Official Blogs

The Official Google Blog

and

The Official Yahoo Blog

The Google Browser

Last summer, Anil Dash suggested that it would be a good move for Google to develop a Google browser based on Mozilla. Give that kid a gold star because it looks more than plausible. Mozilla Developer Day 2004 was recently held at the Google Campus. Google is investing heavily in JavaScript-powered desktop-like web apps like Gmail and Blogger (the posting inferface is now WYSIWYG). Google could use their JavaScript expertise (in the form of Gmail ubercoder Chris Wetherell) to build Mozilla applications. Built-in blogging tools. Built-in Gmail tools. Built-in search tools. A search pane that watches what you're browsing and suggests related pages and search queries or watches what you're blogging and suggests related pages, news items, or emails you've written. Google Toolbar++. You get the idea.

Read the complete article about the Google Browser.

New Search Engine

Anoox is a new search engine, supposedly a "Revolutionary search engine - The best search Engine. It'g got a very interesting not-for-profit model, worth a look at.

How to Predict Yahoo Web Search Listings

Predict listings for yahoo , a very interesting piece.

How long before I get into Google?

There is no easy answer to the question of how much time it takes to be listed on google. There is no fixed period of time before any website gets listed on google. Infact, it depends on a variety of factors such as the popularity of the website, it’s design, content etc. The time it takes to get listed on google may range from a few days to upto 3 months.

To understand how you “get into” google, or get indexed by google, it’s important to learn how Google actually works. The “Googlebot” is Google’s indexing software. This Googlebot visits millions of websites, records the contents of these websites and makes them available to search for the users of Google. The Googlebot is essentially a software, it has a set of capabilities and limitations and algorithms it uses to index content.

What the Googlebot does is, in theory, very simple, when it visits a page it records all the links listed on that page and makes sure to visit them. This activity is known as “Crawling”. By crawling the Googlebot should be able to visit a majority of the websites on the internet. Therefore, having many sites link to you increase your chances of being visited by the Googlebot and thereby increasing chances of being indexed on Google quicker. The Frequency of the visit of the Googlebot also depends on the “Pagerank” of a particular website. The greater the pagerank of a website is, the more often google will index it.

Google adds thousands of websites each time the Googlebot crawls the web. Submission to Google is not necessary, since the Googlebot jumps from page to page via hyperlinks, it is more likely that google will find your site this way before being indexed via the URL submission form. Multiple submissions of your website does not increase the chances of being indexed on google.
For a brand new website, without a pagerank and without any links pointing to it, it may take months to be indexed. It is easier to start a reciprocal linking campaign and chances are your website will be picked up much quicker this way.

The process of being indexed on google maybe broadly classified into three stages, the crawling of the webpage, the indexing and finally listings on SERP or Search Engine Results Page. A webpage maybe crawled but it might not be visible in SERP’s for weeks to come.

If your site is not listed in the major directories, then adding it to the directories will have a significant positive impact. If you pay for expedited review of your site at Yahoo, Business.com and others, than you will see improvement the next time Google, update it’s indexes.

In the end, a bottom-to-top rebuild of your website will result in an improvement in your search engine rankings rather quickly. You should continue to see improvements for 6-9 months, as the changes to your site are indexed throughout the databases that drive the major search engines.

Understanding Google AdWords

Understanding Google AdWords By Sharon Housley (c) 2004

Google AdWordsUnlike many search engines Google, to its credit, clearly denotes search listings that are paid placement. In fact, Google AdWords appear in a separate section down the left side of the screen.Google AdWords provide an inexpensive advertising venue for businesses to advertise products or services to a targeted audience. Advertisers have the ability to control their budget and target their advertising based on keywords. Advertisers are also free to determine the ad content.

Google AdWords allow for nearly instant traffic, which can be turned on and off. Traffic results can be measured, providing information on what is successful, what isn't and what needs to be changed. AdWords can be found that work by running a test campaign.
Benefits to AdWordsAdvertisers bid on keywords. The more an advertiser is willing to pay, the greater the likelihood the ad will appear higher in position in the list of ads served. Google, invariably wanting to make the most from advertisers, determines placement based on a combination of click-through rate, bid amount and budget. Of course, in order to maximize revenue and please searchers Google does have guidelines for ads served and all ads must receive a minimum percentage click-through or they are removed.

AdWord GuidelinesClearly and accurately describe the website. This is to the advertiser and searchers benefit. Ultimately, the more qualified the visitor who clicks the ad, the higher the likelihood the clicker will convert into a sale. By providing clear and accurate information, searchers who click the ad are qualified leads, which tend to convert more consistently than unqualified leads. The most effective advertising communicates a clear message to a targeted audience.

Avoid excessive capitalization, superlatives and lavish exclamation marks in the ad. By doing this, you are not only serving the visitor, you are filtering unwanted clicks from non-buyers. Due to space limitations your ad message will need to be concise. Select keywords that are relevant to your product, service or content. Call to action phrases are not allowed (i.e. you cannot use phrases like "click here" in your ad copy.) There are also no pop-ups.

Increase Conversions by Analyzing Your Server Logs

Most people now understand the "front end" of search engine optimization (SEO): compiling keywords and optimizing content, page titles and meta descriptions in order to increase rankings on search engines.

Yet, judging from my experience with clients, few people pay much attention to the "back end" -- analyzing their server logs. Either they don't look at them at all -- or worse yet, they don't have any!

Effective SEO is based on real data: number of unique visitors, the keywords and phrases people used to find your site, the pages that are downloaded most frequently, and that all-important metric-- conversions.

The easiest place to get that information is from your server logs. If you haven't looked at your logs and don't know where to begin, the first step is to contact your hosting company. Many ISPs and Web hosts such as Earthlink, Readyhosting and GoDaddy offer Web analytics as
part of their monthly hosting fee -- all you do is log on to your server's control panel and type in your account password.

If your site sits on your own server and you don't have server logs, purchase a Web analytics program such as Urchin or WebTrends, pronto!

Once you have your server logs in hand, you want to pay particular attention to the following data:

Number of Unique Visitors and Page Views

Don't be swayed by the number of "hits" to your site. This is a misleading indicator as it is simply a measurement of every downloaded image and file on your site.

Instead, pay attention to the number of unique visitors and conversion rates. To determine simple conversion rates, take the number of unique visitors and divide by the number of people who took the desired action, e.g., downloaded a brochure, submitted your contact form,
signed up for a newsletter, purchased your e-book, etc.

Top Pages

The "Top Pages" metric can give you a wealth of detailed information. You'll see which pages are most popular on your site, which in turn can help you plan future content. Pay particular attention to the page or pages you want people to click on -- for example, I want people to
click on my newsletter sign-up page. Using the number of "unique visitors" to my site, I can determine how many actually went to that page, and then measure that against how many actually signed up for my newsletter. I can also quickly see how many click through from my
newsletter to special offers or landing pages.

Top Keywords

Analyzing your keywords will show you which phrases people are using to find you, and which ones they aren't using. Remember, just because you think your prospects should use specific words to find you doesn't mean they are using them. I learned this the hard way a couple of years ago. I had always assumed my top keyword phrase was "freelance copywriter." It's what others and I used to describe what I do. But, it wasn't until I started analyzing my server logs -- and purchasing
Overture search phrases -- that I learned with a jolt that my number-one keyword phrase was "marketing communications." I have since revised my page titles and content using variations on this phrase -- significantly increasing traffic and conversions.

Top Referrals

Sites that rank highly in search engines also have a number of sites that link to them. You can quickly see which sites are sending you traffic by looking at your "Top Referrals" metric. Most of these referring sites will be search engines -- but if you drill deep enough, you'll get some meaty information. For example, I paid $250 last year to be in a marketing database. Not one person has clicked through from this database to my site, which means I won't be
purchasing a listing this year.

Top Domains or Robots/Spiders

While you're reading your logs, do a quick check to make sure the top search engines are visiting your site. Some programs will show this information as "Top Domains" or "Robots/Spiders." Make sure you see listings from "googlebot," "MSIECrawler," "Inktomi Slurp" and other
spiders or bots.

Good search engine optimization practices include regularly analyzing your server logs and giving visitors the content they want by:

* analyzing top downloaded pages,
* researching and continually tweaking keyword phrases,
* building a solid external link structure (and making sure it's
working).

If you are continuously doing these things, you'll see a steady rise
of site traffic and conversions over time.

Dianna Huff
25 Ways To Grow Your E-Newsletter List
http://www.growalist.com

Google Search Engine Analysis

Google is the fastest growing search engine, and is one of the largest public databases of information that exist today. Approximately 80% of all Internet searches are done using Google, through Google.com and the network of sites licensing the Google search results (AOL, Netscape, iWon, Compuserve, Alexa, and many of others).

Google is an amazing search engine. You can add your url for free. Google doesn't care what kind of files you have on your site - it will index almost anything. And Google ranks your site according to pretty standard algorithms, except for one really neat factor - your site is ranked in part based on the number and quality of sites that have linked back to it. A critical element of the link to your site is the phrase in the link. If the link has the words really amazing website, then your site will get a slightly higher search rank for the phrase really amazing website.

Google also doesn't seem to have any editor "quality rating" system, a system adapted by AltaVista, Yahoo!, and LookSmart affiliated search engines which gives higher ranking to sites based upon subjective evaluations of editors.

Your Search Engine Optimization Plan

A complete guide to search engine optimization would be book-length, and would be out of date as soon as it was published, but here are several tips for building a website with search engine optimization in mind:

1. Every page on your site must have a unique title tag, meta keywords tag, and meta description tag.

2. Follow W3C recommendations for HTML document structure. Begin the body copy of your page with your keyword phrase, and repeat it as needed as the theme of the page throughout your copy. Feature your keyword phrase prominently by including it in headers and making it bold or italics.

3. Use text navigation on your site, and use the keyword phrases you have selected as the links. If you cannot use text navigation, include a footer on every page using text links.

4. Build a text site map, and link to it from every page of your site.

5. Organize your navigation according to the importance of your keyword phrases. If you break your site into many pages, link to the most important pages from every page of your site, and link to the other pages from section header pages and the site map.

6. Establish your site by submitting to the major directories, The Open Directory and the Yahoo! Directory, then build your link popularity by submitting to web directories, search engines, and requesting links from related websites.

7. Be patient. A search engine optimization project can take quite some time to work.

Designing for Search Engine Success

Feature article Shane Borelli

When preparing to build a new website, or redesign an existing website, planning for success in the search engines is a crucial First Step. Even before you choose a color scheme, choose a design strategy that will enhance your chances for success - not work against them.

While many website designs work well in the search engines, some work much better than others. And there are a few website designs that are just plain difficult and best avoided. If receiving traffic from search engines is important to your website, then discuss design implications with your web developer or SEO consultant before the website design is agreed upon, and the actual building begins.

What difference can website design make?

By "design", we do not mean background colors and font styles, but rather how the website is pieced together both structurally (site architecture) and contextually (information architecture). The difference between good and bad design choices can be clear as night and day. The difference may mean having all of your website information indexed in the search engine databases - or none of it.

Take Flash for example:
Flash is a powerful, vector-based animation software that allows web designers to create beautiful websites with rich graphics and robust interactive functionality. Sounds good, right?

The problem is that, until very recently, no search engine could "see" Flash files, or any of the content inside them. Even now, Google is the only search engine that does read Flash files. Google reports this is only a trial period, and they will read only links inside Flash files - not any other content, such as text. This means that even the most appealing, informative, and useful website may never see any significant traffic from the search engines if the site is built with Flash and without regard to how search engines work.

Patch it up or start over?

Virtually any existing website can be modified to perform better in the search engines; starting over from scratch is seldom necessary. However, sometimes starting over is the smartest thing to do.

Workarounds have been developed and refined to enable the use of advanced design features, including Flash, without losing important exposure in the search engines. If properly implemented, these workarounds do work and you can seemingly "eat your cake and have it, too."

The caveat is that once you start implementing large-scale workarounds - it's hard to stop. Each time new content is added to the website, the necessary workarounds must also be added or modified. Therefore, a website that is rife with workarounds may easily become more expensive to maintain over the long term than simply starting over with a better design strategy.

The lesson here is to plan well - speak to an experienced developer or SEO consultant - and build your website right the first time.

Getting Honest With The Search Engines - Part II

Feature article by Daria Goetsch
SearchInnovation.com

SEO Methods that Work

Good Content
Content is one of the most important items you need for your website. Once visitors arrive, you need to keep them there. Adding keyword-rich text that makes sense and serves the concept of the web page improves your ranking and keeps your visitors interested. The more text, the better for search engine spiders when they index a website.

Good navigation
There is nothing worse than arriving at a website and having difficulty understanding where to go for the information you are seeking. Have easy to use, clearly marked navigation so your visitors click through instead of click-away in frustration. Search engine spiders (robots) index text and links; having good navigation is important to the indexing of your web pages.

Title/META tags
Individualized Title and META tags for each of your important web pages gives you the best chance for optimum success in ranking. Title tags are necessary for search engine ranking, in particular with Google's search engine. META tags have decreased in importance, but are worth using for clarity and search results. The META description is still used by some search engines as the default text indexed by search engine spiders for the search results. The keyword tag is the least important but is still used by some engines. My theory is, you never know when the rules of the search engines will change, or a new engine will want them, so take the time to include these tags in all your web pages.

Link popularity
Links from other popular websites back to your website are one way of increasing your site's popularity. Finding websites with similar content (but not your competitors) and high link popularity, then trading links to be posted on each site, is one way of increasing your site popularity. Good content is vitally important because visitors who stay longer while visiting a website help measure the popularity of the site in the search engines.

Paid Inclusion
Paying a one-time fee or (as is most recently the case) a yearly renewable subscription fee to be included in the search engine results. Directories also use this style of service to accept submissions. Paid inclusion does not guarantee that you will be listed with the search engine or directory, but gives a shorter time-line of acceptance if they do.

PPC (Pay-Per-Click)
Overture is the most popular PPC engine. You bid an amount per keyword phrase to get the highest ranking in the Overture search results compared to your competitors.

Google AdWords Select
Google AdWords is a program that uses your chosen keywords in an ad in the Google search engine results in order to promote click-throughs.

Log Stats programs
Having a log stats program is very helpful in tracking your visitors, finding which keywords they are searching on to enter your website, tracking which pages they leave from and much more. Analog is a good free log stats program. WebTrends is a popular paid logs program used by many businesses.

Free submissions take patience
After paying for inclusion, try submitting to some of the secondary search engines and directories. Long before Google was a household word, I thought it might become popular and submitted the company website. It certainly paid off a year later when Google became the best of the upcoming search engines.

Another avenue to venture down are specialty directories. As the web grows larger over time, specialty directories (also known as vertical portals or "vortals") focused on your business area may help you get more link popularity and your company name out to the public.

Maintenance Programs
There are times when a page drops from the search engine listings or you re-design the page which might give you a reason to re-submit the page to the search engine. Re-submitting your pages every month is not always necessary. Having a log stats program in place will help you see which pages are still listed, along with a monthly ranking report. If you have these tools you should be able to see if any of your pages have changed. Be wary of people who consistently re-submit your pages, since re-submission can sometimes cause your pages to be dropped if they are already listed in the database.

My own experience with a very large website I did search engine marketing for, showed that the older (longer) the pages were in the search engine results, the better for link popularity and ranking. Of course, paid inclusion can give you more security in having your web pages stabilized in the search engine results.

A good maintenance plan will include providing a ranking report, tweaking keywords in your source code as needed for a monthly/six month/yearly fee and may also include log stats so you can see where your traffic is coming from and what keywords your visitors are using to visit your website.

Bottom Line: Stay Honest
Stay honest, create good content and do your homework when hiring for services. Using affordable search engine marketing services you will add to your audience exposure on the web. In this way you will always be ahead of the game and hopefully, ahead of your competitors.

Getting Honest With The Search Engines - Part I

Feature article by Daria Goetsch
SearchInnovation.com

I spend a lot of time reading newsletters and forum postings about search engine marketing. More often than not, people are asking about methods used to improve search engine rankings: what works, what doesn't, and what will get you in trouble.

Search Engine*:
A program that searches documents for specified keywords and returns a list of the documents where the keywords were found.

Algorithm*:
A formula or set of steps for solving a particular problem.

Frankly, no one can predict what will happen from day to day with the search engines. Only the search engine companies themselves know if the algorithms will change from one day to the next. Even the search engine rules change from month to month, sometimes daily. Think of the changes that have happened since pay for inclusion and pay-per-click have taken over the market for search engine results.

It seems so simple to try and comply with the search engine rules. Even though optimization adds to the basic content of a site and source code, there are ways to approach this without stepping over the line.

We personally do not use the methods mentioned below (methods to avoid, methods to be wary of) in order to play it the absolute safest way, using a long term plan in providing you optimum ranking in the search engines.

SEO Methods to avoid

* Keyword stuffing. "Stuffing" keywords into places where keywords don't belong, such as comment tags, image ALT tags where the keywords have nothing to do with the specific image

* Invisible text. Text color the same as background color

* Automated submissions. Using automated tools to deliver huge numbers of pages to submission pages of search engines

* Submissions to "thousands" of search engines. A waste of time, since the major search engines/directories drive the majority of the traffic to websites

* FFA (free for all) links. Link popularity is good, but only when the links are relevant; a link from a page of random links is not worth nearly as much as a link from a site that is relevant to your site

* Search engine marketing companies hosting your pages on their server. The marketing company "owns" your pages, and if you decide you want to move them, you may have a hard time wresting them away. (This is not always the case with marketing companies that also provide hosting, but you need to carefully choose when using this option.)

Methods to be wary of:

* Cloaking
* Doorway pages
* Maintenance programs

Cloaking*:
Also known as stealth, a technique used by some Web sites to deliver one page to a search engine for indexing while serving an entirely different page to everyone else.

Cloaking is very difficult to do correctly, if you do not have an expert providing this service you could well be banned by the search engines. There are ways for this to be done that are accepted by some search engines. In general, cloaking is not always accepted by the search engine rules and can be a gamble unless you are certain your service provider knows what they are doing. Check credentials and get referrals from people who have used their services.

Doorway page**:
A page made specifically to rank well in search engines for particular keywords, serving as an entry point through which visitors pass to the main content.

Doorway pages are not accepted as they used to be by the search engines. A carefully crafted doorway page done by hand is entirely different from an automated doorway page generated by software. A few well-designed pages are a far cry from mass generated automated pages sent in large numbers through the search engine submission page, which are often considered as spam. Again, check credentials and get referrals from people who have used their services.

: Creative Methods for Adding Text Content to Your Website

Feature article by Alex Bennert, Beyond Ink

There are two strategies you can use to develop content for your site. One is to create your own and the other is to acquire content.

If you were to open a store on Main St, the necessary ingredients for success are clearly established. It’s been said that if you build a better mousetrap the world will beat a path to your door. But when your door is a file on a server, it takes more than a road sign to direct traffic. What it takes, in a word is… words.

In regards to website traffic, always be aware that the words on your site are sifted through increasingly sophisticated software programs. These programs send out an army of virtual site reviewers, known as “spiders”. Words are the food those spider bots love to gobble. It is impossible to over estimate the importance of relevant textual content in getting highly ranked. Without words, you cannot achieve rankings.

So how do you develop your own word-based site content? The most important thing to remember is that the words must be relevant to your site. It’s not so hard really, just a mental exercise. A little creativity can yield a lot of good words.

Strategy 1: Creating Your Own Content

Exercise a: Write an FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) page.

This one is easy. Review the questions you get from your site visitors over and over. What are the same things they are asking you about in 90% of the emails you receive? Do yourself, your customers, and your site a favor. Make a list, and answer each question. And use this opportunity to provide descriptive responses peppered with your key phrases. Let’s say you often receive emails asking how long it takes for your special ordered doorknockers to ship. One question in your FAQ might read:

Q: How long does it take for your custom doorknockers to ship?

A: Our personalized, engraved doorknockers ship within 3 weeks of order.

Make the page look good… neat, orderly, and professional. Go ahead and add a few of your product photos in a column along the text.

Exercise b: Getting into the psyche of your site’s visitors

Take a little time to think about your customer’s related needs. The best way to illustrate this strategy is with an example. Let’s say you’re an independent realtor. If your site visitors are looking for available houses and prices in your area, they might also want be interested in a layman’s breakdown of the various neighborhoods, suburbs or towns in the area. How close are they to the highway and downtown? What are the local public schools like? On another page, you could discuss how to price your home for sale, as well as tips on selling a home quickly. Even a simple glossary of real estate terms provides not only relevant, useful information, but also food for those hungry, hungry spiders.

Strategy 2: Acquiring Your Content

Exercise a: Pillage your wholesalers

If you have a product-based site, your suppliers can be a terrific source of content. One e-tailer who sold hand woven rugs received permission reprint promotional material provided by the rug maker on the details of weaving and hooking the rugs. This content was beautiful written by a professional copywriter and was naturally loaded with pertinent keywords. Additionally, it was supplied in digital format so adding to the site was a snap. A few product photos were placed along side the content, and it didn’t take long before the site was ranking highly for handmade rugs, hand woven rugs braided rugs, rag rugs, and hooked rugs.

Exercise b: Lazy SEO method for adding more words to your site

The reason this is a great “secret” is because everyone wins. And that’s my favorite method of doing business. Bear in mind, authorities and experts in a given field are often seeking collateral exposure, which you can provide them. The exercise is to find an article published online that contains content related to your industry and ask for permission to “reprint” it on your site. The trick is to identify complimentary, not competing materials. And it’s out there.

Let’s go back to the realtor example. There are numerous associated trades that go hand in hand with selling homes (i.e. home appraisals, financing, etc.). So get on the web and do your homework. Find a really good article that has something useful to say about the associated subject. If you are a regionally based business, it would be even better if you can find something from the site of another local business. When you find it, send a gracious email requesting permission to reprint their article on your site. Mention how helpful and informative their article is and how valuable it will be to your site’s visitors. Naturally you will give appropriate credit to the author as well as a link back to their site. This provides them with additional credibility and exposure, as well as a nice reciprocal link. So… what if they ignore your request, or even say no? Just keep looking. The beauty of this process is that the information is readily available. Trust me, it won’t take long before someone says yes. And voila… you have content. Juicy, relevant, wordy content. And all you had to do was a little surfing and a little sweet-talking.

< style="font-family: arial;">Creating or finding content for your site is not rocket science. Think about it. Every product or service solves a problem for the consumer. Identify that problem, and in theory, you’re an expert on it. So, write about what you know, or find related content that someone else has already written. Just get those words on your site. By doing your homework, providing pertinent content, and supplying your customers with a wealth of resources, you are building not only business, but also relationships. And there’s only one word for that – success!

What is Internet Marketing?

A couple of definitions to help you understand what Internet Marketing is :

• Strategies and techniques applied on the Internet to support the organization's overall online marketing objectives. Goals may include driving targeted traffic to a Website and features on the Website to create a desired call to action. Internet marketing may include keyword and meta tag strategies, newsgroup and mailing list postings, banner advertising, reciprocal links, online promotions, content positioning, online image development, email strategies and other interactive features.

• The use of the Internet to advertise and sell merchandise or services. This involves use of Web sites and e-mail to inform customers about a product, solicit their questions, and accept their orders directly through the electronic medium.

What is Search Engine Optimization?

Here are a few definitions to give you a better understanding :

• A form of online marketing, search engine optimization (or search engine marketing) is the process of making a site and its content highly relevant for both search engines and searchers. Successful search marketing helps a site gain top positioning for relevant words and phrases.
  
  
• Search Engine Optimisation. The art of optimising a website so that it appears near the top of search engine search results.
  
  
• Acronym for “search engine optimisation”. Search engine optimisation is a process of crafting a site's content so that the site gets high rankings in the various search engines (both the site and individual pages), and includes tailoring on-page text (such as headlines and subtitles) as well as choosing the proper keywords for a page's meta tags.