Web Design Discussion

If you spend a lot of time writing content why not try to profit from it. If you develop multiple ways to market your content you can generate multiple streams of passive income.

Definition of Passive Income

This means you “do it once and get paid forever”.

Here’s a personal example of how I did it:

I created an ebook called “101 Highly Effective Ways to Promote Your Web Site” from the articles I had written over several months. I then built a sales page on my web site with a link to purchase and download the ebook.

I marketed the ebook by continuing to write articles related to the ebook topic and submitting them to article directories and ezines. People would be redirected to the ebook web page from the resource box located at the bottom of each article.

Even though the ebook was written 4 years ago, I still sell several copies a month without doing anything except receive checks from clickbank.

Best ways to turn content into cash

1. Adsense

These are ads that you can insert within your content. When someone clicks on them you get paid per click. The key to making money with adsense ads is correct placement, types of ads (ie link ads, skyscraper ads), amount of ads on your web site and the quality of your content.

2. Reports and ebooks

If their is a high demand for a tutorial showing you how to do something (ie a unique recipe)
you could create a short report of 10 pages and sell it for $7.00. The same can be done with
an ebook (ie create an ebook containing all your own southern cooking recipes) except you
would sell it at a higher price.

3. Multi Media

Re purpose your content by presenting it in video, audio, power point, e-course, home study course, speeches, books, teleseminars, web seminars and transcripts. This enables you to profit from the same content many times over.

Read “How to Re purpose Info Products”

How to begin profiting from content writing

If you want to begin writing articles, just start writing on a topic you are passionate about.
Don’t worry too much about the order of ideas, spelling, grammar etc. You initially just want to get all your ideas out of your mind by letting your creativity flow. You can correct the content later.

After you have created many articles related on the same topic you can repackage them
in a report, ebook or modify them for multi media presentations.

The key to profit from writing content is to take massive action. If you analyze your writing too much you will fall victim to paralysis of analysis and never produce your first
information product that makes money.

If I need to read several articles I always select the article title that grabs my attention.
The same applies to the newspaper. I will scan the news story titles then read what interests me the most. Therefore research your article titles before you submit them for publication.

Benefits of creating effective article titles:

1. Attracts readers.

Your article title should entice the reader to read the content of your article. Try to use descriptive words or action verbs. Instead of saying “dog grooming tips’ try to spice
it up a little by writing “Top 10 dog grooming tips that make your dog shine” This sounds much more exciting and will attract more readers.

2. Attract search engines

Your article title should contain your most targeted keywords. The keywords that get the top number of searches should be placed at the beginning of the title to be the most effective.

Example

If your top keywords are “dog grooming” include them at the beginning of the title ie

dog grooming - top 10 tips to make your dog shine.

The title above allows both visitors and search engines to know what your article is about. The description will help draw visitors to read the rest of the article.

How to research article titles

1. Visit related forums, blogs, article banks

Visiting these areas will often help get your create juices going. You will soon see what article titles capture your attention and provide hundreds of article titles. Don’t copy these titles but use them to create your own attention-grabbing title.

2. Create a list of titles

From your research generate ten or more titles. Each one of them can be used to generate separate articles. You can even write several articles on the same subject if you have different titles to choose from.

3. Generate titles after writing content

If you can’t think of an appropriate title, just start writing the content. This will help get your creative ideas flowing. Based upon the content written it’s much easier to generate attractive titles.

4. Title Brainstormer Tool

If you have a copy of Article Architect, use the brainstormer tool to research article titles.

Here’s how it works:

1. First it asks you to answer these 4 questions:

What will reading the article help the reader do?
How quickly will the reader accomplish the desired goal?
What will the reader get out of reading this article?
How many steps are in this article?

2. Click on the “create headlines” button

The brainstormer will create over 100 titles for you to select from.

Conclusion

A highly effective article title will differentiate your articles from your competitors. Articles that get read generate more subscribers, produce more sales than an ad in a magazine or newspaper. You also get the added benefit of a faster response time because you are marketing your articles online.

If you want to use the Title Brainstormer get a copy of Article Architect . It will streamline your article marketing by researching, creating and submitting your articles all in one location.

CSS menus have much greater versatility than the traditional javascript-based menus placed in tables.

Here are some of the main benefits for CSS Menus:

1. Quickly create horizontal or vertical navigation menus without cluttering up your html code.

2. Fast loading. Search engines can spider the code faster than javascript or flash menus because it generates clean code.

3. Versatile. You have the capability to create horizontal, vertical and drop down navigation menus for any site. You also have the ability to create hover effects and use background images. This gives you alot of creativity in developing the best navigation menu for your web site.

4. Accessibility. A CSS-based navigation menu is accessible to all types of computer users no matter what type of browser, screen resolution or computer they use.

5. Flexibility. If you need to create multiple css menus, use css classes in your web page design.

Recently I had to convert an entire web site’s navigation from using applets (often created using the now defunct Front Page Editor) to a css menu. I had to use multiple css classes (instead of ids) to create multiple horizontal menus.

CSS Horizontal Menu Using Classes

Here’s how the css horizontal menu is displayed on a web page:
http://www.ihost-websites.com/test2.htm

CSS


.navcontainer
{
margin-left: 0;
margin-right: 0;
text-align:center;
}
ul.navlist
{
margin-left: 0;
padding-left: 0;
white-space: nowrap;
}

<div class=”navcontainer”>
<ul class=”navlist”>
<li class=”active”><a href=”#” class=”current”>LINK1</a></li>
<li><a href=”#”>LINK2</a></li>
<li><a href=”#”>LINK3</a></li>
<li><a href=”#”>LINK4</a></li>
<li><a href=”#”>LINK5</a></li>
</ul>
</div>


Here is the same CSS horizontal menu using DIV IDS

CSS


#navcontainer
{
margin-left: 0;
margin-right: 0;
text-align:center;
}
ul#navlist
{
margin-left: 0;
padding-left: 0;
white-space: nowrap;
}

#navlist a:hover
{
color: #fff;
background-color: #369;
text-decoration: none;
}
–>
</style>


HTML


<div id="navcontainer">
<ul id=”navlist”>
<li id=”active”><a href=”#” id=”current”>LINK1</a></li>
<li><a href=”#”>LINK2</a></li>
<li><a href=”#”>LINK3</a></li>
<li><a href=”#”>LINK4</a></li>
<li><a href=”#”>LINK5</a></li>
</ul>
</div>


Have you ever looked for a long time at a blank screen hoping for an article topic to pop into your mind? It is called writer’s block. It happens to the best writers also.

4 top strategies for selecting article topics:

1. Choose a topic you are passionate about or are interested in.

If you try to write about something you are not familiar with you will have a difficult time creating the content for it.

2. Explore other resources

Once you have chosen the area to write about, visit online and offline locations where people visit that are also interested in those topics. Online sources may include search engines, forums, blogs, article directories (ezinearticles.com) or join a discussion group.

Offline resources may include magazines (magazines.com), books (amazon.com), newspapers, journals and white papers.

After visiting some of these sources you will soon get an idea what to write about. Reading articles written by others will stimulate your own writing juices. Everyone has there own unique writing style so don’t copy anyone else’s article. Uniquely written articles get read more often and rank higher in the search engines.

3. Keyword research

Before writing your article you need to research the keywords and keyword phrases people use to find information on that topic. Use the free word tracker tool to find the number of searches for that month.

For example if you enter “dog grooming” in wordtracker it will display the top 100 keyword phrases out of 3,785 searches for that month.

Keyword research tools

I often use the keyword research tool: Search It. because it contains all the brainstorming tools you need in one place ie

Wordtracker free keyword suggestion tool
Google adwords keyword tool
Seodigger keyword tool
Yahoo keyword selector tool

4. Find related keywords

The google adwords tool generates lists of related keywords. Enter each of these related keywords into wordtracker. You will now have hundreds of topics (and sub-topics) you can write about.

Tip

Whenever you think of a new topic, jot it down for future reference, then when you get stuck for a subject you can refer back to this paper. It will save hours of your time deciding what to write about. You can also develop many articles simultaneously because you have already done the necessary topic preparation.

No longer will you ever have to sit in front of a blank screen with a blank mind when searching for article topics.

Most of you have eaten at McDonalds and been asked “do you want fries with that?’
If you accept their suggestion and purchase the fries it means you have just been upsold.

Definition of Upsell

This is a marketing term for the practice of suggesting higher priced products or services to a customer who is considering a purchase. The upsell is usually for a related product that is offered at a reduced price or sold as a higher priced item.

Benefits of the marketing upsell

1. Make more money

Extra money is made by suggesting another product. It adds value to what they have already purchased and the customer thinks they are getting a deal by purchasing the second item.

2. Repeat customers

Customers that have already purchased from you are happy to buy again providing they had a good experience and received good value for their money. They can easily become lifetime customers because they have come to trust your products.

3. Sell high priced items

If you want to sell a high-priced item you can first prepare your customer by selling several low priced items. ie create and market several ebooks or reports that lead the customer to purchase the high priced item.

Ways to upsell your customers

Order page

On your order page you could include another offer . The customer has a choice to either purchase the single item or purchase both items at a reduced price. Your customer feels he is getting a good deal because he is paying less for both items than if he purchased them separately.

Thank you page

After the customer has purchased an item he gets redirected to your thank you page. On this page you offer a second item, a subscription to your newsletter or have him subscribe to an on going email course. If he subscribes you will be able to offer him upgrades, or new items or a continuous basis.

Another good example of a company using marketing upsell is Amazon. If you purchased a book at Amazon, other books are suggested while making your purchase from the order page. They’ll also send you an email when a new book comes out related to the one you bought.

Conclusion

Instead of chasing new customers, you can always generate extra income from upselling your products. It’s a fact that 30 percent to 67 percent of all people can be up sold at the time of purchase. Make a list of all the different strategies you can use to upsell your clients, then put them into action.

You will be glad you did!

The meta robots tag is not one of the common tags to include in your web pages. I decided to mention it here because you see it used on some sites when it has a clear purpose.

All web sites will naturally get indexed by the search engines without using this tag.

The code for the robots meta tag must be included within the header tags of your web pages.

Top 7 Benefits and Uses of the Robots Meta Tag

1. Tell search engines not to index your pages (noindex)


<meta name="robots" content="noindex">


2. Tell search engines to index your site but not to follow links (nofollow)

Use this code for pages which contain useful content but have links which are irrelevant or obsolete.


<meta name="robots" content="nofollow">


3. Tell search engines to not index or follow links on your web page (noindex,nofollow)

If you include this code in the header of every page of your web site, it will not be indexed.


<meta name="robots" content="noindex,nofollow">


4. Tell search engines to index your site and follow links (index,follow)


<meta name="robots" content="index,follow">


Because search engines index and follow links naturally, there is no need to add this tag.

5. Tell search engines not to cache your pages (noarchive)


<meta name="robots" content="noarchive">


6. Prevents a description appearing below the page in the search results and prevents page caching (nosnippet)


<meta name="robots" content="nosnippet">


7. Prevent search engines from displaying DMOZ data in the search results of your site (noodp)


<meta name="robots" content="noodp">


The above code prevents all search engines from using this information for the page’s description.

To specifically prevent Google from using this information for a page’s description, use:


<meta name="googlebot" content="noodp">


TIPS

A. A word of warning about using content value “NONE”


<meta name="robots" content="none">


Some webmasters use content value “NONE” to indicate no robots restrictions, however they unknowingly block all search engines from indexing the content on their web pages.

B. If you add the robots meta tags to a framed site, make sure you include them on both the FRAMESET and the FRAME pages.

C. Rather than use the meta robots tag to not index a web page use the robots.txt file to block crawler access to pages.
What is robots.txt file?

Conclusion
If you don’t specific the robots meta Tag on a web page, the spiders will index that page and all its links by default. Only use this tag when you don’t want certain parts of your web page indexed.

Resources

Yahoo Provides NOYDIR Opt-Out Of Yahoo Directory Titles & Descriptions
http://searchengineland.com/070228-140603.php

The keywords tags are the least significant of the meta tags. The major search engines don’t crawl them therefore they has almost no affect on your rankings. Many web sites don’t even bother to include them but focus on the title and description meta tags plus weaving their keyword phrases into the web copy.

So should you include the keywords tag?

My recommendation is to include it anyway because some of the smaller search engines still crawl it.

Here are the top 4 strategies to use:

1. Correct coding

Incorrect coding of your meta tags may prevent the search engine spiders fom crawling your web page. HTML errors throughout your web site slows the loading of your web pages. Slow loading causes customers to click off your web site.

HTML


<meta name="keywords" content="keyword1, keyword2, keyword3">


XHTML


<meta name="keywords" content="keyword1, keyword2, keyword3"/>


2. Length of tag

The keywords meta tag should be under 800 characters. Use commas of spaces between each keyword.keywords (comma seperated, do not repeat a phrase more than 3 times)

3. Keyword repetition

You may repeat the keywords in your keyword phrases however don’t repeat your keyword phrases more than three times. ie

dog grooming and training,dog caring,dog training

Include the keywords used in your title and description tags and web copy.

I use spaces instead of commas so the search engines can automatically pick up the combinations and I don’t have to repeat keywords as much.

Instead of using commas ie

dog grooming and training,dog caring,dog training

I’ll use spaces instead and have less words ie

dog grooming training caring

4. Word order

Place your most important keywords or keyword phrases at the beginning of your keywords meta tag.

Conclusion

The best investment of your time in optimizing your web site is to do thorough keyword research. Keywords are what people enter into the search engines to find your web site. If you include these keywords within your web copy and in the meta tags you have a much greater chance ranking well for your web site.

Keep in mind there are other major factors you need to consider to rank well such as lots of relevant high quality links pointing to your web site.

Site owners don’t often put much thought into meta descriptions tags. They will write anything that comes into their heads without considering who’s going to read them.

What are meta description tags?

These are the tags you insert after the title tags of your web site. The description displays under the title of your web site in the search engine results pages (SERPS).

7 Top Strategies for Optimizing Description Tags:

1. Include keywords

Don’t duplicate the keywords used in your title tag. Try to vary them a little ie if you used the plural form in the title tag use the singular form in the description tag.

If you used an abbreviated word in the title tag use the full word in the description tag.

2. Write a different description for every web page.

Make sure the description adequately describes what the web page is about so the visitor knows immediately what to expect.

3. Get into the head of your visitor.

You only have a few sentences to make an impression on your visitor. A well-crafted description will help differentiate your site from your competitors. Try to understand what will draw the visitor into your web site. Make sure you write full sentences, not an abbreviated ones.

4. Length of description

The search engines will read anywhere from 150 to 250 characters. Google displays about 150 to 160 characters. If it is over 160 characters it will be truncated. Other search engines allow more characters. A general rule is to write 200 characters (approximately 25-30 words.)

5. Include keyword phrases used in web content

Search engines give more weight to sites which include the same keyword phrases in the web copy and description tags therefore incorporate keyword phrases used in your web page content.

6. Word order

Place your most important keyword phrase at the beginning of your meta description tags. It should also be a phrase that captures your visitor’s attention so they will want to check out your web site.

7. Correct coding

Errors in your code slow the search engine spiders or they may not read your description correctly. Check your code by running it through an online validator at: http://validator.w3.org/

The description tag is coded differently for HTML and XHTML.

In HTML the tag has no end tag. ie


<meta name="description" content="7 Top Strategies for optimizing description tags">

In XHTML the tag must be properly closed.


<meta name="description" content="7 Top Strategies for optimizing description tags" />


Conclusion

Optimizing the description tags is is not as important as optimizing the title tags because the description tags don’t impact your rankings as much. Instead focus on providing a well-written description that will make visitors want to check out your web site.

To read 1-5 please visit Top 10 strategies to optimize your title tag

6. Don’t place your company name at the beginning

When surfing the web you’ll notice many sites place their company name or web site address at the beginning of the title tag. You’ll probably rank No 1 for that term however it does not help your rankings. Place your best keywords or keyword phrases at the beginning followed by your company name. ie

dog grooming and training - Dog Care Inc.

7. Use a divider

Use spaces, dashes (-) or bars (|) to separate your keyword phrase from your company name. This will help you to rank your page for both phrases.

8. Repeat the keywords in your headline and content

The header tag (h1) is often used for the first headline on your web page. Include the same keywords in the headline as your title tag.

Your content should reflect the keywords you chose for your title tag. Be sure to sprinkle them throughout your web copy. This tells the search engines the theme of your site and rank it accordingly.

9. Don’t use the same title tags for all web pages

Create unique title tags for each web page by using different keywords for each title tag. Then use these keywords in the content on your web page.

10. Write for your visitors

Keep your web site visitors in mind when writing. Create attractive and descriptive titles. Your description tag and web copy should expand on the contents of your title tag.

Conclusion

Title tags are crucial in attaining high search engine rankings. Take time to craft a short, concise and attractive description for each of your web pages. Most of your competitors have not read these top 10 strategies so your site has the potential to outrank them.

Title tags are the most important tags of your web site regarding search engine optimization. If you optimize the tag correctly you will be well ahead of your competitors.

Top 10 strategies to optimize your title tags

1. Keyword research

Find the most targeted keywords related to your web site content. I use Search It because it contains all the brainstorming tools you need in one place ie

Wordtracker free keyword suggestion tool
Google adwords keyword tool
Seodigger keyword tool
Yahoo keyword selector tool

2. Length of title tags

Limit the length of the title tag to 70 characters (including spaces). Search engines usually truncate the title after 68-70 characters. This means you can use approximately 6-7 words. This increases your chances of getting all your words to display in all three major search engines.

3. Use keyword phrases

Don’t use single keywords. These are far too competitive to attain high rankings. Instead use 2-4 words that include your targeted keyword phrase.

4. Word order

Place your most targeted keyword at the beginning followed by your second most targeted keyword. This not only helps your ranking in the search engines but it’s what will be displayed at the top of your visitors browser when they visit your web site.

If your keyword phrase is “dog grooming and training”

instead of writing:

the top 7 tips for dog grooming and training

write this for your title tag

dog grooming and training - the top 7 tips

5. Don’t repeat keywords

Don’t use the same keyword more than once. This may be considered spam by the search engines and you may see a drop in your rankings.