OK. So you’ve created a nice website with lots of interesting products and information. Now all you need is visitors.
No problem.
This is what online marketers call “getting traffic”, and it definitely is a problem. In fact, probably much more of a problem than you realized when you got into this online selling stuff. You probably figured it was just a matter of creating a nice site and waiting for people to discover it. Get listed in a few directories; “submit” your site to a bunch of search engines, and you’ll be on your way.
Unfortunately it doesn’t work that way.
Why it doesn’t work that way
The reason is pretty simple. Most new internet entrepreneurs have no idea how important the big search engines are — especially Google, MSN, and Yahoo. And they have no idea how these big search engines work. If they did, they would probably tear their beautiful websites apart and start over.
And guess what? That is exactly what most online entrepreneurs end up doing. If they are persistent enough, they eventually learn about the search engines, and they rebuild their sites the way they should have been built in the first place.
What they think they have learned
The reason they rebuild their sites is because they learn a little bit about something called “Search Engine Optimization” or “SEO”. The mysterious art of SEO starts from the premise that search engines analyze websites in terms of content and subject matter. Their automatic “spiders” look over your pages and use hints within those pages to determine what they are about. If they see lots of words about “golden retrievers” on a particular page, then they assume that page is about “golden retrievers”. These are known as “keywords” — the words that indicate what your content is about.
SEO takes this fairly obvious fact and says, “Since the search engines are going to draw conclusions about the subject matter of your pages based on keywords, then you should make sure they see the correct ones.” In fact, there are all kinds of little SEO techniques that try to exploit the way spiders draw conclusions about your pages.
Why this is not enough
Unfortunately, no matter how much SEO you do, it is still not enough to ensure you a high ranking in searches for your most important keywords. Especially if you are chasing popular keywords like most of us are. For instance, it really doesn’t matter how much “optimization” you do for a keyword like “Real Estate”, since you will be competing for search engine results with literally millions of other pages which are also optimized for that term. Why should they choose your humble little page?
The fact is, they don’t choose yours. And the reason is pretty simple. Your page is just not important enough to rank a high position for a term like “Real Estate”. You have to do something to give it some importance.
Making your pages “important”
The most effective way to make your pages “important” in the eyes of the search engines, is to get other sites to link to yours. When the search engines see a link pointing from an outside site to a page on your site, they assume this means your page is important enough to be considered a resource worth looking at. The more links you have pointing at your page, the more important your page is considered and the higher it will rank when people search for the type of content your page is about.
It is also important to understand that not all links are considered equally valuable by the search engines. The most valuable links come from other important sites that share your area of interest. For instance, if yours is a Real Estate site, then the most valuable links are from other real estate sites that have already achieved some importance in the eyes of the search engines.
To put this all in “link strategy” terms:
The best way to enhance the importance of your web pages in the eyes of the search engines, is by getting as many links as possible from relevant sites that are considered authoritative in your area of interest.
Rick Hendershot is an internet writer and publisher and is the creator of the Linknet Publishing Network. For information on products to enhance the exposure of your website and build traffic, go to Linknet Products.
Written by SEO Tipster on April 18th, 2006 with no comments.
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If you are looking for a great way to build multiple web sites on valuable topics or trying to streamline your web development process, you should look into keyword tools and services. Many search engine optimizers usually build web sites off of keyword lists. Many web sites can be 500 pages or more and the odds of a person coming up with all 500 keywords from scratch are remote. If you would like to build high quality, on topic web sites that can bring in valuable income, look to keywords as a major part of the equation.
There are plenty of keyword tools on the market. For instance, Keywordtracker is a web site that you can type in one word or a phrase and receive thousands of words or phrases that are directly related to it. This is an awesome tool for search engine optimizers. You can then go through these lists of keywords and pick out the top keywords or the keywords that will be best for your web site.
There are also membership services that deliver thousands of great keywords via email every month. These keywords are usually set around a specific topic and can sometimes include how many times each term was searched for on a specific search engine or how much advertisers pay for the term through various pay per click providers. So if you are a search engine optimizer, look into keyword tools and services to increase your web sites profitability.
Written by SEO Tipster on April 18th, 2006 with no comments.
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Jack had an amazing idea & started his online business with a vision of making it big someday. But few years down the line Jack is left wondering as to why his business isn’t turning up the way he expected it to!
Mark thinks that he has a better service than his competitors, but still fails to understand why their Balance Sheet figures are running into millions, while his are still in few thousands!
All these puzzling facts make one doubt himself. But my friend, the problem is not with the idea or the service! The problem lies in the promotion strategies. No matter how good an idea or a service is, it won’t be successful unless you put it to the right people in the right manner. Good Web Promotion can do wonders to an average idea; forget what it can do to a good one. Had Jack & Mark adopted the right kind of Internet Promotion strategy, they would have achieved what they wanted to.
Everyone will agree that today’s Web Promotion is dominated by Search Engines, or to be precise, Google. If your site is in the top thirty, for the right “Keyword”, you can be a winner. But how can one make it to the top & stay there for a long time? (Mind you, in this dynamic world called Internet, sticking to your position is as important as getting there!)
The best way to “optimize” your site is through a new “Organic Method of Search Engine Optimization” (SEO) that Google & other search engines just love, generating “Quality One Way Links”. One can generate quality back links by way of “Directory Submission” & “Article Submission”.
Online directories provide you with quality back links, which is precisely what you are looking for. Apart from this, you need to submit your site to the most appropriate category & with a brief description about your business. Thus, they also send targeted audience your way!
Another way of generating quality targeted audience & one way links is by writing quality articles & submitting them to Article Directories! By writing a quality article, you are not just informing your potential customers about your service, but are also sharing your knowledge with them. Again, Article Directories gives you an opportunity to inform people about yourself & also provide a link to your site. This way, people get to know about you & your site. And if your article provides a visitor what he came looking for, you have most definitely found yourself a new client!
Had Jack written an article about his idea & explained his service to his target audience and submitted his site to Hundreds of Search Engine Friendly Directories, he would have been on “Cloud 9″ by now. Had Mark written an article informing his potential customers, how his service is better than his customers & also submitted his site to Online Directories, his Balance Sheet too might have run into Millions. To summarize, when you submit your article or your site to various online directories, this is what you get - 1. You generate hundreds of quality back links to your site.
2. People who search these directories may find your article or your sites description interesting & visit your site. Thus you get large targeted audience.
The end result is that your site satisfies all the criterions set by various search engines to have a favorable Rank. You thus reach high positions in search engines & stay there for a long time!
About the Author
Rahul Rungta is a Professional Internet Marketer. Having done intensive research on Search Engine Optimization & Traffic Generation, he is now pioneering two new innovative tools in Internet Marketing - Article & Directory Submission. To know more about him, please visit http://www.submit2please.com
Written by SEO Tipster on April 18th, 2006 with no comments.
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