I have a keyword/phrase that receives around 1500 searches per month. There are around 165,000 personalized searches in Google for this phrase. Our site ranks 100th. When we type our url in Google search we get 248 results. We have recently optimized our site as best we can for this search term but are obviously not happy with our positioning. My question is... How difficult should it be to get top rankings for this keyword/phrase? We have spent countless hours doing online optimizing, submitting to directories, link exchanges etc. However, we are not being rewarded for our efforts. Are we just idiots???
Well that makes me feel better. Allinanchor doesn't seem to work. I'll try again later. What can we be doing wrong? We use header tags. Our pages are keyword rich but not stuffed. We have been link building. What's left?
give us the search term and we can provide more info. SEO is not a one time thing...it is hard continous work. It can also be that your competition is strong and you need to ramp up your efforts to catch them. You say you are doing link building but directory submissions and link exchanges are not going to cut it for any competitive term. You need to come with a way to get people to link to your site.
Submit to some directories and get backlinks with your targeted keyword in the anchor text. In addition, you can make a blog based on that keyword and link it to your main page.
Search term is "sports handicapping". I'm not sure how strong my competition is. At least 99 are stronger than my site though.
Appreciate the response. Will try to put your valuable input to work for us. I don't mind being called an idiot when it comes to this stuff but the least you could do, is to show off your supreme intelligence by offering up some helpful advice. Cheers!