The (Not So) Shocking Truth About Getting A High Search Engine Ranking

Written by Elizabeth Piotrowski


I have seen my site hit #3 at Google, and some of my fellow entrepreneurs are wondering how I did it. Well, it's no big secret, and it won't cost you anything but your time. Here's what I did:

1. I searched online for information aboutrepparttar title and description tags to get a better idea of what they should say. http://www.selfpromotion.com is a great site for this kind of information. It's all about search engine positioning, and it's free to sign up. However, your account only stays active for 4 weeks, after whichrepparttar 128334 webmaster asks that you donate money to his site to keep your account active.

2. I used Overture's free keyword tool at http://inventory.overture.com/d/searchinventory/suggestion/. Just enter keywords that are relevant to your site, and Overture will generaterepparttar 128335 most popular search terms that people are using. I pickedrepparttar 128336 most popular terms (making sure they were relevant), and made a list of keywords for each page of my site in Notepad.

2. Next, I visited http://www.scrubtheweb.com/abs/meta-check.html. This handy tool will check your meta tags and tell you if there are too many characters in your title, keyword and description. The above site is just one of many meta tag analyzers available onrepparttar 128337 net, so beware - every analyzer says something different when it comes to how many characters your meta tags should have. My advice? Pick one and stick with it, at least for a while. Otherwise, you will just get frustrated.

The Benefits and Risks of Pay-Per-Click

Written by Barry Harrison


Many companies have been "buying their way torepparttar top" of search engines using Pay-Per-Click (PPC) campaigns. Should you promote your Website with PPC? There's no simple answer. But in this REDiTIPS we offer an introduction to PPC so you can make an informed decision. --------------------------------------- What Is Pay-Per-Click?

Google AdWords Select (http://www.google.com/ads) and Overture (http://www.overture.com) arerepparttar 128333 two leading Pay-per-click players, but there are over 400 search engines using this model. They all work in more or lessrepparttar 128334 same way. You bid on keywords and phrases that your target audience may use to find your site inrepparttar 128335 search engines. When they do a search for those keywords your ad or "sponsored listing" appears in a special section nearrepparttar 128336 top or side ofrepparttar 128337 search results.

The position of your ad depends onrepparttar 128338 amount you bid andrepparttar 128339 competition for your keywords, so selectingrepparttar 128340 best keywords is essential. You pay only when someone clicks through to your site.

What Does it Cost?

You can set up your PPC campaign with Google AdWords Select for just $5.00, with no monthly minimum. Overture requires a $50 setup fee and a $20.00 monthly minimum. Both allow you to set a maximum monthly budget. The cost is a function of your keywords, your bid amount, and your click-thru-rate.

Make sure thatrepparttar 128341 cost of acquiring a customer through your PPC campaign is less than your average profit from each sale. Overture has a return on investment (ROI) tool to help with this calculation.

Here's an Example

As of 3/11/03repparttar 128342 top bid in Overture forrepparttar 128343 term "professional website design" is $3.86. Every time a searcher clicks on that ad,repparttar 128344 company pays $3.86. For "web design consultant"repparttar 128345 top bid is $1.05. In January 2003, Overture tells us 5,955 searches were done for "professional website design" and 3,522 for "web design consultant." Assuming a 1% click-thru-rate (CTR) that translates to about $230 forrepparttar 128346 first term, and about $37 forrepparttar 128347 second.

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