Adsense is best

Google AdSense is the current leader in content-sensitive web-based marketing. Webmasters can place Google AdSense JavaScript code on their web pages in order to allow Google's servers to show context sensitive advertisements (Google Adwords). The left hand side of this page shows an example of a Google AdSense skyscraper displaying a text or image ad.
Google's terms and conditions are very strict such that many web publishers cannot use adsense adverts on their sites. They are either denied from joining the Google AdSense program in the first instance, or in a situation that is becoming more and more common do not wish to do business with Google. A number of publishers are also finding their Adsense accounts are being disabled for reasons that are completely beyond their control. The problem is that most of the alternatives to Google's Adsense are pretty useless. Most of the good ones (such as doubleclick) are only interested in very large volume customers and so are not interested in the little guy with his blog who wants to earn a small income on the side. For this reason I have compiled my Top 10 alternatives to Google's Adsense that are ideal for the small time publisher. This site provides an updated list of the best website monetization programs that are available to webmasters.

Crash Course In Getting A No. 1 Google Ranking.

First, here’s the rundown of some of the terminology I’m going to use in this article –

Inbound Links – Links coming into your site
Outbound Links – Links leaving your site
Cross Links – Links that you have “traded” with another site (ie, they’ve got a link from their site to your and you’ve got a link from your site to theirs)
PR (Page Ranking) – Google’s measure of how “important” your site is

SEO Is Not Dead

Ok, now lets talk about what you really want to hear – how to get those coveted 1-10 ranks for your keywords. Remember this - SEO is not dead. In fact, it is very much alive and important. The first thing to do in order to raise your site rank is target specific keywords. I say specific, because you need to target “keyphrases,” meaning more than one word keywords. Some people use the words interchangeably (me included) so just ignore one-word keywords altogether. You will waste your money if you shoot for these, because chances are, there are other, MUCH larger companies who already have you beat, and will continue to have you beat unless you’ve got a bottomless wallet.

Check Out Your Competition

Take this example, for instance, if you sell computers, you should not try to optimize your site for the keyword “computer” or “computers.” First, think about all of the businesses that do ANYTHING with computers. Yeah, that’s a lot. They’ll all show up if you search for “computer.” Now try to think of who would show up at the top of that list. I’ll make it easy, it’s Apple, Dell, Computer World, Computer Associates, IEEE, Computer History Museum, Webopedia, ASUSTeK, WhatIs.com, and HP. I’m going to go out on a limb here and say that I 99.9

Adsense, Googlemail, Blogger and All Things Google Disabled!

How to seo or how not to seo, that is the question? The answer to this is up to you. Whether it through backlinking means or great content, blogger's and article writers seek a pathway to search engine optimization enlightenment. We experiment, make mistakes, learn and become more knowledgeable through the experience. But what if something happens that shocks you into analysis? What if, one day you wake up to find Blogger, Googlemail and Adsense all disabled? How would you feel? Shocked? Frantic? Devastated? You would if you were the owner of these accounts. You would if your articles generated a passive income. You would if you had spent several months building and lovingly nurturing 130 plus articles. So, what's the story? Why did this happen? Read on for a thought provoking theory and remember the answer to how to seo comes from you! If you are reading this, it is by default. This is your journey too!

Yahoo! Launches Search Direct

Yahoo! grabbed the attention of the marketing industry earlier this week when the company announced the debut of Yahoo! Search Direct. Yahoo! Search Direct is similar to Google Instant, where “suggestions” pop up as the user is typing in their search query. Yahoo! announced that “[w]ith Search Direct, Yahoo! content is combined with information from the Web to provide rich answers, not just links, and to give people the option to immediately engage or continue to a traditional search results page.”

In order to not look like a copycat program, Search Direct has a few key features that set it apart from Google Instant.

First off, before a user even begins to type in their search keywords, Search Direct provides them with the top ten trending searches. These results are updated every ten minutes to keep the trends fresh and relevant.

Similar to Google Instant, Search Direct predicts your search query as you type, and offers you suggestions that would finish your search for you. However, unlike Google Instant, when you scroll over the available options, the most relevant links for that search query pop up alongside the search box. Users don’t have to leave the search bar to find the information they are looking for.

Depending on your search (weather, phone numbers, addresses, etc), Search Direct will pull the answer directly into the search box, so users don’t have to click over to a results page.

Search Direct is still in its infancy, so it doesn’t work for every search. Typing in Brick Marketing, for instance, doesn’t yield any results in the search box apart from a few local business profiles. Most users are still going to have to click over to the full results page to find the information they are looking for, but the potential for Search Direct to provide all the information you need without a results page is definitely there.

When Google launched Google Instant, many SEO professionals worried what kind of effect it would have on SEO. Do you think Search Direct has the ability to change the way we search? Is it enough to take on Google? Yesterday, Mashable had an article that shared research done by eMarketer, stating that “Yahoo’s percentage of the search ad revenue pie will fall to 8.1% this year compared with 10.4% in 2010.” Is Search Direct enough to keep Yahoo! relevant?

Google Takes on Content Farms: What Does it Mean for SEO?

There has been a lot of buzz this past week about Google’s “Farmer Update,” which was designed to take on content farms; spammy, low-quality content sites that have been crowding their search results. Google had this to say about their updated algorithm in a post on the official Google Blog on February 24th.

“Our goal is simple: to give people the most relevant answers to their queries as quickly as possible…This update is designed to reduce rankings for low-quality sites—sites which are low-value add for users, copy content from other websites or sites that are just not very useful. At the same time, it will provide better rankings for high-quality sites—sites with original content and information such as research, in-depth reports, thoughtful analysis and so on…”

The Google crackdown affected 11.8% of search queries.

While the “Farmer Update” did successfully knock a lot of splogs (spam blogs) out of the search results, several major content distribution sites took a major hit—EzineArticles.com , Business.com and Yahoo! Associated Content to name a few. Check out this graph from Sistrix to see how hard these and other sites were hit. EzineArticles CEO Chris Knight wrote a blog post about the consequences of EzineArticles getting labeled a content farm and what they intend to do about it:

“…we adamantly disagree with anyone who places the “Content Farm” label on EzineArticles.com… We’ll be evaluating ways to reduce the number of ads per page to improve the perceived user experience… Expect to see our current article rejection rate (40.6%) climb by another ~20%…”

The Google attack on content farms is a prime example of why sites need to take a diversified SEO approach. Sites that were relying on links solely from content marketing efforts suddenly found that a lot of links are now attached to sites that Google views as spam. Link credit (aka link juice) can have a substantial impact on a site’s trust factor. If a site’s inbound links are now associated with content farms, they lose part of their trust factor.

Content marketing got a lot of attention as a critical component of SEO. And once something is considered an important factor, that’s when the spammers and black hat SEO types swoop in and try to game the system. Since content marketing has taken a hit with the “Farmer Update”, websites should take some time away from content marketing and focus on other components of their link building plan. That is not to say that you should give up on producing a company blog or developing quality content. It just means that major content sites that were adversely affected by the update will have some sorting out to do before they can begin to publish new content. Hopefully the sites that were wrongly labeled as content farms will re-earn their spots in the search results.

Other sites were affected by the update because, while they may have had decent content, they may have had too many Adsense Ads or ads in general that are cluttering the page. The number of ads feeds into the overall user-experience, and a lot of ads comes across as spammy. Too many ads can kill the quality and usability of the content. However, Google hasn’t laid down a clear line of what constitutes “too many” ads. This has many site owners frustrated, as the feel like they’ve been unfairly penalized for trying to monetize their site.

Some are grateful for the update, glad to see Google finally taking on content farms that have been burying quality content in the search results. Others feel like Google went too far and attacked sites that typically produce quality content. What do you think about the new Google about and hot it impacts content farms?

There is Nothing “Urgent” in SEO

I firmly believe that companies have to keep a clear line of communication open between themselves and their SEO partner. Bringing in a third party to handle your SEO is a great idea if none of your current in-house employees have the background or the time to handle implementing an SEO plan. But to create the most applicable SEO strategy, your outside SEO partner needs insider knowledge into your company. That’s why it is important you keep them well informed about what is going on with your company and brand, especially anything that deals with the marketing department.

That being said, I feel that sometimes clients go overboard for the sake of communication. I do want to know what is going on at your company, especially if you are thinking about launching a new website or are bringing in a new employee to the marketing department that I will be working with. These scenarios directly affect the job I am trying to do for you. Staying informed is how I know I am on the right track or if I need to change the plan up a bit. But that is what our scheduled meeting times are for!

I take customer service very seriously. When I try to contact someone I’ve hired to do something for me, even if it just a landscaping service, I expect them to get back to me within a reasonable amount of time. Because I expect that of those who I hire, I try to give the same consideration to those who hire me. I’ve responded to emails and voicemails on the weekends, in the middle of the night or incredibly early in the morning. I want my clients to know that I take their business very seriously.

But sometimes clients get a little over-zealous. I’ll get a bunch of emails from one client in one day, or have a quick phone call turn into a full-blown department conference call. I do appreciate the enthusiasm; it is much better than being blind sided with a big change. But in the world of SEO there is nothing so urgent that it can’t wait.

I say it again and again, SEO is a long-term process. It builds upon itself over time and you will rarely, if ever, see your actions have irreversible effects overnight. There are few crises in SEO that can only be solved in a limited time frame. So please, don’t fret over the small details and waste time worrying. There is nothing so pressing that it can’t wait until our next scheduled meeting.

What’s New in SEO for June 21, 2011

We have compiled the latest news and updates from the big three, Google, Bing and Yahoo as it relates to SEO and the search engines overall.

WHAT’S NEW THIS WEEK WITH GOOGLE:
Organizing lists of related searches
Sometimes when you’re searching, you’re not just looking for one specific result, you may be looking for a list to start a series of searches. In Google you’ll now see a collection of the top referenced items from the topic of your search for list seeking searches.

WHAT’S NEW THIS WEEK WITH YAHOO:
Yahoo! App Search and AppSpot Take the Guesswork Out of Finding an App
Yahoo! Search thinks that there is a better way to discover personally relevant apps and introduced two fun, fast ways to search and discover mobile apps: Yahoo! App Search on the PC and App Spot, a new mobile application.

WHAT’S NEW THIS WEEK WITH BING:

World IPv6 Day – Next Generation of Internet was successfully tested!
IPv6 is the next generation of the Internet Protocol, and defines how computers communicate and address each other across networks. Microsoft was able to provide IPv6 access to www.microsoft.com, www.bing.com and www.xbox.com as well as Microsoft advertising services, without any incident.

So there you have it, the latest news in search from Google, Bing and Yahoo. We will be bringing you more exciting updates and news related to SEO and the world of search engine optimization each week, so check back often!

3 Ways to Optimize Your Press Release for SEO

Whenever you publish a piece of content online, you have to be thinking about SEO in the back of your mind before you send it out. Each piece of content is a potential source of valuable, inbound links and could potentially drive targeted traffic to your site. Have you optimized it for SEO to do just that? While it’s easy to incorporate anchor text and keywords in the “About the Author” section of an article or internally link among blog posts, many companies are still failing to fully capitalize on the SEO potential of an online press release.

It has to be said that online PR is no substitute for offline PR. The two need to work together to create the most awareness for a brand.

Here are 3 ways to optimize your press release for SEO

1. Go after branded keywords in the headline
Not only does your headline need to grab the attention of the reader, it also needs to catch the eye of the search engines. One way to do this is to incorporate keywords in the title. You never want to stuff keywords in your headline (that practically guarantees that no news source will pick it up), but don’t forget that your keywords can be rearranged by the search engines to match a user’s search.

Take a look at the headline of this old Brick Marketing press release for example. The headline reads “Boston SEO Marketing Agency, Brick Marketing, Launches New Internet Marketing Blog.” I went after several different keywords (which could rank for Boston SEO marketing agency, Boston SEO, SEO marketing agency, Brick Marketing, Internet marketing, Internet marketing blog, SEO blog, etc…) to help this press release rank well in the search engines for those keywords and help drive targeted traffic to the new company blog. 

2. Include anchor text AND full URLs

A good rule of thumb is one link for every one hundred words. This will keep your press release from being labeled as spam by the distribution services. You want to incorporate both anchor text (hyperlinked keywords) and the full URL into the content of your press release. Most press releases incorporate the full URL in the first sentence of the press release after the company has been introduced. The anchor text is spread throughout the body of the press release.

It should be noted that you always want to link to related pages. If you hyperlink “dog grooming supplies” but the link takes visitors to a page about video games, you’re guilty of tricking traffic along.

3. Add multimedia and images

A recent study found that multimedia press release get an astounding 77% more views! Incorporating videos and images into your press release can help it get picked up by more bloggers, news sources and more. The videos can also be pulled from the press release and posted on their own other sites as well.

It’s Time to Get Your SEO Local

As you know, link building is an important part of search engine optimization. It increases your company’s brand and visibility online and establishes trust with the search engines. The more relevant inbound links that your website has, the greater the chance that your website will rank well. There are many ways to build your links. Popular strategies include article marketing, social networking, blogging, blog commenting, distributing newsworthy press releases and directory submissions. Another great way to build your links is to submit your website to local profile directories. Some people tend to think that only a local business should do this, but that isn’t true. Even if you sell your product or offer your services to people across the country, a local profile can’t hurt. People are sometimes weary about what they see online and are worried about scams and concerned about privacy issues. A local profile establishes that you are an actual company, with an actual physical location. You’d be surprised how many more people are willing to trust you if you provide this information.

There are numerous places to submit a local profile online for free. The first place to start would be local search engine profiles. Google, Yahoo!, and Bing all offer free local profile submissions. The process for each is slightly different, but they are all pretty simple to submit to. Google Places, which is also sometimes referred to as Google Maps or Google Local, asks you to sign in using a Google account. You then type in the main phone number that is associated with your business. If that phone number isn’t listed and is available you can then “claim your business” and fill out information about your company including your address, your website, and a brief explanation about the products or services that you provide. Other information is optional to include, such as the days of the week that your business operates and what hours you are open. Once you fill out the form you will need to adhere to Google’s verification process. In order to exclude non-legitimate listings, Google has implemented a verification process that is done by phone or by mailing a postcard to the address that you used to sign up. It usually arrives within 2-3 weeks. Once you are contacted by Google, you can verify the listing and your Google Places page should be up and running. Bing Local is very similar to Google Places and also sends a verification pin to the business. For Yahoo! Local you only need to sign up, there isn’t a lengthy verification process. According to Yahoo! a site that you register should show up in Yahoo! Local results in about 5 days.

While it’s most important to submit your site to the local search engine profile directories, there are many other places to sign up for a local listing online, such as Yelp, Yellow Pages, and Local.com. The key to local profiles is to include the keywords that you are targeting. If you want to receive phone calls, try and get your phone number in the listing more than once. Local profiles are a great way to build links and get noticed.

SEO - What Do Search Engines Want?

Search engines use algorithms, and sometimes human intervention, to determine the pages displayed in their search results. Intentionally getting those pages to rank is SEO or Seach Engine Optimization.
SEO and Google, Yahoo and Bing are not always in sync and the primary culprits are spam and other devious methods to get unworthy sites to rank in search engines. These other methods include paid links to pages, setting up phony sites with stolen or scraped content to send links to other sites, and phony or fake social media profiles to send even more links.

The search engines don't like spam, paid links, link farms, link schemes, and other methods to influence the rankings. They have published terms of service and these techniques are against their terms of service. They are often called blackhat SEO techniques.

What Do The Search Engines Really Want?

Let's start with why search is so valuable. Search engine advertising through pay-per-click is a multi-billion dollar industry. Google's success is based primarily on Adwords. To make it as simple as possible - search engines need good content to lure searchers to use their search tool.

Good content from the search results is good for the search engines, searchers and those web pages that are ranked at the top of the results. Everybody is happy except for owners of websites that are not ranking who feel they have better content.

How Do Search Engines Determine Results

First, the search engines don't tell us the formulas or algorithms they use to determine search rank. They tell us what they believe ideal content is, but you can create the exact content they want, the best in the world, and still not be found in the top results.

For the most part, search engine computer programs are determining the pages that rank. These programs take signals from two major groups - the web page, and external authority signals.

The web page is the content that you, your visitors and the search engines see when they visit. Visitors are looking for information and to have their questions answered. Search engines are looking for signals related to the search terms. The signals include the page title, page description, heading tags, word frequency and related terms.

The authority signals are mostly from outside your site and can be thought of as links back to the page. The number of links is important, but where they come from is even more important. A link from General Motors to your Corvette content page is worth much more than a link from your friend Vinny. In fact, it may be worth a thousand links from other websites.

The best authority link is from an industry leader with your exact anchor text. If General Motors sends their visitors to your Classic Corvette Parts site with that exact anchor text, you have it nailed. Get two or three of those big time links, and you'll be in good shape. Unfortunately, that just doesn't happen very often.

Give Search Engines The Signals They're After

Google and the other search engines want to give top rankings to the highest authority on a subject. That's what they want, but it doesn't always happen. Instead, they give the ranking to the page with the highest score based on their signals.

So, to get the highest ranking, you need to give the search engines the signals they're after. You don't need to game the system to do this, but you do need to work. The best way to do it is to become the expert for your industry or your niche in the industry. You do that by being active everywhere that's related to your keyword terms on the internet.


Here are a few ideas:

- Write lots of content on your website related to your keywords
- Write articles
- Write guest post on blogs
- Comment on Blogs
- Get listed in every industry directory and portal
- Be active in social media
- Create videos and post them to YouTube and other sites

These are just a few ideas. They are all legitimate and will add to your authority. Each of these actions will add links back to your site and your pages. After people see you all over the web, you will get mentions on other blogs and sites and more links will come naturally. This is whitehat SEO.

This is what the search engines want. They want to see your site and your pages get links naturally over time. They are very suspicious of new sites or new pages that get thousands of links from unrelated sites.

The Future of Search

The search engines will continue to refine their systems, their algorithms and their programs to eliminate spam and blackhat techniques. People will always try to game the system and they may have short-term success. But, in the long run, legitimate signals from legitimate sources will be successful. If you are in business for the long-term, build you web presence and authority over time.