How to Optimize Copy When You Can't Use Keywords

What's the first thing you think of when writing with keywords? Probably one of the first is that keywords and phrases are descriptive of the products and/or services you're writing about. But what happens in those circumstances where you can't (or don't really want to) use your chosen keyphrases descriptively?

Is Your Product or Service Really Cheap?

One of the primary causes of this dilemma is the word "cheap." There's a big difference between somebody typing "cheap travel insurance" into a search engine query field and you calling your own insurance cheap. Nobody really wants "cheap" insurance. That brings up images of companies that go out of business, don't return calls, fight you on paying claims, etc.

What customers want is "inexpensive" or "affordable" insurance. Problem is, in their haste, they type in the first thing that comes to mind. Average Joe doesn't understand that search engines are (in part) matching the words in their query to words on the web pages. "Cheap travel insurance" may be the keyphrase you want and need to target, but you certainly don't want to label your own product "cheap." What can you do?

Use that search term with the opposite meaning.

Perhaps your copy could read something like this:

Affordable? Budget-friendly? Absolutely! But this is certainly not cheap travel insurance. Coverage is underwritten by one of the most trusted and well-respected companies. With this policy, you'll find benefits comparable to more expensive coverage, but with rates at or below what the cheap travel insurance companies charge.

See the difference? Instead of writing, "We sell cheap travel insurance," and degrading your product in the eyes of your customer, you actually use the search term to elevate your product to a higher level of quality.

Legalities That Get in the Way

Another issue with many keyphrases is that they violate government regulations if used to describe a product. You find this often with health supplements. The FDA (and other such agencies around the world) has a long list of what manufacturers can and cannot say with regard to their products. This is mainly an effort to protect the consumer against snake-oil salesmen who make fraudulent claims.

For instance, you cannot call your supplement a cure. In many countries you can't even call your product a remedy. And so you face the issue with those ever-popular search terms that include "remedy" and other such words.

One of my favorite techniques is to ask questions that incorporate these keywords.

You can't legally say, "Here's a new heartburn remedy we've just released." But you can ask questions like:

Tired of that same old heartburn remedy that doesn't work? Wish someone would create something new?

Looking for a heartburn remedy that doesn't require a prescription?

Is your heartburn remedy falling short?

You're not saying your product is a heartburn remedy; you're just asking questions about what the customer might want or need. [Jill's caveat: Double-check with your own attorney to be sure you're not falling afoul of any of your own state or country laws.]

When you're writing with keywords, you really have to think outside the box. We typically have tunnel vision when we write SEO copy, inserting the keywords the same way over and over. But there are so many different methods (like the two listed above) for using search terms when you write.

If you diversify your SEO writing skills, you'll find your copy becomes more natural-sounding and is able to communicate your message better. Why stick to just one ordinary way to write with keywords when there are so many to choose from?

By:  Karon Thackston

How to Strategically Analyze Your Competition's PPC Campaigns

Analyzing your competitor's PPC ads is a great way to extract data about how their company influences conversions. It's also a way to analyze your own ads to see what's missing.
Matt Van Wagner from Find Me Faster and SEM Strategy Consultant Lisa Raehsler lead a session at SES San Francisco that explored how search marketers can monitor their competition's paid search ads to drive new strategies.
They were nice enough to sit down with me after their session and walk me through the process of analyzing a competitor's PPC campaigns.

1. Define Who Your Competitors Are

There's probably more than you think. Where are they and what do they know?
Sometimes your toughest offline competitors don't exist online and your toughest online competitors don't exist offline. Weird, but not uncommon.

2. Do a Quick Assessment of How Good They Are 

How tech savvy they are on a scale from 1 - 5? Check out their webpage, landing pages, social media sites, LinkedIn page, etc.
Are they leveraging retargeting ads? Following paid search best practices?
Note: Monitoring their site, LinkedIn page, and Twitter handles are great free ways to find out any changes or advancements they've made in paid search advertising. Use Google Alerts to your advantage.
What are their strengths and weaknesses in comparison to yours?
Who are they targeting? Are they shooting for premiere small, or businesses in the middle?
If they are the premier leader in your space, where are you in the ecosystem? What are their primary messages? Can you counter with a different message or overpower them with a better way to deliver the same message?
Are they countering your messaging or just doing their own thing? In other words, how aware are they of their online programs? How quickly do they react to changes you make?

3. How do They Sell?

What's their value proposition and how is that different than your business?
With that data, how can you leverage your value proposition in your paid search ads?
Are they saying something that you've been trying to say for years?
High quality / high price vs convenience, types of competitors. Who are they targeting? If they're the premium leader, who you are, where are you in the ecosystem?
Are they countering your message or are they just running their own thing?

4. What Do You Want to Extract From Their Data?

Do you want to exact ad copy? Website data? Keywords?
Here are some things you can analyze:

• Meta tags
• Meta data
• Text analysis of their landing page / web page
• Ads

5. Optimize

What did you learn from the analysis that you'd like to incorporate into your own campaigns?
Keep in mind that your findings from your competitors should be taken as directional and not absolute. Some competitive tools report wildly inaccurate estimates of CPC, ad spend, and so on.
Some changes will be obvious simply because it's a keyword or group of keywords that you missed. Others may be more high level and related to shifts in strategy or messaging.
With any larger strategy changes, it's essential to test the new components of your strategy with the old to gauge performance. Allow the testing to run for about a month, then optimize and continue to monitor your competition for new trends.

Helpful Tools For Competitive Analysis

Van Wagner and Raehsler suggested advertisers investigate these tools:

• AdWords Analyze Competition tool [Free]
• Compete.com [$$$]
• iSpionage [$$]
• AdGooroo [$$$]
• Keyword Competitor [$$]
• Keyword Spy [$$]
• SEMRush [$$]
• SpyFu [$$]
• comScore [$$,$$$]
• Hitwise [$$,$$$]

Keyword Discovery Tools

And here are some more to check out:

• Wordtracker [$$]
• Google Adwords Keyword Tool
• Microsoft Desktop Tool
• Rapid Keyword [$]
• Wordstream [$$$]

By: Andrew Davis

3 Keys to the Future of SEO

Search engine optimization was once very simple, but each year the practice becomes more and more complex with there now being hundreds of possible ranking factors, filters, constant new algorithm changes and so on.
The key to surviving as an SEO is to constantly adapt to these changes and learn how to use them to your advantage so you can maximize search traffic. Below are 3 key factors that have dramatically changed the SEO front recently and will continue to alter the landscape for years to come.
1. Localization
It’s no new news that Google has made huge changes to the search results based on your location. Organic search results used to be pretty simple, but now depending on where your live, you will see local listings related to your search term integrated seamlessly into the search results.
Local results are showing up for large keywords such as “printing”, where once, the page one results for this term would have only shown websites that were heavily optimized for that keyword.
This is why it is important to optimize your website for local keywords and take advantage of great services such as Google Places, Yelp and so on to enhance the amount of local traffic you receive.
SEOs need to keep local search in mind every time they optimize a website and also when they create a search engine marketing campaign. Localization will continue to gain ground because it provides better and more personalized results for the end user.
2. Personalization
As Google continues to acquire massive amounts of data on people, search history, purchase history and so on, it will also continue to try and provide better personalized results. This has been and will continue to be more of a problem for SEOs because Google is displaying different results to individual people even if they are not signed into Google.
If you are signed into Google, Google personalizes your search results based on your web history. If you are signed out, Google personalizes your search results based on past search information linked to you browser using cookies.
Other factors are starting to create more personalized search results as well, such as whether or not you have clicked the Google +1 button on a listing while searching. More recently, Google+ posts are now being integrated into search results and based on your Google+ circle/friends you may see more personalized results.
This personalization will continue to grow more complex and that is why SEOs must think hard about how this will change the search engine optimization game.
3. Socialization
The big buzz this year has been around the incredible growth of social media and its effect on the SEO world. Growing evidence is mouthing that social votes and signals are affecting rankings directly and it is likely Google will continue to put a strong emphasis on social media as a way to determine the authority of a site.
This is why it is extremely important that all websites and SEOs start building brands, not just backlinks. You must then build a community around your brand and encourage interaction on various social media platforms such as Twitter and Facebook.
The stronger your brand and more active the community around, the more social mentions and votes you will get, which can help you stay on top in the rankings.
These keys to SEO will carry us well into 2012, so get on top of these areas quick or watch your websites fade away in the rankings!
By:  Gino Orlandi

5 Steps to Link Building with Widgets

Widgets are one of the best-kept secrets marketers can use to capture the attention of potential visitors and drive traffic to your website. By increasing the interaction and connection of websites beyond links and video, widgets are a great way to promote a business and a website by presenting would-be visitors with interactive content that engages their interest and interaction.
Put literally, a widget is a small software application for distributed websites that displays a user interface designed to perform an action or activity based on data or calculations living on a different server.
We’ve all seen them. Groupon uses widgets to help merchants design their own online offers. Payscale provides a library of widgets that work with their real-time database to help other website builders add salary calculators, cost of living indexes and such, etc.
Beyond these examples, widgets are an effective way to expose data or crowd sourced information in easy to access ways. They can also serve as a scalable way to build links back to your target site while offering an easy to implement distributed application that people find valuable.

Widget “Rules of Thumb”

Creating a great widget is only the first step in widget success. Adhere to the following best practices when thinking about adding widgets to your website:

• Transparency: The embedded link in the widget should be visible to the end user – don’t hide the link using CSS or other coding tricks.
• No Bait and Switch: Make sure the link is relevant to the creator and content of the widget. Don’t use the widget anchor text and link to send traffic to a site not based on the content of the widget. For example, if the widget is from a pop culture site that displays the latest news on celebrities, don’t include anchor text and link that goes to an online college sign-up site.
• Brand Attribution: Focus on the brand creating the widget with a keyword modifier in the link. The anchor text value is only one component of an effective widget link. To make the most of the link include both the brand and a lock-up of the focus keyword you are targeting. An example would be Powered by PowerPoint Presentation Software.

The SEO Litmus Test

As in all SEO related activities, aim to stay above board with “white hat” tactics. The SEO benefits of a well-executed widget include:

• A distributed, persistent brand presence on other sites. Brand exposure can result in awareness and additional brand searches in the engines.
• An increase in the number of different domains linking into your site. Domain diversity is a key component of any inbound linking program. 
• An increase in the quantity of inbound links. The more useful and compelling the widget, the more it will be added to other sites.
• Control over the anchor text in the link.

Development Guidelines for Widgets

A widget should be well designed, load quickly, and be lightweight from a code perspective so that it doesn’t slow the load of the page. The key to making the widget useful for SEO (including links) is making the widget visible to the search engines as part of the hosting page. This means the following:

• Use a build technology that can be “crawled” or “read” by the search engine bots – HTML, JQuery, etc.
• Avoid technologies such as iFrames. 
• Use effective meta tags – not “no-follows” or “no-index” tag on the content.
• Make the widget as code light as possible to keep the page load speed of the host page strong.
• Make the widget as customizable from a color and targeting perspective as possible or as it makes sense for the application.

Widget Promotion

A good widget has a usefulness that excites webmasters, marketers, and end-users. However, the most helpful widget in the world can get lost without the proper positioning or rendered useless if users are unaware of their existence. Below are some tactics for making widgets easier to find and distribute.

• Create a standalone page on your site for the widget. Use good SEO practices. Build the page into the navigation and site map structures. 
• Promote the page by having the widget embedded into your own site, partner sites, or sites you have a business relationship with.
• Create blog posts, mentions in your social media channels, profiles, and email newsletters.
• Find some specific, relevant sites to partner with to “seed” the widget and get early feedback.

Measurement

As with most marketing activities or campaigns, make sure you have referral measurement mechanism set-up in place, so that you can learn which widgets are performing per your expectations. Track click-throughs, visits, conversions, and leads captured from your distributed creations. Keep the widgets that perform well, and remove the ones that are underperforming and potentially causing damage to your brand

By: Erez Barak,

Google+ Wins When Spammers Win

As the never-ending battle of search engines vs. marketers marches on, it occurs to me that (in some instances, at least) only half-heartedly fighting may be in the best interests of the engine itself.
Unlike the virus writer vs. anti-virus company war, where the parasite is necessary for the host to survive, in the search realm it’s easy for the engines to claim they don't want or need those who seek to gain advantage from holes in their algorithms.
In traditional SEO battles, this may have been true. Cloaking, paid links, scraping, keyword stuffing; Google fought these and largely saw their best interests served.
Now, Google is in shaky territory, where winning the battle may cost them the war. This is the trouble with expanding into other markets and against new competitors; the old rules just don't apply.

The Incentive for Google+ to Allow Spamming and Abuse

Google+ is Google's latest major attempt to launch into a new market. The biggest problem they face is that, as with any Google property with marketing potential, marketers looking to use/abuse the system are often faster than Google itself at finding loopholes.
This raises a big question: Is it actually in Google's best interests to stop abuse of the system, or should they simply monitor what’s happening and address it later? There are pros and cons for Google on both sides. This question exists thanks to the race to gain social media market share.
Right now, Facebook and Twitter are the frontrunners in the quest to dominate the social media space. Their success is measured in users and their time on the site.
While spammers won't necessarily help with the latter, they certainly contribute to the former. On the other hand, it’s a problem if spam becomes so prevalent that real users walk away.
Bottom line: the media reports on total users and what they're doing. If media outlets don’t hype the launch when registration opens up, Google+ could be in big trouble. One might suggest it is in Google's best interests to be strict on accounts people will watch closely and a little looser on generic accounts, to help push their numbers up.
Let’s look at some of the Google+ features more prone to abuse and why Google may be tempted to leave the gate open for a while, allowing limited spamming.

Crawlable Comments

When we think of search engine spam, we generally think of ways of getting content to rank. Because Google+ comments and posts are crawled and indexed, they are ripe for abuse.
It would likely require solid accounts to rank well over time; however, I've found many long tail phrases that bring up profiles for people like Matt Cutts. Sure, they're long tail and sure he's a solid user, but one can imagine that with many “massaged” accounts, connected intelligently, and with just the right content, Google could benefit not only from the extra users, but also the additional pageviews. This benefits Google and is the natural byproduct of the heaps of traffic attainable from just a few visits per profile.

Buying Google +1's

Seasoned SEOs will remember the day that little green bar called PageRank appeared and links became a commodity. Immediately, services selling high PageRank links in high volumes sprung up.
Google +1's are no different. Shortly after an SEO value was placed on the +1, companies began offering them for a price.
If you ask Google, this is a violation and they don't like it.
Let's look at it another way: +1's are a commodity and Google accounts have to be set up to initiate them. Webmasters are likely (though not necessarily) going to add them to their sites to get those +1's spread across multiple pages easily. Google can then release their +1 view stats and usage with pride. This isn't to say there isn't solid use of the feature without spammers, but it’s inarguable that they are in the reported mix and enhancing Google's announcements and numbers.

Standard Comment Spamming

Then there's the standard comment spam, just to get the message out to followers. This is probably the peskiest type of abuse for users, but again, this method of spamming really only works in large volumes.
As we all learned with Twitter, to get these large volumes you need large numbers of accounts. So while Google would need to make sure these accounts don't annoy their valued users, in the numbers game they need them for authority with the press and users; they actually benefit more from letting them linger.

Intentional or Not...

Before I get jumped on in the comments for suggesting that Google purposely turns a blind eye to spam accounts (with discussions about their celebrity verification policies, etc.), what I'm saying at this point is that they do benefit from the spam taking place within Google+. They may not have asked for it, but people talk numbers when measuring a social media platform’s success. Like it or not, those numbers are in the mix and directly benefit Google.

By: Dave Davies,

Shareholder Sues Google For Aiding Illegal Drug Sales

A Google shareholder has filed a lawsuit against Google CEO Larry Page and the entire board of directors for unspecified damages because the company allowed advertising from online pharmacies and facilitated the “illegal importation” of drugs.
The lawsuit follows the news of Google’s deal with the U.S. Department of Justice to forfeit $500 million obtained in AdWords advertising revenue from so-called “rogue” pharmacies in Canada and elsewhere, and reports that Page knew what was going on.
“Google’s annual reports from 2003 to 2009 were false and misleading because the company didn’t disclose revenue from the improper advertising,” according to the complaint obtained by Bloomberg. The complaint was filed Monday on behalf of Patricia M. McKenna of Pennsylvania in U.S. District Court, Northern District of California in San Jose.
Google has yet to publicly comment on the lawsuit
By: Danny Goodwin,

Deceptive Marketing: A Necessary Evil for Search Marketers?

A few years ago, I read a good article by Canadian SEO Melanie Nathan called “The Reciprocity Link Building Method” in which she outlined a technique she sometimes used to build up high-quality links for her clients’ websites. The gist, as I understood it, was to first find a website that would be good for your client’s site to link to. Then you’d click around to see if any of their current links were broken (went to dead pages or sites). If you found some, you’d use this information as an opening to start a dialogue with the site owner or webmaster, and eventually mention your client’s site as a substitute for one of the broken links. I thought it was a very clever idea, a great way to make contacts in your client’s industry, and a win-win for everyone involved.
More recently I saw another article on this topic by Nick LeRoy, a search marketer in the Minneapolis area. Nick talked about the same basic technique Melanie had mentioned, and added a real-life example email he had used. In his example email, he mentioned to the webmaster that he had a favorite site from which he liked to buy stuff for his son on birthdays and holidays. Nick again mentioned “his son” in a follow-up email, saying that he liked the products at this particular website because they made his son think.
All sounds good so far, right? Except that Nick doesn’t have a son!
I made the following comment on the post:

“Nick, I didn’t know you had a son (as per the emails requesting a link). If indeed you don’t, are you suggesting that people create a trust relationship with these webmasters by lying to them?”

Lots of comments ensued, which I encourage you to read over at Nick’s site. For me, what he did was certainly not ghastly, but the situation does bring up a ton of questions.
Was it necessary to lie? Isn’t that sort of thing exactly what gives marketers in general (not just search marketers) a bad reputation? Couldn’t he have done things exactly as he did without the lie?
I contend that he could have.
Nick claims that telling the webmaster that you’re looking for links on behalf of a client has less of a success rate for securing the link. It would certainly be interesting to test that theory, and it may very well be true. But even if you get fewer links out of it, that doesn’t justify lying in any aspect of business–or in life. (Are they really two different things?)
Lying in any form is deception.
Even if it’s just a tiny white lie. Even if it gets you more links. Even if it gets you more business. Even if it makes you look better in the eyes of your boss or client.
Which brings up another point: As the boss of someone using this technique, how would you feel about it? If your company culture is one of honesty, then any form of deception within your business should be a no-no. I can tell you that if I found out that an employee of mine did this, I would be very disappointed in them and explain why we don’t use deceptive practices. I would also wonder why I had to explain such a concept to an adult.
And what about the client?
Did they know that their search marketing company was using deception in order to obtain links? Is their company culture such that it’s not a problem for them? Or did they not even know exactly how their links were being obtained? If you’re being deceptive on your clients’ behalf, one would hope that you get their permission and written sign-off so it doesn’t come back to haunt you at some point.
Personally, if I hired a company to perform a service for me and they did it in a way that involved any form of lying, I would wonder what else they were doing that was deceptive. Were they overcharging me? Did they even have the skills they claimed to have?
Not to mention the unsuspecting webmaster on the other side who gave out the link.
How would they feel later to find out they were duped? Would they have a bad taste in their mouth for not only the marketing company, but for the company they were linking to? What if they felt so duped that they decided to go public on social media with the information? How would the client like the technique if they ended up with a reputation management nightmare?
Surely I’m being dramatic here, because we’re only talking about a little white lie. But does the size or color of the lie make it any less deceptive?
And we are talking specifically about link building here. There’s a reason that I dislike it and don’t do it. As far as I’m concerned, link building in and of itself borders on being a deceptive practice because it’s usually done to secure a fake “vote” for a website. It’s an industry that shouldn’t exist, and wouldn’t exist if Google didn’t place so much weight on links. If it weren’t for that aspect of Google’s algorithm, we’d have website owners giving and getting links for the right reasons, with a lot less deception (and payment) going on behind the scenes.
We can debate ethics forever and never come to a consensus because they are often seen as situational. What might be unethical in one situation might not seem so unethical in another situation. Certainly, life-or-death situations are not the same as marketing ones. If a lie is going to somehow save someone’s life, then by all means, please lie your head off!
But marketing isn’t a life-or-death situation.
Lying and deceiving to seek someone’s favor is generally agreed upon by most cultures as being wrong.
This is not a “black hat vs. white hat” issue.
It has nothing to do with hats. When it comes to search marketing, I don’t care what techniques you use or what methods you use to gain more targeted search engine visitors. I don’t believe that there are techniques that are more or less ethical than others. I don’t care what Google puts in their Webmaster Guidelines, because there’s no reason to need to know. If you fundamentally understand that all Google cares about is that your website isn’t being deceptive in some manner, then you can’t run afoul of them. They have to know that they can trust the information contained on your site and the information that you provide to Google. Nothing more, nothing less.
So many ethical conundrums come down to one simple question:
Is it deceptive or not?
I worry about search marketers who believe that deception is a necessary part of their job if they are going to get results. It’s not only incorrect, but a sad commentary on our industry and perhaps our world.
BY: Jill Whalen

Successful SEO Tactics: Off-Site Optimization

The large majority of external factors that influence organic rankings fall within the classification of link building. There have been great debates in recent months that the ranking impact that can be derived through social media signals falls outside of “traditional” link building. That is valid, and will continue to be debated.
It seems there are few topics within SEO or digital marketing that are as highly contested and controversial as link building. As the SEO Tactics chart was developed, it became obvious that off-site influences would be a core pillar.
This article focuses more on the strategies that surround link building as opposed to the tactics. The space is flooded with these tactics already, yet little attention is paid to the strategies that guide successful link building campaigns.
You are simply burning time and money when a thoughtful link building strategy is absent. Hopefully some of the concepts conveyed in this article will translate well into the programs you're managing.

Keywords, Anchor Text & the Value of Diversification

You absolutely must have a data-driven keyword strategy in place to drive results from your link building efforts. If you’re not driving revenue or leads then what’s the point?
Identify keywords that have the highest likelihood of driving incremental online conversions, and set those terms as your target. Here’s some good information on identifying the right keywords.
These keywords become the genesis of your anchor text, but don’t fall into the trap that many SEOs do. Here’s a common problem – I want to rank for “men’s jackets” and in doing so I’ve determined that all of the links that I will attain will be targeted with “men’s jackets” as the anchor text. This is a mistake. While you certainly need some focus on the primary keywords within your anchor text it’s equally as important to work with derivatives of that keyword.
Moderation and diversification are important principles in anchor text selection. Do your homework and identify a set of valuable derivates such as “men’s winter jackets” and “cheap men’s jackets.” Diversifying the keywords within your link profile will help it appear natural.
An anchor text usage rule of thumb that we’ve seen success with looks something like this:

• 50 percent containing the exact match keyword.
• 30 percent to 40 percent containing keyword derivatives.
• 10 percent to 20 percent containing brand terms/URL.

Diversification not only relates to the anchor text but to the proportion of “follow” and “nofollow” links within your profile. Many link builders make the mistake of acquiring an abundance of “follow” links to the point where it makes up nearly 100 percent of the profile. Does this look natural? No.
While the direct value of a “nofollow” link will be less than a “follow,” the indirect value of diversifying your overall link profile will make it well worth the time.

Aiming at the Right Target – Destination URL Selection

The link building components of an SEO campaign shouldn't occur in a vacuum. They should be complimenting a larger and more holistic approach to SEO. When determining the URL that you will be pointing to your anchor text, you should follow the same methodology that your internal linking structure follows.
This consistency is important and will help signal the engines as to which specific URL should rank for a given term. Mapping your keywords to specific URLs from the start is a worthwhile exercise and can be used as a guide for both internal and off-site linking. Here’s some good information related to keyword mapping and on-site optimization elements that should be considered as part of your holistic plan.
Avoid pointing links to the home page when link building to non-brand terms. Diversification again comes into play here and you want URLs that have the best chance of converting to be the page that ranks for a given term.
Strive for a healthy mix of links coming in at you category pages, sub-category pages, and product-level pages. If you are link building with the anchor text “men’s jackets” this should be pointing into your category level page that is optimized for “men’s jackets” with an internal linking structure that is supporting the URL for that keyword.
Sub-category-targeted link building can be quite successful within ecommerce sites. Utilizing a sub-category-specific derivative such as “men’s winter jackets” that is pointed to its mapped sub category URL can be beneficial for both that term and the head term that it is a derivative of. This is where the power of proper internal linking can benefit your link building efforts as weight can be transferred both upstream to the category page and downstream to product-level pages via site navigation, breadcrumbs, etc.

Penalized vs. Devalued – Panda Paranoia

It’s hard to have a discussion on link building without talking about Google’s Panda update. Plenty of ecommerce webmasters are afraid that Google is or will penalize their site because they have links coming in from what they believe is a low quality content site that has been penalized.
Unless you're creating massive amounts of low quality content on your own site, the chances of you receiving stiff penalties from Google because of a few inbound links is quite low (although a small degree of paranoia is a good thing when it comes to SEO). However, it's quite likely those inbound links will be devalued. This is a much different scenario than your site being penalized though - so keep things in perspective.

A Couple of Parting Thoughts

Take the time to do this right. Don’t rush into link building without a clear strategy, and don’t think that it’s purely a numbers game.
Relevance and quality really do matter and will set you up for a sustainable link building campaign. Whether you're acquiring links through blogging, video distribution, infographics, whitepapers, press releases, webinars or distributing articles, always keep your focus on the end user and the value that your content offers them.

By: Ryan Woolley

After Huffington, Is AOL Looking for New Suitors?

“There is no deal on the table, no proposed deal, and both parties are on retainer with us and we work with them. Our strategy hasn’t changed and we are moving faster than ever on it.” Thus spoke AOL Chief Tim Armstrong when questioned by Adweek after retaining two of the biggest names in M&A, law firm Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz and investment banking company Allen & Company LLC.

He was reacting to the Adweek speculation that AOL was itself looking out for a buyer.

Tim Armstrong could be right. He has continuously chopped and changed the strategy and partners at AOL pruning some business while acquiring others since his eventful entry at AOL and retaining the two M&A heavyweights could be just to facilitate the churnings.

Over the last two years AOL has snapped up over half a dozen companies including at least two top of the line technology blogs TechCrunch and Engadget besides the local media reporting company Patch. In February Armstrong was talked into a sugar coated deal for Huffington Post that included a cash payout of $300 million and a stake of $15 million in equity.

The new media’s trophy princess Arianna Huffington came to AOL with the deal as the Chief Spokesman and as expected the viewership has looked up ever since. However the revenue jump has not been enough to justify the expensive all cash acquisition, and investors have given a thumbs down to the deal.

AOL’s share price which had begun inching upwards late last year, slid continuously after the acquisition of Huffington post and is now down by 40% since February. This was largely because the company was unable to get premium advertisement rates despite the high numbers of page views that Huffington Post brought about largely due to the stranglehold Google has in the online ad market.

As a result investor confidence has been down and in July AOL sacked its advertising chief Jeff Levick and kicked upstairs the President of its arm Advertising.com Ned Brody who became the Chief revenue officer allowing AOL to bring in fresh faces.

Whereas AOL does need some tie up to one of the cash flush big brothers Google, Apple or Microsoft who are acquiring with a gusto, it does not need to throw away Armstrong’s finely crafted strategy of transforming AOL to a prime media company.

Perhaps it should begin talks with Google which had offered to take up 5% stake in AOL in 2005, considering that Nancy Peretsman who had brokered the deal then is back to advising AOL as Managing Director of Allen & Co.
By: Sandip Sen 

2012: Search Marketing Armageddon or Opportunity?

What's on the minds of digital marketers as we head toward 2012? Are they looking to bump their search spend up, down, sideways – and what issues are they focusing on in the coming year. The Mayan calendar holds 2012 as a year of Armageddon – but are digital marketers seeing next year as disaster or opportunity?

It’s Budget Season Again

Across the world, the annual budgeting process, also known as “The Family Feud,” is taking place as departments, campaigns, and groups vie for attention, direction, and money. In most companies, budgets are the result of several processes. There is:

• “Zero basis budgeting” where the budget for programs has to be completely re-justified annually. 
• Incremental budgeting where adjustments to the previous year’s budgets are the goal – where spending is bumped up here a bit, and down there a bit. 
• Competitive benchmarking based budgeting, which involves matching budget allocations to key competitive or industry benchmarks.

In media, allocation of budget by channel usually is done incrementally. The trend for years has been adjustments upward in digital advertising at the expense of traditional print advertising – usually justified through media mix models or competitive and industry benchmarking.

Most Important Issues Facing Search Marketers in 2012

So what is the most important issue facing search marketers in 2012? This is what we found during an August 25 webinar, based on 83 responses:

• Mobile search, surprisingly, was named the most important issue by 37 percent of respondents. 
• Attribution modeling came in second – a sign of the growing maturity of the search market. 
• Though social media is a huge issue, optimizing brands to show up on Facebook was the lowest rated goal for 2012 beneath video search.
• Only 12 percent of respondents included integrating Likes and +1s into their SEO programs as the top priority.

Not covered in the specific survey was the impact of rich snippets for SEO on Google. This should be a high priority for advertisers in 2012.
Organizations were also asked to benchmark their maturity in both search and social media. The results:

• Respondents rated the maturity of their search programs as “Average.” Only 7 percent said they are highly mature, and 25 percent said they are mature – that seems low. However, most respondents indicated that they rate themselves this way because they are concerned about their organizations ability to scale search, particularly SEO, into mobile search, integrate programs across channels, and scale the more manual aspects of search (e.g., link building and keyword development).
• Social media was rated as “immature” by 39 percent of respondents, which makes sense. Social is a relatively new channel – we’re still working out metrics on what “success” means. What was most surprising is that 25 percent rate their programs as “mature.” That seems high.

2012: Armageddon or Opportunity?

With so many challenges on the horizon facing search and social media marketers – mobile, video, rich snippets, Facebook advertising, attribution modeling – the question “2012: Armageddon or Opportunity?” isn’t so much a question as a potential outcome.
If advertisers don’t address mobile search, attribution modeling, and increasing the maturity of their programs, then 2012 means digital (or brand) Armageddon. If these issues are addressed, then 2012 is the year of opportunity.

By: Craig Macdonald

What Our Favourite TV Adverts can Teach us About Achieving a Successful SEO Campaign

When flicking through the TV channels of an evening, it’s difficult to avoid the myriad of adverts that interrupt our viewing, most of which are uninspired or worse still, irritate us greatly. There are a few diamonds in the rough though; adverts which make us laugh, make us cry and glue us to the screens for their entirety. We all have favourite adverts that evoke memories of days gone by, but aside from this, what else can we obtain from a successful advert? I put it to you that they can unlock the secrets of a successful SEO campaign; let’s have a look at some of the best and see what they can teach us.

The Lynx Effect:
I’m sure most of you are aware of this series of adverts depicting the ways in which a can of deodorant will attract beautiful women and transform you from average Joe to a God in one swooping spray.

Lynx have an incredibly slick marketing strategy that ticks all the boxes and continues to churn out unique adverts that never fail to amuse. The reason for this continued success? They persistently create adverts that people want to talk about down the pub. Apply this unique approach to the content on your website and you too can get people talking about your product and service.

The Man your Man Could Smell Like

Old Spice gave the world a minute of pure hilarity when they created this advert starring Isaiah Mustafa as the perfect man. This clever marketing campaign changed public opinion of Old Spice, before thought of as a product for the older gentleman, to an innovative and forward thinking brand. It was reported that after the advert appeared on YouTube, sales of the body wash increased by 107%.

If your SEO campaign has been running for a while, perhaps it’s time for a change; take a different approach and engage your audience with something that reignites their interest in what you do. E marketing, guest blogging and using social media are great ways to reach an audience and show them something new that reflects the superiority of your brand.

Compare the Meerkat

This advert featuring Aleksandr Orlov, the loveable Russian meerkat is a lesson to all in what a great advert can achieve. 2010 saw the book ‘A Simples Life’ fly off the shelves and into the Christmas stockings of men, women and children across the UK, selling 500,000 copies by the end of the festive season and peaking at an astonishing 7 copies sold every minute which ultimately saw it outsell the life story of Tony Blair.

Now I’m not saying that every marketing campaign needs a disgruntled Russian meerkat, but Aleksandr raises a valuable point in SEO terms; be personable. Your target audience will be much easier to retain if you market yourself as an approachable and likeable team, so be sure your content is written in a way that makes potential clients comfortable enough to pick up the phone or pop in to your store.

The Bouncing Balls

The TV advert for Sony Bravia features an average of 250,000 colourful bouncing balls making their way through the streets of San Francisco. This visual delight had audiences and competitors alike in awe of what had been achieved. The advert is now widely considering a classic example of a sleek and cleverly composed advertising campaign.

Any business owner looking to engage an audience with their website should refer to this powerful advert for inspiration because quite simply it is visually stunning; something that your website also needs to be. An SEO campaign is effectively useless if your website is an uninspired blur of black text on dull, stock backgrounds. Get a great designer on board who can create a bespoke site that catches the eye and instantly engages the browser.

By Site-Reference

Audience Targeting Strategies for LinkedIn Ads

In March, LinkedIn announced that it had surpassed the 100 million user benchmark – and according to their ad tool, they have surpassed the 120 million mark. In fact, they are adding one new member per second. Smart marketers shouldn’t disregard a concentrated audience of this size. Today we’ll review targeting opportunities for the LinkedIn Ads program.

LinkedIn Audience Information

It’s common knowledge that LinkedIn draws a professionally orientated crowd. However, what else can we learn about the audience on LinkedIn? I conducted some research within the LinkedIn Ad tool and these were my findings:

The current geographic location of LinkedIn members looks like this:

According to an excellent presentation by Amodiovalerio Verde, the industries with the most active LinkedIn members include high tech, finance, manufacturing, and medical:

This gives us a better understanding of who uses LinkedIn. It’s pretty evenly split between genders with a slight leaning toward males; 60 percent of users are between 24 and 54; most users are located in the U.S. or Europe; and there is a wide range of industries represented.

LinkedIn Targeting Strategies

The current targeting options within LinkedIn are robust and well-suited to the audience on LinkedIn: they focus on professional affiliations, rather than personal attributes/interests/likes such as Facebook. First, let’s cover where your ad may appear on LinkedIn:

• Profile Page: When members view the profile of other LinkedIn members. 
• Home Page: The page members see when they sign in to LinkedIn. 
• Inbox: The page where members see messages and invitations to connect. 
• Search Results Page: The page that results when you search for a member by name. 
• Groups: When members view pages in their group.

Unlike Facebook, where you determine the targeting at the ad level, within LinkedIn, your audience targeting is established at the campaign level. These are your targeting options:

• Job Title: “Patent Attorney” or “Sr. Laboratory Technician” or "Registered Nurse" 
• Job Function: “Sales” or “Engineering” or "Marketing" functions
• Industry: “Banking” or “Biotechology” industries
• Geography: “United States” or “Netherlands” or “Toronto”
• Company Size: "1-10" or “500-1000" people 
• Company Name: "GE" or "Hewlett-Packard" or "FedEx"
• Seniority: “Vice President” or “Owners”
• Age: “18-24” or “35-54” 
• Gender: "Female" or "Male" 
• LinkedIn Group: "Business Intelligence Group" or "Corporate Real Estate"

You can (and should) blend these options in order to create tightly focused campaigns and zero-in on your target audience. Take note that LinkedIn targeting operates under the inclusion method, which means that each layer of specificity you add to your campaign will cause your audience to get smaller (and more focused). Here's a quick example of how your audience size decreases with each desired attribute:

To get started, break out your campaigns into a few large buckets and then get more specific. For example, let’s say you are advertising software that is geared toward marketing professionals. The initial campaign structure can look something like this:

1. Company category (marketing): Individuals who work for companies in North America who are in the industries of Marketing and Advertising, Market Research, Publications and Communications, and who are between the ages of 25 and 54. Your estimated target audience is 454,644 members.
2. Specific individuals (marketing): LinkedIn members in North America between the ages of 25 and 54 who have listed their job function as Marketing. Your estimated target audience is 561,693 members. 
3. Specific individuals (decision markers): LinkedIn members in North America between the ages of 35 and 55+ who have listed their job function as Marketing, and their seniority is Director, Vice President or Owner. Your estimated target audience is 161,966 members. 
4. Groups about marketing: LinkedIn Members in North America who have joined groups that pertain to marketing. Here is a snapshot of the possible groups you could target (see below). Your estimated target audience for these groups is 83,554.

These examples should serve just as some inspiration on how your campaigns can be set up. We haven’t even touched on targeting individuals at specific companies (suggested reading: Marty Weintraub’s post, “Radical LinkedIn B2B #PPC: Targeting Competitor's Employees”). Within the example above, you could create a campaign that targets all of the companies that are currently members of the American Marketing Association (AMA).
Within each campaign, you can also target the LinkedIn Audience Network (it’s optional). The Audience Network is a collection of partner websites that display LinkedIn Ads on their pages. Partner websites may include website publishers in the Google Doubleclick Ad Exchange. According to LinkedIn Ad help center, this is how it works:

“Suppose that you are targeting LinkedIn members who are CEOs. If you choose to run your ads on the LinkedIn Audience Network, your ads will be displayed to those CEOs when they visit LinkedIn and when they visit other websites in the LinkedIn Audience Network.”

The reporting in the LinkedIn Ad interface is weak at best. But they don’t provide any visibility into how your ads perform within their network or the audience network. However, the Audience Network does increase click volume.

BY: Joseph Kerschbaum

Supersized Google Sitelinks: A Review & Early Optimization Tips

Google Sitelinks: Then & Now

In 2008 I wrote a few articles about Google then-new “sitelinks.” If a webmaster wanted their site to be blessed with sitelinks, they would need to show Google their site was useful. A year later the system had grown and webmasters were now able to refine sitelinks down to the directory level. Google’s most recent sitelink explanation/suggestions can be found at the Google Webmaster Tools Help Center.
When I read the latest sitelink introduction from Danile Rocha at the Official Google Blog, I was a bit skeptical of the last sentence: “The number of sitelinks will also vary based on your query—for example, [museum of art nyc] shows more sitelinks than [the met] because we’re more certain you want results from www.metmuseum.org.”
Some sites undeservedly received sitelinks in the past. For example, a search for “fitness club” returned LA Fitness, while searches for “health insurance” and “investment advice” yielded sites that didn’t deserve the full sitelinks, because they weren’t an actual brand. Let’s compare 2008 “fitness club” to today.
Here is 2008: (notice no paid search ads)

Now 2011 from Princeton, NJ, where I'm writing this:

And when at home in Twinsburg:

It seems LA Fitness has received a sort of “demotion” and now only has inline sitelinks. However, some would say LA Fitness is still pretty dominant – they’re still ranked first and they are the only ones above the fold that get any sort of sitelinks.
Conversely, Coca-Cola seems to have gone downhill, losing their sitelinks entirely:
2008:

2011:

Were I Coca-Cola (or Pepsi for that matter), I would prefer that U.S. searchers would be given the 2008 version rather than being asked to go to Kenya, Egypt, or India of all the places they could have picked for the inline sitelinks. In fact, I would probably be madder that I can’t get the 2011 love that Jones Soda gets:

New Sitelinks – Is Bigger Better?

Are bigger sitelinks better? Analytics will begin to answer that (Google undoubtedly already has a decent size sample), but it most depends on what the jumbo sitelinks look like.
It takes some setting up to be able to properly attribute organic traffic to sitelinks, but it can be done in each of the major measurement tools. The Jones Soda example above provides some decent sitelinks to look at from a title perspective, but three of the four “description snippets” are the same.
Based on early research, the description snippet will be between 23-29 characters including spaces. It appears to be taken primarily from the meta description tag, although Google pulls from other page content.
Jones’ mistake is having the same meta description for each of the three pages, which is simply SEO laziness. This does, however, suggest to me that the sitelink algorithm to generate description snippets isn’t as “picky” as the one used to pare down and keyword-customize the full search engine results page description.
The title is probably more important than the description, from a call-to-action perspective. In this case, each of the titles is very clear and they have been taken directly from site taxonomy. This is probably the most important thing to note as a result of these jumbo sitelinks.
We as SEOs have long desired (and sometimes succeeded) to be an equal or at least strong influence on site taxonomy. We want to incorporate keywords that are popular into the actual navigation elements of a website. Now we have yet another reason to do so, because keywords equal visits when bolded in the results, so “supersizing” certainly shouldn’t hurt.
Looking at the FBI sitelinks really shows us how seemingly random this process is, as far as we know. Perhaps enough Google toolbars have been installed on people that visit the FBI site, because how else would Google pick the following to be their sitelinks?

When you visit the FBI home page, you will find that the selection of the six “blessed” sitelinks seems to be very random. There are two pages linked-to from the top-navigation, but the rest are sub-navigation pages. Perhaps Google has matched up search volume for “Most Wanted” (and tied social data), “E-scams,” and “Spies” to help pull the content they feel will be most popular. Google is likely testing a few of the sub-navigation pages and will constantly update them based on user interaction.
By the way, the description snippet from the “What We Investigate” page is coming from the bold-tagged (not H1) headline of that page on the FBI site. They must have their meta data on an undercover mission away from most of their pages.
In short, jumbo sitelinks are another way for Google to try to give the searchers what they want. If Google finds that more people are scrolling down to results below the sitelinks, they may end up making them smaller or maybe dropping to only two rows like Jones Soda (most brands are getting three rows).

Bottom Line

It is the responsibility of webmasters to work with the marketing team to ensure youre' making the most of sitelinks, and to use Google Webmaster Tools to request the removal of any you don’t like. Someday, maybe Google will allow us to pick our own sitelinks for brand search results, but for now the only way to pick your own is to fine tune your site’s paths to lead to the right pages.

BY: Chris Boggs

How To Create, Import & Export MySQL Databases via cPanel

  A MySQL database is a way of organizing information tables with a common theme. Items such as address and phone lists, bits of information, email addresses, inventories, price lists, etc., all represent information that can be stored and accessed through a database. A static website will typically suffice if the information is not extensive. However, for large amounts of information displayed in numerous places, a database makes the information easier to update and manage. Making effective use of a MySQL Database consists of being able to create, import and export the information through your cPanel.
 
Creating A Database
The first step is to create the database in question. A database typically contains many tables that can all be linked together. If the tables are linked, the database is said to be a "relational" database. If your database has just one table, it is considered to be a "flat-file" database. To create a database you should log into cPanel and access the MySQL databases tab. Next, type the name you have chosen for your new database in the "Create New Database" field and choose "Create." This saves the database under that given name.

It is possible allow users to access your database simply by configuring the database settings regardless of the type of database you create. Users are assigned access by your logging into cPanel and accessing the MySQL databases tab. Next, assign a user and choose "ALL" privileges and rights to the database. This grants the user access to the information the database has stored.

Using phpMyAdmin

As a part of the cPanel interface, phpMyAdmin is used to manage MySQL databases. To access this feature, your database must already exist within the cPanel. Open the phpMyAdmin tab in cPanel and a box will open allowing you to select the database you wish to manage. You will then be able to choose a table icon that lets you edit individual tables within the database. Next, choose the table icon to open and edit that table. The command "X" removes a specific row within the table and the "pencil" icon lets you change values and edit the contents of a specific row. Once the changes are completed to your satisfaction, choose "Go" or "Save."

Third Party Software and Settings For Your Database

When third party software is going to be accessing your database, there are some settings that are required for the config files. They most frequently are:

1.  Hostname - "Localhost" is typically used for the hostname and shows that the third party software is accessing the database "locally", or to another database hosted on the same computer.

2.  Username & Database Name - This name consists of a combination of the hosting username and the database name. For example, with a hosting username of "misc01," a database named "discussion" and a user named "mod," username would be "misc01_discussion," with the username being "misc01_mod."

3.  Password - Set for whichever database user is accessing the system.

Allowing Access Hosts

There are times when it may become necessary to connect to your database via remote. It is simple to assign access hosts to enable connection with software already on your computer or from another website. To do this you will need to assign permission to that host in order for the database to be accessed. This is easily done using the Remote MySQL option in your cPanel.

When creating access rules, it is always wise to be as detailed as possible. You should make sure your rules are styled so that they are broad enough to give the access you wish, without being so broad that they allow more access than is desired. When creating rules for database access, you can choose either IP addresses, hostnames or wildcards. For wildcards, a percent sign (%) is used.

For example:

192% - allows all IP’s beginning with 192
% - allows all IP’s and hostnames

Importing a Database

Importing a database is simple using phpMyAdmin or the administrative panel within your software depending on the software in use. Uploading a database file can be done through the “Import” or the “SQL” link. Both options will automatically populate the database information on upload. One important thing to remember when importing databases using phpMyAdmin is that tables cannot be overwritten, so the tables must be new. Also, due to PHP software limitations, databases cannot be over 50mb. For databases over this size, it is recommended to backup the database and import them manually using technical support provided by your hosting company.

Exporting A Database Using phpMyAdmin

Exporting a database is best described as downloading specific tables into a predetermined SQL File. PhpMyAdmin has an “Export” option that makes this process simple. By going to “Export” you can choose the tables desired, then “Save as File” and “Go.” This allows you to download and save the SQL file for export at your convenience. Be sure to choose a "Save" location that is easy to remember and find. Also, it is extremely important that you backup both server files and database prior to deleting them off of the server.

Replacing An Existing Database

  If the tables already exist they will have to be “dropped.” The simplest way to accomplish this is to delete the database entirely and recreate it in cPanel. Another option is to remove the tables from the database. To accomplish this, go into phpMyAdmin, choose the database from the drop menu, select “Check All” in the right-hand frame and use the command “With Selected: Drop.”

BY: Site-Reference 

Website Traffic Is Not The Key To Success

Website traffic is deemed the single most important factor when it comes to the success of a website but that statement needs to be qualified. Although it's true that a constant stream of traffic is the lifeblood of a website, the quality of the traffic is far more important than the quantity.

Of course, any amount of website traffic is better than no traffic at all but even if you have the most perfect website, your site is doomed to fail if you are not getting visitors that are looking for the products or information you have available on your site.

It's easy to get caught up in a numbers game. It's exciting to see the number of visitors to your site climb from a few a day to a few hundred a day. On the surface, this looks like exactly what you want but if your visitors are looking for something other than what you are offering, for the most part, your website traffic is wasted.

You could have a great website design, compelling copy, the lowest prices and fantastic specials but all your efforts will be useless unless your website is drawing traffic that is interested in what you are providing or promoting.

What you need are visitors specifically interested in your product or service -- you need 'targeted traffic'.
Don't think of targeted traffic as a sub-category of website traffic because they really are two separate entities. If you're marketing plan is designed to drive as much website traffic as possible to your site, no matter what kind of traffic it is, then you're not making effective use of your time and you're setting yourself up for disappointment.

The web is a very different venue than a shopping mall. A shopping mall relies on unfocused traffic, wondering from store to store, not looking for anything in particular but willing to spend it's money on an impulse.

Believe it or not, people surfing the web will leave a website after viewing it for only about 2 seconds. They're looking for specific items or information and if they don't quickly find what they are looking for on your site, they'll click out of your site and go to one of the other millions of sites on the web.

That's why most of the successful websites are tightly focused on their 'niche' and their marketing plan is focused on driving people to their site that are looking for what they offer - they understand the importance of 'targeted traffic'.

Of course, targeted traffic and a website focused on a particular 'niche' go hand and hand. Think about your website. Does it really lend itself to a specific product or service, or is it so broad that it tends to confuse potential customers?

Here are a few tips to help you prepare your website for targeted traffic:

Design your website to promote one particular product or service as your main item.

Determine the type of people that will be interested in your product or service and adjust your website to be attractive to them.

Establish the items or services that are 'closely' related to what you're promoting on your website. If you think that they would be interesting to your visitors, offer those items on your website as well.

Keep a constant flow of free content, that your visitors will find useful, on your website and add new content and information often. Invite your visitors back to your site to see the new material you're constantly adding.

Keep in mind, a website that's focused on a particular 'niche' item or service lends itself to targeted traffic simply because there is something specific to target and the more targeted traffic your site receives, the more productive your site will be.

There are many conventional and many not so conventional ways to drive targeted traffic to your website but we'll explore them in other articles.

The purpose of this article is to point out the difference between website traffic and targeted traffic. More isn't always better and if you focus your marketing on 'targeted traffic' you'll quickly find that the hits your getting on your website aren't just empty numbers - they'll be potential customers and, more importantly, sales.
By: Mike Burke
 

Can You Make Money by Working For Google Online?

Google AdSense may be the best program that has helped thousands of webmasters become millionaires today. Google AdSense program help from small website publishers to large publishers to display targeted ads and earn per valid click from their visitors. That's cool and easy to make money by working for Google online. Don't seem to misunderstand about the topic. You don't work online for Google but you display Google ads on your websites or blogs and earn money from each valid click that generates from. Thousands of webmasters started out by working a few hours a day. After they have earned enough income, they quit their daytime job and work full time online. This is how thousands or even millions of people working these days.

There is no other affiliate program that can compare with Google AdSense. It has become a main source of online income that you can make a month. Each person can make different amount of income. There is no limit. Some people can make from $100 to $1,000,000 a month. It depends on how much traffic you have on your websites or blogs. How the Google AdSense program really works is that it displays their ads on your web sites based on your content. For example, if you web site has a lot of articles about auto insurance, then the ads will display insurance related ads. This is one of the best part of Google AdSense program because of matched content ads. When you users click on each ad, you will get money for each click. Google AdSense ads have different types, including banner and text ads of different sizes. Each advertiser pays differently so you will get pay per click differently too. Generally speaking, the more traffic you have on your websites or blogs is the more earnings you will make by working for Google online. Each click you get paid from 5 cents to $5. This is the range you should know about. Google AdSense will deliver the targeted banner and text ads that match with your content. So, your readers will find them very useful to click on those ads. There are thousands of advertisers who advertise for Google. These advertisers range from global to small companies. There are many different types of categories.

When you display Google Ads on your blogs or web sites, you will maximize your income. So, all you need to do is to put the ads in the right place and try to get as much traffic as you can. The traffic you bring in is the more money you earn online. Google places cost-per-click and cost per thousands impressions ads so they can compete against one another.

If you have free time, one or two hours a day, you should start thinking about making money online. It is free to get started. Google AdSense is the way to go. You can apply for this program online, which takes a few minutes. When you are approved, you can log in to your AdSense account and copy an HTML code and paste it your websites or blogs. Good luck!

About the Author: In conclusion You can Earn Money From Google by Working Online For Google So if you want to Work Online For Google  Please visit our website to learn about free tips of how to earn money from Google without any investment You need a few hours a day to make money on the Internet
By Tammy Johnston

11 Great Points About Google AdWords Sitelinks

Most PPC managers will agree that Google AdWords’ sitelinks can be a powerful optimization tool for any PPC account. At the encouragement of our Google AdWords rep, I’ve recently been spending more time with sitelinks, and have discovered several new ways to effectively utilize sitelinks.
Last week, I turned to my PPC colleagues on Twitter to find out if their experience matched mine. As with any crowdsourced question, I got some great feedback that I hadn’t thought of – and it’s too good not to share.
With that, here's what’s great about AdWords sitelinks.

1. Great CTR

Sitelinks have a click-through rate (CTR) that’s far above average. One of my clients has an overall CTR of just over 2 percent, while the sitelinks in their account have a CTR of more than 10 percent. That’s a five-fold improvement – not too shabby for a few minutes of setup.

2. Helps Quality Score

Although Google publicly denies this, our AdWords rep told me that sitelinks help quality score. I was honestly surprised at this news, because Google is generally tight-lipped about the quality score factors. Still, we all know that CTR is the biggest factor affecting quality score, so it stands to reason that anything you can do to increase it in your account, including sitelinks, will help.

3. Additional Space for Ad Text

We all know that 95 characters isn’t a lot of space in which to expound the virtues of your PPC offering. Sitelinks offer up to six additional opportunities for additional ad text and/or calls to action. As long as the text is relevant to every ad group in the campaign, this can be a great way to sneak in more ad copy, and take up more space in the SERPs.

4. Alternate Conversion Paths

Along similar lines, sitelinks can be used to point visitors to conversion-oriented landing pages that may be different from those in the individual ad groups. This gives more options to the searcher, and makes it easy for those who are close to converting to find where they need to go.

5. Can Send to Multiple Landing Pages for Relevancy

Yet another benefit of sitelinks is the use of multiple landing pages, a different one for each sitelink; thus giving searchers more options to find relevant information. This is a great option for small businesses without landing page budgets. If you run a small business and can’t afford to create individual PPC landing pages, sitelinks are a good alternative – you can test multiple landing pages in one campaign.

6. Gives Better Sense of Legitimacy

One really cool thing about sitelinks is that most searchers can’t tell the difference between PPC sitelinks and organic sitelinks. For all they know, sites with additional links are just more relevant, according to Google.

7. Allows for More Targeted URLs to Deeper Content

Where else can you run a PPC ad with five or six different destination URLs? For example, you could use sitelinks for broad or general terms this way: A search for "Hot Drinks" could use sitelinks showing "Tea, Coffee, Hot Chocolate, More Tea," etc. This is a great way to help searchers narrow down their choices and get closer to a conversion.

8. Competitive Advantage

For years now, advertisers have coveted the premium top spot above the natural search results. By including sitelinks in these ads, advertisers gain an even bigger competitive advantage.

9. Ability to Optimize for "in-ad" Text/Links

Similar to increasing the length of your ad copy, sitelinks enables advertisers to optimize for multiple landing pages and calls to action.

10. Brand Awareness

You can use sitelinks to promote social media profiles, such as Facebook and Twitter. While the AdWords editorial guidelines somewhat restrict what can be said, there are creative ways to include social media links in sitelinks and build brand awareness and loyalty.

11. Good for Every Type of PPC Campaign

Sitelinks can work for every type of PPC campaign: local, e-commerce, lead generation, etc.

BY: Melissa Mackey

Google + Plans To Own Your Online Identity….why?

As per a recent Bloomberg Business Week report Eric Schmidt has admitted that Google + plans to own your online identity and is hence actively discouraging pseudonymity and anonymity in its social network.

What Google does not probably realize is that such quixotic restrictions on the web are meaningless and will only make its social network less popular in the long run. The early numbers of 25 million subscribers that its spiders and web giant status brought in during the first week should not melt away into oblivion similar to its past social projects like Google Buzz.

Over one out of three Twitter and Facebook users including the powerful celebrities use pseudo names for a variety of reasons. Some use it for convenience as their own names are long or simply not tweetable, others use them to give out a message of their cause, some do it to simply to hide themselves from public glare while others to appear larger than life. Twitter and Facebook has millions of users with pseudo names who don’t need Google+. They would just pass a newbie social network like Google + once it puts up such bizarre conditions for membership.

Why then is Google + pursuing such a risk prone path despite outcry and criticism. One reason could be that it is blinded by the fact that the Google+ button is being shown in over a million websites and appears in 4 billion impressions per day. That could have mistakenly prompted Google to consider that it is already winning the social networking battle with Facebook and Twitter and ot now wants to stamp its own terms.

Another reason is that it will network Adsense with the Google plus users trying to built a wider support base on its claim to online publishing. Though Adsense offers crumbs to publishers the mere posting of the Google + button would make other publishers wary of approaching the Google +users. This becomes increasingly important for Google because Amazon with a stronger publishing reputation would sooner than later enter the fray through its cloud.

A third reason probably is cyber security and Google’s plans to enter this lucrative and critical domain for success of its web browser the Google Chrome. Cyber attacks on big corporations and Government websites have become increasingly pre-dominant and an issue of great concern which no organization has been confident to tackle. It is not only big brands like Sony and Amazon but even defense contractors like Lockheed International, besides the CIA, FBI, Visa and Master Card whose sites have been under attack by individuals, organizations and even competing nations.

After the News of the World scandal involving James Murdoch and his team of U.K. based journalists caught hacking into web and mobile data to get news scoops it has become increasingly clear that hacking and cyber attacks is an institutional tool. It is no longer an odd rotten egg that is thrown at your website by an angry geek but an incisive tool to gather critical information to stay ahead in the information age.

Linking your search to online security could practically stop most cyber attacks on the web believe online security experts. This is because everyone would normally survey the any attack object, well before they start firing in the missiles. Google + effort to own your online identity could be an effort to tag you and your search well before you start to hack into a corporate or Government website.
BY: Sandip Sen 

Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz Fired By Phone

Yahoo Chairman of the Board Roy Bostock fired CEO Carol Bartz over the phone today. Both were apparently on planes heading in different directions when the information was given to Bartz, All Things Digital reported.

The company named CFO Tim Morse interim CEO. An "Executive Leadership Council" has been formed to support Morse until a full-time CEO is appointed, Yahoo said in a statement. The council consists of Michael Callahan, Executive Vice President, General Counsel and Secretary; Blake Irving, Executive Vice President and Chief Product Officer; Ross Levinsohn, Executive Vice President, Americas; Rich Riley, Senior Vice President & MD, EMEA Region; and Rose Tsou, Senior Vice President, APAC Region. Yahoo co-founders David Filo and Jerry Yang, will continue as Chief Yahoo and will provide counsel to Morse and the council.

Bartz, who has been with Yahoo for 30 months, had not turned the company around – the stock price is pretty close to that of when she took over and she's had some run-ins with co-founder Jerry Yang who has become more involved with the company recently. He stepped down from the CEO position to allow Bartz to take charge.

Yahoo has had some problems deciding what the company's objectives are. They turned down a buyout offer from Microsoft at over $30 a share – a price everyone holding the $12.50 shares would no doubt accept today. Interestingly the shares have jumped in after hours trading by over 6 percent to $13.72.

What will become of the company will be fuel for the rumor mill in coming days –AT&T, News Corp and Verizon have been mentioned as possible buyers. Could Yahoo go private? Be split up? Something else, if Yahoo can find itself a true leader?

Bartz has had her moments over the past 30 months - her numerous layoffs, the killing off of many of the companies products, her battle with the media and internal leaks, and the loss of numerous talented executives and engineers.

Bartz had a passing shot at the board in her "goodbye" email sent out to all employees.

To all,
I am very sad to tell you that I've just been fired over the phone by Yahoo's Chairman of the Board. It has been my pleasure to work with all of you and I wish you only the best going forward.
Carol

What happens next will add to the saga of Yahoo - once the flagship of Internet companies, now struggling to find ways to monetize their visitors.
BY: Frank Watson,

Double Your Sales Overnight: The Secret Sauce of Conversion Rate Mastery!

In the ever-evolving world of search engine marketing (SEM), it's easy to get lost in a sea of data points like unique visits and rankings. However, true success in any SEM program is ultimately measured by one vital metric: bottom-line revenue.

If you're looking for a surefire way to enhance your return on investment (ROI) from search campaigns, focus on improving your conversion rates. Even a modest increase of 0.5-1 percent can yield remarkable results for your company's overall health and profitability.

Here are five top-notch strategies to elevate conversion rates for both organic and paid landing pages:

1. Relevancy: Meeting Expectations Right from the Start

When users click on your ad or snippet, they arrive with certain expectations. It's crucial to set these expectations in your ad copy and then fulfill them on your landing page to reduce bounce rates. Here are some actionable tips to convey relevancy to your audience:

• Ensure that your H1 header closely mirrors the key phrase used to drive traffic.
• Utilize images to reinforce relevancy; images are often the first elements to catch a visitor's eye. Include action captions with relevant text.
• Incorporate keywords in scannable sections of your content.
• Domain relevancy is paramount. Keyword-relevant brands can boost conversion rates by up to 4x, making a significant difference in ROI.

2. Proposition: Making Your Value Clear and Compelling

Your users should swiftly and easily understand your business proposition. To achieve this, follow these guidelines:

• Craft introductory text that emphasizes your product or service as a necessity rather than a luxury.
• Prioritize showcasing key features and benefits in the easily scannable areas of your content.
• Experiment with diverse media delivery, offering users the choice of learning about your brand through images, text, and video.
• Address your consumers' key fears and apprehensions.
• Avoid overwhelming users with excessive information. Instead, use soft calls-to-action like downloadable FAQs, demos, or whitepapers to initiate the sales process while capturing valuable sales data.

3. Trust: Building Confidence for Higher Conversions

Trust is often overlooked but can have a profound impact on conversion rates. Users seek trust signals that validate the credibility of your page and brand. To build trust effectively:

• Include reputable third-party badges, certifications, or awards.
• Use trust-inducing language in your calls to action, such as "checkout using our secure server," and provide privacy protection disclosures.
• Incorporate verifiable testimonials; avoid anonymous ones, as they raise suspicions. Video testimonials from users can be highly effective.
• Design your landing page with attention to detail; a polished appearance communicates strength and reliability.
• Offer easy access to a sales representative or customer service for inquiries.

4. Understand User Intent: Tailoring to Your Audience

Conversion is a two-way communication between your brand and consumers. For non-branded search traffic, this is often the first chance for a user to engage with your brand. Successfully converting this traffic requires a deep understanding of your brand's unique sales cycle, the user's confidence level in your offering, and their position in the buying process:

• Adapt to the complexity of your business proposition. More complex propositions typically entail longer sales cycles.
• Offer a mix of soft and hard conversion options, and track results to prioritize the most profitable ones.
• Be creative with your calls to action. Unique and effective approaches can yield exceptional results.
• Make conversions stand out in your design; use attention-grabbing colors and sizes.
• Maximize the post-conversion "Thank You" page by engaging users with additional content to increase brand awareness and customer lifetime value.

Remember your user "persona" and tailor your message, design, and imagery to appeal to your target segment.

5. Remove Distractions: Streamlining the Path to Conversion

Distractions hinder users from progressing through the sales cycle. To minimize distractions:

• Eliminate global navigation from your PPC templates.
• Leverage JQuery to keep users on the page using tabbed pages or overlays for less essential information.
• Avoid off-topic content that can dilute focus.
• Opt for high-quality images and avoid those with poor lighting or unusual angles.
• Limit the amount of information you request during conversions to only the essential data needed to move the sale forward.

By implementing these strategies, you can transform your conversion rates and unlock the full potential of your SEM efforts. Remember, success in the digital landscape goes beyond data points; it's about driving tangible bottom-line results that truly matter.