I know I said we would work on details for getting the Google update working - I'm running a bit short on time getting ready for vacation and thunderstorms popping up in the middle of things.

So we'll regroup and resume posting on or about July 12th.

Till then enjoy your summer and remember to take some time to smell the roses.

Tim

I know I said we would work on details for getting the Google update working - I'm running a bit short on time getting ready for vacation and thunderstorms popping up in the middle of things.

So we'll regroup and resume posting on or about July 12th.

Till then enjoy your summer and remember to take some time to smell the roses.

Tim

So what exactly is the google site map service -

It basically tells Google when to spider your site.... who wouldn't want to be able to do that.
So you could get Google to crawl pages that are deep within your site - and / or let them know when you make changes to your site.

Either way it is a win win situation.

Tomorrow we'll talk more about creating the actual site map.

Happy Monday - hopefully you had a wonderful weekend.

This week is going to be short for us - no posts on Friday - no posts next week.

This week we're going to be talking about Google sitemaps - and overview is here -
https://www.google.com/webmasters/sitemaps

Don't stress about it - we'll go into a step by step process.

For now though make sure to create a Google account if you don't have one yet.

Special Deal -

Get a $100 gift from Sandals for purchasing this -
http://webmaster.sitesell.com/blitzpromotions.html

If you like art... or just want to take a some time off, then check out the Louvre.

http://www.louvre.fr/llv/musee/alaune.jsp?bmLocale=en

Have a great weekend!!

If your site depends on Google News Service for some or all of your traffic then this might be of interest to you -

Long Link

So what does this mean - don't ever put all of your eggs in one basket.

First some informative threads on the Bourbon update -

http://www.webproworld.com/viewtopic.php?t=46557
http://toprank.blogspot.com/2005/06/googleguy-answers-google-bourbon.html
http://www.webmasterworld.com/forum30/29727-2-10.htm

The main thing I believe that Google did on this update was to remove things with duplicate content. You can find sites that may have your content by going here -

http://www.copyscape.com/

So what steps can you take -

1) Offers to provide you with "content" should be taken with a grain of salt - if they are sending it to you , then they will be sending it to hundreds of other folks as well.

2) If you write an article that is going to be an optimization page - put it on only one page - you may link to it from other pages, but don't send it out to others.

3) If you are sending it to others then realize the page won't be ranked well - but again put it on only one page within your sites.

4) If you have duplicate content within your sites work on making only one instance of the content - link that content from other places if you wish - delete the page where the dups were at.

Have a great day.

Hope you enjoyed your weekend - this week we'll be working on continuing our discussions on the patent from Google - with some tidbits on what the recent Google update "Bourbon". We'll start talking about Bourbon tomorrow and go from there.

Enjoy your Monday.

An awesome speach by Steve Jobs can be found at the link below - some great tidbits on business and life -

http://news-service.stanford.edu/news/2005/june15/jobs-061505.html

Enjoy your weekend!!

Before we left Google had an update - on one of the forums we frequent "Google Guy" gives some hints about the changes -

http://www.webmasterworld.com/forum30/29727-2-10.htm

You can click on his user profile and gain some useful information. The main thing is that as with algo changes most of them aren't done all at once - so wait for a bit before making any drastic changes.

Have a good one.

As you know anytime I go on a trip somewhere I try to learn something - so what did I learn from this trip?

My Grandfather made a big impact on a lot of people -

1) He called people on their birthdays and anniversarys - he had a huge book with names / dates and phone numbers (at least 300+ or so). Without fail on that special day you would get a phone call from him. The minister at the funeral asked how many had been called and of the 500 or so in attendance probably 3/4ths raised their hands.

2) He truly cared about young people - sports events, graduations, plays, youth group meetings, he was there. You could tell from the number of young people at the funeral that he had made a difference in a lot of their lives.

So what does this have to do with running your business. If you truly care about your customers they will know - and tell others.

Have a wonderful day!
Tim

You might have noticed we weren't around last week - we were out of town attending my Grandfather's funeral. It's piled up a bit around here but hopefully tomorrow we'll get back to our normal posting.

Tim

More info from -
http://www.marketposition.com/mp-0505.htm

and the patent -

quote -

High scores are also assigned based on the amount of time a user spends on a page. But how can Google know how long you're browsing a page and whether or not you accessed it from your bookmarks? Now you know what things like My Search History and the Google Toolbar are really for (cue ominous-sounding music).

And what happens if people used to spend 30 seconds on average looking at a page, but now only spend an average of 5 seconds looking at that same page? You got it. Page score goes down.

end quote -

So how can you make them spend longer on the page -

Again -

1) Provide useful - updated information.
2) Explain things that may be obvious to you - ie how to use that uber fishing fly to catch more fish.
3) Offer tips on the use of the product.
4) Offer uses for the product that they might not have thought of.
5) Provide customer testimonials.

Tomorrows issue today -

Check out these funnies -

http://www.marketingsherpa.com/sample.cfm?contentID=2994

One other note my grandpa is very ill - they live in Oregon and one of his requests was for me to be part of his funeral. He has lived a rich full life, but they don't expect him to live for the next week or two.

This means that their could be some delay in blog postings. We plan on taking our laptop, but we will only be checking emails a couple of times a day. Please do keep us in your thoughts and prayers.

Have a good weekend.

We continue with some clues from the patent -

Taken from -
http://www.marketposition.com/mp-0505.htm

Traffic, Clicks and User data -

Quote -
The patent implies that Google is tracking not just how many clicks a search result is getting, but also what kind of traffic is going to the page in question. Higher relevance is awarded to pages that are accessed through browser bookmarks, for instance, since those pages are assumed to be more valuable to searchers.
End Quote -

So....

1. Make sure your site is interesting.
2. Make sure your let your visitor know that you make changes - so it is important to bookmark your site.
3. Give them instructions on how to book mark it.
4. Offer useful / relavent information besides just trying to sell something - such as....

Your selling jewelry - give them some useful tips on how to keep it clean, how to get it appraised, tips on storing it etc. The more useful information you give them the more likely they will be to bookmark it.

More info tomorrow.

Hope you enjoyed your weekend - what was your score on the quiz?

Today feels like Monday so we're catching up - tomorrow we'll start working on continuing our discussion on the patent.

Till then enjoy your Tuesday!!

First hope everyone enjoys their holiday weekend - we won't be posting on Monday but will resume on Tuesday.

If you have a chance - take the SEO Quiz -

http://www.socengine.com/seo/guide/seomoz-quiz.php

If we get a chance we'll do the same and post our scores on Tuesday as well.

Continuing our discussion on the patent - possible changes on the google algo.

Again taken from here - http://www.marketposition.com/mp-0505.htm

RATE OF DOCUMENT CHANGE -

What helps :

Blog or News pages that change frequently.
Greater weight is given to changes in the title .... hmm.


What doesn't:

Changes to nav bars - navigation structure
Java / Ads etc.

The rate of change -

If you accelerate the rate of change you're given more credit - so monitor your competitors - note their rate of change if any.

Make it a goal to goal slow - say change every month or so - if your competition increases their rate of change then you do the same - to every couple of weeks.

So how can you take advantage of the changes / coming changes in the last lesson.

1) Make a list of your top ten or so competitors.

On your spreadsheet list -
1) Terms
2) What postion they are in Google.
3) Start monitoring the page changes - update when they changed / what changed.
4) Do this for a month or two.
5) Monitor their positions -

It may actually take more than a month or two to find a trend.

So what is an easy way to monitor page changes - you can find out more information from this site.

http://www.thegrid.org.uk/about/help/updates.shtml

http://searchenginewatch.com/searchday/article.php/2178631

So what can we learn from that patent application -

Make sure to read the complete newsletter here -

http://www.marketposition.com/mp-0505.htm

We'll just be adding our comments to the discussion -

Document Age:

First - think for a moment - which page do you think should rank higher.

1) A page that has been online a week.
2) A page that has been online for three years.

Note that I didn't say changed last week - but has been online a week.

Google obviously likes fresh / content. I agree with the article that probably in instances where newer topics are discussed that fresher pages may prevail -- but if your optimizing for fishing lures then older - fresh pages are key.

So take away things -

1) Old pages can be made fresh with content updates and getting fresh links to them from other sites. If you're still getting all the links to your home page it's time to mix things up.
2) If you redesign your site it is now even more important to keep the structure.

We'll talk more about the patent tomorrow.

Market position posted an excellent newsletter - please take a moment and review it -

http://www.marketposition.com/mp-0505.htm

Most important (and something we'll be discussing some tomorrow and Weds) is the patent application and what it may mean for your site.