Reviewer of Sites

Most of us know or suspect that PageRank has little meaning these days.

Here’s my idea:

Someone (not necessarily Google) creates a toolbar and/or small site banners showing the current SERP for specific terms for that page.

1. Roll your mouse over the top of the banner and you then see the terms or key words (the banner could also show a numerical value, such as “page 1, pos 3″ or just “P1,p3″ for the page showing up on the first page at position 3 on the page.

2. The toolbar could show the search terms and the “SERP rank“.

3. There could be a site that could show graphs of SERP changes and notify the user when there are sudden drops or increases in the SERP.  Perhaps this could be a paid for service to cover costs.

I want to know your thoughts on this.

Tags: SEO // 5 Comments »

Wikopedia describes the Search Engine Results Page (SERP) as “the listing of web pages returned by a search engine in response to a keyword query. The results normally include a list of web pages with titles, a link to the page, and a short description showing where the keywords have matched content within the page. A SERP may refer to a single page of links returned, or to the set of all links returned for a search query.”

The SERPs are the single most important thing with respect to search engines and optimizing your website, and in particular, the individual pages. The SERPs are the “free” way of getting targetted traffic to your site. The usual alternative is paid advertising, which is anything but free. Search Engine Optimization is the science (or art) of optimizing a website for the best SERP results possible for range of potential search terms that the webmaster is trying to improve upon for the SERPs. The higher the position on the page, preferably the first page, of the SERP the better. Most search engine users only look at the top choices on the first page.

Each search term, such as “reviewer” or “reviewer of sites“, will have different results for the respective search engine. You will even notice that the results may change from day to day for the exact same search term on the specific search engine. There are many variables to consider when optimizing your site and pages, including how and what your competition is doing on their end for the given search terms. In my opinion, the best methods for improving your SERPs for the specific search terms is to do the following:

• Use the Firefox plugins SEOQuake and Niche Watch to analyze your (and your competition’s) keyword density for a specific page, determine the amount of backlinks (preferably from pages with related content), number of indexed pages, keyword occurrences on the page, page rank, all in anchor, all in title and all in text rank for both domain and webpage information.
• Continue to add original content on your site, especially articles relating to the specific keywords.
• Give descriptive titles to the content and web pages relating to the keywords.
• If possible, use search engine friendly url’s, such as “http://www.example.com/seo/all-about-seo.html”.

It does take time to work your way toward the top of the SERPs, especially if the keywords have a lot of competition, so you will need to be patient. The important thing is to not do anything that could get you penalized by Google, since it is usually the SERPs for your site that takes the hit.

Tags: Marketing, SEO, Web Design // 3 Comments »

Interested in a new internet business startup idea? Here’s an idea straight from a Google employee!

Matt Cutts, the well known Google employee that blogs about all things internet, has come up with his own internet money making venture. Realizing that most people have a ton of their favorite songs in an mp3 format, only not necessarily legally downloaded. His idea is that people may like to have a higher quality, legal format and would go for the opportunity to upload a list of all their favorite titles and have them converted. The mp3 conversion internet business would charge the customer to cover the cost of making the songs legal, etc

Here’s how he thinks it could work for you:

- offer people ringtones of songs on their hard drive
- charge a penny or two for each song that is converted to “legitimate.”
- run some banner ads or AdSense
- anonymize the data and license the anonymized data to various businesses
- get people to sign up with Pandora, Last.fm, or Rhapsody.
- don’t make any money on it. Use it as a way to build brand recognition or positive karma.

I actually could see how this could work! However, the biggest incentive for people would be a huge assault by the RIAA with lawsuits and other penalties. Also, if they offered higher quality sound and a full catalog of data, since many mp3 downloads don’t include much information and have incorrect spellings.

So, all you audiophile, internet entrepreneurs better get a jump on the competition and do it now!

As a sidenote, Matt Cutts has hinted before that Google would not be a lifelong pursuit when he said “I love working at Google, but at some point my wife is going to wake up and smell the coffee. She’ll say ‘Hey, we agreed we’d try this Google thing for four or five years, and then I’d get to pick what to do next. It’s been like eight years now! When do we move on to our next adventure?’” Maybe he’s considering finally doing one of his ideas.

Tags: Business, Internet // 1 Comment »

Someone raised a good concern on the Digital Point Forum the other day about giving up and “waving the white flag”. This happens to many people that are searching for a way to make a living or some extra income via the internet (among other places). Part of it comes from the type of people that are attracted to internet businesses, and that is that they are looking for “easy money” or they want a way to earn an income with little to no work. Rarely is this true. As the saying goes, “if it were easy, everyone would do it.” Well, many people do try, but give up once they realize the effort it takes to succeed. The truth is that the average internet user is becoming more savvy and discriminating as to what sites, opportunities, or products are worth their time. With this realization, we must continue to evolve and perfect what we create.

Perseverance

By simply sticking it out, you will notice many of the people that started along your side will have given up. For those remaining competitors, you must improve on your good ideas and make them live up to the standards of the savvy internet user.

“Don’t be discouraged. It’s often the last key in the bunch that opens the lock.” ~Author Unknown

Passion

Another important part of success is do something in which you are passionate. When the going gets really tough, it’s often our passion that keeps us going. In other words, do something you really enjoy. Don’t make life harder for yourself by doing something that you have very little interest in doing in the first place.

As Jenn Mattern said in her response in the forum thread, “Don’t worry about a saturated market. Just find a niche you’ll love (if you won’t keep your drive to keep it going, it doesn’t matter how much it could potentially make), and one that you could be considered an authority in, and take it from there.” That is some sound advice.

Learn from Others

Improving on an idea can be a worthwhile undertaking. The USA become what it is today by “standing on the shoulders of other great men” and always trying to improve on what came before. However, make sure you are not simply “reinventing the wheel”. The greatest mistake you could make would be to fall into the same trap as others.

Make a Plan

Another famous quote is by Benjamin Franklin, “by failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail.” How true that is? Flying by the seat of your pants may work for a fighter pilot, but it rarely works for a business. Take the time to formulate a plan so you don’t stray from your original goals. That is not to say that you should not be flexible, but that you should have a guide to follow along the way.

The last lesson that I will mention is that it is important to focus on only a few ideas at a time. Do not spread yourself thin and make your projects suffer because you did not allow yourself the time and energy to see them through.

Tags: Business // 6 Comments »

Good news for those out of Mexico using Adsense.  They can now transfer straight to their banks.

We’re happy to let you know that Electronic Funds Transfer (EFT) is now supported in Mexico.

Signing up for EFT to receive your future payments directly in your bank account is simple. Just follow these steps to set up your bank account — you’ll then need to verify a test deposit that we’ll place into your account. To learn more about EFT or the sign-up process, please visit our Help Center.

We’ll continue to announce any new country support for EFT or additional payments options here on the blog, so feel free to check back often!

Tags: Adsense // 1 Comment »

This is great news for those new to Yahoo! Search Marketing. That is a ton of credit! This applies to the Self Service option only (where you do the setup yourself).

• Select your keywords.
• Write your ads.
• Set your budget and bid amount.

Click here for the link

Tags: Advertising, Marketing, Yahoo // 4 Comments »

As you are probably aware, affiliate (aka associate) marketing is when one internet business/website offers a commission per sale, or other criteria, for each visitor that came from the other website’s affiliate link. These programs have proven to be very successful for some and not so successful for others. The good thing about these programs is that you do not keep any product inventory on hand and there is normally no expense, other than for maintaining your website. You are just the middle man, getting paid for referring a customer to the receiving site.

One of the lesser known, and a personal favorite is the Gomez PEER program. This is one of the few that runs on a pc and is not ran via a website. You can earn some pretty decent money for doing nothing but having an active internet connection and running your computer with it in your system tray. The most sought after affiliates for the Gomez Peer program are those people with computers anywhere in Australia, South America, or Mexico, and any computer with dial up connections in the USA, parts of Asia, and Europe.

Gomez Peer program

An excellent resource for the various affiliate programs is Associate Programs dot com. Associate Programs has an extensive list of affiliate programs, broken down by topic. Also, they also have a very nice selection of articles for the beginner all the way to the advanced affiliate.

Important Tips for Affiliate Marketers:

Need ideas? Look at what is selling well and getting great reviews. Maybe it’s something new on the market. Well, visit the manufacturer or seller website and see if they have an affiliate program.  If so, you could be one of the first to use it, which could mean a great start for you because you may not have much competition.

Once you’ve decided on a few possibilities, take the time to investigate the seller and their program. I don’t mean just look at their site, but look for reviews about the program. You don’t want your visitor to leave your site happy, only to become upset with the result of the other site and their service. There are way too many great affiliate programs out there to saddle yourself with a bad one. Just because they may offer a high commission does not that they are worth it.

The Design. Once you have narrowed it down to one or more affiliate programs, then you begin putting the links in your website. There are a variety of things to consider. Sometimes it would be appropriate to make the affiliate link look less like an advertisement and more like just a simple picture or text link. Usually this means blending the text link colors with the surrounding parts of the web page or putting the picture or banner near other pictures of similar size. Other times, you may want to be upfront with your visitor that this is an affiliate program. If you point out that the money from them buying via the affiliate link would go toward this, their favorite website, or toward a great cause, then they may feel like buying through you as apposed to going direct.

Presell the products. That is when you “warm up your visitors” to the idea of considering the product that the seller sells. You do not sell the product to the visitor, that is the job of the seller. It is your testimony or opinion that the visitor wants. Then they decide to investigate the offer by clicking on the link. Your job is done, until next time.

Unlike the example I am setting right here, do not bother trying to sell others on the idea of becoming an affiliate. There are thousands of sites out there already trying to do that right now. Instead, sell the product to the customer, not the idea of becoming an affiliate. In other words, create about the various products and then sell those via your affiliate links. If you have a trusting audience for your site, they will consider your opinion as an endorsement of the product. This goes back to my point that I made in the previous paragraph, that being, ‘don’t sell something that you wouldn’t use yourself’, better yet, ‘don’t sell a product you haven’t used yourself’.

Be creative. Don’t repeat the same old methodologies of other sites. That’s not to say that you should reinvent the wheel in terms of designing a website or page in an efficient or logical manner. What I mean is; try to make the experience of visiting your site memorable or at least worthwhile. The preferred thing is to have the visitor come back again and maybe even tell a friend. This may include interactive things on your site, such as games or web-based tools for them to use.

Already selling your own stuff? If you have your own products to sell, affiliate programs can be a great way of increasing the types of products available without increasing your own expenses or taking up room with inventory. You could then direct your customer to the other businesses that compliment your own.

Go get em tiger! Rawr!

Tags: Affiliate // 3 Comments »