Content Management System Delivers Quality Content.

October 31, 2009 · Posted in CMS · 2 Comments 
Web-based server content management.
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If you own a website, there is bound to have some amount of content to be worked on. Good content plays important role in success ratio of any website and building online business. In case your website is content centric then the need of content management system arises for smooth maintenance. Processes of uploading, creating new content, modification, storage, editing and deleting content might take even a full day to do the task. Instead of spending valuable time and resources of your business in managing content, it is better to install a reliable content management system.

Web content management system is a time savior tool and helps in simplifying the entire procedure of content creation and mechanizes the website submission to the search engines leading to improved business revenue and site traffic.

CMS is a professional program where web pages can be created without having the requirement to use HTML programming language. This system helps in setting up standardized online system for content management for your business expansion.

As far as functions are concerned, it has many benefits to the user like creation, modification, management, organization and removal of required content through a simpler interface. Even if you lack HTML language knowledge, content creation can be done just like a basic word processing tool. An enterprise content management system also lends helping hand in delivering content to your site. Whenever you update any content, this system can very well submit it to your website without any need for any specialized webmaster for handling this task.

When you get to see the extended advantages of CMS, you can find a number of it. Here the user can protect any specific content area of the website with a password. It also allows your website to have content written by many authors at the same time without risking the other website areas.

Web pages with professional designs can be created, simple process like copy-paste formatting can be done. These formatting of the content include bold highlighting, various fonts, implanted text links and so on. It is useful for affiliate marketing plus getting more website traffic.

Access to web content management system can be done from any pc just net connection has to be present. Search engine optimization can be done in a better form which would lead to higher search engine ranking.

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SEO Blogs and WordPress

October 31, 2009 · Posted in WordPress · 1 Comment 
WordPress.com hosted blogs will plaster advert...
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Even our dear WordPress which so many search engine optimization professionals sincerely love and prefer as a blogging platform, is misinformed or at least, subject to making sweeping generalizations. This is the “banned” category:

And here are some examples of blogs that are banned from WordPress.com (all of these fall under the general heading of “spam blogs”, or splogs, and we will be deleted as soon as we find them or they get reported):
Scraper blogs:  Blogs that take content from other blogs and re-publish it without permission (this is sometimes called scraping). If a blog contains all or mostly stolen and unoriginal content, it’s gone!

SEO blogs: Blogs that are written for search engines instead of humans. These blogs are dedicated to trying to fool Google and other search engines into ranking them highly. WordPress.com is not meant for this type of activity.

Affiliate marketing blogs: Blogs with the primary purpose of driving traffic to affiliate programs and get-rich-quick schemes (”Make six figures from home!!”, “20 easy steps to top profits!!”, etc). To be clear, examples like people writing original book or movie reviews and linking them to Amazon, or people linking to their own products on Etsy do NOT fall into this category.

Warez blogs: Blogs that promote pirated copies of ebooks, software packages, music, movies, games, etc

C’mon WordPress.com, just because some overzealous SEO noobs used (likely experimented and exploited) your free blog hosting service at wordpress.com doesn’t mean all SEO blogs are suspect and shady.

With literally hundreds and hundreds of reviews we’ve done on SEO blogs over the past year, I think I have a fairly good sense about what most SEO bloggers are writing about and the vast majority are on the up and up. I suspect I wouldn’t need to look far to find a sinister “Politics” or “Personal” blog or two or two hundred on the WordPress.com service. That said, I’m not sure whether any of the 500 or so SEO blogs on our BIGLIST are hosted at Wordpress.com. Of course not, they were probably banned – LOL.

The warning is, of course, directed towards blogs setup at WordPress.com and not blogs using the downloadable WordPress application. Regardless, WordPress is such a great piece of software, this just seems a bit over the top. So here’s my suggested alternatives:

SEO blogs: Blogs that provide tips, news and insights into how web site and blog owners can make it easier for search engines and users to find and interact with their sites resulting in improved traffic levels and repeat visits. With literally hundreds and hundreds of reviews we’ve done on SEO blogs over the past year, I think I have a fairly good sense about what most SEO bloggers are writing about and the vast majority are on the up and up. I suspect I wouldn’t need to look far to find a sinister “Politics” or “Personal” blog or two or two hundred on the WordPress.com service. That said, I’m not sure whether any of the 500 or so SEO blogs on our BIGLIST are hosted at Wordpress.com. Of course not, they were probably banned – LOL.

Then they can make a statement against blogs in general that provide mis-information or violate published policies instead of making such a sweeping statement. What do you think? Am I too “glass half full” and idealistic in my characterization of SEO blogs?

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The benefits of a content management system (CMS) – Part 2

October 31, 2009 · Posted in CMS · 1 Comment 
'Learn Open Source'-poster
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A typical content management system, or CMS for short, has two main benefits that make this piece of software one of the must-have tools for the modern day web site owner.

The first main benefit of a CMS is that it allows fast, real time updates of a web site without ever having to touch HTML coding or upload each individual page after editing the content through the raw HTML file. As anyone who has ever spent days hand coding and amending content on 200 page web sites will tell you, using a CMS to update content not only saves you time that is better spent creating your content and focusing on your business, it also saves you money that traditionally would have been spent on hiring a programmer to edit the content and re-upload the pages to your site.

Many modern CMS solutions use graphical interfaces and editing functions similar to those found in desktop applications such as Microsoft Word, meaning that there is less of a learning curve with the application as most PC users will be familiar with the format already. This again cuts down on the time needed to learn the functions of the CMS and means one can hit the ground running when publishing new content.

The second main benefit of a CMS is that with a little training, anyone with even limited technical computer skills can update an entire site’s content themselves. This gives non-technical folk (i.e. non-programmers) the tools to keep their site updated without incurring development costs each time an amendment is made to the site.

Other benefits of using a CMS include the ability to change your web site design just by uploading one template design that is automatically applied to each page across the site, with many CMSs offer the ability to choose different layouts for each page, if needed. This again saves a lot of time and effort and also cuts down on the chance of errors being made on a page to page basis. Additionally, most modern content management systems are coded to adhere to the latest coding standards and best practices, with the more forward thinking CMS providers designing and building the system to comply with accessibility standards to make sure everyone can access and use both the site and content management system.

Although choosing a CMS from the many out there can seem daunting, especially if you haven’t had experience of using a CMS before and are therefore unaware of what is ‘good’, ‘bad’ or just plain ugly, it is always best to use one that the person responsible for updating the web site feels comfortable using.

Each CMS on the web requires varying degrees of technical ability to install and operate, but the one that consistently makes the grade for me and my clients in terms of ease of use, ease of installation and the features it contains, is CMS Made Simple, an Open Source CMS packed with simple to install and use add-ons. It contains options to include search engine friendly URLs (which does require a little technical skill to implement), shopping carts and product catalogues for e-commerce sites, blogging utilities and even an email marketing module, all of which are simple to use and all for free and contained in a fully customisable package.

My advice if you don’t already have a CMS to update your site and you are currently spending precious hours and money on manually updating the site is to get one ASAP.

It will be one of the best investments you ever make.

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Google Adsense And Wordpress Make Money Online

October 30, 2009 · Posted in WordPress · Comment 
Google Chrome
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If you have been considering a business in online marketing using Google Adsense then you should consider using Wordpress as a basis for your site.

Wordpress has dual functionality as a CMS or Content Management System as well as a platform for your blog. It’s very simple to manage your content with Wordpress and you will be able to post your content rapidly with little effort.

Wordpress functions like a word processor using a special administration panel called a dashboard to create and manage posts and pages. All aspects of your site including category management are performed using dashboard.

You can customize Wordpress in almost any way you can imagine to help you maintain your site. Thousands of different themes or templates, many incorporating Adsense blocks to improve your click through rate, are available to you. The practical result of this is that as soon as you upload an Adsense-ready template to your site, it becomes an Adsense website. A real advantage is having much more free time to concentrate on writing high quality website content.

Through Search Engine Optimization (SEO), many Wordpress templates that include Adsense link and ad units are designed to make the pages of your site as attractive as possible for search engine spiders.

Wordpress also ‘pings’ many services for you through pingomatic each time you create a new post. With each ping, search engines are informed that your site has new content, so that they can send their spiders to examine it. If you want a sitemap or an RSS feed, Wordpress can produce it automatically.

Because Wordpress serves as a blogging platform, this functionality makes it simple for visitors to post comments on any article you write. Site “stickiness” is encouraged with this sort of user interaction. Don’t overlook the advantage of increased site content each time someone posts a comment.

Wordpress now has thousands of easily installed plugins available to add functionality to your site. One super-useful plugin for affiliate marketers automatically turns words into links. Creating a list words you want associated with affiliate links is very simple.

Wordpress will make an Adsense or affiliate webmaster’s work a lot easier.

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The Benefits Of Exchange Server 2007

October 30, 2009 · Posted in Sharepoint · Comment 
The "Outlook Today" screen in Micros...
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Email is the most critical communication tool for today’s businesses. This increased reliance on email has escalated the volume of messages sent and received, and even the speed of business. Amidst this change, the workforce expectations have also evolved – today, employees seek efficient and rich access to email, online calendars, attachments, and contacts, regardless of where they are and what type of device they’re using.

Microsoft’s Exchange Server 2007 was specifically designed to rise to the challenge of addressing different needs within the same messaging system. New capabilities in MS Exchange 2007 provide improved protection, along with the access your employees want, and the efficiency IT wants.

The Internet technology professional has the task of providing a messaging system that satisfies these needs yet is balanced in security and cost. As the use and volume of email has increased, security requirements have become more complex. Today’s IT staff must counter a wide range of email security threats, spam and viruses, and risks to noncompliance and tampering in addition to the threat of disasters. Although security is a top priority, Internet technology staff is always aware of the need to manage costs, working within constraints of time, money, and resources. This causes IT staff to seek a messaging system that satisfies enterprise and employee requirements yet is efficiently deployed and managed.

Protection, Built-in

Exchange Server 2007 provides built-in protection technology, reducing viruses and spam, enabling private communications, and helping your business attain compliance.

Key Benefits:

* Safeguards users and data from harmful spam and viruses

* Simplified compliance while satisfying the needs of compliance managers, employees, and messaging administrators

* Automatically provides secure communication within the company without added complexity or cost

* Keeps email communication flowing with enterprise-class reliability and availability

Anywhere Access

Employees can access their email, voice mail, calendar and contacts from a variety of devices and clients. Anywhere access requires an Internet connection, and Outlook Voice Access requires a phone connection.

Key Benefits:

* Quickly delivers a seamless and familiar Outlook experience from different devices without additional software

* Enables improved collaboration, making it simpler to find and share documents, data, and schedules

* Increases overall productivity among today’s workforce, who require the ability to respond from work, home, or on the road

* Provides employees with a single inbox, the source of all important communication – including voice mail, email, and fax

Efficient Operations

New levels of efficiency are possible through optimizations hardware and networking features, helping administrators become more productive.

Key Benefits:

* Improved administrator productivity, making it simple to locate and repair problems and automate tasks

* Simple integration of Exchange Server data with third-party solutions and line-of-business applications, made possible by Exchange Web Services

* Delivers more from your hardware and network investments via powerful x64 computing and bandwidth optimization

* Efficient deployment with roles-based server architecture, automatic client connections, and improved monitoring and diagnostics

In addition, Exchange Server 2007 offers capabilities and benefits with the best integration and broadest client range. MS Exchange Server supports the Outlook experience, from the desktop, to Web Access, Mobile, and now with Outlook Voice Access. Exchange Server 2007 also can be integrated with MS Windows SharePoint Services and other MS Office applications, along with third-party devices and systems.

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J2EE Server

October 29, 2009 · Posted in Training · Comment 

Last time, I pointed out that the continuing lack of J2EE Enterprise Architects and Business Component Developers puts a crimp on plans by Global 2000 enterprises to migrate their applications to the Web. The other huge hindrance, revealed by a Precision Marketing Group survey a couple of months back, is the complexity of transitioning from legacy client/server frameworks to Web-ready J2EE servers.

Taking the survey at face value, one would have to believe that nearly 99 percent – that’s virtually everyone, folks – of these large, globe-spanning businesses are still stuck in Microsoft Access, Lotus Notes and Oracle Forms client/server tools, obviously never intended for Web applications. Even those enterprises that already have some rudimentary Java team in-house complain they still lack the skilled developers to architect and maintain J2EE servers. Without well-administered J2EE servers, there is just no way to attain rich internet applications like wikis, portals or CMS.

Until in-house capabilities can be beefed up and true point-and-click J2EE server admin utilities become available, leading enterprises wishing to leverage the power of the Web have the option to outsource mission-critical development to system integrators or experienced and fleet-footed third-party application developers. There’s no lack of the latter and on a trip to Nashua (NH), I chanced across HyTech Professionals (www.hytechpro.com). Frankly amazing how they took the challenge of rich functionality and robust performance off of a J2EE server as “part of the service” for clients in production, retail, financial services and technology startup’s.

Because your time and money are valuable, you deserve a solutions orientated software development firm that can deliver high quality solutions on time for a great price. Our distinct selling point is the ability to convert our client’s vision into a cost effective and efficient business solution. We believe our unique approach to offshore outsourcing combines significant cost benefits with lower risks and higher levels of customer service. In a highly competitive international environment, HyTech Professionals distinguishes itself by providing the following advantages:

• HyTech Professionals is a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner and ISO 9001 Certified software engineering services company, delivering top quality results on which our clients can depend.

• We have U.S.-based project managers to ensure that the risks associated with offshore outsourcing are minimized, and accountability is increased. You do not have to worry about issues like cultural differences, time differences, communication gaps, etc

• As an employee owned IT firm, all of our staff are committed to helping our clients succeed. Our people are our greatest assets, and as such, we invest heavily in training, our internal mentorship program, and MS/ISO certification. Our programmers bring years of software development experience, domain expertise, and a desire to help you succeed in your business goal.

• By employing world-class software developers in India, HyTech Professionals ensures high quality programming along with significant savings for each one of our clients.

• HyTech Professionals maintains 24/7 service support staff equipped with the latest technologies and secured systems.

• We strive to build long-term relationships with our clients. HyTech Professionals nurtures a company culture of helping our clients beyond expectations, even when we have to go that extra mile. Our organization’s values revolve around customer satisfaction, quality delivery, privacy protection, promoting equal opportunity, flexibility and integrity.

Creating a Blog: Why Wordpress is the Preferred Choice

October 29, 2009 · Posted in WordPress · Comment 

Wordpress is one of the most famous blogging platforms used by many web developers and users as it can do much more than just letting you post entries to your blogs. Using Wordpress as a Content Management System (CMS) for a website has many benefits which you may find useful.

Creating a blog using Wordpress has many advantages. Wordpress is easy to set up and use. And It requires only a few clicks if you have fantastico in your domain control panel (in your hosting account). If you don’t have fantastico in your hosting, you can do a manual installation. This can take a little more time but is not too complicated to do as long as you follow the directions faithfully. If you have no plan to set up Wordpress yourself or if you just want to make sure it is installed properly, you can always hire a technician or someone who can do it for you. You can be assured that hiring someone to install Wordpress will not be expensive since it only takes a short time and a little effort to do this.

Wordpress can make updating your blogging website easier for you. You no longer have to hire a web page designer to work on your website for you. Websites are technically complex to set up or edit, but Wordpress allows you to input or update content for your blogs by just following simple steps.

You can easily outsource website updates or changes with Wordpress. If you have a virtual assistant, you can let her have her own username and password whenever she needs to log in to your website to work. You don’t need to worry about having the most recent version of the website or overwriting the work of others.

Wordpress has other great advantages as well, including giving you total control and management of content for your website. You can use Wordpress to create categories and subcategories to assign your blogs to different sections in the website. With having Wordpress to make updating your blogs easier, you can update every time you want with no hassles, thereby making your website be among the top search engine rankings. RSS feeds also come with Wordpress, which will enable readers to be updated in real time every time you have updates on your blog.

To start creating a blog using Wordpress, it is advisable to have your own domain name which can easily be purchased for less than $10 a year.

Microsoft Great Plains Version Update Faq

October 27, 2009 · Posted in Sharepoint · Comment 

Microsoft Dynamics GP ERP version upgrade should be planned, it is not recommended to do it impulsively. In order to facilitate your homework we would like to give you highlights in technical and functional compatibility areas

1. Microsoft Dexterity core. Great Plains is Dexterity application, which has new technologies, incorporated in Dexterity and serving as additions (and in some cases as replacements) to Dex: eConnect, Sharepoint (with approval cycles), Microsoft Office stack integration, plus integrations with Microsoft CRM, RMS and other MS business applications. The message here is to check if you have custom Dexterity logic – this is first step to analyze and address in version upgrade

2. Great Plains Dex modifications upgrade scenarios. Dexterity was designed as GP Dynamics IDE and programming language, and one of its fundamental features is upgradeability. However this should be given to the hands of professional Dexterity programmers. In the best case scenario, you should have DYNAMICS.DIC dictionary with your customization source code (in the case of Dex it is sanscript codes). Dexterity modification upgrade has further specifics, required to be taken to consideration in upgrade, this is outside of the scope here.

3. Third Party modules. Great Plains is the platform, open to Microsoft Business Solutions ISV, who extends GP business logic. Typically these extensions are written in Dexterity and distributed as Dexterity chink. The examples of popular ISV names for Great Plains: Mekorma, Avalara, Intellisol (late 1990th), Albaspectrum, and others. If you deploy third party GP extension module, you should check if third party tool is available for the new version, where you plan to upgrade

4. Reporting. Well, you may have various blends of reporting tools: Crystal Reports, SRS, MS Access, but in our opinion GP ReportWriter reports should be analyzed in the most careful manner in GP version update. Report Writer in turn is Dexterity-written module and it comes back to one of the first GP versions: 3.2 and 4.0, so this is not a surprise that you may encounter multiple surprises and restrictions

5. FRx. This is financial reporting tool, which has connection to GP General Ledger and GL account summaries. FRx upgrade is typically straightforward, in some cases you have to know “known issues”, you should be familiar with sysdata folder, FRX date and time table in Dynamics database. If you got FRx upgrade deadlock, please try to relax and search Microsoft Business Solutions technical knowledge database at partner or customer source

6. Upgrade Paths. How upgrade works behind the scenes? Dexterity utilities looks in Dynamics database which legacy version you are on and then if it has upgrade algorithm from your version it launches the update process. You should know probably all historical GP versions: 3.2, 4.0, 5.0, 5.5, 6.0, 7.0, 7.5, 8.0, 9.0 and current 10.0 (October 2007). FRx versions: 4.0, 5.0, 6.5

7. GPA upgrade and migration. If you are on old Great Plains Accounting for DOS or MS Windows, you need to undergo migration to Microsoft Dynamics GP path. Migration tool is available if you contact your MBS partner

8. Pervasive SQL 2000/Btrieve and Ctree/Faircom Great Plains Dynamics upgrade. If you are on Pervasive or Ctree, then it is version 7.5 or earlier. Microsoft terminated these legacy platforms support in December 2004. MRP software industry deploys annual support fee mechanism to finance accounting software development expenses. In order to get new version registration key, you should be enrolled and current in GP annual enhancement program. If you are current, then you should contact your GP VAR of record to arrange migration from Great Plains Dynamics on Pervasive or Ctree to Microsoft Dynamics GP on MS SQL Server 2000 or 2005

9. No answer. If your topic is not covered in this publication, please feel free to contact us

Sites for freelance writers to earn money

October 27, 2009 · Posted in Jobs · Comment 

Have you ever thought of teaching? As the writing industry changes, with many new on-line avenues for the freelance writer, there is a relatively new band wagon to jump on that is having great success. Ordinary people, who have gained expertise in a subject, are now able to share their knowledge with the huge population of the Internet. The creation of on-line teaching / school programs, which are loaded onto web sites, has opened up this new adventure.

These programs are free and open source e-learning software packages also known as Course Management Systems (CMS), Learning Management Systems (LMS), or Virtual Learning Environments (VLE). The four top programs are Dokeos, ILIAS, Moodle, and Sakai.

In the past this was limited to Universities, and recognized base educational facilities (example: High Schools). Next to join the band wagon were many trade schools that realized the potential income boost from offering on-line courses. This was followed by private facilities that specialized in particular subjects. All of these were limited by having to offer accreditation and hiring only professional teachers.

Then the corporate community saw the value of these wonderful educational programs. Employees could be taught important subjects, in an online environment that tracked their performance, without the expense of actually sending them to a school. In addition a certificate could be offered at the successful completion of a class.

Moodle (moodle.org, a funny name) gained an edge that the others didn’t pick up on. They created software that could easily be understood, by the average intelligent person, which had a fair amount of web creation experience. They offered their program (free) through cPanel (a web creation platform) opening it up to the hundreds of thousands of Internet web-page creators. This put the power of e-Learning in the hands of the general public.

And this is where you – the freelance writer – comes in. Many of the general public learning platforms are looking for knowledgeable writers / teachers to share their expertise. How do you find these schools? Moodle’s listing of e-Learning environments (using their program) is public and you can most likely find a school that is offering information you love. Keep in mind that almost all of them pay a percentage of revenue generated from the class.

There is another opportunity for the very industrious writer. That is; creating your own e-Learning web site and running your own school. Yes, you have to have knowledge of web site creation, including (but not limited to) html, php, cgi, and working with MySQL data bases. But if you fit into this category you are limited only by your own imagination.

If you have the bug that makes you wish you could teach what you’ve learned, there is now a way to do it.

Your Website From the Ground Up in 10 Steps

October 24, 2009 · Posted in Jobs · Comment 

So, you have finally decided to build yourself a website, but really have no idea where to start. The following 10 steps will give you some insight into what you need to address when creating a search friendly website from the ground up.

While this article is not an exhaustive líst of everything you need to know, it does touch base on many of the important aspects of creating a new website.

Step 1 – Keyword Research
Even before you choose your domain name, you should put a little time into some keyword research. Research all the possible keywords that will fit your industry and the website you plan on building. Having a clear idea of what your end targets are will make the rest of your job much easier and help things to just fall into place. Take a look at Keyword Research for SEO, written earlier this summer, for more help on this.

Step 2 – Domain Selection
If you already have an established brick and mortar business and the website will be an extension of that business, using your company name as the domain name is in most cases the best idea. If your company name is either irrelevant, or simply unavailable, you may want to consider a domain that has your target phrase listed as part of the domain.

A great example of this is if your site is focused geographically. Using the location as part of the domain when possible will give you a little extra juice with the search engines and help draw people to your site as they instantly can see the relevance in the domain.

Let’s say that you are building a website focused on your home town, “Somewhere USA”. A domain you may consider could be “Somewhere.com”; however, this would probably be already taken. Other options such as “SomewhereInfo.com” or “SomewhereGuide.com” may be good alternatives. The same goes for retail stores. “SomewhereCameras”.com or “SomewhereBakery”.com would also be good choices.

Avoid excessive use of hyphens; sometimes it is appropriate to use one, but if you can help it, avoid more than that as it can appear messy and even spammy in some cases.

Step 3 – System Back End
If you plan on having a large scale website that will grow and change constantly then you may want to consider a content management system (CMS) such as Joomla. If you decide to go this route, you want to ensure that whichever CMS you choose is search engine friendly and offers items such as unique title tags, custom URL’s, and full control over content, heading tags, image alt tags, etc.

Starting a website using a non-friendly CMS is like buying a car without an engine. Sure it may look great, but it won’t get you anywhere.

Step 4 – Site Structure & Navigation
This is really one of the most fundamental aspects of your site creation. If the structure of your site does not work well, then your site may be doomed from the very beginning.

Take a look back at your keyword research and brainstorm all the areas of your site that you may want to develop content for. In some cases you may find valuable keywords that would fit perfectly into a few pages of content for your site. If the phrase and the content would be a good match for the theme of your site, go ahead and note them as pages to create. Get a líst, or flowchart, of all the content you plan on adding and sort those pages into relevant categories.

Be sure your site files are saved in a way that makes sense – this includes both the file name, and the complete path to the file. Save files, including similar content in a relevant subdirectory, with simple file names representing each. Let’s take an example of an informational site dedicated to a specific geographic location. If you have a series of pages dedicated to recreation, you may save them as:

/recreation/parks.html
/recreation/trails.html
/recreation/beaches.html

Keeping your URL structure clean and tidy can not only help with search engine rankings, but it will give a good visual impression to the site visitor as well. Often, using each of these categories as main points for your primary site navigation may make the most sense.

Also be sure to keep your site relatively flat, with as few layers as possible. Don’t make the search engines follow a dozen links to get to the deepest levels of your site. Unless the site is literally tens of thousands of pages, there is no need to click more than 2 or 3 links to get to any deep content. The shorter the path to an internal page, the more credít by the search engines.

Step 5 – Navigation
When developing the end site, you also want to make sure that your site navigation is search engine friendly – this is critical if you ever want free organic listings.

If possible, use a text based form of navigation. You can use CSS to style the text links to fit into your graphical design. Text links are the best method, but image based navigation and even some forms of drop down menus are also search engine friendly.

If you choose to use image based navigation be sure to include image alt text relevant to the link to give something for Google to associate with the linked page. If you absolutely must use Flash, or any form of navigation not friendly for search engine spiders, be sure to supplement this with text based links on another location of the page.

Step 6 – Analytics
It isn’t ever too early to start thinking about your stats. Before your site goes live you must have some form of accurate analytics in place so you can measure your site’s traffic and progress.

There is an endless supply of analytics options out there to choose from. You can simply use the stats software that comes free with your web hosting, however, more often than not, they tend to be very basic with no flexibility. Advanced choices such as ClickTracks can give you rather in-depth statistics, but for a very small mom and pop operation it may be too expensive. Google Analytics, is a free option that can give you most, if not all the data you will need and does not require access to your raw log files.

If you do opt for an option such as ClickTracks, check with your host to ensure that you will have the raw log files you require. StepForth can also help you with your statistical analysis and offers a number of inexpensive ClickTracks service packages.

Step 7 – Content Creation
Now is the time to get that new, fresh content posted to your site with the SEO in mind. Make sure that the content you write reflects your industry and target keywords. You don’t need to flood the content with your target keywords, but make sure they are in there a few times. When it makes sense to do so, also include some acronyms to help Google establish the overall relevance.

If you perform a search in Google for “~keyword”, any words that Google bolds in the search results will be acronyms that Google deems relevant. Include some of these where possible.

Step 8 – Basic SEO
Ensure that ALL pages of your site include unique and Meta Description tags. This is one of the core fundamental aspects of an optimized size and it does play a significant role in your search rankings. Make sure that these tags are not only unique but are accurate representations of each page. Also be sure to place your target phrase in heading as well as image alt tags where applicable.

Step 9 – Initial Promotion / Launch
Now that you have your new site all up and ready to go, you want to give it that kick start to help drive some traffic. It will be a while before the search engines fully index your site and even longer before you start to see organic rankings for your target search phrases. It is important to start off right away to get the ball rolling.

Start off by issuing a press release to announce the launch of your new business website. Press releases are a great way to get some traffic and a rather valuable first link into your site. Submitting your press release using a company such as PRWeb will get your link in the engine’s path and should help your site to be initially indexed by Google right away.

Next submít your site to some relevant directories starting with DMOZ. It can take months, even years, to have your site listed in DMOZ, so it is important to get it submitted right away. Consider submittíng to other industry relevant directories. For some information on how to select the right directories take a look at Building Links with Directory Submissions.

Work on getting as many links from relevant industry websites as possible. The more links you can get from reputable sources, the better the overall performance of your site.

Step 10 – Ongoing Promotion
Once you have completed the site, the content looks great, and all appears finished, you’ve still got work to do. For long term success, especially for a brand new site, you need to continually promote your site. You should always be looking at ways to build your inbound links and your relevant content.

Consider creating accounts with various social media platforms to help promote your site. These can not only give you a link back to your site, but they can help you drive traffic and raise awareness about your business and product.

A site that is always growing, and always getting new links, has the best chance of getting a stable top 10 listing in Google

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