Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Blog

Some of you might be considering to spend $299/year so that your site is reviewed and listed in Yahoo! Directory. But is will it be really worth it?

Nonetheless, lets look at the pros and cons
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In the early days of search engine optimization all you had to do was put keywords in the right places on your web pages and sit back, safe in the knowledge that your page or site would appear high up in the search engines and that thousands of visitors were sure to follow. The keywords had to appear in the title tag, the H1 tag and H2 tag, the description tag, and also had to be scattered liberally throughout the body text. Then there were various html techniques like the table trick to satisfy people who wanted a menu down the left side but also satisfied the search engines which preferred the text near the top of the file. There were other simple procedures that most people knew about. The on-page optimization was the easy bit.

Those good old days ended around late 2004 or early 2005, depending on whose account of things you read in the webmaster forums.

Ever since then the search engines, notably Google, have tried to figure out how relevance can be evaluated more accurately, and with a greater emphasis on putting those websites that appear to have more authority nearer the top of the search engine results pages. The battle for off-page optimization had begun.
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I am sure most of you wanted to covertly or secretly wanted to break/bend the rules a bit here and there to make a lot of money. I am also very sure that most of you wanted to hop on the other side of the fence knowing that it might be wrong to do, just to see how much real money can be made. Well, lucky for you (and me ) I've found the prefect solution to making Money from Google AdSense.
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If you are wondering which is the best way or even how you reach number one or the top ten in the search engines, then this is the article for you.

In my opinion it is not rocket science. As long as you have a well designed and optimized website the most important thing you need is backward links and lots of them. These links should have different link texts which even though different will always include your keyword. For example if the keyword is stuttering the link text could be, stuttering therapy, stuttering information, stuttering treatment, stuttering help or stuttering advice.
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Submitting to Online Directories

If you are reading this article, more likely than not you own a website that you would like to see be a success. To achieve that level, you need traffic to your site. But where does traffic come from?

One of the better ways to get traffic for your site is to submit your site to the many directoriesthat exist online. Online directories are similar to your phone book yellow pages: These directories are categorized (education, entertainment, health, etc.), and when you submit your website, you suggest a category for your website. Often, you will even be able to submit to a sub-category within a major category. For example, suppose your website is about aromatherapy.

In your submission request, you would suggest "Health" as your main category, "Alternative Medicine" as your sub-category, and "Aromatherapy" as a further sub-category.

Some of the leading online directories are Yahoo!, MSN Small Business, and the DMOZ directory. Unlike search engines, however, listings in online directories are usually not free. As of this writing, you can submit for free to the Yahoo! Directory (http://dir.yahoo.com), but there is not guarantee on how quickly your website will be reviewed for listing. If you need your site reviewed faster, you can pay Yahoo! $299 US for "expedited" service and they will review your site within seven days. However, this fee is a yearly recurring fee. Your website is subject to a yearly review, and is guaranteed neither initial inclusion or to remain listed year after year.
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I'm sure many of you have spent time making dummy sites with the sole intention of having those sites link to your main site. For example, you may have a forum on Snowboarding, and in order to drive traffic to your main site, you create 60 sites about specific snowboarding niches, such "Colorado Snowboarding" or "Advanced Snowboarding Techniques" Each site links to 20 of the other sites, while the main navigation links on each site all point towards your main site. If the strategy is executed correctly, you now have 60 portals driving traffic to your site. If you're main site already has PR, linking back to a handful of those sites is a good way to start passing the PR down the chain. (more…)

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This technique is not exactly new for link building, and many of you may already know it, however it is a technique that easily falls in to the grey hat area. Essentially this technique revolves around finding places to post your link that either has PageRank, is on an .EDU, or .GOV domain, or both.

Now there is some debate on whether or not EDU and/or GOV backlinks carry any additional weight over ordinary links, but the reality is that a backlink is a backlink. If there's a chance that it may help your ratings, even in a 2nd tier search engine like MS Live, then why not try it? PageRank links on the other hand are unquestionably valuable, so let's explore these methods.

The first criteria we are looking for is a site that will allow us to post a link. That narrows our search down to forums, guestbooks, comment fields, etc. Now, in my opinion if we were to simply spam our URL on these sites, it would be black hat. (more…)

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Do They Have Quality Inbound Links?
You can tell a lot about a web site by the other sites that link to it. Typically, good sites are registered in some of the top directories like DMOZ or the Yahoo! Directory and have links from other good sites in their same industry.

You can do a 'linkdomain:' search on Yahoo! to view some of their best backlinks.

If they have been exchanging links with Viagra, casino, or other high-margin, off topic, cheesy web sites, then they are probably not a legitimate resource and are not a link source worth pursuing.

Does Their Site Offer Quality Content?
If search engines did not exist (more…)

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Not every link you request requires giving a link back. Sometimes it is cheaper and more efficient to just to go target higher quality links. Sometimes you can just request a link and get it by being personal and empathetic. Other times links may require payment.

Be Personal
The best way to go about acquiring links is to be as personal about it as you can. Look around their web site and try to find personal information. The more you find, the better you are.

When e-mailing them, try to submit it to the person who runs the site, not a general info submission. If you can state where your link should go on their site and how it would improve their user experience, you stand a good chance of getting a link.

Off-topic, somewhat personal statements showing you share similar interests may make you seem more human and more connected with them and will make it easier to get links. For instance, if you found out that I like peanut butter, somehow mentioning that or joking about it in the e-mail will make me far more likely to link to your site.
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