Welcome to part ten in this search engine positioning series. Over past nine weeks we have covered nine fundamental steps to a proper search engine positioning campaign. From choosing keywords and writing content to optimizing your pages and building quality links we have covered required steps to attaining solid rankings that will last. In part ten we will cover extras.

The extras consist of tips, tools and resources that you will want to use to keep you on cutting edge of who's who and what's what in search engine positioning arena.

Over this series we have covered ten key aspects to a solid search engine positioning campaign.

The Ten Steps We Have Gone Through Are:

1. Keyword Selection
2. Content Creation
3. Site Structure
4. Optimization
5. Internal Linking
6. Human Testing
7. Submissions
8. Link Building
9. Monitoring
10. The Extras

Step Ten - The Extras

The first nine steps in this series cover true nuts-and-bolts of a solid SEO campaign. These are crucial steps you need to take to attain top rankings that will stick. That said " there are "the extras", icing on SEO-cake so-to-speak. Those little things that will bump you up from number 4 to number 2, or help you hold your positioning through an algorithm change.

Some of these things have been touched on in previous articles while others are completely new. Either way, these are things that will give you that little one-up over other ethical SEO's who know their stuff.

Tools

One of most important advantages you can gain over your competition comes from tools you use and more importantly, how you use them. Some people blindly follow advice given to them from so-called "SEO-software". This is never right decision. Taking information these good tools can provide, and knowing how to turn that information into advantage is key.

Here are tools that many successful SEOs use to build solid rankings for their clients and why:

Top Optimizer Pro

I've noted this one in article on link building and it's definitely worth mentioning again. Never before have I found a tool that can tear apart your competition so thoroughly for such an affordable price and in such an easy-to-understand manner.

This tool with take a look at top 10 for a search phrase, and give you:

• their position
• their PageRank
• their Alexa rank
• the total number of backlinks to their site as seen by Google
• the number of their site pages indexed by Google
• their keyword density for targeted phrase
• their title
• their H1 tag

This is overview it gives you. You can then select one of sites and view more detail including:

• the backlink URL
• the backlink domain
• the IP address of backlink
• the PageRank of backlink from that page
• the specific anchor text use for that backlink (or a note whether it was an image)
• the title of page linking back
• the Alexa rating of page linking back
• the top three keyword focus' of page linking back
• the number of links pointing to that page
• the number of outbound links from that page

Right below that there is access to a breakdown of sites backlink's that gives a summary of:

• the specific anchor text, number of times that anchor text was used, and percentage this represents of total backlinks counted
• where these links come from. This will give you great information as to how many of these links are coming from same domain, which is generally accepted in SEO community as holding less weight than same number of links from different domains
• a PageRank breakdown of all links

At $247 from TopNet Solutions it's a bit pricey but worth every penny if you only use it on one campaign. Click here for more details.

PR Prowler

A necessity for any search engine positioning campaign that requires link building. This tool, also developed by TopNet Solutions, doesn't do all fancy things that Top Optimizer Pro does however it does do one thing VERY well - it's seeks out quality relevant link partners with high PageRanks.

If you're not in a competitive industry and you just want to save time on link building (and I do mean a LOT of time) this tool will do it for you. You simply set it to find links based on specified search phrase(s) and with a minimum PageRank. You can search for up to 1000 links at a time. Simply start tool and continue on with other work or go to bed while it's working for you. Come back and you've got some great leads and best part is, it's weeded out all duds so your efforts are focused only on links that will most benefit your site.

This tool has taken campaigns that would have required many hundreds of links to a point where same effect can often be realized with 50 and in a fraction of time spent. Click here for more information on PR Prowler.

FireFox

While this isn't exactly an SEO tool per-se it makes researching and optimizing much faster and more convenient. FireFox is a browser (read: Internet Explorer replacement) that has MANY features that make it more convenient.

I like tabbed browsing (moving between multiple pages through use of tabs on one browser screen), username and password ability is far better and more advanced than Internet Explorer's and it's far more secure than more popular Microsoft product. It blocks popups and spyware just isn't written for it.

I will admit that for first few hours I was trying it out I found it a bit more difficult to use but once you realize how much more powerful it can be and that difficult arises from instinct to make task more difficult by doing it way you would have with IE, you'll never want to switch back. The next time you've got 5 IE windows open to various search engines, another for WordTracker and a couple more to various other pages think of FireFox and you're world will be made easier. It's a free download.

You can read more on advantages of FireFox browser in a search engine positioning article written by ISEDB Editor Jim Hedger at http://www.isedb.com/news/article/1062.

1. Have an unlisted business telephone number?

2. Pay for a storefront sign and never hang it up?

3. Pay to have a print ad designed and never run it?

Then why would you . . . Invest in developing a website that your prospects can't find?

What, exactly, IS Search Engine Optimization anyway? To understand why search engine positioning is so imperative, you must first understand concept of a search engine. There are over 5 billion documents on World Wide Web today. You use search engines such as MSN, Google, or Alta Vista to help sift through this gigantic collection of documents to find specific information you need.

An Internet surfer will likely choose one of 3 routes to get to your Web site:

1) The Internet surfer types entire URL into command line of their browser. This option requires that your URL is already well known. (And URL should also be easy to spell!)

2) The Internet surfer clicks on an advertisement or link that sends him/her to your Web site.

3) The Internet surfer locates you by typing certain keywords or your company name into a search engine. Internet surfers typically go to their favorite search engine, type in words that pertain to what they are looking for, and wait for search engine to return its results in a list format. This is easy and effective.

To give you an example: go ahead and search for "women's shoes" on Google. This search will return thousands of Web sites!

No Internet surfer will scroll through thousands of results! Instead, they are going to pick from links that are closer to top of search. So it would stand to reason that Web sites that will do well on search engines are those that rank in top 30, and better yet, top 10, for keyword phrases that have been selected for their site.

Search engine optimization is way to go if you are looking to INCREASE TARGETED TRAFFIC to your site while complementing and improving your more traditional marketing and advertising efforts. Search engines work better for promoting your site for a number of reasons.

A top search engine ranking often translates into hundreds and even thousands of new qualified visitors each month. It is reasonable to anticipate a steady stream of qualified traffic when your Web site achieves continuous top rankings on multiple search engines.

When an Internet surfer types a keyword into a search engine, they have already identified product or service they need more information about. The search reflects a definite level of interest by a potential buyer.

Search engines are most important tools for locating companies and their products on Internet. Over half of all Internet users search Web every day, and searching is second most popular Internet activity. (Email is # 1!)

NOW let's focus on why your Web site doesn't get noticed by Search Engines.

While having a quality website with a good design and good content is key, it is not enough to get your site noticed by a search engine. There are many factors that can hurt your site's search engine placement. Let's take a look at some of them:

SERVER DOWN Search engines don't notify you before they visit your site; they simply send spider. If your server goes down or your web host is providing you with unreliable service this can have an impact on whether your site gets spidered or not. Imagine if search engine spider came while you were experiencing downtime. Your web host should be able to provide you with information on their server downtime.

DYNAMIC CONTENT A trend in e-commerce today is to use programs like Cold Fusion to generate dynamic pages. These pages are generated based on a database containing information pertinent to visitor's particular interests. Webmasters love these types of pages because they don't have to maintain them. The pages appear only in visitor's browser and then vanish when visitor is done with them. Sounds nifty doesn't it? The catch is that most search engine robots can only index static pages. If you want to generate traffic for your site, make sure you have pages robots can read.

SPAMMING WEB HOSTS Another possible problem could be your IP address. You may share a web host and IP address with sites known for spamming. There are some search engines that block sites hosted by free website providers because of spam problems. If your web host also accepts adult-oriented web sites this can cause problems for you as well since Adult sites tend to be worst spam offenders. If your web host provides hosting for adults sites their IP may be blocked, preventing your site from getting placement. Your web hosting company should be able to tell you if they host adult sites or not.

SPLASH / FLASH PAGES While splash/flash pages can be very nice and aesthetically pleasing to eye, they are not very helpful when trying to place your site with search engines. Because splash pages are heavy with graphics but light on content they are difficult for search engines to spider. Search engine spiders are looking for links and content to evaluate. If your homepage is a splash page with no content you are basically telling search engines that there is nothing to see on your site.

FRAMES Search engines don't really know what to make of frames. If your site uses frames it is a likely cause of you not getting placed. Search engine spiders can only see top-level frame code. Unless you include links inside your NOFRAMES tag spider will leave your site without indexing it.

TIME You may have to wait months for a spider to visit your site. Additionally, just because you get spidered doesn't mean you get immediately listed. There is a holding period from a few days to several weeks before their database is updated. Keep in mind that in addition to new sites being submitted and old sites being resubmitted each day, there is also a huge backlog of sites waiting to be spidered as well.

What Are Advertising Pages?

Advertising pages are individual Web pages that attract a search engine for one individual keyword or keyword phrase. These pages are designed using a computer-generated analysis to conform to ranking criteria of top search engines.