So just how many inbound links does your site need?

Posted by ljmacphee on June 20, 2007 under blogging, search engine | Be the First to Comment

Now these are figures for the top 25 blogs which may or may not differ from what traditional websites need:

Which means about each 8 links you collect inbound from various sources will get you 1 visitor a month.

But also remember popular blogs have lots of links from low traffic sites. Actual numbers of inbound links per visit are probably lower for most sites.

Source for link and visitor numbers Popular Blogs | eBizMBA

See also:
How Google Measures Link Popularity

Google Page Rank

Posted by ljmacphee on May 3, 2007 under search engine | Be the First to Comment

I thought this was just the distance you were from the first result on Google for a given set of search times. It’s not.

This is a number between 1-10 ( believed to be a log scale ) that scores your site based on incoming and outgoing links to relevant sites. The better ranked a place is that links to you or you to it, the higher score you receive.

Page Rank Explained gives a detailed analysis of how page rank is believed to work. Google for obvious reasons keeps this information private.

MIS Web Design: A Survey of Google’s Page Rank

You can find the rank of your pages by either installing the Google toolbar on your browser and letting the mouse hover over it while you are on your page. Or you can go to Google PageRank Checker and type in your url.

It has also been rumored that the length of time your site has been in place and the future length of time for which you have registered your domain matter as well.

Bringing your website from 1.0 to 2.0

Posted by ljmacphee on May 2, 2007 under blog information, blogging, how to, search engine | Be the First to Comment

What does that mean? First and foremost it means letting visitors interact with your website through forums, blogs, and other means. Let the public contribute if they want to do so.

It means new designs, out with dark pages, html formatting, and java applets. In with new tools and designs; using css, php, mysql, light colors, rounded corners and a whole lot more white space. Add in content that changes frequently, photo streams, news streams, etc.

TimesToCome had sat for about two years while I settled into Houston. I thought it’d take a few weeks to update. It’s been 3 months and I’m just about done. It is going to take longer than you think.

I took the major topics on TimesToCome and spread them across 8 domains, 9 blogs and a few micro sections. The java applets are gone. I’ll replace them with PHP scripts. There is still one section not fully updated. The rest are done. This will make it easier for people, search engines and advertisers to find you and find what they are looking for on your site.

I was still putting details on webpage designs today. Don’t forget the details; contact information, a link back to the old site, and a license on each page. If you use a pre-made template, hack it and make it your design. It doesn’t take a lot of css training to be able to do that. Cross link to the other websites you split your stuff across in case people are looking for more than one subject they found on the old site.

Just this morning I realized I had not added digg buttons back in after updating my templates. I’ll add those back in this week and add directions for you as well this week. Still I’m finding details missing. So you might want to make a list of everything on your pages before you do the move and check them off as you add them to the new design.

TimesToCome got started back in 1997. Last time I did a major update on TimesToCome was about 2002 or so. Google and the other search engines bounced me down in rank for moving pages. They are very unforgiving of that. This time I used 301 redirects. It still cost me ranking to move things around. Don’t forget to resubmit your site to the directories you were previously listed in under your original domain. Google’s DMOZ and Yahoo being the most important. Take your time and do it yourself by hand. But only after you get the bulk of things moved to the new sites.

The good part is, I’ll regain the ranking and then some with the new design. It is far easier to keep the site current and to make changes. So with only one section left to update I’m expecting to spend a whole lot less time on maintenance and much more on content.

see also:
How to do 301 redirects

Labels and Tags

Posted by ljmacphee on April 9, 2007 under how to, search engine, tools | Be the First to Comment

Labels and tags what to do?

Many sites say using tags will increase your visitors, just as many say they won’t. There is a fair bit of work involved in adding Technorati tags to your previous and current posts. I’m not convinced it is worth the trouble. If you are interested Technorati has some information on how to tag your posts There are also several free programs to do it for you. I have not tried any of them.

Blogger labels can be used to tag relevant terms people might search for on your blog. Better yet you can use them to sort your blog entries into categories. On my house plants blog I sorted entries into specific plant information entries and general information about house plants. This can make searching your site easier for people. It also gives them an easy way to hang out and explore subjects of interest on your site. I’ve just added them to my blogger blogs this week and am seeing a fair bit of usage.

To add blogger labels just add them to the box at the bottom of the posting area. Think of them not a repetitions of key words and titles, but rather break your blog down into a half dozen or dozen subject areas that people might want to pursue on your blog.

There is also a new PERL script up on the left to help you do word frequency counts on your blog entries to help with tagging, and search engine key word optimization of your entries.