Daily Web Dev

 I recently stumbled on an article abot Microsoft’s Adcenter. It seems to me to be their response to the success of Yahoo Overture and Google Adsense. I have seen little news about the program, so I thought it would be good if I shared and discussed it on this blog. Here is a Link to the Program.

The program looks promising, in my opinion. There are some interesteting and new features, including Video Advertisements which I predict will become very popular. Microsoft adcenter also had some neat keyword features such as keyword forecast and keyword clustering. The program looks good, however, it does not seem like it can take on Adsense or Yahoo because of Microsoft’s limited search marketshare. I have not yet signed up for the program, but I plan on applying soon. If I am accepted, I will definetly post my response to the program.

4 Ways to Optimize your site for Adsense or YPN

Adsense and Yahoo Publisher Network can generate good revenue for your site. Building a quality site is important to generate revenue. Building a site takes a lot of time and hard work. However, by spending a little time perfecting your Adsense or YPN techniques, you can easily increase your earnings. By using these tips, with time and trial and error, you should be able to grow your Adsense earnings.

Offer Quality Content
The best way to get relevant ads is by writing quality content for users to read. If you have little content on your site, you will likely get unrelated ads and therefore less clicks. Writing some unique articles is a good way to increase traffic as well as Adsense earnings. Users reading articles on a website are also more likely to click your ads.

Optimize your Content for Keywords
Adsense and Yahoo Publisher Network place ads based on the content on your page. The ad networks search your Title, URL, keywords, meta tags, etc… The best way to make sure you get relevant ads is by changing those things to relate them to your articles or website. Many practices used for Search Engine Optimization, can be applied for optimizing your page for relevant ads. I suggest trying to target a certain keyword or a few keywords. Make sure the keyword is in the page title, meta tags and URL. Also, try to use <h1> and <b> tags on the keywords.

Choose the Best Ad Placement and Format
One of the most important parts of Adsense optimization is where you place the ads. Also, the ad format is important. Try not to overcrowd your page with ads. Limit your pages to two ads per page, three at the very most. Users will be unlikely to return to your site if it is filled with ads. Also, fewer ads look more professional. Try to use smaller ad formats, my favorites are the 468*60 Banner and 120*600 skyscraper. Place your ads where they will be seen the most and keep them close to your website’s content. If you have written an article, the best place to put your ads is usually after the article, as the user is done reading and may be interested in going to a related site.

Try to Blend your Ads with your Website
Blending your ads with your website is a great way to increase your click through ratio, as well as make your site look better and more professional. The easiest way to make your ads look more similar to your site is by using the colors in your website in your ads. Both Yahoo Publisher Network and Adsense allow you to change the colors of your ads. You can also blend your ads by placing them in areas where they look like they are part of the site.

Building Links to Help Search Engine Rankings

Websites are becoming more and more common these days, especially with user-friendly programs that allow you to build websites with a few clicks of a button. With all this competition, the true challenge comes with how to get attention from the major search engines. When people search for information relevant to your website, you want your pages to come up first so that you can receive the most traffic. The best way to boost this search engine visibility is by building links.

Building the most quality links you can is the name of the game, you want your websites’ link profile to be as strong as possible. The stronger your link profile, the more credibility you will receive from major search engines. Even if other webmasters are reluctant to link to your site, there’s plenty of other ways to get good quality incoming links.

A common method of link building is to submit your website to free or (better yet) paid SEO friendly web directories. Web directories allow you to submit your website into relevant categories. This way, web directories give you a great opportunity to get relevant one-way backlinks to your website.

Submitting articles to article directories is another popular method of link building. The resource box at the end of the article allows you to put in usually at least 2 links back to your website, thus building on the strength of your link profile. You’ll also recieve traffic from the article itself as well - interested readers will click on your link after reading your article.

If there’s blogs related to the content of your site, take the opportunity to visit a few and leave comments on some of the posts. In your comment, don’t forget to leave a link back to your website. Search engine spiders will pick up your link and add it to your link profile. This might not work all the time, though. Some newer blogs have nofollow attributes attached to the comments section, which prevent you from getting any benefit from the link.

Link building is a super important aspect of search engine optimization that should not be ignored. Your traffic depends on it.

1. Search Engine Traffic
Search engine traffic usually the best and most relevant traffic. However, getting it is difficult and often takes alot of time. Some companies spends thousands to improve their rankings, however, I will give you some basic guidlines to help increase your search engine rankings. First of all, make sure your site’s URLs are search engine friendly. This means that they contain keywords related to your website or page. If you have a forum, blog or are using some script for your website, there are usually mods to improve this. Another key factor in SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is making sure that your site has good link popularity. This means that your site has links to it from other sites. A good way to build up link popularity for free is to submit to dirrectories, this may generate a little traffic as well. Making sure your page have good keyword density is critical. I would suggest going for one or a few keywords and making sure they appear alot in your website and you use <h1> and <b> tags for your keywords will help with your rankings.

For More Information on SEO:
http://www.seomoz.org/beginners.php
http://www.seobook.com/

2. Offline Promotion
This is one of the best ways to promote your site. Most likely you know people who are interested in the topic of your website. Telling friends, colleagues and family about your site is a great way to promote it. If you get a small group of people you know to tell others, your site can really take off. This is a good way to promote your site if it is a niche topic. You can also promote your site by going to events related to your topic and telling people about your site in person.

3. Link Exchange
Link exchanges are a great way to get traffic to your site. The best link exchanges are with sites that are in a similar topic, but not exactly the same. Basically, you put a link to someones site on your page, in exchange for the same on their site. It is hard to exchange links if your site has little traffic, but you can always offer the other person things such as more time or better placement. The best place to find link exchange requests and to post for requests are on webmaster forums, such as www.digitalpoint.com.

4. Social Bookmarking Sites
With certain web sites, you can generate alot of traffic by using social bookmarking site is StumbleUpon. If you have a good site, you can submit it to stumbleupon by writting a review of it. People who use the StumbleUpon toolbar can give it a thumbs up and your site will start getting traffic from Stumbleupon. Also, I suggest that you submit your articles to Digg. To get people to give your site a thumbs up on Stumbleupon or to Digg your site, I suggest visiting webmaster forums, such as, www.digitalpoint.com, where people exchange such services.

5. Posting on forums
If your site is just starting out, a good way to get new visitors is by making quality posts on forums related to your topic. Put your website along with a little description of it in your signature. Then, make some quality posts, for example, make posts that really help people out or spark alot of discussion. The traffic wont be enormous, but is a good way to get some new visitors into your site. If you really help someone, they will often check out your signature.

Hey Webmasters and Developers,
I am pleased to announce the opening of www. Daily Web Dev .com. My goal is to bring daily web development news and information to web developers. If you are new to web development or a proffesional, I will try to keep you informed by posting all the latest and greatest news and resources on my blog. Personally, I have a few websites, however, it is not my primary job. I want this blog to be about its readers, so if you want to suggest or send me something to post feel free. Please enjoy this blog and spread the word!