Students Of Success

For websites, one of the most important things in their existence is their ranking with the search engines. The reason why this is so important is because when websites are ranked high by the search engines, they get flooded with free, targeted web traffic from visitors who are looking for information or products. Obviously, any kind of activity that might hurt a websites chance of getting a premium listing should be avoided at all costs. The following tips are things websites should completely avoid if they want to optimize their results with the search engines.

Tip #1 Don’t Spam

Almost none of the search engines index websites long term that practice spamming. Also, search engines frequently update their definition of “search engine spam” than say the average Internet user, so it would be worthwhile to educate yourself and stay current on the definition of spamming by the major search engines. Search engines frequently blacklist URLs that engage in spamming, so not only will you not get indexed but you could get blacklisted for life. Certainly worth avoiding.

Tip #2 Don’t Use Frames

Search engine spiders that crawl the web do not respond well to websites using frames and frequently miss many of the pages that are listed within the website. As a result, you should avoid using frames on your website because search engines do not treat them favorably.

Tip #3 Don’t Have Pages Under Construction

Make sure when you submit your URL to the search engines to get indexed that you do not have pages currently still under construction. Search engines as a rule don’t like to list pages that are still under construction, so if you have these be sure to finish them before submitting for indexing. Also, never use the phrase “Under Construction” on your pages that are unfinished!

Tip #4 Don’t use Invisible Text or Other Sneaky Tricks

Do not use invisible text with keyword stuffing to try and beef up your search engine rankings. Your viewers might not know that you are using invisible text, but the search engine spiders will catch you and may blacklist your URL. Play fair and by the rules.

Tip #5 Free Hosts

Frequently businesses that use free web hosts find their websites not getting indexed by the search engines. The reason for this is that free hosts have a lot of restrictions and cause a lot of problems for users, not to mention sites that are down because the server is down. Problems with your server will cause problems with SE indexing, so avoid it if at all possible.

These are just a few of the more popular suggestions to keep your web pages indexed by the search engines and ranking in the SERP’s. If you ignore these tips, you should not be surprised if your pages are not spidered, indexed, and ranked.

Michael Turner reveals step-by-step how you can increase search engine traffic in his free 7 part mini-series. Grab it now at http://www.powertraffictactics.com/

1. Google love …

Google and all its programming is not some form of enemy - unless you are a piece of web scum, that is.

Google is based on the idea that it should help people FIND WHAT THEY ARE LOOKING FOR.

That’s all.

Sit with the statement above. Meditate upon it if necessary. Use EFT.

But UNDERSTAND that a pointless site that has no unique content will NEVER get ANYWHERE with Googly or any other outfit that is using their techniques and methods.

You can buy books and ebooks until your wallet bleeds on “how to trick Google” this and that - just forget it.

Unless you have SOME THING that SOME PEOPLE will HONESTLY WANT and be grateful for when they find it, there is no hope and there is no point in reading any further.

Also, trying to fight Google or be cleverer somehow is pointless, distructive and the wrong attitude.

Learn to LOVE Google and work WITH IT.

If you have the contents, and you follow the most simplest common spider robot courtesy protocols, then it will come and it will index you.

It will be that mystical bridge between YOUR (customers, people, communities, friends) and your site.

That’s what it does, that’s what it is, that’s it’s nature and if you know that, then all is well.

You will get good results following the rest of this.

2. Dressing For Google …

So now, let’s have a DECENT website with DECENT content.

A decent website means:

- All the pages and directories have links that work properly and allow Google to slide with immense ease from one place to the other, without ever hitting an annoying dead end;

- All the pages are cleaned up so that you have the absolute MINIMUM of html instructions and nothing that doesn’t need to be there, such as vast and pointless java scripts or the truly appalling “mso” instructions;

- All the pages have the right meta tags which ACCURATELY REFLECT what’s on them, and including title, content, description, keywords at the very minimum;

- All your pages have proper headings and descriptions and content WHICH MATCHES your meta tags to a T;

- All your images are title and alt tagged CORRECTLY and resident on your own site.

Decent content means:

- Whatever you’ve got, it is USEFUL. If it is UNIQUE, so much the better, and that’s not hard. All you need to is to be yourself and use your own words, even if you are affiliate - write your own reviews, put your own dog’s picture on it, be unique, be YOURSELF.

- Whatever you’ve got, I’m sure there’s some people who want to look at it, read it, do something with it. There’s billions of people out there. Just make sure YOU KNOW WHO YOUR PEOPLE ARE and write to THEM.

- Decent content also means that what you’ve got is presented so that both Google and a human being get it what that is all about.

When your website is up and running, test, test and test again. Try every single hyperlink on your own computer, on someone else’s and on all manner of different browsers.

Only when you are happy that it all works as it should, we go to Step 3.

3. Let Google SEE You

You need a minimum of 35 decent links going to your site for Google to take any notice of you and start paying attention.

Please be aware that “one link” is just that - www.snark.net is NOT the same as http://www.snark.net, which is not the same as http://snark.net, nor even remotely similar to any variation including http://snark.net/index.php

All, each and every ONE is viewed as a single separate link - when you need 35 ALL GOING TO ONE SINGLE ADDRESS to do the magic.

So now, to the “decent links” part.

A site that isn’t indexed much by Google or doesn’t turn up until page 1,993,990 on a Google search for its kind is WORTHLESS to you.

Find HIGH RANKED directory listings for your site and list your site THERE. This goes for any of the many variations on getting a link from another site, be it a guestbook signed or an article placed. Don’t waste your time with anything that itself doesn’t turn up on Google’s own top ten.

Now, you’ve got a date with Google.

What we need to do next is to BUILD A RELATIONSHIP - prove our value and worth over time, in other words.

That’s the next of our Google top tips - seniority and reliability.

4. Be THERE When Google Calls!

Make sure you’ve got a decent ISP with 99% uptime or better - that’s of course elementary.

Don’t ever take your site down for whatever reason and make any changes gradually.

Most importantly, get the best tracking software you can afford and find out who is already coming, and what they are coming for.

That’s the key to long term success - to find what you’re doing well and then expanding on it. For example, if one person came from Google (or any other search engine) for the term “snark”, then build on that. Write more articles about snarks, what to do with them and without them, collect snark images - in other words, become the first port of call for any snark enquiry.

Build on your speciality some more with a web directory, guest articles, reviews and then we’re more than 3/4 the way to a real web presence and Google responding to changes in your site near instantly, which is what we want.

5. Keep Improving ALL THE TIME.

The final success tip is to keep improving ALL THE TIME.

Pull up the html or php you wrote a year ago - I bet you can do better now.

Review your meta tags and your site copy and improve on both.

Name your pages, images and directories better. Improve the content, structure, navigation of your site.

Keep at it with directory listings and submissions - directories come and go, you need to be always there with the “state of the art”.

Keep doing useful link exchanges with matching high ranked sites too and keep adding VALUE and UNIQUE CONTENT to your clean and well presented pages.

That’s the most important thing of all - to keep at it with continuous improvement.

Follow these steps EXACTLY with a well named new site with decent content - and you WILL see immediate improvement in your Google rankings.

Good Luck and Good Spirits always,

Silvia

Silvia Hartmann

CEO, The StarFields Network

Author, MindMillion - Rags To Riches In 6 Phases

Silvia Hartmann PhD is an author, NLP, Hypnosis & MET Trainer and international motivational speaker. Her published books include the international best seller “Adventures In EFT”, “Project Sanctuary” and “EmoTrance”. After a five year research project, she created MindMillion, a unique approach to wealth building and reality creation.

News broke this week that Yahoo has purchased the Inktomi search engine for around US$235 million. This is an interesting development in the search engine industry that may impact greatly on exactly where sites get their traffic from. Another new development in the past few weeks is the change to the HotBot service but first, I’d like to look at the ramifications of the Yahoo/Inktomi deal.

Here’s a bit of background information on how the Yahoo and Inktomi search engines work. I’m sure everyone knows Yahoo but not everyone may be completely aware of how their search engine works. Yahoo is a directory. This means that it is a categorised list of sites that are listed by human editors. Getting listed in the Yahoo directory requires a yearly payment for commercial sites. You can get listed for free if you have a non-commercial site but it is very hard to do and can take months. Yahoo provides additional results when you use their search function that come from Google. In the past, Yahoo has used other search engines to provide these results (including Inktomi) but has used Google for the last couple of years.

They initially used results from other search engines to just compliment their own. So, if someone searched for something that wasn’t in their directory, they could still get results. The way it worked was that they would provide results from their own directory first and then a user would click on “web pages” to get more results. Strangely, Yahoo actually changed the way this worked during the year so that the results from a search were a mix of listings from their own directory and Google with the Google results being the more prominent of the two. This has essentially made the payment of the US$299 per year for a directory listing an unnecessary expense. Many people still use the directory to browse for sites but, in my experience, more people use the search function.

Inktomi is a full crawler based search engine that provides results for other search engines. They do have a web site but no-one uses it to actually search - it’s more of an informational site. Inktomi’s results formerly appeared in many search engines but in the last few years, their popularity has declined. The main site that currently uses Inktomi is MSN but Inktomi only provides the fifth level of results. MSN provides sponsored listings from Overture, their own Microsoft sites, their own human edited directory results, LookSmart listings and then Inktomi. So, Inktomi does drive traffic to sites but far less than a search engine like Google.

So, what does all this mean to us? It’s hard to say at the moment but there are three options. Either nothing will change (which is unlikely), Yahoo will use Inktomi together with Google on it’s site or it will dump Google and use Inktomi for it’s search results. Yahoo actually owns part of Google, maybe 5%, so there is a chance that they will keep using their results for this reason. Also, Google provide far better results for searchers than Inktomi so Yahoo would be making a mistake to replace Google. But, apparently Yahoo is annoyed that Google has become competition to them through Google’s own site and that Google’s news search service is also providing competition.

Without a crystal ball, it’s very difficult to know what is going to happen but it’s worth making sure that you are prepared for all occurrences. There is really very little that you need to do because it is only the popularity of Inktomi that may change. Even without the searches from Yahoo, Google will still be the biggest search engine in the world due to the fact that it’s own site is very popular and it’s results are also used by AOL (amongst others). So, what can you do to get the most from Inktomi?

Inktomi is the only major search engine that uses meta tags. This is actually the reason that it is not as popular as before because meta tags allow webmasters to “trick” Inktomi into thinking a page has more relevant content than there really is. Therefore, Inktomi’s search results are not very good. However, as there is a good chance that Inktomi will now become popular again, you need to make sure that you have your meta keyword and meta description tags in place. Make sure they are relevant to the page that they are on - you don’t want to be caught “spamming” their search engine. The other thing that will probably make a difference is to get other sites to link to you. Link popularity makes a difference on all search engines except possibly AllTheWeb.

I’ll keep you updated here with any news on what Yahoo decides to do and any changes that I find out about the way the Inktomi generates results.

As I mentioned above, the other major search engine news in the last month is that HotBot has finally updated their site. HotBot is owned by Lycos and was quite a popular search engine a few years ago. It has become far less popular lately - since it was purchased by Lycos and was just left to “die”. It’s results largely came from a mix of the ODP, DirectHit and Inktomi. DirectHit has since become Teoma which is owned by AskJeeves but HotBot went for months after DirectHit ceased to exist saying that it’s results were coming from them.

So, HotBot has essentially become another meta search engine - like DogPile or Excite. It now works pretty much like Netscape does. A searcher can choose which search engine they would like their results to come from. The search engines that you can choose from are Fast (AllTheWeb), Google, Inktomi and Teoma. This may mean that HotBot starts to get some of it’s market share back but as webmasters, there is nothing that we can do to target HotBot. All we can do is target the search engines which provide it’s results.

About The Author

Sean Burns is the author of the WebmastersReference.com Newsletter - http://www.webmastersreference.com/newsletter. More than five years of experience in site design, marketing, income generation, search engine optimisation and more is passed on to subscribers - hype free. Sign up today to get real information of real value to webmasters.

seanb@webmastersreference.com

The methods employed to increase your search engine
rankings may seem like rocket science to you, so you have
probably avoided dealing with this issue. I am here to tell
you - the time has come to face your website! A high search
engine ranking for your website is so essential that if you
have the slightest desire to actually succeed in your
business, there is no way you can continue to avoid this
issue.

At least 85% of people looking for goods and services on
the Internet find websites through search engines such as
Google, Yahoo, and MSN. The idea of optimizing your pages
for high search engine rankings is to attract targeted
customers to your site who will be more than likely to make
a purchase. The higher your page comes up in search engine
results, the greater the traffic that is directed to your
website. That’s what search engine optimization is about.

You can immerse yourself in all the technical information
available online to figure out how to optimize your web
pages to achieve higher rankings. Or you can look at a few
simple items on your pages, make some small adjustments,
and most likely see improved rankings quite rapidly. The
first item you should examine is the title bar on your
homepage.

The title bar is the colored bar at the top of the page.
Look at the words that appear there when you access your
home page. To increase search engine rankings, the words on
your homepage’s title bar should include the most important
keywords or phrases, one of which would include your
company name.

Then click on all your links and examine the title bars on
the pages you access. Each title bar on every single page
of your site should contain the most important keywords and
phrases taken from the page itself. However, avoid very
long strings of keywords, keeping them to six words or
less. Avoid repeating keywords more than once in the title
bars, and make sure that identical words are not next to
each other.

The next item to put under your microscope is your website
content. Search engines generally list sites that contain
quality content rather than scintillating graphics. The
text on your site must contain the most important keywords
- the words that potential customers will be typing into
search engines to find your site.

Aim to have around 250 words on each page, but if this is
not desirable due to your design, aim for at least 100
carefully chosen words. If you want to achieve a high
ranking on search engines, this text is essential. However,
the search engines must be able to read the text, meaning
that the text must be in HTML and not graphic format.

To find out if your text is in HTML format, take your
cursor and try to highlight a word or two. If you are able
to do this, the text is HTML. If the text will not
highlight, it is probably in graphic form. In this case,
ask your webmaster to change the text into HTML format in
order to increase your search engine rankings.

Next we come to what is called meta tags. I know this
sounds like something out of science fiction, but it is
really just simple code. Many people believe that meta tags
are the key to high search engine rankings, but in reality,
they only have a limited effect. Still, it’s worth adding
them in the event that a search engine will use meta tags
in their ranking formula.

To find out if your page is set up with meta tags, you must
access the code. To do this, click the “view” button on the
browser menu bar, and select “source.” This will pull up a
window revealing the underlying code that created the page.
If there are meta tags, they usually appear near the top of
the window. For example, a meta tag would read: meta
name=”keywords” content=. If you do not find code that
reads like this, ask your webmaster to put them in. This
may not do much for your search engine rankings, but any
little boost helps.

Lastly, we come to the issue of link popularity. This is a
factor that is extremely important in terms of search
engine rankings. Almost all search engines use link
popularity to rank your website. Link popularity is based
on the quality of the sites you have linked to from your
links page.

If you type in “free link popularity check” in a popular
search engine, the search engine will then show you what
sites are linked to your site. In the case that there
aren’t many sites linked up to yours, or that the sites
that are linked up have low search engine rankings,
consider launching a link popularity campaign. Essentially,
this entails contacting quality sites and requesting that
they exchange links with your site. Of course, this
requires checking out the rankings of the websites you want
to link up with. Linking to popular, quality sites not only
boosts your search engine ranking, but it also directs more
quality traffic to your website.

Search engine rankings are extremely important for a
successful Internet marketing campaign. Before you go out
and hire a search engine optimization company, try taking
some of the simple steps listed above, and see if you can’t
boost your rankings yourself. Don’t ever ignore this
all-important factor in Internet marketing. Remember, the
higher your search engine ranking, the more quality
customers will be directed your way.

Article By Dan Meiyers - SEO Pro
info@emarketingbooks.com

Search Engines Revealed
http://www.eMarketingBooks.com/seosecrets

With more and more experts and search engine enthusiasts
claiming the right way and the wrong way to handle link
swapping, link exchanging or reciprocal linking!

You can tell something is important when there is more than
one name for it! GRIN!

There are also two schools of thought on the reasons link
swapping.

The first reason for link swapping has always been to carry
favour with Search engine rankings.  Have a good site with
lots of links and this is seen as a good thing and
therefore Search Engines will rank you higher.

Sadly, like all things in life, this system can be abused
and taken to the extreme.  Sites are buying in hundreds if
not thousands of links trying to “boost” their ranking
artificially.  This is fine in the short term but we are
starting to see a fundamental shift in Search Engine
algorhythms.

My last article of link swapping , If Content is King, then
surely relevance is Queen! explains my personal view of
relevant linking which is still follow.

There is now a second and perhaps more disturbing reason for
swapping links.

To build a useful link resource or directory for your
visitors.

With working with similar themed sites, swap links to build
a directory service which can share and drive traffic to
sites within it. Some have even claimed this can drive more
traffic that a Search engine ranking.

So how do I create this vision of loveliness.

Simple, build an on topic directory of your major site
content.

There are a couple of great tools you can use to automate
this process.

http://www.j2-squared.com/linking-101.htm

http://www.j2-squared.com/power-linking.htm

These tools will add new sections, manage your directory
structure, and allow you to add links or even allow others
to add their own links which you just approve.

This can all be run from a web browser so you can be
swapping links sat on the beach or in fact from anywhere.

They are so simple to use you could get family to help out
too! GRIN!

In terms of places to find links try:

www.linkpartners.com

as a good start point.

Remember, Search Engines change their algorhythms all the
time and you could fall out of favour at any time.

Your visitors are also getting more sophisticated and
demanding at the same time.  Give the visitor what they want
first and let the search engine sort the rest out!

Good Luck!

Jason Hulott is Director of J2 Squared, leading specialists in Internet consultancy whose specific aim is to drive more revenue to websites. Their main area of focus are the insurance, finance, and automotive industries.

Who doesn’t want to get high rankings in the search engines. I’ve read everywhere and have been sold a bill of goods that writing and publishing your own articles get you to the top of the search engines.

Think this through with me.

You will see for yourself it’s not altogether true.

Let me paint a picture for you. . . You pick a keyword or
keyphrase and write an article using your keyword or keyphrase
that you think will rank well.

Next you submit your article to all the places you can submit
articles to, ezines, directories and article submission sites.

(I know what I’m talking about, because I did this very thing).
Wow! Your article gets published in many places, maybe hundreds.

Now you have hundreds of links pointing back to your main
site…But what I found to be true was my own site never shows up
in the top ten results for that specific keyword or keyphrase.

Rather, you discover that there are lots of other sites carrying
your article that out rank yours. You’ve lost a great opportunity to reach high rankings for your keyword or keyphrase.

What have I done wrong, you ask yourself. Why you just gave your
keyword filled article to possible people who compete with you
because they can publish your article on their website. They get
the high ranking and your ranking stays the same.

So, how did this happen? Right from the start, your article was
used for the wrong purpose. (This was a hard lesson for me to
discover).

The right way to use articles to hike up your search engine
rankings.

1. Putting one of a kind articles on your website.

Articles made available for reprint by you, now have the possibility of being published on hundreds of other sites, which means, they no longer meet the requirements as one of a kind or unique content.

2. Feed the Spider

Look at this way, your articles are like crumbs dropped along a path.

When you publish your articles all over the web it’s like leaving a trail of food for someone to follow (the search engines in this case).

But where do you want the search engines to go as they follow the trail (food for the Spider)? BACK TO YOUR WEBSITE!

Back to your one of a kind content (such as a report, article you wrote just for your website.)

3. Keywords - Place keywords in your Resource Box As Anchor Text.

This is the important point. Place your keyword or keyphrase in
the anchor text of the article resource box that has a link
pointing back to your unique content.

What happens is you make hundreds of keyword links pointing back
to the your well optimized report on your website, and give your
pages a gigantic advantage over other websites.

Many times this alone is enough to take your Website to the top
of the search results, particularly with Google and MSN.

These tips are a few steps you need to get a high ranking for the keywords that you have chosen.

Cindy Warner owner of Christian Book Outlet, writes about Internet marketing and owning your own online business. Visit her site at:
http://www.christianbookoutlet.spreadtheword.com for more information about the Online Christian Book Business.

What’s in store for us in 2006? Inspired by Google’s poor search
relevancy and making friends with Wall Street rather than its
users, disaffection is growing apace and surfers are switching
their loyalties to Yahoo and MSN. Conspiracy theorists believe
that Google influenced pay-per-click and the ranking process to
crank up their share price to almost double that of January 2005.

But whatever negative sentiments are shared about Google, all of
the major search engines have recognised that users are
demanding far more specific search, a trend driven by localised
search, personalisation and increased specialisation. These
three initiatives are narrowing the scope of the current
problems inherent in generic search.

Today, web users are demanding far more selection and choice,
with personalised content gaining the upper hand. This has been
achieved with syndication through RSS. Today, the web is no
longer about surfing and passive reading; it’s about creating,
sharing, socialising and collaborating. Increasingly, many new
websites are disseminating news and views through blogs and
articles.

RSS really did make headway last year - and expect even greater
take-up this. Instead of the web browser, users are increasingly
looking for content via news feeds. This allows them to see at a
glance what sites have added new content on any of the topics
they select as being of interest. This means less time is wasted
on checking to see whether or not a site’s content has changed.
It also ensures a more efficient delivery platform.

But it’s not just news sites that have converted to RSS feeds,
companies are increasingly offering information via news feeds
using WordPress as a seamless and integral part of their
website. This method of information delivery helps users
evaluate new content and, as a bonus, categorised sections of
WordPress blog are being indexed from the home page. This in
turn increases the volume of data on the site, thus boosting PR
ranking, and broadens keyword exposure.

Also, professional blogging has a very bright future. Internet
search now finds many blog sites on first-page returns. Many
professionals are also using external blogs, such as
blogger.com. When these keyword-rich blogs are linked to the
main site, it helps the site to grow. However, the blog should
be fresh, as it would be foolish to merely duplicate content and
get the main site blacklisted.

The third aspect of the paradigm is article writing. The aim
here is to provide interesting articles that, even though they
have limited time exposure on the engines, do find themselves
float to the top very quickly.

So the professional blogger has a lot to look forward to in
2006. And as business blogs start to take hold as the new
standard for marketing, public relations and SEO, 2006 should
witness a huge increase in demand for their services.

As we all know Google uses their PageRank technology to measure link popularity by counting the number of inbound links to your web pages, and it is one of the many factors influencing your ranking. Most website owners do not utilize properly what PageRank they already have. Their linking campaigns could be in vain if they let a large number of outbound links drain their existing PageRank. If their site were a bucket it would be full of holes, to illustrate this point, if you had a large number of outbound links, which are not reciprocated it would reduce your overall PageRank. Be diligent in identifying sites that are no longer linking back to you anymore. Also keep in mind putting more than 50 outbound links on any page is not advisable. Also be wary of sites that link to you from pages with more than 50 outbound links. Google’s PagerRank is based on incoming links, but not only on the number of them. Instead PageRank is also based on the PageRank of the page on which your link is placed. For example a link to your site could be more valuable from a PR4 page with no other links than a link from a page with PR5 and 60 other links.

The factors influecing Google PageRank

The fact is that nearly half of your PageRank comes from within your site. As long as you have more than one page, and they are well linked you should be getting at least roughly 49% of your PageRank from internal links. If your site is particularly full of holes it may be less, but still substantial, and if you have plugged all your holes it will be more. PageRank is yours to control, and if it is targeted correctly it will help you considerably. Make sure you have a sitemap and all pages on your website are linked together with keyword rich link text instead of images.

Use common sense and careful language when asking for reciprocal links

Here are some helpful tips for requesting reciprocal links to keep in mind when you E-Mail or otherwise contact webmasters to ask to trade reciprocal links, I’ve have learned you usually get one shot to make a good impression. Over time I received some valuable feedback from other webmasters in assisting me on how to be requesting links, and since we are focusing on building proper links exchange channels, I would like to share this with our readers.

First and foremost do not forget to mention your own web address in the message. Yes, I have received letters about how I should reciprocate a link to a site and the Webmaster forgot the address. Likewise, do not forget to mention your own website’s name. Don’t forget to describe it either. You don’t have to write a book, just give a few sentences or a paragraph summarizing your website’s content.

Ensure you take a good look over the site you wish to link to you, be familiar with it’s content and mention some of the content in your request for linkage. Identify the common theme between the sites. If the site has a “Submit your URL” page, ensure that you use it and read the guidelines for submission carefully.

If you are sending an attachment, please ensure they are small in size, animated banners or code of any kind this is unusable in a reciprocal link campaign. Starting an email with an attachment of any size is no introduction and ultimately could deter the Webmaster from ever responding to your request. Attachments are not the way to start a conversation.

Being too agressive and persistent could work against you

Ask the Webmaster if they would like your complete package of reciprocal link codes and graphics before you send such information Do not forget to let the Webmaster know how they can add a link to your website and make the process as simple as possible. With your first correspondence, provide them with some of the HTML that they can place on their website, or on your own website. After sending your first request and they do not respond within 24 hours, do not ask again. Being too persistent will generally put webmasters off trading reciprocal links, be patient, I found that webmasters usually do respond within a one-week time span, if not then write a follow-up. You need a way to record which sites you have asked for reciprocal links to avoid this problem, I have used an Excel spreadsheet to record such information. Remember finding good quality links are important so you don not want to miss an opportunity by being too aggressive.

Make your reciprocal exchange request stand out

Most of what I have written seems to be common sense, but starting out with a good code of conduct and etiquette can only improve your chances of obtaining reciprocal links. Here is an example of a well-structured template used for reciprocal link exchange.

Greetings [Name],

I visited your web site, [Web Site Name Here] and found some great information regarding [Insert Subject Topic Here].

[If you have linked to the other site already, mention it here and give the URL of the link - ask them to approve your link to them or to recommend editing suggestions - DO NOT threaten to remove their link if they don’t respond in x days - these kinds of notes usually end up being deleted]

I thought you might be interested to know that we have a web site dedicated to [Your Site Topic - special points of interest].

We were hoping that you might consider linking to us and invite you to review our site at your convenience. [Depending on situation, insert further offer of reciprocal linking, banner impressions or exchange of services here]

If you determine that a link to our site is appropriate, please add it at your discretion, or might we suggest the following link and description: [Your site name and URL] - [Your site description - keep it brief, focused and not too much hype]

If you’d like to discuss this further, please feel free to contact us at [Your contact details].

Regards, [Full official signature lines here]

Keeping an eye on your inbound links

Now that you have started exchanging links, you will want to keep tabs on your inbound links. You need to visit the sites that accepted your link request. Check their link pages to make sure your link is properly placed with keyword rich link text. You also have to start checking the search engines to see if they indexed those pages where your links are placed.

To do so, I am providing you with link search commands on some of the major search engines, allowing you to view backlinks to your website:

Go to AltaVista, Google and type in the following information:
link:www.yourdomain.com

Go to Inktomi (AOL, HotBot, iWon, MSN) and type in the following information: INSERT URL HERE linkdomain:www.yourdomain.com

Go to AllTheWeb, Lycos (for AllTheWeb results only) and type in the following information: link.all:www.yourdomain.com

Shelley Murphy

Shelley is a freelance writier for Web-based e-zines for the past 5 years focusing on the evolution of technology. Her primary interest is in Search Engine Optimization continuing to educate small to medium sizes companies on the importance of marketing businesses for the web world.

Search Engine Optimization is broken down into two segments.
Aspects of onsite changes to make your site more spider friendly
and Offsite keyword text backlinking.

>From an on site SEO perspective, consistency and placement of
your keywords are important. Spider read a page top to bottom
left to right. Therefore your major keywords should be
consistent from your Meta tags all the way down to your footer
page. Consistency in Syntax as well a prominence. Interlinking
your site with keyword text links not only helps navigation of
your site but it improves your keyword density.

There is much discussion in regard to the keyword density as to
what is considered a non spam factor. Each page should have
about 350-500 words per page with a keyword density of no more
than 7-10%. Keyword density is also considered in your graphic
alt text as well as hyperlinks.

Generally speaking, if your keyword looks stuffed, it is.

Basic On site SEO Factors:

Title Tag ( with Keyword)

Meta Description ( Consistent with Title Tag)

Meta Keywords ( Consistent with Title tag and Description)

H1 Tags ( with Keyword)

Graphic Alt Text ( with Keyword)

Keyword Hyperlinks

Keyword Density in body text

Keyword in Menu Links

Footer Page with Keyword Text Links

Off site linking is generally though of as the most effective
way to raise in the search engine rankings. However if your on
site SEO is not complete you are battling an up hill battle.

When planning your off site linking strategy you need to keep in
mind that reciprocal links are considered devalued through the
latest round of algorithm updates. Textual Keyword Rich links
from various C-block IP address are the best links possible.

There are many ways to receive quality links.

Some of the top linking strategies to receive quality links come
from the following venues:

Article Submissions SEO Friendly directories Blogs Press
Releases Growing your links in a consistent manor is also
relevant. Creating 1000’s of links in a short period of time
could set up red flags. You will receive many links via RSS
Feeds from the sources described above and be successful in your
linking campaign.

Getting Search Engine rankings can take time depending on your
keywords, but consistency and effort both on site and off site
will bring you the desired results.

Search Engine Optimization
Richmond Virginia

Given that Google now provides over 75% of all Internet search traffic, the last possible thing any site owner would want is to be banned from the Google index!

With countless search engine marketing techniques being employed these days, and contrasting advice available all over the web, it is well worth ensuring that you do not ‘over optimise’ your site or use any techniques which will result in Google penalising your site.

Although the main rule would be to create a site which caters for your audience, provides quality content and contains meta information which is faithful to your site content, you should always optimise your site code to aid in your search ranking efforts, but this should be done in moderation, and in line with the following tips.

Spam

Never, ever spam. This involves sending a large amount of unsolicited mail via your domain mail server. Although the legality of mass mailing is a grey area, sites which do this deserve to be banned by every search engine.

Link Farming

Link Farms, or Free-for-all links pages exist solely to help listed sites gain higher search engine rankings. These are bad neighbourhoods and are frowned upon by the major search engines. Obviously you can’t control which sites link back to you, but you can ensure you don’t link to link farms.

Excessive Links

Now that so many webmasters are more obsessed with their Google Pagerank than the amount of quality traffic they receive, link pages are fuller than ever. You should try not to place too many outbound links on a single page. If you do need to link to 100 or more sites, place the links on separate pages.

Cloaking

Seen by many SEO specialists as probably the thing most likely to result in a Google ban, cloaking involves creating one page designed specifically for the search engines, and another which will appear for the user. This is search engine manipulation at its worst.

Selling PageRank

Some sites have gone so far as to sell PageRank - i.e. selling links on highly ranked pages. You can sell links (i.e. advertising), but you cannot sell links for the stated purpose of increasing Google Pagerank.

Doorway Pages

A few years back, doorway (or gateway) pages were as common as normal pages - these are usually small pages, crammed full of keywords, designed solely for the purpose of gaining high rankings. They usually look awful and a site which uses a lot of doorway pages is likely to be penalised.

Excessive Cross-Linking

Some webmasters create multiple site, often with identical or similar content. They are then heavily linked together with the sole purpose of increasing Pagerank. Not recommended. If you have several sites, inter-linking is fine, but in moderation as with all search engine marketing techniques.

Submitting multiple URL’s from the same site

An example would be for a webmaster to submit mysite.com and mysite.com/index.html to the Google database, thereby essentially trying to get two search results for the same page. If Google doesn’t find a new site quickly anway, just submit your index page ONCE!

SEO Software

Don’t use unauthorised computer programs to submit pages, check rankings, etc. Such programs consume computing resources and violate Google’s terms of service. Google does not recommend the use of products that send automatic or programmatic queries to Google.

If you follow these guidelines and steer clear of excessive search engine marketing techniques, you should be fine. Just remember to create a site with is faithful to the product or service you are providing information on and you should be fine. Concentrate on exchanging quality links with similar sites and don’t get too obsessed with your Google Pagerank. Quality, returning traffic is the goal.

For Google’s webmaster guidelines, visit http://www.google.com/webmasters/guidelines.html

About The Author

James Leckie is editor of http://www.bytestart.co.uk - the small business portal and http://www.trafficgeneration.com - the web promotion portal.