In today’s world of template run websites the change is relatively easy to make.  There are many different CMS Systems and blogs.  The most common is WordPress and perhaps the easiest to change without an advanced knowledge of code. To edit the footer in WordPress:

From the admin panel select Appearance -> Editor -> Footer -> Change Copyright Year -> Update File

* Copyright image from Business Image

Over the past few months I have been honing my development skills in addition to getting back in to politics.  As I have indicated before… Once upon a time I worked in Politics.  I have been both a volunteer, activist, and professional in politics for the last 8 years.  Due to unforeseen circumstances related to the current state of the economy I decided it best to pursue using my degree and experience to join on the bandwagon.

I have taken a job on the ground in Oakland County, Michigan on the outskirts of Detroit working for a non-profit organization that shares similar values to me and most importantly the same goal.  After the election is over, November 4th, I will be back in the market pursuing a job as a regular person.  Aren’t we all just regular?  No, or at least a few months ago I didn’t think so.  I had convinced myself somehow that I was special.  In that  last few years I have worked hard and some how imagined myself  to be someone I am not.  In reality my illusion was allowing me to get away from what matters most.  Happiness. After years of working for even higher profile figures than me gave me hopes and dreams to be them.  After spending a summer with my parents taught me that it was all an illusion.  After spending months drifting about my parents house I came to the realization,  “I am regular!“  In fact I want to be regular.

As I came out of my daze I blew a couple interviews, unintentionally just did bad, and realized I love SEO and the challenge to the constantly changing SEO Universe.  But my place in the SEO community is low on to totum poll.  Sure I could rise to the top of the SEO community but that would bring very little to me.  So after this election is complete I will be back in SEO only part-time.  I am going to follow my instinct and go for a regular job with stability and most importantly with benefits.  I will continue to blog for personal fun and work with clients on a part-time basis.  Focusing on smaller numbers of clients will give me the ability to help create the perfect plan all the while not neglecting what is important to me.  I have two personal choices ahead of me.  1.  Return home and hope to get a good paying rewarding job (thinking something in construction or mill work). 2. Move back to DC and work my way up in government or the non-profit world.

The full-time life in SEO consulting is a bit to much stress in combination of high profile jobs is what drove me into the fog and ultimate burn out.  I want a full time job that at the end of the day or week I can look at and be proud of.  Weather that justification comes from hard work on an issue of championing a piece of legislation or helping family farmers navigate the rigors of Washington.  Being able to take a pile of dirt and create something like build a new Eco friendly power plant or make steel pipe that is helping end the dependency on foreign oil.  I want to be able to fulfill a quote may dad says very frequently “When they put me down in the ground. People will say there goes somebody that made a difference”.

How will SEO and your SEO business going to fit into that?  The same way I originally intended for it to be. I am going to put it back in the hobby category and part-time employment.  I am not ending SEO I am just not going to do as much as I was.

In my break I did lots of work on the growing area of Content Management systems and new technology using Adobe Flex.  Those article are sure to come at some point.  So stay tuned for updates.  I am adding an e-mail subscription via feedburner so that it can be delivered to your e-mail.  I have been writing on my personal blog lately about politics and other things.  Just so much going on in the world that needs my attention!

Humane Society Legislative Fund is a social welfare organization incorporated under section 501(c)(4) of the Internal Revenue Code. HSLF works to pass animal protection laws at the state and federal level, to educate the public about animal protection issues, and to support humane candidates for office.

In this case I am heading up their team in Michigan’s Congressional District 9.  One of the most highly contested and closest races in the country.  To be asked to spear head this operation is very much a privilege and an honor.

As you know from previous posts I am a big supporter of non-profits and charities.  So instead of sharing a link for charity how about dropping them a donation.  It helps secure more than just your pets and wildlife it protects human rights also.  They are just as concerned with our well being as any other organization.  They are currently in the fight for changing the current state of affairs.  No other politically affiliated organization needs your help more.  Please donate $10 or more.  If you can’t give money try giving them a link and a spot in one of your post.

Back in December there was a lot of talk about Sam’s Club offering SEO and SEM services. I haven’t seen a follow up on the service and wonder how the service is working out. I have not seen or heard of a business actually using the service.

Over at Search Engine Journal they discuss “Sam’s Club Search Marketing: Good or Bad for the Industry?” I haven’t seen a follow up since the rumblings started. I would like to get a hold of a solid review of the service. Let me know if you can review it objectively and show proof of the service.

Example:

My favorite local restaurant, Campbells Field, located miles from anything that resembles modern civilization. I even tried looking them up in the phone book and could not find them. This quaint little restaurant has excellent food and for cheap and situated next a great view of a local working airport. They have T-shirts and sponsor local little league baseball teams. They have a marketing plan that is based solely on word of mouth. Over the past few years I have put reviews and resources out to help promote them out of the kindness of my heart for the community.

The fact they don’t have a website or being listed in the phone book is hurting their growth.

In my opinion every business needs a website at least helping promote themselves locally. No matter the business having a website is simple. With the abundance of hosting providers that provide free domains and hosting for only $3.99 a month. Once you sign up they even give you automated tools to build a website. With about 30 minutes of work you can have a webpage that will bring you business that will pay for the cost within a few customers.

The host I use 1and1.com has several plans that are economical and are great for a first website. You don’t need a fancy designer or expensive web team. Most of these services make it “so easy even a caveman can do it.” Click the banners or use the domain search form to see if your company name is available. Even if you don’t want to create a webpage it is wise to purchase your companies domain name. You don’t want someone using your name.

5 free Domains with Select Hosting Plans. Get yours

Here is a recommendation to all small business owners no matter what you do. Buy your domain name setup a few page website no matter what it looks like. Put information about your services and how to contact you. A link back to my website will help raise the style, class, and look for your website.

One thing to remember though about having a website is a direct reflection on your business. So take that extra step create the website. If you feel that it is necessary barter with an employee, family member, friend to help you. The idea is to save on cost until it proves to you that you will get a return on your investment. The more time and money you spend on the design, development, and promotion of the website will get you a larger return on investment.

Promoting your new website can be time consuming but with all the social media outlets it has become easier. If you don’t promote it then don’t expect a large return on your investment. Having a page with links to it means it will promote itself naturally and require little input from you.

So Purchase your web address set it up on a basic hosting plan that has automated web building tools and you will be on your way into the future. Check out 1and1.com as they have the entry level plans I recommend.

If you have questions about setting up your first webpage don’t hesitate to contact me.

Read the complete article here.

Social-networking sites work to turn users into profits

By Jon Swartz, USA TODAY
SAN FRANCISCO — It is the burning question in tech circles, and Mike Murphy answers it before it is completed.
“I hear it every time I’m on a (tech) panel,” Murphy, Facebook’s vice president of media sales, says with a wry smile.

STORY: Social networks vs. TV networks

He’s referring to the inevitable question on when Facebook and other social-networking sites will turn their steep market valuations into mounds of currency. (Invariably, Murphy answers that Facebook has a long list of major advertisers.)

Facebook, MySpace and other social-networking sites have been the rage of the tech industry for more than a year. Following investments by Microsoft and News Corp., the companies are valued in the billions of dollars and are considered blueprints for how to build a website. Yet a deeper question lingers: How are they going to consistently produce profits to match their soaring valuations?

It is a parlor game that has Silicon Valley buzzing. With online ad spending booming into a nearly $50 billion market this year, there is plenty of money to be had. Big-name advertisers are drooling over millions of young, affluent consumers who are spending more time on their online profiles than in front of TV and movie screens. They are particularly smitten with the prospect of tailoring ads to people’s specific interests.

But Google commands a sizable chunk of the market — especially in the USA — leaving dozens of social-networking sites to scramble for a piece of the advertising pie. Plus, there is the ticklish task of sites and advertisers pitching products without trampling the privacy of consumers.

Short of striking it rich with online ads or creating a new revenue stream, how can so many sites leverage their vast audiences? In many respects, it is the same query that dogged portal companies in the mid-1990s and search engines in the early ’90s. Some were sold. Some went public. Some went belly up.

The ongoing challenge is to concoct a potion — be it through banner ads, premium subscriptions or licensing agreements — that no one has perfected. Facebook, crown jewel of the field, is valued at $15 billion but barely turns a profit.

“You can’t have a $15 billion market valuation based on advertising alone,” says Bill Eager, co-founder of bSocial Networks, a maker of software that helps social-networking users market to each other. “It’s the single most-asked question in this field.”

Forrester Research analyst Charlene Li has pondered the next stage for social networks. She envisions the ubiquitous sites will, in five to 10 years, “be like air: They will be anywhere and everywhere we need and want them to be.”

Eager estimates there will be as many as 250,000 sites that call themselves social networks within a year, compared with about 850 today. “Everyone will reposition their site to take advantage of this phenomenon. It happened before with portals.”

To get there, though, there is that little matter of making money. “Facebook’s real problem isn’t privacy, it’s monetization,” says Dave McClure, a start-up adviser and angel investor in Silicon Valley. “It’s not too early to worry about how Facebook makes money.”

Murphy and other Facebook executives are well aware of that concern. “Advertisers follow people,” says Sheryl Sandberg, a former Google executive who recently was named Facebook’s chief operating officer. “We have 70 million active members. Once you have engaged users, the revenue will follow in that order.”

I have often discounted the long term impact of social media. In the short term social media can be leveraged to your benefit. The verdict is still out on the long term effect.

The three primary Meta Tags for SEO and the others have little or no bearing for search engines due to past abuse or overuse.

1. Title – <title>The name of your page should go here</title>
2. Description – <meta name=“description” content=“The description of the content should be contained withing these quotation marks” />
3. Keywords (less relevant in recent but may or may not be read by search engines so should be used with less focus) – <meta name=“keyword” content=“keyword1, keyphrase2, keyword 3″ />

By putting these between the head tags in the html source code give significant help to Search Engines. Using these tags should describe the page. A page about cooking oil should look like these:

1. <title>Cooking Oil proper disposal</title>
2. <meta name=“description” content=“Cooking oil disposial done correctly is environmentally safe and has the least damage to our environment” />
3. <meta name=“keyword” content=“vegetable oil corn oil olive oil disposal” />

In the past there has been debate about whether to use commas or not in the keyword meta tag since they aren’t really all that important don’t get caught up in the debate. Do what ever flows or isn’t included in the other tags. Spend more time SEO copywriting the page than on the Keyword Meta Tag.

Meta tags are not required for display in a browser. Meta tags are invisible to the eye or at least relatively. You can see meta tags by right clicking a page and viewing it’s source. They are typically near the top of the page. So what makes Meta Tags important to Search Engine Optimization? The content in meta tags are displayed in Search Engine Results.

Displays:

In the case when meta tags aren’t used, search engines typically generate the description used in search results from text on page. For the obvious reason pages that don’t have the description meta tags don’t typically perform well.

Using the meta tags properly will come in another post later that you will be able to find over at Birmingham SEO.

A few days ago I posed a question to a respected friend in the SEO community, Kalena Jordan. Kalena heads up the Search Engine College and as an old timer in the industry earns more than just my respect.

I asked:

Hi Kalena

This may be a little off your normal topics… But, you always seem to have such a well thought out view that I want to know your opinion of SEO Standards?

What do you really think about the idea? Good and bad?

Adios
Chris

You can see her response on the Ask Kalena Question and Answer Blog.

I still have not formed an opinion on Search Engine Standards and probably will not until I see a first draft of the proposed standards in front of the governing body. My only thought is what happens if the anti-internet regulation people get involved or even the pro? I wonder what kind of political mess that would turn into?

• Target Keywords and Key Phrases
• Targeting your audience
• Writing effective content

 Simple right?  If you can maintain and understand those basic things you have a the basis for an effective SEO campaign.  There are many detail postings and strategy oriented Search Engine Optimization articles, always remember to keep it simple.

The word optimization means streamline, simple, and easy.  Keep it simple.  If it seems complex then you should change it. 

A traditional example of branding and image is pizza places. Most everyone has gotten fliers from the pizza place dot matrix neon pink flier that is hard to read. Then there are the fliers from the big chain places printed on a smooth high quality paper, with vibrant earth tones, and a picture of delicious looking pizza. Both places carry the same exact product with the same exact prices. Now which one are you most likely to buy? The one on the smooth nice paper. You spend a lot of time. energy, and money on your product don’t let it fall because of a bad image.

So how does branding apply to SEO and online advertising? If you don’t have a good web-site design you are giving good traffic to your competitors. No matter your SEO power, no matter how good your product, if you website is hard to read and unusable, no online plan is going to give you a maximum return on your investment. If your website is poorly designed or not usable you might as well stick with the neon pink flier.

Online branding is as important to your image as the cleanliness of your store front. Protect your online brand with a clean up-to-date style.

Over the past few weeks increased additional security has been added. An Secure Socket Layer (SSL) to secure and encrypt data via the internet has been installed.

I have also done a lot of server work. Including .htaccess like the previous article. I have also been doing some design work for Bagley School. What started out as fixing broken image tags turned into a design and upgrade. You can see the work in progress here. Suggestions are welcome. I have taken this on for free using open source and currently available resources.

If you have been following this blog you know that I do this for entertainment and hold down a regular day job… Well, over the past few weeks I have been undergoing career changes. I am currently between jobs and actively seeking full-time employment. Being between jobs theoretically leaves more time for blogging. I have found that assumption to be the opposite. If you know of job opportunities please let me know. Don’t hesitate to share my online portfolio which includes my resume. portfolio.chris-estes.com Comments and corrections are greatly appreciated.

In other news you will notice some changes to Search Engine Optmization by Chris. In the month of January a new brighter more colorful design has been added. Also, Yahoo Publisher Network ads sponsored ads have been added. A different placement of ad’s has been put in to offer you a a much better range of services. As a supporter of Search Engine College I recomnd taking a look into one of their classes. All thought a class will help you get up to speed on SEO basices but n0thing is going to be as sufficient as an experienced professional. As always I have some affiliate marketers online that would like to put ads on the blog. So stay tunned to some deals I am tyring to work out for you the readers Discount programs and discounted SEO and other equipment.

You don’t want to miss out on some of the exclusive deals I am working out with companies like, Apple, Itunes, and dell stay tuned by subscribing to my feed.

The point is to explain the advertising. Google Ad Sense pays a commission to post content specific ads on websites. It is a great service they offer to help aspiring Internet marketers. There are several problems with advertising this way. On my page you can see ads for other SEO companies, search marketing, hosting providers, and all kinds of other goods and services. It is obvious to most people why this is a bad idea… I am advertising for other people. A flashy ad as opposed to my long-winded articles? Isn’t it obvious why this could be a bad idea? That still doesn’t take away the fees I have to pay every month. So until this blog can become profitable without the sponsored ads I will have to let others advertise.

If you asked me if you should put advertisements on your website, I would recommend not doing it.

The non profit I have chosen is Wake up WalMart Americas campaign to change WalMart. We all know the terrible stories of walmart driving down wages and hurting the small business while its leaders make billions in profits. WalMart has started a business that has the potential to hurt freelance and corporate SEO’s. So for my charity I choose them to hopefully help them strike back against Walmart with Free online Marketing.

I have chosen to freelance part-time outside of my full-time job. I work full-time on a team of world-class IT and Search Engine Optimization specialists for a niche small business that has risen over the past few years to a medium size business in no small part due to SEO.

Being apart of such an organization gives me valuable experience in helping grow a small or startup business. The truth be known I enjoy working with small business due to atmosphere, the lack of “red-tape”, and the ability of understanding seems to be much higher. Plus a small business has room to grow. I have worked for government, large-business, and major corporations. My passion is small business and sharing information in hopes to raise awareness for growth is important.

Subscribe to my feed or shoot me message as I hope the information to follow will be beneficial.

Regards,

Chris Estes