Friday, December 10, 2010

Why Article Writing will REALLY Boost Your Website Traffic!

If you are looking for a quick increase in traffic to your website, particularly if you have a new site, it is a relatively simple process to get some REALLY fast action. Even more important, is that you can get this traffic "completely Free!"
Trying to get your website listed with the major Search Engines is often a long, complicated, and sometimes expensive task. One sure of increasing your presence on the web, is to write your own articles.

What do I write about?

Select a subject that you are familiar with, or one that relates to your website. If it is a subject that you are interested in, then it is normally quite easy to write about it. Keep your article to between 500- 600 words. You may have already written something similar, that you have included in your website.

Get away from it all

Haven't you ever had time you wanted to get away from it all? In March/April 1978, www.motherearthnews.com published a story about a couple who bought McLeod's Island - a 90-acre island off the coast of Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia, Canada.

They have a few animals, spend very little on groceries, and are pretty well sustained by the island itself. Although it does present them with some challenges:

"The sea, you know, is not called "restless" for nothing. A glass-smooth bay (as we've learned so well!) can churn-sometimes seemingly in seconds-into a windswept chaos of currents and combers. We've also seen that same bay (the one in which our island is located) thaw and then completely refreeze in just hours on a single December day.


Winters up here can be especially variable. Continual spring-like thaws throughout 1976's cold season, for instance, kept our bay filled with slushy ice that was too thick to push a boat through ... but too dangerous for even a fox to walk on. We were marooned for three full months, from the first of January until the end of March. Last winter's record cold snap, on the other hand, filled the bay so solidly with pack ice that we could hike back and forth to the mainland for our mail and toboggan loads of supplies any time we wanted."

For some of us, we find the Internet gives us the freedom to be able to work and live almost any place we want to. These people didn't have that luxury. I use the past tense as I can't find any current information about them. Who knows? Maybe the tide swept the out to sea.

Life is full of sacrifices. Some are just more dear than others. Still, I don't think buying an island is in my future.

You can read the whole article here.
http://www.motherearthnews.com/library/1978_March_April/We_Homesteaded_an_Island

Making Your Blog Stand Out And Look Professional

If you are attempting to create a successful blog for personal or business reasons, you should know that looks do count. Many bloggers make the mistake of thinking that looks are not as important as content, since readers are essentially reading your blog for the words, not the way it looks. This is true to some degree. The fact is however that people will not take your words seriously if your blog looks less than attractive. To have a successful blog you have to have it all. You must have interesting content as well as a great look. If you want to update the look of your blog, consider these areas of importance.

Easy To Scan

The way your blog reads on a page is an extremely important part of your blog's look. You should always remember to keep your blog posts short and to the point. If you are treating your blog as a personal diary, your posts may be a little longer than normal. But, if you are trying to get more traffic to your blog, then you really want to focus the attention with short posts that offer the main point easily. Most blog readers will only scan your posts, not read them word for word. So keep this in mind when you are writing. The shorter the post, the more likely they are to read the entire thing. If your blog is easy to scan because the posts are short and the breaks are clear, you will have a great looking blog.

Professional Edge

When designing or redesigning your blog, try to make it as professional looking as possible. Even if the blog is not for a business, the more professional it looks, the more seriously people will take it. Not everyone knows a lot about programming, so you may need to research a bit. If you have the extra funds, you might even want to get a professional to program it for you. No matter what you have to do, just keep a level of professionalism in your mind throughout the designing process.

Friendly Colors

Most people don't think twice about what colors they choose for their blog. The facts are that some colors come across better on the web than others. Blue and black are easy to see, so they are always great choices to use. Sea-green, beige, or purple are also great soothing colors to use for a blog. You should stay away from using colors like pink, yellow, or any neon varieties. They are extremely hard on the eyes when reading them online and can deter people from reading your blog. Keep these color tips in mind when you design your blog to get the best results available.

Appropriate Graphics

It has been noted that the use of pictures on your blog is a great way to boost traffic. Blogs that offer pictures that correlate with their content are fantastic. Readers love to connect with the content further through pictures. With most blogging software offering ways to easily add pictures, it should not be a problem for most publishers to add them right into the blog. If you do have trouble, consider checking the "help" area in your blogging software for more information. The information there should provide you with step by step instructions to help you get on your way.

Successful Layout

Most people who design blogs and websites will tell you that the layout does matter as well. The way a blog looks to the reader in important in terms of layout. The layout should be clear and defined. If the reader is confused by the layout, they will likely not stick around to explore. They will most likely go right on to the next blog available. If you are letting a professional design your blog, you will likely not need to worry much about the layout. However, if you are doing it yourself, take a look at other successful sites to get ideas about what works and what doesn't. Look at your site like a reader would to get the best advice you can. Lastly, simply test different layouts on your friends and family to see which ones they find the most suitable for your blog. 

PHP , Internet Business Marketing , & Good Web Content Go Hand In Hand

Everyone has heard that content is king when it comes to search engine optimization and just good old plain web site marketing smarts. But how you present that content on your site can also make a world of difference.

PHP is a server-side, cross-platform, HTML embedded scripting language that lets you create dynamic web pages. PHP-enabled web pages are treated just like regular HTML pages and you can create and edit them the same way you normally create regular HTML pages.

Now here is were it gets interesting. Search engines like Google Yahoo and MSN love fresh new content that is changing on a daily basis. But if you are using a java script snippet the search engines will not be able to read the content. If however you are using a PHP type script the content will automatically be transformed into HTML and the search engines will be able to pick it up and read it.

The first thing you will need to do before you jump onto the PHP bandwagon is to make sure your web host provider has PHP support. Most do but if you are only paying for basic services or using a free host you may have to pay for an upgrade. It's well worth it trust me.

One of the best PHP based scripts you can add to any web site is the forum or bulletin board. Forums will take on a life of their own after several 100 members have joined and are posting threads on a daily basis. If 100 members seems like a lot think again. I have one work from home internet business forum and after just 2 month I already have over 70 members. Each time someone posts to the forum the HTML changes and the search engines treat it as new content.

Another great PHP script you can add is the link directory. You can actually set up a categorized reciprocal link directory with 20 links on each page and the process is completely automated. I have mine set up so that I have to approve each link first but if you want you could by pass this so that once your script is set up the directory will just start to grow all on its own with no additional work on your part. Again each time someone adds a new link you HTML page is changing. Make sure you add categories that are relative to your main theme. My directory for example has categories for work from home , internet business and business opportunities because that's what my web site is all about. Also make sure you have added instructions on how they can link back to you. This is the reason why I like to approve all my liks first. No reciprocal link back to my site NO directory listing.

PHP can also be used for blogging. Wordpress is one of the most popular PHP script based blogging tools. I have not used Wordpress but I do use blogger for all my blogging. A weblog (usually shortened to blog, but occasionally spelled web log) is a web-based publication consisting primarily of periodic articles (normally in reverse chronological order). Although most early weblogs were manually updated, tools to automate the maintenance of such sites made them accessible to a much larger population, and the use of some sort of browser-based software is now a typical aspect of "blogging". With a blog or web log you can make daily posts on almost any subject matter creating new content for the search engines to crawl. To date Yahoo seems to be giving a bit of an edge to all my blogs incuding my work form home internet business news site. Ironically most of the post on that blog come from yahoo and or Google news. This is a great way to get free content on a daily basis for your blog. Just go to Google news or yahoo news and type in the keywords you are using for your blog. Each day there will be a new news article that you can legally use on your blog.

There are many more PHP scripts that you can use on your website to automatically create fresh new content with. The ones listed above are the ones I have downloaded for free and installed to my web host. If you are not using PHP now is a good time to get started. 

For newer sites, Web Marketing depends on "titles" & "links"

We all start out the same. Some have budgets, some don't. The one true factor out there is that we all want to expose our business. For 99% of us, starting out in the world of web marketing means a few things:

* - A huge learning curve
* - Endless nights working
* - Trial & Error
* - Learning the ropes

Compared to older more established sites out there, a brand new site without a network of well established web sites to back it up will need to depend on good quality links pointing to it. This will commence the search engine ranking strategy.

See most "grand father" sites out there have already gone through the trials and tribulations of getting recognized. Since this is true, they don't always have to depend on the "Title" of the link pointing to their site, nor do they have to depend on the "Title" tag within their site.
Now here's the [kicker]. Let's say Joe has been doing this for 2 years now, 9 times out of 10, if Joes web site is still promoting content about "Web Marketing", he probably doesn't have to add "Web Marketing" to his main title anymore. He can now add it further down within another link on his site.

So the moral is???

If your site is new, you'll need to depend on the "Titles" of many things to get your rankings up for something specific. If you're site is more mature and has been established, you can work on other search terms you've been longing to get for your site.

Just keep plugging away and try to keep your "titles" the same for new sites and mix it up for older sites!

I hope you enjoyed the article!

Read more of Martins articles online here:
http://www.smartads.info/newsletter

English In The New World

From its early British heritage, the English language has evolved and it will continue to do so as it creeps its way into societies all over the world. The English you know may not be what another person, who lives in another country, knows. Marquez Comelab, author of The Part-Time Currency Trader , explains.

From its early British heritage, the English language has evolved and it will continue to do so as it creeps its way into societies all over the world. The English you know may not be what another person, who lives in another country, knows. Different countries have developed their own unique way of using English. For example, the Australian English, a dialect I have grown accustomed to, uses the letter ' u 's in certain words. They use suffixes such as – ise instead of – ize as well as – t instead of – ed . Below are some examples of the common differences between how Australians spell words and how these words are spelt elsewhere.

• Centre rather than Center
• Endeavour rather than Endeavor
• Colour instead of Color
• Armour instead of Armor
• Dreamt instead of Dreamed
• Spelt instead of Spelled
• Learnt instead of Learned
• Jeopardise instead of Jeopardize
• Organise instead of Organize
• Organisation instead of Organization

When I wrote my book: The Part-Time Currency Trader , I had to think about who my audience was. People who might be interested in this book were not just going to be Australians. In fact, currency trading is big in America , Europe and Asia . I would have to communicate with them as well. Therefore, I had to do a little researching and what I discovered for myself would be relevant to all writers, website owners and anybody who wishes to communicate with the global community and compete internationally.

From its early British heritage, the English language has evolved and it will continue to do so as it creeps its way into societies all over the world. The English you know may not be what another person, who lives in another country, knows. I found it most intriguing that there are so many English dialects.

Below are the types of English dialects (Source: http://www.wikipedia.org):

Types of English that evolved from the British Isles :

• English English
• Highland English
• Mid-Ulster English
• Scottish English
• Welsh English
• Manx English
• Irish English

Types of English that evolved from the United States:

• AAVE (Ebonics)
• American English
• Baltimorese
• Boston English
• California English
• General American
• North Central American English
• Hawaiian English

Southern American English:

• Spanglish
• Chicano English

Types of English that evolved from Canada :

• Canadian English
• Newfoundland English
• Quebec English

Types of English that evolved in the Oceania :

• Australian English
• New Zealand English

Types of English that evolved in Asia :

• Hong Kong English
• Indian English
• Malaysian English
• Philippine English
• Singaporean English
• Sri Lankan English

Types of English that evolved in other countries:

• Bermudian English
• Caribbean English
• Jamaican English
• Liberian English
• Malawian English
• South African English

Other Classifications of English:

• Basic English
• Commonwealth English
• Globish
• International English
• Plain English
• Simplified English
• Special English
• Standard English


With this many types of English to cater for, writing can get complicated, especially when it comes to spelling words. If you are writing a book, people expect you not to make any spelling errors. None of us are perfect and I'm sure there are mistakes in most manuscript or on most websites but the last thing you need as a writer, is that your readers attribute spelling mistakes to you because of these basic differences in English.

If you want to know how I got around this problem, I simply wrote my book in my local dialect, Australian English. Then, I added a page in my book where I explain to the reader the most common differences between the Australian English and the English they may be accustomed to.

I just thought I would let you know and I hope this helps when you are reading or writing.

- END OF ARTICLE -

Please activate all hyperlinks and include the paragraph below if you are republishing this article online or in print.

About The Author:

Marquez Comelab is the author of the book: The Part-Time Currency Trader . It is a guide for men and women interested in trading currencies in the forex market. Discusses analysis, tools, indicators, trading systems, strategies, discipline and psychology. See: http://marquezcomelab.com. His other articles are also published at http://thefreedomtochoose.com along with other helpful articles. 

Article Services And Search Engine SEO

Article services and search engine SEO can be used together to provide a powerful means of attracting a high volume of traffic to your website – if you know how to do it.

It is not possible to provide a course in SEO or in article marketing or writing in an article such as this, but you can get the rudiments from appropriate web pages on the internet that are interested in showing you how. Initially, however, here are a few tips on how to make a start in combining these two powerful facets of internet marketing to your advantage. To make it work you have to get up and do it, and not expect it to come to you.

Achieve Nothing by Doing Nothing

My father used to say to me that nothing will ever be achieved by doing nothing but thinking about it. He said that when he was fighting on the destroyers in the Russian convoys protecting the merchant ships attempting to maintain supplies to the Russians in Archangel in 1942 it would have been easier to do nothing, but a job had to be done and they all did it by knuckling down and getting on with it, no matter what it cost.

Compared to that I find spending a few hours on a website simple and trouble free, and I have never forgotten the lesson he taught me. I work the hours I need to complete a task: the clock does not exist. The failures in internet marketing are those that give up too early. If you haven't finished your day's work by midnight, then stay up till you have finished – whether it is 2 am or later. OK, you might have the day job in the morning but nobody said it was easy, unless you believed the guys who offered you to get rich quick.

My dad didn't help supply the Russians by bunking down at midnight. You won't make a success of your new internet business by doing the same. That's the reality of it. However, if you do knuckle down, and if you do apply the effort, then you will succeed since all it takes is the hard work then the rest will happen if you do as you are advised. Do what the winners do and you will join them.

Get Writing: Or Get Me Writing

If you can write then start writing. Write at least two articles a week on the subject of your website. More if possible. If you can write 50 then do that, but you will get success with just two. I have proved that to myself. If you can't write, get a ghost writer. If you can't afford a ghost writer contact me and I will help you if I have the spare time of the 24 hours I have each day.

You must also have more than one website, so get yourself two at least. The more the better, but two will do to start with. If you can't afford two web hosts, then get one that allows unlimited subdomains and you can have as many independent websites as you want. eMail me for info on parked subdomains if you don't know how to use them.

Optimize each page on each website as well as you can, and link one to the other. The topics or niches should be complementary, so that one is relevant to the other. Optimize the links between the pages on each of your sites to maximize your internal Google PageRank, and design the sites logically. If you use classic search engine SEO techniques, and tie them up with good internal and external linking strategies, you should soon start to see your traffic steadily increasing.

Build Up Your Website

There are several offsite actions you can take to improve the chances of your web pages appearing high in the Google listings for the keywords each page is optimized on. You should have at least 10 pages on each site, preferably more. It is easy to keep adding pages if you design one page to use as a template for the others, and add all the links to it that you want to have on every page.

Then all you need do to add a page is to change the article content, page heading, page title and graphics Alt text. The change the keywords, description and title meta tags and you are all set. You can do it in 10 minutes. Imagine: a new web page every 10 minutes!

Now write articles on the topic of each new page on your site and submit them to as many article directories as you can. You will get an initial page rank rush, or at least a rush of clicks to your site, until Google starts to take note of all the duplication of your article on multiple web pages (article directories). It will then begin to penalize these in the Google listings but not, and this is VERY IMPORTANT, not from the directories because Google cannot decide what content article directories hold. Your articles will remain on each directory until it decides to remove it – that could be years hence.

Do the Hard Work and Reap the Benefits

These are the basics of how to use article services and search engine SEO. The hard work is the writing and generating of the websites and web pages. However, if you are like my dad, and get on with the job even though your hands are frozen solid to the breach block of a five inch gun of a destroyer in the Arctic Ocean at 3 am on a cold February morning, then you will succeed. Work will get you there, not paying hundreds of dollars for software that does it all for you – it never does. Get the right guy to point you and you should be OK.