren't as unimportant as I first thought!!! <grin>

 

>>do you mean I should get people linking to me to use varied anchor text - for example the keywords you suggested?

Yes, on-page optimisation isn't 'particuarly' important to google, IBLs are pretty much the be all and end all.

>>just about all my incoming links use "New Norfolk - Capital of the Derwent Valley - Tasmania - Australia

That could be part of the problem, to Google this won't look like natural linking

>>BrianK - I don't quite understand what those figures mean (the 4.0 / day part) - how did you get those figures?

Probably from overture, take a look at their tools section - http://inventory.overture.com/d/searchinventory/suggestion/

 

I doubt that this is doing anything negative.

Truly "natural linking" would probably be just the URL but that rarely happens. I know you (and I) have seen this claim before but I don't think it's anything more than rank speculation. I really don't think Google goes looking for keywords in anchor text and devaluing any links that look spammy...

 

I'm pretty sure that they'd be taking some steps to address webmasters 'google-bombing' their way to the top of the SERPS and looking for pages that have 1000's of links pointing to a page with the same anchor text would be one of the easier ways to do this.

Agree it probably wouldn't have a negative effect, though it may not help at the same time. Getting a range of anchor text is by far the safer and more sensible option, not only as you'd guard against anything like this happening, but you'd also be higher in the SERPS for more search terms.

 

I'd agree with that although there are sites where there are only a small number of search terms that are really useful. I don't think you should be worrying about penalties because most of your backlinks are for 1 or 2 search terms.