My comments to his most recent comments are posted there and here.

Joseph’s comments:
“…my experience and learning indicate that most business people don’t care about science.”

Agreed, however they don’t have to care about it to use it. Anyone who has ever used a tire gauge or a tape measure has employed a scientific calibration method.

Take web analytics; vendor produces web analytics tool – company buys web analytics tool - company is responsible for correct, complete and functioning implementation of web analytics tool - automated monitoring identifies implementation problems. This last step is the rub. The web analytics vendor specializes in providing the measurement tool, not the calibration tool. The company does not have to be expert at science to employ automated monitoring of their web analytics. It must, however have accountability at a senior level – one neck to grab - and a recognition that without this calibration, all bets are off, and that manual discovery of implementation problems is a complete and utter waste of valuable time that their web analysts could be using to do more important things. The results of my survey that is currently underway (Where in the Organization is the Web Analyst – July 15-22, 2008) will bear out the chronic problems that practitioners have with their own implementations.

Going back to Avinash’s observation – “We have too many damn tools!’” Yep, the toolbox has 4 hammers, 5 screwdrivers and a utility knife, and the task calls for cutting a mitered corner. Now I suppose you could position the utility knife, whack it with the hammer, wedge a screwdriver in the crevice, and repeat the process until you make your way across the board…..it’s possible, not efficient, the outcome will be really ugly, but it’s possible.

Joseph’s question : “Is the natural progression due to the tools being used, due to the information provider becoming more trusted, perhaps due to the people receiving the information finally having the cognitive readiness to accept the information as both valuable and valid, …?”

I believe it is a confluence of things contributing to maturation in organizations. The web has disrupted entire industries – newspapers, auto, real estate, travel, consumer goods, government agencies. It would be great if somebody had an “Easy Button” for managing web assets – maybe Staples could start loaning them out. People are coming to grips with the fact that no one product is the magic answer, and that jumping from one vendor to another is not the answer either. They are coming to grips with the complexity of their sites, the fact that legislation and market conditions are constantly changing, that they are subject to the laws of all the countries they operate sites in, that achieving good natural placement in Google has a tangible benefit, and that bad things can happen to good sites, and can lurk there for a long time, that if you’re a great big company, you might be a “target” for lawsuits by people who find your site inaccessible to them, that the mobile web tsunami is coming, all this in addition to the daily grind of figuring out who is looking at what for how long using what type of viewing device and what are they doing as a result? Joseph refers to it as “cognitive readiness”. I’ve always called it “the teachable moment.” Increasingly organizations are getting there.

Joseph’s comment:
“I’d love to see a piece that demonstrates the successful implementation of such a group if such is available.”

Here are a couple of success stories. The first one is a site of around 2000 pages owned by a company with numerous locations across the country. The site’s primary function is lead generation and information provision on health-related issues. SEO is important to them and they run online ad campaigns. They conduct surveys through the site. The organization supporting the site is small, so they rely on their vendors. Once a month, the manager has a call where all the vendors are present – site structure, web analyst, SEM, search analyst, survey company. Everyone is expected to present information and recommendations based on the agenda the manager sets.

The second is a global B2B company. Their public site is large, their intranet is sprawling, and they have a constant flow of micro-sites going up. Their web team consists of people with expertise in search, web analytics, copyrighting, marketing, ad campaigns; yet they all are part of one team. Content management is dispersed throughout the organization using a CMS that was developed in-house after they determined that there was not a market solution that fit their business. This team, however, has dotted lines to content owners and teams. Decisions of what web site management solutions they use (whether it is traffic, search, A/B testing, surveys, or structural analytics) are made by this team. They have developed and are utilizing web standards and continue to grow from strength to strength.

There are others. I like these two because they are at opposite ends of the spectrum and demonstrate that there is more than one way to get there, once people define what it is they are trying to achieve.

Your comments are most welcome. What are you seeing in your organization?

Recently,  Hitwise Monthly Category Report for  Travel was released based on US Internet usuage for the month of June 2008. Leading the way in the top 4 were Mapquest, Google Maps, Expedia, and Yahoo Maps. In the last 4 months the above websites have remain constant in their positions.

Maps are becoming increasing important on websites as they provide useful information on how to find your business as well services nearby. You can include photos, videos, reviews and much more on your map. Maps are also high in search engine listings as well. Usually in the search, map(s) will be listed in first page of your search.

Visit Victoria County website has being using maps on its website for the last 3 years and has most of Victoria County businesses with GPS positions. Try the Interactive Map on Visit Victoria County website.

Source Code Testing: 

1. Source Code history
2. Use of readable indentation for source
3. Source Code optimization
4. Source Code Comment documentation
5. Source Code Backup
6. Appropriate naming conventions for source files
7. Appropriate storage location for source files
8. Appropriate use of Transactions wherever required
9. Appropriate use of Stored Procedures wherever required
10. Use of functions for code reuse
11. Use of Common library
12. CSS Code to be separated from the source code
13. AJAX code to be separated from the source code
14. Use of version control mechanism
15. Source Code encryption mechanism
16. Appropriate use of sessions / cookies
17. LDAP authentication
18. Following the standards. (for e.g. XHTML 1.0 standard for web coding).
19. Appropriate naming conventions for functions used and functions in the common library
20. Appropriate Folder structure for source code files
21. Clearance of extra comments, unnecessary code, echoes, alerts, type texts
22. No hard coding should be present 

Database Testing: 

1. Appropriate linking of tables
2. Normalization
3. Naming Conventions
4. Appropriate storage engine is used
5. Optimized field types are used
6. Backup function
7. Appropriate use of Triggers
8. Encrypted storage of confidential data
9. Compressed storage of big data
10. Appropriate prefixing for special characters before storage
11. Scalability
12. Database Document - Design schema with sample data
13. Appropriate filtering of data before storing into the database
14. Appropriate default values for table fields
15. Appropriate comments entered for table fields
16. Database Design query with sample data to be documented 

UI Testing: 

1. Consistency of screens
2. Consistency of background colours
3. Usage of pleasant colours
4. IPR violation with logos, images, colours, text
5. Consistency across multiple browsers (IE, Mozilla, Netscape)
6. All controls on the screen should be accessible through keyboard / Keyboard shortcuts
7. Various screen sizes testing
8. Various Platforms testing
9. Best Configuration message on home page
10. Appropriate tool tips for all elements on UI
11. All dropdowns heights and widths, symmetry and consistency
12. Textboxes height and width
13. Overall symmetry
14. All kinds of necessary validations for blank data inputs, illegal data inputs
15. Warning, error window sizes and placement
16. Test for SQL injection
17. Testing for over limit, under limit, different data types, null inputs
18. Testing for Reflection, no variable/class/method names should be hard coded
19. Print all the output reports and test them for alignment, proper page breaks, formatting, paper size, data readability and completeness
20. Scalability for various technologies, if yes, define configuration and process steps for migration
21. Backup
22. Backup Procedure documented
23. Auto/Manual Backup
24. All necessary documentations: commenting the code, flow chart, database design/schema, table design/scheme, user manual, source code/files naming conventions, ER diagram, help files, researched material
25. Testing for SOX compliancy
26. Overall user friendliness & aesthetics
27. Should be best viewable with 800x600 resolution
28. Maximizing, minimizing, resizing of windows to be possible
29. Positioning of cursor on the first editable field in Data entry screens
30. Every screen should have one Default button
31. Acknowledgment of error messages should take the control to where the error occurred
32. The Title bar should contain appropriate title
33. Every screen should have a title/header
34. Ease of use without any help
35. Grammatical correctness of error messages
36. Correct grammar for texts, field names, tool tips
37. Grammatical correctness of Help text
38. Text box lengths should correspond the length of data they take, wherever possible
39. Default values to be populated wherever possible
40. Consistent behaviour when screen resolution is changed
41. Consistency of margins and header and footer
42. Consistency of Colour of form
43. Consistency of Size of form
44. Consistency of fonts used for labels
45. Consistency of Size of buttons
46. Consistent use of animations/graphics
47. Consistency of labelling of controls (buttons, boxes)
48. Consistency of length of textboxes for the same field
49. Consistency of formats for date fields
50. Effective reuse of repeatable visual themes
51. When a button is clicked
52. When an error is encountered
53. When a field is being validated
54. Should support users' sequence of accomplishing a task
55. ‘Back' and ‘Home' links to be provided
56. Correct order of tabbing
57. Text to be selected when tabbing to a textbox
58. All tab controls should be accessible thru' keyboard
59. Shortcut keys (hot keys) to be unique
60. Links should be obvious and consistent
61. Functioning of the ‘Back' and ‘Forward' functions of the browser
62. Check if all links are active
63. Alignment of labels
64. Alignment of buttons
65. Anything that needs user action must be communicated
66. Feedback should be provided whenever relevant
67. Minimum usage of pop-ups and message boxes
68. User errors must be communicated
69. Availability of Help feature
70. Availability of Context-sensitive help, wherever needed
71. Buttons should be enabled/disabled depending on context
72. Non-editable text fields should be distinctly visible from others
73. Messages and labels should be accurate and appropriate for the context
74. Check if all links lead to meaningful points
75. Use of familiar and comfortable language
76. Abbreviations and code language to be used minimally
77. Help and Search links should be distinctly visible
78. Visible font for all text
79. Avoid all CAPS text
80. Help messages to be clear and concise
81. Error messages to be clear and concise
82. Should avoid horizontal scrolling
83. Should avoid vertical scrolling as much as possible
84. Logical ordering of controls
85. Position of controls should be meaningful
86. Grouping of related info. and data
87. Appropriate label for grouped data
88. Drop down/combo box menu to be ordered
89. Toggling of checkboxes
90. Checking/un checking of checkboxes through space-bar
91. Single choice for radio-buttons
92. Access keys (Keyboard shortcuts) letter should be underlined when visible on the UI
93. Frozen grid titles
94. Horizontal alignment of tables, body, div, span, data grid
95. Vertical alignment of tables, body, div, span, data gird
96. Mandatory fields should be distinctly marked in the UI 

Functional Testing: 

1. Basic Data flow is working properly
2. To be able to add data and save it correctly
3. To be able to edit data correctly
4. To be able to copy data correctly
5. To be able to delete data correctly
6. Cancel function
7. Logout function
8. Change Password feature
9. Password Complexity
10. Password History
11. Various authentication levels
12. Application should be accessible thru' URL as well as IP address
13. Time to load the application must be appropriate
14. Search Function
15. Search facility should be flexible (wildcards, mixed case, partial strings etc.)
16. Prompt to save unsaved data while trying to move to next screen
17. Password validation
18. Positioning of pop up windows
19. Field vs. form level validations
20. Destructive actions to be confirmed
21. UI shows navigation and user friendly message for null records in the database
22. Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
23. A "Contact us" page for maintenance team. The page should have mail id,  address and phone numbers
24. Application should have a visible status bar - logged in user, logged in time, date
25. A user confirmation while logging out or closing the application
26. User should not be allowed to navigation to any of the application pages without logging in
27. User session should auto expire within the following specified time period (5 minutes > Session Expiry time > 15 minutes)
28. Highlighting of searched keywords should be present for Search feature

Yet when Darren Gaudry co-founded the My Internet Business opportunity in April 2008, experts predicted that Passport to Wealth would be eclipsed and replaced by this robust new online business.

We learned today that the experts were mistaken, from an interview with Rob Hunter, co-leader of the Mentors 4 U team. Mentors 4 U is a community of internet entrepreneurs that set records for both Passport to Wealth and My Internet Business. This team focuses on providing advanced marketing training for members, as well as turn-key setup of business websites, email campaigns and closing services for Passport to Wealth and MyInternetBusiness.

“Darren Gaudry has made it his personal crusade to bring Passport to Wealth 2.0 to the very top of the industry, and keep it there,” stated Rob Hunter. “Passport to Wealth 2.0 is going to be continuously updated with exclusive new products, powerful Web 2.0 marketing tools, a stunning new video presentation of the business opportunity, and most importantly, the ability to OUTSOURCE the major components of the business.”

In order for someone to earn money with an online business, it is necessary to have a great Product, in the right Place, with an attractive Promotion, at the right Price. These are known as the 4 P’s of the Marketing Mix, and this applies equally to online or offline business.

For Passport to Wealth entrepreneurs, the two key components are Marketing, and Sales.

“The coup de grace that makes Passport to Wealth 2.0 the IDEAL choice for anyone who wants both money AND time is the ability to outsource either or both of these functions,” explained Mr. Hunter. “For example…do you hate phone calling, but realize that the personal touch will increase your sales dramatically? You’ll be able to outsource your Sales with literally the click of a mouse, and have professionals calling your prospects and closing your sales FOR you!”

“And not only that…although we pride ourselves at Passport Mentors 4 U on the incredible training that we provide for doing your OWN internet marketing, some people just don’t have the time to promote their website using our exclusive search engine optimization marketing techniques…others don’t feel that they are internet/tech-savvy enough to do their own marketing, and some others just don’t WANT to have to deal with that. Well, with Passport to Wealth 2.0, you can outsource the Marketing as well as the Sales!” Mr. Hunter continued excitedly. “Darren Gaudry himself is going to be running an elite marketing coop, which will be a complete overhaul and redesign of traditional managed marketing campaigns. This will give even novice internet marketers a chance to start earning money right away as Passport to Wealth Directors!”

Unlike many online business opportunities, which furnish cookie-cutter websites that search engines abhor, Passport to Wealth 2.0 is going to feature robust Web 2.0 lead capture pages with full personalization capability, to allow members to name-brand themselves on the internet.

“So to wrap it up, with Passport to Wealth 2.0 you are going to be able to outsource whatever parts of your business you want, so that you can be earning money while out practicing your golf swing,” laughed Mr. Hunter. “It really doesn’t get any better than that!”

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• Good design
• Proper and appropriate content
• User friendly

The keywords as well the key-phrases in a SEO should be applied properly. With a SEO you can improve your ranking on search engine result pages. Moreover SEO is known as a well practiced process that requires far-reaching commitment of resources with time and proficiency.
Bottom line - SEO not only drives more traffic towards your site but also helps in online business appreciation.

Website design Mumbai

You need enough money to pay your employees. You need sufficient returns for yourself. You want to have better infrastructure and make your business grow.

The most basic requirement for an Internet marketing company is the generation of traffic. A sale always logically follows traffic

If there are employees who take care of getting maximum traffic to your site, it’ll be extremely valuable for your business. That is an obvious fact.

NicheforSEO Traffic SEO Experts do exactly that. They are specially trained and supervised by experts in the cutting edge traffic-generation tactics. For your site!

Targeted Email Marketing

The importance of Emails in business communication cannot be overemphasized. Businesspersons as well as customers devote several hours everyday to send and receive business emails. Its importance in modern business is totally unprecedented. The most updated email marketing technology makes it possible for you to send reasonably personalized email using population-related, ethnic, behavioral, or other information you have about your customers. Email marketing aimed at specific types of customers enables greater attention to customer interests, repeated visits to the websites, and higher ROI from your marketing efforts.

Email marketing with relevance is an essential part of any online marketing campaign. It is the best way to continually increase leads and also to get them to return to your website. Whether you are using search engine marketing or not, targeted email marketing can help your organization make the most use of your marketing.

Basics of Targeted email marketing

If your goal is to kickoff your email marketing campaign, one thing you need to do is focus on your target market. You need to have a thorough understanding of your target market. At this point, you need to build detailed lists. Email marketing would be a damp squib without having a large database of email addresses on your list. If the list is ready, the next task is to get a very persuasive email written.

One of the most important things is the subject line. One cannot send out a promotional email with a flimsy attitude to make sure that it doesn’t sound spammy. Skillfully written, it can prove to be very effective. The subject line should be made really attractive. The content of the email has to be constructed with considerable thought and expertise. Paying attention to all these will ensure the expected kind of results from the receivers. That way the end result of your email marketing campaign can be very fruitful.

Make sure all the email ids are legitimate. Do not send out emails to people who are not your target customers. They will be the only ones who are interested in getting supplementary information. It is usually pointless to send thousands of emails to a number of random addresses. Your emails should look attractive. In order to accomplish that, carefully design the layout and colors. By working on the language of your emails, you can attract a large audience. Do not place content which your audience might find boring. All these would make your emails effective.

Benefits of Targeted Email Marketing

• No additional software is required
• Real-time tracking may be carried out (view opens, click thru and responses)
• Has a very easy forward option, which would let you forward your email to a friend.
• Dynamic List Management
• You can maintain unlimited number of lists. Lists may be created easily.
• Easy carrying out of editing and scheduling of campaigns.

There are three reasons to run an email marketing campaign:

• You can develop a better relationship with customers, resulting in improved trust and sales.
• It is a great way of promoting your own products.
• You may sell advertising or the products of others you may have tie-ups with.

You may come across problems such as spam and email blocking. Targeted email marketing continues to be a very effective marketing method. As in the case of everything, the more aware you are of it, the better you carry out the marketing.

If email marketing is used the right way, it would prove to be the best way to balance the lower costs with the more motivated response rates. This could be brought about by making it as effective as possible. Your marketing campaign must be based on an improved content, accurate tracking and the right kind of targeting.

The most basic rule of effective targeting is absolutely straightforward. Decipher what your target set is in need of and then offer it to them. Email has a more personal flavor. It is a more Effective Internet Marketing method than selling through a website, which lacks the human face. Being a stronger medium, a website has the potential of harming your reputation and sales.

Putting targeted email marketing into action enables you to reach your target audience and build customer relationships. Targeting is nothing more than the art of focusing your marketing on a particular niche. The two variables you need to work upon are the message and the list.

Email marketing has become a crucial tool for getting customer attention in the first place and making sure that the customers stay. Today everyone has an email address and most users know a good deal about the system. About ninety percent of the customers look forward to getting confirmation orders for their purchases and information about shipping over email.

Being a Winner in the web domain requires your presence at the right place, all the time. Search Engine Optimization is all about being there and doing that. It requires diligently written content, rich enough to catch eyeballs, and unsurpassable technical know-how to complement it.

'Slow but steady' is the mantra we follow at NetCreativeMind for optimizing your website on popular search engines. Our timeless experience has taught us that optimization is a journey, which takes a while to get you in full flow. The ultimate destination is always climbing up to the top of the ladder using moral ways.

In a world of ever-increasing technologies and ever-decreasing support it can be difficult for small businesses to keep up with the latest trends. But Google has built their empire on reaching out to the little guy. With tools such as AdWords, AdSense, Wiki's and an ever-evolving slew of beta programs Google is equipping small business owners with the arsenal they need to stay competitive. Perhaps the greatest tool Google offers its customers is its personal service.

I recently talked with Rod and Vanda Lancour of The Support Hose Store. They run a small, internet-based business that sells medical support hose and stockings. Rod and Vanda have been working with Google for the past ***** years to keep their website competitive. It goes without saying that with the slew of sites out there it is easy for as small company to lose out if their site isn't maximized for search engines. Yet this small company based in Amarillo, Texas is consistently at the top of Google searches for their keywords. How do they do it? By taking advantage of all Google has to offer.

First off, The Support Hose Store makes it a point to take advantage of the programs and Beta's that Google offers. They also got Google to assign them a 3-member team to work with them in providing support and feedback...just by asking. And recently they were invited to visit the Google campus for one-on-one strategy meetings with members of the Google staff.

During their 3-day stay Google members sat down with the couple and went over their history of marketing and ad campaigns, getting feedback on what was working and what was not. Then the Google AdWords team spent one day going over The Support Hose Store website with Rod and Vanda page-by-page. For Rod, the highlight of the visit was an extensive tour of the hi-tech, space-age Google campus with the Google Marketing Team.

The Support Hose Store spends about 10% of their total sales on Google products and services, but according to Rod it is well worth it; "As long as advertising is a percentage of total sales...what's the difference what the dollar amount is?"

Rod and Vanda were so pleased with their Google encounter; they plan to make the trip an annual event. Meanwhile, they continue to hear from their Google team members an average of once a week.  "Google is not static...it evolves weekly, some other ideas are coming out, some other betas, it's hard to keep up with." Rod believes it's that attention to service that will keep Google, and The Support Hose Store, ahead of the competition.

1) Best locally relevant results served globally. - they often this the "no query left behind" principle.
2) Keep it simple - this simple understandable system has allowed them innovate quickly, and it shows.
3) No manual intervention - answer to "Does Google manually edit its results?".

Well, the above points are the philosophies of Google rankings. But now, it's all about the technologies behind the rankings for any website in Google results. Basically, the technologies for understanding the three components (of the search process) including the pages, the queries, and the Google users. He has explained these three components with some good examples.

URL to read about behind Google rankings - http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2008/07/technologies-behind-google-ranking.html

Cheers!

 Q. A client recently sent us this email - note that this is a cut-and-pasted email, see my response under the answer section below it:

 What do you think of this?

------ Forwarded Message
From: xxxxx
Date: Tue, 15 Jul 2008 15:53:05 -0400 (EDT)
To: xxxxxx
Subject: I visited your xxxxxxx.com site and had a question

I was looking at websites under the keyword xxxxxxxxx
and came across your site xxxxxxxxx.com. I see
that you're ranked #7 on page 19 in google.

I am not sure if you are aware of why you're ranked this low but
more importantly how easily correctable this is.There is no reason you cannot have a top three ranking for this
keyword based on your site structure and content. You have a
very nice site, with quality content.

You need significantly more one way anchor text backlinks.
If you are interested I can help you with this...

I am talking about getting you ranked for ALL your keywords.
Adding new backlinks on a steady and consistent basis from
high PR quality websites is what produces the rankings you
are looking for.

The right kind of links are very critical in getting top
ranking....and I can hand deliver these quality links to you.

My partners and I own 1000's websites and offer private
linking to hundreds of website owners just like yourself.

I did not send this email out to thousands of people but I am
currently reaching out to a list of your "keyword competitors"
as well. You are the one I really
favor and the one I see can monetizing the targeted website
traffic this can deliver.

I have your contact info as: phone # xxxxxxxxx. Is it Ok to
give you a call?

I have a very simple way to prove that what I do works and it is
risk free for you to try. Nothing beats seeing the results with
your own eyes.

Is it ok if I give you a call? I would love to pursue this
further over the phone with you or should I go somewhere else? 
 

A. In general, I would be very suspicious of any email offers like this. A lot of times companies that promise to deliver higher search engine rankings use what is considered “black hat” SEO approaches which will actually hurt your site’s reputation in the long run. Placing links to your site on “1000s” of other sites will most likely do that because I am sure Google knows that those sites are most likely “link farms.”

What is a link farm?
Google's Webmaster Guidelines
Google on Link Schemes

One of the most useful tidbits Google offers when suggesting ways to evaluate whether what you are considering doing for SEO is truly good for your site is "Avoid tricks intended to improve search engine rankings. A good rule of thumb is whether you'd feel comfortable explaining what you've done to a website that competes with you. Another useful test is to ask, 'Does this help my users? Would I do this if search engines didn't exist?' "

Some of the more basic "best practice" tactics you can consider implementing instead (if you haven't already) are:

• Page-specific “page titles” (what appears in the top bar of Explorer)
• Page-specific “metatags” (in the backend code)
• More detailed content on individual pages, adding more content-specific pages
• Backward Link research – to see what sites ARE linking to you (which I don’t see any at first glance), and what RELEVANT sites could link to you to help direct the Google crawlers into your site
• If you want to use your website to drive new sales leads via search, you may also wish to look into Google AdWords (paid search advertising)

Of course there are many more advanced tactics you can implement as well, but this gives some insight into the basics.

I'd also love to hear if anyone has any personal experiences with these type of email solicitations - have you responded or used one of these services? What happened?

Being an in-house designer, photographer, videographer, marketing and advertising specialist, print designer, web developer, ok I'll stop. Anyway, I have been busy to say the least. The President of my company had proposed that we go with a specific SEO company located in Nevada. I found this to be crazy. Why give an unknown company out of state a lot of money, often, to do things I felt I could teach myself and implement, myself? At the time we had a web programmer that worked side-by-side with me. Between the two of us, we were able to understand the basic concepts of how to go about doing these tasks. After so many months of being very proactive, our internet business is within the top 5 natural listings for all of our keywords we use.

The basic web optimization procedures any website should practice are as follows;

1. Sitemap
2. Meta tags
3. Content
4. Blog
5. Link Exchange

Granted, I spend a lot more time on other things but the five bullets above give a basic outline on what you must have, and they have to be updated quite often.

A site map represents the sturcture of your web site.  A document in any form used as a planning tool for the site that lists all your pages. It must be organized in hierarchical fashion. This is what gets the 'bots' to be able to search and cache your webpages for search engines to be able to list them.

A meta tag is an element that is used to provide data about the website. These give page descriptions, keywords and any other information placed in the header of the html.

The content of your website is the text that you implement throughout the site. It is extremely important to put in proper and appropriate content so as to receive the proper listings and receive the viewers you are wanting to get. If you are creating a website about trees, your content should discuss trees.

A blog is something many companies do not use. Although, the ones that maintain and update on a consistent basis find great results. These blogs show visitors updates to the content they are seeking and give a personal touch to the subject at hand.

Link Exchange between one site and another with similar content creates higher page ranking with search engines and is a vital source in higher listings. Link exchange can, though, be a detrimant if not done correctly. In some cases, it is ok to not have link exchange at all, and link within one's website properly.

Other than the things listing above, there are many things that can help and / or hurt one's seo capabilities and progress. It does take someone in the know-how to implement these things on a daily basis correctly. Instead of spending too much money outsourcing, do your homework and ask people that have gotten good results doing it themselves (like myself).

About 6 months ago we (Eckweb Designs, Inc.) signed a contract with a new client who sells Name Tags among other products. He had been using another SEO firm for a few years and he was not seeing the kind of results that he wanted.

His main complaint was that he was not on the first page of Google for the very competitive keyword phrase of "name tags".

So, we cleaned up his website coding, did some keyword research and optimized his website pages. We also encouraged him to write articles and we'd submit them to article sites, blogs, etc. In other words, we did what we do for every one of our clients.

Well, 6 months later, his website is #7 in Google for the phrase "name tags"!! How exciting is that? We've been doing SEO since 2000 but still, to this day, it's still so exciting and wonderful to see how our hard work pays off. We immediately called our client and he was elated, to say the least.

So, if your SEO firm is telling you it will be impossible to get top rankings for your keyword phrases (and I'm not saying that every phrase is possible) you should take a moment and make sure that the SEO firm is doing all that they can do to get you that ranking. After all what are you paying them for?

The Serious Entrepreneur, for those not familiar with this post, is a web blog about the application of White Hat SEO Methodologies for testing purposes to prove whether or not White Hat SEO is applicable and successful for deployment on Social Marketing and Blog Marketing websites.

The Serious Entrepreneur, here on Wordpress, is pleased to say that the use of Whit Hat SEO methodologies is useful and apparently successful for Social and Blog Marketing.

The Serious Entrepreneur started this test after being prompted by a client to look into Web 2.0 methodologies that this particular client was being shown by his / her associates.

After viewing the materials being presented, the Serious Entrepreneur, decided to throw his hat into the ring and test the SEO knowledge that his firm, Buildtelligence Web Solutions, had already proven most successful in the Organic Search Results for their clients.

The application of SEO White Hat techniques to a Blog / Social Marketing Post mechanism, such as Wordpress, and the subsequent results are quite satisfactory.

During this test, the Serious Entrepreneur, has witnessed a lot of Black Hat SEO techniques being implemented on the internet by bloggers in an attempt to game the Search Engines.

This is not acceptable. These techniques got them banned from operating organically in the results, and they will get them banned even on a mechanism as powerful as youtube, myspace, wordpress, etc...

The Serious Entrepreneur's SEO and PPC White Hat technologies have earned a form of communication between our firm and some of the major search engines. The limited, however useful, knowledge that has been allowed by the Search Engine Companies, has led the Serious Entrepreneur to believe that the banning of Blogs and Social Marketing avenues used to spam or game the Search Engine algorithms is not a question of IF, but a question of WHEN.

The Serious Entrepreneur has seen every bad SEO practice for organics applied to blogs. Duplicate content. Gaming the algorithm by posting duplicate content but changing the keywords only. Spamming, the overuse of the keyword. Posting to non-relevant site. I mean seriously, what kid on Quizilla is looking for a get rich, multi-level marketing, work from home, bask in the sunset in Hawaii type of scheme? Give em Nickelodian and they are good. But, we've seen a lot of post to irrelevant sites by would be gamers of the SE algorithms.

In follow up, while the client that we originally set up this test bed for is gaining valuable information from his / her mentors, the reality is that some of the information is just Black Hat trickery.

Sure, anyone can win the organics by writing a post in one of the major Social Marketing arenas by picking a keyword that means nothing to anyone in the world but themselves, but the question is why?

Why waste serious time and money trying to win a keyword that has no value at all?

This serious entrepreneur will continue, as always, to promote our clients' best interest while following the allowable webmaster guidelines while providing a rewarding experience for the user.

Before starting SEO services, the search algorithms used by various search engines for indexing the web pages should be well understood. Search engines generally start spidering the website once the website is registered at the search engine, for inclusion in the search results. If a website has unique content and the contents are written, keeping in mind the search engine algorithms, the web pages will probably get indexed more easily and at the same time it should be ensured that these contents are useful for the general public, so more and more visitors come to the pages again and again.

Search engine optimisation not only requires changes and regular updates in valuable content, but sometimes it might also require changes in the actual website design and source coding. The most advanced search engines use crawlers for finding web pages that meet their algorithms criteria. These search engines include Google and Yahoo, however Yahoo also has paid inclusion that guarantees crawling and page indexing of the website for a fixed fee or a fixed amount per click. Yahoo has a paid inclusion program however it is still not preferred by many advertisers. Google does not have any such program so far, however Google sitemaps allows free submission of XML type feed for indexing those web pages which are not automatically indexed.

Search engine optimisation is a process to divert more organic or natural traffic to a particular website; however it is more difficult and confusing. There are a number of processes required that should have been tried to increase the visibility of the website and some of the more common useful processes include excellent website design, analysis and selection of suitable, relevant keywords, well written fresh content and good meta tags.

Search engines love fresh content, therefore you should ensure that you keep the content updated by adding to it regularly, so that search engines spider your site more regularly. There are various guidelines provided by a number of search engines about what to do and what not to do and you should follow these guidelines to stand a chance against all the competition on the internet.

Robots.txt files are the first file crawled by search engine crawlers and after parsing it, the search engine crawler follows the instructions provided there. Internet marketing can be a tough task and SEO experts have to not only increase organic traffic, but also meet search engine expectations and keep up-to-date with the constantly changing algorithms.

The key to optimizing your searchability is through linking. Search engines like Google and Yahoo send out "crawlers" that screen the internet for related subject material. Think of your page as a building; the more roads leading to your location the easier it is for people to access it. One of the easiest ways to link to other pages and get recognized is through blogging. By consistenly posting on blogs you are not only carving multiple paths through cyberspace, you're also developing a name for yourself in the blogosphere. Make people want to reference you as an authority and deepen the significance of your links.

Ever heard the term "consistency is key" (?). No where is this more true than in branding. And when it's search engine optimization you're after, it's all about delivering a consistently branded message. If you're taking advantage of the blogosphere, make sure your messages match and so too do your screen names and personal information. The goal is to build as many paths to your page without too many forks in the road.

Next to linking, the second most important factor in organic SEO is tagging. Tags are the code through which search engines and web pages communicate. By manipulating the meta tags to incorporate keywords that reflect your brand, you can boost your searchability. A few important things to keep in mind:

1. You can't include every key word on the planet. Search engine's are intelligent enough to label these type of meta tags as spam.

2. Your web content must be reflective of these keywords. This is where great writing comes into play. Make sure all copy (particularly the home page copy) contains the key words embedded within it. Note: This is also true for optimizing a press release. Include keywords in the first few sentences of the release.

Try these sneaky tactics and squeeze your brand into the limelight for less.

Social bookmarking sites are particularly popular among people with affiliate marketing programs because such sites are a free and effective way to get backlinks and drive traffic to websites and blogs.

If you have been thinking about promoting your websites, blogs or affiliate marketing programs through social bookmarking sites, this guide will help you get started.

How to Use Social Bookmarking Sites

First off, you need to find a social bookmarking site and register as a user. If you participate in affiliate marketing programs, your best bet is to choose one of the more popular sites, such as Digg, Del.icio.us, Reddit or StumbleUpon. These social bookmarking sites have the most traffic and allow you to submit and bookmark websites and blogs.

The next step is to get used to the site. To make the most of social bookmarking, you need to make sure that there are other users besides yourself who will be interested in your website content. Different social bookmarking sites have different types of users. Finding a site that works with your niche rather than against it is a must.

Finally, pay special attention to the blogs, websites, and articles that are bookmarked the most and ranked the highest. This will give you an idea of what people like to see. Knowing your audience is essential, particularly if you are promoting affiliate marketing programs or niche-specific blogs.

How Not to Use Social Bookmarking Sites

Nobody likes a spammer. Social bookmarking users are no exception. If you want to promote your affiliate marketing programs, it is best to do it in a round-about way. Sales copy will only make it so far up the ranking.

The blogs and websites that do best in the social bookmarking arena are those that offer entertainment, worthy news, or some sort of draw. In other words, don't submit content with a title like "Check out These Affiliate Marketing Programs".

When submitting content to social bookmarking sites, it is essential that you stick to submitting quality content. Once you get traffic flowing into your websites and blogs, the sales will follow naturally, especially if you focus on conversion optimization on your site or blog.

A few other things you will want to keep in mind when promoting affiliate marketing programs and blogs through social bookmarking:

• Timing is everything. Articles that get at least 25 votes within the first 15 minutes will rise through the social bookmarking ranks faster than articles that get 25 votes in two days' time.
• Opening several accounts on one social bookmarking site so that you can vote for yourself should be avoided. This will only damage your reputation if you are promoting your own blogs and affiliate marketing programs.
• Get your friends to help. This is the easiest and best way to promote your blogs and affiliate marketing programs through social bookmarking.

When done properly, social bookmarking can be an efficient and cost-effective PR tool to get traffic to your website and promote your small business.

Internet Marketing Consultants

Reference: About.com