Enhance your site with a Yahoo-style directory
Does your website have a links/resources page?
Do you exchange reciprocal with other websites to help boost your targeted traffic and search engine rankings?
Do you believe that a relevant, yet comprehensive resources page provides tangible benefits to your site’s visitors?
If you answered “yes” to one or more of these questions, then you should consider adding an inexpensive (or free!) Yahoo-style Directory to your website. A quality Directory script will add an air of professionalism to your website and provide valuable content for your users.
A quality Directory script:
* Gives your website a professional “look and feel”. You can eliminate those bloated, unattractive links pages that might brand your site as a “link farm”.
* Allows your visitors to search for sites of interest in your directory using keywords.
* Allows you to display banner ads on your Directory pages (including the search results pages). With the best scripts, the search results pages will even display different banners according to the search terms used. This allows you to sell advertising targeted to specific keywords!
* Encourages other webmasters to exchange links your website. You’ll soon have webmasters standing in line to exchange links with you.
* Automates the link exchange process to a large extent without all of the negatives that can get a website banned by the major search engines. A quality Directory script will handle everything related to adding a link to the database, yet still allow you to manually approve the link!
There are many good directory scripts available on the web. Just do a Google search for “CGI scripts”. Add a quality Directory script to your site today and you can take your web presence to an entirely new level!
Author Bio:
Rick Rouse is the owner of RLROUSE Webmaster Resources and the author of “Super Webmaster SEO Toolkit” which gives step by-step instructions for getting a top 10 listing in Google & Yahoo. Visit his web site: http://www.rlrouse.com/SEO.html
How to Gain Credibility and Sales By Writing Online Articles
Writing is one of the most powerful secrets you will find for bringing in new business and gaining credibility among your peers and potential clients.
Writing articles in online publications that cater to your ideal client will put you heads and tails above your competitors. Most competitors feel they are incapable of writing or feel they are too busy focusing on other parts of their businesses to write articles. So they don’t do it.
This is a huge advantage for you.
Likely your clients enjoy and even pay for information that is of interest to them. So if you have the ability to write, do so.
What Do You Write About?
How about a problem-solving how to' article? Or maybe a list of ideas or tips that help your readers? Since you know your business well, writing such articles should be relatively simple.
If your typing speed is not up to snuff and is holding you back then you can dictate’ your writing into your computer using a microphone and a voice recognition software program such as Dragon Naturally Speaking or IBM’s ViaVoice. Both work fairly well and are available online and at most major office supply retailers.
Where Can You Submit Your Articles Online?
Here is a BIG list of locations for publishing articles online. I too had questions of where to publish articles online. So through research I collected these links, added them to my favorites, and began submitting articles of my own.
No online marketing has to date presented as high a response from qualified potential clients as those who found my site through articles I’ve published online. I suspect the results will be the same for you too.
Sites Where You Can Post Your Articles For Redistribution
1. http://addme.com/nlsubmit.htm
2. http://allnetarticles.com/submitarticle.asp
3. http://articlecity.com/article_submission.shtml
4. http://boconline.com/sub-art.htm 5. http://bpubs.com/
6. http://businesstoolchest.com/articles/submit.shtml
8. http://cerebuswebmaster.com/onsite/articles/submit_artic
7. http://buzzle.com/ le.html
9. http://certificate.net/wwio/ideas.shtml
10. http://connectionteam.com/submit.html
11. http://digital-women.com/submitarticle.htm
12. http://ebooksnbytes.com/
13. http://ezinearticles.com/add_url.html
14. http://freesticky.com/stickyweb/submitarticle.asp
15. http://goarticles.com/ulogin.html
16. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/aabusiness/
17. http://hugeaffiliates.com/modules.php?name=Submit_News
18. http://ideamarketers.com/writers.cfm
19. http://marketing-of-training.com
20. http://marketing-seek.com/articles/index.shtml
21. http://netterweb.com/articles/articlesubmit.htm
22. http://scamfreesuccess.com/article.htm
23. http://searchwarp.com/
24. http://small-business-forum.com/
25. http://thewhir.com/find/articlecentral/suggest.asp
26. http://top7business.com/submit/
27. http://upromote.com/newsletter/submit.html
28. http://vectorcentral.com/articles-form.html
29. http://web-source.net/articlesub.htm
30. http://webpronews.com/submit.html
31. http://womans-net.com/modules.php?name=Submit_News
32. http://work911.com/cgi-bin/links/add.cgi
Article Announcement Mailing Groups
1. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/publisher_network/
2. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/reprintarticles-paradise/
3. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/reprintedarticles/
4. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/aainet/
5. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/article_announce_list/
6. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/articles_archives/
7. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/articlesubmission/
8. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/aageneral/
9. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/PromoteYourArticle/
10. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Free-Reprint-Articles/
11. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Free_eContent/
12. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/freezinecontent/
14. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/netwrite-publish-announce
13. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/marketing_articleblaster/
15. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ReadMyArticles/
16. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/TheWriteArticles/
A Useful Article Submission Tool
This online tool will automatically reformat your text for
you: http://www.web-source.net/format_text.htm
Many sites have guidelines concerning the layout of your article. One of the common guidelines is that your article must not exceed 60-65 characters across.
By using the format text tool you can be certain your article will be properly formatted, so that it does not get rejected for something that is so simple to fix.
Now’s The Time To Take Action
Writing articles that appeal to your “dream” clients should be one of your first steps to bringing in new business.
However writing alone is worthless if no one ever reads your articles. So the next step is to actually distribute your articles.
Hopefully you find as much success through submitting articles to these sites as I have.
Author Bio:
Andre Bell is principal marketing consultant with Andre Bell Consulting Group. A free copy of his new book “101 Marketing Secrets Revealed” is available through his site at http://www.economicbooster.com.
5 Free Ways to Increase Traffic to your Online Store
So you’ve finally created a website for your small online store! Now you think, “How do I get people to visit my site?”. If you’re like most new website owners, you wonder how to bring potential customers to your site without spending lots of money on expensive advertising. In order to help you, I’ve compiled a small list of five methods that I have used to drastically increase traffic to my own site. I’ve also listed two websites under each tip that will help you get started implementing these suggestions.
1. Offer a freebie or a contest for your items:
One of main reasons that people use the Internet is to find free (or cheaper) stuff. If you offer a freebie or contest for one of your items, then you are likely to attract potential customers. To get maximum exposure for your freebie or contest, you should register with as many “free stuff sites” as possible. Here are a couple of sites which would be a good starting point: http://www.thefreesite.com and http://www.realfreesite.com.
2. Link to similar websites:
A popular method used by webmasters to increase web traffic is to swap links with comparable websites. However, the trick to maximizing the effectiveness of linking is to find sites with a minimum Google PageRank, which is a system which Google uses to judge the importance of each webpage, of 3 or 4. To find out more information about PageRank, click here: http://toolbar.google.com/. To find good linking partners, check out these two link partner directories: http://www.links-pal.com/ and http://www.gotop.com/.
3. Join an internet discussion group:
People also frequently use the Internet to find places where they share common interests with other individuals, which has led to the creation of Internet discussion groups. You can use discussion groups to introduce yourself and your product. Find a group that is related to your store or personal interest, and make sure any topic that you post is tied into a current discussion. Don’t SPAM any discussion group with an obvious sales pitch. Simply write comments applicable to both the group and your product; people will naturally want to know more about you! Two great listings of potential starting points for discussion groups are: http://groups.yahoo.com/ and http://topica.com/.
4. Post your product or service on a free classified ad page:
Although many websites only have paid inclusion into their classified ads, many offer a free place where you are allowed to advertise your merchandise. If you spend time developing an interesting headline or ad, you can bring in a steady amount of traffic from these sites. To get started on free classifieds, you can use my own free service http://www.mizambar.com/classified.html. In addition, the following link has a directory of tons of free classified services: http://www.ecki.com/links/.
5. Write an article related to your website and submit it to ezines:
By writing an article about your service or a topic related to your website, you instantly become an authority on your issue. Although you might have some apprehension about writing, if you have a website, then you probably have something to talk about. Two great directories on ezines are: http://freezineweb.com/ and http://www.ezinelocater.com .
By following these steps, you should see a dramatic increase in your web traffic. The key is to always think about website promotion–if you spend a little time each day following one of these steps, you will be rewarded with more visitors and hopefully more customers.
Good luck, and happy advertising!
P.S. Stay tuned for more free ways to increase traffic to your website!
Author Bio:
Scott Patterson is the owner and webmaster of http://www.mizambar.com, a retail site of Evil Eye Jewelry, and http://www.onlinestoreexchange.com, a directory of tips and advice to help you with website design and website promotion for your online store. To receive free webmaster ebooks & free promotion/design tips, join his email list – onlinestoreexchange- subscribe@yahoogroups.com. For more information, email him at scott@mizambar.com
Googleopoly: The Motivation Behind Gmail
Just before the close of business on Wednesday, Google announced that it will be launching Gmail, its new free e-mail service set to offer 1000 megabytes of free space to its users. This announcement comes after a flurry of changes at Google, all of which are geared to securing their place as the dominant search engine in light of recent competition offered by Yahoo! and soon MSN. The search engine wars have been predicted for some time now by search engine insiders, and the launch of Gmail is Google’s attempt to win the war before it gets fully started. But is Google really ready to take on the big portals?
Google was an innocent project through Standford University. It was a project started in the days of optimism about a free Internet not supported by ads or corporate revenues, but rather the free exchange of ideas. As a result, they focused solely on product. There were no worries about creating a flashy interface, hiring a sharp marketing team, or launching an IPO. They were worried about good search results. The result is that Google is now synonymous with searching the Internet.
Today, Google stands with a much different outlook. The success of the launch of AdWords propelled Google into a class all their own. Almost overnight, Google entered the PPC industry and dethroned Overture as the untouchable kings of PPC. Although other search engines such as Lycos, FindWhat, Kanoodle, and Sprinks had been competing with Overture, none of these engines were able to bring the reach and brand power of Google.
The success of AdWords was a notice to every other Internet giant. Companies such as Yahoo! and AOL ‘ who were providing Google’s results to their users ‘ took notice to the fact that Google had an incredible influence on the Internet, and if they desired, they could leverage that influence into a variety of new markets. Worse yet, Yahoo! and AOL helped Google gain such influence by providing Google results to their users. These giants became nervous, and with good reason. Google started to show signs that they were expanding into new markets.
Dictionaries, glossaries, news services, Froogle, Catalog search, maps, blogging, and other services were all emerging from the Google labs and news rooms. If Google was able to instantaneously compete and lead in the highly competitive PPC market, what would happen if they moved in on the territory of Yahoo!, AOL, or MSN? These Internet giants helped make Google powerful, possibly more powerful than they were themselves.
The battle for web searches had begun. Yahoo! has taken the most notable steps by replacing their results provided by Google with their newly acquired Inktomi division based results. To fight Google on the advertising revenue level, Yahoo swooped up Overture, still all-star in the paid search market. Overture, now playing catch-up in an industry which they practically founded, launched their own site content match system which rivals Google AdWords.
MSN has vowed to refine their search algorithms to become more relevant. Most of the work being done by MSN has been fairly quiet, but rest assured, there will be a lot of talk about MSN search when they are ready to release their new product to the Internet. And, with every new PC you buy, don’t be surprised if it comes with a host of web searching tools built in.
There have even been rumors over at AOL that they are going to be abandoning their Google based results. The fact is, AOL is scared of Google. As it stands right now, Froogle already steps on their shopping market, and Google News is taking away from AOL’s news delivery service.
By abandoning Google provided results, these Internet giants are attempting to limit Google’s reach. The fact is simple: users still use Yahoo!, MSN, and AOL. They use these services because they offer a host of unique information, updated news, financial reports, maps, phone directories, etc. Most importantly, users visit MSN, Yahoo, and AOL for their free e-mail. While they have these users attention, Yahoo! and MSN will now try to sell these users on their new and improved search results not provided by Google in order to steal a bit of that search engine market.
Just as Yahoo!, AOL, and MSN realized how powerful Google was in the search engine market (and subsequently the danger that posed to them), Google is realizing the real threat that these portals present. If these portals are able to offer suitable search results, users will have less reason to utilize Google’s search. Google has also recognized the main advantage these portals have: free e-mail. Free e-mail is what makes Yahoo! and MSN such popular destinations. People who have e-mail accounts at these locations find themselves visiting these sites multiple times every day just to check their e-mail. While they are there, they have the opportunity to be grabbed by a headline or service offered through these portals. The free e-mail is what brings the users back time and again.
Gmail is a direct attempt by Google to destroy any competition before it arises. With 10 times the amount of storage and what appears to be a superior interface for viewing and organizing mail messages, Gmail is not simply a nice thing to offer to web surfers. Gmail is an attempt to put an arrow through the heart of Yahoo! Mail and Hotmail. The services will not be comparable in quality, and that is the way Google wants it. The goal of Gmail is to make Hotmail and Yahoo! Mail look like laughable solutions to web based e-mail.
If Gmail is successful in converting Yahoo! Mail users and Hotmail users, the search engine wars will most likely be much ado about nothing. The battle and war will be won, and the victor will be Google. But don’t expect MSN, AOL, or Yahoo! to simply watch Gmail launch without developing a plan to strike back hard. Yahoo! alone has invested incredible amounts of money to acquire Inktomi and Overture just so they can compete head to head with Google. It would be uncharacteristic of them to simply fold. And do not forget about the power MSN has with their search.
Remember that Microsoft controls what search engine is used by default on most every computer around the world. That is a competitive advantage that Google will have a very hard time overcoming.
Gmail will not be the last new service offered by Google. It certainly will not go unanswered by Yahoo! or another portal. It will, however, mark a fundamental point in this search engine war that appears to now be in full swing.
Author Bio:
Mark Daoust is the owner of Site-Reference.com and TowerSearch. Signup for a free TowerSearch account and receive guaranteed top rankings for all of your chosen keywords.
It is very unlikely that Google founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page had any idea exactly how big their original search engine (then called BackRub) would actually become.
Wording Up Your Website
Are you losing business because of your website? More and more customers are logging on to the Web to decide where to spend their money because it is quick and convenient, and they can jump from site to site instead of walking from store to store.
Web savvy customers don’t need to be patient, studies have shown that you need to engage a potential customer very quickly by giving them easy, fast access to the information they need. Otherwise they will simply move on to the next site.
Appealing design and speedy functionality are important but they don’t ensure that your site is well structured (intuitive) or well written (clear).
Write First
The real message on most websites is in the writing, and so it makes sense that the writing should determine the structure. Unfortunately, this is not the usual case. Most businesses choose the structure and design of their site first and then try and fit the writing around that structure. This flies in the face of commonsense. When you speak to someone, you structure your speech around your message, you don’t decide on a structure then change the message to suit. So you need to plan what you want to say before you create the site. Maybe even write the whole thing first and then use the message to determine the structure.
When deciding what to write, think about what your customer wants to know rather than what you want to say. It’s a subtle difference, but it is the key to engaging a potential customer.
Most customers will want to know the basics:
– What do you do?
– What benefit can you offer them?
– Why should they choose your service or product?
– What does it cost?
– How can they contact you?
– Where are you located?
– Brevity & Clarity
Your website has to communicate a lot of information and to make matters worse, you are going to have limited space.
Ideally, your customer won’t have to scroll on any page (all your information will fit in a single window) and that single view will need to contain more than just words. The design and navigation elements take up about a third of a window, and you should leave a bit of room for white space (you don’t want to overwhelm the customer). As a rule of thumb you should expect to have about half the window free for text.
How you are going to fit all your information in such a confined space? This is where writing skills come in – choose your words very carefully.
Websites can be an extremely powerful piece of marketing collateral. You can reach millions of potential customers for as little as a few hundred dollars. Unfortunately, your competitors are all doing the same thing – it’s a level playing field but there are a lot of players.
It is important that your message is structured and well thought out, otherwise your site will be a mess and no-one will bother to read about your business. If your message is clear, your site will be simple and easy to use. It’s all in the words.
Author Bio:
Glenn Murray heads copywriting studio Divine Write. He can be contacted on Sydney +612 4334 6222 or at glenn@divinewrite.com. Visit www.divinewrite.com for further details.
10 Tips for Tech-Writers
Tech-writing is a tricky business. It’s not a very high profile industry, so there’s not much support around. Follow these 10 quick tips, and you’ll be well on your way to a satisfying tech-writing career.
1) Follow a sensible career path:
STEP 1: Start in a team
STEP 2: Stay only just long enough
STEP 3: Manage yourself
STEP 4: Manage a team
STEP 5: Go contracting (depends on the market)
2) Knowledge is your lifeblood – learn the politics of your company. Know who knows what. Find someone who consistently gives you timely, reliable, technically accurate answers, and get their name tattooed on your shoulder! Every company has at least one. And they may not be in the project manager/product manager/customer/programmer roles. They are generally the people who’ve used the product in the real world, and dealt with real world customers.
3) Communicate WITH, not AT. Tech-writers don’t have enough power to get away with communicating at.
4) Track stuff (take spreadsheet printout and write it up on the board).
5) Develop good product and domain knowledge – The more you can figure out for yourself, the better off you’ll be (and the more respect you’ll get from the techies).
6) Find out who your users are, what they are trying to do, what they are having trouble doing, and how they want to be helped. Then provide this assistance. Help the user do what they are trying to do. Don’t just tell them what the product can do- a help system is only helpful if it addresses the users’ needs.
7) Treat everyone as a customer. Then manage their expectations and your commitments. Always ensure they know what you’re doing. Tell them when you’ll be finished. And pull out all stops to meet your deadline.
8) Provide a surrogate user testing mechanism for the development team – providing usability feedback.
9) Work as hard as required to get good quality doco finished on time and to budget – this is how you’ll get the satisfaction out of work that you need.
10) Have fun with it.
Don’t become jaded and cynical by the high-tech, harsh, uncaring IT world. Use your smarts, and make the most of the resources provided. Most importantly of all, make work satisfaction your number 1 goal. It’s the best way to stay happy and get ahead.
Author Bio:
Glenn Murray heads copywriting studio Divine Write. He can be contacted on Sydney +612 4334 6222 or at glenn@divinewrite.com. Visit www.divinewrite.com for further details.
Increase Web Site Visitors For Relevant Terms Using Your Less Relevant Listings
Completely by accident and through no effort of my own, besides the effort to get my site spidered by Yahoo’s Slurp Search Engine Spider and Google’s Googlebot Search Engine spider, I’ve seen an accidental increase in the visitors to my web site.
Suddenly, I was ranking first page for Google, Yahoo and AOL for the phrases like “picture of William Hung”, and “william hung she bangs”.
The Good news is, this means that when the Yahoo Slurp spider came to the site and indexed my front page last Saturday, (and no, I didn’t submit my site OR pay for inclusion), my results were in the search engine by Sunday apparently, which is when I started getting clicks from Yahoo for this unusual term.
The Bad News is, William Hung, except for being an example of the power of Free Marketing, has NOTHING to do with my site!
So how does one fix this situation? How do you turn an accidental good ranking into several good rankings for other terms? Or say you’ve got great rankings for a relevant, but fairly insignificant term? The solution is the same.
Just give the spider more of what it wants.
Google, Yahoo – and apparently their search partners – love that page. So, first thing I did was improve the page in question. At the time there was no picture of William Hung on the page that was ranking so well. It’s important that you satisfy web site visitors who accidentally happen up on your site.
It only happens once in a while, but sometimes the person who come by is also interested in your regular content.
The next thing I did, was create other pages I believed the two sites would like. Since the articles here primarily offer resources to webmasters who want to learn how to increase the number of visitors to their sites, all I had to do was tweak some of the wording to the liking of both those visitors and the search engine spiders, and write one more article.
How did I know what the search engines would like, and how that would increase the number of people who would come to the site? Well, I found out that some guarded information about the latest optimization tips for Yahoo and Google was available on the Web FREE. (If you want to know what that resource is, just download the updated Free Google Optimization Guide.)
Once I had the pages optimized to my satisfaction, all I had to do was link some of those pages to the front of my site (where the article was then located) and wait for the increase in traffic to my site. Google spiders me every day like clockwork ever since I made this tiny change to my website that increased my site rank from zero to five in January.
Of course, I then had to figure out if my secret technique to baiting the Google spider was going to work with Yahoo’s new search engine spider.
Not only did it work, but it worked faster than leading the Google spider to specific page of my site! Yahoo’s spider is not back at my site on a daily basis yet, but it does come regularly, finding new pages, and reindexing the area with the most content.
So there you have it. If your site has been indexed well for a term you didn’t really want, first, make the page as relevant as possible to the visitors who end up at your site.
Next, give the search engine spider “food” to eat that is more relevant to your site. It doesn’t hurt to optimize this page. You can now download the new optimization guide for FREE. IF you’re one of the next 100 subscribers. Only 1000 copies will be available for download so get yours now.
Third and last, get the spider to come on back to your site. If you know how to bait a search engine spider, great! You’ll get your results faster, and since the spider finds the link on its’ own, you may get better placement. Or, you can submit your site to one of Inktomi’s partners, and/or Google and wait the 6-8 weeks it takes to be included.
Author Bio:
Subscribe to Free Traffic Secrets to find out how to get the Googlebot spider sooner at ftdsecrets-subscribe@topica.com or visit http://www.freetrafficdirectory.com to get more time-tested information on getting Free Quality Traffic to Your Site.
SEO’s Relationship With Website Architecture
Search engine optimization for today’s search engine robots requires that sites be well-designed and easy-to-navigate. To a great degree, organic search engine optimization is simply an extension of best practices in web page design. SEO’s relationship with web design is a natural one. By making sites simple and easily accessible, you are providing the easiest path for the search engine robots to index your site, at the same time that you are creating the optimum experience for your human visitors.
This approach ties well into the notion of long-term search engine marketing success. Rather than trying to “psych out” the ever-changing search engine algorithms, build pages that have good text and good links. No matter what the search engines are looking for this month or next, they will always reward good content and simple navigation.
Search Engine Robots
Search engine robots are automated programs that go out on the World Wide Web and visit web pages. They read the text on a page and click through links in order to travel from page to page. What this really means is that they “read” or collect information from the source code of each page. Depending on the search engine, the robots typically pick up the title and meta description. The robots then go on to the body text of the page in the source code. They also pay attention to certain tags such as headings and alt text. Search engine robots have capabilities like first-generation browsers at best: no scripting, no frames, no Flash. When designing, think simple.
Search Engine Friendly Design
Creating search engine friendly design is relatively easy. Cut out all the bells and whistles and stick to simple architecture. Search engine robots “understand” text on the page and hyperlinks, especially text links. The relationship of SEO and web design makes sense when you start with good design techniques for your visitor. The easier the navigation and the more text on the page, the better it is not only for the visitor but also for the search engine robots.
Obstacles For Indexing Web Pages
Search engine robots cannot “choose” from drop down lists, click a submit button, or follow JavaScript links like a human visitor. In addition, the extra code necessary to script your pages or create those lists can trip-up the search engine robots while they index your web page. The long JavaScript in your source code means the search engine robots must go through all this code to finally reach the text that will appear on your page.
Offload your JavaScript and CSS code for quicker access to your source code by the search engine robots, and faster loading time for your online visitors. Some search engine robots have difficulty with dynamically-generated pages, especially those with URLs that contain long querystrings. Some search engines, such as Google, index a portion of dynamically generated pages, but not all search engines do. Frames cause problems with indexing and are generally best left out of design for optimum indexing. Web pages built entirely in Flash can present another set of problems for indexing.
Depth Of Directories
Search engine robots may have difficulty reaching deeper pages in a website. Aim to keep your most important pages no more than one or two “clicks” away from your home page. Keep your pages closer to the root instead of in deeply-nested subdirectories. In this way you will be assured the optimum indexing of your web pages. Just as your website visitor may become lost and frustrated in too many clicks away from your homepage, the robots may also give up after multiple clicks away from the root of your site.
Solutions And Helpful Techniques
If there are so many problems with indexing, how will you ever make it work?
The use of static pages is the easiest way to ensure you will be indexed by the search engine robots. If you must use dynamically-generated pages, there are techniques you can use to improve the chances of their being indexed. Use your web server’s rewrite capabilities to create simple URLs from complex ones. Use fixed landing pages including real content, which in turn will list the links to your dynamic pages. If you must use querystrings in your page addresses, make them as short as possible, and avoid the use of “session id” values.
When using Flash to dress up your pages, use a portion of Flash for an important message, but avoid building entire pages using that technology. Make sure that the search engine robots can look at all of the important text content on your pages. You want your message to get across to your human visitor as well. Give them enough information about your product to interest them in going the next step and purchasing your product.
If you must use frames, be sure to optimize the “no frames” section of your pages. Robots can’t index framed pages, so they rely on the no frames text to understand what your site is about. Include JavaScript code to reload the pages as needed in the search engine results page.
Got imagemaps and mouseover links? Make sure your pages include text links that duplicate those images, and always include a link back to your homepage.
Use a sitemap to present all your web pages to the search engine robots, especially your deeper pages. Make sure you have hyperlink text links on your page, and a sentence or two describing each page listed, using a few of your keyword phrases in the text.
Remember that the search engine robots “read” the text on your web page. The more that your content is on-topic and includes a reasonable amount of keyword-rich text, the more the search engine robot will “understand” what the page is about. This information is then taken back to the search engine database to eventually become part of the data you see in the search engine results.
Last of all, it is very important to test your pages for validation. Errors from programming code and malformed html can keep the search engine robots from indexing your web pages. Keep your coding clean.
Check List For Success
Include plenty of good content in text on your web pages Incorporate easy to follow text navigation Serve up dynamically generated pages as simply as possible Offload JavaScript and other non-text code (style sheets, etc.) to external files Add a sitemap for optimum indexing of pages Validate your pages using the World Wide Web Consortium’s validation tool, or other html validator On Your Way To Indexed Pages The best way to assure that your pages will be indexed is to keep them simple.
This type of architecture not only helps the search engine robots, but makes it easier for your website visitors to move throughout your site. Don’t forget to provide plenty of good content on your pages. The search engine robots and your visitors will reward you with return visits.
Resources
To learn more about how to work around optimization problems with JavaScript, dynamically-generated pages, Frames and Flash, read the following articles:
Optimizing Pages with JavaScript and Style Sheets for Search Engines
http://www.searchinnovation.com/optimizing-pages-with-javascript.asp
Optimizing Dynamic Pages (Part I)
http://www.searchinnovation.com/optimize-dynamic-pages-1.asp
Optimizing Dynamic Pages (Part II)
http://www.searchinnovation.com/optimize-dynamic-pages-2.asp
Optimizing Frames for Search Engines
http://www.searchinnovation.com/optimizing-frames-for-search-engines.asp
Html validation tool
http://validator.w3.org/
Stylesheet validation tool
http://jigsaw.w3.org/css-validator/
Author Bio:
Daria Goetsch is the founder and Search Engine Marketing Consultant for Search Innovation Marketing, a Search Engine Promotion company serving small businesses. Besides running her own company, Daria is an associate of WebMama.com, an Internet web marketing strategies company. She has specialized in search engine optimization since 1998, including three years as the Search Engine Specialist for O’Reilly & Associates, a technical book publishing company.
How much should you be expected to pay?
This is obviously a tricky question. All I can say is a PR with a value of 4 is worth less than a site with a value of PR 5, and even less then a site with a value of 6.
That said, the asking ‘monthly leasing’ quotes I received from some of these companies range between a low of about $ 15 a month to a high of about $ 70 (too high I think) for a PR 4. In the PR 5 category, costs ranged between $ 40 at the low end to about $ 110 at the highest. In the PR 6 and 7 categories, they were ‘all over the map’, with ranges between $ 150 to $ 250 for a PR 6, all the way up to $ 450 for a PR 7.
Note that these figures are in US currency and that prices can vary widely. I’ve even heard (but I don’t believe it) that some sites with PR of 4 are almost giving them away. Again, it is buyer beware. You should obviously do your due diligence on any of this before you decide to go with one company or another.
Is it better to stay in the same field?
I have been saying this for a long time and I will repeat it: Links are not all equal. A link from a site dealing in real estate pointing to another site in real estate will be given higher ranking privileges, not just by Google but also by some of the other search engines.
If your business is involved in home renovations and improvements, try leasing links from sites that will help your users, such as home decorators, lumber yards and building contractors. Some may not agree with me on this, but staying in the same field you are in will go a long way in substantially improving your rankings.
Conclusion
Leasing monthly links should be viewed as any other business function. You do it to increase traffic at your site and to help your users, not just to increase your rankings with the search engines. Having targeted traffic is not all. You also need a site that converts well.
Converting well means that visitors become buyers and eventually repeat customers that come back to your website time and time again. If leasing links from high-ranking sites in your industry does it for you, you have accomplished one of your goals: to increase the size of your business, at the same time making it become more successful, independently of how search engines will rank your site.
Since we know that the number and the quality of inbound links to a site helps it in its rankings, leasing links thus accomplishes two main functions for businesses that engage in it.
Buying Links
The subject of buying one-way links is a controversial subject at best. A lot has been said about it in the past, especially now after Google’s Florida and Austin updates. Depending to whom you talk to, you are likely to get opinions that range from ‘don’t do it’ to ‘it’s now OK to do it’. So what’s the average site owner or small business to do?
Look at it from a business perspective point of view. If some search engines look at it from an advertiser’s point of view, then maybe that’s how you should look at it too. In the last two months, we have had (and continue to have) an increasingly higher number of clients and people that contact us to buy one-way links from other sites.
So the question is: Should you do it? Is it ‘safe’ to do it in this conjecture?
Back to the basics of linking
Before I answer that question, let’s go back to basics. Why do we need links in the first place? Can’t we just have a site with no outside links that will still rank high?
Here’s how Google ranks Web pages:
Google ranks websites on their value of merit. One of Google’s algorithms that does just that is the Page Rank’ algorithm, named after one of Google co-founders, Larry Page. In its most basic form, Page Rank’ calculates the number and quality of incoming links to any given website.
As far as Google is concerned, a link from site A to site B is viewed as a ‘vote’, which means that if 300 sites link to site B, that site must be more important than if it only had 5 or 10 inbound links.
As a result, the more links you would have pointing to a given website, usually the better that site would be perceived in terms of quality of content. Since the past 3 or 4 years, a great number of webmasters and site owners have participated in what is called “reciprocal link exchanges”, which, as the name implies, does just that: “I will put a link from my site to your site, if you do the same”.
In essence, there is nothing wrong with that. However, since Google’s two major last updates, in November and January, reciprocal links don’t seem to have the same impact as they once had, at least not from a ranking point of view.
Since then, it would appear that one-way links (from A to B and not B to A also) are receiving better rankings.
Which reopens the debate on “are buying links ethical?” Look at this analogy: if a website or portal carries a number of advertisers with links on its homepage, all pointing directly to those sites, isn’t this link buying? It sure looks like it to me.
Viewed in this manner, then I think its safe to say that buying links is now an acceptable practice in the Internet age.
So how do we go about doing it?
You should approach the subject of buying links the same way you would approach any other business proposal or transaction: with careful planning and attention to the small details. You should sit down and plan carefully the way you will do this. You probably have some sites in mind you would like to contact in an effort to see if they will ‘lease’ you some links.
I prefer the term leasing instead of buying since, in these uncertain economic times, nothing lasts forever. A few years ago, what would have happened if you purchased a ‘lifetime link’ from a site like Enron? It’s pretty clear today that this would have been a bad idea.
In the last few weeks, I have been approached by a number of companies with websites that said they might be interested in leasing some links. Some of them have a PR (Page Rank’) value of between 4 to 6, with a few of PR 7. I personally believe that this trend will most likely increase.
Author:
Serge Thibodeau of Rank For Sales
Introduction
In search marketing, there are many more questions than answers, particularly when it comes to how people search. We know how we search and we assume everybody searches in a similar way. Also, because searching has become such an intuitive function, we tend not to really give the actual search process much thought. If many of us actually looked at what we did in a search process, we’d probably surprise ourselves.
At Enquiro, we decided to try to peel back the shroud that covers common search behavior. We wanted to see just how people searched, and ask them what went through their minds during the search process. It was a fascinating study, and resulted in a 30 page white paper which you can download from www.enquiro.com. Today, I want to cover just a few of the things we uncovered.
What We Did
First, we decided that we’d invite people to visit our computer lab, give them a couple typical search scenarios, and record their actual search behavior. Then, we sat down with them, reviewed their search activity and asked them questions about how they interacted with the search results. We recorded their comments and then compiled them for analysis. We had 24 participants, with a fairly broad representation from different age groups, income and education levels and backgrounds.
There’s No Such Thing as an Average Searcher
First, the assumption that everyone searches in a similar way quickly proved to be false. We saw marked differences in the way people searched. These differences could be due to gender (yes, men do search differently than women), age, education or experience with the internet. In same cases, the differences were dramatic and could have a major impact on an advertisers search strategies. For instance, women tended to scan all organic results and read titles and descriptions more carefully than men. An organic listing in the number 8 position on Google might not have been seen by almost half the men in the group, but would have been seen by the majority of the women. This is just one example of how one search marketing strategy won’t fit all prospective customers.
How They Saw a Search Results Page
One of the foremost questions on our mind was how people react with a search page. Do they scan all the listings, or just a few? How important is position versus the title and description? Do all users see sponsored listings?
It seems that people have already mentally divided the results page from their favorite engine into sections. These sections tend to be sponsored listings (in some cases, both at the top and along the side of the page), above the fold organic results (free listings that appear without the user having to scroll down), below the fold organic results (free listings that require scrolling down) and other features (such as Google’s news and shopping feed results, just above the organic results). Not all these sections are treated equally by the user. Some, particularly the sponsored listings, are often skipped over by many users (over half the group) to go directly to the organic listings. Depending on the type of searcher and what they find in the organic results, they may or may not come back to sponsored listings after looking at the organic ones.
The above the fold organic results proved to be the prime real estate on the search engine results page, with all users making sure they looked at the top few listings. The eyes started to drop off as we moved to below the fold organic results and the sponsored results, with only 16.6% of users saying they check out sponsored listings, regardless of what they find in the organic results. 50% of users said they’d check out sponsored listings if they didn’t find anything relevant in organic results.
Searching is more Complex than we Imagined
As marketers, we tend to think of the search process as a linear one. A person searches, chooses a results, visits a site, and hopefully converts. In reality, we see the typical search pattern is quite different
A typical search is a circular and complex process, with multiple interactions with sites and search engine results pages. The average online research interaction can involve 5 to 6 different queries and interactions with 15 to 20 different sites. Often, the actual contents of a search results page can cause the searcher to take the search in a totally different direction, launching a new query that is at best somewhat divergent from the original purpose of the search. Dead ends are common and the browser back button is used extensively to navigate through the search process. For this reason, the search engine results page is actually used as a navigation aid in negotiating the online research interaction, as people continually refer back to it and launch another online exploration from this starting point.
While difficult to strategize for, search marketers have to understand that a search interaction is a complex process and that the searchers mindset evolves as they move through it.
Building the Search Query: The Funnel Approach
Over 70% of participants indicated they like to start with a generic, inclusive keyphrase and narrow it down from there. Reasons for this included:
* Not wanting to exclude potential quality sites by being too exclusive in the original search
* By being broader, the searcher may find other options to help take the search in new directions by looking at the results
* Being able to judge relevancy of the original findings and selectively increase relevancy by adding qualifying keyphrases
* It’s easier and quicker to type in a broad, short phrase at the beginning
In this type of search pattern, looking at search volumes and typical conversion metrics can be misleading to many marketers.
For many searchers, the search becomes increasingly specific as they go through the searching process. As this happens, the chances of the searcher finding results that could lead to a conversion becomes greater and greater as the search progresses. However, the direction the search takes can be determined by the results found in the early, generic searches. For instance, in one case where a participant was looking for information on cruises, the searcher didn’t start out looking for either a Panama Canal Cruise or a Princess Cruise, but results found early in the search process led her to refine her search query in these directions. If awareness of these options hadn’t been introduced early in the search process, she would have never refined her search in these directions, leading to a likely conversion for Princess for a Panama Canal Cruise.
Introduction of Brand
This iterative search process introduces the opportunity for a multiple touchpoint approach to search marketing, introducing brand early in the search process and then reintroducing brand throughout the process. Obviously, this process works better if the brand is familiar with the consumer, with the advertiser having built brand equity through other online and offline search channels.
The Anonymity Threshold
In watching the participant’s interactions with a site, we also found that another common trait appears, particularly with the deliberate researchers. We have called it the Anonymity Threshold.
In general, people feel they are relatively anonymous when they are browsing online. And when people are gathering information about a purchasing decision, most prefer to remain anonymous. They don’t want to be exposed to sales pitches at this point, because they’re not ready to engage in the purchase process. They haven’t narrowed down their list of options yet.
In looking at the cruise example used in the buying funnel, it wasn’t until the searcher had found the right destination, type of cruise and cruise line that they were ready to engage in the purchase process. For this reason, they were resistant to purchase process oriented incentives (i.e. discounts) until the very last.
The internet has become very popular as a research tool during the information gathering process because it appears to offer the ability to remain anonymous. Through search engines, you can gather a lot of information quickly and you don’t have to enter into a situation where you surrender your anonymity until you choose to. We believe this is the reason there is a significant drop off between people willing to use the Internet to research a purchase decision and people willing to use it to purchase online. This drop off has been identified by a number of ecommerce studies. The purchase requires people to cross the anonymity threshold and they’re not prepared to do that. They know once they surrender contact information, they will likely be contacted by the vendor and be engaged in a purchase transaction. The consumer wants to do this according to their timing, not the vendors.
An interesting example of a violation of the anonymity threshold was presented by the use of online real time, real person sales chat tools such as HumanClick and Groopz. At first glance, these tools seemed a great answer to the impersonal nature of the Internet. You could watch visitors navigate through your site and if they wished, they could click on a button and initiate a real time chat with a sales person. As long as vendors stayed on this side of the fence, and let the visitor initiate the session, there was no problem. The challenge came when the vendor ‘pushed’ a chat window to visitors, offering assistance. Almost without exception, the visitors left immediately. We, along with a few other vendors we talked to, found that the minute we walked over the threshold and made visitors aware that they were being watched, they quickly left our site.
People won’t cross the threshold until they have no option. If given the choice between getting information and remaining anonymous and getting the information through registering, people will always choose the former. This creates a bit of a dilemma for the marketer, because generally the key metric is measuring against acquired or converted visitors. Almost every definition of an acquisition or conversion requires the visitor to cross the anonymity threshold. Because of the reluctance of the visitor to cross this threshold, the site owner may be building significant brand equity or trust with the visitor but is not giving credit to it because of the anonymity threshold.
In order to entice people to purchase online, the web vendor has to offer at least one significant advantage, whether it’s price, selection or convenience. If all things are equal or even close to equal, people will tend to avoid entering into a purchase process online.
In looking at most search marketing strategies; the emphasis is put on encouraging the purchase, while most people using search engines are more interested in anonymously gathering information. I believe there’s a potential disconnect here that more search marketers have to give some serious thought to.
More to Come
In this article, I’ve just looked at some of the findings from the study. In the next Net Profit, I’ll be looking at the 4 identified types of searchers, and what caught their attention in the search listings. And if you just can”t wait to get all the goodies, please download the full white paper at www.enquiro.com/research.asp.
Yes, despite what I said before, you will have to step over the anonymity threshold long enough to give us your email and name. Ironic, certainly, but like I said at the beginning, I don’t have all the answers. Hopefully we’ve thrown a few more at you.
Author:
Gord Hotchkiss
