Traffic Flow SEO

One of my favorite Google tools, Google Analytics has been down since last Saturday night (7/28). While no one is sure when it will be back online, Google has placed a message on their Analytics Blog which can be seen here with an update and information.

It is good to know that they mention no data will be lost. Also, an update will be posted to the Blog as soon as everything is back online (if you don't see it in your stats first).

It has also been speculated around the SEO community that this outage may be associated with a bigger update at Google that may include the next PR update. That would be great as many have been waiting impatiently for the last month or so for this update.

While no one really knows the exact date of the next Google PageRank (PR) update, except maybe Google what is know is that it usually happens about four (4) times a year resulting in around one (1) update every quarter or so.

As everyone seems to want to guess when the next one is coming you can find people's guesses and other interesting info on threads about these updates at places on the Web like Digital Point Forums. One thread in particular has had over 1,680 posts since June 2nd.

There is also a great history resource available at SEO Company Canada that lists every update since July of 2000.

In the end, no one really knows exactly when the next one is coming, all we do know is that history tells us it should be on its way in the near future!

Have you ever wanted to check out a site or directory and see if they are applying any ‘no follow’ code to any outbound links? If so, you probably had to spend a little time looking through the site’s code and/or use some tool to check it. Well it just a got a whole lot easier as I found out when I downloaded and installed the latest versions of Quirk’s SearchStatus Firefox add-on (version 1.20). It has a great ‘no follow’ highlighter that is incredibly helpful when reviewing sites for possible link partners. It is very simple and all you have to do once you have installed the add-on is turn on the ‘no follow’ highlighter by right clicking the symbol next to the SearchStatus toolbar and check it.

Once the ‘no follow’ highlighter is checked when you visit a page you can easily and quickly see which links are ‘no follow’ links by looked at what is highlighted. SearchStatus is not just a ‘no follow’ link highlighter is also includes rankings in Alexa and Compete, Google PR ranking, a keyword highlighter, a listing of the number of indexed pages, Meta tags and more.

Check it out at – Search Status 1.20 (for Firefox)

Many people choose to host their Website on a shared server, usually as a cost saving measure. While shared servers offer considerable savings do you have any idea what sites are being hosted with yours, do you care? You should. A bad site on your server could create problems for everyone. There have been other services to help figure out what sites you are sharing server space with, but recently I found a new site with a nice and easy (Web 2.0ish) interface called, 'myIPneighbors'. It makes it easy to reveal who is being hosted along with your site(s).

You can check it out at - myIPneighbors.com

After seeing this you may consider moving your site(s) to a better neighborhood, for more information check out the discussions at the premiere Web hosting forum - WebHosting TALK - Good luck!

If you want to get some cool and detailed stats on a domain look no further than the new Web-based tool at dnSCoop. In addition to the forum, directory and hosting reviews, dnScoop offers a tool that allows you to enter a domain and it will extract (in a very pleasant Web 2.0 looking layout) all kinds of data for you. The data includes approximate domain age, current PR, inbound links, traffic rank (via Alexa), indexed pages (in Google, Yahoo, AlltheWeb, AltaVista and MSN), an interesting domain name IP report, text link values (via Text-Link-Ads) and a cool site value estimate.

Check it out now at - dnScoop

Have you been struggling to get some reasonably priced high PR links from quality Web sites? Why not make a donation to a good cause and get that quality link you have been look for? There are many high PR sites on the Web dying for contributions ranging from $5 to $100 that would just love to give you that link from their contributor’s page. Below is a small list to get you started:

Cacti – a complete network graphing solution.
PR6 - Donation page Contributor’s page -$5 minimum, appears to be permanent.

Moodle - a course management system designed to help educators who want to create quality online courses.
PR6 - Donations/Contributor's page - $50 minimum (for a link, the more you pay the higher you appear on the page), appears to be permanent and also an added bonus of being a '.org' backlink.

Open Wall – a resource for finding open source software to help bring security to open environments.
PR 7 – Donations/Contributor’s page - $100 minimum, appears to be permanent.

In the next few days eSyndiCat Web directory software pricing will be going up. Currently they offer an unlimited license (set-up as many directories as you want) for only $149. This is a steal for anyone creating their own directory empire. The new pricing will be $249, which is still a good deal, just not as good as $149....:-)


Also, I believe that the new version 2.2 (coming soon) offers some cool new features link a deep links mod!

Check out the deal at eSyndiCat.

Smart PageRank (beta) is a new Website that offers a interesting twist on monitoring the PageRank (PR) value of your Website. It allows you to submit your email address which they will use to communicate with you when there has been any updates to your Website PR. This is a nice service by itself, but the site also offers some additional information that you might find interesting including PR ranking in up to 67 datacenters, the age of domain (in detail, not rounded off), Alexa rankings, DMOZ and Yahoo directory listings, backlink checker, indexed pages checker and Website value estimate (which is probably not that accurate, but interesting).

Check it out now at - Smart PageRank.

How many search engines can you name? Probably 5-10 at most, but there are others out there and some of them offer some pretty cool features and have some interesting search results. Well the guys at Alt Search Engines have their top 100 list ready for July. Click here to visit the list of top 100 alternative search engines.

Also, check out the top 10 mobile search engines!

Watching this is a like watching a car accident. You don't want to see it, but you just can't help yourself. Watch at your own risk...:-)

Have you ever been in your favorite forum and noticed people selling the signature links at the bottom of their posts? One of my favorite forums is Digital Point and I have seen many people sell one or more of their signatures links (Digital Point allows up to four) to make a little extra money. I guess I never realized that there was such an organized approach to selling signature links until I found the forum to end all signature link forums - Sig-Link. Check it out and see what your posts are worth....:-)

Apparently the 'Rumor of the Day' is that Microsoft wants to desperately get some additional traction in the Web world and is going to try and buy Facebook.com. Since most of their recent efforts have been less than stellar and more of a 'me to' catch-up approach, why not buy yourself some additional presence? They may want it, but it may not be for sale - read all about it at Internet Outsider.

Just noticed that iwebtool.com has added some cool new tools.

List Cleaner
&
IP Location

Have fun!

Search Engine Land has opened it's new social network, Sphinn. At first glance it looks like a great place for the SEO/SEM community. I am getting ready to register and will provide an updated opinion in the coming weeks....:-)

Are you familiar with the Google of China? If not, it is called Baidu and it is very popular among China's large population (1,321,851,888 estimate as of July 2007). I have noticed some of my English sites starting to get indexed and actually receiving traffic from Baidu.

I wanted to optimize my sites and recently came across a great blog post at China SEO Blog that has some great tips on getting and staying indexed within Baidu.

Baidu site submission

I wanted to share some of my favorite FREE Web marketing resources. Some of them are print and some are electronic - see list below:

Website Magazine - A great printed and electronic magazine covering all aspects of running a Web site from SEO to programming.

Revenue Magazine - A printed and electronic magazine that covers everything abotu making money with your Web site from Affiliate programs to AdSense advice.

Make Millions and Make Change - An electronic book broken into chapters that is an incredible resource that provides practical and useful Web business advice.

The Marketing Pilgrim Essays - An electronic collection of essays from leading industry individuals that contain advice and information on SEO and Web marketing advice.

SEO Fast Start - A great getting started in SEO electronic book.

Good luck and enjoy!

Another Monday, another bought company. This time it is Postini, a leader in on-demand communications security and compliance solutions. To learn more check out the links below:

Info and response - Search Engine Roundtable

Google Press Release

I get asked a lot about how to find free keyword research tools, so I decided to make a quick list of some of the more popular tools (Web-based and downloadable). They are not listed in any particular order:

Keyword Tracker (free edition)

Keyword Discovery (free tool)

Google's Traffic Estimator

Yahoo's Traffic Estimator (via a little outdated and slow Overture database)

SEO Book's Traffic Estimator

Digital Point's Keyword Tracker

wordpot.com

Good Keywords (download software)

Good luck on your keyword research!

Just got an email from Adrian who owns Directory Share and the upcoming dValuation.com and he shared with me that everything is hush, hush at dValuation.com and that as soon as he was ready to release this new service to directory owners we would be getting EXCLUSIVE information 24 hours prior to launch! Make sure to stayed tuned for more updates, this looks to be an exciting new addition to the Web directory community!

I was just poking my head around the Digital Point Forums and was reading some new posts by a guy who is incredible at making PHP Link Directory (PHPLD) mods and noticed a new link in his signature (by the way he also owns Directory Share - check it out). This link took me to a site that is running a pretty cool teaser track for an upcoming project that looks to help directory owners. If I can read a little into it, it may be a a new list of directories with a new twist. Check it out for yourself at dValuation.com.

P.S. I have requested more info to share and will post if and when I hear anything...:-)

I recently saw a great article on using Flickr in your SEO efforts. You can check it out at Search Engine Roundtable.

I run some Web directories and I am constantly amazed at what crappy sites people submit. Usually they are some type of AdSense templated site with little to no value or some affiliate program with a URL like www.affiliate_program_name.com/x123hh67. Sometimes they are placeholders without an actual site yet or they are someone's blog which has not been updated since 2005 and only contains one entry. I wonder if these submitters actually think that I would ever consider approving their sites? It must be like spam, if you submit to enough directories (usually free ones) some of them will probably overlook it and you will get accepted (I suspect this usually happens with the newer directory owners who have not seen thousands of these sites before - I once fell for them too, early on as I was just excited anyone wanted to submit to my little directory). I wish these sites would all go away as they are a complete waste of time for me and serve no purpose but to get a cheap, misleading buck off some unsuspecting Web surfer while clogging up search engine results.

This is just my little soapbox rant as I am reviewing the thousands of sites waiting for approval in one of my free directories and realizing that almost 95% of them are just crap!

Who could not just love a new search engine where it's namesake logo appears to have eyes that follow your mouse movements and as a bonus is also from Russia? Not me, so go check-out gogo.ru and be bedazzled....:-)

Is Business.com still for sale? How much is it worth if it is for sale? I have heard a lot as of late. It first started while reading an interview with Jessica Bowman, the director of SEO at Business.com on the Aviva Directory Blog. The story was entitled, "What Everyone Ought To Know About Business.com" where an offer of 20% a submission was offered. I thought this was nice, since I had never seen any discounts for Business.com submission previously. After that I started reading for and more about Business.com being for sale. The pricing in articles I read said that Business.com was worth somewhere between 300 and 400 million dollars. I originally thought that maybe they were offering discounts to pump up their submissions to make it look better on paper before the sale, but in the last couple of weeks I have not heard much. Maybe it has cooled down and Business.com is not actually for sale, or maybe it still is - only time will tell.

Article in paidContent.org

Article in Search Engine Journal

Article in Searchviews

Article in Reuters

It is not an easy business, but some do well buying and selling domains. I had recently found a new online expiring domain research tool that I found rather interesting. Below is a link to this tool.

Dropscout - Free expired domain name research.

You may also enjoy the wonderful domain information provided by the Seven Mile blog from world famous domain investor Frank Schilling.

If it is not acquired by Google before it goes live (no pun intended), My Live Search has a chance at being an interesting new search engine. Instead of pulling from an indexed database that may or may not be out of date, My Live Search treats your browser as very fast spider to instantly crawl for relevant results in real time. Seems like an awesome task, but Rob Gabriel the creator of this new engine seems to believe that he can produce better, more relevant results in 'real time'.

You can read more by clicking here.

Check out the My Live Search Homepage by clicking here.