| LED Digest 1921: New Directions |
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================================================== The LED Digest Moderated Discussion List "Effective Online Advertising, Since 1997" pair Networks: The LED's Web Host Hosting and Domain Reg. from a Trusted Leader pair.com for Hosting | pairNIC.com for Domains ================================================== List Moderator: Published by: Adam Audette LED Digest adam,led-digest.com http://www.led-digest.com ............................................... January 19, 2005 Issue #1921 ............................................... .....IN THIS DIGEST..... ==== CONTINUING ================= --== Problems for Linkers ==-- ~ Steve Pronger "...here are some observations from my own site." ~ Donald Nelson "...links pages were among the most visited pages on these sites..." ==== BILLBOARD =================== --== Dropped by Google ==-- ~ Stephen Mareches ~ Heather Champa --== CSS Cross-Browser Issue ==-- ~ John Arrowsmith ===== CONTINUING ================================= From: Steve Pronger Subject: Linking > Does anyone have any data on how > often links pages are accessed? - William Ernest Waites, LED 1920 I'm not sure if William was referring to global statistics but here are some observations from my own site. Visits to my #1 links page are roughly 1/5th the number of visits to my home page and one 1/60th of all pages. This is my most visited links page out of 11 at the moment. Around half of the traffic to those links pages entered via that page, and also around half exited via that page. So, from that you could say that as many people enter my site via the links pages as leave by them. And that suits me just fine. Call me crazy but I also link to many fellow website designers who in turn link to me. Using this "link development myth" (Shari Thurow, LED 1919) which the "search engines no longer pay the kind of attention to it that they once did" (Michael Martinez LED 1920) those webmasters and I hold page 1 rankings on Google for "website designer". Of course it's not all about recip links. There are many other on-page and off-page factors at play, not the least of which is good, frequently updated content. There is nothing inherently wrong with the "you scratch my back and I'll scratch yours" method of generating business. It happens all the time in the offline world. Have you ever seen business cards for other local business displayed in your local hairdressers? How did they get there? One business owner approached another and said "Hey, would you mind if I left some business cards to put on your counter? Give me some of yours and I'll put them out at ours." Of course, you wouldn't exchange cards with businesses who you observed to have a run-down shop front or who sold sleazy products or who had questionable business ethics, would you? Business in the online world is really not that much different, and the search engines understand that as well as anybody. Steve Pronger http://www.stevepronger.com ------- new post - same topic -------- From: Donald Nelson Subject: Linking Dear All, In LED 1920 William Ernest Waites, asks how much traffic links pages get: do people actually look at them? I have been managing sites since 1995 and found that the links pages were among the most visited pages on these sites. So, people do visit them. Also looking at the referrer statistics: I find that if a site has a good number of incoming links, then these links will bring in a steady flow of traffic each day. So, these stats lead me to believe that reciprocal linking is still a viable strategy of acquiring traffic (irregardless of its effect on search engine rankings). But that said, the reciprocal linking craze is also a nuisance because it is often hard for webmasters to keep up with the steady stream of requests to add new links (unless they have an automated or semi automated system to manage their link directories). My hope is that the dominance of Google will soon be challenged by other search engines which place less importance on incoming links in their ranking algorithms. But while Google is still dominant, and while Google continues to stress incoming links, then reciprocal linking and other methods of acquiring incoming links has to be taken seriously. Sincerely, Donald Nelson www.a1-optimization.com ==== BILLBOARD =================================== From: Stephen Mareches Subject: Google > ... if you want a guinea pig site for figuring out a change > in Google rankings, please feel free to look at mine: > http://www.mosaicworks.com ... without any change, last > spring Google dropped my site from it's long time place > as number 1 or 2 for the search 'mosaics' to... the mid-20's. - Sonia King, LED 1920 Hi Sonia, Nicely done site! I did a quick check on your home page for the term "mosaics" and the term does not appear there, which may well explain your losses in search engine rankings. If you click "Edit", "Find on this Page" in your browser you'll see what I mean. While your title bears your keyword, the rest of your home page does not, so the content isn't reflecting your keyword. You might want to do some checking on keyword optimization and follow the guidelines. As a rule of thumb I would try to utilize "mosaics" about seven times in the content of your home page so the little search engine spiders will be more aware of the site's actual content. Also, don't forget that while Google has its popularity it's not the only game in town, so you'll want to check your rankings on other important search engines as well. SearchEngineWatch.com does a pretty good job of keeping abreast of the trends in web search and offers informative articles on the subject as well. Hope this helps, Stephen Mareches, Web Consultant Sophia Solutions www.sophiasolutions.net stephen, sophiasolutions.net ------- new post - same topic ------- From: Heather Champa Subject: Google I have a couple of suggestions for you, Sonia. First, it is very difficult to get and keep first page rankings on a single keyword. Key phrases are easier to optimize for, and usually produce more targeted visitors. For eample, you don't want traffic from people looking for photo mosaics, or for materials that would allow them to create their own mosaics. That's not what you offer. And I would urge you not to rely on a single word / phrase - you should optimize for multiple key phrases that are relevant to your site. For example, a quick look at Wordtracker indicates that there are far more searches done for 'mosaic' than 'mosaics', (1428 vs 910 as I look right now) so perhaps you'd also want to optimize for 'mosaic'. And have you considered related words or phrases, such as 'stained glass'? And how about phrases that identify the different types of mosaic work you do, such as 'custom mosaics'? You have a ranking of 5 on Google for that phrase. And you rank #4 for the phrase 'mosaic classes'. Second, you should have text links in your pages with your key words / phrases in them. This could be accomplished with a site map page. And consider replacing the images that describe your pages with text in H1 tags. These are little things, but they can help. Third, your resume is very impressive. Ever thought about offering a free newsletter? This can help both with ranking and bringing targeted visitors tou your site. Finally, if you are getting good, targeted traffic (and analyzing your web logs will tell you this), and these are turning into sales, I wouldn't worry as much about ranking. Remember - you want a web site that makes it easy for visitors to understand what you offer and how to purchase it, that provides good content, that ranks well for relevant key phrases on major search engines, and that gets targeted traffic that produces sales. While this is not an in-depth analysis, I hope it provides you with some ideas that you'll find helpful. Regards, Heather Champa ------- new post - new topic ------- From: John Arrowsmith Subject: CSS Tom couldn't find the Firefox Web Developer Toolbar add-on. What seems to be the latest version is available here:- http://www.chrispederick.com/work/firefox/webdeveloper/ Hope that helps :) John the Old-Age Pensioner Website Provider / Editor for http://www.rockchallenge.co.uk,
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