By Dr. Michel Fortin

    If you have good search position but want to improve it, here
is a powerful approach that can be extremely effective.  The key
here is to remain focused on your audience, and to use keywords
that cater to them specifically.  The more targeted you are the
less competition you will have on the search engines. "But what
if I am outranked, even with targeted keywords?" you may ask. If
so, here's a little trick I use to spy on, analyze and outrank my
competition.  It utilizes resources on four helpful, free sites:

   - The Informant at <http://informant.dartmouth.edu/>
   - Keyword Count at <http://www.keywordcount.com/>
   - Link Popularity at <http://www.linkpopularity.com/>
   - And Alexa at <http://www.alexa.com/>

    The first thing to do is to open an account with The
Informant. It's a free service that will save search engine
queries, monitor them periodically and send you email whenever
there are new or updated pages.  It will also compare your site
with four other URLs.  However, the trick is to not use assumed
competitors but actual competitors.

    So to begin, visit one of the four engines monitored by The
Informant, AltaVista, Excite, InfoSeek or Lycos.  Enter a keyword
as if you were to conduct a normal search for your site.
Remember to use a targeted keyword or phrase and not one which
your audience would never know or use. (However, you may use
buzzwords if they're common in your industry and are known among
your target audience.)

    Then find your site. (If it's in the first group of pages,
your job will be simple.)  Then take the URL immediately above
you as well as the very first, number one URL that appeared --
if your site has not yet been submitted, simply use the latter.
Keep in mind that The Informant is free.  You can open as many
accounts as you wish.  So open one account for each of the four
search engines mentioned earlier, giving you a total of four
accounts.

    Before you enter those URLs in The Informant, you need to
take another step.  Visit <http://KeywordCount.com/>  Keyword
Count is a free service that will analyze your web page and the
density of your top keywords -- up to 50.  And it will also
compare your results with a second URL.  Enter your URL and those
you found when you queried the search engines directly, above.

    (This process, in itself, should be quite revealing.)  Once
your results are given, look for the word used when you conducted
your original search.  If your competitor has it listed in its
top keywords, that's great. Compare each other's density of that
specific word.  But it doesn't stop here.  Take the top 10 words
from your competitor's count (copy and paste them into a text
file, if you must).  Do this with the second URL too.  (Remember
you have two URLs from your earlier search.)

    Now, enter the two URLs in The Informant as sites you will
be monitoring.  In the keyword preferences area, enter the
keywords from each of the three.  The Informant allows you up
to three keyword listings so use one for each of the URLs above
(yours, the one immediately above you and the number one URL).
Remember to remove duplicates before you do so.  If all of the
keywords from the three URLs are different you should have 30
in total.  You can add more if you like.  If so, go back to
Keyword Count and copy the ones that follow, in order.

    While each keyword list offers the choice of search engine
to monitor, use the same search engine for all of your queries.
Also, you will have a choice between an "OR" or "AND" query.  Use
"OR," not "AND."  (Again, since The Informant is free you can use
the "AND" query by opening another account, monitoring the same
engines and URLs, particularly if you have a specific keyword
phrase you want to analyze.  The query will thus match all of
the words listed in a single keyword list.)

    Then, let The Informant do its job.  After you've received
your first batch of results by email, The Informant will give you
the top 10 results it found and the specific ranking of all the
URLs monitored. The next step is to copy the top URL The
Informant gave you (if it's the same as one of the URLs you
retrieved earlier, choose the second one).  By using the same
approach mentioned above, check this third site with Keyword
Count.

    Next, copy the top 10 densest words. Remove any duplicates
with the batch already listed in all of your keyword preferences,
and then add them to your lists -- always separated by spaces.
Then add this third URL into The Informant.  You will then have
four different URLs in all being monitored from now on.

    Finally, you can repeat the entire process for all the other
search engines and for specific pages on your site.  And if a new
competitor appears -- one that outranks you -- add the new URL
and keywords retrieved from Keyword Count in your account
settings or open a new account if you need to.  (As you can see,
this can become quite cumbersome over time.  So stick to only a
few URLs.  Remember that achieving consistent top search engine
rankings is literally a full-time job.)

    And as you improve your optimization, whether it's through
better meta tags or simply adding more content, over time you
should also see some improvement in your rankings.  In the end,
you will have a list of keywords from which to work.  And if
your original query with the search engines, mentioned at the
beginning, reflects a specific page on your site, use that one.

    Now, what happens if your rankings do not improve?  Remember
that keywords are not the only ranking criteria. Therefore, the
next step is to visit Link Popularity at
<http://LinkPopularity.com/>.  It's a free service that will
query the search engines on how many sites have linked to yours.
Try it with all four URLs.  Write down the results.  (You can
also choose to have Link Popularity send them to you by email.)
Then compare the results.  This will provide you with some
insight as to how the search engine prioritizes link popularity
in its algorithm.  And if yours is not high, you have some work
to do.

    Once you've boosted your link popularity, if your rankings
still do not improve, the next step is to see how much traffic
these URLs actually get and compare them with yours.  First,
download the Alexa browser add-on from <http://Alexa.com/>.
It's a free tool that allows you to retrieve a lot of information
about any site you visit (e.g., content freshness, download
speed, site owner information through a "whois" lookup, link
popularity, and, most important, traffic level).

    However, keep in mind that Alexa's traffic indicator is not
a genuine metric.  It's based only on Alexa visits  (Alexa
tracks visits only of people with Alexa browsers).  But it is
a great indicator nonetheless as one can easily extrapolate
the number and obtain some insight into a site's real level
of traffic.  (There are several million Alexa users out there.)

    There are two versions of Alexa: One for Netscape and another
for Explorer.  In this example, Explorer is used.  Once Alexa has
been installed on your system, visit your competitors' URLs.
Alexa's browser will open and give you the site's statistics.
At the top is the level of traffic, which appears as a star-
rated system (out of five stars).

    But if you hover your mouse over the traffic indicator, an
ALT text (or "tooltip") will give you that site's actual ranking.
Click on the traffic indicator.  Alexa will then show you what
the rating system means based on a ratio of actual Alexa visits
versus the total number of Alexa users and websites indexed.
(Beyond search engines, you can also use Alexa for checking on
other competitors or sites. In fact, it can reveal a lot!)

    Both Alexa and Link Popularity will give you some clues as to
how your competitors are doing and why they are outranking you in
the search engines.  But your work is not done yet.  Armed with
all this information, you now have your work cut out for you.
Agreeably, several software programs exist that can help you save
time.  One of them is WebPosition Gold.  It has a compare feature
and a ranking monitoring system, much like The Informant and
Keyword Count services mentioned above.  (For more, visit
<http://MarketingChallenge.com/webposition/>)
            ______________________________

    Mike has not yet uploaded "Demystifying Search Engines, thus
I can't give you the URL. But the following points to his listing
of articles. http://successdoctor.com/archive.htm
            ______________________________

Michel Fortin of <http://SuccessDoctor.com> is
dedicated to helping businesses turn into magnets.
Visit his site to receive a FREE copy of his book,
"The 10 Commandments of Power Positioning."
            ______________________________
 

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