August 4th, 2008Web Tools for SEO-Newbies

seo

Before plunging head-on into using several applications to optimize results for your web page, a few things should be kept in mind even during this research and labor-intensive phase. Remember, search engine optimization relies mainly on a tight archive of interrelated keywords that are managed extra efficiently so that results are brought back in fractions of a second. There are a few things that search engines actually look into in the attempt to place a particular value for a link: the anchor text of a link, the global popularity of the site, the popularity of the site in relevant communities, the text directly surrounding the link and the subject matter of the linking page.

The anchor text of link is important because search engines often rank in terms of how many relevant terms there are in a particular link. So, more relevant terms in one link means a better ranking for multiple searches using disparate terms. For instance, if the anchor text of link has “shopping is great” and “it saves money” at the same time, it caters to two specific searches at once. The global popularity of the site simply connotes how many other websites link directly to the website. For example if your website is cited by CNN or other heavyweights, then those links carry far more weight than lesser sites pointing to your own website. The popularity of the website in relevant communities pertains to the granular approach of many of the advanced search engines, which acknowledges that there are now topical communities across the Web, and the interlinking of the websites is also used in the ranking of pages. Texts directly surrounding the link are ranked better than those, say, in sidebars or those in the middle of the paragraph or the end of it. Subject matter of the linking page refers to the relationship of the subject matter of a given page and the sites or pages linked to it. These links may also influence the ranking of a particular page, so it will be more advantageous to put links that are relevant to the topic at hand than those who have little to do with the topic.

After taking into consideration all these aforementioned elements, it’s time to decide on what applications to utilize in order for your website to be truly search engine optimized. Search engine optimization is always a work in progress, and so don’t be discouraged if it takes a while for your conclusions regarding your keywords to take effect. Always be proactive- be on the lookout for new studies and simultaneously conduct your own investigation of different market behaviors. Applications that may be able to help you is Google’s AdWords program, keyword research tools such as Wordtracker and Overture, SEOmoz’s KW Difficulty Tool and Indextools and ClickTracks for further refinements. Analytics programs like Indextools and Clicktracks further narrow down specific viable keywords and they also measure website traffic, activity and detailed conversions of clicks and searches.

Popularity: 6% [?]

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To actually earn from your website any aspiring webmaster should be familiar with the particular mechanisms in place already on the Web. If your host allows banner advertisements to be put on your website, and is affiliated with sponsors that would actually directly pay for putting advertisements on your site, then there are four major ways you can earn by just allowing ads on your site: CPM (cost per thousand shows), CPC (cost per click), CPA (happens when someone signs a form or signs up for a particular online or otherwise service), commission (the payment comes in when someone buys something through a link through your website) and finally, of course, directly selling something on your website, such as products or services. The kind of traffic that your site attracts is variable, and so there is also a chance that your profits would also be variable. It depends on circumstances; there may be times when you earn a few bucks at a time, and there are times too, when you earn less a month. Some companies that have had a good record in the past with ads are Google AdSense, Commission Junction, Websponsors, LinkShare and BeFree.

A vital key in the particular endeavor of earning money through your website would be making it optimized for search engines. This means your website should be easily indexed by crawlers and does not contain certain elements that would bring down your site’s ranking in search engine results. Targeting the right terms is a must. During what may internet researchers call keyword research, the conversion rate, predicted traffic, value per customer and keyword competition should be analyzed. The conversion rate is the particular percentage of users searching with the term/phrase that convert (clicking of an advertisement, completion of a particular transaction, filling up forms, et cetera). The predicted traffic is an estimate of how many users or searchers will be searching for a given term or keyword in a specific timeframe, e.g. in a month, or in a year. The value per customer is the average amount of revenue earned per customer using specific terms or phrases to search. This includes the comparison of small ticket terms with big ticket terms. Small ticket terms earn the webmaster decidedly less than big ticket terms. And finally, keyword competition is a rough measurement of the competitive environment of the web and the level of difficulty for a given term or phrase. This particular analysis is typically measured through metrics that include in the statistical examination the number and type of competitors, the relative strength of the links of the competitors and what the financial motivations are in the sector. After analyzing these elements, it would be very possible for you now to create vital decisions regarding what specific terms of phrases you wish to include in the as a target. Internet researches highly recommend putting one or two highly studied terms or phrases in each page for better, more optimized results for both the owner of the website or the webmaster and the user.

Popularity: 12% [?]

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SEO or search engine optimization is the process of improving the volume of traffic to specific websites using designated keywords or phrases fed into search engines. As search engines crawl the web, the robot crawlers save websites and mark specific keywords in the website for more efficient and quick indexing of content. To utilize SEO for the webmaster’s advantage is a must in our globally competitive environment today. There are several factors in the inclusion or exclusion of websites during search engines’ periodic crawls, but some of the tips listed below might be able to help in improving the chances that your websites or websites would be included during the periodic indexing.

First tip would be to use longer keywords for your website. Singles words rarely deliver nowadays because of the number of websites usually utilizing a specific word to present a general idea of what they are all about. If possible, any webmaster should be able to formulate a very specific string of terms that would denote what precisely the website is about. This is where relevance also comes in. The webmaster should make sure that the string of keywords for his website is also precisely what his website offers to the possible consumer. It would also be good if you can anticipate what your probably clientele would be typing into search engines.

There are various permutations of a single idea, and make sure you anticipate all of the possible ones. Also, knowing what particular region of the world your clientele would be coming from would help you in formulating your keywords. As mentioned earlier, there are primary keywords; try to think of ways of making your primary keywords stand out from all the other similar ones. Research may also be of help, but in the long run, your experience as a webmaster would help facilitate in the improvement of your keywords. On the more technical side, make sure that your optimized, wisely-chosen keywords are placed in the places on the html code that are most likely to be looked at first by the robot crawlers. There is also a chance that there would be plenty of misspellings; use these to your advantage.

Misspellings don’t mean that the person on the other end of the search engine isn’t serious about his or her search. Include these misspellings in your list of secondary keywords, and make sure to also optimize them according to what you perceive to be the standard permutations. Always remember- the less competition you have for your keywords, the more chances of your site being able to garner more traffic. Be highly specific, knowledgeable and make sure that you don’t get penalized by the search engines for keyword volume. After reviewing these tips, also remembers that there are two major concepts that have been studied by internet research early on: relevance and popularity. Relevance simply means that a website returned precisely what the user wanted to see in his search. Popularity or relative importance means that a website has been cited by other websites for a particular content. More citations mean more relevance. Thus, choose your keywords wisely.

Popularity: 17% [?]

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phpmotion hosting, clipshare hosting,vhsare hosting, social media hosting, clip-share hosting, ostube hosting, rayzz hosting, attachmax hosting, dolphin hosting, alstrasoft hosting

As a follow up to a previous post made in this blog about video sharing scripts & ffmpeg hosting, we thought we would follow up with a comparison of the most common Youtube Clones & Video Sharing Scripts out there. There are several choices with prices ranging from free to almost $1000.00 however it all boils down to the specific features you want. Of course all the scripts require ffmpeg hosting support before you even start looking for a script. Most features are common with all the scripts out there, but one or two stand out in terms of that extra feature to make your website stand out from the crowd. Below is an in-depth analysis & comparison table on some features that may be of interest to you, plus the cost of each script. Features that are listed in the table as not being available could be updated at anytime by the developer so be sure to double check.

So how do you start a Youtube style Video Sharing Site? It’s simple as 1-2-3!
1) Choose one of the video sharing scripts below
2) Choose a hosting company (PHPMotion auto-installer included @ CirtexHosting)
(Read more at our previous article on FFMpeg Hosting)
3) Customize and Setup your Youtube Clone and you’re LIVE!

Features
Customizable
Upload/Insert Videos from Youtube/Google
yes
yes
yes
X
X
X
X
Paid
Rating & Commenting System
yes
yes
yes
yes
yes
yes
yes
yes
Membership Signup System (Free or Paid)
yes
yes
yes
yes
Free Only
Free Only
Free Only
Free Only
Multi-Language Support
yes
yes
yes
yes
X
X
yes
X
Messaging System
yes
X
?
yes
X
yes
yes
yes
Search Engine (SEO) Friendly
yes
yes
X
?
yes
yes
yes
Paid
Multi-Server Support
yes
yes
X
X
X
Enterprise

yes
X
Cost
$199
$195
$418.95
$300
$10
$Free/299
$197
$Free



Below are brief descriptions of each video sharing scripts.

Clipshare Hosting - Demo

With ClipShare, now you’re limited only by your imagination, not by the software! Unleash the power of video sharing to boost your websites’ traffic & revenues!
With a huge variety of features and options, at an extremely affordable price, ClipShare is the ultimate solution for starting your video sharing and uploading community website just like the big boys: Youtube, Metacafe, DailyMotion, LiveVideo, Vimeo, MySpace Videos or Google Video.

Attachmax Hosting - Demo

Attachmax allows you to run your very own youtube Video Community site, just like popular Videos sites such as youtube, dailymotion and revver. Additionally Attachmax includes the ability for Images and Files, following the trend of other popular File Sharing communities such as Imageshack and Rapidshare. So not only do you get a fully functional Video Script, but a complete File Sharing Website.

Rayzz Hosting - Demo

Life is a movie…You are the Producer, We write the Script! Ready for Rayzz? Agriya’s original approach to video sharing, Rayzz 2.0, is now stuffed full with even more exciting features for webmasters to enjoy! High quality video broadcasting combined with social networking and community features make this script a must to build your own video sharing website.

AlstraSoft VideoShare Hosting - Demo

AlstraSoft Video Share Enterprise is the ultimate solution for starting your video sharing and uploading community just like the big boys such as Youtube, DailyMotion and MySpace Videos and what’s more we now allow your members to share Audio and Photos as well. Video Share is our enterprise level audio, photo and video sharing software that offers a powerful and feature rich solution and most important of all, at an extremely affordable price.

Vshare Hosting - Demo

YouTube Clone Script allow you to run your own video sharing portal. Visitors will be able to upload video to your web site, view existing video, comment on video, share video with others.

OsTube Hosting - Demo

osTube is the first content management system for media contents (MCMS) - a basic framework for creating websites similar to YouTube, Veoh, and Revver. After the successful release of osTube 1.0, 1.1 and 2.0 we have just published the brand new 2.1 version of osTube - a quantum leap in player-functionality and CMS-scalability.

PHPMotion Hosting - Demo

So just what is PHPmotion anyway? - PHPmotion is a free video sharing software that now also have support for audio/mp3 sharing. Our application that will allow you to create and run your very own video sharing website. With very little knowledge required you can now have website just like youtube.com and dailymotion.com and best of all, its 100% free to download and use.

AdQuick - Adbrite Clone Hosting - Demo

AdQuick 2.0 allows you to run your own ad network similar to websites such adbrite.com, adengage.com and adster.com. AdQuick 2.0 will allow you to bring together advertisers and publishers, and you the script owner will take a cut from every ad sold through your adbrite clone website.

http://www.cirtexhosting.com
http://www.hostv.com
http://www.cirtex.com

Popularity: 100% [?]

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Increasing the traffic to your website can only mean one thing. More sales. The more traffic you get to your website increases the amount of people that know about your site and the products you offer. The more people that know about your products and services the more opportunities you have to sell. Of course traffic will only bring the customers, it won’t sell your products. So if you feel like your products are ready to be seen and sold, then your next step is to make sure that the people that need to see your site, and the products and services you offer, do actually find it.

One of the best ways to create traffic is to do so through social websites. People naturally phase out un-original and pushed advertising, so talking to your customers, without pushing anything is one way to get their attention.

Social news and social forum websites are generally specific to subject areas. Which means that the people who are using the forums are interested in particular areas. So for example lets have a look at one business owner. Mark Duncan owns a business that sells gardening products, like clippers, shoes, and so on. About three years ago he started trading online. Duncan Gardening offers fantastic prices and plenty of variety. Duncan had problems getting traffic to his website and even when he did, the traffic wasn’t specific enough to create sales.

Duncan decided to visit gardening forums in order to talk about his interests. After a while Duncan told fellow forummers about his business and what kind of products he sells. As time went on and word of mouth (or type) spread Duncan noticed that the traffic to his website started increasing. And over time Duncan started visiting a range of gardening websites and forums, and told more people about the products that his website offer. Duncan found that after visiting and posting on these forums for one month, his traffic increased 5 fold and his sales increased 2.85 fold. And the sales and traffic was still growing. The best part? This didn’t cost a cent.

Social news, bookmark sites and forums, are driven by the community. The community maintains it and the more interest your post gets the further it moves up into the first pages. Not many people travel to far back into the forums, so it’s important to any poster to maintain and drive interest. Social news, bookmark sites and forums are not for boring and pushy posts. In fact if you post something that reads too much like advertising, you post will likely be ignored if not deleted. So it is up to you to be interesting and in return you will get a ready made market for the picking.

To get your start in forums and increasing your website traffic through them, have a look at the terms below.

Drive Traffic: social networking sites use these words to describe traffic that has been delivered by forums and their traffic.

Reach Influencers: forums and social networking sites have the ability to reach influential people. These influential people will often help you by linking their website to theirs and so on.

Build Authority: by taking part in forums and social networking sites, that are particular to your field, you will build authority in the area. People will generally buy from someone with authority rather than someone who doesn’t.

Brand Growth: social networking sites will give you the opportunity to grow your authority and grow the recognition of your brand.

Popularity: 42% [?]

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Using Forum Marketing to Build Your Business

Forum marketing and taking part in social networking and business networking websites can considerately boast your brand and traffic to your website. Forums give you the ability to reach your target audience and develop an image for your brand and yourself. The best part? IT’S FREE!!

Forum marketing a new term that often gets put in the Spam pile. But in reality forum marketing is a worthy activity that can boast more than your sales. Basically to take part in forum marketing you need to take part in forums. You can do this by answering people’s posts or starting your won threads. Generally to consider forum marketing actually marketing rather than just taking part in a forum you will need to have your own website linked every now and then (when appropriate). Although many people have their website link on their signature so that their link is always there without being pushy.

How can boast your traffic and brand identity at the same time?

1) Your profile should be well done and correct. Make sure you have a fully functional profile that actually has your contact details, name, link and information that readers can use to establish your authority in this particular field.

2) Never be to sales driven. If you are online trying to establish traffic and brand identity, people will be turned off if your posts, profile and threads are too sales driven. Forums are more about directing people rather than pushing people.

3) Take part in the forum topics. If you have an active presence in the forum people are more likely to trust you and your website. So take some time each day to answer questions and be part of the community.

4) When you post make sure that your posts make sense, are intelligent and offer something to the community. The more questions that you answer and the more people that find your posts relevant, the more authority you will form.

5) Make sure than you forget about your products and services. When posting you should be trying to build up authority for yourself, then your site and finally your products and services. People can smell a salesman a mile away.

6) Put a photo or picture on your profile, so that your posts can be recognized immediately. This way once you have trust you will develop more brand recognition.

7) Always remember that you’re representing yourself on these forums. So don’t swear or say/post things that you might regret later on.

Popularity: 57% [?]

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March 27th, 2008The War on Nanotechnology

“Is it the next best thing to sliced bread…or the next asbestos?” - Dr. Mark Wiesner, a Duke University professor.

Reports are sketchy about what really went on at the grand opening of Minatec*, Europe’s primary center for practicing innovation in nanotechnology, in Grenoble, France.

An apparent press-blanket kept news coverage of the event to a minimum, but what appears certain is this: on June 1 2006, roughly a thousand protesters crashed Minatec’s opening party, causing the French President to pull-out of his planned attendance, and delaying the center’s opening by a day. According to activist group Earth First!* there was a “military-like control & siege” of the French town, “with riot police wading in and injuring people.”

Since then the center has managed to remain open and in business, protests aside. But the questions remains: what is nanotechnology all about, and perhaps more importantly, why is it worth waging war against?


War on very small things

To start to understand the war on nanotechnology, we have to grasp at least some of the concept of what nanotechnology is. If, like me, you aren’t employed in applied physics, materials science, interface and colloid science or supramolecular chemistry, it’s worth pointing out that nanotechnology is the science of the very very small. Word experts at Princeton University describe it as the branch of “engineering that deals with things smaller than 100 nanometers”; and to answer your next question, a nanometer is equal to one billionth of one of our regular meters– which makes a nanometer very very small.

So why are people becoming hostile to nanotechnology? Well, the practice of nanotechnology itself generally involves manipulating nature at the atomic and molecular level; reconstructing matter, and even creating entirely new living organisms; from the cell up. The impact this could have on our future lifestyle is tremendous. An article* published in 1995 in Wired magazine spoke about biologist Leeroy Hood’s vision of being able to “rewrite human genes” and cure diseases in an instant. Over a decade on, medical scientists are trying to realize these dreams; but now nanotechnology isn’t being restricted to medicine. An India Daily article on current and future developments in the field of “Military Nanotechnology” spoke of the terrifying “Nano-bomb that contain engineered self multiplying deadly viruses that can continue to wipe out a community, country or even a civilization.” Researchers in the US are already trying to find out just how advanced China’s research into the field of nanotechnology is.

The war against this potentially dangerous science of the very small rages on. Protests at the potential health implications of clothing modified by nanotechnology, to be “stain- and wrinkle-resistant”, has taken place outside stores selling these goods in Chicago. A spokesperson for the protesters described nanotech as “a radical and unpredictable new technology”. In Jürgen Altmann’s report Military Nanotechnology* he concluded that it “could trigger a new arms race and gravely threaten international security and stability”. A study* carried out by a professor of life sciences communication at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, rocked the world with news that 70.5% of Americans found nanotechnology morally unacceptable. “They are rejecting it based on religious beliefs,” said Dietram Scheufele, the author of the study. He stated they don’t want people “playing God.”

Regulating nanotech

With the scientific giants like Minatec still doing business, and the Eddie Bauer store in Chicago still selling nanotech clothes; there seems to be no end in sight for the technology which last year was incorporated into $50 billion worth of consumer goods– and neither for the war against it. As the debate becomes more and more popular, and the implications of nanotechnology come further and further into the realm of our daily lives; it’s good to hear a voice of reason amongst all the hysteria. Nanoethics* is a research & education organization, which like many similar organizations, was set up “to move nanotech ahead responsibly”, and work “to develop real safeguards before we unleash such a powerful technology on our world”. Whether Nanoethics and there contemporaries will have their desired effect on the science remains to be seen; but one thing is for sure: the war on nanotechnology has only really just begun.

References
* Minatec… http://www.minatec.com/minatec_uk/index.htm
* Earth First!… http://www.earthfirst.org.uk/actionreports/?q=node/1397
* Wired… http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/3.09/hood.html
* Military Nanotechnology… http://www.amazon.com/Military-Nanotechnology-Technology-Contemporary-Security/dp/0415371023
* Nanoethics… http://www.nanoethics.org/

Popularity: 34% [?]

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March 18th, 2008Work Smarter Not Harder

Recently it has been popular that people who are successful don’t have to work 5 plus days a week and work their fingers to the bone to achieve their goals. Working smarter, but not harder is the new way of doing things, so get on board and have some fun.

1. Focus

Keep the focus on your goals and where you are going, stop thinking about how you are traveling and what is in your way, instead keep your mind on what you are working towards and what it will be like to get there. Keep the focus on these goals and do every task with the knowledge that this task is taking you to your goal. You may also want to come up with short term goals to help yourself through each period.

2. Look After Yourself

You need to take the time to check in with yourself and make sure that you are balanced and focused. Take the time once a week or month to schedule some thinking time. Block everything out and spend some time working on yourself. Just like your car, you need to service yourself every now and then.

3. Work with yourself

You know what you are good at, what you need help with and what kind of things stress you. Make sure that your work is tailored for yourself. Therefore you need to spent more time doing the things you are good at, less time on the things that trouble you and the things that will cause stress. If you like working during the night, you should. Don’t try to do important things in a time of the day that isn’t your peak and so on.

4. Rewards

Take the time to reward yourself and take time for vacations. This is important but so is the idea of a mini break. This means that every hour, try to take 2 minutes to yourself. Just breath and refocus yourself.

5. Indulge your work space

If you are going to spend a lot of time in your work place, make sure that it suits you, the way you work and how you like to work. If you like bright colours around you, then put them in your work place. Make sure there is sufficient ventilation, clean air and pleasant sounds. Also make sure that your desk is organized and easy to move around.

6. Delegate or Outsource

You need not do everything yourself. If you have a small company it may be worth while outsourcing smaller work so that you can concentrate on your goals and focus. For instance you should work towards having an answering service, bookkeeper and perhaps even a virtual assistant.

Popularity: 36% [?]

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Your brand is a the very essence of who you or your company are. A brand will give you the opportunity to stand a side from your competitors and be remembered. Take a minute to think about a few things in life that you like. What’s you favourite drink? What kind of computer do you use? What kind of car do you drive? And so on. The answers will most likely be brands, like, Coke, Apple and BMW. Why do you like these brands? What about the brands that you stay loyal to makes you stay loyal? Is it their products or their name?

Brands, actually strong brands, stand the test of time and have the ability to ride through issues that may occur. For instance an issue that concerned Panadol in the early noorties could have ruined their brand. But through brand re-establishment their brand stood the test of time.

brands

Tips for creating and establishing your brand

1. Take a minute to think about some strong brands that you look up to. Write them down, think about them and find out more about them.

2. Start thinking about your own brand and the core message that you want to present. Ask yourself some questions: Who are you? How to do you want people to think about you? What values are important to you? What images do you want people to see when they think about you?

3. Write down answers to these questions and think about what connects these statements.

4. Your branding needs to authentic and feel real. This means that your brand and it’s statements need to come from the heart. People won’t believe in a brand that doesn’t seem real.

5. Now think about your brand message and it’s audience. Who is your audience? What kind of people do you want to impress? What kind of people do you want to deter, if any? When your audience leaves your sight, what do you want them to remember? Think about your general audience, but also take the time to think about your target audience, because you don’t want to spread yourself too thin.

6. You need to make sure that once you have designed your brand image you make sure that everything you do, say and send out has you brand image on it or the core values of your image is attached to it.

7. Take time to study the brand messages of people that you look up to. You can start by googling the person and finding out more about them and their brand. Sir Richard Branson is a great place to start.

Popularity: 42% [?]

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February 24th, 2008Smart Blogging Tips

Blogging is not all about being the best writer on the web. Becoming successful at blogging is all to do with providing excellent content for your readers. Nowadays anyone can set up a blog site and start blogging. It takes a matter of hours to set up and such resources such as WordPress make things 100 times easier. Even though anyone can do it, it takes a lot of effort to be a great blogger.

First off you need to have a blog strategy. Pick a niche subject you are interested in and blog about your subject. While writing your niche it is important to you conduct blogger relations. This is where success will begin. Contact and maintain conversation with other bloggers. Leave comments on their blogs and in turn they will do the same for you. Bloggers provide link backs, this way there are links back to your blog from other blogs, and a great way of getting additional traffic.

Content is the key. Create content of value to your target audience. This way your readers will have a reason to return at a later time. This is one of the most important parts of blogging. Good return and relations with your readers is essential.

Don’t be afraid or put off blogging when others criticize your ideas and blogs. Use it as opportunity to get a conversion flowing. This will earn you respect in then the blogosphere. In many ways a criticism of your work can bring more attention to the discussion and increase readership, as well as being constructive.

Most of all promote your blog. No-one will find or read your blog if you don’t open doorways to it. When you have written articles you must start to promote them. Start chatting to other bloggers online and connect with them. When bloggers take note of your article, it tends to have a viral effect, increasing the amount of reader you will receive. So start producing quality content now and promote your blog.

• Use WordPress to make managing your blog easier

• Have a strategy

• Pick your niche

• Conduct blogger relations

• Leave comments for link backs

• Have good content

• Give readers a reason to return

• Use criticism constructively

• Open doorways

• Enjoy it!

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