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Google Adwords Top Tips - Part 2

10 2007 Monday

By Dave McEvoy in Google

Welcome to part 2 of this 5 part series on Google Adwords.Google AdWords is one of the best advertising tools on the Internet, but only if you know how to implement Adwords properly to achieve maximum potential. So here are the next ten tips to ensure that you get the best possible results from using Google Adwords.

1. Organise your campaigns by topic

You don’t want to have your health supplements in with your running shoes now do you? Each campaign should be for a unique topic. If you sell one type of product then keep to one campaign unless there is a good reason to do otherwise. It will be easier to manage this way.

2. Target the right languages and locations

I see this mistake over and over again. You run an ad that is selling blue widgets and you want to target the ad to the folks in Kentucky, then what happens? Because you have your settings wrong, Mr Wong goes onto Google China and sees your ad for Blue widgets.

You have targeted the wrong country, and the wrong language!

3. Make sure your Ad Groups are highly specific

As with your campaigns, each and every ad group should be aimed at a unique product or service. Example: Campaign 1 - Omega 3 Supplements Ad Groups - FISH OIL - all keywords relating to fish oil EPA - all keywords relating to EPA (the most important ingredient of fish oil) OMEGA 3 - All keywords relating to Omega-3 MIXED - Mixed terms relating to all above If you are very serious about maximising your profits and really giving AdWords good shot, you will need to do this for every product or service that you are advertising. Keep it organised, clean and laser targeted!

4. Optimise all of your Ad including your URL

Let’s say for example you were selling golf clubs. Think about which URL looks better: www.sportsshop.com/asp.369£0-/lop0-9823309877654/4/a/098665 or SportsShop.com/GolfClubs

You also need to remember that the ad copy is what is going to make people click through, so make sure it is keyword rich and appealing In a display URL on AdWords, the domain name (www.sportsshop.com) must exist, but the extension (/golfclubs) does not need to exist, so use it as another opportunity to state your keywords and tell your users that you have a whole section on this topic.

5. Avoid your home page as your landing page

The landing page is the page that the person who clicked on your ad will see when they come through to your site. Don’t use your homepage as your landing page unless it deals only with selling the product you’re advertising. For instance, if you’re selling posters, have a landing page for ‘flower’ posters and a landing page for ‘car’. You can even go one better and have a landing page for each poster - so you’ll have a page for ’sunflower posters’ and ‘bmw 5 series posters’.

Land people in the relevant place.

6. Track conversions

This could actually be the biggest key to helping you increase your AdWord profits, if you don’t know which words are turning into conversions then you are on a loser right from the word go! Just because an ad has a high CTR doesn’t mean that it is making you money! How would you know if you are not tracking it? You can use Google’s own conversion tracking codes, or you can use your own software. Use Googles as it will be easier! You need to know which keywords are performing so you can put more money there and switch off words that are not getting you conversions and are wasting your money.

7. Work out your cost per sale

Why is this important? If it is costing you $20 to gain a sale and the profit on that sale is only $15, then you are losing money! Tracking your cost per sale is easy if you have the Google tracking code inserted on your site as Google work this out for you and display the result in the cost/conversion box on your account.

8. Don’t enter into bidding wars

It is easy to get into bidding wars with your competitors. You want to be number one and so does your competitor. The best thing to do is to take a step back, ten deep breaths and consider how important it really is to be in the number one spot. If you can justify it, fine but otherwise: let your competitor be number one, sit in the number two slot and wait. If you have a better product, your click-through rate will get you to the top - and you’ll still be paying the same as you were in the second position.

More and more people are using automated bidding software. This software will update at a set interval to keep the ad in the desired position. Doing battle with this kind of software is even more frustrating and less rewarding than trying to outbid a competitor. Bidding software that targets a certain position can waste a lot of money. You can be cleverer than that by working out your ROI and therefore your optimum bid price.

9. Use GeoTargeting for local campaigns

If you are running an Ad Campaign targeting certain geographical areas for example ‘golf course repairs in Florida’, make sure you use the GeoTargeting option. This will save you a lot of money on useless clicks and help speed your progress toward successful conversions and, ultimately, sales.

10. Double-up when GeoTargeting

When running GeoTargeting, always mirror the campaign with a non-GeoTargeted equivalent with place names in the keywords. For example, for a Manchester-based IT company, run ‘IT Company’ as a keyword in a campaign targeted to Manchester, and run a country-wide campaign including the keyword ‘IT Company Manchester’.

More Google Adwords Top Tips coming up in Part 3

Author: Dave McEvoy is an Adwords expert with years of experience in ppc management. For more information please come and visit our site.

Google Adwords Top Tips - Part 1

10 2007 Friday

By Dave McEvoy in Google

Welcome to part 1 of this 5 part series on Google Adwords.Google AdWords is one of the best advertising tools on the Internet, but only if you know how to implement Adwords properly to achieve maximum potential. So what exactly should you be doing to ensure that you get the best possible results from Adwords?

We have put together the following tips to help you get those all important click throughs and conversion rates.

1. Use targeted keywords

Never go with the full list of keywords that Google suggests. Pick the keywords that closely match your business. What would people search if looking for your products. Time and time again we see unrelated keywords in campaigns that companies run. For example, if you sell real estate in Florida, don’t buy the keywords ‘Florida’ or ‘real estate’, buy ‘Florida real estate’. Simple, effective, and won’t waste your money. Keywords really are the central hub of your success on AdWords. Take your time, and read every tip below that has anything to do with keywords before you start.

2. Search for the keywords that you are buying

Type the keywords into Google. See if your competitors are showing. If the page that shows is unrelated to your business then probably it is not a good search for you.

3. Get some keyword clues from your competitors

Companies that know what they are doing in the area of search will have their page titles loaded with their best keywords. Have a look at the good performers in your market. See what keywords they are using in the page titles (the text that appears in the top bar of the browser window). If you are familiar with viewing the source of a page, you can see the keywords they have placed in their ‘keywords’ META tag.

4. Use lots of keywords

Think of as many ways of saying your product or service as you can. This will enable you to buy more specific keywords. It is much better to buy a specific keyword such as ‘buy Reebok running shoes’, than expect to catch this search on a broad match of ‘running shoes’.

5. Use keyword research tools

Google’s tool is good in that it suggests similar searches. Google’s tool is available as you set up your AdWords account. You type in a search and the tool will return similar searches. Some of these will be irrelevant so be careful.

Yahoo has a tool that allows you to type in your root term and it shows searches that include this term. It also gives exact search volumes on Yahoo for the previous month for that term. It is an excellent tool when looking for negative keywords

6. Use Global Negatives

If you’re selling something, you don’t want people finding your ad when they’re searching for free stuff. This sounds obvious, but do some searches and you’ll see it happening. Use the word ‘free’ in your campaign global negatives. Add any words you don’t want your ad associated with to this list. Using negative keywords is especially important if you’re using broad matching.

7. Create lots of ad groups

An ad group should contain a small number of keywords (10-40) that are targeted around a certain theme. These keywords will all show the same ad. Ad groups should be created for dominant search terms, different product groups, often individual products if they are well searched. The choosing of ad groups and grouping of the keywords is a difficult area so be prepared to restructure your campaign after a couple of months because your first attempt was not good.

8. Test different positions

How much of a difference will being in the first position, as opposed to the second, third or sixth position make, for your net profit? The answer is that it depends on your creative, industry and who else is bidding on your keywords. Test your creative in each position and work out where it will be most effective, from an ROI point of view. Remember also that the AdWords ranking algorithm works on a bid price x CTR (click through rate) basis (it’s actually more complicated than that, but this gives an idea as to why out of two ads with similar bids, one will be higher because of a higher CTR).

9. Test different creatives

You can also test your creatives (the ad text). Write two or three different ads and Google will rotate them in this ad group. The creative that gives you the highest ROI is the one you should go with. You need to give the test long enough to produce statistically significant results. How long this is depends on the search volume and the number of conversions you achieve. Use common sense as to when you think the results show that one ad is better than the others unless you know your stats.

10. Rotate ads evenly

In your campaign settings one of the options is to rotate ads evenly or to have Google optimize for you and show better performing ads more frequently. The default setting is for Google to optimize. Change it! Google optimizes based on clicks, not conversions. In other words, it shows the ad that brings Google the most money, not you. Many times we see ads that have lower click through rates getting a better ROI because they appeal to buyers, whereas other ads with higher click through rates appeal to the masses.

Look out for more top tips to improve all the important features and get the maximum profit from Adwords in Google Adwords Top Tips Part 2
Author: Dave McEvoy is an Adwords expert with years of experience in ppc management. For more information please come and visit our site.

AdSense Farming Reaps Daily Profits

10 2007 Thursday

By Michael Small in Google

You keep hearing about all these people making a fortune on AdSense. But have you ever met one of them? Same here; never.

I’ve bought ebooks promising overnight success, but never made the big bucks. Then I realized that making money from AdSense is a lot like farming. Some crops (keywords) yield a higher price than others and the more fields you have planted, the better your chances.

Of course, your “field” is a website that can be had for next to nothing so even small profits are pretty much all profit. Btw – I’m not making a fortune but I make an average of $3.50 per day; about $105 a month, per site.

I’ll show you exactly how I did it, step-by-step.

First, if you don’t already have one, sign up for a free Adsense account at http://www.google.com/adsense. But do NOT get your ad code yet. I have some tips that can triple your response rates - and income.

Second, if you want killer free information about your visitors and some really nice metrics information, get your free Google Analytics account at http://www.google.com/analytics/.

Third, sign up with http://www.WhyParkWeb.com or a similar service. Just be sure to pick one that can create content rich, search engine optimized sites for you automatically. That’s how you make your AdSense money. When I registered for this service it was $99 and would let you have 100 automatically created websites – forever, with no additional fees.

Now here are some tips from a 9 year veteran search engine optimization specialist that will put your sites over the top! Let’s do this by the numbers…

#1 Find the best keywords

Google gets more searches than any other search engine so let’s peek into their database. Check out https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal and type in any keyword or phrase you can think of that you think your target audience is looking for.

Try to use specific keyword phrases whenever possible. If you have a web-page that deals with floral delivery, instead of “flowers”, which has 233,000,000 competing pages on Google, try “send flowers”, which has 1/10th the number of competing pages. Better yet, think like people speak (I.E./ I’m sending flowers to my mom.) As it turns out, a lot more people are searching for “sending flowers” than are searching “send flowers” and – here’s the best part – “sending flowers” has less than 1% of the competing web-pages as the search term we started with, “flowers”. Now that’s impressive! You have an advantage over about 99.5% of your competitors with just this tip.

#2 Write a killer title Google loves

Take your most important specific and general keyword phrases and put them together, specific first; general second. Let’s use “sending flowers” and “flowers”. Now separate the keywords or phrases by a pipe (that vertical key over the Enter/Return key). We now have “sending flowers | flowers”. Now go back and grab one or two more relevant keywords like “wedding flowers” and “Mothers Day” and combine them like this “sending flowers | flowers for weddings, Mothers Day and more”.

Now you’ve covered all your bases and build a fantastic keyword rich title that won’t look like keyword spamming. You can also change the Mothers Day to Valentines Day, Easter, as needed.

#3 Write a META description that gets you noticed

This is important. Not only can this tip alone get you ahead of most competitors, but it’s also what readers see of your site before they decide to visit. You need to write something for people, but that search engines will like. Don’t worry. It’s a lot easier than it sounds.

Take all of your keywords and line them up in order of importance. Since “sending flowers” gets more searches than any other, let’s start there and use the same logic for the rest. Now we have, in order, “sending flowers”, “flowers”, “wedding flowers”, and “Mothers Day.” Now improve your keyword prominence (relevance based on position) by using your best keyword in the beginning of the description: “Sending flowers has never been easier. Here you will find inside tips on the least expensive ways to send the freshest wedding flowers, Mothers Day arrangements or whatever else you need.”

We used all of our keywords without overloading the text and broke it up a little by adding some detail. It works great! Just try to keep the description at or under 250 characters (including spaces).

#4 Add great content

Why Park does 99.9% of the work for you. All you have to do is enter your keywords into the article finder provided by the “Research Your Keywords” link (located beside the keywords box.)

Without using any imagination at all, I found 172 articles in a few seconds…

sending flowers - 5 flowers - 151 wedding flowers - 16

Total Articles: 172

Add “roses” and get another 59! That’s 231 articles in 10 seconds. You get the idea - more general related keywords can take you over the top and give you a huge, content-rich search engine friendly site, in seconds!

#5 Use the best-pulling AdSense ad style and color combination

My click-through rate (CTR) tripled when I switched to this format.

Select ad size 336 x 280. If that’s too big, try 300 x 250. And try to make your ad border and ad background colors the same as your Website’s background color. It helps it blend in and take away some of the “advertisement” feel. It’s also usually best to go with the standard blue hyperlink color for the actual links.

#6 Get submitted to major search engines fast and free

I use this place all the time. They submit your site to 40 search engines instantly, for free http://www.submitexpress.com/.

You’re ready!

You can do this - Good luck!

Author: Former Information Technology manager for Harvard University, Michael Small is the author of several well-known search engine optimization books including the SEO Answer Book – http://www.SeoAnswerBook.net

How To Use SEO Or Search Engine Optimization For High Google Listings

10 2007 Wednesday

By Peter Nisbet in Google

If you know how to use SEO to get a high listing in search engines, or are an expert in search engine optimization for high Google listings, then you need read no more of this article. Your website obviously has at least one page in the top 10 of Google, MSN and Yahoo, and you have as much traffic as you need for your success.

However, if not, then you need some advice. You need to understand the basics of search engine optimization. Incidentally, what the basics are to you may not be basics to others. Basics to some are the correct use of LSI (latent semantic indexing), of internal linking strategies and of other techniques designed to lead search engine spiders by the hand and convince them that their site is the tops. Can you do that?

If not, then here are one or two tips. Good SEO is a lot more than just having your page title in title tags and your heading in H1 tags. It is more that just having the correct keyword density – do you know what that is? The vast majority of people don’t have the slightest clue about keyword density or what it means. Formulae said to relate to keyword density and the number of words in the key phrase as a function of the number of times the phrase should appear in a web page are mediaeval in internet time.

Do you know what? Google doesn’t give a toss about your calculations. Google cares about the service you are providing to Google customers and how relevant the content of your web page is to their needs. To find that out, Google applies a statistical mathematical equation based on statistical analysis of semantics as related to the specific keyword being used by the searcher, and the semantic content of your web page.

Google doesn’t care if you have exactly 15 incidences of your keyword every 500 words – in fact if you do, you have no chance because that is now excessive. Keyword stuffing or keyword spamming they call it! Yet people still write articles packed full of keywords in the mistaken belief that it will be good for them. Who is still telling them that?

So let’s forget keyword density. It’s old SEO and no longer relates to Google’s needs. Internal linking: now there’s a new thing to most people, even though it has been relevant for the past few years. By intelligent use of internal linking you can lead your friendly neighborhood spider down any web you can weave for it. And you will benefit greatly by doing so, if you know where you should be leading it.

Internal linking strategy is a different concept entirely to an external lining strategy involving one way or two way reciprocal links back to your web page from that of another website. Most people are involved in that, but also most don’t know how to do it properly, and therefore lose out. Let me give you a simple example.

You have a website with a page rank of 4 for your home page. Note that it is not your whole site that gets a Google PageRank, as it is properly written, but each individual page in your site is individually ranked. When you come across a website with a PR of 4 or even 8, it is the page you are looking at that has that PageRank. That will generally be the home page, and when you agree to a reciprocal link, guess what! Your link will be placed on a ‘links page’ in that site with a PR of zero. That’s right, a Google PageRank of zilch: and that’s the benefit you will get. Zilch!

If you place their link on your home page, or any other page with a PR of greater than zero, you lose out. Even if your page has a Google PageRank of only 1, THEN YOU LOSE OUT!! They get a share of your PR of 1, and you get a share of their PR of zero!

Stick that in your pipe and smoke it, and then tell me I don’t know what I am talking about as many have. Some of these many are so-called internet gurus and SEO experts that fleece you by promising you a Google Page 1 position for your site, when they can’t even get one for themselves.

If a site offers you a top 10 position, check out their position by using their URL. If they were so good, wouldn’t they be in the top 10 for their URL? I would have though so! But NO.

So, do what you can to understand what Search Engine Optimization is. What it really is – not what some would want you to believe what it is. Check out the source code of successful sites and compare it to the unsuccessful sites and try to spot differences. If you cannot, then it is the linking strategies that make the difference. Whatever strategy you use, however, make sure that you fully understand it and that you are using it as it should be used. There are links and links – some better than others. Some can give you positive results, and some of your links can be very bad for you.

Do you know how to tell the difference? Most can’t, and so are led by what they read online. The problem is that since ‘most can’t’, most of what is written online is garbage. It is difficult to spot the truth from the opinion. It is truth that gets you a good Google or Yahoo listing, not opinion. The problem is that more people believe opinion than truth since they don’t know what truth is, and most of what they read is false opinion.

The best advice you can have is to check out the websites that have succeeded and copy what they do. However, that is not as easy as you think since the off-site linking strategy that you cannot see is as important as the on-site SEO that you can see.

Author: If you want screenshots of a website that succeeds, then check out Pete’s site Article Services that varies from #1 and #4 on Google for the keyword ‘article services’, and then find the screenshots and explanation of how he does it on Improved Search Engine Rank. That is how to learn: from successful sites.

Reaching The Top of Page One In Google In As Little As One Week

10 2007 Saturday

By Clinton Douglas in Google

When you have the right information, climbing to the top of Google in a very short period of time is entirely within your reach. I am living proof. Two weeks ago, I launched my new website, and now I have multiple listings on page one of the Google search results.

An Empirical Truth

Scientists make their way in the world relying upon empirical truths. For those who are unaware, an empirical truth can be defined as, “verifiable or provable by means of repeatable observation or experiment.”

In essence, if you can observe it once, then it is interesting. But, when you can repeat the experiment and achieve the same observations multiple times, then you have evidence of an empirical truth.

From my own observations, what I am about to tell you is an empirical truth, because I have observed it happen again and again.

The Challenge In Exposing The Truth

Anytime someone writes about how to influence placement in the search engines, the writer faces a difficult choice.

In order to light the path of those who come after the writer, the writer must provide some kind of proof as to how the methods work and what kinds of results the writer was able to achieve using the methods.

Introducing the quandary.

In order to believe my story, many people want to see my keywords so they can personally verify my story by reviewing the Google search results. Although you may not be competing directly with my website and the keywords on which I rank, one can almost guarantee that my competitors may stumble over my tutorial at some point in the future.

In other words, if I told you that I was trying to rank for the keyword “cock-a-doodle-doo”, then you (the reader) could validate my results. At the same time, my competitor might discover this article and decide to use my methods and my keywords to outrank my own website in the search engines.

This actually happened to one of my mentors. In a public discussion of these same methods, he had given a bone to the readers of the forum where he was participating in a discussion. Within eight weeks, two of his top competitors held the top two spots for his keyword phrase, and after a five-year run at number one in Google, he suddenly found himself sitting in the number three spot.

So, the question is how I tell my story in a way that will help you to also see the light, without giving away the light bulb…

Have A Little Faith In Those Who Are Looking Out For You

Some of you may choose to have faith in the story that I tell. Others will choose to deny my methods, on the principle that they cannot see my results for themselves.

All I ask is that you have a little faith in my story. Then run your own test. Your test will not require a major investment, but when you see your website climbing from nowhere to somewhere in the Google results, you will be glad that you took my story on a little bit of faith.

Some Background

One of my mentors, Bill Platt, has been telling me about these methods for years. But to be honest, the picture just was not clear in my brain, for longer than I would care to admit.

Now and again, I would read something by one of the Internet gurus, and they would tell that they used these methods themselves. When the really rich people on the Internet tell you something about how to perform well on the Internet, it has always been my position that you should listen. I listened; well, I mostly listened anyway.

I hooked up with Bill shortly after having been told the importance of article marketing. Bill seemed to have the answers concerning the article-marketing model, having been in the business himself for a number of years, through his website (http://www.thephantomwriters.com).

Bill always told me that writing articles was about generating traffic and sales from the placement of my articles in ezines. He had also told me that if I played the game right, I could even benefit the rankings of my website in the search engines.

I started using Bill’s article distribution service to put my articles into circulation.

Bill had also advised that his client’s, who get the greatest benefit from article marketing, use multiple systems to distribute their articles. He advised that Willie Crawford (http://www.gitofftheporch.com) was one of the Internet guru’s who used more than one distribution service to put his articles into the wild.

Bill said that using more than one service was a good thing, because most article distribution services have their own unique reach, enabling the writer to get published in more ezines and on more websites. He emphasized that the goal should be to get as many people to your website as possible, using your articles as a method for introducing the reader to your website.

Beware Of Your Own Smartness

After using Bill’s article distribution services for a few months, I had the privilege of reading John Reese’s Traffic Secrets (http://www.trafficsecrets.com). John offered many useful tips for a successful online business, but one piece of advice he offered I implemented immediately.

John emphasized the importance of tracking our results. He said that in order to see what is successful, we must have a method in place to enable us to track where our traffic came from. Suddenly, I realized that although I knew that my website had been driving a lot of traffic, I had really no idea where that traffic was coming from or its cause.

Let me clarify that a bit. I knew that most of my traffic was coming from the large numbers of articles that I had distributed through Bill’s service and the service of one of his competitors (http://www.isnare.com). But, I did not know which articles were generating the bulk of my traffic.

So, I followed John’s advice and bought a software package designed to help me track my results (http://www.dynatracker.com). Then, I told Bill that from that day forward, we would need to use tracking URL’s with all of the articles I distributed through his service.

Bill agreed that tracking was important, but he suggested that there are better ways to track results than the one I was proposing. I listened to John, but I did not fully listen to Bill’s advice. Looking back, I kick myself daily for not listening to Bill in that one moment.

Tracking Your Article Results

Bill had always told me that using the Dyna Tracker was a good product for tracking my results, but it had an inherent problem. That problem is that I would be passing the search engine Link Value from my articles to my tracking software and not to the individual pages of my website.

If only I would have listened… I ran a full-year worth of articles with the Dyna Tracker links in my resource boxes. While Bill was telling me to dump the Dyna Tracker links, I was busy praising the value of the data I collected from the software.

One Test Blew My Mind

On one of my regular phone calls with Bill, I told him that I was launching a new website to complement what I was already doing. I asked Bill if he had any recommendations that he would give me on the new site.

Bill told me that I would not like his answer, but if I wanted to hear it, he would tell me.

I have to be honest, a knot formed in the pit of my stomach as I braced for his comments.

He told me that I should get back to basics. He told me that I already knew from experience that articles would help me to drive traffic to my website. I did know that. Bill recommended that I do two articles per week for twelve weeks. I have done that before, so I knew that I could get good results from that advice. He told me to use more than one article distribution service to put those articles in the wild. I followed that advice as well.

Then Bill got to the stomach punch. Bill told me to throw away my Dyna Tracker and provide direct URL links to my website. He also told me to keyword some of those links to my website, for the purpose of influencing my search placement for those keywords.

He told me to test the idea and to measure my results in just a few weeks. He told me if the methodology did not work for me, then I could start using my Dyna Tracker again.

He also suggested that I should use his Link Building system to develop 100 inbound links to my website, targeting the keywords that I felt would be important to my business. (http://www.linksandtraffic.com) I figured it was worth a try. Bill had never led me astray before, and I did not expect he was doing so then.

The Results

Within just a few weeks, I was getting a good amount of traffic to my new website. Strangely, I found that I was getting far more traffic from the search engines than I ever had before, yet the website was almost brand new! That just flew in the face of that sandbox theory we all hear about.

So, I started testing the keywords that Bill targeted in his linking job on my behalf. Wow. I found my brand new website sitting in the #12 spot in the Google search results on a two-word keyword that is actually pretty competitive. I also found the keywords we targeted in the campaign sitting in the #1, #1, and the #3 spot in the Google search results. I also found many page one results in the Yahoo search results as well.

Cock-a-doodle-doo! The light bulb went on, finally.

Then two weeks ago, I started another new campaign for my newest website. Within 24 hours of completing that website, I had distributed my first article promoting the website. Within 8 days of releasing that site to the public, I also had page one and page two listings for a wide range of keywords that I have so far targeted for my new website.

When In Rome, Do As The Romans Do

I mentioned three of my favorite teachers in this article: Bill Platt, Willy Crawford, and John Reese. I felt all three needed a mention, because all three have taught me things that have helped me to make money online. If you would like to learn from their expertise yourself, just Google their names.

The most important thing that I have learned since starting my website is that if I want to get rich online, I need to listen to those who are already making money online.

My hope is that you will listen to them too, so you can join us at the top.

Author: Clinton Douglas IV, teaches people how to work from home. Learn how to make thousands of dollars while keeping your day time job! Visit his site now; Learn the insider secrets to Building an Online Empire ==> Learn How to Make Money Fast

The SEO Keys That Unlock Google Success

10 2007 Tuesday

By Kevin Gibbs in Google

Using the Internet to its highest potential when it comes to indexing and promoting your website is vital to your business. No matter whether you provide a service or a product, getting the word out about it is your primary goal.

Google, being the world’s most popular search engine, is naturally going to be one of the places you want to submit your website URL to, and Google offers free submission opportunities. However, merely submitting your website isn’t the answer to instant rankings and visitors. It takes hard work, patience and search engine optimization know-how to achieve a top ranking with Google. The easier your website is to find by Google spiders, the more chance you’ll have of reaching better positions in the Google ranking index.

Google is the most popular search engine in the world today, and earning a top ranking there is definitely a feather in anyone’s cap. Taking advantage of several different options will help you to obtain your goals. Determination is the key when it comes to achieving high rankings in Google, and it’s not an endeavor for the weak of heart.

One of the most important things a Webmaster or web business can do to enhance rankings is to write and distribute articles relating to your topic, service or product to article directories throughout the web. Embedding links to your article, called back links, will get your website noticed by Google spiders, but don’t overdo it. Try to limit your back links to one per article. Articles should be written well, grammatically correct and include keywords or keyword phrases that relate to your product or service. (These keywords should also be listed in the Meta Tags used to design your website as well).

When writing SEO Google content, keep in mind the following factors for success, not only in obtaining ranking with Google, but with the success of your content in its ability to do what you have designed it to do; inform and get people back to your site. When searching through Google’s ranked pages, certain factors become immediately apparent. The most successful written content has these things in common:

Content is comprised of paragraphs that are fairly brief, with between 3 to 5 sentences each. White space around paragraphs and content allows for easy reading and addresses short attention spans when it comes to reading on the Internet.
Proper grammar and spelling is used in the content. As always, make sure that you proofread your work before submitting to article directories and banks. Make sure that use of punctuation, quotations, and sentence structure and flow are correct and proofed. If you are aware of your own shortcomings in the writing department, have someone else proof your material. Content that is poorly written is more damaging to your reputation and that of your website than no content at all.
Many articles submitted to Google, and other search engines, are written with bulleted lists, such as this. This serves to break up large areas of text as well as to provide precise information related to a specific topic.
Most highly ranked pages on the Internet are updated regularly, and by regularly, that means ideally about once a week, or at least twice a month.
Sentence structure is varied, which means that short and long sentences are mixed together.
Keyword density is over-rated these days, but using keywords in your content is desired.

However, don’t stuff articles with keywords when their usage doesn’t add flow to the text or is too obvious. Make sure that the keywords you are using make sense within the overall focus of your article.

Choosing the wrong keywords, or choosing highly used and common keywords or phrases won’t help you much, so it pays to be knowledgeable about how to go about determining how popular or unpopular particular keywords are before you even start writing. Keyword stuffing, or overusing certain keywords in any given article, will only defeat your purpose, as search engine spiders, especially those launched by Google, seem to know every trick out there.

Bottom line: have a professional look over your text before you launch your website. Be aware also that having someone write SEO content for you doesn’t mean they will do it correctly, either. Good SEO writing means more than focusing on keyword density, placement and catchy article titles. Good SEO content should contain useful, correctly structured sentences with proper grammar and spelling.

Google itself offers a terse explanation of how to get your website content highly ranked: Good content. It’s so simple that most people don’t believe it’s true. A website owner can sit down and research keywords, keyword density and Google algorithm factors until they’re blue in the face, and it won’t make a difference if the words don’t make sense or the spelling is so atrocious that visitors will take one look, laugh and click away.

Submitting articles to article directories and providing free articles, with your website back link in them, of course, is a great way to get noticed, but keep in mind that sometimes dozens of articles or more must be written and submitted before you’re going to get noticed. This doesn’t mean just writing about anything, it means carefully choosing and selecting appropriate keywords that will get your content noticed by search engine spiders and thereby bring you the results you’re looking for.

Website HTML coding and proper use of Meta tags is essential in creating Google SEO results, and as with anything worth doing, takes time, patience and determination to learn. There are no easy shortcuts when it comes to creating SEO content that will fly with Google and gain you a coveted page ranking.

Take advantage of the opportunity to submit your articles to free directory listings, especially at Google, as well as writing numerous, free articles for submission purposes as well as properly using back links will get you started on your way to success.

Utilizing Google tools and accessing their news, site directory, helpful hints and forum boards will help hopeful Webmasters achieve their goals when it comes to obtaining a long and enduring, and hopefully beneficial relationship with Google, whose influence reaches to the far corners of the globe.

Author: Kevin Gibbs is the founder of www.articlestamp.com (http://www.articlestamp.com/) a successful article directory that provides users the opportunity to improve their traffic performance. Contact Kevin at kevin@articlestamp.com for more info or questions on article writing.

How I Became #1 on Google and You Can Too!

10 2007 Monday

By Michael Small in Google

How great would it be to make your website #1 on Google? Trust me, it’s an amazing feeling that words really can’t describe. I can help you experience that feeling, if you have about 15 minutes.

As a search engine optimization (SEO) specialist, I’ve had the privilege of helping hundreds get to where they need to be on the world’s best search engines. Now I’d like to help you do the same by sharing the simple three-step process that I personally use to get my client’s site on top of Google, Yahoo and tons of others. It’s very simple to duplicate the process and results usually show sooner than most people expect. Anyway, here goes…

Step 1: How to Find the Best Keywords

Google gets more searches than any other search engine so let’s peek into their database, shall we? Check out https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal and type in any keyword or phrase you can think of that you believe your target audience is looking for. Not only will it give you tons of data on that and related keywords, it will also provide “Additional Keywords to Consider”, which is a section at the bottom of the page.

Here’s a tip worth knowing; Try to use specific keyword phrases whenever possible. Let’s say you have a web-page that deals with floral delivery. Instead of “flowers”, which has 233,000,000 competing pages on Google, try “send flowers”, which has 1/10th the number of competing pages. Better still, think like people speak (I.E./ I’m sending flowers to my mom.) As it turns out, a lot more people are searching for “sending flowers” than are searching “send flowers” and – here’s the best part – “sending flowers” has less than 1% of the competing web-pages as the search term we started with, “flowers”. Now that’s impressive! You have an advantage over about 99.5% of your competitors with just that single tip. Ready for more?

Step 2: How to Get Killer a Domain Name the Search Engines LOVE

If you already have a domain name with a hosted website, you can skip this part. However it’s worth a look if you don’t mind spending a few extra bucks and doubling your search engine real estate.

Most search engines will give you major bonus points if you have your main keyword or keyword phrase in your domain name. It’s even better if words in the phrase are each separated by a dash (-). Let’s try to find a good one for our main keyword phrase “sending flowers.”

If you go to http://www.DomainsBot.com and type in your keywords, you’ll get plenty of choices. I’ll cut to the chase and select “sending-flowers.biz.” A “.com” would have been better, but “.biz” is fine.

By the way, Google and a few other big search engines also consider when your domain name expires. The longer your domain name is “guaranteed” the better. I have found that a five year registration term, or longer, works great.

And don’t forget - If you setup this site and it ranks well, but you want your company’s name as the domain, you can always just redirect that domain name and point it to this site. That way, when people type in your business domain name it will go to the right place. It’s like getting two for one, which is always nice.

Step 3: How to Pick the Host with the Most

Where you host your Web site can make a huge difference. Choose your web hosting company very carefully. Here are some tips:

Avoid free hosting. Most search engines don’t think that serious sites (i.e. those worth top ranking) would be hosted on freebies.
Consider getting a private static IP address. Your hosting company should provide you with this number and you should be able to contact your site directly with it. Some of the major search engines don’t like ever-changing (dynamic) IP addresses because of problems they’ve had in the past.
Steer clear of companies that host banned Web sites, such as those owned by spammers. Search engines might penalize or even ban your web for being associated with such sites. Try to find a hosting company with a “family friendly” policy, like Godaddy.com.

Step 4: How to Get Great Links and Monitor Your Site

Having quality inbound links can account for more than 75% of you search engine optimization success. Getting these links is the crucial step that will get you over the top. Next you need to monitor your progress and your site’s status (how search engine really see it). This will tell you not just where you are – but where you are likely to be. In the old days, we used to do all link work and monitoring by hand – and it took a long time (I averaged about 16 hours per week – per site!) My advice to you is to find a good SEO tool and let it do the work for you. If you get the right product, it’s the best money you’ll ever spend.

I promised I’d show you how I have attained so many #1 placements on Google, Yahoo and more, so here are the two best products I’ve used, with my Top Pick on top:

#1 Pick: SEO Elite http://www.SeoEliteWeb.com (free trial offered) Cost = $167 (lifetime free upgrades and no annual fees) Results: 121 top 5 rankings on Google in three weeks – Mostly 1’s and 2’s. Top Features: Finds best link partners; Automates link process; Provides 100% Site Monitoring Comments: I bought it 2005 and have used every upgrade – never spending another dime. I retired my other three programs after using this for the first three months.

#2 Pick: WebPosition http://www.webposition.com (free trial offered) Cost = $149 SE or $389 Pro (plus $99 per year in subscription fees for either) Results: 44 top 5 rankings in Google in eight weeks – Mostly 3’s and 4’s. Top Features: 100% Site Monitoring; Great reporting; Site Critic Please Note: No automated linking capabilities. Comments: I purchased the professional version and found it most useful for reporting (but still did linking manually)

Step 5: How to get submitted to major search engines fast and free

I use the Submit Express free submission service all the time. It’s great. They’ll submit your site to 40 search engines instantly, at no cost - http://www.submitexpress.com/.

Now you’re ready! Just follow the steps and you can do this with no problem. I’ve been doing it for years and have helped hundreds do the same. Good luck!

Author: Former Information Technology manager for Harvard University, Michael Small is the founder of free search engine optimization site http://www.SEOpartner.com and author of several well-known search engine optimization books including the SEO Notebook – http://www.theSeoNotebook.com

10 Steps To Higher Rankings In Google

10 2007 Friday

By Titus Hoskins in Google

Most webmasters go totally “gaga” for top 10 rankings in Google. And for good reason, Google is the most dominant search engine on the net and will deliver the largest amount of traffic.

Even those webmasters who are fortunate enough to get No. 1 rankings for their keywords in all the three major search engines will tell you Google is the one that will deliver the majority of their traffic. Hands down.

More importantly, those same webmasters will also inform you, getting top 10 rankings in Google often means your site will prove profitable. Mainly because obtaining targeted traffic is usually your first obstacle in creating a viable online business. In other words, if you get top ten listings in Google for good searchable keywords, it is almost impossible not to earn money

How To Proceed?

First, you must know the rudimentary basics of how keywords work. Keywords and keyword phrases are the exact words someone types into a search engine to find what they’re looking for online. If you have a site on “dog training” then your goal is to get a top 10 ranking for the keywords “dog training”.

Now if no one searches for “dog training” it would be a useless keyword, you would get no traffic no matter how perfectly your site is optimized for that keyword.

How Do You Know If A Keyword Is Good?

To find out, you have to do some keyword research on your particular keywords. Many professional online marketers use keyword research software like Brad Callen’s Keyword Elite. However, you can also use the keyword suggestion tools supplied by Google Adwords or Overture. Try here: http://www.digitalpoint.com/tools/suggestion/

Now if you check “dog training”, you will find it receives around 4,469 searches each day. That’s a lot of traffic but you must realize that it may be too good, or rather too competitive for your purposes, especially if have a new site.

Biggest Mistake When Choosing Keywords

The most common mistake most novice webmasters make is targeting keywords which are too competitive. You simply will not be able to compete or place for extremely competitive keywords. Well established sites and businesses with very deep pockets have the resources to completely dominate those keywords.

While it is not entirely futile nor a waste of time to concentrate your efforts on highly competitive keywords, you will have better success if you target low to medium competitive keywords such as “dog obedience training” with 285 searches per day.

Long Tail Keyword Marketing

Besides online marketers have discovered that longer keyword phrases are usually the most lucrative. These phrases deliver traffic which is better targeted and more likely to convert into a sale. “Dog hunting training” which gets around 100 searches a day will be more targeted than the general term “dog training” and if you have a site devoted to training hunting dogs then this keyword phrase may convert better for you.

Always keep this “Long Tail” keyword strategy in the back of your mind as you implement the following steps to achieve your own Top 10 Rankings in Google.

1. Make A Master Keyword List

Your first step is to make a master list of the keywords you wish to target. Obviously these should be closely related to the theme of your site. As you can see from the example above, it is best to choose low to medium competitive keywords. Check the keyword competition by seeing how many sites are listed in Google for that keyword. Webmasters also check the Google PageRank of the sites that hold the top 10 positions. If all those sites are PR6 and above it may be hard to get ranked high for your keywords.

2. Choose Related Keywords

Once you have your master list of keywords, find long tail related keywords to target. Again, check out the competition and daily searches made for each chosen keyword.

3. Use Quality Content For Your Keywords

Creating quality content should always be your main goal. Write for actual visitors who will see and read your content. First and foremost you must have good useful content that your visitors will use themselves and recommend to their friends or colleagues. Tie this quality content in with your chosen keywords. Use one keyword phrase per page.

4. Use Keyword In Domain Name, Title and URLs

Having your keyword in your domain name will score big points from search engines. Plus, each page of content should contain your keywords in the title & meta tags for that page. Most experts also suggest you have your keyword in the URL and use hyphens to separate your keywords. Although the author has gotten good results by using an underscore and htm in URLs. Example: www.yoursite.com/your_keyword.htm

5. Do On Page Optimization

Keyword ratio is a much discussed topic by SEO experts and many suggest you should have your keyword in the H1 or headline title of your page. Sprinkle your keyword and variations of it throughout your page. Don’t over do it but make sure the robot/spiders will clearly discover what your page is about. Many webmasters make sure they include their main keyword in the first and last 25 words on their pages.

6. Use Traffic Modules

One technique that works extremely well in Google is clustering a closely related topic or subject into a distinct separate section on your site. For example, if you have a marketing site, you could create a whole section on article marketing where you would have 50 to 100 keyworded pages all relating to your subject. Writing articles, formatting articles, submitting articles, article software… place a keyword linked menu on each page to connect all your pages together.

Keep in mind, your main objective is to supply quality information to your visitors. One reason Google may favor this type of structure is because they want quality content returned in their SERPs.

7. Try Article Marketing

Article marketing is writing short informative articles on keyword topics related to your sites. You then submit these helpful keyworded articles to ezine directories on the web, when your articles are picked up by related sites you receive quality One-Way links. The higher the quality of your article, the more links you will receive.

Another ranking tactic to use, if you’re just starting out your site will probably have a low PR rank and you will find it hard to rank for even modest keywords. That’s why it’s useful to take advantage of the higher PageRank of the major ezine directories. Your keyworded articles on these high PR sites will get picked up by Google and displayed in the top 10 rankings. Now the displayed URL will be the article directory site but the links in the resource box will be pointing back to your site. Over time this article marketing technique will raise your own site’s rankings for those keywords. Simple but effective.

8. Anchor Text And One Way Links

Off page optimization is important in obtaining high rankings in Google. Getting quality One-Way links is very important. Anchor Text simply refers to “the underlined clicked on words” in your links. Most webmasters include their keywords in their anchor text as this tells the search engines exactly what the links are about.

9. Tags, Blogging And Web 2.0

Take advantage of Web 2.0 by using blogs, RSS feeds and the social bookmarking sites like Reddit and Digg. Try AddThis.com for a simple social bookmarking system. At the very least your site should have a blog and RSS feed attached to it as this is an effective way of boosting your keyword rankings.

Tags have become very important for getting higher rankings. Keep in mind, in free blogging software such as WordPress, categories will automatically be seen as tags. Blogger, which is owned by Google, now has a form where you put your keywords (tags) for each post you make.

10. PPC vs Organic Search

Of course, one of the fastest ways to get your links displayed on Google is to pay for them by using Google Adwords. Your ad and links will sit side by side with the organic link results. In Pay Per Click advertising you bid or pay so much per click for your keywords and you only pay when someone clicks your links. But smart marketers also know since you’re getting millions of impressions advertising your products, acquiring name recognition and branding through PPC advertising can be a major side-benefit.

However, most webmasters would say that organic links (SERPS) will return better traffic than paid links or advertising. In most cases, this may be true because Google’s organic rankings are becoming more respected and more trusted by users. They simply carry more weight with surfers.

This makes it even more beneficial to obtain top 10 rankings for your keywords in Google. Depending on the competitiveness of your chosen keywords reaching the first page listing or even the favored number one spot is well within any webmaster’s reach. Just go for it. The rewards are well worth your efforts.

Authfor: Titus Hoskins is a full-time online marketer who contributes his high rankings in Google as the major source of his online income. For the latest web marketing tools try: Internet Marketing Tools For the latest Internet Marketing Strategies go here: Internet Marketing Strategies http://www.bizwaremagic.com

Understanding The Google Adwords Program

10 2007 Tuesday

By Patrick Schwerdtfeger in Google

If you’re just starting out with internet marketing, you’re probably curious about the Sponsored Links listed on the right-hand sidebar as well as across the top of Google search results. In both cases, there are a series of ads listed and you can be among them if you’re willing for the placement. The program is called Adwords and Google remains the market leader with this type of online advertising.

It’s important to understand that Google isn’t the only company providing such advertising opportunities. Yahoo does the same thing and so do a variety of other search engines. These programs are referred to as pay-per-click advertising because the advertiser only incurs a charge when someone actually clicks on their advertisement. In other words, the advertiser only pays when someone has actually visited their website. In effect, you’re paying for visitors.

It’s also important to understand that the primary search results listed in the left center portion of the search results page are NOT paid for positions. Today’s search engines go through a lot of trouble ensuring the results they provide are the best possible resources given the search criteria entered by the user. Companies like Google use complicated algorithms to assess the value of different website pages and their search results reflect those assessments.

Having said all that, the ads listed in the Sponsored Links section are paid for and anyone can have their ad show up on the first page of a search result if they’re willing to pay enough for it. You see, the amount you pay is determined by an auction-style process where everyone looking to purchase a particular keyword bids on the price. If more people are looking for the same word you’re looking for, the price will be higher. If fewer people are looking for the same word you want, the price will be lower.

The interesting thing is that you don’t have to buy a single word. You can buy an entire phrase. And by doing so, you end up paying a lower price because there less competition for word phrases than for single words, and the people entering a word phrase as their search criteria are usually closer to a purchase decision anyways. If they’re entering multiple words, they obviously know exactly what they want and those are precisely the people you want. So by purchasing word phrases, you end up paying less for better leads.

The argument against buying word phrases is that you immediately eliminate a large percentage of the people who might enter the single word. It’s indeed true that someone purchasing a single word to activate their ad will get a lot more traffic than someone purchasing a word phrase. But again, the increased traffic will be less likely to buy anything and each click will cost you more.

The thing to do if you’re looking to get more traffic is to buy many different word phrases, each slightly different. Google even has a free keyword tool that will provide a long list of related searches for any individual phrase you enter. The tool will even tell you how often the different word phrases are entered by Google users as well as the competition for each phrase by other Adwords advertisers.

The world of pay-per-click advertising can be complicated at first. But once you understand how the system works, you can quickly and easily purchase a series of low-competition word phrases and get visitors to your website at a low cost. Go setup an account with Google Adwords. It’s free. Even if you never use it, your account will give you access to some great tools for processing better than all your competitors.

Author: Tactical Execution with Patrick Schwerdtfeger is a strategic company focused on growth marketing and program implementation across business markets.

10 Factors Google and Yahoo Consider For a Top Search Engine Ranking

09 2007 Friday

By Tim McGaffin in Google

Want to get into the top 5 of either Google or Yahoo? Make sure your website contains the top 10 factors for deciding a top search engine ranking.

It does not matter if you have the cure for cancer, if nobody knows about it you are not going to make any money. A top search engine ranking in either Google or Yahoo is the surest way for buyers to find your products so you can become a wealthy marketer. Google and Yahoo are responsible for about 80% of all search engine traffic in the world.

Make sure your online business or website contains these top 10 factors used for determining sites with a top 5 search engine ranking in Google and Yahoo.

Factor #1: Number of Quality Sites that Link to Yours

Google and Yahoo put a lot of significance on how many quality sites link back to yours with a page rank of at least 4 and above. This is probably the most important factor when considering a top search engine ranking.

When search engines see lots of important sites link back to yours it must mean that your site is also pretty important.

Remember the purpose of the internet is to provide information back to the end user. As someone is conducting research on the World Wide Web, sites must also participate and flow and connect to other related sites allowing those searching for your keyword terms various paths to the information being inquired.

Factor #2: Number of Pages Your Website Has

A website with less than 50 pages is really going to struggle to get a top search engine ranking unless it has more quality back links coming into it than their competitors.

Factor #3: Keywords in Your Title Tag

Google and Yahoo look to see if your keywords are contained in your page title and description. Make sure your keywords are also listed within your heading and subheading tags.

Factor #4: Keywords Showing in Links

Keywords that are highlighted within a link are considered more significant than those not at all highlighted within a link.

Factor #5: Keywords in Bold

Likewise words in bold are also considered more important than those not in bold.

Factor #6: Keywords in URL

Websites that are in less competitive markets that contain the keywords within their URL are considered more important than those sites that respectively do not.

Also keywords in the URL that come before unrelated words are considered better than a URL that follows an unrelated word within the URL. For example if your keyword is televisions, a URL with `televisions’ followed by unrelated words such as your name `Mike’ is better than putting your name `Mike’ before `televisions.’

Factor #7: More Significance Given to First 25 Words on Page

The first 25 words of each page are given more weight than all other words on the page. Make sure your keywords are in the first few words of your page. However, if you try and just list the same word or phrase 25 times repeatedly Google and Yahoo will penalize you.

Factor #8: Greater Than 300 Words on Your Homepage

Make sure you have at least 300 or more words on your homepage.

Factor #9: Keyword Density

Keyword density is not as important as it once was in the past but it still is an important factor. In order to get a top 5 search engine ranking look at your competitors sites and compare the density of their sites to yours and try and match their density.

Factor #10: Page Rank

Want to find out the page rank of your website or the page rank of another site? Download the Google toolbar and make sure the page rank indicator is activated. One major factor in determining your page rank is the first factor listed in this article. Quality back links are the most important factor for formulating your page rank.

A top search engine ranking in Google and Yahoo is decided most often by the combination of these 10 factors. If you want to get into the top 5 of the two most important search engines than make sure your website applies these major search engine ranking factors.

Author: Tim McGaffin has helped many online businesses achieve their financial goals. Vist: http://www.WealthyMarketerDirect.com

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