Archive for August, 2005

You’ve got a cool new website with all the works: cool Flash presentations, eye-catching colors, informative text, easy-to-use layout, and an interesting topic. You think your site is amazing, and you know that others will agree with you. If only they know it exists.

How do you make your website known? How do you make yours stand out among millions of others? You can spend lots of money on advertisement, but that will not work if you don’t have the money to spare on advertising. So what do you do? Make search engines work for you, that’s what!

Google, Yahoo, MSN, Lycos, Altavista – you want to be at the top of their results list. The higher your site is in a search results page, the better chances that it will be visited. The science behind making your site a popular search result is called Search Engine Optimization (SEO). Don’t worry, though – even if SEO is referred to as a science, it is not all that complicated. You just need to take note of a few things, and before you know it, your site will have more visitors than you could ever dream of.

Here are five tips to ensure that your site would be a favorite of search engines all around the cyber world.

1. Give importance to substance over appearance
   Do you want to share your knowledge on a subject that you have authority on? Do you want to sell products? Do you want to build an online shrine for your favorite actress? Whatever topic you have chosen for your website, make sure that you are able to give useful information on it. Search engines work by scanning sites for keywords. They search text and completely ignore everything else. So if you have made your site rich in colors, don’t forget to make it rich in content as well. After all, a beautiful layout can make people look, but relevant content is what will make them stay. Remember, in this day and age: content is king!
2. Know your topic well
   If you know much about your topic, you will know what people usually ask about it, and what they ask about it is what they will type in the search bar. When writing the content for your website, put yourself in your other people’s shoes, people who will be your target audience or market. Know the possible questions they might have about your topic, and give answers in your site.
3. Learn from the best
   Take time to browse and read sites that get lots of visitors and have the same topic as yours. Take note of any recurring phrases in these sites’ text. These phrases are most likely keywords. Incorporate them in your own site’s content. Don’t saturate your site with keywords, though. You don’t want to sound redundant to your site visitor. A 3% density level would be enough.
   In searching for the right keywords, use Overture’s services. It may take quite some time, as it is more of a trial-and-error method, but the results are conclusive, and a pattern can easily be observed.
4. Submit…and re-submit
   You will never get a certain job if you don’t send in your application for it. The same thing applies to SEO. If you want your site to be recognized by search engines, then go out of your way to register your site with them. After a couple of weeks, search for your site by putting in the keywords you used in your content. If your site is still not coming up in the search results, do not give up, and just re-register and resubmit your site. It’s possible that your initial registration was discarded without being processed. This usually happens because a lot of submissions are being done everyday.
5. Constantly update your site
   This can’t be stressed enough: search engine spiders love sites which constantly change their content. You can’t build your site and expect it to last forever without any updates. There will come a time when those search engine spiders would stop fetching your site for query requests. Here’s a tip: integrate a blog program in your site. Blogs have a user-friendly interface that allows easy updates.

Additional Reading: Search Engine Ascent, Blogger’s Edge

You’ve finally written your first article. Congratulations! Now what do you do with your article?

First you need to make sure to add a “how to publish” statement to the begninning of your article. You also need to end your article with a resource box.

A “how to publish” statement reads something like this:

“Please feel free to publish this article on your web site and/or in your e-book or newsletters with the authors resource box included and without any changes to the article. (Add your contact e-mail)” If you’d like them to inform you as to where and how your article will be used, just ask them to send a complimentary copy of the ezine, or a link to where your article is published.

A resource box appears at the end of an article. This is what makes your article a powerful viral marketing tool. It tells the reader valuable information about you, your services and the link to your website.

Here’s an example of a resource box:

Debra Simpson, has been helping small business owners use the internet to market and grow their businesses. Her website, Magic In Words offers plenty of information to help you make “magic” with your words.

Next, begin submitting your article to article submission sites. These sites are specifically for articles and are where ezine publishers and web masters go for free content for the ezines and web sites.

Below are a few sites to get you started. The first few Article Submission Sites are Yahoo Groups. You have to be a member of the group and each group will have a subscribe address. Joining and submitting is very easy. Just go to their site and follow from there.

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/article_announce

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/aabusiness

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ap-shorts –400 words or less

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/free-content

As you write articles, keep in mind that you can bundle the articles together to create an ebook. But, that will need to wait for another day!

Recommended Reading
Article Magic

You’ve finally written your first article. Congratulations! Now what do you do with your article?

First you need to make sure to add a “how to publish” statement to the begninning of your article. You also need to end your article with a resource box.

A “how to publish” statement reads something like this:

“Please feel free to publish this article on your web site and/or in your e-book or newsletters with the authors resource box included and without any changes to the article. (Add your contact e-mail)” If you’d like them to inform you as to where and how your article will be used, just ask them to send a complimentary copy of the ezine, or a link to where your article is published.

A resource box appears at the end of an article. This is what makes your article a powerful viral marketing tool. It tells the reader valuable information about you, your services and the link to your website.

Here’s an example of a resource box:

Debra Simpson, has been helping small business owners use the internet to market and grow their businesses. Her website, Magic In Words offers plenty of information to help you make “magic” with your words.

Next, begin submitting your article to article submission sites. These sites are specifically for articles and are where ezine publishers and web masters go for free content for the ezines and web sites.

Below are a few sites to get you started. The first few Article Submission Sites are Yahoo Groups. You have to be a member of the group and each group will have a subscribe address. Joining and submitting is very easy. Just go to their site and follow from there.

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/article_announce

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/aabusiness

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ap-shorts –400 words or less

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/free-content

As you write articles, keep in mind that you can bundle the articles together to create an ebook. But, that will need to wait for another day!

Recommended Reading
Article Magic

Most people think Internet Marketing is all about search engine optimization. While search engine optimization is a part of marketing on the internet, it’s not the sole component.

Let’s just start with e-mail and a word processing program like Word or WordPerfect. All you need to do is create a document about your business.

Tip: Take 5 minutes with a blank piece of paper and a pen. Create a list of 10 items. Now, use the 5 minutes to list 10 different titles for an informational product. I know you can do it.

Take one of your titles and each day for the next five days, write 20 or so tips. By the end of the week, you’ll have 100 or so tips for your clients. Now all you need to do is go to Adobe and use their “try it out free for 5 pdfs” offer and create a pdf of your “tips” document.

Now, you can attach that document to e-mails you send prospective clients. You have the basics of internet marketing without any hard costs involved.

Here’s an Internet Strategies ebook for your perusal. If you have any questions, just add a comment below.