Google has exported the latest PR values to the toolbar today. Both Access Database Security and SliQTools are winners with PR increases from 0 to 2 and from 3 to 4 respectively but again this blog didn't get assigned a PR.
Have you noticed changes on any other sites?
by ML
Saturday 27 September 2008
Saturday 20 September 2008
Whats an unreasonable amount of programs on a download site for an author?
I did a keep clean up job a few months back and deleted authors who had lots of programs on softtester. I can't remember the figure I deleted from.
However I've noticed a lot of credit site listings etc again.
So I plan to limit the amount of programs an author can have on one email address.
I know that the author could then have more that one email address, but I figure since some sites require listings to be activated, its probably too much hassle for a spammer to have lots of email addresses. But I may be wrong.
At the moment I have 50 authors with over 100 programs some with a lot more than that.
I'm thinking 50 or 25 sounds about reasonable?
I guess I could limit things further and say they can only have x number of programs in a category.
However I've noticed a lot of credit site listings etc again.
So I plan to limit the amount of programs an author can have on one email address.
I know that the author could then have more that one email address, but I figure since some sites require listings to be activated, its probably too much hassle for a spammer to have lots of email addresses. But I may be wrong.
At the moment I have 50 authors with over 100 programs some with a lot more than that.
I'm thinking 50 or 25 sounds about reasonable?
I guess I could limit things further and say they can only have x number of programs in a category.
Friday 19 September 2008
My first C# program
Well I've now read 3 hours of my teach yourself C# book.
I've found it really hard to keep awake, not learnt that much so far.
Taken me ages to motivate myself to keep going.
Anyways, I thought I'd try and write a small program to see how far I could go.
I'm stuck already, having difficulty creating a function, or what I'd think of as a function in vb.
I googled and found someone saying that you can't do functions in C#.
That seems weird.
So, I guess I'm a bit more motivated to read further in my book.
Otherwise I'll not be able to finish my program :(
by
JM
I've found it really hard to keep awake, not learnt that much so far.
Taken me ages to motivate myself to keep going.
Anyways, I thought I'd try and write a small program to see how far I could go.
I'm stuck already, having difficulty creating a function, or what I'd think of as a function in vb.
I googled and found someone saying that you can't do functions in C#.
That seems weird.
So, I guess I'm a bit more motivated to read further in my book.
Otherwise I'll not be able to finish my program :(
by
JM
Sunday 14 September 2008
Free article sites
At least a year ago, I read about free article sites and added some article pages to my kids mask factory site. Aaron just emailed me, he'd done a personal search and found one of my articles.
I guess there is some value is having these pages, but I'm not sure whether such pages lead to sales. But are these pages valuable for an SEO / Google point of view?
Maybe I should add some free articles to my other sites?
I guess I know the answer to this question, these articles haven't led to a massive raise in sales, although I can't really tell.
by
JM
I guess there is some value is having these pages, but I'm not sure whether such pages lead to sales. But are these pages valuable for an SEO / Google point of view?
Maybe I should add some free articles to my other sites?
I guess I know the answer to this question, these articles haven't led to a massive raise in sales, although I can't really tell.
by
JM
Friday 12 September 2008
Adwords Tool, competition indication, whats good ?
We've been using the adwords keyword tool to try and find good keywords. My initial thoughts where that I should avoid ANYTHING with any competition but have at least a thousand search volume.
However, Aaron found a video on how to use the tool and this changed our / my understanding of it.
Heres the video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZDB6T_L-mqs.
In the video it says you should have around 100,000 search volume and the guy ignored the competition indicator.
Mike, whats your understanding / thoughts?
I'm not thinking I should have waited with my directory submission until I'd found good keywords to use in the links, however I can now change them I guess, so it doesn't look like I've got lots of the same.
by
JM
EDIT: I've also learned from the video, that you REALLY need to know your keywords and near keywords, I mean, I did realise this to a certain extent, but this guy knows numbers too. I think I'm going to have to keep records, I just don't know what. Although, I guess keyword / phrase and search volume, would be start.
However, Aaron found a video on how to use the tool and this changed our / my understanding of it.
Heres the video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZDB6T_L-mqs.
In the video it says you should have around 100,000 search volume and the guy ignored the competition indicator.
Mike, whats your understanding / thoughts?
I'm not thinking I should have waited with my directory submission until I'd found good keywords to use in the links, however I can now change them I guess, so it doesn't look like I've got lots of the same.
by
JM
EDIT: I've also learned from the video, that you REALLY need to know your keywords and near keywords, I mean, I did realise this to a certain extent, but this guy knows numbers too. I think I'm going to have to keep records, I just don't know what. Although, I guess keyword / phrase and search volume, would be start.
Well done to BlueSkiMoney
Well done to BlueSkiMoney aka Aaron, We've been chatting about SEO and using the adwords tool and watching some howto videos from youtube and last night hes, produced what I think is a well SEO page.
http://www.burnyourvinyls.com/audio-adaptors/2-5-to-3-5-adaptor-headphones-adaptor-mobile-phone-adapter/prod_11.php
Having said this there is always room improvement, he could do with more content and some internal links and of course some incoming links to that page or more probable his home page.
Anyways I think this first good attempt.
by
JM
http://www.burnyourvinyls.com/audio-adaptors/2-5-to-3-5-adaptor-headphones-adaptor-mobile-phone-adapter/prod_11.php
Having said this there is always room improvement, he could do with more content and some internal links and of course some incoming links to that page or more probable his home page.
Anyways I think this first good attempt.
by
JM
Thursday 11 September 2008
Going along with the traffic
I may be imagining things, but I've noticed something funny with the traffic to my main site in the last few weeks. For most of the last 6 months, visitors to my main site followed the same pattern - up on specific days of the week, down on certain others, up at certain times of day and so on. This pattern was as reliable as clockwork.
In the last 5 to 6 weeks however, the pattern has changed. Days which had lots of visitors no longer do - at least as a porportion of overall traffic, whereas other days now have proportionally more. I also notice that Softtester's traffic goes up and down inline with my main site's traffic - a bit like US and UK shares!
The only thing I can put this down to is that I've done a whole load more PAD file submissions in the past couple of months and I'm tapping into the same type of traffic visiting Softtester. Also Softtester is an old site in comparison with mine. In non-UK countries I've only begun to do well really since the end of July so perhaps now my visitor profile is beginning to match Softtester's more global audience.
by ML
In the last 5 to 6 weeks however, the pattern has changed. Days which had lots of visitors no longer do - at least as a porportion of overall traffic, whereas other days now have proportionally more. I also notice that Softtester's traffic goes up and down inline with my main site's traffic - a bit like US and UK shares!
The only thing I can put this down to is that I've done a whole load more PAD file submissions in the past couple of months and I'm tapping into the same type of traffic visiting Softtester. Also Softtester is an old site in comparison with mine. In non-UK countries I've only begun to do well really since the end of July so perhaps now my visitor profile is beginning to match Softtester's more global audience.
by ML
Tuesday 9 September 2008
Shop Sites, should they be like normal sites too?
At the moment my shop sites are my top priority, well my kids maths site is and anything I can transfer into the jewellery site I do that too.
I've been using the adwords keyword tool to try and add some further keywords into my product pages.
Then I started thinking, it difficult to add content to shop sites without ruining your product pages. So what about genuine content pages?
I suppose the difficultly is what content do people who are searching to buy your product want to see?
by JM
I've been using the adwords keyword tool to try and add some further keywords into my product pages.
Then I started thinking, it difficult to add content to shop sites without ruining your product pages. So what about genuine content pages?
I suppose the difficultly is what content do people who are searching to buy your product want to see?
by JM
Friday 5 September 2008
Freeware version as a selling strategy?
In the past few years I've seen many of my competitors and other software where theres a freeware or free version, which is a cut down version of the real thing. The real thing not being free.
Up till now I've considered other factors but not the SEO factor.
There would be more traffic, downloads and people using your software.
All of which have got to be good things.
The only down side I can think of is that people using a freeware program are possibly less likely to pay money for more features. Although I guess when I search for software I don't start out just searching for freeware.
Apart from attracting extra sales, I've always considered then next biggest benefit to be, that your program gets tested more.
Has anyone else got anything to say on this subject?
by JM
Up till now I've considered other factors but not the SEO factor.
There would be more traffic, downloads and people using your software.
All of which have got to be good things.
The only down side I can think of is that people using a freeware program are possibly less likely to pay money for more features. Although I guess when I search for software I don't start out just searching for freeware.
Apart from attracting extra sales, I've always considered then next biggest benefit to be, that your program gets tested more.
Has anyone else got anything to say on this subject?
by JM
Sitemaps and big sites
I'm just thinking I really need sitemaps for softtester but theres 60,000 urls / dynamic pages.
Even if I have a-z pages, the sitemap files are going to be huge.
What should I do ?
by JM
Even if I have a-z pages, the sitemap files are going to be huge.
What should I do ?
by JM
Tuesday 2 September 2008
Sales Growth Factors
It would be interesting to find out what factors people think have been successful in gaining or growing sales for their products. One factor might be time, another advertising and so on.
For me, my sales have grown almost directly in line with the number of visitors I get via search engines. I usually find there is a step change in the number of visitors and a corresponding rise in the number of sales every 3 months at around the time Google exports its PR values.
In the early days I used Google Adwords. This did attract traffic and some sales but only enough to break even - organic traffic has proved much more profitable.
In more recent months - say the last 3 - I have also begun to see a rise in repeat sales, i.e. people wanting more than one copy, and also word of mouth sales. I've put this down to achieving a certain critical mass of sales, i.e. enough sales for personal recommendations to be sufficient to encourage a few more sales.
One thing that did slightly dent the rise in sales was the UK school summer holidays, particularly the last 3 weeks before children went back to school. During this period, website traffic was slightly down, though it seems to have recovered this week.
by ML
For me, my sales have grown almost directly in line with the number of visitors I get via search engines. I usually find there is a step change in the number of visitors and a corresponding rise in the number of sales every 3 months at around the time Google exports its PR values.
In the early days I used Google Adwords. This did attract traffic and some sales but only enough to break even - organic traffic has proved much more profitable.
In more recent months - say the last 3 - I have also begun to see a rise in repeat sales, i.e. people wanting more than one copy, and also word of mouth sales. I've put this down to achieving a certain critical mass of sales, i.e. enough sales for personal recommendations to be sufficient to encourage a few more sales.
One thing that did slightly dent the rise in sales was the UK school summer holidays, particularly the last 3 weeks before children went back to school. During this period, website traffic was slightly down, though it seems to have recovered this week.
by ML
Some selling strategies
Last days I stumbled upon some smart product selling strategies which I want to share with you.
I was searching for concurrent products from other vendors. As you would expect - time recording software. I found a guy who pretented to be an expert for time recording issues. But instead of selling software on his webpage he offered free handouts which would describe the advantage of time recording and strategies for implementing time recording in companies. At a total different web page and URL, the same guy, offers time recording software .... So, what do you think does he praise in his free handouts on that total different URL?
Advantage: You are collecting addresses of potential buyers.
Another company, another software ... This company announced a contest where the first three winner, gets a free software license of their software. What the people needed to do was writing why they are absolutely wanting to get the software. So the people who wrote the best answers got the free software license. I think that's smart ...
Advantage: You are collecting reasons why people need your software.
By GS
I was searching for concurrent products from other vendors. As you would expect - time recording software. I found a guy who pretented to be an expert for time recording issues. But instead of selling software on his webpage he offered free handouts which would describe the advantage of time recording and strategies for implementing time recording in companies. At a total different web page and URL, the same guy, offers time recording software .... So, what do you think does he praise in his free handouts on that total different URL?
Advantage: You are collecting addresses of potential buyers.
Another company, another software ... This company announced a contest where the first three winner, gets a free software license of their software. What the people needed to do was writing why they are absolutely wanting to get the software. So the people who wrote the best answers got the free software license. I think that's smart ...
Advantage: You are collecting reasons why people need your software.
By GS
Monday 1 September 2008
WOW, WOW, Google webmaster tools and top searches ?
Mike, I'm guessing you haven't seen this, or haven't noticed it or well at least you don't use it.
As you do searches on google and look at your position.
Google webmaster tools, has a top searches feature which shows the keyword used and the postion you are for that page on google.
So if we use word tracker to check that term gets lots a of hits...
Then surely this is all we need to do to find googd keywords, well that and some common sense to make sure people will use the keyword in the right way. And obviously we have to be getting some of those hots in the first place to see the term in google tools.
Seems like the holy grail to me ?
by JM
As you do searches on google and look at your position.
Google webmaster tools, has a top searches feature which shows the keyword used and the postion you are for that page on google.
So if we use word tracker to check that term gets lots a of hits...
Then surely this is all we need to do to find googd keywords, well that and some common sense to make sure people will use the keyword in the right way. And obviously we have to be getting some of those hots in the first place to see the term in google tools.
Seems like the holy grail to me ?
by JM
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