Can I beat this kind of SERP competition?

Chianti

Chianti

New member
Apr 24, 2010
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In the SERP for a certain key-phrase, if you saw the top ten sites were large, broad, old sites (unoptimised, old technology, stagnant content, amateur themeing, etc) ranking just one internal page each for the target key-phrase, would you think it is possible to rank a small focused niche site ahead of them for that phrase?

They are between PR 4 and 6. They've got 1000 to 2000 pages indexed. Very aged - 1996 to 2003. They each have 2000 to 4000 backlinks each to the respective ranking internal pages, and between 4000 and 20,000 backlinks to their domains.

If I can get onto the first page, I might be able to get around 200 UV a day just from this one key-phrase.

By the way, this is my first site.

Any advice?

Cheers.
 


Anything is possible dude. You can do it. The points that i always remember are fresh content, plenty of backlinks as high PR as you can get and preferably related to the niche you are targetting and make sure your on page SEO is optimised as well:)

Thanks
 
Well I used to think a lot like you whether I could beat this competition or that, but I realized it was pointless to think about all these unless you have personally ranked a site yourself to at least athe #2 position.

So just start with a site and get your feet wet in a niche with medium competition on the first page, and then once you have managed to rank that site you will have a rough idea or understanding of what kind of competition you can outrank and go for.
 
> but i'd love to read an seo journal similar to your ppv one

Wrong guy. Niko has a different chimp in his avatar. I like reading the journals, but wouldn't do one. I might do a 'case study' for noobs if I ever have anything interesting or motivating to say.

> So just start with a site and get your feet wet in a niche
> with medium competition on the first page

Yep, I hear you... optimise the frontpage for the 'fathead', consistently build quality links to it, but basically forget the SERP for the domain and instead concentrate on #1 spots for a large amount of internal pages using the longtails to get most of the traffic. Maybe in a couple of years Google might decide that my site is better than the old crap it's listing just now for the main key phrase.

Sounds like a plan. I read recently that longtails account for 70% of total keyword potential anyway. It just means you've got to write a shedload more content and get a few good quality backlinks for every page.

Cheers.
 
When I'm assessing competition strength then I never look at the PR. From what I learned from your description these are old sites, which means the SEO was done long long time ago. Maybe you could include a traffic travis or MS top10 screenshot (of course without the links). I'm more of a visual person.

Btw what's the exact search count for these kws?

As for outranking them shouldn't be hard?
 
Chianti said:
> but i'd love to read an seo journal similar to your ppv one

Wrong guy. Niko has a different chimp in his avatar. I like reading the journals, but wouldn't do one. I might do a 'case study' for noobs if I ever have anything interesting or motivating to say.

> So just start with a site and get your feet wet in a niche
> with medium competition on the first page

Yep, I hear you... optimise the frontpage for the 'fathead', consistently build quality links to it, but basically forget the SERP for the domain and instead concentrate on #1 spots for a large amount of internal pages using the longtails to get most of the traffic. Maybe in a couple of years Google might decide that my site is better than the old crap it's listing just now for the main key phrase.

Sounds like a plan. I read recently that longtails account for 70% of total keyword potential anyway. It just means you've got to write a shedload more content and get a few good quality backlinks for every page.

Cheers.
Click to expand...
Register an account at serpiq and figure out what the CI score is. That will give you an idea of how difficult it will be.
 
jeffrey said:
Register an account at serpiq and figure out what the CI score is. That will give you an idea of how difficult it will be.
Click to expand...

I just remembered something a wise guy once told me and would like to add on to my reply above...

Basically he said.. if you can tell the top few sites are affiliate sites, then you can outrank them, because they are just normal guys the same as you and me. Just reverse engineer their backlink profile and get the same links as them, and make your site better than theirs! :1bluewinky:
 
Thanks for all the replies and advise.
Eli's article was particularly relevant.. thanks for the heads up.
 
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