Targeting Local Canadian Customers with Google

Writen by Gerard Manning

If you are a Canadian company and the Canadian market is one of your main sources, then there are a few things you will need to check to see if in fact you are showing up in Google Canada results when someone searches “pages from Canada”. First thing you can do is search for your company name in Google.ca and make sure you check the option “pages from Canada”. If you are showing up in the results, then there should be no problem.

First, if you have a .ca domain name, and this is the site you are marketing, then you should be fine. But the problem is, many Canadian companies choose to pick a .com for the web address. If you fall under this, scenario, and the Canadian market is a main focus, then you will need to check to see where your IP address is listed (the country that is). Some of the more popular whois sources these days will provide information on what country the IP is listed, or you can contact your hosting company and ask them.

If you are looking for a hosting company in Canada, do not assume because they are from Canada that they will have a Canadian IP address. Sometimes they happen to get their IPs from the United States (or else where), so a quick email to the hosting company should be suffice in finding out the information you need. From here it’s finding a reliable hosting company. Picking the wrong one could provide negative results for your business. Check around and do some research. It will pay off in the long run.

There are other options available involving registering a .ca domain name and using a redirect to your main site. But the quickest way would be changing hosting companies.

One thing you may have noticed that is a bit odd, is that your website will show up in Google Local search no matter what your domain extension is or where your hosting IP is located, but Google Local Search and Google Canada “pages from Canada” still doesn’t seem to match up. You would figure that if you qualify to show up for one Google Local, then surely you should for the other. Lets hope this missed connection is eventually linked up.

Gerard Manning is an SEO consultant for the Search Engine Marketing Firm Manning Search Marketing based out of Atlantic Canada

Restaurant Website Promotion – How to Boost Your Business Using Tested Online Marketing Tactics

Writen by Michael Turner

Being a restaurant owner means you are always interested in getting more people into your restaurant, whether that be return customers or new customers, hopefully always a mixture of both. Fortunately, the Internet can help you in your marketing goals and not cost you a lot of money. However, since you will be marketing your particular restaurant, even if it is a chain, you will need to include a lot of locally specific information.

Tip #1 – Directories

A great way to increase your traffic is to focus on local directories that focus on area restaurants. You can provide your information, menu, pricing guide, directions, and other pertinent information so when individuals are searching online, whether locals or visitors they will come across your link. This will allow you to reach more people than otherwise and always put your restaurants name in people’s minds when they are considering where they want to eat.

Tip #2 – Links

Links are great for driving traffic, regardless of whether you want local traffic or not. For local traffic you will need to get your link on a lot of other local web pages to increase your area exposure. It does not matter where your links are as long as you have them when it comes to search engine statistics. If you have a lot of links you will get better search engine rankings.

Tip #3 – Keywords

Keywords are also important for your restaurant to get more business. Evaluate what keywords describe your restaurant and services and be sure to include your location in city and state. This will help your information to come up when people are looking for a specific type of restaurant in your area.

Tip #4 – URL at Restaurant

Another interesting tactic that works well is for you to include your domain name on your paper napkins, menus, mints, and anything else that people will see when dining in your restaurant. They will realize you have a web presence and will be able to visit the next time they are considering eating out. They can use your website to book reservations, place a takeout order, read the menu, or simply get directions. This is a great way to keep new and return customers informed and returning.

Now that you know how to get your restaurant promoted online go ahead and start today. You don’t want to lose anymore business to the competing restaurants that already have an online presence. Get started immediately and enjoy your increased traffic and sales. Once you see your results, you will wonder why you waited so long to get your restaurant online.

Michael Turner reveals his foolproof way to increase website traffic in his free 7 part mini-series. Grab it free right now at http://www.powertraffictactics.com/

How to Write Great Testimonials and Why it Can Increase Your Profits Incredibly!

Writen by Laurie Meade

Everyone likes to read or get a referral about something they are considering buying. It helps overcome that fear of mistrust. Do you know how to get over that fear of mistrust with your visitors on your website?

Use great testimonials of your product. Its like the friend who recommends a certain dentist, doctor or plumber. You would rather use the friend’s referel, than pick a stranger out of the yellow pages. I know I would. Would you like to know how to get these wonderful comments that praise your products?

A good testimonial is descriptive, using words that entice feelings of happiness, satisfaction. Words that show a customer is very happy that he bought the product. Descriptive phrases that show how the product has increased the customers, profit, time management, etc….

You probably thinking, yeah right, and just who is going to do that, for me? please read on!

A good testimonial also has a live link and person connected to it. Another requirement to fulfill. Actually this requirement becomes your selling benefit to your testimonial request.

A great testimonial is very important in the world of internet online marketing. It is important in the web design of an internet sales page.

The human voice, touch and feel, is not present in your sales pitch on the website print. Adding several testimonials for your product, with live links, will increase trust and credibility for your business.

Okay, I hear you thinking, so just how do I go about getting these wonderful words of wonder for my product?

What many business owners don’t realize is how easy it is to get testimonials.

So, how do you get unsolicited testimonials? Well, you could just ask? But you don’t have to. There are other ways to naturally receive raving reviews of your product.

Make sure you have a quality product.

First, remember that the good you do comes back to you. Offer free review copies of your product to newsletter publishers and other parties likely to have an interest in your product.

They have a stake in being honest and in backing up anything they’ve said about your product. That will get you started.

Then, if your product is good, you will receive good feedback from your readers.

When you get something you’d like to use, write to thank them and ask if you can quote them. Tell them you’ll link to their website if they like.

Then you’ve got an unsolicited testimonial from someone likely to stand behind what they said because it was an honest and unsolicited comment to you.

Be sure and let them know that you will be posting their comments with a link to their website. Offer to post links to their site directly from their testimonial. They will get extra traffic to their site just for telling the truth about their experience with your product! Do you see how this can be a win -win situation for both businesses involved?

You would be amazed at how fast you can grow your own websites traffic with testimonial links on other sites. When I check my web statistics, it amazes me how many of my visitors are generated from a link from another webmasters sales page!

This technique will also help you get your website link rating for the search engines increased. It will help you build credibility has an expert. It will also help you build relationship with other online internet marketers.

Can you ask for much more than that?

Laurie Meade is editor of the “Yes You Can!” Ezine. She focuses on reviewing information products, software, webmaster tools, and resources. She tells it like it is, the honest facts in her own words and opinions. Get a review written for your product or service! Visit her website, or her blog for more resources and great help with your webmaster needs. http://lauriemeade.blogspot.com http://lauriemeade.com Subscribe to the “Yes You Can Ezine,” by sending an email to mailto:subscribe@lauriemeade.com

Competitions and Giveaways on Your Website

Writen by Tim Priebe

One of the ways to promote your site and drive traffic to your site is to have competitions and giveaways. If you give a good prize away, it will bring people to your website. I’ve run tons of online contests. I’ve given away everything from DVDs to action figures to comic books to gift certificates. And it always get traffic to my website.

There’s two basic different ways to run a giveaway. The first is to require nothing, or almost nothing, from those who enter. The alternative is to require some level of participation in your site before they can be entered into the contest.

With the first, you may require something as simple as their email address. Perhaps you require that they sign up for your email newsletter. Either way, there’s minimal effort for the entrant. The advantage to this method is that a lot of people will probably enter. The disadvantage is that you have no guarantee that they will provide anything but a momentary spike in your traffic. You need to work hard to have great content up at the same time so that they are more likely to stick around.

Remember, even if you just collect their email address, that’s a good time to offer them a subscription to your email newsletter that you should already be using to promote your site.

With the second method, there’s a variety of ways to go. It really depends on the nature of your site. You can require that the entrants write a certain number of posts in your forum. Maybe they need to submit an article or review to your site. Perhaps they can go to your site, get a secret word, then come into your store and tell you that word to be entered.

I have preferred the second method in the past. The site I generally ran these contests on had articles and reviews. So promoting the submission of additional articles and reviews made sense. I also sometimes ran giveaways just for people who placed membership. That helped to drive up my level of membership. The downside of that method is that often those members will not have any level of participation in the site.

Whichever way you go, make sure you set a time limit of some sort on your contest. It will start whenever you announce it to the world, or you can set an official time and date to start. But you will definitely need to have a time and date to end it. And you will probably need to clarify time zone as well.

Next, you’ll need to promote it. If you have a blog, make sure you blog about it. If you have friends with blogs, get them to mention it. The blogosphere can do a lot to promote your contest.

Also, you can list the promotion on sites like www.online-sweepstakes.com. This can drive a lot of traffic to your site. Note that if your contest has any part that requires visiting your physical location, this will not help as much. But if it is completely online, it will help greatly.

Once your cut-off date comes, be fairly strict about the time. If your winner is randomly picked, you can use sites like www.random.org to produce a random number. If there is some sort of judging involved, make sure the process is fairly speedy.

Once you have your winner or winners, make sure you let everyone who entered know who won. Also put a short site promotion in that email as well. After all, if they did not sign up for your newsletter, this is one last chance (for awhile) to directly promote your website.

One mistake I made early on was waiting too long to send the winner the prize. They tended to get a little irritated. Remember, at the least, you’re trying to make the prize winner a huge fan of your site.

On my sites, I gave away prizes as often as once a month. You’ll learn from any mistakes made the first few times. So if everything doesn’t go completely smoothly the first time, don’t fret. I had plenty of kinks when I first started. They worked themselves out over time.

Well, what are you waiting for? Start giving stuff away!

Tim is the owner and senior web designer at T&S Web Design. His company has developed and maintained website for dozens of small businesses and organizations. Tim also maintains a blog with free website advice for small business owners, GetASiteOnline.com.

The Advantage of Web Directories Over Reciprocal Linking

Writen by Craig Rowe

Linking is a popular way for website owners to bring Internet user traffic to their website. If one has a link to their website placed somewhere out on the World Wide Web, it makes it more likely that the individual website will have a better chance of receiving new visitors to their website. There are two often cited ways one can have their link placed throughout the Internet which are web directories and reciprocal linking. Web directories allow the website owner to place their link on their sometimes free and sometimes paid web directories. With regard to the reciprocal linking technique, one who uses this method will place their link on another website owner’s site and in exchange for doing so the other website owner will be able to place their link on the reciprocal site. There are a few reasons why link placement on a web directory might be more advantageous than with reciprocal linking.

Web Directories Provide Group Placement

On a web directory, the links to various websites are put in groups depending on their subject matter. This provides the web directory visitors with an easy way to locate whatever type of website they need to find. On the other hand, with reciprocal linking the website owner will place his or her link somewhere on another owner’s website which may not have similar subject matters involved. As a result individuals interested in that type of website may not be able to find it as easily.

Individuals Go to Web Directories to Find Websites

Another reason why using a web directory to post one’s website link may be more advantageous to a website owner is that individuals go to web directories to find specific websites. They do not simply happen to be visiting the website for one reason or another and come across the link by accident, as with reciprocal linking. Individuals who use web directories are looking to find website links which makes it more likely that one will gain visitors from posting on web directories.

Web Directories Do Not Require One to Post Competition on Their Website

An additional reason why posting a link on a web directory might be better than using reciprocal linking to do so is that with web directory posting, the website owner does not have to post a link to another website which may be competition for them. One who uses a web directory to advertise their website can do so without having to include a competitor’s information on their site.

Build incoming links to your web site by submitting to the Net-Guild web directory at http://www.net-guild.com

Why Link Farm and FFA Submissions Are a Bad Idea

Writen by Tom Dahne

Before search engines got smart, a site’s page ranking was based on keyword match-ups. When webmasters stock-piled their sites with keywords, the wrong sites were getting too much attention. Google decided to focus on a site’s “popularity” instead. The number of incoming links became the focus of PR criteria. The theory behind this system was that if a lot of sites link to another site, that site would contain valuable content.

But again, webmasters got sneaky. With this trend, we began to see the evolution of “Link Farms” and “Free-for-All” (FFA) sites. These pages were essentially a gigantic collection of (often times) useless links. In most cases, the sites were not categorized or descriptive. They became a place for webmasters to dump their links in order to make their site appear more popular.

This strategy worked for some time, but soon search engines caught on. “Link Farms” and FFA sites served no purpose to web users. Since Google prides itself on catering to web users (and NOT developers), a solution had to be formed. “Link Farms” were cluttering up the web and making it more difficult for users to find valuable resources online.

Google soon began to rate the quality of the links that determined a site’s “link pop.” “Link Farms” and FFA sites became categorized as spam, and thus contributed no value to a site’s link popularity.

Today, submitting to a “Link Farm” or FFA site can be harmful to your website’s reputation. Google takes a strong stance against these kinds of link pages. At best, the “Link Farm” will drag down your ranking and make it harder for the valuable sites to work in your favor. At worst, your site will be BANNED altogether for using spam sites to attempt to generate traffic. This is a very real possibility.

“Link Farms” and FFA sites present very little value. Although it may sound tempting, users will not obtain quality or relevant links from the submission. Plus, who wants to see their link among “junk” websites for adult entertainment, dating sites, and casinos? Submitting to “Link Farms” doesn’t contribute to your credibility and is just not worth the risk.

Instead, spend your time submitting to credible directories and exchanging links with other relevant sites. The process can be time-consuming, but it is the only way to generate safe, site-specific traffic.

For an easier method to the tedious directory submission process, and to Submit your website to 300+ link directories fast and easy we recommend Directory Submitter.

Tom Dahne and Paul MartinAre the creators of the very popular Directory Submitter Software found at Directory Submitter.

How To Gain Web Traffic Through 9 Simple Tips

Writen by Leanne Hoagland-Smith

Driving traffic to your website can be a time consuming task. However, these easy tips may help you increase traffic and convert those visitors into actual customers.

1. Title on your main URL and secondary pages
Originally, my title was ADVANCED SYSTEMS-A Leadership & Organizational Training & Development Firm near Chicago, IL. If I searched for the first two words ADVANCED SYSTEMS using Overture at http://inventory.overture.com I found a little over 4,000 keyword searches. By using this tool, I entered various key words and discovered that the term education and training had over 210,000 searches during the previous month. Research also recommends that the title length not exceed 77 characters and so I continued researching the most effective key words to pair with my first two terms. Also, additional reading suggested that you indicate your location within this title. Even though the completed title may exceed the recommended length, this is OK because the search engines do read beyond 77 characters. Also, as you construct or revise each page, make sure that title has the appropriate key words. Currently, I am doing that for my site because as stated earlier ADVANCED SYSTEMS is not a popular searched term.

2. Content
Both my Internet marketing coach (www.leaders-perspective.com) and my marketing consultant (www.hodgecommunications.com) acknowledged that the content on my site of which I wrote was of exceptional editorial quality. Their praises made me feel very good. However, both told me that the content wouldn’t “sell an igloo to an Eskimo.” This wasn’t what I wanted to hear after spending hundreds of hours writing this exceptional content. Currently, I am revisiting each page and rewriting the content using a marketing content focus instead of editorial one. I had failed one of the basic lessons in marketing – write to the audience needs by identifying potential benefits not your expertise.

3. Search Words
Again using the mentioned site in tip #1, I began to rewrite the content and then checked key words and phrases to ensure that they were embedded within the content. Writing in Microsoft Word, the writer can go to the Edit button and scroll down to the Find icon. By typing in a specific word or phrase, this handy tool will check to see how many times it appears in the document. A note of caution – Be careful not to overload your content with search words because the robots are quite sophisticated and can distinguish this overload.

4. Call to Action
Within the content on each page should be a call to action. The visitor should be encouraged to sign up for a free newsletter or contact your office by phone or email. Also, you can provide links to other pages within your website such as “click to hear read more articles.”

5. Thematic Approach
Using a theme entices search engines to travel through all the pages within your site. The theme can be your unique selling proposition. Also, a thematic approach encourages your visitors to visit more than one or two pages.

6. Use of Pictures, Graphics and Flash
Pictures are far more effective than clip art. Remember to use a variety of genders and ethnicity because your Internet audience is diverse. Be careful with flash and other time consuming graphics as they may consume too much time to download. Many visitors leave sites if the site doesn’t download in a matter of seconds. Time is money not only for you, but your visitors as well.

7. Free Offers
Visitors like to receive free offers from ezine booklets to articles to recommendations on books and other sites. Entice your visitors with freebies and have them coming back for more.

8. Regular Updates
Sites need to be updated on a regular basis to encourage Search Engines to continually visit your site. A static site is not good for web traffic or building relationships with your visitors. Construct a plan to revisit your pages to provide new content for Search Engines. HINT: Remember to check Key Words as you update your pages.

9. Perfection and Under Construction
Since web sites should not be static, perfection is an ongoing experience. Don’t wait until the content is perfect. Load it and then watch your statistics. Under construction shouldn’t be forever, however prioritize those pages you wish to update first. If you need to add a page, do so and mark it as “Under Construction.” I currently have several new pages “Under Construction” and still have yet to revise all my pages. Working using a plan (see tip 8), I anticipate completing the entire site within the next 30 days. And then, revisit at least 2 pages each month to update the content.

These last two months have been an incredible learning experience for me as I continue to work on my site to expand traffic and therefore potential clients. For example, one of the most visible results has been a 300% increase on one of my revised pages (http://www.processspecialist.com/youth.htm). Even though the site is still has pages under construction, I know that following these 9 simple tips will continue to multiply traffic and eventually increase my client base.

Copyright 2005(c) Leanne Hoagland-Smith, www.processspecialist.com

This article may be freely published. Permission to publish this article, electronically or in print, as long as the bylines are included, with a live link, and the article is not changed in any way (grammatical corrections accepted).

Leanne Hoagland-Smith, M.S. CEO of ADVANCED SYSTEMS, is the Learning & Process Specialist. With over 25 years of business & education experience, she helps her clients to double their performance. By uniting systems, strategies and people to create loyal internal customers, Leanne delivers ROI solutions in 4 key areas: financials, leadership, relationships and growth & innovation within a variety of industries including education, healthcare, manufacturing and professional services. As co-author of M.A.G.I.C.A.L. Potential: 7 Capacities for Living an Amazing Life Beyond Purpose to Achievement due for 2005 release, Leanne speaks nationally to a variety of audiences. Please contact Leanne at 219.759.5601 or visit http://www.processspecialist.com if you are seeking to connect your passion to your purpose to double your performance and receive unheard of results.

How to Promote Your Sites to Ensure a Steady Flow of Traffic

Writen by John Woon

We all know that in order to be successful in Internet marketing business, we have to promote our websites to generate a steady and increasing number of visitors. This is true whether you are promoting a product, a service or a business opportunity. Also, it does not matter whether you are promoting your own products or somebody else’s via an affiliate program.

In the process, you would probably come across many challenges some of which are listed below:

1) It is too expensive

Most of the newbies when first started out, are not willing to invest financially due to lack of knowledge and uncertainties. Especially with those lacking the required budget, there is a great reluctance to spend on promotion. Hence the progress of promotion is very slow in the beginning. It takes time to study all the countless and seemingly very attractive offers and to make the decision to part with their money.

2) Can this offer still work?

With the Internet, what used to work 6 months ago might not work now or two months down the road. For example, E-books or articles on the 12 top search engines published 3 months ago might no longer be valid. The recommended strategy would therefore no longer apply.

3) It takes to long to learn

How often have you heard this: “You don’t have to be a computer techy. In fact you don’t have to have any computer knowledge as long as you can type and send an e-mail! Our software would do all the jobs for you!”? Once you have done the process of ordering and parted with your money, you realize to your disappointment and frustration that it’d take months for you to learn the so-called a-few- easy-steps procedure.

One of the main reasons most Internet marketers have given up after having failed to achieve any positive results is the fact that they have wasted too much time searching for the ideal the promotional strategies. Whatever they have tried or purchased do not work according to plan or the promise given. As a result, there is still no effective system to ensure traffic flow to their sites after months or even years.

One of your objectives should therefore be putting at least one or two traffic-generating systems such as writing and submitting articles to directories and optimising search engines (SEO) through the selection of keywords. This entails only minimal financial commitment on your part. If you are good in writing and enjoy doing it, you might decide to write your own articles. Otherwise you could join an article cooperative to get access to private label articles OR hire someone to write articles for you.

Let’s discuss the differences of these 3 possibilities:

1) Do Your Own Research and Write Your Own Articles.

The main advantage of writing your own articles is that it’s “free” and it would give you a sense of pride in accomplishment. You might enjoy writing articles to share your experience in Internet online business. The downside is that it’d take up some of your time to conduct some research work.

2) Join An Article Cooperative to Get Pre-written Articles.

A recommended article cooperative is InfoGoRound where you could get hundreds of pre-written articles for a small enrolment fee. From these you could choose those discussing subjects related to the content of your website. These are referred to as the “Private label articles” which you have full permission to use and also add your own name and article resource box to the article as the author.

3) Hire Someone to Write Articles For You.

If you are not comfortable writing your own articles or if you find it too much a hassle especially when you’re new to this business or if you do not fancy pre-written articles due to lack of originality, you could use an article ghost writing service such as Just Articles to put your own ideas into writing.

For a relatively small fee you can get your articles written very quickly.

For article marketing on the Internet, articles written with between 400-700 words would suffice. It goes without saying that your articles must be relevant to your Internet business. Hence topic of your articles should be related to: “working at home”, “home based business”, “Internet marketing”, “making money online”, “promoting a website”, etc.

Submitting your articles and getting them re-published on others’ websites and newsletters/ezines is one of the most powerful Internet marketing strategies. Your articles will then start working as a free advertisement for you forever. And you do not have to pay even a dime for such advertising space. You will continue to enjoy free traffic driven to your website for a long, long time!

Search engines are the first things Internet surfers look for when they are searching for goods or services. Where your website appears to the visitors in their search results is of utmost importance. The objective of all Internet marketers is to ensure that their URLs appear right at the top of the first page or at least the first 50th position since this would mean higher chances of the visitors clicking on the most prominent URLs. First and foremost, it is the Keyword. Keywords are the foundation on which the entire search engine system works. If a top ranking site suddenly drops drastically, it may mean that certain content of the website has become invisible or inaccessible to search engine spiders and crawlers. Very often certain particular keyword or phrase has been ineffective due to fierce competition.

Hence, Search engine optimization refers to the development of the right keyword strategies to ensure good ranking of your website. The most effective advertising technique online today is good placement in the search engines.

In conclusion, with writing and distributing articles and optimizing search engines, you would have at least two effective systems to ensure traffic flow to their sites after months or even years.

Copyright© 2006 John Woon http://www.johnwoon.com

About The Author: John Woon (Sung-Liang Woon) is a Latex Consultant with about 30 years of experience.

1) Multiple Internet business opportunity SECRETS: http://easyhomebiz.blogspot.com

2) Hypertension and the Heart: http://hypertension2.blogspot.com

3) Diabetics’ Valuable ONE-STOP Guide: http://diabetics-guide.blogspot.com

Popup – Why Do They Get A Bad Rap?

Writen by Michael Russell

Let’s not beat around the bush here. We all hate popups. Every time we see one we want to head for the nearest axe and put it through our computer, or at least through the company’s web site. But why? There are many HTML functions of web sites that are equally as annoying and yet we don’t go ballistic over them. The answer is simple. Many companies use popups in a way that serve no useful purpose and are just plain annoying. The truth is, popups can actually be very useful and welcome if used properly.

One example of a well designed and very useful popup would be as follows. You are browsing through a web site and you reach a section where you want to sign up for a particular offer that requires you to enter your name and address because this is something that is actually going to be physically mailed to you. You get to the offer on the page. While you are there you notice that there are other offers you are probably interested in. You really don’t want to have to go to another page to fill out your mailing info because you want to stay on this page to look at the other offers. This is where a popup would be welcome. In clicking on the link to fill out your personal information if a popup were to appear, you could simply type the info in the popup and then after you were done and clicked the submit button, the popup closed. You would then be back at your original page and could continue on to look at more offers you were interested in. If each offer was set up this way you would never have to leave the main page. This is an example where a popup window is a wonderful thing.

Another example of where we would want a popup window, and a site that uses this technology with pure brilliance, is POGO, one of the top Internet game sites. Many of their programs require that the game be played in a popup window. But even if they didn’t, with all the games available on their main page it would become a real pain to have to keep going back to the main page after playing a game and to access another one. With the popup window you can play your game while keeping the main page open. After you are done playing your game you simply close it up and you’re back at the main page of games again quickly, ready to pick another one to play. Nobody makes better use of popup windows than POGO.

An example of poor popup use is a site, who’s name won’t be mentioned, that is a work at home site. Every link on their navigation page functions as a popup. With so many areas on this site to go to, including affiliate area, tools, jobs, personal info and tons more, you can easily end up with 7 or 8 windows open for this one site when clearly there is no need for it. In this case a simple HTML link would be sufficient to take the user to another page.

And yes, there are the companies and sales pages that insist on opening up a popup window even after you have decided you want nothing to do with their site. One sales page actually pops up a window that has an audio on it screaming at you, “Hey, this is Rod, where are you going?”. This is the ultimate in annoyance. It is because of sites like these that popups get a bad rap, which is sad because they can actually be of great use.

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Michael Russell
Your Independent guide to Popups
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Don’t Put All Your Promotion Eggs In The SEO Basket

Writen by Gary Mchugh

One of the most frequent questions I get asked by my clients is “What is the best way to promote my site?” If a brand new webmaster asks me that question then I will take as much time as I can possibly muster to answer their request, before they learn about and put on the SEO and ranking blinkers so many webmasters wear with pride.

Allow me now to state the obvious, the success of any website is in direct proportion to the amount of visitors it receives. If success is about visitors then why on earth would any intelligent business person devote 95% of their promotion time and budget to a single method of advertising their site?

Imagine for a moment you are the advertising executive for a large automobile company. Your company has just released the most economical car ever and your job is to make sure everyone knows about it.

Which of the following would you do?

1. Place a full page ad in one or two car magazines, then spend the next year rehashing and tweaking the wording of that ad, because it wasn’t creating the sales you wanted.

OR

2. Advertise in every magazine and newspaper you can find, start national TV advertising campaigns, make sure you have slots on every commercial radio station in the country, advertise on billboards, in cinemas, sponsor sporting events and what ever else you could think of.

It doesn’t take a genius to work out the second idea is a much better plan. Now this may come as a shock to you, but the major search engines are not the only source of visitors to your website. Many SEO gurus are quick to point out to you that search engines are the only way to achieve substantial traffic. That is simply not true. One disturbing idea promoted heavily by the SEO world recently is that “Links are dead” My answer to that idea is, if links were dead then there would be no web.

Links are how people travel the web, whether they are text links, banners or email links to visit any site you need to click a link. Google itself is one enormous searchable link database.

Let’s states something even more obvious. Google is not the only site on the web that links to other sites. There are directories, there are banner exchanges, and the big one there are hundreds of millions of other websites. How many of those carry a link to your site?

For any keyword or phrase on the major search engines there are millions of sites vying for just 10 first page places. Are you really devoting all your promotion time to SEO with those kinds of odds?

There is also much talk of the value of links, and nearly all of it is based on the value of links in a search engines eyes, and how that will or will not improve your rankings. STOP!!! You need to get this!!! The value of a link is how many times it gets used, clicks and visits NOT rankings.

While many will object to this statement SEO is nothing more than educated guesswork, why do I say that? Simple because Google, Yahoo and MSN do NOT tell SEO experts how they order their results. Just the opposite they regularly change how their results are ordered to stay one step ahead of the SEO experts. Why do they do that? Because they do not want their results manipulating period! They want one thing, to deliver accurate search results.

Don’t take my word for this, go and get the words from the horses mouth here.

http://www.google.com/webmasters/guidelines.html

Notice the all the advice is geared towards building your site for visitors not for search engines.

If you really want to build steady long term traffic to your site, then advertise your site in every legal way you can. Yes it requires time and a consistent effort. As a wise man once said ” The only place success comes before work is in the dictionary”. In closing, how many of the following have you used to advertise your site? If you haven’t done them all maybe you need to.

Have you:

Listed your site in a couple of hundred directories?

Exchanged quality visible links with at least 200 sites?

Exchanged banners with sites in your genre?

Started a small pay per click advertising campaign?

Written articles to do with the genre of your site and offered them to other sites for free inclusion in their newsletter or on their site?

Had your site reviewed by a review site?

Donated a product or free membership to a competition on another site?

These are only a few promotion methods that will bring visitors to your site. There are many many more if you use your imagination. This is also advertising that will not be undone in one minute by a Google algorithm change.

Am I saying don’t optimize your site? NO I am saying don’t rely totally on SEO for your traffic.

Are you putting all your promotional eggs in one basket? If so, isn’t it time you stopped and gave your site the best chance of success.

Gary McHugh is co author of HonestLinks.Net, a site dedicated to teaching webmasters to exchange links that bring traffic. He also runs his own web design and hosting company 2001web.com