One of the first things I would check would be to see if the competition improved their search snippets. I've had clients enjoy great click thrus at the #3 spot in Google - because their messaging was more in tune with what the person was searching for.

That's one place to start.

Good luck!

Yes, ping every article you post.

Depending on your platform will dictate what you can do. If you're on wordpress, they have a built in system that automatically does that for you.

I'm sure other systems have them in place as well, but I am not familiar with them.

If you need to manually do it, here are a few sites I am aware of:

pingler.com

pingoat.com

Good luck!

Just some SEM basics - get links from India pointing to your site, talk to Indian bloggers to write about your service, and be active in the social networks.

Like Anthony said - create great content, and you'll never have to worry about linking penalties. Here's another item to consider - links are always going to be pointed to your site, and not all are going to be of high quality sites today. But, you never know that one blog that stays online and in 5 years from now has grown into an authority site.

People are way over-reacting to this latest Google "penalty". If it was that easy to lose your rankings to just a few blog networks, why wouldn't I go out and get thousands of "bad" links pointed to my competitor to de-rank them?

Look deeper at what Google is trying to accomplish.

Just because the top site is an exact match doesn't mean you can't dislodge them from their #1 spot.

Without knowing all that you have done for your site, the best advice I can give is to look at what they are doing, and then think about other ways to beat them. For the sake of this discussion, let's say that they have a great youtube channel and are very active on twitter. First, you will have to make sure you have a presence on those two sites as well.

Then, you need to take it to the next level - make sure you have a Pinterest, LinkedIn, FB, StumbleUpon, reddit and delicious accounts. Make sure you have the google +1 button on your site and a Google plus page where you link back to your site from.

Simply put, you will have to do more than them in order to take the top spot.

In regards to if it's worth it or not, only you can determine that.

Good luck!

Have you done a press release for that term and the site? Typically, those will get some high quality authority links pointed to your site and should solidify your rankings.

There is a

<figure>element that is supposed to provide better descriptions of image on the web in HTML5 - do you think that will replace the importance of the "Alt" tag?

Link to figcaption description

</figure>

The questions I would ask:

Expectations - how long will it take to get ranked?

What techniques will you use?

While you can certainly ask as many questions as you want, at some point in time, you just have to trust that your vendor is delivering value to you. By asking for weekly reports and ALL links that point to your site, you are taking time away from your vendor to do work that will get your site ranked.

Accountability and transparency are important, but if you are constantly asking your vendor to "show your work", they won't have time to get your properties ranked!

I understand that every dollar spent has to work for your business to grow. At the end of the day, you have to trust your intuition and go with the people that are interested in your success.

Good luck!