February 24th, 2009
Content pages form the bulk of Web sites on the Internet. It’s hardly surprising when you think about it. Consider the number of hobbyists, enthusiasts, bloggers, information sites, and even the more serious publishers who create informative content on a daily basis.
Whilst e-commerce sites tend to generate the majority of their revenue from tangible (real life) items, content sites rarely have this luxury. They must generate money using other avenues, the most obvious and popular being advertising. Other revenue opportunities exist for content sites, such as donations. However, by and large, it is advertising that is the major money spinner.
Visit only a handful of Web pages and you will struggle to avoid advertisements. They have been, and will persist to be, a focal and accepted fact of Internet life. Adverts are everywhere: on popular sites and also on smaller, niche sites. Even the owners of some personal sites use advertising to help cover the cost of hosting.
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Posted in Advertising & Site Monetisation | No Comments »
February 11th, 2009
Internet marketing, Web site promotion, online marketing, whatever you’d like to call it, is a process concerned with establishing a presence on the Internet. Notice I said a ‘process’ – not an activity. The reason being, promoting a site online involves constant improvement over a period of time. Make no mistake; there are no short cuts to a successful Web site.
Too many people just go through the motions of ‘promotion’ and expect their site to become successful. What they often fail to realise is the two most critical aspects of the Web promotion process:
1) A site that is a useful resource for visitors.
2) Quality content and the credibility that this breeds.
This may be a shock to many readers. Did you expect me to talk about link building or directory submission? Maybe you did, maybe you didn’t. The fact is, unless you have a truly outstanding Web site, your promotion will suffer. However, combine good solid promotional techniques with a quality site, and you immediately give yourself an advantage. You never know, people might actually start linking to you without asking anything in return (and this will seriously help you on the search engines).
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Posted in Internet Marketing (General) | No Comments »
February 5th, 2009
If you intend to update your site on a regular basis, a Content Management System (CMS) is something you should seriously consider. Not only will it save you a whole lot of time, it can potentially allow you to manage multiple content authors.
Even if you already use a CMS, it could be very worthwhile to research the latest applications available. CMSs have come a long way since the early (and often ugly) in-house attempts by various organisations. Modern CMSs are flexible and some even allow you to update content on the move. ‘Mobile blogging’ is the latest trend and if you’re the owner of a smartphone (such as an iPhone, Blackberry or HTC device), you can write posts from virtually any location you like.
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Posted in Copywriting and Content | No Comments »
February 5th, 2009
Perform a quick search on an engine of your choice and you’ll find thousands of references to ‘link building’.
Now before we get too deep into this post, I want to point out that I am all in favour of “getting the word out” on the Internet, and I am equally in favour of earning links where they are due. I’m also in favour of exchanging relevent links for traffic purposes (note: if you think link exchanges are any use for search engine promotion, you need to do some serious reading).
Deliberately seeking links for the purpose of ‘link building’, however, has a serious number of flaws. Read on and you’ll discover why.
Link building is a superb money spinner because the demand is enormously high, but it’s unfortunate too many people are willing to fall for the sales pitch: “you need links, loads and loads of links from all over the place”. It’s true, you do need links, but rather you need good links (that’s one-way links from high quality sites). ‘Link building’ in the spammy sense can rarely provide this.
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Posted in Search Engine Optimisation | No Comments »
February 5th, 2009
Keyword density is a term created by those attempting to ‘crack’ search engine algorithms. It is usually given as a percentage of the total amount of text on a page. Most often the suggested figure is between 3 and 8%. This says your keyword(s) should encompass 3 to 8% of your total text.
It is ‘anti-visitor’ because the very concept promotes modification of content to suit search engines, rather than visitors. Followers of keyword density are more concerned with meeting the correct % than ensuring the text is suitable for a human. Big mistake! What does keyword density do to help you create good content for your visitors? Absolutely nothing!
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Posted in Copywriting and Content | No Comments »
February 5th, 2009
There is a big difference between how sites are ranked on google.co.uk and google.com. When most people in the UK visit Google, they are automatically forwarded to google.co.uk. The listings on Google UK have more of a UK slant, whilst .com Google tries to be all-inclusive, with varying degrees of success!
Google wants to deliver the most relevant results as possible, especially when it comes to geographical location. Therefore, if you access the Internet in the United States your results will likely differ still. If you are sat at your computer in the UK, even google.com listings will be tailored - at least to some extent. In the future we will no doubt see more of this.
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Posted in Search Engine Optimisation | No Comments »
February 5th, 2009
It’s 2009 and a select bunch of commentators have recently been proclaiming e-mail marketing as dead in the water. When it comes to e-mail, spam is obviously a major turn off, but has it crippled the use of e-mail? Absolutely not. Sending e-mail is, and will persist to be, the single most popular activity on the Web, at least for the foreseeable future.
RSS (Really Simple Syndication) has been touted as a possible replacement for e-mail delivery, but new technologies always take numerous years to gain momentum and are still relatively unknown to your average Joe in the street.
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Posted in E-mail Marketing | No Comments »
February 5th, 2009
Directory submission is something you will certainly hear a lot about if you are promoting a Web business. Directories come in various shapes and sizes: some are purely for business listings, some are generalised, some operate in a niche, and some require payment for a review. There are also varying degrees of quality: some are ‘fly by night’, some are neither hopeless nor great, whilst others are what we call ‘quality directories’. A quality directory is a worthwhile place to submit your site.
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Posted in Search Engine Optimisation | No Comments »
February 5th, 2009
A question I am frequently asked is: “How can I see which sites have added my link?”.
Quality inbound links are a major factor in search engine optimisation, so you’ll obviously want to keea tabs on this. However, not all search engines will disclose the full extent of your link popularity.
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Posted in Search Engine Optimisation | No Comments »
February 5th, 2009
If you opt to use highly suspect SEO tactics thinking you’re unlikely to get caught, this post might just change your mind. Many webmasters participate in dodgy SEO and (unfortunately) get away with it, but thankfully the tides are changing. An increasing number of sites are being penalised, and some even find themselves banned completely.
I am aware of numerous sites that have been penalised for practices such as buying links, duplicate content and link schemes. One site I am aware of, which is a perfectly respectable site in all intensive purposes, was punished after the webmaster used the same content on his other (more popular) site. It spent the best part of 3 years out of the Google index!
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Posted in Search Engine Optimisation | No Comments »
