Web Promotion Articles

Blog And Ping Does It Work?

Blog And Ping Does It Work?

 by: Douglas Titchmarsh

I have been doing an experiment with blogging and pinging, one of the ways which supposedly gets your site listed and ranked higher quicker.

Firstly I’ll explain what blogging and pinging is. Blog and ping is a technique you can use to get your site listed in search engines. The idea is that search engines like blogs because of the ever updating content, so they keep going back. By writing a blog and placing some site links in the posts, the search engines will spider the links, and pages shortly after you blog.

Pinging is when you send a “ping” to let the directories, which keep lists of blogs, and when those blogs are updated, know that you have added content to your blog. These are allegedly closely watched by the search engine spiders, so they can spider any new content and add it to the search engine which controls them.

Anyway, back to my experiment, does blogging and pinging really get your site noticed?

Well my results have been encouraging. I have tested by only using a blog as the front page of a new information site I started. http://www.informationpagesonline.com has only been advertised by way of the blog to announce new content, and then pinged through http://www.pingoat.com which distributes the blog entries to several large ping sites.

Following a week of adding content, and then posting an announcement of the new content to the blog on the front page and pinging with pingoat, the site seems to be getting visitors to most of the sections, which I can see from the log files. I can also see some of the traffic is coming from search engines, and also a lot of spider activity can be seen on the site, where the search engines are crawling the content.

So I have to conclude that blogging and pinging is a way of getting listed on search engines, or at least of getting noticed by them quickly.

Should you be blogging and pinging?

Of course that’s up to you, but for the time it takes, it maybe worth trying blog and ping for yourself and tracking the results. A quick blog post (use http://www.blogger.com if you don’t already have a blog) and then ping with pingoat takes only a few minutes, and may help a site into all the search engines quickly.

Add comment September 4th, 2006

11 Ways to Promote Your Blog

1. Ping weblogs.com and other search engines. When you ping a blog, you are telling the search engine that you have updated your blog content and that your listing should be refreshed. Weblogs.com is a blog update notification service that many individuals and services use to track blog changes. Pinging your blogs to the search engines is the fastest way to get the search engine robots to visit your blog. Also, many people browse these sites to find something new.

Add comment September 4th, 2006

Newbie Guide to Quick PageRank and Rankings

Newbie Guide to Quick PageRank and Rankings

 by: Robert Flournoy

Being relatively new to search engine optimization techniques, I dreaded confronting the mysterious Google aging penalty which, by some accounts, plagues websites for well over a year. Moreover, I figured that achieving a decent PageRank (not that it really matters) would be as elusive as first page Google rankings. Well, after about 3 months of worrying, I’m fortunate enough to say that my newly registered domain has emerged from the depths of anonymity with a PageRank 5 and more importantly, several first page search result rankings.

Since I never came across an easy to digest newbie “how to guide”, I figure why not share my experiences? With that said, I’d like to layout exactly what I did so other newbies have a framework by which satisfactory PageRank and first page rankings can be achieved. It should come as no surprise that my short-term success was a result of domain selection, unique content and link building.

Domain

1. Keyword rich domain, not too long and yet catchy. Don’t go overboard with keywords and hyphens. The shorter the better.

2. Try to buy an existing domain with a favorable reputation and topical authority. Expect a somewhat attractive, aged domain to sell for $500 - $10,000. In my opinion, the “extreme” cash outlay isn’t worth it unless you’re rolling in bills or the competitive landscape warrants a “running start”.

3. Register the domain for multiple years since Google favors multi-year registrations. Most fly-by-night spam websites are registered for only a single year.

4. Host the domain on a dedicated or managed server that includes at least 1 IP address - finding a reliable host in itself can be an exercise.

Website

1. Set up a temporary website as soon as possible and don’t wait for the finished site since website development usually takes a lot longer than expected. In my case, the project timetable allotted 2 months when in fact development took 6 months.

2. Develop a simple HTML website to house temporary content unless a better alternative is possible. The temporary site is meant to be search engine “fodder” designed to begin the search engine courting process in which Google, et al. assign your site to a topical neighborhood. In my case, a rather rudimentary homepage was developed that was updated several times a week with new content. Once moved off the home page, older content was hot linked from the home page, and yes, it was damn ugly.

3. Create on-topic keyword-rich content with a length of 300-500 words. I started with content derived from industry news. Topics were researched, expanded upon and then transformed into unique articles.

4. Update keyword rich unique content as frequently as possible. Since golf real estate isn’t that newsworthy, my options were limited. Therefore, on average, 3 new and unique content items were posted on my site weekly.

Link Building

1. Secure one-way inbound links with any reciprocal linking. Basically, there are 3 alternatives: directory links, article syndication and press releases. Natural inbound links are nearly impossible since your site is really set up for search engines. Despite this, one should be able to safely generate at least 300 external links over a 3 month period.

2. Create 3-4 site descriptions for link building with targeted keywords in the anchor and description text. Vary site descriptions by using word stems and related keywords. I created a basic site description template that changed on the fly when submitting to directories.

3. Submit to as many credible directories as possible and don’t worry about accumulating too many links too soon since most directories don’t approve links immediately. Over the 3 month period in question, I probably submitted my website to at least 150 free directories. Prior to submitting my site to a directory, I made sure that the page my link would be on had a PageRank and that PageRank was passed. I wished I had known about RoboForm which I recommend using for directory submissions.

4. Write and post at least 2 articles to as many credible article syndication sites as possible. Articles should target a couple keywords without going overboard on keyword frequency. Optimum length is 500-1,000 words. I submitted 3 articles, each spread a month apart, to about 110 somewhat credible article syndication sites. The sites were compiled by parsing through the numerous SEO forums.

5. Submit a couple press release if you have something noteworthy to announce. Article syndication guidelines can be applied to press release distribution. I’ve been able to find approximately 50 credible free press release sites.

Add comment September 4th, 2006

What is Google Pagerank?

PageRank is one of the factors that Google uses to evaluate your web site and determine its position in the Google search engine results. PageRank is a number from 0 to 10.

Generally, if your web site has a higher PageRank, it will appear earlier in Google search results pages, all other factors being equal. In fact, you can see a significant improvement in where your pages appear in search engine results when your PageRank increases.

Add comment September 4th, 2006

Any One Can Create A Website

Any One Can Create A Website

 by: Robert Nixon

Yes, anyone can create a Website, it is not as hard as you may think and it will not take a long period of time to get done. If you can not afford for pay for a professional to create one for you, there are other options you may not have considered.

Most people today that have a PC (personal computer) at home today also have some sort of ‘office’ program, either from Microsoft or some other company of the same level. You may even want to take advantage of the offers from the big search engines themselves, such a Google’s new page creator, and have an additional websites on the internet.

These programs come with additional programs that make life easier, such as Word, Publisher, Power Point to name a few. Since many are well versed in one of these programs, they often use it’s ‘website’ function as their first tool for creating a website. It all depends upon the level of the master program you install, and that depends upon the value you think the program will have for you at the time of purchase. For instance, you can get Microsoft office ‘pro’ or ’student/teacher’, which will have only certain programs included. The ‘pro’ version has Access, FrontPage and Publisher, where as the ’student/teacher version does not.

You will just have to try them out and select the one you feel is best suited for your level of expertise. You can always at a later time,use one of the others and even a ’stand alone’ program of some sort to make your website better, if desired. There is nothing wrong with any of the mentioned programs,I used Word as my very first website creation tool once Microsoft added that function to it. I have been active with computers since the early 70’s when I took computer science in college and majored in programming. At that time is was all ‘main frame’ languages since the internet as we know it today did not exist. There was one but it was not available for public use and many did not know about it, only the colleges and government.

We know the search engines love to ‘re-visit’ your site and check for changes in order to have the latest changes you have made to your site. There will be changes during the course of time as many change associations, add links or pictures and text. I too go through this and get tired of having the same old page jump up at me when I go to my site. If you are like most of use, you visit your site much more than anyone else. You like to check things like your ‘hits’, ‘page views’, and links ( to see if any are no longer valid ).

Here is where having an advanced editing program (the more common are ‘Dreamweaver and Frontpage’) comes in very handy or having a working knowledge of html code as you will need one of them to get your ‘meta tags’ in place. Do you have to do this? No, you do not, but if you do not then you may never get listed with some of the better engines since the ‘robots’ they send to check out your site for listing may not find the information they require.

The key to any website when creating it is to detach yourself and think about what others will like or think about what they see when the visit your site. There are physical aspects to this, not only mental ones. You will find in a room of many people they each will have input on what ‘they’ like. You will have to get the common factors and use those as your basic ones as the starting point for your site. You can always ignore this and do what you like and that is ok too. With the millions of new people getting on the internet every month, the chances of ‘like minds’ like yours that will love your site just as you created it grows. It will be seen no matter what, so don’t become overly concerned and get your site up as soon as you can.

When Google came out with ‘Adsense’ they found many neglected certain aspects called site page ‘hot spots’. These ‘hot spots’ should never be overlooked when creating a website or any of it’s ‘related’ pages. Google has a set of articles about this.

I, like many of you, love to ‘do things myself’ and got advanced programs such as Frontpage to use for my website creation and up-dating once I had the initial site up using one of the basic programs such as the ones mentioned above. I am even more into learning how to use them myself by relying on the ‘help’ aspects. I have found that for me, trial and error brings more rewards. I also just have not the time to attend a night class or private class on the program, although I do think most should do this before attempting to do a site with an advanced website program.

Once your done, you will face another challenge and that is ‘up-loading’ it to your domain for the rest of the world to view. There are several ways you can do this or you can contact your hosting company and they will assist you or do it for you. If they charge will depend upon the level of site you have with them or other factors. I have found it is better to create the site first, then get your hosting. Let them know you have a ‘web’ ready to up-load. In the process you will also find it will take up to 72 hours before your domain will be viewable across the whole internet or for your hosting server to get what is called the DNS active.

The bottom line is to get your site up as soon as you can and start making money with it if that is what you desire.

Good Luck,

Add comment September 4th, 2006

SEO Expert Guide - Ongoing Monitoring of Results (part 9/10)

In the Guide, you have, so far, learnt how to plan for and execute a search engine optimization and promotion strategy. However, this is not a one-off process, but an ongoing and iterative process, where you tweak and refine towards ever better ranking.

To inform this iteration, it is vital that you objectively monitor your performance, using measurable indicators and statistics.

(a) Tracking PageRank (PR)

As I have indicated previously in the Guide, you can find out your Google PageRank at any time by using the Google Toolbar.

Add comment September 4th, 2006

Search Engine Optimization :: The Basics and Why Websites Need It

We all know that the most targeted traffic we can get for our websites is from search engines. If you have a little patience and time to set websites the right way you can have a great source of excellent traffic and, best of all, you get it for free.

I will outline first in this article the basics that you have to know to get started with the optimization the right way and, if you read it carefully, you will find out how to be one step ahead the majority.

Add comment September 4th, 2006

Link Building Strategy

Link Building Strategy

 by: Henry James

Website promotion is essential to promote your e-business. Building a website is not enough for carrying on a successful online business. You have to adopt right link building strategy to promote your website in a search engine friendly manner. Search engines consider link popularity as an important factor to determine the ranks of the websites.

A website with quality links is likely to rank among the top ten results of the search engines. The link popularity for every search engine is different from the other. You can find out the link popularity by typing “Link: domain name of the website” in any of the search engine. The compete details of the sites linking to your website will be in front of you.

You can devise an effective link building strategy to raise the link popularity of your website. You can incorporate three types of links for this purpose— internal, external and reciprocal links.

The best possible way to have a good linking plan for your website is to develop a site map. A site map is the plan of the whole website that contains entire links on a website. The links are specified according to the specific details of a topic. They are generally given in a hierarchical manner. The links must be text links containing the keywords related to your website. This makes the search of the search engine for links quite easy.

You can have a quality internal links and can get the pages of your website linked internally. The website is rated as a good quality website, if it has rightly placed internal links. The link building strategy also stresses up on the outgoing links. They make your website user-friendly.

Connecting to the right websites makes your website to access good content. If the content of the sites related to your site is not good or useless, the search engines will not consider such links as useful. The message is clear that you have to stress on the quality of the links rather than the quantity.

The inbound links are the most important for link building strategy. You can get other websites to link to your website by developing good content. According to the experts, content of a website is the primary decisive factor in link building. Others will be interested to link to your website, if and only if, you have a good content on it.

The expert link building strategy is also to build reciprocal links with your competitors. This is beneficial to both the parties of linking. Both of them will provide targeted traffic to each other. This link building strategy is the ultimate mantra for getting quality links and gain good link popularity as the information on both the links will be related to each other.

The accurate link building strategy pushes ahead your target of link popularity, resulting in high search engine ranks.

Add comment September 4th, 2006

Why You Should NOT Submit Your Site On Search Engines

Before to answer to this question we have to know what is the difference between a search engine and directory. Here is a brief explanation.

Main difference between search engine and directory lay in the way how websites get entered into their index. People submit their sites to the directories, which are reviewed by human editors. Think of the directories as collections of Internet sites organized by subject. Search engines works by sending out a spider to fetch as many documents as possible. Another program, called an indexer, then reads these documents and creates an index based on the words contained in each document.

Add comment September 4th, 2006

MLM and SEO. Bad Business! No Business!

MLM and SEO. Bad Business! No Business!

 by: Joe Balestrino

MLM has been around way before the Internet. It is a few steps above a chain letter. Well, maybe more then a few steps. MLM has paved the way for people to have their own business. It can start out as side money and flourish into a very profitable business.

Now, you are probably saying to yourself “Joe, what do you know about MLM?” Well, folks in the early days I did MLM. Yes, I am a not proud of it. Not because it’s MLM but, because I wasn’t any good at it. Thank goodness though. I may not have found my calling in SEO if I did. What I am trying to say is…MLM is hard. Nowadays, they try to make it easier by offering you a cookie cutter site. What? A cookie cutter site? Isn’t that bad SEO? YES! MLM in their attempt to help their down-line are actually making it harder. You want to spend more time promoting your site by:

Writing content

Testimonials

Recommendations

Providing tips about the items or products

.and so on.

MLM companies force you to throw more of your hard earn money into advertising. If you know the name of a well established MLM company type it into Google. What you get is dozens of sites. Many of them are the same exact site dominating over the others. It is usually the companies own site. Generating leads that YOU will have to pay to get. While your cookie cutter site fights for spots on Google adwords. Which by the way YOUR MLM has the top 3 positions. So, how do you win?

Create your own web site. Find keywords related to what you sell and not the company name. If you cannot do that then create a blog. Place tips, recommendations, and testimonials and so on in your blog. Do your own Google campaign. Find message boards, blogs and websites that have interests in what you sell. You can even do a link exchange with other blogs.

Until MLM companies’ see how valuable SEO is to the success of their business and yours you can never be successful. They will always tell you about the successes and never the failures. It is true it takes money to make money. But, if the main company corners the market on leads how can you ever make it ahead? Go door to door?

Take matters into your own hands. Or, better yet. Demand your up-line provide you with a better way to achieve your goals. They are profiting from all your hard work. So, let them help you as much as possible. If that doesn’t work take matters into your own hands. The worst you can do is make things better.

Add comment September 4th, 2006