An organized website tends to rank higher than others. What makes a website organized other than the designing aspects, and quality content? Title and alt tags are another thing that is needed in the website for it to be an organized website.

I am sure most of you know what alt tags are. Alt tags are attribute tags which are mostly used with images. The essential of these tags are so important, that even w3 requires them for your website to be XHTML valid. While many designers, don’t use alt tags, and if they do they leave it blank. It is your responsiblity to go in your design and add the alt tags. Personally when I design, I add alt tags to all my images just so the design is xhtml valid, but I leave majority of them blank other than the navigation buttons because I don’t know which keywords the owner wants to target. Therefore, I would seriously recommend you guys to check the attribute tags in your website and give your images an attribute. This tag is also the one to replace the image when it is broken, so if your image is broken then this tag would take over, so the user knows what was suppose to load there.

Title tags are another essential element of your website which is used to rank high for your targetted keywords. Basically in each hyperlink that you enter in the website, It is eligible for the title tag. A good example of this would be, when I write Balkhis in a place where I am really counting on my backlink, I make the hyperlink small, but the title tag would be Balkhis – Vision for Success. You can’t abuse the url by keep linking really long keywords, but this way you can actually target a wider range of audience. These long keywords can often rank. I have seen some people even use sentences in their title tag. Such as Uzzz Productions is your web solution provider instead of Uzzz Productions – Your perfect Web Solutions. These techniques often get you rank higher in search engines which means that you are getting traffic indirectly by following these methods.

I know I am using these tags in my website, and I try to use it in most of my images. I am getting alot of traffic from long-tailed keywords. I think this is definately worth a shot.

Google has gone on a road trip of banning paid links. Which is causing users to either stay away from buying links or getting their site banned when they are trying to buy links. I believe it is a time to get Organic links. Organic links are genuine links that are gained when some site like your services and link to you. Such as your blog posts being quoted on other websites. But it does become a really hard task to get tons of organic backlinks. Is it possible to trick Google and make the paid link looks like that it is organic?

This is just a theory which has not been 100% tested, though I am trying it just to increase my knowledge.

I never really buy alot of links, but now a days many users are claiming that template sponsorship and sponsorship of these kinds are also being considered Paid Links, but I believe that is only if you use the same keyword to redirect the link to your homepage with no rel tags. Recently, I have started adding rel=”" tags in the links. I have been adding rel=”friend”, rel=”partner” and such type of tags in the links that I have been adding on Balkhis. Another trick that I am thinking about is mainly concernced with templates, but I believe it can be used in other areas also. When I am releasing the template, instead of linking to my homepage, but if I make the links more relative such as Linking to the template page, I believe it would work.

So try to buy links in your own industry and don’t try to be too obvious. Start linking to your inner pages which will make your website more stronger on all pages. Another thing, I have been thinking that now from paid links, alot of people will be switching to Blog Post Reviews because people are paying for a blog review by the writer. Therefore they are going to get organic links and a (honest) review. Sometimes the credibility of the author comes in question, but mostly smart bloggers give honest reviews rather than just writing positive reviews.

I would like to hear the thoughts of my users and other Search Engine Marketers. What do you think about these techniques? What other techniques if any you have.

Alright, as you all know about my Pimp my Blog Program, in which I am offering a free custom wordpress design to my email subscribers. The winner will be picked by random drawing. Before I launched the contest, I had it in my mind and decided to begin with Simon Emery’s Blog.

A little about Simon – Simon is a one man team behind one of the coolest plugins for wordpress. OIO Publisher. I liked his plugin so much that I decided to reward him for his work through this. As I mentioned that the winner was picked by me before I started the contest.

Simon’s blog was running on a customized version of a free theme called The Morning After. I took his blog and with the help of Uzzz Crew, the site is now officially Pimped! Check it out.

Simon asked for a custom homepage in his wish list and a dark design with a wall. I made sure that his wishes were fulfilled. I made a custom design with a brand new logo, and fulfilled all his wishes and added a wall. Wall of Ideas is the wall that is below the About text. The blog have the officially Pimped Logo in the footer.

I have compiled a video of the development process which I made as I was developing. Which will give you everything in details.

Now Don’t miss out on the great opportunity. Do you have a wordpress blog that needs a better look? Well you better subscribe to my blog via email. Use that same email to post comments on the blog. Each comment will get you an entry in the random generator. The winner will be picked once every month. Simon was the winner of March 2008.

Another advantage of this would be a backlink from the pimp my blog program page, as I will add the thumbnails there for people to see your site.

My title basically explains the subject of the post. What should you do in regards with SEO of your website. I will answer one of the most common questions asked related to SEO. These questions include, What is the first step you should take with SEO when you are starting a website?, Should you do your SEO by yourself, or hire a professional?, and How much is enough, When should you stop?.

So fellas, What should be the first step you take with SEO when you are starting a website?

Your first SEO step starts with a design. A good design is the basis of the SEO of your website. Insufficient use of heading tags (h1, h2, h3) can do serious damage to your SEO Rankings. Basically your designer needs to know where to use h1 tags and what not. Just a little overview if you want to check your site. You should not use the h1 tag more than once in the site. h2 tags are suppose to highlight important titles, categories etc. h3 tags are subtitles etc. Don’t abuse h2 tags and keep them minimum as well. Another big think with SEO is the structure of the design whether the content comes first or not. More about this issue in this post. Once this step is fulfilled you need to look at your options in advertising methods. I have shared multiple ones on this blog which you can look up.

Next Question is “Whether I should hire a professional, or do the SEO myself?”

There is a pro and con side to both. You have to evaluate your options because I can’t make the decision without knowing the criterias.

By Hiring a …[Read the entire post]

Am I going to give you a law lesson. NO!, but I am going to share what I found through a client about HostGator. Well, I have a client who needs a website for their new business. They asked me which webhost should the get, so I said get HostGator because they are pretty big. After the fact, the client emailed me the chat conversation and the issue they had with hostgator. I said get the Baby Plan which is advertised on the homepage for $7.95 / month. It even says, No Hidden Fees and No Contracts. Apparently that is not true when you go and follow through with the plan.

At first, I thought they just put the best price on the homepage, and when you Read more, It will tell you, so I clicked More Info. Which still said $7.95/month. So I said well lets go and click order now just to confirm what my client was claiming. I proceeded to the cart, It said enter the domain. I entered one of the domains that I own. Next Page believe me or not said $9.95 monthly. Not even that, but they require you to sign up for 36 months for you to even get the price.

They not only put out all their terms up front, but HostGator false advertise their prices on the homepage by adding No Contracts / Hidden fees. When there is a 36 month contract needed to get that price. This is considered a federal offense in United States. I am wondering if there is a law suit awaits for this big hosting giant.

Even more funny was that their representative owned upto that they are false advertising and it was not an error.

Chat Transcript
info: Please wait for a HostGator operator to respond.
info: Welcome to HostGator Live Chat! You are now chatting with ‘Jeffrey S.’
Jeffrey S.: Welcome to HostGator, how may I assist you?
Client: My web designer just sent me this link to your site. He will be managing my site and told me to buy the 7.95 a month plna- the “baby” I filled out the form and clicked on baby. The total on the next page is 9,95 a month- why is it more than what you have on the selection page?
Client: Even the yearly rate is 120- no discount at all
Client: are you still there?
Jeffrey S.: I’m still here
Client: ok- thanks
Jeffrey S.: yearly is 83.40
Client: is that were the 7.95 comes from? I thought the web site said 7.95 a month, no contracts
Jeffrey S.: sorry , wrong page, baby doesn’t have a discount for 1 year, the 7.95 comes from the 3 year monthly average.
Client: ok- but when you select baby by clicking on rder now” it takes you to the place to pay and it says the cost is 9,95, not 7.95
Jeffrey S.: 286.2/36=7.95
Client: ok-but your math is still off- first- 83.40 times 3 years is NOT 286.20. it is 250.20. That is still. Also, the plan does not say anthing about the 7.95 being a 3 year plan. The web site says 7.95 a month- no contracts- that means, it is 7.95 a month. Otherwise, it should say 7.95 based on 3 years. You really can’t have it both ways. My web designer sends you a lot of business. I ca’t beleive that you are not posting your correct prices and trying to scam people with a a 3 year contract to get the rate you have on the website. I am already not impressed.
Jeffrey S.: when you pay for 3 years (36 months) you pay $286.20
Client: Do you rally have any idea what you are doing? Did you not type “yearly is 83.40″ in the second entry you sent? This is not fuzzy math- the numbers have to be the same.
info: Your chat transcript will be sent to xxx@gmail.com at the end of your chat.
Jeffrey S.: “sorry , wrong page, baby doesn’t have a discount for 1 year, the 7.95 comes from the 3 year monthly average.”
Client: ok- so we are back to square one- the “baby” is 9.95 a month- even though you advertise it on the website for 7.95- is that correct?
Jeffrey S.: 286.2/36=7.95 yes
Client: OK- I just want to be sure that you put it in writing that you prices are not correct. You fill out the form that says monthly at 7.95, and when I go to pay, the price jumps to 9.95. I do believe that is false advertising, or “bait ad switch” which is illegal. The feds require that you make it clear when a price is an average. Nowhere does it say that the price is an average.
Client: I will not waste anymore of my time or yours. Thank you for verifying this decepetive business practice in writing.
Jeffrey S.: You can email sale@hostgator.com and voice your concerns to them.

What do you guys think about this ?? I know I am not supporting HostGator any more.