Looking Beyond Google: Meta-Search Engines Can Help Online Marketers

Read this interesting article on looking beyond Google, Meta-Search Engines Can Help Online Marketers By Bill Platt
For businesses that market wholly or partially online, it may seem that three words are the only way to get more customers: Search engine optimization (SEO). Typically, the search engines being referred to are: Google, Yahoo, and MSN. These three engines have almost become interchangeable with the phrase “do a search”, so much so that the word “Google” has entered the English lexicon as “find information”. There are actually hundreds of search engines, not just the Big Three (Google, Yahoo, and MSN) that many Internet users think of. By focusing only on the most well known search engines for your online marketing strategy, you may be missing out on as much as 30% of the billions of searches being done online every single day. While not the oldest search engine on the internet, Google does have the reputation of being the granddaddy. However, it is worth investigating alternative search engines – niche engines, meta-search engines, and human-powered engines. Niche search engines focus their searches on a particular subject matter, such as blogs (http://www.blog-search.com) or articles (http://www.goarticles.com).
Meta-search engines compile results from multiple search engines (http://www.dogpile.com,http://www.widow.com). Finally, human-powered search engines are composed of directory pages with link and general information,put together by humans who search for the most relevant content (http://www.mahalo.com, http://www.dmoz.org). These alternative search engines tend to have pretty high page ranks, which give more credence to the fact that online marketers shouldn’t overlook them. There is also the fact that some Internet searchers do not want to use Google because of personal or political views. Because of Google’s popularity, it can (incorrectly) be perceived as having a monopoly on the search engine market. That perception, combined with opposition to a seemingly growing “corporate world”, turns off some potential customers and eliminates your potential to reach them, if you focus only on Google or other big search engines. As part of SEO, using keywords to bring in consumers is all the rage. Businesses spend a great deal of time and money researching keywords, keyword density, and effects on page rankings in results lists. Guess what? It’s not only a pain for the businesses to constantly be looking for which words may get them more hits and higher rankings; it’s quickly becoming over done.
Continue to read more here >> SEO: Look Beyond Google: Meta-Search Engines Can Help Online Marketer

Top 10 Search Engine Optimization Strategies For Your Website!

Although the concept of search engine optimization can be somewhat complex, there are a number of basic search engine optimization techniques you can use to improve your organic search results. Keep the following in mind when trying to achieve top rankings for your website.

1. Meta Tags.

Meta tags are simple lines of code at the top of your web page programming that tell search engines about your page. Include the title tag, keyword stag, description tag, and robots tag on each page.

2. Create and update your sitemap.

Developing a site map is a simple way of giving search engines the information they need to crawl your entire website. There are plenty of free software packages on the web that can help you generate a sitemap. Once you create a sitemap, submit it to Google and Yahoo.

3. Ensure that all navigation is in HTML.

All too often, navigational items are in the form of java script. Even though navigation technically still works in this format, it’s not optimized. Create your navigation in HTML to enhance internal links throughout your website.

4. Check that all images include ALT text.

Your image’s alt text is spidered by search engines. If you’re not including your keywords in alt text, you’re missing out on a huge opportunity for improved search engine result placements. Label all of your images properly.

5. Use Flash content sparingly.

Content generated through java script or flash is a big no-no. Some webmasters like to use flash because of the presentation. If you must, use it sparingly, but only after your site has been properly optimized with basic search engine optimization in mind.

6. Make sure that your website code is clean.

Keep in mind when optimizing a web page crawlers are basically only looking at your source code. When programming your web pages, having W3C compliant code can make all the difference. Run your code through a W3C validator before promoting.

7. Place keywords in your page content.

Search engines scan your website and web pages for keywords. Shoot for a keyword density of between two and eight percent. Google likes your page to be at the lower end of this scale and Yahoo at the upper end.

8. Submit your website to search engine directories.

It’s always a good idea to let large search engine directories know that you’re out there. Submit your website URL to directories like Google, Yahoo, and DMOZ.

9. Build links to your website.

Consider building a link exchange program or create one-way links to your site using articles or forum posts. All major search engines value the importance of your website based on how many others websites are linking to it.

10. Learn the basics.

Learning to optimize your website for search engines takes time and patience. Start by applying basic search engine optimization principles. If you’re new to website optimization, or even a well seasoned veteran, begin by prioritizing which pages are most important to you and go from there. Soon you’ll find yourself moving up the rankings.

About the Author: Michael Fleischner is a Marketing Expert and Search Engine Optimization Specialist. He has more than 12 years of marketing experience and had appeared on The TODAY Show, Bloomberg Radio, and other major media. Visit MarketingScoop.com for further details and more marketing articles.

Technorati Tags: SEO, Meta Tags, HTML, Keywords, Top 10, Search Engine Optimization, Strategies, Website, Web Traffic, Internet Marketing, Link, Google, Adsense, Adwords, Website Optimization, Search engine results, PageRank, organic search

SEO: 20 Things You Need to Know Before Optimizing a Web Site

One of the most important aspects of a search engine optimization project is also one of the most overlooked – preparation! There are some important steps to take in advance of optimizing your site that will make sure your SEO is successful.

Before You Start

Before you start any search engine optimization campaign, whether it’s for your own site or that belonging to a client, you need to answer the following questions: 1) What is the overall motivation for optimizing this site? What do I/they hope to achieve? e.g. more sales, more subscribers, more traffic, more publicity etc.

2) What is the time-frame for this project?

3) What is the budget for this project?

4) Who will be responsible for this project? Will it be a joint or solo effort? Will it be run entirely in-house or outsourced?

Answering these questions will help you to build a framework for your SEO project and establish limitations for the size and scope of the campaign.

Ready: How Search Engine-Compatible is the Site Currently?

Something I find very useful before quoting on any SEO project is to produce what I call a Search Engine Compatibility Review. This is where I carry out a detailed overview and analysis of a site’s search engine compatibility in terms of HTML design, page extensions, link popularity, title and META tags, body text, target keywords, ALT IMG tags, page load time and other design elements that can impact search engine indexing.

I then provide a detailed report to potential clients with recommendations based on my findings. It just helps sort out in my mind what design elements need tweaking to make the site as search engine-friendly as possible. It also helps marketing staff prove to an often stubborn programming department (or vice versa!) that SEO is necessary. You might consider preparing something similar for your own site or clients.

Steady: Requirements Gathering

Next, you need to establish the project requirements, so you can tailor the SEO campaign to you or your client’s exact needs. For those of you servicing clients, this information is often required before you are able to quote accurately.

To determine your project requirements, you need to have the following questions answered:

1) What technology was used to build the site? (i.e. Flash, PHP, frames, Cold Fusion, JavaScript, Flat HTML etc)

2) What are the file extensions of the pages? (i.e. .htm, .php, .cfm etc)

3) Does the site contain database driven content? If so, will the URLs contain query strings? e.g.
www.site.com/longpagename?source=123444fgge3212, (containing “?” symbols), or does the site use parameter
workarounds to remove the query strings? (the latter is more search engine friendly).

4) Are there at least 250 words of text on the home page and other pages to be optimized?

5) How does the navigation work? Does it use text links or graphical links or JavaScript drop-down menus?

6) Approximately how many pages does the site contain? How many of these will be optimized?

7) Does the site have a site map or will it require one? Does the site have an XML sitemap submitted to Google Sitemaps
(https://www.google.com/webmasters/sitemaps/login)?

8) What is the current link popularity of the site?

9) What is the approximate Google PageRank of the site? Would it benefit from link building?

10) Do I have the ability to edit the source code directly? Or will I need to hand-over the optimized code to programmers
for integration?

11) Do I have permission to alter the visible content of the site?

12) What are the products/services that the site promotes?(e.g. widgets, mobile phones, hire cars etc.)

13) What are the site’s geographical target markets? Are they global? Country specific? State specific? Town specific?

14) What are the site’s demographic target markets? (e.g. young urban females, working mothers, single parents etc.)

15) What are 20 search keywords or phrases that I think my/my client’s target markets will use to find the site in the
search engines?

16) Who are my/my client’s major competitors online? What are their URLs? What keywords are they targeting?

17) Who are the stake-holders of this site? How will I report to them?

18) Do I have access to site traffic logs or statistics to enable me to track visitor activity during the campaign?
Specifically, what visitor activity will I be tracking?

19) How do I plan on tracking my or my client’s conversion trends and increased rankings in the search engines?

20) What are my/my client’s expectations for the optimization project? Are they realistic?

Answers to the first 10 questions above will determine the complexity of optimization required. For example, if the site pages currently have little text on them, you know you’ll need to integrate more text to make the site compatible with search engines and include adequate target keywords. If the site currently uses frames, you will need to rebuild the pages
without frames or create special No-Frames tags to make sure the site can be indexed, and so on.

This initial analysis will help you to scope the time and costs involved in advance. For those of you optimizing client sites, obtaining accurate answers to these questions BEFORE quoting is absolutely crucial. Otherwise you can find yourself in the
middle of a project that you have severely under-quoted for.

The remainder of questions are to establish in advance the who,what, where, when, why and how of the optimization project. This will help you determine the most logical keywords and phrases to target, as well as which search engines to submit the site to.

For those of you optimizing web sites for a living, you might consider developing a questionnaire that you can give clients to complete to ensure you tailor the web site optimization to their exact needs.

Go!

So now you are clear about your motivations for optimizing the site, you know more about the target markets, you know how compatible the existing site is with search engines and how much work is involved in the search engine optimization process. You’re ready to tackle the job.

Article by Kalena Jordan, one of the first search engine optimization experts in Australia, who is well known and respected in the industry, particularly in the U.S. As well as running a daily Search Engine Advice Column , Kalena manages Search Engine College - an online training institution offering instructor-led short courses and downloadable self-study courses in Search Engine Optimization and other Search Engine Marketing subjects.

Technorati Tags: SEO, Optimizing Web Site, Web Traffic, Google, Internet Marketing, Ready Set Go, Tips, Technique, Make Money Online, Strategy, Online Marketing, Web Search , Website

Optimizing Your Site for Both Google and Yahoo!

Search engine optimization techniques for Google and Yahoo are quite different. Many websites rank well in one search engine but not the other. This is the direct result of each search engine having its own unique ranking algorithm. For example, the Google algorithm predominantly values the anchor text of in-bound links. Yahoo places more emphasis on keyword density and meta tags.

The primary reason for the difference in ranking algorithms is that Google owns the patent on Page Rank (PR), named after Google’s founder Larry Page. As a result of owning this patent, other search engines need to place more emphasis on different optimization factors including website URL, keyword density and so on.

What are the greatest differences in search engine algorithms?

Google places a significant amount of emphasis on inbound links to your website. The value of these inbound links are measured based on their Google PR. The more links you receive from high Google PR web pages, the better your search result placements will be for a given keyword or search term.

Yahoo places emphasis on website URLs, meta tags, and keyword density. These factors can be analyzed on any website with a limited amount of effort, allowing Yahoo to quickly and easily rank websites properly.

How you can optimize your website for both Google and Yahoo!

The challenge all website owners face is making the most of their optimization efforts. When thinking about search engine optimization, you need to cover all the bases. To do so, pay particular attention to the following guidelines.

Keyword Targeted URL. If your website URL doesn’t contain your keywords, consider purchasing a new one or creating a new page off of your root directory (ex: marketingscoop.com/internetmarketing.htm). Having your keywords in the URL helps improve both your Yahoo and Google search results. Yahoo weighs the website address as an important ranking factor. Google values a keyword rich URL when third party websites place a link to your site using nothing but a web address.

Meta Tags. Although not as important as they once were, Yahoo still uses meta tags to help align search engine rankings and appropriate website pages. Make sure that your meta tags are complete and include your keyword phrases in the title, description, and keyword tags.

Keyword Density Between 6 - 8%. Although much has been written about the importance of keyword density remaining between 2 - 3%, Yahoo looks for sites with keyword densities as high as 8%. Don’t be afraid to include your keywords throughout your webpage content. Make sure however, that your keyword density is not more than 8%.

Link Building. This is the most important factor for increasing Google search result placements. Develop a link building campaign and give other sites a reason to link to your site. This may include free downloads, tools, or other valuable resources.

Site Map. Publish a sitemap. This makes it easy for search engines to spider your website and access all of your most important web pages. Site maps should be accessible from your home page and kept up-to-date.

Optimizing for both Google and Yahoo can be challenging. Following basic seo principles and working to develop incoming links can help you reach the top of the largest search engines. Apply these techniques regularly to see the greatest results.

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About the Author: Michael Fleischner is a marketing expert with more than 12 years of Internet marketing experience. Learn how to improve search engine rankings with his latest ebook, The Webmasters Book of Secrets at http://www.webmastersbookofsecrets.com.

SEO:Why Keywords Are Vital To An Seo Campaign?

SEO, or Search Engine Optimization, is the optimization of a web page in order that it ranks higher in the SERPs (Search Engine Result Pages) for specific keywords or keyword phrases. The pages that rank higher typically gain the greater amount of search engine traffic compared to pages ranked lower for the same keyword.

Targeting Keywords

However, a top position for any keyword won’t suffice. In order to increase your ROI, it is vital to ensure that you target the most appropriate keywords for your pages, and for your business. While generic, or very general topic keywords, may have the highest number of searches conducted in a month they are also the most competitive and typically least productive.

Competitive Keywords

The more competitive a keyword the more pages that you need to compete with in order to benefit from an SEO campaign. Many of the pages that appear at the top of the list will also be well optimized and have a powerful link profile, making it difficult to rank highly.

Improved Conversions With Targeted Keywords

General topic based keywords have also proven to have lower conversion rates compared to more specific keywords. Targeted keywords generate targeted visitors, and targeted visitors are much more likely to be active while on the pages of your website.

Continue to read more... SEO:Why Keywords Are Vital To An Seo Campaign?

Tags: Seo Campaign, Keywords, Adsense, Google, AdWords, Internet Marketing, Web Traffic, Make Money Online

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.

10 Steps To Top 10 Rankings In Google By Titus Hoskins (c) 2007

Most webmasters go totally “gaga” for top 10 rankings in Google. And for good reason, Google is the most dominant search engine on the net and will deliver the largest amount of traffíc.
More importantly, those same webmasters will also inform you, getting top 10 rankings in Google often means your site will prove profitable. Mainly because obtaining targeted traffíc is usually your first obstacle in creating a viable online business. In other words, if you get top ten listings in Google for good searchable keywords, it is almost impossible not to earn money.

How To Proceed?
First, you must know the rudimentary basics of how keywords work. Keywords and keyword phrases are the exact words someone types into a search engine to find what they’re looking for online. If you have a site on “dog training” then your goal is to get a top 10 ranking for the keywords “dog training”.
Now if no one searches for “dog training” it would be a useless keyword, you would get no traffíc no matter how perfectly your site is optimized for that keyword.

How Do You Know If A Keyword Is Good?
To find out, you have to do some keyword research on your particular keywords. Many professional online marketers use keyword research software like Brad Callen’s Keyword Elite. However, you can also use the keyword suggestion tools supplied by Google Adwords or Overture. Try here: http://www.digitalpoint.com/tools/suggestion/
Now if you chëck “dog training”, you will find it receives around 4,469 searches each day. That’s a lot of traffíc but you must realize that it may be too good, or rather too competitive for your purposes, especially if you have a new site.

Biggest Mistake When Choosing Keywords
The most common mistake most novice webmasters make is targeting keywords which are too competitive. You simply will not be able to compete or place for extremely competitive keywords. Well established sites and businesses with very deep pockets have the resources to completely dominate those keywords.
While it is not entirely futile nor a waste of time to concentrate your efforts on highly competitive keywords, you will have better success if you target low to medium competitive keywords.

Long Tail Keyword Marketing
Besides online marketers have discovered that longer keyword phrases are usually the most lucrative. These phrases deliver traffíc which is better targeted and more likely to convert into a sale. “Dog hunting training” which gets around 100 searches a day will be more targeted than the general term “dog training” and if you have a site devoted to training hunting dogs then this keyword phrase may convert better for you.
Always keep this “Long Tail” keyword strategy in the back of your mind as you implement the following steps to achieve your own Top 10 Rankings in Google.

1. Make A Master Keyword Líst
Your first step is to make a master líst of the keywords you wish to target. Obviously these should be closely related to the theme of your site. Chëck the keyword competition by seeing how many sites are listed in Google for that keyword. Webmasters should also chëck the Google PageRank of the sites that hold the top 10 positions. If all those sites are PR6 and above it may be hard to get ranked high for your keywords.

2. Choose Related Keywords
Once you have your master líst of keywords, find long tail related keywords to target. Again, chëck out the competition and daily searches made for each chosen keyword.

3. Use Quality Content For Your Keywords
Creating quality content should always be your main goal. Write for actual visitors who will see and read your content. First and foremost you must have good useful content that your visitors will use themselves and recommend to their friends or colleagues. Tie this quality content in with your chosen keywords. Use one keyword phrase per page.

4. Keyword In Domain Name, Title and URLs
Having your keyword in your domain name will score big points from search engines. Plus, each page of content should contain your keywords in the title & meta tags for that page. Most experts also suggest you have your keyword in the URL and use hyphens to separate your keywords. Although the author has gotten good results by using an underscore and htm in URLs.
Example: www.yoursite.com/your_keyword.htm

5. Do On Page Optimization
Keyword ratio is a much discussed topic by SEO experts and many suggest you should have your keyword in the H1 or headline title of your page. Sprinkle your keyword and variations of it throughout your page. Don’t over do it but make sure the robot/spiders will clearly discover what your page is about. Many webmasters make sure they include their main keyword in the first and last 25 words on their pages.

6. Use Traffíc Modules
One technique that works extremely well in Google is clustering a closely related topic or subject into a distinct separate section on your site. For example, if you have a marketing site, you could create a whole section on article marketing where you would have 50 to 100 keyworded pages all relating to your subject. Writing articles, formatting articles, submitting articles, article software… place a keyword linked menu on each page to connect all your pages together.
Keep in mind, your main objective is to supply quality information to your visitors. One reason Google may favor this type of structure is because they want quality content returned in their SERPs.

7. Try Article Marketing
Article marketing is writing short informative articles on keyword topics related to your sites. You then submit these helpful keyworded articles to ezine directories on the web. When your articles are picked up by related sites, you receive quality One-Way links. The higher the quality of your article, the more links you will receive.
Another ranking tactic to use: If you’re just starting out your site will probably have a low PR rank and you will find it hard to rank for even modest keywords. That’s why it’s useful to take advantage of the higher PageRank of the major ezine directories. Your keyworded articles on these high PR sites will get picked up by Google and displayed in the top 10 rankings. Now the displayed URL will be the article directory site but the links in the resource box will be pointing back to your site. Over time this article marketing technique will raise your own site’s rankings for those keywords. Simple but effective.

8. Anchor Text And One Way Links
Off page optimization is important in obtaining high rankings in Google. Getting quality One-Way links is very important. Anchor Text simply refers to “the underlined clicked on words” in your links. Most webmasters include their keywords in their anchor text as this tells the search engines exactly what the links are about.

9. Tags, Blogging And Web 2.0
Take advantage of Web 2.0 by using blogs, RSS feeds and the social bookmarking sites like Reddit and Digg. Try AddThis.com for a simple social bookmarking system. At the very least your site should have a blog and RSS feed attached to it as this is an effective way of boosting your keyword rankings.
Tags have become very important for getting higher rankings. Keep in mind, in free blogging software such as WordPress, categories will automatically be seen as tags. Blogger, which is owned by Google, now has a form where you put your keywords (tags) for each post you make.

10. PPC vs Organic Search
Of course, one of the fastest ways to get your links displayed on Google is to pay for them by using Google Adwords. Your ad and links will sit side by side with the organic link results. In Pay Per Clíck advertising you bid or pay so much per clíck for your keywords and you only pay when someone clicks your links. But smart marketers also know since you’re getting millíons of impressions advertising your products, acquiring name recognition and branding through PPC advertising can be a major side-benefit.

However, most webmasters would say that organic links (SERPS) will return better traffíc than paid links or advertising. In most cases, this may be true because Google’s organic rankings are becoming more respected and more trusted by users. They simply carry more weíght with surfers.

This makes it even more beneficial to obtain top 10 rankings for your keywords in Google. Depending on the competitiveness of your chosen keywords reaching the first page listing or even the favored number one spot is well within any webmaster’s reach. Just go for it. The rewards are well worth your efforts.

About The Author
The author is a full-time online marketer who contributes his high rankings in Google as the major source of his online income. For the latest web marketing tools try: MarketingToolGuide.com . For the latest Internet Marketing Strategies go to: BizwareMagic.com . Titus Hoskins. This article may be freely distributed if this resource box stays attached.

Tags: SEO, Internet Marketing, 10 Rankings, Google, Adsense

11 Tips for Pay-Per-Click Success

11 Tips for Pay-Per-Click Success

This list details some very important points to keep in mind when creating or managing any pay-per-click campaign. Is this all there is to know about pay-per-click advertising? Absolutely not, but for those new to PPC it should serve as good place to start. Additionally, pay-per-click veterans or at least the moderately-seasoned will want to touch upon these points now and then to brush up on their fundamentals.

1) Do your keyword homework.

Use Google's free Keyword Tool or sign up for a WordTracker account to find out which keywords are the most competitive. The more competitive the keyword, the more expensive your clicks will be. While you're finding out which keywords are too expensive you'll come across some that aren't being targeted heavily by advertisers. Take a good look at these - they may be your keys to a successful niche campaign.

2) Don't bunch your ad groups.

You should be striving to separate your ad groups by keyword. Whatever your target, separate your keyword lists into closely related groups containing the same target words and write ads geared specifically to those words. Your ads will show up higher in results based on their quality, and search terms show up bold in results - a click-through rate booster.

3) Drive home your selling point.

What's your offer? Why are you better than the others? Remember that your ads are going to display with your competitors. The difference between a user clicking your ad and clicking a competitor ad is about 100 pixels on the screen - or a millisecond of time. You need to convince them that you are the one they want. You are better. Grab them.

4) Don't send users to your home page.

This is perhaps one of the worst things you can do to your Pay-Per-Click campaign. Internet users are notoriously impatient. Send them to your home page when they were searching for a specific product or service and see how fast they leave. Don't waste your advertising budget - send them to optimized landing pages.

5) Optimize your landing pages.

Your landing pages need to drive something home immediately for your users: "you have landed in the right place." They need to know that, yes, this is what they were looking for, here it is, here is why it is better than the rest and here's the easy thing they need to do to get it. In most cases you'll need to create multiple landing pages based on your different ad groups and keywords, but look at it this way - if your users aren't landing at pages geared exactly to their search phrases they'll leave and take your advertising budget with them.

6) Don't lie in your ads.

People aren't dumb. If you promise something in your ads you had better well deliver. Otherwise you'll not only waste advertising dollars but damage your brand. Be honest, and focus on points that make you stand out from the competition. Grandiose ad text might bring in clicks, but if it isn't the truth it won't bring in conversions.

7) Your domain name counts.

In most cases you can display a domain name that you own as the "display domain" but point the ads to a page on a different domain. Why does this matter? If you own a domain name that contains the keyword text it will show up bold and increase conversions. Enter the optimized domain as the displayed domain, point the ads to your landing pages and you can expect higher CTRs in most cases.

8) Utilize negative keywords.

Google has a new Negative Keyword Tool that will allow you to find negative keywords that you should specify for your ads. Negative keywords are those that you don't want your ads to display for. For example, if you're selling "blue widgets" you don't want to display your ads to those users searching for "free blue widgets." If you don't use negative keywords you are missing out on a chance to get more targeted traffic to your landing pages, and this can really hurt your conversion rates.

9) Test, test, and test some more.

The greatest thing about internet advertising is the ability it grants you to measure your success. It's easy to create A/B split tests with Pay-Per-Click advertising. Change one word, add a comma, include a value proposition. . .just make sure you only change one thing for each split or you won't know which variable it was that made the difference! You'll find out right away that this is a great way to optimize your click-through rates - just don't forget that clicks aren't everything!

10) Don't focus too heavily on CTRs.

Getting tons of clicks isn't always the name of the game. In fact, if you aren't using proper techniques to ensure that you're getting targeted traffic and sending it to well-optimized landing pages you can blow through your advertising budget in no time flat. Remember that the success of any advertisement is getting back more than you put in. It's an investment, not a cost - so do all that you can to better your rate of return!

11) Don't pigeonhole yourself.

We all know that Google AdWords is the most popular Pay-Per-Click service out there. Your competitors know it, your users know it - even your grandma might know it. It would be foolish to ignore Google as a venue for advertising, but don't forget that there are other search engines out there who offer similar services. Yahoo!'s new Panama search system is catching on, and Microsoft's adCenter is nothing to sneeze at either. Both companies are currently offering sweet promotional deals to new Pay-Per-Click advertisers to stay competitive so take advantage and diversify!

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About the Author: Mike Tekula handles SEO, SEM, usability and standards-compliance for NewSunGraphics, a Long Island, New York firm offering Search Engine Optimization, Search Engine Marketing, W3C-Compliant web design using full CSS layouts and all things web design/development.