Tips For The Week Beginning January, 31st

Marketing Tips For Online And Offline Home Businesses!

META Tagging Your Web Site!

Now that you have your very own web site, or if you are thinking of starting your own web site, one important step you must do is place META tags into your pages. "What are META tags?", you may me asking. Here are some facts from the folks at WebPromote:

1. What are META tags?

META tags are a tool for helping a web site to get indexed correctly by many of the major spider based search engines. They are a couple of simple lines of code that go into the header of the HTML source document. Since spider based search engines index web sites based upon what they find in the HTML code of the site, META tags help to ensure that the visiting spider finds the information you want it to.

The two tags that are the most important are the "description" tag and the "keywords" tag. The description tag gives the search engine the description that you want for your web site. Without this tag, search engines will usually take the first text in finds from your site and make that the description. The keywords tag tells the search engine exactly which keywords you want your site to be searchable under. Without this tag, a search engine will choose words for your site to be searchable under from the title and text of your site.

It should be understood that META tags are not a turnkey solution for getting your site to the top of search engine lists. They will help to get your site indexed correctly and they increase the relevancy for the keywords you chose but they do not guarantee top placement.

2. How long should my META description tag be?

WebPromote recommends that you limit your META tag description to 20-25 words or about 150-200 characters of text. Anything longer will be cut off in the middle of the sentence and will look less professional. One thing to avoid with this tag is the temptation to load the description tag with keywords for your site. This tag should be used to provide a short but colorful description of your site that will entice searchers to click on your link instead of your competitor if they come up next to each other in the search results. Try to use only the keywords that you feel are the most important in you description.

3. How does the META tag builder work?

The META tag builder, in many ways, works the same as the "robot spiders" that index pages for the search engines. When you hit submit, a little program is sent out to read the HTML code of that particular web page. An exact duplicate of that HTML source code is made and the properly formatted META tags and TITLE tag are put in place. Then, the updated code will be sent to your in an email. You can then take the improved code and update your site.

4. What keywords should I use?

Choosing the keywords for your site is an important step. You should put yourself into the shoes of your target audience and try to determine what keywords they are likely to search use when looking for a site like yours. Also, be aware that many words have more than one meaning. For example, a law firm using the keyword "injury" may find itself competing with a doctors office using the same word.

Here are more helpful tips to keep in mind when making your keywords selection:

• When choosing keywords it is important to be specific. Usually, two-word and three-word phrases work better than single words. Words like 'travel' or 'software' are very vague and will put you in competition with hundreds of thousands (or millions) of other web sites that deal with these topics. Keywords like "Florida travel" or "contact management software" narrow the focus and give you a better chance of being found.
• Don't overdo it with your keywords tag. The more words you put into this tag, the more you dilute the relevancy for all of the other words in the list. For better results, use different keywords for different pages within your site. Try to use words that are relevant to the information on that particular page and then submit each page to the search engines individually. WebPromote Blitz at http:www.WebPromote.com/blitz is an effective tools to help you at this stage of your online promotion.
• Keep in mind that most of the search engines are CASE SENSITIVE. This means that a search for "computers" will yield different results than "Computers". For common words, it is best to keep everything in lower case since a large portion of the population does not even capitalize most proper nouns in their searches.
• Be careful with repetition. Many search engines will give you a 'spam penalty' if you repeat a word or phrase over and over. If there are words in the keyword list that you must repeat be sure to spread them out a little bit.

5. I used your META tag builder but it did not put the tags into my site.

Since we do not have access to your password protected server, WebPromote cannot actually install the META tags into your site. The META tag builder will actually create an exact duplicate of the HTML code that already exists in your site. It then sends the updated code to you in an email with the properly formatted META and TITLE tags based on the information you put into it.

6. How do I put META tags into my site?

You need to have access to your site's HTML source code. You may FTP (File Transfer Protocol) your Meta tag into your site's source code. If you are using web site publishing software, you should consult with the software manual or software technical support.

If a webmaster or webdesign firm built your site, you would need to consult with them as to how you can implement these META tags. You can still use our free META tag service; all you need to do is forward the information on to the correct party.

I make it a point add META tags to all my major web site pages. It is a lot easier than it sounds! Here are a couple of great places to get free META tags and instructions on insertion. I personally like using WebSite Garage's Free META Tag Generator!

Free Resources:
WebPromote  META Tag Builder: http://metatag.webpromote.com/avmeta.cgi
Web Site Garage META Tag Generator: Click Here!

Getting Referrals From Current Customers!

One way to spread the word about your home business cost effectively and easily,  is to ask your current customers to provide you with a referral,  if they can. There may be times where a current customer may know someone that is thinking of using a service that your business supplies, or that is in need of the service. Why not set up a referral system where you pay your current customers a certain amount of money for their successful referral to you, or offer them a discount on your service. For example, if you run a typing service and one of your customers refers a friend who successfully used your service for say $150,  you can offer the customer that referred the friend  any percentage of the $150 you see reasonable or offer him or her a reasonable discount towards their next purchase. Often times, word of mouth and referrals from current clients, are the backbone to a successful business.

Last Week's Weekly Biz Tips! Click Here!

Free Weekly Home Biz Marketing Tips written by Andrea Taylor, owner of the home business related web site: Money-At-Home.Com at http://www.money-at-home.com.You may add Andrea's Weekly Biz Tips to your web site, provided that it is copied verbatim, and proper credit is given.
To contact Andrea e-mail her at: webmaster@money-at-home.com

Andrea's Weekly Biz Tipsİ 1999

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