by;Stacie Leonard volusion.com
Search engines are something to not only be considered, but valued from the very beginning of a site’s creation. Noted by many as the number one place to advertise an online business, search engines and the way in which they work and are used should be an ongoing thought in the mind of an online store builder. Whether on an organic search listing or a pay per click ad, a site appears to be more pertinent to what the user is looking to purchase or acquire information about when the actual domain name includes the keyword being searched for. That keyword will also appear bolded within the domain name, furthering the suggestion of site relevancy and the overall likelihood of a click.

When you work to develop a keyword rich domain name, be creative. Make sure the name is not only relevant, but is one that will be remembered. Start off with a list of the most obvious and valid keywords for your site. Then, focus on the not-so obvious. Also consider the amount of competition each word garners. Last but certainly not least, apply common sense to the equation. Using valid keywords within the domain name will likely garner more clicks to your site. And remember, more clicks often equal more sales!

*Important Note: For branding purposes, choosing a company’s name as the domain name is also an important consideration. You could then create smaller microsites using these keyword rich domain names, leading to your main site.

-Stacie Leonard, Ecommerce Marketing/Copywriting

By: Ian Simpson

More people are discovering the power of affiliate marketing to supplement or even replace their existing income. But there are even more people who would like to have a slice of this exciting world but are unsure exactly what an affiliate program is or what it consists of.

When discussing an affiliate program, it helps to compare it to a traditional networking company where a network of salespeople and distributors are recruited to sell their products to all corners of the globe.

As an example, instead of a company selling directly to their customers it sells products through a series of distributors and salespeople. In turn, the members of this distribution and sales network enjoy a very good living by promoting the products made by others.

In essence, the affiliate programs found on the internet are distribution and sales efforts taken to the online world. The affiliate web site takes the place of the distributor and sales network, and the individual is paid by the seller of the product when a sale is made. Of course there are affiliate programs where physical products have to be shipped but there are also many other affiliate programs where only software or informational products have to be downloaded.

It is easy to understand why this arrangement is so popular, from the point of view of both the merchant and the owner of the web site. The merchant benefits from increased sales and at the same time, does not have to pay for additional advertising and he can expand his network without the need for additional and sometimes expensive advertising. The affiliate on the other hand may not have a product of his own to make money from and selling someone else’s product for a share of the selling price gives him the opportunity to start his own business.

Of course, effort is required on the part of the affiliate to promote his website and the product he is trying to sell. There are many ways that an affiliate program can be promoted. An example would be if the affiliate already has a website and a link added directly to the merchant site. It costs nothing to set up and is very easy to do with a little cut and paste.

All good affiliate programs will have a back office with tools to use and it is always advisable to protect your affiliate links and therefore your commissions, by disguising your links so that they are not chopped off or used by anyone else.

Commissions paid by merchants vary. You can expect anything up to 70% or even more with some affiliate programs, but these will mainly be software downloads. If you go to Clickbank you will find thousands of such programs to promote. With these kinds of commissions, it is easy to see why the promotion of software type programs is such a great way to make money online. At the other end of the scale though some affiliate programs pay a pittance, as low as 1.5% in some cases and you will have to ask yourself if these will be worth the effort.

Affiliate programs are very popular on the internet. If you do not have your own product to sell and you want to have a shot at earning some money on the internet, then affiliate marketing is the way to go. Give a little time, effort and patience and you will be rewarded. So if you’re not already familiar with the concept of affiliate marketing, why not check it out?

by Larry Dotson
1. Participate in chat rooms related to the product you’re reselling. Start a conversation with a person without trying to sell to them. Later on, while you are chatting, mention the product you’re reselling.

2. Create a free ebook with the advertisement and link of your affiliate web site. The subject of the free ebook should draw your target audience to down- load it. Also submit it to some ebook directories.

3. Start your own affiliate program directory. Join a large number of affiliate programs and list them all in a directory format on your web site. Then just advertise your free affiliate program directory.

4. Write your own affiliate program ads. If all the other affiliates use the same ads you do, that does not give you an edge over your competition. Use a different ad to give yourself an advantage over all the other affiliates.

5. Use a personal endorsement ad. Only use one if you’ve actually bought the product or service for the affiliate program. Tell people what kind of benefits and results you’ve received using the product.

6. Advertise the product you’re reselling in your signature file. Use an attention getting headline and a good reason for them to visit your affiliate site. Make sure your sig file doesn’t go over 5 lines.

7. Join a web ring. It should attract the same type of people that would be interested in buying the product you’re reselling. You could also trade links on your own with other related web sites.

8. Participate on web discussion boards. Post your comments, answer other people’s questions, and ask your own questions. Include your affiliate text link under each message you post.

9. Create a free ezine. Use your ezine to advertise the affiliate programs you’ve joined. Submit your ezine to online ezine directories and promote it on your web site.

10. Start a private web site. Use it as a free bonus if people buy the product you resell. You could also allow people to join for free and you could advertise the affiliate program you’ve joined.

by Jon Ricerca

Lots of research has focused on inbound links to a site, but little has focused on the number of links actually on a page (outbound or to other parts of a site). Many SEO gurus have recently been talking about something they call “PR Leak” which seems to be a theory that the more outbound links you have, the more your page rank on Google “leaks” away. That concept isn’t found in the academic papers published by the founders of Google, but does seem to be accepted by a majority of SEOs. I decided it was time to take a look at the number of links present on a page and how that number correlates with ranking.

The methodology: I gathered the results of the queries that were naturally performed last month by myself and three associates using the two leading search engines and analyzed them. I counted the number of links on the page (references to “href”) and tabulated the results against the ranking of the URL in the search results. The tabulated results were finally converted into a normalized “ranking correlation.” The results for each of the two leading search engines were kept separate so that we could discover any differences between the two leading search engines for this factor.

The resulting graphs show the results for groupings of number of links normalized into a number between -100 and +100 showing the likelihood of being ranked higher/lower. A value of +100 shows that all 10 rankings were in the proper order to show that pages of the studied value ALWAYS rank HIGHER than pages of another value. A value of -100 shows that all 10 rankings were in the proper order to show that pages of the studied value ALWAYS rank LOWER than pages of another value. Numbers in between show the varying likelihood of rankings proportionally between – 100 and +100.

That is the number you see on the Y-axis. On the X-axis, we have the number of links found. They are grouped into sets of 10 in order to increase the statistical significance with the amount of data we had available to analyze. Here are the graphs for the two leading search engines:

The number of links were grouped in this way in order to increase the number of data points available. Unfortunately it also reduces the precision of the results. One is able to see that 91-100 links rank much higher than 1-10 links, but you are unable to see if 77 links rank differently than 79 links (for example).

The result is very conclusive. Both leading search engines rank pages with more links much higher than pages with fewer links! Once again, it appears that the SEOs touting the “PR Leak” theory are simply wrong. If their theory held any weight at all, we should see the exact opposite. Pages with more links should rank lower on average.

Notes:

1. There was no exercise to attempt to isolate different keywords. I merely took a random sampling of the queries performed by myself and three associates during the month.

2. This is merely a correlation study, so it cannot be determined from this study whether the leading search engines purposefully entertain this factor or not. The actual factors used may be far distant from the factor we studied.

Just because there is a reminder note in your admin dashboard saying there is a newer version of the theme you are using don’t be so quick to press the auto update button!! I did and it screwed with my site appearance, all the tweaks I did were ruined. But on the upside I switched to a new theme, and gave the website a whole new updated look.
Ahh the beauty of wordpress…..