a detailed tracking can show you which advertising is working, which keywords were used to find your site, and help you tune your future advertising.
Free tracking, usually limited in the number of sites or pages, and requiring special HTML code on your site, is done by many, including:
Extreme DM - great for blogs
OneStat
Most third-party tracking involves generating a different URL that you can use for each different advertising source. This form of tracking is good for use with ezines, traffic-exchanges and safelists. Obviously with search engine submitting, you would want to publicise your actual domain name.
TrackMe gives you free tracking via generated URL, as long as you agree to receive two emails a week from its creator.
ResultsTracker is a free url tracker program.
Showing posts with label Free Internet Marketing Help. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Free Internet Marketing Help. Show all posts
Friday, April 27, 2007
Internet Security
The scary part about internet security is the potential for outsiders to access your home PC. They can do this through nasty programs such as keyloggers and trojan horses. Keyloggers are programs that record the actual keystrokes you make at home on your PC. Trojan horse programs often masquerade as an innocent program, and can be used to take control of your PC. These programs are often downloaded to your PC without your knowledge, when surfing, or especially on peer-to-peer programs such as music-exchange programs.
There are numerous security software programs you can download to improve your computer security. You should scan your PC at least weekly (and probably daily) to search for spyware, keyloggers and trojan horses. You also should run an anti-virus program and firewall to control access to your PC. When I first ran the following programs, I found heaps of spyware on my PC, and ZoneAlarm detected several live attempts to directly access my PC. Not anymore. I have also since upgraded to Norton Internet Security, with their frequent automatic updates. You should also check each week if there are updates to your security program, as they need updating to cope with new viruses and programs.
Most frequently recommended security programs (I use all of these):
ZoneAlarm- Free firewall
Ad-Aware- Free spyware detector and deleter.
Search&Destroy - An even tougher free spyware detector, with great descriptions to help you decide whether to go ahead and DESTROY that spyware.
PestPatrol - Good trojan detector
GRC - Great Shields-Up analysis
GRC.com is a stunning site. Once your firewall is installed, run Shields Up, the Full Service Port Scan, the DCOMbomulator, Shoot the Messenger and Unplug and Pray, to close unnecessary ports and flaws.
Some free online scans:
Free Trojan Scan
Panda Active Scan-Free ONLINE virus scan Free Trendmicro ONLINE scan
Other security/performance programs:
Panicware Popup stopper
MailWasher - spamfilter
Now that your PC is secure, check out what kind of reputation your affiliate programs have:
MLMWatchDog
MLMWatch
SEC Warnings
Better Business Bureau
And unfortunately, there are some unscrupulous program owners out there. There have been stories of owners who guessed that one of their affiliates used the same userid and password in different programs. And accessed their accounts in different programs. So make sure you use different passwords for different programs. You can store these passwords in an encrypted form using the latest version of Roboform.
Another tip is to never keep over $50 in any online financial account. Many people use more than one e-gold account: one for "public" use with programs, and another private account, into which they transfer funds as quickly as they can.
And passwords to financial accounts should not be stored on your PC, even in encrypted forms. Some people save them to a removeable diskette, and cut-and-paste them into the programs, so that keyloggers cannot detect typing of the password.
There are numerous security software programs you can download to improve your computer security. You should scan your PC at least weekly (and probably daily) to search for spyware, keyloggers and trojan horses. You also should run an anti-virus program and firewall to control access to your PC. When I first ran the following programs, I found heaps of spyware on my PC, and ZoneAlarm detected several live attempts to directly access my PC. Not anymore. I have also since upgraded to Norton Internet Security, with their frequent automatic updates. You should also check each week if there are updates to your security program, as they need updating to cope with new viruses and programs.
Most frequently recommended security programs (I use all of these):
ZoneAlarm- Free firewall
Ad-Aware- Free spyware detector and deleter.
Search&Destroy - An even tougher free spyware detector, with great descriptions to help you decide whether to go ahead and DESTROY that spyware.
PestPatrol - Good trojan detector
GRC - Great Shields-Up analysis
GRC.com is a stunning site. Once your firewall is installed, run Shields Up, the Full Service Port Scan, the DCOMbomulator, Shoot the Messenger and Unplug and Pray, to close unnecessary ports and flaws.
Some free online scans:
Free Trojan Scan
Panda Active Scan-Free ONLINE virus scan Free Trendmicro ONLINE scan
Other security/performance programs:
Panicware Popup stopper
MailWasher - spamfilter
Now that your PC is secure, check out what kind of reputation your affiliate programs have:
MLMWatchDog
MLMWatch
SEC Warnings
Better Business Bureau
And unfortunately, there are some unscrupulous program owners out there. There have been stories of owners who guessed that one of their affiliates used the same userid and password in different programs. And accessed their accounts in different programs. So make sure you use different passwords for different programs. You can store these passwords in an encrypted form using the latest version of Roboform.
Another tip is to never keep over $50 in any online financial account. Many people use more than one e-gold account: one for "public" use with programs, and another private account, into which they transfer funds as quickly as they can.
And passwords to financial accounts should not be stored on your PC, even in encrypted forms. Some people save them to a removeable diskette, and cut-and-paste them into the programs, so that keyloggers cannot detect typing of the password.
Ebooks
An ebook is an electronic book that you can read on your computer, handheld or even phone. They usually come in one of three formats: PDF files (as created by Adobe Acrobat), Exe files (executable books), or Ebo files ( Microsoft Ebook format).
PDF files are the most widespread format as they are compatible with both Windows and Macintosh computers. . Exe are less popular as they are only compatible with Windows, and often exe files contain viruses. Although they do let you have another level of control, with the ability to apply passwords to ebooks, to ensure they cannot be given away to others.
Ebooks are extremely popular products for sale on the internet as they don't involve delivery costs. Heaps of so-called gurus boast about how they quickly wrote an ebook and then made thousands of dollars selling it online.
And if they aren't selling you an ebook, they're giving you some for free, so that you will join their mailing list.
Ebooks are often used in viral advertising, as a free giveaway. Webmasters and list owners are always looking for free things to give to their list. So someone who writes an ebook, and allows free resale rights, will see their ebook (with personal affiliate links ebedded) circulating through major lists, and their reputation and profile growing quickly. It's a great way to make an impact on the internet.
CutePDF is a great free program that converts documents into PDF format.
Useful links:
Viral PDF - learn how to customise PDFs
eBook Compiler
PDF files are the most widespread format as they are compatible with both Windows and Macintosh computers. . Exe are less popular as they are only compatible with Windows, and often exe files contain viruses. Although they do let you have another level of control, with the ability to apply passwords to ebooks, to ensure they cannot be given away to others.
Ebooks are extremely popular products for sale on the internet as they don't involve delivery costs. Heaps of so-called gurus boast about how they quickly wrote an ebook and then made thousands of dollars selling it online.
And if they aren't selling you an ebook, they're giving you some for free, so that you will join their mailing list.
Ebooks are often used in viral advertising, as a free giveaway. Webmasters and list owners are always looking for free things to give to their list. So someone who writes an ebook, and allows free resale rights, will see their ebook (with personal affiliate links ebedded) circulating through major lists, and their reputation and profile growing quickly. It's a great way to make an impact on the internet.
CutePDF is a great free program that converts documents into PDF format.
Useful links:
Viral PDF - learn how to customise PDFs
eBook Compiler
Tuesday, April 24, 2007
Ezines
Ezines are electronic newsletters or magazines sent by e-mail to a list of people who have chosen to subscribe to them. They are an extremely popular internet marketing technique. Some ezines are little more than a paragraph in length. Others have heaps of content. Ezine was the popular word for a newsletter a few years ago, but now the term newsletter is coming back into vogue.
Get people to subscribe to your own ezine by offering them something for free. This is a great way of building a mailing list. Let them opt-out at any time, and never handout your list. But your ezine must deliver some ongoing benefit, and not be a constant sales pitch, or else people unsubscribe.
Advertise in other people's ezines. The bigger the circulation, and the more targetted, the better your results (although usually dearer). You may buy an ad in someone else's ezine, or they may agree to swap ads with you. This is a common "joint venture" technique.
The benefit of ezine marketing is that you can develop an ongoing relationship with your readers. The goal is to develop their trust in you as a source of information in your particular area of expertise.
The top ezine resource would be the Directory of Ezines, although it is not free.
Other ezine directories include Email Universe and
NewsLetterAccess and Promote Free, which has a page listing ezine submission sites.
A good ezine should have lots of content. You may wish to pay others to write content for you, or grab some from article directories, such as:
Idea Marketers
Ezine Articles
Go Articles
Amazines
Check out reviews of other ezines:
Best Ezines
Top Ezines requiring payment to advertise:
Cash From Home
Bizweb2000
You can test the water with paid ezine advertising at Ezine Ad Auction
There are many ezines that will publish your ad if you subscribe to them. Subscribeme.net has gathered many of them together into a system where you may submit your ad every three months. You should have a dedicated email address for this program.
If you send out your ezine via email, be aware many ISPs may filter it. Check your content for trigger words at EzineCheck and also at SpamCheck
Get people to subscribe to your own ezine by offering them something for free. This is a great way of building a mailing list. Let them opt-out at any time, and never handout your list. But your ezine must deliver some ongoing benefit, and not be a constant sales pitch, or else people unsubscribe.
Advertise in other people's ezines. The bigger the circulation, and the more targetted, the better your results (although usually dearer). You may buy an ad in someone else's ezine, or they may agree to swap ads with you. This is a common "joint venture" technique.
The benefit of ezine marketing is that you can develop an ongoing relationship with your readers. The goal is to develop their trust in you as a source of information in your particular area of expertise.
The top ezine resource would be the Directory of Ezines, although it is not free.
Other ezine directories include Email Universe and
NewsLetterAccess and Promote Free, which has a page listing ezine submission sites.
A good ezine should have lots of content. You may wish to pay others to write content for you, or grab some from article directories, such as:
Idea Marketers
Ezine Articles
Go Articles
Amazines
Check out reviews of other ezines:
Best Ezines
Top Ezines requiring payment to advertise:
Cash From Home
Bizweb2000
You can test the water with paid ezine advertising at Ezine Ad Auction
There are many ezines that will publish your ad if you subscribe to them. Subscribeme.net has gathered many of them together into a system where you may submit your ad every three months. You should have a dedicated email address for this program.
If you send out your ezine via email, be aware many ISPs may filter it. Check your content for trigger words at EzineCheck and also at SpamCheck
Safelists
Safelists are lists of email addresses that people have opted-in to belong to, so they can advertise without it being considered spam. Basically they are groups of people sending emails to each other.
You must create separate email list address(es) (also known as list or subscription address) for use with safelists, otherwise your main contact address one will be overloaded. If you subscribe to lots of lists, your emails can be in the thousands per day. You can probably squeeze 5 safelists per standard email account such as Yahoo. But you will need to make sure they are emptied each day.
When I did safelist advertising, I used one paid email box at Yuhknow with large storage and great filtering for all my safelist emails. First I filtered validation/confirmation emails out, then emails from certain quality programs into separate folders so I can look at them later on, and trash the rest. One-click delete ability is very useful. Yuhknow is one of the premier email businesses, catering specifically for safelists and emailers.
The most important thing in safelist marketing is THE HEADING. Don't trick people by using the word 'confirm' in the heading. Don't use the same heading as everybody else. Go for the emotions. Think what would make you read a heading - and use that. Power words such as free, new, success etc.
Many people do not use safelists to get sales. They use them to get subscribers to their lists. They offer a freebie, or a secret, so people will sign up at no cost, and leave the selling to a later date. It works.
Large numbers of people signup to safelists, intending to use them, but never get around to sending emails. Don't be one of them. Get organised.
You will get the best results from safelists that offer an incentive for reading the emails. For example they reward you with points which can be redeemed for sending out more ads yourself. Or hidden cash bonuses.
The best advice I got about safelists was using an auto-submitter.
One of the more well-known safelist submitters is SafeListBoys. The most successful safelist-users I know all use safelistboys. They use it to manage their submissions to over 400 safelists, with minimal effort. I've only just joined, and am looking forward to big things. They also just updated it with great new functions.
If you are going to manually submit to safelists on a small scale, take advantage of your browser's Favourites folder. Many free safelists only let you send mail once a week. So set up a separate folder in favourites for each day of the week. Add a few safelists to each day of the week. Then each morning, just click on the correct day of the week and send out your emails.
My top performing safelists were:
Adtactics - a fantastic points-based safelist
BusinessWorldList
Herculist
You must create separate email list address(es) (also known as list or subscription address) for use with safelists, otherwise your main contact address one will be overloaded. If you subscribe to lots of lists, your emails can be in the thousands per day. You can probably squeeze 5 safelists per standard email account such as Yahoo. But you will need to make sure they are emptied each day.
When I did safelist advertising, I used one paid email box at Yuhknow with large storage and great filtering for all my safelist emails. First I filtered validation/confirmation emails out, then emails from certain quality programs into separate folders so I can look at them later on, and trash the rest. One-click delete ability is very useful. Yuhknow is one of the premier email businesses, catering specifically for safelists and emailers.
The most important thing in safelist marketing is THE HEADING. Don't trick people by using the word 'confirm' in the heading. Don't use the same heading as everybody else. Go for the emotions. Think what would make you read a heading - and use that. Power words such as free, new, success etc.
Many people do not use safelists to get sales. They use them to get subscribers to their lists. They offer a freebie, or a secret, so people will sign up at no cost, and leave the selling to a later date. It works.
Large numbers of people signup to safelists, intending to use them, but never get around to sending emails. Don't be one of them. Get organised.
You will get the best results from safelists that offer an incentive for reading the emails. For example they reward you with points which can be redeemed for sending out more ads yourself. Or hidden cash bonuses.
The best advice I got about safelists was using an auto-submitter.
One of the more well-known safelist submitters is SafeListBoys. The most successful safelist-users I know all use safelistboys. They use it to manage their submissions to over 400 safelists, with minimal effort. I've only just joined, and am looking forward to big things. They also just updated it with great new functions.
If you are going to manually submit to safelists on a small scale, take advantage of your browser's Favourites folder. Many free safelists only let you send mail once a week. So set up a separate folder in favourites for each day of the week. Add a few safelists to each day of the week. Then each morning, just click on the correct day of the week and send out your emails.
My top performing safelists were:
Adtactics - a fantastic points-based safelist
BusinessWorldList
Herculist
Traffic Exchange
Traffic Exchange programs want you to click on other people's web sites, and in return they will see yours. This is a relatively good market, as it is comprised of people who are willing to put in an effort to market, and beginners are often referred there. It includes startpages, webpages, banners, blogs - anything where you want people to click, in exchange for a click from you, or in the case of banners, to display a banner impression on your site in exchange for an impression on someone else's site.
Traffic Swarm seems to be the most popular traffic exchange program that involves deliberately viewing others' websites.
Instant Buzz is another new traffic exchange program that involves a toolbar at the top of your browser, displaying a line of clickable advertising text while you use your browser. And your ad appears on other people's browsers. It apparently generates good traffic.
An excellent suite of traffic exchanges are the Best of the Best ones: Clickaholics.
A great site that gives you analysis and comparison of traffic programs is:
TrafficHoopla.
Crazybrowser is a free browser that lets you surf several traffic programs at once. It has been optimised to speed up handling of multiple screens. Actually, if you use traffic exchanges, you'd have to be crazy not to use Crazybrowser. It includes a free pop-up killer. When I did traffic exchanges, I generally had 12 startpage sites open at the same time for surfing. Crazybrowser
As traffic exchange systems are rarely 1:1 (where one click on someone else's site earns one click on your site), the program administrator is usually able to sell clicks to your site, if you have more money than time.
ShareAdSpace will actually pay people cash to surf through other people's webpages.
Autosurf programs had a brief spurt of popularity. But given that people usually start them up, and go off somewhere else, nobody sees your ads. So why bother?
Traffic Swarm seems to be the most popular traffic exchange program that involves deliberately viewing others' websites.
Instant Buzz is another new traffic exchange program that involves a toolbar at the top of your browser, displaying a line of clickable advertising text while you use your browser. And your ad appears on other people's browsers. It apparently generates good traffic.
An excellent suite of traffic exchanges are the Best of the Best ones: Clickaholics.
A great site that gives you analysis and comparison of traffic programs is:
TrafficHoopla.
Crazybrowser is a free browser that lets you surf several traffic programs at once. It has been optimised to speed up handling of multiple screens. Actually, if you use traffic exchanges, you'd have to be crazy not to use Crazybrowser. It includes a free pop-up killer. When I did traffic exchanges, I generally had 12 startpage sites open at the same time for surfing. Crazybrowser
As traffic exchange systems are rarely 1:1 (where one click on someone else's site earns one click on your site), the program administrator is usually able to sell clicks to your site, if you have more money than time.
ShareAdSpace will actually pay people cash to surf through other people's webpages.
Autosurf programs had a brief spurt of popularity. But given that people usually start them up, and go off somewhere else, nobody sees your ads. So why bother?
RSS
RSS is an acronym for Really Simple Syndication, or Rich Site Summary (depending on who you believe). It is an excellent way for people to "pull" information to themselves, by subscribing to a blog feed, or displaying it on a website.
An RSS Feed is basically a file containing the latest headlines (and content) from a blog, or other information source. Technically, it is an XML document, which can be created automatically by your blogging program, or even simply using a text editor. You may produce multiple RSS Feeds from your website - one from your blog, one for new product announcements, press releases, etc. Anything you publish frequently can be formatted as an RSS Feed. Not just blogs.
RSS Feeds are commonly accessed through an RSS Feed Reader program (aka Aggregator) to view Feeds you have subscribed to. These may be either a desktop program that you download to your PC, or a web-based program where you create your own account and view them through your browser.
RSS Feeds may also be displayed on a website, or used as you wish.
An RSS Feed may contain text, audio and/or video.
Subscribing to an RSS Feed is more attractive to users than signing up for an email newsletter, as it does not clog up your inbox, and avoids email hassles of spam filters and email legislation.
Yahoo provides a simple way of viewing an RSS Feed. You need a Yahoo email account, but can open one for free. Then go to Yahoo.com, and select My Yahoo. With My Yahoo you can customise the information displayed on yor screen. Eg RSS Feeds, news, mail, weather. You do have to logon to your Yahoo account. To add an RSS Feed, click the "Edit" box. Then type the URL address of your feed into the search box and click search. Then when it has found your feed, click Add, and then Finish. That's all. When you visit your My Yahoo page, you will now see the headings from your own blog appearing.
To get your Feed onto a website, you need a third party to convert it into HTML format. There are several that will convert it to Javascript, but some search engines find reading Javascript difficult, and this will remove any advantage.
BigBold offers free conversion. Go to their site, type in your Feed URL (ending in atom.xml), and click Create. The next screen will ask you what your target website is, and your preferred format. Click Create again. Choose the IFRAME format, and copy and paste that code onto your website. I chose to paste mine onto Work From Home. (If you view it in IE, the colours aren't quite right, as IE doesn't correctly interpret CSS formatting inside an IFRAME. But it is nice in Mozilla FireFox)
Then, make sure you promote your blog in all the blog directories. Ping it after each new post. Search Google to find directories to submit to. Exchange links with other sites.
Track visitors to your account. Extreme Tracking offers great free tracking if your display their little icon on your blog.
An RSS Feed is basically a file containing the latest headlines (and content) from a blog, or other information source. Technically, it is an XML document, which can be created automatically by your blogging program, or even simply using a text editor. You may produce multiple RSS Feeds from your website - one from your blog, one for new product announcements, press releases, etc. Anything you publish frequently can be formatted as an RSS Feed. Not just blogs.
RSS Feeds are commonly accessed through an RSS Feed Reader program (aka Aggregator) to view Feeds you have subscribed to. These may be either a desktop program that you download to your PC, or a web-based program where you create your own account and view them through your browser.
RSS Feeds may also be displayed on a website, or used as you wish.
An RSS Feed may contain text, audio and/or video.
Subscribing to an RSS Feed is more attractive to users than signing up for an email newsletter, as it does not clog up your inbox, and avoids email hassles of spam filters and email legislation.
Yahoo provides a simple way of viewing an RSS Feed. You need a Yahoo email account, but can open one for free. Then go to Yahoo.com, and select My Yahoo. With My Yahoo you can customise the information displayed on yor screen. Eg RSS Feeds, news, mail, weather. You do have to logon to your Yahoo account. To add an RSS Feed, click the "Edit" box. Then type the URL address of your feed into the search box and click search. Then when it has found your feed, click Add, and then Finish. That's all. When you visit your My Yahoo page, you will now see the headings from your own blog appearing.
To get your Feed onto a website, you need a third party to convert it into HTML format. There are several that will convert it to Javascript, but some search engines find reading Javascript difficult, and this will remove any advantage.
BigBold offers free conversion. Go to their site, type in your Feed URL (ending in atom.xml), and click Create. The next screen will ask you what your target website is, and your preferred format. Click Create again. Choose the IFRAME format, and copy and paste that code onto your website. I chose to paste mine onto Work From Home. (If you view it in IE, the colours aren't quite right, as IE doesn't correctly interpret CSS formatting inside an IFRAME. But it is nice in Mozilla FireFox)
Then, make sure you promote your blog in all the blog directories. Ping it after each new post. Search Google to find directories to submit to. Exchange links with other sites.
Track visitors to your account. Extreme Tracking offers great free tracking if your display their little icon on your blog.
Blogs
Blogs are an extremely popular form of website for a variety of reasons:
One of the earliest popular blogs was Blogger. It is easy to create a new blog, it's free, easy to use, and owned by Google. And even lets you put Adsense ads on the free blog, so you can make money. But the free version only produces Atom feeds, not RSS, and they do tend to attract spammers comments.
Currently Wordpress is extremely popular. There are heaps of advanced software programs being sold that turns them into search-engine-friendly money-making websites. The actual WordPress software is free, although you generally need to have somewhere to host your blog. The default WordPress implementation is not optimised for search engines, so you will need to install some plug-ins, to maintain meta tags, and to make blog entries permanent URLs.
A free hosted version of WordPress is available at WordPress.com, as long as you don't mind having a name like fred.wordpress.com, as they currently don't do domain name forwarding.
- There are lots of free ones
- You don't need to know HTML to update them
- Search engines really like them
- You can subscribe to them
- You can extract and aggregate information from them
One of the earliest popular blogs was Blogger. It is easy to create a new blog, it's free, easy to use, and owned by Google. And even lets you put Adsense ads on the free blog, so you can make money. But the free version only produces Atom feeds, not RSS, and they do tend to attract spammers comments.
Currently Wordpress is extremely popular. There are heaps of advanced software programs being sold that turns them into search-engine-friendly money-making websites. The actual WordPress software is free, although you generally need to have somewhere to host your blog. The default WordPress implementation is not optimised for search engines, so you will need to install some plug-ins, to maintain meta tags, and to make blog entries permanent URLs.
A free hosted version of WordPress is available at WordPress.com, as long as you don't mind having a name like fred.wordpress.com, as they currently don't do domain name forwarding.
Sitemaps
In the beginning was the HTML sitemap. This was a simple web page, generally listed at the bottom of the index page, and listed all the pages of your site. It was supposed to be an easy summary of all the pages on your site and how to get there, although surely if you had nice simple one or two level navigation, you really shouldn't need to have one. It was also a good form of backup, in case you used fancy Javascript navigation, to make it easy for search engine spiders to find all pages of your site, within two clicks of the index page.
Then came Google Sitemaps. These were written in XML, and designed to help Google find obscure pages of your website more easily, telling Google how important they were, how frequently updated, and to notify Google of new pages. Theoretically it was particularly good for dynamic database changes that Google might find hard to detect. There are happy case studies at the Google Sitemap help page.
A side benefit for Google is that you need to have a Google account, so they have more information about you. But they do make it worth while, by giving you some nifty statistics on how and where visitors found your website through Google search and whether you had any link errors on your site.
Then Yahoo jumped on the bandwagon. Their submit page allows you to provide either a simple text list of pages, or a zipped file, or an XML file. You could even submit your Google sitemap file to save yourself effort.
Webmasters seem to be in two minds about Google's XML sitemaps, whether it is giving too much information to the search engines, and whether they have seen any real indexing benefit yet. But if you've got nothing to hide, and have a quality fresh site, then it simple can't hurt, and should help.
Google do provide a sitemap generator, but it is a Python-based tool, so most people go for a free generator, such as the AuditMyPC Free Sitemap Generator. Then submit it at Google and Yahoo and start checking on your indexing.
Then came Google Sitemaps. These were written in XML, and designed to help Google find obscure pages of your website more easily, telling Google how important they were, how frequently updated, and to notify Google of new pages. Theoretically it was particularly good for dynamic database changes that Google might find hard to detect. There are happy case studies at the Google Sitemap help page.
A side benefit for Google is that you need to have a Google account, so they have more information about you. But they do make it worth while, by giving you some nifty statistics on how and where visitors found your website through Google search and whether you had any link errors on your site.
Then Yahoo jumped on the bandwagon. Their submit page allows you to provide either a simple text list of pages, or a zipped file, or an XML file. You could even submit your Google sitemap file to save yourself effort.
Webmasters seem to be in two minds about Google's XML sitemaps, whether it is giving too much information to the search engines, and whether they have seen any real indexing benefit yet. But if you've got nothing to hide, and have a quality fresh site, then it simple can't hurt, and should help.
Google do provide a sitemap generator, but it is a Python-based tool, so most people go for a free generator, such as the AuditMyPC Free Sitemap Generator. Then submit it at Google and Yahoo and start checking on your indexing.
Article Marketing
Article Marketing has been a high profile traffic generation technique for the last year, as webmasters seek out new ways of generating one-way incoming links.
It has been accompanied by a spate of software products to submit articles to the numerous directories that have sprung up.
Instant Article Submitter is one of the latest programs aimed at article writers. The list of directories is updated each time you start the program. You only have to enter your article description and author details once, and the program will fill in the form fields on individual directory sites. A great time saver.
Article Equalizer is by the same authors, and this time is targetted at website publishers instead of article writers, extracting articles from article directories for use in providing content for your website. It even includes functions such as rotating the displayed articles, so it looks like your website is being frequently updated.
SubmitContent is a free article submission site with over 1500 associated niche directories, websites, blogs and feeds.
ArticleSubmitterPro is another article submitter. It is an instant download, so you can start straight away, unlike the more expensive ArticleAnnouncer.
ArticleMarketer has a free online university to teach you about article marketing that includes many free audio interviews with successful marketers, and a solid PDF on best practices for article writing and submission.
If you do use an article submitter, stick with just one product to avoid accidentally re-submitting the same article to the same directory.
The article directories themselves have varying reputations. Some of the more popular directories include: ezinearticles.com
In practise, not all published articles will generate a real backlink for SEO purposes - some have quoted around 10%.
It has been accompanied by a spate of software products to submit articles to the numerous directories that have sprung up.
Instant Article Submitter is one of the latest programs aimed at article writers. The list of directories is updated each time you start the program. You only have to enter your article description and author details once, and the program will fill in the form fields on individual directory sites. A great time saver.
Article Equalizer is by the same authors, and this time is targetted at website publishers instead of article writers, extracting articles from article directories for use in providing content for your website. It even includes functions such as rotating the displayed articles, so it looks like your website is being frequently updated.
SubmitContent is a free article submission site with over 1500 associated niche directories, websites, blogs and feeds.
ArticleSubmitterPro is another article submitter. It is an instant download, so you can start straight away, unlike the more expensive ArticleAnnouncer.
ArticleMarketer has a free online university to teach you about article marketing that includes many free audio interviews with successful marketers, and a solid PDF on best practices for article writing and submission.
If you do use an article submitter, stick with just one product to avoid accidentally re-submitting the same article to the same directory.
The article directories themselves have varying reputations. Some of the more popular directories include: ezinearticles.com
In practise, not all published articles will generate a real backlink for SEO purposes - some have quoted around 10%.
Non Search Engine Traffic
Also known as "Don't put all your eggs in one basket".
Wonderful (and free) as search engine traffic is, it is beyond our control. We are at the mercy of frequently-changing search engine algorithms and competing websites, and can see massive changes in traffic from day-to-day, if you're unlucky (or lucky).
So any good internet marketer diversifies the source of their traffic.
Links from other sites
An easily remembered domain name
Promotional items - Tshirts, coffee cups, coasters etc
Word of mouth references - a good reputation
Viral advertising part 1 - Your own software items to pass around - programs, ebooks etc
Viral advertising part 2 - Create something catchy/leading-edge/shocking that others will talk about
Articles
Press Releases
Tagging
Radio
TV
Newspapers, magazines and journals
Wonderful (and free) as search engine traffic is, it is beyond our control. We are at the mercy of frequently-changing search engine algorithms and competing websites, and can see massive changes in traffic from day-to-day, if you're unlucky (or lucky).
So any good internet marketer diversifies the source of their traffic.
Links from other sites
An easily remembered domain name
Promotional items - Tshirts, coffee cups, coasters etc
Word of mouth references - a good reputation
Viral advertising part 1 - Your own software items to pass around - programs, ebooks etc
Viral advertising part 2 - Create something catchy/leading-edge/shocking that others will talk about
Articles
Press Releases
Tagging
Radio
TV
Newspapers, magazines and journals
Pay Per Click
Pay Per Click advertising is another form of advertising growing at an extraordinary rate.
A few years ago it was possible to get extremely targetted pay-per-click ads for only a few cents per click. Now you may need to pay many dollars to get a decent position for the most popular words, and learn how to optimise the actual pay-per-click ad. With search engines such as Google, even having the maximum cost-per-click doesn't guarantee you the number one place, unless your ad also has a good click-thru-rate and is optimised for the targetted keyword.
Per Per Click advertising has also increased due to the extreme competition for good organic rankings on search engines, and also the time delay for new sites to get a good ranking. It has become standard practise for new sites to do pay per click advertising for the first 6-18mths until they get a good ranking on search engines.
One fad is for mini-sites. With a little experience, people have been known to decide on a niche, build a money-making site, and then use PPC to get their site at the top of the result list on search engines. They can be making semi-serious money within the space of a week.
The danger with PPC is untargeted keywords. If you pay 50 cents per click for the phrase "buy a car online" and somebody in Alaska selects your site, which only sells Australian Ford Falcons, that was a waste of 50 cents. You would have had better luck with "discount Ford Falcons". You can also generally restrict ads to a particular country, region, search engine or third-party site.
Pay Per Click advertising can be expensive. If you want to experiment with this technique, there are usually a bunch of sites that will give you a free introductory balance to spend on PCC at their site. PayPerClickSearchEngines has a list of new PPCs at the top. New ones often offer a free introductory balance.
Also check out these sites for help:
PayPerClickAnalyst
PayPerClickGuide
An excellent guide to selling products through Google's Pay Per Click Adwords program is GoogleCash, famous for its advanced advertising techniques.
Other well-known marketers who utilise Pay Per Click advertising heavily are Rosalind Gardner with her Super Affiliate Handbook, or Phil Wiley with his Minisite Profits in Australia.
A few years ago it was possible to get extremely targetted pay-per-click ads for only a few cents per click. Now you may need to pay many dollars to get a decent position for the most popular words, and learn how to optimise the actual pay-per-click ad. With search engines such as Google, even having the maximum cost-per-click doesn't guarantee you the number one place, unless your ad also has a good click-thru-rate and is optimised for the targetted keyword.
Per Per Click advertising has also increased due to the extreme competition for good organic rankings on search engines, and also the time delay for new sites to get a good ranking. It has become standard practise for new sites to do pay per click advertising for the first 6-18mths until they get a good ranking on search engines.
One fad is for mini-sites. With a little experience, people have been known to decide on a niche, build a money-making site, and then use PPC to get their site at the top of the result list on search engines. They can be making semi-serious money within the space of a week.
The danger with PPC is untargeted keywords. If you pay 50 cents per click for the phrase "buy a car online" and somebody in Alaska selects your site, which only sells Australian Ford Falcons, that was a waste of 50 cents. You would have had better luck with "discount Ford Falcons". You can also generally restrict ads to a particular country, region, search engine or third-party site.
Pay Per Click advertising can be expensive. If you want to experiment with this technique, there are usually a bunch of sites that will give you a free introductory balance to spend on PCC at their site. PayPerClickSearchEngines has a list of new PPCs at the top. New ones often offer a free introductory balance.
Also check out these sites for help:
PayPerClickAnalyst
PayPerClickGuide
An excellent guide to selling products through Google's Pay Per Click Adwords program is GoogleCash, famous for its advanced advertising techniques.
Other well-known marketers who utilise Pay Per Click advertising heavily are Rosalind Gardner with her Super Affiliate Handbook, or Phil Wiley with his Minisite Profits in Australia.
Search Engine Optimization
Search Engine Optimization has been one of the fastest growing areas of web development in the last few years, due to the increasing usage of search engines such as Google, Yahoo and MSN. Search Engine Optimization is the "art" of modifying, or optimizing your webPAGE to make it more appealing to search engines for your chosen keywords. Each page of your site should be optimised for a different search phrase.
Search engine optimization has two components:
On-page factors - the actual code and content
Off-page factors - submitting to search engines, links, stickiness
On-Page Optimization
On-page search engine optimization involves modifying/development the HTML code and content of a web page to concentrate on:
TITLE - Start with your keyword. Don't use the exact same title for each page. Don't repeat words, or use more than around 50 characters
META DESCRIPTION - Use your keywords, AND be descriptive. People often decide whether to visit you based on your description. Again, don't repeat your keywords too any times.
META KEYWORDS - Use your keywords, but don't repeat them too often. Search engines may consider it spamming, if they bother to use this section. Don't put words here that are not part of your main text. Use combinations eg fried green tomatoes, tomato soup
H1,H2,H3 headings - Use your keywords.
IMAGE ALT - Use your keywords to provide alternative text describing your images, 1-3 times on page in combination with other words such as "picture".
P - Use your keywords in your first paragraph, last paragraph, and sprinkle them through the rest of the page.
A HREF - Use your keywords in your link text and link filenames and sub-directory-names. Eg meaningful-domain-name.com/directory-name/file-name. Use the title alt text.
Make your pages content-rich - use your keywords liberally throughout the page, to a keyword density of around 3-8%
Bold or underline keywords on your page.
Most search engines will give you tips on good practices, and what to avoid, in their webmaster or submit sections.
As many people know nothing about optimisation, if you use your keywords in the above parts of your website page, you will be doing better than the majority of websites.
Analyse your page to check your keyword density:
for single words, at KeyWordCount
for phrases at KeyWordDensity
Or else you could just analyse your competitors sites to see what they are doing in terms of keyword count and incoming links.
Make sure your page is still understandable and that visitors will want to return. Write for people first, then search engines.
Use synonyms for your search words. This will tell the search engine spiders that the rest of your page matches your targetted search phrase.
Link outwards to an authority site on your subject. Especially a government or organisation. To prove that your site truly is an information site, which is what people and spiders really want.
The Google Poodle attempts to predict how Google will view your page. This is excellent - I didn't realise my image alt code could make things look so different. Try it here
Off-Page Optimization
See pages on link development and submitting to search engines
With increased use of personalised search, the likelihood of web site stickiness, or how long a person stays at a site may become a factor in search engine ranking.
Search engine optimization has two components:
On-page factors - the actual code and content
Off-page factors - submitting to search engines, links, stickiness
On-Page Optimization
On-page search engine optimization involves modifying/development the HTML code and content of a web page to concentrate on:
TITLE - Start with your keyword. Don't use the exact same title for each page. Don't repeat words, or use more than around 50 characters
META DESCRIPTION - Use your keywords, AND be descriptive. People often decide whether to visit you based on your description. Again, don't repeat your keywords too any times.
META KEYWORDS - Use your keywords, but don't repeat them too often. Search engines may consider it spamming, if they bother to use this section. Don't put words here that are not part of your main text. Use combinations eg fried green tomatoes, tomato soup
H1,H2,H3 headings - Use your keywords.
IMAGE ALT - Use your keywords to provide alternative text describing your images, 1-3 times on page in combination with other words such as "picture".
P - Use your keywords in your first paragraph, last paragraph, and sprinkle them through the rest of the page.
A HREF - Use your keywords in your link text and link filenames and sub-directory-names. Eg meaningful-domain-name.com/directory-name/file-name. Use the title alt text.
Make your pages content-rich - use your keywords liberally throughout the page, to a keyword density of around 3-8%
Bold or underline keywords on your page.
Most search engines will give you tips on good practices, and what to avoid, in their webmaster or submit sections.
As many people know nothing about optimisation, if you use your keywords in the above parts of your website page, you will be doing better than the majority of websites.
Analyse your page to check your keyword density:
for single words, at KeyWordCount
for phrases at KeyWordDensity
Or else you could just analyse your competitors sites to see what they are doing in terms of keyword count and incoming links.
Make sure your page is still understandable and that visitors will want to return. Write for people first, then search engines.
Use synonyms for your search words. This will tell the search engine spiders that the rest of your page matches your targetted search phrase.
Link outwards to an authority site on your subject. Especially a government or organisation. To prove that your site truly is an information site, which is what people and spiders really want.
The Google Poodle attempts to predict how Google will view your page. This is excellent - I didn't realise my image alt code could make things look so different. Try it here
Off-Page Optimization
See pages on link development and submitting to search engines
With increased use of personalised search, the likelihood of web site stickiness, or how long a person stays at a site may become a factor in search engine ranking.
Link Popularity
Link Popularity refers to how many sites are linking to you. Also known as incoming links. It does affect your ranking at search engines, in particular Google, as they see it as other sites voting for you, indicating that you are valuable or popular, and worth visiting.
Google uses link popularity as part of their algorithm for determining where a webpage will rank for a particular search. Their proprietary name for link popularity is "PageRank", or "PR". It is a page-based (not site-based) numeric measure between 0 and 10, where 10 is exceedingly rare, only achieved by the most popular sites, for example google.com, msn.com, adobe.com etc. An unindexed site has no PR, a newly-indexed site usually starts at 0. You can see what PageRank a page has, if you download the GoogleBar for your browser, as it has a little green bar that displays the PR if you hover over the green bar. It is kind of a logarithmic value in that the higher numbers are harder to achieve - a PR of 2 to 4 is generally quite achievable if you work at it. Higher values require significant effort, or incoming links from sites with high PR themselves. PR value is passed from one site to another, as you link to it. For example, if a page with a PR7 had your site as the only outgoing link, you would probably end up with a PR6 yourself.
Having a high link popularity (PR) does not guarantee you being at the top of results for your targetted searchphrase. In addition to the content of your page, currently Google places a lot of importance on the "link text" used to describe your link as it appears on other sites. And possibly the surrounding text as well. And eventually the theme of the page. So if you want to be ranked well for say the phrase "pink bellies", then ask sites related to pink bellies if they will link to your site using the text "pink bellies". Ask a lot of belly sites. Don't ask sites that have nothing to do with pink bellies. To avoid being considered as spam by Google, slightly vary your link text, for example "pink belly", "belly in pink", "why bellies are pink" etc.
The ideal situation is that your site is just SO valuable, that other sites will link to you as a reference. Or because you're funny, have lots of useful information, or some tools that are worth using. Failing that, they may link to you if you reciprocate by giving them a link. Choose sites on related subjects, with not too many links per page, organised by theme, and hopefully with PR.
A few years ago, simply having lots of incoming links was an easy way to get to the top of Google. Then, as unscrupulous webmasters began buying links, creating heaps of useless doorway sites and pages to generate links, building directory sites, link farms and arranging irrelevant reciprocal link arrangements, the value of large numbers of unrelated (or reciprocal only) links began decreasing in value. Google and other search engines began tightening their algorithms to devalue links. And webmasters constantly try to outthink or trick the search engines.
One of the latest crazes is the three-way link, where siteA links to siteB, siteB links to siteC, and siteC links to siteA. So theoretically these are not easily-detected reciprocal links (siteA to siteB, siteB to siteA), and the search engines won't notice. The downside is maintaining your link, as not all link management software can track three-way links - they were setup to monitor reciprocal links only).
A fantastic free method for finding valuable related sites who are happy to exchange targetted links, is Sitesells Value Exchange. You register your domain and the subject of interest, and they will mail you periodically with a list of sites suitable for link exchange. And it's completely free.
Brad Callen has created a solid tool for finding and managing links to your site, called SEOElite. It allows you to find high-PR related sites, automatically email them, find who is not reciprocating links, manage potential partners, and much more.
A slow and steady method to find sites to exchange links with is to search on Google, MSN or AltaVista for the top results for your chosen keywords and ask if they will link to you. Even though they are your competitors. Hopeflly your site is jst so much better than theirs that they are not a threat to you. With your unique selling proposition (USP). Then find out who is linking to those sites, by typing the LINK command. If those sites have a page where you can link to, exchange links. Google is famous for not showing ALL incoming links. Altavista and MSN are good for searching for incoming links. But you should track which sites you have approached, and what their reply was, and where they have your link, which is why people use products like SEOElite to track that kind of information.
From experience, many people say they will exchange, but never place your link on their site. So at the end of each month, check your site for incoming links, and delete references to those who are not, preferably after giving a courtesy warning notice.
A quick way of finding sites willing to exchange links, is to include extra words in your search. For example search on Google for "home business - add url" to find willing partners for the home business area.
Sometimes you strike it rich, and find a quality site who only exchanges with other quality sites. Examine who they have linked with, and approach those sites as well. Assuming, of course, that you also have a quality site with only quality links.
These days, as so many people do not reply to emails, I am starting to send an inquiring email first, and only adding the link after their response. It seems to be accepted practise on many forums.
Get your site mentioned in as many places as you can. Other tips to improve your ranking:
Submit your site to directories.
Include your site in your signature in forums, testimonials, articles, ezines.
Include it in the resource box for articles you write
Higher value is placed on links from related sites.
Include text descriptions with the links. Engines don't like plain pages of links.
Don't have more than about 40 outgoing links per page.
Make your links page accessible within one or two clicks from your main menu, or people won't agree to link to you.
Code your own link page. Automated solutions are predictable, and are often targetted by search engines and deliberately excluded.
Try to get a page rank > 1 on google. Many people will not link to you if you have a zero ranking.
Find out whether you are indexed, your link popularity and saturation using free tools at these sites:
MarketLeap
TrafficRanking
Link Popularity
Link Popularity Check - Checks MSN, Lycos, Altavista
Find sites to exchange links with you:
Links To You
EProfitNews
LinkPartners
If you'd like to learn more about link building, check out LinkingMatters.com and Linking101.com
If you have money to spare, you can buy tools to organise your links for you, eg:
LinksManager. Although purists say that a manually managed link directory is best, because you can vet your link partners.
There are many free link checking tools that you can download to see if your links are valid, and reciprocated. Although you will need to setup/maintain the reciprocal link information, which is why people generally upgrade to paid products that automatically check for reciprocal links.
So basically, once you have optimised the content of your webpage, the best way to get to the top of the search engines, is to increase your link popularity. Hence the ongoing competition between webmasters as to ways of generating more and more, relevant incoming links.
Google uses link popularity as part of their algorithm for determining where a webpage will rank for a particular search. Their proprietary name for link popularity is "PageRank", or "PR". It is a page-based (not site-based) numeric measure between 0 and 10, where 10 is exceedingly rare, only achieved by the most popular sites, for example google.com, msn.com, adobe.com etc. An unindexed site has no PR, a newly-indexed site usually starts at 0. You can see what PageRank a page has, if you download the GoogleBar for your browser, as it has a little green bar that displays the PR if you hover over the green bar. It is kind of a logarithmic value in that the higher numbers are harder to achieve - a PR of 2 to 4 is generally quite achievable if you work at it. Higher values require significant effort, or incoming links from sites with high PR themselves. PR value is passed from one site to another, as you link to it. For example, if a page with a PR7 had your site as the only outgoing link, you would probably end up with a PR6 yourself.
Having a high link popularity (PR) does not guarantee you being at the top of results for your targetted searchphrase. In addition to the content of your page, currently Google places a lot of importance on the "link text" used to describe your link as it appears on other sites. And possibly the surrounding text as well. And eventually the theme of the page. So if you want to be ranked well for say the phrase "pink bellies", then ask sites related to pink bellies if they will link to your site using the text "pink bellies". Ask a lot of belly sites. Don't ask sites that have nothing to do with pink bellies. To avoid being considered as spam by Google, slightly vary your link text, for example "pink belly", "belly in pink", "why bellies are pink" etc.
The ideal situation is that your site is just SO valuable, that other sites will link to you as a reference. Or because you're funny, have lots of useful information, or some tools that are worth using. Failing that, they may link to you if you reciprocate by giving them a link. Choose sites on related subjects, with not too many links per page, organised by theme, and hopefully with PR.
A few years ago, simply having lots of incoming links was an easy way to get to the top of Google. Then, as unscrupulous webmasters began buying links, creating heaps of useless doorway sites and pages to generate links, building directory sites, link farms and arranging irrelevant reciprocal link arrangements, the value of large numbers of unrelated (or reciprocal only) links began decreasing in value. Google and other search engines began tightening their algorithms to devalue links. And webmasters constantly try to outthink or trick the search engines.
One of the latest crazes is the three-way link, where siteA links to siteB, siteB links to siteC, and siteC links to siteA. So theoretically these are not easily-detected reciprocal links (siteA to siteB, siteB to siteA), and the search engines won't notice. The downside is maintaining your link, as not all link management software can track three-way links - they were setup to monitor reciprocal links only).
A fantastic free method for finding valuable related sites who are happy to exchange targetted links, is Sitesells Value Exchange. You register your domain and the subject of interest, and they will mail you periodically with a list of sites suitable for link exchange. And it's completely free.
Brad Callen has created a solid tool for finding and managing links to your site, called SEOElite. It allows you to find high-PR related sites, automatically email them, find who is not reciprocating links, manage potential partners, and much more.
A slow and steady method to find sites to exchange links with is to search on Google, MSN or AltaVista for the top results for your chosen keywords and ask if they will link to you. Even though they are your competitors. Hopeflly your site is jst so much better than theirs that they are not a threat to you. With your unique selling proposition (USP). Then find out who is linking to those sites, by typing the LINK command. If those sites have a page where you can link to, exchange links. Google is famous for not showing ALL incoming links. Altavista and MSN are good for searching for incoming links. But you should track which sites you have approached, and what their reply was, and where they have your link, which is why people use products like SEOElite to track that kind of information.
From experience, many people say they will exchange, but never place your link on their site. So at the end of each month, check your site for incoming links, and delete references to those who are not, preferably after giving a courtesy warning notice.
A quick way of finding sites willing to exchange links, is to include extra words in your search. For example search on Google for "home business - add url" to find willing partners for the home business area.
Sometimes you strike it rich, and find a quality site who only exchanges with other quality sites. Examine who they have linked with, and approach those sites as well. Assuming, of course, that you also have a quality site with only quality links.
These days, as so many people do not reply to emails, I am starting to send an inquiring email first, and only adding the link after their response. It seems to be accepted practise on many forums.
Get your site mentioned in as many places as you can. Other tips to improve your ranking:
Submit your site to directories.
Include your site in your signature in forums, testimonials, articles, ezines.
Include it in the resource box for articles you write
Higher value is placed on links from related sites.
Include text descriptions with the links. Engines don't like plain pages of links.
Don't have more than about 40 outgoing links per page.
Make your links page accessible within one or two clicks from your main menu, or people won't agree to link to you.
Code your own link page. Automated solutions are predictable, and are often targetted by search engines and deliberately excluded.
Try to get a page rank > 1 on google. Many people will not link to you if you have a zero ranking.
Find out whether you are indexed, your link popularity and saturation using free tools at these sites:
MarketLeap
TrafficRanking
Link Popularity
Link Popularity Check - Checks MSN, Lycos, Altavista
Find sites to exchange links with you:
Links To You
EProfitNews
LinkPartners
If you'd like to learn more about link building, check out LinkingMatters.com and Linking101.com
If you have money to spare, you can buy tools to organise your links for you, eg:
LinksManager. Although purists say that a manually managed link directory is best, because you can vet your link partners.
There are many free link checking tools that you can download to see if your links are valid, and reciprocated. Although you will need to setup/maintain the reciprocal link information, which is why people generally upgrade to paid products that automatically check for reciprocal links.
So basically, once you have optimised the content of your webpage, the best way to get to the top of the search engines, is to increase your link popularity. Hence the ongoing competition between webmasters as to ways of generating more and more, relevant incoming links.
Web Development
Web development can appear easily achievable, with the availability of free WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) Editors allowing every man and his dog to create a website. However developing a web site that is functional, enjoyable, useable, informative, and attractive to search engines still requires care and attention to detail.
Even if you have a WYSIWYG editor to construct your website, you should still learn some basic HTML code, to fine-tune your website performance, especially when it comes to optimising your site for search engines.
Some good free visual HTML editors are available for downloading.This one was very highly recommended by the programmers over at webproworld: HTML Kit
For web development tips you can't go past these sites for learning about basic HTML:
HTMLGoodies
WebMonkey
BigNoseBird - wierd name, great site.
WebAlley
When you've finished coding your website, check the results using these web development tools:
Submit Corner's Metascan
ScrubTheWeb'sMeta-Check
Doctor HTML's Single Page Analysis
NetMechanic
TheWebClinic
If you're a sucker for punishment, you can get your code validated by the web development mob that wrote the specs for HTML: W3. Be warned - it is incredibly tough, and one mistake up top will produce a lot of errors.
Web developers should know about HTML document types, and how they cater for old non-standard sites. DocType can help out here.
Check your CSS as well: CSS Validator.
W3C also have a program called HTML TIDY, to analyze your code and identify any html problems. HTML Tidy
An excellent resource for web useability checking is UI Test. How do you think you site will perform for the blind, using screen readers?
Visit Website Optimisation if you want to see how fast your site loads.
If you'd like a fancy Flash slideshow presentation on your site, but haven't got time to learn Flash, then try a free Flash web development program like PowerBullet. Amazingly easy to use.
You may be good at web development, but can you spell? If you want some guidelines on correct use of the English language, see Dictionary.com
Even if you have a WYSIWYG editor to construct your website, you should still learn some basic HTML code, to fine-tune your website performance, especially when it comes to optimising your site for search engines.
Some good free visual HTML editors are available for downloading.This one was very highly recommended by the programmers over at webproworld: HTML Kit
For web development tips you can't go past these sites for learning about basic HTML:
HTMLGoodies
WebMonkey
BigNoseBird - wierd name, great site.
WebAlley
When you've finished coding your website, check the results using these web development tools:
Submit Corner's Metascan
ScrubTheWeb'sMeta-Check
Doctor HTML's Single Page Analysis
NetMechanic
TheWebClinic
If you're a sucker for punishment, you can get your code validated by the web development mob that wrote the specs for HTML: W3. Be warned - it is incredibly tough, and one mistake up top will produce a lot of errors.
Web developers should know about HTML document types, and how they cater for old non-standard sites. DocType can help out here.
Check your CSS as well: CSS Validator.
W3C also have a program called HTML TIDY, to analyze your code and identify any html problems. HTML Tidy
An excellent resource for web useability checking is UI Test. How do you think you site will perform for the blind, using screen readers?
Visit Website Optimisation if you want to see how fast your site loads.
If you'd like a fancy Flash slideshow presentation on your site, but haven't got time to learn Flash, then try a free Flash web development program like PowerBullet. Amazingly easy to use.
You may be good at web development, but can you spell? If you want some guidelines on correct use of the English language, see Dictionary.com
Email Addresses
If you are going to advertise online, you must have more than one email address. From the minute you go online, you are in danger of coming to the notice of spammers. By the time you have signed up to a bunch of free marketing programs, posted to a few forums, filled in a few surveys, or filled in requests for information, your email address inbox will be on the way to getting full, and bouncing all the emails you really do want.
Keep one email address purely for personal emails. Never use it for business. Even reliable programs will send you updates, and they soon add up. Then you can use spam filter programs on your personal email address, without worrying that you are missing out on an important business update. Mailwasher.net has a free version with a sterling reputation.
Incredimail - good POP3 access, bounceable, colourful.
EPrompter - another free mail manager. Can download 16 mail accounts. Good for free yahoo accounts.
EmailAddresses - lists free email addresses and reviews of paid email addresses.
Having different email program managers is good, as you can open them all at the same time. My favourites are Yahoo, Hotmail and fastmail.fm.
If you are going to use safelists, you will need a large email box.
Having multiple email addresses also makes it easier to track where your email address was exposed to spammers.
If you setup multiple addresses associated with your own domain, disable the default address. Spammers often try the standard webmaster@yourdomain.com. Make it something unusual, like myleftfoot@mydomain.com.
Encrypt your email address before displaying it on your site, using a tool such as SiteUp. This hides it from spam-robots, that browse sites looking to harvest addresses.
Keep one email address purely for personal emails. Never use it for business. Even reliable programs will send you updates, and they soon add up. Then you can use spam filter programs on your personal email address, without worrying that you are missing out on an important business update. Mailwasher.net has a free version with a sterling reputation.
Incredimail - good POP3 access, bounceable, colourful.
EPrompter - another free mail manager. Can download 16 mail accounts. Good for free yahoo accounts.
EmailAddresses - lists free email addresses and reviews of paid email addresses.
Having different email program managers is good, as you can open them all at the same time. My favourites are Yahoo, Hotmail and fastmail.fm.
If you are going to use safelists, you will need a large email box.
Having multiple email addresses also makes it easier to track where your email address was exposed to spammers.
If you setup multiple addresses associated with your own domain, disable the default address. Spammers often try the standard webmaster@yourdomain.com. Make it something unusual, like myleftfoot@mydomain.com.
Encrypt your email address before displaying it on your site, using a tool such as SiteUp. This hides it from spam-robots, that browse sites looking to harvest addresses.
Web Hosting
Web Hosting is another important decision to make. There are heaps of companies on the internet that provide paid or free web hosting services. Most free web host companies want you to upgrade to paid web hosting, so they impose bandwidth or storage restrictions, and use advertising popups to make money from your website.
Free web hosts I have tried are:
FreeWebs - no popups
Geocities - popups
MySiteInc
Friends have recommended these for free web hosting:
Brinkster - no ads, not for commerce
Portland - no ads
Sites listing free web hosting companies include:
0Hosts
FreeWebSpace
100Best Free Web Space
If your host does not come with FTP (File Transfer Protocol) software for uploading and downloading your files, the easiest one I have used is Coffee Cup Free FTP Software at coffeecup.com. FileZilla is also excellent.
If it is important for you to be listed in the local version of major search engines, you may need to use a local hosting company. For example - Web Hosts Australia has hosting in Australia, which is invaluable for getting into google.com.au, when people search by country.
Paid Web Hosting should provide a high level of site uptime (99%+), web log statistics and helpdesk support.
Free web hosts I have tried are:
FreeWebs - no popups
Geocities - popups
MySiteInc
Friends have recommended these for free web hosting:
Brinkster - no ads, not for commerce
Portland - no ads
Sites listing free web hosting companies include:
0Hosts
FreeWebSpace
100Best Free Web Space
If your host does not come with FTP (File Transfer Protocol) software for uploading and downloading your files, the easiest one I have used is Coffee Cup Free FTP Software at coffeecup.com. FileZilla is also excellent.
If it is important for you to be listed in the local version of major search engines, you may need to use a local hosting company. For example - Web Hosts Australia has hosting in Australia, which is invaluable for getting into google.com.au, when people search by country.
Paid Web Hosting should provide a high level of site uptime (99%+), web log statistics and helpdesk support.
Monday, April 23, 2007
Domain Names
Domain Names can affect whether someone clicks on your site or not. A meaningful domain name is the best asset you can have. You can take it with you, even when you change hosts. Once registered, you need to renew it each year. Don't leave it until the last minute, as a well-known, high-ranking domain name will always be in demand.
A domain name can contribute to your online identity. Getting a good reputation and keeping it, is important.
Many search engines will not include sites with question marks (as with sites provided by most affinity programs), or multiple sites per domain name, as with free hosts. Eg mydogsite.tripod.com
The domain name you promote on search engines also often affects whether somebody chooses your site. Given a choice of several sites, they will prefer a meaningful domain name obviously related to the topic.
Having multiple domain names can be beneficial if advertising through Google Adwords, again because a relevant domain name will convince people your site is relevant. You may have a main domain name related to your business name, eg FredFlintstone.com, but having additional domain names redirected to the main domain name, eg StoneAgeFamilies.com.
Using your keywords in your domain name may help your ranking a little at some search engines, although it is probably more important to have an easily remembered domain name.
Consider whether or not to use dashes in your domain name. It can get annoying having to spell out the dashes in your domain name eg freemarketinghelp vs free-marketing-help. It no longer seems to give an advantage in search engine positioning.
You can purchase and register your own domain name extremely cheaply at these sites. GoDaddy also has a name suggestion tool. Most of my domains have been purchased from GoDaddy.
GoDaddy
SimpleURL
Dotster
.COM is the most professional ending for your domain name. Although you may wish to purchase additional domain names with other suffices, eg .NET, .ORG, to prevent others from taking advantage of your goodwill.
You may wish to buy additional domain names in your country. For example to get included in the Australian Google index, you generally have to either be hosted in Australia, or to have a .com.au domain name.
In return for showing a popup about the country Tokelau, you can get a free meaningful domain name ending in .TK. But you must send traffic to it. Free .TK domain names resolve to a frame, which prevents you from accessing individual pages directly, which is bad for link exchanges. But if you are happy just promoting your index page, then go for it.
Dot.TK
A domain name can contribute to your online identity. Getting a good reputation and keeping it, is important.
Many search engines will not include sites with question marks (as with sites provided by most affinity programs), or multiple sites per domain name, as with free hosts. Eg mydogsite.tripod.com
The domain name you promote on search engines also often affects whether somebody chooses your site. Given a choice of several sites, they will prefer a meaningful domain name obviously related to the topic.
Having multiple domain names can be beneficial if advertising through Google Adwords, again because a relevant domain name will convince people your site is relevant. You may have a main domain name related to your business name, eg FredFlintstone.com, but having additional domain names redirected to the main domain name, eg StoneAgeFamilies.com.
Using your keywords in your domain name may help your ranking a little at some search engines, although it is probably more important to have an easily remembered domain name.
Consider whether or not to use dashes in your domain name. It can get annoying having to spell out the dashes in your domain name eg freemarketinghelp vs free-marketing-help. It no longer seems to give an advantage in search engine positioning.
You can purchase and register your own domain name extremely cheaply at these sites. GoDaddy also has a name suggestion tool. Most of my domains have been purchased from GoDaddy.
GoDaddy
SimpleURL
Dotster
.COM is the most professional ending for your domain name. Although you may wish to purchase additional domain names with other suffices, eg .NET, .ORG, to prevent others from taking advantage of your goodwill.
You may wish to buy additional domain names in your country. For example to get included in the Australian Google index, you generally have to either be hosted in Australia, or to have a .com.au domain name.
In return for showing a popup about the country Tokelau, you can get a free meaningful domain name ending in .TK. But you must send traffic to it. Free .TK domain names resolve to a frame, which prevents you from accessing individual pages directly, which is bad for link exchanges. But if you are happy just promoting your index page, then go for it.
Dot.TK
Sunday, April 22, 2007
Keyword Analysis
Keyword Analysis should be the first step you take in planning a new website or marketing campaign. Keyword Analysis will guide you in choosing the most effective keywords to base a site or advertising campaign upon, as it will tell you which keywords are frequently searched for, how many sites are already available targetting those keywords, and how achievable a good result on the search engines may be.
Basically, there's no use in building a site if no-one is looking for it. You need to know what people are looking for to decide if it's worth building.
Keywords are the words people type into a search engine, in the hope of finding your site. Choosing the right keywords is vitally important, and should affect your choice of domain name, design and site content. Keyword analysis will help achieve this.
As people become more sophisticated in their use of search engines, they tend to use keyword phrases, rather than a single keyword. For example "studded dog collars" instead of just "dogs". Many sites specifically target a keyword phrase on each page. You also have more chance of scoring a better ranking for a keyword phrase, rather than a single, popular keyword.
Initial Keyword Analysis
First of all, visit these sites to get some ideas on which keywords are currently popular, being searched for through search engines. (If you don't already have a favourite subject you plan to build your site about).
The Lycos Top 50
The Google Zeitgeist
Yahoo Buzz
MetaSpy
I also subscribe to the free weekly report from Wordtracker on the most frequently searched keywords.
Keyword Suggestion
Now that you have a rough idea of a subject or keyword you are interested in, you need to find related keyword phrases people actually use. Various free suggestion tools will "suggest" related phrases. They may also tell you how often the phrase was searched for. Take note of whether daily, monthly or yearly figures are quoted.
SearchIt is a fantastic new free search and keyword tool. It has a heap of search tools built into it: - keyword brainstormer, Adwords suggestor, Overture suggestor, monetization, competitors, and more. Plus they keep updating it when they think of a new tool. The only keyword suggestion tool you should ever need.
Yahoo search suggestion tool (formerly known as Overture Suggestion Tool ) returns a list of related phrases and how many times they were searched for last month. Although it does combine plurals, so you can't tell the difference between say flower and flowers.
Google search suggestion tool is available as an external tool, or if used through your Google Adwords login, it can also suggest cost-per-click advertising costs.
Goodkeywords (requires a download) also suggests keywords.
Advanced Keyword Analysis
Knowing how many times per day/month/year a keyword was searched for is not enough.
You also need to know the scope of the search database (was it only searches through Google? for one country or the world? ), and how many websites on that topic already exist.
Some keywords are so popular (eg home business) that you have buckley's chance of getting a top ten ranking for that keyword. So you need to analyse which ones are both popular, and have comparatively less competition.
Wordtracker provides a paid service which will analyse keywords in this way. They use a measure called KEI to measure competitiveness, where the lower the KEI, the less competition (and more achievable). You may have a one-time free trial of their services. So make sure you have used the Overture Suggestion Tool first of all to work out common keywords, and then go over to Wordtracker to analyse the competition for those keywords. I also receive their free weekly report on top keywords. WordTracker statistics are drawn from two main metacrawler search engines.
KeywordDiscovery is another leading provider of keyword analysis functionality. Limited functions are available for free. Their strength is in:
the breadth of statistics - search stats from over 100 search engines around the globe
keyword suggestion - misspellings, thesaurus, related words
keyword analysis - their own version of KEI to determine competitiveness
TheDowser Keyword Research Software was released in mid 2005, that brings together the different forms of keyword research covered above. There is a free version you can download, or upgrade to a full version, that even allows you to sell keyword research as a business. It has the ability to suggest keywords, retrieve link bids, research popularity, calculate KEI, drawing on databases such as Overture, Wordtracker, KeywordDiscovery and other PPC engines. Very worthwhile.
KeywordElite is another keyword analysis tool that performs advanced analysis, including letting you spy on your Adwords competitors bids, and organise keyword lists.
Nichebot is a free tool allowingkeyword analysis for the top 15 related phrases for your keyword. It will also analyse the backlinks and Pagerank of the top 15 sites for your keyword.
A similarly useful tool based around Overture results instead of Google, is ResultsGenerator. Great for finding keywords related to your topic, how much people pay for them and how many times they search for them.
Using Keyword Analysis Results
The end result of this section is that you should have a list of preferred, achievable, keywords. Now you can start designing your site layout so that you can optimise your site to target one or two keywords per page.
Your goal is to optimise each page of your website, so that each page will be found for different (although related) keywords.
As a good webmaster/mistress, you will be planning to build rich content-filled pages. To earn money, you may be selling your own products, or have affiliate links to related products.
Many people also earn significant income from displaying Google's Adsense ads on their pages. This allows Google to display related-topic ads that other people have paid for, and you earn a percentage of what those people paid for their ads. Many people therefore search for topics where people pay large amounts to advertise, so they can earn a percentage of those large figures. Do a search at Google for lists of top-paying keywords.
Basically, there's no use in building a site if no-one is looking for it. You need to know what people are looking for to decide if it's worth building.
Keywords are the words people type into a search engine, in the hope of finding your site. Choosing the right keywords is vitally important, and should affect your choice of domain name, design and site content. Keyword analysis will help achieve this.
As people become more sophisticated in their use of search engines, they tend to use keyword phrases, rather than a single keyword. For example "studded dog collars" instead of just "dogs". Many sites specifically target a keyword phrase on each page. You also have more chance of scoring a better ranking for a keyword phrase, rather than a single, popular keyword.
Initial Keyword Analysis
First of all, visit these sites to get some ideas on which keywords are currently popular, being searched for through search engines. (If you don't already have a favourite subject you plan to build your site about).
The Lycos Top 50
The Google Zeitgeist
Yahoo Buzz
MetaSpy
I also subscribe to the free weekly report from Wordtracker on the most frequently searched keywords.
Keyword Suggestion
Now that you have a rough idea of a subject or keyword you are interested in, you need to find related keyword phrases people actually use. Various free suggestion tools will "suggest" related phrases. They may also tell you how often the phrase was searched for. Take note of whether daily, monthly or yearly figures are quoted.
SearchIt is a fantastic new free search and keyword tool. It has a heap of search tools built into it: - keyword brainstormer, Adwords suggestor, Overture suggestor, monetization, competitors, and more. Plus they keep updating it when they think of a new tool. The only keyword suggestion tool you should ever need.
Yahoo search suggestion tool (formerly known as Overture Suggestion Tool ) returns a list of related phrases and how many times they were searched for last month. Although it does combine plurals, so you can't tell the difference between say flower and flowers.
Google search suggestion tool is available as an external tool, or if used through your Google Adwords login, it can also suggest cost-per-click advertising costs.
Goodkeywords (requires a download) also suggests keywords.
Advanced Keyword Analysis
Knowing how many times per day/month/year a keyword was searched for is not enough.
You also need to know the scope of the search database (was it only searches through Google? for one country or the world? ), and how many websites on that topic already exist.
Some keywords are so popular (eg home business) that you have buckley's chance of getting a top ten ranking for that keyword. So you need to analyse which ones are both popular, and have comparatively less competition.
Wordtracker provides a paid service which will analyse keywords in this way. They use a measure called KEI to measure competitiveness, where the lower the KEI, the less competition (and more achievable). You may have a one-time free trial of their services. So make sure you have used the Overture Suggestion Tool first of all to work out common keywords, and then go over to Wordtracker to analyse the competition for those keywords. I also receive their free weekly report on top keywords. WordTracker statistics are drawn from two main metacrawler search engines.
KeywordDiscovery is another leading provider of keyword analysis functionality. Limited functions are available for free. Their strength is in:
the breadth of statistics - search stats from over 100 search engines around the globe
keyword suggestion - misspellings, thesaurus, related words
keyword analysis - their own version of KEI to determine competitiveness
TheDowser Keyword Research Software was released in mid 2005, that brings together the different forms of keyword research covered above. There is a free version you can download, or upgrade to a full version, that even allows you to sell keyword research as a business. It has the ability to suggest keywords, retrieve link bids, research popularity, calculate KEI, drawing on databases such as Overture, Wordtracker, KeywordDiscovery and other PPC engines. Very worthwhile.
KeywordElite is another keyword analysis tool that performs advanced analysis, including letting you spy on your Adwords competitors bids, and organise keyword lists.
Nichebot is a free tool allowingkeyword analysis for the top 15 related phrases for your keyword. It will also analyse the backlinks and Pagerank of the top 15 sites for your keyword.
A similarly useful tool based around Overture results instead of Google, is ResultsGenerator. Great for finding keywords related to your topic, how much people pay for them and how many times they search for them.
Using Keyword Analysis Results
The end result of this section is that you should have a list of preferred, achievable, keywords. Now you can start designing your site layout so that you can optimise your site to target one or two keywords per page.
Your goal is to optimise each page of your website, so that each page will be found for different (although related) keywords.
As a good webmaster/mistress, you will be planning to build rich content-filled pages. To earn money, you may be selling your own products, or have affiliate links to related products.
Many people also earn significant income from displaying Google's Adsense ads on their pages. This allows Google to display related-topic ads that other people have paid for, and you earn a percentage of what those people paid for their ads. Many people therefore search for topics where people pay large amounts to advertise, so they can earn a percentage of those large figures. Do a search at Google for lists of top-paying keywords.
Email Marketing
Email Marketing is the process of building a mailing list, and marketing your product and/or services to that mailing list. Email Marketing has suffered in recent years as a result of the increase in spam, and use of email blacklists, but still is an extraordinarily effective way of marketing to a targetted audience.
Professional internet email marketers all agree that your mailing list is your goldmine. Your goal as a serious email marketer, is to build your own email mailing list that you can market to - with their permission, of course.
Successful email marketers maintain multiple lists, and sub-lists. For example those who signed up for a freebie, those who then purchased at a later date, multiple purchasers, etc, those interested in particular products.
The most important reason to have a list is because people rarely buy things on their first visit to your site. Getting them on your list and following up with them later is the best way of increasing conversions.
An autoresponder is a program that lets you send emails to your list at controlled intervals. You can use your autoresponder to send free reports, to confirm a sale, to do a followup, to send an automatic welcome when they join your list, and more.
There are numerous free autoresponder programs available (courtesy of ads in the messages), generally with paid upgraded versions (without ads). Such as:
Bravenet
GetResponse
FreeAutobot
If you have something to sell, capturing people's email address is the most important thing you can do. Even the best websites may only get about sales conversion rate from their visitors. But following them up via email can increase that rate. So capture their address, by offering them something free, and then follow them up with an autoresponder to remind them how good you are, and how much you are willing to help them, the benefits of your product and how it can change their life for the better and solve their problems.
This is where people talk about front-end and back-end. People may join your list as they buy your main front-end product, or to get a free ebook or course. Then you can periodically continue to offer them related products later on, that they may be interested in, as back-end products for satisfied customers.
You can buy lists of names of people who are willing to join your list. Allow them to opt-out at any time. Make sure you buy from a reputable company, to avoid getting spam complaints. Get personal references from people who have used the company.
A common way is to write a series of lessons about a particular topic, with a catchy title, such as "Seven secrets to Marketing Success" or "Health Tips you can't afford to ignore". Save them in an autoresponder. Advertise your lessons. People have to enter their email address to subscribe to your course. Particularly if you offer something for free. Then you can followup with your primary and followup offers.
But you have to provide value to your list. If you are constantly mailing them ads, soliciting their money, without giving anything back, then they will get sick of the junk mail, and unsubscribe. I know I do.
Professional internet email marketers all agree that your mailing list is your goldmine. Your goal as a serious email marketer, is to build your own email mailing list that you can market to - with their permission, of course.
Successful email marketers maintain multiple lists, and sub-lists. For example those who signed up for a freebie, those who then purchased at a later date, multiple purchasers, etc, those interested in particular products.
The most important reason to have a list is because people rarely buy things on their first visit to your site. Getting them on your list and following up with them later is the best way of increasing conversions.
An autoresponder is a program that lets you send emails to your list at controlled intervals. You can use your autoresponder to send free reports, to confirm a sale, to do a followup, to send an automatic welcome when they join your list, and more.
There are numerous free autoresponder programs available (courtesy of ads in the messages), generally with paid upgraded versions (without ads). Such as:
Bravenet
GetResponse
FreeAutobot
If you have something to sell, capturing people's email address is the most important thing you can do. Even the best websites may only get about sales conversion rate from their visitors. But following them up via email can increase that rate. So capture their address, by offering them something free, and then follow them up with an autoresponder to remind them how good you are, and how much you are willing to help them, the benefits of your product and how it can change their life for the better and solve their problems.
This is where people talk about front-end and back-end. People may join your list as they buy your main front-end product, or to get a free ebook or course. Then you can periodically continue to offer them related products later on, that they may be interested in, as back-end products for satisfied customers.
You can buy lists of names of people who are willing to join your list. Allow them to opt-out at any time. Make sure you buy from a reputable company, to avoid getting spam complaints. Get personal references from people who have used the company.
A common way is to write a series of lessons about a particular topic, with a catchy title, such as "Seven secrets to Marketing Success" or "Health Tips you can't afford to ignore". Save them in an autoresponder. Advertise your lessons. People have to enter their email address to subscribe to your course. Particularly if you offer something for free. Then you can followup with your primary and followup offers.
But you have to provide value to your list. If you are constantly mailing them ads, soliciting their money, without giving anything back, then they will get sick of the junk mail, and unsubscribe. I know I do.
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