Search engines are the gateway to the Internet; they are
the first tool that potential customers use to find the
products and services they need. This is why link
popularity is so imperative. If the customers do not find
your website, you have no possibilities of making any
sales.

You’re probably wondering what the blazes is popular about
a link! Well, in a word - plenty! Link popularity refers to
the ranking assigned to your website by the search engines,
and it determines the ranking your page gets when keywords
are entered into a search engine. So, you’re probably
wondering, how do I make my link popular?

Search engines are discretionary, giving status and ranking
to sites that have links to their pages from related,
quality sites. It’s a simple formula, but a very important
one. Google created the system, and now virtually all the
most popular search engines employ it to rank your web
pages in their indexes.

The more commonly used your keyword is, the harder it will
be to achieve link popularity, but without achieving this
step, it is almost certain your site will never rank highly
on any search engine. But don’t be discouraged; there are
tried and true ways of achieving link popularity using the
most competitive keywords.

There are a few things you should be aware of. The first is
that just linking up with a large number of other websites
will not achieve link popularity. In fact, it may have
quite the opposite effect. This is particularly true when
pertaining to websites that are nothing more than “link
farms” - pages containing line after line of indiscriminate
links. Search engines may aggressively discriminate against
your website if you are associated with a link farm, so
steer clear of them!

The next thing to bear in mind is the quality of the site
you are linking to. Never link to a page you have
reservations about your visitors seeing. The last thing you
want your website to appear as is indiscriminate and cheap.
Linking to sites of poor quality will only lessen your link
popularity, if not completely destroy it.

So let’s get to what you need to do to achieve supreme link
popularity and improve your rankings to stellar status on
all the popular search engines.

The first step, and the fastest way to get your foot in the
door, is to get a listing in a popular directory, such as
Open Directory Project and Yahoo. If your site is
business-related, you will want to be listed on Yahoo, and
despite the fact that it will cost you around $300 a year,
it will be money well spent. If your site is
non-commercial, the listing will be free, but it will take
time and follow-up to actually get it listed. Open
Directory is gives you a free listing whether you are
business-related or non-commercial, but be prepared to make
a lot of follow-up inquiries before you see your site
listed.

You are aiming to get listed in the highest level of
appropriate category, and this just takes some common
sense. For example, if your company ships Alpaca wool from
an Alpaca farm located in the middle of Nowhere, Tiny
State, do NOT submit your listing to “Retailers from
Nowhere, Tiny State.” BIG MISTAKE! All you have to do is
look a little deeper - and submit your listing to the “Fine
Alpaca Wool” category. You will not only associate yourself
with culture and quality, but you will be listed in a
national category.

The next step after you have attained directory listings is
to locate other quality sites that will increase your link
popularity. Try to find sites that are in some way related
to yours, so not only will your link popularity increase,
but your customer base may also be expanded. You want to
avoid your competitors and look for sites that are useful
to your site’s visitors. Let’s look at the Alpaca Wool site
example. Linking up to a site that sells knitting supplies
would be helpful to your visitors, and the chances of the
knitting supply site wanting to link up to your site are
also greater. By linking to a related site that will be
relevant to your website’s traffic, you are increasing both
of your site’s business prospects - and both of your sites’
link popularity.

Not all sites want to link to other sites, so you will have
to do some research when you are looking for possible
linking partners. Google is an excellent starting place for
your search. Make sure you enter keywords that you think
quality customers will also enter to find your own site.
Remember, your criteria are quality, highly ranked,
non-competing websites that have a links or resources page.
Go to these sites and objectively assess them. Look at the
quality of the product, the graphics, and the ease of use.
Then check out the other sites they are linked to, and
determine if your own site would fit in with the crowd.

When you decide you have found a good prospect, you must
set out to woo them. The first thing to do is to add a link
on your own links page to their site. This is an essential
first step; it shows good faith, and ups your chances
significantly of their reciprocity. After you have added
their link, you must contact the webmaster of their site.
Since this is almost always done by email, you want to make
sure it is immediately clear that your message is not junk
mail. This requires that you tell them right off the bat
that you have added a link to their page on your site. A
hook like this almost always insures the reader will read
on.

Next, be sure to be flattering and let them know how much
you appreciate their website. Make sure you emphasize that
you have actually visited their site, and that their site
is not just a random pick. Give them the address of your
links page, and ask them to check out the link for
themselves. It’s a good idea to mention that they will not
only benefit from the increased traffic your website will
direct their way, but you will also increase their link
popularity. Briefly, explain why link popularity is so
essential, but do this in a sentence or two so you don’t
sound like a professor! Finally, tell them you would
greatly appreciate if they would reciprocally add a link on
their own links page to your website.

Go through this process with as many appropriate sites as
you can find, bearing in mind the criteria of quality and
non-competitiveness. After you have emailed all relevant
sites, be sure to check these website frequently to see if
they have added a link to your page. Give it about a month,
and if no link appears, try another charming email. Then
give it another month, and if your site is still absent
from their links page, it’s time to remove their link from
your own links page. The only time you want to pursue a
link further than this is if you believe a site is crucial
to your link popularity and your business needs. Just
remember to keep all your communications complimentary and
cordial.

Then set up a schedule to check your ranking in search
engines frequently to see if your link popularity has
improved. This is not achievable in the blink of an eye. It
will take some time and a good deal of work. There is no
way around the labor-intensive quality of improving your
link popularity, which is why search engines regard it with
such importance.

By the way - make sure you have a beautiful, streamlined
site or you will never persuade anyone to link up to you.
Be prepared to keep plugging away at this process, as long
as it takes, until you achieve link popularity stardom!

keywords, link popularity, Page Rank, search engines, Uncategorized

PPC marketing - the method of choice for advertisement on the Web

PPC marketing or Pay-Per-Click marketing is the most popular method of advertisement employed by various websites on the Internet. PPC marketing may often be referred to as pay for position, cost per click or pay for performance. But regardless of the term used, PPC marketing is the online advertiser’s medium of choice for promoting products and services to online consumers.

PPC marketing is beneficial to both the advertiser and the consumer. Advertisers using PPC marketing only need to pay for the actual click throughs linked to their sites from search engines. At the same time as consumers are relieved of having to get annoying emails or pop-up ads for products and services.

When an online consumer searches for a specific product or service on the Internet, corresponding PPC marketing ads are also displayed alongside the results generated by the search engine. This forms a highly targeted consumer group that is more likely to purchase a specific product or service. In addition, websites get to limit their advertisement costs with the use of PPC marketing. PPC marketing is truly a winning solution for both parties.

Possible drawbacks of PPC marketing

Despite the obvious advantages of PPC marketing, there are possible drawbacks that can cancel out its benefits. One of the most common problems associated with PPC marketing is the inexperience of many people attempting to use this profitable advertisement method. Simply submitting PPC marketing ads to a search engine such as google, does not make up the entire campaign.

PPC marketing requires a calculated and systematic approach to setting up ads. PPC marketing involves the use of keywords and biddings in order to get top placement on a search engine. Getting top search engine placement helps boost traffic to a website that can easily translate into profit.

Without the necessary experience and knowledge to carry out a typical PPC marketing ad, may turn into an expensive campaign that does not convert into profit. PPC marketing ads also require continuous funding, as discontinued payments will also result in discontinued ads. This can be unfavorable for a website that has already built high rankings with their PPC marketing ads.

Bidding on keywords can also be quite costly, as the growing number of websites on the web struggle against each other to bid on the most popular keyword for their PPC marketing ad. Obviously small business websites are at a disadvantage here since big business websites are able to pay more for popular keywords related to their site. This is because most small businesses only set aside a small portion of their capital for advertisement, putting them at a disadvantage.

Running an effective PPC marketing campaign

There are a number of things that a website should consider when running an effective PPC marketing campaign. It is important to develop a marketing plan in order to get the most return on investment from PPC marketing. Selecting the most appropriate keywords that relate to the site’s business is essential in PPC marketing.

However, simply choosing the most popular keywords does not necessarily translate into profit. Selecting more specific keywords that will put a site within the first ten results of a search also gets greater awareness from online consumers. In addition, it doesn’t cost as much as getting the top spot for PPC marketing.

It is also important that a website constantly monitors the performance of their PPC marketing campaign. This will help the site modify any existing PPC marketing ad to make it more productive. At the same time any PPC marketing ad that has not proven effective can be immediately discontinued. Altering PPC marketing ads is a continuous process that many websites do in order to increase their return on investment.

Getting professional help with PPC marketing

The popularity of PPC marketing has given rise to professionals offering PPC marketing services for small and big businesses. Hiring a professional PPC marketing company is advisable for a small business without experience in PPC marketing. Most PPC marketing companies offer reasonable rates for their services and at the same time produce acceptable results.

A PPC marketing professional can attend to all the details commonly involved in a PPC marketing campaign. Handling a PPC marketing campaign is a time consuming process that can be overwhelming for a small business. A PPC marketing professional can help set up a PPC marketing campaign and later on train someone from within the business to handle it to ensure its continued success.

I hope this was helpful

Until next time….

Pj Germain

advertisement costs, Advertising, click throughs, pay per click marketing, ppc, promoting products, search engines, search engine placement, top search engine placement, Training, website

If you have a website, then, you should know that search engines will automatically keep track of it every time somebody searches for some information in the Internet. However, failure to optimize your website for search engines will only put your business into trouble.

Why is that? It is imply because search engines use spiders to search websites that contain the keywords used by a particular individual. Therefore, if your site is not fully optimized, chances are, you will have lower ranking in a particular search engine result page.

The drawback? It is goodbye for you and your business. In the Internet, getting good rankings is definitely the name of the game. Rankings on search engine pages and submitting your site to Web directories are the primary factors that will help you generate and boost your traffic. Once generated, increasing sales performance is inevitable.

However, one of the main reasons why some web developers fail to come up with a site that has the makings of a successful online business website is their inability to distinguish the disparity between directory submission and search engine optimization.

Hence, most web developers know that once they have created a website, search engines will automatically find their site and add it to their database considering the fact that the site is search engine optimized.

The only problem is that before a particular search engine adds your site to their directory, evaluation is still carried out to ensure the merit due in case it really needs optimum recognition. At this point, search engines no longer use spiders but real human editors that work on the double and review every site that comes their way.

Once evaluated, search engines will add your site to their directories, thereby, making it easily accessible in the World Wide Web.

You can also opt for other directory submissions available in the Internet. The only problem is that the choices are so diverse that choosing the best directory submission for your site can be a daunting task.

However, directory submission alone will not guarantee feasible and effective traffic patterned to boost and increase your sales. Your website has to be fully search engine optimized to receive the necessary recognition that you need.

So both search engine optimization and directory submission have to go hand in hand in order to reap online business success.

On the other hand, the combined powers of the two powerful Internet marketing tools do not yet guarantee optimum success. This is because the way you submit your site to directories and the way you indulge into a search engine project will still depend on some factors. Considering these, you can be sure that your ranking in search engine is permanent and progressing.

Factors to Consider

Before you agree to search engine directory submission, it is best to consider the overall appearance of your site. Keep in mind that search engines use human editors to evaluate and decide whether your site is worthy to be included in their directories.

Hence, the visual aspect counts most. After all, search engines would never want to put their name at risk just by allowing poorly designed website to be included and promoted on their directories.

Second, it is imperative that you are aware of the rules in directory submission. Since not all search engines have the same directory submission guidelines, it is best that you research on a particular search engine and focus on how they want directory submissions take place.

Keep in mind that search engines use real people to evaluate your site. If by chance, you were not able to follow directions as to how you can properly submit your site, the probabilities of getting rejections are high.

Lastly, ( and probably the most important factor to consider) you should ensure the proper usage of keywords. After all, this is what Internet marketing is all about. Hence, there is nothing cliché-ish on the saying, “Content is king” because that is the truth. The things that you put on your site should be well optimized to generate the kind of traffic that you need.

So what does search engine directory submission try to imply? Given all these information, it only means one thing — quantity is better than quality. The way you do your work in order to reap good traffic is the utmost concern of it all.

SEO, Training