How to Keep Your Website Clear of Bad Neighborhoods
Issue #2321
- WEALTHY: Is it too late to jump on this commodity bull? (Rick Pendergraft)
- HEALTHY: An old-fashioned, low-tech way to keep in shape at any age (Dr. Jonny Bowden)
- WISE: Mr. Rogers on neighbors
ALSO IN THIS ISSUE:
- Have you somehow wound up on the wrong side of the tracks? (Alexis Siemon)
- The most efficient sales you’ll ever make (Charlie Byrne)
- It’s Good to Know… about fire alarms for the deaf
- Add "autochthonous" to your vocabulary
Winners Cherry Pick! Losers Bottom Feed
Thousands of stocks have just fallen 40% or more… most will continue to tumble… but you should still overpower the markets.
Because a select few stocks are now set to roar back for outstanding near-term gains.
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Grab this low-hanging fruit here.
Worth Their Weight in Gold
Everyone’s heard about oil going over $100 a barrel recently. Getting less publicity is the dramatic bull market in precious metals. Year to date, gold is up almost 17 percent and silver is up almost 37 percent.
Too late to catch the upswing in prices? Not necessarily. Global demand for precious metals will likely keep rising as the exploding middle class in Asia gets a taste for the finer things in life. So, yes, prices have moved up considerably over the last few months. But there is no reason to believe this is a bubble that could burst anytime soon.
You can get involved in this market by investing in ETFs (Exchange Traded Funds) that focus on precious metals. Choose from broad-coverage ETFs, such as the Powershares CD Precious Metals Fund (DBP), to more narrowly focused ETFs, like the iShares Silver Trust (SLV). You can even invest in silver and gold mining companies with the Market Vectors Gold Miners (GDX) fund. Purchasing shares in ETFs is as simple as buying shares of a stock. The benefit is you get the diversity of a mutual fund.
Commodities should always be a part of diversifying your portfolio, and it’s easy to add them with ETFs. Take advantage of the precious metals bull market and pick up a few. Don’t get spooked by any short-term price drops. We are in the midst of this long-term bull market, so consider them to be longer-term investments. A moderate pullback in prices may just make it cheaper for you to buy in.
[Ed. Note: Rick Pendergraft is a professional trader and market analyst. In Rick's new investment service, he reveals how you can make hundreds - even thousands - of dollars just by playing a simple game of "guess the pattern." Learn more here.]
"It’s a beautiful day in this neighborhood,/ A beautiful day for a neighbor./ Would you be mine?/ Could you be mine?"
Fred M. Rogers
Linking Best Practices: Beware of Bad Neighborhoods
Get 1,000+ directory submissions for $50! Guaranteed results! Buy links for your website!
To a new website owner, that kind of offer can seem irresistible. The idea of all those submissions, all that potential website traffic, and all that potential new business, for a relatively low price, can sound like a great deal. But what price is your website paying in the long run?
I’ve talked before about the important role link building plays in getting increased search engine rankings. Links to your site act like endorsements in the eyes of the search engines. They help validate your website content - leading to high rankings.
Submitting your site to trusted and relevant directories (human-edited catalogs of websites) is one way to build those links. So it would seem that signing up for 1,000+ directory submissions would be a quick and easy way to start building lots of links right away. However, it’s important to be aware that there IS such a thing as a bad link.
My advice? Make this (from an article at SearchEngineLand.com) your mantra: "My link sources must be relevant, consistent, reputable, and from the right link neighborhood."
Right about now, you’re probably thinking, "Relevant, consistent, and reputable. Okay. That makes sense. But… What is a link neighborhood? What’s the difference between a good link and a bad link? What will a bad link do to my website?"
Link Neighborhoods Defined
In the simplest terms, a link neighborhood is a group of related, complementary, or like-minded sites on the Internet, each linked to other relevant sites. They could be niche sites focused on health, finance, sports, pets, movies, etc. Pretty much any niche you can think of has its own neighborhood. For example, Early to Rise, The Warrior Forum, and CopyBlogger would all be part of the same link neighborhood because they are related to Internet marketing and copywriting in some way.
The best link-building practice is to link to and acquire links from your own neighborhood. Niche directories, respected organizations, and well-known bloggers in your field are all examples of good links that will associate your site with good link neighborhoods. For instance, if you ran a women’s health website, a link from the National Breast Cancer Foundation website to your site would be a great one! Acquiring that link would be the first step in building a pattern of good linking behavior. The search engines would then associate your site with an outstanding and relevant link neighborhood.
Similarly, if ETR, The Warrior Forum, and CopyBlogger linked to each other, it would have a positive effect on their search engine rankings.
The Wrong Side of the Tracks
Now that you understand what a good link neighborhood is, you can see that almost anything that doesn’t fit within those guidelines would qualify as a bad link neighborhood - particularly those 1,000+ no-name directories.
Bad link neighborhoods typically include:
- Sites penalized or banned by the search engines (typically any site not following Google’s Webmaster Guidelines)
- Sites hosting spyware
- Sites promoting phishing
- Link farms and free-for-all links pages (large pages full of unrelated links)
- Any site that offers no value or unique content to visitors and that could potentially be viewed as dangerous
Being linked to a website that isn’t related to your website would also put you in a bad neighborhood.
Google is notorious for being the harshest judge of bad links, and will punish your site for linking to, or being linked from, a bad link neighborhood
A number of sites in the real estate industry suffered severe drops in Google rankings in the past year due to bad link practices. It seems that real estate agents in several states were linking to each other - and, by doing so, built a large volume of links very quickly. But because real estate is such a localized industry, Google determined that an Arizona real estate agent linking to an agent in Connecticut didn’t provide any value to the Web user. That, combined with the sheer speed and volume of this reciprocal link tactic, set off a red flag at Google. This prompted them to fire a "shot across the bow" of those real estate sites - dropping their rankings.
If you have friends or colleagues who are linking to bad neighborhoods - or are acquiring links from free-for-all links pages - and they want to link with you as well, think twice. They might be on their way to getting penalized themselves. And you don’t want your site to be part of their bad link neighborhood.
If you’re a beginner, what I’m telling you today may sound alarming - especially if you’ve always heard that linking is good for search engine rankings. Don’t panic. Google and the other search engines aren’t going to penalize you for a couple of bad links you didn’t know about. They are typically looking for patterns of bad linking behavior: acquiring hundreds of links from unrelated spammy sites quickly.
The Takeaways
Let’s go back to our mantra: "My link sources must be relevant, consistent, reputable, and from the right link neighborhood." With that in mind, follow these rules when starting a link-building effort…
- Always be sure you are getting links from legitimate websites in your niche. If you run a website about stock investing, linking to sites about pet care won’t help your Google ranking. Instead, try to exchange links with other financial sites.
- If you are offered a link from a website that requires you to link back to them, first verify that the website is relevant to your niche and is not participating in any bad link practices.
- Resist the temptation to pay for thousands of directory submissions. There are only a handful of directories that are worth the trouble of submitting to, and one of them is Yahoo. Start there.
These link building best practices may seem like a lot of slow, hard work - especially when it looks like there’s an easy way out. But you will be rewarded for your hard work with increased search engine rankings, more targeted traffic, and, eventually, more sales.
[Ed. Note: Alexis Siemon is ETR's resident Search Engine Marketing Specialist. Get step-by-step instructions for starting your own Internet business with ETR's Magic Button program.]
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Praise for Ready, Fire, Aim : "I find your new book very user friendly."
"My compliments, Michael, on Ready, Fire, Aim. I teach business classes at a local college, and I find your new book very user friendly. It is easy to read, easy to understand, and easy to apply. This is a book where real-life experience triumphs over textbook theory. I am going to recommend it to my students. I know they will benefit from it.
"I have come to expect superior information from you since studying AWAI’s Accelerated Program for Six-Figure Copywriting in 2007. You have not disappointed me. From ETR and Investors Daily Edge to AWAI’s Golden Thread, the information is always timely and informative.
"My financial copywriting career is just beginning. I am sure it will be a success with the support I get from the articles, information, and products that your companies provide. Thank you."
-Richard S. Sowa
New Albany , IN
[Ed. Note: Have you read Ready, Fire, Aim? If so, we want to know what you think! Send your comments, full name, hometown, and state to ReaderFeedback@gmail.com and we may publish it in Early to Rise.]
Walt Disney Marketers on the Ball
Marketing in the new Web 2.0 era was on the agenda when MaryEllen and I recently attended Rich Schefren’s "New Beginnings" conference at Disney World in Orlando.
But the folks at Disney itself clearly haven’t forgotten one of the oldest marketing axioms: The best customer is your current customer.
- When I checked into my room, a placard on my bed offered me "25% off a future visit - but only if you book before your current stay ends."
- The day after I checked out, I received a similar offer via e-mail.
If you don’t have immediate cross-sell programs (trying to sell customers a product similar to one they just bought) and bounce-back programs (making another offer shortly after a sale) in your sales cycle, start implementing them now.
Otherwise, it’s a lose-lose situation.
First, you are not giving your customers a special opportunity to take advantage of more of your products.
Second, you’re missing out big-time on the most efficient sales you’ll ever make.
[Ed Note: Charlie Byrne is Creative Director at Early to Rise. Sign up for e-mail delivery of his blog and get edgy and useful ideas on copywriting, marketing, and other category-defying posts.]
A Terrific Way to Build Strength and Fitness
High-tech gadgets and shiny exercise equipment are "musts" for any big city gym. So it’s easy to lose sight of the many benefits of old-fashioned, low-tech, equipment-free bodyweight exercises. I’m talking specifically about the plain old push-up.
Push-ups are a terrific way to build upper-body strength and endurance. They’re also a symbol of fitness and vigor. (Ask anyone who watched 71-year-old Jack Palance drop to the floor and do his now-famous one-handed push-up routine during his Oscar acceptance speech.) Push-ups engage multiple muscle groups, including the chest, the triceps, and the shoulders. Plus, they require abdominal strength for stability. And you can do them anywhere.
Push-ups are particularly valuable for older people. As science reporter Tara Parker Pope says, "The ability to do them more than once and with proper form is an impo rtant indicator of the capacity to withstand the rigors of aging."
Here’s how to do a push-up using proper form:
Keeping your back straight, put your palms flat on the floor a little wider than your chest.
Bend your elbows to lower your shoulders and upper body till your nose is almost touching the floor. Then straighten your elbows to raise back up. Be sure to keep your neck in line with your body. (A good illustration of how to do push-ups can be found at ABC-of-Fitness.com.) Women - who have about one-fifth less muscle than men to begin with - can start with their knees bent and build up to the harder version.
If you really want to test yourself, the Army’s standards are the way to go. Passing the test for the military requires at least 24 repetitions for a 37- to 41-year-old man, and six for a woman in the same age group. Want to be better than average? Go for 34 if you’re a guy and 13 (or more) if you’re a woman.
[Ed. Note: Dr. Jonny Bowden is a nationally known expert on weight loss, nutrition, and health. He's the author of the new book The Most Effective Natural Cures on Earth. For more information, go to www.jonnybowden.com. To read more of his articles on healthy living in ETR's natural health e-letter, click here.]
It’s Good to Know: Fire Alarms for the Deaf
Fire alarms that alert you with a loud, blaring noise are obviously useless for deaf people. So a Japanese company has developed an alarm that sprays the scent of horseradish in the air when there is a fire. Tests conducted by researchers at Shiga University of Medical Science Hospital have shown that the spray is very effective in waking up sleeping subjects.
(Source: Boing Boing and WCTV)
Take Charge of Your Future
You don’t have much spare time… you’re not exactly rolling in the bucks… and you’re no Bill Gates when it comes to technology.
We’ve heard you… and that’s why we asked Marc Charles to be our “advance scout” for profit opportunities that you can run from a kitchen table, your desktop, or out on the road.
They’ve got to be inexpensive and easy to start, without a lot of red tape or technical know-how, and still have great income potential.
There’s a reason they call this guy “The King of Business Opportunities”…why not take a look at what he’s got for you?
- Charlie Byrne
Word to the Wise: Autochthonous
Someone or something that’s "autochthonous" (aw-TOK-thuh-nus) - from the Latin for "of the land" - is native to the place where it’s found.
Example (as used by Anthony Pagden in The New Republic): "For cultures are not monoliths. They are fragmentary, patchworks of autochthonous and foreign elements."
Copyright ETR, LLC, 2008
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