Webmasters in an online webmaster forum observed an anomaly in Google’s results that might indicate a new Google penalty. Which websites have been penalized and could this affect your own website?

What has happened?

Many webmasters reported that their websites lost all of their top positions on Google and dropped to position 50 and below.
The problem is that the usual metrics shows that the websites are okay. For example, one of the websites was older than two years, the inbound links did not change and the Google PageRank in Google’s toolbar also did not change. Another penalized website was older than 10 years.

Why have these websites been penalized?

There were several theories in the forum thread:
1. Spam on another websites
One theory was that the websites could have been penalized because the webmaster used spammy methods on another of his domains.
Even if your websites are not linked, Google can still know that you are the owner of both websites. They have several ways to find this out, including WHOIS information and Google accounts.

2. Links to spammy websites
Your website might link to spammy websites even if you don’t want to do that. Website widgets, counters and other plugins sometimes put invisible links to other sites on your website.
The server might have also been hacked and there could be a link that you don’t want on your website. (Editor’s note: You can find a link checker in IBP: Tools > Broken link checker).

3. Paid links from .edu domains
A theory that looks very likely was the use of paid links from .edu domains. It seems that there are many hacked .edu servers that host websites on which these links can appear.
Paid links from other sites might also cause problems. If paid links from .edu pages really can cause a ranking drop then this would enable your competitors to harm your website by purchasing these links for your website.

What should you do now?
We think that it’s likely that Google is working on its paid link filters and that paid links from .edu domains and other sites are the reason for the problems.
Stay away from paid links. Google doesn’t like them and chances are that your website will get problems if you use them. Better focus on high quality organic links.

Anyhow, try to watch the video with Larry Halff.

Citizen Garden Episode 11: Whither Ma.gnolia? from Larry Halff on Vimeo.

Here are just 5 simple rules to keep in mind when designing your website.

Rule #1. Limit the use or do not use flashy banners and advertisements at the beginning of you website. There is a time and place for the banners and advertisements.

There is nothing more annoying than clicking on a website to see cartoon characters and advertisements for other products flashing in front of your face. This can be too much for your potential customer. Your customer is there for a purpose and if the blatant advertisements or flashing banners turn them off they may just hit the back button before they find what they are looking for.

The only exception to this rule is determined by the purpose of you website.

Rule #2. Make sure your website design make it easy for the visitor to find the navigation buttons. If a customer has to search for a navigation button to find information about the company or the navigation buttons are not working, the visitor may get frustrated and leave you website.

As a rule of thumb, your navigation buttons should be on the left side of your web page because the majority of people read from left to right. Think about reading a newspaper or a book. You look at the headlines then you read from the left to the right.

Rule #3. When visitors are browsing your site, have a clear indication for the visitor of where they are on your website and how to get to other parts.

You may want to put a link on each page that the visitor clicks to take them to the home page or another page relating to the information currently viewing. In other words do not confuse your visitor or your visitor may just click off the website totally.

Rule #4. When designing your website pay close attention to loading time, the time it takes your web pages to load. You can reduce loading time by reducing graphics on each page. A good website design should load under twenty seconds.

The longer it takes the pages to load the more frustrating it can be to the visitor. People want it yesterday not today and definitely not tomorrow.

Rule #5. Use a font that is common to all web browsers and easy to read. You have to think of your market. If you are selling a product or service that is used by older individuals you may want to increase the font.

Most of us are not going to get younger and with age, we find our eye sights are not what they use to be.

In addition, different web browsers display fonts differently. Therefore, you want to use a universal font compatible to the popular web browser for better viewing.

Bonus Rule #6. Make sure the information on your website is up to date, and relevant to what you are offering. If your website is selling 32″, LCD Flat Screen TVs you should not be offering products to repair your driveway. I know that is extreme but people want to know they are visiting a website that has up to date information and is relevant to what they are searching for.

These are just a few rules of website design. There are many other things to adhere to when designing your website for optima visitors.

When designing your website look at it from the customers’ or visitors’ standpoint. Would you want to visit this website? Would you want to purchase a product from this website? If you answer “no” then correct the problems.

If you deal with customer service, you need to do as they do. Get out from behind the counter and see what the customers see from where they stand. If you go “ugh”, that is not good and you need to make some changes.

About the Author: Pat Turman is a successful mid-level manager and internet entrepreneur. She co-owned a quarter million dollar e-retail store selling golf equipment for women, runs numerous online businesses, and manages a company with revenues of over a million dollars. She holds a BBA from an accredited University and numerous awards and certificates. www.eznichewebsitedesign.com

Programs such as Awstats, a web analyzing program found on most Linux based servers will reveal how those web visitors came to you. Of great interest to most webmasters is the keywords used by visitors who find your site through the search engines. In the past few years a new science called “Search Engine Optimization” (SEO) has evolved into a business model that specializes in making sure your web site gets a strong flow of business from people who look for your niche of goods and services using Google, Yahoo or one of the other big search engines.

The key to great traffic from a search engine is your “search engine ranking”. When you search for something on the Internet, Google (or your favorite search engine) comes back with lots of web sites for you to consider. Well, experts tell us that the majority of web shoppers use a web site shown on that first page of links that the search engine returns. So if your web site is among that first one or two pages, you have a good search engine ranking and you will see more customers than a business that is way down on page 54 where customers never go. SEO is the science of working with search engines so your web site gets a good ranking. SEO is also a fairly complicated science because it involves how your web site is programmed, the kind of text you have on each page and a good SEO expert has specialized tools and software to monitor your SEO on a daily basis to see how you are doing.

So how do we go about improving our web site’s SEO? A SEO company will have those specialized tools and software resources to do the job right. They understand how search engines work and they can prepare specific suggestions to your web team to improve your search engine ranking. You will also want to make sure the articles you purchase from private label sites or ghostwriter services are optimized for your site’s keywords as well. If, on the other hand, you are outsourcing custom articles to a ghostwriter you can specify the articles be “SEO” ready for your chosen keywords upon delivery. This will ensure your articles will rank well in the search engines.

About the Author: Linda Van Fleet is a freelance author and SEO expert who has been using the power of the Internet to promote online businesses since 1996. Do you need private label articles? We have private label article packages and custom articles for your website content.

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There are actually websites that will measure the ranking of your website. For those of you that don’t know what page rank is, it’s a tool put together by Google that determines the effectiveness or efficiency of your Web site.

The higher your page rank, the higher your Web site is listed in the various search engines, and that means more traffic to your site. This, in essence, means more people are looking at your site, your products, your services, thus putting more money in your pocket in the form of paying customers.
If more people are going to your Web site then less traffic is going to your competitors’ Web site. Unfortunately most people don’t even know what page rank is but those visitors that do will place your website in a higher esteem than your competitors and feel that your content is much more valuable and insightful.

Now you are probably wondering how page rank determined? And more importantly how do you increase your page rank?. Well, let’s look at the first part of that question.

One way to help determine your page is when another site links to your page with a back link. The more back links you receive from other pages the higher your page rank. It’s a good idea to make sure the back links are coming from sites that have content on the same theme as yours.

This process can get quite involved and a little messy because all back links don’t carry the same weight or force. The higher the page rank that a link is coming from the more beneficial it is in terms of boosting your page rank. So if you get links from a lot of pages with low page ranks it will not have as strong an impact as a few pages with higher page ranks.

Now this is the complicated part: If you have a page that has a page rank of 7 and it is already linked to 10 or 15 other pages then it will not be any more beneficial to you than a page that has a page rank of maybe 3 or so. There is only so much linking that a page can do. It’s almost like the law of diminishing returns, in other words after awhile it begins to have the opposite effect.

Another way to improve your page rank is through the use of web directories. Not only will this increase your page rank but it will also increase the traffic to your site. So if you submit your site to a large number of Web directories you will be able to increase your rank. There are a number of web directories you can submit your website or blog to.

There’s a host of other items that will definitely help you to increase your ranking and the general traffic flow to your Web site. Also if you are curious about the page ranking of your own site you can see exactly where you stand by doing a Google search for page rank. This should help you to find some of the sites out there that measure page rank. Once you find a site all you have to do is put your own URL in the designated box and you will have your answer. A page rank of 6 or higher is very high.

About the Author: Mel Richardson - Coach, Author and Internet Marketer has been recently putting together programs for those that are new to the internet and looking to build an online business. http://www.freeonlinemarketingstrategies.com/

To prepare your site for easy indexing, be sure to follow these basis guidelines:

1. Design your site in html or similar format that minimizes the use of java script and flash. The more complex you make your code, the more difficult it becomes for the search engine spiders to read your content and prescribe the appropriate Google PR to your web page.

2. Make sure that your meta tags are coded properly and include the Robots.txt tag. Many individuals downplay the importance of meta tags. Although meta tags themselves won’t drastically change the organic ranking of your site, they do create the display text users will see when your site appears in search results. If your meta tags are search engine optimized and compelling, you increase the changes of improving click-throughs.

3. Apply the proper tags to your page. H1, H2, and H3 tags are a great wall to call attention to your content and promote your keywords and keyword phrases. Try to use each tag at least once, but don’t force the issues. You want your text to flow and appear normal.

In addition to ensuring that you’ve made your page easy to access and presented text that is optimized, you also want to consider other factors that can help long-term with your SEO efforts. So often, web designers get caught up with on page factors, that they overlook the requirements for establishing a foundation that supports long-term initiatives.

In particular, consider adding pages that you can add to over time that support link building and accessibility for search engine spiders. Be sure to include:

1. An html sitemap and an xml sitemap. Including a sitemap on you site makes it easy for search engines to access all of your website pages and index your site accordingly. Your sitemap should be in both html as well as xml. Although users would not access the xml sitemap, search engine spiders use this version to crawl websites. Additionally, key search engine submission resources like Google’s Webmasters Tools require xml site map versions.

2. Include a partners page. Previously referred to as a links page, the partners page is essential for reciprocal linking. This strategy isn’t as powerful as developing one-way links, but until your site has been assigned a Google PR, one-way links can be difficult to acquire. So begin your link exchange program with a partners page that allows you add or remove link quickly and easily.

3. Submission pages that encourage new content. One of the most powerful seo techniques is the addition of new content. Make it easy for your users to add or submit content to your website. When search engines see new content, they rejoice. Don’t underestimate how important it is to make it simple for your browsers to add or submit content.

When focusing on search engine optimization, especially with a new website, follow the basic ideas outlined above. There are a number of other factors to consider as well. However, you should always start with a strong foundation - a site design that meets basic SEO standards but one that also supports your long range search engine optimization goals.

About the Author: Michael Fleischner is the founder of the The Good Marketing Tips Blog and has more than 12 years of marketing experience. Learn how to improve search engine rankings at http://improvesearchenginerankings.blogspot.com.

Meta-data is geek-speak for the page titles, page descriptions and keywords that you enter for each page. Each page on your website should have a unique title and description that summarizes what that page is about.

I am stunned at how many sites have www.yoursite.com as the page title for every page - that’s wasting prime online real estate.Putting in a page title or description that does not accurately match what the page is about is considered “spamming” a search engine. Relevant content - People seem to understand that good content is really what they are looking for when they search for something. More and more we are seeing sites that have regular updates or blogs showing up higher in the search results than sites which have larger quantities of older, “stale” content on them.

Responsible link building - This is perhaps the least understood part of SEO. In a nutshell search engines consider a link from another website to your website as a popularity vote. Sadly though link building, like keywords and meta-data, have been abused by many site owners with schemes such as link farms where sites are setup simply to house links to other sites. If you would like help with SEO for your website, or other online business needs we would love to hear from you.

SEO Manager
(Cagayan de Oro City)

Responsibilities:

The SEO Manager’s responsibility is to lead and manage all SEO related activities for all clients. Activities include on site optimization, link building, content coordination, submissions and other activities. This is a tremendous opportunity for someone with 2-3 years SEO experience. Meant for an aggressive SEO specialist who understands all facets of conducting an SEO campaign. The successful candidate will be someone who can help take our clients rankings to the very top of the major search engines.
We are looking for someone who has a documented record of success managing SEO campaigns at all levels (enterprise level sites and smaller, static sites).

• Once a new client has been signed, the SEO Manager will be responsible for ensuring the campaign gets off the ground and stays on track through its life cycle.
• Coordinate with internal team members to accomplish SEO tasks
• Manage all aspects of technical SEO for new and existing clients: Keyword research, competitive analysis, baseline reports, title/meta tag creation, content optimization, link building,and others
• Utilize multiple tools to arrive at sound decisions on which way to take a client’s campaign.
• Utilize analytics (e.g., Google Analytics) as feedback for a client campaign.
• Implement SEO management best practices into company procedures to make entire process more efficient.
• Communicate with clients about specific technical details of their campaign
• Participate in monthly client meetings and update clients on progress and activities
• Relocation will be provided for successful applicant.

Requirements:

• Candidate must possess at least a Bachelor’s/College Degree in Computer Science/Information Technology, Business Studies/Administration/Management, Human Resource Management or equivalent.
• Required skill(s): Search Engine Optimization, Search Engine Marketing, PPC Marketing.
• Required language(s): Filipino, English
• Preferred language(s): English.
• At least 2 year(s) of working experience in the related field is required for this position.
• Preferably Assistant Manager / Managers specializing in IT/Computer - Software or equivalent.
• Full-Time positions available.
• Applicants should be Filipino citizens or hold relevant residence status.

To apply, visit http://ph.jobstreet.com/jobs/2008/9/default/20/1991307.htm?fr=L

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