Write Description Describe your website in a way that will attract visitors. The length of your description will vary from directory to directory, but most will be under 250 characters. Some will allow up to 1,000 characters, and in those cases write most comprehensive description of your site and its features that you can. It is a good idea to write several descriptions of different lengths, say from under 50 characters for a brief overview, to around 150 characters for a fuller description, up to 250 characters for a yet more comprehensive listing, and finally a full description as previously mentioned for over 250 characters. Keep your listing pertinent to your website, insert keywords where relevant and appropriate, but do not just submit a keyword listing, as most directories will reject your submission. Save all your descriptions in a text file, and just copy & paste into descriptions boxes when needed rather than typing same descriptions out again and again.

Choose Keywords Again, as with description mentioned above, amount of keywords you can use will vary from directory to directory. Some will not give option, some will allow you numbers of keywords, whilst others go by numbers of characters. Make a list of all relevant keywords for your site, from most important to least, and basically keep adding keywords until either you get to bottom of your list (unlikely unless your list is really short) or you run out allowed characters/keywords. Check what keywords your competitors are going for if you need inspiration. This can often be done by viewing source of a web page and checking META tags. Again, save your keywords to a text file.

Keep Track of Your Progress Keep a careful record of what directories you have submitted to, and your progress. It is far too easy to totally lose track of what you are doing, which does not help your linking campaign at all. The best way is by using a spreadsheet, such as Excel, to keep track of your campaign. At a minimum, you need to keep track of following: Directory URL, Directory Name, Date Submitted, User Login & Password for those directories that allow you to alter your details and Response (accepted/declined). Other categories can include: Directory Alexa Ranking, Directory Page Rank (this will be for home page only), Referral URL (if directory will improve your ranking for referring visitors) and any Notes. If you are using deep linking and multiple submissions strategies above, also keep track of what other pages you have submitted to each directory. Make a seperate entry for each URL submitted. For example, your spreadsheet columns could go as follows: Directory Name, Directory URL, URL Submitted, Referral URL, Login, Password, Alexa Ranking, Page Rank, Date Submitted, Response. I would advise keeping list in alphabetical order, rather than order submitted, as that way you can check more easily whether or not you have submitted to a particular directory.

2. Say how often your ezine is published in subject line - weekly, monthly.

3. Put date of newsletter in subject line.

4. Put issue number in subject line.

5. Ensure your newsletter is a proper ezine with some substance in text.

To help identify spam in your emails/ezines use following spam checker always before you send anything out.

http://www.merchant-account-service.com/stop_spam_mail.html

Above all, use your common sense. We know what spam looks like, so avoid anyting that resembles it in your ezine.

(C) John Lynch

( Learn how to Make Money Online by subscribing to Free 6-part 'Internet Marketing Explained' mini course. Get 6 free Internet Marketing E-books; free autoresponder; and free trial top-notch website. http://www.merchant-account-service.com/internet_marketing_explained.html)