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It happened on June 19th — You probably missed out on well over an hour of answers to questions from users like me and you in the Google Webmaster Central forum. Techs responded on everything from how many cats they owned to all sorts of technical and SEO type issues. Barry Schwartz from SERoundtable.com has a very complete post describing the event. He was kind enough to record the audio (yes, it was live via audio) and has a full transcript in text for those of us who would like to actually READ the back-and-forth.

We own thanks to Barry and SERoundtable.com for his/their hard work in recording this for us, and hosting the audio downloads (never easy on a server). You may want to make his site a regular stop on your daily surfing schedule.

The audio is in MP3 format, which means almost anyone can play it right in their browser. Read the text or listen to the MP3 file at the SERoundtable.com archived page (78 minutes long, or about 71MB).

If you want to participate in the post-mortem discussions or read even more about the session, where some of the unanswered questions are dealt with, then visit the Google Groups: JuneTune Unanswered Questions page.

Enjoy the rare event, while the audio version is still available.

Google knows an astounding amount of information about the world’s sites. Now they are beginning to share that knowledge with companies who buy advertising online for their clients.

These advertising agents or media buyers will be able to learn a significant amount of data about their prospective hosts for banners, Adwords text links, and so on. The new service is limited to a small group of ad buyers and their reps. But you can apply for an invitation if you want.

Of course there is no guarantee that they’ll let you into the group.

The web pages actually at the top of Google have only one thing clearly in common: good writing. Don’t let the usual SEO sacred cows and bugbears, such as PageRank, frames, and JavaScript, distract you from the importance of good content.

I was recently struck by the fact that the top-ranking web pages on Google are consistently much better written than the vast majority of what one reads on the web. Yet traditional SEO wisdom has little to say about good writing. Does Google, the world’s wealthiest media company, really only display web pages that meet arcane technical criteria? Does Google, like so many website owners, really get so caught up in the process of the algorithm that it misses the whole point?

Apparently not. Most Common On-the-Page Website Content Success Factors

Whatever the technical mechanism, Google is doing a pretty good job of identifying websites with good content and rewarding them with high rankings.

I looked at Google’s top five pages for the five most searched-on keywords, as identified by WordTracker on June 27, 2005. Typically, the top five pages receive an overwhelming majority of the traffic delivered by Google.

The web pages that contained written content (a small but significant portion were image galleries) all shared the following features:

• Updating: frequent updating of content, at least once every few weeks, and more often, once a week or more.
• Spelling and grammar: few or no errors. No page had more than three misspelled words or four grammatical errors. Note: spelling and grammar errors were identified by using Microsoft Word’s check feature, and then ruling out words marked as misspellings that are either proper names or new words that are simply not in the dictionary. Does Google use SpellCheck? I can already hear the scoffing on the other side of this computer screen. Before you dismiss the idea completely, keep in mind that no one really does know what the 100 factors in Google’s algorithm are. But whether the mechanism is SpellCheck or a better shot at link popularity thanks to great credibility, or something else entirely, the results remain the same.
• Paragraphs: primarily brief (1-4 sentences). Few or no long blocks of text.
• Lists: both bulleted and numbered, form a large part of the text.
• Sentence length: mostly brief (10 words or fewer). Medium-length and long sentences are sprinkled throughout the text rather than clumped together.
• Contextual relevance: text contains numerous terms related to the keyword, as well as stem variations of the keyword. The page may contain the keyword itself few times or not at all.

SEO “Do’s” and “Don’ts”

A hard look at the results slaughters a number of SEO bugbears and sacred cows.

• PageRank. The median PageRank was 4. One page had a PageRank of 0. Of course, this might simply be yet another demonstration that the little PageRank number you get in your browser window is not what Google’s algo is using. But if you’re one of those people who attaches an overriding value to that little number, this is food for thought.
• Frames. The top two web pages listed for the most searched-on keyword employ frames. Frames may still be a bad web design idea from a usability standpoint, and they may ruin your search engine rankings if your site’s linking system depends on them. But there are worse ways you could shoot yourself in the foot.
• JavaScript-formatted internal links. Most of the websites use JavaScript for their internal page links. Again, that’s not the best web design practice, but there are worse things you could do.
• Keyword optimization. Except for two pages, keyword optimization was conspicuous by its absence. In more than half the web pages, the keyword did not appear more than three times, meaning a very low density. Many of the pages did not contain the keyword at all. That may just demonstrate the power of anchor text in inbound links. It also may demonstrate that Google takes a site’s entire content into account when categorizing it and deciding what page to display.
• Sub-headings. On most pages, sub-headings were either absent or in the form of images rather than text. That’s a very bad design practice, and particularly cruel to blind users. But again, Google is more forgiving.
• Links: Most of the web pages contained ten or more links; many contain over 30, in defiance of the SEO bugbears about “link popularity bleeding.” Moreover, nearly all the pages contained a significant number of non-relevant links. On many pages, non-relevant links outnumbered relevant ones. Of course, it’s not clear what benefit the website owners hope to get from placing irrelevant links on pages. It has been a proven way of lowering conversion rates and losing visitors. But Google doesn’t seem to care if your website makes money.
• Originality: a significant number of pages contained content copied from other websites. In all cases, the content was professionally written content apparently distributed on a free-reprint basis. Note: the reprint content did not consist of content feeds. However, no website consisted solely of free-reprint content. There was always at least a significant portion of original content, usually the majority of the page.

Recommendations

1. Make sure a professional writer, or at least someone who can tell good writing from bad, is creating your site’s content, particularly in the case of a search-engine optimization campaign. If you are an SEO, make sure you get a pro to do the content. A shocking number of SEOs write incredibly badly. I’ve even had clients whose websites got fewer conversions or page views after their SEOs got through with them, even when they got a sharp uptick in unique visitors. Most visitors simply hit the “back” button when confronted with the unpalatable text, so the increased traffic is just wasted bandwidth.
2. If you write your own content, make sure that it passes through the hands of a skilled copyeditor or writer before going online.
3. Update your content often. It’s important both to add new pages and update existing pages. If you can’t afford original content, use free-reprint content.
4. Distribute your content to other websites on a free-reprint basis. This will help your website get links in exchange for the right to publish the content. It will also help spread your message and enhance your visibility. Fears of a “duplicate content penalty” for free-reprint content (as opposed to duplication of content within a single website) are unjustified.
5. In short, if you have a mature website that is already indexed and getting traffic, you should consider making sure the bulk of your investment in your website is devoted to its content, rather than graphic design, old-school search-engine optimization, or linking campaigns.

About the Author: Joel Walsh is the owner, founder and head-writer of UpMarket Content. To read more about website content best practices, get a consultation with Mr. Walsh, or get a sample page for your site at no charge, go to his SEO website content page.

It is no secret that Google and Yahoo are on a continuous battle to win our hearts and get everyone to convert, but is converting someone really a matter of the quantity or the quality? Let’s take a look at some top key searches and compare them with some search engines online. I will outline a few things for each search result:

1) Search Engine
2) Number of results found
3) Quality & content of the top 10 sites
4) What you find going beyond the first 10 pages

Each section will get ranked out of 10 points for quality (information taken on August 26,2005).

Starting with my all-time favorite search term: "INTERNET MARKETING"

Google.com
- 99,000,000 results
- 10/10 on quality
- 10/10 Past 10 pages still delivers top quality results

Yahoo.com
- 281,000,000 results
- 7/10 on quality. There’s no reason to list a "Hotel Marketing Firm" & "Building websites". The #1 spot was reserved for Yahoo marketing.
- 9/10 Past 10 pages, it is very generic for business, not specific.

MSN.com
- 93,661,176 results
- 10/10 on quality
- 10/10 Past 10 pages still delivers high quality results. I am surprised and give MSN two thumbs up for their attention to detail.

Moving onto the search term for "BUSINESS NEWS"

Google.com
- 627,000,000 results
- 10/10 on quality
- 10/10 Beyond 10 pages delivers high quality & local news centers.

Yahoo.com
- 1,260,000,000 results (wow)
- 10/10 on quality
- 9/10 Beyond 10 pages. There are still some sites that should never be there.

MSN.com
- 381,631,054 results
- 8/10 on quality - Some aren’t related at all and brand new sites as well.
- 10/10 beyond 10 pages. Their results seem to tighten up and get better.

Let’s now take some more "local" search results to see deeper and more targeted results…

Moving on to the search term for "WASHINGTON UNIVERSITIES".
I hope to find the "University of Washington" come up #1 or thereabouts.

Google.com
- 22,700,000
- 10/10 on quality (www.washington.edu is #1)
- 10/10 beyond 10 pages. The results still deliver "university" topics.

Yahoo.com
- 143,000,000 results
- 9/10 on quality - The top spot is reserved for Yahoo on Washington University in St. Louis. There seems to be a strong battle going on here on which university to list.
- 10/10 beyond 10 pages. Content is specific and relevant.

MSN.com
- 34,442,536 results
- 9/10 on quality - Again another battle going on and washington.edu is #10 tilting on the verge of page 2.
- 10/10 beyond 10 pages. All related to Washington & University living

Let’s now get even more specific than that… For this search term I will be using something very local that I can relate to and give a better analysis.

Moving on to the search term for "HAMILTON ONTARIO CANADA".

Google.com
- 3,700,000 results
- 10/10 on quality - Great job
- 10/10 beyond 10 pages - Anything goes but is directly related to Hamilton.

Yahoo.com
- 14,900,000 results
- 10/10 on quality - Almost the same as Google but a couple of different choices.
- 9/10 on quality - Some results are found by keyword stuffing their pages.

MSN Local *New (http://search.msn.com/local/)
- 1,280,405 results
- 9/10 on quality - Getting some random placements & keyword stuffing
- 10/10+ beyond 10 pages - Many local companies well listed in the results.

Let’s now take a look at these results as a total. Out of a possible score of 80 points, here are the total scores for each:

Google - 80 points
MSN - 76 points
Yahoo - 73 points

Total search results delivered:

Google - 752,400,000
Yahoo - 1,698,900,000
MSN - 511,015,171

And people wonder why Google is the king of searching?! But wait, without even noticing the results, as I totaled the final point standings, MSN came up in second place! In my study, I tried to be as neutral as possible.

How is it that Msn & Google have 50% the amount of results shown in Yahoo, but outrank Yahoo in quality?

In conclusion:

Even though Yahoo delivered a report stating that it has over 19 billion search items, what does it matter when you’re still trying to figure out how to deliver all that content? MSN & Google seem to know exactly what to do with their results. They don’t seem "off the wall" at all. If Yahoo is to step up and be crowned the search king, I really think that they need to refine the amount of search terms they have, to match the quality of search results as well.

Yahoo has major potential to outreach Google but they still have a lot of work ahead of them and by the time they figure things out, Google may even step up their game even further and wow us all on some other search plateau.

About the Author: Martin Lemieux is the president of the Smartads Advertising Network. Smartads is dedicated to helping you expose your business online and offline. International: http://www.smartads.info Article Submission Website (Beta): http://www.article99.com Post Comments Here: http://forum.article99.com/viewtopic.php?t=24

Link popularity can make or break your website. Search engines have their own ranking systems and they use links to do it. Search engines count for so much in the online world. They are invaluable in the constant search for information. This is where links come in.

Google laid the groundwork for other search engines to follow. This is primarily ranking to sites that have links to related information from other worthwhile websites.

Keywords matter in regards to link popularity. The more often a keyword is used the more difficult it makes it to obtain the end result of link popularity.

It’s not as simple as managing to link up with plenty of other websites. Quality is your aim, not quantity. Link farms are everywhere on the Internet but they only make your search for link popularity a nightmare. Look past these awful “endless lines of link pages” and continue your quest for exceptional quality.

It cannot be stressed enough- quality of a site must always be put before quantity. Cast aside junk sites masquerading as sites of worth and soldier on to higher peaks!

Now it is time to get down to business and look at what you need to do to improve your website rankings.

Yahoo and Open Directory Project have directories worth looking into. Search around on the Internet and you will find a host of others. Some require a monthly or yearly fee while other are completely free.

Shoot for the stars as far as categorizing your site. Some sites are less known or sought after than others. Think big dreams and go after the successful “big cheese” kind of sites.

Once you have directory listings you now need to find other sites on the Internet that provide some of the same products and services that you yourself provide to customers. Related sites help ensure a higher degree of link popularity so bear that in mind as you do your homework. The time and effort you put into your site will benefit if it is linked up with others who feel the same way. And they will in turn benefit as well.

Do your research first as not all sites have an interest in linking up with others. Search out sites and see what they have to offer and see whom they are linked to.

Once you have found a site that suits your needs, congratulations! Now it’s time to get to work. Right off the bat make their link a part of your site. Drive the traffic to both of your sites. Now via e-mail inform the owner of the other site that you proudly have linked their site to yours. You’ve joined forces in a sense. Everyone needs allies in the online world after all.

Show your appreciation of their website and let them know that you handpicked their site especially because you enjoyed what you found when you visited it. Do be honest and do not shower false flattery on them. It’s deceitful.

Repeat the same process with as many sites as you wish to link up with. You can never have too many link partners in the Internet. Just remember that you stand for quality and you won’t accept anything less.

Be consistent and disciplined not just in finding other sites to link to but also in checking the search engines to see how much advancement of your site is taking place. Remember that it will take a considerable amount of time but rest assured that success is near!

Is your site pleasing to the eye or an eye sore? Put a lot of effort into making your site one others would be honored to link to!

About the Author: Tom Bishop Runs Double Qualified PPC Traffic Which Offers Ultra targeted, High Converting Traffic For Just 20 Cents a Click. For Full Information visit his company, Double Qualified PPC Traffic.

Information that is posted on the internet in the form of web pages includes business information, family photo albums, book contents, school courses, even stores where you can place orders with your credit card and have your products shipped to your home without ever speaking to a human.Of course, the value of having business information posted on the internet is its ability to be displayed to potential customers 24 hours a day. The internet is a very economical way for businesses to advertise. For a nominal monthly fee they can post a great deal of information on a web site that could potentially be viewed by millions of potential customers each month.

With all of the information on the internet, it can be hard for any one web site to stand out or even be found by an internet user. This is where search engines and websites that are search engine friendly come in.

NOTE: The estimated number of web pages on the internet is currently in the billions.

Search engines such as Google, MSN, and Yahoo continually “crawl” (search) the internet through programs called “spiders” or “bots”. These programs look at all websites they come across, read the information in them, determine their category, and index them in a giant catalog. When a person uses a search engine to find web sites in a certain category, they type in “key words” or “key phrases” describing the subject they are searching for. The search engine then looks at its index to find the best matches for that key phrase and displays its results for the user to select from. Exactly how each search engine ranks web sites is something that web designers are continually trying to figure out, but there are some things that ARE known about them.

Utilizing these known factors when creating a website is important in ensuring that the website will appear high in the rankings when a user looks for a category that the website fulfills. The higher the website is listed in search engine results, the more likely it is that the website will get people visiting it. Higher rankings in search engines may also lead to increased credibility in the eyes of potential customers, and could lead to a higher number of visitors who will also become customers.

NOTE: The percentage of people visiting a website who become customers is called the website’s “conversion rate”.

Although there are hundreds of search engines on the internet, most people only use an important handful. Google, MSN, Yahoo, AOL, and the Open Directory Project constantly search the internet for new websites, so even without paying a service to submit your website to them a website should be crawled within 2-4 months. Once a website is listed with these major search engines, the smaller engines should pick up the website automatically.

NOTE: You should only pay to submit a website to a search engine if you need it to be listed right away.

Businesses today have a great need for web designers who can create a search engine friendly website for their company, and often pay thousands of dollars to have their website “analyzed” and reworked for search engine optimization. Successful optimization can actually be accomplished in a series of simple steps.

About the Author: Visit Alexandra DeBoer at http://www.chadandrewsgraphics.com.

Are you interested in tapping into the vast internet market, but you are not sure the best way to go about it? Do you have an amazing product or service and a fantastic website, but you are not getting traffic and buyers to support it?

If you could find a way to get a 700% return on your advertising investment would you be interested?

If you have been disappointed by pay-per-click services and the small amount of traffic they bring in, you need to check out the newest trend in the pay-per-click business-double targeting. Double-targeting brings individuals to your website after screening them for their level of interest. In other words, you only get visitors who are serious buyers, instead of those who are just clicking around for the fun of it. This kind of targeting is more productive, it is simple to set up, and it will pay off with big dividends in the end.

How exactly does double-targeting work? When someone types a keyword they are sent to a content site. Your ad is featured on the site. Once the customer clicks on your ad, they have now expressed not only initial interest in your type of product, but also in your specific business and product. This eliminates false clicks from those who are not really interested in buying and also those who are looking for a different product or service altogether. You will only be paying for clicks of people who really are interested in what you have to offer.

However, there is a new kind of advertising available that is easier to use, more cost-effective, and more productive. Double-targeting is a new kind of pay-per-click advertising that is emerging as a leader in the new online advertising arena. With double-targeting potential customers type in a keyword or phrase and are sent to a content site. Your ad is on the site. When the customer clicks again on your site they have demonstrated a specific interest in your product or service. This narrows down the people who visit your site to those who are most likely to buy. You will not get a bunch of false clicks to pay for that will be of no value to your business.

You will not find a more effective way of bringing customers to your site. Customers that really want to buy your service or product. You will be able to concentrate on the other aspects of your business as customers come pouring in.

With Fix My Traffic bring you this type of traffic. You will be able to focus on your key elements of your business. Don’t ever let another client slip through the cracks.

About the Author, Jessica Vandervilts: Jessica is contributor and visitor of Fix My Traffic, where you can find more of her articles. Or visit: http://www.fixmytraffic.com