Search Engine Optimization Tips Tutorials

Tuesday, February 20, 2007

Website Submission - Just the Facts

Search Engine Traffic Breakdown

Over 90% of US search engine traffic is driven by Yahoo! or Google owned search technology - source: Search Engine Watch. Additionally Ask Jeeves owns around 5% of the traffic. You may hear the names of many other search engines, but most of them are powered by the above search engines in one way or another. For example, Yahoo! owns Inktomi, AltaVista, and AllTheWeb. All three of those search engines are powered from the same database as Yahoo! Search. A few meta search engines also drive a decent amount of traffic.

What are Meta Search Engines?

Meta search engines do not crawl the web, but combine the results of other search engines. If you are listed in the top few engines then you will also appear in meta search results. Vivisimo is an example of a meta search engine.

Search Engine Submission Software

There is no reason to purchase search engine submission software. Any search engine worth being listed in will usually list your site if you get just a few incoming links. Also people who claim to resubmit your site monthly are trying to take advantage of you. Search engines will keep your site in their index if you have a few decent inbound links.

I do not even submit sites to search engines anymore, but here are links to the only five search engine submission pages I would potentially use.

Free Search Engine Submission

I rarely submit pages to search engines since I know they will follow links and index the pages (that is what search engines do). Anyone who tries to sell you submission software is ripping you off.

If you want to submit your site (please note submission does not guarantee inclusion) then these are the locations where you can. I usually just submit to directories and let the search engines find me.

Submit to Google (free) - powers around half of US based web search.

Submit to Yahoo! (free) - powers over 40% of US based web search. Requires a free Yahoo! id. Yahoo! also has a paid inclusion program by the name of Overture Site Match.

Submit to Ask Jeeves / Teoma ($30) - powers around 5% of web search. Ask Jeeves / Teoma is the only major search engine which does not have a free site submit option. Eventually (usually around 1.5 months) they will list your site in their search results if you have a few inbound links.Submit to Gigablast (free) - powers a much small percentage of search than the other engines, but it is quick to index pages when the site submit is working.

Directory Submission

Directories are human compiled search engines. They generally each have their own specific focus and taxonomy. By listing your site in a few directories you can ensure that search engines will eventually pick up your pages.

Since directories are compiled by humans they take an extremely large amount of time to maintain. Directories do not aim to list all websites, but only the best. Many websites will not fit the criteria to list in the best directories.

Major Directories

There are two directories which are generally stand above all others in distribution and importance.

Open Directory Project - 100% free directory of websites created by volunteer editors. The Open Directory Project is the largest directory on the web, and many other sites mirror portions of the data on their sites. Open Directory Project submission guidelines

Yahoo! Directory - large directory owned by Yahoo!. Commercial listings are $299 / yr (via Yahoo! Express), whereas noncommercial sites can be submitted free. Yahoo! Directory submission guidelines. You do not need to list in the Yahoo! Directory to list in Yahoo! Search search results. The $299 fee is not worth it for most websites. For $299 you can list your site in many second tier directories.

Second Tier Directories

There are a ton of smaller directories on the web. Many of them require a reciprocal link to be included. If a general directory requires a reciprocal link to be listed in then it is usually not worth listing in.

The cost for submission into most second tier directories is usually less than $50. In addition it is easy to become an editor for many of these second tier directories. Some of the more popular second tier directories are:

JoeAnt
Zeal (the non commercial arm of LookSmart)Web Atlas
Uncover the Net
GoGuides
Skaffe
Web Beacon
BlueFind
Wow Directory
Gimpsy

Reviewed Web Guides

Some sites have a directory type structure but are focused more on article based and have individual editors which frequently write articles covering their topics.

Web Guides are generally extremely selective in what sites they will list.

About
BBC Web Guide
Virtual Library - somewhat of a cross between a web guide and a directory. The Virtual Library was the original web directory.

Topic Specific Directories

Many directory are built to cover niche topics. Sometimes these links are more valuable than links deep within general directories since your specific category may be only one or two links away from the home page.

Business.com and the MSN Small Business Directory are business directories, and there are literally thousands and thousands of other topical directories. I think one time I even found a nail care directory. You can search for directories specific to your site by searching some of the top search engines for various descriptive keywords in your topic (for me some examples might be seo, marketing, search engine marketing, search engine optimization...) and adding phrases to them such as add url, submit site, resources, websites. More tips on how to find web directories.

Other Directory Resources

You can find tons of other directories looking through the following resources.

ISEDB: Web Directories
Directory Archives
Yahoo! Directory: Search Engines & Directories
Google Directory: Directories

Other Link Ideas

There are tons of free links here and there on the web. Some good examples would be:
Leaving testimonials for people (sometimes they will link to your site).
Providing donations to help out other websites or organizations.


Putting your website in your signature in SEO discussion forums (or any other type of forum).
Leaving comments on blogs (Journals such as Fast Company, Inc., or any of the other thousands or millions of blogs on the web). Some of them go through redirects, but some do not. I have had a decent number of customers contact me based on comments I have left in blogs.


Writing articles that you submit to sites like Buzzle or sites related to your topic.

- by Aaron Wall, author of The SEOBook

PageRank : a True Commodity

What is PageRank Worth?

Whatever people are willing to pay for it. Nothing more, nothing less...

How does PageRank Relate to Relevancy or Rankings?

Some people believe that PageRank directly relates to relevancy, but it doesn't. In the past the Google algorithm was more reliant upon PageRank than it is today, but currently PageRank is a small factor in the Google search algorithm.

Currently the biggest factor in Google's search relevancy is getting many keyword rich links from a large variety of C block IP addresses. Getting a bunch of links from a single source is easy. Getting links from many different sources is much more time consuming and expensive.

Why do People Make Such a BIG Deal out of PageRank?

When your site is new you will have a PageRank of 0. After you get a few links in about a month or two you will see your PageRank go up and it is usually one of your first signs of SEO progress. People see that and as they continue to work they associate their improved rankings with the improved PageRank.

Since PageRank is one of only a few visual signs of SEO progress (the others being inbound links and actual rankings) and it is often easier to get a mid ranged PageRank than it is to get strong rankings many people place too much focus on PageRank.

Additionally many link brokers and sites selling links use PageRank as a factor to determine the price at which they sell text links.

How Search Engines Work

Search engines try to place the most relevant results at the top. These results are not necessarily the most optimized pages with the most links. In fact the whole reason pages and sites are optimized is to deceive search engines into thinking the sites and pages are of greater quality and value than they actually are.

As webmasters learn more about search algorithms the algorithms are required to evolve. As you and I learn more about how Google works the relevancy of their search results decline.

Google likes the fact that many people focus on PageRank because in doing so people are missing the bigger picture: PageRank is not that important anymore.

Why PageRank is Not Important

Tons of people know about PageRank because it is an extremely simple concept to understand. Google is not going to go public as a company worth billions of dollars because they rely heavily upon a system that is easy for anyone to manipulate.

What makes a search engine valuable is not what you know and can manipulate, but the things you do not know about. New filters, clustering technologies, semantic grading of pages, and the fact that Google can change to heavily integrate any of these new technologies into their algorithm at any time is what keeps webmasters on their toes. The knowledge to be able to continually make better technologies work is what makes Google valuable.

How Easy is it to Manipulate PageRank?

Super easy. Lets say I have a PR6 website. If I decide to create another site and link to it from all the pages on my current website then my new site would automatically get at least a PR5.

Most industries only have a PR5 or PR6 site as the top ranking result. If PageRank were the primary driving factor behind the Google search algorithm I could dominate a new industry every month without investing much money. Google doesn't want that.

Pockets of PageRank

PageRank is worth whatever people are willing to pay for it. While most of the value of PageRank is artificial based upon aggressive business models with high profit margins at some spots you can still buy PageRank for well under fair market value. I like to call these spots "pockets of PageRank."

Pockets of PageRank exist on the web from small scale to large scale sites. One great large scale example is the Internet.com network. You can buy keyword rich text links throughout their network of sites for $7,500 a month.Most sites that are doing this likely will get a PR of 7 or 8 right out the gate. If you think beyond your own business model and think about all the various different commercial interests on the web there are a ton of websites that could easily afford to spend $10,000 a month renting links.

Many major link brokers also list some of their own topical directories on some of their more powerful sites that they are brokering links from. The same way I can use my sites to make anything get a PR5 or PR6 right out of the gate many link brokers make topical directories with a PR6 or PR7 based on giving them one or two exceptionally strong inbound links from a site they manage. They in turn can provide these listings free for those who reciprocate links back to the directory or to their clients sites and also as bonus kicker links to their customers.

The people renting links from the Internet.com website can also parse a bunch of that PageRank through to many other sites. If relevancy were just an issue of PageRank a person could dominate dozens of industries for under $10,000 / month.

Smaller and Cheaper Pockets of PageRank

Many smaller businesses can not afford to spend $7,500 a month renting links. Many businesses can however afford to trade a few links and to buy or rent a few links off sites that are buying bulk PageRank.

John Scott's BlueFind directory is one site which is participating in the Internet.com partner network. While he is not directly selling PageRank he is accepting quality sites into his directory for a one time fee of $40. Most sites will likely list in a PR5 or PR6 category and could likely get a PR4 or PR5 based on that single link.

While these links are powerful and well worth the $40 for most sites you still need many links from many different locations to really compete for competitive search results.

Other Directories

Getting links from lots of different locations has became important to rank well in Google's search results. Since many people are exclusively focusing on PageRank many people are missing out by not buying lots of cheap links form various locations.

Running a directory is an extremely profitable business model and there is a ton of demand for static text links from a variety of sites.

Some of the older directories such as GoGuides or JoeAnt have over time built up a PR6 or PR7. I have a directory of directories and get to see many of the new directories when they first come out. Some new directories are starting out of the gate are a PR6 or PR7 just by renting a few links.

A few hundred dollars per month can give you a PR6 or PR7 directory. At $10 or $40 per submission it does not take many submissions to make your money back. Some of these newer directories have smaller category structures which mean that you may get a PR4 or PR5 link that may last many years for that one time fee.

Since running a directory can be such a profitable business model the quantity of directories will continue to increase sharply over the next 6 months to a year.

Free Pockets of PageRank

* If you allow others to use your work (which spreads your name and helps you market anyway) you can list your site in the Common Content catalog.

* Some community based sites provide free signature links in forum posts. V7N and SEO chat both have a ton of inbound link popularity and provide signature text links on your posts.

* Popular bloggers such as Dan Gillmore understand the value of feedback and provide static text links in their comment posts. Obviously it is important to contribute to the conversation when you post, but the point is that it is free and some of his writing is pretty darn interesting.

* Creating interesting content or useful tools such as Prog is another way to get a ton of free links.

PageRank is a Commodity

The only value that PageRank really has is artificial, and the prices are frequently based on high margin industries.

When you are new to SEO PageRank seems exciting, but as you burrow yourself into the social structure of the web your PageRank will naturally increase over time and you begin to realize it is not that important.

One of my buddies has a PR6 site in which all of his links come from forum comments. There are a ton of free or cheap sources of decent PR links all over the web.

Because it is so easy to manipulate PageRank does not mean that much anymore. To rank well for competitive terms you need keyword rich links from a bunch of different locations. Getting links from a ton of different locations takes a ton of time, money, and effort.

The SEO Goal of Search Engines

Search engines would like SEO to be so complex and to take so much time and effort that you would just decide to use their ads or create a resource that would naturally pick up enough links to rank well.

Renting PageRank from a single powerful site is easy and can often be done for as little as a hundred to a few hundred dollars per month, thus Google will continue to find ways to devalue it as their algorithm advances.

If you are focusing exclusively on PageRank then likely you are focusing your efforts on a commodity which will continue to decrease in value as Google advances its algorithm.

The ticket to top Google rankings right now is many keyword rich links from many unique C block IP addresses. I also recommend using a couple different variations of link text to prevent your link popularity from looking entirely automated.

- by Aaron Wall, author of The SEOBook

Monday, February 19, 2007

Domain Names and Anchor Text

Branding vs Naming

Many people say that the name of a website should be original. It should convey some sense of branding unlike any other site. They say your name should not be generic.

The truth of this matter is that branding is more developed by how you interact with people than by what your name is. Your name can be used to help develop brand, but many smart webmasters use their domain name for more than just branding.


Superstar Websites

People take the branding idea one step further and rattle off some of the best technological leaders. Amazon, Google, Yahoo!, Ebay, etc. None of these sites say what they do in their site name.

Google is so powerful because it is the only Google. It was a wide open market. Yahoo! became Yahoo! because there was no great well marketed directory on the web. Ebay became Ebay because nobody else had a PEZ trading marketplace. (Ebay is yet one more great thing we all owe to PEZ).

Business Facts

Most successful businesses or websites will not be like Google. Most will not be a runaway technological success. Most businesses become successful from soft innovations. Small focused consumer centric changes can help you craft a successful business model.

For every Yahoo! or Google on the market there are 1,000 Door Hangers.com or Cheese.com websites which are doing just fine "bringing in the cheese."


Anchor Text

Anchor text is extremely important to search engines. What a link says is as important as who is saying it. When I link to your site with the words "I eat cats" as the link text a search engine will evaluate that link and assume you eat cats.

You can't control all the links you get (meow), but you can help control some of them. People often link to you using the words in your domain name as the link text (also known as anchor text.) If your domain name has your primary keywords in it then you have an extremely powerful business advantage over your competitors.

Using Dashes in Domain Names

Most of the benefit of dashes in the domain name have eroded in the last year or two. Domain names themselves have been greatly devalued in search engine algorithms, and most links use the site name vice the domain name as the anchor text.

I am of the opinion that you usually can pick out a keyword rich domain name without needing dashes. It may take a bit of creativity and a bit of time, but it is possible. If you are aiming to sell products vice become a consultant you may be able to do well making a living from search engine traffic and not need as strong of a branded name behind your domain.

Brandable Generic Domain Names

Sometimes they do still exist!

I wanted to write an ebook about SEO. Less than a year ago the domain name SEObook.com was still available. It will not always be that easy to find a domain name, but if you think hard enough you should be able to find a brandable domain name which is also keyword rich.

High quality directories usually prefer to list sites by their name vice "insert keyword phrase here."

Having a domain name like mine makes it very easy for me to get inbound links with "SEO Book" or "Search Engine Optimization Book" as the link text. This allows me to rank better for those search phrases, and eventually it will allow me to rank good for "SEO" and "search engine optimization."

Creativity in Domain Naming

If the domain name with your keywords is already taken you still have many other options. If my domain name was taken odds are I could have still got a domain name like seo-ebook-book.biz, but that seems a bit too generic and lacks the creativity to keep it somewhat brandable while still making it keyword rich.

Usually you can add other words around the main words in your domain name to keep the keyword rich words in there without making it overly long.

TheSEObook.com is one example of an alternate domain I could have used. I could also try synonyms. I just looked and SEOreport.com was gone. My next guess for a name was SEOsecrets.com, and it was still available. There are a ton of good domain names still on the market .

Domain Name Summary

Search engines such as Google heavily weight link text in their relevancy algorithms. Soft innovations drive most successful businesses. It is highly unlikely that my business or your business is going to be the next Google. Often times keyword rich domain names are available which will give you a considerable competitive advantage over your competition.

About the Author
Aaron Wall is the author of
The SEOBook, possibly the best search engine optimization ebook on the planet.

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Why Build a Niche Website

Quality vs. Quantity

Larger is not necessarily better. Many people tell you to make tons of content but fail to explain exactly what quality content is. The biggest problem with growing extremely large is a complete loss of focus.

Adding on Cheap Businesses

If a person is a good web designer and understands a decent amount about how search engines work they can easily add SEO to their bucket of services. Hosting is also cheap too. Some people will add on a couple services to website design and call themselves a full service interactive media company.

It may sound impressive, but how often do you use the phrase "full service interactive media" in your daily routine? Next to zero I bet. So the message is harder to spread. It is far easier to be successful if you sharpen and focus your business efforts vice spreading your efforts across many industries.

Focusing in on an Industry

Telephone numbers were given 7 digits because human memory sharply drops off as you add much more data. In any industry people will usually only remember one or two products or companies.

Think of the name of a copy machine company. Think of another... it gets a bit harder as you go down the list.

There are full service internet marketing firms, and within the internet marketing industry there is the SEM community. The SEM community has the pay per click side and the organic search result side.

The organic search results side of SEM consists of keyword research, copywriting, link building services, and link brokers. If you look in DMOZ there are over 800 generic or full service SEO firms.

Each of the generic SEO firms probably has a less than one in one hundred chance of being a well known industry leader within the industry.

The Ranking Problem with Line Extension

If you make a huge website then many pages will be multiple links deep into the site. Many of the links into your site will usually be linked to the home page.

Having only one home page on a huge site vice having five or six really focused sites means you will probably only have one chance to rank well for really competitive phrases. You will need to build extreme link popularity into your site to have your inner pages rank really well for competitive search terms (unless the inner page is an extremely unique well positioned idea).

The Linking Problem with Line Extension

The web is a big social network. Many quality links are based upon business partnerships. If you host, design, and promote sites you make it hard for hosts, designers, or marketers to link to you. People do not generally like to link to their competition, especially their unfocused competition.

If you pick a focus on a single industry it is much easier to make business partnerships with other sites around your business idea that do not directly compete with you.

Inside the Consumers Mind

As you add to your services you lose the positioning you have for your other services. When Google bought Blogger they left the name Blogger alone. When you think Google they want you to think search. When you think search they want you to think Google.

While line extension may at first seem like a good idea it often hurts businesses more than it helps them. When Heinz became ketchup it lost it's position as pickles. Right now I can tell you who I would refer you to for almost anything in SEO because certain people have branded themselves that way. Certain people become synonymous with ideas within their industry.

Breaking Down the SEO Industry

When I think of SEO there are really only a few companies that come to mind (out of many hundreds or thousands of companies). When I think of each of the market segments I usually think of one or two people or websites.

SEO Copywriting: People argue as to whether or not copywriting or links are more important. Obviously both matter at least somewhat. Jill Whalen positioned herself as "The SEO Copywriter."

It does not matter if she is right or wrong in her thinking how important SEO copywriting is. If you think you need an SEO Copywriter then you likely will end up running into Jill Whalen.

Linking is Important: In that whole arguement about whether llinking or copywriting is more important John Scott branded himself as the person who thinks links rule the world. His voice has been rather crass and perhaps too loud for some, but he has established a brand. If you believe in the power of links there is a good chance you will run into John Scott.

Announcing Websites: Sometimes landing a big client can make your name. Eric Ward helped build the Amazon.com linking campaign.

He has since worked for many other large national or international sites with his website announcement service. If you need to announce your website it is likely you will run into Eric Ward.

Link Brokers: There are only a handful of large link brokers on the web. I can think of maybe a half dozen off hand.

By taking Google to court for lowering his PageRank SearchKing made himself the ridicule of many jokes. He now has a gigantic new office. He too was laughing all the way to the bank.

Sometimes adding on extra things to combat problems within your industry boosts your popularity and may define you as a leader within your industry. Recently Google began to stop parsing link popularity on some sites that were selling links and Jarrod Hundt came up with a service called BlockedPR.com that tracks these sites.


Odds are that if you need a link broker you stand a good chance of running into the PRadNetwork or TextLinkBrokers.

Keyword Research: Thought to be too small or too focused of an idea by many SEO firms, keyword research became a lucrative field for Dan Thies.

Dan Thies snatched the opportunity to become synonymous with keyword research. He has just about zero competitors and if you need help with keyword research you will likely stumble into Dan Thies.

Article Summary

The web is a social structure where many links are based on business partnerships.

If you have a huge broad sweeping business it is usually harder to get free links.

People usually only remember a few names in any field.

Most people become successful by focusing their energies vice expanding their offerings.

- by Aaron Wall, author of The SEOBook

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Sunday, February 18, 2007

Building Value on the Web

Tricks of the Trade

There are many SEO tricks which can help boost your rankings, but for the most part they are continuously changing. If you want to do search engine marketing for a living it might be worth it to learn them, but for the most part its not necessary to learn any tricks.

The General Business Cycle

For a business to create great wealth it first has to create great value. How I look at the internet is that I can read about and test things that interest me for a few thousand hours and then redistribute these ideas quick and free. If it is something I am interested in learning I tend to discount the value of my time since I am just learning what I want.

Many people want instant profits. Generally it is not possible to make long term profits which start today unless you are busy learning and building a reputation. Short term profits are possible, but my goal is long term.

Every week thousands of people glance at my site and hopefully can save a few minutes or hours. Thus the overall return is time saved. If I save someone time hopefully they will consider linking to me or telling their friend about me. My marketing power expands as third part votes add up.

Niche is Better


If you are starting a website as a hobby it is much easier to pick a smaller market to dominate. Some opposite examples:

Marketing is an extremely large category.

Internet marketing in an extremely large category.

Even search engine marketing is a fairly large category.

Some people have wanted to make an online Canadian pharmacy, which can generate tons of revenue. The problems with such an idea are:

It is a super competitive environment.

Many of your competitors will be spamming in various ways making junk link rings and throw away sites. By the time their current site gets penalized their newest site will already be competing with you.

The drug companies and doctors themselves will be directing traffic and sales.

Often times the person with this idea knows nothing about drugs.

Very rarely does this type of idea build any long term value.

A better idea is to pick a drug or disease and become the knowledge source for it. I prefer disease, since drugs have patents on them which eventually run out. Also, by only collecting data about a specific drug it will make your information biased. Information about a disease can be unbiased with the resulting solution for the problem promoted.

The Indirect Route

The road to profits is sometimes an easier path if you use an indirect route. Relative to the size of the web there are not many unbiased topical directories and resources. Those that do exist may sometimes be hard to find. Some even discredit themselves greatly by selling irrelevant ads. Simply put, its not that hard to be the best in a focused topic that interests you.

One of the biggest tips I have for most people is to write out what you know in a non commercial website. If you can place the text into small palatable chunks you can create articles which are not only well appreciated, but also easily syndicated. Using this knowledge base and the popularity it brings you will then allow you to more easily acquire links to your future slick conversion-geared website.

An Example

I actually have had a few of my articles from my site referenced by many other websites. Its usually not a good idea to tell people what your future plans are, but I will:

Another topic I am greatly interested in is mental health and more specifically depression. From what I have learned 5 HTP is an amazing supplement which can help people overcome depression. If you look at the 5HTP.com website you will see that Dr. Murray is a moron. He is advertising the 48 hour Hollywood diet at the bottom of his page. This move is killing his credibility.

Hunting for good 5HTP articles I have found there to only be about a dozen or so good ones which are easy to find in search engines.

Recently I have purchased a half dozen books on 5HTP and serotonin. After I get done reading the next 5 of them I will put my knowledge down in web format and be one of the top sources on the internet for 5HTP.

Becoming an Expert

For you to be able to really extract the desired profits people will need to view you as an expert. Having articles appear around the web will make you seem more like an expert. In addition having articles on other sites which link back to your home page in the tag line will give you topical authoritative inbound links.

It is human nature to be skeptical. If independent people say exceptionally kind comments about you (and publish your work) then it is easier to accept the comments as truth.

The biggest expense we all face in life is time. It is something that you can not recoup. If a person is willing to pay you $5 / hr they will likely be willing to pay $50 or $100 / hr. if you have proven that you can help save time.

The Payout

After you are well developed you can decide to change your focus. While it is a good idea to keep your content up to date you may decide that it would be better to distribute your information in a way that allows you to extract more profits.

You can create niche specific sites which drive people to the desired action. In addition you can reformat the knowledge or try new marketing schemes. After you are beyond self sustaining everything you do will only improve the future payout.

Eventually links just start showing up without you asking for them. When that happens it is a fair assumption that you are doing something really good (or really bad).

- by Aaron Wall, author of The SEOBook

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