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Short of getting a new domain and starting from scratch what options do you have to carry on promoting your site.
I thinking low-budget marketing of your site without worrying about the Google update.
How feasible and realistic is this in today's internet climate?
I can think of several first steps but will they be sufficient.
1) DMOZ Submission - Takes time though!
2) AllTheWeb - Never seems to generate anything close to google traffic-wise for me
3) PPC - Overture useful for commerical sites, but can be a trickier option for non-profit or sites with very tight budgets and little revenue
4) Yahoo - Can you still get in for free, because $399 is lot especially if it isn't guaranteed
5) MSN - How do you get listed here. I am in, but have no idea how I did it.
I am sure there a quite a few other but will a combination of these make up for not being in Google? I don't planned to get banned, but would like to know that there is still life after Google!
4) Yahoo - Can you still get in for free, because $399 is lot especially if it isn't guaranteed
they still have a free submission form, now whether or no they actually review them is a whole different ball game.
Inktomi now spiders almost the whole web for free, and MSN uses Inktomi results, though other paid listings come above them in many categories.
Also if you are not for profit you can get into the Looksmart directory (also used by MSN) through Zeal.
> I am sure there a quite a few other but will a combination of these make up for not being in Google?
Not really. I am in DMOZ, Zeal and Yahoo!, am spidered by Inktomi so I am in MSN, and still Google is over 65% of my referrals (20% from links, 15% from other search engines).
> ..., but would like to know that there is still life after Google!
If one third of your current traffic can be called "life", then yes :(
Yahoo is definitely still in the picture. I guess it is just a matter of if and when they drop Google. Although the results are from Google, some sites can draw in A LOT more traffic than Google proper.
Paying to get into Yahoo is your decision but with their current system you can get listed within a week. Right now a category doesn't really help much for many sites out there. I, myself, am just waiting to see what their plan is before I submit anymore sites.
It can be done. For commercial sites you can spend money on PPC with Overture, Looksmart and even if you are banned from the free listings of Google they will probably take your money for an Adwords campaign.
Do your math to see if your return on investment makes this worthwhile.
For a non-commercial site there are also options:
Work on improving your listings in all the other search engines. Get listed in all the topic specific directories that match your site, their traffic can be pure gold. Get listed in all the general directories, both large and small.
While you are doing the above, keep an eye on what is happening with the majort search engines. Large changes are in the works and places like Yahoo may not be serving up Google results for much longer and AltaVista or AlltheWeb migh get the money to attract new surfers soon.
You are getting traffic from MSN, this is probably from Inktomi. MSN can drive a lot of traffic.
(7) Develop your newsletter subscription list
(8) Think offline promotions ...
(9) Sponsor relevant pages on other sites. Think traffic, not Page Rank.
(10) Add a "tell-a-friend" link to your site. Only a tiny percentage of visitors will use it, but when someone does it's a well-targeted free ad. I like the free CGI script from bignosebird-dot-com.
(11) Remember the ancient story about the seven fat years and the seven lean years ... use the good times to build resources to help you survive fluctuations that are beyond your control.
Yes it does, however careful consideration of the submission guidelines often makes it quicker.
It still seems to be worth it.
<url>http://www.webmasterworld.com/forum3/9965-2-15.htm</url>
You'll be happy to hear that I believe that we did get a newer RDF dump of the ODP
