To produce a thriving website or blog you want subject matter, web hosting and SEO. Nowadays it is achievable to set up an on-line store for free and for a low number of dollar you can create your own online shop with good backup from your Internet Service Provider.

At the base of your web publication is a reliable web hosting company with sound hosts and serious support. Counting on your location, it should not be challenging to retrieve such a hosting company. If you project to run a blog on Word press, we recommend utilizing a UNIX based webhosting solution while other solutions demand a IIS server.

Developing serious content for your web log or internet site is smooth if you like authorship. Be sure to select a topic that genuinely occupies you; you will have to continue publishing about that topic for a extended period of time to have the success you set out for. Cool sites to find thoughts and inspiration are blogs and social networking sites like TwitterMySpace and YouTube.

In the process of creating a good website or blog, you must keep your web site up to date with the latest SEO proficiencies and be positive your web site is well optimized for search engines. The work of optimizing your site for search engines requires great content, lots of inbound links and a perfect host setup so you can control all technical elements of your websites performance including the best URL construction.

Building a successful presence on the Net takes a great deal of work and numerous attainments but with publishing software like Word press the programming skills will be kept at a minimum, so that you can concentrate on making sound and serious content.

The quality of a resource cannot always be determined by the number of references made to it. Those references can be faked or inflated through a variety of methods. People in the search engine optimization industry may go out of their ways to create links to their Web sites in order to make those sites look important. But not all links work. Why is that? A good SEO theory book will explain the short-comings of many traditional SEO strategies to you. It quickly becomes clear that just because someone lumps together a book about SEO doesn’t mean they are the best authority on the subject.

One of the biggest problems with books about search engine optimization is that they discuss tools and techniques that won’t work for very long. The more people who use a tool or technique, the more likely it will become obsolete. When you study the fundamental principles of search engine optimization, you don’t make the mistake of substituting art for science.

To learn more about what a good SEO theory book should explain, spend some time looking at resources that focus on SEO theory and not the latest cheap SEO trick of the day.

You also need to consider which web hosting site will be good for the web site of your online business. There are a number of domain web sites available at reasonable rates and you have the freedom to choose any of them. Just be sure that the web hosting plan you have chosen will be easy to manipulate so you can design the web site in such a way that it will make its way to the top with your SEO operations.

With the perfect SEO tools, the best search engine optimiser or company to optimise your website and the budget to back up the demands of a growing online business, success is at hand for sure.

Most plastic surgery practices want their web site in front of these consumers, but don’t do the hard work of (1) ensuring their site “converts” visitors, or (2) “optimizing” it to compete for top search engine positions. If you want to get more leads and more patients, you need to address both.

Web Site Development

When you are ready to upgrade your web site, begin by assessing your strategy before you become overly focused on just the design. Obviously, the image you project is important and says a lot about your aesthetic taste. However, if you build your design around a solid strategy and good content, rather than forcing your content and strategy to fit within a particular design, you will attract more well-informed patients.

Some things you should consider when revitalizing your strategy and renovating your web site:

Itemize and prioritize: Identify a prioritized list of cosmetic procedures you want to promote, and a comprehensive list of target keyword phrases that local consumers will use on the search engines to find your web site. Does your web site appropriately promote each of these areas with that same priority? Also, think about possible “niche” services that your local competitors overlook, such as brachioplasty or even male procedures, like gynecomastia.

Do your homework first: Conduct competitive research and identify web sites that consistently appear high on the search engines using your list of keyword phrases. Evaluate what they are doing to secure their positioning and rate the overall effectiveness of their web site. How does your’s compare? How can you do it better? Remember, creating a winning strategy doesn’t happen by accident, and isn’t done in a vacuum.

Identify your brand: To solidify your “brand,” make sure you have a defined branding strategy to “keep your eye on the ball” during the copywriting and design phases. Be sure your content and look will work together in furthering your brand.

Strategize calls-to-action: If your web site is intended to be an effective direct marketing tool, and more than just an on-line brochure, don’t assume visitors know what to do when they get to your site. Develop creative and compelling calls-to-action and obvious “next steps” that will drive visitors to target “destination” pages, and get them to take specific action.

Review content: Most practices make the mistake of focusing only on the look of the web site and undervalue rich, highly organized web site content. Not only will effective, highly organized content help educate visitors and develop credibility, it is also essential in securing valuable positions on the search engines. Keep in mind, the primary objective for search engines is to index relevant information for specific keywords and phrases. Also, don’t sell upscale Internet consumers short. Remember, they are investing time and energy to research cosmetic procedures and local providers, not to look for “advertisements”. They want to buy, but don’t want to be “sold”. Be sure you provide them web pages that have substance and compelling copy.

Finally, design: Once you have invested the time to research and plan, the web site design phase will be much more efficient and focused. The following are some items you may want to consider when designing your sales-driven web site. Make sure new visitors immediately realize that you are a local provider and that your site offers information on the services they are researching. Place your phone number and “email us” link above the fold of every page. Don’t end any page without an obvious next step (“back to top” is useless). Refer regularly to your pre-design research and plan throughout the design process to ensure you stay on track.

Recommended reading: If you are redesigning your web site or updating the content of your site, consider the following resources:

- Net Words: Creating High-Impact Online Copy by Nick Usborne
- Don’t Make Me Think by Steve Krug

Search Engine Positioning

Developing a compelling web site is only worth it if local consumers find it. Getting your web site to appear on the first page of the search engines is the most direct means to attract high quality visitors. Consider the following when selecting a search engine positioning service.

Focused provider: Web site designers are seldom experts in search engine positioning. Due to the competitive level on the search engines, be sure your provider’s primary focus is on optimizing and positioning your web site pages.

Accountability: Be sure you get monthly reports to track your search engine results. Your report should not only indicate where your site shows up on the search engines, but also where it does not.

Guarantees: Nobody can guarantee you a number one listing for a specific phrase. However, some reputable search engine optimization firms do offer a limited guarantee. Be sure to evaluate the guarantee carefully. Try to avoid large, upfront fees and pay only for positioning results that are documented.

Focus on content: Credible search engine optimization firms focus heavily on the content and organization of your site. This is the foundation for long-term search engine positioning results.

Beware: Some search engine optimization tactics can hurt more than help you in the long run. Avoid techniques that fool or deceive search engine spiders into thinking your site is something that it isn’t. Using hidden text and “link farms” will eventually get you banned on the search engines. Remember, short cuts to search engine positioning are short lived. Be sure you get a full understanding of how your web site will be “optimized.”

Web site marketing should not be seen as a quick fix. Develop your web site marketing program like you build the rest of your practice, with the right foundation and strategy.

Bill Fukui is Director of Marketing for Page 1 Solutions, LLC. PSAA members receive a free evaluation of their web site and search engine positioning. Page 1 will also reduce its web site design charges by $500 and donate $500 to PSAA for each PSAA member web site they develop. Bill can be reached at 800-916-3886 or by email at BillF@Page1Solutions.com. (http://www.page1solutions.com)

SEO in a nutshell: get quality links to your site; the
higher the pagerank, the better.

The problem is that if you submit your site to a high
pagerank directory or search engine, it can take months for
your site to appear. Moreover, many high PR directories and
search engines charge big bucks for the privilege of getting
listed with them. For example, the Open Directory Project
(DMOZ) directory takes several months or more to list a
site. And Yahoo charges $299 per year for a commercial site
to be listed in their directory.

While it’s great to be listed in these directories and
search engines, many will automatically find and list your
site free if you have good quality links to your site. High
pagerank links to your site indicate to many search engines
that other sites that they rate highly link to you.
Therefore, they conclude, your site will probably be useful
to their users. So you deserve a higher pagerank, according
to Google. And the higher your pagerank, the better your
search engine visibility. It’s part of the SEO game and you
can learn how to play.

Now here’s my secret to getting some high pagerank sites to
link to you immediately and at no charge.

First you need to create a web page on your site with a list
of links. You will be adding links to other sites on your
links page in exchange for these sites adding your link to
their link pages. So let’s call this page a reciprocal links
page. You don’t just add any site to your reciprocal links
page, however. You will be looking for high pagerank links
to add to your links page. It’s better if you include links
to sites that are related to your products or services. To
make search engines happy, limit each of your reciprocal
links pages to about 50 links.

Many sites maintain their reciprocal link pages using the
free LinkMan script from PHPJunkYard. If you wish, you could
do the same, but it is not necessary. You can download this
php script from http://phpjunkyard.com

The LinkMan script allows a site’s visitors to add their
links immediately after they add links to the site on their
pages. So all you have to do is to find sites using this
LinkMan script, add their link to your reciprocal links
page, and you can immediately add your link to theirs.

Because the LinkMan script is free, the developer requires
the following notice on the links page: “Powered by Link
manager LinkMan 1.02 from PHPJunkYard – free php scripts.”

You can find sites using LinkMan then by searching for the
exact phrase “Powered by Link manager LinkMan 1.02 from
PHPJunkYard” on Google, for example. Note that there are
other scripts named Linkman, so you should not just search
for “LinkMan”. Play around with your search phrase to find
also sites using earlier versions of LinkMan.

Visit some PHPJunkYard LinkMan link pages with a browser
showing the Google pagerank. You will very soon come across
a site using LinkMan that has a high Google pagerank. Bingo!
Add their link to your reciprocal links page and then add
your link to theirs. You immediately have a free link on a
high pagerank site. Free instant SEO!

And that’s a quick and easy search engine optimization
technique you can use to generate free, high pagerank links.

Kempton Smith is an internet marketing consultant who writes
interesting, useful, keyword-rich articles for
internet businesses to use to promote their products or
services online. Contact him at kempton at kemptonsmith.com
for details. Visit http://site-dr.com for a free report on how to use articles to promote your web site online.

Copyright © 2005 by Kempton Smith.

This article
may be freely published provided you leave its content and links intact.