AOL Browser BETA A Major Contender?

AOL Browser BETA A Major Contender?

by: Pete Crewdson

To me, AOL Browser .68 Beta is what a browser should be. Relatively lightweight, easy to install, and most of all, it works how I want it to. Iกve been using for one day, and Iกm already converted.

Based on Internet Explorer 6 technology, the new AOL Browser has taken what is good with browsers such as Firefox and Opera, and incorporated it all into one browser. With features such as tabbed browsers, quick search and an all inclusive desktop search facility, could this be the browser that puts a dent into Firefoxกs golden run?

Perhaps, but lets not look too far ahead. As with any beta software, AOL has a long way to go with their new browser, and it has lots of features lined up and raring to go. Some of the key features to the browser include:

Tabbed Browsing: Everyone loves it, it saves space, and it saves memory. Tabbed browsing is the future of internet browsing, and AOL have found a solution that works just fine. Itกs nothing innovative, no, but the tabbed browsing is fast, efficient, and easy to use. Hovering over a tab will display a screenshot of the page which lies beneath, so no more having to flick through browser tabs to find the page your looking for!

Website Snapshots: The idea of a snapshot has been around for a while, but AOL have made good use of it this time around. Hover over the back and forward buttons to see the webpage you just left behind, hover over a tabbed window to see what is on it, and hover over quick favourites to see where exactly where they are going. It couldn’t be simpler!

Quick Favourites: In addition to normal favourites, AOL offers quick favourites. Simply add a webpage to a specified folder in your favourites, and it will display a small textlink in the browser window, just under the address bar. Click it, and your browser zooms off to the webpage you specified. Quick, easy and effective.

Power Browsing: All in good fun, AOL serves up a series of กPower Browsingก methods, these include zooming in and out, highlighting links, listing all the links on a specific page, mirrors and flips, and even changing to a high contrast version of the page, which inverts the style sheet!

Builtin Desktop Search Facility: No more having to download a Google or Yahoo! addon, the new AOL browser comes complete with a built in desktop searching facility which indexes your harddrive as you are browsing. Itกs not quite as competent as other desktop search utilities out there, but it gets the job done, it finds what you want, and it couldn’t be simpler to use.

And what features are still to come?

AOL Smartbox: Find what you are looking for with this search facility. It will find, navigate and organise your search results for you, to make sure you get only the most specific results for your search terms.

Designer Skins: Completely customise your online experience by customising the browser to fit your mood. Choose from a range of AOL designed skins, or make your own. Your browser, your choice!

For more on what AOL Browser beta has to offer, take a look at this page: http://beta.aol.com/aolbrowser/help.html

Could the AOL Browser give Firefox an unwelcome challenge, or will it be fogged off like its predecessors? No specific date is set for a full launch, but AOL need to make their move now, whilst thereกs still a chance.

About The Author

Pete Crewdson is the owner of the Forfeit The Game Network (http://www.forfeitthegame.co.uk), and runs the Forfeit The Game Media Weblog (http://www.forfeitthegame.com/weblog/) For all the latest Music, TV, Film, Computer and Internet and Sports articles, look no further than Forfeit the Game.

This article was posted on February 14

by Pete Crewdson

Five Step To A Successful Online Shopping Business

Five Step To A Successful Online Shopping Business

by: Linda Quinones

Before you set out to explore the online shopping market you should do some planning, take a piece of paper and pen and write down the steps that will help to bring in traffic to your website.

And once they have visited you must have something to entice them to remain and do some shopping, in our website: www.shopshopshop.org. We try to mix our affiliate, we have some highly recognizable name and some not so well known.

One frequent complain we get is the cost of shipping, people are willing to pay for convenience but they do not want to pay for shipping, so we use the free shipping banners when available.

And the great savings the affiliates are offering, this is a lure to catch their attention, after all when people are saving money and are provided with theconvenience of shopping from the comfort of their home they are happy.

Step (1). Mix your affiliates you want some well known names, but remember the well known retailer pay the lowest commissions and are the most demanding.

Don’t settle for the first affiliates that accepts you, you may start with a few, but if you build your site right some of the affiliates that turn you down will revisit your site and approve you.

Make sure to keep good records, and stay on top of the affiliate emails to be able to use the incentives they provide to induce people into buying the products your affiliates are offering.

Develop a program where shoppers will provide their email address so that you can inform them of future promotions and savings available to them.

(2). Links are a way to have search engines give your site a high ranking, reciprocal link exchange are a good way to get started , many businesses are in the same position you are in and are looking to link to somebody.

The more links you have leading to your site the better the search engine will rank you. You may choose to pay for links and here again make sure they are giving you good companies to link with.

If you a have a family oriented business you don’t want to be link to an adult site. You want sites that related your business or are complimentary.

A example would be if you have a site that sells only clothing you would like to link with a site that sells jewelry or footwear.

(3). Keywords: key words play a crucial role in your internet business, people must be able to find you. Keywords are what people search for on search engines.

People who have never heard of your company are not going to look for youby name but they go on the search engine and type in keywords to be let to a site that matches the keywords provided.

If the keywords type in relate to the keywords on your site then you will getcustomer to come and visit your site, and hopefully buy something.

You will want to have as many combination of keywords as possible in order to drive web traffic to your site, Make sure you have the most popular search terms and use as many as possible.

Keywords is the key to traffic and traffic the key to sales, when your web page comes up near the top ten in response to a searches on searche engines , your traffic will increase and so will your sales.

(4). Contacts: everybody knows somebody so start using the those contacts to promote your business, but do so in a tactful manner so that people are not turn off by your aggressiveness.

Giving somebody a business card and asking them to checkout your website might be a very soft sell that might lead to conversation about your business and help you gain a potential customer.

Just think of all the people that you come in contact with on a daily basis, by themselves it will not be enough to make a fortune but added to the other marketing results it could make your business venture a profitable one.

(5). Incentives: Offer businesses incentives to continuously use your site for their purchases, businesses expend thousands of dollars every month on office products and other essential items for their businesses but get nothing in return, so offer them some kind of rebate or free items for purchasing through your site.

Offering a free gift for individual is also a good policy but make sure that it is contingent on purchases being made so that you don’t attract all the freeloaders.

Everybody shops the question is where? Your job is to make sure they do it on your site. Or preferably at www.shopshopshop.org.

About The Author

Linda Quinones has been active in promoting her own site while helping others to succeed in the Internet marketing field. Previously she was involved the financial sector for several years. Her website is: http://www.shopshopshop.org.

This article was posted on August 12

by Linda Quinones

The Art of Online Business Marketing

The Art of Online Business Marketing

by: Arthur

Marketing is a mind game where the advertiser seek to grad your attention with their advertisement.

Traditional advertising are via Television, Cinemas, Newspaper, Popular Magazines, Posters, Radios, Buses, Taxis etc.

Online Marketing via the Internet are Banners display, Text links, Email, FFA, Classified Ads, Search Engine, Pay Per Click Search Engine etc.

In order to understand more about the creature Marketing, it is best for you to start paying attention to the various form of advertisement that surrounds you wherever you are. Keep a little marketing note book with you and write down what attract your attention, why it attract you, how it influence your purchasing decision etc.

The concept of Marketing whether Traditional or Online is the same.

The challenge of all Online Marketer is to attract as many traffics to their sites as possible via the various means of Online Marketing Method.

There are no straight answer to successful marketing and you just have to keep learning and trying until you find a method that is suitable for you.

Many says that Banners are lousy and attract little clicks through but why does it still exists today. There are people who are successful in using Banners and those who are unsuccessful. A lots depend on the design of the banners. It is just like posters advertisement where you make used of colors, famous movies star, funny or interesting quote to attract attention.

For others, it may be Pay Per Click Search Engine. Pay Per Click Search Engine like Google Ads word provides you a constant flow of traffics if you make used of it wisely. You can start playing with it with an initial registration fees of 5.00. There are smart PPC expert who bids for certain keywords for 10 cents or lower while others bid it for 50 cents or higher. They do it by researching and bidding for less competitive keywords. They bring a constant flow of relevant traffics and sales by studying and researching on how people search. With PPC Search Engine, you don’t have to worry about the ever changing Search Engine Ranking algorithm anymore.

For example, Assuming you are selling Power Ranger related products, instead of the competitive expensive keywords Power Ranger, you can try different combination of less expensive keywords such as:

power ranger sports

power ranger song

free game power ranger

blue power ranger

power ranger white

As you can see, different people can be good at different Marketing method. There are no one size fit all method. It is all about trail and errors no matter which method you used.

Wishing you success in your Online Business Marketing.

By © Arthur, The Online Biz Home

About The Author

Copyright © Arthur

http://www.sapbasisabap.com/homebusiness/

Grow Rich by Operating a Successful Work At Home Online Business.

This article was posted on September 14, 2004

by Arthur

web page building for beginners 2

web page building for beginners 2

by: Ted Dupuie

A search engine robot actually reads the wording on your web pages and places a certain amount of importance on what the content says, but not quite like a human does. A human will place the words together in their head and try to decipher the relevancy to them personally and decide within a few seconds whether they will continue reading or click to another site, whereas a robot counts words and places all relevancy in the numbers it finds. It also gives extra credit to the size of the type and title of each page. What a webmaster should consider, is every word connecting to a keyword and not wasting words, for the public and the robots. This can be difficult to do when writing about certain subjects, but not impossible. Take diets for instance. Saquoyah Publishing writes diets and uses www.freediet.biz to promote them, but nobody wants to read pages full of the word diet just bandied around with no oomph in the article that should teach the reader about diets. So a happy medium must be reached to get the website placed high in the search engines database, yet allow the articles to inform the reader of the subject written. Remember, the information super highway is called that for a good reason. Most people just want to learn something about a subject, not necessarily buy something. So if you are selling, the first thing you will want is to get the reader to find the pages you have written, and that means search engine optimization, or SEO as it is called.

SEO should be a major consideration as the page is written, and a concentration on keywords should be the main concern of the page writer. Take diets as an example of page writing. The word Diet or Diets should be placed in the title of each page on the website if at all reasonable, and each page should utilize those words as many times as possible without deterring hopeful customers. The title of the page is the most noticeable attraction to your website from the searcher’s perspective, and the few words you have to say everything about your site. Free diet is a two word search that will get you over twenty five million pages on Google or Yahoo, and the competition is fierce. Just the word free will get you over a half billion pages and the competition is downright crazy. So stick with keywords that you can compete in, and use those words wisely as you write your pages.

Simple, free, healthy diet are the four keywords that describe the title of my index page, and they are the best way to describe what I hope the searchers will be looking for, as well as what I have to offer. This is the most optimistic I can be when writing my title to help people learn about diets and to help my website get a good placement with search engines. Also, a four word phrase has less competition than a two word phrase. So make sure your title is something that the searcher is looking for as well as something you provide or you will never get customer satisfaction, and maybe never get customers.

The contents of the page can be categorized into sections to help keep your keywords alive without pushing them on the reader. For instance, free diets, beer diets, funny diet jokes, potato soup diet, pineapple diets, Beverly Hillbilly Diet foods, and many other strange things can be written without being insensitive to the reader, if they are titles of some of your other pages or just paragraphs on each topic. The contents close to the top of your page should also be the same words you have in the contents meta tag that the robots will copy to be placed under your title in a web search. In this way, the reader will also get a fair chance at what you really have to say on your site and can make a better judgment call on whether to open your index page or some other. This is how you select customers instead of wasting everyone’s time. This article can be copied and reprinted anywhere as long as it is intact and includes the author’s bio.

About The Author

Ted Dupuie owns a home based publishing company that only publishes his work, which includes diets, an investment strategy, and 8 websites, plus a family newsletter. He is also a writing critic with top ten placement on Google and Yahoo!

www.saquoyah.com www.homewriters.com www.freediet.biz

This article can be copied and reprinted anywhere as long as it is intact with the author’s bio.

This article was posted on August 21, 2004

by Ted Dupuie

Effective Online Advertising Tips

Effective Online Advertising Tips

by: Lisa Maliga

Helpful Tips for Increasing Your Online Sales

Once you’ve launched your eCommerce web site, you’ll need to show it off to the online world. Whether you’re paying someone to submit your site to all the major and minor search engines and directories, it’s still up to you to continually advertise your eCommerce site in order to keep attracting business.

Many online business owners will tell you that within six to nine months of your launch date you’ll start seeing increased orders for your products. However here are 8 things you can do to lure people to your site now!

Advertise on http://www.Craigslist.org . This entry will only last for 10 days and you must submit to only one city and category at a time. You can include photos and/or advanced HTML in your ad.

Write a press release and send out for free to the following sites:

http://www.prweb.com [this one has been around for several years]

http://www.prbot.com

http://www.openpress.com

http://www.expresspressrelease.com

http://www.freepressrelease.com

http://www.prleap.com

http://www.prfree.com

Paid submissions will get you more views, quicker listings in the search engines, and the ability to post photos and keep track of your statistics.

Submit your site[s] to http://www.isedb.com/html/Web_Directories [You’ll discover loads of directories here, from the highly specialized to the mainstream. Many of the sites have ratings; indicate whether they’re accepting new submissions, and if there’s a fee for submitting].

Search engine positioning. When advertising your eCommerce site, always have the following information on hand: A. Your Web site title. This should be approximately 712 words.B. Description. Have 3 different descriptions of varying lengths. 15 words, 25 words, 100 words. Have them summarize the essence of your site. C. Keywords. 10 – 50 of your most important keywords arranged in order of importance. Again, some online directories will allow you to contribute more keywords than others.

Write articles about your products/service. Be an online expert. What makes your site so unique from the thousands of others in your chosen category? Is it your customized service? Your low prices? Your high quality? Don’t over promote your product, but concentrate on what will help others. It’s highly recommended you include at least two or three testimonials.

Exchange links with other sites that have quality information and are related to your field in some way. For example, I sell a lot of soap so I link with mostly gift basket, crafting and candle sites.

Free classifieds. While these can sometimes get you sales or your listed in the search engines, don’t expect too much response from them.

Offer a freebie. For example, if you have an eBook for sale, you won’t give the entire book away, but having a chapter or two online will increase interest – and sales. If you make or sell a product, offer a free sample with a paid order. Or free shipping on sales over a certain amount.

Contests reel ‘em in! Not only will you get their email address for future offers, [but ask that they opt in to your mailing list first], but you can give away a product or service of yours and look good doing so. Also, this is a good time to send out a press release and let the online community know about your special contest that runs for only a short time, thus generating more publicity.

Follow one or more of these helpful tips and watch your online business bloom!

About The Author

Visit Lisa’s Library of Writing, home of writer http://www.lisamaliga.com and receive tips on free web promotion, read articles on webrelated topics and get library news on a variety of subjects.

[email protected]

This article was posted on April 10

by Lisa Maliga

Marketing Articles: Promoting Your Site Twice!

Marketing Articles: Promoting Your Site Twice!

by: Martin Lemieux

I recently became aware that promoting your web site in Search Engines can instantly be double within Google! Thatกs right, you can instantly promote your site 2 times at once!

So how do you Market Your Site twice?

Simple…

Most of us typically promote www.yoursite.com. But what you need to realize is that most sites can be found on search engines simply by entering… http://yoursite.com without the www.

Try it for a second, lets go to google and type in your url with the www. and then without the www.

So for me it would be:

www.smartads.info

http://smartads.info

The same will apply for subdomains as well. A subdomain is a section of your site dedicated to something you create but instead of residing within your normal directory, it resides within itกs own directory,like Iกve illustrated below…

Normal:

www.yoursite.com

SubDomain:

www.subdomain.yoursite.com

And with that again, you can promote your subdomain twice in Search Engines like so…

www.subdomain.yoursite.com

http://subdomain.yousite.com

So in turn, Iกve just showed you how you can promote 4 sites with all the same goal in mind, yours of course!

How to utilize your new found knowledge:

Hopefully, you are all aware of how important it is to create a link exchange program for your business? Well, what you simply want to do is to mix up your links when submitting to other companies for a listing within their site.

In other words…

Lets say I just found 4 sites that I want to exchange links with, I would do something like this…

Site #1: I would submit (www.yoursite.com)

Site #2: I would submit (http://yoursite.com)

Site #3: I would submit (www.subdomain.yoursite.com)

Site #4: I would submit (http://subdomain.yoursite.com)

Now Iกm promoting my site with 4 times the power than before!

But don’t stop there…

Do you write articles? How about committing 2 of your links to every article. Change them up with each article.

Ex:

Article #1 (How to Submit Your Site to Search Engines)

Try adding

www.yoursite.com

www.subdomain.yoursite.com

Article #2 (How to Market Your Site Twice)

Try adding

http://yoursite.com &

http://subdomain.yoursite.com

I hope this small timbit of knowledge gives you the edge you need to put your business ahead of the game!

Best of luck to you!

About The Author

Martin Lemieux

Smartads President

http://www.smartads.info

Affordable web site design

http://smartads.info

Marketing Articles & Web Site Marketing Tactics

This article was posted on October 10, 2003

by Martin Lemieux

My Identity Crisis

My Identity Crisis

by: David Leonhardt

When we are young it is all so simple. We know exactly what I want to กbeก when we grow up.

You know what itกs like: กI want to be a fireman.ก I want to be a ballerina.ก กI want to be a movie star.ก กI want to be a nuclear physicist specializing in embryonic schisms in postmenopausal subatomic particles.ก

This aspect of growing up came back to haunt me recently when reading a magazine article by someone working in television who had always wanted to be a celebrity. To paraphrase her words, กIt never occurred to me that I might have to actually do anything.ก

Well, here I am, a fullygrown adult. Or perhaps I am no longer fully grown – Iกm not sure at what age we start shrinking! But I do have a confession to make; I never knew what I wanted to กbeก. I knew only what I wanted to do.

What I wanted to do was design cities, urban spaces, bus routes. No, thatกs not true. What I really wanted to do was design maps…but most map companies want map designers to simply mimic the cityกs existing design. Geesh, whereกs the creativity in that?

So I was led astray, falling in love with politics instead. For a while I worked as a political aide, plotting to become King of the World. Amazingly, it took only five years for reality to grind my idealistic innocence to sawdust and send me on a frantic search for a doityourself lobotomy kit. (I never did get to be King of the World, nor did I ever find that doityourself lobotomy kit.)

I spent the next decadeandahalf as a consumer advocate and lobbyist, doing media relations, government relations and industry relations none of which are technically verbs that one can actually กdoก.

At social events, the accountants and lawyers had it easy. กI am an accountant,ก says it all.

I was not so fortunate.

กI am a consumer advocate,ก I would say.

กSo what do you do?ก

กWell, I talk to the media and to the government and to industry,ก I would explain.

กAhaaa… and I talk to the tooth fairy. So what do you do?ก

Now, I have an even harder time when somebody asks what I do. Most people have no clue what search engine optimization is, which is my main กcareerก. Few people really understand what freelance writing is, except if they read a freelance writerกs article in a magazine . I don’t even try to mention that I run three websites and do affiliate marketing. But people do understand what it means to be an author.

กWow, you wrote a book on happiness? Congratulations. So whenกs your next book coming out?ก

Which is when I have to explain how a book really doesn’t feed a family, and if I took the time to write a second book, it would take time away from search engine optimization and affiliate marketing…

กHuh, whatกs that?ก

กNever mind,ก I answer. กIกm a stayathome dad.ก Which also is true. People might look at me weird, but at least they understand me. Or, so they think.

All of which brings me back to that question I never answered when I was young: what do I want to be when I grow up? I guess Iกll just have to wait a little longer to find out. Like when I grow up.

About The Author

David Leonhardt is author of Climb Your Stairway to Heaven

http://www.chapters.indigo.ca/Item.asp?Catalog=Books&Item=059517826X

Read more personal growth articles:

http://www.thehappyguy.com/selfactualizationarticles.html

Visit his liquid vitamins store:

http://www.vitaminsupplementsstore.net

Or his happiness website:

http://www.thehappyguy.com

[email protected]

This article was posted on January 30

by David Leonhardt

Googleกs New SEO Rules

Googleกs New SEO Rules

by: John Metzler

Google has recently made some pretty significant changes in its ranking algorithm. The latest update, dubbed by Google forum users as กAllegraก, has left some web sites in the dust and catapulted others to top positions. Major updates like this can happen a few times a year at Google, which is why picking the right search engine optimization company can be the difference between online success and failure. However, it becomes an increasingly difficult decision when SEO firms themselves are suffering from the Allegra update.

Overoptimization may have played the biggest part in the dropping of seoguy.com from the top 50 Google results. Filtering out web sites that have had readability sacrificed for optimization is a growing trend at Google. It started with the Sandbox Effect in late 2004, where relatively new sites were not being seen at all in the Google results even with good keyword placement in content and incoming links. Many thought it was a deliberate effort by Google to penalize sites that had SEO work done. Itกs a few months later and we see many of the กsandboxedก web sites finally appearing well for their targeted keywords.

With 44 occurrences of กSEOก on the relatively short home page of seoguy.com, and many of them in close proximity to each other, the content reads like a page designed for search engine robots, not the visitor. This ranking shift should come as no surprise to SEO professionals as people have been saying it for years now: Sites should be designed for visitors, not search engine robots. Alas, some of us don’t listen and this is what happens when search engines finally make their move.

One aspect of search engine optimization that is also affected in a roundabout way is link popularity development. After observing the effects of strictly relevant link exchanges on many of our clientกs sites recently, weกve noticed incredibly fast #1 rankings on Google. It seems Google may be looking out for links pages designed for the sole purpose of raising link popularity and devalues the relevance of the site. After all, if a links page on a real estate site has 100 outgoing links to pharmacy sites, there has to be a lot of content on that page completely unrelated to real estate. Not until now has that been so detrimental to a siteกs overall relevance to search terms. It goes back to the old rule of thumb: Make your visitors the top priority. Create a resources page that actually contains useful links for your site users. If you need to do reciprocal linking then keep it relevant and work those sites in with other good resources.

Keeping up with the online search world can be overwhelming for the average small business owner or corporate marketing department. Constant Google changes, MSN coming on the scene in a big way, and all the hype around the new Become.com shopping search function can make heads spin. But just keep things simple and follow the main rules that have been around for years. Google, as well as other search engines, won’t ever be able to ignore informative, well written content along with good quality votes from other web sites.

About The Author

John Metzler is the cocreator of Abalone Designs, Inc. www.abalone.ca, a Search Engine Optimization company in Vancouver, Canada. He has been involved in web design and web marketing since 1999 and has helped turn Abalone Designs into one of the top SEO companies in the world.

[email protected]

This article was posted on February 28

by John Metzler

PayPerClick Advertising & Search Engine Optimiza

PayPerClick Advertising & Search Engine Optimization

by: Carrie Reeder

There are proกs & conกs to both PayPerClick advertising and optimizing for natural search engine traffic.

PPC advertising has many great benefits. First of all, you get your traffic going quickly. I have used this advantage many times. I test new products and even new websites through PPC advertising before making a decision to promote or scrap my new website or product idea.

I am a firm believer in testing new products before throwing large amounts of money into advertising. PPC advertising is a great way to do this. For example, with Googleกs Adwords program, you can post your ad, pay a $5 signup fee and have highly targeted traffic to your website within an hour. How is that for efficiency?

Also, you can moniter your click charges and stop them before they get too expensive. By the time you have spent your budget on clicks, you should have a pretty good idea of how successful your product is going to be.

I think of PPC advertising as being the most useful when starting a new business or product. WIth PPC advertising, you can quickly and efficiently find out which keywords you need to target and which products are the most popular.

Once that testing period is over, however, itกs time to look into Search Engine Optimization. PPC advertising can be very expensive, costing hundreds, even thousands a month in advertising costs. Once you know what keywords to target, itกs time to put together a plan on how you are going to optimize your website. The drawbacks to search engine optimization is that it requires a lengthy amount of time to get your site to rank high with your keywords. That is why I suggest using this method after the testing period is over, when you already know your business will be profitable.

Search Engine Optimization is definately a slow way to get your website traffic if you plan on not using PPC traffic. It could be a long, expensive road before you even begin selling your product. Search engines can take months, even years to start pulling up high with the search engines. But, natural search engine traffic is definately the best long term way to get the majority of your traffic.

When getting your site to start pulling up in SE natural listings there are 2 main things that need to be done:

Add Content

Add Backlinks

Search engine traffic requires you to submit your site to many different search engines and wait, maybe even months for them to spider your website.

I have had much better luck with another route. You can pay a fee to have your website listed in a very high ranking directory like www.dmoz.com (free), www.yahoo.comกs directory ($299), sbd.bcentral.com (only $50), or another website where your link is on a page that has a page ranking of 4,5,6 or higher. The sites I mentioned above have rankings of 8 or 9. When you have your link on a site with that high of a ranking, the search engines are spidering those sites constantly and will find your website and spider it very quickly. Not only will they find it quickly but because you are linked to a high ranking site, you will also rank higher with the SE.

When looking for backlinks, focus on sites with content related to yours and high page rankings of 4 or higher.

As for content on your site, try to include about 200500 words of content or text on most of the pages of your site. Text makes your site bulkier. Make sure to integrate all of the keywords you want to target within the content of your site. Don’t worry about cramming the same keywords in over and over. Search engines may possibly even blacklist your site for keyword stuffing, if you try to do that.

There is a lot to know about Search Engine Optimization but, those are the 2 main factors when getting started.

In summary, when starting out, I suggest using PPC advertising for testing products and keywords. Spend time optimizing your site for search engine traffic after you have tested your products and keywords.

About The Author

Carrie Reeder has been a web marketer for 3 years and has various websites where she sells a variety of products from software to clothing accessories.

www.thelevelcollection.com

[email protected]

This article was posted on November 02, 2004

by Carrie Reeder

Specialty or Niche Directory Submissions

Specialty or Niche Directory Submissions

by: David G Hallstrom

The following article was written for and originally published by Resources For Attorneys.com.
You are an attorney or other service or product provider. You have built an excellent web site, it looks good, it is well optimized and it tells your clients and prospective clients or customers everything they need to know in order to do business with you or purchase your product. You have submitted your site to the major and many minor search engines. Now all you need to do is sit back and wait for clients or customers to come flowing in, right? Wrong.
As the number of websites grow on the internet, it is getting more and more difficult for web sites, even excellent web sites, to obtain good rankings in the search engines. Nowdays it appears that in order to obtain good search engine rankings (somewhere on the first page for your catagory) you must have your meta tags, format and text just right, and then you have to get tons of other web sites to link to you. Even if you do everything right there are still numerous other businesses out there also doing everything right. Therefore, you still might not obtain good rankings. Even if you do obtain good rankings today, the search engines might change there way of ranking sites next week, and your site might well drop or even dissapear from the rankings.
Additionally, it is estimated that nearly 200 million adults use the internet as a source to search for products, services or information, and this number is likely to grow each year. As the number of websites grow on the internet, it is getting increasingly difficult for web surfers to find the product or service that they need. As a result, web surfers are turning to online specialty or niche directories, such as the legal and service directories from Resources For Attorneys.com or the Lifestyle Directories from Resources For Attorneys, to sift through the numerous websites and locate the product, service or information that they need.
Specialty and niche directories normally charge a small fee, $3.00 to $100.00 per year, for your listing. They are usually much smaller and have far fewer listings than the regular search engines. This makes it easier for you to obtain a good listing and it makes it easier for consumers that are actually looking for your service, product or information to find you. Additionally, there is a collateral benefit to listing your site in a directory. Most search engines count directory links as good links and this can sometimes increase your link ranking with those search engines, thereby improving your search engine listings.
Although there is a cost in subitting to these directories the total cost of submitting to several specialty and niche directories is much less than the cost of yellow page, radio or television advertising and the benefits can be as good or sometimes far better.
Finally, many of these directories allow you to submit articles, press releases, news storys and testimonials about your services. This can increase your presence and allow your customers to learn more about you, your service or product.

About The Author

Permission is given to reprint this article providing credit is given to the author, David G. Hallstrom, and a link is listed to Resources For Attorneys the owner of this article. Anyone or any company reprinting this article without giving proper credit and the correct link, is doing so without permission and will be subject to legal action.

This article was posted on July 04, 2004

by David G Hallstrom

Write Articles Geared to Your Local Market to Bols

Write Articles Geared to Your Local Market to Bolster Your Local Search Visibility

by: Lynella Grant

The Shortest Distance to Your Home Town Enterprise is Over the Internet

Combine two dynamite online methods for bringing your business to the attention of buyers Local Search and widely posted articles you write. Doing both gives you a jump on your local competition, plus additional credibility and exposure to your market.

Local Search occurs by adding a geographic term is added to a search engine query. Instead of results comprising millions of pages, only businesses within your specific area are included. For example, entering Florists + Boston only returns Boston florists a small pool of available choices.

Geographic terms can be town, state, region, zip code, etc. Results appear on both a list and map, so the most convenient stand out. Today, nearly 40% of search engine queries ask for Local Search information with that number increasing rapidly. 70% of buyers go online to conduct research before they buy, even from local merchants. So the impact is considerable.

Articles Deliver Credibility and Links

When you write articles and post them widely to Internet directories and ezines, your knowledge is spread to thousands of readers. Sites displaying your articles link back to your website. That encourages readers to seek you out. Links also increase search engine rankings, which push you higher on the results lists. Capture all the benefits http://www.promotewitharticles.com/benefits.html that come with writing articles.

You’re Not Competing Against the Whole World

The widespread assumption dictates shooting to be on first page results if you can (most searchers don’t look past the first page). That all depends. If you’re competing against every other business and website out there, that’s true. And your odds are slim. But you don’t need to only the ones competing for the same customers you are.

Besides, sophisticated searchengine optimization strategies or tracking methods are beyond the needs or skills of most small businesses. There’s a danger that SEO demands can easily pull an owner away from their brickandmortar priorities.

There’s a wellknown joke about two men being lost in the wilderness, who come to the attention of a bear. One man stops long enough to put on his running shoes. His friend scoffs, กYou really think you can outrun a bear?ก He replied, กI only have to outrun you.ก

When it comes to Local Search, you don’t have to outrun all the other enterprises that do what you do. You only have to outrun the ones in your local market. Those likely to show up in the same Local Search results you do.

Consider all the plumbers who could show up in a Local Search for:

Plumber + กyour townก. Visualize three groups:

1. Those who won’t appear in the search because they’re not listed in the search engine data bases. See if your business is included in those databases at http://www.localsearchresources.com/listed.html

2. Those who appear in the results, but who have done nothing further. They won’t show up in all the search results they could have.

3. Those adding specific information for search engines, website visitors, and their local customers: a) enhance their website, b) provide searchenginerelevant information on their pages, c) provide easytofind information that Internet users are looking for.

#3 lets you outrun the other guy. Your articles help you to do that, too. Of those who show up in your search results list, how many are likely to have such additional information (and keywords) for the search engines to draw upon? Your information seems more complete and relevant—leapfrogging you to the front.

Adapt Your Articles for Your Neck of the Woods

The usual method for getting better search engine rankings is to post articles widely to article directory sites and ezines interested in your topic. That’s how the game’s played for ecommerce topics, or products and services with a national reach.

But that’s not primarily what you’re after as a small business operator. Certainly, you’ll benefit from links from other posting sites and links to your website. But you’re interested in reaching the people who live in your area. They’re the ones you want to read your articles and be moved to come to your place of business. Your priority is to build relationships on the local level.

So also post your articles to websites or portals in your community. They may not have high page rank, but they have access to your local customers. And links among local enterprises help to support each other and the local economy. Aso, print off a stack of your articles for handouts in your storefront.

Write your articles differently. Mention your town in your title or keywords. Make sure your signature file (sig) says your town and state. Use examples that are specific to your town or region. กChoosing roses that can thrive above the tree line.ก Refer to landmarks or make geographic references that the locals will recognize. The search engines will pick up some of those references, and they’ll boost your Local Search prominence.

Learn to Make the Most of Local Search Exposure

The easier you can be found online, the more ways you appear in Local Search results. It’s here for the long term, bringing customers to your door who don’t respond to your other marketing methods. Articles and Local Search awareness will build on each other, and you’ll gain a tangible edge in your local market.

Copyright 2005 Off the Page

About The Author

Dr. Lynella Grant An expert in Yellow Page ads and Local Search. Stand out online and offline, so you capture more Internetsavvy buyers for your brick and mortar business. Free resources http://www.localsearchresources.com 7193959450

This article was posted on September 05

by Lynella Grant

Google Takes Care of Idiots Too

Google Takes Care of Idiots Too

by: Alexis Dawes

Thereกs an old saying that goes, กGod takes care of babies and idiots.ก

Truly this statement applies to me, because when it comes to my search engine optimization skills, Iกm on the idiot side of scale. But thatกs okay because idiots are loved, and can easily survive in the search engine game too.

Let me explain.

Although NONE of my 6 web sites rank in Googleกs top 10 (or top 20 and 30 for that matter), and I only advertise 2 of my sites using AdWords, Google still helps me make a lot of money.

Thatกs probably because I went into this search engine optimization ‘thingyก with a grain of salt. I don’t keep any secret arsenals of software tools that reverse engineer web sites to figure out why their ranking high. I haven’t read any of the latest musthave volumes on search engine optimization. (Although they’re on my todo list when and IF business ever slows down.)

And still my MVP Google does its best to make me happy. And I do my best to give its searchers relevant content. But not in the way that most SEO savvy webmasters would recognize.

กItกs actually very easy to get traffic from Google if you think outside the box.ก

My strategy for getting traffic from Google is quite simple.

You see I don’t go out of my way looking for link partners. My sites are basically 12 page sales letters, and nobody wants to link to me, unless they’re getting paid.

Nor do I put a tremendous amount of effort into onpage optimization. I sprinkle my targeted keyphrase here and there, and Iกm done with it. I write for my paying customers.

What I do is follow this process:

I find other established sites that already have good PageRank and adequate incoming links.

I make sure these sites add new content every day. Sites with frequently added content get visited by the Googlebot often… sometimes every day.

I then place an advertisement on these sites, promoting my actual web site. When the Googlebot pays these sites a visit, the ad itself (NOT my web page) is ranked in Google for the keyphrase Iกve used. On many occasions my adกs have reached the #1 position in Google for my targeted keyphrase, in as little as 48 hours.

กWhere can you readily find such sites?ก

Believe it or not, a handful (literally a handful) of classified ad sites fit the description to a tee.

Backpage.com (http://www.backpage.com/) is one of them.

Backpage.com is a free classified ad service run by New Times, a publisher of alternative news weeklies. They offer classified ad listings for 14 US cities. However even if you’re not in one of their specific cities, you may still place an ad.

Certain advertisements placed through Backpage.com have reached top 10 positions in Google. The adกs that get favorably indexed in top 10 positions normally have less competitive keywords in the title. My personal synopsis is that these are keywords that receive fewer than 3,000 searches a month, according to the Overture Search Term Suggestion Tool.

An example is กmobile pc repair.ก

This is a lowtraffic, but extremely targeted keyphrase.

If you do a search on Google for กmobile pc repairก youกll notice an ad placed on Backpage.com is featured in the #5 position. Okay, so itกs not the best advertisement in the world, but thatกs irrelevant.

The point is

The ad got indexed in a top 10 position in Google.

Backpage.com allows advertisers to include web site links in the advertisement. So even though this particular advertiser didn’t include his/her URL, they very well could have. This wouldกve generated traffic to their site.

กMy point?

This is cure for getting targeted traffic while waiting for your actual web site to get ranked.ก

Early February 2005 webmaster forums around the world were abuzz with groans, gripes and periodic fits of happiness.

Why?

Because Google was doing a major update (dubbed Allegra).

Sites that had ranked in the top 10 for years were being mercilessly tossed around. Other sites that hadn’t gotten any decent rank in the past were beginning to see the light. And still others didn’t notice any changes.

As for me… well my actual sites still didn’t rise much in the ranks. Iกm still hovering somewhere around #50+.

But that hasn’t phased me one bit.

I look at the big picture and understand that getting traffic from Google is much more than having my site reach the top 10.

If I have 50 advertisements (similar to the oneกs from Backpage.com) that are in top 10 positions, and they’re all delivering traffic from targeted keyphrases, I haven’t lost anything. All those keyphrases delivering trickles of traffic equal a flood of clicks and orders at the end of the day.

Not a bad deal for somebody whoกs SEO illiterate. I guess the old saying is true… God really does take care of babies and idiots.

Copyright 2005 Alexis Dawes

About The Author

Alexis Dawes is the author of ‘taking The Back Road To Get On Googleกs First Page.ก This report offers details on several more loopholes you can use to get a top Google ranking. You can find more information at (http://www.GetInGoogleNow.com).

This article was posted on February 16

by Alexis Dawes