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What is your name? Bill Gates?

Cool; would you like to book a domain like www.bill.gates/ and would you like to publish your retirement plans at www.bill.gates/retire-plans.html?

If you are Bill Gates, you can have it; but you will have to wait until the second quarter of 2009 and you must prove that you are Bill Gates and you have a well established brand name to book that domain.

And it is not a joke. We are moving into a new era - ICANN has approved a recommendation from the global stakeholders to introduce new TLDs to the Internet’s addressing system. And this is what they call the “Biggest Expansion in gTLDs Approved for Implementation“.

This decision is not finalized in one day. It has undergone major discussions and planning for last six years.

However, you cannot have any TLD you wish. You must have an established brand that you would need to put forward as an application to the ICANN (responsible for the global coordination of the Internet’s system of unique identifiers like domain names). Your application and brand equity will be properly evaluated by ICANN before allowing you the domain name. Perhaps, they would try to ensure that, none but McDonald’s get the domain name http://www.mc.donalds/. It is not just about first come - first serve. And to add to this, anyone can place objection during the evaluation process (BTW, ICANN will not be the only decision maker when someone places an objection).

So, those who are planning to earn some more money from domain trading, should be a little bit disappointed (domain trading is a big business and you can still do well from regular TLDs like .com or .net) to loose such a big opportunity.

How much would it cost?

This would cost you a lot more than premium domain names. According to Dr Twomey, it may cost you something around a six figure amount ($$$,$$$) to book such a domain name. And this is not a big deal for established brands.

By 2009, we will have more than just 21 TLDs to fight for. But don’t you think it would make a common man’s web browsing more critical? At present, we have a naming convention and people are used to it. Won’t it be more confusing as far as recollection is concerned? And what if the same name exists for two brands in two countries - which would get the domain name?

We often say the keyword research is the most important part of webpage development. However, if you want to do proper keyword research, you would need to pay subscription fees. For example, Wordtracker would charge you something around $59/month or $329/year. For a blogger who is not earning enough from his or her blog, this amount may seem very expensive.

Another big problem is that, for a blogger keyword research is a continuous process if they want to get enough visitors to their blog (ideally before publishing any post, you must do some keyword research - do you?). Especially, if you are looking to target keyword long tail, you must subscribe to one of them (unless you are experienced enough to guess it right.). And thus there is no other option but going for the yearly subscription to save some $$ in the long run.

But is there any other way to keyword research?

There are some free keyword research tools in the web. Though all of them are free, you may not expect complete result from a free account except from Google AdWords (even though Google AdWords is not primarily a keyword research tool, it is close enough to help you).

So how do you start?

At the very beginning do guess some keyword on the topic of your blog post. Prepare a small list - it is better to be generic. For example, if you are writing a post on proper keyword research for bloggers, “keyword research” or “free keyword research” should be taken as generic keywords. Now use those free tools to find out other variations of these keywords that your target audience is actually using.

So do you think that you have got all the keywords you want?

Ok, let’s go a bit deeper - now use these keywords to search in Google (.com or .co.uk or .com.au - depending on your target market) and find out how many people are targeting these keywords. You can also go for exact search (use the keywords in the “”) to know how many people are using that exact key phrase. This would give you a lot of idea on your competition.

Now you are ready to get your targeted phrases. Good key phrases should have more searches and less competition.

You can also try using Google Suggest or Google Trends if you need something more.

Trust me; the time you are spending in the process is worth it. And if you are writing some post as a linkbait, you simply can’t afford to ignore it.

Tagging is undoubtedly a web 2.0 phenomenon and it may actually hold hands with the visitors or readers of a website. (Take a look at Amazon Unspun. Do you remember that Amazon has already taken a great marketing strategy by implementing a simple section - “Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought…” at the end of a product?)

And undoubtedly, it can help you a lot in case of SEO and more importantly, keyword optimization. At least we are trying it in one of our client’s website.

What happens in a traditional product based websites? They line up different products under different categories and sub categories and put everything into the sidebar.

But what if we change the website layout and place a tag cloud at the top of the page and associate the popularity (voting or page views) of the product with related tags (keyphrases)?

I am implementing this idea in a website that connects service providers with respective buyers in a local niche. The main reason why I had to take such a step is that they had around 2000 keywords along with 170 categories and more than 1500 subcategories.

Now, to keep things simple and to keep almost everything into the eye fold, I was looking to do something different (obviously not for the sake of being different). Another big reason to implement tags was keyword targeting. If I had to accommodate maximum number of keywords in the home page, it would have looked like SPAM. And at the same time if I needed to use all the categories into JS Dropdown menu, it wouldn’t have passed any value to the internal pages. To add to the situation, we did not want to keep the product beyond two clicks.

Apart from adding tags in the home page, we introduced tags in the category pages too. Thus the category pages had sub categories and products as tag along with the popular products under that category.

We are yet to come into some definite conclusion as the whole system is only a few days old. Soon we would come to know about user experience and make necessary changes (we may scrap the idea of tagging too if it does not work effectively).

What else, do you want to know the name of the website? Oops, can’t disclose client’s identity.

But what do you think about that?

As SEO Consultants, we almost always need to work on websites that are already running for quite sometime. I often call myself website doctors when I need to tell someone (who does not know much about web) about my job or job responsibilities.

Anyways, the trend is very simple; people start a website thinking that it would get them business. Or, after running a website for sometime, they come to know that SEO can improve their business. But by the time we get those websites, it is already late. Often we need to recommend complete remodeling of the website. And at this point, most of the clients are never too happy to implement any major change.

When should one start thinking about SEO?

SEO runs hand in hand with the business model - the goal you want to achieve after a certain point of time and after certain amount of investment (both time and money). And if your website is your only business outlet, there should not be any doubt about thinking SEO from the very beginning.

What should be the common website development flowchart when you have identified the goal or objective you want to attain?

Understanding the target market and competition > Brainstorming and identifying proper keywords > selecting a good domain name > Developing the website > Evaluating end user experience > Redeveloping the website (to be continued…) > Closing Goal

And in the “developing the website” section - some on page factors (content, design navigation, optimization etc.) and almost all the off page factors (link building, organic and inorganic promotion, tracking competitors etc.) get in and it continues throughout the lifecycle. But the whole process becomes tougher when the client has made some big mistakes in the initial stages of development. And more importantly, the problems become more acute when clients do not want to share the complete history of the website development process. It creates lots of puzzling situations for us.

But what if you consult a good SEO consultant when you have developed an idea to start your business online? He or she may guide you step by step. If this is a problem and you do not invest on consultation, please do some extensive research on SEO to get some idea about how to start a business online. At least, you would come to know what you need to do to stay in the first track of web business.

I often say one thing - a good idea is not good enough unless properly executed. Same rule applies to your business too.

Ok, there is no point in denying that like a lot of other people out there, I am a big fan of Seth Godin. And I just like to follow what he is writing or how he is packaging his products or how he is selling himself.

In my last post [writing a blog post] I was talking about Squidoo. Lets complete that discussion. What do you find the most interesting thing in Squidoo?

I asked this question to some fellow content writers and web designers. And as expected, there were two answers - “emphasis on user generated content” and the other is “simple design”. Do you want to add anything to it?

Ok, here are my observations on Squidoo:

1. The most stunning thing about Squidoo is its navigation - it does not have traditional navigational pattern like - home | submit article | Contact Us | About Us | etc. And this is the section, where Seth has left Hub Pages miles behind. In Squidoo, you have just a drop down image that is inviting you to ‘build your own’ lens.

What webmasters generally does when they start such a website? Just take a look at any other article directory and you will have the answer. We would have definitely kept a common navigation bar for the reason that, the users may not be as much web savvy as we are and may face problems to use the site.

What does this mean? We are actually giving them the freedom to move around as they wish. And Seth (may be with his team) is guiding the visitor through the process of creating a lens. And, undoubtedly, it takes lots of courage to take such a drastic step when you are dealing with general people and Seth has successfully done the job.

2. Another most important aspect of Squidoo is its use of language. All through the process, the website is more playful than serious and he is selling it every time.

3. And the idea itself is great - a one page blog on anything with as many link as you want.

There are lots of other issues that you may notice in Squidoo. And this is what I call Web 2.0.

By the way, did you click on Seth’s Head in his blog? What do you call it? Just a design or idea branding?

Whenever a webmaster starts talking about duplicate content issues, the very next word that drops in is - “Google” (can you think of ‘duplicate content issue’, PageRank, ‘paid link’ and ‘Google’ in separation! Lol… would you like to add some more tags!).

And lately there had been lots of talk on duplicate content issue at Google’s Webmaster Central Blog. You can also find lots of other pages issued by Google on the same topic.

Google says that it always thinks from a visitor’s perspective. Certainly - visitors are the most integral part of their business model and who sells information more than Google!

I agree at one point with Google that there is ideally no need to use duplicate content within a website - it does not help your visitors at all and there is no need to distribute concentration in different pages to serve the same purpose. If someone has done proper keyword analysis before planning the site structure, there should not be any problem in keyword or content distribution. And you can easily write different footer text (a common SEO trick) to optimize all pages of a website.

However, this is not so simple when you are operating a product based website.

We often find that a range of products have similar features with minor differences. Or maybe, the same product is being manufactured by different companies. Thus while writing about them you cannot be 100% unique - what do you do in such a situation?

This is a bigger problem for those who are not manufacturers of the product and the manufacturers have their own websites to sell it directly. For example, if you are selling something like an iPod in your website, it is very difficult for you to be different from what is already there in other websites or there in Apple’s own website. You job becomes more tough in proportion to the products’ popularity. And as a seller, you cannot afford to link to those main websites for more information as they are selling the product in their website too. Who want to loose a hard-earned prospective customer!

Take a look at websites like eBay. They are full of duplicate content for the same reason.

How do you overcome such problems? Tell us your stories:

For last couple of days, there had been lots of talks in the web on “SEO has no future”. Some renowned bloggers and publishers talked a lot on this issue and in the process lots of links were generated and at the end of the day, everybody was happy. Some people thought that these were nothing but marketing (getting links) gimmick and that’s why lots of big guns fired.

Does SEO have a good future?

There is a simple market rule - if there is a need in the market and if you can deliver quality product, you have good chances to stay in the business. And this rule applies to SEO too. Perhaps I have a classic example to justify that there is a need of good SEO in the market.

Who is the undisputed search service provider - undoubtedly it is Google and almost 79% of organic traffic is generated from Google itself. But did you ever search in Google for search engine! Just click on the link and try to find Google out there? Where is it?

Now search for Google’s back links and do some research on the anchor texts. The pattern is simple - the majority of back links have the anchor text “Google”. To add to it, Google’s home page does not have the term “search engine” in its homepage - Google.com. And the end result is that you cannot find Google for the search term - search engine.

People type Google.com in the browser to enter web. Now think about the situation in a different way - if Google had to fight to rank high in the Google’s SERP for the keyword “search engine”, could it ignore SEO? And now, just think about your situation. Do you have enough “word of mouth” support and bigger budget to create and promote your brand offline via advertisements? Did you calculate ROI?

However, I would like to add another point here - if you do not offer quality product, SEO cannot sustain you for long. SEO can get you targeted customers but you need to be extra careful to offer them quality product so that next time they come back to your site directly.

Now, going back to the original story - a lot of bloggers have got some link love in the controversy - as expected.

Are you planning something? 

Almost everyone wants to earn money online. And undoubtedly, internet is still a goldmine. You have different ways to start earning. For example, Google Adsense or Yahoo ads are some of the most common revenue solutions for online publishers like bloggers.

And for the seasoned bloggers and marketers, affiliate marketing and product review can offer the biggest revenue generating solution. And affiliate marketing is perhaps the best solution for niche bloggers to earn more and more money. It is always a win-win situation for both the advertiser and the publisher.

Now, it is often very tough to decide upon which advertiser is worthy enough and who would offer you the best ROI. In some cases, the product price is very high and thus you do not get enough signups. And in some other cases, commission is low as the product price is too low and thus you earn fewer amounts even after a lot signups.

A lot websites run their own affiliate program. But it is often tough to say that each of them is honest enough to pay you the money that you really deserve.

They best way to earn from affiliate marketing is to join an affiliate marketing network. You will easily find a lot of them in the web but Advibrance is undoubtedly the best of the lot and they offer “an exclusive super affiliate commission of 4% per referral” along with some great rewards and bonuses for affiliates.

There is another reason why we are saying that Advibrance offers a great affiliate marketing solution. Almost all the affiliate networks have a fixed payment date - you can do nothing but wait for the date even though you are in some urgent need of cash. However, in this point, Advibrance has left everyone behind. They have taken the extra initiative to keep payment schedules flexible - that means you get the money when you need them the most.

They have already signed up some of the best advertisers in the market. But that is not all - if there is no advertiser in your niche, you can contact Advibrance directly and they would try to include advertisers from that niche in their network.

What else do you expect from an affiliate network?

BTW, they are offering $20 as signup bonus, so if you want to earn $20 without selling anything, join Advibrance Affiliate Network now.

Some rules are pretty similar in both formats; for example you need to write in a clear and well formatted language with targeted keywords in the content body, title etc.

However, it won’t be wrong if I say that the similarity is between the structural parts only. A blog post is quite different from regular webpage content in its style and presentation.

Yes, I know, you would be saying that a blog post is more personal than web page content. But what does the word “personal” mean?

Does it mean writing about personal stuff?

Certainly not - it means that you would need to portray your ‘identity‘ in your writing style - what you feel about a subject is more important than just writing about it. Someone reads your post on iPod to know your personal views on iPod as an end-user. They do not come to read about the features of an iPod - Apple is good enough to provide them all the information on iPod. And this is the point where blogging is different from newspaper reporting. Things would be clearer if you compare a news report with the editorial. News reporting is close to general content and the editorial is close to blogging.

Just think about a successful film star - how does he or she move between different characters in different films? You can easily relate the concept of blogging with a performance and a good performer knows what his or her audience is expecting from them and delivers the same. And sometimes you just need to be the opposite to keep the interest growing.

Another most important aspect of a blog post is - attitude. If you want to be a successful blogger, you must have lots of attitude (attitude does not mean being rude or extravagant). Just think about Seth Godin. Do you think he is a successful blogger just because of his ideas? He has got lots of attitude - read his posts twice and think about how he represents his points - you will have the answers. Also take a look at his videos - he has developed a unique identity and selling it for lots of $$$.

You may also take a look at Squidoo - how does he represent the whole concept and how does he guide you from one link to another (I would write another post on Squidoo)?

Good bloggers are leaders and leaders have attitude. What about you?

Like many areas in web development, there is a long-standing argument whether it is better to learn and practice SEO or if it is better to outsource this task to professionals. There are advantages and disadvantages on both sides and it is important to weigh these aspects against each other before making the final decision.

Advantages of working with an Expert

·         Diverse experience – professionals have several years of SEO experience so they know what to expect from search engines as they conduct the optimization of your site. They can also understand ranking data and interpret “hiccups” in the search results that indicate certain trends that should be avoided or implemented.

·         Link building know-how – experts can easily identify communities and the sites relevant to your website. SEO experts also have an extensive link acquisition experience and can recognize whether certain sites want reciprocal links, paid links, etc.

·         Network – SEO experts have contacts within the SEO industry. These contacts may be experts in niche areas and this can have a huge impact on the success of your site.

·         Managing possible problems – experts are competent in identifying and solving possible issues that arise from low ranking, lack of indexing, and penalties from search engines. This is very hard still to develop without years of experience.

·         Time savings – SEO can be time-consuming. An SEO professional have the necessary process of optimization so that you can have the advantage of great service in the least possible time.

Advantages of DIY

·         Learning from your actions – the SERPs will tell a SEO newbie about what tactics work and what doesn’t. Links, on-page changes, and timing are also fully visible so it can be a good learning process.

·         Complete control – you are in control over your site’s progress. There is no question as to what or who created a certain link or changed the content.

·         Cost savings – Doing the SEO process yourself means that you would not have to hire another person to do the job for you. If you know that your time is less expensive than an outside provider, DIY can be a good way to save money.