Forum Moderators: mack
The aim of this article is to help people promote a website for business or personal use using effective but ethical search engine optimization techniques. The article has been written in such a way as to offer advice to seasoned professionals as well as enabling total newcomers to start promoting and marketing their web presence.
What is website promotion
Website promotion is in effect marketing for your online business. Online marketing is very different to the more conventional marketing methods used by bricks and mortar organizations. The overall aim of website promotion is to get as many people to visit your website as possible. Ideally these visitors should be targeted visitors and be actively seeing your services or products. The main difference about the online world is that you are actively able to sell to anyone in the world.
The great thing about website promotion is that is doesn't not always have to cost a lot of money. Many very popular websites have been actively promoted and marketed without any form of marketing budget. It all comes down to the sort of products or services that you offer from your site.
First steps
The first thing you need to do is develop a website. You may choose to do this yourself or outsource this to a professional website development company. If you choose the latter be sure to check them out by looking through their portfolio. You might also want to approach some of their customers and ask for their opinion. When using a company ask what exactly you will receive for your money, also ask them to talk you through the process in such a way as you will understand it.
If you have previous experience if website creation then you may well decide you you wish to do the development work on your own. If you have little or no experience then to be honest this is best left to someone who knows what they are doing. Your website is in effect what your user/customer will see and if it does not give out the right signals then your online business will suffer. Your website is not only your point of sale it is also your customers first and last impression as well as their sales person and customer services advisor.
During site construction
When you are building your site this is the first step towards website promotion. you need to build pages that are capable of ranking well in search engine for your targeted keywords or phrases.
Keywords: Keywords are what a user to your site will be searching for. You should write page content that is directory related to your keyword subject. You should also try to achieve a good keyword density ratio. This means what percentage of your total words on the page is your keyword. You need to be careful when doing this though because the page still needs to be easy to read to an end user. Excessive use of keywords, sometimes referred to as "keyword cramming" is also frowned upon by many of the top search engines. Keyword are also used within the header section of your web page. The header is the part that is invisible to users but visible to search engines. Within the header section you could use something like...
<meta name="keywords" content="keywords,seperated.by,commas">
Title: The page title is without a doubt the most important element if your page from a search engine point of view. The title is inserted within the header section of your page. The title is also visible at the top of your browser when you are on the web page. The title should be a short and very specific title that relates directly to the pages content. The title will also very often be displayed within search engine results pages as the part a searcher should click on to visit your page. When you are inserting a title the format should be like this....
<title>Page title goes here</title>
Description: The description is another section that is placed within the header of the page. The description is simply a fairly short description of the page contents. Some search engines will also display the description within the results page. Most however do not and will use actual content that they find on the page. The description tag should look like the following...
<meta name="description" content="A description of your page goes here">
All of the above elements are placed within the header of the web page. below is an example of the makeup of an average web page with descriptions for what each section is.
<html>
<head>
<title>Page title goes here</title>
All header content goes here keywords, description.
</head>
<body>
The body is the "body" of the page so all page content goes here.
</body>
</html>
The above is just to give you an example of how a simple web page would be constructed. You will notice that each page section has a start and a finish defined like this <element>element stuff goes here</element> The entire page is surrounded by <html></html> this means that the page was written in html. Hyper Text Markup Language.
As far as site development goes you have now done all the basics required in order to continue with your site promotion.
When you have a site online
If you have a site already online then you are ready to begin your promotional efforts. Website promotion is not instant it takes time. simply doing all the work that I recommend in this page will not bring you great traffic tomorrow. You will not see any noticeable change for at least 2 months. Note the words "at least" Website promotion is also not a one off event. You need to be prepared to stick at it. If you do everything right once you may see an increase in site traffic only to see it drop off again. You need to work at it.
Simple website promotion can be outsourced but to be honest is not difficult, although it can be time consuming.
Before you continue please check the following.
I have a website
My website is online
I do not have any dead links on my site (a dead link is a link on your page that has an error)
I do not intend to change my domain name in the near future.
If you agree with all four statement above then you are ready to continue. If you do not agree with all or any of the statements that you really should wait until you have made the changes and then start from then. Website promotion is all about constants. If something is likely to change then make the change before you start your promotion.
Your first active promotional efforts
Now you have a website set up and running it is time to start on actively promoting your website. The first stage in this promotional effort is web directory submissions. This can take time but will get links pointing to your site. The reason I suggest you do directories before search engines is because of this. If you list your site with directories , search engines will find you through these directories. Search engines love web directories because they give them access to loads of other websites from a central location. To be honest I think you would be faster getting into search engines using this method as opposed to submitting directly to them. Here is a list of places I would highly recommend you try to get listed.
www.dmoz.org this is the home of the open directory project. The ODP is the largest human edited directory and supplies directory results to hundreds if not thousands of other directory sites. In effect one ODP link will lead to loads of other links from sites that are using ODP data.
www.yahoo.com Yahoo is another directory site. They claim to be the first large scale directory of the www. If your site is commercial (you sell products or services) you will have to pay Yahoo to be listed in their directory. Non commercial sites are still entitled to free listings although yahoo are very selective when it comes to editors and free listings. From my experience yahoo directory listings are not great providers of traffic because yahoo usually defaults their web search to search the entire web.
www.goguides.org Go-guides is a relatively new directory. They offer some free listings in certain categories. Others will need to pay a one-off listing fee.
www.joeant.com Joe ant is another new up and coming directory.
Here is a page from the ODP that lists web directories [dmoz.org...]
Work your way through this list and you should build up quite a large number of links. Print of the page from the open directory and score out the sites that you get a link from. This will help you when you next go to submit because you will only need to re-submit where your submission failed on your previous attempt.
you have now submitted to the top directories. What I will now do is try to explain the rather complicated relationship between web directories and search engines.
Currently the top search engine in terms of market share is www.google.com they provide web search results for a large number of other websites such as Yahoo!, AOL, Myway and many many more. For this reason is is very very important to rank high on Google. Google is a very unique search engine due to the technology it uses to rank sites.
Google use a technology called "Rage rank" This is a method of giving a numerical value to any given web page. Page rank is in effect the score given to a page as a result of it's importance on the internet. Before you go any further I would highly recommend you download and install the Google tool bar from [toolbar.google.com...] . Be sure to install it with advanced features. This is an option on the download page from the toolbar web page.
Now that you have The toolbar installed and working take a look around some websites and you will see the little green bar on the toolbar goes up and down. If you move your mouse over the green bar it will give you a read out. A good example is to go to the yahoo homepage where you will see a full green bar page rank 10-10 this is an excellent page rank and something most of us can only dream about. Now visit some other sites and you will see how page rank varies from site to site and also from page to page.
This is my explanation of how page rank works
Every page on the web has a score set between 0 to 10 with 10 being the best and 0 being the worst. So how is this score calculated? Not a very simple answer but here goes. The web is made up of a mass of links. Pages link to other pages and sites link to other sites. It is this massive web of link that makes the internet work the way it does. What Google does is to class a link from site A to site B as a vote for site B from site A. Google will then take into account the page rank of the site that cast the vote and pass on some of this value to the page that received the link. In effect you are passing page rank from one page to another with each and every link. The higher the page rank of the site that votes the more page rank will be passed on. Every sites page rank is updated each month to reflect it's new value when the Google search engine updates.
So what does page rank do? Page rank is one of the many factors that are take into account when working out the ranking order for the search results. A very simple example would be 2 sites that are exactly the same content and layout and about the same subject (totally cloned sites) each site is about "broken bottles". The only difference is that one site has a page rank 3 the other has a page rank 7. If a user to Google or any of it's partners was to carry out a search for "broken bottles" they would see the site with the highest page rank, rank higher within the results page. This example is a very simple demonstration about how page rank works. What you need to keep in mind is that page rank is only part of the equation. There are several other factors taken into consideration such as keyword density, source of inbound links ect.
How what you need to do is work to increase your page rank by attracting links from sites that are similar to your own. Remember a link to your site is a vote for your site. As I mentioned before some page rank value is passed with every link. More value is passed if the link to you is from a site that on a similar topic. General links do help, although on topic links help out a lot more.
You must also remember that the purpose of a link is not all about page rank. A link is a link and the main reason for them being there is for users to come and visit your site. Because of the way page rank has become such a dominating force on the web a the majority of webmasters only think of links as page rank givers. If I was you I would call a spade a spade and work on building good link popularity and let the page rank just happen happen. A lot of people are starting to think of page rank as "ego rank". I think this is possibly the case.
As you build up links over time you will begin to see your page rank starting to increase. This is a sign that you are moving in the right direction. Now I will try to offer some advice on linking rules and things to try and avoid. I will also make some suggestions on how to manage your page rank within your site.
When you have page rank within your site this becomes a valuable asset. You can link to other sites or keep the page rank within your own pages. Even if you choose to retain all the page rank within your site you should still use sensible linking methods to ensure more page rank is distributed to your important pages than your minor pages. If you choose to link to other sites they you need to be very careful who you link to. The safest thing to do in this situation is link to no more than three sites from each page on your site. It is also good if these pages are the definitive sources of information on your page topic. You should be really careful to avoid linking to sites that appear to be bearing a penalty from a search engine. Linking to a "bad neighborhood" could eventually lead to your own page receiving a penalty. A website that occurs a penalty from Google might as well shut up shop. It really is that bad so be very careful who you link to.
So how do I get links? The most effective method of attracting inbound links is to build as much content as possible on your site. This will make other sites likely to link to you. In the web content is king. For example if you where building a site to sell mobile phones you might want to add information as well as the sales core of your site. This information might be reviews of the latest mobile phones and detailed history of mobile technologies. This will increase your scope for keyword searches and will make other sites more likely to link to you if they find your articles useful. I always like to make it easy for people to link to my sites. One method of doing this is to have a link on your pages "link to us" if a user clicks on this it will take them to a page where they can choose an image or text and the page will display the HTML code they will need to add to their pages in order to display a link to you. This method is fairly slow but costs nothing and used no effort on your part after you set the pages and banners up. In the case of text link this method will let you set your anchor text that is used within the link. Anchor text is the term used to describe the words that are highlighted within any link. Anchor text is also an important factor when Google decides how much page rank is will pass from one page to another when a link occurs.
What to do after the major directories?
OK, you have now suggested your site to the major directories, it is now time to look towards the smaller topical directories. Almost every subject has some form of topical directories, sometimes called vertical portal or "vortals" Vortals are generally a lot smaller than general web directories because they are related to a specific topic. Here is a little trick I use to find small directories for any given subject. Go to google.com and type in the following search query. "add url [your subject here]" Type your subject topic within the brackets and this little query will give you a list of pages that are related to your site subject and contain the words add url. You can fine tune this search term by altering to provide better results. you might wish to place the "add url" part of the query within double quotes"" this instructs the search engine that this phrase is required. There are a few other variations of this search term. I will show you some here.
add url [site topic]
"add url [site topic]
add site [site topic]
"add site" [site topic]
gossamer [site topic]
In example five I used the word "gossamer". This can sometimes be a useful term because a lot to smaller web directories use software from a company called gossamer threads to run their directories. Very often the word gossamer will appear on the directory page. If you are able to find pages with your subject topic and the word gossamer then the chances are you have found a suitable directory to add your site to.
The process of adding your site to smaller directories is an on-going process. In general these sites will not send you a lot of traffic but will pass on some page rank. The more page rank you can accumulate the higher your chances are of ranking well on Google. If you rank well on Google you will also rank well of some of the webs premier locations such as yahoo and AOL. Eat sleep and dream about page rank. You want it, you need it so go get it.
What you have to be very wary of is where you are submitting. There are places that are not worth the time taken to submit and can actually cause you harm. The main cause for concern for any web promoter has to be link farms and FFA pages (free for all links pages) In general these places work by adding your link for free in exchange for you linking to their page. The best way to avoid this is to never add your site to anywhere that insists you return the link. Linking to a link farm or FFA page could be the kiss of death for your web presence. On the subject of linking the Google toolbar can be a very useful tool for deciding if you should link to another site. The page rank will be displayed on the toolbar. If you see a site with a page rank zero and a gray bar then the chances are this site has some form of penalty for an offence. You also need to be very cautious so as avoid the possibility of getting penalized yourself.
There are a lot of services and websites that offer to submit your site to ****xxxx number of search engines for a set price or sometimes for free. Avoid these services like the plague there are not that many search sites on the web and of the ones that exist only about 30 matter. Most of these sites will add your site to FFA and link farm pages and all you can be assured of is an in box full of spamm email after you submit. Do all of your search engine and directory submissions manually.
Here is a short list of some of the more popular "illegal" things that can lead to a Google penalty.
linking to a bad neighborhood: Placing links on your site that link to places Google conceders bad. This could lead to the penalty being passed to your site.
Hidden text: This is where you place text in your site that is the same color as your background therefore making the text invisible to your users but not to search engines. This means that the search engine will view your page and see if filled with your keywords whereas the user will view your page and see your true content.
Cloaking: This is where you set up your site to display a different page to search engines and users so the search engine will see a well optimized page and your users will see a standard page.
Keyword stuffing: This is where you use a section of your page to cram it full of keywords that your users may be searching for. This is still very common place on the web. You will often see sites using the bottom of their pages to cram in as many keywords as possible.
There are probably many, many more illegal activities that will lead to a Google penalty but Google do not publish any info about this subject so I have chosen only to include the common knowledge ones.
Now for the search engines
Now you have worked your way through the web directories and hopefully got a good few links under your belt. I suggest you wait about 10 weeks between submitting to directories and moving onto the search engines. Lets start with the most important search engine good old Google. go a spin on your browser to www.google.com and type in your site url.
Google will then tell you if it has your site in it's database. If it does it will display your site title and a description with a few other options below such as view cache, find sites that link to. If your site was listed then you do not need to re-submit. To be honest I would recommend you do not re-submit your site if it is already listed with Google. It is best to just let things flow at this stage. If your site is not listed then click on the add site link from the Google homepage and follow the instructions from there. Repeat this process every 4 weeks until your site gets listed. Once your site is listed you should not re-submit.
Here is a page from the ODP that lists search engines. [dmoz.org...]
Work your way through the search engines page carrying out the same process as mentioned above. This will take some time but is well worth the effort. It is well worth printing out the page and scoring off the ones that list your site. This way you only need to re-submit to the ones that did not list you. Work through the list once every 4 weeks until you get as many as possible.
Below are a selection of other adverting methods that I do not have enough experience with to be able to add to in much detail. They are paid methods to attract users to your website.
Pay for inclusion
Some search sites directories and search engines offer what is knows as a pay for inclusion service. This means that you require to pay to be listed. The return you receive on your investment is dependent to a large extent to who your users will be. It has to be said that a lot of people only use PFI for the page rank that will be passed through.
PFI engines and directories come in all shapes and sizes. Don't be surprised to fins some of the smaller topical directories asking for a listing fee. You just need to think in terms of ROI (return on investment) If the on topic directory receives decent traffic then it may well be worth the expense. The page rank will also be a welcome addition.
Cost per click
Cost per click is becoming more and more popular as an advertising model. With cost per click you only pay for users who click through to your site. One of the more popular CPC advertising sources is Google adwords. Google adwords are the small text links that appear at the right hand side of the main search results. The great thing about adwords of you can receive targeted click through and only pay for users who actually visit your site.
Affiliate programs
Affiliate programs can be a great way of making sales. They are based on the principle of other sites marketing your product or services, If a user clicks through from an affiliates site they are then paid a percentage of the sale. This is great because the affiliates are only paid when a sale occurs and you receive additional marketing for your brand.
Summary
I hope you found this article of use to you and hope you will be able to put the information within to some good use on your own website. Website promotion is not the easiest subject on the earth but it is not rocket science either. This article was written to offer very general information to help you start the promotion ball rolling.
Promote promote promote promote promote ZZZ but remember to sleep sometimes.
Alistair McIntyre
Mack.
Thank you for a fantastic post. This one will get printed out and re-read many times.
Glad you liked it.
Mack.
Mack.
Thanks - excellent post!
Makes very good reading for a relative Newb. I have added this to my flags and printed this it - Added to the voluminous folder on my desktop (realworld) entitled 'useful ww threads'. I'm thinking I need to add directory structure and search engine to this ;) - it's looking a little bloated!
Your web site is not only your point of sale it is customers first and last impression as well as their sales person and customer service advisor
Mind if I quote you to a client/Boss?.
Ta
Limbo
By all means :)
I think it's a true point though, a lot of businesses think of the website as "just their website". If they had a higher pinion of their own website then perhaps so would their users.
Mack.
Particularly small businesses with no existing web presence(my clients) They view a website as just a flier or Newspaper Ad - a common misconception!
______
ŚLimboŚ
