Category — Internet Traffic

I am, by no means, an expert on the subject. Everything stated below are simple things that I have observed about my searching habits, the searching habits of others around me, and my Adwords account. Take my advice at your own risk.

Biding top dollar for Google Adwords will probably bring you the most traffic. However, I feel that one can achieve desirable results in the Pay-Per-Click advertising model with a little creativity and with much less money.

Ever since I started advertising through Google Adwords, I have put in many hours of research, and have been more observant to my own searching habits and of others around me.

Being a bargain shopper, I truly believe that biding top dollar for Google Adwords is not always the best idea, especially when you lack deep pockets and/or your niche requires popular search phrases like “buy domains.”

Instead, I feel that having a clever or humorous ad near the middle of the page can be almost as effective.

When people search Google, typically they are not looking for someone to sell them something in an advertisement. Instead, they are looking for keywords which suggest a solution to their problem.

One thing I noticed about my own search habits is that I usually keep my eyes on the left column at least half way down the page before I even glance at the ads on the right. Usually if I am not seeing what I am looking for in the regular search results I look to see if there is anything of interest in the ads section.

When this happens my eyes are already about three quarters the way down the page and scroll from bottom to top (not top to bottom) on my way up to redefine my search terms. That means that I would see ad number 4 or 5 before I ever found ad number 1.

Since I do a lot of things differently than others, this trend really did not occur to me until I started noticing some of my friends and coworkers had similar searching habits. In fact, I think more people do this than you would think.

The same idea can be applied to web browsing also. Since people do not typically browse websites looking for ads, its safe to say that the ads are not viewed until at least the introductory paragraph is read if not the majority of the page.

If you think about it, if this wasn’t true then ads would have a much higher click-through rating than they do now. In fact, almost everyone would be clicking on ads because they would be specifically looking for them. If it wasn’t true ad biding would be less competitive. You wouldn’t need to bid as much because you would get a good amount of traffic from biding only the minimum.

As I stated before, this method is probably not better than simply having a fat wallet to run your ads. Great ads that appear at the top of the page will most likely always perform the best. However, this method is certainly an option to the rest of us just starting a business while living off of Top Ramen and tap water or just trying to conserve money.

If your looking for a bargain way to get traffic to your site, write a clever ad and place it in a lower spot. You may be surprised with the results.

Adwords, making money online, Adsense, ppc, pay per click, online niche

-E

Will Ferrell Owes His Landlord Rent Money!

The Crocodile Hunter, Steve Irwin, Meets Ross The Intern From Jay Leno

Funny Email Forwards: Tongue Twister Joke

Technorati Tags: Adwords, making money online, Adsense, ppc, pay per click, online niche

Some friends and I are finally starting the web development business that we have talked about since the first year of college. So during the past five years, I have done a lot of research on web development and now I have an extensive list of resources for web developers.

Well spring is in the air and it’s time to clean out those developer links that I have accumulated over the years.

So hear they are, I hope they are as useful to others as they have been to me.

General Web Developer Resources

A step-by-step guide to becoming a freelance web developer

Web developer Firefox extensions

Things that web developers should always do for clients

101 resources for freelancers

Open Source Web Design

Quick reference cheat sheet

Preview Stylesheet

Development trends

Design Layouts

Fonts and Text

Preview fonts

500 free fonts

Font database

Lorem Ipsum generator

Search Engine

Submit your sites to the major search engines

A Google Tech Talk about internet security

Google search tools collection

Google webmasters central

Colors

Color palette generator

Web Color Picker

Color Shades

Color Whore

Color Codes reference

Tricks and Other Useful Information

Ways to hide an email on a webpage

Learn linux in 10 minutes

Tips for new IRC users

Smart ways to redirect a webpage

htaccess - prevent hot linking your images

-E

Technorati Tags: Web, Developer, Reference, Tools

More than two years ago I attended a convention for aspiring startup founders called Startup School hosted by Paul Graham and the entrepreneurs at the Y-Combinator. One of the guest speakers (also an employee at Google) that I had the privilege to meet, has a nice writeup about how to propose a business deal with Google. Since he is the le ‘azon of such deals, I would pay attention.

Highlights from the article:

Email Rules - Phones are very yesterday.

Thesis Statements - Lead with what you want.

Threats don’t work - A surprising number of people write to me saying “If you do not act in 5 days I am taking this to Microsoft . . . ” or “This note will be forwarded to Terry Semel . . . ” I am very inclined to let those proposals go.

Differentiate - Tell me right away why you guys are different and what comparative advantage you have on the market.

Google is Bottom-up - That last point reminds me that Google buying/partnering decisions are made bottom-up. Meaning, product managers and engineers are your ultimate clients.

Read the full post

-E

Most websites suck, but many people and most businesses still have one

People pay anywhere from $100 to $20,000 to develop and maintain a website, for which, they will gain little or no return on.

Success of a website usually depends more on the content of the site rather than just the look. Furthermore, getting returning visitors takes more than the “If you build it, they will come” approach.

Most websites suck because they lack a direct purpose

Everyday people put up blind sites that have no direction or clearly stated purpose. That’s fine, as long as you understand no one is going to use your site except for you and that your probably not going to make any money.

Since there is an estimated 80 million websites and on average, web surfers spend less than 8 seconds on a web page before deciding whether to move on or not.

The odds are not in your favor.

Keeping your audience is usually achieved by placing great titles in larger fonts near the top of your page. A clear and concise statement about your page usually decides the fate of your site. This helps with search engine page rank too!

Most websites suck because they lack good content

In other words, if your site doesn’t deliver what it promises in its purpose, people will not find it useful. This may sound like a no-brainer, but you’d be surprised at how many websites lack good content (Hint: Get Rich Quick sites that tell you “how to” after you buy their book).

By improving and increasing your useful content you not only increase the chances that people will visit your site, you will also increase the odds that people will read what you have to say.

So you have a concise purpose and you have your useful content, now you need to make sure your content is interesting.

Most websites suck because they are not interesting

Not many people want to read dictionary style writing in MLA essay form. Nobody except your mother cares about what you ate for lunch (unless, of course, you run a food review site).

Good content gets a read once, great content gets a returning audience, hungry for more. So, spice it up a bit. Make it happy, or sad, or compelling - do something to grasp your audience and keep them coming back for more.

Also, don’t be afraid to have a little fun with your writings. It will make it more interesting for your readers and more interesting for you. After all, if your not interested, can you really expect others to be?

Now go on and revise those old, boring web pages of yours!

-E

Technorati Tags: Websites that suck, Websites, Good Website, Best Websites, Content, Entrepreneurship, Get Rich Quick, Web Traffic, Blog, Blogging, Make Money Online

As the old saying goes, “don’t put all your eggs in one basket” (no Easter pun intended), is still true today with regards to making money online. The internet changes so fast that what may be a excellent income stream today, may be gone tomorrow with little notice. That is why I recommend using the following tips to grow your online business presence.

Think Simple. Simple ideas are, well, simpler, both to implement and maintain. Leave the big ones to the big guys. Take the new domain naming service CleverSiteNames.com, for instance. Simple idea, endless possibilities.

Take each idea, feature, and business step by step. As Tina Seelig says, “You can do it all, just not all at once.” Break down your problems and solve them bit by bit, not as a whole. Your results will come much quicker.

Automation is your friend. Automate anything that can be automated. Software like WordPress has gazillions of plug-ins - feel free to take advantage of them, in fact, feel like your getting the bad end of the stick if your not using them. It will save you time and frustration. This is especially true if you are running multiple popular websites and/or online businesses. There are only so many hours in the day. Wouldn’t you rather be spending time with family, doing a hobby, or starting another business anyway?

Traffic is King, but the content which dictates traffic is Queen. Its like the saying goes “getting initial customers is expensive, getting sustained customers is where the money is.” (I’m just full of sayings today!) The same rule is true on websites, even if you are not selling anything per se. Without great content, it is difficult to get anyone to return to your site more than once.

User driven and constantly changing sites give people a reason to return. I’m not talking about layout, though. Change that rarely or you will probably piss off a lot of people and prevent them from coming back. I’m talking about content. Update and add new content often. You may not notice immediate effects, but in the long run, your traffic is likely to expand as your content grows.

-E

Technorati Tags: Multiple, Online, Business, Traffic, User Driven, Content, Wordpress, CleverSiteNames.com, Domain Name, Naming, Easter, Simple, Automation, Simple Business Idea

1. Participate in your topic of interest on and off-line

Post on forums, message boards, etc to get people seeing your site out there. However, don’t be annoying with it. Do it where it is needed and leave it out when it is not. Don’t post it like an advertisement. Be subtle about it but to the point. For instance, if you were to give advice that relates to your site on a message board, this would be an instance when a link to your site would be appropriate.

2. Link out to other sites that you get your info from

Link to similar sites that you like. Do it in a section or a sidebar of your site and especially within the text if you can.

3. Tell the searches about your site. Don’t just wait.

All the big players allow you to tell them about your site. Although it may be days or even weeks before they get around to indexing it, it will still probably get indexed quicker than simply waiting for their spiders to crawl your site. Take advantage of it.

4. Network with people who have similar interests and have them link in to your site.

Many sites will be willing to link to you if you link to them. Take a look at some of your favorite sites and blogs to see if they offer anything like that. If not, then ask. The worse that they can say is no.

-E

Technorati Tags: Internet Traffic, Web Traffic, Traffic to your website, Blog, Blog Traffic, Network, Social Network, Digg, Reddit, Technorati, Forums, Yahoo Answers, Google Groups, Sitemap, Search Engines