We're one of only 2 licensed penpal dating and matchmaking websites
in Vietnam to the best of our knowledge. Please, this is not an
opinion or a self serving statement for the board but a fact. Yet our
rankings on google would indicate that we're in
the same pool as those who we know have no real exposure in Vietnam.
How can we get better ranked so as to show our true place in this Asian
dating arena? Our websites are http://www.loveofasiavietnam.com and
http://www.vietventures.com ( which is the country information site
and also needs some help)We've been doing this for more than 2 years
now and are somewhat mystified as to how we've been ranked so low when
we provide such quality and are licensed to do so. Please help! We
have a lot to offer in terms of real in-country service and
information on Vietnam but need to get the word out. Any suggestions
are appreciated. Thank you. Tom and Hanh

Hello MrVietnam. I've examined your sites and have some suggestions
for you. Unfortunately, the quality of a site has little to do with
the ranking. This is all about optimizing the meta tags and text of
your site to match what the search engine thinks is important. For the
sake of simplicity I am going to deal with just
http://www.loveofasiavietnam.com/ and you can apply the principles to
your other site.

First of all know that it takes time to tune up a page to beat out
competitors in the search engines. This time can be greatly reduced by
buying a program called Web Position Gold
(http://www.webposition.com/). What this program does is analyze the
top sites for any given keyword/keyphrase, then it analyzes your page
and tells you what you need to do to make it into the top 10 and will
even help you to write the page. It will also help you to create
'doorway pages' which are pages that focus on specific
keywords/keyphrases and redirect visitors to your main site.Here is an
article on doorway pages:
http://www.weprintcolor.com/search_engines/dooorway.htm

Alternately, you can hire a professional optimizer, but know that most
of the just use Web Position Gold. If you don't want to spend the
money you can do all of this yourself, but it will take time. Pick a
keyword/keyphrase you want and examine the pages  that make it to the
top. What is in their meta tags? Are the keywords mentioned in the
text of the page? If so, how many times and where? All of these
factors make a difference.

One thing I noticed about your site was that the text on the index
page does not really mention your meta tag keywords. I would
definitely suggest rewriting this page to mention your main keywords
as much as possible. At least 3-4 times if at all possible.

Here are some good articles/sites on using keywords:
http://searchenginewatch.com/searchday/article.php/2231541
http://www.submitcorner.com/
http://www.marketingtops.com/searchengine/myguide/i12.html


About your current meta tag keywords. You want to focus here. 
I would recommend losing the starred ones as they are either too
generic or off topic:

Asian Dating,
**Matchmaking service,
Vietnamese Dating,
**Matchmaking services,
Asian Girls,
Vietnamese Girls, 
Vietnamese Brides, 
Asian Wives, 
**Vietnam pen pals,
**girl of your dreams,
**Asian escort service,
**Asian modeling agency,
**Post Picture,
**photo,
**Profile,
**Vietnamese 
**Penpals,
Asian Girlfriends, 
Vietnamese Dating, 
Asian Brides,
Vietnamese Wives,
**Asian Pen Pals,
**interracial dating,
**Love of Asia

Here's a few I can think of to add:

cherry blossoms
mail order brides
asian personals
asian wife
vietnamese wife
vietnam personals

Keep going and adding different combinations. You might even want to
add things like korean personals, phillipine personals, etc. as people
looking for those keywords might be very well interested in your
service. And make sure that the keywords are in the text of your
pages!

Also, it is crucial that you have other sites linking to you. Looks
like you are doing pretty good with that, but you can't have too many.

Finally, have you looked into cost-per-click advertising services? A
sure fire (if costly) way to get to the top of the search engines
right away. Check out:
http://adwords.google.com
http://www.overture.com
See this Google Answer for tips:
http://answers.google.com/answers/threadview?id=193878

I hope this helps you on your way to success! If you need
clarification on anything I've written, please ask before rating this
answer.
Thanks! -shiva777

Please note:

"Don't use unauthorized computer programs to submit pages, check
rankings, etc. Such programs consume computing resources and violate
our terms of service. Google does not recommend the use of products
such as WebPosition Gold? that send automatic or programmatic queries
to Google."

"Webmaster Guidelines" [under "Quality Guidelines - Basic principles"]
Google
://www.google.com/webmasters/guidelines.html

Thus, to the extent that shiva777 is recommending Web Position Gold
with respect to Google, the answer would be incorrect.

Follow the advice in the answer with caution!!!

Here's what Google itself says:

"Don't use unauthorized computer programs to submit pages, check
rankings, etc. Such programs consume computing resources and violate
our terms of service. Google does not recommend the use of products
such as WebPosition Gold? that send automatic or programmatic queries
to Google."
://www.google.com/webmasters/guidelines.html

In fact, there are credible reports that Google has removed from its
indices sites that use programs such as WebPosition Gold. I am not an
employee of Google, and I can neither confirm nor deny these reports.
But you should be aware that they exist.

Here are two examples of such reports:
http://www.cre8asiteforums.com/viewtopic.php?t=739&highlight=
http://www.webmasterworld.com/forum3/8573.htm

Also, the use of doorway pages is a definite no-no.  Here's what
Google has to say about that:

"--Make pages for users, not for search engines. Don't deceive your
users, or present different content to search engines than you display
to users.
"--Avoid tricks intended to improve search engine rankings. A good
rule of thumb is whether you'd feel comfortable explaining what you've
done to a website that competes with you. Another useful test is to
ask, 'Does this help my users? Would I do this if search engines
didn't exist?'"

If you follow the advice in the answer about doorway pages and use of
certain optimizing software, you face the risk of jeopardizing your
page ranking, not helping it.

The answer as given is just plain wrong.

http://answers.google.com/answers/search?q=webposition+gold&qtype=all

-K~

I would like to mention that
http://www.marketingtops.com/searchengine/myguide/i12.html has been
moved at http://www.work-at-home-profits.com/searchengine/myguide/i12.html


dan