The Axandra newsletter archive

13 May 2003

This week we're featuring the Invisible Web and the latest Google acquisition.

Some statistics indicate that the average buyer must see your sales message seven times until they are ready to buy from you.

So how do you get people to visit your Web site again and again? Here are some ideas:

1. Original content

If your site is interesting, your visitors want to come back by themselves. Give your visitors content they can't read elsewhere. Try writing an article related to your business every week and add it to your Web site.

This will also improve your search engine rankings because search engines like Web sites with much content. In addition, articles that are related to your business will automatically contain the keywords that are relevant to your business.

For example, all past issues of this newsletter are available at http://www.Axandra.com/news/index.htm.

2. Prize drawings, polls or quizzes

Make your Web site interactive. Give your visitors a series of questions related to your business. Post answers a day later on your Web site. This will make people want to come back to your site to see if they were right.

The same applies to polls. People like to give their opinion if the poll form can be filled out quickly.

Hold an ongoing prize drawing on your Web site. Of course, the prizes should be something of interest to your visitors. Usually it's enough if you provide a free copy of your product once a month.

3. Mini-Yahoo

Tell your visitors about Web sites that are related to your Web site topic. The Web sites should be interesting and helpful. For example, you could list free stuff of other Web sites that is available and related to your business.

Become your readers' Mini-Yahoo and they will return regularly. See some link directory examples: http://www.Axandra.com/link-page-samples.htm

These three tips help you to make your Web site interesting and useful for your visitors so that they come back. The more often people visit your Web site, the more likely they are to buy something from you.

* Google plans to create a search tool for Web logs

"Google is to create a search tool specifically for weblogs, most likely giving material generated by the self-publishing tools its own tab."

* Google News expands to other English speaking countries

Google launched beta versions of its news search engine for Australia, Canada, India, New Zealand and United Kingdom.

* Overture sued over FAST acquisition

"Overture Services has been sued over its acquisition of Norway's Fast Search. MRT Micro ASA filed suit seeking all of the proceeds from the $70 million deal. MRT alleges that it owns some of the technology that Overture is acquiring in the purchase."

* Overture to trim staff

Overture "said it would cut about 10 percent of its work force to integrate units it has purchased".

* Overture to announce merged paid-inclusion technology

"Overture said a product that combines search products from Fast and AltaVista will be out before the end of 2003, while a version of those companies' merged paid- inclusion technology is due within 90 days."

* Majority of Web searchers now uses word phrases in queries

OneStat.com "reported that most people use 2 word phrases in search engines. Of all the search phrases world wide, 29.22 percent of the people use 2 word phrases and 24.76 percent use 1 word phrase."

OneStat.com also published a list of the seven largest search engines on the Web:

1. Google 55.2%
2. Yahoo 21.7%
3. MSN Search 9.6%
4. AOL Search 3.8%
5. Terra Lycos 2.6%
6. AltaVista 2.2%
7. AskJeeves 1.5%

* In memory of Jim Wilson

Search engine marketing expert Jim Wilson passed away last Tuesday. He was the founder of several prominent Web sites for webmasters, such as searchengineforums.com, jimworld.com and gethighforums.com. Friends have put up a memorial site for him.

* MSN Search "Top of the Flops" 2003

The MSN Search "Top of the Flops" chart "provides a fascinating sneak peek into people's weird and wacky interests and proves we really are a nation of eccentrics."

* Interview with Google's VP of Advertising, Tim Armstrong

"Google's been profitable for over eight quarters in a row now and we feel that Blogger is a natural fit with what we already do. Blogger has a very strong focus on users, and it's going to have a very strong focus for the advertising community, as well."

* "Google is self-aware"

Here's an interesting Google joke from Jeremy Zawodny's Web log.

* Publish our newsletter articles on your Web site

Did you know that you can publish all articles you can find at http://www.Axandra.com/news/index.htm on your Web site? Yes, it's true. If your Web site is about Internet marketing or search engine optimization, then you can quickly publish a library of good articles.

However, you must meet these two requirements:

1. You must not change the contents in any way (including the links).
2. You must add a link to www.Axandra.com with the link text "Copyright by Axandra.com. Internet marketing and search engine ranking software".

Copy & paste now: http://www.Axandra.com/news/index.htm

• Are you part of the invisible Web?
  
  
• Inktomi paid inclusion - for you?
  
  
• About Google results on Yahoo and AOL
  
  
• Google AdWords partner list
  
  
• Cookies required?

The Search Engine Facts newsletter is free. Please recommend it to someone you know.

You may publish one of the articles above on your Web site. However, you must not change the contents in any way. Also, you must keep all links and you must add the following two lines with a link to www.Axandra.com: "Copyright by Axandra.com. Internet marketing and search engine ranking software ."

All product names, copyrights and trademarks mentioned in this newsletter are owned by their respective trademark and copyright holders.

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