Don't Over-Think It! Yes, You Too Can Do SEO

As someone who sells SEO as a service it is often not in my best interest to tell people they can do SEO on their own. But it's true. Just as changing the car's oil, fixing clogged pipes, or painting a house are all relatively easy, most business owners can SEO their website on their own. All it takes is some knowledge and time.

Knowledge can be found easily enough for free, and time, well, that's not something you likely have an excess of. Fortunately, SEO doesn't all have to be done at once, it can be implemented a little at a time, as you have time.

If you want to optimize your site yourself then you need to simplify. A lot of what you'll learn about SEO can be complicated. Especially when you start reading about .htaccess, robots.txt, 301 redirects, absolute links, and so on. This is all good information to have but you don't always have to start there.

If you're doing it yourself then start with the things that you can do yourself. Don't get caught up in all the complicated issues that go beyond your knowledge or ability to implement. The more difficult technical tasks may still be necessary down the road, but for now, do what you can with what you have.

Here are some things that you can often do easily enough on your own:

1) Customize all your title tags. If your site is big this may take some time. If its dynamically generated then you may want to have your programmers implement a template that pulls in and inserts keywords based on the page.

2) Customize your content. This can be especially important if you sell products. Don't settle for stock descriptions, and take the time needed to write somethign different for each of the 20 products you have that are simply different versions of the same thing. This customized content is essential.

3) Get content on all of your pages. If you have category pages that link to products or other information pages, put at least a paragraph of text on each page.

4) Link, link, link. Add links throughout your content to other pages and products of your site. Link back and forth between pages, add links to related products, link to your blog and from your blog.

5) Blog. Write content that your visitors will love. Don't just use your blog to pimp your products or services. Write helpful tips and tutorials or provide insight that your readers can use.

Read More...

Yahoo! to Launch New, Comprehensive Mobile Portal

Yahoo! will launch a new mobile experience called, wait for it, Yahoo! Mobile. It will be available via mobile web and downloadable mobile applications for the iPhone as well as smartphones powered Nokia, RIM, Samsung, Sony Ericsson and Motorola. An app will also be available for smartphones with the Windows Mobile operating system.

Yahoo! Mobile will feature a ton of stuff including:
Yahoo! oneSearch - Yahoo!'s award-winning mobile search service providing the most current, relevant answers you need.
Today - The most interesting stories buzzing on the Internet right now, selected by Yahoo!'s editorial team.
Yahoo! oneConnect - Yahoo!'s service designed to provide consumers everything they need to stay in touch with the people about whom they care:
Email - Access to Yahoo! Mail and other popular email service providers, including Gmail, Windows Live Hotmail and AOL Mail.
Pulse - Access totheir social networks, including Bebo, Dopplr, Facebook, Flickr, Friendster, Last.fm, MySpace, Twitter and YouTube.
Yahoo! Messenger - An upgraded version of Yahoo!'s popular mobile instant messaging service.
Yahoo! Address Book - Keeps consumers' contacts always handy and in sync.
Yahoo! Calendar - View, add and edit appointments when users are away from their PCs.
Yahoo! News - Breaking headlines across popular topics.
Yahoo! onePlace - Access and manage your favorite content, all from one location including news topics and sources, RSS feeds, weather conditions, sports scores, stock quotes, websites/blogs, horoscopes and movie theaters.

Smartphone apps will include:
Yahoo! oneSearch with Voice - Allowing users to launch searches by simply speaking.
Maps - Powerful improved tools that let consumers locate, learn about and get directions to points of interest.
Opera Mini 4.2 - An integrated version of the world's most popular mobile web browser, with easy return to the Yahoo! Mobile app, that launches when web site access is needed.
Widgets - Enhanced mobile-optimized experiences for services from Yahoo! and other brands. Users can browse, add and remove these at anytime according to their tastes.

Read More...

Timing of SEO in the Web Design Process

If you’re just starting to build your website now is the best time to start planning your search engine optimization and search engine marketing strategy. The best time to introduce the SEO planning of a website is when the site design is ready and the site is ready to be launched but there is no content yet for the site. Just before the site launches is the time to bring in an SEO consultant to provide some SEO services.


After the design of the website is done an SEO consultant can give you suggestions about what keywords and key phrases you need to add into the site HTML as Meta tags and where those tags should go. Once the site is tagged and the design and navigation has been tested it’s time to add in content. Having SEO content on your site from the start will give your web site a big advantage over older websites that might already have a bit of a following but haven’t had any SEO services by a professional SEO consultant.

For a new site where that site ends up on the search engine results pages can be critical to its success. In order for the site to get a high ranking on the search engine results pages it’s imperative that a professional and experienced SEO consultant creates search engine optimized content that is ready to be part of a broad search engine marketing campaign. It just makes more sense to get all your ducks in a row before you launch the site doesn’t it? Bring in an SEO consultant when you’re ready to start putting content on the site so that when the site launches your site will be instantly indexed by the search engine spiders and can start drawing traffic from search engines immediately.

If you have an existing site that is due for an overhaul or a design revamping then you should also consult a professional SEO consultant before the site is redone so that you will have a good idea of what SEO services that you need. Cosmetic work on the site is important so that your site doesn’t look outdated but changing up the content on the site will be very important. Most of the traffic that websites get comes from searches done by people who use Google or another search engine to look for website dealing with a particular topic.

You want your site to be at the top of or at least near the top every search that is done by a search engine for the topic that your site is about. In order to achieve that you need an SEO professional to write great search engine optimized content before the site launches. If your existing site has had the same content on it for more than six months you should get an SEO professional to write new content. Changing the content is a great search engine marketing strategy to draw new web site traffic and improve your search engine ranking.

Read MOre..

What You Need To Know About Directory Submission?

Do you own a website? Have you tried all the methods to generate traffic to your website. One of the methods which used by webmasters to increase the credibility of their website is directory submission. A web directory is a website which is divided into different categories and sub-categories. Webmasters submit their website to the directory for the purpose building backlinks pointing to their website. Number of quality one way links is one of the criteria which is used by search engines to rank their websites. Greater will be number of the backlinks pointing towards the website better will be the rank on the search engine result page.

There are two types of methods which people use to submit their website to the web directories. The first method is automatic submission with the help of software. This method is fast and does not need so much time and effort. The second method is manual submission. This method is bit difficult and needs time but this method is preferred by webmasters and SEO experts.

Building backlinks is a slow process. If you will try to fasten this process your website can be banned by the search engines. Nowadays you can also find many SEO firms which offer directory submission at reasonable prices. A good SEO firm can save lot of money and time for you. Always remember that the benefits of directory submission are long lasting. If you want to generate more traffic to your website then you have to use different techniques in proper way.

Read More...

Google toolbar adds adds Chrome's speed dial to Firefox

If you like Chrome but miss your Google toolbar, you might just want to keep using Firefox (or switch back). The latest version of the Google Toolbar for Firefox adds features mimicking Chrome's start page to newly-opened tabs in Firefox.

In addition to your 9 most frequently visited sites, the page also displays recent bookmarks and recently closed tabs. The update also boasts an array of new buttons and the ability to add Gadgets as buttons.

Here's a shocker for you: the new version has been labeled a "second beta" by Google. We'll wait with bated breath to see if the label changes at some point in the next 8 years.

Read More..

Long Tail Keywords And Its Search Engine Optimization Usage

Many Search Engine Optimization experts have used Long Tail Keywords and basically what they are, are search phrases consisting of several words. A simple example of this would be if a general keyword were ‘SEO’ then the long tail keyword phrase would be ‘How to incorporate SEO’.

Experts say that the reason behind using long tail keywords on a website is that your marketing is more effective. This is achieved through the ability of targeting specific markets. When searching for a particular topic it is more likely that searches will type in a short keyword of one or two words. However, by typing in long tail key phrases, one is able to get more specific and relevant results. This will drive these visitors to click on your website as they know precisely that your sites content contains the information they require.

Another great advantage of using longtail keywords is that there is less competition for your phrases. Most online businesses in your field will more likely use one worded keywords during search engine optimization which ultimately benefits you. However, do not fully rely on this. It is always best you do Keyword Research for long tail phrases just as you would do for keywords. This can take time but is vital.

The Long Tail Of SEO
Targeting traffic through SEO begins with keywords and key phrases, which gives you better ranking. Top ranking cannot however be achieved by all websites and it usually takes strategy and time and sometimes lots of money. In Search Engine Optimization, long tail keywords are very useful even if they generate fewer searches but receive sufficient traffic. They will not always guarantee high ranking, which is what you hope to achieve through Search Engine Optimization but you will get a good traffic flow to your website.

The best ways that long tail keywords can be incorporated onto your website so that your Search Engine Optimization can be effective is by including it in the page title and tags. Also ensure that these long tail phrases are used abundantly throughout your websites content but do not overcrowd it – all key phrases should be relevant and befitting.

Longtail Keywords Research
Selecting appropriate keywords on its own and trying to decipher what searchers are looking for is a hard enough task that requires great research. When choosing long tail keyword, in order to gain great profits, research is too required.

How one goes about researching potential long tail keywords is by using the following tools. Start by employing free services such as Wordtracker and Google’s free keyword aid. Look specifically for long tail Niche Keywords that receive ok traffic and have low competition but use quality phrases that you know people will actually search for. Little competition means that you have a better chance of entering into your niche market and although long tail key phrases is not going to instantly make you a millionaire it will get your foot in the door.

ReaD More...

How to Start SEO and Increase Web Traffic - Using Keywords

Submissions & Keywords

Many small business owners know that Search Engine Optimization (SEO) helps generate traffic to their websites. They even know that they need to start doing it for their own website. But how?

You can always hire someone to do optimization for you but what if you don't have the budget for it? What if you want to do something yourself? Below are some basic tips of how to get started. Unfortunately, SEO takes time, spanning weeks and months. It's something you have to keep working at. Some of these tips will get you started but some should be worked on every week. Set aside an hour or two each week on your calendar. Pick a day you know won't be filled with constant interruptions, maybe even on a weekend.

If your website is up and running you need to make sure you have the following in place. Some may have already been done by your web designer so check with him or her first so you don't duplicate steps.

1. Submit your Web site name to Google, Yahoo Search and MSN
2. Submit to directories DMOZ, Yahoo Directory (Yahoo requires a fee)

There are many ways to increase your traffic and get the search engines to give you better placement, for now I will stick to the essentials.
Keywords

Keywords are used to categorize your site by search engines. Then the search engines share your site when those words or phrases are searched. You want to make sure you are using the right keywords on your site's copy and in its meta tags. Meta Tags are a a few lines of html code that explain your site's title, description and keywords to the search engines.

First you need to figure out which keywords or keyword phrases are relevant to your business and searched often by people. Many you may be able to guess. Think about what you would type into Google if you were going to look for your products or services. Start creating a list of these words and phrases.

If your site has been up for a while and gets a regular stream of traffic you can use the traffic reports from your site. Better yet use an analytics tool, some are free like Google Analytics, to see what keywords are bringing in the most traffic for your site. Setting it up is easy. You sign up with Google and it gives you a tracking code. Then either you or your web designer just need to paste the code into the website. If you have access to a content management system or are using a system like Wordpress this shouldn't be too hard. Just follow Google's instructions. Once active see what keywords bring in the most traffic.

Another way is to use Google AdWords' new Search-based Keyword Tool (also free). After you sign up with Google and sign-in you can type in your Website address, add a few words that you think would work and Google will give you more suggestions. They will also tell you how many people search for those words per month, if your competition is buying those words for search engine marketing (SEM, or paid search marketing) advertising and how much it costs.This is helpful to determine what will work for you.

Since you are a small business you may not be able to compete with large companies that are always optimizing their site's keywords and appear at the top of searches for popular phrases. Instead you want to find your niche, an area that isn't extremely popular or competitive and then you want to be strong with those keywords.

Look for words that have:

* A high volume of searches on it
* A high relevance to your site
* Low competition

Add these words to your list, to the copy on your site and to your meta tags to help optimize it for search engines. This will help build traffic. Remember it takes time for you to do all of this and time before the search engines go through all your new keywords, sometimes a few months. So be patient. But remember you'll save in the end by not having to pay someone.

Read More..

10 Ways to Use Facebook for Increasing Web Traffic to Your Site

1. Build a Facebook network. Before you start implementing any of the techniques discussed here, you need to develop a network of Facebook friends. To do that, join a few groups that are related to your business and a few groups that you are passionate about.

Ask people in the groups to add you as their friend. Facebook also has nifty tool that suggest people you would like to know. Send request to these people to add you as their friend. Send a short note explaining why you want to be their friend. If send 20 requests a day, you will have a network of more than 1,000 friends in two months.

2. Update your status every day. Login every day and update your status. Don’t use status messages like “I am sleeping now”, “Just came from work”. These types of status messages are not interesting. Use quotes from famous people about a specific niche, for example love, dedication, work ethics, peace, war, etc. You can also use jokes. Your aim is to draw people’s attention to your messages so that they would click on your profile to know more about you.

3. Wish birthday wishes everyday. Facebook also shows upcoming birthdays of all friends in your network. Every day send birthday wishes to friends whose birthdays are due. Read their profiles to know more about them and write a nice personal message on their walls. Don’t use canned birthday messages for everybody.

When you write on a friend’s wall in Facebook, everybody in the network gets updated news feed. You need to write something that get attention. You may craft a 10 to 20 attention grabbing birthday messages and than personalize them slightly for each friend.

4. Create a business page. Besides your personal page, you should also create a business page. Creating a business page is similar to creating a personal page in Facebook. Design a nice logo and use it for your business page picture.

Next, become a fan of your business page. You can use your business page to launch targeted Facebook ad campaign. Promote your Facebook business page using blogs, blog comments, etc. and ask people to become a fan of your business. Use some promotional materials, like free t-shirts, free eBooks etc as incentives for becoming a fan.

5. Tag promotional photos using friends’ names. Upload all promotional photos to your business page. Some people tag these photos with the names of their most influential friends in the network. Your promotional photos will show up in your friends’ news feeds. Once you setup a network of friends, make a list of friends with high number of friends, preferably more than 1000. Setup your mini network to tag each others names in promotional photos.

6. Change your relationship status regularly if it is possible. One of the least frequent activity in Facebook is changing the relationship. Because people don’t change their relationship frequently, Facebook places a great deal of importance to relationship change and send the news feeds to everybody in your network whenever there is a change in your relationship status.

People have explored this loop hole to attract attention to their profiles. They change their relationship almost weekly and try to attract visitors to their profiles. It is up to you to adopt this technique because it may not reflect your true relationship status. If you do adopt this technique, don’t forget to publish some promotional materials in your personal feed.

7. Attend Multiple Events. True to its college root, Facebook is all about friends gathering at some place for an event. Facebook gives high priority to events in the news feed. Your goal is to RSVP all the events in your network even if you miss a few of them.

When your friends see you as a frequent event attendee, they consider you as an event resource. The trick is to show your name in all the places you can. As your friends see your name multiple times, some will be curious to check your profile.

8. Import your blog post. If you have a blog, import your blog’s RSS feed into Facebook. Facebook will publish the articles in the feed as Facebook notes automatically. Encourage your friends to comments on your articles in Facebook notes. You can also tag friends in the articles but don’t overdo it.

9. Post comments on popular groups. Visit popular Facebook groups that you have joined regularly and post comments. Just like blog comments or forum posting, Facebook comments on popular groups will attract attention to your name and profile. Add something valuable or post a link that adds value to the topic under discussions.

10. Start your own events. Events are very popular in Facebook and if you can promote it properly, it will have viral effects and thousands will register for the event. Send invitation to your network friends who have thousands of friends in their networks and also to attractive female friends in your network who may not have a large number of friends.

Read More...

11 FREE Ways How To Explode Your Website Traffic Hit Counter

1) Start an affiliate program. Its the #1 way how to get high quality traffic to your website. Almost every successful online business has an affiliate program.

2) Build an opt in list. This is the most important factor of any internet business. With an opt in list you can get massive high-quality traffic to any website instantly. Every successful internet marketer has an opt in list. Learn how to build a massive opt in list by sending a blank email to affila@aweber.com

3) Use a tool such as Traffic Equalizer. This tool instantly creates thousands of search engine friendly pages for your website. Each page is targeted for one keyphrase and gets traffic from search engines. Get the tool at trafficequalizer.com

4) Write articles and submit them to article directories and ezine publishers. Collect a list of ezine publishers and submit your articles to them. Also submit your articles to article directories.

5) Exchange links with other websites. Exchanging links with hundreds of other websites can bring heavy traffic to your website. You can exchange links very fast using ARELIS link exchange tool at axandra-link-popularity-tool.com

6) Create a brandable viral ebook that promotes your website. Give this ebook to marketers with large opt in lists. Let them customize it with their affiliate links that point to your website and give it away to their subscribers for free. This will bring steady, non stop traffic to your website.

7) Submit your website to directories and other websites that accept submissions. You can find such websites by visiting search engine such as Google, and searching for add url your keywords, add site your keywords, your keywords directory. There are hundreds of other variations you can search for.

8) Post at forums. Participate in forum discussions and leave a link to your website in your signature line. Make the title of the link catchy by stating a benefit to get more people click on it.

9) Go to http://www.affila.com/ and learn about website traffic and opt in list building methods that work today. Visit the website and use your first name and email to subscribe to the course that it offers.

10) Make your website viral. In your website offer content that literally forces your visitors to tell their friends about your website. Add tell-a-friend functionality to your website. An excellent example of viral website is http://www.themeatrix.com. This website gets tons of viral traffic.

11) Write testimonials. Write testimonials for products that you like and that you have used. If youre lucky, your testimonial can be on the product sales page that has hundreds of visitors every day. That would mean your website link in testimonial clicked many times.

Read More...

Search Engine Optimization SEO Ranking for 5 Proven Ways to Find Link Exchange Partners

If you're like most small business websites on the internet today, you use link exchanges to market your website. But sometimes finding websites to exchange links with can be a time consuming task. Here are a few proven methods for finding websites to exchange links with.

1: Search Engines Queries

Using Google or Yahoo, perform the following searches, replacing “keyword” with a keyword related to your site.

Keyword add URL
Keyword add site
Keyword add link
Keyword submit URL
Keyword submit site
Keyword submit link
Keyword link exchange
Keyword link swap
Keyword reciprocal link
Keyword related sites
Keyword links directory

2: Find out who's linking to your competitor's.

If you can find out who is linking to your competitors, you can try to acquire a link to your site ob each site that already links to your competitors. Just search for link:http://www.competitors-url-here.com

3: Other link directories

Find sites that relate to your site that have link exchange directories. Visit each site in their link directories and attempt to exchange links with each site.

4: Link exchange tools

There are several excellent websites that match webmasters with related sites that are interested in exchanging links. Two of the best are Link alizer and Site Sell’s Value Exchange. In general, you'll want to stay away from sites that completely automate the link exchange process. I have used some of them, but the search engines do not like these sites, and may penalize your site if you use them.

5: Software

There is also software available that searches for and automatically emails sites to see if they will link exchange with you. I have used and like higradeworld if you decide to use this method, ensure that you comply with all spam laws and the search engine's guidelines.

Read More...

Search Engine Optimization For Internet Videos

Research firm Forrester has taken a look at the state of search engine optimization of Internet videos, and have found that less than 20% of marketers insert keywords into the filenames of the videos on their site, and even fewer use more advanced tactics like writing keyword-rich captions and annotations, or creating online video libraries.

“If you’re not optimizing your videos, you should start,” says Forrester’s Nate Elliot. “Optimizing video content to take advantage of blended search is by far the easiest way to get a first-page organic ranking on Google.”

Here are the steps that Forrester recommends:
- Insert keywords into your video filenames.
- Host your videos on YouTube, and embed those YouTube videos into your own site. - Google says its algorithms consider how many times a video is viewed, and any views embedded videos receive on your own site get added to the ‘views’ tally on YouTube. (And yes, nearly every video we saw Google blend into its results came from YouTube.)
- Optimize your YouTube videos by writing keywords into your videos’ titles, descriptions, and tags.
- Embed videos into relevant text pages on your site. The context provided by the text on those pages (which is hopefully already optimized for search as well) will help the search engines figure out what your videos are about.
- Also create a video library on your site, so Google knows where to find your video content. (Google Video Sitemaps can help with this too.) Write keyword-rich annotations for each video in the library.

In addition to the suggestions Forrester offers, you should consider using keywords related to your video within the video itself. Some search engines are beginning to index the audio of your videos - so including your keywords in your script may help you optimize your videos for future search engine technology.

Read More...

5 Tips to Make the Most of Your SEO Investment

Whether you’re a marketer at a large Fortune 500 company or a small business, search engine optimization (SEO) can be one of the most cost-effective tools for reaching a broader audience and increasing online sales. A solid and persistent search engine optimization program can increase search visibility for many types of content affecting the bottom line: sales, customer service, recruiting, public and investor relations.

These are challenging economic times calling for prudent marketing decisions. Search industry, business and analyst publications agree: search marketing is recission proof, or at least recession resistant. To make sure your SEO program investment yields effective and efficient marketing results, keep the following tips in mind:

Planning: A solid plan of action is a necessary component to any successful SEO program. Before beginning an effort to optimize content for better search visibility, be sure you have clarified specific goals and expectations. This will help you to decide which SEO tactics will be most effective, what internal resources will be necessary and what metrics will be used to measure success.

Resources: Assess your resources to ensure you can actually implement your SEO program. The most common reason for an unsuccessful SEO effort is failure of implementation. Take stock of available budget (yours or another department that will be affected) talent pool and any existing media assets that can be leveraged. You will need to determine if you have the resources to complete your ideal SEO plan on your own, or if you will need to enlist the services of a SEO agency (like TopRank.

Measurement: Organize a process to measure the results of your program. You will want to be able to tie your measurements of success directly back to your SEO tactics. If increasing leads was the initial goal for your program, this may mean using an analytics package to determine the origin of your online leads. If you choose to work with an agency, be sure to select one with a strong record of measurable SEO success.

Promotion: A well-optimized website will increase your search engine rankings and help your target audience find your services over that of competitors. However, a solid SEO program does not end there. Make the most of search engine optimization by promoting useful content. Place your URL on your business card, in your email signature, and promote it online beyond the search engines in social networks, blogs, forums and anywhere that it can be useful. It will be passed along and linked to, sending traffic and further increasing search visibility.

Innovation: Don’t rely on what has always worked, or assume that your initial optimization will last forever. The online world is constantly changing, and this extends to optimization best practices. A solid SEO program is an ongoing investment that requires you to adapt and innovate to ensure your website stays at the top of the rankings and top of mind with your consumers.

Read More...

4 Key Components to Search Engine Optimization

Search engine optimization is an absolute necessity if you want your site to be easily found on the internet. By properly preparing your site you will make it easier to be located thru a search by anyone looking for the type of information, service, or product your site offers.

In order for you to best optimize your site there are 4 areas you'll need to pay special attention to. This optimization process basically involves the correct use of keywords, site labeling, content, and linking with other sites.

Let's have a look at 4 key components you'll need to address to optimize your site for the search engines:

1 - TITLE TAG
This field should be kept short (55 - 60 characters) and should describe the main theme, intention, or content of what the site is all about. What you put here is what will show in the top bar of the window when the site is displayed. It is also the 'title' that appears when it is displayed in any search engine results.

It is important to accurately describe the site content in your title so as to not confuse the search engines. If inaccurate the title may cause you to not be listed at all in any search results.

2 - KEYWORD USE
The use of keywords throughout the text of your site content is important so that the search engines can easily locate your site. These keywords will act as 'guiding lights' for search engine spiders when seeking particular content. If your keywords are not relevant to the site content you again risk a lower search ranking or not one at all.

Be sure your keyword selection reflects your sites content. Also take time to research the popularity of the keywords selected since the most searched upon keywords will not only bring you more traffic but will also boost your search engine ranking.

3 - KEYWORD DENSITY
Once you've selected the keywords you want to build your site around it is best to utilize them within the content in a natural and flowing way. You DO NOT want to overuse any words or phrases since it won't sound right to anyone reading the content. In addition any deliberate overuse will get you penalized by the search engines for 'keyword stuffing' resulting in lower rankings. It's best to stay within a 2% to 3 % range of keyword use within your content.

4 - INBOUND LINKS
These links also referred to as link popularity reflects links that come from other websites. This generally is an indication of the relevancy and quality your site content may have to the other websites. Think of this as your online list of references that will vouch for your websites legitimacy.

These links will appear over time or as a result of particular marketing techniques you may utilize. Social tagging, article marketing, and leaving comments at forums or blogs will accelerate your link creation efforts. The more links you develop the bigger boost your search engine ranking will receive.

Read More..

Helpful Tips for Corporate Blogging

Blogs are massive resources of information from both and outside companies. Businessmen survive the world of blogging because they know how and where to dig information while protecting their own secrets. Although blogging can be risky world for businesses, there are several helpful tips that can help bring success to corporate blogging.

The Important of Training:

It is important to make sure the members of the communications team. In the past, this team was composed of a small group. However, with the advent of blogging, everyone who blogs at the company is spreading a specific message about the company. People who handle the blogging for the company must be trained to avoid any spill of unnecessary information.

If by accident, important information regarding the company has been disclosed, this can put the company under the watchful eyes of the regulators. More so, inappropriate leaks can provide competitors with leverage and may lead to embarrassing revelations about the inner workings of the company and its staff.

Although the usual action to be taken is to restrict employees from blogging, this can be a shortsighted decision. Bloggers from within the company can easily relate and make contact with potential clients and even enhance the brand of the company.

The Fake Blogs:

Several, if not all, companies are eager to establish one-on-one links with their consumers, though they are
often hesitant to venture in the world of blogging. As a result, they set up fake blogs. Fake blogs are those that are created by marketing departments of the company in order to promote a product, brand or service using a fake name or character.

These kinds of blogs are risky since several bloggers who are passionate about what they do view them as an insult to the blogging community and no one can deny the fact that these blogs are very visible to the public.

Although there are no rules prohibiting a company from making pseudo-blogs, the subject of creating one is always welcome. Always keep in mind that you can choose to create fake blogs but remember all the risks
involved.

Blog Tracking:

Tracking blogs is one of the easiest and most important tips to remember. Firstly, the company can look around online and search for the most influential blogger who writes about their products or services. Remember to read the blogger’s updates everyday and perform an automated tracking of discussions.

Tracking blogs is important because even those postings from small-time bloggers can be selected by search engines, strengthened by a well-known blogger and ultimately hit the mainstream.

The Public Relations:

Blogs have the ability to break down barriers between the company and its customers. It is important for businesses to take that into consideration and adjust. There are several companies that start blog in order to attain customer loyalty and address the customers’ concerns and comments. Relating to the customers is a vital factor in the survival of a business. Knowing what the customers think about the products or services can help enhance the company’s services.

The Company’s Secrets:

Take into consideration one secret or secrets that you have kept at your company. Be it a list of projects for the following year or information about scandalous activities, there are several things that you must learn no to leak to your competitors.

In blogging, there is a certainty that you must rethink about something that you are trying to avoid, for that fact that other companies are increasingly sharing information to win new partners and generate new ideas. Although this does not mean that they are not keeping any secrets from you or that you must not keep any from them, it is important to reevaluate whether you can gain more out of sharing details than keep them to yourself.

Read More....

7 Ways To Get Traffic

Using Tutorials to drive traffic
Creating tutorials for popular software such as Adobe Photoshop is an easy way to drive traffic. Where should your tutorials for Adobe Photoshop be submitted.

Using Stumbleupon to drive traffic
Signing up is fast and easy, and its free. It brings in a bit of traffic over time, but not a lot. It will however help to bring in new visitors, and the benefit of getting visitors from Stumbleupon is that people who are “stumbling” are interested in finding new content, and unless your site design is totally hopeless, most “stumblers” will hang around for a minute or two, trying to discover what exactly your homepage is about.

Using RSS feeds to drive traffic
A classic approach has always been to publish your RSS to drive traffic, but there are created thousands of new blogs each day, and your content will immediately disappear in the mass of information published. Submit to every one of them.

Using niche sites to drive traffic
Posting to specific sites containing your topic will increase traffic, for a while. Several sites have the option where you can submit news items to their front page, but mostly people would complain if you are simply self-promoting without your information being particular new or interesting. www.stylegala.com drove a lot of traffic to my site early on, but their policies changed, so I stopped posting to that homepage.

Using Digg to drive traffic
A common known effect of Digg is known as the Digg Effect (also known as the Slashdot effect). This is what happens if a particular site is submitted to Digg, Slashdot or Fark or any similar type of site, and receive so much traffic their server simply gives up. This rarely happens for minor sites, but the overall effect of submitting interesting tidbits cannot be underestimated. You will receive a least a little amount of visitors if your submission is at least a little bit interesting, and you will also gain a backlink to your homepage.

Using forums /BBS’s to drive traffic
A quick way to drive traffic to your homepage is to become engaged in various forums regarding your specific niche. Do a search on Google for your particular area in which your homepage refers to, and become a member of the first 10 forums you encounter. Here you sign up and create a signature for every post you make, with a nice description and link back your homepage. Only make relevant comments, or you might be considered a spammer.

Also, most forums (at least the most well visited) have a high PR (Google PageRank) since many people link to their site, and unless they have added the “link red=nofollow” to external links, your site will gain PR from those pages. They share their high PR with all other external links, and the benefits from a SEO perspective might be limited, but the traffic driven will be very targeted and relevant and should convert a lot better.

Using link directories to drive traffic
Now, this is not in any way a new nor novel idea to drive traffic. It might not bring traffic except from random referrals from search engines
. It will take some time, and it is important to remember every link counts for the quest for the #1 spot.

Read MOre..

Google, Yahoo! look to boost search engine marketing

The two biggest search engines on the web are attempting to encourage more companies to integrate their offline campaigns with search engine marketing.

This is according to new media age (nma), which reports that Google and Yahoo! have recently stepped up talks with agencies and brands to persuade them to include calls to action in campaigns that ask consumers to search the web for specific terms.

Mobile operator Orange recently saw success with this tactic by asking TV viewers to "search online for I Am online" in its broadcast ads, prompting a 15 per cent surge in web traffic.

Nick Gill, head of account management at Yahoo UK, told nma that integrating search with offline campaigns in this way "makes sense" as search engines tend to be the starting point on the internet for most people.

"It's easier for consumers to remember a search call to action than a phone number or specific URL," he added.

Last year, a report from MultiMedia Intelligence suggested that call to action advertising will boom on the mobile platform as web TV becomes more popular on mobile phones.

Read More...

SEO predicted to boom in 2009

More businesses may place greater importance on search engine optimisation (SEO) this year as the downturn means marketers will look for strategies with high return on investment (ROI).

This is according to William Flaiz, vice-president of SEO and web analytics at Razorfish, who wrote in a Search Engine Watch article that while traffic generated through SEO is not technically free, it tends to offer a greater ROI than paid search.

"Organic search marketing just might become the bread winner as cash-strapped clients become wary of increased media costs in traditional space and an upturn in bid competition in paid search," he explained.

The expert went on to predict that local search will also gain in importance over the course of 2009, particularly as mobile search continues to rise in popularity among consumers.

Read MORe..

New SEO and email marketing blog launched

A new blog featuring expert guidance and advice about email marketing, search engine optimisation (SEO), social networking and Web 2.0 strategies has been launched.

Dr. Scott's Cool Marketing and Business Blog is the brainchild of Philadelphia marketing professor Dr Scott Testa who is hoping he can use his 20 years of experience and the knowledge of a number of guest writers to help educate people about the internet marketing sector.

Predicting what the next 12 months could have in store for the industry, he remarked: "I am really looking forward to 2009.

"Unique and inexpensive marketing techniques are going to be at the forefront."

As well as containing more than four dozen educational articles, the blog also acts as a hub for several other websites and blogs, linking to over 20 in total.

Email marketing, SEO and paid search should be at the heart of any online marketing strategy, according to Straight Up Search.

Read More..

Search engine marketing 'should target all e-commerce stages'

Marketers must ensure their company is present in search results at all stages of the buying process, an expert has indicated.

While data might point to one particular keyword as being the most used by consumers when visiting a company's website, the user could have started the process of searching for that company some time ago, using different keywords, according to .net magazine's Gary Reid.

Companies should therefore carry out the proper research and ensure their search engine optimisation (SEO) strategies use the most relevant keywords at each stage of the buying cycle, he said.

"Blindly optimising for a set of keywords you think is appropriate is a quick way to waste time and money," Mr Reid stated.

"You really need to work smart to get the best from your efforts."

Search marketing strategies such as SEO and pay-per-click accounts for half of all spending on internet advertising globally, according to MarketingSherpa.

Read More...

The Future Of Search Marketing In 2009

The experts are gazing into their crystal balls and sharing their visions for 2009 in terms of search, social, online, mobile and marketing in general.

Google will cull non-revenue generating services in an effort to exceed analyst expectations. The share price will not recover to its $600USD high.
Google will also face a massive legal challenge in 2009 from a non US country regarding its business practices.

The Web 2.0 bubble will burst with many companies entering the "dead pool". The only companies which will survive will be those who have a sustainable business model.
Twitter will be bought by a major internet player and whilst will remain free to use for basic version, a premium service offering will emerge. Will continue to be plagued by reliability issues whilst seriously challenging mainstream media and blogs in breaking news.

Yahoo! value will drop considerably, forcing even further reduction in forces worldwide. Their search market share will continue to decline at the benefit of Google and Microsoft. Microsoft will over take Yahoo! in terms of search share within the US, forcing Yahoo! to reconsider its search options.

Search spending growth will slow considerably in the first half of the year but still grow (single digits). Growth will accelerate to double digits by end of 2009.

2009 will be known as the year that SaaS becomes mainstream, with fortune 500 companies adopting it to reduce costs. Amazon will loose its place as the number one provider of cloud services to start ups, with major IT vendors all offering competiting products but with a far superior development interface i.e. merging of cloud services into traditional desktop development tools.

Read More..