the do it yourself webmasters seo guide

7/30/2019 The Do It Yourself Webmasters SEO Guide

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The Do It Yourself Webmasters SEO Guide(A Collection of SEO Strategy Articles)

A Practical Guide to SEO, Faster Indexing, Marketing Insights, and ProvenStrategies That Save Time and Money.

Dexter NelsonTechDex / Live Minder

http://www.techdex.nethttp://www.mindyourowndata.com

(919) 576-9255


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The Do It Yourself Webmasters SEO Guide

2011 Live Minder www.mindyourowndata.com 1

Table of Contents:

1. How to Do Keyword Research the Right Way.a. Two strategies for converting your content into products.

b. The Google Keyword Tool.c. Google Insights for Search.d. Problem-based Thinking (Thinking like a customer).

2. Optimizing Your Website (Alexa and Data Reporting).a. Google vs. Facebook. Whos #1?b. How to Increase your Alexa Rank.c. A Step by Step Guide to Reporting Data.d. One Important Tip for Higher Ranking.e. How to Get Indexed In Google.

3. How to Get Indexed In Bing.a. A faster way to get indexed.

4. How to Get Indexed In Yahoo.5. W3C Compliance and SEO.6. DMOZ Search Engine and Free Search Engine Submissions.

a. Free search engine submission sitesb. What about backlinks?

7. In Closing Considerations.


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How to Do Keyword Research the Right Way

All effective marketing efforts begin with research, especially when it comes tosearch engine optimization (SEO). In a world of search, it identifies the quality

that people are looking for, and filters out the ineffective and hype-driven contentthat sound good, but really dont bring about many results, if any.

What is keyword research?

In layman's terms, it's trying to find out what terms people enter in searchengines when they are looking for something, then applying the relevantinformation to your business.

How you do that varies with your business, and the ways of doing keywordresearch vary from person to person. Some are ok, and others are as crazy as

some of the misconceptions and advice out there, which is, in part, is why Imwriting this.

Here is a stern warning

There are a lot of wannabe Internet Marketers out there, and they will lead youdown the road of disaster very quickly. I'm sure we're all aware of the phrase, "Ifyou can't dazzle them with brilliance, baffle them with bulls..." well, you get theidea.

Just because you look good, you have a nice video, rehash someone else's hard

work, and use high tech lingo doesn't mean you're an Internet Marketer. There isno cookie-cutter one size fits all solution for business.

There are, however, systems and methods that you can use to increase yourbusiness and your success. All good business starts with research.

You need it in planning your business; planning your product BEFORE youcreate them; planning your marketing; planning your next sales event...

THE RIGHT WAY TO DO KEYWORD RESEARCH

How do you decide what to target? How do you decide what keywords tochoose? How do you know youre targeting the right market? Obviously, the firstthing you need is a basis to make decisions on.

If you have your own website, (or content you can convert to web-based contentlike word docs, PDF's, etc.), you can start right away. If you don't have a websiteyet, then the best place to start is by looking at your competition.


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Note: This guide is making the assumption that you already have at least somecontent that you are trying to promote. If you dont, then we will talk about contentcreation in detail soon.

CONVERTING CONTENT INTO A PRODUCT

Before we continue, let me show you two very useful strategies for convertingyour content into a product. I use these two strategies myself and I can tell youfirst hand that it is the quickest way to create a product if you arent tech savvy.

The Web FormatFor those that don't have a website, but have content, convert it to web format. Itdoesn't take a lot and you don't need to spend a lot of money. Here is a quickand dirty method to convert your content to a web page.

If you have Microsoft Office, create a new word document then copy and paste

your content to it. Make sure it is well organized and readable and save yourdocument, (youll need this later).

After its saved, were going to convert it to a web page. Still with your documentopen, click "File," select "Save As" and in the "Save as type:" drop down menu,select Web Page and save it has an .htm or .html file.

Select your desktop as your destination, and then type a name that does notinclude spaces or special characters.

TIP: I always name my documents by the subject of the content. Forexample, since Im writing a webmasters SEO guide, I named my web pagewebmaster_seo_guide.html.

There are a couple reasons for this. First, when you post a link to a webpage, there arent any spaces or special characters and shouldnt be. Aspace or a special character can cause 404 Page Not Found errors and afew other undesirable effects.

Secondly, by naming your pages based on your content, you will increasethe relevancy of whatever you do. People will know what its about just bylooking at it, and search engines generally give higher ranking to relevantcontent.

ONE MORE TIP ON RELEVANCY:When you are considering your file structure for your website, just as you wouldname your pages and documents with the keywords you target, you should alsouse keywords for everything else.


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For example, instead of putting all of your images in a folder called images, placethem in a directory named after the keyword. So if you were targeting widgets,name your directory widgets-images, and all of the images would be namedappropriately.

Again, instead of naming your images header, or footer, or navigation and so on,name them widgets-header, widgets-footer, or widgets-navigation. You can useunderscores as well.

Do this for everything including documents, style sheets, audio and video,javascript files and all externally linked content.

Most engines do not use the META tags as a factor for ranking; however they doreflect what users see in the search results. Make sure that they are keyword richand descriptive.

And one more thing every image should use an ALT tag. This provides a textdescription of what the image is in the event the image cant be displayed.Google especially will use these tags, and your images will most likely appear intheir image search, linking back to your site.

An SEO smart structure will usually have more files, however because of thedense relevancy you are far more likely to rank well in most search engines,including both Google and Bing at the same time, even with their currentlove/hate relationship.

Continuing on

Now that you have a decent, web-friendly and relevant name, click Save, thenclose your document.

On your desktop you will see the freshly saved file as a web page, (it usuallylooks like an internet shortcut). If you used images in your document, you willalso see a folder that is associated with the created web page.

DO NOT RENAME THEM or you will mess up how it looks. All thats left for youto do now is upload them to your server, and send the link to it.

Now that you know how to create a web page, lets talk about creating .PDF filesthat you can use for e-books and offering downloads.

The PDF FormatIf youre interest is in creating an e-book or a free report like this one, in whichyou can download, here is the strategy I use. Point your browser tohttp://www.primopdf.com. It is a free application that converts your worddocuments into a PDF file.


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It installs as a printer, and you can print to Primo PDF and the result is a PDF file.After you have download and installed it, re-open your word document, (thedocument and not the web page).

Once its open, click on File, then click Print. Choose Primo PDF as yourprinter then click Print.

The Primo PDF application will run and you will be presented with a few choices.They are screen, e-book, print, prepress and custom. Select e-book and click thesave button. You will be prompted for a destination. Select your desktop onceagain and continue.

On your desktop, you will see a new PDF version of your document that you canupload to your server for others to download, or you can even sell using PayPal.

Now, back to keyword research

KEYWORD RESEARCH IN A NUTSHELL

First, let's talk about what NOT to do. A lot of people make the same mistake.They will do a search and search for what they think their product is about orwhat they want their product to be about, then trying to target those keywords.This is DEAD WRONG!

There is a useful purpose for doing searches, but only as indicators of whats agood market to go into or consider IF YOU KNOW WHAT TO LOOK FOR,(more on that later).

There are two types of keyword analyses.1. You have direct analysis where you analyze your content.2. Then you have competitor-based analysis where you research a

competitor and the keywords they use.

You need to understand that no two businesses are exactly alike. Even if you areclose competitors, your businesses from A to Z will be different. You can't learneverything you need to know just by examining your competitors.

We will be covering direct analysis, because it's the best way to know whatpeople are searching for in your market, based on your own content.

Again, assuming you have content you can analyze, just upload the files to theweb. If you don't have a host I wouldn't recommend any free ones because theyall tend to add their own advertising to your page and it can throw off the results.


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Note: If you need cheap hosting, one of the things I do is offer web space andtemp hosting. Simply contact me using the information on the cover or the end ofthis e-book and ask.

To analyze your content, (such as the web page you created and uploaded to

your server), let's look to the Googleplex in Mountain View, California, andthe Google Keyword Tool,(https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal).

If you have a Google account, go ahead and sign in, then create your Adwordsaccount. If you dont then the external keyword tool will work all the same,however, with a CAPTCHA.

When you go to the site you can find keywords based on a word or phrase, awebsite, or both. I leave all settings as default when I do my search. Mine isdefaulted to Location: United States and Languages: English. Feel free to add

and change settings.

Enter the URL of your web content and click search. The keyword tool will scanthat page and bring up a list of keywords and phrases. The two columns that youwant to pay attention to are Global Monthly Searches and Local MonthlySearches.

Global Monthly Searches is the approximate 12-month average of user queriesfor the keyword on Google search. This data is specific to your Keyword MatchType selection.

Local Monthly Searches, (if you specified a country or language for yoursearch), the approximate 12-month average number of user queries for thekeyword for those countries and languages and it's specific to your KeywordMatch Type selection, meaning this changes depending on what your optionswere.

Both columns vary, however if you are trying to target local markets, you shoulduse the local monthly searches, as it returns results specific to your area,otherwise sort by global monthly searches. You do this by clicking on the name.

Some people say that you should show 100 results, (by selecting the Showrows: option at the bottom of the page), but Google will show the highestnumbers regardless.

In that list, just because there are a lot of results, doesn't mean that you shouldstart targeting every one.


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We need to make sure that the keywords you choose are valid choices. You dothis by comparing the keywords that are relevant to your site against searchvolume patterns across specific regions, categories, time frames and properties.

In layman's terms, you want to make sure that the keywords you use are relevant

to your site are actually being searched for.

For that we need another Google tool called Insights for Search,(http://www.google.com/insights/search/), which does exactly that.

This is what you do.

On the page with the Keyword Tool results, write down ten keywords that aremost relevant to your site, product, or service. If you don't have ten results,(which isn't uncommon), you need to do a little bit of work.

Problem-based Thinking

Nobody who ever bought a drill wanted to buy a drill they wanted to make ahole.

There is an explicit distinction between the keywords you would choose, and thekeywords that people search for.

As a product creator, your focus is on the product and the benefits, butconsumers dont care about the bells and whistles if it doesnt relate to how itsolves their problems.

Ask yourself why someone would buy your product or use your service. Putyourself in the shoes of a customer and figure out what they want. What do theywant to accomplish? What problems do they have?

By figuring out the end result, or by relieving some problem, you can better targetwhat people are looking for; and most often, the problems you solve will be thekeywords that are searched for and it's a great place to start.

This plays directly into your marketing and understanding that is a HUGE steptowards seeing results. I often turn problems right back into my marketing andtarget the problems that my market has.

If Im selling a drill and I know my customers want to make a hole, I wouldnt talkabout the RPM and the technology use to create the drill. I would talk about howmy drill makes more precise, faster, etc. holes, and then elaborate the features inrelation to making holes.

But before we continue on that tangent, lets continue


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Insights for Search only allows you to search five keywords at a time, so start byentering the first five of them, but before you click Search, make sure that youselect the country you want to target from the filter on the right.

I like to make sure that both the keyword tool and insights have the samecountry. Leave everything else the same.

After you click search, you will notice that the results gives you very useful dataabout usage, including interest over time, regional interest, search terms, andrising searches.

Rising searches are searches that have experienced significant growth in agiven time period, with respect to the preceding time period. In it you will find"Breakout" searches as well, or searches that are now starting to rise.

Search Terms are related to the filter that you selected, (time, location, etc).

What you want to pay attention to is the regional interest, which shows a searchterm's popularity.

The graph and bars next to the regions show the Search volume index. In short,the more popular a search term is, the higher the index, and it shows inpercentages from 0 to 100. The keywords you choose should have the highestindexes.

You should play around with these two tools, testing different demographics andlooking at the different results. You can break down the information as detailedas by city or make it as broad as world wide.

Also, don't be afraid to try variances in the keywords. A little change can reap ahigh index reward.

For example market analysis and marketing analysis have completely differentscores. One has an index of 48 and the other has an index of 17. Often times,

just by tweaking a word here or there will give you extremely different results.


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Optimizing Your Website (Alexa and Data Reporting)

This is one of those topics that I get several questions about, and to be honest,when it comes to Alexa, there is a lot of misinformation out there, and I will do my

best to stay within the context of what Alexa has published.

But even more than that, there are several things to learn and to take intoconsideration.

OPTIMIZATION AND ALEXA RANKING

Most people, when they create their website first buy their domain name, thenthey pick a design, then add content, then make a few posts, join groups and soon, then they try to do SEO and Optimization and worry about ranking as an afterthought.

This is where they get into trouble, and this is where it's easy to be takenadvantage of by those who over-charge for work you can do yourself, given thetime and care.

As part of my business and my history in the IT field, I have always been able toget websites with low ranks and even no rank, to be ranked on Alexa and haveimproved ranking for many of my customers.

So what's the big deal anyway? Why is Alexa so important?

Well? For starters they calculate the top sites on the Internet and it's used byseveral people. Ranks are, in part, affected by their community of users - that'speople like you and me who help them collect data.

So whenever you hear someone talk about the top sites on the Internet, chancesare it was reported by Alexa.com. I would even venture to say that they are"THE" authority on things like Internet trends, because of their large userparticipation.

For this reason, their demographics, statistics, relevant links and more, are avery important piece of marketing, because they report very accurate trending

data.

And just for fun, let me settle this debate. All of that marketing hype about theGoogle slap and how Facebook is this, that, and the other is nothing more thanmarketing hype.

When you put the numbers to the grind, according to the users andAlexa, Google is still #1 and Facebook is still #2.


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With that said...

How do you increase your Alexa rank?

It is after all a decent indicator that your site is growing and the reputation frombeing one of the top million sites on the globe, and being in the top 100 thousandsites in your respective country is something to be proud of.

So how do you do it?

There really is only ONE answer to that - get more traffic! That's it. Forget all ofthe "guru" talk and the hype - ignore the endless blog posts that promise a higherranking in "10 easy steps" - when you get down to it, there is only one factor thataffects your Alexa rank - traffic.

But what if you get a lot of traffic and you don't have an Alexa rank at all?

THIS I have seen happen, and it's one of the most common questions I get, solet's address that right now.

The answer is to quantify your site and report data. No question about it, youhave to let the big players know you exist or you don't show up on the radar. Youcan wait for their crawlers and users to find your site on their own, or you cantake an active role and make let them know you are there.

MY STEP BY STEP OPTIMIZATION GUIDE FOR REPORTING DATA

What follows is a step by step guide to quantifying your site so that you can startreporting data to increase your rank, (and don't be surprised if you go from norank to having a rank in one day). And for this guide, there are four sites that Ibelieve are very important.

1. First, go to http://www.quantcast.com and register for a free account thenlog in. There is a lot you can do with Quantcast.com, however in thiscoaching session we're only going to do one thing with it.

o On the right side of the page there is a box that says "Quantify asite." Click on the Generate Tag button.

o A small window will open with a code snippet. Copy it to notepad oryour favorite text editor, then open a new window or tab, but don'tclose the quantcast.com page! (You're going to need this page in aminute.

2. Next, you're going to use Google's webmaster tools, so goto http://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/.

o If you have a Google Account, go ahead and log in. If you don't,create an account, (it's also free).


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o Once youre logged in and looking at the Dashboard, click on theAdd a Site option and enter your site's URL.

o You will have to verify ownership. I would suggest using the ad aMETA tag to the home page.

o Again, copy your text editor below the Quantcast code and open a

new browser tab, (don't close this one either).3. Google has a second tool that you need to set up.o At the top of the webmaster tools page, click on the "Analytics" link.o Log in to Google Analytics, then, on the right had corner where it

says "My Analytics Accounts" select the "Create New Account"from the list.

o At the bottom of the next page, click on "Sign Up" in the Sign up forGoogle Analytics box.

o Fill in your websites URL, Account Name (this can be anything youwant so make it easy to remember), your country or territory, andyour time zone, then click "Continue."

o

You will then be asked to fill in your contact information. Do so andclick "Continue."o Check "Yes" to their agreement if you agree with their terms, and

click "Create New Account."o You will be given a tracking code to copy to your website. Copy this

and paste it to your text editor, and open a new tab again.o Click Save and Finish! It is easy to miss this step because it is at

the bottom of the screen.4. Go to Alexa.com, and on your home page, do a search for your domain

name.o On the results page, scroll all the way down to the bottom.o What you're looking for is the "Is this your website?" section.o Select the "Update your Listing" section and then proceed to "Claim

your Site".o You will be prompted to create a new account. If you already have

an account just log in. You can also select the "Sign in withFacebook" option to log in or register.

o Repeat the process just as you did with the others, and once youare done, you will again be given a META tag to add to your site'shome page.

o Copy and past that too to your editor.

You should now have a few code samples. This is what you do with them.1. The two verification codes go before the tag ON YOUR HOMEPAGE

ONLY.2. The Google Analytics and Quantcast snippets, even though they tell you

should go before the tag, place at the bottom of the page before the tagON EVERY PAGE YOU WISH TO REPORT DATA FROM.

I do this so that traffic isn't counted until after the page is fully loaded.


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There is a lot of debate about where to put it, however I have noticed thatplacing it at the bottom gives me less traffic results, but slightly higheraccuracy. Test it for yourselves and be the judge.

Here is where the magic happens...

Once they are all in place, go back to the tabs you left open, starting withQuantcast. Click on the Scan your site option for quantcast.com, and then repeatthe process for all of the others until they are all verified.

If you've completed the steps and get success messages for all of them, all ofthese sites will begin monitoring the data your site is reporting.

Now that the big boys know that you're there and reporting, don't be surprised tosee a rapid change in you global ranking.

JUST ONE MORE TIP

Have your friends, co-workers, partners and associates leave their positivecomments and ratings on Alexa!

There is no better way to increase your rank than to gather positive feedback andhave people report it. Here is what I do.

When I have a satisfied customer or someone I help, I ask for their email andsend them this link, thanking them for working with me and I ask them to leave apositive review.

In that email, I include this link, (replace the techdex.net with your own ofcourse). http://www.alexa.com/write/review/techdex.net

When they click on it, they will be taken to a log in page, similar to the one whereyou can connect with Facebook. After they do, they can leave a comment andreview or testimonial, and then click Submit.

Alexa reviews comments, but if it is approved, it will show up and in myexperience, I've seen improvements in rank when I receive positive feedback.

GETTING INDEXED IN GOOGLE

After adding a site in the Google Webmaster Tools, you can have Google crawlyour website so get faster indexing. Heres how you do it.

Go back to the dashboard and click on the domain name you just added. You willbe taken to the dashboard for that domain name.


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In the left column there is a menu of options. Click on the Diagnostics link. It willexpand and you will see more options. They are malware, crawl errors, crawlstats, fetch as Googlebot, and HTML suggestions.

Click on the Fetch as Googlebot link. You will see your domain name with an

input text field. That text field is for directories and specific pages on your site.Leave web as the default option and click the Fetch button. Googlebot willthen go out and fetch that page. If its done successfully it will appear in the listbelow.

Submitting your site to the Google Index is the next step. Many people believethat once Googlebot has fetched a page, that it will be automatically indexed. Atsome point it may have been true, however Google instructs that after a page isfetched, then you can submit it to the Google index.

In order to do that, point your browser to this URL.

http://www.google.com/addurl/?continue=/addurl

You will see a form on that page. Enter the URL and Comments, solve theCAPTCHA, and then click the Add URL button.

Google values relevancy above all else. Their business is giving people the mostrelevant information, so it helps if the page you submit is relevant. For commentsI always enter a brief description about what the page is about.

I would advise against leaving it blank.


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How to Get Indexed In Bing

For a very long time now, there has been a debate in SEO about which is better,Google or Bing?

While I may not have a definite answer to that, what I do know is that BOTH areimportant to SEO and when it comes to online marketing and getting exposure -you want to be listed in both.

A lot of people will charge you to get your site indexed on Bing; however that issomething you can do on your own if you're willing to use a little bit of elbowgrease.

Just as Google has it's webmaster's tools, Bing has its own toolbox andwebmaster tools, it is just as easy to use.

INTRODUCING THE BING WEBMASTER TOOLS

First, point your browser to this URL: http://www.bing.com/toolbox/webmaster/You will need a Windows LiveID to sign in, so if you have a Windows Live servicelike MSN Messenger for example, use that. If not, go ahead and create one, thensign in.

Once you're signed in to the Webmaster Center, you will see two sections. At thetop you will see Message, (similar to Google's notifications), and below it you willsee Sites. Let's go ahead and add your website.

Click on Add Site.


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A small pop up box will appear. Enter your URL, (examplehttp://www.howtoreadandwritemusic.com), the click Submit.

After clicking Submit you will be taken to a new page that asks you to verifyownership. You have the option to upload an XML file on your server, or copyand paste a tag to your default web page.

I personally choose to upload a file to my server, but if you don't have a filemanager or FTP access, you will want to choose to copy the tag. DO NOTCLICK VERIFY YET!

I've run into a bug where if your site fails verification, I couldn't get back to thisscreen unless I deleted the site, then started over! So make sure you have eitherupload the file to your website's default directory, or copied and pasted the METAtag before the closing tag on your default or index website page.

Once you've done that, click the Verify link, and Bing will verify your site

ownership. Once it's done, you will be taken to the Dashboard for that site.


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Here you will be able to monitor all of the information about your site includingthe Traffic Summary and Index Summary.

I would suggest you spend some time exploring the Bing Webmaster area. Thereare some very cool tools to become familiar with. For example Submit URL's isone that I use often for making sure that my client's pages are indexed.

NOTE: Bing automatically indexes sites that are W3C Compliant, but there isfaster way to getting your site crawled by Bing.

If you're looking at the dashboard for your site, you will notice that there are fournew tabs at the top, Dashboard, Crawl, Index and Traffic.

Click on the Index tab link.

There will be a menu just below it. Index Summary, Index Explorer, SubmitURLs, Block URLs, Inbound Links, Deep Links, and URL Normalization.

Clicking on Submit URLs allows you to submit individual pages for Bing to crawl.Simple enter one URL per line and click continue.

This is a VERY useful tool.


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How to Get Indexed In Yahoo

Im sure by now much of the information has been pretty overwhelming,especially if you arent a tech savvy person. There is a lot that goes into SEO and

a lot to consider when planning your marketing.

This part isnt very long, but it is very important, and not many people know howto do this, and in fact, many people focus strictly on Google.

Just as Google and Bing have webmaster tools, Yahoo has their own similar toolcalled Site Explorer. I won't go into all of the features but there are two importantthings that you do need to know.

Introducing Yahoo Site Explorer

First, here is the website. http://siteexplorer.search.yahoo.com.

Any action will require you to sign or create an account, so if you have a yahooaccount go ahead and click on My Sites on the left hand menu and do so.

Once you are logged in, you will be looking at your dashboard.

The first step is to add your site to My Sites so you can manage them. So here ismy simple guide...

1. Enter your sites URL into box at the top and click Add My Site.

2. You will be taken to a verification screen, (Authentication), where youhave the option to verify by META tag or by uploading a file to the rootdirectory of your website.


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3. I prefer to upload a file as my authentication method, (no messing with

code), however not everyone has a host that will give ftp access to uploadfiles.

If you choose the uploading method, you will be given the option todownload an html file that you would need to upload to your server.Likewise, if you select the META tag option, you will be given a piece ofcode to paste to between the and tags of your homepage.

3. After you have uploaded the file, or copied and saved the META tag toyour home page, click the Ready to Authenticate button.

The page will go back to the upload/meta option page, but wait anddon't do anything! It takes about 20 seconds to verify, and after itdoes, it will go back to the dashboard.

4. Once Authentication is complete, you will see your domain name in thelist, and next to it, there is the Explore button. Click it.

Yahoo will then fetch your site for pages and links, and it will show up in a listwhere you can get more details and remove URL's from being indexed.


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CRAWLING WITH YAHOO

You have just one more step to follow. That is to manually send Yahoo to crawlyour site. In the left column menu, underMy Sites click on Submit Your Site.

If the site is already in the list, then it will go fetch your site and extract pages and

links that they missed when adding your site.

You have two options. The first is to submit a website or web page, and if you runa blog, you can submit your site feed.

Select one, (or both), enter your URL, then click the submit button. After, you willbe taken to a thank you page.

NEWS: There is magic happening in the world of Yahoo. According to their blog,Yahoo Site Explorer now works with Bing Webmaster Toolkit, and if you arealready using Site Explorer, you may see the words "submitted to Microsoft"

when you look at your blog feed details.

http://www.ysearchblog.com/category/site-explorer/


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W3C Compliance, SEO, Internet Marketing and the AdvancingInternet

As a developer for almost eleven years now, W3C Compliance has been

something of a developer's niche and a big advantage to people who have madesearch engine optimization their business.

History: So what is W3C Optimization?

In 1994 Sir Timothy Berners-Lee, (the inventor of the Internet), headed the WorldWide Web Consortium, whose makeup now includes more than 400 membersincluding all of the major search engine and global corporations from Toshiba,HP and several others.

The Consortium determined to create a set of standards for the Internet. What

they did was develop, and continue to advance the technical specifications andguidelines related to content, to ensure the quality of information on the web.

This began with coding specifications and now includes standards for thefollowing, and we can expect to see that list grow as technology advances.

1. Web Design and Applications (CSS, SVG, AJAX, etc)2. Web Architecture (including URIs and HTTP)3. Semantic Web (Web Data - more on that later)4. XML Technology like XML, XQuery, XML Schema, XSLT, XSL-FO,

Efficient XML Interchange (EXI), and other related standards

5. Web of Services (SOAP, WSDL, etc)6. Web of Devices7. Browsers and Authoring Tools

How Does This Affect SEO?

First, it's important to understand that not being W3C Compliant affects a lotmore than the search engines, but to get back to the question...

I recently began optimization for a few clients' websites and to my horror they allfailed W3C Compliance, meaning that they didn't meet the requirements set by

the World Wide Web Consortium as being quality websites.

I spent several days going over the code, page by page and showing my clientsthe possible impact non-compliance could have.

All of the major search engines are part of the Consortium, and with that in mind,quality is a factor in how search engines index and rank your sites. While someengines weight compliance more heavily than others, engines will most likely


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give you a lower ranking or even not index your site at all.

But as I mentioned, it's much more than just indexing.

Readability is one of those factors that come along with quality and many

browsers including Mozilla, Firefox, Opera, and Lynx, and as I found out recently,Google Chrome will not display your pages properly.

Many contend that W3C Compliance is a long term effort and more study isneeded, however we have already begun to see the effects of non-compliance.In fact many of the SEO tools now factor in compliance as a required element toranking.

Which, if you are a blogger should bring up an interesting dilemma; is your blogplatform W3C Compliant? If not, it's definitely something to inquire about. Theremay be a reason why your blogs aren't ranking highly, or even showing up in the

search engines.

So whats all the concern now about compliance?

Quite frankly, it's the direction the web is going. As a career engineer andprogrammer and Internet Marketer I have a unique perspective and I've noticedthat there seems to be this emerging battle between marketing and the path theInternet is going.

On one hand you have marketers still trying to capitalize on existing technology,and on the other you have technology itself saying, "Keep up. I'm going this way."

There's already a big play towards the term Web 3.0 and in this author' opinionit's just another marketing play for the next big buzz term, however there is sometruth behind the advancing web.

Many believe that we've barely scratched the surface of the potential to theInternet, (myself included), but Internet Marketers seem to lag behind technology.

For me, it's always a race to keep up with both, but it's given me a rather keenedge and what's turning out to be a big advantage in both development ofsoftware and Internet Marketing.

February of last year Tim Berners-Lee participated in TED Talks with adiscussion on the next web. Here in his words is the next emergence on the web.Keep in mind that I just listed the Semantic Web (linked data) as part of the W3CStandards governed by the Consortium.

Take the time to watch it. It's not very long, but very insightful.


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Tim Berners Lee on the next webhttp://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/tim_berners_lee_on_the_next_web.html

Just a few months later we saw a remarkable change

Tim Berners Lee - The year open data went worldwidehttp://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/tim_berners_lee_the_year_open_data_went_worldwide.html

In such a short time, you can already see the huge difference in where marketingis and the direction the Internet is going.

Already there are applications that use Linked Data like dbpedia and statisticsused by Hans Rosling in his TED Talks - the best stats you've ever seen, (avideo worth watching).

So the question is

Is W3C Compliance important enough to pay attention to, and put out effort on?In my sincerest opinion, yes it is, and it will become even more important in thevery near future.

As I said, having professional experience in both development and marketing, if Ihad to give advice and not just make people aware of what is going on behindthe scenes it would be this.

The World Wide Web Consortium is defining the Internet including data andapplications as to what is quality, (a growing factor in the major search engines).The major search engines are part of the Consortium and as a result, striving forcompliance can only benefit you and your audience and give you an advantageas technology advances.

Will the gap between Internet Marketing and Internet Technology ever sync up? Ipersonally thing it will be hit and miss for the next several years. Lined Dataapplications are a whole new emergence of the Internet and I'd bet we haven'teven begun to see the new Internet's potential.

Resources and Links

1. World Wide Web Consortium - http://www.w3.org/ 2. Markup Validation Service - http://validator.w3.org/ 3. TED Ideas Worth Spreading - http://www.ted.com/


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DMOZ Search Engine and Free Search Engine Submissions

You cant talk about SEO without talking about submissions, and youre probablywondering why I didnt mention AOL search, right? The answer is quite simple.They are in partnership with another engine that you should consider being a

major player.

That is DMOZ, the open directory project, (http://dmoz.org). It, like Alexa is ahuman powered search engine, meaning that every site listing, (almost fivemillion to date), is approved and edited by an editor, and not a robot.

Needless to say, being listed in DMOZ is a very big boost to your onlinepresence and increases your web rank.

Submitting to DMOZ is pretty straightforward.

Simply go to their website and browse to the category in which you would like tobe listed. At the top of that page, click on the suggest URL link. If you click onthat link, you without first browsing to the directory, you will be taken to a pagethat tells you to browse to a directory then click the link again.

A good strategy I suggest is doing a search for the keywords that youresearched, and then submitting your site in the most relevant directory for yourcontent.

Your submission will be reviewed by an editor and then listed if approved.Unfortunately there is no guarantee of being listed in DMOZ because, even

though they are supposed to be neutral, I have run into editors that were biasedin one way or another.

A FREE PLACE TO SUBMIT YOUR URL

There is no explaining to be done here. This link allows you to submit yourwebsite for free to 50 search engines and directories for free.http://freewebsubmission.com/

What about backlinks?

Backlinks are definitely a hot topic because of the value that is placed on them bysearch engines. Im not going to give you a tutorial on backlinks here. Instead Iam going to give you a link to a free tool that will let start building backlinks.Youwill get email confirmations that require your confirmation!

Its from Reilly Labs and it is a very good tool called Website Indexer.http://reillylabs.com/website-indexer-tool/


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In Closing Considerations

The world of SEO and marketing is constantly evolving and as I continue toadapt with it and learn new things, I will gladly share what I am learning. And of

course, if you have any comments or questions, please feel free to contact methrough my website or calling and leaving a message.

Facebook:http://www.facebook.com/dexter.nelsonTwitter: http://twitter.com/#!/dexterwebnLinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/dexterwebn

The Live Minder Traffic Pack

At this time I would like for you to consider a solution I have created that, in myopinion is one of the most complete and affordable solutions.

It is the ONLY service that combines strategies from several online marketingresources, includinglocal marketing, social media, search engineoptimization, CPA networks, Pay per click,article & blog marketing,web 2.0,andmuch more into ONE SERVICE.

I do the research and analysis, make sure your website is optimized, reportingdata and is W3C compliant, and then I use all of the above strategies to buildbacklinks, grow your rank and drive traffic, all for less than $200.

For more information, please contact me or visit

http://www.mindyourowndata.com/trafficpack/.

Thank you for your interest and taking the time to read.

Warmest Regards,

Dexter NelsonTechDex / Live Minderhttp://www.techdex.nethttp://www.mindyourowndata.com(919) 576-9255


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The Do It Yourself Webmasters SEO Guide(A Collection of SEO Strategy Articles)

A Practical Guide to SEO, Faster Indexing, Marketing Insights, and ProvenStrategies That Save Time and Money.

Dexter NelsonTechDex / Live Minder

http://www.techdex.nethttp://www.mindyourowndata.com(919) 576-9255

the do it yourself webmasters seo guide

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