I spent some time recently talking to various Search Engine Optimization firms. These are people who offer to increase the visibility of your web site for a fee. Other than pretending to be interested in their services (I’m not), I was completely honest about my site, my present statistics, and my goals. We’ll cover all that, but first a statement you probably won’t find surprising:
There’s a lot of snake oil out there.
Well, you probably knew that. On the other hand, I did have some pleasant conversations with a few people, and even got a few snippets of free advice. Some of that advice might have even been worthwhile, though most of it was rather generic and nothing you couldn’t find easily on the web. (more…)
Advertising your business in the correct manner is a sure shot key to success. Advertising helps you to reach out to a larger number of people from other websites. You definitely cannot expect these many people to come to you on their own.
But Advertising is very, very COSTLY! And if you don’t watch out, you may actually be going broke after paying your advertising bills, if your ads do not generate revenue. So, you should make sure you get value for your money.
With my own experiences in this field, I have drawn up some questions for Webmasters who are new to the field of Website Marketing. Take a good look at them EVERY TIME you make your advertising plan. (more…)
Profitability with Pay-Per-Click (PPC) advertising comes down to how well you have chosen your keywords.
Choose too generic a term and you will lose your shirt – and fast. Choose too specific a term and you’ll miss out on traffic your competitors will get.
For example, let’s say you offer a travel guides for sale online – here are some possible keywords with associated monthly traffic counts and top bid as of the time this article was written: (more…)
Google Search Engine Optimization
Google is by far the most popular search engine available today for both ordinary surfers and webmasters.
Surfers like it because of the highly relevant results it gives, and the speed it gives them at. This is due to its complex text matching algorithm and of course the PagerankT system that this engine uses. More on the PagerankT system later.
Google is popular with webmasters and Internet Marketing companies due to the highly workable ranking system it uses. (more…)
Search Engine Optimization
Many small businesses simply do not have the resources to hire a search engine optimization (SEO) company to promote their web site. There are countless resources online for do-it-yourself (DIY) optimizers where professional SEO’s offer general recommendations and advice. This article is my opportunity to offer more of my SEO experience in the form of a 10-minute optimization process.
This process will be effective for any page designed in HTML with at least 1 paragraph of html text but for the purposes of this article, I will concentrate on the all- important home page. (more…)
First of all, for beginners, I’ll give a brief definition of a domain name.
Your domain name is the same as “www.yoursitename.com”. It’s also known as your URL or Website Address.
For example, www.webmastercourse.com is my site’s domain name or my web address.
The domain name must be registered and approved before you can call it your own. The reason it works this way is because two websites having the same domain name cannot reside online at the same time. If someone types in www.webmastercourse.com, he/she will go to my website and no one else’s.
Registering your domain name and awaiting approval gives the registration company opportunity to check with every other company around the world to be sure no one else has already applied for your domain name “first.” (more…)
Not too long ago the search engines depended heavily on meta tags and keyword density to determine the positions or rankings of web sites. Google is the first search engine to shift its primary focus to link popularity when ranking web sites. Some other major search engines are doing the same. It is therefore very important to focus on link < popularity (in addition to meta tags and keywords) if you want to get a better placement on the search engines and drive more traffic to your site.
The search engines regard a web site as very valuable if there are several links pointing to it. The rationale is that an informative and useful site will attract the interests of several web site owners. These owners will link to this site as a benefit to their viewers and to increase the “content” value of their sites. (more…)
Researching Your Keywords
Once you’ve opened your account, start researching your keywords. You will probably already have several relevant words and phrases in mind. Write them all down and head over to the GoTo Keyword Suggestion Tool with your list.
The Keyword Suggestion Tool tells you how many times in the previous month people have searched for the keyword you input, or any phrase containing it. Results are listed in order, with the most popular searches at the top.
Type your first keyword into the tool’s search box. When the results come up, select “Save As” on your browser, and choose to save as “Text.” This will save your results in a small plain text file that can be opened by any text editor (like NotePad). Use the keyword as the file name. (more…)
You have a web site ready for action. Your product catalog, order tracking, credit card payment system, and fulfillment process are all in place. Now all you need is traffic! Many web entrepreneurs have learned that the magic nut to crack is attraction: get a steady flow of customers who explore your site and eventually purchase goods. The overhead costs of most web businesses are minimal relative to brick and mortar stores. However, the variable marketing costs can over shadow sales revenues by orders of magnitudes. Unfortunately, unlike the saying in the movie Field of Dreams, ?If you build it, they will not come!? Luckily, the industry has learned this lesson; some the hard way, and others in spite of the losers. Dot-coms are clearly not the darlings of the capital markets any longer; however, there is still money to be made! If you plan to start a web business or already have one but are not sure how to increase traffic and make money at the same time, you should consider a science-driven approach.
How to Lose $500 in 12 Hours
One weekend, my business partner and I created an affiliate commerce site. The site comprised a list of links to other online retailers. People go to our site, pick a link to a jewelry store for example, buy something, and in turn we receive a commission from the sale. The process of creating the site, signing up the affiliate agreements, and turning it on was a cinch. The cost was virtually nothing. We, being new to this whole web business concept, thought we had an incredibly smart marketing idea: pay to have our site come up in an ad box on a major search engine (Google) every time someone searched on the word ?gifts?. The word gifts is searched for 49,000 times per day! We figured we would have a good flow of visitors and the money would start rolling in. For certain, we would at least break even. We sunk $500 in one day and let it rip. Here’s what happened: (more…)
1. Build a solid business foundation. Design a business plan, marketing plan, ideal client profile, and a site map for your web site.
2. Be consistent. Brand your company.
3. Make your website trustable. This article will show you 10 ways. www.coachmaria.com/trustableweb.html
4. Create policies the build trust: customer service, code of ethics and newsletter privacy policy.
5. If you have pages on your site that you update monthly (like an articles page or recommended links page) say so on the page. (more…)
