If Google Sculpting is Dead Then SEO Must Be on Life Support?

I have always thought of SEO as optimizing your content, both on-site and off-site, so that it ranks at the top of the search engines. Promoting your content or site should never be a crime in the eyes of Google or any search engine for that matter.

Years ago, before I even knew what SEO was, I wrote an article and submitted it to the major online article directories. Next morning my article and links were on a thousand sites across the web, that may be a bit of an exaggeration but you get the picture. How can Google or anyone fault webmasters for voting on the quality of your content by placing it on their sites?

Same thing happens when your visitors bookmark, tweet or digg your content and you end up on the homepage of Digg with hundreds of sites linking to your content. How can Google fault you for that happening?

Democracy happens. SEO happens.

But not without a lot of promotion and marketing to get the wheels rolling. If you want to sit around and wait for things to happen, buy a big soft cushion and some extra patience at the check-out counter because you're going to need it.

Any business has the right to advertise, to aggressively market their products. How can Google fault any company for doing such a thing? Now outright buying of thousands of links to get your site to the top should be wrong but presenting quality link bait in the form of articles, videos, ebooks, press releases, quality information... and letting webmasters decide what content and sites they want to link to should be at the heart of all this foolishness.

SEO is knowing how to fine-tune your link bait and your site to reach the top spot in organic search.

But is Google cracking down on webmasters who actively pursue this kind of link building? On webmasters who try to get those embedded anchor text links on important relevant sites? Are they trying to give SEO a bad name? Like that's even possible!

Over the years, my sites have held some very profitable keywords on the first page results in organic search, mostly in Google. That's mainly because I optimize my content and web pages to rank well in Google. I have been quietly Google Sculpting for years, controlling what links I want on their first page results.

Actually, ranking well in Google is not rocket science and any idiot can do it; all it takes is good quality content and plenty of good quality backlinks to that content. Anchor text (underlined clickable part of an URL) is extremely important for ranking high in Google but you have to be careful to vary your keywords because many SEO experts believe Google has a keyword quota -- use the same keyword too often and your content will be penalized for keyword and/or URL spamming. Makes sense.

Actually, I have been studying and analyzing Google since it was merely an itch on someone's back. And it seems like I have been constantly rubbing that ever changing Algorithm ever since. Generally, it has paid off handsomely for me and I have been a full-time professional search engine marketer for 3 or 4 years now.

I am rarely stumped by Google but it does happen occasionally. And recently my SEO alter ego took a massive beating, some kind of filter has taken one of my main keyword phrases off the first page of Google and landed it in the 60th place. Ouch!

What is even compounding the problem, this keyword phrase sometimes bounces back onto the first page and then back off again. This is not like Google, they are never erratic unless it's one of their dances or a major update when all hell usually breaks loose. For the most part, my keywords in Google have been fairly stable, if they drop, they drop slowly and because I have stopped promoting them. Years of monitoring your keywords tells you something very different is happening here in this case.

It is totally frustrating when Google won't do what you want them to do! Usually they are so easy to lead and they take directions so well. However, this recent erratic keyword bouncing in Google has me so perplexed I am stumbling to find possible reasons. I am jumping to conclusions way too quickly.

In my case, Google was listing both my main index homepage and my optimized page for the same keyword phrase. This appears to be diluting the ranking of both pages. The optimized page was at around 50 and my homepage came in at the 95 spot. However, this seems to be more my mistake than Google's, since I inadvertently placed the same keyword phrase in links on my homepage going to other interior pages and not necessarily to my main optimized page which I wanted and which is usually ranked in Google for this keyword phrase.

Let me explain further, I develop sections/guides on my site that are keyworded to different markets generally relating to the theme of my site or domain. For the keyword phrase in question, I have a well established page that's linked from hundreds of related sites around the web; this is the page that should be ranked for this keyword phrase since it is the most relevant, not my homepage. Likewise, on my own site I have constructed my pages so that PR flows to this optimized page. For years, this optimized interior page held the number one spot in Google.

Could this possibly have something to with regards to PageRank Sculpting, which Matt Cutts spoke about in a recent blog post? If PR sculpting no longer works on my site, can this be causing the erratic bouncing of that particular keyword but if this is true -- why aren't my other keywords turning into bungee cord wannabes?

Now there could be separate filters at play here and the above scenario has nothing to do with these bouncing keywords within Google. It seems to be connected with URL spamming in some form or manner, even when those links are legitimate links coming from quality sites. It seems Google's Algorithm has become so sophisticated and complex, it probably has developed a mind of its own and nobody can tell it what to do.

However, it is always rather foolish to draw conclusions regarding Google on just a few erratic keywords. But something definitely has changed in how Google is ranking those keywords - could it be that PageRank Sculpting or even Google Sculpting is killing the old tried and true SEO techniques. I am seeing a lot more Brand Rankings in the SERPs which Aaron Wall talked about a little while back; I am also seeing much more relevance on News listings, more relevance on Video listings... can Google be shaking up the whole ranking order?

Rumor has it that many top Google big-wigs are upset with the introduction of Microsoft's Bing into the search arena. That orders have gone out to shake up and improve Google's Algorithm... to further combat this pesty new competition.

But does Google have to worry about Bing? The answer is a possible yes - if you do a side by side comparison of Google and Bing here: http://www.blackdog.ie/google-bing/search-com.php

You will see Bing is not half bad - whether it can give Google a run for its search dollar money is still up in the air but it could definitely eat into Google's share of the search market. I am seeing Bing turning up in my own traffic stats with a lot more traffic than I get from MSN or Windows Live; now it's no where near the amount of traffic Google delivers but still it more than what was there before Bing launched.

All this shouldn't give Google any sleepless nights but Google can't afford to take too many catnaps if it wants to keep its dominance in online search.

Could all these background events be playing into Google's shakeup of how it lists popular lucrative keywords. I am not seeing the same kind of movement in my other less profitable keywords. Can Google be hand-picking certain lucrative keywords and applying different standards or filters to those keywords? Are there "human eyes" filtering Google's organic rankings? Extremely hard to believe with Google's well deserved reputation, but something is definitely not routine as usual in the Kingdom of Google?

It now seems to rank high for certain lucrative keywords in Google, you MUST have TWO highly ranked optimized pages instead of JUST one?

Is this a new and more powerful ranking factor which overrules most other factors? It's my most burning SEO question at the moment. What has caused that keyword to drop so far, so fast? And why does this keyword phrase seem to be in Everflux, with new listings jumping unto the first page every day. The rankings/listings are much, much more fluid than they used to be; if Google ranks all its keywords in this fluctuating manner, SEO may indeed be dead. At least whitehat SEO where the webmaster is doing everything according to the rules.

Again, this is micro-reasoning on my part since all this could be just some filters holding my keywords back or recent activity from competing sites have suddenly increased and my rankings have naturally dropped when compared to them. But I have held that keyword for years in Google, how dare other sites take my spot? For the other sites to gain so quickly and for mine to fall so fast and so far has me scratching my head. Something just doesn't smell right in the land of Google?

Could something more sinister be going on? Could someone be Google Sculpting my links in the opposite direction? Since it's so easy to sculpt or convince Google to list your page, can it be just as easy for someone to use underhand methods to get your page or site ranked lower? Spam your link on thousands of nasty sites or simply get you ranked for two pages for the same keyword, one of them that's poorly optimized such as your homepage so as to pull both of them down lower. This is too laughable and too paranoid to entertain, or is it?

Regardless, I have learned long ago, SEO has to be taken with a large grain of salt. Besides, this is just one of thousands of keywords I am monitoring. Win or lose, I am having the time of my life, even when Google goes erratic and won't do what I want them to do. After all, when everything is said and done; SEO means never having to say you're sorry!

Google Morning! Google Afternoon! Google Evening! Google Everywhere!

Why and how much Google is Getting Important, either you are Businessman, Doctor, Engineer, Software Professional, SEO or Housewife, you tend to Google every time. Google is more or less an integral part of our online life now. Google has become the biggest brand on internet, it's still a seven year old kid and has surpassed young and healthy fellows like Microsoft and Yahoo!
Google Means the World!
Google means everything for almost everybody, you ask from it, it'll serve you with the best. Google People intent to capture all World's Information at one single platform, one can guess how big they aim to be! Thought Google hasn't get 10% of its Goal but still it's the Biggest Online Database. It serves to everybody including Businessmen, Visitors, Professionals and Competitors as well.

1. To Visitors: Google is their Genie, which can serve them anything they want without spending any penny.
2. To Business Owners and Advertisers: Google is their God father, which provides them immense quality traffic every moment.
3. To Competitors: Google is their Teacher, which sets new Trends, it's competitors try to follow the same way as it does, try to learn from Google.
Google Loyalty!
Google is basically a Search Engine that has built enormous Loyalty with its Visitors through its consistent quality, reliability, innovation and simplicity. Whatever Google is going to experiment, people already trust that it's going to be big and very reliable. That's why thousands of people get dependent on Google.
Google to Follow!

Well, it's not easy to follow Google's way, because Google always believes on Research and Innovations, how can it be restricted to Search only? It had started Testing and Launching New Services and Tools for better user Experiences. Its BETA Launched Services and Tools got Mega Success and surprised big players like Microsoft and Yahoo!
Secret of Google Success!
David C. Drummond, Google's Vice President, Corporate Development, according to him there are four factors as the key to Google's success:
1. Technology: Along with its innovative approach to page ranking, Google is a purpose-built hardware company, building all its own servers from components it buys directly for their manufacturers. According to Drummond, Google now operates the world's largest distributed computer system.

2. Business Model Innovation: By perfecting the nature of targeted ads, Google not only has created a highly effective revenue generator, it has produced what it hopes to be a better experience for its users. It is Google's goal to make their targeted ads at least as relevant and useful to users as the search results themselves.
3. Brand: According to Drummond, a European study recently determined Google to be the number one most recognized worldwide brand. Indeed, Google has become a verb ("I can't wait to get home and Google him") which poses real challenges to a company seeking to protect the strength of its mark.
4. Focus on the User Experience: Product decisions at Google are driven by optimizing for the user experience first and for revenue second. The folks at Google firmly believe that the better the user experience, the more easily money will follow.
Google Info
The Google name was chosen to represent the gigantic amount of material available on the Web. It comes from "googol" the number 1 followed by 100 zeros.
For more http://www.google.com/intl/en/about.html

Google History
Google was created by two Stanford students, Larry Page and Sergey Brin. In 1996, they developed BackRub, a search engine that analyzed the "Back Links" the number of web links that pointed to that page. With an investment from Andy Bechtolsheim, a Sun founder, and others, Google Inc. was founded in September 7, 1998.
For more http://www.google.com/corporate/history.html
Google Tools and Services
Google has launched dozen of Desktop and Web Tools and Services, though majority of services and tools are still beta but they are very effective, here is a list of Google tools and services http://www.google.com/intl/en/options/

Asif Iqbal is a Researcher, SEO, Trainer, Speaker and Author, specializes in branding and promotion, founder of http://www.5icreations.com Pakistani SEO Outsourcing Company that outsource to US, UK, Canada and Australia. He can be reached at asif@asif-iqbal.com

Google Co-Op Overview

Google Co-op was announced by Google, along with other announcements, in May of 2006. Google Co-op represents Google's efforts to embrace social web and social search concepts in a major way to help improve Google search results. Google Co-op will allow users to contribute context, knowledge, and expertise. In essence, Google Co-op allows users to tell Google what web content really is by providing labels (categories) for that content. Users will also get to "vote" on what content they find to be valuable by subscribing to the content of various web sites that they value. An additional benefit to end-users is that Google Co-op allows them, through their subscriptions, to alter their own Google search results so that the provided information better meets their needs. It further helps end-users to filter out spam content, or content of little or marginal value.
Google Co-op is currently in beta test. As with any new service that is being beta tested, there are still some things being "worked out". The documentation is somewhat limited and lacking, making it a little difficult to understand and implement Google Co-op. The remainder of this paper will provide a high-level overview of Google Co-op to help individuals better understand what it is, how they can use it, and what they will see. Subsequent papers on the topic will delve more into the "nitty-gritty" of how to implement it.
At its most basic, "social web" (aka Web 2.0) is a process whereby users provide information and opinions, and share them with others. It is the sharing that provides the social aspect. Users can share information about what they find to be valuable. A good example of this is del.icio.us (http://del.icio.us) where users share links to their "favorite" information on the web (for example, favorite articles, or web sites about a topic etc.). Other examples of "user-vetted", or user-contributed information, would include Wikipedia (the open, user contributed, encyclopedia), and DMOZ (the open directory). There are many other examples.
"Social search" is the same process of humans providing and sharing information to help improve the results that a search engine presents to various queries. Google Co-Op would appear to be a strong move by Google into the social search arena.
Google Co-Op Components
Google Co-op consists of two things:

1. Topics
2. Subscribed links

TopicsTopics is simply Google's way of saying "area of interest". Topics allow users a way to provide labels (or tags, or categories) for information on the web. A user does this by associating a URL with a label (for example, http://www.google.com might get the label "search_engine"). These labels simply tell Google what a particular URL is all about. Users may use labels for topics that Google already has under development, which include: health, destination guides, autos, computer & video games, photo & video equipment, and stereo & home theater. Users may also develop labels for their own topics (for example, if a user has an interest in "wine" they may develop labels for the topic wine, which may include "wine_regions", "wine_types", etc.).
The process of labeling content will benefit everyone in several ways. Labels will provide Google with a vast amount of information about what web sites are all about, potentially down to a very granular, or individual page level. In addition, by taking the time to label a site, users are essentially "voting" on what sites are valuable to them. As these votes accumulate over time, Google will have a clearer picture of what sites are authoritative on a topic or topics. It is not hard to come to the conclusion that with time, Google will start to use this data so that sites with a lot of votes will start to appear much higher in appropriate search results.
Subscribed Links
Subscribed links provide several very beneficial features to both users and web publishers. Subscribed links provide:

• End users a means of altering or tailoring their search engine results so that they receive more relevant search results as well as results from sources that they "trust"
• End users a potential means of saving time since the results that they need may actually appear in the search results, negating the need to click through to the site
• End users another mechanism to "vote" on sites that they find to be valuable or authoritative by going through the process of subscribing to those sites
• Publishers with another means to make content available to end users

With subscribed links, publishers can make a subset of their information available to end users by submitting their subscribed links via an XML file to Google, and letting users know how and where to subscribe. Users who value the content of particular publishers will subscribe to their subscribed links. In so doing, the content for subscribed sites will appear at the top of search results when the users searches on relevant terms. In essence, the user alters their own search results by subscribing, so that content that they find to be more valuable appears at the top of search results.
As a site gains more subscribers, Google will most likely, with time, come to see it as more authoritative. As has already been mentioned earlier in this article, it is not hard to jump to the conclusion that such a site will appear higher up in Google search results for relevant search terms over time.
Google Co-Op Will Improve the Content That Users See
The whole process of labeling and subscribing has the added benefit of being self-vetting. This means that spam sites, advertising sites, and sites that providd marginal or useless content will be pushed down in search results. Social web dynamics in action means that users simply will not bother to label or subscribe to poor quality sites in high enough volumes for them to be seen as authoritative and useful. The end result for all should be better and more useful search results.
What Users Will "See"
At this point you may be wondering how users actually see Google Co-op search results. Google Co-op content appears to the end user in one or more of three ways:

1. As "Refine Results": Refine results are search refinements for the topic. This is a set of predetermined categories that can be used to refine a search for a given topic. For example, a search on "Boston" will yield a "Refine results for boston:" box at the top of their search results with the following categories: Dining guides, Lodging guides, Attractions, Shopping, Suggested itineraries, and Tours & day trips.
2. As "Subscribed Links": A Subscribed Links results box that presents the results from one or more of the authoritative sources to which a user has subscribed at the top of Google's search results. For example, if the user were subscribed to a travel site, and they searched on "Boston", they would see an "About Boston, MA" subscribed links box at the top of their search below the "Refine results".
3. "Labels": Labels appear for result items within a search. A label is a tag that appears below a search result. For example, an item after the title and brief description might say "Labeled Dining guides". These labeled sites show up below the subscribed links, but above Google's organic search results.

Users who do nothing will see search refinements for the health and destination guides topics areas at the top of any relevant set of Google search results (try a quick Google search on "Boston" to see "Refine results for Boston"). This is because Google subscribes everyone to those topics by default. In fact, there does not appear to be any way to unsubscribe from these two topics. Users will also see relevant labels from these two topics below search results for sites that have been annotated by users or publishers.
Users who subscribe to the subscribed links of web sites and search on terms that are relevant to those authoritative sources will see items from those sources at the top of their search results. The end-user's search results are altered from what they would "normally" see and they will see the "Refine Results", "Subscribed Links Boxes", and "Labels" for the sites with which they have subscriptions. By subscribing, the user alters their own search experience so that it is more relevant and tailored to their own needs.
To see this in action go to Google's directory (http://www.google.com/coop/directory) and subscribe to one or more of the listed subscribed links.
Conclusion
While still in its infancy, and going through the growing pains that are normal for services that are in beta test, Google Co-op clearly has a lot of promise to enable Google to provide much more powerful and relevant search results to users. As the volume of labels and subscribed links grows, as well as user "votes" by going through the process of labeling sites and subscribing to sites, Google Co-op will become a very powerful and important force impacting both how people go about searching, as well as what search results actually appear.

Rob Pirozzi is a contract writer for CityTownInfo.com. CityTownInfo is a quick reference web site that provides statistics and indexes on thousands of cities and towns across the US, as well as articles, comments from local residents, and more. The web site may be found at: http://www.citytowninfo.com/. To subscribe to citytowninfo.com's subscribed links visit http://www.google.com/coop/profile?user=008291016253664647185

The Google Story - An Inspiring Journey in Time

The story behind a success always makes for good reading. And, if such a story is presented like a drama, interspersed with audacious ambition, envy, struggle for control, rivalry, lawsuits, accusations, counter-accusations, and some humour, it would most likely make for some very engrossing reading. To top it all, this is not a work of fiction - in fact, it is not even a dramatization of reality. It is a chronicle of events that happened behind the scenes of what in the words of the author is the 'hottest business, media and technology success of our time'.

The book starts with describing a scene in 2003, where the founders of Google, Larry Page and Sergey Brin, address a high school in Israel. They explain how Google was born.

Page and Brin were PhD students at Stanford University. The idea of Google was born when Page conceived of downloading the entire web on to his computer to try and devise a search program for it. It was an audacious idea. While he had planned to finish the exercise in a week, he could manage only a portion of it even after a year. "So, optimism is important," Page told his audience, "One must have a healthy disregard for the impossible."

It was this optimism that helped Page persist with his plan. He kept downloading the web on to his machine, and Brin helped him mine the data and make sense of it. According to the duo, it took a lot of effort, a lot of night-outs, and a lot of working through holidays.

After this brief prelude-like beginning, the story goes back to the beginning - when Page met Brin.

Page and Brin were both PhD students at Stanford, and they had a lot in common. They were both from families which placed great value on scholarship and academic excellence. They both had fathers who were professors, and mothers whose jobs revolved around computers and technology. Computers, mathematics, and intellectual debates and discussions were part of their genetic codes as well as their day-to-day lives. It was only natural, then, that they got along with each other quite well, and started working together.

They also had an environment that was very conducive to innovation, experimentation and ideation. Stanford is known for churning out several successful technology ventures, including HP and Sun (Sun stands for Stanford University Network). People in Stanford are firm in their belief that sometimes, making a business out of a technological innovation delivers a much greater effect than writing a paper on it.

Also, at the time the two were together, there was a major IT revolution happening. The likes of Netscape were creating waves outside with unprecedentedly huge IPO's, and the Internet was touted to be the next big thing. As a result, venture capitals were skewed heavily towards funding technological start-ups. These circumstances created a setting ripe for research and innovation relating to the Internet, and Page and Brin believed that a robust search application was the one thing that Interndt users most needed.

Search engines prevalent at that time provided service that was far from satisfactory. There were many in operation - the likes of Lycos, Webcrawler, Excite and a few others. All of them fell short. They would only display a slew of results that made little sense to the searcher.

At that time, another duo from Stanford was running a company which they had named 'Yahoo'. They devised a better search algorithm, by creating an alphabetized directory of Web Pages. Also, another new search engine called AltaVista came up. Its search algorithm was based, like other search engines, on the number of times the key word figured in the web page, but it displayed results using the now popular concept of web links. A link, essentially, is a kind of a pointer to another web page.

The idea of using links for a search engine excited Brin and Page. They started thinking of it on an entirely new dimension.

Coming from families that treasured academic research, Page and Brin looked at links as something akin to citations in academic research. In academia, a paper was considered good if it had citations. The more the citations, the better the paper. Also, not all citations were equal. Citations from quality sources enhanced the paper's value.

Using the analogy, the pair developed their search algorithm, called PageRank. It depended, among other things, the number of links that pointed to the web page. The more the links, the higher the rank. Also, links from the more renowned websites, such as Yahoo, would carry more weight than a link from a lesser known website.

Initially, the Google Guys named their search engine 'BackRub', as it was based on the links pointing backward to the site. However, they eventually decided that they had to come up with a new name. Because it dealt with vast amounts of data, they decided to name it 'Google'. Googol is a very large number - 1 followed by 100 zeros. 'Google', is actually a misspelling of 'Googol', something which many people do not know.

Google was first released internally in Stanford. From the beginning, it has maintained a clean and simple homepage, free from flashy animations and the like. It was an instant hit in the Stanford network.

As their database grew, Brin and Page needed more hardware. As they were short of cash, they bought inexpensive parts and assembled them themselves. They also tried all they could to get their hands on unclaimed machines. They did everything they could to keep their hardware cost at a minimum.

Initially, the duo attempted to sell Google to other major web companies like Yahoo and AltaVista. However, both companies could not accept Google, because, among other reasons, they did not believe that search was a vital part of the Web experience.

In the initial days, the Google guys were not sure of the business model. They did not know just how Google could make money. The motto of the company was 'Don't be evil'. They believed that advertisements on web pages were evil, and hence wanted to avoid having ads on their webpages. They were hopeful that in the future, other websites would want to use their search engine, and they could profit by charge these websites. They were also relying purely on word-of-mouth for their marketing. They did not advertise at all.

Google's database kept growing, and they started buying more hardware and recruiting more people. Initially, Google was funded by a $1 million investment by an angel investor named Andy Bechtolsheim. Eventually, though, they ran out of it, and needed more money.

They did not want to go public and raise money like many other companies did, for they had no intentions of letting their information go public, and they also wanted to have full control over the company. The only option, then, seemed to be to approach venture capitalists. The duo was convinced that they could get VC's to fund them, and at the same time continue to retain their control over the company.

They approached two VC companies, Sequoia and Kleiner Perkins. Both companies were impressed with the idea, and were ready to fund Google. However, because they did not want to give up control, the Google guys demanded that both companies invest jointly in Google.

In Wall Street, two major VC companies would hardly consent to a joint investment in a fledgling firm owned by a couple of unrelenting youngsters. However, due to the inherent attractiveness and workability of their idea, and through help from some of their contacts, the Google guys pulled off a coup that was unheard of. They got the two companies to invest $25 million each, and they still retained full control of Google. The only condition that the two VC's placed was to hire an experienced industry person to manage their business. The Google guys agreed, hoping that they could push such an appointment to as late a date as possible.

As Google progressed, several improvements came up. The now famous Google Doodle - an image that appears in the Google homepage to signify an important event or to honour a person - started out as a signal to employees that Brin and Page were away. When Brin and Page went to a party called Burning Man, they left an image of a burning man in the homepage to signal to employees that they were away. After this, they experimented with replacing the two O's of Google with Halloween pumpkins, to signify the festival of Halloween. It was an instant hit with Google's users. Since then, the logo is often decorated with a doodle to signify or honour important occasions/landmarks/persons.

Google started recruiting people for specific roles. There was an employee dedicated to making doodles, and another to polishing and improving user design. Significantly, they recruited Dr.Jim Reese of Harvard to manage operations. His responsibility was to ensure that Google's burgeoning hardware requirements were consistently met. Since Google saves a lot of money by buying cheap computers and assembling them themselves, it was important that they be maintained, monitored and managed properly. To ensure reliability, Dr.Reeves spread data over several computers, managed them all from a central system, and used redundancy to insure the company against system crashes. By minimizing hardware costs, and using free to use Linux based operating systems over expensive ones like Windows, Google had earned for itself a major cost advantage.

Google got more and more popular. It won the support and admiration of Danny Sullivan, editor of an influential newsletter focused on Internet search. It had built for itself a very loyal user base that gave feedback on even the slightest of modifications to the site. However, it had yet to come up with a way of making money.

At that time, a company called Overture caught Brin's attention. Overture was the company that provided the search results that accompanied searches of Yahoo and AOL, among others. The Google guys liked the idea of having ads based on search, rather than flashy and distracting banner ads. However, there was one practice of Overture's that they did not approve of - Overture guaranteed that if a company paid a certain amount of money, it would find a place among the advertisements. It went directly against their motto of 'Don't be evil'.

They decided, therefore, to go it alone. They developed an algorithm for search-based advertising on their own. True to their motto, they ensured that there was a clear demarcation between the actual search results and the advertisements. Like the search results, the advertisements, too, would be ranked. The ranking of the advertisements would be based not only on the amount of money paid, but also on the number of times it is clicked. Hence, popular ads would appear more prominently.

Prices for Google's ads were fixed through a nonstop auctioning process. Auctions were done for every search phrase. A phrase like 'investment advice' would cost a lot more than a phrase like 'pet food'. Companies started having dedicated employees to carry out Google auctions. There were several subtleties involved. For instance, 'digital cameras' would be auctioned for a higher rate than 'digital camera', because a user googling 'digital cameras' is more likely to buy one.

Google advertising policy was not without its share of problems. Once, an insurance company named Geico filed a lawsuit against Google, on the grounds that it had allowed other companies to bid for its name. A user searching for 'Geico' would see in his results all insurance companies that had made a winning bid for it. Geico claimed that Google did not have a right to let Geico's competition take advantage of searches on its name. Google's defense was that Geico's understanding of consumer behavior on the Internet was incorrect. A user googling 'Geico' is not necessarily looking only at Geico's website. Besides, Google was not the publisher of the ads, and it also had systems in place to protect trademarks. It did not allow ads to contain trademarks in their heading or text. Google ended up winning the case.

It has also been alleged that Google's naming of the advertisement section 'Sponsored Links' misleads many users. Many users confuse ads with actual results, and click on them without even knowing they are ads. The ethicality of this lack of clear distinction has often come under question.

With the business model set straight, innovation and new ideas flourished at Google's expanded office, called the Googleplex. One employee came up with the idea of retrieving a person's phone number if his name and zip code are entered. Another came up with the idea of auto-correcting spelling mistakes. If, for instance, you misspell a celebrity's name, Google would automatically correct it and display search results for the corrected name. If a less obvious mistake is made, Google comes up with a "Did you mean...?" link at the top of the page.

Google also launched its Google Image Search, which again was revolutionary. Millions of images are stored in Google's database and can be retrieved at the click of a mouse.

The Google guys created an infrastructure and a culture inside the Googleplex that would make employees want to stay there for most part of the day - and night. Mean as they were with spending on computer hardware, they spent unrestrainedly when it came to creating the right environment for their employees. There were free meals, unlimited snacks, toys, roller hockey, scooter races, and lots more. Even the buses were equipped with Wi-Fi Internet connectivity, so that employees could be productive even while they commuted.

External happenings also helped Google. The dotcom crash of 2000 left several extremely talented software developers unemployed, giving Google access to a vast talent pool. Also, around that time, Microsoft was facing a legal dispute regarding its anti-competitive practices. This made the image of Microsoft take a beating. Google, with its 'Don't be evil' motto, suddenly overtook Microsoft as the ultimate place for a software developer to be in. The creme-de-la-crème of the software profession started preferring to work in Google.

Google also actively encouraged and fostered innovation inside the Googleplex. Employees were free to spend 20% of their time on innovative tasks that interested him. They did not have to worry about whether it could be made profitable, or have any fear about its acceptance or workability. They could so just work on anything that was of interest to them. Ideas were often discussed in bulletin boards and over lunch. As an idea grew, it would get bigger and bigger. Google also provided the resources to carry out innovation. Out of this culture were born several ideas. An avid reader of news came up with an idea of providing users with multiple sources of news clustered together, to help them analyze and understand news better. Thus was born Google news. Interestingly, unlike Google search results, the Google news results are cramped close together. This denseness is intended to give the user as much news as possible. Ranking is based on relevance, and also the source. Another innovation was Froogle, later renamed Google Product search, which helped users search for retail products to shop.

Google soon became a verb in several languages, including English, German, and Japanese. A lot of debates about Google were triggered. With information on people only a Google search away, there were issues related to online stalking of individuals. Google's advertisements, despite the company's checks, included certain obscene websites. In academia, the use of Google by students in preference to the classically used specialized databases was looked at, on one hand, as increasingly easy and wide access to information, and on the other hand, looked down as a shortcut method that fostered laziness.

Google Sitemaps (AKA Webmaster Tools) Tutorial For the Non-Geek, XML Challenged Site Owner

Google recently announced a change to their "Sitemaps" program. It went from a protocol meant for Python programmers and XML wizards to a much kinder, gentler (and friendlier to webmasters) program to help get all of your pages crawled and indexed. It's called "Google Webmaster Central. The tools can now be used and understood by most small business site owners.
Google explains everything and lists Sitemaps resources at:
https://www.google.com/webmasters/sitemaps/docs/en/about.html
To use Google sitemaps, you must first sign up for a Google Account. If you already use Google Adwords, Analytics, Gmail or other Google provided tools, you can use your existing account to submit a Google sitemap for your site. Get an account at the following URL if you don't already use Google services:
https://www.google.com/accounts/
NON-PROGRAMMER SMALL BUSINESS WEBMASTERS WANT SIMPLICITY
Many webmasters struggle to understand even the simplest HTML and meta tags and after visiting the Sitemaps program page when it was first announced in the summer of 2005, those small business site owners went away sadly shaking their heads and mumbling. They complained, "I can't even add PERL scripts to my own CGI bin and properly set permissions on page files - how am I going to install and debug a Python script on my server, run cron jobs and generate XML files?"
Apparently Google heard all that grumbling and came back with the newly released "Webmaster Central" to answer the concerns of excess complexity. They no longer require you to be a geek to get all your pages into their index. They've created tools to make the job of submitting all of your pages for inclusion in their index very much easier to handle.
http://www.google.com/webmasters/
The first listed "Site Status" tool lets you check indexing of your sites. If you enter an address into that search box and press the "Next" button, they'll return a page with a button labeled "Take me to Google Sitemaps" and encouraging use of the sitemaps tools, regardless of whether you've already submitted that sitemap or not. They'll list some minor details about the site entered such as:

Pages from your site are included in Google's index.
Some of these pages are indexed without a title or description.
Googlebot last successfully accessed your home page on Aug 18, 2006

They list "Potential indexing problems" and then state:

More details about your site may be availableBy using Google Sitemaps, you can learn more details available only to site owners, such as:
o errors Googlebot encountered while crawling your site
o top search queries that return your site

GOOGLE SITEMAPS DIFFERENT FROM HTML SITEMAPS
Let's back up for a moment though. Webmasters have been told for ten years now to build a sitemap into their web site that lists all of their pages (if it is a small web site with under a hundred pages) or at least listing major sections of their site (if they have thousands or tens of thousands of pages.) So what is the difference here?
Google sitemaps are actually XML documents (not public html pages) that hold much more information about your web pages to help Google determine several things. They list the "priority" or importance, "last modified" dates, and "change frequency" of each page. But the creation of those documents had required webmasters to install that Python script on their server. Available at:

http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=137793&package_id=153422
Or webmasters had to use third party software to generate the required XML file. Google recommends a brief list of sources for third party software to help them programmatically create the XML sitemaps:
http://code.google.com/sm_thirdparty.html
I've personally tried several of those third party tools and found two of the web-based sitemap generators lacking, one of the downloaded software tools crashed my computer (and created havoc for me), so what is a small business owner without programming skills to do?

Those business owners who are non-programmer types and want to use Google Sitemaps complained that Google was favoring geeks over business owners. They wanted a simple way to submit all of their pages to Google without running cron jobs on their server and debugging Python scripts.
PLAIN TEXT SITEMAPS FILES NOW ACCEPTED
Google heard our grumbling and now allows simple lists of URL's in a plain text document. All you have to do is create that list of page files, save it as sitemap.txt and upload it to your server. Then you log in to your Google Webmaster Central (AKA Sitemaps) account and tell them the URL of your sitemap text document.
Before you submit your first sitemap URL on a domain, Google requires you to put a "site verification" meta tag on your site home page and click a "Verify" button to prove you own the site. Anyone with a Google account and access to your server can do this. You can add or remove any authorization tags placed by anyone with access to your server who is no longer authorized to see this data.
WEBMASTER CENTRAL TOOLS FOR SITE OWNERS
In the "Diagnostic" tab, there is a tool that will validate your robots.txt file, tells you which pages are restricted by that file and lists problem URL's and reasons for the problems. It also lets you make changes in a copy of your robots.txt file locally, which shows immediately how changes would affect the next crawl by all Google bots, including the AdSense and PPC landing page quality crawlers! They warn on that page that local changes don't affect your own robots.txt file and remind you to make the changes to the file on your server.
Another useful "Diagnostic" tool lets you set your preference for canonical URL's to include www or non-www versions of your site. (This last item shows how seriously the Google team takes this canonical issue.)
What other tools are provided in Webmaster Central?
Under the "Statistics" tab in Webmaster Central is are "Query stats, Crawl stats, Page analysis" links with more data on your pages. The Query statistics show your top 20 search queries that searchers have used to find your web site and your top 20 click through queries. Those data tables provide some interesting and sometimes unexpected detail about how visitors find your site and allow you to further optimize and funnel those visitors. The "Crawl Stats" promises to show PageRank and distribution of PageRank throughout your site and in comparison to other sites.

The "Sitemaps" tab simply lists your submitted sitemaps for all your sites and shows the dates "Submitted, Last Downloaded, and Sitemap Status." The status tells you if there are errors, and what they were (not allowed, external site links, 404 error page not found, etc.) I've just submitted a new sitemap on a just reserved, created and newly posted site this week and will report back on how long it took for index inclusion on that site to record the effect of early sitemap submissions.
LIFTING YOUR SKIRT FOR GOOGLE
Finally, there is a "Tools" link in the upper right corner of the "Sitemaps" page which allows you to "Download Data for all sites", "Report Spam in Our Index" and a "Reinclusion Request" link to use if you've been banned for questionable techniques. Clearly, since you are doing all of this from within a Google account, you are openly providing Google with your information and making all spam reporting and reinclusion requests under your name from within a Google account. This suggests that you trust Google with all information they hold on your sites and any complaint made about search engine spam.
Currently there are ratings tools from within the Webmaster Central site to let you tell Google if you like the tools with a smily face, a neutral face and a frowny face. This may not last as the program comes out of beta, but lets you tell them what is useful and what isn't.
Still need some help? Try joining, reading, searching and posting to Sitemaps and Webmaster Central Google Groups. Posts from webmasters get back responses from knowledgeable members. Watch for the little green "G" logo for Sitemaps team members for particularly definitive and useful recommendations.
http://groups.google.com/group/Google_Webmaster_Help
http://groups.google.com/group/google-sitemaps
Want ongoing official Google blog posts about Webmaster Central?
http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/
If you've had trouble getting all your pages indexed and want to use those informative and useful webmaster tools and reports - give Webmaster Central a try.
Copyright © August 23, 2006 by Mike Banks Valentine

Mike Banks Valentine operates SEOptimism, Offering SEO training of in-house content managers
http://seoptimism.com/SEO_Staff_Training.htm as well as contract SEO for advertising agencies, web development companies and marketing firms. http://seoptimism.com/Ad_Agency_SEO_Contracting.htm

Content aggregation, article and press release optimization & distribution for linking campaigns.

http://seoptimism.com/Linking_SEO.htm

How Does Google Rank Blogs? Completely Different Than You Think!

SEO and Search Engine Optimization for Blogs
How Does Google Rank Blogs? A lot different that you think!
Google does not rank blogs anything like you think they do. What we think of as SEO does NOT work for blogs. For months I h`ve been chasing Google with incoming links, social marketing and keyword SEO in my blog. Then I discovered how Google really ranks blogs and what it can mean to your blog traffic.
Let's look deep into the Google patent and see how SEO really applies to blogs and Google.
In this article...
1. How Google Really Ranks Blogs and Blog SEO
2. By the number of blog readers you have in Google Reader and Technorati.
3. By how many blogrolls you are in and the quality of the linking blog.
4. By how many times your Google search engine listing is clicked.
5. By social bookmarking posts and the number of times you are Dugg etc.
6. The number of times your URL appears in conversations.
7. The quality of the links in a blog article and the quantity of links.
Google judges your blog by the number of blog readers you have in Google Reader and Technorati.
Yes, Google is reading your RSS reader.
From the Google Patent:
"The popularity of the blog document may be a positive indication of the quality of that blog document. A number of news aggregator sites (commonly called "news readers" or "feed readers") exist where individuals can subscribe to a blog document (through its feed). Such aggregators store information describing how many individuals have subscribed to given blog documents. A blog document having a high number of subscriptions implies a higher quality for the blog document. Also, subscriptions can be validated against "subscriptions spam" (where spammers subscribe to their own blog documents in an attempt to make them "more popular") by validating unique users who subscribed, or by filtering unique Internet Protocol (IP) addresses of the subscribers."
I other words, Google is judging you by the number of subscribers you have in Google Reader. Google reader owns about 60% of feed reader use. To calculate the other 40% they just do the math. Definitely the number of subscribers you have in
Technorati is an indication of you blogs reach and popularity.
To see how many subscribers you have in Google reader, look on the left side of the page for "+ Add Subscription." Click the button and a search box will open up. Enter the name of your blog, not the URL, and a list of blogs will appear in order of readership in descending order.
You may want to use "" around your blog name to slim down the results.
Blog SEO Solutions
Add a Google button to you site prominently on the top right of the page. I am currently testing adding the Google button to my email newsletter popup forms.
Here is the add to http://www.google.com/webmasters/add.html Google Reader button wizard.
The Technorati button is a little more hard to find so I am just going to post the code here.
Here is the Technorati image Just right click the image, select "save picture as" and save it to your images folder. Then upload it you your site. Adjust the img src= path in the code.
img src="http://www.keywebdata.com/images/technorati.gif"
Here is the add to [http://publisher.yahoo.com/rss_guide/submit.php] MyYahoo button wizard.
Also a lot of skilled bloggers are adding a "if you found this post useful why not add my RSS feed" link at the bottom of posts.
Google ranks your blog by how many blogrolls you are in and the quality of the linking blog.
From the Google Patent:
"Similarly, the existence of the blog document in a blogroll of a well-known or trusted blogger may also be a positive indication of the quality of the blog document. In this situation, it is assumed that the well-known or trusted blogger would not link to a spamming blogger."
So let's talk blogrolls. Think of this as the friends list of blogs. Three factors come into play here.
The number of times your blog is listed in blog rolls. Quantity matters.
The quality of the other blogroll members in blogrolls you appear in.
The quality of the blog that adds you to their blogroll.

Do not trade recipricol links with other blogs in blogrolls. Google puts more weight on incoming one way links that do not return the favor and link back.
You want to appear in powerful authority laden blogrolls. You also want your blog roll to be nothing but #1 rated blogs about your blog topic.
Blog SEO Solutions
This is not reciprocal linking here. In fact there is some evidence that reciprocal blogroll linking can hurt your blog.
Google ranks your blog by how many times your Google search engine listing is clicked.
Punch up that title tag, it is really your search engine headline.
From the Google Patent:
"An implied popularity may be identified for the blog document. This implied popularity may be identified by, for example, examining the click stream of search results. For example, if a certain blog document is clicked more than other blog documents when the blog document appears in result sets, this may be an indication that the blog document is popular and, thus, a positive indicator of the quality of the blog document."
Have you ever searched a term and gone back and searched it again and the top results were different?
That is Google testing the pulling power of the title tag of your post and the snippet that Google pulls from your body text.
Believe me Google watches everything we do.
Blog SEO Solution
Turn your title tag into a benefit laden headline. Either craft the title tag to include a benefit to the reader of use a little scare tactics by defining a problem that a searcher is looking to solve.
The latter is best. People are not proactive, they do not look to head off problems. They use search engines to solve a problem they already have.
I am writing this page because my blog did not rank well in Google. You are reading this because yours did not either.
Did either of us search Google to find out how what we could do to get our blog ranked well before we noticed that we were not doing well in SERPs?
That is why I used the title tag on my post "Why blogs don't rank well in Google." Because that is the phrase that I used to find the original content that I started blogging about.
Google ranks blog by the number of social bookmarking posts and the number of times you are Dugg etc. Social marketing definitely effects SEO.
From the Google Patent:
"Tagging of the blog document may be a positive indication of the quality of the blog document. Some existing sites allow users to add "tags" to (i.e., to "categorize") a blog document. These custom categorizations are an indicator that an individual has evaluated the content of the blog document and determined that one or more categories appropriately describe its content, and as such are a positive indicator of the quality of the blog document."

Google is definitely not just tracking the number of listings in social bookmarking sites like Digg, StumbleUpon, Delicious and Blinklist.
Google is tracking how many times we are dugg, the tags that are used in the original Digg and the quality of the user.
Have you ever noticed that Digg posts do not show up in a links check? They will when you have at least five to ten Diggs or the Digg page itself and will show up in a keyword search even sometimes above your original article.
Google ranks blogs by the number of times your URL appears in conversations.
Think Gmail....
From the Google Patent:
"References to the blog document by other sources may be a positive indication of the quality of the blog document. For example, content of emails or chat transcripts can contain URLs of blog documents. Email or chat discussions that include references to the blog document is a positive indicator of the quality of the blog document."
Yeah, Google reads your Gmail. Google listens to your Google chat. All the time counting how many times your URL is present.
Blog SEO Solution
This is a good case for not using tracking links in emails to your list. By using click counting URLs to see how count click thrus to your site you may be removing a positive indicator that Google counts.
Google ranks blogs by the quality of the links in a blog aritcle and the quantity of links.
SEO also is effected by the link text in these body text links.Don't be scared to link to other blogs.
I am also thinking that the quality of blogs that you link to in the body text has a lot to do with your blog and your posts' ranking.
I feel that Google thinks if you are unwilling to link to blogs better than yours then you are not sure of your own content.
It is also possible that the number of links in a blog document (or lack of) says to Google that you are just building landing pages that are worthless rather than writing a well researched article using a number of authoritative sources as background.

While not mentioned in the Google patent there does seem to be evidence that using Feedburner helps your Google rankings.
Since Google acquired FeedBurner, just using Feedburner analytics seems to increase your SERPs position.
Obviously if the more subscribers you have in Google reader helps your rankings then the greater the number of subscribers that Feedburner tracks has an effect too.

Want to learn more about Google and how social larketing can take over the search engines for you? Of course you do!

Tips, tools and tricks for more traffic and better rankings!

Look to Chris Lang's Social Marketing and Social Networking blog.

10 Most Valuable Free Google Marketing Tools

Google has become the dominant search engine on the Internet.
It would be hard to imagine a web without Google. For that
matter, it would now be hard to imagine a world without Google.
As frightening as that may seem to many people, it is none the
less true.
For better or worst, Google has permeated into almost every aspect

of our everyday life. Being Googled is now a common expression and
an act carried out by millions of users around the world each day.
New Google products and services are coming on stream at a frightening
pace, further increasing Google's impact on our lives.
Despite this dominating presence, many people still don't realize
Google offers some excellent free marketing tools for marketers
and webmasters. Marketing tools which ban prove extremely valuable
to any webmaster or marketer trying to promote their sites or
products online. Useful tools that will make your promotions
easier and much more profitable.
Don't be fooled by the 'free' label, these marketing tools
might be free but there are also valuable. One even wonders
why Google would be giving away these tools and services for
free? It probably makes good business sense in the long

run, by providing these free tools Google is fostering a
lot of company good-will and building up the Google brand
name in the process. Good PR is good business.
Every marketer and webmaster should be taking advantage of
Google's good-will and snapping up these professionally run
services and marketing tools. Here's a quick run-down of
the 10 most valuable free Google Internet marketing tools:
1. Google Analytics
Perhaps the premier marketing tool offered by Google.
It will prove helpful to both the marketer and the webmaster.
Google Analytics gives you a daily snapshot of your web site. Google
Analytics analyzes your traffic, where it comes from and what it does
once it enters your site. You can monitor up to three sites
for free.
Google Analytics is extremely valuable in analyzing your
marketing funnel, it tracks all the steps leading up to your
sales or checkout page. Vital information for raising
your conversion rate and ROI.
You may be placed on a waiting list for this highly in
demand service from Google.
LINK http://www.google.com/analytics/
2. Google Sitemaps
Webmasters can use Google Sitemaps to almost instantly place
newly created pages on their site into the Google Search Index.
This is an XML file that is uploaded to Google as new pages
are added on your site. Needless to say this can be a valuable
service for any webmaster or marketer who wants to get their
information on the web quickly.
LINK https://www.google.com/webmasters/sitemaps/docs/en/about.html
3. Google Alerts
Be notified when someone or another site lists your site

or mentions your name. Great way to keep track of all your
online activities. Great way to monitor all your online
business interests and products.
LINK http://www.google.com/alerts
4. Google Froogle
Froogle is Google's price directory! It simply lists all
the cheapest prices for different products on the web.
For marketers and webmasters who are promoting products,
it should be studied and analyzed. Optimizing your
site's content for Froogle may prove to be very beneficial.
Follow Froogle or Google directions exactly on how to
list or display products on your site. Froogle will
spider your site and display your prices and products
to thousands of targeted customers. That, as they say,
is priceless.
LINK http://froogle.google.com/
5. Google Checkout
Not exactly free but for those marketers who use AdWords
--- for every $1 spent on AdWords you can process $10 for free.
You can also place the shopping cart logo on your AdWords ad
and take advantage of the prestige and trust the Google
brand name has built up.
Over time marketers may find this tool to be very
effective and valuable.
LINK https://checkout.google.com/
6. Google eBlogger
Blogging has become vitally important to the health and
functioning of your web site. No site should be without
at least one blog and RSS feed. Creating a blog (online journal)
on the topic of your web site or product will bring in extra traffic
and targeted customers. eBlogger is a simple free
blogging service that even lets you publish or post your blog
files to your own web site server. Keep in mind, each blog
has that all important Google Blog Search bar.
LINK http://www.blogger.com/
7. Google Toolbar - Enterprise Version
Try the new enterprise version of the Google Toolbar
for your company or business. Integrates countless
features with all your employees or corporate
network. These could include a common customer
database, company calendar, financial news...
Keep in mind, Google also ranks every page it indexes on
a scale of 0-10. While it is important to know the Page Rank of
your own pages, it is even more important to know the PR of
your competitor's pages. You can use the toolbar to get
the PR of each page you're visiting. Extremely helpful
information for webmasters and marketers to know when
forming online linking or business arrangements.
LINK http://toolbar.google.com/T4/enterprise/
8. Google Groups
Every marketer knows the important of having a large
contact list of people with a similar interest. Social
networking will play an ever increasing role in your
success on the web. Just look at the growing popularity
of sites like MySpace and LiveJournal.
Google groups is another form of social and business
networking that every marketer should be aware of and
pursuing.
LINK http://groups.google.com/
9. Google AdSense

One simple way to monetize your web content is to
use Google Adsense. Just place the AdSense code
on your site and receive a check from Google each
month. For webmasters who are not really into
online marketing (does such creatures exist?) AdSense
can be a painless way to earn extra income from
your site.
For professional marketers using the AdSense system can
supply a tremendous amount of marketing information on the
keywords in their particular niche. It keeps the
marketer informed on what keywords are being bid
on and how much advertisers are willing to pay.
AdSense also has an excellent real-time tracking
system you can use to keep track of all your
important web pages.
LINK https://www.google.com/adsense/
10. Google Writely
A recent addition to Google's stable of free products.
Writely is a full featured online writing editor with
spellcheck and great collaborating features. It also
lets you publish your content directly to your blogs.
One feature that may be of interest to marketers, it lets
your save files in the popular download format of PDF.
Lets face it, until video takes over the web in four
or five years time --- the written word is still king on the
net. It is the medium that markets, promotes and sells
your content or products. Writely will help you write better.
LINK http://www.writely.com
Honorable Mention - Google Trends
This Google program will let you search popular trends,
important for marketers searching for the latest hot
product to promote. You can also break down these trends
by different regions.
LINK http://www.google.com/trends
Final Note
Please take note that signing up for a Google account will
usually help you in obtaining most of these free services or
programs. Some of these programs may have to be applied for
individually. But be assured, all these free Google marketing
tools are well worth your time and effort. They will make your
marketing easier and they will help any webmaster or marketer
run their online business more efficiently.

...

The author is a full-time online marketer who runs numerous web sites, including two sites on Internet marketing. For the latest web marketing tools try: Internet Marketing Tools Everyone is profiting from Google, why not you? Click here: Google Cash File Copyright © 2006 Titus Hoskins. This article may be freely distributed if this resource box stays attached.

How To Make Money Online With Google

The general public probably best recognizes Google
as the web's premier search engine. Google's dominance
on the Internet can't be denied or argued. But
perhaps what many people don't realize, Google has
become a premium revenue source for many webmasters
and online marketers.

It has became a virtual cash-cow for those who have
mastered Google with their marketing techniques.
They know a number one spot for a competitive keyword
or keyword phrase in Google will usually prove very
lucrative, bringing in a steady automatic income.

Regardless of what the other search engines will attest,
seasoned webmasters also know getting a top placement in
Google will usually bring more traffic than a top placement

in MSN or Yahoo combined! Getting a number one spot in
Google for a popular keyword can prove very lucrative,
earning a webmaster revenue 24/7/365.

Therefore, webmasters have to optimize their sites and
keywords for Google if they want to turn a healthy profit.
Optimizing your webpages for Google is a complete industry
in itself, what you really have to keep in mind, besides
on-page optimization like keyword density, mega tags, etc.
is that Google places a great amount of weight on off-page
links and anchor text.

Google ranks all webpages on the Internet by a scale
of PR0 to PR10, higher is better. One-way links from
high PR sites related to your keyword or website theme
is highly valued and will usually move your site up on
the SERPs (Search Engine Return Pages). This is the major
factor why 'article marketing' is all the rage and why
articles are great building blocks for getting top
keywords and consequently extremely important for
earning you revenue, directly or indirectly from Google.

There are countless strategies for getting those top
keyword listings in Google. But in my opinion, one of
the best experts on the net for website SEO is Brad
Callen. His 'SEO Elite' is top quality SEO software and
his soon to be released 'Keyword Elite' will greatly
impact how keywords are used by webmasters and
marketers.

Once you have gained significant traffic, you can use
Google AdSense to earn revenue from your site or blog.
Google AdSense lets webmasters and bloggers earn
advertising revenue by placing the AdSense code on
their sites. These can be text links, images, or banners.
These AdSense ads will be directly related to your
page's keywords. Top or highest paying keywords will
naturally return more revenue. AdSense ads are
extremely targeted and is an effective way of
earning money from your site. Learn more:
https://www.google.com/adsense

One of the undisputed top experts on using Google
AdSense is Joel Comm. A seasoned marketer who has
created some well informed products on AdSense -- mainly

his Google AdSense Secrets ebook and courses.

Of course, Google gives marketers another option, you
can buy your way onto Google's first page results by
using Google AdWords. This is the popular Pay-Per-Click
advertising system offered by Google. Perfecting the
AdWord system is an art form in itself; do it right and
you can create very lucrative cash streams. Do it wrong,
and you can create your very own personal money pits!
https://adwords.google.com/select

Therefore, it is strongly advised that you learn more
about AdWords before you risk your hard earned cash.
One of the best sources for Google AdWords is still
Perry Marshall's excellent ebook 'The Definitive Guide
to Google AdWords'. It will give you all the basics on
Google AdWords.

Just about everyone knows about Google's two popular
programs AdWords and AdSense, but there are other ways
marketers can earn money promoting Google products or
services. Google has started to list products that an
affiliate can promote through the AdSense program. You
can earn money by promoting the Firefox browser with
the Google search box and you can also promote Google's

AdSense program to other webmasters and earn money by
referring new users.

The next logical step for Google is to offer more
products through its AdSense affiliate program. Many
seasoned marketers are promoting Google's AdSense, it
would be counterproductive for Google not to take
advantage and offer other products/services through
this marketing system. Its own produbts or other
closely related third party products. Many marketers
would gladly promote products under the Google banner
mainly because any Google branded product would be an
easy sale for most affiliate marketers.

Google pays monthly but you do have to earn $100 before
they send you a check. Getting a check from Google is
somewhat special, no matter what the amount, show your
family and friends a check from Google and their eyes
will pop open! If you're an online marketer you may get
quite a few larger checks from different online companies
but nothing will get you the respect a Google check does.
Just goes to show how much Google has permeated into our
everyday lives.

Not that you need it, but it's just another reason to
start earning money for Google. Try some of the programs
listed above and you will be smiling all the way to... now,

where the heck is that Google Bank?