Google And Your Domain Name

Google, being the largest and most used search engine and is extremely important to optimize your website for. As a matter of fact, if you optimize your website just for Google you’d find your rankings in Yahoo! and MSN will jump up higher than your ranking in Google. I’ve optimized many websites that show up in at least the top 20 listings in Google and found that in each case they ranked higher in Yahoo! and MSN usually in the top 3 positions with most in the number one spots.

Most everyone agrees that with Google content is king. So writing good copy with just the right amount of keyword phrases, for keyword density is important. And natural anchor text links is second to the throne, which takes lots of work and proper timing to do properly.

Third in line are keyword phrases (notice I said phrase because single keywords are almost impossible to optimize for), which need to be researched to find the right phrase for you and not used to often in the content/text to get the right density. Used to often and you’ll hurt your ranking.

Fourth in line are the Meta Description Tag which when used properly can actually bring visitors to your website who wouldn’t normally come there. Of course there are several other factors involved with getting that elusive number one spot.

But what most everyone often overlooks is what I call the fifth element which Google uses to determine their ranking of a website and that's the domain name.

People, even SEO companies, don’t either know the importance of the domain name to Google or take the time to chose the proper name for the website. Most just use their company name or what they conceder a "Cool" name for their websites. Now, unless your company is well known or at least well known in its field, using a basically unknown company name is pointless. Even more pointless is the "Cool" name.

The entire reason you optimize your website is to get visitors from search engines, so why not use all the tools available to get the best ranking possible for your website.

Use your domain name as one of those tools. Instead of your company name or the "Cool" one, use a keyword phrase, one that describes your product or service. Take your time in choosing the proper name. Make sure that it will work best for your website. If you not sure ask your friends and relatives what keywords they would use to find your product or services on the Internet. You might be surprised at what they would use.

You have the keyword phrase that you know will work. But before you jump online and get that domain name there are a couple of things you may still need to do.

Let's say you're the owner of Mike's Bikes and you specialize in Colorado Mountain Bikes so you figure to kill two birds with one stone and use the domain name mikescoloradomountainbikes.com to keep your name in it along with using the keyword phrase. Now this might make sense to you but you’re not Google. You're not going to like it but you need to drop the mikes out of the name because it's dead weight.

So now you've got coloradomountainbikes.com but wait before you burn up the keyboard use Colorado-mountain-bikes.com instead. Why? Because Google sees this as three different words and would see coloradomountainbikes.com as a single word. When people are doing a search they will not be using coloradomountainbikes, they are going to use Colorado mountain bikes. The bonus is that your domain name now becomes a keyword phrase used by Google when it performs a search.

Here's 4 Quick and EASY Steps To Getting Your Website IN Through Googles 'Back Door'

Google... one of the Internets MOST powerful search engines recently announced a new FREE service that makes it easier for you to improve your websites coverage within Googles index through its NEW collaborative crawling system. On the down side though, Google does not 'Guarantee' immediate inclusion, But, is still good news for those of you who have just finished building a website and are ready to submit to the top search engines. So, what's this NEW service called that Google just released? It's called "Google Sitemaps". The real cool thing about "Google Sitemaps" IS it accepts RSS(Real Simple Syndication) and Atom feeds with the .XML extension as one of the accepted formats for submitting your websites Sitemap for inclusion in Googles index. This is just one of the four formats Google accepts and is the one that I'm going to use for the rest of this article to show you how to generate your own .XML sitemap of your website for inclusion in Google. It's real easy to do so don't worry about it being to complicated. So, with that said, lets go to Step #1. Step #1. Sign up for "Google Sitemaps". This step is easy, simply follow the link provide below and sign up for a Free account. It should only take you a few minutes to do, then once your done, come back here and go to Step #2. Go to: http://www.google.com/webmasters/sitemaps/login Step #2. Generate your .XML sitemap. In this step your going to generate a .XML sitemap for your website using a Free online sitemap generator. This Free online generator will build you a sitemap up to 500 pages. If you have a larger website with thousands of webpages you'll have to use a paid service and/or software to generate yours. Go to: http://www.xml-sitemaps.com Enter your required information on the form provided. Step #3. Upload your generated .XML sitemap to your server. Once your generated sitemap is finished(your generated .XML file should be called site.xml.gz) it's now time to upload it to your server using your FTP(File Transfer Protocol) program. This is very important that you do this before submitting it to Google Sitemaps for inclusion. Step #4. Submit your NEW .XML sitemap to "Google Sitemaps". Now that you have generated your "Sitemap" for your website and uploaded it to your server all you have to do now is to go to "Google Sitemaps" and submit your sitemap URL. (ex. http://www.yourdomain.com/sitemap.xml.gz) That's it. Now, depending on Google, your sitemap should get downloaded within the next 24 hours, so be sure to check and see that it did and that there wasn't any problems or errors. Also, your going to want to be able to track your indexed webpages within the search engines, especially Google, so you can see how things are going, so I'll leave you with one last resource that will do this for you. Go to: http://www.uptimebot.com All you have to do is enter your URL and click "GO". The results page will list the results from Google and 9 other popular search engines. Well, there you have it... "4 Quick and EASY Steps To Getting Your Website IN Through Googles 'Back Door'".

Use Article To Increase Your Google Rank

It doesn’t really matter who you are; you definitely know something that’s worth sharing with other. In fact if you are a webmaster chances are you have a lot of knowledge that other’s could gain insight from. And that knowledge shared through articles can be a valuable asset to your website. Interesting and informative articles are in big demand. Article directories meet this demand by making them available in one location for webmasters to use on their sites, in their newsletters, and in their Ezines. There are many article banks to choose from and you should sign up for as many as possible. So you are wondering what qualifications you need to write an article? You simply need to have knowledge on a topic, any topic that others might benefit from. You need to ensure your content is clean, contains no profanity, and no hate literature. Article banks will accept most articles that are interesting and informative as long as they don’t contain the above. If you aren’t sure? Consider this. Would you read it? Does it catch your interest? If the answer is yes then there are most likely many others that would read it. From search engine optimization, to how to grow the most beautiful roses, to buying jewelry, to lawyers and doctors. It’s all useful. From simple to technical to basic, your perspective may be anywhere from useful to universal. Your articles should be written in proper English. If English is not your native tongue consider hiring a ghostwriter to write your article for you. Ghostwriters are also a valuable tool if you are not good at writing or simply don’t have the time. There are several sites online where you can obtain the services for a reasonable fee. When submitting your article to the article directories be sure to read their submission guidelines. Only submit your article if it fits in an appropriate category. If it does not then find a different article bank that is more suited to your article. The exposure you get from your article is unlimited and you can submit your article to thousands of directories if you like. These articles are an excellent way to boost your one way inbound links and they are a lot less hassle then finding good link partners. Use the resource box to provide information about your site or yourself and be sure to include the active link to your site. Use the resource box to entice visitors to visit your site. You can get traffic to your site because of search engines and the possibility or probability of someone reading the article, then clicking your link. You get a double hit - two for one. What more could you ask for. This is virtual marketing at its’ best! Exposure 24/7. Everyday, all day long, and the only effort required by you is to submit your article or articles. So if you are looking for more exposure, improved search engine rankings, and to get your company in the lime light, you certainly should consider writing a few articles and submitting them to the article directories. In fact submitting one article each week can give you great benefits!

Mastering The Google Dance And The Use Of Page Rank

The update of the Google index is often referred to as the Google dance. For several days when Google is updating their index to include new pages and update their algorithms, search results almost seem to take on a life of their own. High positioned sites have been known to drop into near obscurity while the lesser-judged sites suddenly find themselves careering towards dizzy heights in the rankings. While this phenomenon is usually relatively short lived, lasting only two or three days, many webmasters take it to be a sign of things to come during the next major update. Spurious Search Engine Results Google uses a number of patented algorithms to determine the exact ranking of every indexed website. They also attempt to index as many websites and pages as they can possibly find. In order to do this they utilize tens of thousands of different hosts and over a dozen data centers. It is impossible for Google to update each and every one of these at the same time and it is also impossible for them to alternate between using old data and the new updated data. This leads to some potentially skewed results in their listings. However, these results are not usually indicative of future rankings. Relying Too Heavily On Toolbar PR The problem for many webmasters is an over reliance on the toolbar page rank. This is a problem for several reasons. Page rank isn’t the be all and end all of search engine rankings. It is used to determine the weight of an inbound link, meaning that a link from a page with a PR5 is much better than a link from a page with PR2. However, having a PR6 won’t necessarily mean that your site will list above all the PR4 sites on the web. Relevancy Of Website Content The logic is fairly simple. The PR of your site is a numerical value determined by numerous factors including the number of inbound links. In no way can this numerical ranking indicate the relevance of your website content when looking at a particular search term. Having a PR6 website does not necessarily mean that your site bears more relevance to a particular term than another website with a PR2. So, as well as the PR of your website, Google must also consider the topic and the content of your site and how relevant this is to the relevant search term. Toolbar PR Compared To Live PR Another problem is that the toolbar PR is only updated every three months or so, sometimes longer, sometimes shorter. While you’re seeing that your site only has a PR2 it could be that it actually has a PR closer to 5. Your site will receive the credit from this “live” PR in preference to that of the toolbar PR so don’t panic. A Final Word On The Google Dance During the time the Google dance is being completed, the servers located around different data centers are upgrading and updating one at a time. This is why some sites will show spurious results and why some webmasters benefit for a day or two while others lose out. There is absolutely nothing that can be done to prevent this Google phenomenon and there is nothing you can do to hurry the process up. All that is left is to sit back and watch in amazement as the Google index dances.

Top 7 Fundamentals for Google Optimization! Google SEO Tips and Techniques by Expert!

Who doesn’t want to get Top Ranking Positions in Google? 1st Page Placement in Google is NOT difficult, you need to follow Google Optimization Guidelines, and this Article has Summary of the Seven Fundamentals for Google Optimization. Google optimization is about following Google guidelines, Google likes ethical SEO practices, those SEO practices which are to help website owners as well as Google and it has published guidelines for SEOs here: http://www.google.com/intl/en/webmasters/seo.html Top 7 Fundamentals for Google Optimization Fresh and Original Content Clean and Validated Code Easy and Accessible Navigation Good Interlinking of Web pages Healthy and Relevant Incoming Links Domain Age and Registered Period For Same Contacts at Site and Domain Registration Fresh and Original Content Google love fresh and original content on web page, selectable content/text copy of your web page, google can’t read content on images or at pics. Clean and Validated Code Clean and validate code helps google to crawl deeply, try to put content at the beginning of your web page, ignore nesting, javascript or comments, in fact try to shorten the text format with the help of external CSS. Easy and Accessible Navigation Text or image base navigation helps google to read, google bot can’t read javascript, dhtml, flash base navigation, try to avoid using these practices which google doesn’t like. Keep your navigation at top or left side of the web pages, make sure to add a sitemap page which will guide web surfers and web bots to each and every page of your website, if you have huge website then make sure to add at least all main categories’ links at sitemap page. Good Interlinking of Web pages Web links are like roads and streets at website, make sure all website’s internal links are text base or image base, with relevant content. Healthy and Relevant Incoming Links Google likes referred websites, specially referred from quality and relevant resources. The more referrer links the more top rankings. Here one thing should be remembered that one relevant incoming links is better than hundred irrelevant links. Domain Age and Registered Period For Google started keeping new registered domains in sandbox since April 2004, in sandbox almost all new domains kept on probationary period for 6 to 8 months, in some cases for longer period, Sandbox domains don’t get good rankings. Google also likes to rank better to those domains which are registered for longer period like for 5 or 10 years, because whoever registered domains for longer period shows how much s/he is serious with her/his business and most probably won’t do SPAM with those domains. Same Contacts at Site and Domain Registration Google likes true businessmen and a true businessman doesn’t misguide his website visitors, google likes those websites which have physical mailing address to their contact pages and google compares it with that physical mailing address which is used in domain registering.

SEO Tools Poem

I am in my cave, and looking out kind of furtive, The reason being, psychologically, I am low assertive, It seems to me with dinosaurs just outside the cave, Its entirely reasonable now, to be anything but brave, But the tribal psychiatrist insists that I must face my fears, And he issued me with stones, and little wooden spears, And so I went out bravely, into the land of fools, And got quickly eaten because I lacked the proper tools. ”You see things haven’t changed much,” the tutor whispered sage, ”Psychiatry still screws up, no matter what millennium or age”, He pauses for best effect, and to let the chuckles die, ”What was needed was a plan, and the means to try.” ”So they tried all sorts of weapons, all sorts of cunning ruse, But they always ended up, as just amusing little chews, And just when they were despondent, try as they might, Along came Dinosaur disaster, in a great big meteorite.” ”So there’s a lesson in the parable, of your cavemen of old, Don’t listen to the shrinks and to anything you are told, For if you are to triumph, over the odds against the rules, You will need a bigger club, or ideally 21st century tools, We don’t have dinosaurs now with which to fight, But PCs and internets where things have to be right, So ignore your Psychiatrist when problems rear their head, Just go and see your Guru, and use his tools instead.” The poem you just heard and wondered at in awe, Is a totally new creation and not cribbed from one before, And the Tutor is a Fowler, mentioned on the training pages, Who uses methods slightly more in tune to current ages, There may not be any dinosaurs lurking on your drive, But these days a super virus may be all too much alive, And though Google isn’t Pterodactyl proof, it avoids bad links, And dodgy linking areas, and your ranking quickly sinks. So crawl out of your cave and click on the link to tools, That validate bad html and make your website cool, That check your viability and show you where you are, And put you back in charge, instead of watching from afar, Google will love you, the more you do right and sound, And these tools will pare away all that is not allowed, And should you need an expert we are here never doubt, Not with psychiatric counseling, but with proper technical clout. One day I stepped outside my cave, and the creatures were in shock, For I hadn’t brought a little spear, hadn’t primed up my flintlock, Hadn‘t sharpened up my arrows, with my trusty longbow in tow, Hadn’t brought a big pistol or a nasty grenade to throw, No I had brought a massive tank, and though it was overkill, I flattened all the bloody creatures that ever wished me ill, And so instead of cowering, like me come out clanking, And visit the Gurus tools site, and develop your prime ranking.

Should Meta Tags Be Used With Search Engine Optimization?

I deal with many questions from curious website owners everyday. One question I have a new answer for is, "Should I use META tags on my site when do search engine optimization?" Old Answer: It couldn't hurt, but don't worry about them, the search engines ignore them for the most part. New answer? Read on...

Should I really use a META tag? Really?

The new answer is yes, you should use META tags on your site. The keyword META tag is still not used by search engines but when submitting to directories, a valuable use of time by the way, the META keywords are used in many cases to automatically fill in the keywords for your site in that directory.

Even more amazingly, the META description tag has soared in importance. How so you ask? Google has started showing the META description in its search results when certain criteria are met.

The criteria being used appears to be very simple, unlike many of the other things Google does. When the keyword or search terms appear in the META description, the META description is used instead of the snippet of text containing the keyword on your page.

For example, if you do a search in Google for 'Big Oak SEO' you will see our site in the first listing and the description used is our META description tag. All three words being searched for are also in our META description.

If you do a search for 'big oak client' you will see the first listing is pulling a snippet of text from the page itself. Since 'client' is not in our META description, it uses a snippet of text from the page where all three words can be found.

Where should you use a META description tag?

Every website should use a META description tag on the home page at the very least. This way you can say exactly what you want and not worry the snippet of text being used is not best choice for your message. What this really means is Google is giving us some measure of control.

And now that we have this knowledge and control, how best to use it? This allows us to take off our search engine optimizer hats and don our search engine marketer hats. Think of what you can say in the brief sentence that will entice a user to click your link rather than the one above or below. You can put your phone number in the META description for starters or how about being really creative and offer a discount or advertise a sale. Tell them your unique selling proposition. It should be a one sentence phrase already in your head. The only caveat to remember is that your META description will only show if the search term is in the META description. While this can be tricky, it can be done with some forethought. You can do this for all of your targeted pages and have dozens of marketing messages.

Use the META description wisely: target your market and entice your customers. Do not abuse this control and put outlandish, untrue or slanderous statements as I am sure Google will be watching; and if this technique is abused the META description may have seen its last search result this time.

Link Popularity FAQ

Building links doesn't always have to be so stressful. Many sites tell you that they'll increase your links by 1000 overnight if you spend $39.99! I'm here to tell you, it's not the quantity, it's the quality. Although quality does help, it's hard to judge what is quality and what isn't. The first comes first, reciprocal links aren't all that great, so don't spend hours upon hours of sending hopeless spam mails to sites who, if you had good content, would link to you for free. The best way to gain links quickly is article submission. One article, if well written and of high quality, can generate 10-15 links. Think of the possibilities! Write one article a day for a week and you may end up with 100 links. And that is, 100 non-reciprocal links. Why are non-reciprocal links so important? Well, I will tell you. Search engines, such as Google and Yahoo!, are now counting reciprocal links for less. There is even speculation of the recent update that Yahoo! is penalizing sites which have links pages. Even if this were not the case, non-reciprocal links are more important for one reason, visitors. Visitors don't like to see sites with worthless links to websites they don't want. Why have a link to a travel website if you are in entertainment (besides the obvious, but you get the point)? Even if you do have a reciprocal link to a site which is your competitor you may lose visitors by giving them a higher link popularity. Should I not link to anyone then? No. In fact, you should link to as many authoritative sites as possible (authoritative sites are sites which are ranked 1 or 2 throughout your genre). Links are very important on every site. Don't just give them away, choose carefully. Link to authoritative sites with great content you know your visitors will appreciate. Just ask yourself, "If the links are not for the visitors use, what use are they then?" So, I've done the whole article submission thing, what other ways can I gain link popularity? Directories and great content. Content is king and is becoming more-so with the evolution of Search Engines. When a site owner finds an article useful he or she generally places a link to it, even if it is just a blog, it's still a link. But whatever you do, don't do the silly thing and spam blogs, that will only get you banned. Directories are also a major part. If you can write a great description and have an editor in your field at DMOZ.org, submit it and forget it. Either you will get in or you won't. If there isn't an editor, try becoming one. It will only take a few hours of your time, just don't get too hopeful. If you can't get in DMOZ, don't worry, there are tons of other useful directories out there. Tons of FREE directories. Don't spend $10-$20 on a directory submission unless you know they are worth it and can generate quality traffic. Google and others are starting to crack down on directories who require a fee in order to get listed.

Getting Indexed in Google – Quick and Easy

Google is the dominant search engine on the net, controlling more traffic than Yahoo and MSN combined. This means you need to get your entire site into Google as fast as possible.

Getting Indexed in Google – Quick and Easy

Millions upon millions of dollars have been made by sites getting ranked highly in Google. Of course, these sites are optimized to get the rankings. While optimization is critical, it is also vital that you get all the pages of your site indexed in Google.

The good news is it is fairly easy to get Google to suck up the pages of your site. There are a couple of different ways, but you need to do one thing before worrying about getting indexed.

Site maps are rarely clicked on by most visitors to a site, but they are critical nonetheless. A site map isn’t vital because it helps a visitor get around the site. It is vital because it helps the search engine indexing robots find all the pages on the site. In this case, you want to create a site map for your site to make sure the “Googlebot” finds all the pages you have labored to put up. Google actually has an xml site maps tool, but I prefer to actually make sitemaps since I want Yahoo and MSN to index the site as well.

Once you have a site map, the easiest way to get the attention of Google is to create a free blog. Go to Blogger.com and open a free account. Just follow the three or four simple steps and you will be ready to go. Once the account is open, create your first blog entry. Type anything you want, but make sure to include a link to your home page and your site map in the entry. Hit the enter button and you are on your way. Why? Google owns blogger.com, so it regularly canvases the blogs and links. Within a week or two, your site should start appearing in Google.

A second way to get indexed in Google is to write an article. Create one on a subject relevant to your site. Make it about 400 words long or about a page in length. Open an account with an article directory. The account should be assigned immediately after opening the account. Login and go to your member profile. Add the domain to your site in the appropriate box and save it. Then submit your article. Make sure to include an author byline where indicated and include a link to your site. The Google indexing robot will crawl the site at least once a week, find your links and follow them to your site. Within a few weeks, you should see your site indexed in Google.

You can also add your domain directly to Google, but this is really a waste of your time. So many people do it on a daily basis that it may take three months for Google to get to your site.

You can use any of the above techniques to get the attention of the Google indexing bot. Regardless of how you do it, keep in mind it will take a few weeks for your site to appear. There are millions of sites on the web, so the robot has a lot of ground to cover.

Optimizing with Firefox

One piece of software any optimizer should love is Firefox. Now some may say "Why Firefox, it's only a browser?" Yes, it's a browser, but one that supports a big variety of plugins, some of them very useful for search engine optimization. So let's see what those plugins are:

1. SEOpen ( https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/570/ ): this is one of the best and most used Firefox seo plugins, and has many tools that make it a favorite of mine. So let's see what it can do:

* in Google it can check for: backlinks, indexed pages, related pages, cache and PageRank.
* in Yahoo and MSN: backlinks and indexed pages.
* for Alexa: overview, traffic details, backlinks and related sites.
* keyword density of the most used words on the page.
* DMOZ checker: see if the site is included in the directory.
* check for robots.txt.
* validator to check your page for errors (it uses the validator from www.w3.org).

There are other things, but these are the most important.

2. SEO Links ( http://www.webmasterbrain.com/seo-tools/firefox-extensions/seo-links/ ) is another extension I use everyday. When the extension si active and you hover over a link a tooltip will appear that will show you Yahoo, MSN, and Google link popularity and ranking data for the URL and anchor text pair. When you're simply browsing this can be annoying, but you can simply deactivate it with a right-click!

This could be very easily used to check your search engine rankings for a certain page, and here is how: write up a list with all the keywords and keyphrases that you want to rank for, and then link those words or phrases to the web pages associated with them!

Now every time you want to check your ranks activate the SEO Links extension and hover over the links -- you will see where your pages are in Google, Yahoo and MSN.

3. Don't waste anymore of your precious screen real estate just to find out what your PageRank and AlexaRank is! SearchStatus ( https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/321/ ) can sit anywhere you want (I keep it in the status bar) and you'll receive the precious info at a glance. But this little tool can do a lot more than that:

* it shows what metatags a site has
* checks for backlinks and indexed pages in Google, Yahoo and MSN
* it shows the robots.txt file
* keyword density report function
* and best of all: the highlight "nofollow" links will show you what links will be followed by search engine spiders -- very useful when you want to submit your site to a directory and don't know if it will matter from a seo perspective.

So in case you're not using Firefox, go get it! It could be your best friend when it comes to search engine optimization!

Florin Costache writes on a daily seo blog for Romanian webmasters, called Optimizare pentru motoarele de cautare (a.k.a. search engine optimization for those who don't speak Romanian).

Importance of Genuine SEO Techniques

There are some methods of SEO (Search Engine Optimization) you should follow for your website. SEO is very important for all websites out there in the WWW. Without SEO techniques, which are genuine, you cannot get your website to be known, and get any profit from it.

1. Content is King: Every search engine, Google included, looks for only the content. Content is the most important thing to rank high in search engines. Without content, your site is just another site, without much importance. So create good genuine content.
2. Build links: Building links is utmost important just as content. For this, there are several methods. One such method is writing to the related Webmasters and letting them know of your site’s existence. If they believe that your site has some content, which is linkable, they will definitely link to your content. Maybe some reciprocal linking is required. In that case, you can negotiate with the webmaster and ask them about the reciprocal.
3. No one can guarantee number one in search engines: Google is the most important search engine out there, and even Google top employees cannot guarantee your number one position in Google search. It is the result of your hard work and genuine SEO link building that will position you at the top of the search results. Otherwise, you cannot just get to the top of any search engines.
4. Link building yourself is better than consulting: You may promote your blog with genuine SEO, and that will rank your site higher than any SEO firm can do. So, it is extremely important that you do it yourself. Set apart some time in your daily schedule to build links with any niche blogs you know of. Also, ask your friends who have blogs themselves in the same subject to link into your site.
5. Do not trust blackhat SEO firms: Blackhat SEO techniques are those, which do not do genuine SEO but go by such methods as doorway pages, invisible text, keyword stuffing, etc. SEO should be done through Whitehat methods only. Otherwise, you may be permanently banned by search engines.
6. Do not do reckless link buildings: if your blog is two days old and has 1200 incoming links, then Google will ban you on the third day. So, reckless link building is equal to link spamming. Do not do that.

These and more of the techniques to do good SEO are available in the resources mentioned below. SEO is a very important technique to get your site to the top of search engines, thereby building your brand, getting sales, and profit. So, genuine natural SEO technique is extremely important for the success of a website.

Google Page Rank Is Dead - Part III

Is it really dead?

In an online forum post from WebProWorld.com (A discussion on Google), people from all over are speculating about what is going on. In fact, one member was quick to point out that the last big shift Google had, we saw the PR system go down as well. This begs the question...

Are we on the verge of a BIG PR shift? or,
Are we seeing a Google marketing scheme just to shake people up?

In many ways, Google needs to be improved upon their "broken down PR system". There are so many areas if they payed attention to forums and blogs all around the world, they would have more than enough feedback about their PR system to fix this growing PR issue.

Page ranking is a potentially a great system. It CAN be a great system if it directly ranks websites properly by content, relevance, and not simply by the number of links pointing to an individual website.

These days, you see a website with 15 "medium relevant" links pointing to it while its front page holds a PR of 7-8 out of 10. How do you justify that?

What will it mean if Google's PR systems stays down?

I believe it will mean a big shift to online marketing. Many newbies out there that are barely legal when it comes to SEO have an opportunity to measure everything they do. In turn, the newbies may even sound professional to their clients. Take away these tools and you are left with true marketing gurus that have stood the test of time and can deliver results for themselves and their clients.

The internet is vastly growing into a pool of professional fakes and scammers. This is really giving the internet marketing community a bad name. Without the Google PR, many people won't be able to prove their results nor will they have that "fake respect" that you get from having a website with PR 7/10.

What about MSN & Yahoo?

In growing efforts to keep up with MSN & Yahoo's strong and growing marketing campaign, Google may be feeling left out these days. Many people think that their PR system is simply a gimmick; a gimmick that attracts a lot of attention. By disabeling this system, you create mass fear and confusion. Bad publicity is still publicity neverless?

So, is Google trying to create a buzz?

This could be possible and it could be possible that everything will be back to normal within a couple of days. We won't know until time catches up with us.

Until then, take this "dark saga" moment and find other ways to build your business online. Don't worry about what Google is doing, worry about what you are doing to improve your internet marketing campaign.

Site Indexing - Great Eight Tips

Site Indexing - The Most Effective SEO Technique

By: Prashant K Shukla

The most effective SEO technique is to index the pages of new website. There are lot of important issues, one should take care. We are providing a simple guide steps to help you in this regard.

1. Just design you website structure, create your content pages (don't worry if they are not completed yet) and publish them swiftly. Because, the process of indexing, new websites takes about two months. So, this technique helps you saving time.

2. Since, you have already designed your web site structure and contents (may be incomplete or with minimal info) as I said earlier. Now, create a sitemap for the site and submit this to Google Sitemap Service. Yahoo has lately created a similar service to Google Sitemap and so also submits your website to it. There are lots of online free site map generation services available.

Here are few of them, you may use.

* Create your Google Sitemap Online By: XML Sitemaps
* ROR Sitemap Generator By: ROR Web
* Site Map Builder By: sitemapbuilder

3. Third step is to submit your website to some Open Directory Project; DMOZ is good and is used as basis by many search engines like Google, MSN and Alexa. This process again takes several months. So, the first step plays a good here too.

4. There are three major search engines namely Google, Yahoo and MSN. Submit all your pages for inclusion in these three major search engines and keep submitting your site pages to other search engines on a regular basis. Do it manually or you may use some search engine submission software or service which may help you by automatic submission.

5. There are lot of SEO Friendly Directories on the web. Some are paid services and some allows free submissions of URL. Submit your website to these SEO Friendly Directories. All major search engines crawls these Directories frequently. This will help you both a catalyst for the indexing of the web pages and also move a step forward in Page rank Building.

6. You may start Building links using Reciprocal Link exchange programs. The text links should not only point to your website homepage but also to other pages down in the website page structure.

7. Posting on Google Groups advertising for your website is something very helpful in building good Page Rank. The posts should include at least two links to your website.

8. Participate in topic discussion on other sites is also a great technique to make your existence strong and do include your site URL in the reference section.

When Will Google Update The Page Rank Of Older Sites?

There has been another page rank update in the last couple of weeks but it seems as though this has only affected sites which previously had a page rank of zero. The question many people are asking is when will google update the page rank of all of the other sites which already showed a page rank?

This latest update seems to be very similar to the previous page rank update in which the older sites were also not updated. When reading on various websites about other webmasters opinions on this current trend, I have found a number of reasons as to why this may be happening.

Over the last couple of years there have been quite a large number of link exchange programs which have been created. This have proven to be quite popular but are frowned upon by google as the people who enter these programs are in a way cheating to get to the top. Most people are aware of the importance of backward links and these link exchange programs make it very easy to obtain them. In clearly states however in the google guidelines that webmasters should not take part in these link exchange programs. Webmasters who still go ahead are at risk at having their site or sites banned.

The problem could be that it is very hard for search engines like google to establish which links that each site obtains are from these link exchanges and which links are actual real and valid links. It is possible that google is close to finding a formula to this problem and is delaying any page rank updates on older sites until all of the finishing touches are completed. My advice would be to never take part in any of these link exchange programs and that if you are currently in one, to come out of it as soon as possible.

There are many valid ways of promoting a website such as via writing articles and by having good content which will encourage other webmasters to want to link to your site.

I have to say that for somebody like myself who works very hard to promote my own websites, that it is quite frustrating to not be able to see the changes in the page rank, as when I see my sites go up in page rank it gives me a little boost and shows me that I am still doing the right things. In a way it should not really matter however as I am able to see my websites have higher rankings in the search engines, this itself of course is the most important thing. It is also a good thing that google are trying to stop the people who are trying to cheat their way to the top, that is of course if this is the real reason why there has not been a full page rank update for some time.

Google Patent Application - SEO Highlights

The recent patent application filed by Google details numerous items the search engine uses to rank web pages. The specific application is summarized as:

“A method for scoring a document, comprising: identifying a document; obtaining one or more types of history data associated with the document; and generating a score for the document based on the one or more types of history data.”

The patent application sheds significant light for those pursuing search engine optimization with Google. Patent applications can be difficult to understand, so following are highlights that you should consider for your SEO efforts.

Update Your Site

Updating your site is important when it comes to maximizing your rankings on Google. In addition to the manipulation of keyword density and meta tags, the patent application reveals that Google places significant value on how often your content is updated. The more often you update, the timely and relevant your site will appear to Google. In turn, this leads to higher rankings.

To appease mighty Google, consider the following plan of action:

1. Update pages frequently,

2. Add new pages to your site,

3. Interlink the new pages with others on your site, and

4. Add new pages on a weekly basis instead of all at once.

When Google returns to the site, you want to make sure that there is new content. The high rankings of blog sites are evidence of this approach.

Google’s Looking at Your Domain

In a new twist, Google claims that it analyzes the number of years of domain registration as part of the ranking process. The application suggests that domains that are registered for longer periods of time are given more value because such a commitment shows the site is not a fly-by-night jump page. It is recommended that you extend all domain registrations for as long as possible as part of your search engine optimization efforts. It is difficult to tell how much the registration process impacts the ranking process, but every little bit helps.

Google claims that it also digs deeper into domain names to evaluate the legitimacy of the site. Factors in the evaluation include the web host and the “who is” information. According to the patent application, Google maintains a database of hosts that facilitate spamming of the Google search engine. While such hosts are not detailed in the application, pray to God that you are not using one. You should evaluate your host if your optimization efforts are not producing results.

If your search engine optimization efforts for Google are failing, the patent application may provide answers. Talk about a perfect E-book!

Search Engine Wars: Google Thumps Yahoo, MSN

Well the score is in: Google has resoundingly thumped Yahoo and MSN in the ongoing search engine wars. I wouldn’t have believed it if I hadn’t read it myself; Google continues to grow in size and popularity while Yahoo and MSN continue to firm up their “also ran” positions. What does this mean for you? Plenty, especially if you are wasting your time with the other search engines.

Yes, I am surprised. My previous statistics were evidently a bit outdated as I had the search engine war between the Big 3 Providers -- Google, Yahoo, and MSN -- running a tight 1-2-3. Indeed, it must have been early in 2005 the last time I bothered to look at the statistics, but at that time my stats showed that Google controlled 36% while Yahoo and MSN were running at 33% and 32% respectively. Yes, the statistics total to more than 100% since they include those people who use more than one search engine [in this case they are counted twice].

According to the Neilsen//NetRatings and as republished in the October 20, 2005, issue of USAToday, Google’s share is as follows:

Google is the Internet's most-used search engine, with a 45.1% share of searches in September, according to market tracker Nielsen/NetRatings. Yahoo (YHOO) had 23.3% and MSN 11.7%, says Nielsen.

To put it bluntly, only Yahoo is in the game and MSN is quickly fading to irrelevancy. How can I say this? Because when I do searches of key words that I frequently check up on including, Corporate Flight Attendant Community, I find some vastly different results.

With MSN, the search results yielded 3117 results, with Yahoo 326, and with Google 9850. What is apparent to me is that Google is doing the best job of indexing pages while the other two are way behind. I will give MSN credit for the recent leap in the number of results for Corporate Flight Attendant Community, but several of the results were for pages I deleted months, even years ago! Overall, I believe Yahoo harnesses their popular Yahoo Groups, Hotjobs, and other key features to give them a search engine edge over MSN.

I am betting my money on Google. While it isn’t good for one search engine to dominate, when it comes to building my business I want to go with a winner. Clearly, Google has a leg up on the competition, so every page that I create is optimized for my buddy Googlebot to index!

Do you, Yahoo? I don't... now you understand why.

The Benefits of SEO

SEO stand for Search Engine Optimization. It's a fancy term that means a website is user friendly to search engines bots. When you use SEO on a site you fix the site's meta tags, title, discription, and even the body of the index page, among other things to give the bots the best possible idea what your page is about and how relevant the content is to everything else on the page.
Most search engines have a submission form making it easy to get you listed from a few days to a week and often a site with SEO techniques on it won't matter at all for them. You won't be at the top of the rankings, but that's the price you'll pay for doing it for free and with a 2nd tier or lower search engine. Even Yahoo has submission forms, and now multiple of them depending on the purpose of the site. Google however, has surpassed Yahoo in usage, making it the current #1 search engine in the world, so it's really them you want to be listed in.

Google's search engine bot is automated. There are no more manual submissions put into the Google index anymore. It's been said using their submission form could take a week to years to getting listed to not even at all. It's bot crawls the internet looking for websites to index according to their relevancy. As it combs through your pages it looks for words that tell it how your site should be indexed and if the words it finds really are what your page is about. InBound and OutBound links need to be relevant to your page as well. If your site is not relevant, or not relevant enough, it may move on and not list you at all. So, basically, Google is at the top of the mountain and you want your site Google bot friendly.

On my first site, I thought I had done this correctly, but to this day it's not listed in Google. After having some inspiration for anotehr website I openned a new page. I was picky with sites linking back to me and careful keeping each page slightly different in subject matter, but just enough to hit other keywords the Google bot may like when seeing if it was relevant. It was already preset with SEO as a habit so when the bot came along, everything it found through the SEO, it would find onsite. Sure enough, I was listed very, very quickly. Especially when you compare it to the zero listings of my first site in a much longer period of time.

It's really amazing how quick the bots add you when it's done correctly. The extra time it takes to make sure everything is just right more than makes up for the extra time it'll take to get it listed and indexed the hard way.

Google Patent Application – Linking

The recent patent application filed by Google details numerous items the search engine uses to rank web pages. The specific application is summarized as:

“A method for scoring a document, comprising: identifying a document; obtaining one or more types of history data associated with the document; and generating a score for the document based on the one or more types of history data.”

The patent application sheds significant light for those pursuing search engine optimization with Google. Patent applications can be difficult to understand, so following are highlights for those that don't speak lawyer.

Google’s Link Evaluation

It is well known that Google uses links as a significant ranking element. Although the patent application doesn’t dispute the value of linking, it does highlight the best method for pursuing a linking strategy. Simply put, consistently adding links will have a much better effect than adding links in bunches.

Google notes in the patent application that it looks at links from a historical perspective. The search engine notes the discovery date of links, the life span of the link and the speed at which a new web site obtains links. This approach reveals that Google is discounting quick link exchange strategies such as buying bulk links for your site. Instead, Google appears to consider a natural linking evolution as a sign that a site is “legitimate.”

The specifics of a good linking strategy are a bit difficult to nail down. In the patent application, Google tries to hide the evaluation method by listing factors that “might” go into evaluating links to a site. Factors that “might” be considered include:

1. The anchor text of the link.

2. The discovery date of the link.

3. The growth rate of links to your site.

4. The rate at which links to a page appear and disappear.

5. The age of links with older links carrying more value.

6. Numerous links to a new site will be looked at as spam, unless some of the links are from highly valued sites.

7. Link growth that is constant is optimal.

8. Sudden bunches of new links will be devalued as spam.

A general theme becomes clear as one reads the Google patent application. Google values sites that are in it for the long term, update regularly and consistently grow in link popularity. Taking this theme into account, it is easy to understand why the Google sandbox exists.

A steady approach is the key if you intention is to gain top rankings in Google. While the delay can be aggravating, the results are certainly worth it.

Link Building for SEO On A New Site

Ah, the joys of link building and search engine optimization. If you have a new site, here is a tip that you might want to consider. Then again, you may just want to pitch it.

Link Building for SEO On A New Site

Link building simply refers to an issue known as relevancy. When ranking sites in search engine results, Google tends to list the site that is the most relevant. There are a lot of factors that go into determining relevancy, but the number of other sites linking to yours is one of them. This is why a site like the one for the IRS is high in search results for tax issues even though it does not trade links per se.

Ideally, you want only inbound links from other sites that are relevant to the subject of your site. If you have a plumbing site, you want links from other plumbing or home improvement sites. Despite all the junk email you receive, links from casino and pharmacy sites are not going to help the rankings for your plumbing site. They will hurt the rankings because they are not relevant.

When building links to your site, Google favors a slow, steady increase in links. If you want top rankings on Google, you should follow this mantra with one exception. If you have a new site, you need not be a slave to this approach.

As you probably know, new sites are not ranked by Google. Instead, your site will sit for six months or so in the much discussed Google sandbox. Given this fact, you really don’t need to worry about Google for the same period of time when it comes to your links. Google isn’t going to rank you anyway, so picking up the pace isn’t really a problem.

With a brand new site, I prefer to create as many legitimate, relevant links as possible as soon as possible. The reason is I find it beneficial to start aging the links as soon as possible. Links to your site tend to grow in value the longer they exist on another site. From my point of view, why not maximize the number as quickly as possible? It isn’t like it is going to hurt your rankings on Google. You aren’t going to have any!

In taking this approach, I am not suggesting that you purchase links, use link farms or so on. I am just suggesting that you maximize your link trading efforts immediately to build up as many links as possible and get the aging process rolling. As you approach month four in the sandbox, you can start scaling back your efforts to a more slow and steady approach. Its worked for me.

Google Use of Visitor Data in Rankings

In this article, we continue to dig into the patent application of Google regarding the method used to rank sites in search results. Interestingly, Google asserts in the application that it “might” consider user data as a factor in organizing search results.

What Is User Data?

Without being rude, you should already know what user data is as part of your site evaluation. Any owner of a site on the web should be constantly looking at user data found on site servers.

The site server should have an administrative program telling you what searches are being used to reach the site, better known as “search strings.” The program should also be telling you how many pages the user looks at on each visit and where in the site they go. By reviewing these statistics, you can identify the sections of your site that appeal to potential customers. If clients are leaving after visiting only one or two pages, such statistics should tell you that you have an abandonment problem. The new information from the Google patent should motivate you to closely monitor your site.

Essentially, Google is also looking at your server statistics to determine the value of your content and factoring it into the rankings. Specifically, Google claims in the patent application that it tracks the amount of time that users spend accessing a page on your site. Having filed a few patent applications in my time, what this really means is Google is looking at how long a user spends on your site and how “deep” they go into it.

Expanding on this subject, Google details an additional factor. As with the Adwords program, Google is monitoring the click through rate on search results. The more click-throughs to your site from its listings in Google, the higher it will be moved in the search results.

Every Little Bit Helps

Google claims that it looks at what users are bookmarking. The apparent jist is that Google considers a site with a lot of bookmarks to be “worthy” of a higher ranking. In short, get out there and bookmark your sites!

Conclusion

The effort of Google to look for depth in a site should be commended. There is nothing worse then clicking onto a promising search result to find one crappy page full of links. With this new policy, Google rewards sites with healthy amounts of relevant pages. In short, content is king again.