To be short, your task is to find web-sites that have highest SE listing positions and/or page rank (determined via Google Toolbar) and negotiate a link to your site in return for some service, product or solicit simple exchange of links. As you see these "manual" work is most time-consuming, but it repays if you are focused to get as much relevant links as possible.

You may apply viral strategies by offering some free/paid service that implies putting a link back to your site.

Google has developed its own link popularity evaluation tool called Page Rank. It is calculated basing on consistently changing number rules: current rank of site link to your page is pointing from, its relevance to your web-site topic, presence of targeted words etc.

Fake tactics

They are what I call them and used by webmasters similar to ways some "marketers" use spam to promote their businesses.

Unfortunately, usual internet users don't have ability to "ban" spammers same way SEs penalize those "smart" webmasters. I don't recommend you to use any of these tactics, even on someone's "advice".

They include excessive use of related and totally unrelated keywords, comment tags, hidden layers, text on background of same color, artificial link farms, numerous entry pages etc. This game simply won't be worth candles if your web-site is banned for good.

robots.txt file

Very important file every web-site should have. It allows you to literally rule or direct SE spider to "proper" places, explaining what and where should be scanned, not just blind waiting of your lucky day. With its help you can also protect your confidential web-pages and or directories from scanning and showing at SE searching results, very important feature many web-masters solve with "tons" of Java or even Perl coding instead of one line string in robots.txt file that will forbid to scan "download", so-called "thank you" pages or anything you want!

General rules of creating robots.txt file you can find here http://www.robotstxt.org/wc/robots.html

Design & Layout issues

Next point is to have a textual info. The simple declaration of content rich web-site is not enough, SEs need text to scan.

Clear to follow links. If you have Flash or Java applet navigation menu, make sure to duplicate somewhere and include HTML links as well. Most SE spiders cannot distinguish dynamically created web-pages with help of ASP, Perl, PHP or other languages. It is also clear that all web-pages, access to which was forbidden (no matter how) by administrator, would also be left unnoticed. The same relates to HTML frame sites. What frames actually do is complicate way web-site is being scanned, no more, no less. When I see web-site made of frames, it is like webmaster telling me: "I want lower SE position."

Because of excessive work spiders have to do in order to scan as many pages as possible, their scanning "accuracy", if we can say so, have dropped, so they will hardly scan each and every of your pages from very top to bottom, it is more likely to be selective scanning, so, to ease this process you should try to arrange most valuable info, including header tags and text at very top of web-pages. Having "site map" page with all link connections of your site not only does it help your potential visitors, but SEs as well.

All link names, inside your informational content, are to contain your related keywords or phrases, not just "click here" or "download here".

Avoid a lot of javascripts, cascade style sheet tags or a lot of image tags at top of page that could occupy more than a page of HTML source code with almost no textual info. If you have java or .css coding save them as separate files and upload on request, leaving one string of code in your HTML document only. This tactic is also very smart considering general web-page optimization and space saving purposes.

Allow to Internet market know your business better.

The Legal Question Each of companies offering these services has a policy designed to ensure that a web site only buys keywords related to their content, and their review process is designed to keep cybersquatters from hijacking popular names and products. Unfortunately, there is no way to guarantee that any one of these keyword ownership services adheres to any naming standard, or even ensures that any purchaser has legal right to any of terms they are buying. This means that rights to copyrighted material like "Pepsi" or generic words like "business" could end up in hands of first buyer. While Pepsiis a well known brand name, there are millions of copyrighted and trademark protected terms, covered in multiple jurisdictions. For these services to police copyright and trademark infringement would not be cost effective or practical.

In summer of 1999, U.S. Court of Appeals for Ninth Circuit, denied Playboy's request for an injunction barring a search engine from selling advertising based on terms playboyand playmate. In precedent setting ruling regarding keyword advertising, Judge Stotler of United States District Court in Santa, Ana, California, dismissed a lawsuit brought by Playboy Enterprises against search engine Excite, Inc. and Netscape. The ruling limited online rights of trademark holders, as it recognized that a trademark may be used without authorization by search engines in advertising sales practices.

Playboy claimed that search engines were displaying paid banner ads from pornographic web sites whenever "playboy" or "playmate" were used as a search term. As owner of trademarks for both terms, Playboy argued that use of its trademarks for a third party sales scheme was trademark infringement and branding dilution.

In ruling dismissing Playboy's case, Judge found that Excite had not used trademarks "playboy" and "playmate" in an unlawful manner. This was because Excite had not used trademarked words to identify Excites own goods or services and therefore trademark infringement laws did not apply. It was further determined that even if there was trademark usage, there was no infringement because there was no evidence that consumers confused Playboy products with services of Excite or Netscape.

What about within Meta Tags? Is it illegal to use trademarked terms in your meta tags? Sometimes. The problem occurs with how and why you are using terms. Web sites that use tags in a deceptive manner have lost legal battles. However, legitimate reasons to use terms have resulted in successful defenses.

In a case involving Playboy, firm was able to prove trademark infringement, based on use of their trademark in meta tags, url and content on web site. The case was filed by firm against web site operators for stuffing their web pages with words Playboyand Playmatehundreds of times. Furthermore, defendants were also using terms Playboy and Playmate in site names, URLs, and slogans. In this case Judge ruled for Playboy, as there was a clear case of trademark infringement.

In separate case, Playboy vs. Terri Welles, court refused Playboys request. The reason was simple. Terri Welles was Playboy's 1981 Playmate of Year. She had used terms "Playmate" and "Playboy" on her web pages and within her meta tags, and Court felt she had a legitimate right to use them to accurately describe herself, and to ensure that search engines could catalog her web site properly within their databases. Playboy's appeal was dismissed on Feb. 1, 2002.

In Summary It is clear that if you have a legitimate reason to use a trademarked word or phrase in your web site you can. You may also rent their ownership from one of keyword ownershipcompanies. Be careful, though, it is possible that may get sued.

Does technology work? Yes, but only for some of approximately 3% of Internet users worldwide who have installed any one of a variety of competing plugins that enable this type of searching. I stress a fraction of 3%, as you would need to buy keywords from each individual vendor to ensure reaching all 2%.