Professor Higgins Secrets
Keyword and Key Phrase Finder
http://inventory.overture.com/d/searchinventory/suggestion/
This is a handy tool to see what keywords and key phrases to
choose. The tool is actually designed to find search terms to
bid on for overture.com's search engine but you can use it for
several functions:
- See what key phrases people are typing in with your keyword.
- See if your keyword or key phrase is viable
- See how many people approximately typed in a keyword or phrase
last month.
- Type your keyword or phrase into the tool.
- Take the number it gives you and divide it by .013
- This should give you an approximation of how many times your
keyword or phrase was typed in last month.
The reason this works is because currently overture.com represents
approximately 1.3 % of the searches conducted on the Internet. If
the statistics change, you need to adjust your proxy number accordingly.
Current bids can be found at: http://www.overture.com/d/search/tools/bidtool/
Domain Name Choice Tips
What I did during my Y2K vacation
http://www.selfpromotion.com/domainfun.t
This page with the weird name has some interesting stuff at the
bottom about which domain names are still available.
Sections include:
- 2- and 3-character .com domain names
- 2- and 3-character .net domain names
- 2- and 3-character .org domain name:
- Word domain names
- Phrase domain names
- Networds!
- Composite domain names
- The 4 and 5 letter word-based domain names
In order for your web page to be found you need to index it.
Meta tags are one way of indexing your page or your site.
Meta tags are part of the HEAD of your document and should be
placed between the <HEAD></HEAD> pair.
The two main meta tags that we will be concerned with for this
class are keywords and description.
Keywords are the words and phrases that people might type in
to a search engine in order to find you. The description is the
description that the search engines search and display to people
who query the engine.
The syntax is:
<META NAME="keywords" CONTENT="keyword1, keyword2,
etc.">
<META NAME="description: CONTENT="your description">
Note: anytime you use a parameter that requires quotation marks,
you need to be sure that the line does not wrap. In other words,
make sure all information between quotation marks is on one line.
Design Notes
The material in the book is fairly comprehensive. I did want to
point out that what is acceptable in one media may not be acceptable
or best when designing for the net.
One big mistake most beginning web designers is to waist valuable
space in the initial page with a huge logo. The idea of having
a large logo comes from print advertising where you are competing
with editorial content on an adjacent page. The same thing goes
with very large headlines. You may want to emphasize with large
text on the web but be careful not to overdo it. You want to make
the best use of the space you have on the first page (and all
the pages for that manner). Remember that you only get one "first
impression."
An important idea is repetition. When you repeat images such
as logos, design features, and backgrounds, the visitor feels
comfortable because of the consistency from page to page. Also
by repeating images, the browser doesn't have to download them
again which makes your pages load faster.
Images
See the textbook for a review. The main thing you need to be aware
of is the use of the different formats. JPG is usually for photographs
or pictures with a lot of color graduations. GIF is better for
line drawings or images with large blocks of a single color. Also
only gif (gif89a) supports transparency and animation.
Be sure to use your keywords in the image's alt tag for extra
points on search engine palcement. <IMG SRC="your.gif"
alt="keyword here">
Images should be compressed for use on the web. I slow loading
site is usually an unsucessful one. I quickly went over in class
how to do this in Adobe Photoshop by reducing the colors for gif
and compression ratios for JPG. Many people use Photoshop to compress
their graphics so they load faster.
Lately, I have been using Macromedia'a Fireworks to compress
my images. Fireworks has features that make it ideal for image
compression. It blows away Photoshop in this department. It also
has an amazing array of other features. I highly suggest that
you purchase a copy especially if you use Dreamweaver or Flash.
An alternative way to compress your graphics is to use a commercial
service like www.optiview.com
Keywords and Keyword Phrases
In order to find the best keywords and keyword phrases for your
site, I have supplied you with the address of a database that
keeps track of which keywords were typed in, how many times they
were typed in and what combinations of words were combined with
that particular keyword.
Follow the directions on the handout to find the approximate
number of times your keyword was typed in last month.
Domain Names
I supplied you with a site that breaks down what domain names
are taken and which ones might still be available. It is interesting
to note that no 2 letter domain names are left with the com extension.
By having a short domain name, experts say that it is easier to
type in and easier to remember. As of the end of last year, the
maximum length allowable for a domain name is now 56 letters,
up from 26 previously. Note that at this time, Netscape seems
to have a bug sometimes with domain names over 49 letters. Also
note that some older software will not accommodate the longer
domain names and you may need to update your software if you use
them. The moral of the story is, if there is a domain name available
that you want, grab it before someone else does. It may not be
there tomorrow.
Although the programming is beyond the scope of this introductory
class, a professional web site should try to pre-load graphics
and other download intensive items (JAVA programs, large pages,
etc.) so the pages will load much quicker and your visitors won't
have to wait. Many fine pre-load scripts are available on the
net, which you can download and past into your page. Many are
free. If you have pages that will be seen in a consecutive order,
you should definitely consider using a pre-load script.
Robots for submitting your site
World Submitter
http://www.worldsubmitter.com/?rhiggins
This site offers free submissions for up to five sites, which
are saved so you don't have to type them in again for free. Even
though the basic service is free, you are still required to sign
up to receive your login and password. A more comprehensive submission
program (up to 30 web pages) is available of a monthly fee.
World Submitter now submits URLs to over 1640 search engines
including Yahoo!, Open Directory Project (DMOZ), Hot Bot, AltaVista
and many other top worldwide search engines/directories as well
as Country-specific search engines/directories. They also submit
to an amazing 135000+ FFA (Free For All) link pages and 51000+
Classified Ads sites! All free and no catch ever!
World Submitter is so cool that I bought the premium membership
and I think it is the best submission service on the net (and
believe me, I have looked.)
Jim Tools
http://www.jimtools.com
Jim Tools offers submissions and more. Register with 46 major
search engines. Put your link on 1,160 FFA pages. Submit to 20
Spam Free FFA pages and 144 directories. Before you submit, read
the Meta Tag Tutorial, generate great Meta tags. Visit Search
Engine Forums to stay on top of the engines. LinkTool makes sure
that every link on your page is working. PositionTool checks how
well your page ranks at major search engines.
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