According the National Association of Realtors(R) ("NAR") surveys completed between 1999 and 2003, 66 percent of all home buyers stick with the first real estate agent they contact.  The number one reason stated was that buyers perceive all real estate agents to be the same.  This means that two out of every three contacts that you receive when you are the first contact, you are most likely to get the business.

There are two major items that get in the way of this not happening.  First, if you don’t show them how you are different from the other realtors and if you don’t have a formalized conversion system.

The NAR news is good news if you are the first contact.  But what do you do if you aren’t?  What can you do is a more accurately way of asking? Agents know there is a wide difference between experience and competence.  This doesn’t really matter though, agents main target isn’t selling to other agents.

The key is to create a marketing process that pushes you in front of the line of other realtors.

The 2003 NAR report stated that 71 percent of buyers use the Internet to gather information on buying a home yet only 6 percent use the Internet to find an agent.  This means that 65 percent of the people visiting realty-type web sites and just there for information.  The 2003 numbers are an increase from 41 percent and 3 percent in 2002.  Keeping at this same growth rate, the 2004 prediction would be 91 percent and 9 percent.

The Internet is the fifth method to find agents.  The first four are:  referrals, repeat business, met agent at open house or office walk-in.  The fifth with  the Internet were yard signs.  The least effective at 1% were advertising trinkets and direct mail.

What type of Internet presence do you need in order to be first contact — or part of the nine percent in 2004?  With the Internet ever evolving trying to keep up creates a throw-up-the-arms frustration at times if you’re not techie savvy or paying for someone else handing the site.

There are four major keys for staying present and being in the this nine percent:

1.  Automatic database system
2.  An informative, interacting, and evolving web site
3.  Technology support for leveraging time
4.  Newsletters, printed or e-delivered.

I don’t need to remind you that buyers are getting savvier every year with the Internet and with home buying.  And due to this they will test your knowledge level during your first contact to see if you have what it takes to save them money, time and headaches.  The latter, headaches, being
number one.

Just recently I called four real estate agent companies and asked them one question out of the yellow pages and it was amazing what I discovered and the way I was treated.  One agent took my name and number, promised to call back, and never returned my call until the next day with kids and dogs
screaming in the background.  It took me seven more tries to find an agent that could answer the one question correctly (the way NAR said it needs to be answered).  Out of 12, 8 answered incorrectly, and four of them you could tell were "winging" the answer.

What are you doing to make yourself different? Communication skills need to be a big consideration.  There are three major Internet communication items that make the determination of whether they are going to contact you or
pass you up for another web site.

1.  Clear communication and instructions on the web site. This happens most of the time through linking.  You ask visitors to click here but all they have is an underline on the word.  Say "click here for."  The other item is that
what are they going to get or find if they click there?  Is it perfectly clear.  Where are they going to go if they click there?  Is the link taking them to another site, another page?  The why, why do they need to go there, why do you want them to go there.  What is their benefit for clicking there.

2.  Ease of use.  Is the navigational system of the site easy to use for visitors.  Some people are very visual and by giving them an overall view of what they can find — either in words or in a diagram eases their comfort level.

The more comfortable they feel at the web site, the more comfortable they are going to be taking the call to actions you have designed on the site.  Create Step 1, 2, and 3s to handhold them through a process.

3.  Provide details.  Again, something similar to what I said in #1.  Be clear, give details on what will happen if, where they will go next, or what they can expect to get or know by this.  Remove the scariness of unknown quantities
and expectations.  Lead visitors through your site.  Give them a handshake and don’t let their hand go and walk them through all the processes they came to accomplish.  How are you different than other agents — spell it out with details.

Catherine Franz, business coach.  Previously a real estate agent and exec with National Association of Realtors.  Additional articles and ideas about marketing to attract business:  http://www.abundancecenter.com

Accessibility: Is your website causing you to loose potential clients?

With millions of people going online everyday the potential for your business is almost unimaginable! However, the great challenge is creating an environment that is positive, effective, and accessible to all of your potential clients.

No two people see everything exactly the same way. In addition to our own paradigms that shape how we interpret things presented to us, there are also very real obstacles that affect many people surfing the web. By removing barriers to accessibility and addressing these obstacles you open the door to new business and greater success.

"The power of the Web is in its universality. Access by everyone regardless of disability is an essential aspect." - Tim Berners-Lee, W3C Director (Web Accessibility Initiative)

The most common obstacles facing many individuals are auditory and visual. This includes people with various levels of hearing, language barriers, color blindness, visual perception, level of sight, and complete loss of sight. Any of these challenges can render your site potentially useless to a visitor and potential client who may simply be unable to distinguish the color variation of your text on your background.

In the United States a new Bill has been proposed to legislate the web and enforce handicap accessibility standards for all government related websites. While there is currently no policy in place for the private sector, the issue has provided insight and opportunity for every business to be more accessible.

Some basic steps you can take to open your site to potential clients:

1) Make sure all of your relevant and core content is in text-based format. For example: if you have power statements as graphics embedded in your content they will not be readable by a speech synthesizer (a tool used by people to turn written content into an auditory format).

2) Make sure your images have alt tags that say what they are. If someone is using a Braille display to view the web, untagged images show up as a large blank space that could easily be interpreted as the end of the content.

3) Try changing your setting to quickly view your site in black and white. This is an option that people with color blindness in any degree often use so they can avoid missing valuable content. Check to see if your color palette allows text and hyperlinks to still be clear and readable.

New technology is bringing more and more people online everyday. Is your site ready and open to everyone?

Have a successful day! Leslie Durand, Marketing Coach and Emarketing Specialist

Leslie brings over 10 years experience in new media marketing to every project and a unique coaching approach to every client relationship. http://www.ldurandconsulting.com

First Generation - The Popup

Popups, if you’re somehow, strangely, not familiar with the term, are those little windows that open when you visit certain sites.

Popups are secondary browser windows that are opened up using JavaScript code. The properties of this new browser window are set in such a fashion that the new window does not have a address bar, status bar or the menu.

Until about a few years ago  the popup was considered to be the biggest breakthrough in advertising on the web.

When they were first introduced they were a great success and click-through rates went through the roof.

Exit the banner ad - enter the popup.

Web marketers could interrupt whatever a visitor was viewing, by launching a secondary window on top of the first  to draw attention to his advertisement or opt-in list or any other item that he wished to get the attention to.

After a while like most good marketing tools, popups started getting abused. Popups would open secondary popups and eventually by just visiting page that has a single popup in it, you would end up with a barrage of say about 15-20 popups. This was exploited by unscrupulous marketers to the fullest, especially those hawking porn sites.

Of course, webmasters who were in tune with the sentiment of visitors, soon began to use cookies to track if the popup was already shown and ensure it was not shown more than once per visitor.

Frustrated visitors soon began complaining about popups.

Popups are your problem? - Get a popup blocker.

Looking at the need of website visitors, software companies soon came up with popup blocking software. These applications read all the code that’s going to the browser and if they find any JavaScript in the page code that’s trying to open a window, BAM, it deletes that part of code. So Bye Bye popup!

Generation Two - The PopUnder

Not to be left behind, web marketers came up with another version, the popunder, which still launched a secondary window but placed it below the primary window. In most cases, the visitor didn’t even notice this popunder until they closed the primary window.

Of course this was less intrusive, but a pain nonetheless and you don’t get an award for guessing what happened next.

Yes you guessed right, the popup blockers soon started blocking popunders as well.

Generation Next - Enter Hover Ads

What the beejeezus are Hover Ads? They are floating ads that popup blockers can’t stop.

The technology that creates Hover Ads is not new. In fact, it’s been available to web designers for at least 2 years now as DHTML (that’s Dynamic HTML to those who don’t know).

These ads cannot be seen by older browsers like Internet Explorer 3.0. But since most netizens are using browsers (IE 4.0 and above) that are capable of displaying this code this type of advertising has started enjoying a rise in usage.

Hover Ads are DHTML layers which can be selectively moved and displayed over the primary page that’s being displayed. The basic code is still JavaScript, but since a new window is not being opened, the popup blockers can’t figure out that an advertisement is being displayed.

These layers can be animated, moved around, made to appear once per session, shown after a delay, etc.

So that makes you ask "Why should I switch from regular popups to Hover Ads?"

The one and only compelling reason. Popups can be blocked! Hover Ads can’t.

So the bottom line is, if you use popups as a part of your online marketing strategy you’re losing out on a lot of potential revenue, coz what they can’t cant see they can’t buy!

Some statistics that make Hover Ads a compelling technology to use:

• The Alexa Toolbar can now block pop ups (10,000,000 Users not seeing your AD).
• The Netscape 7.0 Browser has a built in popup blocker( almost 52 million users never seeing your popup ad).
• Earthlink provides its users with a popup blocker( prospects who cant see your ad:5,000,000.
• AOL released version 8.0 with Popup Blocking capabilities. (Total Subscribers: 35,000,000).

Bottom line: 40 million customers never see your advertisement!

Hover Ads, on the other hand cannot be stopped by blocking software. Their technology is regular JavaScript that runs well in all modern environments, so they are relatively safe to deploy on your site.

"So how can I add Hover Ads On my Website?"

If you are looking for a free way of doing this then there are freely available JavaScript snippets that you can put to use on your site today without buying any fancy software.

A sample of code can be obtained from CodeLifter.com

The drawback here is that you would need in depth knowledge of JavaScript coding, which not many people know about.

Another approach is to use high end HTML editors like Dreamweaver which have DHTML scripts included under the "Layers" menu. Then again, Dreamweaver is an expensive software.

Any other easier option you ask?

One software that quickly automates the creation of Hover Ads, using a simple 3 step interface is the Hover Ad generator.

The Hover Ads created using this software can be fully customized and are very professional looking.

I especially like the opt-in style Hover Ads which lets your prospects sign up for your opt-in list by simply clicking a button. You subsequently receive a mail with their name and email-id.

I’ll let you look up the other four styles on your own.

Summary

If you use popups on your website, chances are pretty good that they are being screened away by some software or another. Perhaps even by your visitor’s ISP - without any active attempts on your visitor’s part to block them. You’ll need to do something about this situation  and soon.

"So, what choices do I have?"

1. Do nothing. Pray that your content is good enough to attract visitors.

2. Visit CodeLifter to get your FREE layer generator script. You will be stuck with one style, though, if you just cut paste. If you know JavaScript you can modify it as per your liking.

3. Use Dreamweaver or your HTML editor, if it has layers support.

4. Check out Hover Ad Generator . They offer a FREE trial.

Satyajeet Hattangadi is the Owner of Novasoft Inc, a software solutions provider, who specialize is affordable customized software solutions.

Recently one of my students asked a great question: We have a product we want to sell online - and we need to make money fast. We already have a domain name. What should I do in the next 10 days?

Here are some ideas:

1. Take *good* photographs of your product. The picture will allow you to charge more, so get a great digital camera and take those pictures.
 
2. Write a good short sales letter that paints the story of the product - your reason behind creating it, benefits to the reader, vivid pictures of what it will mean to the buyer, etc.
 
3. Set up a paypal account and arrange to take payment.
 
4. Start lining up partners who will do an email for you. Find people who already send an email newsletter to your potential customer.
 
5. Plan to send sample products to the partners you want to work with. That will get their attention and you can seal the deal via email.
 
6. Set up your site on a template-driven site. It’s something you can do yourself with no programming knowledge. You can choose a templates so you have no design costs. It generally includes hosting, so you have no additional hosting costs. You can upload your own photos.
 
7. You’ll need a technical person on call in order to connect your web page and paypal - or at least someone who has a little backgroud in doing this. It’s faster than doing it yourself.
 
8. Use this site for just this one project. Don’t try to do too many things with it.
 
9. Look around for other sites with similiar ideas - selling  the same type of product. Then handle yours approximately the same way.
 
10. Prepare an email for your partners to send to their lists and get it to them a few days before their newsletter goes out. That means you need to get this ready now!

That’s a quick 10-day plan. Get started right away and plan to start seeing sales in a little over a week.

Dr. Jeanette Cates is an Internet strategist who works with experts who are ready to turn their knowledge and their websites into Gold. Her reputation as a speaker and trainer has earned her the title of The Technology Tamer. Jeanette shares her news and views in OnlineSuccessNews.com

Search engine optimisation is big business. Ezines and websites litter the Internet with strategies to boost your search engine ranking. Search engine specialists charge large amounts of money to apply their strategies to your website and will go so far as to guarantee you top listings in the webs’ major search engines.

And, in my opinion, they are all frauds.

Strategy is defined as a long-term plan. So, if these search engine specialists have the ideal strategy, why do the techniques and approach constantly change. Forgive me, but that isn’t strategy. That is a last line of defence that is hastily patched up when the latest changes to the rules punch holes in it.

In "Alice through the Looking-Glass" the red queen said Alice had to run as fast as she could just to stay in one place. This impractical and short-sighted view is ludicrous, but is practiced by search engine optimists world-wide. These companies tweak and tweak and tweak, constantly changing their approach in a bid to keep those top spots. Google’s latest dance showed that, at any point, your efforts can be reduced to nothing leaving you with no choice but to start again.

The reason for this rat race is that most, if not all, of these specialists neglect to tell us one simple fact.

Search engines are there for the searchers, not for the searched.

Google, Yahoo, MSN. These weren’t set up to send you traffic. They were set up to help people find information on the terms they are searching for.

Search engines spend a fortune developing spidering techniques that will help them put the most useful and beneficial websites at the top of their listings only to forced into changing their approach when the search engine specialists hijack the listings.

Think I’m exaggerating? Are you really so arrogant that you believe your website should be in the top ten just because you spent the last twelve months building a thousand reciprocal links that no-one clicks on?

Ask yourself this question. If you do a search in Google, which website would you like to see at number one?

a) A website with genuinely useful and original information.

or

b) A website with perfectly optimised keyword density that doesn’t answer your questions.

In truth, if you are a multi-million dollar company, then you need the search engine specialists, just so that you can keep up with all the other multi-million companies intent on damaging Search Engines for the rest of us. How else are you going to be able to afford that second porsche?

For the rest of you, give it up. Stop wasting your time tweaking your site EVERY time a new trick is circulated. Once the Search Engine cottons on to the trick, they will change their format and you’ll be back to square one.

Reciprocal linking is a good case in point. Google ranked you high if you had plenty of sites pointing to you as this was a good indication of quality. Then it became a matter of, the more reciprocal links you had, the higher you ranked on Google. Everyone started linking with everyone. Software was released dedicated to helping you build page upon page of reciprocal links.

Somehow Google found out and started discounting reciprocal links. Months of work down the toilet? You’d better believe it.

Now people are starting from scratch.

"You link to my site A on your site B and I’ll link to your site C on my site A."

How long before Google start dismissing links in their scoring process altogether?

And don’t forget. Even if you were capable of following every scrap of advice perfectly, do you think you would be the only one? If a thousand people optimise their site perfectly, will they all get a top ten spot?

So here it is then. The ultimate search engine strategy that will never need to be changed, no matter how many times Google dances, Yahoo jiggles and MSN sits in the corner getting drunk.

Make sure your meta tags are properly formatted, contain ONLY the words pertinent to your content, and that your TITLE tag actually describes the page you’ve produced.

Ensure your homepage doesn’t use frames and contains a brief description of what you do. It could just be a single line, but it needs to be on there.

Add, and keep adding, more and more original and useful content to your site. Don’t plagiarise and don’t copy and paste from other sites.

Only accept reciprocal links from sites you believe may be of interest to your regular users. Make sure you have at least one link to your website from a site that is already listed in Google, Yahoo and MSN.

Make sure search engines can see all of your pages, by linking to them from the homepage. If you have a lot of pages, have a site map page linked to your homepage instead.

Make sure you have a homepage link on EVERY page. If your content is good and abundant, visitors will enter your site through deeper pages. If they like what they see, they will want to visit your homepage to see what else you do.

Stop trying to incorporate every search engine "strategy" you hear. Instead spend time focussing on step 3.

Google seems to reward sites that stick around, but its probably because time affords you more inbound links, more pages to spider and a greater pagerank. You might not get the top positions from following these steps, but you will get traffic from search engines. And you will have a site that people want to visit.

So, patience is needed. To build up a really good site with lots of decent content can take years.

If you don’t have patience, try Pay-Per-Click instead.

Dylan Campbell has been quietly making a living on the Internet since 2000. He has a unique, and often controversial, view of the industry.

Dylan Campbell writes exclusively for The Nettle Ezine.

Just because you put up a web store doesn’t mean people will come, take a look and then give you their hard earned dollars. The most successful e-commerce sites have systems in place that entice people to come and buy-again and again. How do they do it. Here are some helpful hints:

First they do everything they can to get people to leave their names and e-mail addresses so they can tell them about upcoming sales, new products and so on. Consider offering a free newsletter or service that sends out updates about your products or services.

Second, they pay close attention to their catalog copy. They try to make it interesting yet concise so that it can be easily understood. Also, their pricing information is very clear.

Third, they also know that their sales strategies on the Web shouldn’t be different from storefront sales strategies, they discount items, have sales and offer coupons for consumers to download.

Fourth, they also let their customers know that real people are behind their Web store. They list their phone and fax numbers-and an e-mail address-prominently on their Web site. They put their customers more at ease about buying from there knowing that they can be reached easily and by a number of different methods.

Last but not least is you want to get customers to your web store. One very simple way is to register your web store with the top search engines. There are also services that automatically do this for you. However, we have found it is always best to do it yourself.

Copyright 2004 DeFiore Enterprises 

Interested in having your own successful, home based creative real estate investing business? Chuck and Sue have been helping folks start successful home based businesses for over 19 years,
and we can help you too! To see how, visit http://www.homebusinesssolutions.com for the latest FREE tips and tricks, educational products and coaching in creative real estate investing and home based businesses. No time to visit the site? Subscribe to our "how to" Home Business Solutions Digest,it’s like having your own personal coach:
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Cross promoting is when two or more businesses promote their products or services together. I try to find businesses that have the same target audience, but are not in direct competition with my business. Doing cross promotions with other businesses increases your profits, sales, and beat your competition.

You can find businesses to cross promote all over the Internet. Participate in e-mail discussion groups, online forums and newsgroups that deal with your target audience. Subscribe to e-zines that deal with your targeted audience. Note on your Web site or e-zine that you are interested in cross promoting your products and services. Search in your favorite web directories and search engines to find targeted businesses.

Cross promoting has many benefits. Save money by sharing the advertising and marketing costs. Save time when both businesses share the workload. You can offer your customers new products and services. Get referrals from the other business’ clients. Receive valuable information from the business.

Once you find a business you would like to cross promote with simply e-mail them your proposal. Tell the business owner the benefits of the cross promotion. Explain to him or her why it would be a win/win situation for both of your businesses. Give them a lot of compliments about their business, Web site, products and services. Using all three methods above will greater your chance for a profitable cross promotion. Good Luck!

———————————————————
Julia Tang publishes "Smart Online Business Tips", a fresh
and informative newsletter dedicated to supporting people
like you. To find out the best online business opportunities,
to discover hundreds more proven and practical internet
marketing secrets, plus FREE internet marketing products
worth over $200, visit: http://www.best-internet-businesses.com
———————————————————-

How to improve conversion rate for your website? How to get more traffic to your website? How to turn your traffic into profit? Here are some techniques you can use:

1. Give your prospects extra incentives so they will order quicker. It could be free shipping, a faster shipping option, free gift wrapping.

2. Make your small business look big on the world wide web. Design your web site using professional graphics, ordering systems, organized layouts.

3. Attract a lot more customers by giving them clear ordering instructions. Give them all the information they need so they can complete their order easily.

4. Give your customers buying incentives so they’ll make repeat purchases. Offer them discounts, free gifts, bonus points.

5. Tell people about your site whenever you get a chance. Those people will tell other people and so on. It’s a cheap way to multiply your advertising.

6. Write and send press releases for your web site. Use a strong headlines, make it newsworthy, and tell the journalist why their readers would like it.

7. Use a lot of headlines on your web site and ezine. Some types of headlines are free offers, questions, problem solvers, sales, and statistics.

8. Design graphics, templates, buttons and banner ads for other sites. Allow people to use them in exchange for your web link on their home page.

9. Use time saving promotional software. You can automate your search engine submissions, posting to online classified sites.

10. Advertise your online business by dressing in clothes that are imprinted with your ad. It could be a T-shirt, ball cap, coat.

Run split testing for different web copies and find out what works the best and what not, then use the good ones over and over again for maxium profit.

Julia Tang publishes "Smart Online Business Tips" Newsletter which helps people to start, run and grow Internet businesses. To get tips, tactics, reliable business opportunities and promotional tools, plus over $200 free bonuses, you can visit http://www.best-internet-businesses.com

If you own a website, you definitely want to improve visibility and get more traffic. There are a number of ways to do so like using search engine optimization, pay-per-click, submit to directories and more. Here are a list of effective ways to get more traffic and get more sales.

1. Sign-up to win web site awards. When you win, some award sites publish your web site link, name and description on their site.

2. Join online business associations or clubs. If you join, they will usually list all their members on their web site. It will give your business extra exposure.

3. Utilize a simple form of viral marketing. Write or have someone else write a small report with your ad included on it and allow others to give it away.

4. Improve your business by promoting customer feedback. Tell them you want their honest opinions about your business, good or bad.

5. Design your packaging so it sells your products. Utilize colors and lettering that make your product more attractive to your prospects.

6. Compare your product’s guarantee to your main competitors. Find a niche were your can design your guarantee to be more powerful.

7. Try not to assume your audience understands everything in your ad copy. If you have words they may not know the meaning to, define them.

8. Build alliances with other online businesses. You could trade links or ads, create joint venture deals, cross promote your products, etc.

9. Design your web site to be a valuable resource for people. Include original content, links to other interesting web sites, ebooks, software, etc.

10. Compete with the highly branded businesses by practicing good customers service, strong product quality and speedy service.

By implementing some of the techniques listed here, you can see good results and generate more sales.

Julia Tang publishes "Smart Online Business Tips" Newsletter which helps people to start, run and grow Internet businesses. To get tips, tactics, reliable business opportunities and promotional tools, plus over $200 free bonuses, you can visit http://www.best-internet-businesses.com
 

In order that someone finds your website and buys your product on the Internet it is essential to make it known to the world. So the first thing you do is to submit to search engines.

But a search engine listing alone does not assure you will receive any new visitors to your Website until and unless you appear among the high rankers. Your Website must achieve higher search engine rankings in order that your customers are able to find your site promptly.

You will reach higher rankings if you follow the easy steps to optimise your website which I’ve compiled below:

1. Research Your Keywords!

This is the single most important aspect of search engine optimisation, so there simply is no way out. If you don’t know how your visitors search for your product or service, then you are only guessing.

And can you imagine a hunter who doesn’t know where to send his bullet? I bet you don’t. Don’t just assume you know how people are going to try and find you.

Visit your competition and look at the terms they use in the keyword tags and throughout their pages and compile a list of keywords.

You’ll spend a good bit of time on this because it will payoff big later. Once you have your list, rank the phrases in order of importance starting with the most important keyword phrase.

2. Give Your Keywords Focus!

Now it is time to start getting the text for your pages ready. When doing so, you will want each of your pages to focus on one of the keyword phrases from your list. Your homepage should focus on your most important phrase and each subsequent subpage should focus on another keyword phrase.

Ideally, you should never focus on more than one or two keyword phrases per page. Trying to focus on more than this will dilute the theme of the page and could have a negative effect on your rankings.

3. Optimise Your Title Tag!

The title tag is one of the most important elements of your page. Search engines put more weight on the title tag than any other single element of your page. Your title tag should ALWAYS contain the keyword phrase you have chosen to target for that page.

Keep the tag short, no more than about 6 words generally, but make it appealing. Make the title irresistible to your visitors but keep it also short enough that you don’t take away from the importance of your keyword phrase.

4. K.I.S.S. - Keep Your Pages as Simple as Possible!

Avoid overloading your page with things such as frames, excessive javascript, flash, too many graphics or image maps. This can have a negative affect on your search engine rankings.

A good rule of thumb is that the simpler the page, the better it will generally rank. Even tables, when used too much can break up the flow of the text on a page and hurt your chances at a top ranking.

5. Create Good Content!

For sure you will find top ranking sites with very little content, but you will have a much better time getting and keeping a top ranking with good content. This not only gives the engines more to index, but it gives your visitors something worth to read and absorb.

Your customers will thank you and they will be more likely to return in the future to do business. Don’t just compile large lists of links – it’s not very attractive to your customers.

You should make it to your personal rule to offer only high quality – no matter what target group you are trying to appeal.

6. Think Big!

What does this mean? Quite simply, it means that a site of 30 or more pages has, at least, 6 times the chances to get a top ranking as a site of 5 pages.

The more pages your site has with good, solid, quality content, the more keyword phrases you can target and the more chances you have of achieving a top ranking.

7. Create a System of Internal Linking!

You should be able to get to just about any page on your site within no more than 3 clicks. Consider creating a site map with links to all of the pages within your site. This will assist the engines in properly indexing your site.

When creating your internal links try to use the actual keyword phrase that you will be targeting on the page you are linking to as the link text. Many engines look at the visible text of a hyperlink as a description of the target page. If the visible text matches the focus of that page, it will help to give that page a boost in the rankings.

8. Build External Link Popularity!

Even if this might appear to be a long and arduous task, but it is crucial to your success. All of the top engines use link popularity quite heavily when ranking sites. It is important to note that it is not only the quantity of links that is important but also the quality of those links.

One link from a site such as Yahoo is worth as much or more than 100 links from unknown sites. Also remember, it is also important that you link to other sites. When linking to other sites, or attempting to get them to link to you, always shoot for sites that are of a similar theme as your site.

9. Monitor Your Rankings!

This is best accomplished through a program like Rank Me, WebPosition Gold, or other similar programs. If you see your position starting to slide, look at your competitors sites that have overtaken you and see if you can determine a pattern. This will tell you what you need to do to regain your position.

10. Keep Going!

Now that your’re at this step keep at it, don’t quit. This is just the beginning. If you don’t get a top ranking right from the scratch don’t get discouraged. Therefore be consistent and patient in your efforts.

This will establish a basis for building a successful business online for years to come. Heck, how did your first attempt at rideing a bike turn out?

Give yourself some time to get accustomed to this new field. Keep tracking your progress, analyse your competition, and making adjustments, and in no time at all, you will find yourself sitting among the high rankers.

About The Author

Marcus Schroefel is an Author, Publisher and Success Coach. Visit: http://www.mindclicking.com. You can get more proven traffic generating tips delivered to your e-mail box just 5 minutes away — for FREE by sending a blank e-mail to: trafficgenerator@robotreply.com.