August 10,
2005
In This Issue:
1. Link Away!
2. In the News - MSN PPC, SES, Battelle book excerpt
3. More News Headlines
4. This Week's Q&A - SE submission
5. Wrapping It Up
_________________
Link Away!
You know the benefits of inbound links - links
from other sites to yours. They can lead to more
traffic and even higher search engine rankings.
But we're often asked by clients and prospects
about linking to other sites -- is it okay? Should
we do it? The biggest fear is usually something
related to the idea that "we're encouraging
people to leave our site." Say what? Links
aren't the main reason people leave a site; the
main reasons are because a site is poorly designed,
poorly planned, or just isn't what the user was
looking for. Besides, you can't lock people on
your own site and pretend other web sites don't
exist. Users aren't that stupid, and if you think
they are, that may explain why you don't have
the traffic and sales you want from your web site.
Outbound links -- links from your site to other
sites -- should be included on your web site wherever
it's appropriate for your users' experience. There's
no reason to be afraid of linking to other sites,
yet so many business owners are. Why be afraid
of serving your customers' needs? I think it's
terrific when I go into Store A, and when they
don't have what I'm looking for, the associate
tells me I should try Store B. That's great customer
service, and putting helpful links to other sites
is no different.
Plus, outbound links can also help YOU with your
own site's search engine rankings. It's true.
So I say, link away! I'll let Andy Hagans of the
Link Building Blog explain why in this recent
post....
Link Building Blog: Outbound
Linking - Underrated
_________________
In The News
MSN Adding Paid Search Advertising
MSN continues to rely most heavily on Yahoo Search
Marketing to display ads next to its regular SERPs,
but not for too much longer. MSN says they'll
start testing their own paid search advertising
platform in October. It'll be called MSN Keywords,
and just as you do with Google Adwords and Yahoo
Search Marketing, you'll be able to bid to have
your ad show up next to certain keyword searches.
Search Engine Strategies, San Jose
The big, annual Search Engine Strategies conference
is happening this week in San Jose. Various industry
sites and blogs are posting daily recaps of the
expert sessions and panels. Here are a couple
if you want to follow along.
Search
Engine Roundtable
Search
Engine Watch
More from Battelle's Book
John Battelle has posted another excerpt from
his upcoming book, The Search. This one is about
Bill Gross, the man who invented pay-per-click
advertising.
The
Search: Bill Gross
_________________
More News Headlines
Here are a few news headlines worth your time
to read. These are just some of the headlines
we've posted to OWTweb.com in recent days.
Web
sites have sex appeal
August 09, 2005 - TechWeb
Men and women are very different in what catches
their eye on the Internet, which means a website
can appeal to one while unintentionally turning
off the other, a university study showed.
Best
practices for e-mail opt-in?
August 08, 2005 - ClickZ.com
Search
engine penalties at Yahoo & MSN
August 04, 2005 - Search Engine Watch
More headlines: http://www.owtweb.com/news/
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This Week's Q&A
Can I submit specific pages of a site or just
the URL to search engines and directories? Thank
you.
Bruce
Hi Bruce --
Submission to search engines is pretty much a
dead issue these days. They may have a "submit
URL" form, but in reality they all find new
web pages simply by crawling the web. So the best
way to "submit" your site to a search
engine is just to get another web page to link
to it, and wait for the crawler to find that link
to your site. Our article "Getting
Listed in Google" explains this in a
bit more detail.
As for directories, some will allow you to submit
specific sub-pages instead of just your home page.
Whichever directory you're submitting to, just
look for their submission rules or guidelines
and proceed accordingly.
(Have a question? Email questions@owtweb.com)
_________________
Wrapping it Up
Can't believe school is almost here. Hope your
summer is going well and that business is good.
Thanks for reading,
Matt McGee
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