Dan Petrovic
Before you begin reading this in detail, take a moment and follow these steps:
- Open a new tab in your browser
- Go to Google
- Type in ‘SEO’
- Scroll down just a fraction and notice where DejanSEO is placed for ‘SEO‘
Based on that quick task you have verified results that Dan Petrovic is one of Australia’s most creative and leading SEO specialists. Dan is completely obsessed with search engine optimisation and all things that relate to Google’s wonderful algorithm, so much so that it only takes a trip to his office at Brisbane Technology Park to see the equations scribbled in whiteboard marker on the office walls! This is either the work of a genius…or a crazed madmen! I’d definitely say it’s a mix of 95% of the former and 5% of the latter.
Dans’ team at DEJAN SEO has consultants in Australia and Europe who all collaborate to deliver results for all kinds of businesses, from all over the world. Dan prefers an open and transparent approach to his work, choosing to involve clients at every step of their SEO campaign, which is why he is a known and trusted entity when it comes to SEO.
We asked Dan a few questions in the lead up to his talk which he has kindly answered below:
You’ve been working with SEO ever since your university days, what was it that caught your interest about search engines and their ranking algorithms?
I was going to be a scientist you know, but my creative drive lead me to study multimedia instead. I soon realised that SEO satisfies both the scientist and artist in me. It was an obvious choice when I think about it.
Ranking so incredibly highly for the term ‘SEO’ is an amazing achievement in itself, however I would imagine that remaining in that position would be an ongoing task. How much planning and monitoring takes place in your office to maintain your ranking?
Our strategy has always been to stay focused, work hard and share all the awesome things that we discover. My team and I spend a fraction of our time each day to write something of value. This is not only good for karma, but it also generates free links.
The HTML5 standard now allows multiple heading tags <H1> tags because of the new HTML5 <article> tags. Have you conducted any experiments with this to see if Google ranks HTML5 markup in a different way because of these new tags?
No. There are much more exciting experiments in our queue at the moment. Contrary to belief of many webmasters H tags are not as potent as they are believed to be. Although they do help a fraction, I recommend that you do not obsess over it and maintain a good semantic structure of your headings to benefit both search engines and users. Here’s a good example:
-H1: Vehicles
–H2: Cars
—H3: Sedans
—H3: SUVs
–H2: Motorbikes
—H3: Dirtbikes
—H3: Roadbikes
—-H4: Harley Davidson
—H3: Sportsbikes
—-H4: Suzuki
—–H5: SFV650
——H6: SFV650 Engine Specifications
What has been your favourite SEO campaign for a client and why?
How do you pick a favorite child? But if I had to highlight one cool company we worked with it would have to be Atlassian. I think those guys have a healthy corporate culture and support their products well. It’s good to work for a brand that others love.
You can follow Dan on Twitter. You should also follow WordCamp Gold Coast on Twitter.
Keep in the Loop
Great interview with Dan. Thanks for the post and sharing!