How to Use SEO or Search Engine Optimization for High Google Listings By Peter Nisbet (c) 2007

If you know how to use SEO to get a high listing in search
engines, or are an expert in search engine optimization for high
Google listings, then you need read no more of this article.
Your website obviously has at least one page in the top 10 of
Google, MSN and Yahoo, and you have as much traffic as you need
for your success.

However, if not, then you need some advice. You need to
understand the basics of search engine optimization.
Incidentally, what the basics are to you may not be basics to
others. Basics to some are the correct use of LSI (latent
semantic indexing), of internal linking strategies and of other
techniques designed to lead search engine spiders by the hand
and convince them that their site is the tops. Can you do that?

If not, then here are one or two tips. Good SEO is a lot more
than just having your page title in title tags and your heading
in H1 tags. It is more that just having the correct keyword
density – do you know what that is? The vast majority of people
don't have the slightest clue about keyword density or what it
means. Formulae said to relate to keyword density and the number
of words in the key phrase as a function of the number of times
the phrase should appear in a web page are mediaeval in internet
time.

Do you know what? Google doesn't give a toss about your
calculations. Google cares about the service you are providing
to Google customers and how relevant the content of your web
page is to their needs. To find that out, Google applies a
statistical mathematical equation based on statistical analysis
of semantics as related to the specific keyword being used by
the searcher, and the semantic content of your web page.

Google doesn't care if you have exactly 15 incidences of your
keyword every 500 words – in fact if you do, you have no chance
because that is now excessive. Keyword stuffing or keyword
spamming they call it! Yet people still write articles packed
full of keywords in the mistaken belief that it will be good for
them. Who is still telling them that?

So let's forget keyword density. It's old SEO and no longer
relates to Google's needs. Internal linking: now there's a new
thing to most people, even though it has been relevant for the
past few years. By intelligent use of internal linking you can
lead your friendly neighbourhood spider down any web you can
weave for it. And you will benefit greatly by doing so, if you
know where you should be leading it.

Internal linking strategy is a different concept entirely to an
external linking strategy involving one way or two way reciprocal
links back to your web page from that of another website. Most
people are involved in that, but also most don't know how to do
it properly, and therefore lose out. Let me give you a simple
example.

You have a website with a page rank of 4 for your home page.
Note that it is not your whole site that gets a Google PageRank,
as it is properly written, but each individual page in your site
is individually ranked. When you come across a website with a PR
of 4 or even 8, it is the page you are looking at that has that
PageRank. That will generally be the home page, and when you
agree to a reciprocal link, guess what! Your link will be placed
on a 'links page' in that site with a PR of zero. That's right,
a Google PageRank of zilch: and that's the benefit you will get.
Zilch!

If you place their link on your home page, or any other page
with a PR of greater than zero, you lose out. Even if your page
has a Google PageRank of only 1, Then You Lose Out! They get a
share of your PR of 1, and you get a share of their PR of zero!

Stick that in your pipe and smoke it, and then tell me I don't
know what I am talking about as many have. Some of these many
are so-called internet gurus and SEO experts that fleece you by
promising you a Google Page 1 position for your site, when they
can't even get one for themselves.

If a site offers you a top 10 position, check out their
position by using their URL. If they were so good, wouldn't they
be in the top 10 for their URL? I would have thought so! But NO.

So, do what you can to understand what Search Engine
Optimization is. What it really is – not what some would want
you to believe what it is. Check out the source code of
successful sites and compare it to the unsuccessful sites and
try to spot differences. If you cannot, then it is the linking
strategies that make the difference. Whatever strategy you use,
however, make sure that you fully understand it and that you are
using it as it should be used. There are links and links – some
better than others. Some can give you positive results, and some
of your links can be very bad for you.

Do you know how to tell the difference? Most can't, and so are
led by what they read online. The problem is that since 'most
can't', most of what is written online is garbage. It is
difficult to spot the truth from the opinion. It is truth that
gets you a good Google or Yahoo listing, not opinion. The
problem is that more people believe opinion than truth since
they don't know what truth is, and most of what they read is
false opinion.

The best advice you can have is to check out the websites that
have succeeded and copy what they do. However, that is not as
easy as you think since the off-site linking strategy that you
cannot see is as important as the on-site SEO that you can see.
================================================================
If you want screenshots of a website that succeeds, the check
out Pete's site http://www.article-services.com that varies from
#1 and #4 on Google for the keyword 'article services', and then
find the screenshots and explanation of how he does it on
http://www.improved-search-engine-rank.com That is how to learn:
from successful sites.
================================================================

Copyright © 2007 Jayde Online, Inc.  All Rights Reserved.

Deep Linking Strategies For SEO By Seomul Davis (c) 2007

Linking is one of the prime areas of any SEO campaign and is considered a key concept that can drive targeted traffic to your website if done the right way. The good news is that Linking is effective and the bad news is that there are many aspects of linking that have undergone severe changes over the years.

One of the good aspects is that one single linking tip can put you way ahead of your competition especially where most webmasters think that all you need is a reciprocal link directory for gaining link popularity in some of the top search engines like Google or Yahoo. If you have already gone through the Google page rank update then you are aware of the fact that directories with hundreds of links are not happening any more. It is being treated as a negative tactic.

There was a time when content was supreme and then it shifted to design and other elements and it has come full circle back to content. Hence more and more people have started to focus their efforts in content. Let us look at a different perspective, maybe an example.

Hypothetically, you have a website with 500 pages of resourceful content. If you want to publish articles on multiple categories then the page number can go higher up. Now on the other hand if you have a website with 30 pages, you can expect it to grow to 500 if you keep publishing articles. Now each of the articles as well as the resource pages is live links to your web site. There are two ways by which you can get links to your website in a given situation and they are:

You can get a link for your home page as a part of an exchange for a link to one of relevant article pages on the site with whom you are doing the exchange.

The second option is deep linking. In deep linking, you will get a link straight to the particular page on your web site, which you are going to link them to. The question is how will it benefit you?

So let us look at the various benefits of deep linking:

1. This will make webmasters excited regarding linking with you/your site simply because you will be putting them on your web site and not on any low rank, low traffic website where people might not visit.
2. This will give a signal to other webmasters that you have studied their website carefully and completely and hence know where their link will fit on your website. It is any day better than a simple swapping of web site links. There is a more meaningful result associated with deep linking.
3. You will start to build link popularity directly on to the pages that are within your web site.
4. You will have the leverage and hence you will be in a position to ask for better links from different web sites. This means that there will be no dumping of links. You will also have the advantage of asking for links of importance from various webmasters.
5. Your links page will grow in value because it will not be crammed with links, it will now have only useful or relevant links.
6. These links will help to direct meaningful or targeted traffic to your website, which in the long-run will generate revenue and provide opportunity for many more traffic spikes.

These benefits are enough to keep your website ahead of competition and will not impact your Google page rank severely even when the next page rank upgrade is released.

Seomul Davis is a senior SEO Services expert with SEO 1 Services, a Dallas SEO Company.

SEO: 20 Must-Have Search Engine Marketing Tools

Anyone working in Search Engine Marketing knows that this industry travels at warp speed. If you’re trying to market your web site or the web sites of your clients via search engines, chances are your time is limited - severely limited. To squeeze as much into my schedule as possible without resorting to self-cloning, my daily routine involves the use of a range of time-saving tools and software. I use such tools on a daily basis and I truly don’t know how I’d function without them. I’m not the only one. I’ve talked to other SEM experts and they also rely on various tools to help them through their hectic schedules.

Here is a líst of 20 must-have tools used by busy SEM professionals:


1. Freshbooks Invoicing and Timesheets
Freshbooks is an online estimating, invoicing, project management and time tracking service that gives your business a professional image, no matter how small. I use it to invoice all my clients online and it can even be set up to automatically bill and debit the credít cards of recurring clients every month. It also has built in staff timesheets and project management tools for online collaboration.

Price: Free for 3 clients or less

2. XML Sitemaps Generator
The XML Sitemap Generator trawls through all levels of your site to generate an XML sitemap. It also gives you a running count of pages, provides a text-based URL líst and a HTML sitemap you can import straight into your site. The online version of the generator is free for sites of less than 500 pages, but there’s also a low-cost script-based version for large sites that can be set up to automatically index your site, upload an updated XML file to your server and ping Google and Yahoo when done.

Price: Free for sites of 500 pages or less

3. Proposal Kit
ProposalKit takes the chore out of creating and tailoring client estimates and proposal contracts. With over 200 pre-designed self-guiding templates ready to fill in the blanks with your company, project/product/service and client information, ProposalKit has already half completed your proposal for you.

Price: From USD 47.00

Continue to read.. SEO: 20 Must-Have Search Engine Marketing Tools

The Death of Paid Content Has Been Exaggerated! By Miles Galliford (c) 2007

There is a debate raging on the internet at the moment about whether the move by some of the major national newspapers in the US, away from subscription to a free, advertising driven business model, is a signal that the days of paid content is over.

This debate shows a lack of understanding of content publishing on the web. The reason that the national newspapers are failing in the subscription market is because most of their content is available elsewhere for free. If there is a free alternative, guess what, people will always take the free option.

In the early days of the web, brand was enough to sustain many of the online sites of the national newspapers, but now brand is not enough. There are many credible sources creating content and the internet community is getting pretty good at ensuring quality floats to the surface and the dross is trampled under foot.

So do huge national newspaper sites being forced to go free mean paid content is dead? The figures suggest not. In fact they suggest that the market has blood surging through its veins. According to the Online Publishers Association, paid-for content billed over $2bn in 2005 and is expected to reach over $5bn in 2007. In Europe according to a study for the EU, revenues will jump from €849m in 2005 to €2bn by 2010. So if the large national newspapers with their huge audiences are not generating subscriptions, who is? The answer is highly focused niche websites. As Gary Hoover said at the recent SIPA (Specialist Information Publishers Association) Conference "In the information business all the money is in the niches".

At the specialist information end of the market, knowledge and expertise is still a limited resource and there are many reasons why people pay to get access to it. These include:

• When knowledge is restricted to one individual or a small group of individuals e.g. share tipping and ínvestment information - www.t1ps.com and Bull Market Report www.bullmarketreport.com

• When knowledge is inextricably linked to one personality or celebrity e.g. Jancis Robinsons' expertise in wine, www.jancisrobinson.com

• When the editor has privileged access to source material e.g. insider industry information like www.beernet.com

• The timeliness of information. If one website gets access to information quicker than other sites, people will pay for that time advantage e.g. the fashion trend prediction site www.wgsn.com

• A specialist website aggregates information which saves the reader time and hassle e.g. www.lvtbulletin.com provides analysis of court judgements that are relevant to landlords.

• The website hosts a specialist community. Charging for access acts as a quality filter to ensure all members have a reason and interest in participating e.g. the many collectors clubs and niche industry groups such as www.restaurantowner.com

• People pay for exclusivity. Many paid-for websites are driven by people wishing to be a member of a small elite group. It's much the same as private members clubs or exclusive golf clubs in the real world e.g. www.smallworld.com

• People who are passionate about a subject often want to submerge themselves in it and are prepared to pay to mix with likeminded people e.g. fans of the T Bird car www.tbirdfans.com

• Training sites that give people access to information that will improve their skills or knowledge e.g. the photography site www.photographytips.com and the writers bureau's writing course www.writersbureau.com

• Help sites that enable people to improve themselves or their health e.g South Beach Diet, www.southbeachdiet.com and What to Expect Pregnancy Club, www.whattoexpect.com

• Save people time e.g. business book summary sites such as www.bookbytes.com, www.redbooks.com and the site that provides preachers with downloadable sermons www.preachingtoday.com

What is driving this revolution is the combination of cheap and simple publishing tools, zero cost distribution via the web and the access to a global audience via the search engines. Suddenly individual experts can easily share their knowledge and become global celebrities in their specialist areas of interest.

Chris Anderson has researched this phenomenon in his book "The Long Tail: How Endless Choice is Creating Unlimited Demand". He observed that:

"When you can dramatically lower the costs of connecting supply and demand, it changes not just the numbers, but the entire nature of the market. This is not just a quantitative change, but also a qualitative one, too. Bringing niches within reach reveals a latent demand for specialist content. Then, as demand shifts towards niches, the economics of providing them improve further, and, so on, creating a positive feedback loop that will transform entire industries – and the culture – for decades to come"

Historically the distribution of knowledge and expertise has been restricted by the cost of distributing it via magazines, books and newspapers. Editors, literary agents and publishers were the gatekeepers who decided and controlled what was worth printing. Chris Anderson compares this to islands being visible above an ocean, where the waterline is the economic threshold for what is worth printing. The islands represent the publications that are popular enough to be above that line, and thus profitable enough to be offered through the publishers distribution channels. However islands are just the tips of vast undersea mountains. When the cost of distribution falls, it's like the water level falling in the ocean. All of a sudden things are revealed that were previously hidden. And there is much, much more under the waterline than above it. What we are now starting to see, as online production and distribution costs fall, is the shape of the massive mountains of choice where before there was just a peak.

This can illustrated by the fact that there are approximately 75,000 print magazines, newsletter journals and newspapers in the UK and US, yet there are over 15m active blogs and millíons of niche content websites.

Conclusion

The future of internet publishing is in the niches. Subscription and advertising revenues will continue to migrate down the long tail to the niche sites. Specialist publishers who are focused on creating the best site in their subject area in the world are set to prosper. The mass market publications will continue to see their audiences and revenues squeezed.


About The Author
SubHub provides an all-in-one solution to enable you to rapidly design, build and run your own content website. Publish for profít on the web. Website: SubHub.com SubHub Articles Feed

SEO: Crafting Good Title Tags For SEO and Clickability By John Buchanan (c) 2007

It's amazing to me, the number of people who still do not take proper advantage of the power of the title tag. The title tag, is arguably THE most important on-page factor in SEO (and much more as you'll soon learn).

If you happen not to be too versed in HTML coding I'll explain what the title tag is.

The title tag is found within the and tags of a webpage. It's format is as follows: “Your Page Title Here”

The title tag is important for two very simple reasons.

1. The title of the page is given an enormous amount of weight by the search engines. It always has and it always will. It's of less importance today than it was 6 or 7 years ago, but it is still the most important on-the-page factor a page has. After all, it's sole purpose is to describe the page so it *should* be considered important.
2. The title tag is also used as the anchor text of your listing in the SERPs (Search Engine Results Pages). When someone visits a search engine and runs a search for one of your products, if one of your pages comes up in that search, it is the title tag that the visitor will see (along with a short description) and be able to click on to visit that page.

The problem is a LOT of webmaster's simply don't understand or make proper use of the title tag. Instead of name the page using keywords relevant to that specific page, they use their company name, etc.

Unless you are FORD, GE, or some other multi-million dollar company you should NEVER have your company name or website name (unless it's an SEO'ed website name) in the title tag. Are people going to be searching for your company or website name or are they going to be searching for keywords related to your product or service?

Let's look at a quick example from a real search I ran earlier today:

So a ran a search for "lawn chairs" clicked to page number two and there sitting at #14 is a site with the title "Brookbend".

Now, this particular site actually has a LOT wrong with it, but for now we'll stick to the title tag, or lack-there-of as this particular site's title tag actually just said "Untitled Document". As a result, Google replaced that with the name from the URL which Google will often do when a webmaster does something stupid such as this. ;)

As I said, this particular listing was the 14th listing for "lawn chairs". That is actually VERY good considering it doesn't have a title tag. Imagine what it could have ranked if it had actually made use of the title tag? Possible using something along the lines of:

*Beautiful Outdoor Furniture, Lawn Chairs, Patio Tables*

Think they may have been able to achieve an even better rank? I would venture to say yes.

Now, there is also a second problem with their lack of a title tag and that is that their listing in the search engine is simply "Brookbend". I don't know about you, but if I'm looking for "lawn chairs" I'm probably not going to click on a listing that just says "Brookbend". For one reason, it doesn't contain either of the search terms I used in the title. For another thing, it isn't very "clickable".

You see, a title tag should do two things. It should incorporate that pages most important phrases and it should make someone want to click on it. You will notice in my above example, for the title I used "Beautiful Outdoor Furniture... ". That is because, while I wanted the keywords in there, I also wanted it to read well and entice the surfer to click on it. After all, it doesn't do much good to get a top ranking if no one clicks on your listing.

So, when you are designing your pages always remember to:

1. Decide on what that pages target keywords are
2. Incorporate those keywords into the title tag of the page
3. Make sure the title tag is enticing enough to make the visitor WANT to click on it.

Do the above three consistently and you will see the results in no time.

See you at the top!

John Buchanan is a veteran search engine optimization specialist with over 9 years experience. For more information, visit his site at http://www.sesecrets.com or his newest site http://www.seovideoanalysis.com where he will provide you with a professional SEO Video Website Analysis of your site.

Web Traffic: Dirty Tactics to Increase Comments on Your Blog By Gobala Krishnan

If you’re ok with “gray” tactics to build your blog, you may like these suggestions. These are merely half-serious suggestions, so please do your own due diligence first. Let’s think “outside the box”.

• Fake your comments - No one wants to be the first to comment on anything, but they don’t mind joining in. You can always fake it, by submitting fake comments yourself or by hiring others to do it. Fortune 500 companies do this too, they call it “content seeding” and every major site has done this to some extent before they go live, so as not to look empty to new visitors.
• Use visual stimulation - Use pictures that appeal to emotions, for example pictures of sexy women, cute toddlers or even cute puppies, depending on your market. Don’t pretend like you’ve never seen this happen on someone else’s blog before. You probably commented on that post too, right? Find a reason to put that picture into your post or else this won’t work. Use as often as required.

• Comment bashing - A software like Instant Blog Links will get you a list of blogs where you can post your comments. Then, either post really negative comments or post a link to your blog that bashes the original post. You’ll get a lot of angry people dying to comment on your blog.
• Re-light the fire - Do you know some topics never run out of comments? Are men smarter than women? Are dogs better than cats? Are blondes better than brunettes? Are Macs better than PCs? Some topics just have no conclusions, and that means you can get an infinite amount of comments and be no closer to a resolution for the topic itself.
• Write something stupid - Break the rules, and do something contrary to what people expect from you. Go silly on your posts and you can wake up the next morning to a few comments at least.

Tags: SEO, Blogging, Make Money Online, Gobala Krishnan, Wordpress, Web Traffic, Internet Marketing

Website Design - Cornerstones of an Effective Website

Just about everyone has a website today. Certainly, if you’re in business one way or another, you have a website. And people have different objectives behind their sites. Some are content-driven. Others provide an online service and have sophisticated user interfaces. Others still are designed to entertain and amuse their visitors. But regardless what your website is designed to do, there are a few primary objectives you should keep in mind before you start building.

This first website objective is FOCUS. Your site needs to have a narrow and specific focus. Why is this? Because there are literally millions of websites out there and the visitors you’re lucky enough to attract will only take a few seconds to decide whether they’ll stick around or whether they’ll simply click the back button and continue browsing elsewhere. Within those few seconds, your site needs to communicate exactly what it’s designed to do so the visitor can decide if it meets his or her needs or not.


One of the best exercises to enhance the focus of your site is to establish a 15 to 25-word positioning statement that guides all your development activity going forward. Think about it like a mission statement. It should articulate exactly what your website does in just 15 to 25 words.

Another way to look at it is to do a Google search for a keyword in your field and see what comes up in the results page. Under each listing, there’s a short description of what that site is all about. As it turns out, the search engines get that description from the meta tags on those websites but it’s exactly the same thing. What do you want YOUR description to say?

Once you’ve established a positioning statement, you should display it prominently on your homepage. It should be one of the first things visitors see when they land on your website. And as I mentioned above, the same statement should be included in your meta tags as your site description. That way, the search engines know exactly what your site is about at the same time. And if your site shows up in a search results page, that description will show up as part of your listing.

Continue to read more here

7 Marketing Mistakes to Avoid when Promoting your Business

Many people rush into business thinking it will be easy to run, but very soon they realize that it is not as easy as it looks. A successful business is a finely tuned machine. In order to keep your business running smoothly it is important to avoid making mistakes.

Here are the 7 most common mistakes to avoid:

1. Not having clear objectives:
Many business people start a business without clear objectives. They fail to set realistic goals for their marketing and consequently set themselves up for failure. It is important to make a list of goals and objectives based on a quarterly time line. If you do not have company goals and objectives you are like a car driving without a road map. Make sure all employees are briefed on company objectives. When your employees are not properly prepared you will not be able to achieve company objectives.


2. Neglecting to analyse your potential customers
Neglecting to analyse your potential customers is a dangerous mistake. It can lead to many problems. When you do not analyse your customers wants and needs you do not know what products and services to develop for them. This will lead to targeting the wrong market and neglecting to understand your own niche market. It is important for any business to do their marketing analysis so that you can target your market and maximise your sales.

3. Not testing:
By not testing your sales copy and places you advertise with split testing your advertising, you will be losing sales. Split testing is simple to do but many businesses fail to do this. This results in a lot of wasted time and effort. If you do not test your ad copy and marketing promotions you will not have a proper idea of the ads and promotions that are pulling and what is not working. It is simple to do by placing 2 ads for the same product in a publication or website etc. You can then see which one is performing the best.

4. Not budgeting:
Budgeting is extremely important in business. Your business should never run out of money. This is especially true with your marketing and advertising ventures. It is important to have a monthly or quarterly budget for your marketing. Within that budget put aside money for each promotion you will be doing. Start small, test and then build on successes. This will allow you to always stay solvent and have enough for promotions.

5. Giving up too soon:
Companies go out of business at an alarming rate these days. One of the reasons is that the owners give up too soon. Just when success might be just around the corner they give up and decide to close the business down. In exactly the same fashion marketing promotions can fail. You need to give your promotions at least 3 months before you decide to scrap them. Some promotions will take longer than others to bring results. As always, test all marketing tactics before you launch a larger promotion. Patience is one of the hallmarks of business and you need to implement it.

6. Poor sales copy:
How often have you wanted a product but when you read the sales page you had serious doubts? Poor unprofessional ad copy will cost you sales. In fact without good sales copy you will not be able to sell effectively at all. It is critical to your business to get this right. If necessary get an experienced copywriter to do this. It is worth the investment, as you will see returns when you make sales.

7. Not screening your employees carefully:
To handle the extra load for the Christmas season you will need to hire new employees. It is very important not to rush into this. There is no dearth of people needing employment but you need to screen them carefully before hiring. One rude customer service agent can cost you customers. Do not take this type of risk. You want to preserve the integrity of your company at all times and screening employees is the way to achieve this. You will then be able to build a core of loyal professional employees that will be an asset to the company.

The golden rule is to diversify. You should always use multiple forms of marketing promotions in your business. Do not just do one or two promotions and then wait for results. This will slow company growth and your business will stagnate. The last thing you need is to slow your marketing in the Christmas season. So remember to diversify and enjoy the increase in sales.

By avoiding these mistakes you will take your company to the success you deserve. You will be able to have year round success for your business and really be able to cash in on the Christmas season. So plan ahead and be careful not to make these common mistakes.

About the Author: Sean McPheat is a leading authority marketing consultant and helps businesses across the UK, Europe, US and the Middle East. Sean's marketing services include direct mail, internet marketing, sales copy, sales training, telemarketing, PR and strategic alliance marketing.