Search Engine Optimization Strategy Austin Dallas Houston San Diego Boston and Nationwide

Evolution of Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

2005-01-10T14:23:00.000-08:00

How Search Engines Work Simply put, search engines use computer programs, commonly referred to as “spiders” or webcrawlers that literally “crawl” throughout the complex circuit of web pages across the entire Internet, logging the content on each page and following the links associated with those pages.

Searches on Your Hard Drive If you have ever utilized a search feature on your computer or word processing software, you know the process is fairly simple; you enter a word or phrase at the prompt and the software looks throughout the hard drive or the document for the word or phrase you entered.

Searches on a Search Engine Using a search engine such as All the Web, Alta Vista, Google, or Yahoo, among others, you can get similar search results as you did searching documents on your own computer, but the results that contain your search criteria are for web pages on the Internet.

Search Engines Defined Essentially, a search engine is a set of programs used by search engine companies to generate an index or database of websites that likely match the search criteria entered.

How Search Engines Work Simply put, search engines use computer programs, commonly referred to as “spiders” or webcrawlers that literally “crawl” throughout the complex circuit of web pages across the entire Internet, logging the content on each page and following the links associated with those pages.

The information is then placed into databases. When queried on the search engine, they will generate a list or “library” of relevant websites, based on the search term and the search engine company’s algorithms. The algorithms created by the individual search engine companies rate each web page’s importance by its content and relevance. The value they place on the various words and phrases contained on a page determine where that page will show up in the ranked results.

What are Links? A hypertext link is a link on a website which identifies a website address and enables a direct connection from that webpage to another. In most cases, the link’s address is highlighted or underlined, so website visitors will know to click or follow the link to another page on that site, or another site altogether. Photos oftentimes have links associated with them.

Link Relevance With the advent of the Internet, computers branched out and linked to related computers in the network. The original concept of the World Wide Web was that web pages connected via hyperlinks to one another would be related in some way. For example, on a website about ‘speech writing’, there could be links leading to relevant websites containing books on writing or public speaking, or the site might provide links to various speaking schools, associations, or a speakers bureau, etc.

One important factor in determining relevance is the number and quality of related web sites that link to a particular web site. Over time, many websites created “link farms” whereby anyone could post a series of unrelated links to a website, hoping to cross-link their sites en mass to add perceived value in search engine rankings. This resulted in corruption of the library of information that the search engine spiders had gleaned. Most of the search engines have incorporated complex subroutines into their algorithms that look for link farms, non-relevant links, duplicate content, hidden text, hidden links, and many other factors, which detract from the quality of their search results.

After link farms came ‘familiar link listings’ for all of a website owner’s friends, family, et al. Businesses did favors for business associates, linking to their associates’ unrelated business sites from their own business sites. The links to other sites then became less relevant in search engine rankings.

Following came abusers, who basically generated websites that would fare well in search criteria only because of repetitive keyword usage throughout the pages. Visitors to those types of sites saw only relevant keywords sprinkled throughout the page, but no relevant content, further corrupting the relevance of the search queries. In the end, links to other sites then became less relevant in search engine rankings.

Consequently, search engines must constantly adjust their algorithms in order to rank the websites by algorithm-perceived relevance and hopefully, weed out the sites that do not contain relevant information based on the search criteria.

As a result, search engine optimization is a constantly changing and rapidly evolving area. About a year ago, there was really only one search engine worth worrying about. Google provided in excess of 80% of all search engine traffic and their methodology was fairly easy to understand. Now there are at least three main competitors and they are constantly changing their algorithms.

SEO = Search Engine Optimization Simply defined, SEO is the process of determining relevant keywords and phrases as they relate to a website, crafting the visible content of a web page to highlight those words and phrases in search engine friendly ways, and adding those specific words and phrases to the title, keywords and descriptions in a website’s metatags which the search engines read and in turn, add to their databases.

What is Internet Marketing? Internet marketing firms promote websites in a variety of ways including advertising, link building and registering the website on various search engines. Their ultimate goal is to ensure that the website places well in the search results for related keywords and phrases for that website, just like an SEO firm does.

What to Look for in an SEO or Internet Marketing Firm There is a growing niche of consultants and firms who specialize in search engine optimization but not all SEO’s have the same level of expertise, specialties or standards of service.

If a company offers to “Submit your site to 8000 search engines for $xxx.xx” be sure to run as fast as you can. If they discuss their expertise at “fooling” the search engines, creating doorway pages, cloaking, etc., you should quickly lose their phone number. If they guarantee you the number one spot on the search engines, be sure to find out which obscure four-word phrase they will guarantee that placement for and whether anyone actually ever searches for that phrase.

Some SEO companies will simply market client websites to a variety of search engines, charging the website owner a monthly fee to ensure that the website is found in search engine databases. Most of the ‘work’ by these SEO firms simply consists of utilizing an automated mass marketing software tool to repeatedly register a site to a number of search engines. Use of the program ensures the SEO’s ‘marketing efforts’ will produce evidence of placement on search engines for a limited search term and for an extremely limited time. They then report proof of search engine placement to the client who then justifies the expense based on that ‘factual’ report of the SEO’s marketing efforts. The SEO in essence does not provide optimization services to the client and lets the computer do all the ‘work.’ This type of SEO does not serve the client’s best interest and will seldom produce favorable results

Be aware that search engine spiders will eventually find every website on the Internet, even poorly designed, non-optimized and those lacking in relevant keywords compared to their site content. The key to effective SEO does not lie entirely on search engine listings, to the surprise of many. If mass-marketing tools were all that was needed to effectively market a website, SEO’s would be out of business in a heartbeat. Fortunately for the successful SEO and Internet Marketing companies, there is more to SEO than meets the eye and their jobs will be secure long into the future.

Remember this: A non-optimized website that shows up “somewhere” in search results may never be found due to its unfavorable ranking. In that case, ranking ‘somewhere” may as well equate to ranking nowhere.

On Google, for instance, the search term ‘speech writing’ yields 3,850,000 results as of this writing. The list of web page results displays ten related sites per page.

If a site is poorly optimized for the phrase speech writing, it may actually show up in the results ‘somewhere’, but could be buried among those 3.85 million results and could even be listed last! The likelihood of anyone weeding through 385 thousand pages of 10 sites per page to find a relevant site is nil.

Most search engine users will find precisely what they are looking for on the first page, even though there may be extremely relevant pages on the first three to five pages or 50 listings.

Reputable SEO’s will research the client’s industry, analyze their competitors and keyword relevance, create a shopping list of relevant, highly targeted key words, phrases and descriptions to focus on, make recommendations for revisions to meta tags and page content, and may advise on a site redesign for ease of navigation by the search engines and site visitors. Additionally, they will make recommendations for advertising as necessary, and provide ongoing analysis and reports to the client.

SEO experts should have extensive technical experience as well as project management, system design, and systems integration experience. (Some say that SEO is not rocket science but several of AZhttp’s staff members have related experience just in case!)

There are many criteria which should be taken into careful consideration in choosing an SEO for Internet marketing and planning efforts. Consulting with an expert or specialist SEO consultant might be the best search engine investment you will ever make.

Internet Marketing Services and SEO Overview

Define Objectives

Define Goals

Identify the Current State of Site or Sites

Identify the Target Audience for each Site

Identify and Select Strategies

Research

Site design recommendations

Search engine placement campaigns

SEO Monitoring and Reporting

Choose an expert to ensure a successful SEO campaign to improve your online sales and Internet marketing efforts and to aggressively promote your products and brands.

Oftentimes, a commercial site has an extreme number of competitors. All sites cannot be listed first, therefore an SEO might focus on other products to increase his client’s results, or focus advertising on a specific product or target a region or city. Search engine results are ever changing, so analysis should be ongoing. Lastly, the SEO should be heavily involved in monitoring the client’s advertising campaigns or they could put a company out of business by mismanagement.

AZhttp has seen a multitude of poorly rated, badly designed client websites with extensive sloppy or careless use of html coding, many that do not even have a title, description or keywords! Additionally, we’ve seen code that actually sends search engines away from the site rather than code that encourages the search engines to visit and follow links.

Following is one example of how the source code below the header of a properly constructed page should appear. To view the source code of your site, visit the site, place your cursor in the body of the site (where there is content), right click and select ‘view source’ from the menu:

THIS CODE TELLS SEARCH ENGINE WEBCRAWLERS TO INCLUDE THE PAGE IN THEIR DATABASE AND TO FOLLOW THE LINKS ON THE PAGE!

Reprinted from Zongoo.com Daily Press & Consumer Information

Google Ranking Tips

2005-01-10T14:23:00.000-08:00

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 at which it delivers them. This is due to its complex text matching algorithm and of course the Pagerank™ system that this engine uses. More on the Pagerank™ system later.

Google is popular with webmasters and Internet Marketing companies due to the highly workable ranking system it uses.

Unlike other engines where information about how the results are obtained are sketchy at best, Google actually publishes information on its site about the results it produces. So webmasters have things they can do to produce higher rankings. What also makes Google popular with webmasters is the speed at which they will spider / list your site.

If you are not listed in Google and submit you are usually indexed within two weeks. If, however, your site is already listed in the index Google should reindex once every month, but more frequently if you have a high Pagerank™.

This indexing / reindexing time is much quicker than most other search engines, this allows webmasters to edit their pages properties such as title, first few lines of text, headings, keyword distribution and of course the number of incoming links to their site. They can then discover quickly if the changes were successful or not.

It's because of this popularity that you need to know the workings of the google search engine. Without knowledge of it you will be ranked lower than all other sites that are only slightly familiar with the Google algorithm.

So let's indulge ourselves in the Google ranking algorithm. Well, there are two main parts to the algorithm google uses, the first is its text matching system, whereby Google tries to find pages relevant to what the searcher has entered. The second and equally important part of the algorithm is of course the Google patented Pagerank™ system.

I'll first go through how to make your page relevant, i.e. - the text matching part of the algo.

Google gives a lot of "weight" to the title tag when searching for keywords. So make sure your most important keywords or keyphrases appear in the title tag. It seems to work best if you have other words in your title tag, too, after your keywords, but try to remain under 35-40 characters.

As many of you know, Google does not use meta tags such as keywords or description tags. This is because the text in these tags cannot be seen by visitors to a website. And Google feels these tags will be abused, by webmasters placing lots of unrelated words in them in order the get more visitors.

The lack of support for meta tags means that Google creates your description from the first few lines of text on your page, this means you have to have your keywords and phrases right at the top, if it finds them your page becomes more relevant. If it doesn't the rest of your page has to work harder to become relevant. For example Scroll back to the top of this page and you will see:

AKA Marketing .com - Free Internet Marketing Articles , Google submitting tips, ranking high at google.com

The above sentence includes keyphrases related to this page.

Google considers keyword density in the body of a page for determining relevancy too, so make sure your keywords and phrases appear a couple of times throughout the whole page. Don't go overboard though, a density of 6-10% seems to work best.

Other advice about making your page relevant includes putting keywords into the heading tags . Also try and bold as many keywords as you can. As of late Google seems to be indexing text in alt image tags, so includes your keyphrases in there too.

One final tip on page relevancy is the point on having your keywords and phrases in links which point to your site. It is a good idea to have the linking text contain your keywords as Google even says itself that it analyzes pages that links come from too, in it's description of it's pagerank technology.

How much keyword laden links matter is anyone's guess. But I have noticed a lot of sites which give the HTML code to visitors who want to exchange links do include keywords in the actual linking area. You should do something like this to on your links page. Say something like "if you want to link to this site, please use the following code".

In the above section of the article you have learned what areas Google uses and looks at when looking for a relevant site. But what method does Google use to determine which site is better, the answer is the Pagerank™ system.

Pagerank™ is as the name suggests a ranking system of pages. It works on the basis that if a website ABC.COM has been linked from a website XYZ.COM, abc.com must have some good content and therefore Google will count the link from XYZ.COM as a vote for ABC.COM. You can check your link popularity on Google by downloading the Google toolbar from http://toolbar.google.com

The Pagerank™ scale goes from 1 to 10 on the Google toolbar and from 1 to 7 beside listings on the Google toolbar. A less important site is of course a site with a PR of 1 and a very very important site is a site with a PR of 7 or 10, in the directory or toolbar respectively.

The more links or votes a site has the more important it must be and therefore the higher it will rank for search words which it is relevant to, right?, WRONG!.

Google does not simply count the number of incoming links a page has, if that was the case every webmaster from Iceland to Vietnam would try and exchange links to every tom, Dick and harry website that would let them. In Googles own words

"Google looks at more than the sheer volume of votes, or links a page receives; it also analyzes the page that casts the vote. Votes cast by pages that are themselves "important" weigh more heavily and help to make other pages "important."

Hopefully your beginning to get the idea. If not - The idea is to have your page linked to by as many high quality and high pageranked sites as possible. Right?, RIGHT and WRONG.

WRONG BECAUSE - You see Google pagerank system also takes into account the number of links the page that has linked to you has. The reasoning for this is that a page X has a certain amount of voting PR, if your site Y is the only link from that page X, then Google feels confident that page X thinks your page Y is the best link it has, and will give you more PR. If however page X has 50 links, page X could think your only the 50th best page. So the more links it has the less of a PR boost your site gets.

RIGHT BECAUSE - Linking to a site with a 6+ PR will provide a significant boost to your PR in most cases, but in cases where the site also links with 100 other sites the boost will be almost zero. Likewise if a site has a PR of just 2 but you and only one other site are linked from it, then the PR boost would be more than the site with 100 links and a PR of 6.

It's beginning to come complex isn't it, just wait till you see this formula. Its looks scary for non math's people.

First let me explain what the damping factor is. The damping factor is the amount of your PR which you can actually pass on when you vote / link to another site. The damping factor is widely known to be .85 . This is a little less then the linking pages own PR.

PR(A) = (1-d) + d(PR(t1)/C(t1) + ... + PR(tn)/C(tn))

In layman's terms PR(A) is the Pagerank™ boost your page will get after being linked from someone else's site (t1). PR(t1) is the pagerank of the page which links to you and C(t1) is the amount of total links that (t1) has. It is important to know that a pages voting power is only .85 of that pages actual PR and this voting power gets spread out evenly between all sites it links to.

Imagine akamarketing.com was linked by XYZ.COM's link page which had a PR of 4 and 9 other links, here's how the formula should look like:

PR(AKA) = (1-.85) + .85*(4/10) PR(AKA) = .15 + .85*(.4) PR(AKA) = .15 + .34 PR(AKA) = .49

To sum up my site would get an injection of .49 PR after being linked from a page with a PR of four and 9 other links.

Lets say I was linked from a site with a PR of 8 - double the previous example's amount, which had 15 other links, a total of 16 outbound links, my boost would be:

PR(AKA) = (1-.85) +.85*(8/16) PR(AKA) = .15 + .85(.5) PR(AKA) = .15 + .425 PR(AKA) = .575

The above two worked examples show that not only is the PR of the linking page important but what is also important is how many other sites are also linked / voted for from that page.

OK, I think we've had enough mathy stuff for now. Just remember that the name of the game is to get as many links from pages with high PR and few other links. The more of these links you get the more your PR will grow and the more your rankings will improve for your relevant keywords.

The best thing you can do for your PR seems at the moment seems to be getting listed in Dmoz.org - The Open Directory Project.

Pagerank™ is widely known to be biased towards big name directories such as Dmoz.org, Yahoo and Looksmart.

This is true, especially in the case of Dmoz.org. These ODP links are treated like gold by Pagerank™. It doesn't even matter what the individual PR of the category page is. I have seen sites gain a large PR boost on the toolbar as soon as Google updates it's directory with the latest one from dmoz.org. This is because Google uses it's own version of ODP for the Google web directory.

Don't believe ODP links are very important to Pagerank™? Don't believe a listing in the ODP will boost your ranking?

Well they are and they will. Perform a search for almost anything on Google and you'll discover that 75-80% of the top 10 results are also indexed in the Google directory. The fact of the matter seems to me to be if your not listed in ODP, you shouldn't expect much traffic from Google.

It's not difficult, it does sometimes take time, but it's not difficult. Just make sure you site has good content and follow the guidelines for adding a URL. Try to get you index page listed at least. I say at least because although ODP claims only to list your index page, there are plenty of sites with 5 - 10 pages listed. So if your site has very distinctive sections, then submit each section - slowly. Once Google updates it's directory, these listings could do wonders for your site maximum PR.

As for Yahoo and Looksmart, Pagerank™ will usually allocate a more than normal amount of PR boost for any sites listed. For tips on getting listed in Yahoo, read Yahoo Submitting Tips.

If you are a non-commercial site or have a site that's almost completely non-commercial you can get into the looksmart directory through www.Zeal.com. I really love this site, just like Google obtains results from ODP, Looksmart obtains it's non-commercial listings from the Zeal web directory, without Zeal I would have to fork out hard earned cash and all my site does is provide information.

To continue - I submitted AKA Marketing.com on a Tuesday and was listed in Zeal by Thursday morning. On Monday I checked my logs and found lots of referrals from Looksmart, I was in Looksmart already. I looked at my logs later only to find MSN had updated it's DB from the looksmart DB and was sending my loads of visitors cause of the good listing I got. My site was listed in Zeal, Looksmart and MSN within six days. So get over to Zeal.com and submit your site.

Before you can submit a site however you must pass a member quiz, which is fairly simple and straightforward.

If you happen to be a webmaster that has a listing in all three of Dmoz.org, Yahoo and Looksmart then I'm guessing your site has good to very good PR and rankings.

RECAP Have your main keywords and phrases in your TITLE tag and well spread throughout your page. Get as many links from as many high PR low number of outbound links pages you can. GET LISTED IN DMOZ.ORG, Yahoo and Looksmart.

Well that's it. I hope you have enjoyed this Google Ranking tips article, as much as I have enjoyed writing it. I also hope that you can put this advice into use and help get yourself some real traffic.

Did you like this article?, it took three days to write, so any feedback good or bad would be appreciated. My email is admin@akamarketing.com

Article by David Callan - admin@akamarketing.com David is the webmaster of http://www.akamarketing.com. Visit his site for free internet marketing articles, advice, ebooks, news and lots more.

Reprinted from Zongoo.com Daily Press & Consumer Information

Search Engine Optimization - A Must

2005-01-11T09:00:00.000-08:00

By Alec Duncan

As you surf the web take a look around at many of the sites you see. Do you notice anything that seems strange? Well, let me point it out to you. There are hundreds of thousands of web sites that just don’t get much traffic. Some of these sites house hundreds of articles, reviews, tutorials, tools, products, forums to mention a few things, yet still they do not receive large amounts of traffic. What is their problem? They have the content. What is left?

The problem is these sites aren't optimized for the search engines. SEO, Search Engine Optimization, SE Friendliness, however you refer to it doesn't matter, the fact is it works and I'm going to tell you what's involved.

Before we continue let me familiarize you with some relevant terminology in my own words.

Search Engine Optimization Search engine optimization can be referred to as the addition and modification of all variables and extended variables of a web site in hopes of achieving a better position in the search engines. By variables I mean components of a website such as META tags and content. By extended variable I mean things such as links from other sites.

Different SEOs, search engine optimizers, may have different opinions on this but alas this is only my own.

What is a Search Engine Optimization Company? A search engine optimization company is a company that offers the service of creating and adjusting all the variables involved in search engine optimization in order to get your web site the best ranking they can achieve, during the designated project period, for all the major search engines.

Search Engine Optimization Hurdles

Back to the question of why these sites rich with content aren't bringing in the numbers. There are several reasons why sites small and large aren't optimized for the search engines, fortunately these can be remedied.

1. Many webmasters/site owners believe in "If You Build It They Will Come". This attitude will get your web site no where fast. Sure if you build it you will get users maybe even a decent amount of users but you will not be unleashing the real potential of your web site.

2. Not feeling that your site can do better than it is. Websites can always be further optimized. Search engines change their algorithms all the time so what worked 2 months ago may not work as well or at all in present times. For any of you that fee you can get your site optimized better, think of the story of the Little Engine and don’t think you can, KNOW YOU CAN.

3. Laziness is also a major contributing factor. Many webmasters feel it is just too hard or too time consuming to do search engine optimization.

This is partially true. Search engine optimization is not easy but then again, anyone can do it. It does take time though and time is a precious commodity. In situations where you just can't devote the time to search engine optimize your site I would recommend seeking the services of a professional search engine optimization company. You can choose one here SEO Companies

4. Time + cost = a deterrent. For a situation like this I would recommend optimizing little by little on your own. Eventually you will become better and better at it and be able to accomplish more in less time.

5. Another problem is many people think "Well my site is only a small site, there is no way I will be able to compete with the larger sites that have top spots in the search engines". If you think like this I’d like to say this to you. It is possible that that if you optimize your web site you may not be able to compete with the larger sites and may not be able to get a page 1 or 2 ranking in any of the search engines, BUT, what if you did. Always shoot for the stars so if you fall short you will at least hit the sky.

Now for those of you who plan to better your websites via Search Engine Optimization here are the stages you need to follow in order to have an efficient and effective SEO campaign.

Search Engine Optimization Stages

Planning Your Search Engine Optimization Campaign Planning is an essential factor in your SEO campaign. Knowing exactly what steps you are going to make and in what order and how you are going to go about achieving each of those steps will save you not only time but it will save you frustration as well. Planning is essential.

Researching the Most Effective SEO Strategies What works and what does not. You will need to learn as many optimization strategies as you can that are currently effective with the search engines. This will be one of the most time consuming steps in your SEO campaign as you will have to sift through information as well as participate in SEO related forums to get additional information from professional. You can take this process in stages and apply your newly gained knowledge as you get it. There is also some useful software available both free and paid that will greatly help with this effort. WebPosition Gold is one of the more popular ones.

Search Engine Optimize Your Site This should be done in stages so you can see the effectiveness of the applied strategies you are using. Don’t change your entire site all at once, instead, change a few areas at a time and see what results they produce. If you are satisfied with this then move on and optimize another section.

Search engine optimization does not only deal with your site it also deals with the relationship other sites have with yours and yours with theirs. Keep this in mind when utilizing your link building strategies.

Monitor Your SEO Progress There are many ways to do this you will have to find the best method for you. You will need to monitor your search engine ranking for the keywords you are targeting after each update. Changes should be recorded and used as references to monitor progress and for strategy adjustments. There are many tools for this process as well. I recommend This Tool for monitoring your progress on the Google search engine as it is very easy to use and you can monitor several domains and keywords all from within the same account. It also gives you the option of viewing the number of backlinks.

These steps follow the Plan Do Review methodology which is a proven strategy for engaging in any task. It is again unfortunate that there are so many webmasters who overlook this entire process; hopefully this article will stop you from making this same mistake.

Author Bio: Alec Duncan is the founder of Li'l Engine a Search Engine Optimization resource. Visit Li'l Engine for great seo strategies and also check out Developer Tutorials for web development tutorials.

Reprinted from Zongoo.com Daily Press & Consumer Information

Yahoo Submitting Tips

2005-01-10T14:25:00.000-08:00

Getting listed on Yahoo should be without doubt the most important mission on any Internet marketers mind.

Yahoo is the biggest of all the search engines, well actually that's not true, you see Yahoo is not technically a search ENGINE it is a human compiled directory of websites and does not have a spider bot going to sites and indexing them. But for the sake of this article when I say search engines I am referring to all 'search sites'.

Did you know that recent estimates show that Yahoo is currently capturing an amazing 40% of all search engine traffic online? Do you know what this means? That means that almost 1 out of every 2 people that do searches on the Internet use Yahoo, everyone on the Internet has done searches some time or another.

Nothing in the world should be clearer to anyone with a website whose just after reading the above figures - you need your site listed in Yahoo. A.S.A.P.

RECAP If your site is not listed in the YAHOO INDEX, (note - being listed under webpages does not mean you are listed in Yahoo, it in fact means you are listed with Google because Yahoo gets webpage results from google) you are losing lots of potential customers to competitors that are listed in Yahoo. And with the amount of visitors Yahoo can send you even with an average listing this could amount to hundreds, maybe thousands of dollars worth of lost profit.

Now you know how important it is, lets get on to the good stuff, the main body of this Yahoo submitting tips article - how to submit to Yahoo.

Well first you have to determine the scope of your site. Is your site commercial or non-commercial? Commercial sites that want to be listed by Yahoo now must use "Business Express" when submitting. This used to cost $199, however the price has risen to $299 a year.

"Business Express" what is it? Good question and one that many people ask, well it's basically the same as free submit except that with business express your site is guaranteed to be reviewed within a week's time. However please be aware that it does not guarantee that your site will be accepted and added to the Yahoo index. If your site is rejected Yahoo will allow you to appeal for free within a certain time scale (usually 30 days) of being informed of your rejection. Also Yahoo staff usually includes in your rejection the reason you have been rejected; you should examine these reasons fix any problems and resubmit after a week or so.

If your site is a non-commercial site, you will still be able to submit for free, but a review could take as long as 8 weeks or might never happen at all.

Before you submit make sure your site is 100% ready, under construction pages need not apply to Yahoo because they are not going to get in. Your site should be aesthetically pleasing to the reviewer, be quick loading and of course should have lots of content.

OK lets get started. How does Yahoo return results? Well search results on Yahoo are determined by words that appear within these four areas: 1) Category, 2) title, 3) description, and 4) URL. These sites are then sorted by relevance using an automated algorithm.

I will now go through these four different factors and how to optimize you submittal for each one First up category selection, many people don't realize this but when someone searches for a term(s) on Yahoo its algorithm searches through the category name also, for example visit www.yahoo.com and you will see the results for a search done on 'Internet marketing articles'. You will see under each listing that these words are highlighted if they are in the name of the category, the top listing has the most occurrences of these words between its title, description, URL and words in the category its in.

You should remember this when submitting to your category, when trying to establish what category you are going to submit to you should do a search for one or two of your keywords and see what categories come up. But which of these categories do you submit to?

Since most referrals to sites from Yahoo come from the search results and not from people visiting certain categories, it is wise and best (in most occasions) to submit to a very specific category with lots of keywords in the category name. To see this strategy in practice revisit the results page for 'Internet marketing articles' on Yahoo.com notice that the top ranked site is in a category with lots of keywords, these are: Internet, Business, Advertising and Web, these combined with various keywords in the title, description and URL combine to give this site a pretty good chance at ranking well on a few good keywords and phrases. Therefore category names are just like having more titles and descriptions. Note - if you are a regional operation try to pick a category with the name of your state or province in it. This will help you get targeted visitors from Yahoo.

I said in most occasions a little higher up the page, well here's why it's not the best policy in all occasions. Imagine if your business name or official website name began with an A or any other alphabetically high character and someone goes into a general high - level category and there you are listed in the top few, you could receive lots of traffic from your category listing like this.

Basically what I'm saying here is that if the title you are submitting (i.e.. Your official business or website name) is alphabetically very high. Then you'd want to compromise between a lower level very specific keyword rich category and an upper level more general category in the hope that you'd receive more visitors because you would be listed high on the page due to your alphabetically high title.

Personally I'd try to get into the most general category possible on all occasions and rely on the keywords in my title, URL, and description to get a good ranking in search results.

As for the title Yahoo insists that you use your official business or website name when applying to them, if you submit some keyword rich title they wont even look twice at your application. You should take this into account when choosing a domain name/official website name.

I did - AKA Marketing - 'A' is useful in getting listed high in general categories as discussed earlier, because AKA is an abbreviation I can 'get away' with having AKA all caps which again helps with the category strategy. Also it includes a good keyword - Marketing and they can't accuse me of applying to them with a keyword rich title, can they?

Yahoo favors short titles, this stems from the fact that the shorter the title is the less likely they will be to edit it. Which means less work for them. However if you follow the above guidelines and indeed Yahoo's own onsite guidelines chances are you wont get edited down.

The description part I think is the tricky part. The Web site description posted with your URL is a big factor in how your site will rank once it's listed in the directory.

You have to submit a description which has your main keywords in it, and make it sound very appealing to potential visitors at the same time, however you can't have anything that resembles hype and bragging, for example - number 1 site on the net for... The best on the web for . . . . .

Again Yahoo will either edit it to something that doesn't benefit you at all or just move on to the next application (most likely). If they do edit it you can bet your keywords won't appear in the final listing, for these reasons it is important to get it right first time.

The description should be concise and based on facts, most importantly it should include your most important keywords whenever possible. Do not exaggerate what is located on your site. Remember a real person reviews your site and in the end; your site will not get listed, simple as that.

The length of the description should be about 10 - 15 words. Note however on the Yahoo submittal form, they say 25 is the maximum, never go near this number, they are sure to edit it, a mess with your keywords. Refer to Yahoo's own words "Please be brief".

SIDENOTE Sometimes people email me asking this question ''does my title and description that I submit to Yahoo have to be the same as the Meta description tag and title tag on my site''. Simple answer, NO!

We have already discussed most of the issues regarding domain name choice and Yahoo above, however there are others, most notable the whole 63 character thing, this allows for very long keyword rich domain names, if you decide to pursue this strategy, don't go mad and use up nearly all 63 characters because Yahoo reviewers wont like it, however do use long domain names to your advantage. Get ones with your main key phrase in it, and have these words separated by hyphens (-) because Yahoo's algorithm like hyphens it may give you a rankings boost. Also remember to try for alphabetically high domains, which are plausible and make sense. If you can that is.

Some experts question the merit of keyword rich domains as a way of gaining an advantage over other sites in Yahoo, however I have seen this strategy in action and it does give advantage, most of the time it's only a slight advantage but we're talking about Yahoo here, a small advantage can mean a lot more visitors. To see why I believe in keyword rich domains, go to Yahoo.com and enter in ''linking strategies''. WHAT SITE COMES UP! . That was a very good example wasn't it :-)

Other tips for Yahoo is to have an about us page on your main page - Yahoo likes to know who it's dealing with. On this page describe what you do honestly and also post the physical address of your business/building your website is run from.

IMPORTANT Don't under any circumstances Spam Yahoo, it they notice your submitting your site more than every 2 or 3 months they will just forget about you and more on.

Well that's it - I hope you enjoyed reading this Yahoo submitting tips articles as much as I enjoyed reading it. Good luck in your quest for Yahoo success

Article by David Callan - admin@akamarketing.com David is the webmaster of http://www.akamarketing.com. Visit his site for free internet marketing articles, advice, ebooks, news and lots more.

Reprinted from Zongoo.com Daily Press & Consumer Information

Hiring a Search Engine Marketer

2005-01-10T14:21:00.000-08:00

By Scottie Claiborne © 2004 http://www.successful-sites.com

Many website owners put the cart before the horse- anxious for search engine traffic and rankings, the first thing they do once their site is complete is buy a "submit to 1,000 search engines for $29" service. Unfortunately, what they receive is a tenfold increase in e-mail spam but no increase in search engine traffic.

Do-it-yourself SEO is a great way to go- if you've got the time to put in, anyone can effectively optimize a website. However, it makes sense to hire a professional when your time is better spent doing what you do best; running your business.

Where to start? Selecting an internet marketer can be a daunting task. There are a wide range of fee levels as well as different attitudes, strategies and experience levels.

A few pros and cons can help you in your search:

Con: Submit your site to 25,000 Engines

Any service that claims to submit your site to more than 4 or 5 engines is not submitting to search engines at all. Most likely, they are submitting to free-for-all pages or they are spamming directories. Currently, the only engines with significant traffic are Google and Yahoo and to a small extent Teoma (Ask Jeeves). You don't have to submit to any of these engines- they will find your site by crawling links to your site . Pro: Directory Submission Service

There are professionals who will prepare and submit your listing request to the major directories as well as industry-specific portals. This is a valuable service- a well-written description as well as a carefully chosen directory category can improve your chances of getting listed quickly and accurately.

Directory listings are valuable links that add to your link popularity and can send traffic in their own right. Many directories are still free but several have paid options that can speed your review. Directories such as Yahoo and Business.com are paid listings only. Directory submission specialists can let you know what options and fees are available.

Con: We Won't Change a Thing on Your Site

Companies that do their optimization "off-site" by building a mini-network of sites or pages on their own site that point to yours aren't really optimizing your site. They may send you traffic, but when you stop paying, the traffic goes away. You can do that yourself with PPC listings!

Other companies create software-generated "doorway" pages or "information" pages - these pages are often created with nonsense words sprinkled with keyword phrases and meant to appeal to the search engine algorithms. The key is that they are only for search engine spiders to see; not humans. They may work for a short while (if at all.) The problem is that these pages have no links pointing to them and aren't very important in the eyes of the search engines, therefore they are not very effective.

The most dangerous companies will tell you that you won't "see" any of their changes- they add hidden links, hidden text, and other tricky techniques designed to fool search engine spiders. Some create different pages that are shown to spiders than to people- this is referred to as cloaking. These techniques can and will eventually get your site penalized or banned.

Pro: We Can Optimize Your Site

A professional SEO is likely to work with you on keyword research, change your tags, your copy, possibly your links and other code on the page. They will optimize the page- making it friendly to users and search engines while making it relevant to the terms you have agreed upon.

They may recommend you remove splash pages, frames, flash navigation, javascript links, or other things that interfere with the user experience and hinder search engine spiders. While there are workarounds and techniques that can help with situations like these, they are not the optimal solution. Even if you choose to leave search-unfriendly elements on your page, your SEO should point them out to you and advise you of the best option.

Con: We Guarantee #1 Listings in the Editorial Results

No one can guarantee you a #1 listing in the search engines' algorithmically determined results for a specific term. The engines do not have special agreements with anyone that allows them to choose where your site will appear!

Read the fine print- often the guaranteed terms are "guinea pig" terms- words no one is searching or optimizing for that even a guinea pig could get you #1 rankings for! Remember that a guarantee doesn't mean they have to achieve the results- simply that they'll give you your money back if they don't.

Other companies guarantee rankings on PPC terms. That's easy enough, you just have to have a big enough wallet to be #1.

Pro: We Guarantee Improved Results

A good search engine marketing firm should be able to guarantee that they will improve the performance of your site in the search engines- you shouldn't be worse off than when they started. Really good companies should be able to improve your conversions, not just your traffic and rankings. Isn't that the ultimate goal?

Don't be surprised if, after a search engine marketer works on your site, your traffic figures decrease. Don't worry- traffic doesn't pay your bills; in fact it actually costs you bandwidth. The quality of the traffic you continue to receive should be improved- more sales or conversions in relation to the number of visitors.

The ideal situation is achieved when you narrow your search visitors to people who are interested in your site and they are easily able to find the information they want. This is more likely to occur when you stop focusing on unqualified but high traffic keyword phrases and start focusing on terms that really relate to your site.

Go with Your Instincts

Don't let a search marketer change your pages for the worse- slapping keywords on the page here and there may improve your rankings but decrease sales. Optimization techniques should complement and improve your site and good SEO copywriting will improve the focus of the page without losing the marketing edge.

You should feel confident that the search marketing professional you hire knows what they are doing and is willing to explain what they will do to your site and why. There really aren't any "secrets" in search marketing anymore- you can spend a few hours reading at any of the major search engine forums to find out how things work. If a marketer isn't willing to tell you what they plan to do to your site to drive more traffic, you may have a mess to clean up later.

Ask for examples of the marketer's other work; it's the best way to see what they do and how. Don't just look at the ranking reports, take a look at the page and make sure it reads well and isn't using sneaky tactics. Above all, pick someone you trust!

Scottie Claiborne is the owner of Right Click Web Consulting (http://www.rightclickwebs.com/) and the facilitator of the Successful Sites Newsletter (http://www.successful-sites.com). She is a speaker at the Search Engine Strategies conferences and the High Rankings Seminars as well as the administrator of the High Rankings Forum (http://www.highrankings.com/forum

Reprinted from Zongoo.com Daily Press & Consumer Information

How To Stay One Step Ahead of the Google Dance

2005-01-10T14:20:00.000-08:00

It's taken you 6-months of hard work, constant changes, reading every shred of information on search engine optimization strategy not to mention thousands of dollars trying out web optimization tools and services.

Finally, you have a page rank of 5, you are listed in the top 10 on your major keywords, and you are seeing the benefit - some decent traffic from Google and other search engines.

Then, as quickly as your search engine optimization strategy begins working, it suddenly, and without notice, disappears!

You frantically look for evidence of dropped links, pages not working, it HAS to be something you've done!

Well, the truth is, it may not have been anything you did - turns out Google updates their algorithms every few months in an attempt to improve it's search engine optimization strategy.

In fact, Google has shown that they are not afraid to make major changes impacting tens of thousands of sites, businesses and corresponding sales and profits.

Even more concerning, everything points to the fact they will continue to make changes.

So what can you do to protect your search engine optimization strategy and the resulting traffic critical to the success of your online marketing?

There are some things you can do.

1. BUILD CONTENT WITH REAL, RELEVANT VALUE

Do you develop content just for search engines or just for your visitors and customers?

The answer is both.

Truth is, your customers search for information based on keywords. Use tools like Wordtracker (http://www.highertrustmarketing.com/part/wordtracker) to find those keywords.

Plan your articles around answering questions associated with each keyword. Over time, you will build highly relevant content that will be irrisistable to the search engines - no matter how they change them.

2. LINK FOR QUALITY, NOT QUANTITY

One single link with a Pagerank (Google's term for ranking sites) of 5 is worth 10 or more sites with a Pagerank of 3.

In addtion, as an important part of your search engine optimization strategy, make sure your links include a brief description (a URL only inbound link may be ignored), includes important keyword and appears on a relevant partner site.

Avoid FFA's and most link farms, they may actually do you more harm than good.

3. AVOID KNOWN MISTAKES

Common mistakes people make with their search engine optimization strategy are:

- Cross linking unrelated sites, recent discussion with master Affiliate Marketing pro James Martell recently brought this issue to light - Submitting to link farms, in many cases this will eventually get your site penalized or even banned from the SE's - Duplicate content. Many people feel the need to duplicate their pages and make small changes for each search engine (also called doorway pages) - however if this is not done properly, you will get penalized - Trying to load your content with too many keywords. Focus on 1-3 keywords only

4. USE GOOGLE ADS

While still unproven, it certainly has been found by many in the search engine watch community that sites who use Google Adwords or Google Adsense tend to appear higher in listings.

5. VARY YOUR TRAFFIC GENERATION TECHNIQUES

Too many people rely on Google traffic for 99% of their traffic. It's true, search engine traffic is the most economical way to advertise online, but there are many other ways to vary your traffic generation strategy.

Add these traffic generation techniques to your search engine optimization strategy:

- Writing articles - Running affiliate program - Joint Ventures - Viral "sticky" tools - Press Releases

Yes - you need to dance with Google. By following these techniques, you can actually lead your traffic generation strategy rather than follow the Google dance.

Discover how to create your own best-selling eBooks, Special reports or books to sell online ...AND keep 100% of the profits. Limited time complimentary access to 7-Part Minicourse will get you started quickly and easily. Visit: http://www.highertrustmarketing.com/

Reprinted from Zongoo.com Daily Press & Consumer Information

A Way for Search Engines to Improve

2005-02-01T08:34:00.000-08:00

By Richard Zwicky Published October 31, 2003, SiteProNews

Wouldn't it be nice if the search engines could comprehend our impressions of search results and adjust their databases accordingly? Properly optimized web pages would show up well in contextual searches and be rewarded with favorable reviews and listings. Pages which were spam or which had content that did not properly match the query would get negative responses and be pushed down in the search results.

Well, this reality is much closer than you might think.

To date, most webmasters and search engine marketers have ignored or overlooked the importance of traffic as part of a search engine algorithm, and thus, not taken it into consideration as part of their search engine optimization strategy. However, that might soon change as search engines explore new methods to improve their search result offerings. Teoma and Alexa already employ traffic as a factor in the presentation of their search results. Teoma incorporated the technology used by Direct Hit, the first engine to use click through tracking and stickiness measurement as part of their ranking algorithm. More about Alexa below.

How can Traffic be a Factor?

Click popularity sorting algorithms track how many users click on a link and stickiness measurement calculates how long they stay at a website. Properly used and combined, this data can make it possible for users, via passive feedback, to help search engines organize and present relevant search results.

Click popularity is calculated by measuring the number of clicks each web site receives from a search engine's results page. The theory is that the more often the search result is clicked, the more popular the web site must be. For many engines the click through calculation ends there. But for the search engines that have enabled toolbars, the possibilities are enormous.

Stickiness measurement is a really great idea in theory, the premise being that a user will click the first result, and either spend time reading a relevant web page, or will click on the back button, and look at the next result. The longer a user spends on each page, the more relevant it must be. This measurement does go a long way to fixing the problem with "spoofing" click popularity results. A great example of a search engine that uses this type of data in their algorithms is Alexa.

Alexa's algorithm is different from the other search engines. Their click popularity algorithm collects traffic pattern data from their own site, partner sites, and also from their own toolbar. Alexa combines three distinct concepts: link popularity, click popularity and click depth. Its directory ranks related links based on popularity, so if your web site is popular, your site will be well placed in Alexa.

The Alexa toolbar doesn't just allow searches, it also reports on people's Internet navigation patterns. It records where people who use the Alexa toolbar go. For example, their technology is able to build a profile of which web sites are popular in the context of which search topic, and display the results sorted according to overall popularity on the Internet.

For example a user clicks a link to a "financial planner", but the web site content is an "online casino". They curse for a moment, sigh, and click back to get back to the search results, and look at the next result; the web site gets a low score. The next result is on topic, and they read 4 or 5 pages of content. This pattern is clearly identifiable and used by Alexa to help them sort results by popularity. The theory is that the more page views a web page has, the more useful a resource it must be. For example, follow this link today -

http://www.alexa.com/data/details/ traffic_details?q=&url=http://www.metamend.com/

- look at the traffic details chart, and then click the "Go to site now" button. Repeat the procedure again tomorrow and you should see a spike in user traffic. This shows how Alexa ranks a web site for a single day.

What Can I Do To Score Higher With Click Popularity Algorithms?

Since the scores that generate search engine rankings are based on numerous factors, there's no magic formula to improve your site's placement. It's a combination of things. Optimizing your content, structure and meta tags, and increasing keyword density won't directly change how your site performs in click-tracking systems, but optimizing them will help your web site's stickiness measurement by ensuring that the content is relevant to the search query. This relevance will help it move up the rankings and thus improve its click popularity score.

Search Engines Can Use the Click Through Strategy to Improve Results

Search engines need to keep an eye to new technologies and innovative techniques to improve the quality of their search results. Their business model is based on providing highly relevant results to a query quickly and efficiently. If they deliver inaccurate results too often, searchers will go elsewhere to find a more reliable information resource. The proper and carefully balanced application of usage data, such as that collected by Alexa, combined with a comprehensive ranking algorithm could be employed to improve the quality of search results for web searchers.

Such a ranking formula would certainly cause some waves within the search engine community and with good reason. It would turn existing search engine results on their head by demonstrating that search results need not be passive. Public feedback to previous search results could be factored into improving future search results.

Is any search engine employing such a ranking formula? The answer is yes. Exactseek recently announced it had implemented such a system, making it the first search engine to integrate direct customer feedback into its results. Exactseek still places an emphasis on content and quality of optimization, so a well optimized web site, which meets their guidelines will perform well. What this customer feedback system will do is validate the entire process, automatically letting the search engine know how well received a search result is. Popular results will get extended views, whereas unpopular results will be pushed down in ranking.

Exactseek has recently entered into a variety of technology alliances, including the creation of an Exactseek Meta Tag awarded solely to web sites that meet their quality of optimization standards. Cumulatively, their alliances combine to dramatically improve their search results.

ExactSeek's innovative approach to ranking search results could be the beginning of a trend among search engines to incorporate traffic data into their ranking algorithms. The searching public will likely have the last word, but webmasters and search engine marketers should take notice that the winds of change are once again blowing on the search engine playing field.

About The Author Richard Zwicky is a founder and the CEO of Metamend Software, a Victoria, B.C. based firm whose cutting edge Search Engine Optimization software has been recognized around the world as a leader in its field. Employing a staff of 10, the firm's business comes from around the world, with clients from every continent. Most recently the company was recognized for their geo-locational, or GIS technology, which correlates online businesses with their physical locations, as well as their cutting edge advances in contextual search algorithms.

Reprinted from Zongoo.com Daily Press & Consumer Information

How to "GoTo" the Top of the Major Search Engines

2005-02-01T08:33:00.000-08:00

When it comes to pay per click search engines, GoTo.com is the clear leader. Over the years, GoTo has established relationships with many of the top search engines and directories, including Dogpile, Netscape, Hotbot, MSN, Compuserve, NBCI, American Online, Lycos, AltaVista and CNET.

So what does all of this mean to you and how do you use these relationships to your benefit? If you bid on keywords/phrases with GoTo and are listed in one of the top three positions, your site will also show up on the above engines when someone performs a search for one of your keyphrases. For example: Suppose you've snatched up "London vacations" as a keyphrase in one of GoTo's top three positions. If an AltaVista user types the phrase "London vacations" in the search box, the results page will have your site listed at the very top. You'll have similar results at the other search engines that are powered with GoTo listings. A nice way to get a top listing, don't you think?

According to GoTo, the top three bids - which they call "Premium Listings" -get more than twice the number of searches as a regular listing. Let's take a look at just where your site will appear on the various search engines /directories when you secure a premium listing.

AltaVista: To show up on AltaVista's search results page you need to be in the top six bid positions at GoTo. These bids will appearing as "partner listings" on AltaVista's search results page, with the top three bids showing up at the top of the listings and an additional three appearing at the very bottom of the search results page.

America Online: American Online boasts over 2.3 million members. To show up here you'll need to have one of the top three bid positions at GoTo. The links are labeled as "Sponsored Links" at the top of their results page before other search options are listed.

Lycos: The top three listings from GoTo appear under the heading "Featured Listings," before Lycos' own search results. There is also a link labeled "More Featured Listings" that leads you to a full page of GoTo results in bid order. Two more GoTo listings show up in the first ten results under what Lycos refers to as "Web Sites" section.

Netscape: Owned by America Online, they also display GoTo's listings under what's called "Partner Search Results" but only the top two bid positions are shown.

HotBot: The top three GoTo bids show up on HotBot's search results page under the title "Featured Listings."

MSN: After performing a search on MSN, the results page has a link that says "Get the Top 10 Most Popular Sites for [ the keyphrase you searched]". When you click through, the first three listings you'll see are the top three bids from Goto for that keyword or phrase.

CompuServe: If you're in the top ten at GoTo.com, you'll show up in searches at CompuServe. All of their search results appear to be supplied by GoTo and are labeled as "Premium Web Pages."

CNET: If you perform a search on CNET you'll see GoTo.com's top three listings for that particular word/phrase appearing in the right hand column in a box titled "Goto.com Search Partners."

NBCI: NBCi appears to be pulling the top 15 GoTo search results to be displayed on their results page. By clicking "more results" at the bottom of the page, additional GoTo listings are displayed.

DogPile: The first ten results from GoTo.com are displayed on DogPile's search results page. Below those you'll see LookSmart's results followed by Sprinks listings.

FAs you can see, positioning yourself in the top three positions with GoTo can get you some major exposure on many of the most popular search engines and directories online today. If you've been hesitant about opening your own GoTo account you may want to reconsider after seeing how widespread their reach is.

Remember, with GoTo you're not paying for impressions - only for actual click throughs, and the traffic you'll receive is highly targeted. More bang for your buck, so to speak.

By partnering with GoTo and obtaining a "premium listing," you too can be listed at the top of the search engines and isn't that what everyone wants?

About the Author

Merle http://www.EzineAdAuction.com "Where some of the BEST Deals in Ezine Advertising are Made" Buy & Sell Ezine Ads in a live auction setting! Publishers sell off your excess inventory and Buyers pick up some Fantastic bargains. Go now.

Reprinted from Zongoo.com Daily Press & Consumer Information

Is Your Thinking Deflating Your Profits More than Google's Florida Updates?

2005-02-01T08:33:00.000-08:00

By Jessica Albon

Copyright 2003, The Write Exposure

You spent a ton of time getting your website just right for Google. And now your site has sunk to the very bottom of the results for several key phrases.

Your traffic has plunged, and, worse, so have your profits. Sure, you know now you shouldn't have relied so heavily on one source of website traffic, but how do you fix the problem?

If your online business has taken a hit from the Florida Updates of Google, read on for five ways to build a broader base so the next algorithm change won't be as devastating.

CHANGE THE WAY YOU THINK ABOUT THE SEARCH ENGINES It's not the search engine's job to deliver traffic to your website. Rather, a search engine strives to give the best results to each searcher. Think about your site from your visitor's point of view. What information is that visitor looking for? And how can you make it clear up front that that's the information you provide?

Work at providing information from your website and giving the search engines that information-don't work so hard at convincing search engines that your site is what visitors want.

CHANGE THE WAY YOU THINK ABOUT SITE VISITORS Each visitor to your website is worth a certain dollar amount to you. Whether or not they buy. If you don't already know this amount, now's the time to calculate it. With this number in hand, you can consider advertising and pay-per- click strategies that'll bring more traffic to your website.

If you're looking for stability, seriously consider what a visitor is worth to you and then check into pay per click advertising to bring in the right number of visitors every day.

CHANGE THE WAY YOU THINK ABOUT FOLLOW UP You've been stalling and hesitating to set up a follow up program. It takes too much time, you thought. And, besides, you were getting that steady flow of new traffic. So you didn't set up anything. And now that you're hurting for traffic, you don't even have a group of people you can offer a promotion to to bring them back to your site. Without a follow up program, the little traffic that's trickling onto your website is lost forever.

Get those people to opt-in to receive updates from you so you can bring them back to your website time and again until they buy.

CHANGE THE WAY YOU THINK ABOUT WEB PROMOTION Sure, it's easy to hire an SEO expert and sit back and wait for the search engines to bring traffic to your website. But search engines are run by third parties over whom you have no control. And that means relying on them to bring you traffic is risky at best.

Instead, look for ways you can bring traffic to your website yourself. Publish articles on other sites, set up cross- promotions with related websites, go off line for traffic.

CHANGE THE WAY YOU THINK ABOUT YOUR WEBSITE Do you think visitors should visit your site and think you're exactly the solution they're looking for? Without visiting your competition, considering their options, contacting your help desk, or having any questions? Good luck.

Instead, set your site up to be a friendly experience for the traffic you do get. Give each individual visitor plenty of support and resources. Not only will this increase the number of visitors who buy, but it'll also increase the number of visitors who recommend your site to a friend.

Ultimately, the responsibility for bringing traffic to your website rests with you-not the search engines, and not your SEO expert. By taking responsibility for bringing the visitors you need in to your site each month, you'll be able to ride out any algorithm changes, shifts in public opinion about specific search engines, and other day-to-day changes in business. Setting up these systems now will start bringing traffic to your site very quickly, and will also have lasting effects.

Want more tips on how to build follow up programs that'll put your profits back under your control? Visit http://www.designdoodles.com for free information on creating newsletters to follow up with prospects.

Reprinted from Zongoo.com Daily Press & Consumer Information

Now More Than Ever. You Need To Optimize Your Site for Search Engines

2005-02-01T08:32:00.000-08:00

by Diane Hughes © 2004 http://www.probiztips.com

As the economy begins to recover in certain parts of the world, more and more online marketers are looking for affordable ways to drive qualified traffic to their sites. That's why, now more than ever, you need to optimize your site for the search engines.

Have you heard the saying, "Short-term sacrifice for long-term gain"? It applies here. For just a little effort, you can ensure a practically endless supply of visitors to your site for years to come. And the benefits are unbeatable.

Fr.ee Exposure

There is absolutely no cost for submitting to most of the major search engines like Google. That means you get exceptional exposure in front of people who are looking for what you have to offer. Anybody can afford fr.ee.

Targeted Traffic

If you develop your site to focus on specific keyphrases that your customers would use when searching, you can drive extremely targeted traffic to your site. Use tools like Wordtracker (http://www.wordtracker.com) to find out which phrases are most often used to locate sites like yours.

Easy To Learn

Search engine optimization (despite what many so-called "gurus" will tell you) is relatively easy to learn. Simply hang out in a few search engine optimization (SEO) forums (http://www.highrankings.com/forum and http://www.ihelpyouservices.com/forum are two of the best) and ask questions.

Consistent Delivery of Visitors

People use search engines to find what they are looking for all the time, all day long. In fact, 85% of people online use a search engine when trying to locate a product, service, or information. That means your SEO'd site receives a constant stream of visitors 24/7.

Exposure On Other Sites

Many search engines now offer to provide their search results on other Web sites. If a site that subscribes to Google or MSN's search result service has a similar theme to your site, you could find your URL popping up all over the 'Net.

Overall, for the little bit of time it takes to optimize your site, search engine listings simply can't be ignored. Why continue to pay hundreds or thousands of dollars a month for paid advertising when you can have a horde of visitors delivered to your site fr.ee? Before you spend another dime on paid ads, take a good, hard look at search engine optimization.

Diane Hughes is an accomplished Internet entrepreneur and editor of the popular ProBizTips Newsletter. Subscribe to her newsletter for more tips, tricks, and secrets of the trade - plus get HUNDREDS of eBooks, software, and tools just for subscribing! http://www.ProBizTips.com

Reprinted from Zongoo.com Daily Press & Consumer Information

Thinking Beyond Search Engines Stats

2005-02-01T08:31:00.000-08:00

by Stephan Miller

First of all, what type of keywords should you optimize for? A single word, a whole sentence. The actual question is what are people searching for? Here is a breakdown of the most popular type of searches.

Two word searches 29% One word searches 25% Three word searches 24% Four word searches 12% Five word searches 5% Six word searches 2% Seven word searches 1%

What about active verbs? Think about it. If someone types in "buy", "find" or similar words, wouldn't this be an indication that the person is about to make a move, instead of just surf. Although you could go to a top 100 search terms site, why not create your own top 100 active search terms by putting these active verbs into a keyword tool.

People talk to their computers. They will use "I" in their search engine queries sometimes. "How do I find...?" I know I do. I also hold my computer personally responsible when I can't find something or Windows locks up.

People put .com in their searches. Type .com into the Overture keyword tool and see how many websites people know by name but still are attached to using a search engine.

Which sites have a really bad interface? I can name a few, a few big ones. You can find these by typing "registration," "signup", "login", or "join" into a keyword tool. How about "purchase"? If you are doing affiliate marketing you may try these and take advantage of webmasters who should be called webminors.

Although a little bit off-topic, I read somewhere that sponsoring cars for Nascar races is one of the most effective ways to advertise a product. Nascar fans are very loyal. This got me thinking.

Fans are definitely an endless source of revenue. What would they be searching for? A few of the words they may type in are "posters", "zine" and others. Or just type in a celebrity name and "fan" and look for keywords in the pages that come from Google.

Then there are terms that are standard on many sites. When I was looking for places to submit my software, I just plugged "submit pad" into Google. If you are looking for Clickbank affiliates, you might type the product name and "hop."

The point is that the customers you are looking for aren't a computer and they aren't a dictionary. So you can't be either when you search for terms to optimize. You've got to think like someone in need of your product. I bet if you gave it a little time, you can come up with more examples

Stephan Miller is a freelance programmer, writer, and webmaster. Visit the newsletter issue this article came from. http://www.profit-ware.com/newsletter/18Profit122703.htm

Reprinted from Zongoo.com Daily Press & Consumer Information

Google's Latest "Dance,"Looks More Like "Slam Dancing!"

2005-02-01T08:30:00.000-08:00

By Merle http://MCPromotionsPress.com

Google's recent November changes to its algorithm, now known as the "Florida Update, have left many site owners in a quandary. Many who were enjoying top placements, have lost their spots, and apparently, for no real reason.

Now keep in mind, that periodic algorithmic changes are a normal and vital maintenance feature of "ALL" major search engines, but the effect of this particular "Dance," as these adjustments have come to be called, has been truly enormous, and carried with it consequences, still yet unmeasured or understood.

It's hard to tell what kind of "dance" Google was doing,as, to many, it appears to be more of a form of "slam dancing". Algorithms are what are used to rank web pages,and periodic changes are to be expected, but this one is being hailed as the most substantial change at Google in years.

Google is definitely trying to clean the spam from its database, but many innocent people, who claim not to be using illegal search engine optimization techniques,were hurt in the process.

Certainly Google's main goal is to provide relevant results to its users. If they didn't, no one would want to use them for searching. There was no advance warning of the change, but that's pretty normal. No real surprise there.

What is a surprise, however, is that many site owners who felt they were doing nothing wrong, were penalized in the process.

Manipulative behavior is definitely being punished. Google is certainly enforcing their guidelines and has grown tired of those website owners using "spammy optimization" techniques and having little or no real content. Google claims the change is all part of their continued efforts to improve their search engine results, but many others have their own "conspiracy theories" about what lies behind the big change.

Keep in mind that this is all purely speculation:

1) Some say Google is trying to force small business owners to join their "AdWords" Program. Since most of the sites that were hardest hit by the flux, happen to be highly competitive, commercial ventures by nature, there are whispers in the shadows, that perhaps an unpredictable index rating might convince the "freebie" seeker to join "Adwords," in order to obtain an ascertainably better placement.

2) The other theory is that Google is trying to increase their "perceived value" in the eyes of the business world, as a whole, before issuing their IPO. This would make them a far more attractive commodity to potential investors with big bucks.

Certain genres of websites were definitely hit harder than others. That is a fact, which is not even being debated. Anyone can quite easily verify that for them self, with a minimal effort of research. The biggest classifications to suffer from the slam, seems to be:

1) Real Estate Agent Sites 2) Search Engine Optimization Sites 3) Travel and Tourism Sites

It would appear that a lot of the sites, now ranking highest with Google, are more editorial, instead of commercial. Is this purely coincidence?

So why is everyone so shaken up by this change? Well, with over 3 billion pages in their index and with Google powering so many other of the major search engines,they control a lot of the search engine pie. Lose ranking with them, and you lose a lot.

As a site owner with a good marketing plan, you should be using many other promotional / marketing methods, and not putting all your "eggs in the Google basket" so to speak. Those who were using Google for their main source of traffic are definitely hurting right now. Let this serve as a lesson to diversify your marketing efforts.

So what's an "honest" site owner to do? Stay away from irrelevant linking and link farms, and build a quality site with good solid content. Use keywords in the first 250 words of text on the page, but don't go overboard. If, when read "out loud," it sounds funny, it's overkill.

Google outlines their guidelines for building a "search engine crawler friendly" site over at: http://www.google.com/webmasters/guidelines.html

If you haven't read this in awhile, or maybe you never have, you just might want to take an attentive look at it now, in hopes of safely improving your ranking, by conforming to their guidelines.

Google is also now integrating its "Froogle Listings" on its pages, so if you sell a tangible product, then you may very well want to use Froogle as an opportunity to get better placement.

Froogle is an extension of Google's search engine, which many people use for product research, before making a purchase. If there's a Froogle match on an attempted search, the results will show up on the results page. For more on Froogle go to: http://froogle.google.com/froogle/merchants.html

Remember, search engines should only be one small part of your marketing mix. By relying too heavily on any "single" search engine for your traffic, you'll likely find yourself in the position of being irretrievably out of balance and completely at their mercy, whenever such an algorithmic quake is inserted into the index.

So be sure to always use a wide variety of marketing/ promotional tactics, thereby, ensuring that the next time Google goes "Slam Dancing," you don't get an unintentional elbow in the eye or your feet stepped on.

Merle http://www.EzineAdAuction.com "Where some of the BEST Deals in Ezine Advertising are Made" Buy & Sell Ezine Ads in a live auction setting! Publishers sell off your excess inventory and Buyers pick up some Fantastic bargains. Go now. FREE e-book on how to "Write Winning Ezine Ads" http://www.ezineadauction.com/ebooks/greatezineads.pdf

Reprinted from Zongoo.com Daily Press & Consumer Information

Pay Per Click Search Engines…A Fundamental Overview

2005-02-01T08:30:00.000-08:00

Forbes magazine reported that pay per click ads accounted for $1.4 billion in 2002 and are expected to increase to $8 billion by 2008. The fundamental core elements of a successful pay per click program are constant monitoring, analysis, and refinement.

Pay per click search engines offer a way to buy your way to the top of search results for any term you wish. With proper management, and a clear focus, pay per click search engines can offer some of the most well targeted and economical advertising on the Internet.

Pay per click advertising works through a bidding process, and the ads appear prominently on the results pages of search engines such as Google and Yahoo. The highest bidder for a particular word or phrase receives top placement, and depending on the engine, the top three to five bidders also generally also receive placement on the first page of unpaid search results.

Fundamental questions to be addressed when formulating a pay per click search engine strategy include the following:

When is the top pay per click bid necessary for highest conversion, and when will bidding for a second or third place position create a more attractive return on investment (ROI)?

How can you keep your PPC bids from cannibalizing your search efforts on other (non pay per click) search engines?

What percentage of your pay per click budget should go to each search engine?

Does either Google Adwords or Overture work better for your particular product or service? Or, perhaps neither one is appropriate from a return on investment (ROI) perspective.

It is of critical importance to focus sharply on identifying the search terms that convert most frequently for your particular site, eliminating those that don't perform, and most importantly, calculating and maximizing your return on investment.

The cost structure of pay per click is action-driven and each time a user clicks your ad, the pay per click engine deducts the amount of your current bid from your account. Pay per click offers a high level of assurance that your ad is reaching the proper target.

Pay per click campaigns, however, are not perfect. Without CONSTANT monitoring, you sometimes risk incurring advertising costs that can spiral out of control, focusing on terms that don't convert well for your product or services, or falling way down in position during a bidding war.

PPC advertising can be a great help to a site's success, but only with very close supervision and a thorough knowledge of the unique characteristics of each PPC search engine.

Kirk Bannerman operates a successful home based business and resides in California. For more details, visit his website at http://business-at-home.us

Reprinted from Zongoo.com Daily Press & Consumer Information

Search Engine Marketing

2005-02-01T08:29:00.000-08:00

Copyright © 2003, Scott F. Geld Marketing Blaster.com http://www.MarketingBlaster.com

Search Engine Marketing is one of the most important ways of marketing your business and getting noticed. Most of the people start with search engines and if you are not listed and ranked higher on the most popular ones, then the chances are you would never be even noticed. It is just like having a great restaurant with great menus, but no readers. Where would it take you? Probably "no where"! Search engine optimization and positioning should always be the first and foremost chief concern of any Internet marketing strategy. You should search extensively for information, guidelines, and tips to help webmaster achieve good rankings on search engines. You can search for the latest online tools on the Internet itself to facilitate the implementation of your search engine strategies and plan.

Do everybody know that a website is all about content and product? Yes, they do. Marketing on the Internet through search engine is done through the content you place on your website. Content is like a fire to those flies (i.e. readers here). So when you create your website and decorate it with content, you should keep the few things in mind. You have all the important meta-tags listed in your HTML document and you should also be using the right keywords, descriptions and title for your pages. Beside these, you should also put cool scripts and graphics to make your website stand out in the ocean of information and make it look attractive. Marketing through search engine can broadly be classified under below mentioned heads.

Submission at Main Search Engine

You must first possess a ready website with all the meta-tags in place and ready to be submitted to key search engines. The major search engines where you can submit your website, are listed hereunder:

AllTheWeb.com (FAST Search) AltaVista Google Ask Jeeves Lycos AOL Search MSN Search Direct Hit Yahoo HotBot Netscape Search iWon Inktomi LookSmart Open Directory

Search Engine Ranking

More than 85% of the people get to know about other sites through the search engines. According to a survey by 'Forrester Research', 57% Internet users considered search engines the best way to get on to a website. Email scored the second place by securing 38% of the users; external links third with 35%, and 28% opted for "word of mouth".

Just don't get relaxed here! A mere submission of your site to the search engines is not enough. Unless your site appears in the top 25 of the major search engines, there is hardly any point in taking pain and submitting your beloved site.

According to the April 2000 issue of 'Target Marketing Magazine', the success rate of different mediums is as follows:

Search Engines 46% Word-of-mouth 20% Random Surfing 20% Magazine ads 4.4% By accident 2.1% TV spots 1.4% Targeted email 1.2% Banner ads 1%

Ergo, you would be loosing thousands of potential customers and register millions of dollars in lost profits, unless your web site secures the top position in search engines. The search engines are the most important source of traffic for your web site. Ignoring them would be foolish.

Search Engine Optimization

Link popularity is the most important ranking factor to consider for the search engine if you are trying to improve your position. The best way to enhance your link popularity is by exchanging reciprocal links with other webmasters. The topic being very vast needs a separate section in order to get explained appropriately.

So keep all these in mind and put your best foot forward to help your website reach places and get noticed by classes and masses.

Scott F. Geld is the Director of Marketing for MarketingBlaster.com, a company providing targeted traffic and leads: http://www.MarketingBlaster.com

Reprinted from Zongoo.com Daily Press & Consumer Information

Being dumped by Google? Learn how to avoid becoming a victim next time around!

2005-02-01T08:21:00.000-08:00

After Google latest update nicknamed "Florida", many webmasters discovered that their traffic plummeted.

What happened? More importantly what can you do about it? And what will Google do next?

What happened was that Google made an algorithm change on how they rate web pages.

Every time you make a search, Google tries to show the most relevant web pages that match your search term. By being able to give the most relevant results for queries, they have become the most used search engine in the world.

In order to keep out competitors they have to constantly adjust and improve how they judge web pages.

Because this judgment is done automatically using software, many webmaster have been modifying their sites in order to improve their position in the search results. To do this they have exploited different shortcuts and loopholes made possible by shortcomings in the software algorithm.

Periodically Google make changes in order to stop some webmasters to get unfair advantages by plugging one or two of the loopholes.

This is what happened during the Florida update.

With this update Google introduced new algorithms which intended to stop overuse of some search engine optimization techniques.

More specifically they seem to have targeted search terms found in text links also called anchor text. Web pages with good positions in the search result, which had had a disproportional number of in-bound links to them from other web pages with the exact same search term in the anchor text that the page was optimized for suddenly, disappeared from the listings.

The pages did not disappear altogether. Just for the search term that the page were optimized for. For Google, the high proportions of anchor texts with the same text indicate that the texts were put there for one purpose only, to boost ranking.

One suggestion for you is to spread out the anchor text with a mix of different texts to keep your page in the search results. We don't know if your pages will come back after some time if you do this, but it is likely.

Apparently the search result generated after the latest update have been of a lower quality than before. What seems to have happen is that a large percentage of web sites have traded links with one another. This link trade has been done with the same search term in the anchor text that they have optimized their pages for.

The victims more often than not have been commercial web sites that relied to heavily on search engine optimization technique. The search results have been taken over by web sites composed of low quality directory and link farms.

Now, what will Google do next?

I don't know, but TRY TO THINK like Google! This is what I would do if I was responsible at Google for this.

First I think that they will modify and adjust the new algorithm they have introduced during the latest update. Changing the threshold or don't let the "over optimized pages" drop out of the search result so easy, but rather penalize them and put them under the threshold point.

I think, Google have a problem! You see, many "over optimized" sites are of higher quality that those that are not. To simply drop them out and say that there are enough pages for the same search term is not always true.

There is a thin line between optimization and spamming and where this boundary should be.

After this, what will Google do next? It is clear to me that the many low quality directory sites found in Google search results is a nuance to Google and to the average web user.

It is in this area that, I think, they will make the next modifications.

Google rate web pages according to relevance. The level of relevance is judge based on the web page content and/or how popular the web page is in the view of Google.

To get a page popular you need to have links from other pages. This can come from pages on your own site or from other sites.

Ideally these links should be many, come from pages dealing with similar or identical subject or come from pages that themselves are popular. The best is to have many links from pages dealing with the same subject that themselves are popular.

This had led to an intense link exchange active among webmasters. And the primary reason has been to achieve better ratings. The primary purpose has not been to increase the visitors experience value.

This goes against Google's principles.

To quote Google webmaster guidelines: -Make pages for users, not for search engines. -Avoid tricks intended to improve search engine rankings. -Don't participate in link schemes designed to increase your site's ranking or Page Rank.

To counter this I think Google will target several popularity increasing schemes like:

- Low value directory sites which have been created automatically by robots. These sites contain extracts taken from search engines and directories. Google can easily spot these sites.

- The building of link directories attached to web sites. They are built with link partner extracting software and services. With them you can upload directory structures directly into your site. This way you can build up a massive number of link partners and also identify link partners with high Page Rank values.

Of course, one can say that by doing this you can add to your visitors experience as the directories make it easy for them to find similar web sites. However this is an argument that Google most likely would disagree with.

Web sites using tactics like this are easy identifiable by Google. The directory pages are composed of outgoing links which either have the Title, Meta descriptor or other content directly taken from the web pages they are linked to. Google just have to look at the texts from the directories and the text on the web pages for matching.

Using product or services for this purpose is risking you get banned or at least being penalized by Google.

Will this happen? I think so!

When? I don't know! Anytime soon, next month,..next year! Nobody knows, only Google can tell!

I think Google also will look into reciprocal linking as a whole. Maybe they will start to identify pages with outgoing links on them that link to other web sites and identify which links are coming back from those domains.

What they like to see is spontaneous linking to your site from web owners that regard you as a valuable resource to link to, without you linking back. I believe that they will limit the impact of reciprocal linking, somewhat!

What can you do to improve your web traffic from Google without violating its guidelines?

Build web sites that give value to your visitors. Make it into a popular site, so that others want to link to your site. Build niche information rich sites. Either as mini sites or as larger information sites. Larger sites within a niche are given higher popularity rating than smaller sites by Google.

If you do this your web site will not be affected next time Google make a change. Unless of course your competitor drops out of Google, then your traffic will get a boost.

Per Strandberg is a web marketer and software developer! Currently he operates a web site for backup products and data security information! At http://www.data-backup-and-storage.com

Reprinted from Zongoo.com Daily Press & Consumer Information

Considerations for a pay-per-click Ad Campaign

2005-01-31T13:24:00.000-08:00

by Robert Williams Copyright 2004

Submitting your website to the Search Engines today may seem like a futile task or at very least, a complete waste of time. When you consider that there are millions of websites that could be listed just for the word FREE, it hardly seems worth the effort.

Most websites today compete heavily for a top ten listing on the major search engines for words or phrases that are relevant to their websites. This equates to targeted traffic or visitors with a desire to see their webpages.

Whether people are surfing for entertainment or shopping from the safety of their homes, it's usually the top ten listings that get clicked on when search results are given.

Optimizing a website for a top ten listing is best left to the professionals. While such exposure can equate to heavy traffic, does the benefit out way the cost?

Most website owners may not have the budget to attain and maintain a top ten listing on the major search engines.

An alternative to the major search engines is the pay per click option. Usually people bid an amount from 1 cent on up per click for a key word. Whoever makes the top bid for that key word gets the #1 position on down. It can be an ideal way to bring targeted traffic to your website and maintain a budget within your reach.

How do you know if a pay per click option is right for you?

1. Would it be cost-effective? If you pay 1 cent per visitor and make 2 sales with 100 visitors, did the 2 dollars you spent on advertising make it worthwhile?

2. What words are relevant to your site? If you want people who have an interest in Work At Home Opportunities to find your site when doing a search you might bid on this phrase or similar phrases. Computer Jobs might bring people to your website however you see its probably not relevant enough.

3. Who visits your site? Know your target market. If you are selling something or seeking to hook up with other opportunity seekers be sure its spelled out in the title and description of your site. You want people who will make an action at your site. You are looking for them and are they looking for you.

4. Where on Your Website? List the page on your website that calls for an action on the part of the visitor whether it be the point of sale page or just obtaining the email address of the visitor.

As you can see, Pay Per Click Search Engines can be an

alternative for your advertising campaign especially when you may be on a limited budget or just don't have the resources or time to bring your website up to a top listing on the major search engines.

Getting your website in front of the right people is mainly your task with search engine listings.

About The Author

Robert Williams is the co-owner of SearchImport.com, a PPC Search Engine dedicated to the delivery of relevant results to its users. Join our affiliate program. http://www.searchimport.com/affiliate-program.html

Reprinted from Zongoo.com Daily Press & Consumer Information

Search Engine Optimization Strategy

2005-01-31T13:24:00.000-08:00

Search Engine Optimization Strategy: Website Design Techniques for Search Engine Ranking Improvement Copyright © 2003-2004, Scott F. Geld Marketing Blaster.com http://www.MarketingBlaster.com

It is a must for you all to know, how do search engines work. Search engines are not human and they don't scan the pages as we do. They are just robots, which work on the codes and mechanism implied upon them. If you have a small business website and are trying to close sales on a single visit from a customer, it is advisable that you don't make a rich media enhancements like flash animation and excessive graphics, which result in slow page loading time and makes people run away. Established players or business, which are concerned on spreading awareness about their business rather that selling a single standoff product usually uses high media enhancements.

Proper website design is the key to a higher search engine ranking. Before you begin to construct your website, take the time and consider the design elements those are essential to both the viewer and the search engines. This will also contribute in determining the ranking of your website. Design your web site so that every page contains "title", "description", and "keyword" meta-tags. These tags are the basic road map for the search engines. When a search engine enters your web site these tags prepare the spider for what to look for on your web page. They prompt the search engine for what words you feel are important and to use them in the ranking process.

The layout of your web site becomes significant to higher search engine ranking. Placement of text in the optimal positions on your website becomes paramount, so if the search engine ignores the meta-tags - which many are starting to do because of abuse and spamming - then text placement will become the first impression that search engine robots would read.

Spiders of the search engines crawl on the web page and index your website. You have to be very clear about your requirements. Keep all your content optimized for all the major search engines. Though all have almost a similar mechanism, you can even learn about how all search engines work, and then design your web content in accordance. For example, Google has a specific set of rules, which it uses to index web pages. It can be learnt from Google itself and you can put your content with the specified guidelines. This is a time consuming process but as you know: "No Frill Without Drill". You can also hire specific companies that can optimize your website to specific search engines.

Viola! You have achieved your dream of learning some key aspects of Internet marketing.

Scott F. Geld is the Director of Marketing for MarketingBlaster.com, a company providing targeted traffic and leads: http://www.MarketingBlaster.com

Reprinted from Zongoo.com Daily Press & Consumer Information

Getting Your Site Seen by Search Engines

2005-01-31T13:23:00.000-08:00

By Karyn Greenstreet

Is your website listed on search engines? When people search for you, does your site show up on page 1 or page 20 of the search engine results?

Optimizing your site to get it ranked highly on the search engines can be a complicated subject. To simplify things, it's helpful to first understand how search engines add sites to their database. Then we'll cover some tips that you can put on your own website that will help you to get listed on search engines and get a higher ranking.

The Major Players

Let's start off with the major search engines, the ones that most people use. Google is the most widely used search engine with Yahoo and MSN searches following close behind. While there are thousands of search engines, it's always a good idea to start with submitting your website to the three largest. Why? Because 95% of all searches go through either Google, Yahoo or MSN.

Who Is Powered by Whom?

Many search engines do not have their own database, but rely instead upon data supplied by someone else. This is important to know so that you can submit your site to the most popular search engine databases first. For example, AOL Search and Yahoo Search get data from Google, while MSN and HotBot get some data from Inktomi.

How Search Engines Read Your Site

There are two ways search engines read your site: automated (crawlers) and human-entered (directories). Crawlers follow the links found on your site and enter your site into their search database based on text they find on your pages. This text is either found on your public pages, or the text keywords found in behind-the-scenes "meta tags". The amount of your keywords found on your page, the more weight it has with the search engines and the higher your ranking. But in case you think you can load your page with keywords in order to fool the search engine, think again. Search engines are smart and you can be penalized for "spamming" keywords on your website. Major crawlers include Google, AltaVista and Inktomi.

Human Directories are few and far between. Just imagine hiring enough people to research the millions of website on the Internet! It's no wonder they're steadily being replaced by automated crawlers. Yahoo is one of the most famous human directories, where real people actually evaluate your site and categorize it in their database directory. More and more these search engines are relying on partial automation for categorizing and listing new sites in the search engine database. In addition, getting your listing in a Directory for free can take months. Some human directories are charging a fee for business sites to be included in their directory.

How Search Engines Index and Rank Your Site

Search engines use several techniques to determine which category your site belongs in and what keywords or key phrases people will use to find your site when using the search engine.

When submitting your site to search engines, they will ask you four things: the title of your site, a short description of your site, your keywords or key phrases (what words or phrases people typically use to search for sites like yours) and what category your site belongs in. Then they will often crawl your site, checking to see if the keywords/key phrases you supplied match the text on your website. And remember, you will be penalized for spamming your keywords and rank LOWER because of it. Also it's important to note that search engines can not read the text in graphics, so if you are using a graphic-based navigation or have your keywords on a graphic next to your logo, the search engine will not notice it.

Some search engines will rank your site based on your title, description and keywords that are supplied behind-the-scenes in special coding called "meta tags." While not every search engine will read meta tags, it certainly can't hurt to use them. Again, there are rules: your Title meta tag can't be more than 100 characters, your Description meta tag can't be more than 250 characters, and your Keyword meta tag can't be more than 1,000 characters. And anti-spamming of keywords applies to meta tags as well - no more than six instances of the same word in your Keyword meta tag or you'll be penalized by the search engine. For example, if my key phrases include "business coach," "starting a business," and "small business coach," that counts as two uses of the word "coach" and three uses of the word "business".

Submitting Your Site to Search Engines

Once your site is primed and ready for the search engines, then you have to submit it to them. You have two choices: either go to each search engine and submit your site individually, or use a search engine submission tool. Remember that the majority of searchers use either Google, Yahoo or MSN, so consider submitting to those first. You'll often find a link on their main page where you can add a site to their search engine. If you want to automate the process, use an automated submission tool. Make sure the submission search tool you select will analyze your site to tell you if you're really ready to submit, then submit your site to the top search engines for you.

Preparing your site for submission to search engines can feel like a daunting task. With these tips in mind, you'll save yourself a lot of time and frustration when it comes time to submitting your site and rank higher in search results.

See you on the Internet!

© Karyn Greenstreet 2004.

Karyn Greenstreet is a Self Employment Expert with 23 years of self-employment and computer industry experience. She shares tips, techniques and strategies with self-employed people to create and grow their businesses, stay focused and motivated, and perform at their peak. Visit her website at http://www.PassionForBusiness.com

Reprinted from Zongoo.com Daily Press & Consumer Information

Search Engines 101 - Search Engines Explained

2005-01-31T13:22:00.000-08:00

What Are Search Engines?

A search engine is a database system designed to index and categorize internet addresses, otherwise known as URLs (for example, http://www.submittoday.com).

There are four basic types of search engines:

Automatic: These search engines are based on information that is collected, sorted and analyzed by software programs, commonly referred to as "robots", "spiders", or "crawlers". These spiders crawl through web pages collecting information which is then analyzed and categorized into an "index". When you conduct a search using one of these search engines, you are really searching the index. The results of the search will depend on the contents of that index and its relevancy to your query.

Directories: A directory is a searchable subject guide of Web sites that have been reviewed and compiled by human editors. These editors decide which sites to list, and, in which categories.

Meta: Meta search engines use automated technology to gather information from a spider and then deliver a summary of that information as the results of a search to the end user.

Pay-per-click (PPC): A search engine that determines ranking according to the dollar amount you pay for each click from that search engine to your site. Examples of PPC search engines are Overture.com and FindWhat.com. The highest ranking goes to the highest bidder.

There are a few downfalls you should know about using PPCs:

1. The use of PPC search engines as part of your search engine optimization process will not improve your search engine positioning in the regular editorial search results. Instead, they will most always appear in a "Sponsored" or "Featured" area located at the top or side of the regular search page results. Even though your paid listing will appear at the top of the search page, many users will not click on paid listings because they look at it as an advertisement. In the past, people used to always click on banner ads, but now they are seen more of as a nuisance. Similarly, the same thing is happening with PPC listings. Also, PPC listings are not always as relevant to a query as the editorial search results.

2. If your site is not effectively search engine optimized before you begin to submit it to a PPC, it will still be poorly advertised afterwards. The optimization of your Web site is critical to the success of your rankings.

3. When you stop paying for a PPC submission, your listing disappears and so does the traffic.

PPCs can be an effective short-term solution for gaining exposure and driving immediate traffic to your Web site while you wait for full indexing, but it can become expensive if you use it as a long-term solution.

How Do Search Engines Work?:

Search engines compile their databases with the aid of spiders (a.k.a. robots). These search engine spiders crawl the Internet from link to link, identifying Web pages. Once search engine spiders find a Web site, they index the content on those pages, making the URLs available to Internet users. In turn, owners of Web sites submit their URLs to search engines for crawling and, ultimately, inclusion in their databases. This is known as search engine submission.

When you use search engines to find something on the Internet, you're basically asking the search engine to scan its database and match your keywords and phrases with the content of the URLs they have on file at that time. Spiders regularly return to the URLs they index to look for changes. When changes occur, the index is updated to reflect the new information.

What Are The Pros And Cons Of Search Engines?

Pro: With the vast wealth of information available on the Internet, search engines are the most effective and efficient way to find information based on your specific search requests.

Con: Because search engines index mass quantities of data, you are likely to get irrelevant responses to your search requests.

Are Search Engines All The Same?

Search results vary from search engine to search engine in terms of size, speed and content. The results will also vary based on the ranking criteria the search engines use. If you aren't getting the results you need, try a different search engine. While the results may not be wildly different, you may get a few search results from one search engine that you didn't from another.

How Do Search Engines Rank Web Pages?

When ranking Web pages, search engines follow specific criteria, which may vary from one search engine to another. Naturally, they want to generate the most popular (or relevant) pages at the top of their list. Search engines will look at keywords and phrases, content, HTML meta tags and link popularity - just to name a few - to determine the value of the Web page.

About the Author Kristy Meghreblian, kristy@submittoday.com http://www.submittoday,com As Submit Today’s copywriter and editor, Kristy Meghreblian has written online content for many successful companies, including Monster.com. She has successfully combined her excellence in journalism with the delicate art of keyword density as it relates to search engine optimization. As a result, she has helped many Submit Today clients achieve top ranking. Submit Today is a leading search engine optimization, submission and ranking company located in Naples, Florida.

Reprinted from Zongoo.com Daily Press & Consumer Information

PPC For Dummies - Part One Of Two

2005-01-31T13:21:00.000-08:00

For the beginner, understanding PPC (Pay Per Click) services can be utterly confusing. With so many search engines to choose from, and so many options within each one: different billing schemes, different terminology, and different techniques for ranking in the top spot, the learning curve is quite substantial. So why would anyone go to the trouble?

For quite some time now Google has been the primary source for web search. Nearly everyone who has ever use a computer has either used or at least heard of Google. But as the Florida update has shown us, free placements in the search engines are not as stable as we would like them to be. Sure after an algorithm change we can go back to the drawing board figure out the newest line of attack, re-optimize a site, and bring back that first page placement, but how much traffic and sales are lost as a result of the down time?

When it comes to most PPC campaigns you can be sure of one thing: Your rankings are stable. When you go to bed, you know that when you wake up the next morning you placements will still be there. Now, of course in many cases you may be out bid in overture and find your self slipping a couple of notches, but after a quick adjustment to your maximum bid, you're back in contention. This is a far cry from the potentially months lost after slipping, in some cases off the charts, into the dark abyss of positioning into the thousands.

Google is not going away any time soon, so it is still very important to optimize and try to get those top placements regardless of whether or not you wish to pursue a PPC campaign. If you are ranking well on Google, in many cases it is still well worth it to pursue PPC placements as well to get that extra exposure. With a PPC campaign its important to remember that it isn't always as simple as paying top dollar to dominate the number one spot. Regular tweaking and maintenance will be required.

So what is involved in achieving top spot in a PPC campaign?

Google Adwords Your Google AdWords Ad is given a ranking value by multiplying your maximum Cost Per Click (CPC) with your current Click Through Rate (CTR) and ads are sorted according.

For AdWords you must constantly monitor the performance of your keywords and ads. If the CTR of your keywords begin to slip then your position will most likely drop, and its time to either re-write your ads to draw attention, adjust your max CPC, or a combination of both. What will work best, depends on a variety of variables; your CTR, current CPC, how competitive your keyword phrase it, and the wording in your competitors ads. Remember you want to stand out as the obvious best choice.

Looksmart Looksmart has a PPC Service that is somewhat different than AdWords and Overture. With Looksmart you write your own title and ad text for your listing and pay a set rate of 15 cents per click. The ranking order for listings is "based solely on their relevance to a user's search as determined by LookSmart's proprietary search algorithm. Payment does not influence the appearance or rank of the listings in the Reviewed Web Sites section." - Looksmart

If you choose to use Looksmart, it is essential for your website to be properly optimized. The one main downside to Looksmart is that your payment of 15 cents per click is just to get you listed, and does not guarantee any positioning.

Overture The ranking of your Overture listings is determined by one thing and one thing only. How much you are willing to pay. If your ad position drops, increase your bid and within seconds you are back to where you left off. Now remember, being number one is not everything. If people see no interest in your listing they will simply click on number two. Of course this doesn't cost you anything directly, but indirectly you may be losing the all so important sales. This is why it's important to have carefully written copy for your listing.

In the case of Overture, Looksmart and Google ads, the copy you choose does not affect your position, so you don't need to worry about the ad being 'search engine friendly,' but you do need to ensure it is searcher friendly. Carefully select the wording to use in your ad copy and be sure to include the keyword phrase in either the title or the beginning of the text. Say something that will jump out at the reader. You want them to see your ad as being highly relevant to their search, as well as being interesting and inviting. Remember; just because you dominate the top spot, does not mean you will necessarily draw all the traffic (although it does help!)

Before you get started with any PPC Campaign be sure to understand the billing practices of the search engine before you starting using it. Google AdWords charges a one time, $5.00 setup fee, and after that you pay only for delivered traffic. Overture does not have a setup fee, but they do require a minimum charge of $25/month regardless of weather or not your click through's have accumulated to that total. Looksmart bills 15 cents per click flat rate, and a minimum usage of Each Search engine has different billing plans, and its important to understand them so that you don't get burned.

Once you have selected what search engine, or engines, you wish to use start off by reading through their FAQ page, guidelines, tips pages, and absorb as much information as you can to get a good grasp on how their PPC system operates. If you are new all this, at first glance AdWords and Overture will seem extremely overwhelming, but you will find the more you explore, the better understanding you will develop. It doesn't take long to get a firm grasp of the various systems.

Coming Soon: Scott Van Achte writes on how to choose your max bids and wording for your PPC campaign.

About the Author Ross Dunn, Victoria, BC, Canada ross@stepforth.com http://www.stepforth.com Ross Dunn is the CEO of StepForth Placement Inc., a search engine marketing company founded in 1997 and based in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada. Ross Dunn is a Certified Internet Marketing and Business Strategist (CIMBS) with a background in web design and online marketing.

Reprinted from Zongoo.com Daily Press & Consumer Information

For the beginner, understanding PPC (Pay Per Click...

2005-01-31T13:20:00.000-08:00

PPC For Dummies - Part Two Of Two

2005-01-31T13:20:00.000-08:00

Two of the most important factors of any Pay Per Click (PPC) campaign are creating successful ads and deciding how much to pay per click. There are many PPC options out there to choose from, I am going to focus on the two most popular, Google AdWords and Overture.

Creating your ads for AdWords Creating your ad copy is the single most important part of any ad campaign. You want your ad to stand out amongst the others and scream out ‘click me!' If your add looks and says the same thing as everyone else users will simply pass it by.

Before creating your ads you need to determine your target market and keyword selections. If your company focuses on a specific market niche try to target your ads in regards to that niche. Properly targeted ads will almost always out-perform those directed at a general audience.

When creating your first ad be sure to fit in your main keywords either in the title or near the beginning of the body text. Say something to draw attention by using call to action phrases and words that provoke enthusiasm and response. Things like “ Save on DVDs," "Get cheap stereos," or "Join now for 20% discount,” etc. Just be cautious, if you advertise something that you don't offer, Google will pull your ad. If your ad says you have something for free, you better have something for free listed on your landing page! Always be sure to follow Google's Guidelines .

Once you are happy with your first ad, create 3 more ads that are radically different from the first. After 3 or 4 days take a look at how your ads are doing. (If you are using less frequently searched terms you may have to wait 1-2 weeks for better results.) Check the click through rate (CTR) of each ad. In most cases one of the 4 will show to be out-performing the rest. If this is the case, delete the poorly performing ads and create 3 new ads that closely resemble the successful one, each with subtle differences in the title and body text.

Again wait 3 or 4 days to see which of the ads is out performing the rest. If you again notice that one stands out, repeat the process. Eventually you will end up with 4 quality ads that are performing equally. Once the ads have leveled out, continue to keep an eye on them, I recommend daily. If one begins to slip, slightly tweak the wording. You must always keep an eye on your ads if you wish for them to continually perform well.

Determining your Max Cost Per Click with AdWords With AdWords when you enter your MAX CPC, it will then show you what Google estimates your average position will be for each keyword. ( The position predictions provided by Google are based on historical data from previous advertisers and are not 100% accurate, but it will give you an idea what to expect.)

Unfortunately there is no way to see what the competition is paying, so in most cases it's a bit of a duck hunt in the beginning. I suggest starting out with a MAX CPC slightly higher than you would normally, this will give you a slightly higher ranking and increase your chances of accumulating clicks. If your ad performs really well your rank will increase. As you begin to establish a good click through rate (CTR) you can adjust your max CPC to reflect the position you wish to obtain. (See part one of this article to find out how Google ranks ads.)

Creating your ads for Overture With Overture, writing the perfect ad is slightly different than with AdWords. Overture only allows you to create one ad per keyword, so this takes away the option of trying out various ads and going with the obvious winner, however, the basis for creating your initial ad remains virtually the same. After you have selected your target market and main keywords, write a specific ad targeting each individual keyword and be sure to include the keyword in the title or beginning of the main body text along with a call to action phrase or something that is sure to draw attention. Remember to check the status of your ads on a weekly basis, and tweak as needed. Keep and eye on your click through rate and regularly tweak poorly performing ads

Determining your Max Cost Per Click with Overture Deciding how much to spend on Overture is simple. Take a look at what the competition is spending, and out bid them. With Overture you should always try to be in the top 3 if you wish to have your ad dispersed among partner sites. (Yahoo, Lycos, MSN, etc). If the number 1 spot is currently paying 25 cents per click you need only bid 26 cents to grab the number 1 spot. If you want the number one spot, but are also willing to pay more, you can bid 40 cents, and will only be charged the 26 cents. One penny above the competition. Keep in mind though, if someone else increases their bid, your actual cost will also increase up to the max CPC you have entered.

Managing an AdWords or Overture PPC campaign can be confusing at first, but it doesn't take long to get a handle on what works. Creating a highly successful ad the first time around with either AdWords or Overture is a rare occurrence, but with a bit of regular maintenance and a well targeted campaign it won't take long to start seeing results.

Scott Van Achte is a Search Engine Optimization Professional and PPC Manager at StepForth Search Engine Placement Inc. Based in Victoria, BC, Canada. You can read more of Scott's articles and those of the StepForth team at http://news.stepforth.com or contact us at http://www.stepforth.com/ Tel - 250-385-1190 Toll Free - 877-385-5526 Fax - 250-385-1198

About the Author Ross Dunn, Victoria, BC, Canada ross@stepforth.com http://www.stepforth.com Ross Dunn is the CEO of StepForth Placement Inc., a search engine marketing company founded in 1997 and based in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada. Ross Dunn is a Certified Internet Marketing and Business Strategist (CIMBS) with a background in web design and online marketing.

Reprinted from Zongoo.com Daily Press & Consumer Information

Are The Pay-Per-Clicks Paying You?

2005-01-31T13:19:00.000-08:00

Using PPCs (pay-per-click engines) to get visitors to your web site can be a very effective way to drive traffic to your web site and increase your profits.

If you do it right, the profits you receive will far out-weigh the costs.

But if you do it wrong, you can end up spending a lot of money for zero profit.

This article demonstrates the correct way to use PPCs for maximum benefits and high profit levels for your web site.

There are three golden rules for using PPCs effectively, and this is in common with all online advertising - track, track and track.

Seriously, you need to track absolutely everything scrupulously. You need to know exactly how many sales, and therefore how much profit, each link from the PPC generates for your business. This is the only way to know whether a particular keyword is bringing you a profit or not.

You'll need some software to help you do this. The software I personally use at http://pro-analyzer.com allows me to set up any number of tracking links (eg. one for each keyword in each PPC), and for each one I can see detailed statistics on click-throughs, sales, and even 'actions' such as subscriptions.

It gives me detailed reports on which campaigns are profitable, tells me what my ROI (return on investment) is on particular campaigns, and even allows me to do split- testing by sending traffic to differing URLs.

This allows me to maximize the effectiveness of all my PPC expenditure (and I can use it for all my other tracking purposes too).

It's fairly unsurprising that different keywords and keyword phrases can have a huge difference in the number of sales they generate, and therefore their profitability.

Perhaps more surprising is the fact that different PPCs can bring you very different results even when you are using the same keywords.

This only underlines how important tracking is for your business. To use PPCs for the maximum profits, you simply focus on the profitable campaigns, and stop those that aren't profitable.

But tracking is only one side of the coin - you also need to maximize the profitability of every click.

One way to do this is to try to capture the details of as many of your visitors as possible, via the use of popups (with certain exceptions) and subscription forms on your web page, with proper incentives for your visitors to hand over their name and email address to you.

This not only means you can follow-up with them in order to drive more sales home; but you are also increasing what can be a very targetted and therefore profitable list, and you'll be able to make other targetted offers to them in the future.

If you have popups on your site normally, and are using, or you intend to use, Google Adwords or other PPCs where popups are not permitted, the easiest way to remove the popups just for these particular PPCs is as follows:

Copy your main page (eg. 'index.html') and save it as a separate file (eg. 'index_nopop.html')

Remove all trace of popup code from your new page

Send the PPC traffic to this popup-free page

And remember, it doesn't matter if popups are elsewhere on your site, the only restriction with PPCs like Google is on the page that the visitor arrives at (the 'landing page') after clicking on the PPC link.

This means that you could also use a technique where the landing page is just a teaser page for the main site, containing some information directly related to the ad, but its primary focus is to encourage visitors to click through to your main site, where of course you can use popups as normal.

Another option would be make lead generation the primary objective of the landing page - try using a mini sales page that simply invites visitors to leave their name and email address, rather than trying to directly sell them anything, and then direct them to your actual sales page via your follow-up messages.

In brief, to maximize your use of PPCs, track carefully, and maximize the value you get from visitors that do click through - remember, you're paying for them to visit your site, and it's up to you to recoup this investment and make it work for you.

Would you like more top-notch advice that gives you the technical edge on running your Internet business more successfully and profitably? Subscribe to The Takanomi Newsletter, published by Technical eMarketer, Steve Shaw. Click the following to subscribe: http://takanomi.com/newsletter

Reprinted from Zongoo.com Daily Press & Consumer Information

Stop Whining About Google!

2005-01-31T13:18:00.000-08:00

Blame Game

Nearly anyone and everyone involved with search engine optimization and Internet marketing is aware of the famous "Florida" update by Google that caused many commercial sites to lose their Google ranking and position.

Industry experts speculated as to why Google made such radical changes to their algorithm. Those sites that no longer ranked well for popular search terms had to take drastic steps in order to salvage the holiday purchasing season. Many noted the timing and thought perhaps Google was attempting to capitalize on the Google Adwords Pay-Per-Click advertising program. Others simply whined that though their site contained commercial material, it also contains valuable content and was unfairly penalized.

What many failed to acknowledge is that Google has every right to make algorithm changes and if they choose to drop sites that lack relevance, it is their business. Listings in Google's main search directory are free. Many have profited from Google's ability to send traffic for years. Google doesn't owe anyone, anything, least of all an explanation of their algorithm changes. Businesses that rely on Google's free listings as their sole source of web traffic lack good sense. Google, being an independent company, reserves the right to run their business as their management sees fit. If you are unhappy with Google stop using them for searches.

If the results that Google serve lack relevant listings, then find another engine to use! It has happened before and it will happen again. It is the law of supply and demand. If Google is unable to provide relevant content that searchers demand, Google will become irrelevant. Look at the how the search engine landscape has changed over the past few years: AltaVista is no longer the leader, Infoseek no longer exists and others are barely resemble what they once were.

As for the commercial sites who have been battered by the Florida update here are some suggestions:

- make your site relevant! - submit to other search engines (MSN, Inktomi, Lycos etc..) - pay for traffic (pay-per-click and pay-for-inclusion) - develop traffic from alternative sites - rely on traditional methods of advertising - promote your website in your signature line in newsgroups - promote your website on your business cards or on mailings - participate in industry specific directories - participate in vertical market pay-per-click the return on investment tends to be *much* higher though the traffic is significantly less

The bottom line is become proactive rather than reactive, stop whining about Google and find alternate sources of web traffic.

About the Author: Sharon Housley manages marketing for NotePage, Inc. http://www.notepage.net a company specializing in alphanumeric paging, SMS and wireless messaging software solutions. Other sites by Sharon can be found at http://www.softwaremarketingresource.com , and http://www.small-business-software.net

Reprinted from Zongoo.com Daily Press & Consumer Information

Does It Still Pay to Optimize for Search Engines?

2005-01-31T13:17:00.000-08:00

Here's a question that comes up frequently these days, either on discussion lists or directly from clients:

If paid listings through Overture, Google, and other PPC programs result in top rankings on major search engines, why bother to optimize your site for search engines?

It's a good question, and the answer is equally compelling. There are many reasons why search engine marketing (SEM) is necessary and remains a top marketing strategy that gives you an excellent ROI. While it's true that paid listings will put you at the top of many major search engines, these links are usually labeled as "ads" and are separated from the "free" listings. Users know this, and many will ignore the paid listings.

Do Paid Links Dominate? Quite the contrary, it's the free links that dominate. According to a recent estimate based on 3 top search portals by Danny Sullivan of Search Engine Watch , sponsored listings accounted for 17 percent of the links on result pages; whereas, a whopping 71percent were free listings.

Are Paid Links Tainted? You tell me. Most people still hesitate to click on paid listings. Some will ignore them altogether. The search engines know this, and that's why they're loath to make it obvious that the top listings are paid ads.

This is why Commercial Alert filed a complaint with the FTC last year against 8 major search engines. The consumer advocate group thought these engines were deceiving the public by failing to label some search results as paid ads and also by confusing the public with various different labels like "sponsored listings," "featured listings," "partner listings," and so forth.

The status of that complaint is still being investigated. In the meantime, many search engines have started to identify their paid links more clearly. Yet there has been no attempt to label paid listings uniformly.

Andrew Goodman, in an excellent report on how to maximize your ads with Google Ad Words Select, suggested that the reason both Overture and Google are implementing stricter editorial rules for text ads is because they want the listings to look like regular listings and not like ads! Making the ads look more like regular listings would induce more people to click on the paid listings, which get fewer clicks. I wouldn't be a bit surprised if that's true because most people prefer untainted search results versus ads when gathering information.

Creating Your PPC Listings It takes time, effort, knowledge, and special skills to manage PPC campaigns and create good text ads for these listings.

You must manage your PPC campaigns to ensure you aren't over-bidding and are getting a good ROI for your marketing dollar. There are reports, software programs, and services you can purchase to help you manage your campaigns.

It takes good writing and editing skills to create the kind of Overture and Google ads that are accepted by editors and also bring a good return. Again, reports and services are available for purchase.

Optimizing Your Site for Search Engines There is much to gain by optimizing your site correctly for search engines because of all the qualified traffic you can convert. Of course your site has to be designed to close the sale in order to get those conversions. For those who want a well balanced SEM campaign:
Get listed in directories first, starting with the Open Directory Project. This will start to seed the robot engines for you.

Optimize your site for free listings by using keyword analysis and relevant content in your pages and HTML tags.

Submit manually, following the guidelines for each engine on the number of pages allowed and the frequency of submissions permitted (after verifying your listings).

Use paid inclusion programs to see your listings appear sooner and to get your site indexed more often.

Get a Yahoo! Business Express listing - a must for every serious business.

Supplement your campaign with PPC programs like Overture and Google Ad Words Select early on with a substantial initial investment, gradually reducing your PPC program as free listings begin to eliminate the need for paid listings.

Does it Pay to Optimize? Search engine optimization is one of the most cost-effective marketing strategies around. It's well known to drive qualified traffic. When compared to banner ads, email marketing, and direct mail, it was found to drive conversion rates up while lowering cost-per-click and cost-per-acquisition. So take advantage of all those free listings as long as they're still around.

About the Author Paul J. Bruemmer is the CEO of Web Ignite, a search engine marketing company founded in 1995. Web-Ignite earned a top grade in the Buyers' Guide to Search Engine Optimization Firms and has helped promote over 15,000 Web sites.

Visit www.onlinetransmissions.com for related articles.

Reprinted from Zongoo.com Daily Press & Consumer Information