Forums: Discussions for entrepreneurs and small business.

What are you doing to promote your own web site regarding Search Engine Submission  (SES) & Search Engine Optimization (SEO)?

Other than hoping and praying for Google, Yahoo, MSN Search and others to index your site ...

what are you actively doing to make sure that your site is getting the proper submissions, utilizing "strong keywords and phrases", and helping to increase your ranking (without using Adwords or Yahoo Search Marketing)?

Does using Yahoo Search Marketing or Google`s Adwords help to create exposure for your site ... while your ranking improves?

Or is there a better way?

My question is presented for one reason ...

If folks can`t afford a professionally designed and maintained web site ($3000 - $5000 for a fully functional e-commerce web site) ...

How are folks ever going to afford the several hundred dollars a month it takes to do a good job using Adwords or Yahoo Search Marketing? Or other marketing tools and programs?

Does it take money to earn money ... or ... can you really get away with spending a few hundred dollars on a me-too web site ... hosted by one of the majors (so that you are simply just a number) ... and hoping and praying that success will come your way?

And then after 6 months or a year of the web site doing nothing ... do you throw up your hands and say ... "I did that Internet thing ... it just wasn`t for me" ...

Or ..

Do you realize that you need to invest the needed $3000 - $5000 to establish yourself, the way you should have in the first place?

 

Hi TJG,

Great question!  I guess that`s the million dollar question with all websites that are trying to promote a product or service.  I am also looking for these very answers.

As far as the costs you stated I guess that depends.  I was fortunate to have a friend in the internet selling business who took me through all the steps to develop a website, so for me the costs were very minimal.  Having said that if you set up a shopping cart, merchant account and such it does add up.  Hopefully by running a clean website, submitting my site to the search engines and using add on software like traffic blazer will help. 

In my experience I can suggest two valuable tips for improving the ranking of your site: 1- update your home page every week (change a handful of things so the site stays fresh) and 2-create links to other sites and throughout your site on as many pages as possible (the search engines like that you link off of your own page...just don`t make it all that noticeable or you will actually drive traffic away from your own site.

If anyone else out there knows how to drive traffic to a website or how to overcome the startup costs of a website please let us know...

David.

-------------------------

David Pollitt, BPE, CSCS*D, CFC
Optimal Performance Fitness Coaching
www.opcoaching.com & www.dphockey.com

You know, building your own web site is kind of like building your
own house. Sure you can buy a `kit` with a bunch of plans and
materials that will cost much less than hiring a professional, but you
have to spend a great deal of time setting things up, learning all of
the ins-and-outs to get things done, and then try to put it all
together in a reasonable way that doesn`t freak people out when
they see it, and doesn`t break. You can bet it`s going to take a lot
longer for you to do it than to pay a professional to do it, and it`s
probably going to have a few problems that will haunt you down the
road.

I would say this same logic applies to building web sites. Sure, you
can spend the time to figure out how to do some of the things that
are required, but it`s going to take a lot of time, probably isn`t going
to look as good or be as effective as it would be if you hired a
professional to do it, and might have problems you don`t even know
about because you really don`t know enough to know what to look
for. The more complex the site, the more you`re going to need a pro
to do it.

It does come down to the simple universal rule: you get what you
pay for.

Now I`m not suggesting you rush out and find someone to build your
site... it really does depend on your goals. TJG stresses that you
need to have a modest chunk of money to get started, or don`t
bother. That`s certainly one way to look at it, and to be honest, it`s
going to be a longer, tougher road if you don`t have either the
money or the skills to get started. But depending on your goals and
your business model, there are some things you can do at a low
price that can get you rolling.

Since TJG opened this thread up for SEO discussion, I`ll keep my
suggestions here specific to that topic, otherwise this could become
a long boring textbook. So, here are some FREE tips to help you with
your SEO. For brevity, I`ll assume you have a web site already up and
running.

#1. Content, content, content. If you want people to find you via
search engine placement, you are going to need a lot of relevant
content. To be specific, you need to write copy that uses your key
words and phrases with enough frequency and context for the
search engines to `understand` what this page and your site is all
about. Take note that they don`t `see` text in graphics or in Flash
animations, so don`t rely on those for search engine placement. To
help you even more, setting key words and phrases as headers using
tags like: <h1>,<h2> or <h3>; and using bold tags <b> or
<strong> will help the search engines "see" what is designated as
important on your pages.

#2. Meta tags. There are two key types of meta tags, keywords and
description. Each should be carefully chosen to maximize the key
words and phrases that you use in your text on those pages and that
you are wanting the search engines to notice. Whatever you do, don`t
overdo it. I see people put every key word and phrase they can think
of in their meta tags. To be sure, it`s confusing for a human to read,
and you can safely assume a search engine will be even more
puzzled.

#3. Internal links. Make sure if you use graphic menus or Flash
menus that you also have text links somewhere on the page. Search
engine spiders generally follow text links better than image links,
and having text as a link helps the search engines know that that
particular word or phrase is important, especially if the content on
the linked page is using the same words as the link it followed to get
there.

#4. External links. For this I am referring to other sites that link to
your site. This is an important thing. Having your site linked by
another site, especially one that has similar content and key words
and phrases, will definitely help improve your rankings, not to
mention help the spiders find your site for indexing. Which leads me
to my final point...

#5. Don`t try to be tricky. Beware of some SEO companies who want
to include your link on bogus pages that are designed to "fool" the
search engines. Those search engines are getting smarter and
smarter and if they decide you are on one of these bogus pages, you
can expect your rankings to drop... or worse, disappear from the
search engine. Some might disagree with me on that last point, but I
don`t believe in trying to "fool" anyone, or in this case anything,
because I am a believer in playing by the rules, and I know of
situations where people have been burned by these SEO spammers.
Just play by the rules, and you`ll do fine.

****

That`s basically it. Sounds simple, but it does take quite a bit of
work. I
am no expert on the matter, but since SEO consulting is expensive, I
use these tried and true methods to do it on my own.

Here are a few of the tools I use to help me optimize my key words,
phrases and content.

http://inventory.overture.com/d/searchinventory/suggestion/
Overture keyword selector tool. This one is
great to help me discover which key words are getting the most
volume, and even discover potential business ideas. A two-for-one
super special. ;)

http://www.submitexpress.com/
Submit Express tag analyzer, link popularity checker, keyword
suggestion tools.

http://www.webmaster-toolkit.com/web-page-analyser.shtml
Web page analyzer. This is the main tool I use on this site, but check
the menu in the left column, there are many more tools here to help.

I know what it`s like to bootstrap a business, so hopefully that helps
those of you who cannot currently afford to hire a consultant for
search engine optimization. It`s not going to be as good or as
thorough as a pro, but it can get the ball rolling. Someday you`ll be
able to afford to have it done, so you can focus on what you do best:
run your business.

Good luck, and Godspeed!

-------------------------

-Zepp

Creative solutions for digital communication; providing web site design and marketing for small businesses.

Personally, when I get sick, I look in a book for the cure. I`m pretty sure I know what`s wrong with me, and damn if those Shaman and old Louisiana bayou ladies couldn`t cure anything!

Whenever I go into a business, particularly buying complicated things, I like to write my own contracts, and I just read up real quick on the Law. I figure "Legal Contracts for Dummies" should just about do the trick, so why bother with a law library? Besids, it`s probably on Google if I need to know something!

LOL!! This is such an excellent topic question. It really speaks to the entire "do it yourself" practicality of Yankee Know-How. But okay, at what point does technology and specialization at last wipe out the possibility of really doing it yourself? I can build a go-cart, but I sure as hell can`t built a new hybrid energy-source car!

I can build a fire, but not a nuclear power plant. I can set fire to my home, but probably won`t be able to put it out.

How did we arrive at a point where everyone believes they can do anything? I suspect it began with that stoopid phrase, "Everyone has a right to their own opinion!" Absolutely, but an informed opinion is quite different from an ignorant one. Just because someone has a right to an opinion, doesn`t at all mean they should act upon that opinion! In my opinion, speeding trucks should watch out for me when I walk out into the street, not the other way around! :-D

Pay the money based on priority. "Don`t be penny-wise, dollar stupid" or whatever`s the old platitude. You can shop for a bargain on a surgeon, then have your 5-way bypass. Is your business and livelihood all that important, really? Can`t you just save a few bucks by doing it yourself?

Someone I know set up an e-commerce site, and was hacked. They had an unsecure shopping cart, and next thing they knew, they were being sued and personally liable for $50,000 of fraudulent charges! But at least they had the satisfaction of doing it themselves.

If you can`t afford a big company, try a small one. If that doesn`t work, look for a startup, trying to get out the word-of-mouth. If that doesn`t work, go places where writers hang out (SuN is a good place) and see if you can beg or barter for some writing.

As they say, if you have to ask the price, you can`t afford it. It took me 40 years to learn the power of that simple phrase, but it stopped me from leaping before I looked. (Don`t`cha just love how I can slide in all these cliches without any real reason?)

One thing I`d point out is there`s a significant controversy about meta-tags. The consensus is the search engines just skip them, as they`ve been worked into the ground by porno sites. Currently, it seems to be more about percentage of occurrence of phrases, within "x" number of words.

The other is that a search engine only can read text, so you really do have to watch those links in Flash, graphic images and alternate text, and wherever else there`s the possibility for some useful text.

That being said, you can definitely put actual links to each of your pages in a list, down at the bottom, in small print. Title each page with it`s primary content, and make the link text a keyphrase. It`s redudant to the tabs and menu items, but it`s wayyyyy down at the bottom where most people won`t botther. However, it`s there! That`s all that counts.