Schewanick Computer Services

The Secret Behind the Internet
Last week's issue of "Getting Results" was largely theoretical and abstract. This week I hope to offer you some real-world advice that you can put to use straight away to help you gain better search engine rankings and grow your online contact base without software, spam, or any dirty tricks.

Before We Begin
I'm going to be discussing something called PageRank. (Click that link to find out what it is.) You can check the PageRank for any website by downloading the Google Toolbar.

OK, now I have a question for you:

Do You Get Linking?
Of course you do! You own a website, it gets a reasonable amount of hits, you've got some green on the Google PageRank bar, obviously you know about linking! But <strong>how do people link to you? </strong>Do the sites that link to you use your company name? Do the links say "click here"? If they do, read on: I have much to teach you...

Be the Holmes to My Dr Watson
Here's a useful bit of info that I gleaned from Michael Cheaney over at websitemarketingbible.com. Do me a favour and follow the simple steps below. We're going to do some investigating...

1. Visit www.google.com

2. In the search box, type in "<strong>click here</strong>" (without the quotes), then click "<strong>Google Search</strong>"

3. Cast your eyes over the results. Pretty familiar looking aren't they? Now click on the first result (should be "Adobe Reader Download - All versions")


4. Perform a search on that page for the words "click here". Check your browser's Help documentation if you're not sure how to do it. (Usually you can just press CTRL and F at the same time)

5. Notice how your search has returned no results. So that page can't be top of Google's ranking for content. Maybe it's in the HTML code?


6. If you know how to check a page's source code, do it, and search for the word "keywords". Interesting...This page doesn't even have any keywords! So how has this site managed to get top of the list for the phrase "click here?" Google doesn't sell ranking within the results returned, so how do they do it?

All over the Internet, people link to Adobe, Apple, Macromedia and the like using phrases such as "<strong>click here</strong> to download" or "<strong>click here</strong> for more info". Because so many people use that phrase to link to pages like the Adobe Acrobat Reader download, Google ranks these pages 10 out of 10. But why does Google think that "click here" is a description of the Acrobat Reader?

Anchors Away!
In Internet-speak, another word for links is "anchors", and the text that you click on to activate a link is called "anchor text". That piece of text is <strong>vitally important</strong>, because it's supposed to describe the link destination. The more people who use that particular phrase to describe the link, the more Google believes that is in fact what the link is about. So, because so many people link to sites with "click here" as the anchor text, Google assumes that this text describes in some way the Adobe Acrobat Reader download page, and all the others in the results. The guys from Google agree:

"...anchors often provide more accurate descriptions of web pages than the pages themselves ... We use anchor propagation mostly because anchor text can help provide better quality results."

Quote by Sergey Brin and Lawrence Page, taken from "Search Engine Optimization for Dummies" by Peter Kent

Don't Click Here for a Solution
You can achieve a better ranking by playing by Google's roogles...sorry, rules. Make sure people link to you using a phrase that describes your company's products and services, or better still, use keywords that people type into Google to find your site. For example, I ask all of my link partners to link to me using phrases like "web design", "business cards" and "promotional CD-ROMs", so that my Google PageRank will increase and my site will become easier to find for those phrases.

Don't go too far with it though, because badly constructed link text will discourage people from clicking on you - and you do still want human beings clicking on the link <em>aswell</em> as Google - so try and be smart with it.

Oh, and another piece of advice. If you manage to amass hundreds of link partners using the same phrase, you may be in trouble, because Google penalises sites that it thinks are taking liberties. So try and mix it up a bit.

Next Week...
This week I've looked at inbound links, ie: links coming into your site from another, and how to improve your PageRank through good link descriptions. Next week I'll be looking at reciprocal linking, and trying to dispel a few myths about it.

In the meantime, if you've got anything to do with marketing, IT, copy writing or small business services (like forums, help sites, newsletters etc), feel free to ask me to include your link in our Links Directory. I only accept sites that are relevant to my business, and I'll explain why next week.

About the Author
I'm Mark Steadman, director of MSO Media. My weekly eNewsletter "Getting Results" helps people get the most out of the Web, with practical advice, tips and tricks.
For web design and business cards visit www.msomedia.com.