SEO For MSN Search

MSN is in the top 3 (along with Yahoo and Google and followed by AskJeeves) when it comes to Internet traffic and usage of its search engine. There exact standing changes depending on who you ask and when, but their importance for search engine optimization cannot be denied.

The news is quickly changing concerning MSN and its requirements for websites and webmasters who want to ensure high search engine optimization (SEO) results. Beta or not to beta and a possible merger with AOL are among the spotlighted foci of MSN. Whether you are an SEO beginner or an SEO guru, it’s important to keep up with the changing times in order to ensure top ranking for your pages.

As recently as January 20, 2005, website promotion webmasters were reporting that beta results were the order of the day at MSN. Every search produced them in bulk. Ten days later on February 1st at 12 AM, however, MSN dropped its beta designation from its search engine and officially launched a completely overhauled homepage layout and changed its algorithm for gaining search results. This move made them an official independent search engine as opposed to previously when they culled results from the Yahoo/Inktomi search index.

The other change that affects webmaster search engine optimization on MSN Search is their new, huge advertising and promotion campaign. Called adCenter, this produces search results that will appear alongside web page results, a fact that every webmaster looking to gain strong SEO results on MSN should bear in mind.

Some studies have shown that roughly half of the searches initiated on MSN are health related. In general, Internet users search for the several common topics on a regular basis. In fact, Internet users frequently perform searches to perform one or more of the following: to find directions or phone numbers instead of using the Yellow Pages, both for individuals and local businesses; to find the latest news; to shop online and to find entertainment news.

How does this affect the webmaster interested in obtaining high SEO? First, since this are viewed as ‘niche’ searches, it is important that you use the general search engine optimization tools like keyword repetition, variations of keywords, Meta tags, title tags, and rich content throughout the interior pages of your site with these niche searches in mind. Using terms related to shopping, including directions with street names as well as the people involved in any aspect of your site and the product or services or events related to it will increase traffic through MSN, especially if any of things are health related as well. The key here is to not only reach those who search terms directly related to your site but to those who don’t know that they are looking for your site until they find it. By searching related terms, they link to your site and find even more of what they are looking for.

On the same token, using the search engine optimization tactics like ad placement, link sharing, pay per click, and affiliate promotion will also gain traffic. On MSN Search in particular, because half of the searched terms are health related, try to angle an aspect of your site to relate to health search terms. There are health implications for almost everything available or done or offered online. Find yours and use it to gain affiliation or advertisement opportunities with some of the most popular health sites on MSN Search and, at the same time, gain high rankings and increased traffic for your website.

The SEO Benefits of Having Directories on your Website

Search Engine Optimization, or SEO, is actually a misnomer, as search engines are not actually optimized. Web pages are the ones that are optimized, through website submissions or submitting url’s, which make the search function more efficient.

There are a number of ways to optimize a site to incur higher rankings and more hits. Some choose to place links on their sites, which actually works quite well. Technically, SEO means any process that allows your site to gain high rankings.

Aside from placing links, others choose to use XML feeds. They place the precise information they want, and push these to the various search engines. Some choose to optimize their site by rewriting or editing the content and copy on the site. Simply put, any activity that gives your site higher rankings can be counted as a search engine optimization process.

Yet another effective way to jumpstart your site is by placing directory links. By doing so, you can list your website in search engines and directories. This is a great help in popularizing your website, most especially if yours is a start up site. When doing this, you have to choose your directories or search engines.

To start, get your site listed in a number of directories. The more directories you get listed into, the better. There are directories that charge a minimal fee for your website submission , and more often than not, it is worth it to get listed. Suggested directories that you should get into are DMOZ (http://www.dmoz.org), Yahoo! (http://www.yahoo.com), LookSmart (http://www.looksmart.com), and Business.com (http://www.business.com) Sorve.com (http://www.sorve.com).

Being listed in these sites can be very rewarding, they’re actually considered valuable gems as link partners, because most webmasters go to these sites to search. So when you submit your URL up for listing, you become part of a large database that people can choose from. In doing so, you can increase the traffic on your website.

Before putting you embark on your website submission in the various directories and search engines, make sure that the search engines and directories are reputable ones. It’s also best if you know how popular it is, especially if you are asked to pay a minimal fee for signing up. You have to ensure that every penny you shell out is accounted for, and will go into your website’s promotion.

You can also place a directory on your site. Directories are topical lists of various resources found on the Internet, arranged in a certain order or hierarchy. They are usually browsed according to subject, they can also be browsed by typing in certain keywords.

Directories are more thorough than search engines, as they are maintained by a team of people. These people are responsible for the information present on the site, as they do the researching and maintenance themselves. Search engines, on the other hand, make use of spiders or crawlers to come up with links and information.

A main advantage of having a directory and making use of it to search for subjects is that it narrows down the search for you. By doing so, your site becomes more popular to people who want a refined search for the topics they are interested in. This way, your directory draws in your much-needed audience and target.

These are only some of the ways you can optimize your site’s popularity. You can come up with your own, or do as the others do. Whatever you choose, try to weigh the pros and cons of every procedure, and try to choose the most advantageous to your site. Whether it’s submitting your site’s URL to a search engine or directory, or refreshing your site’s content, do it well, and you’ll be rewarded accordingly.

Web Site Development Process - The Life-cycle Steps

A system development process can follow a number of standard or company specific frameworks, methodologies, modeling tools and languages. Software development life cycle normally comes with some standards which can fulfill the needs of any development team. Like software, web sites can also be developed with certain methods with some changes and additions with the existing software development process. Let us see the steps involve in any web site development.

1. Analysis:

Once a customer is started discussing his requirements, the team gets into it, towards the preliminary requirement analysis. As the web site is going to be a part of a system, It needs a complete analysis as, how the web site or the web based application is going to help the present system and how the site is going to help the business. Moreover the analysis should cover all the aspects especially on how the web site is going to join the existing system. The first important thing is finding the targeted audience. Then, All the present hardware, software, people and data should be considered during the time of analysis. For example, if a company XYZ corp is in need of a web site to have its human resource details online, the analysis team may try to utilize the existing data about the employees from the present database. The analysis should be done in the way, that it may not be too time consuming or with very less informative. The team should be able to come up with the complete cost-benefit analysis and as the plan for the project will be an output of analysis, it should be realistic. To achieve this the analyst should consult the designers, developers and testers to come up with a realistic plan.

Input: Interviews with the clients, Mails and supporting docs by the client, Discussions Notes, Online chat, recorded telephone conversations,Model sites/applications etc.,

Output: 1. Work plan, 2. Cost involved, 3. Team requirements, 4. Hardware-software requirements, 5. Supporting documents and 6. the approval

2. Specification Building:

Preliminary specifications are drawn up by covering up each and every element of the requirement. For example if the product is a web site then the modules of the site including general layout, site navigation and dynamic parts of the site should be included in the spec. Larger projects will require further levels of consultation to assess additional business and technical requirements. After reviewing and approving the preliminary document, a written proposal is prepared, outlining the scope of the project including responsibilities, timelines and costs.

Input: Reports from the analysis team

Output: Complete requirement specifications to the individuals and the customer/customer's representative

3. Design and development:

After building the specification, work on the web site is scheduled upon receipt of the signed proposal, a deposit, and any written content materials and graphics you wish to include. Here normally the layouts and navigation will be designed as a prototype.

Some customers may be interested only in a full functional prototype. In this case we may need to show them the interactivity of the application or site. But in most of the cases customer may be interested in viewing two or three design with all images and navigation.

There can be a lot of suggestions and changes from the customer side, and all the changes should be freezed before moving into the next phase. The revisions could be redisplayed via the web for the customer to view.

As needed, customer comments, feedback and approvals can be communicated by e-mail, fax and telephone.

Throughout the design phase the team should develop test plans and procedures for quality assurance. It is necessary to obtain client approval on design and project plans.

In parallel the Database team will sit and understand the requirements and develop the database with all the data structures and sample data will also be prepared.

Input: Requirement specification

Output: Site design with templates, Images and prototype

4. Content writing:

This phase is necessary mainly for the web sites. There are professional content developers who can write industry specific and relevant content for the site. Content writers to add their text can utilize the design templates. The grammatical and spelling check should be over in this phase.

Input: Designed template

Output: Site with formatted content

5. Coding:

Now its programmers turn to add his code without disturbing the design. Unlike traditional design the developer must know the interface and the code should not disturb the look and feel of the site or application. So the developer should understand the design and navigation. If the site is dynamic then the code should utilize the template. The developer may need to interact with the designer, in order to understand the design. The designer may need to develop some graphic buttons when ever the developer is in need, especially while using some form buttons. If a team of developers is working they should use a CVS to control their sources. Coding team should generate necessary testing plans as well as technical documentation. For example Java users can use JavaDoc to develop their documents to understand their code flow. The end-user documentation can also be prepared by the coding team, which can be used by a technical writer who can understand them, writes helps and manuals later.

Input: The site with forms and the requirement specification

Output: Database driven functions with the site, Coding documents

6. Testing:

Unlike software, web based applications need intensive testing, as the applications will always function as a multi-user system with bandwidth limitations. Some of the testing which should be done are, Integration testing, Stress testing, Scalablity testing, load testing, resolution testing and cross-browser compatibility testing. Both automated testing and manual testing should be done without fail. For example its needed to test fast loading graphics and to calculate their loading time, as they are very important for any web site. There are certain testing tools as well as some online testing tools which can help the testers to test their applications. For example ASP developers can use Microsoft's Web Application Test Tool to test the ASP applications, which is a free tool available from the Microsoft site to download.

After doing all the testing a live testing is necessary for web sites and web based applications. After uploading the site there should be a complete testing(E.g.. Links test)

Input: The site, Requirement specifications, supporting documents, technical specifications and technical documents

Output: Completed application/site, testing reports, error logs, frequent interaction with the developers and designers

7. Promotion:

This phase is applicable only for web sites. Promotion needs preparation of meta tags, constant analysis and submitting the URL to the search engines and directories. There is a details article in this site on site promotion, click here to read it. The site promotion is normally an ongoing process as the strategies of search engine may change quite often. Submitting a site URLs once in 2 months can be an ideal submission policy. If the customer is willing, then paid click and paid submissions can also be done with additional cost.

Input: Site with content, Client mails mentioning the competitors

Output: Site submission with necessary meta tag preparation

8. Maintenance and Updating:

Web sites will need quite frequent updations to keep them very fresh. In that case we need to do analysis again, and all the other life cycle steps will repeat. Bug fixes can be done during the time of maintenance. Once your web site is operational, ongoing promotion, technical maintenance, content management & updating, site visit activity reports, staff training and mentoring is needed on a regular basis depend on the complexity of your web site and the needs within your organization.

Input: Site/Application, content/functions to be updated, re-Analysis reports

Output: Updated application, supporting documents to other life cycle steps and teams.

The above-mentioned steps alone are not strict to web application or web site development. Some steps may not applicable for certain tasks. Its depend on the cost and time involved and the necessity. Sometimes if it is a intranet site, then there will be no site promotion. But even if you are a small development firm, if you adopt certain planning along with this web engineering steps in mind, it will definitely reflects in the Quality of the outcome.

See the flowchart "How we do web development in Macronimous?"[PDF format]

Macronimous is a specialised international web development agency, with a difference. We realise that Web development agency is a terminology that has been recently misrepresented and aim to differentiate ourselves from the others.

http://www.macronimous.com/resources/web_development_life_cycle.asp