Google Search Options may be new to a whole lot of folks (as a lot of people just miss it), but it marks a big change for all webmasters and online marketers. By introducing of Google Search Options, there are more ways to find information online. Google now allows you to go through videos, forums, and even reviews to find information that may be relevant to your search. You can also filter through the results by date. The reviews filter will essentially finds you what people are reviewing online. It’s not that complicated.

So now you know what you need to do to get ranked high on Google. You want to be involved on forums. You want to review products on a consistent basis. You want to make your own videos. Adding images and posting on a consistent basis is going to matter as well! And who can forget about the social media.

There are 2 cool, interesting features with Google options. You can use Wonder Wheel to find related searches and visualize them:

Timeline is essentially a time visualization tool that lets you find out who’s been talking about your keyword phrase in the past years. A cool way to do some trend analysis as well:

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WebPosition is one of the best software solutions for SEO consultants or anyone who’s serious about search engine optimization. If you have been interested in the field of SEO for a while, you are probably familiar with all the free tools that you can use to measure your site’s success in the organic search channel against others. WebPosition is premium theme that goes beyond what you get with these free tools and helps you create professional reports for your consulting or small business. In WebPosition, you have a software solution that can track your progress in the organic search channel over time. It can also give you tips on how to optimize your pages for search engines to help you get more free leads.

WebPosition is a very intuitive software package. While it’s very capable, the software is designed to let anyone run reports and track results. All you need to work with WebPosition is a basic computer knowledge and SEO.

Here is what you get with WebPosition:

• Reporter: lets you run reports from multiple search engines and combine them all into one. You can also e-mail or export your reports.
• WordTracker Keywords: if you have a WordTracker account, you can use your WebPosition software to conduct keyword research right on your desktop.
• Page Critic: goes through your pages and lets you know what you need to do to optimize your pages for search engines.
• Page Builder: while Page Critic shows you how to patch your existing pages, Page Builder makes it easy to build your pages right from the start.
• Submitter: submit your pages to search engines easily with Submitter. It makes it so easy to set it and forget it (though you should keep your eyes open).
• Scheduler: set it and forget it like a pro with Scheduler. If you are running a business, you can’t afford to keep track of everything. With Scheduler, WebPosition get things done automatically.
• Meta Manager: lets you locate, modify, and delete duplicate tags.
• Link Defender: broken links can affect your search engine rankings. With Link Defender, you can catch them before it’s too late.

By outsourcing your SEO reporting and tracking process, you can spend more time focusing on more important business activities. In that regard, WebPosition saves you time and money in the long run. If you are a business owner or consultant, you will appreciate it.

So you are ready to get started with WordPress? You have planned your website and ready to set it up and start getting traffic to it. I am often surprised by the large number of folks who pay more attention to the look and feel than the small details about their themes. You can have a theme that comes with a whole lot of bells and whistles. That doesn’t necessarily mean that you are going to get free traffic by using it. I don’t know about you, but if I am starting a business on the back of my WordPress site, I prefer to have a WordPress theme that is SEO friendly and can help me get free leads. You’ll have to do some optimizations, of course. No theme is perfect in that regard. However, it’s always better not to have to start from scratch.

So what is a SEO friendly theme? I have often seen lists of SEO themes on other websites that contain themes that are not exactly SEO friendly. You can’t just look at a theme and say, “oh that seems to be optimized for the organic search.” It’s just not the way it works. You need to pay attention to details and go through the code to figure out whether the theme you are planning to buy is search engine friendly. Here are a few things you need to look for in a search engine friendly WordPress theme:

• Clean Code: you want a theme that comes with a clean code. No messy, loopy code. It would be a great plus if the code is W3C valid.
• Headers: a theme that makes good use of header tags can help you gain a lot of free traffic. Not a lot of theme developers take advantage of header tags, so make sure you look for themes that do.
• Images: how your theme handles images is important. Some sophisticated theme automatically provide alt tags for your images in case your forget them. Of course, you want to make sure you stick with the best practices here.
• CSS/Javascript: make sure you choose a theme that comes with external Javascript code its pages. The same can be said about CSS. No need to have all these in one file.
• Load: you don’t want to get a theme that is to heavy for slow connections to handle. Make sure you go for a lightweight theme that works for most folks.
• Cross-browser compatibility: wouldn’t it be nice if your theme worked great with Chrome, Firefox, and IE?
• Link structure: while you will have a lot to say about how your internal links are structured, you still want to make sure your theme doesn’t take away from your efforts to increase your PR and search engine rankings.
• Content: where your content shows up in your code is somewhat important too. Make sure you choose a theme that puts your best content first in the eyes of search engine bots.

As webmasters become more aware of the importance of owning a search engine friendly theme, theme developers are putting more focus on building templates that give their customers to best chance to get free traffic from the SERPs. No theme is perfect but themes such as Thesis are awfully close to perfection in this area. You’ll still have to do some optimizations yourself, but at least you don’t have to start from scratch.

The field of search engine optimization is one of the hottest fields in the search engine industry. Whether you are looking to get more traffic for your blog or drive free leads to your business, search engine optimization is one of the best way to go. But learning the art of SEO and keeping up with the latest developments can be sometimes a hassle. It’s not that easy to keep up with such a dynamic field. Google changes its algorithm on a consistent basis which means you’ll have to read on to keep up. And I am not talking about reading classic books. Reading the most recent SEO books and supplementing it with what you learn from blog and forums can help you stay up to date in the field of SEO.

If you have fallen a bit behind as far as SEO is concerned, you should read these fairly recent books to get back on the right track:

Search Engine Marketing, Inc: a great book that helps you find out about the latest developments in the search engine industry. Great for SEO directors and the higher ups.

Search Engine Optimization for Dummies: you can’t really argue with the quality of this book. Bruce Clay has written one of the most comprehensive books ever written on search engine optimization.

Search Engine Optimization Bible: another great book that gets you familiar not only with the latest developments in the field of SEO, but it also shows you how to get the best out of the social media.

The Findability Formula: a high level book that is written for those who don’t have the proper technical knowledge when it comes to search engine marketing. This book shows you how to use search engines to drive lead to your business and take your brand to the next level.

There you have it. I am sure these books will be outdated in their due time, but right now they provide you with the most up to date information to enable to keep up with the latest in the field of SEO.