A client contacted me wanting to get some SEO started prior to the launch of their brand new site. One of their concerns was that they didn’t want to put-up an ‘under construction’ page because they read somewhere that Google bans parked domains.
Search Engine Roundtable confirms that this isn’t the case in their post - Does Google Ban Parked Domain Sites?
Whilst a parked / under construction page won’t get your site banned, it still probably won’t do much for your rankings either. Most parked pages have very little content and subsequently don’t attract any links.
So if an under construction page isn’t very useful but you still want to start some SEO prior to the launch of your new site… what can be done?
Getting some interesting content online as quickly as possible is crucial because without content, the search engines will have nothing to crawl and link building (even directory submissions) is almost impossible.
A well optimised landing page is a great way to generate some initial hype without spoiling the official launch of the site. On top of that you could even start building a client-base before your official site opens by offering some early-bird incentives for anyone who submits their contact details.
If you don’t want to go down that path, another option is to setup a blog and talk about how the project is slowly coming-together prior to the launch. This can be a great way to connect with your prospective clients and show them that behind the e-commerce and corporate structure, there is a real person (or persons) making things happen.
It’s also a good idea to start getting involved with online communities that pertain to your business. If you can build a good reputation through commenting on blogs and contributing to forums, you’ll find people a lot more willing to link to you.
I understand that the suggestions above won’t fit with all businesses, so the next best thing is to ‘hit the ground running’ with an incredible link bait idea that you can distribute the minute your new website is online.
These are just a few suggestions that can help gain some initial exposure prior to the launch of a site… if anyone has any other great ideas, feel free to share them in the comments.
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Funny to read this because I have recently gone/going through this. I guess first I’ll back-up. I currently work full-time for someone else and am moonlighting/freelancing in my spare time until I can justify taking the “plunge” to work for myself full-time. At first, even working on my own site was a challenge because most of my free time was spent working for my clients. I finally found some time between projects to work on my site. I kept changing my layout over and over and was also working on optimizing it while I was builing it. I did run into problems when trying to get people to link to me until my site was finished. Some accused me of cloaking or being up to no good. I guess my point is, you (or your site) are not really legit until it is finished and live.
I have mixed feelings of putting up the under construction pages. It helps from the standpoint of trying various things and getting people to view it and provide feedback. However, I had trouble with people taking me serious until it was finished. OK, I’m done rambling now.
You could always make a really nice about us page and drop it in there. That’s content that is pretty simple to come up with, provided you aren’t still trying to figure out what to do. Most of all, make sure you capture your visitors contact info.
I have linked to unfinished pages in the past and was very skeptical. My first thought was -this is a bogus site probably full of mal and viruses.