SEO DAILY Tips & Tricks

Abandoned by Google Googlebot, Wherefore Art Thou Googlebot

2009-10-19T21:08:00.000-07:00

As a search engine optimization specialist I often optimize existing web pages for small business clients, upload them to the site and see pages re-indexed by Google within a week. This only happens with existing business sites that have been online for a few years. Google seems to be updating their index as often as every other week at this point and older established sites that are already indexed seem to be re- crawled on that twice a month schedule on a fairly routine basis.
Two clients that hired me for recent work saw their rankings shoot to the top for a newly targeted search phrase in a weekend when I did optimization on a Thursday and they were ranked instantly by Saturday. Now keep in mind that this doesn't happen for everyone, only those that have been online for some period and already have significant content that simply needs tweaking and proper title and metatag information added. They usually have relatively good existing PageRank and do well for other RELEVANT search phrases already. I offer that warning only to avoid instilling false hopes in anyone hoping to achieve the same instant ranking boost overnight.
Those clients that do succeed in this way are often thrilled with the results accomplished in such short order. I'd love to be able to offer that type of ranking boosts to everyone, but some are more equal than others when it comes to easy, inexpensive SEO tune-ups that rev up your rankings overnight. Your mileage may vary.
WHY DO NEW SITES SUFFER?
What is going on with newer sites that don't get crawled for months? I've got a client, a newer attorney directory that offers tons of great information in the form of articles on specific areas of law, links to incredibly valuable and relevant legal sites and over 600,000 attorneys listed by practice area and state. Yet the site has not been re-crawled by Google for over 3 months! Now this would not be such a big issue for many sites, but this site is relatively new and we've optimized all the titles, tags & page text, created a complete site map and placed links to all these resources on the front page.
I know that the site is not being crawled because Google's cached copy of the front page shows it before we did the work four months ago, without the new links and without title tags. We've submitted the site by hand, (manually) once a month for three months via the Google Add URL page. http://www.google.com/addurl.html When the hand submission failed to get it re-indexed for four months, we submitted the sitemap page, which has not been crawled at all. Google shows only ONE page on this site, when in fact it has thousands of pages, a sitemap and dozens static pages!
Part of the problem is that this site must be dynamic, since a database of over 632,000 attorneys must be accessed, retrieved and served for any of those law firms searched for to be returned to the site visitor. Google warns owners of dynamic sites that Googlebot may not crawl dynamically generated pages with "?"" question marks in the URL. This is to avoid crashing the server with too many concurrent page requests from Google's spider. http://www.google.com/webmasters/2.html#A1
The solution to this dynamic URL problem has been discussed widely in search engine forums and solutions have been bandied about including software provided by SEO's, URL re-write techniques for dynamic pages on APACHE servers http://www.alistapart.com/articles/urls/ and PHP pages http://www.stargeek.com/php-seo.php to generate search engine friendly URL's. Others recommend simply adding static HTML sitemap pages as alternatives for the search engine spiders. In this instance the client's developer simply said "I can't do that (PHP solution) on this server". So we resorted to putting up the static HTML sitemap pages with hard-coded
URLS to the main 54 pages of the site at http://lawfirm411.com/Law-Firm-411-sitemap.html This should get at least those fifty pages crawled by Googlebot, but Googles' spider appears not to be crawling this site at all. How do we know this? See for yourself by using the following query in the search box at Google: allinurl:www.lawfirm411.com where the result page shows ONE page in the results. If you try that query on your own site (replace your own domain name for lawfirm411.com), you'll see the results lists ALL your pages.
The site home page was crawled by Google four months ago, when they took their "Cached Snapshot" of the page. You can see this by visiting the Google cached page here: http://66.102.7.104/search?sourceid=navclient&;ie=UTF-8&q=cache:www.lawfirm411.com where the date of this snapshot is "Apr 20, 2004 07:42:19 GMT" and they haven't been back since. The page in that snapshot has none of the newly added links, an outdated title tag, and old content.
This problem is not unique to this site. One client we worked with two years ago had a dynamically generated, framed site! Those two site structures have always given search engines trouble. Their site was not crawled at all and only the front page showed up. Our solution was to create a second domain (owned by the client), which had static HTML pages that precisely mirrored the content of the client's framed, dynamically generated site. Guess what happened after Googlebot crawled the static site? Google indexed the framed site in full and then banned the static site from the index! Not an approach we advocate, but the one that worked for this client.
We're still searching for ways to get Googlebot back to LawFirm411.com before creating that new static site, but decided to share this odd experience with the SEO community before going to any extremes. Google provides over 70% of most search engine referred traffic to ALL of our clients and we realized we can't site idly by and see a major client languish because Googlebot didn't like what it found at the client site on the first visit four months ago. This issue dogs newer sites in other places as well. The Open Directory Project has also become notoriously slow in adding new sites to the directory and in this case, has not picked up this site even after 6 regular monthly submissions. The web playing field may have begun tilting toward older, established sites and away from new ones.

Abandoned by Google Googlebot, Wherefore Art Thou Googlebot

2009-10-19T02:49:00.000-07:00

Get Your Website Seen With Improved SEO

2009-04-03T06:31:00.000-07:00

If you have an internet-based business, one of your key marketing concerns is trying to get people to see your website because, quite simply, if people can't find you, your not going to make any sales. One of the best ways to get seen is to get placement on the first two pages of Google or other search engines. There are ways you can increase your search engine optimization, or SEO, that take a little bit of effort but could, in the end, make or break your business.
Ideally, you want your business to pop up on the first two pages of the search engine results page because the better your SEO, the better your chances of increasing traffic to your website.
Just for fun, type in something pertaining to your business, something a person would search for if looking for your particular product. Where does your business rank? if it's on the first or second page, you're in good shape. But what if you're on page 20? or 200?Chances are no one who is looking for your product will ever get to you. They'll click on one of the other sites that offer the same product.
It doesn't matter if your products are better or if you have a prettier website, what matters is being seen. With all the competition out there, how do you increase your SEO.
Chances are you have a limited marketing and advertising budget and improving your SEO is one of the few ways you can go head-to-head with the big hitters. Thankfully, there are ways you can increase your SEO without spending a penny, but it will take some work.
The key is keywords. Keywords are the words that someone will type in the search bar if they are looking for a particular product. Google ''ranks'' sites based on keywords to determine if its a quality site. It's all done by computer and is based on what there computer recognizes as a quality site, or one that matches the keyword typed in.
Google has a free web analytics program that helps determine what keywords people would use to find your business. That's the first step. Then make certain those keywords are featured prominently on your website. Another thing to consider is your domain name.You should pick something that is close to the name of the product you are selling. For example, if you sell business software on your site, something like BusinessSoftware.com is a terrific domain name. Having a good domain name can increase your SEO dramatically.
Link-backs are another way to increase your search engine visibility. Link-backs are just that--- other places on the internet that link-back to your website. You can do this by several ways, including blogging, writing articles for online publications, issuing press releases, social networking, ect. The bigger your presence on the web, the better your SEO.Increasing your SEO doesn't happen by itself, you have to work constantly at it. It's an on going part of doing business on-line. Treat it like a game---one that you want to win.

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3-Way Links - The Evolution of Back Linking

2009-03-28T00:38:00.002-07:00

There is a lot of competition going on in every single niche. May it be business, sports gaming, cooking etc... The only way to get ahead of the competition is to get ranked high up in search engine rankings. The problem is everyone in the niche knows this and most probably every single one of are listed in the search engine ranks. This leaves you far behind the people using SEO's. You're left there trying to use articles and blog posts with back links to get your site listed higher in a search engine ranking but it isn't going up that much, maybe that extra 8 visits but nothing special and you don't want to use programs like AdWords because you're worried about wasting money with all the other sites using other SEO's and soon you're on the verge of giving up altogether.
If that sounds like you then don't worry I have the solution to get you ahead of your competition. 3 way links. What's that I hear you ask? Well 3way links is this program that will put your site straight into the high listings of search engines like Google. It is just like back linking but you get much better results. Some of you know that search engines treat 3 way links like normal back links, but this is different. 3 way links increases your traffic by double in a month and it increases month after month for at least 50 sites.
However, the problem with 3 way links is that it takes time for the results to come. It takes about 1 week maybe a little longer to get some good traffic to your site and by a month you should be getting a lot more traffic than you were getting by submitting your articles.

Why it is Vital to Hire an SEO Writer

2009-03-25T06:58:00.000-07:00

If you are in the arena of search engine optimization, then you surely must know how important it is to hire a competent and efficient SEO writer. Good for you if you have years' worth of experience in SEO marketing already because by then, you would not have any trouble looking for that particular writer who would help you propel your website towards success. However, if you are still new to the industry, then do not fret. You do need help with the basics but as soon as you get the hang of them, finding that writer that you are the most compatible with can be achieved in no time.
We need to define the job description of an SEO writer so that you would know what to look for when you start posting ads for one. In essence, a search engine optimization writer is a writer that produces articles to respond to SEO needs. For a website to establish strong presence on the Internet, it should have high quality content that a search engine optimization writer is capable of producing. What the writer does is he actually produces articles and materials that are optimized with keywords or key phrases that are relevant to that particular niche of the website. This way, draw quality traffic is drawn to the website by catching the attention of search engines.
For instance, you operate an online store that sells tennis apparel and equipment. You should realize that there are hundreds, even thousands of online tennis stores selling pretty much the same merchandise as you are. Thus, you need to publish optimized content on your website so that when a person googles "Adidas tennis shoes", your website would be amongst the top search engine results. This is basically the end purpose of an SEO writer's writing endeavors.
What the writer needs to do is do extensive research on the central theme of all the articles that he or she needs to come up with. In the example mentioned, this would be tennis apparel and equipment, of course. From this central theme, the writer can then come up with other relevant keywords or key phrases and then expertly insert these into articles of various topics - all related to the central theme, of course.
All the same, the articles produced here should be informative and grammatically correct. Gone are the days when articles would be published just to trick search engines into ranking your website high. Quality content is needed to give your website that competitive edge and to do this, you definitely need the services of a competent SEO writer.

10 Ways to Build Search Engine Optimization

2009-03-17T03:13:00.000-07:00

Organic Search results appear in the non-advertising areas of the search engine results page. This is the equivalent of FREE advertising, so search engine optimization (SEO) is a very important strategy for creating a successful web site. So, it is imperative that you create an effective SEO strategy to help your web site bring you new customers. Here are 10 ways to improve your search engine optimization strategy.
1. Keywords: Develop unique keywords and relevant titles for each of your web site pages and each article or blog you publish.
2. Content: The depth of research and development applied to your content strategy will be directly proportional to the quality and quantity of traffic you receive in organic search. "Content" includes the written word, applications, widgets, tools and other digital assets.
3. Copy writing: Adding one word or phrase in the right place can increase visibility for a particular keyword. Be careful in your approach, and consider the human element, no matter how tempting it is to over-tweak.
4. Permanent Links: Start the process of cataloging multiple redirects and campaign URL's and set up permanent redirects to make it easier for the engines to find the "real" URL.
5. Interlinking: Link to others web sites, have others link to yours. Writing useful articles that link back to your web site and getting others to use the articles on their home pages is one of the best strategies for improving your rankings in the search engines.
6. Feed submission: Determine which feeds are most relevant to your business (products, maps, etc.) and take steps to provide data to the engines. With placements like Google Maps, a feed could be a quick ticket to a No. 1, No. 2, or No. 3 natural ranking.
7. Title and Description: Create a succinct title and description, which along with your Keywords, is an important part of your meta strategy for SEO.
8. Linking Architecture: Search engines need a unique URL for each page to actually index each page separately. Using parameters like /ShowArticle.cfm?article_id=14 doesn't work. You could have a million articles linked like this, but the search engines wouldn't know it. But search engines do like /ShowArticle.cfm/14 - if your information architect designs your system in this way, you can be assured that every article or web page will be reviewed by the search engines - making sure each has a different title, keyword list and description will guarantee that the search engines actually index the articles and pages. This is the best strategy for getting search engines to crawl your site and index content.
9. Clean up broken links: Find and remove permanently broken internal links or set up properly configured 404 error page to improve crawling performance that lets engines know that the old link is history.
10. Make your pages smaller by removing common JavaScript and CSS code to external files. The files are then cached by the browser and your page loads quicker and the search engines can crawl your pages quicker and easier.
These are only a few of the many things you can do to help your SEO. They are free and if you can coordinate all of these things into your web site, they are also very effective.
Bonus Information!
For coders, these are some of the areas that must be taken into consideration:
*Meta Tags - though your title, keywords and description in your site's meta-tags may have been effective when you launched your site, this can change. Your meta-tags must be tested regularly - it is important to test and re-test your meta data.
*Content - like meta tags, your site content must be updated regularly and must reflect the meta data you are using. When it comes to search engine indexing, the continuity of your meta data and content are checked. Event the order in which your keywords are set and HTML like bold text can make your information easier for the search engine spiders to crawl.
*Links - building links on your site allows you to become more friendly on-line. By making friends virtually, you are increasing your popularity and reputation on-line. This interlinking is an effective strategy to promote your site - the more relevant your links are, the more powerful your web site becomes.
For marketers, this is the most powerful way to build traffic.
*In-Bound Links - Article marketing is one of the key ways to build in-bound links. Every site that posts one of your articles becomes a billboard pointing back to your web sitearticles becomes a billboard pointing back to your web site. Imagine having an article on 1,000 web sites - that's 1,000 billboards pointing to your web site. Now imaging 100 articles on 1,000 web site pointing back to your web site - that is 100,000 billboards that make your site one of the highest ranked sites on the Internet.
When you implement these Strategies, you'll find two long-term benefits for your website:
1) This will boost your web site search engine rankings. 2) This will attract quality traffic to your site.

Search Engine in Your Real Estate Business, and Why It's a Must

2009-03-13T09:21:00.000-07:00

Real Estate is a cut throat business. You must equip yourself with the proper tools to make a success of it. Every single day, hundreds of thousands of sites are battling for position in the search engines. This includes nearly every Realtor or real estate agent in the country. If you don't keep up, you are going to fail, and lose positioning fast. You must know what you are doing, or your time will end up a complete waste.
90% of home buyers nowadays turn to the internet when beginning their home searches. It is extremely important that you are the first contact to these people. You will not only need a professional looking website, it will also need to be highly optimized for SEO or search engine optimization.
Most people don't get past the first page of results in the search engines before they click on a link. You want to do everything possible to secure your spot on the first page. For this very reason, many Realtors end up hiring an expensive SEO expert to do their real estate SEO for them. Not only is this unnecessary, it's also not the best idea for a few reasons.
1. They charge way too much for something you can easily do yourself in just a few minutes a day.
2. When someone else is doing your SEO, they don't share the same interest in your business succeeding as you do.
3. Knowing how to do your own SEO will ensure that the job is done the right way
4. There are no on-going fees!
Another great thing about knowing how to do your own search engine optimization for your real estate business, is that if you ever do decide to hire some help, you can actually know if they are doing what they are supposed to. Many times, SEO experts charge hundreds or even thousands of dollars for doing dead simple SEO. This can be just a couple hours of work!
Search engine optimization is not only easy to learn, it's also easy to implement. The key is knowing exactly what needs to be done. Real estate agents need search engine optimization if they want to get qualified leads! It's a steady source of free traffic, and many Realtors don't even do SEO. That's a huge mistake. A first page ranking in any search engine for a top real estate related keyword can bring thousands of targeted visitors to your website.
A real estate business without proper SEO is severely limiting their income potential. Not only from new business being generated, but also the amount of real estate relocation leads you can get referral fees from. The possibilities are endless! Bottom line, learn how to do your own SEO for your real estate business. You will see drastic changes.

Great Tips to Make As Much As $5,000 - $10,000 Every Month

2009-03-12T03:38:00.000-07:00

You've heard about the people who have started to make money online, and you feel like you want to do the same. You want to have your own internet business, so that you can also earn money online. Well, guess what? What you want to happen is possible. And these tips are to guide you where you're supposed to be going.
Earning Cash on the Internet the Short Way
According to what I've learned, when anyone makes money through the internet using a process that doesn't recur, it is most likely a 'short term' way of earning money. There are pros and cons to wanting to make money online and they are the following:
· Working for another Employer on the Internet
This type of work is sort of what most people do offline. The money that they get is exchanged for the services that they provide. An advantage to this is that there is very low risk, especially regarding your finances because most of the time, for these type of jobs you don't need to come up with a capital. But, the perfect way of becoming rich in the long, long run by making money online is not exchanging your time and expertise for their money. You need to be able to gain assets that increase in value over time. These are what would earn you some huge returns. But for those who are interested in working for another employer, you can try Elance, oDesk, Guru or Rent A Coder.
· Immediate Cost Per Action (CPA) Earnings.
This is when you get paid when a person fills out a zip code or an email offer. There are a few top CPA offers that have caps on them. You need to be able to move fast in order to capitalize on these offers. Examples of great ways to do these are to distribute an email blast, create viral marketing for these offers and grab that commission before it is filled. This is definitely a fast way to make money online, and is not stable enough to keep you satisfied in the long turn. It's a good income for the present time or the short period. Another disadvantage is that it has stiff competition. Almost everyone wants to grab a way to earn money fast, especially for the best
For more steadfast and credible reviews on how you can make money online, visit Profit Lance. The Only online marketing course that is endorsed by CNN, FORBES, and CNBC. Find Out How The Profit Lance System Can Have You Making Money Online In Under A Week!

Post Production Grief - Why it Happens and How You Can Avoid It

2009-03-11T02:11:00.000-07:00

Your booklet manuscript is finished and you've proofread it several times. It looks and reads great, so you're ready for production, right? Wrong! What you need now is a pair of fresh eyes to look over your work. Why? Because you're too close to it to see it objectively.
When you have someone else read your manuscript you gain a new perspective of your work. It's a chance to see what your readers might think if you produced and published your manuscript just the way it is. This gives you the opportunity to correct errors and tighten your text before it goes public. You'll be amazed at the errors someone else will find in the manuscript you thought was perfect and ready to print!
You'll probably want to have more than one person look over your text, including a professional editor if your grammar and punctuation skills are a little rusty or need a little help. The old saying "Two heads are better than one" is certainly true. But, when it comes to your manuscript, having a few people read it over will save you alot of post production grief. There's nothing worse than having your freshly printed booklets arrive only to find that there are several errors you missed or that the text just doesn't look appealing. Your booklet is an extension of you as an author and business person, and it must appear professional.
Even after much scrutiny, you'll often find an error or two in most published works. One or two can be easily forgiven by your market if your content is top notch. Editors are human and humans do sometimes make mistakes. But, a manuscript that is published with many errors will hurt your career as a booklet author and publisher. It tells your audience that you really don't care what you put into the marketplace. It tells them you just slapped something together to make money. Having your manuscript read and corrected by someone other than yourself will ensure this doesn't happen to you.

PPC Concepts Basic SEO

2009-03-07T00:33:00.000-08:00

Many people are unaware of the basic concepts of search engine optimization and PPC management. For those people, I have put together a very basic overview to help explain what these Internet marketing strategies are.
Put simply, Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is the process of amending a website to appear closer to the top of the search results, and increase traffic as a result.
Google combines two "values" to determine the order of websites for a given term. These "values" could be described as a site's "relevance" to a search term and its overall "popularity".
The "relevance" is determined by a number of factors, relating to the content of the page. For example, if a site selling "exercise mats" does not include examples of this phrase in its pages, then it will not be considered to be highly relevant for this phrase, and is unlikely to rank as highly as a site that has "exercise mats" within its pages' titles, headings and paragraphs.
The "popularity" is determined by the links to the site from other web pages. Each link is considered to represent a "vote" for the site and the more links a site has, the more credible it becomes and the more likely it is to rank highly in the search engines.
Search Engine Optimization involves on page modifications and link building strategies to increase rankings and traffic over time. Making good keyword choices is essential to the success of SEO. The keywords must be searched for often enough to deliver a significant amount of targeted traffic but must not be too competitive for the site to achieve a decent level of exposure within the search engines.
AdWords, Google's Pay Per Click advertising system can provide almost instant exposure for a website for any search terms. A cost is incurred each time a visitor clicks on your ad and is sent to your site. The system is much like an auction where advertisers can set a maximum bid price, and higher bid prices will lead to higher ad positions. However, bid price is not the only factor that determines ad positions. Other factors, such as keyword to ad relevancy and website content will affect ad position. Professional Pay Per Click managers may be able to improve these factors, giving better ad positions or reduced bid costs.
Generally, SEO provides a better long term return on investment, whereas PPC campaigns have the benefit of instantaneous and easily quantifiable results.

Why Get Software Download For Spyware Removal?

2009-03-06T03:20:00.000-08:00

Do you want to get software download for spyware removal? There are many different spyware removers on the web available for download, but their capabilities can vary greatly. All are able to scan and find all the errors in a PC, but eventually some of them are only able to quarantine the bad files but unable to delete them.
Despite these drawbacks, downloading spyware removal software is still the best and fastest way to fix malware problems. The key is to find a good and reputable remover program that can deal with every spy-ware problem.
1. What Are the Dangers That Spyware Can Do to a Computer User?
Firstly, every PC user should understand that these malicious programs can get installed into the system without the user knowing anything about it. Once it has infiltrated the system, it can potentially do a lot of damage like stealing sensitive and confidential information like credit card numbers, bank account numbers and passwords from the user's PC.
It is very important that you only download files from other people whom you know, and also be very careful when downloading free executable files from the web.
2. Why Get Software Download Spyware Removal?
It is the fastest and easiest method to deal with malware problems. They have become very popular on the internet and have been helping me to deal with many spyware and adware issues. Always remember to read reviews of these programs from users' testimonials before you download any of them.
3. How Does Spyware Removal Software Work?
The first thing it will do is give your system a full and detailed scan before generating a report on a list of all the errors found. Once that is done, it can then quarantine and remove or fix all the erroneous files found.

The Qualities Of List Builders

2009-03-05T00:43:00.000-08:00

With the large number of list building devices online, it would be easy to be confused as to what seems to be the best one being offered. You have looked at the product, and seen the literature and testimonials, but you still remain undecided. What you need to do is take a step back and with the list below, find the qualities of list builders that is best for your business.
1) Attuned to your business needs
If you have a small part time business, what you need is a list builder device can do the work on its own and at your spare time the generated interest would be addressed. On the other hand, if you have a full time operation ongoing, having a generator that immediately reaches out to prospects would be most appropriate. By reviewing product capacities and specifications, you would be able to find the best device for your business purposes.
2) Cost effective
Look for a product that is within your budget and see the capacities the product provides. You need to find a list generator that is within your budget to be able to work within your means. This decision to be cost effective would be pivotal to your investments and make your bottom line within reach.
3) Proven effectively
Finding write-ups on your prospective list generator is key to making the right decision on the list generator you would procure. Look for independent sources of commentaries on the product in consumer websites or forums. This would help you analyze the issues attendant to the product and see what can provide the best service for your business purposes.

5 Mistakes With Do-it-yourself SEO

2009-03-03T03:53:00.000-08:00

I look at a lot of sites on a daily basis. There is a lot of common problems I see on the sites. Some people may have tags establishment or misuse of tags that have no real purpose. I have compiled a list of the top 5 do-it-yourself SEO mistakes. It is safe to say that many do-it-yourselfers can have at least one of these errors on their sites. These should help you avoid these costly mistakes and often pull you in the ranks.

1) Keyword tag - Seo Services
A keyword is the beacon of keywords, but not for keywords. You can not just stuff this tag with keywords that your entire site is related. The tags must reflect the keywords only on that particular page, not the entire site and not all of the keywords you think your site could be searched. Also, you should not have more than 20 words in the tag. You should not repeat any word more than 3 times. If you sell tickets, for example, do not write: Broadway tickets, the circus tickets, hockey tickets, boxing tickets, and so forth. Do use Broadway, the circus, hockey, boxing, tickets and so forth.

2) Description tag - It is sometimes used as a replacement for or combined with a description tag. However, more and more people are using these keywords to stuff. Search engines like Google are interested in what is on the page. More specifically, what visitors can see. In my opinion, the abstract tag has no place on a site.

3) Description Tag - The idea behind this tag is to describe what the "page" is about. Keywords related to the page should be implemented as well. The limit on words should be 20 to 25. I see a lot of site owners stuffing this tag with keywords, or having a description that is just as long. Stay within these guidelines and you will be fine.

4) Title tag - This, I believe, is the most important tag. This is the first tag the search engine bed. He tells what the search engine of the "page" is about. Do not put your web address here. Do not add your company name at the beginning of this tag either. It should not exceed 60 characters.

5) Content-If you notice, I received comments on the relevance of the "page", not your entire site. Each page has its own keywords. Tag the title tag, description and keywords. All these keywords should be the same. Add it to your content as well. Now your page should be fairly well optimized.

Why is it that the sites fall short? Simple, the content is not optimized. Search engines are, for the most part, pretty basic. You enter a search term and it retrieves sites containing those terms while also taking a number of other factors into account. So if your site does not have these terms, how will you find it? You will not. More to do with keywords and you will experience the same result, but for different reasons. Sometimes, while reading about SEO can be bad. Try too many tricks, tips or methods is like too many cooks spoil the soup. At the end, they may do more harm than good. These rules are very easy to be followed by all. And the doubt? Always consult or hire a professional SEO Expert

How to Bring Your Page Rank Down

2008-05-17T08:30:00.000-07:00

First of all, some people give importance to PageRank and others don't. You do not need to worry about your PageRank much, however it is an indication of how many backlinks your website has, how good it is optimized.

When search engine software called spiders visit your website, they follow each of your site links, as long as the links have not the nofollow tag, or other signals for search engines to ignore certain links. Like robots files or instructions to spiders in the meta tags.

Now PageRank is given to your homepage and each of your website pages. The PageRank comes from those websites that link to you. So when someone links to your website it is like they are giving you some of their PageRank. The higher their PageRank number the more PageRank they give you.

That means the more websites linking to you the higher your PageRank will be.

So it's important not to link to other peoples sites if you don't have to. You will give them some of your website PageRank when you do so. So avoid linking to other websites from your own, or put the nofollow tags on these types of links. That way spiders ignore these links completely.

When you do link exchanges you give some PageRank but also receive from your link partner. It is important to check they still keep linking to your site because if not you give them PageRank and they give you none. If you have many link partners that do not link back to you, in the end the result will be bad. You will probably not only loose some PageRank but for sure rankings.

To fix the problem, you either contact those webmasters that removed your link, see why they did so and try to make them link back to you again. If they do not remove their links from your website.

In a certain way, the more links you have the higher your PageRank will be. Now your own website pages pass PageRank to each other. So if you link to your homepage from your blog you are giving some of your blog PageRank to your homepage.

The solution is to make sure the most important webpages of your site get the most PageRank. Make sure they are not passing PageRank to other pages they do not really require. It is better that your homepage gets the most PageRank rather then your privacy policy webpage.

So make sure you put the nofollow tags properly on your site, so certain webpages do not receive too many PageRank, while the important pages receive the most PageRank and do not loose a lot. A webpage looses PageRank when it links to another page within the same site or links to another site completely.

Your PageRank improves more if you get one way links. These are links you get when you submit your articles, submit your site to directories, get links from forums, blogs, and other places where you do not link back. So unlike link exchanges these websites give you PageRank and you give none.

Those are the sites that help you increase your PageRank really fast. But they are also the toughest sites to get links from, because it is easier to make a link exchange since there are millions of sites doing link exchanges. Article directories are limited in amount and even other methods of getting one way links.

So make sure you treat your PageRank well, so your most important pages get the most PageRank. That all helps your rankings improve.

Page rank of any website holds great deal of significance if you want your website to rank on page 1 of Google. Google Page Rank, Yahoo Page Rank and Msn Page Rank exact parameters are unkown and are safely guarded by the companies. However, the tips and tricks to increase your page rank or the things to avoid which I discussed above will help you to increase your page rank.

SEO Tip of the Day: Use Web Directories

2008-05-16T00:59:00.000-07:00

Back Links are one of the most important parts of successfully running a search engine optimization campaign. As a matter of fact, having well-placed links will do a lot to help to push your website to the top of the search engine result pages for the keywords of your choice. Although there are many different ways for you to acquire these links, there are some ways which are almost automated in nature. By taking advantage of every aspect of your link building campaign, you can not only get your website listed in the search engines quickly, you can also be benefited by the incoming links for a long time to come.

One of the easiest forms of linking that exists is that which is found in directory submissions. There are literally hundreds if not thousands of directories for you to choose from on the Internet where you can post a link to your website. Some of these directories are free to post links and others charge a fee, either a one time fee or a recurring fee. It is up to you to decide if it is worth the effort to post to the free directories and if it is worth the cost to post to some of the paid directories.

Some of the paid directories are very important for you to be listed in, regardless of what the price is. This is especially the case if you are a little bit experienced with search engine optimization and are fairly confident in your ability to get your website listed well on the search engines from your efforts. Some of the paid directories that you want to make sure you're part of include Yahoo and Joeant.com. Yahoo is fairly expensive at $299 a year but by having a link in the Yahoo Directory, you will be giving your SEO efforts of major shot in the arm. Popular directories such as Joeant are an excellent way for you to position yourself with some back links as well.

Submitting your website to the free directories is also an excellent way to give yourself a boost in the SERPS as well as getting yourself listed on the search engines initially. Google does not necessarily give as much weight to these free search engine submissions but remember, Google is not the only kid on the block. Yahoo also has the ability to send you a massive amount of traffic if you're positioned well in their search engine results and MSN can send you traffic as well. Each of these lesser search engines will place a lot of weight on many incoming links from these free directories.

All in all, submitting to directories, whether free or paid is an excellent way to set yourself up for success in your search engine optimization efforts. Make sure, however, that you don't stop with just a few simple directory submissions. Make it a part of your overall efforts to continue improving on your rankings in the search engines.

Web Page Optimization: Do it like a PRO

2008-05-14T21:54:00.000-07:00

SEO (Search Engine Optimization) both the bane and boon of many a person's existence. It's a known fact that the best way to get traffic to your website is by simply having your site show up in the first page or two of the major search engine's results. Visitors that come in from those search engine results pages (referred to as SERP) have two main things going for them.

They are more likely to buy, and they didn't cost you any money to get there. Getting your site onto those first two pages can be a struggle, and people are always watching what you are doing and gunning for the top spot. You have to keep aware of all of the latest tactics and methods and measure yourself against your competitors.

Yes, competitors. Many people aren't aware of the competitive nature of SERPs positioning, but it is. Keep in mind that you are ranked in comparison with the other sites in the results. If the search engine thinks that your content is more relevant, then you rank higher, if it is determined that your content is less relevant, then you fall in the results. If they know what they are doing, the other sites showing up for the searches you wish to rank high in are watching you, and the other sites on the first two pages to see what they are doing, and if they are rising or falling.

So how do you ensure that you can rank well against the other sites out there and rise in the SERPs? Well, for starters, let's assume that there are only three search engines, because frankly, Google, Yahoo, and MSN (in that order) represent the majority, the vast majority of searches. And Google represents the vast majority amongst those three. For the purposes of this article we'll focus only on Google. If you do right by them, what you do will be good for other search engines as well.

Before we go any further it's important that you understand the nature of SEO. It is not an exact science. The exalted minds inside the Googleplex do not share their secret sauce with the unwashed masses. The reason for this is simple: if they revealed exactly how their logic works, it would be exploited--this has happened before. The methods for performing SEO are based upon the trial and error of many, many internet users as they worked out what works, what doesn't and what will get your site unindexed - or worse: banned.

This is important. There are good and bad ways to optimize your site. The bad ways are called 'Black Hat'. Sure, they may work for awhile, and some Google can't (or doesn't bother to) pick up automatically. However you can report a site to Google as using Black Hat SEO tactics and Google will remove that site from the index (meaning it won't show up in search results). Removing a site from the index is usually only done for a certain amount of time and can be appealable. Banning is far more severe and banned sites are often gone for good with no way to get Google to add it back to their index. Beware of a lot of things that seem shady.

If you think they are shady, chances are that the folks at Google will think so too and if one of those other sites in the SERPs wants to rise up and they visit your site and see your shady tactics, they won't hesitate to report you.

Yeah, it's a bit unfair, but it's the world we live in. Google's not alone in this--the other search engines will do it too.

Now that we've got that out of the way, let's dive into the two ways to optimize your site.
On Page Optimization

This is what most people think of when they think of SEO. In reality it is the less effective of the two methods, though as Google improves its ability to determine real content from fluff it is getting more valuable. A bit of history first.

Back when people started realizing that they could make or break their business by where they came up in the SERPs, they started adding all sorts of content to their sites to improve their ranking. The most common of these was the meta keywords. These are words that are placed in the code on a website that tell the search engines what the site is about. Way back when the 'net was young, the search engines believed these keywords.

They don't anymore. People abused the keywords system by putting their competitors names in them, or by even putting completely bogus words in. A site looking to sell more jeans would put Britney Spears in their keywords to get people to visit them inadvertently. Needless to say, keywords play very little importance anymore. I have gotten sites to the #1 position on Google without using keywords at all.

As the search engines got wise to the whole bogus keywords thing, they started looking at all of the content on a website. They can only read text, so images and animated graphics (like flash) were ignored. People learned tactics to place all sorts of text on their site that was invisible to users, but that the search engines (looking at the source code) would see. So search engines started to distrust the websites themselves.

You're asking yourself how they can know what a site is about then. They asked themselves the same question and came up with an obvious answer: they can't. But other humans can. This is called 'Off Page Optimization' and is covered in the second type of optimization.

They never really disregarded the webpage entirely, but they lowered its importance in their overall factoring of a page's importance and relevancy. However, as their savvy increases and they have more computing power to analyse content, search engines are starting to consider the page's content as being more and more important. They can often discern the difference between human generated and computer generated text, and can tell if the content on a page is relevant to a particular topic or not. As they do this more, the page itself will continue to get more important.

There used to be a lot of tactics and tricks to get the search engines to pay more attention to your page, but the number one tip is now this: Write human readable content (don't try to write it to load it with terms and keywords) that has value and real relevancy. Make sure that you do use the words and phrases you think people will search for, and do use them more than once, but don't go overboard. Bolding and using larger fonts (and H1 tags) will help as well, but don't overdo it. If you make your page look too wonky it will not work for the second type of optimization.

Here's a quick rundown of things to make sure you do.

Make sure the page title is descriptive - make it different with each page if you can

Use the meta description tag and make it good - this is what most search engines show as the blurb about your site on the results page.

Don't worry alot about your HTML formatting. Search engines are used to reading crappy HTML and they don't care too much

Make sure you use your keywords in your copy more than once

Do bold them if it works in your content

If you can make it work, use an H1 or H2 tag. If you are comfortable with CSS you can make the text in them smaller (this is becoming less and less important).

Make sure to use alt and title tags on images. It lets the search engines know what the image is about and can cause your images to show up on the Google image search.

Use title tags on your links. It will help the search engines know more about the page you are

linking to and improve relevancy

Don't put too many links to other sites. Links out lower your page's importance.
Off Page Optimization

This is also called 'Off Site Optimization' which is a misnomer. Search engines care little about 'websites' and care more about 'web pages'. The reason for this is that they don't link to a site, they link to a page. So what is this mysterious type of SEO you ask? Well, if you read the on page part above you will have learned that Google and the other search engines decided that they couldn't trust the page itself too much as too many people put fake content on a page to generate traffic. So they decided that the best way to know if a page was relevant was to let people do it for them.

How do they make this work? Well, they simply look at who links to you and what their page is about. If your page is about sewing, and another page that Google knows people like is also about sewing and it links to you, then your page is probably not misrepresenting itself. This is the driving force behind what is called 'Page Rank'. Page rank is essentially a calculation of the importance of the pages linking to you vs the relevancy of your content to those pages. If a page about banking links to a page about peanut butter, then chances are that the search engines won't assign any importance to that link, but links between pages of similar content have high importance.

There is also a nebulous thing that we know exists, but don't know how to quantify. It is the matter of how much a search engine trusts a site. Sites with high trust have their outbound links given more importance than sites the search engine does not trust. An easy way to determine if a site is trustworthy or not is to think about it yourself. The folks at the search engines are humans, they will trust the same sites you do and distrust the same sites you do (give or take a bit).Untrustworthy Sites

Link/Banner farms - sites with nothing but links to various other sites. These used to work, but the search engines wised up and now having a link farm link to you will hurt, not help
Sites with a lot of advertising on them - The search engines know that these sites are mostly computer generated and have no valuable content, and so don't pay any heed to what they link to.

Black Hat Sites - sites that use questionable SEO tactics aren't ones that you want linking to you. Google is suspicious of them, no reason to make it suspicious of youTrustworthy Sites
Directories - There are two types of directories. Automatic and Human verified. Google knows which are which and if your site is listed on a human verified directory (meaning that someone looked at your site and verified that your description and content match the category you chose to have it listed in) then it knows that your content is relevant to the description you gave. Find the directories for your market (just google things like sewing boston directory or whatever your niche/market is and you'll find some to list in.

News Sites - Many news sites allow you to post comments on them. Don't spam, but find some relevant articles to your site and post a few comments. Its not advised that you place your link right in the article (unless you think it applies) but rather have your link in your profile.
Sites with high page rank - This is key. There is little point having sites with no page rank link to your site with no page rank. You want sites with high page rank linking to you. Install the Google toolbar and select yes when it asks if you want to view pagerank. This will let you know how other sites rank and help you determine where to try to get links.

There are a lot of other tips and helpful bits of information out there and I'll be posting a few more specialized articles about them. While there is a lot of bogus software and ebooks out there that will literally tell you no more than what you have read above, there are some that will help you carry out the suggestions above.

They'll suggest directories, give you reports on how well you rank against your competitors and many other things. Most you can do on your own, but they take time. Good SEO software should mainly remove the tedious, manual tasks involved in SEO and help you focus on more important things like niche research and adding actual, valuable content to your site.

Top 3 Ways to Get Backlinks

2008-05-14T11:42:00.000-07:00

I don't want to bore you guys with telling you why we need backlinks why they are improtant blaaaaaaaaaaa blaaaaaaaa blaaaaaaaaaa .... But What I really want to share here are the top there ways which are working for the people who want to follow White Hat SEO. These are simple and they give you the much required and needed backlinks.

We all know that without traffic, your Internet business will do nothing. Backlinks, acting like large roadside signs pointing to your blog, will direct new visitors to your blog and give your blog the needed exposure.

I will discuss three ways to get backlinks pointing to your blogs.

Submit your blog post to social directories

This will quickly get backlinks to your blog. when done properly, a submission to Stumble Upon and Digg will create many backlinks and huge amounts of traffic.

Article marketing -

Article marketing is still a great way to create traffic and back links to your website and for the most part is free. Just make sure your author bio box is well written and includes links to your blog. This is what gets the links to your blog as most article submission sites don't allow direct links. If they do then link away in the article also.

Post comments

A very effective and easy way to create backlinks is to comment on blogs that are related to yours. If people like your comment, they will most likely go to your blog to read more of your material. One great way to create back links is Posting comments in other people's blogs. Every time you post you are able to include your name and your website address in some comments. Try to include your primary keyword in the name if you can.

These are three ways to get backlinks to your blog. None of them are hard and they don't take a long time to do. Once you start doing them regularly, it will become second nature to you, just like watching all the traffic coming to your blog. I hope this helps you in your endeavor to make money on line and improve your Internet business and blog.

These are the 3 best methods of getting tons of backlinks which are used by maximum web publishers. If they are using this methods of creating backlinks and undoubtably they have achieved great level of success you can do that too.....

If you run a local business, your first priority in search engine optimization should not be to focus on the most popular, universal keyword phrases,

2008-05-06T05:38:00.000-07:00

Today let me share some really good and effective Search Engine Optimization Tips and Tricks with you. These Search Engine Marketing Tips are let me assure you first these are all white hat techniques and I will never be sharing any blackhat technique here on this blog.

Search Engine Marketing Techniques that are being employed by the SEO Guru's are no different that what you would see here or what you might read in Search Engine Articles on any good Article Submission Web directory.

Reason why I never encourage anyone to use black hat techniques are quite simple. Well these techniques might give you some success in fooling the system and you might end up making some money "FOR A WHILE' eventually you will be busted and then your account if its Adsense then that would be banned. It happens all the time and all those guys who are invovled in such things realise this when they get the Email from Google for there Account Suspension.

As said before Search Engine Optimization or Search Engine Marketing are quite simple and what is requried is patient and persistence. Anways enough of that lets get straight to what are the todays tips;

If you run a local business, your first priority in search engine optimization should not be to focus on the most popular, universal keyword phrases, but to focus on local keyword phrases that get fewer searches.

While it is a good idea to invest some time in optimizing for those popular keyword phrases throughout your seo campaign, you should first be concerned about getting visitors to your site, and, especially if you service a local area, you should be interested in bringing in local clients.

Essentially, there are two types of search engine optimization universal search engine optimization and local search engine optimization. The importance of each depend greatly on the nature of your business.

If you offer a service or product that clients throughout the country, and perhaps the world, are interested in, then you should optimize for universal keywords. Example: You sell laptop computers on the internet and ship throughout the world. Your primary interest would be to rank highly for terms such as 'laptop computers'.

If you run a local small business such as a flower shop, law firm, or car dealership, you want to attract local patrons, and it does no good to bring in customers from California if your business is in Maryland. If you run a car dealership you should be interested in terms such as 'baltimore ford dealer' or 'maryland ford dealership'.

A well-planned seo strategy first identifies which type of search engine optimization you require: universal or local. If you require local search engine optimization, here are a few helpful steps you can follow.

Analyze keywords on Wordtracker or Trellian and determine which are the most popular universal terms.

Log on to Google Adwords keyword phrase suggestion tool.

Enter local search engine optimization keyword phrases in the box provided (check Descriptive words or phrases). Utilize the most popular universal keyword phases and localize them. If the most popular universal term is 'ford dealer' then search for 'baltimore ford dealer. All try searching for local counties and other local cities from which customers may come to your business.

Google will provide information regarding that particular keywords level of advertiser competition and both last month's and this month's search frequency. If the local keyword phrase has been searched, record that phrase and continue to the next one.

Once you've developed a substantial list of local search engine optimization phrases, you can continue on with your internet marketing campaign.

Free Traffic Exchanges Are King

2008-04-22T23:01:00.000-07:00

If you’re a serious online marketer with your own website or websites, or you promote affiliate marketing programs, you know how expensive PPC (pay-per-click) advertising can be. If you’re in a very competitive market, you know first hand how very expensive this can be. Your $1 and $5 clicks add up very quickly, and if you don’t know what you’re doing, you will lose a lot of money to your competition, and to the PPC companies you’re advertising through, like Google AdWords.
There are other online advertising options open to you other than just PPC. There are traffic exchange websites that allow marketers to earn credits to have their websites advertised to a whole community of many thousands of users within the exchange. Webmasters earn credits to have their websites and promotions added into the rotation while surfing through other websites within the traffic exchange system. Also, most of the newer click exchange websites allow you to purchase hundreds or thousand of hits for fractions of a penny, so you don’t have to spend a lot of time surfing. Some also have games to keep you occupied and amused while earning credits. Some allow you to sell or trade your credits for cash. Many of the newer traffic exchange sites are truly a huge benefit for online marketers today.
Another huge benefit for website owners from traffic exchange systems is the number of back links they receive for their websites. The more popular these click exchange sites become, the higher their page rank becomes in popular search engines. When your website URLs are in the website rotation, your click count increases, and search engines start to rank your website higher on the free search engine chain. You not only attract new visitors to your website each and every day from the exchange, but you have the ability to get your website higher in the free search engine listings.
One of the absolute best ways to get free, or very cheap, targeted traffic today is by using traffic exchange website. Having a large community of users, clicking through websites and advertisements to earn credits is a powerful way to get targeted traffic to your website. Having the ability to generate more free traffic, and options to purchase clicks for fractions of a penny, or cash in credits for cash, are just some of the benefits why these traffic exchange sites are so popular today and their popularity is growing by the day. All website traffic is not created equally. Traffic is one thing, but targeted traffic is king! These traffic exchange website deliver targeted traffic by visitors who are interested in what you have to offer.
Nothing will replace good old PPC advertising, but when you compliment PPC with click exchanges, just watch your visitors increase by the hundreds, if not thousands each and every month, and watch your sales increase as well. And isn’t this what it’s all about? So do all you can to increase your targeted traffic, and you will increase your odds of converting your visitors into paying customers. And that’s the name of the game my friend.

Keyword Research 101

2008-04-18T04:09:00.000-07:00

By Michael Pedone

As a search engine optimization company, eTrafficJams.com has a responsibility to help our clients find the right keyword phrases that will help them improve sales. Unfortunately, there is a widespread misconception that you need highly competitive keyword phrases that get the most traffic to do this. This could not be farther from the truth!

More often than not, and understandably so, clients who hire us for search engine optimization will request very general, non-specific keyword phrases because tools like Overture’s keyword finder tells them that keyword phrase “XYZ” gets the most searches. However, there is a major pitfall with using only this data.

Now you may be thinking, “Oh you’re just another search engine optimization company trying to avoid having to target the hard-to-get keyword phrases," but that is not the case. It is possible to get first-page rankings in the free listing area of the major search engines for competitive keyword phrases, and we have done so numerous times for ourselves and clients.

But although you may have been sold on the idea that top website positioning is the goal, what you really want is for your web site to generate more qualified leads or, better yet, sales.

Quantity vs. quality
Simply trying to get top search engine placement based upon “quantity” (in other words, those keyword phrases being searched on most) may totally miss the mark of your ultimate goal: more sales. Getting targeted website traffic, meaning people who are literally using the search engines as an online yellow pages phone book to find a product or service that will solve their need / pain, is what SEO is really all about. Because only targeted traffic will spend money on what you’re selling.

Take a moment and think about your own search habits for a moment. Let’s say you live in Connecticut and you need a limo. Do you use Google to search for “limo” or “Connecticut limo”?

Sure, the keyword “limo” gets a ton more searches than does the phrase “Connecticut limo," but the fact is even if your SEO company was able to get your site ranked on the first page of Google for the keyword “limo," what are the chances that people using that search term are customers looking for a limo in your area? What are the chances they are your target audience? Do you really want to get Internet leads from people all over the map who you can’t serve, or would you rather be found under a keyword phrase that pre-qualifies your prospects?

This does not mean you shouldn’t go after competitive keyword phrases ever. I believe that if a keyword phrase accurately describes your product or service and would bring you targeted website traffic (buyers, not just shoppers) then by all means optimize for it! But make sure your expectations are realistic and don’t put all your keywords into one basket.

Instead, let’s say you choose an SEO package that includes 20 to 30 keyword phrases. Have a good mix of five or 10 really relevant keyword phrases that are highly competitive, and then make sure the rest of your keyword phrases are ones that will bring targeted website traffic, even if the numbers are low. The payoff will be higher search engine placement across the board, plus your quality and quantity of leads will skyrocket, bringing increased sales along for the ride.

The art of finding the right keyword phrase
OK, so now that you are on board with finding the right phrases and not just the ones that get the most searches, you need to know how to find them.

Simply using a tool like Overture’s word suggestion tool is just not going to cut it. You need to have a clear goal before you even start the hunt for keyword phrases.

There are several fundamentals at play here that even most search engine optimization companies overlook:

One: You need to get in touch with your real market, those who pay your bills. Ask yourself who your customers are and what problems do they have that your product or service solves.

Two: You need to think like your customers and not assume you know what keyword phrases they use to find you. All too often the clients who hire us to handle their optimization are too close to their own situation and they need a little eye-opening Q and A session to get them thinking more like their clients. This goes a long way toward uncovering the right type of phrases...but it is not the end of the road.

One last note before we move on. Depending on your own server logs or stats package to tell you where your customers are coming from is not the right way to determine the keyword phrases to use in your search engine optimization campaign. Why? Because if you were satisfied with the results those keyword phrases were currently bringing you, you wouldn’t be looking to hire or do your own SEO. You need to find the “money phrases” that buyers are using everyday to search for and find companies just like yours. Let’s look at one way of doing just that.

Finding the 'money keyword phrases'
Once the suggestions above are in progress and your juices are flowing, the following method works very well in uncovering keyword phrases that will bring traffic to your site and put money in your pocket.

First, decide what your categories are.

Look at your site and note all the different page groupings and subjects you have in your navigation. Start with general subject headings and move deeper into your site. Here’s an example:

At eTrafficJams.com, we offer “Search Engine Optimization” so our main category would be:

Search Engine Optimization

And we have sub categories such as:

SEO Services
Free Search Engine Optimization Analysis
Free SEO Price Quote
SEO Articles

Just to name a few. But if you go deeper into the site you see second-level sub categories. For instance, our search engine optimization services page reveals that we offer:

Keyword Research
Web Site Optimization
Search Engine Copywriting
Search Engine Registration
Link Popularity
Web Site Traffic Analysis

So the end result of our category research would look like this:

Main Category:

Search Engine Optimization

Sub Categories:

SEO Services
Free Search Engine Optimization Analysis
Free Price Quote
SEO Articles

2nd level Sub Categories (Hint: this is where you can really score some homerun traffic)

Keyword Research
Web Page Optimization
Search Engine Copywriting
Search Engine Registration
Link Popularity
Web Site Traffic Analysis

The actual names of these categories and sub categories are what you would use to start your keyword phrase research.

Now you need a good keyword tracking tool so you can enter the title of each category into it and start honing your list of keyword phrases. I use and recommend Wordtracker. I have found that there’s an art to using Wordtracker and we have developed our own methodology for using it in a way that will produce the best keyword phrases for your optimization venture.

Believe it or not, the hardest part is already done. Now that you’ve brainstormed on what your target market is, what problems your product / service solves for them, and determined your website’s categories, you are ready for Wordtracker.

The finish line is not far away at this point and the rewards could be great but you must finish what you started and not cut any corners here. The next section will guide you on how to use Wordtracker like a pro to get the best phrases for your search engine optimization.

Selecting the RIGHT keyword phrases
As with any powerful tool, there is a right way and a few wrong ways to use Wordtracker. We’ll try to prevent the most common mistakes in this section. But first, a few words about how Wordtracker works.

It allows you to enter a keyword phrase (such as one of your category names) and then:

It automatically supplies other keyword phrases related to your original phrase. So if I type in “search engine optimization” it will provide me with other related terms being searched for. Check out the example below:

Click here to add all keywords to your basket

Keyword Count Predict Dig
search engine optimization 1045 1067
economical search engine optimization 176 180
search engine optimization company 28 29

The other thing Wordtracker does is it tells me how many searches are being done on a particular keyword phrase.

Beware: This is where a crucial mistake is usually made! It’s still too early to choose keyword phrases based on their “search count” (the popularity of a keyword phrase based upon the amount of searches it’s getting).

Why you ask? Because there is still one crucial element missing: the amount of competition for each keyword phrase.

Wordtracker can help you with this, too. If you type in your main keyword category and some of the other additional phrases related to it, Wordtracker will give you a good indication of:

a) How many searches are expected to be done on those phrases on a given search engine like Google, and...

b) The number of competing web pages for a specific keyword phrase already in the database of a given search engine.

This information will become indispensable as you settle on your final list of keyword phrases.

At this stage of the game, many fall into a trap that can completely derail their optimization efforts. That trap is selecting keyword phrases based simply on the number of searches their primary keyword categories are getting.

Chances are most if not all of your category and sub category keyword phrases will be among the most competitive in their class. And yes, I did mention earlier that it’s okay to optimize for highly competitive keyword phrases if your page is all about a specific product or service and those keyword phrases bring the exact type of traffic suited for that page.

But there are probably several primary keyword phrases on your list that may prove to be quite difficult to get first or second page ranking results with.

So to help you make an educated decision on what terms to optimize for, I recommend you enter your category keyword phrases and related phrases one at a time into Wordtracker, regardless of their reported popularity. (All the keyword phrases you select are added to a master “basket” for you to review when you are done).

Once you have this master list, review it without looking at the stats. If you include the stats at this stage, it will probably skew your thinking.

If it helps, move the keyword phrases only to an Excel sheet and organize them alphabetically.

Then simply go through the list and ask yourself, “If a customer found our site with this keyword phrase, would he / she be a buyer?”

Deep six the ones that immediately say “no” to you.

With your new, scaled-down list, go back to Wordtracker and this time examine the words and stats together. (This is where a professional search engine optimization consultant can truly come in handy.)

Now you are faced with the biggie: “Which keyword phrases do I choose for the final cut?”

Fortunately, you now have all the data on the three most important considerations in your hands:

What are the most relevant keyword phrases for this page in order of importance?
What is the popularity of each of these keyword phrases?
How much competition does each of these keyword phrases have?

So, to review...

You have determined that the following keyword phrases would bring targeted web site traffic to your site:

ABC
ABCD
ABCDE

Keyword phrase “ABC” gets 200 searches a day and has five million web pages already competing with you in this category.

“ABCD” gets 85 searches a day but only has 600,000 competing web pages.

“ABCDE” has 25 searches a day and only 250,000 competing web pages.

So, that’s the complete picture! Now that you’ve completed this tutorial, you’re better equipped to select the right keyword phrases that will sky rocket not only your search engine placement but your sales, too.

Search Marketing Predictions for 2008

2008-04-12T12:37:00.000-07:00

Last week, we shared some New Years Resolutions from several search marketers and social media marketers. I asked many of those same marketers what they thought 2008 had in store for search. Again, I'll be sharing their responses in two parts.

If you want to share your own predictions, or discuss any of the ones shared here, feel free to join the conversation in the SEW Forums.
Q: What do you predict will be the three most significant happenings in search for 2008? General themes, specific events to watch for, or even straight-out predictions would work.

Amanda Watlington, owner of Searching for Profit

Top theme for me is a bit gloomy. If the pundits are right we may be lurching into a recession. Again if they are right, it will last throughout the year; hence it is not a short term blip in the purchasing radar. Other than the dot-com bust, which did not uniformly impact the broad economy as a whole, we have no data on how search performs during a time of reduced employment and lowered consumer spending – typical hallmarks of recession.

Search is a pull medium, with the consumer doing the pulling via the keyword. In the past decade consumers have continued to elevate their level of engagement with search and have increasingly integrated it into their daily lives. We have enjoyed huge growth as a result.

I am curious and a bit anxious to see: What happens to search when the searcher's daily life changes – loss of job, loss of home, loss of health insurance – all part of the ugliness of recession. Do laid off consumers reduce their searching as they no longer have the fast broadband connections they once enjoyed in the workplace? Should we be looking at differing times of activity? For many of my client sites, the busiest times are at the end of the workday. Will this shift? Will we see changes in traffic and basic site visitation metrics?

Clients have enough experience by now with search to have developed expectations as to what they believe it will deliver, but those expectations have been framed during a time of continuous growth in the online sector and for the economy as a whole. During recession, I expect that we may see lots more lookers and less buyers. The malls were very busy at Xmas, but the buying was slow and the discounts and early sales were used extensively to draw in the purchaser. Huge sales reduce margins and increase business risks.

What will this mean for search? In my opinion unless the site owner has a firm grip on the metrics of search as it relates to the cost of selling the goods, they may falter, particularly if the recession extends through multiple seasons. Last year would not have been too soon to focus attention on improving conversion of paid search. Every marketing dollar is more precious during recession and must be spent ever more carefully. So that being said, improved bang for the buck is a must-have.

As search marketers we are the insiders. We are supposed to know and understand search in all of its dimensions. We are moving into uncharted territory. It is not territory that I am excited to explore, but I will go there nonetheless.
Andrew Goodman, principal at Page Zero Media

1. Justified or not, there will be renewed calls for investigations into forms of "bias" in how Google serves up content, how it downgrades the performance of its direct competitors in both paid and organic listings, etc. For the time being, these claims and charges will remain toothless, as it is an election year and no one is actually going to do anything about anything.

2. Rich Skrenta's search engine startup, Blekko, will be acquired by Yahoo even before it comes out of beta.

3. Jason Calacanis will discover that he doesn't have "unlimited access to capital."

4. Google will release the GPhone. It will be one of the most embarrassing flops in Google history.

OR, Google will begin giving away free mobile devices of some sort, intended to create loyalty to the Google brand and software. This too will add fuel to the fire of "antitrust" and "unfair competition" charges being bandied about, and again, nothing will happen soon because it's an election year.

5. Several prominent Googlers will be accused of bias in their support for presidential candidates, especially Barack Obama. Their responses will refer to such basic Constitutional rights as the First Amendment.

6. In Myanmar, Internet usage will continue to be restricted or banned. A blogger will be executed publicly. It will lead to external military intervention. Pro-am journalists will bravely enter the country and images of repression will be posted on NowPublic, YouTube, etc.
Anne Kennedy, managing partner of Beyond Ink

In 2008, we need to keep an eye on Wall Street. Here's why: as our market expands to include many more businesses, which is good, many potential customers will be publicly held, and sensitive to economic factors such as stock prices, prime rates and quarterly earnings reports, always dodgy for marketing budgets. That search marketing provides measurably superior ROI to other media is good. The challenge remains to convince marketing folks inside such companies of this, when search is strangely foreign and often in conflict with traditional marketing principles.

We need to watch our backs for competitive undermining from Madison Avenue agencies, who are already worried about their own budget allocations for 2008, given the anxious U.S. economy. The last time a recession reared its ugly head, they were the first our established media partners jettisoned from new business as they drew up the gangplanks to save their own revenues. Search marketers worked smarter and more nimbly and prospered then, but are we solid enough to do it again?

Marketing budgets will be cut. Our task is to increase the search proportion regardless of this, which means dedicated effort to befriending and convincing traditional marketers that search is their best strategy.

The shape of 2008 will be set by the efforts of folks at either end of Pennsylvania Avenue, and the resulting effect on the economy. The race for the White House will prove distracting and even divisive to our customers, and raise the noise-to-signal ratio considerably by competing for space in the search stream.

With the search engines, dwindling transparency is of concern, both in PPC pricing and organic results.
Dana Todd, executive VP at SiteLab International

1. We should see a leveling-out of the search market share pie this year, although I think it's going to be end-of-year before we see it hit a ceiling. Google will continue to take share-of-queries from the others, but will cap out at 85% or less. The others will focus on leveraging their non-search ad programs to make up the revenue losses.

2. The Google/DoubleClick merger will prove a strain for Google, as they find themselves in the same boat as Yahoo after its Overture acquisition. Selling both performance advertising and display advertising is a challenge, and creating synergies between the sales/customer support teams of both organizations will take years. However, the behavioral targeting potential upside is huge if they can get it integrated.

3. Google's stock price will take a tumble, but probably not as bad as some folks might think – it's not going to collapse the way many internet stocks did in the last bubble. Wall Street is fickle, and many are looking for reasons to doubt Google's valuation. I see it taking a wallop at the end of the year, Q4, losing about 2/3 its stock price.

4. Ad exchanges will NOT prove to be a significant evolution in the display ad world, as advertisers test the model and find that remnant inventory is still remnant inventory, even if it's in a bargain bin. With a few exceptions, most of the insta-networks will die this year. Even behavioral will not drive significantly higher CPMs for display. What WILL drive up pricing is scarcity, as the premium spaces fill up their inventory. Expect to see a growing gap between premium and non-premium ad space.

5. Yahoo will separate its publishing properties (e.g. Yahoo News, Yahoo Finance) from its advertising networks (display, search, mobile), which will give it more flexibility in providing a larger suite of offerings to advertisers. Alternately, AT&T will buy Yahoo to help bulk up its mobile and local/directory products.

6. Google News will take on Yahoo News head to head for users – this is one area where Yahoo has dominated easily, and it's an under-monetized asset. If Google can beat Yahoo News in uniques, they can easily leverage the DoubleClick display business into the property.
Danielle Leitch, EVP of client strategy at MoreVisibility

I feel that Yahoo will be someone to watch in 2008 as it relates to its market share and where it could shift to another player. I'd expect a possible acquisition or partnership to do rev share with someone else's search results, versus trying to compete with their own.

Also, I see adaption of the industry as a whole shifting from just acronyms (SEO, CPC, SEM) to "interactive marketing." As a result, I believe agencies will become more full service then they had been – which could lead to mergers or partnerships in that area too.

Education and training will be important. Although I don't know I could say that the focus will be to try and bring it in house, I do expect that companies will be requiring their own staff to be better educated on the areas that their interactive marketing agency manages for them. So training and education (online and offline) should be an important area (and opportunity) to get addressed to advertisers this year. Agencies will become more accountable than ever before, as clients push for harder-to-obtain metrics and results.
David Berkowitz, director of emerging media & client strategy at 360i

1. Consumers gain the most control yet over their privacy. Ask.com is already trying to turn privacy protection into a differentiator, but we're going to see this spread. It's going to be much easier for consumers to turn on and off features that will associate their searches and online behavior with personally identifiable information.

2. At least one of the major engines will test adding in display elements such as logos and other images in search ads.

3. While Wikia's search engine won't pose a major threat to the existing order, its presence and activist community will cause the major engines to discuss transparency much more openly.
David Wallace, CEO of SearchRank

I think more people are going to be watching Google closely in how they treat the information they have. In other words, what their policy continues to be regarding privacy issues.

I hope (crossing fingers) that Google will lose some of their market share, allowing the other three (Yahoo, Microsoft and Ask) to pick up some of that share, especially Ask.
Deborah Richman, SVP of marketing & business development at Collarity

If I'm looking at the top search engines:

1. That Google's going to game-change the contextual ad business with banners next year
2. That DoubleClick and Google will figure out new sales deals to draw in big publishers
3. That Google's not going to make much progress in search algorithm, and still include Page Rank
4. That Microsoft will make money from its publisher deals, and not from increased consumer market share
5. That Yahoo continues to milk its traffic (unless that well-known Microsoft deal prediction happens)
6. That Ask.com will try to cash out somehow, with some Diller financial engineering

If I'm looking at other search engines:

1. That human-powered Mahalo and Cha-Cha won't make it big
2. That some vertical searches will have shake-ups, maybe health
3. That other print publishers try to buy smaller vertical engines
4. That some of the shopping engines will keep dropping away
5. That metasearch will not be the answer to better search

If I'm looking at social sites:

1. That social search will finally be useful, not just for friends
2. That Digg will get acquired by Microsoft
3. That Facebook will open up and allow friends-data sharing
4. That MySpace will figure out how to get in the mobile game better

If I'm thinking about widgets:

1. That widgets become another online presence just like a website, a blog, or social page
2. That we all get smarter about how to distribute them, not just on Facebook or Google gadgets
3. That we start testing what belongs best in them, either links, search or content
4. That publishers start to really get comfortable with controlling content off their domains

Debra Mastaler, link building specialist at Alliance-Link

1. Reputation management is going to be the hot service this year. With more sites adding and encouraging customer reviews, it's going to be very important to monitor what's being said about your company and provide counter-spin measures to affect rankings if needed.

2. I think you'll see a lot of the smaller SEO single shops/agencies merging and/or partnering with larger companies. SEO is no longer textbook, its success relies on custom link building, reputation management, usability and content generation tactics rather than Titles and tags. Single person shops won't be able to offer the broad and specialized services and will either need to partner out or merge.

3. More private forums are going to blossom as people become hesitant to talk openly about what works and what doesn't.
Eric Enge, president of Stone Temple Consulting

1. Google will continue to implement changes to make paid links less and less interesting. They have opened the door to overt action, and they will not turn back. The other search engines will simply bask in the glow of the results of this. This allows them to reap the benefits without taking the heat.

2. Awareness that search (SEO and SEM) is just one of many marketing-related activities will increase. As a result, SEOs will be forced to work more closely with marketing, development, and design.

3. People-driven search engines (such as Mahalo) will struggle to succeed, and fail. Groups of people do not have the capacity to be objective, and extensive human review of each search result cannot be made scalable. Ultimately, a machine algorithm will be shown to be fundamentally better.
Fionn Downhill, president of Elixir Systems

1. The Search engine marketing industry will continue to mature and there will be more consolidations of traditional SEO companies

2. Rather than the predictions from previous years that traditional ad agencies will acquire SEO companies to implement search, I see more agencies implementing their own search departments with consulting and poaching from traditional SEO firms.

3. Traditional old-style SEOs who have not adopted more of an agency model will fold, or they owners will move on to other things. ( I am working hard not to be one of them!!!)

4. Kevin Ryan will get drunk at SES New York on St. Patrick's Day
Frank Watson, director of SEM and co-founder of Kangamurra Media

1. Wikia will get some groundswell. Although it will not threaten the majors, it will grab a decent amount of market share.

2. Facebook and MySpace will be pushed aside by some new social media/networking program. The shelf life is not a long one.

3. Second Life will fall away, and possibly close, unless they develop niched "worlds" that are more easily accessed and developed.

4. China's percentage of global search share will increase dramatically, be it through Baidu or even Google and Yahoo China.

5. Bill Gross will roll out something this year that will eventually be seen as another "GoTo" type innovation.
Greg Meyers, SEM consultant at SEMGeek

1. I believe you will see the birth of "political PPC" due to the upcoming 2008 election. I think PPC will play a major part with regard to the ads/creatives messaging as well as the keyword selections. Every tactic that is being used on older media channels such as TV, radio and print will be mimicked in PPC. Not only will they be bidding on all of the candidates names and negative campaigning, but more importantly the issues for which they stand for (abortion, taxes, environment, etc..)

2. I see the search engines spending more of their R&D money on contextual advertising. As PPC continues to get more expensive, advertisers will have to find alternate ways to generate cheaper, relevant traffic.

3. I also think there will be more companies and corporations bringing search marketing "in-house," as more and more people get exposed to this industry. This is a result of the future economy and the knowledge of blogs and search engines making it easier to execute.
Gregg Stewart, senior VP at TMP Directional Marketing

Local starts to make and impact. First it will be national brands going local via their distribution channels (e.g., dealer, franchisee, etc), then local businesses beginning to embrace search.

How to Get the Best Deal on Your SEO Project

2008-04-09T11:37:00.000-07:00

If you own or manage a business Website, chances are you are at least somewhat familiar with the concept of search engine optimization (SEO). You may have read any number of books and articles on the subject and possibly given it a try yourself. Or perhaps, after exhaustive research, you decided that your time is better spent in your area of expertise. If that’s the case, I have some good news for you. There is such a thing as affordable search engine optimization. In fact, when you know what to look for, it can be a real bargain.

Step One – 3 Simple Questions:

The first step is estimating some target market information. Just ask a few simple questions and write down the answers that you come up with. You’ll need this information later:

1. How many people do you think are looking for what you offer?
2. What keywords are they using in search engine searches?
3. Which keywords are the most popular to meet your needs?

Step Two - Verify:

Now that you have your initial estimates, let’s validate the information. Visit Overture.com’s Advertiser Center and try their Search Term Suggestion Tool located at: http://www.content.overture.com/d/USm/ac/index.jhtml

Type in any term that you think is close to what your potential visitors are looking for. You will see how many searches were performed, on the Overture search system, for the previous month. TIP – Use a general search term to start with.

Now you have the single most important advantage when dealing with any trained business professional – you are informed!

Step Three – Make it Happen:

Now that you have this great information, you want to see it implemented. This is the best part. I recommend a visit to SEO Partner. SEO Partner (www.SEOPartner.com) really lives up to its slogan “search engine optimization on your terms”.

They have assembled an enormous talent pool of SEO developers, who actually compete to work on your project. It does not cost you anything to post your optimization projects. To operate the service, they accept a small commission from the SEO developers (which is only a fraction of what developers would normally spend on marketing efforts alone).

Finally, there’s one of my favorite features. SEO Partner protects you from those less scrupulous SEO ‘experts’ you read about more and more with their protective escrow payment system.

Step Four – Track Your Progress:

Finally, once you have your campaign underway, you really need to track your progress. There are some great tools available for that purpose. Here are links to some of the better products that I have worked with

If Content is King, then Surely Relevance is Queen!

2008-04-08T11:41:00.000-07:00

There has been a lot of to-ing and fro-ing in the search engine world of late and there are lots of conspiracy theories as to why these things happen.

It is easy as a webmaster to get caught up in these webs of intrigue.

You get email notes about them, you view so-called experts' thoughts on bulletin Boards - hey you probably even read things in newsletter articles!

Well I hope so anyway....

The big driver for webmasters currently appears to be content and link building.

While link building is important I don't believe it makes Queen. Maybe a Prince. Content and links DO go hand in hand but, without relevance, the Kingdom is doomed. Sorry I will stop the analogy now! :-)

If your site is about finance, then finance content is best supported by finance link exchanges. Relevance!

If your site is about finance, then finance content supported by casino link exchanges from a PR8 site while in the short term may help,…but all the signs are saying this is not a long term strategy.

Okay,so what is the best strategy?

Keep EVERYTHING relevant. It is that simple.

Make sure that you only swap or link to sites that are relevant to the content on your pages. Yes I am suggesting link exchanging on pages of your site not a links page.

Links pages seem to be being abused. There are rumours that pages called links, resources or partners are not passing page rank. You could be wasting your time building links that are not giving you any benefits!

Delivering relevant links from relevant content is the future.

Look at sites such as www.bbc.co.uk or www.independent.co.uk. News sites have the right idea. They have 2 or 3 relevant internal links to other articles on the same topic or links to internal tools that are related. These usually can be found at the right hand side of the article.

They also then have weblinks or external links to sites of interest that are related to the topic. These are relevant!

Another benefit of this is that with a content rich site you can add hundreds of links quite legitimately and really add some value both to your Rankings and your users.

With a content-poor site it is difficult, you have to add link pages or create a links directory. A five page site will need to add 10 or 12 good link pages to compete and even then with algorithm changes, this may not be prudent.

Having a site with 400 pages means you can easily add 3 links per page, so you have 1200 link options straight away.

Hopefully this explains that relevance runs a close second to content.

Always bear in mind when writing content that relevant links will not only boost your search engine rankings, but you will also add a service to your visitors.

Combining PPC and SEO to Completely Dominate a Niche

2008-04-07T11:34:00.000-07:00

Alright. So recently I was examining a niche that I previously succeeded in, and decided “Why not? I’ll throw up an adwords campaign in the same niche”. Well people, that solidified the belief that PPC and SEO need to be done together, as I’ll explain in this entry. It’s pretty amazing to me how many companies will do only PPC, or ONLY seo, and not both.

How Much Traffic Really gets Driven to the Search Engine Results?
Right now CTR hovers around 20-35% on an ad I’m running in niche X that I’m also ranking for. My position is 1.5. So given that, we can assume that the upper position (#1) probably drives 30-35% of searches for that keyword to my landing page. #2 probably drives 20-25% of searches. Assuming 10% for the other placements, we’re sitting at only 20% of the actual searches for that keyword ever have people click the search results(assuming they only click one result). As a result, it seems like getting high search engine placement for that keyword is not very profitable. However, this is not the case….

So Why is That Ranking Worth it?
If we control 1 top ranked PPC ad, and 1 top ranked search engine position, we can control the entire mood of the niche. We can give people their first impression of the products, and use both things to control their thought process.

What are you Getting at XMCP?

Example 1: The Scam Approach
Let’s say we have an anti-snoring medication site. On it, we have review pages for 10 different products. We rank highly for each product name. Let’s say amongst these are My Snoring Solution(a real product with Advaliant), Snore-Be-Gone, and Nasal Noise Stopper. We also rank for the term cure snoring. Ok. Now let’s say those products have a fair amount of search traffic(My Snoring Solution is one of those “As Seen on TV” offers, so it for instance would get a lot).
We set our adwords campaign around those keywords, and promote ourselves as a “Review” site, preventing against scams. This type of ad(in my somewhat limited adwords experience, and the experiences of others who have been doing it longer) seems to get a very high CTR on it’s own. Hopefully they’re not set as copyrighted terms.
With properly phrased creatives, it should begin our goal. Casting doubt on the niche competitors. Our goal is to be seen as the authoritative source, while the others appear to be potential scammers/less trustworthy.
Note: Directly calling other products a scam is generally against the advertisers TOS, so be sure to either promote just as a review site, or include a question mark in anything involving the word scam, so it’s not a declaration.
Ok, so now that our AdWords campaign has cast a layer of initial doubt, it’s time to use the rankings to drive the point home. For our page that ranks for “cure snoring”, let’s try a title of Which Snoring Cure Works? and a meta description that says “A Lot of Products to Cure Snoring are Scams. Read our reviews and figure out which cures work”
For the product names we rank for(so long as you’re within the TOS for the advertiser) try the basic title “Is _PRODUCT_ a Scam?” or (if that’s already your adwords title) “Reviews of _PRODUCT_”.
What is Achieved Here?
With those being the first 2 things the user sees when they search for the niche, suddenly a haze of distrust is put over the entire niche.
We have effectively changed the entire way the niche is perceived by the consumer. So long as nobody else picks up on it, we are established as the authority. The light in the dark.
While the traffic may not convert as well if they decide your landing page/reviews are not trustworthy(which should be your goal), it should make your competitors appear even less trustworthy. Following the declaration that there is apparently a lot of scamming going on within the niche, the readers are going to definitely want to read a review or two of any product before they buy. Ideally, everyone else’s adwords CTR tanks, and your clicks get cheaper. Plus you get more traffic to your ranked reviewsite of the product.
Example 2: The Brand-Trust Approach

For this example, let’s say we rank for “cheap web hosts”, and own a hosting company. Since we cannot even infer our competitors are scams or inferior without fear of repercussion, we’re going to instead try and make ourselves seem trustworthy via nicer methods.
If you want to play nice with this method, conduct a survey on your current customers. Get a list of commonly used hosts in your niche, and ask them which of the list(with your own brand included, of course) provided the best value for them. They’re your customers, so in theory you should come out on top.
Set the AdWords campaign to go to a landing page with quotes from this survey. Title may just be your company name or “Cheap Web Hosts”(yay for adwords bolding), and creative may be “98% of customers say _company_ Provides the Best Value“.
Use your ranking description to point out something else that’s a big seller. A coupon, how cheap the server prices are, etc. The title should obviously contain the company name, since you’re using the adwords ad to pump up it’s credibility.
Since the 2 statements appear to come from different sources, they seem more trustworthy. Where the ad itself gets rid of the fear that they may get a crap server, the search engine page is left in a position where it can say what the people w/ that search are truly going after. “Cheap” web hosting. All angles are covered, and seemingly corroborated.
There’s a lot of expansion someone can do on these ideas (getting the PPC ad to compliment the SEO ranking). I shared a few basic examples, because I’m still formulating thoughts on some more complicated ones, and want them to still be useful when I finish these thoughts.
Don’t take my ad copy and think it will work as-is I’m still grasping the ropes of adwords, and this is just a trick I picked up on that worked. I’m sure you guys can think of better copy than what I mentioned.

Done properly, this should increase both adwords and search engine traffic to your site.

101 Link Building Tips to Market Your Website

2008-04-06T11:16:00.000-07:00

By Andy Hagans and Aaron Wall.

Link Building... Time-intensive. Frustrating. Sometimes confusing. Yet Unavoidable. Because ultimately, it's still the trump card for higher rankings.

Many of us have been hoping that it would go away. In Brett Tabke's 5/18 Robots.txt entry, he echoed a sentiment that many, many webmasters hold on to as a hope:

What happens to all those Wavers that think [i]Getting Links = SEO[/i] when that majority of the Google algo is devalued in various ways? Wavers built their fortunes on "links=seo". When that goes away, the Wavers have zero to hold on to.

The pertinent questions:

Will link building still be very important for rankings in the medium term?
When will link popularity be devalued in favor of other algo elements (that are less tedious, from a webmaster's point of view)?

The answers:

Sorry, but link building is still going to be the SEO trump card for the foreseeable future.
I wouldn't hold your breath for search engine algorithms to place less importance on link popularity until the Semantic Web arrives, or maybe when HTTP gets replaced by a new protocol. Because links are still the basic connector, the basic relationship, on the Web. And for the forseeable future they're going to be the easiest way for a computer program to judge the importance and trustworthiness of a Web page.

What will happen to the way search algorithms score links is already happening. The Google algo has become much more elegant and advanced, devaluing staggering amount of links that shouldn't count, and placing more emphasis on trusted links. And the trust and juice given by those links is then verified by elements like user data, domain age, and other relatively hard-to-spoof factors.

But please, don't fool yourself. Links that should count are still the key to rankings (in Google, at least — and MSN and Yahoo! are only a few short years behind). In that spirit, Aaron and I have created our 101 Ways to Build (and Not Build) Links in 2006. (Yeah, it just so happened that there were exactly 101!)

Oh, and mad props to our inspiration, 131 Legitimate Link Building Strategies, one of the original authority documents on link building. It was just getting a bit rusty, that's all ("Host your own Web Ring"?). Anyway, enjoy the update. It's guaranteed to be accurate until January 1, 2007. ;-)