Are you wondering why you don't come up high in the search engine list?

Another Way to Support Each Other Through Cooperation, not Competition

Our Business Directory is designed to help you achieve good ranking in the search engines by being a highly trafficked site that links directly to yours. Read the article below to find out why that's so important. In case you aren't familiar with SEO (Search Engine Optimization) I am including an article that will be in the May/June 2008 issue of Lotus Guide explaining it. I can't over emphasize the importance of "Sharing Links" also known as "Reciprocal Links." Bottom line, in simple terms, search engines rate your website importance by analyzing the people you link to and that are linked to you. If you have gone to the trouble and expense to put up a website you may as well work a little more so people can find you when they search. One-third of Lotus Guide visitors are new and find us through GOOGLE. Another thing you can do is list your website with GOOGLE Analytics. You will get a weekly report telling you how many people visited your website, how they found you, which pages they visited and how long they were on your website...very valuable information because if visitors are going to your website and staying 30 seconds you need to do something to hold their interest and get them engaged. I highly encourage you to take the time to read the following article.

Link Popularity and Relevance

The key to getting your website to the top of the search engines, especially Google (75% of all searches today), is to understand link popularity and relevance. While there are many factors that contribute to your websites ranking in the search engines, these two factors are Googles most important. Link popularity means that other websites have links to your website. Relevance means that the content of the site that is linking to you is relevant to the page on your site that it links to. Link Popularity can be accomplished in many ways. Find websites that are similar to yours and trade links with them. As an example, say you have a Massage business and you specialize in 3 types of massage, Acupressure, Swedish , and Lymphatic. You develop 3 pages on your website that explains in great detail what each one is and the benefits of each. Sprinkle throughout the text hyperlinks to other websites on the net that also explain in detail the methods and benefits of each. Get in contact with the owner of the other website and ask for a link back to your page or site from them. Add links within the text to other pages on your site as well. Internal link popularity matters also. Another way to gain link popularity is to do local online advertising wherever you can. Google likes links from local websites because it assumes that local is better. Many local organizations such as chambers of commerce and community information sites offer free links. Take advantage of this wherever you can. Relevance is a little more difficult to understand. It is related to link popularity. When Google searches your website it looks for outbound links and compares the content on your webpage with content on the page it has an outbound link to. When the content on the two pages of the different sites is similar (important: NOT the same) then your ranking goes up. Google gives you better ranking results when it determines that your website is REALLY USEFUL to visitors and when your visitors can read your site and find useful links to other sites that you link to with similar information, then it raises your ranking. Google also considers your inbound links in a similar fashion (link popularity) If the site that is linking to you has similar information as your webpage, then Google determines that the two pages are “Relevant” to each other and gives you a higher ranking factor.

Other secrets to Organic Website Marketing

To Banner or Not to Banner, that is the question. While it is a true that the click through rate on banners is low, don't underestimate the value of a banner in your website marketing campaign. Banners provide branding for your business as well as links to your website. Remember link popularity discussed above? Banners count as links in the link popularity rankings so have banners readily available to exchange with others and give to other websites to link back to your website. Make sure that you're getting a link and not just a banner. It must be a banner link! Keywords and meta-tags are also important. Meta-tags are ‘hidden’ words embedded in the underlying code of your website that help your rankings. If you don't know about them, ask your website developer. Make sure that your keywords and description and title tags are unique and relevant for each page. Also make sure that the content of the page uses the same words and phrases that are in your title, description and keywords. Content is King. Perhaps you've heard this before. It’s been around for 8-10 years and it has never been more important than it is today. If you can, have a page for each part of your business and talk it up on that page, i.e. lots of words about the topic with links out to other websites with similar topics (relevance ranking, remember?) then you are well on the way to a successful natural website marketing program.

Top Ranking Factors and Some Negative Factors

Here is a short list of positive ranking factors:

• User of Key Word in Title Tag.
• Age of Site
• Keyword Use in Body
• Relevance of Inbound Links
• Text of Inbound Link
• Popularity of Site on Topic
• Link Popularity of Linking Site
• Freshness of content
• Link Popularity within the Site
• Header Tag Relevance

Here is a short list of negative ranking factors:

• Server inaccessible
• Duplicate content
• Low Quality of outbound links
• Link Schemes
• Keyword Spamming - Overuse
• Duplicate Keywords/Descriptions

Organic Search Engine marketing can be a lot of fun because it involves telling in words what you tell your customers every day. It’s important in any search engine optimization (SEO) program to monitor your results for effectiveness and make changes regularly. While it can be time consuming the long term benefits are great. You may want to hire the services of a professional to assist in certain components that are difficult. All website developers are familiar with the concepts described here and regular communication with your webmaster about your website are very important. Enjoy the benefits of Natural Website Marketing.

About the Author

Andy Main is the owner of AccessNow.com, a Redding and Chico based Internet service provider. He has been building websites and performing SEO (Search Engine Optimization) for customers for over 10 years. Access Now is the owner of many north state city sites such as Chico.com, Shasta.com, Redding.net, Oroville.com, RedBluff.com, YubaCity.com and Marysville.com and recently launched InstantYellowPages.com as a way for local business websites to increase their rankings in the search engines with outside links that include keywords, text descriptions, products, banners and links. Questions can be directed to This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.