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Billboard Ads
With the current landscape of Link Building transforming constantly, one product LinkWorth offers is standing out among the rest for its’ value and strength: Billboard Ads. A Billboard Ad is an article written by an Advertiser which has static text links embedded within the content of the Article. This holds, at least in our opinion, a very strong value because the links are within the content of the page instead of in an area of the page where they are easily distinguished as paid links.
We have found through trial and error that Billboard Ads are not only a great value to our Advertisers, but to our Partners as well if done in the proper way. The two keys to successfully utilizing Billboard Ads are:
1. Make the Billboard Page on the Partner Site look like it “belongs” to the Partner Site. Simply calling the provided include file in a blank page does not do much to help the Partner or the Advertiser. If an Advertiser is using the same content among more than one Billboard Ad, it can get marked as duplicate content and not be included in Google’s index. This devalues the links within the Billboard and may throw a red flag up for the Partner because they have “duplicate content” on their site. This is easily resolved with a little work though. Most Partner’s have templates they use to create a new page on their site or use include files for the elements of a page of their site that stays the same from page to page. When creating the Billboard Ad, it is highly advised that you use this template (or include files) and simply call the provided code in the content area of the page. Plus, when we build these internally for our Advertisers, we’ll request this of the Partners.
2. The second important factor in successfully utilizing Billboards is to have a site wide link to the Billboard Ad from every page of your site. It holds the most strength if this link is close to the other Navigational links of your site. Since the posted links all point to a subpage on the Partner site, the site-wide link isn’t suspicious and shouldn’t dilute the Partner’s site at all.
As we move deeper into the constantly evolving world of linking, this product will continue to gain popularity. So, LinkWorth Partners, accept Billboard Ads! You’ll stand to gain Advertiser market-share within our community! These will be key components to many of our Managed Services campaigns moving forward, too. For more info on Billboards, visit http://www.linkworth.com/products/billboard-ads.php …
System Upgrade Explanation
As some of you may have noticed, our file inclusion feeds were displaying an error today. Not all file inclusions were displaying this error, but all it takes is a few to be an issue. The reason for these issues is due to a system upgrade we performed which surprised us with a few incompatibilities.
Our programmers are working quickly to update these problem area’s and should have everything back to normal very shortly. We do apologize for this unplanned update and assure you it will be fixed quickly.
If you have any questions or concerns, our help desk is running fine at http://help.linkworth.com.
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Update: Everything is worked out and running smoothly. If there is anything still wrong on your end, please submit a support ticket.
Shopping for a New Payment Processor?
With the recently launched payment arm of Google, known as “Google Checkout“, online merchants are finally getting much better options to process credit cards on their websites. Processing credit cards through the internet is such an important step for any online merchant, it is important to attach your business with a reliable and trustworthy credit card merchant. Credit card merchants will handle Visa & MasterCard, with AMEX and Discover running their own show. Then third party credit card merchants are more of a middle man between you and the actual card merchant. Now let me shed a little light that might help in getting your credit card processing setup right the first time.
3rd Party Merchant Companies – Pro’s & Con’s
- Very easy and quick to get setup and process for customers
- Large companies (Paypal * Google Checkout) make it easy to buy/sell at low prices.
- Monthly volumes can fluctuate, but are easier to go higher
- payments usually occur on weekly, bi-weekly or monthly schedules
- first glimpse of fear, processor will place hold on all funds and cease payouts
- usually require a reserve or rolling reserve, usually a percentage of each payout
- provides their own custom built software to easily function transactions
Direct Merchant – Credit Card Processing – Pro’s & Con’s
- Signup process can be lengthy and require quite a bit of upfront details that play into the approval/denial stage.
- Monthly volumes must start low or will fall into high risk, with financials of past history to qualify
- payments will occur on a daily basis less their fees
- any remote thought of fraud or chargeback’s and your account is frozen with no money being deposited but it will still allow processing to go through and charge you for the transactions. Getting account in good standing can take anywhere from 1 week to 3 months, along with money being returned. Usually, if your account is closed, cut your loses and find a new processor.
- rolling reserves and/or set reserve required for higher risk accounts.
- Gateway provides software to get instant approvals, but software from your site to talk to the gateway is your responsibility
- This method is a great way to go if you can find a reliable merchant and you sell a product or service that everyone loves 100% of the time.
Direct Bank Credit Card Processing
- Fairly lengthy application, with large monthly volumes more accepted. Especially if you are an existing bank customer.
- Batch payments occur daily
- Holdback and/or reserves typically are not necessary
- Risk department is proactive in working with client to resolve issues
- Provides gateway of your choice and software of your choice.
- This is the best way to go.
Oddly enough, it crossed my head to signup for Google Checkout just to see if they would process for our service, since they seem to have turned their backs on the text linking industry
Support Section Upgraded
For those who have used our support section recently, you should have noticed things look a bit different. Due to the software we use being outdated; we felt it was time to upgrade to the latest, greatest version. The new version is a major update which led to several changes with how LinkWorth and the software interact. If you were used to a certain way our support worked before, we apologize as it might be a little different.
There are a couple of areas we’re still working on, but the functionality of our support system should have no issues. We do request that if anyone runs into an issue, please email support.
Hidden URL Feature Now Available
One of the advantages to LinkWorth, from an advertisers point of view, is they are able to see the websites before they actually spend money to advertise on it. Most other services within our market restrict the actual web address for several reasons, until it’s paid for. As a partner, this option isn’t always the most preferred method. I choose not to get into specifics, but there are pro’s and cons for either way.
We’re proud to announce that we know give the partner a choice in this matter. If being anonymous is your cup of tea, you can now be anonymous to window shoppers. When listing a new site or editing an existing site, there is a new option available that allows the partner to hide their web address until an advertiser actully buys a text ad. Once the request is approved by the partner, then the advertiser will see the website address in their approved listings.
Obviously, we recommend the listings not be hidden to increase sales, but if it’s important to the publisher, the option is now as easy as turning it on. One thing to note, this is a per site setting. If 10 sites exist, all 10 would need to be edited to turn this feature on. All statistical information will remain available to potential advertisers.
Google Makes Update To Googlebot
Google makes announcement regarding an update, or improvement, to their Googlebot. This is the update found on the Google Webmaster Central Blog:
Most people know that Googlebot downloads pages from web servers to crawl the web. Not as many people know that if Googlebot accesses a page and gets a 304 (Not-Modified) response to a If-Modified-Since qualified request, Googlebot doesn’t download the contents of that page. This reduces the bandwidth consumed on your web server.
When you look at Google’s cache of a page (for instance, by using the cache: operator or clicking the Cached link under a URL in the search results), you can see the date that Googlebot retrieved that page. Previously, the date we listed for the page’s cache was the date that we last successfully fetched the content of the page. This meant that even if we visited a page very recently, the cache date might be quite a bit older if the page hadn’t changed since the previous visit. This made it difficult for webmasters to use the cache date we display to determine Googlebot’s most recent visit. Consider the following example:
1. Googlebot crawls a page on April 12, 2006.
2. Our cached version of that page notes that “This is G o o g l e’s cache of http://www.example.com/ as retrieved on April 12, 2006 20:02:06 GMT.”
3. Periodically, Googlebot checks to see if that page has changed, and each time, receives a Not-Modified response. For instance, on August 27, 2006, Googlebot checks the page, receives a Not-Modified response, and therefore, doesn’t download the contents of the page.
4. On August 28, 2006, our cached version of the page still shows the April 12, 2006 date — the date we last downloaded the page’s contents, even though Googlebot last visited the day before.
We’ve recently changed the date we show for the cached page to reflect when Googlebot last accessed it (whether the page had changed or not). This should make it easier for you to determine the most recent date Googlebot visited the page. For instance, in the above example, the cached version of the page would now say “This is G o o g l e’s cache of http://www.example.com/ as retrieved on August 27, 2006 13:13:37 GMT.”
Top 10 Things to Determine if a Link is Good
These are ten factors one can check when trying to decide if a particular website is worth the link:
10: High link popularity score (more inbound links) run site: (siteurl).
9: High PageRank in Google toolbar. 4-5 up to 7 or 8. (mean’s they’re indexed well, usually)
8: Well laid out site with easy navigation from page to page throughout the site.7: Pages full of content with regard to the site theme.
6: The page has a well indexed cache stored on Google/Yahoo/MSN, along with recent date.
5: The inbound/backlinks are mostly from sites on topic and are full of relative content.
4: The partner site has only outbound links to other same theme sites.
3: The outbound links are very limited. Below 10 is good, but preferrably below 5 outbounds.
2: The partner website/domain has an age minimum of 2-3 years old through registrar.
1: The price is relatively competitive and the partner is trustworthy.
Just like any list, there are many additional steps that one can follow, but these are the 10 we’ve decide to make for this list. The best way to finalize your own steps, is to run and test campaigns on your own.
Top Ten Mistakes In Linking
There are many mistakes one can make when link building, but these are the top ten mistakes we’ve compiled:
- Buy links solely for high PageRank.
- Buy links on unlike/non-relevant themed sites.
- Buy a “100 links for $50” deal. If it seems too good to be true, it is!
- Buy links today for top placement tomorrow.
- Reciprocate links with a linking neighborhood.
- Reciprocate links in a 3 way trade trying to disguise the swap. They’re smarter than that.
- Acquire a link from a website who has no cache or backlinks or PageRank. Could be in trouble.
- Acquiring a link from a keyword stuffed site and tens of thousands of pages that are built solely for placement.
- Not using the best anchor text that pertains to your website and it’s goods and services.
- Having the links setup with non static html code. (ie… javascript, java, marquee … and so on)
It really comes down to making the best decision for you and your website. What might work for Google.com, will be on the other side of the world for Yahoo.com. So think ahead of offers. Consider how things might be 2 month’s down the road and make a decision on what you see in the future. It might just save you from some of these common mistakes.
SES San Jose
This was my first trip to SES San Jose and I must say that overall I was impressed with the show out there last week. I felt more involved as an attendee than I have at previous shows and I thought the turnout was great. San Jose is, after all, located in the heart of Silicon Valley so there should not have been a shortage of technology companies displaying their search engine-related wares and services. The Google party wasn’t bad, either. 😉
My schedule allowed for two full days at the conference so I had to use the time wisely. My plan was to peruse the exhibit hall on Tuesday and attend sessions the entire day on Wednesday with several client meetings sprinkled throughout. It worked out well although there never seems to be enough time to accomplish everything. I noticed her custom stand from the exhibition was an amazing way to create a unique space for her brand. IÂ talked about my products with an https://www.exposolutions.com.au/Â Exhibition supplier that gave me even better advice on how to present my brand accurately and at the same time attracting customers. Here’s a quick rundown of my time in San Jose.
Tuesday
Because I couldn’t book a room anywhere near the McEnery Convention Center I had to take a cab downtown. (A word to the wise: book these trips early….it’ll save you some grief if you plan ahead and get convenient accommodations.) I was able to obtain my registration badge quickly and then it was off to peruse the exhibition hall. GYM (Google/Yahoo/MSN) occupied much of the prime real estate as would be expected. They all had great booths set-up where they were touting the greatness of their respective PPC programs and handing out their shwag. MSN, being the newest kid on the block in this arena, seemed the most enthused about discussing their product. I hope they do well…I’d love to see Bill give Larry and Sergey a run for their money in search advertising!
Several companies represented themselves very well with fresh booths, cool give-a-ways, and had educated staff on hand to field even the most uncommon questions. Others did not, but I won’t mention any names. It was nice seeing what everyone had to offer and I made a special point to stop be each booth on display. Whether it was for twenty seconds or twenty minutes, I wanted to see it all. I was very impressed with a company I knew nothing about: www.weRlive.com. They boast live video chats with experts on a variety of topics. I thought that was a very unique concept and they seem to have it put together nicely. They could still use some “depth” in regards to the subjects their experts cover, but I was still impressed with their concept. (I would have been more impressed had I won the Pontiac Solstice they were giving away, but no…I didn’t walk away a winner on that one.)
SES has what they call a “networking lunch” each day in the exhibit hall. They had, I don’t know, a hundred tables or more set up that seat 8 people each. Half of those tables had signs on them that would detail a specific topic of interest and folks could just have a seat and chat with like-minded individuals while eating their complimentary box lunch. I got there late and the two “Linking” tables I saw were completely full. I wasn’t really in the mood to learn more about “In-house SEM” or “CPA” so I decided to take my grub out to the WiFi area and return some emails. I like the concept, though, and for anyone who is considering attending an SES show in the future by themselves….this would be a great way to meet people.
Tuesday’s events led right into the Google Dance; the big bash that Google hosts each year at their corporate headquarters. All SES attendees, Google employees, and whoever else was invited and it was definitely an experience that I’m glad I didn’t miss. There were literally thousands of people crawling the Google campus and I, for one, was blown away by the magnitude of this event. First of all, they sent chartered buses to ferry everyone to and from the Google headquarters. Once we arrived, I was promptly greeted by cheerful Google employees who enthusiastically issued me a Google t-shirt and coralled me in the direction of the closest bar…of which there were several. There was a lot of great food, interactive exhibits, cool gadgets, fun activities, and good music. (Yes, I even did the “Dancing Heads” deal that superimposes your face on a dancing, cartoon body. Funny stuff.) Everyone had a great time from what I could tell so I’d like to personally say, “thanks, Google.” One of their employees even offered to drive me back to my hotel so I wouldn’t have to wait in the long line to be bussed back to the convention center. Thanks, D!
Wednesday
After a client meeting for breakfast, my first session of the day was an interview between Danny Sullivan and Eric Schmidt, the current CEO of Google. Mr. Schmidt offered a fairly guarded-yet-polite perspective on Google’s current state-of-affairs and product offerings. Mr Sullivan even asked him at one point why they had so many products? There has been some banter that people are beginning to fear Google because of their size. Mr. Schmidt calmly stated that their overall mission is clear and simple: to solve people’s problems online. I think “to make more money” would have been far more honest yet less-popular answer, but whatever. It is business after all, right? At any rate, it was an interesting conversation.
My next session was called “Linking Strategies” and the speakers were Debra Mastaler from Alliance-Link.com, Greg Boser from WebGuerilla, & Eric Ward from ericward.com. Although there was nothing ground-breaking about any of the information discussed, I must say that I was impressed with Eric during his presentation. He appears to be very professional with a deep understanding of the SEO industry.
The next session was called “Buying Links” and the speakers were the same but also included Patrick Gavin & Thomas Bindle. Again, nothing new here but the consensus is there is a HUGE demand for links…which we’re in touch with here at LinkWorth. Relevancy is rule #1. Attention LinkWorth Partners & Advertisers: Buy/Sell links from relevant sites only! This is common knowledge in the industry but a friendly reminder never hurt anyone. From a Partner’s perspective, if you only accept relevant text ads to publish on your site you’ll benefit yourself in two ways: 1) you’ll attract more Advertisers because you won’t have unrelated links next to each other which could dilute the strength of that inbound link. 2) you will have more credibility in the eyes of the search engines because you won’t have irrelevant outbound links. The stronger your site is, the more ad requests you will receive. From an Advertiser’s perspective, inbound links from relevant sites have more “juice” and your chances for click-throughs are higher because you’re addressing your target demographic.
I attended most of the “Link Baiting” session, as well. This session was focused on methods & techniques to attract links naturally. All due respect, I lost interest in this session and left early so I don’t want to mention the names of the speakers. Sorry guys! It was at the end of a long day and I had a plane to catch, anyway.
So that was my experience in condensed form. We’ll be attending SES shows across the country at least semi-regularly but I’d certainly recommend San Jose to those who have never been before. Have a great day….
Want to Participate in Our New Beta?
LinkWorth is proud to announce our upcoming beta launch of a new product. We will be launching our new in-text advertising product and we’re looking for a few good volunteers to help test it out. Our new logical text ads will become a great addition to the LinkWorth family of products offering advertisers yet another way to drive targeted visitors to their website.
The way our logical text ads will work is by the publisher inserting a small bit of JavaScript code on their web pages they wish to include, then our software will read the page and match targeted keywords with advertisements created by our adverters. The software is quick to identify the top five converting keywords on a page, then underscore the keywords. If a mouse pointer passes over the keyword, a “tooltip”, or advertisement will display right above or below the keyword. A short delay after the mouseover and the advertisement will disappear. I’m sure most have seen this type of advertising on a website before.
At this time we are taking a set number of volunteers to help us in testing. If you would like to participate, you must be a current advertiser and/or partner of LinkWorth. When the beta is ready, we will activate the navigation within your existing account (YES! All from the same login!). To sign on to our beta, please complete the form below and we will be contacting you shortly. (All emails will be used strictly for beta purposes only.)