There are a few key things to remember when trying to create links to you web site

• Are they related to your business? You need to have some kind of content in your web site that relates to the site you are linking to otherwise the search engines will not consider this a subject relevant link.
• How popular or how much traffic does the site you are linking to generate.  By linking to sites that already have a high Google ranking pull your ranking higher.  Some examples would be your local Chamber of Commerce.  As a member, your company name is on their site and creates a relevant link
• It’s also important that they too are linking back to you.
• Have your site listed in as many directory’s as possible.  Yellow Pages would be one example.  There are many directory that are out there for about every business you could image.  Some require a fee, but many are free.  Yahoo Local or Google Local are a must. Take the time to sign up for these and update them regularly.

Blogging is a great way to keep in touch with current and potential customers. You can upload pictures of the “Latest Catch” or the “You’ve got to see this” sunset! Even pictures of the latest ash fallout – just to show everyone that it really isn’t THAT bad – “Come on up and visit us, we’re still here and everything is fine.” Besides seeing picture of what they could be doing or seeing, customers love to read other customers comments about your business. Often times it’s the comment of others that will bring you additional customers. Share those comments in a Customer Testimonial blog entry.

Constantly updating your Web Site will bring more spiders to your Web Site and gain you a higher rate on their Search Engines. You can pay someone to write a “Dynamic Web Site” (about $3,000- $5,000) and/or pay a Web Master up to $1000 a month to continually update your Web Site which brings those Search Engines Spiders to your Web Site OR, you can add a blog to your Web Site and update the blog yourself. With each update, you will bring the Search Engine Spiders to your Web Site looking for the new content that you have entered into your Web Site! Obviously, it’s much cheaper for you to have a Blog attached to your Web Site and update it yourself instead of paying someone to update your site regularly. Make sure you have a Web Master who is up on the latest Search Engine Optimization techniques and who is willing to help you attain inexpensive alternatives to reach as many customers and potential customers as possible.

One last great feature of a Blog is the RSS feed. You can have an RSS feed put on your home page, asking people to sign up to receive your Blog entries and you have an instant mini-newsletter. Each Blog entry will go straight to your customers In Box! It’s a great way to announce Sales, Specials or Upcoming Events. It’s a lot less work than a full Newsletter and it keeps you in the customers In Box and in their mind. The more you are on their mind, when it comes time for that vacation, guess who they will think of first? The one who has been sending all those great pictures and all those inspiring Testimonials, not to mention the Sales or Specials that you are running! It’s a win – win situation!

For more information visit our web site at http://gtlenterprises.com or email dave@gtlenterprises.com

A couple of day ago I decided to google our company name and found a bunch of blog sites that had our blogs attached to their blog site.  So I clicked to them and they where re-posting my blog on theirs without any link-backs.  Come to find they are automated systems that harvest blogs on certain topics and re-post them on their blog site.  Biggest problem is, Google considers this duplicate material and if your site is not the first one crawled by Google, your ranking with Google will be penalized!!

But how to stop it,  The easiest way is to add a plug in to your site that automaticly ads a copyright and link to your site at the bottom of each blog. You can download this plug at http://yoast.com/wordpress/rss-footer/ and install it into your Wordpress plug-in folder.

Or, you can add the code yourself.  Collin LaHay wrote an excellent blog about this and goes into much more detail on how to do it yourself. I would recommend you read his article. http://collinlahay.com/2008/01/11/protect-yourself-from-content-theft/ . He goes into more detail about blog theft.  DON’T LET ANYONE STEAL YOUR BLOG!!!

The basic difference between Google and Yahoo is the algorithms they use.  Yahoo leans on commercial results, Google leans more toward information websites. With that said, how do I get my ranking up on both engines when they use such different techniques.

If you have a business, you submit your site to Yahoo, have your site optimized well by your webmaster, submit to Yahoo Local and fill out your profile completely and you should rank well with Yahoo.  This also depends on your competition.  If your aiming in a small local community  you’ll rank much higher than if your in a large metro area with much competition.

Google on the other hand will look more at the information you provide on your website and if your updating that information regularly.  Simply submitting your site to Google does not mean you will rank high.  Getting involved in social networking helps immensely,  have your webmaster attach a blog to your site. Facebook, Twitter, join Linkedin or write ezines, all of these tools help your business rank better with Google because they look closely at your content when ranking your site.  Have good content that relates to your business and update it frequently.

Even though Google does a much better job with their query’s and alogrithims, I find if your looking for brick an morter kinda place, Yahoo does a better job with better results and fewer false negatives. If your looking for information, Google is King.

So, if you just use Google as a search engine or Yahoo as your only search engine,  you are most likely missing the target.  First determine what your searching for then pick the right search engine for the right job.

Google and other major Web Search Engines are placing higher rankings for those who have new, relative content rather than the old ways of “buying your way to page 1”.  Therefore, by placing a Blog on/in your site (located in your Web Site – not off site with someone else building their Web Site) the Search Engine Spiders will search through your Web Site and rank your new content every time you write something!  This is good.  The more they search your Web Site and find new, relative content, the higher your site will rank on the Search Engines! 
 
Also look over your original Content on your Web Site.  Is it well written, using Key Words relative to your business niche?  If not, re-writing it might be well worth your time.  If you write your own Copy, you will save money.  You can hire a writer to come in and re-write the copy (content) in your Web Site to make it more relevant to your business niche or you can sit down and write it yourself.  Hint: read it out loud or better yet – have someone else read the copy you have written out loud to you.  Usually you can hear mistakes or things that just don’t sound right when read out loud!
Keep in mind, your Web Master will put whatever you want into your Web Site.  While he/she might question you, the final choice of what goes into your Web Site belongs to you, the Web Site Owner.  Most of the time your Web Master will want to help you achieve the highest rankings possible and therefore will advise if they see something that might be better worded a different way, however, if you are not paying for an Editor/Writer, it might get missed. 

Writing Your Own Copy Will Save You Money – as long as it is well written!
The more work you do, the less work your Web Master needs to do and therefore, the lower your Web Designer fees should be.  This is especially true when starting a new Web Site or switching to a new Web Master.
   
Copy work is HUGE!  Supply your Web Master with well written copy for your Web Site.  Tell about your business using key words that are unique to your business niche.  In order to obtain the highest ranking possible, it is important to continue to add relevant copy to your Web Site – which is why we recommend adding a Blog to your site.  It is much more economical for you to add new content to your site weekly (or daily) than it would be to pay a Web Master to continue to add new content into your web weekly/daily!

What will get me higher Web Site Rankings?

• Constantly adding content
• Link backs
• Meta Tags
• Picture Tags
• Social Networking

Over the next few days, we’ll be exploring each of these and finding ways that you can help your Web Site reach higher Web Site Rankings.  There are some things that only your Web Master can do, but there are a lot of ways you can help your Web Site reach Higher Rankings without paying someone else to do it for you.

Times are tight right now and people are going to think twice before they place their hard earned money in your palm.  Make sure your Web Site gives an up to date, accurate description of who you really are.
  
First, you need to figure out who your target audience is.  This starts with your business – are you a service for local people or are you a vacation destination or are you somewhere in-between?  Do you need to reach across town, across the state or across the nation or maybe even reach out to the world?
 
Next, take a look at where you are right now.  How do people find you?  Are you out in the “desert” with hardly any traffic to your site or are you on the “corner of Fifth and Main” with lots of traffic.  “How do I know that?” you ask.  You – as the business owner – should be able to go to your C-Panel and look for yourself.  You can get into your own C-Panel by typing in your “web site.com/cpanel” (the verbiage may vary with different hosting servers – ask your Web Master for your exact url, user name and password for your particular Web Site)
 
Finally, does your corner of the WWW match who you really are?   We walked into a Hat Shop that was painted all red.  When we created the Web Site for that shop it was – you guessed it – all red!  Make sure your Web Site sells the same thing that people see when they see you in real life!  If you include too much Photo Shop, (touch up your pictures too much) people will be disappointed when they see the real life Cabins or Bed & Breakfast.  However, the same is true of not using Photo Shop at all … untouched up photos can make your Web Site look drab.  There’s a good chance that you will lose customers if your Web Site doesn’t have a professional look to it. 
 
If you have any questions while working through these helpful tips, please feel free to email us at Maggie@gtlenterprises.com  We would be happy to help you assess your current Web Site and talk over any changes you might want to make.