Welcome to the Q&A Forum

Hey guys, I want to give you a bit of background to help you understand what I'm trying to do, and the motivation why. I understand that there are a variety of opinions and beliefs regarding what I'm trying to do online, and I hope this post doesn't turn into a list of everyone's views, or a place for someone to say mean / disrespectful things regarding what I'm doing.  I feel like this group is a professional one, so I don't think any of what I've mentioned above will be a problem.

Last year we were surprised to learn (in the delivery room) that our first child was born with Down syndrome.  Not having any interaction with anyone with Down syndrome I had no idea what my new life was going to be like and set out to find some information online (videos, blogs, etc.)  I was surprised to learn that there isn't much quality content out there.  Much of the information is outdated, cheesy, lame, etc...In fact many of the videos that I found by searching online about Down syndrome were by people making fun of those born with Down syndrome (comedians, etc.)  Very few of them gave me any sort of idea what the future over our family was going to be like.

A few months went by, I met many many parents and others who personally knew someone with Down syndrome whose lives have been greatly enriched by their interaction.  In addition to that I realized that our life was much more normal than I could have ever imagined.  In addition I released that there have been tremendous medical advances in the last two decades and today children born with Down syndrome can attend regular classes, attend college, get married, have jobs, and live productive life's.

They no longer ride "short buses", forced to stay in special needs classes, or destined to live a life in some sort of institution.  I was surprised that our son (at 3 weeks old) was going to physical / occupational / speech therapy at such a young age.  The idea today is that children born with Down syndrome work hard at a young age to stay ahead of the curve. I couldn't believe the things they had him doing at such a young age. (At just a few months old they had him on a treadmill so he could get a head start on learning to walk! ----> http://noahsdad.com/treadmill/)

All of that to say, I decided I wanted to be an online resource to help give people an idea of what life is really like raising a child born with Down syndrome. I do a daily one minute video where I'm creating an online narrative by telling his story every day. 
I have a growing Facebook page (http://facebook.com/noahsdadcom) and twitter account (http://noahsdad.com/) and our blog readership is growing everyday.  
I own a lot of good domains, and am trying to figure out the best way to use them to create awareness.  I've been trying to read about SEO as much as I can. I've only been going on NoahsDad.com since May and my page rank is 4. (I'm not sure if that really means anything, but just wanted to share it.)

All of the SEO info can be a bit overwhelming and I'm not sure  I'm doing things the best way. I was wondering if someone would mind taking a look at my site and I'll be happy to give any info you need (info from google webmaster tools / antlytics, etc…).
I think I'm doing all the 'basics."  But I'm not sure what I need to be doing to really step it up. I think the tag line / title page for the home page could be changed up, and perhaps doing some different things on my home page.

When I first started my idea was to have a few different categories, Noah's Minute (which is where I was going to put my daily video), resources (posts counting helpful info), Noah's Mom, MD (medical posts by my wife who is a doctor), twitter/iPhone photos (I used one of these catigories and excluded it from my home page to post random pictures form twitter)..

Not that I'm 6 months into it, I've relaized that it didn't work out the way I thought at first..every post is a Noah's Minute post pretty much (and lots of twitter pictures)…and the Noah's minute posts could be broken down into sub - categories. Or…I could not have a "noah's minute" category and change my catagories to "resources" "therapy" "toys" "how-to's" etc…and break up what I used to call "Noah's Minute" into those categories..if that makes sense.

The reason I didn't do that before is that I wanted someone to be able to watch every video in the order they were created to see the whole story..since I'm doing one minute every day, someone could come and watch his story unfold from birth until present day..but I guess you wouldn't really need a category for that…you could just go to the last page of the blog.

The key words I'm trying to rank well for (and I know some of these wont't be possible) are:

Down syndrome

Down syndrome videos

Down syndrome facts

Down syndrome information

Down syndrome Blogs (I actually own the domain downsyndromeblogs.com as well..I wanted to make a list type website where i list out a lot of the good blogs on down syndrome)

Down syndrome families

Down syndrome pictures

Down syndrome toys (I own this domain also…thinking of doing an amazon affliate page or something..)

Down syndrome physical therapy

Down syndrome occupitonal thearpy

Down snydrome speech thearpy

Also there are some mis-spelling of these terms that I would like to try to rank for as well..and I'm not sure how to do that in a post without my post looking like I made an error.

I know that is a lot of info, but I wanted to lay everything out there. I'll be happy to post any more details that anyone needs to help me out.
Thanks again and I'm looking forward to the feedback.

Rick

NoahsDad.com

UPDATE: I thought I would include a picture for you guys to see what your dealing with...!  Warning: His cuteness is contiguous!

down-syndrome-cute-boy-halloween1.jpg

Wow!

I can't believe you are reading this, and taking the time to reply.  Thank you.

I very much would be ok with you writing a blog or doing anything that you would like in regards to the site.  There is more to my overall plan, and my long term idea, but I already rambled to long and didn't want to add to the rumbling.

I'd be honored to talk to you (email, phone, Skype, ichat, etc..) anytime about what we're doing, and why I think this is an area where my family and I can really help hurting people (90% of babies born with Down syndrome are aborted because they are often considered to be "a burden" on the family) In my case I was very surprised to learn it was not only not a burden, it was the best year of my life. It was nothing like I, or any of my friends who know us, thought. In fact the most common thing I hear from people in "real life" and through the number of messages we get (almost daily) about our site and videos is "Wow...I wouldn't even know your son had Down syndrome if you didn't tell me..he seems so 'normal."  This is the view that I want the world to help see...Again, I don't want to turn this into a religious post or anything, but I really want to use the web to put a dent in that crazy sad abortion statistic.

Another thing is every single website about "special needs" I've seen (with the exception of maybe 1) is either very very outdated, or written by weird-o's. There family doesn't look 'normal' in any sense..not because they have a child with special needs...becuase they are just weird!

Not to mention there is NEVER any quality to the design...not that my site is super designed or anything...but even the Nation Down Syndrome society webpage is lame. My hope is to really step up the quality and be a great resource for people.

Because people who are 'faced" with giving birth to a special needs child are often very desperate to find QUALITY information, they look at everything when they show up to the site. And post, pin, share, like, etc..:)  For instance, this was a popular post:

http://noahsdad.com/nordstrom/

And my wife (a medical doctor) is writing a great new parent guide that is getting some decent views:

http://noahsdad.com/new-parent-guide/

Sorry for more rambling, but I 'm very passionate about this. I'm not interested in seo to simply make money like a lot of folks...I'm interested in doing this to do good. For no other reason that I simply love my son, and know that other families would love people with Down syndrome also..if they just had a window into what life is like raising a child born with it. That's what I hope I can do for the world...give them a window by doing this online narrative. I'm a little behind right now (we just bought a home and moved) but I'll be catching up very soon and will have a one minute video for pretty much every day of his life......an online narrative....a story being told daily in one minute nuggets.

Again, I can't think you enough for showing interest!  (And I'm amazed at how kind everyone has been..typically when you ask questions online about a site dealing with a topic like mine, you get trolled by people making fun of your son, people with special needs, etc...) So thank you everyone for being so kind, and helpful.

By the way, my personal website it http://rickwsmith.com and my twitter is @RickSmith

I want to chime in and say that as a a normal person who wants to learn SEO in order to have content found, and ultimately help people, I find SEOmoz to be extremely useful. Without sounding over dramatic, I can even say it has been life-changing for me, and my "career."

The info you will learn from the White Board Friday's, this q&a, and the rest of the staff of SEOmoz is invaluable. There is so much junk info online about SEO, and I personally enjoy having a "home base" so to speak. SEOmoz is the place where I go to line up other info that I hear about. I can trust that the info that I read/watch here is accurate.  Time is one of our most value assets, so if you value your time, SEOmoz is a great place to come and learn (and build your business/brand/story, etc..)

And on a personal level I have to say that the people here are great. A lot of "seo junk" you find online (free or paid) just seems to be ran by shady people, hard core salesman, and just generally untrustworthy people. But you won't find that here. I could type for days about my personal experience, but I'll save you details, and just say you can trust these guys. They aren't out to get you. They don't try to sell you on stuff. They don't "over-promise." And they aren't into SEO just to make a buck. It's the way the company is led from the top down.

If you back and read some old posts by the CEO (Rand) you'll find lots of stuff about how we wants to be in business to help people. To do the right thing. To change the way people think about "SEO." And above all he cares about his customers. And I think that counts for something. A big something. I enjoy supporting organizations  I feel generally have in interest in their customers, and you will find that here.

/rambling

Yes it did.

I'm an editor for one of the categories, and depending on the catagory you're trying to listed in, it can indeed take some time.

By the way, I actually don't think a link from DMOZ is all that powerful any more...just my 2 cents.

Yah, I read up on CloudFrare, but it looks like a lot of people don't like them / suggest them. Some people even saying they lost a lot of rankings after using them.

Thanks for your help, I've been doing many of the items you have suggested, and am aware of where I am for several of my key words. I struggle with how to use a lot of the data included in google analytics and webmaster tools. I see how the data, but not sure how to use it to my advantage.

Regarding subcategories, from the information I have seen online seemed to suggest its better not to use subcategories so I have stayed away from doing so. Do you think it hurts SEO? As someone else mentioned, no one really knows what "Noah's Minute" is, and although it helped brand my site (which I like) it seems like the 'branding" doesn't really help if no one knows what it means, if that  makes sense. (That's just what I'm thinking, I could be wrong.)

We have already created what I think is some really creative and helpful content like our new parent guide (http://noahsdad.com/new-parent-guide/) and our what is down syndrome post (including a crazy awesome picture of what my son's dan (And other's with Down syndrome) DNA looks like (http://noahsdad.com/down-syndrome/)

I can list tons of other posts on there that I've gotten great feedback on. With my wife being a pediatrician we are able to write medically accurate information that has some authority to it which is another area that really makes us unique.

Hey thanks so much!

And you are very correct...they are VERY kind and giving!

By the way are all the forums public? I wasn't sure how that worked.  You mentioned it's 'now public.'  Did something happen to make it public?

I used to rank really high for the phrase "characteristics of down syndrome" for this post: https://noahsdad.com/physical-characteristics/ but not I've lost almost all traffic to the post. Even if you search for "characteristics of down syndrome Noah's Dad" the post doesn't seem to come up. I have no idea what is going on.

If someone has a few minutes to take a look it would be very helpful. Also, I have lost almost all organic traffic to my site. I used to get close to 100,000 visits a month from organic traffic and now I'm getting 3k or so. So almost all of it is gone. I'm hoping whatever is going on with this post can be figured out so I can address and fix all of the other pages as well.

Thanks so much for your time.

I was wondering if someone had a few minutes to talk a look at our site and see how to speed it up. I've ran some of the speed tests and I get different results, so I'm not sure if my site would be considered "slow" or not.

Also if there any other things that jump out at you (usability, side bar, things I should change / add / take away to make a users experience better, etc.) please let me know. Any feedback is good feedback to me.

I'm using WP Super Cache as well.

Thanks!

As there other folks have said billions of web pages is a lot of work. But the question you have is why is the work not done by the time they say it will be done sometimes.

They have posted detailed explanations every time there was a problem. (Including this week.) Have you had a chance to check out there posts?

Hey thanks so much for taking the time to take a look at my site. I really appreciate it. Thank you also for the kind words, it's very motivating (and encouraging!)

I'm aware of my issue with the anchor text with my back links....but I can't really figure out any good ways to create links with the anchor text I really need.  When people link to me they usually say things like "Here's a great site about Down syndrome - Noahsdad.com" or something to that effect.

I leave comments on many blogs about down syndrome and i"ll often add a link and anchor text for some of those keywords..but I can only write so many comments..and I'm not even sure how useful it is since so many more people are linking to my site with  the site name.

Another issue is that the items people search for,  and the respectful way to say and write things are different. For instance many people search for "Down's syndrome" (some research will show lots of searches for this and not a lot of competition in this area..so my first thought was to try to use this to my "advantage" to capture some of those searches since I think our site would help them..) But...anyone that knowns anything about Down syndrome knows that the correct way to say and spell it is "Down syndrome" there is no 's. I could tell you the reasons for that if you would like..but just trust me One of the first thing a new parent of a child born with Down syndrome (and most news websites, blogs, etc) knows is that it's not "downs", "downs syndrome" or "down's syndrome") it's "Down syndrome."  But..people who are searching for this info and perhaps haven't had their child yet, but prenatal testing shows that their child may be born with Down syndrome don't..so they search for the incorrect terms...a lot!

So I can't really title anything or use anchor text with that because it's not " correct" and will make me look like I don't know what I'm talking about...if that makes sense.

Also people search for "down syndrome facts" and "downs syndrome facts" a lot. I rank around 37 for "down syndrome facts" right now..which is pretty good for me a guy like me... But...it's hard for me to add anchor text with that phrase because the correct way to say it is, "facts about people with Down syndrome" --but once again people don't know that...so they don't search for it.

So that is a bit of what I'm running into. Not to mention I feel like I've read so much over the last 6 months and have heard many different opinions I sort of gotten overwhelmed. There is so much info, and it seems like everyone tells you something different that conflicts with everyone else. So you can start to feel like you'll never 'get it" and you get unmotivated.

However, I could share a 100 or more email messages we have gotten from people who have found our website and it would bring you tears...those emails tell me I've got to keep going..and learning..and trying. So I do.

I really appreciate you taking the time to help me, and for your kind words, they mean more to me than you know.  I"m humble and open to any advice / feedback  / suggestions, and I'd appreciate any feedback on the road bumps I mentioned above.

Humbly,

Rick Smith

(Noahs Dad)

I'm trying to decide if I should use a CDN to speed up my site. I've never used one before, but I do know that there are a lot of images on my site and I think that could help a great deal.

Are they hard to set up? Are there any down sides? And are the pricey?

Also I'm not sure even sure if it would make a difference for me, but I want to work on getting my site faster.

Thanks.

I'm wanting to get a few things designed for our site, and I was curious if anyone has any experience using any of the companies online where you can hire graphic designers.

It looks like a lot of these companies use people over seas, and although some of them are talented, I don't think their styles are the same as I'm used to here.  (Hope that doesn't sound bad...I'm not meaning it like that.)

Does anyone have any suggestions for a good company to use online? Thanks.

My main readership is moms, so they are very active on pintrest. They repin a lot of my content, and spend time looking at other pages on the site once there.  However, they know what they are getting before they come to the site.

Like the others have said, it really just depends on what sort of audience your site has.  For me, it's been good (I actually want to step up my boards, and make them a bit more organized...) but may not be for you.  Also remember it's invite only at this point, so even though there are a lot of people on it, not every one is. So you'll have to decide if it's worth your time at this point.

I think it depends on the site, design, content, etc. If you are careful with your ad placement and your users can EASILY find the difference between your content and your ads, I think you'll be ok.

Good isn't anti-ads like some articles you read would lead you to believe. In fact, Google even has material showing a user where they suggest placing ads on a page. Be sure to check out that link, especially sense you were asking about adsense.

I also know some bloggers that have ads set to display a set time after a post goes live, for instance 2 weeks after, that way your regular readers aren't having to look at ads, mainly organic traffic. However, if ads are done correctly (used sparingly, they take a back seat to content, etc) they can actually blend in nicely on a page.

Again, think like a user. If you were visiting a site what would you want to see? You probably wouldn't mind a few ads, placed in areas where you would expect to find ads, ads that are well done (if I use adsnese I ONLY use the graphic / media rich ads), and ones that are contextual to the site you are reading. (I've actually found adsense to pretty good at showing ads that are contextual on the page.)

Please let us know if you have any more questions.

I'm not sure there is any technique that can guarantee a new website gets crawled and indexed withint 24 hours. However here are some tips that will certainly help.

1. Make sure you set up a webmaster account with each of the search engines. Within the dashboard of that webmaster account (I'm thinking of Google WMT here) you can have the crawler fetch the page, than ask that Google crawl that page (and all linked pages on it.) While you are there be sure you submitting a site map as well.

2. Also the various search engines allow you to summit your content. For example: http://www.google.com/submityourcontent/website-owner/

3. You could try to build some high quality links on another site that get crawled on a regular basis.

4. If there is good content on the site you could share it on social networks, twitter, fb, stumble upon, etc. Just make sure there is quality content there, otherwise your social network may not like you very much.

5. This is perhaps the best tip: Share the link on Google +. I've had pages indexed within minutes after sharing them on my Google + page. Here's a White Board Friday that Rand did that talks more about Google + http://www.seomoz.org/blog/why-every-marketer-now-needs-a-google-strategy

I hope these tips help you out.

On our site I use it on each individual page (post). Same with Facebook, stubmle upon, pintrest, etc...

Like someone mentioned, I want people to be directed back to a specific post. I did put a Facebook like box on our home page which allows people to like our facebook page directly from our home page (which has been very effective) and I thought about adding a "like" button for our home page, but it would be sort of confusing I think to people. There would basically be two different like buttons....

I may experiment with having a place in the footer to like our main page: site wide. I'll have to see how it goes.

Thanks for the feedback, categories and tags was what I was thinking of. We actually use a custom CMS that was made by the developer who did the site...

Google is now indexing embedded youtube videos as rich snippets.

I did a search on your site and you can see you have lots of these rich snippets showing up. Good job.

https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ie=UTF-8&ion=1#q=site:betheboss.ca/&hl=en&prmd=imvns&source=lnms&tbm=vid&sa=X&ei=OgA4UIKqDYPy2QWfkoGICg&ved=0CAoQ_AUoAw&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_cp.r_qf.&fp=11e613fc21dc669b&ion=1&biw=1312&bih=1079