25th November 2007
Have you seen this list of the 100 Oldest Currently Registered Dot-Com Domain Names? It’s a fascinating list of internet history. The first domain on the list is SYMBOLICS.COM and it was registered on March 15, 1985.
There are a couple interesting things to point out here:
- From what I can tell about 80 of the domains are gigantic companies. The likes of Intel, Xerox, Apple and Convergent are all on the list.
- There are no “market-oriented” domains on the list. For instance, you don’t see names like LOAN.COM or PETS.COM. I found that very surprising.
After looking at this list, it seems the corporate behemoths in the US were alerted to register these names by the government before anyone else had ever heard of the internet. Of course, that’s just speculation. Thoughts?
25th November 2007
SEO Feed’s guide to the top 7 videos available covering Web 2.0. After scouring the web for the best videos out there covering Web 2.0 and its impact on consumers and businesses, these are the best of the best.
7) 12 Days Of Web 2.0 Christmas
This is too funny. Thought we should start the series out with a funny video. 12 marketing strategies for Web 2.0 sung by a guy driving a car. I wish it was Christmas time -:)
6) Understanding Web 2.0
This is a good overview of Web 2.0 and what it means to consumers. I don’t know why the music is in the background. I guess the guy doesn’t like hearing himself talk.
5) What is Web 2.0?
I want his office. He’s got the writeboard walls. Too cool. This is a good introduction to all the buzzwords and what they mean.
4) Bill Gates at the World Economic Summit
Bill Gates speaking at the World Economic Summit. He evens admits Google has Microsoft beat in a couple of different categories. Very insightful stuff from the “man” himself.
3) Web 2.0 Summit Opening Session
From the O’reilly conference on Web 2.0. Lots of useful insights about user-generated content and nimble companies.
2) What Do Technology CEO’s Think About Web 2.0?
Thoughts on Web 2.0 from the founders and CEOs of several different Web 2.0 companies. The founders of TechCrunch, Technorati, Rojo and Socializer are all featured.
1) The Evolution Of The Web
This is just a really cool video to sum everything up. Where we’ve been, where we’re going and the power of the internet as it has evolved over time. Kudos to the developer.
25th November 2007
How about a PageRank 6 homepage link for free? The service is called TagACloud and they have a tag cloud of various different fonts and sizes on their PR6 homepage. Acquiring a Level 3 got me an anchor text link for seo on their homepage.
The concept is simple:
- You place the TagACloud code on your page.
- Your visitors click on the TagACloud link.
- After a certain number of hits you move up a level
- With each level comes new benefits.
TagACloud also has a bunch of cool stats to monitor how your campaign with them is going. This service is an easy way to earn a high PageRank anchor text link. Also, you get to put another cool widget in your sidebar. Highly Recommended!
tag clouds, tagacloud, web 2 seo
25th November 2007
If you read the What To Expect From SEO Feed post, then you won't be surprised by this entry. In fact, one of my goals for publishing this blog is to expose these types of services and save unsuspecting webmasters and site owners hundreds of dollars.
I got a solo mailing from SEO News today and I thought I was going to be sick. A slick, full-page color ad promising to "Get Your Site Listed in 48 Hours, Guaranteed!" Immediately, my bulls*&t detector started flashing. It's not that you can't get listed in 48 hours, the question is: how much are they charging and what are they actually doing?
They charge you $99.95 a month to submit your site to the search engines and update your title, description and keyword meta tags. They also provide ranking reports (by request) and a bunch of other great stuff I'm sure.
So, I went through their guarantee and decided that it would be useful to show my readers how everything they claim to do can be done for free or very low-cost. No need to pay $99.95 a month. I've only used a few of the guarantees in this post, please visit their site for the complete list of claims.
Guarantee #1:
In 48 hours or less (many times the same business day!), your site will begin to show up in many of the web's most important search engines and content sites, including Google, Yahoo!, AOL, Ask.com, AltaVista, Excite, InfoSpace, NBCi, CNET and many others. No other service is able to match this claim.
Ok, let's talk about indexing for a minute. All you need is a link from a high PageRank (PR) site to get your site indexed quickly. That's it. High PR sites are crawled multiple times a day and if you find a link from one of them, your site will get indexed in a matter of hours.
If you have a good linking structure on your site, then your whole site will get indexed. By good linking structure, I mean all the pages link to each other and vice versa.
Now, you may be saying, "Where do I get a high PR link instantly?" Easy. CraigsList. Go to CraigsList and post an ad. Try to make it useful. Never abuse a great thing, otherwise it disappears. Include your URL in the ad and you'll be indexed before you know it. Your ad will expire in 7 days, but the ad isn't what you're after, you are just trying to get indexed.
But, CraigsList is so Web 1.0.
Let's try another way. All of the Web 2.0 story submission sites have great PR. It's just a fact of life. Now, if you submit a story to Digg, Reddit or Netscape you may not be on the front page long enough for the search engines (namely Google) to notice.
So, search out the smaller sites where the submissions are less frequent. There are hundreds of these sites, but my favorites are ContentPop, HypeDiss and BlogMemes. Submit a story there and participate in the community; you'll be amazed at the results you get.
Oh, and a quick note on all the search engines they mention. Who cares? Google got 63% of the search market share in February 2007. Why would you even worry about the other engines?
Guarantee #2:
That's only the beginning! We then submit your site, using our superior proprietary submission software, to every other search engine on the planet that matters, and re-submit every 30 days thereafter (click here to see the complete list). We submit to Google, Yahoo!, AOL, Ask.com, and all applicable international versions of these engines. Your site will be submitted by hand using our superior proprietary software, and we review all submissions for accuracy, efficiency and completeness.
Ok, the phrase I want to focus on here is, "superior proprietary software." Could that proprietary software be Internet Business Promoter? This software will do everything they are claiming and then some. Once again, I'm just speculating. I don't know what they use for tracking and submission.
Another interesting thing to note is that there is absolutely NO reason to submit your site to search engines. Never, no matter what! The last time that was effective I was still in high-school.
Guarantee #3:
You may update your site name, description, keywords or any other information, with absolutely no cost or headache, an unlimited number of times (existing customers click here for Client Tools).
This is a good little feature to have for customers. I'm sure you enter your FTP information and then you can make updates to your meta tags. But, is that worth $99.95 a month. Microsoft Notepad and a free FTP program will accomplish just the same.
Guarantee #4:
At your request, we will provide you with a free report of where your site places in a select group of the top search engines and directories.
Now, we are talking about ranking reports. Internet Business Promoter will do this also, but say you don't want to spend the money and buy it. As always, free solutions exist. Digital Point has a very capable and useful ranking checker that costs you absolutely nothing.
After dissecting this company and what they do, I want to make a few things clear.
Do you feel a disclaimer coming?
This post in no way reflects the owners of the company or the service they provide. In other words, I'm not trying to get sued for slander. Everything here is just my opinion. That's it. Their site has dozens of testimonials from happy customers and I am inclined to believe they are real.
I'm sure they provide the exact service they claim to provide and I have no reason to believe they are shady. Most importantly, I have never used them personally.
What do you think?
search engine submission, website indexing
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21st November 2007
Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of improving the volume and quality of traffic to a web site from search engines via “natural” (”organic” or “algorithmic”) search results. Usually, the earlier a site is presented in the search results, or the higher it “ranks”, the more searchers will visit that site. SEO can also target different kinds of search, including image search, local search, and industry-specific vertical search engines.
As a marketing strategy for increasing a site’s relevance, SEO considers how search algorithms work and what people search for. SEO efforts may involve a site’s coding, presentation, and structure, as well as fixing problems that could prevent search engine indexing programs from fully spidering a site. Other, more noticeable efforts may include adding unique content to a site, ensuring that content is easily indexed by search engine robots, and making the site more appealing to users. Another class of techniques, known as black hat SEO or spamdexing, use methods such as link farms and keyword stuffing that tend to harm search engine user experience. Search engines look for sites that employ these techniques and may remove their listings.
