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Girl Geek Speaks Newsletter

Welcome to the April 2004 Issue of our newsletter for the technically challenged and web site wannabe's. We feature articles to help guide you through the process of designing, building, and promoting your business or personal web site. If you know someone who may like getting these newsletters, feel free to forward it to them in its entirety, or have them sign up for their own copy below.

In This Issue:
Top 12 Things You Must Have on Your Business Website
Ask Girl Geek: What Search Engines Should I Be Listed With?

Top 12 Things You Must Have on Your Business Website

• Your business phone numbers “above the fold” and on every page – you’d be surprised how many websites either don’t have their phone numbers anywhere on their site, or they make them hard to find by burying them in interior pages
• A unique selling point – in other words, why would the potential customer choose to do business with you over your competition. Spell it out for them.
• A call to action – tell the site visitor what action you want them to take as a result of viewing your site. For example, it could be “call for more information,” “sign up for our email newsletter,” “buy my e-book,” or “take our online assessment.”
• Your tagline in the upper left-hand corner of the homepage – since search engines read your site from top to bottom and left to right, the first text they read will often become your meta-description = the information printed below your site title in search engine results. Therefore it needs to be compelling, so people will open your site and look at it.
• An email link or address where visitors can contact you – if you’re doing business on the Internet, why not let potential clients contact you immediately via email from your website?
• A reason to return to your site – Two words: repeat business. People will return to a site that continues to update its content and give them something useful.
• Keywords in the title bar, page content, alt-text, navigation – How many times have I seen a title bar on a website that reads “Home Page”? Too many. It tells me 2 things. First. it tells me nothing about the content of the site. Second, it tells me that a relative probably designed the site.
• Text navigation on all pages and to all pages – people want to be able to easily navigate your site, so put your navigation on every single page of your site so they don’t have to use their browser’s back button. Also, if you link to every page with TEXT navigation, the search engine spiders will be able to index every page of your site, not just your homepage.
• A site map – This is like a table of contents. It is a page within your site whose sole purpose it to index your entire site. It helps site visitors quickly find the information they are looking for. It also is yet another way to rank higher in the search engines.
• A consistent look on all pages – This establishes that visitors are still on your site and gives them a familiar reference so they don’t get “lost.” Plus, if you have a link to a site outside of your website, have it open in a separate browser window so your site will always be there behind it.
• Text as text, not integrated into image files – I have seen beautiful, expensive websites that have all of their text contained within image files. THESE FILES ARE INVISIBLE to search engines.
• A way to gather information about your site visitors – either get a good statistics package or put a contact form online

Ask Girl Geek (Actual questions from people just like you.)

What Search Engines Should I Be Listed With?

According to searchenginewatch.com one of the well-respected websites for search engine optimization and marketing the following are the top choices for search engines to be listed in
1. Google
2. AlltheWeb
3. Yahoo
4. MSN search

Also to consider are
1. AOL search
2. Ask Jeeves
3. HotBot
4. Lycos
5. Teoma

Search providers
The companies below are really in the business of providing search results to other people, rather than hoping you'll visit their own sites to search. They are listed here primarily to provide further explanation of how they partner with some of the search engines listed above.

1. Inktomi
2. LookSmart
3. Open Directory Project
4. Overture

Other choices
1. AltaVista
2. Netscape Search
3. WiseNut

to learn more about each go to http://searchenginewatch.com/links/article.php/2156221
Some of these are free listings, some are paid inclusions.

If you need help submitting your site to search engines or checking your ranking in search engines, give Girl Geek a call at (618) 457-8103.

DISTRIBUTION RIGHTS:

The above material is copyrighted, but you may retransmit or distribute it as long as not a single word is changed, added, or deleted, including the contact information. However, you may not copy it to a web site. Copyright 2004. All rights reserved.

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