Welcome to the Q&A Forum

Last year my company hired an SEO company to build backlinks for targeted achor text keywords.  It turns out that they wrote average to below average blog posts that had content related to my business, but that were placed on odd websites, not related to my business.  They did this for about one year before I fired them.

Should I try to get each of those blog posts removed and then disavow them?  If the external links back to my site are nofollow then it is my understanding that I don't really need to worry about them...is that accurate?

Is it too risky to keep any external backlinked content alive when it is on a site that is unrelated to my business?

I hear you on the backlink profiles, and what is funny is that the top ranking sites, other than Yelp, FindLaw, Avvo, Thumbtack, and others, have little or no backlinks.

Using MajesticSEO, one of my local competitors has 8 backlinks from two domains with a trust flow of "0" and a citation flow of 13.  Another has 4 backlinks from 3 domains with a trust flow of "12" and a citation flow of "18."   The third has 28 backlinks from 15 domains with a trust flow of "0" and a citation flow of "29."

MajesticSEO shows my site with 1,835 backlinks from 137 domains with a trust flow of "18" and a citation flow of "27."  Many of them were questionable, which is why I requested that the links be removed and then disavowed the remainder of low quality, spamming links.

I suppose the quality of the backlinks may be an issue here.  I supposed a site with one backlink from a local chamber is probably of higher quality than 2000 backlinks of questionable quality.

Thanks for your response.

My on-page SEO efforts are focused on generating higher visibility in Google's SERPs for my site:  http://www.thegrossmanlawoffice.com.  My primary keyword phrase is "winter garden divorce lawyer"

I have noticed that my home page ranks higher in Yahoo (5) and Bing (2) for my primary keyword, and Google does display my site in the 7-pack local results but does not rank my home page organically.  It actually ranks my business's Facebook page on page 3 of the SERPs.  Yahoo includes me in the local listings in position #2...at least today it does!

I am happy that Google includes me in the local results, and I am curious why it does not rank my home page organically at all.

Yahoo's rankings seem to be accurately tracking my keyword phrases and the appropriate pages, and it has me ranking really well for many of my keyword phrases.

I am not quite sure why Yahoo and Bing see my relevant pages and seem to be ranking me appropriately, but Google is not.  I recently (within last week) cleaned up my backlink profile per a great suggestion I received here.  Is that the likely culprit?

Any thoughts?  Thank you in advance.

I sent you a PM with the URLs for the sites.

These sites are in a boring industry; divorce lawyers.

None of these sites are "popular," nor do they have any user interface experiences that are cutting edge or fund or exciting.  Each site provides information about the law firm, the lawyer(s), and the services offered.  None of the sites utilize much media, such as video or audio.

I can provide the URLs for the sites, but I don't know if that is acceptable to do in this thread.  If not, I would be happy to send them via private message.

None of the sites are providing anything truly unique, however my blog does provide information for people that goes beyond the stereotypical divorce information blog.  The information is related and relevant, and I would like to think it is somewhat unique.

As far as I can tell, these other websites are not updated frequently.  There are no active blogs on any of these sites.  Google+ accounts are non-existent or not active.  Facebook business accounts are non-existent or not active.

In my local marketplace, I have competitors who have the following:

• unoptimized title tags and description tags (really long using keyword stuffing),
• stuffing keywords into the Meta keywords tag,
• lacking keywords in the body copy,
• using spammy footers or sections of text with a lot of local cities listed where no physical business is located,
• unattractive design (in my humble opinion),
• lower page authority,
• lower domain authority,
• lower number of back links

and are organically outranking my site that I have tried to optimize using the MOZ tools, Market Samurai, other tools, and other great advice provided by people much more knowledgeable than myself about SEO.

I don't understand how these sites that lack SEO continue to rank in the #1 or #2 spots in Google for my main keyword phrase + location, while my site is either not in the top 50 or in the top 40s range.

How is it that sites with little to no optimization, no blogs, and very few backlinks, continue to rank quite well?

These are not all new sites.  Domain ages range from 1 to 10 years.  What I am seeing appears to go against the grain of SEO recommendations.

Any general thoughts?

Miriam,

Yes, I can write about Orlando cases and other activities in Orlando.  Would you recommend doing that on my blog?  If I did that, would it be best to have a city page for Orlando to link to from any blog posts that mention/target "orlando?"

Thank you all for your responses so far.  What you all have provided so far is very helpful for me, so thank you.

Miriam,

My firm represents clients from Central Florida and we regularly appear for hearings, trials, and mediations at the main Orange County courthouse located in downtown Orlando.  We also appear at other courthouses in other areas around Orlando, such as Lake County courthouse, Osceola County courthouse, Brevard County courthouse, Seminole County courthouse, etc.

Wherever there is case filed, we appear.  So, in a sense, we travel to where our client's cases are handled.  Since our attorneys are licensed in Florida, we can represent anyone in the entire State in any State courthouse.

We are members of the Orange County bar association, located in downtown Orlando as well.

Does any of this information help?

My question is about keyword selection for a small divorce law firm located outside of a major city.

My firm focuses only on family law matters, such as divorce, child support, child custody, and paternity.  Divorce cases generate the most revenue.  We are located outside of the Orlando, Florida metro area, in a small town about 15 miles west of Orlando.

My keyword research shows a significant amount of traffic for keywords including Orlando, such as Orlando Divorce Lawyer, Divorce Attorney Orlando, and Orlando Divorce Attorney.  For my location, Winter Garden, Florida, the search volume is reported as "0" using Moz's Keyword Difficulty tool.  When I use other tools, such as Google Keyword Planner, the reported volume for my physical location and surrounding cities, other than Orlando, shows a volume of "0."

We do get potential clients contacting us indicating that they found us via a Google search, and I know that we are ranking well in local search results.  That's the good news.  However, we are trying to increase the volume of potential clients contacting us, and it seems that the way to do that is to rank well for searches including the word "Orlando."

I know that ranking in the local results for Orlando is out of the question because my office is not physically located in Orlando.  However, it does not seem to make sense to target keywords for organic search including my location and the surrounding cities because the search volume appears to be next to nothing.

So my questions are as follows:

Even though the search terms with high traffic seem to be quite competitive and my office is not located in Orlando, should I still target keywords including the Orlando location?

How should a small business approach this strategy as far as keyword usage and organization of the website?  Should I have a city landing page for Orlando or should I target my main pages using keywords including "Orlando" and build city pages for the smaller, surrounding cities?

Thanks in advance for the help.

My website is located at http://www.thegrossmanlawoffice.com

In my local marketplace, I have competitors who have the following:

• unoptimized title tags and description tags (really long using keyword stuffing),
• stuffing keywords into the Meta keywords tag,
• lacking keywords in the body copy,
• using spammy footers or sections of text with a lot of local cities listed where no physical business is located,
• unattractive design (in my humble opinion),
• lower page authority,
• lower domain authority,
• lower number of back links

and are organically outranking my site that I have tried to optimize using the MOZ tools, Market Samurai, other tools, and other great advice provided by people much more knowledgeable than myself about SEO.

I don't understand how these sites that lack SEO continue to rank in the #1 or #2 spots in Google for my main keyword phrase + location, while my site is either not in the top 50 or in the top 40s range.

How is it that sites with little to no optimization, no blogs, and very few backlinks, continue to rank quite well?

These are not all new sites.  Domain ages range from 1 to 10 years.  What I am seeing appears to go against the grain of SEO recommendations.

Any general thoughts?