SEO

In a word.... yes.

Not sure I would want to go to a party there! Although East Texas has a 'mighty fine' Spring. A Fall option would be the Finger Lakes Region of Western New York.... it would be tough to find a prettier Fall.

If you are asking my thoughts? I can not stand pop-ups .... I would not use this service. All the numbers are there, banner ads, pop-ups, etc. do not work (e.g. poor ROI, return on investment). How many banner ads pop-up ads have you clicked? This style of marketing is 'traditional' moved onto the Internet, but the Internet is a very different medium, .... read (or re-read Internet Marketing: Have things changed? The best traffic builder (by far) is top search engine rankings resulting from ideal keyword phrases. This is truly a no-brainer, think about it..... How many times do you search and what pages you do land on? For commercial sites, nothing compares to being on top... nothing! [Does that sound like a SEO Program Director talking or what? ]

Charlotte, I added your site. I put it under 'Nonprofit and Informational Sites'. Ok? You have a TotalChoice hosting graphics link on your home page, a text link would be much preferred ('web hosting by TotalChoice web hosting' is ideal wording) You also have a text link on your main page; this opens in your central frame. I think it would be better if it opened in a blank window. SEO thoughts: You are in Google ; you could use more backlinks I always like to preface my thoughts with: remember this is strictly with regard to SEO, meaning that some comments may not be appropriate for the visual experience you are trying to create. Having said that, here we go: I would not have your opening page... make your main page your home page. This one suggestion is the one change that would affect your rank the most. Do not use Extreme Tracking... AWStats in Cpanel gives you nice stats. This will also get rid of an external link. Your site would be a little difficult to optimize for the search engines because it deals with different and unrelated topics. The first step would be Keyword Analysis.... What would be the best keyword phrase(s) for your site? Having said that, I am not sure how 'critical' it would be for you to obtain high rankings, although many would love your tutorials. You have developed into a nice graphical artist....

International Lyrics added .... Cool resource! SEO thoughts: You are ranked 8 for 'international lyrics' in Google I would do keyword analysis and make sure you are choosing the 'best' phrase. Now for the home page (SEO thoughts only): I do not like frames I see why you are using them. How about using this idea on all the pages accept the home page. In other words just have your header (no alpha index links) and your opening welcome box. Again, I am speaking in terms of SEO here. Get all the external links off your home page (accept TotalChoice Hosting of course ). Create a separate page for those resources. This is BIG advice (i.e. use it!). Another strategy I employ (if I really want the link 'seen' on the home page) is having an external link from your home page first point to an internal page. Example: Site Design by Ty Smith - Earthturt Web Design Now instead have 'web design' and instead of pointing to webdesign.boxturt.com, point to an internal page entitled Web Design. On this page, have the words 'International Lyrics Playground was designed By Ty Smith - Earthturt Web Design' and the link to the actual site (webdesign.boxturt.com). P.S. I agree dmoz listing and google directory are big pluses for your rank.

Personal Site added .... on to lyrics.

You have been added SEO thoughts: My top recommendation for you would be to add an Admin's Notes page and move all the notes there. In their place, expand your welcome page. Make a header with the words Okinawa Resource, and then fill in with your welcome text. If it fits, change the name on your links from ORO to Okinawa Resource (e.g. ORO Site Map to Okinawa Resource Site Map). Every other instances that you use ORO in your text change to Okinawa Resource. These are three biggies that will make a very big difference. Good luck.

Sorry, just went to the next post... there you are. [you can tell I am going from the bottom up ]

Ice: A text link is ideal, thank you. Better wording would be 'Web Hosting by TotalChoice Hosting' as opposed to 'Proudly hosted by...' Thanks for being proud though Did you want to be included into the family member's page?

You are covering most of the SEO basics. This is a new site, correct? I remember reviewing it just a little while ago (in website reviews). I like it. Your biggest help would be obtaining more inbound links... and you just got another tonight! The following comments are assuming that your keyword phrase is Creativity and Innovation. I did not do keyword analysis and see if this is truly your 'best' phrase to use. In reviewing your home page, there are a couple of layout changes which would help (remember, I am speaking in SEO terms only): 1. Reduce the amount of text on the page substantially.... you are diluting the importance of key words. Use sentence fragments, not whole sentences. 2. Reduce the number of outbound links on the page.... I think this would help visually too - how about drop down menus? (e.g. Creativity, Techniques, Puzzles) - you have 'Site Layout' on the left and repeats on top right 3. Flip the links from the left side to the right. 4. Change your header tag wording and begin each with Creativity and Innovation (e.g. Creativity and Innovation - Required for any of your solutions?) 5. First two sentences (get the gist?): Creativity and innovation for solving problems and implementing solutions is Mycoted's, a small UK company, specialty. Creativity and innovation within the science and technology area is our focus, the techniques we use are equally applicable to other areas. My two cents.

Ty: What do you think... do you want to be under the commercial or personal section? Quick Comment: I would love to see a text link rather then the graphical Let me know about which section and I will get you added.

A little more clarification.... it is great that you are asking the questions you are, wanting to understand is over half the battle to understanding. As you know, frames are used to break a window into regions, this can independently display their own content. When you use php (or javascript, perl, etc.) to call a header script and/or footer script on a page, you are not displaying regions independently. It is just that the 'source' is coming from different places (i.e. files). The actual page is a single unit though (unlike frames). There is nothing in php which will 'give you frames'. Although that wording is funny, because you can use 'frames' in php files… again, meaning that you put html in php files. If the 'static' part of this statement is true, then you have to use frames. That is using 'static' as in remaining in the window as different information is being loaded. However, we can say the header and footer will be static information and thus put them in separate files and load them on all pages (as in the original example). Again, I am not thrilled with frames. I am not sure why or if you need the header and footer to remain static on the window. As far as having things 'fit', you can do wonders with tables. Not sure I helped... but you are asking good questions. Food for thought: If you ever 'see' a site who's layout is one that is similar to what you want to accomplish, look at their source code and see how it was done.

Schmuck: You have a bit of a misunderstanding. Using the header and footer script as described here is just a means of repeating the same code throughout a series of pages without having to rewrite that code. It has nothing to do with frames, which is strictly HTML. For instance, you could put frames in a header, which could be in a php file.... make sense? Frames can be a problem; I personally do not use them or recommend their use for many reasons (one, which is dear to my heart, would be regarding search engines).

Yes..... we all have been there As popular as cPanel is, I am surprised that they have not changed to a more intuitive design.

Honestly not sure about the advantage vs. disadvantage for this route... would have to look into it more. I agree with your selection of the 301 redirect route, that I do know. As to your other comments, my advice would be to have a static html index page and a static html site map (off the home page). The rest of the site can be dynamically generated. Just my nickel's worth.... As you may note in my other posts I only give 2 cents, this would suggest that this advice is more valuable (i.e. take the advice)

Redirect 301 (as you and I have discussed before) is the only way to go. The 301 redirect is the safest way to preserve your existing rankings. Any spider that visits your pages will obey the redirect and in the next index update will drop the old file name and path and replace it with the new one... no loss of recognition or rank. 301 Redirects explained here

Why are you adding a counter? AWStates in your cPanel gives you the information you need. I do not believe that a visual counter is of any benefit to your visitor and can actually distract from a 'clean' look. Just my two cents.

Very nice work! Juergen: You site is not added to Our Family Members Page, you can do that here. To others: Juergen link to TotalChoice Hosting represents a perfect example of the proper way to link back.

How about this?

Yes, you answered your own question (correctly )

After we wrote The Importance of Inbound Links, we had a surge of 'Add Me to The Family Members Page' requests (I promise we will get to them all soon ). You'all are quick learners I think we can improve on the one way communication of the 'Add me to the family' form. Therefore, we are creating a special Forum Topic entitled Add Me To The Family From here you can post your URL (please make it a link), give a brief description of your site and acknowledge that you have link back to TotalChoice Hosting. This will allow us to confirm the above information and reply that your site has been added to our Family Members Page. As a bonus ( ), you may request a 'Search Engine Rank Evaluation'. Now please do not misunderstand, this will be a quick look at your site followed by a brief written evaluation (my two cents, time permitting; may be only fractional cents ). Please have fun with your posts…..

My "tonghit's" was off by a couple nights... sorry. Here it is

How do you rank among the search engines? Once you have selected the 'proper' keyword phrase(s), it is best to review how your site ranks today. Again, I will focus on Google for this discussion. Go to Google and type in you search phrase. First note how many pages are within the index for that particular phrase (this give you some idea of the competitiveness). Now see if you are listed in the top 50… not? Are you listed at all? Type in your name (e.g. YourName.com)… are you listed? If yes, see how many pages link back to you (remember these are called backlinks or inbound links). To do this, type in >link:http://www.YourName.com/ This shows the number of back links that point to your home page. In addition, it shows the number of pages from your own site that have been indexed. Now you can check on your actual Google PageRank by using the Google Toolbar. Review Google PageRank here Install Google Toolbar here A word of caution, the Google Toolbar does collect 'information' about your Internet 'movements'. Read their privacy policy; here is a brief overview: By placing a cursor over the PageRank bar, you can get your actual PageRank score. Not happy with your rank? TotalChoice Hosting Search Engine Optimization guarantees top 20 listing Want us to look at your search engine ranking? Look at this thread

That will be explained in tonight's write-up. Stay tuned.

No, it is part of the Matrix.