Mission Statement:To provide and enlighten
small to mid sized business owners with the services/ products
and information they need to become successful online.
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In This Issue: |
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 Note
From Merle: |
Hi Kids,
Ever feel like you hate the world? If I sound
like I'm in a mood this morning I am. Whatever happened
to personal responsibility in our society? I swear if I
hear one more Lawyer commercial soliciting for a lawsuit
I'm going to scream. We have become a nation of lawyers
and laws and it's ruining our society. Our freedom is being
slowly taken away with every new law that comes into play,
more laws, more lawsuits. People seem blind to this fact
as they openly welcome the government into places they just
don't belong.
20 years ago if you misbehaved in school you'd
be bent over the Principals desk and paddled, now that would
be a quick lawsuit. And the "blame game" makes
me sick. Something bad happens to you and right away it
must be someone else's fault and not your own. People you
need to wake up and take responsibility for your own decisions
in this life.
Let's take for instance this whole issue of
"gay marriage" that was recently on the election
ballot. Should there be laws in place on people's personal
lifestyle choices. Sorry, but I think not. If you take a
closer look at what is happening in today's world it's being
run by politicians who many were once Lawyers. Bad, bad,
bad. Lawyers like lawsuits as it makes more money for them.
So who's interest are all of these new laws serving? But
the condition of our society is infringing on our freedoms.
I predict if something isn't done to stop this we will be
closer to a communist country then you think. Think about
it.
OK, I'm off my soap box now. Speaking of laws
California has put a new one in place regarding the use
of Privacy Policy's on commercial websites (see what I mean).
If you haven't read over the requirements you'll want to.
It calls for very specific info like an effective date on
your policy, and a clear link on every page of your site
and more. I won't bore you with the details you can read
the full story of what's required here:
http://news.zdnet.com/2100-3513_22-5258824.html
If you don't have a Privacy Policy and need
to create one there's an online generator here:
http://www.the-dma.org/privacy/privacypolicygenerator.shtml
Of course, you'll need to refine the template
once it's created to how you actually use the information
your website collects.
My house is still a mess. Can you believe
it? It's been over 3 weeks since the fire and I'm still
living out of my bedroom. I finally called my Agent and
he called my Claims guy's Manager who is finally getting
some response for me. All that's been done so far is that
my contents have been cleaned and boxed up. What that means
is every time I need to look for something I have to go
out in the garage and rummage through boxes. Aint life grand.
With snow looming on the horizon and the holidays rapidly
approaching I'm in a real pickle here.
***This Issue's Free Ad Contest Winner***
Today's contest winner for a free ad in this
ezine is: Varonda Williams .Send in your ad and I'll get
it in the next issue.
If you'd like a chance to win fill out the
survey by clicking on the link at the bottom of this ezine.
A winner is picked for every issue.
Thanks again for joining me.
Warmest Regards,
http://www.MCPromotions.com/
http://www.EzineAdAuction.com/
http://www.MerlesWorld.com
|
| Discussion
Question of the Week: |
"What specific steps do you take to optimize your site
for the search engines?"
To POST your comments hop over to the board
at..
http://www.mcpromotions.com/webbbs/config.pl
I look forward to reading your comments. No Spam
it will be deleted. You'll find some great resources in today's
ezine so what are you waiting for....Let's go.....
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|
|
1) Marketing News |
Things You Can't Advertise with Google Adwords
https://adwords.google.com/select/contentpolicy.html
--------
How to Code HTML Newsletters
http://tinyurl.com/5ecut
--------
AOL to Cut 700 Jobs
http://www.clickz.com/news/article.php/3430221
------
Amazon Hit with Recommendation Suit
http://tinyurl.com/5myl9
|
2) Feature Article |
"How to Design a Search Engine Friendly Web Site
"
By Herman Drost
Many web site designers don't design their sites
for the search engines. This is a huge mistake
because they miss out on attracting lots of f-r-e-e
traffic. Your beautifully designed web site may
have cost you thousands of dollars but it still
needs to attract visitors to be profitable.
Here are 12 highly effective strategies for
designing a search engine friendly web site:
1. Research highly targeted keywords - do this
even before you begin designing otherwise you may
have to go back and clean up some of your web site
design. Use the keyword research tool, Wordtracker
(wordtracker.com) to research the most popular
keywords that pertain to the subject matter of
your web site. Wordtracker will show how many
people have searched for that particular keyword
over several search engines within the last
60 days.
2. Create a list of approximately 100 keywords or
keyword phrases that you can include within your
web pages. After having completed the above research,
you should have found the keywords that were searched
on most frequently, but only produce a small number
of competing web sites.
3. Write a paragraph of 250 - 500 words of text
for the top of each web page. Weave your keywords
within this text being careful not have them so
close together that your copy reads strange for
your visitors. Aim to please the search engines
as well as your web site visitors.
4. Optimize meta tags - the most significant meta
tags are the title and description meta tags. The
keyword meta tag has lost its effectiveness due
to people sp*mming it, however include it anyway
as some search engines still use it. Include your
keywords within each of these meta tags. The title
meta tag should be a short sentence about the
purpose of your site. In your description meta tag,
write a sentence on the greatest benefit of your
site. Your keyword meta tag should include the
most frequently used keywords contained within
your web page.
5. Include Heading Tags - these can range form
H1-H6 most designers will only use H1-H3. These
tags separate each section of your web page with
subheadings. The H1 tag contains the largest font
and is the most significant. Within the descriptive
text of these header tags you should include the
keyword phrases placed in the same order as your
keyword phrases that are within your keyword meta tags.
6. Optimize images using the alt tag - write a
short description for the alt tag of your image.
The alt tag has 2 purposes:
a) visitors can read the description if they can't
see the image. b) search engines only spider text
(not images), therefore this could help your
site's rankings.
7. Reduce image size - too many images or very
large images on your web page will slow down the
loading time of your web site. Make sure your
images have a resolution of 72ppi. Slice large
images into smaller pieces with your graphics
editor.
8. Find incoming links (backward links) - web
sites that link to yours raise your link popularity.
Search for web sites that are compatible with yours
and have a PR 4 or more to do a link exchange.
Write optimized articles and include them on
your web site. This means your site has a greater
chance of being indexed quickly as well as
getting a boost in its rankings.
Create absolute links (ie http://www.domainname.com)
from all your internal pages to your home page. This
will increase the number of links pointing to your
home page.
9. Use Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) to implement
a clean design throughout your web site. This will
reduce the time to implement a consistent text (or
layout) style for your web site. It will also enable
you to easily update your whole site should you
wish to make any future changes.
10. Place any script code into external files -
when using javascript (ie for swapping images
on your navigation bar) it creates a lot of
code between the header tags, pushing down the
text that search, engines would spider first.
Placing the script code in an external file
reduces the code to just one line.
11. Insert the DOC TYPE tag at the top of every
web page. A DOCTYPE ( "document type declaration")
informs the validator which version of HTML you're
using for your web pages. DOCTYPEs are a key
component of compliant web pages: your markup
and CSS won't validate without them. i.e.
[!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01
Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd"]
DOCTYPES are also essential to the proper rendering
and functioning of web documents in compliant
browsers like Mozilla, IE5/Mac, and IE6/Win.
12. Write clean html code - web site editors often
write extra code. This can increase the loading time
of your web pages. Check your html code by running
it through a html validator
(http://www.htmlhelp.com/tools/validator).
Once you have implemented all the strategies above,
submit your site to the search engines and get ready
for lots of targeted traffic.
You now have built a profitable search engine
friendly web site.
Resources
The Global Structure of an HTML Document
http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/struct/global.html#h-7.1
Page Validation and Loading Times
http://stoco.net/cgi-bin/wc/wc.pl
Fix HTML code errors
http://www.netmechanic.com
*************************************************
Herman Drost is the Certified Internet Webmaster
(CIW) owner and author of http://www.iSiteBuild.com
Affordable Web Site Design and Web Hosting. Subscribe
to his "Marketing Tips" newsletter for more
original
articles. You can read more of his in-depth articles
at: http://www.isitebuild.com/articles
**********************************************
|
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over $1,300 in bonus gifts. Help this young author climb
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a holiday gift.
http://www.SoccerDreamsBook.com |
|
3) Net Hot Spots |
Google Grants
"Designed for 501(c)(3) non-profit organizations,
Google Grants is a unique in-kind advertising program.
It harnesses the power of their flagship advertising
product, Google AdWords, to non-profits seeking to
inform and engage their constituents online."
http://www.google.com/grants/
--------
Create Pop In Forms
This is really cool. If you'd like to add a pop
in box to one of your web pages you can use this
online tool to create and completely customize it.
I used it this week and found it very easy to get
up on my site.
http://popinbuilder.icoder.com
|
4) Sites to Help |
AdCopy Writing Tutorials
Need help with writing ads? We all do. Unless you're
a trained copywriter there are tips and tricks that
you don't know about that can increase your responses.
Learn from someone who knows.
http://www.adcopywriting.com/Tutorials_List.htm
--------
How to JV
Download this free time limited video by the king
of joint ventures Jason Cox. Learn the ins and
outs of a successful JV.
http://www.hotproductideas.biz/content/
-----
Keyword Research Tool
"Helps you research appropriate words and phrases
to include in your webpage's body text to aid in
promotion. Simply enter the sort of word of phrase
you wish to be found under, and the tool will
suggest some additional words and phrases"
http://tinyurl.com/ywc86
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"How to Write Your own Ebook"
8 Easy ways to create and sell your very
own ebooks. Step by Step.
http://tinyurl.com/5d6df |
**** QUICK TIP***
------------------------------------------
How to Check out a Domain
If you go to Google.com and type in
info:typethedomainhere.com it will
come back with a lot of great information
on that particular domain including who
links to it, similar sites, and other
pages that mention that particular domain.
|
5) Site Promotion Software & More |
Instant Press Release- Software
It allows anyone to write and professionally
format a press release in a matter of minutes
by simply filling in some blanks and answering
some questions. Totally F-R-E-E.
http://tinyurl.com/5udfb
--------
Creates a Downloadable Software
Application in 5 Minutes or Less! "Make Your Own
Software" is a mission-critical must-have tool.
Click here for an instant download:
http://www.makeyourownsoftware.com/msmerle.ta1
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|
6) Ebook & Ezine Resources |
Ebay Buyers Guide
This f-r-e-e ebook, "The eBay Buyer's guide
will
help you find better deals on eBay and help you
avoid falling victim to the unscrupulous scammers."
http://www.auction-revolution.com/buyerguide.shtml
---------
"Are You an Ezine Publisher"?
Are you tired of constantly looking for new
content for each issue? Search no more. Browse
our huge database of FREE articles written
by some of the Net's Top Experts. Browse
now at....
http://www.Family-Content.com
|
7) Other Valuable Ezines- Ad Swaps |
If you would like to swap ads send your ezine
information
to mailto:swap@mcpromotions.com
"Merle's Mission Ezine"
Merle's Mission is published twice a month and
is
geared towards webmasters and those who own their
own website. Contains software, free e-books, website
tips and tools, design resources and much more that
will help you build a better website. You'll never
be at a loss for content ideas if you subscribe now!
http://MerlesMission.com
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|
9) Important Info- How to Unsubscribe |
If you are not a subscriber and would like to
be please send mailto:subscribe@mcpromotions.com
If you would like to be taken off our mailing list
Click Here.
Read Past Issues Here....
http://www.MCPromotionsPress.com
http://www.MCPromotions.com
Merle's Cyber Promotions - Send comments to Merle
Tell me what you like, what you don't like, ask me a question
or suggest a topic for a future issue.
*PLEASE DONATE*
If you enjoy this ezine and feel you have gained
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Honor System. Your donations will help to keep this ezine
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dog cookies ....go to.... http://tinyurl.com/2ji9
Would you like your Ad featured in this ezine? It
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you're email bounces you'll be unsubscribed the very first time
it happens.
**Solo Ads Also Available**For current ad rates:mailto:ad_rates@mcpromotions.com
***************************************
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*********Win a Free Ad in This Ezine:*********
If you still haven't taken the demographic survey
you still can and you'll pick up a free gift in the process
and be entered to win a FREE ad in this ezine- Drawing held
every two weeks.Go to http://www.advancedsurvey.com/
and type 8244 into the "take a survey" box on the
right hand side.
PS. One other note if anyone is in need of a
programmer for simple script installation or anything else
contact my guy David
Black he's wonderful and I highly recommend him. Just
tell him what you need and he'll dash off a quote to you.
He also does website hosting with superior customer service.
I love this guy!
----<<>>----<<>>----<<>>----<<>>----<<>>----<<>>
If you'd like my online marketing articles to appear "like
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syndication feed.
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Disclaimer. The information contained in this archive is provided
'as is' without warranty of any kind. The entire risk as to the
results and the performance of the information is assumed by the
user, and in no event shall Merle's Cyber Promotions be liable
for any consequential, incidental or direct damages suffered in
the course of using the information in this archive. Use of the
information contained in this archive are governed by their respective
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