SEO SEM Services

The Future of SEO – Structured Markup

noreply@blogger.com (Shailendra Singh) — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 12:21:00 +0000

Ever since I started doing SEO, I remember coming across “The Future of SEO” style blog posts, taking a punt at what the future might hold in store for Search Engine Marketers. Among some of the more recent posts on the topic, Rand at SEOmoz gave a lot of weight to user data and the social graph beginning to play a role, while, over at SES San Jose, experts discussed subjects ranging from search query refinement for better results quality, to understanding semantic intent in search queries and the mechanics of mobile search.

The Future of SEO

No SEO blog would be complete without at least one post on the subject of the future of SEO, so I’d like to put my thoughts out there too – feel free to feedback, comment and add to the discussion. The “future SEO” subject I’m feeling most passionate about at the moment is the use of structured, uniform markup to highlight data in web page development and how this could impact search user experience, and on page SEO.

I’m talking about the introduction of standards such as Microformats, RDFa, HTML5, the Common Tag and thinking about the likely impact on search results these structured data formats will have.

What is structured data?

Let’s imagine a website that contains products, reviews and prices. Our imaginary website has been lovingly crafted in W3C compliant HTML, offers a great user experience, generates heaps of revenue and has plenty of authority according to Google. For a search engine, there’s a wealth of product and price data to crawl and display in search results for users. As a result of a predictable, consistent code build and good solid levels of authority, we begin to see details from product pages (such as price) appear in search results:

Today, the way a search engine “sees” the information it gathers from one website can be quite different to the way it sees another. That’s because the data is very likely to be marked up differently. This is no problem for users as they’re unaware of the differences found in the page code, but it’s a challenge for search engines looking to enhance and develop their search results pages.

Consistency and standards are the key

Imagine a world where important data, such as prices, reviews and dates are all identified in a more consistent way across the internet via a uniform approach to semantic markup. What you need are Microformats, RDFa and HTML5 – all standards that will or are enabling search engines to interpret data more easily.

Search engines and structured data playback

We’re already seeing search engines developing different ways to playback search results pages to users, with the intention of presenting information in a more useful and meaningful way. If search engines are more able to discover and understand the data being collected, they’re in a much stronger position to play back that data in their search results.

In May 2009 Google announced their support for RDFa and Yahoo had already been working on this for a year or so via the Search Monkey application, with early example implementations in sites such as Linkedin and Yelp.

So if we’re already seeing search results changing as a result of more structured data on the web, what examples can we see to prove search engine companies intentions towards more meaningful, structured and information rich results?

Google Squared

Google previewed Google Squared at the Searchology conference back in May 09.

According to Search Engine Watch, “Searching via Google Squared means searching for pure information.”.

SEW hit the nail on the head with that quote, but sadly for Google, the data has to exist in the first place! Take the example above for “resturant in London“.

Out of the first 4 results on the page, only 1 address has been found and there’s really very little alternative information to work with. No menu data and critically, no reviews. Further acceptance and processing of Microformats standards such as hreview could address this small problem quickly and easily, and give search engines the data they need to create a more convincing search experience.

Prices from the page

About a week ago we started seeing an option in Google search using the “show options” link.

This is an example of Google playing price data back to the user, though laterooms.com do not appear to be using the standards we’ve discussed so far in their page build.

“Prices from the page” options are definitely an early sign of Google’s longer term intentions to develop a richer, informative experience on their serps, though without webmasters implementing a more structured approach to their code, progress could be slow.

My future of SEO is the ability to bring the knowledge of structured, consistently marked up data to the table to allow search engines to play back results in as meaningful and relevant way as they see fit. Ultimately, keeping up to date with new standards could give you the advantage over your competitors in the search results, making your site stand out, winning you the clicks.

5 Tools to Compare Google with Caffeine

noreply@blogger.com (Shailendra Singh) — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 06:39:00 +0000

Here are the tools for Caffeine I currently know about and that you might find useful –

Google Caffeine Bookmarklet — This one is my favorite but I might be biased What I like about it is that I can easily check Caffeine results on a whim by just clicking the bookmarklet in my browser.
Plug Caffeine into FireFox Search Bar — This adds Caffeine as a search engine to your FF search bar.
Ranking Checker — This tool checks your ranking at Google and Caffeine at the same time. It doesn’t show you the actual search results for comparison, but it is a quick way to check rankings if that is your main concern.
Google vs. Google Caffeine — This tool takes your search and returns results from Google and Caffeine at the same time in a split screen (you can choose horizontal or vertical split which is nice). Good for those that need to do lots of testing.
Google.ie and Google.de vs Caffeine — This is another split screen tool but in addition to the US version of Google it also does the Irish and Deutsch versions too.

If you know of another tool please let me know in the comments.

10 Reasons Why Journalists Will Write About Your Website

noreply@blogger.com (Shailendra Singh) — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 10:15:00 +0000

“Vision is the art of seeing what is invisible to others.” Jonathan Swift

Opportunities for great free publicity and inbound links are all around us. They arise every day from a host of newspapers, magazines, blogs and online news sites… but we just don’t see them.

Often we don’t see them because we don’t look.

Our brains work on autopilot most of the time. We filter out lots of things that are happening all around us, they just pass us by unnoticed.

But once you start to look for something, you see it everywhere.

Several years ago, I was featured in the New York Times – and the feature gave a live link to my site. The link brought me a lot of traffic, other sites linked to me because I’d been featured and I got the search engine benefit of a link from a strong authority site. A fantastic piece of publicity.

Afterwards, I wondered how many other small businesses had been featured in the New York Times and whether they too had a link to their site.

I started looking for other examples of how link building and online public relations could work together. And sure enough I found them. I’ve continuing looking off and on, and I’ve built quite a collection of examples. Last week, I shared one of these examples with you in my article Is Online PR The Ultimate Link Building Technique?

In this article, I’d like to outline 10 reasons why a journalist would write about your website, and I want to give you real examples that will inspire you to try the same.

An important online PR tip

Before jumping into the examples, I can’t stress enough that if you want to get this type of coverage and the links it will bring, you’ve got to start paying attention to news. Not only in your own industry but in the general media that reaches a wider population.

News is something most of us consume every day. But we do so without giving it a second thought, and once read it’s quickly forgotten. Reading business stories of the kind we’d all like to be featured in, how much of the story do we really take in?

How about asking questions like:

* Why did the journalist choose to write about that?
* What are the main themes of the story?
* How often have you seen these themes before?
* Why did the story appear now?
* Why write about this business and not that one?

Answer these questions and you start to see what journalists look for in a story and understand how the media works. You’ll see, as Jonathan Swift puts it, “what is invisible to others”. And when you see what is invisible to others, you have an advantage.

I’ve been looking at this for years so let me give you my top 10 reasons journalists write about small businesses, together with some of the great examples I’ve found.

1. They need to create a list

When journalists review a particular topic – say holiday destinations, specialist food suppliers, restaurants, they often provide a list of recommended suppliers.

This is one of the most common ways that a small businesses can get both coverage and a link to their website. For examples, Five upstate New York spas for a relaxing weekend from the Daily News and Cheap travel and vacations are out there from the Boston Globe.

In order to compile these lists journalists will search Google, scan directories and otherwise look for highly visible businesses online. If you do your homework and make sure you appear in the places journalists are likely to look, then you stand a good chance of being considered.

Action: Make sure you can be found on popular directories, Google news and general searches.

2. They need a seasonal story

Editorial stories follow a very careful calendar and features and content will be planned months in advance. So if you get in early with a relevant message clearly geared to a specific event or season, you raise your chances of getting coverage.

For example, feature story in The New York Times in early summer focused on barbequing outdoor food with real wood, instead of charcoal. The story earned two small companies some valuable links. You’ll find the story here - Seasonal start-ups seek promotion.

Action: Anticipate these seasonal stories and submit your ideas to journalists well in advance.

3. They want to follow up on a big story

Jeremy Paxman, a famous English journalist, author and television presenter, created a stir when he publicly criticized the quality of underwear available from Marks and Spencers. The temptation to do a follow up was irresistible to many journalists and provided underwear and lingerie retailers with some valuable links. BBC personality says his underwear is a load of pants.

Action: Learn how to ‘piggy back’ on big stories. Set up Google alerts using your major keywords and every morning browse the results looking for opportunities to react.

4. They’re writing about a competitor

Journalist often want to give balance in business articles they write. This story, Your Photos, Off the Shelf at Last in the New York Times was essentially about ScanMyPhotos.com but for balance, the journalist included a link to Digmypics.com. Therefore if they’re writing about one of your major competitors, they may give you a mention too – especially if you appear alongside them in Google searches.

Action: Monitor whether you appear in searches alongside your competitors. Track their major keywords and aim to appear in the results pages too.

5. They’re writing about a particular group and you fit the bill

Journalists will often cover business stories from specific groups, for example, mature entrepreneurs. This article from the BBC tells the story of a number of over-50s entrepreneurs and provides a link to a business and a support organization. You can check the story out at Mature entrepreneurs come of age.

Action: It often pays to join special interest groups. Not only will you get great help, but you’ll find opportunities to volunteer for media interviews – take them!

6. You’ve won an unusual order

Your own order book can entice a journalist to write about you. Valerie Johnston who started Big Feet Pyjama Co. from her own home, not only created an unusual product, but had it included in the Academy Awards Gift Baskets. Her rapidly growing business has been featured in over 100 media outlets including the New York’s Daily News. Read Valerie’s story - Big Feet strides towards big profits.

Action: Make sure you look through your customer lists for potentially interesting stories. Get your customer to agree and then contact the media.

7. They need an example to illustrate a national trend

Marcia and Tom Blackwell founded Blackwell's Organic Gelato in 2005. At the time, financing the business with a home equity line of credit. However, the credit crunch meant that in 2009, the bank froze the line of credit. The Blackwells made a perfect example of how the crunch is affecting small American businesses.

See Falling house prices effects entrepreneurial opportunities.

Action: Monitor big news stories and wherever you can provide a concrete example volunteer information.

8. They need an example to illustrate federal legislation

The federal stimulus package may provide the experienced environmental company with a large boost. In Taking green global we give the background to the company that attracted CNN.

Action: Always be ready to feature in larger breaking stories.

9. They need expert comment

Journalist are rarely experts in industry. Their job is often to write about and explain things that they don’t fully understand. Therefore they need the help of experts who they can ask to explain complex issues. If you get known for your ability to speak clearly and simply on your industry, then there’s a good chance that trade journalists will seek you out. Perform well and they will come back time and again.

The business travel website Joesentme.com illustrated the use of this marketing method in a New York Times article on the battle to implement Wi-Fi internet access on domestic airlines. See The power of comment.

Action: You can probably speak well and be understood by peers in your industry. But can you speak in everyday language and explain complex issues. Practice this skill and make sure journalists know of your ability.

10. They need an award winner

Interviewing small businesses can often be a difficult job. From the start a journalist may not know whether you’re going to be reliable and deliver the important content they need. However, if you’re an award-winning small business they have outside proof that there is something special about your company and they will come back time and again whenever they need a story. Green Dragon Pest Solutions is in that happy position - Friendly Pest Killer Strikes Again.

Action: Always be on the look out for industry awards you can enter. Even if you don’t win, the involvement can bring you to the attention of news hungry journalists.

Let me remind you of the quote, I started this article off with - “Vision is the art of seeing what is invisible to others,” Jonathan Swift. Start looking for media opportunities and you will surely find them.

Top 10 Ways to Get Traffic more

noreply@blogger.com (Shailendra Singh) — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 12:30:00 +0000

There are different ways to get more traffic. here I'm mentions top 10 ways:

Article Submission
URL Submission
Social Bookmarking
Forum Posting
Affiliate Marketing
Press Releases
Classified Ads
Blog Comments
FaceBook
Videos

SEO Proposal

noreply@blogger.com (Shailendra Singh) — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 07:57:00 +0000

We hereby purpose to offer SEO services and perform all tasks necessary for the optimization of your website. You know, just submitting your website’s URL is not enough to get in TOP TEN of search engine results. AS search engines change their placement algorithms, pages get dropped from the search engines, and other sites try to place above you. Therefore, regular maintenance is important.

We will optimize your website according to your keywords and also help you in closing more sales. Getting a front page listing in the search engines is great, but if you cannot convert the traffic you get into sales, what good is it? Our SEO team adequately knows how to optimize your web site and help you convert more sales.

About the Company

We are specialized in offering quality and cost-effective search engine optimization (SEO) and online marketing services to both our domestic and international clients. Our top priority is to assist our every client in every possible way to gain maximum return on the investment.

We offer cost-effective Search Engine Optimization (SEO) services that will not only give you competitive advantage but also generate more leads and sales.

However, some of the tasks we may perform on a monthly basis are shown in the following bullet points.

Services to Be Performed

* Meta tag coding
* SEO friendly layout re-framing
* Code Optimizations
* Manual Directory Submission
* Keywords optimization
* Image Optimization
* Link Building Campaign
* Search Engine Submission
* Keyword Analysis and keyword density ratio maintenance
* Article Submission
* Press Release
* Social Book Mareking
* Social Media Optimizations
* Data Distribution
* E-Book Markeing
* Weekly listing and rank reports

FEATURE	BASIC	STANDARD	ADVANCED	BUSINESS
No. Of. Keywords Optimization	5	10	15	20
Duration	6 Months	6 Months	6 Months	7 Months
Onpage Optimization ( Per Month)
Meta Optimization	Y	Y	Y	Y
Sitemap	Y	Y	Y	Y
Robots.txt	Y	Y	Y	Y
Site validation w3c	Home Page*	Home Page*	5 Pages*	10 Pages*
Content optimization	Y	Y	Y	Y

Offpage optimization ( Per Month)
Directory Submission	50	75	150	200
Article Submission	25	50	75	100
Social Bookmarking	25	50	75	100
Press Releases Submission	25	50	75	100
Blog Creation	1	1	1	1
Classified Posting	10	20	40	100
Link Exchange Request	20	50	75	100

Free Google Adwords	Rs. 1000	Rs. 1500	Rs. 2000	Rs. 3000
PPC Keywords	20	50	75	100
Reports
Work Reports	Per Month	Per Month	Per Week	Per Week
Competition Analysis Report	Per Month	Per Month	Per Month	Per Week
Traffic Report	Per Month	Per Month	Per Month	Per Week
Ranking Report	Per Month	Per Month	Per Week	Per Week

Support
Email Support	Y	Y	Y	Y
Chat Support	Y	Y	Y	Y
Voice Chat	N	N	Y	Y

Monthly Cost	Rs. 6000	Rs. 9000	Rs. 12000	Rs. 15000

Google Launches TipJar, a Yahoo Answer-Like Money Saving Tips Site

noreply@blogger.com (Shailendra Singh) — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 12:26:00 +0000

FEATURE	BASIC	STANDARD	ADVANCED	BUSINESS
No. Of. Keywords Optimization	5	10	15	20
Duration	6 Months	6 Months	6 Months	7 Months
Onpage Optimization ( Per Month)
Meta Optimization	Y	Y	Y	Y
Sitemap	Y	Y	Y	Y
Robots.txt	Y	Y	Y	Y
Site validation w3c	Home Page*	Home Page*	5 Pages*	10 Pages*
Content optimization	Y	Y	Y	Y

Offpage optimization ( Per Month)
Directory Submission	50	75	150	200
Article Submission	25	50	75	100
Social Bookmarking	25	50	75	100
Press Releases Submission	25	50	75	100
Blog Creation	1	1	1	1
Classified Posting	10	20	40	100
Link Exchange Request	20	50	75	100

Free Google Adwords	Rs. 1000	Rs. 1500	Rs. 2000	Rs. 3000
PPC Keywords	20	50	75	100
Reports
Work Reports	Per Month	Per Month	Per Week	Per Week
Competition Analysis Report	Per Month	Per Month	Per Month	Per Week
Traffic Report	Per Month	Per Month	Per Month	Per Week
Ranking Report	Per Month	Per Month	Per Week	Per Week

Support
Email Support	Y	Y	Y	Y
Chat Support	Y	Y	Y	Y
Voice Chat	N	N	Y	Y

Monthly Cost	Rs. 6000	Rs. 9000	Rs. 12000	Rs. 15000

Perform An SEO Audit On Your Website

noreply@blogger.com (Shailendra Singh) — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 09:36:00 +0000

What makes or break an SEO campaign is knowing where to start, what is important and what is simply not worth the time.

Resources are never infinite. If you're not careful you can spend them spinning wheels and tweaking things that will have no real effect on your search traffic. Plan effectively, and you'll achieve true growth and a positive return on your investment.

The difference lies in understanding how search engines work - how they crawl the web and how they use that data to rank web pages - and how your website does or doesn't meet these criteria.

The Technical Audit

The first order of action is the technical audit of your site. Tackle these issues first because this represents the foundation of your site. Some technical problems can render web pages invisible to search engines. Identifying and resolving these issues upfront is critical.

A technical audit should include:

Code cleanliness / content visibility
• Does the site use JavaScript heavily?
• Is the code bloated?
• Is content generated by JavaScript or otherwise not SEO-friendly?
File size / page load time
Navigation structure
• Is the navigation Flash or JavaScript driven? If so, does it degrade gracefully for browsers
that don't support these technologies (like a search crawler)?
URL structure
• Are there session ID's in the page URLs?
• Are the URLs long and do they include multiple variables and parameters?
• Do the URLs contain keywords?
Title tag / headlines
• Does the site have unique titles and headlines on each page (sometimes content
management and eCommerce systems weren't built with this feature)?
Current index
• Have search engines fully indexed the site? If not, why?
Canonicalization issues
• Are there multiple URLs for the home page or other pages?

This technical audit can sometimes uncover serious problems.

If your site includes session IDs in all URLs, for example, you've got a major problem. Search engines do not index URLs that include session IDs. Some older content management and eCommerce systems were built this way, and, to put it frankly, there's no point in launching an SEO campaign if this can't be fixed.

Other problems are not quite as detrimental to SEO but still should get attention.

If your site navigation is generated by JavaScript and does not occur as standard HTML in your source code, it's likely that search engines aren't seeing it. This means they also aren't reading the words in your links - an important signal for page relevance. In the worst cases, they haven't indexed pages linked to this way at all. Rebuilding your navigation to be SEO-friendly can yield positive results without requiring significant costs.

The Content Audit

Having content that is relevant to your site topic and attracts links is a crucial piece of the puzzle.

This is a bit simpler than the technical aspects, but simple doesn't mean easy.

Your content can target keywords, but the user experience must always come first. When in doubt, sacrifice keyword use for better copy.

Some of the content aspects that are important:

Keyword targeting
• Do your title tags include relevant keywords?
• What about your heading tags and body copy?
• Does your site navigation use relevant keywords or more general language like "services?"
Link attraction
• Do you have link-worthy content? Has anybody linked to it yet?
Readability
• This gets more into usability issues than SEO, but it's vastly important. Does your content
grab the reader? How well does it convert visitors into customers?

While targeting keywords is important, the general rule here is never to sacrifice your user's experience for SEO. They don't like it, and they'll get cranky and leave. And forget about attracting links if users don't enjoy your pages.

The Trust Audit

Why do search engines rank some pages over others? The simple answer: they trust that the content will satisfy the user.

Google's algorithm has always been focused centrally on signals of trust. There is money in ranking well, and for this reason webmasters, bless our hearts, can't be trusted to be honest or objective about how much trust we deserve.

This is why Larry and Sergey (Google founders) decided to focus on links as a signal of trust and authority. The basic idea is that the more links that point to a page, the more authoritative and trustworthy the page. The other major search engines followed suit.

Over time, since links were "out of the bag" and link building schemes erupted across the web, search engines have honed their algorithms to use other signals to determine trust.

Still, links are the single most important aspect of trust - and, in almost every case, SEO as a whole. Even tiny sites with just a few, poorly-optimized pages can rank well for competitive keywords if they simply have a powerful enough inbound link profile.

What to look at in evaluating website trust:

Inbound link profile
• How many links does the website have?
• Are any of these links on websites with a high PageRank or a large number
of inbound links?
• What anchor text is used in inbound links?
• What pages do these links point to?
Site age
• How long has the site been live?
• How long has the domain been registered? The older the better.
• How long is the domain registered for? The longer the better.
Outbound links
• Does the website link to other websites?
• Are any of the websites this website links to spam? Do they look to have been penalized by
Google? Are they in a "bad neighborhood?"
• Has the webmaster obviously engaged in link schemes, reciprocal or otherwise?

These questions aren't always easy to answer, but they're important. Many of them are crucial.

Before you start researching keywords, creating content, building links or otherwise optimizing your website (or hire a professional to do so), you need to know where you stand and what to expect moving forward.

The answers aren't always pleasant, but if building the volume and relevance of your search engine traffic matters to you these answers matter too.

20 Hard Core SEO Tips

noreply@blogger.com (Shailendra Singh) — Thu, 05 Mar 2009 08:26:00 +0000

Redesign your Web site once or twice a year.
Add 5 pages of content to your site every week.
Change the titles on your least successful pages twice a year.
Stop using keywords in your URLs.
Stop using keywords in your titles.
Find 3 SEO forums that accept site review requests and write 20 reviews in each forum before you ever ask a question.
Create your own SEO book by collecting your favorite SEO forum and blog posts, newsletter articles, and tech tips in a .PDF file that you review once a month.
Create a new SEO book once each year, replacing the one you just created in the previous step.
Optimize your best peforming page for the exact mirror of your targeted keyword expression (turn an ABCD page into a DCBA page).
Find 5 low-traffic blogs or forums that are consistently active and support them through comments, links, and referrals WITHOUT being self-promotional.
Write 10 blocks of ad copy (no more than 25 words each) every week. Place them on the Web where they won’t offend anyone.
Write 1 full-page announcement about your Web site each week. Post it some place where it won’t offend anyone.
Get a text editor like Wordpad (the fewer frills the better) and use it to code one of your Web pages from scratch.
Learn how to write Who, What, Where, When, and Why in 4 paragraphs or less.
Create a 1-page listing of 20 UNKNOWN Web sites you wish you had created. Post that page on your site.
Create a forum signature that does not promote your Web site. Put it into every forum profile you have created.
Design a 5-10 page Web site about a community project or charitable activity. Promote that site to number 1. Now repeat the process without changing or building more links for your first site.
Find a niche directory you have never heard of before that you feel is honestly listing unique, useful Web sites. Promote that niche directory through links and comments on your own sites until you see improvement in its Compete, Quantcast, and Alexa metrics.
Find a friend or relative who has no clue about Web sites and persuade him or her to create a Web site. You must restrain yourself and ONLY give advice on how to build and promote the site.
Define a metric that uses from three to five factors OTHER THAN Google PageRank, Alexa Rankings, Compete Rankings, Quantcast Rankings, and backlink counts. Use this metric to track five to ten sites you don’t control for six months.

Google News sitemaps for publishers around the world

noreply@blogger.com (Shailendra Singh) — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 11:39:00 +0000

If you're a news publisher and want greater control over how your articles get included in Google News, we've got a great opportunity for you: Today we made Google News sitemaps available globally. If your site is currently included in Google News, you can now directly submit your most recent articles via News sitemaps in all the languages we support. You can also specify keywords for each article to tell us more about them so we can better place them in the appropriate news section. You'll get error reports specific to Google News explaining any problems we experienced crawling or extracting articles from your site. And you'll receive additional information on the types of queries that lead Google News users to your site.

Why should I use News sitemaps? So that you can tell us which articles you'd like us to crawl.

When should I submit my articles? As early as possible. You can submit your articles as soon as you upload them on your site. The earlier you submit, the sooner we can crawl and extract them. The result is that you'll boost your publishing power, and we'll process your most recent articles more quickly, since we recrawl all News sitemaps frequently.

How do I submit a News sitemap? Sign up for Google Webmaster Tools. Verify your site. If your site is currently included in Google News, the presence of the News Crawl link on the left indicates that the news features are enabled. If your site isn't included in Google News, you can request inclusion.

Sounds good. How do I check the status of my submitted News sitemap? Once we've verified site ownership through your Webmaster Tools Account, you can view details about your site, including error reports, from the Dashboard by clicking on your site link in the Site column and then clicking the Sitemaps tab.

What if I don't use News Sitemaps? We don't favor sites that use a News sitemap over those that don't. We still crawl all news sites quickly. However, a News sitemap is a great tool to give you greater control over how your content appears in Google News and to alert you to any errors we might encounter when we try to crawl your site.

Follows these Step
If image not visible please click the image

General Search Engine Optimization Questions

noreply@blogger.com (Shailendra Singh) — Sat, 07 Feb 2009 01:58:00 +0000

Give me a description of your general SEO experience.
Do you currently do SEO on your own sites and give me some examples. Do you operate any blogs? Do you currently do any freelance work and do you plan on continuing it?
Where do you think the SEO industry is headed?
What industry sites, blogs, and forums do you regularly read?
Have you attended any search related conferences?
What SEO tools do you regularly use?
What SEO areas are you weak and strong in, and give examples of both.
What areas do you think are currently the most important in organically ranking a site?
Do you have experience in copywriting and can you provide some writing samples?
What kind of strategies do you normally implement for backlinks? What do you think about link buying, link bait, and other specific backlink strategies?
What are your thoughts on the direction of Web 2.0 technologies with regards to SEO?
Are you familiar with any blackhat SEO techniques, search arbitrage, and affiliate marketing?
Are you familiar with enterprise web analytics and what packages are your familiar with?
Are you familiar with A/B testing and multivariate testing?
Do you have experience in email marketing, banner advertising, other types of media buys and other forms of online advertising?
Are you experienced in managing PPC campaigns? To what extent and on what platforms?
Do you have experience in bid management tools, API tools, and click fraud issues?
Do you have experience in extensive competitive analysis and what techniques do you use?
What technologies are you familiar with? (We primarily use HTML, CSS, ASP, .net, PHP, SQL, and JavaScript)
Why are you moving from your current position and/or leaving any current projects?
You know who Matt Cutts is?
What is page segmentation? (ever heard of VIPS?)
What’s the difference bewtween PageRank and ToolBar PageRank?
What is Latent Semantic Analysis (LSI - Indexing)?
What is Phrase Based Indexing and Retrieval and what roles does it play?
What is the Ultimate Answer to Life, the Universe, and Everything?

Streamlining Your Social Web Presence in 6 Steps

noreply@blogger.com (Shailendra Singh) — Fri, 30 Jan 2009 09:23:00 +0000

Following the advice of social media and Web 2.0 experts, you have established your own blog and joined a number of social sites, including Facebook, MySpace, LinkedIn, Twitter, YouTube, Flickr, LibraryThing, and Upcoming.org, among others. Now, the experts say you must add content to each of these accounts regularly to keep them dynamic. So, how's this supposed to make your life easier?

Relax. With some careful planning, you can streamline the process of keeping all of your Social Web accounts fresh and engaging without breaking your back or the bank. The trick is to make your social accounts work together. Most social sites use the concept of open source to make it easy for developers to write applications that enhance the features of the site. For our purposes, we will look at applications that can help us streamline our existing presence in the Social Web.

To demonstrate what I mean about streamlining the process, I'll start with an example. Imagine that you have the following social media tools and accounts already in place on the Social Web:

A WordPress Blog
A Facebook Profile
A Facebook Page
A MySpace Page
A YouTube Account
A Flickr Account
A Twitter Account
An Upcoming.org Account
A GoodReads Account

Your 6 Step Plan to a Streamlined Social Web Presence

Step 1: Optimize Your Blog Feed

The very first step in streamlining your presence in the Social Web is burning your blog's feed to Feedburner. This is a free service, and obtaining a FeedBurner account will help you to easily manage and track your feed subscriptions. Once you have burned your feed to FeedBurner, note the URL of your new feed, which will look something like this: http://feeds.feedburner.com/MyBlogName .

Step 2: Feed Your Blog Now

You want to make sure that you are getting the most mileage from your blog posts. To do so, feed your blog entries into all of your social accounts that offer blog feeding applications. Remember that each social site may provide its own different way of accomplishing this.

Facebook, for example, allows you to feed your blogs into the Notes section of your Facebook page. Click Edit in the Notes box of your Facebook page and find the option that allows you to import notes from an external blog.

Feeding blog entries into MySpace is a little different. Find and add the application RSS Reader. You can access many MySpace applications by clicking More/Apps Gallery from the main menu of your MySpace homepage.

It is possible to feed your blog posts into Twitter, but blog posts are typically too long for this purpose. If you read on, I will clue you in to a better solution for streamlining your micro-blog entries.

Step 3: Maximize the Use of Your Multimedia

Maximize the exposure of your images and video clips by adding galleries and badges to your blog or Website, and by feeding your images and videos into your social networking profiles and pages.

WordPress has many plugins available for integrating Flickr images. My favorite right now is Flickr Tag, a plugin that allows you to easily place your Flickr images right into your blog posts, and create galleries.

A Flickr badge is a snippet of Flash or HTML code that you can place on the sidebar of your Website or blog that will pull in and highlight random or specific photos from your Flickr account. Find out more by going to: http://www.flickr.com/badge.gne.

Similarly, you can embed video galleries into your blog or Website by using your YouTube channels. After you've added videos to your YouTube channel, you can generate code for a video gallery and place this code on your Website or blog.

To feed images from Flickr into your Facebook page and MySpace profile, find the appropriate application and add it. For Facebook, I use an application called My Flickr; for MySpace, use Happy Flickr.

You can place videos on your Facebook page by implementing an application called YouTube Box, and using the application YouTube Favorites, you can display video clips on your MySpace profile.

Step 4: Integrate Other Social Tools

The way in which you proceed in step 4 depends entirely upon which social tools and Websites make up your Social Web presence. In the example I have created, we have accounts with Upcoming.org (a social event calendar) and GoodReads (a niche book sharing and author site) that have not yet been integrated. By searching the applications in Facebook and MySpace, you'll find that Facebook offers an application that allows you to integrate your Upcoming.org events, and both Facebook and MySpace include applications that allow you to display your GoodReads books and book reviews.

Step 5: Take Advantage of Streamlining Tools

Using the social tool, Ping.fm, you can add short posts to your mini feeds on Facebook, MySpace, and your micro-blogging sites like Twitter and Jaiku. Ping.fm is a useful tool that lets you post one brief entry, or often a status update, and feed it into a number of social sites.

Step 6: Research and Repeat

The very nature of the Social Web is connecting people through social platforms and applications; therefore, when deciding whether or not to invest time and resources into a new social tool, it's best to research the ways that tool will accommodate your existing Social Web presence. Can you feed in your blog posts? Does it allow you to import images from a photo sharing site or video clips from from your video sharing community? Have sites like Ping.fm integrated the new tool yet, or do your existing social sites offer applications to integrate the new tool?

When you do decide to integrate a new social tool or Website, do so as best you can by repeating the applicable steps presented above.

List of 300+ Social Bookmarking Sites

noreply@blogger.com (Shailendra Singh) — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 09:16:00 +0000

Bookmarkindo

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Search Engine Optimization for Affiliate Marketers

noreply@blogger.com (Shailendra Singh) — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 02:11:00 +0000

There are no secrets on how to rank high with the major search engines because effective search engine optimizations are now immense. What is search engine optimization? Before we discuss that thing, you have to understand first how search engines work and a bit of know-how.

Search engines are into providing their users with the most relevant and up-to-date information to match the search term that was used. They are sophisticated pieces of technology which allow users to quickly find relevant websites by searching for a word or a phrase. Search engine
results are useless to users if the information doesn’t relate to the search term, or if the results are old. People expect the most up-to-date and fresh information that is useful to them.

Updating your website everyday and adding some materials will help you get noticed by the search engines. So, if you are going to sell any type of product or service online, you have to optimize your website for the search engines, in order to boost traffic and sales. It is because over 90% of your business will likely come directly from search engine results. And for that reason, it is absolutely important to optimize your site for search engines for you to have the greatest deals in the entire world.

Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process by which webmasters or online business owners utilize strategic copy to augment their website’s status. It is certain that the internet has grown so fast over the years and the competition for the best search engine position has created an
enormous market. Therefore, better understanding the fundamental elements of Search Engine Optimization is vital for an online business’ success.

Making use of effective search engine optimization techniques will improve the page rank of your website. There are many tricks that can be used to increase page rank; the most effective method is to provide high quality content consistently. This seems like a simple concept but there are many websites that fails to provide content that visitors find interesting. Sites which provide content that are interesting, well-written and regularly updated create highly engaged visitors who are more likely to return to the website in the coming days. So, if you can set your website apart from those boring, lifeless sites then do it. You’ll surely have a step closer to achieving high page rank through search engine optimization.

The next significant factor for an effective search engine optimization is to include keywords and phrases within your content. To make sure that you are properly targeting your market, you have to make sure that the keywords and phrases you have on your site are the keywords and phrase that your site is actually optimized for. The more keywords you use in your content, the more likely it is that online visitors will find your site when they do some research with those words. If you are unfailing with these techniques, then your overall search engine optimization will increase, boosting your page rank.

You should also have to develop a linking strategy as a part of your search engine optimization. Not only does this provide free advertising for your site, but it makes the impression that your site is imperative because of its affiliated links. For each link that you have pointing back to you, that is another chance for your potential customer to find you. The more inbound links that you have pointing to your site, the higher you will be ranked in the search engines. Another is to develop a content stratagem. People who get to search from the internet are looking for information. The more information you provide for them and the more helpful it is, the more likely you will make the sale. Writing articles is the most effective way to build up content for your site. When writing articles to post on your site, make sure that you develop a clear means of arranging their content. You can do this by simply adding a new page to your site. This will allow room for extra articles to be added as you write them, and will allow you to build up an archive of articles which will maintain to draw online visitors. Make sure also that you have included your archived articles in a directory that is next to the root web of your site so that the search
engines will catalog your online articles. Always keep in mind that search engine optimization methods are important in developing your site’s status. With that thing in mind, make sure that
you write high-quality, keyword rich content and link your site to and from a deliberate family of other sites. These things will help improve your site’s popularity and coerce increased business through your online business.

What Is Pay-per-Click?

noreply@blogger.com (Shailendra Singh) — Mon, 19 Jan 2009 01:34:00 +0000

"Pay-per-click (PPC) started out as the placement of small text ads in the
search engines"

Overview of a PPC Campaign:

1. You sign up for an account at Google AdWords.

2. You create a small AdWords ad with a title, two lines of text, and a URL. When someone searches for your keywords, your ads show up. Your ad can be text, images, video, or a widget.

3. You add a list of keywords that are relevant to your product. These are the search terms that people type into search engines to find you. Start with a wide collection of keywords and narrow this down to find the best keywords for your product. These keywords are customer-centric: This is how the customer defines your product, not how you see your product.

4. You set the daily maximum for your budget. If you set this at $20 per day, then Google AdWords will display your ads until you reach $20 in clicks and then it stops for the day. Google spreads the ads across the day, so you won’t use up your entire budget in
the morning.

5. You place a bid for your keyword (for example, 12¢). If your competitor is number two and you are number three, you increase your bid until your ad appears above your competitor’s. This is an auction: the more you bid, the higher your ad appears. If you want to be number one, increase your bid.

6. When someone types a search that matches your keyword, Google displays your ad in the results. They search for “SEO" and Google shows ads about SEO.

7. Google AdWords displays eight ads per page. If you go to the second page, you’ll see eight more ads.

8. When a visitor clicks your ad, your landing page comes up.

9. Google AdWords charges you for the click. If you bid 12¢, Google charges you 12¢ for the click. (We explain the details later.) You pay for the click, which is why this process is called “pay-per-click.” If nobody clicks on your ad, it was shown for free.

10. The account is linked to your credit card. Google AdWords charges your credit card at the end of the month.

11. You use analytics tools to manage the campaign so you can improve the results. The analytics tools show you the keywords that produced conversions, the value of the conversions, and so on.

What Is Search Marketing ?

noreply@blogger.com (Shailendra Singh) — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 04:31:00 +0000

How do I rank higher with the search engines and attract visitors to my site??

Unfortunately, just because you have created a website, it doesn’t mean people will be able to find it. “Search marketing” is a term used to describe the steps you can take to make sure your site ranks well when someone searches for your product or service on the Internet.

If your site shows up near the top of the relevant search results, you’ll have a constant flow of potential customers who are actively looking for whatever it is you’re offering.

But there’s a lot of competition out there. Web searches can return MILLIONS of results... and the majority of people don’t bother looking beyond the first 30.

In fact, search marketing says more than 40% of people stop reading after the first 10 results!
That’s why it’s so important that your site consistently gets a top ranking in relevant search results — the higher the better. And if you can break into the top 10 results in Google (the Internet’s biggest search engine) you’ll score yourself TONS of seriously targeted traffic!

To understand search marketing, the fi rst thing you need to consider is how the
search engines really work.

Free Press Release Links

noreply@blogger.com (Shailendra Singh) — Mon, 22 Dec 2008 10:46:00 +0000

Free Press Release Distribution Sites:

* 1888PressRelease.com
* 24-7 Press Release
* AddPR.com
* BizEurope.com
* eCommWire.com
* Express-Press-Release.com
* Free-News-Release.com
* Free-Press-Release.com
* Free-Press-Release-Center.info
* FreePressIndex.com
* FreePressRelease.co.cc
* FreePressReleases.co.uk
* i-Newswire.com
* IndiaPRWire.com
* MediaSyndicate.com
* MyFreePR.com
* NewswireToday.com
* PageRelease.com
* PR.com
* PR9.net
* PR-Inside.com
* PRCompass.com
* PRlog.com
* PRurgent.com
* PRzoom.com
* PressAbout.com
* PressBox.co.uk
* PressFlow.co.uk
* PressMethod.com
* PressRelease.com
* PressReleasePoint.com
* TechPRSpider.com
* TheOpenPress.com

Good Luck who are searching Free Press Release Sites

Keyword Research

noreply@blogger.com (Shailendra Singh) — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 06:46:00 +0000

Welcome to this new column outlining SEM fundamentals.

Discovery is important for PPC and SEO campaigns, link building, even as it relates to general marketing like writing press releases, product and service descriptions, or even your positioning statement.

The general steps for approaching a keyword discovery project are:

Define your keyword strategy, business goals and objectives.
Identify and build your initial set of keywords.
Refine those keywords and sort them into meaningful groups or themes.
Identify your top performing keywords, test them, and put them into action.

Strategy

It's important to think about a strategy for your campaign and what goals you wish to accomplish before you begin. Are you leaning for more of a branding campaign where you're more interested in being seen in the search results, or are you more interested in driving traffic to your site and, ultimately, a user conversion? This will affect the type of keywords you ultimately go with.

For example, someone who is at the beginning of the buying cycle may start their searching with general terms like "digital camera." Conversely, someone who uses "Canon EOS 1000D Digital Rebel XS" is probably toward the end of the buying cycle. They've done enough research to know which model of digital camera they want and are probably now searching for a good deal.

If you sell digital cameras and have relevant content (and a good price), you're likely to close this sale, assuming you rank high enough in the SERPs through PPC or SEO. This principle is sometimes referred to as the "long tail." Chasing the long tail leads to more customer acquisition and conversions, but fewer impressions.

Identify and Build Your Initial Set of Keywords

Spreadsheets are a great tool for capturing the keywords you identify as you go along. The key here is to take the blinders off and look at all possibilities -- don't rule anything out yet. We'll do that in the refining stage.

Two of the most popular keyword tools are Keyword Discovery and Wordtracker. We'll discuss these more in Part 2, but you may want to check them out as you work on developing your initial set of keywords.

Within Your Company

Find information that has already been compiled on your products and services. Your company's Web site, press releases, marketing materials, etc., are all good sources.

Your company Web site keeps a log of all visitor activity in "log files," or you may already have your site tagged to work with an analytics tool. If not, you may need the help of a computer engineer (or your kids, if you work from home) to locate your log files or have your site tagged.

Free analytics programs like Google Analytics, AWStats, or StatCounter are a great place to start. There are also commercial applications like Omniture, ClickTracks, and WebTrends that offer more features, but for a price. These tools are great for studying user behavior. You can even get glimpses at the keywords visitors are typing into a search engine to find your Web site.

Another area of your company's Web site is its search engine. If you have a search function on your Web site, you may want to look at what keywords visitors are using.

This is a good indicator of what they're most interested in on your site. Or it could indicate what they can't find on your site. Again, you might need professional help to get at this information.

Outside Your Company

Take a good look at your competition. Chances are, they may have already gone through the keyword discovery process. Visit their Web site. Learn what terms they seem to be optimizing for.

A good way to do this: view their source code. All browsers have a feature that lets you do this. The source code will give you a glimpse of their H1 tags, meta description, and meta keywords. Remember: each page of their site might have different information.

Universal Search Should Be a Plus

noreply@blogger.com (Shailendra Singh) — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 03:54:00 +0000

It's no secret that online marketers love universal search. Variety in the search results gives us multiple opportunities to rank and gain new listing visibility. And the universal results appear in their vertical searches as well, which means increased coverage.

We love images, videos, local, news, shopping feeds, maps, and all the vertical listings that can appear in the SERPs. But how does the user feel?

This is the inherent problem with universal search. As new listing types begin appearing in results, we often lose sight of whether these listings are really helpful to the user.

SEO efforts can gobble up an entire top results page with universal listings if left unchecked. It's great for marketing; it's great for businesses; but the end user may take the hit.

SERPs can be a convoluted place for searchers. Excessive universal search optimization can impede a user's ability to find the most relevant listing. As marketers, we must strive to enhance the searcher's experience, not crowd out what they came to the engine seeking.

The issue of results obfuscation affects displayed search real estate and page length. While universal results shape what appears at the top of the page, the latest incarnations of these bells and whistles have the potential to severely push listings below the fold.

Product Search Plus Box, a User Plus?

One of Google's newest universal features really illustrates this results-pushing premise. Google recently began alpha-testing a new feature for its paid search listings, the Product Search Plus Box.

This paid search Plus Box functions similarly to other Plus Box features Google has introduced, such as for local searches and financial information. The difference is that the Product Search Plus Box includes an actual product list from the advertiser. The products are listed with a picture, description, price, and (if set up correctly) a link directly to the product page on the advertiser's Web site.

When these ads appear at the top of the page in the sponsored links section, a user can click on the Plus Box and push the organic results further down the page.

Now, let's say you're an advertiser in search position four in the rankings for a specific term -- not a bad place to be. If a paid listing has a Product Search Plus Box, your organic listing could be pushed far enough down the screen to appear below the fold.

The same can be said for paid search listings on the right side of the page. Once that plus box is expanded, above the fold ads are pushed out of sight.

Brave New Search Results?

Fast forward about 12 months. Let's assume the Product Search Plus Box makes it out of alpha-testing and becomes just another feature on the search page. Hypothetically, a savvy advertiser could own a significant portion of the SERPs and everything above the fold.

What if someone searches for "flat screen tvs at circuit city?" We can assume that this user is looking to compare flat screen televisions and, presumably, purchase one through Circuit City. I would argue that the user's search would be best serviced by a single Web page (most likely a deep page on Circuit City's Web site) that compares the latest models of flat screen televisions.

For the sake of this example, let's say that Circuit City has its online act together and has spent some time optimizing for search and aggressively funding a paid search program. Potentially, the search could return results that include a paid search ad for Circuit City above the organic listings, and this ad could contain a Product Search Plus Box. The organic results could also yield a result for the Circuit City domain with site links and a Plus Box for financial information (including a stock quote and graph), shopping engine listings, local listings (if the user provided a ZIP code during sign up or is logged into a Google service), and news results that include video.

Let's say the results appear as follows: Circuit City paid search ad with Product Search Plus Box, shopping engine listings, image results showing Circuit City's latest circular, and then Circuit City's domain with site links and a financial information Plus Box. This wouldn't be an unthinkable return of results. Now, our target page -- the Circuit City flat screen television comparison page -- would appear in organic position number four, beneath the domain listing.

Now, say the user expands the Plus Boxes. The page is now filled above the fold by Circuit City information and flat screen product listings. But this doesn't meet the searcher's needs. Our target page at listing four is beaten out by "relevant" yet unhelpful listings.

The shopping engine listing is triggered by a targeted branded search. The image listing appears highly due to freshness. The domain appears at the top due to its clout.

And listing four, the most informative listing, can go unseen by the searcher.

In this scenario, universal listings work against the searcher. The Plus Boxes certainly push the relevant listing down if activated. The marketer here clearly succeeds in covering the space, but the user is hung out to dry. This is the potential menace of over-optimizing universal content: you create clutter.

Don't Overdo it

As search results become more complex, we can't lose sight of the end user. Sometimes we can go overboard with universal optimization efforts. We need to get back to basics and make sure that we're putting our strongest optimization efforts behind the client's most relevant page (or content piece) for a search term. This makes the user happier and increases the chance of a customer conversion.

I like seeing the search page evolve, and I understand that Google needs to continue to innovate in order to stay the search market leader. Innovation should enhance the searcher's user experience.

Ultimately, Google is only providing the tools for us to reach search audiences. We have to learn to use them responsibly. Let's not give people reason to pine for the days of text link-only search results.

From :SearchEnginewatch

PPC Landing Pages

noreply@blogger.com (Shailendra Singh) — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 04:24:00 +0000

PPC advertisers ignore the importance of landing pages entirely. Sophisticated advertisers know that PPC landing page design and testing is at least as important as building and optimizing great ad groups with great ads.

Expert PPC advertisers realize that PPC landing pages have more impact on conversion rates and ROI than anything else they can do. And the few truly god-like advertisers don't stop at landing pages; they build, test and optimize the entire conversion path, from the landing page through the last page of the conversion process.

As usual, I'll try to start out with simple concepts. First, what's a PPC Landing Page? It's simply a page on your site that is customized to match the theme of a particular PPC ad group -- the keywords and ad message.

Which brings us to Important Point #1:

The PPC Landing Page can, and often should, look very different from the other pages on your site.

This is often a difficult but crucial concept that's hard for many site owners to grasp. They're accustomed to thinking about their site as analogous to a bricks-and-mortar storefront: one entrance (the home page) through which all customers enter, linked to other pages where site visitors can (hopefully) easily find what they're looking for. Site owners often design their home page to satisfy the needs of casual browsers as well as visitors who are looking for specific items or information.

This design viewpoint makes sense when the source of site traffic is natural search or links from other sites, since it's difficult to know or infer the visitor's need/intent.

But with a properly-constructed PPC campaign, the advertiser knows with laser-beam precision, by virtue of the search term used and the ad message that elicited the click, the visitor's need and intent.

Let's pause for an alternative metaphor. Most sites are not like a storefront with a single entrance. Think of a circular building with multiple entrances. Signs around each entrance describe the products sold just inside the door. The customer who walks through the door sees only the products described by the outside signage. It's easy for customers to find what they're looking for, and they can conduct their transaction quickly and easily.

There's a real-world example of this: Sears stores. Most have multiple entrances, and often those entrances are labeled to indicate which department is just inside the door. The guy who enters the hardware department door doesn't care that Sears also sells baby clothing. He can spend his precious time in the one department that interests him, find what he needs, and finish his transaction quickly.

What if Sears had only one door? Customers would be frustrated by the necessity to wander around the store trying to find the right department. They would be assaulted by the sights and sounds of thousands of products that don't remotely interest them. Some would be distracted from their initial goal, run out of time and leave before buying anything.

You may be thinking, "Some people love to shop. They're actually attracted by the need/opportunity to browse through multiple departments. So the one-door metaphor might be perfect for them."

Absolutely true. But thanks to the miracle of modern merchandising, your web site can be like the Sears store with multiple entrances -- and satisfy the needs/desires of the casual shoppers as well as the focused ones.

Most PPC landing pages should be designed with the multiple-entrance metaphor in mind. PPC keywords represent the intent/desire of the shopper. PPC ads are analogous to the signs around each of the multiple entrances -- describing what's inside the entrance, and the benefits the visitor can enjoy. The PPC landing page is like the shoppers experience once they step inside the door.

Which leads us to Important Point #2:

The first and most important objective of the landing page is to convince the visitor that they've come to the right place.

Link Building

noreply@blogger.com (Shailendra Singh) — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 03:50:00 +0000

SEO isn't as easy as it was in years past. At one time, optimization meant dropping some keywords in your meta keywords tag, using your most important key phrases a dozen or so times on a page, and exchanging links with anyone who had a Web site.

As search engines became more sophisticated, SEOs adjusted and evolved. Link generation is certainly a key component of today's search engine results.

Generating quality links to a Web site is hard work. The search engines want it that way because they're trying to make it more difficult for you to manipulate their results.

There are several methods for generating quality links. The most critical things you need are content and quality links.

Content

Search engines want you to provide a high quality Web site for your visitors, and let the natural process of "popularity" take place, so that you naturally get links.

So, how can you make your commercial content linkable? Who, in their right mind, would link to overtly commercial content as a resource? Business directories might, but you'd most likely be paying for placement there.

What about the common Webmaster or blogger? They'll only do this if your site truly enhances the experience for their visitors/readers.

How often have you received a link request that reads something like, "I have visited your Web site and found your content to be very compelling for my visitors. As such, I have added your Web page to my site and would ask that you please link back to me using "blah blah blah."

Today's search engines can see right through this link swap. They much prefer that you have one-way links to your Web site and that you not swap links in this manner.

Besides, by swapping links with them, you're basically telling the search engines that you endorse their Web site and are in "partnership" with them. What if this other Web site participates in risky optimization methods? What if this Web site was banned/blacklisted and you exchanged links with them?

Today's search engines will see this association. This is why there should be a link generation strategy instead of saying, "we need 1,000 more links."

Developing a blog is a great way to provide non-commercial content and generate natural links. I recommended building blogs using WordPress, and structuring the categories to co-relate to your product/service offerings.

For example, my company's SEO blog has categories set up for interactive marketing, SEM/PPC, SEO, social media, Web development, and Web design. These core service areas of our company each have their own category within the blog. Writing content under each category is certainly key.

To make our blog content compelling, we developed a "SEO tips" series, which readers have appreciated and -- yes -- linked to. People have also linked to our SEO RFP, which anyone can use (yes, including competitors).

Including imagery will certainly help the content to be more compelling to read. But, that's only part of the equation. For more links and traffic, you need to promote. Distribution sources, such as StumbleUpon, Digg, Reddit, will get these posts in front of readers and help to generate links.

If you can't create a blog, consider generating content on other Web sites. Perhaps you can contribute to someone else's blog, or become an "industry expert" and write for a major publication within your industry.

SEO press releases are another great content generation tool that can also help with link generation.

With all of these types of efforts, including the keyword targeted within the anchor text of the link is key. For example, the link above ("SEO press releases") points to a page on Search Engine Watch that is specific to "SEO press releases," has the title tag of "Press Releases and Search Engine Optimization." This page also uses the keywords in the H1 (Press Releases and Search Engine Optimization).

Finding Quality Links

Link quantity isn't the end game. Link quality is the critical element for success. Many great tools can help you determine which links you should be targeting, including:

Linkscape. The "latest/greatest" tool out there comes from SEOMoz. The price is affordable and it provides valuable information. You can see which Web sites link to other sites. If you already know the Web sites that rank organically for keywords you're targeting, you can plug them in and get a list of these Web sites and it also provides a ranking of "importance" of these links, so you'll know where to spend your time/energy. Keep in mind, some of these links may have been generated because of the content of the Web site being linked to.
Advanced Link Manager. This tool provides great information on backlinks. You can see all of the links to a given Web site and see the instances of various anchor text used within these backlinks.
Traffic Marks. This tool offers a quick (and cheap) way to determine the common areas where others "top ranking" Web sites are getting their links. We paid $197 for a year's worth of access (they promote this as being 50 percent off). (source from:SearchEngineWatch)

Contact Us

noreply@blogger.com (Shailendra Singh) — Mon, 01 Dec 2008 12:08:00 +0000

Address:

B1-50 New Ashok Nagar
New Delhi-96

Mobile No: 9971233640
9910820825

How To Increase Your Website Traffic With nil Cost

noreply@blogger.com (Shailendra Singh) — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 06:04:00 +0000

How To Increase Your Website Traffic With nil Cost

How to increase your website traffic with nil cost'. It's a bold statement don't you think. But, believe me it's true. You can increase your traffic by 1000% with no cost involved if you do it the right way. Continue reading if you want to know how.

I've outlined 5 ways to reach your target. But, please keep in mind that these are not the only ways that you can do to increase your traffic. There are hundreds of techniques to increase traffic. But these one are the proven one. I've used it personally. More importantly, these techniques can get you FREE traffic. You're money is saved in your pocket. Let's go to the first one.

Technique #1: Linking strategy

Linking strategy is the easiest way to get free traffic. When I say "the easiest way" it does not mean that you can ask everybody to link to your site and do nothing after that. Compared to other techniques that you'll discover, this one will take less time to do.

Here's how to do it. First select the site in your niche market. Be selective. Choose one that has a high traffic. Usually a high traffic site is pretty stingy to put link to your site. So, the key here is to be persistent. Ask them how many visitors do they received per month and if they could link to your site. If they don't answer your request, email them the second time.

Be persistent. If they don't want to link to your site, ask them to trade link instead (reciprocal link). This is the last resort you want to have.

Word of warning: Don't crowd your site with too many links. Only accept link trading if it's really worth it.

Technique #2: Offer Free eBooks or articles

You'll fall in love with this technique if you see what it can do to your site. This technique can create an excellent'Viral marketing' effect. It can multiply the no of visitors to your site in a matter of days. This most important thing about this technique is that to offer something that is really useful to your visitor. So useful that they can only get that information from you!

You need to the 'wants' in your need market. What problems do they encounter? Solve these problems and you have a killer articles or e-book that you can give away for free. Remember, don't sell it. Give it away for free. If you feel really reluctant to give your article or e-book for free, you can give your visitors a partial of it. But, make sure it's really useful. Don't forget to put your name and your contact information in this article or e-book. Usually, if you write an article, you need to include your resource box at the very bottom of your article.

The most important task in this technique is to offer a reprint right to your visitors. What this mean is that your visitors can publish your articles or e-book to anyone in any medium; email, Ezine, website or anything. But please state your condition: Include your contact information or resource box. This will create viral effect to your visitors.

Before I forgot, there is one particular e-book compiler that is good in doing this kind of task. The name of this e-book compiler is 'E-book Edit Pro'. With this compiler, you can offer your visitors a customizable e-book. This is a great incentive for them to distribute your article or e-book since they can put their name and information in it. If you like to know more about the excellent compiler, please visit ebookedit.

Technique #3: Classified Ad

This is the most time consuming technique compared to all 5. While it is time consuming, it is really worth it.

Tips - This technique should be used together with the above technique. Let me explain:

First, you need to write an e-book or article that you can give it away for free. Then, you need have an autoresponder. If you don't have an autoresponder (your hosting company should provide this service for free), you can get one for free. Just type 'free autoresponder' in your search engine and you'll get hundred of sites that provided free autoresponder. If you're searching for excellent autoresponder, I'd like to suggest these autoresponder:

1. getresponse - Most online marketers used this service. You pay monthly to them for providing service. The most important feature is that you can personalize your autoresponder with your visitor's name. They also provide a free service. The only catch is that there will be an ad in your email.

2. aweber - One of the first companies to provide autoresponder service. Try to visit their site if you want to learn more. Basically, it offers the same kind of service as getresponse.

3. autoresponseplus - You only need to pay one-time fees for this service since the software will be installed on your server. It's great in you don't want to pay high monthly fees. The only drawback for Autoresponseplus is that you need to have a little bit skill on how to install cgi (Common Gateway Interface) on your server.

Enough talking. Let's continue.

After you have your own autoresponder, place your free article in this autoresponder. Now, you need to advertise your autoresponder address in the classified ad website. Don't put your email address but your autoresponder address. The best part with this technique is that you can capture you visitor's email. You can contact them again and again if you have any offer in the future.

Technique #4: Deliver informational pack Ezine/newsletter

People surf the net to look for information. Out of 100, only 3 people surf the net to buy something. But others are doing some research or try to find something informational.

With this keep in mind, you can attract people to come to your site if you can deliver them timely information. By producing timely information, you glued these visitors to your site preventing them from going elsewhere. This can be done by giving them free newsletter or Ezine.

This is not an easy task because there is abundance of free information on the net. You need to give them something different from these 'free' stuff. Try to provide something unique in your Ezine. For example, if you're publishing music Ezine, try to make a deal with music label so that you can give special price to your subscriber. Make sure your subscriber cannot get this of kind if deal in other place. If you can create this unique proposition, you're already on top of the world. Your Ezine will spread like fire. More people will come to your site to subscribe your unique newsletter.

Technique #5: Offer affiliate program

This is the greatest FREE traffic generator technique out there. With this technique both parties win; you and your affiliate program participant. You get more traffic and sales, they get more money from referral commission.

This topic is really a large topic. I can write a whole e-book about how to create a successful affiliate program. But, I'll discuss the basic thing about affiliate program in here.

Basically, to create an effective affiliate program, you need to create an interest for your visitor's to join your affiliate program. You can do this by giving them high referral fees and marketing tools for them to use. Above all, you need to make them easy to promote your product or service. Don't make them do all the hard work. It is your job.

The next thing you need to do is to motivate them to spread the word about you. Contact them in a timely manner. Don't forget them after they've joined your program. Make them feel special. In fact, they are special since they are the one who will do the promotion and advertising. A well designed affiliate program can increase your website traffic and sales by unimaginable amount. But again, you need to devote all you effort in this technique if you want to have a successful affiliate program. Don't do it half way. Even if you've to work 18 hours a day to create your own affiliate program, it's really worth it in the future. The payoff is going to be thousand times your initial effort.

All of these techniques are free. You don't have to spend a dime on them. Try it on your site. I've tried all these techniques. And they work!