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Are Banner Ads Worth It? The statistics tell the tale.
Most people on the Internet today simply ignore banner ads and move on to other things. Why so much skepticism in the media about Banner Ads? Well, I hate to burst your bubble, but Web Banner Ads are a proven thing. If you don’t believe me, check...
Link Popularity and PageRank (PR) misconceptions and facts
In this article I'll try to demystify Link Popularity and
PageRank, or PR, clarify some common misconceptions and tell you
how things work, in plain English, with facts and examples. Link
Popularity is based on the premise that people link to...
Postcard marketing for tourism industry - The great cheap marketing tool
As a travel agent marketer, or a hotel promotion, all you need is a good marketing tool is a cheap cost and high effect, contribute to the brand building and create a good relation with your visitors.
These things can be obtained when you use...
SEO: SEOelite software a best tool for SEO
SEO is the process of optimizing the site. There
are many criteria for optimizing the site. It is very important
to use the ethical ways to optimize the site for its promotion.
We all are very well aware that in SEO the Link Exchange and...
Your site on the first page of Yahoo search engine
Are you ready to know a little powerful secret? A little secret that means 388% of extra-traffic to your site totally free of charge? ..Do you think that I'm gone crazy if I'm telling you that Yahoo! wants your sites on its first page of results?...
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Search Engine Publicity - The Free Ride is Over
For years, almost anyone involved with the promotion of their website, be it for commercial or other purposes, has come to either love, or hate, search engines. Whether it is Yahoo, Google, MSN, Ask Jeeves, or one of the literally thousands of smaller search engines and directories, website owners have known that by “optimizing” their site for search engines, they could hope to rise to the top ranks of a leading search engine when an applicable keyword or phrase was entered in the search engine by a user.
Back in 1997, when I started a small retail website that sells antique maps, http://www.vintagemaps.com , all it took to get indexed in the Yahoo directory was a free submission. My site was dutifully submitted, and within four weeks it was #1 for its most important keyword phrase, and it remained in Yahoo’s top 10 for at least a year. Today, by contrast, it would cost $299 to even submit a commerical site to the Yahoo directory, and there is no guarantee that it will even be indexed!
The world has changed. For observers of the search engine phenomenon, it was only a matter of time before the free ride was over. How could it be otherwise? For years, website owners such as myself had been enjoying vast, and free publicity, courtesy of various search engines and directories. It could not last forever. First came search engine optimization, whereby savvy website owners hired specialists to “tweak” their sites to get better placement on the search engines. As soon as the search engines saw dollars being pumped into search, they began setting up their own payment models, including
“pay-per-click” methods that allow an advertiser to display a small ad, adjacent to the free search results, tied to specific keywords.
2004 is turning out to be the year when the free ride is looking like an endangered species. Everyone is getting into the act: Google, Microsoft, Yahoo, Verizon, and more. The phone company “Yellow Pages” people are growing their internet presence, and all these companies are searching for just the right mix of keyword/pay-per-click/paid directory listing model. Already, the paid options for website promotion far outnumber the old-fashioned search engine placement. Where it will end is anyone’s guess. But what’s for sure is that the free ride is nearly over. Exposure on the Internet, like exposure in the rest of the media, has become a commodity. In the future, many ways of promoting a webiste will resemble advertising models familiar from the non-Internet world. To garner promotional exposure, the website owner will need to expend more resources than ever. Whether the resources are supplied personally by the website owner, or by hired specialists, does not really matter. The new reality is that promotion on the Internet is already looking a lot like promotion everywhere else in the world. Vital, and valuable.
About the Author
Neil Street is co-founder of Small Business Online, based in Wilton, CT., a website design, management, and promotion company dedicated to the Internet needs of the small business. His website is at http://www.smallbusinessonline.net Send email to neil@smallbusinessonline.net He can also be reached at (203)761-7992
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