Hey guys, ive started a new image host (link in my sig) and I want to do some SEO for it. I want to be on the first or at least second page of google for the term "free image hosting"... Seen as ive never done this before do I need to just submit to directories and stuff to boost my PR? Thanks.
Not to discourage you in your quest but it may take a while. There are currently about 36,900,000 results for your one keyword phrase. You would have to start with good content for your site with the proper balance of keyword saturation (ca. 3%) and make sure to have clean metatags. Add new content to your site regularly and make sure to avoid duplicate content in both the page text and your head tags. As for getting backlinks to help your PR for serps, you will need to find relevant sites in your niche to trade with you. Make posts in image hosting related forums with your site in your signature. Write good articles about images and image hosting and submit them to article directories to get links and exposure. Just adding your site to directories will not get you far. That would be just one of many ways to help your page rank increases. This will get you started in the right direction. If you want recommendations for a few good books to help you get started just PM me and I will send you a few links. It is a long rocky road you have set as a goal but keep plugging at it and it can be obtained. Good Luck.
I suggest you target the "long tail" keywords instead of phrases that are already competitive. Check them out at the Digital point Keyword suggestion tool. So for instance, you can target keywords such as "image hosting for parties", "host holiday images"... you know what I mean. Working on the "long tail" keywords has always brought me success. And like The Patrician said - you need to do "way more than that". Best of luck
The good news is there's only 120,000 sites with the intitle phrase "Free Image Hosting". So that's a little better than 36 million. Still, When I'm considering a keyword phrase to go after, I don't want to compete with more than a couple thousand intitle competitors at most. Just keep your site fresh, build good links and eventually you'll get there.
well it will need time and effort since the competition is high, you can;t be on first all of the sudden, yiu have to work for it. Do proper on page which will really help you in SERP then do off-page using your target KW as your anchor. I have to agree with meteorite, why don't you start with longtail for a quicker result
put your keywords in title, content, anchor text, meta tags, alt tags, sigs...make an article/blog and submit it in directories...
There's a reason why I suggest people read this thread... SEO starts before you write a line of code or a sentence of regular content. If you're worrying about SEO after the site has gone live, you've done something wrong. http://forums.digitalpoint.com/showthread.php?t=413544 In your case though, I'm going to suggest you also read this thread as well: http://www.sitepoint.com/forums/showthread.php?t=182915 (and kharen, alt is an attribute of the IMG element, not a tag - tags have opening and closing brackets, attributes don't)