Affiliate Marketing

What is Affiliate Marketing? 

• Affiliate Marketing is a type of marketing in which whenever a affiliate bring sale to company through his own efforts in online marketing he gets a reward on behalf of sales.
• Affiliate is not a company employee but any outsider who is promoting the company product online.
• Affiliate marketing can be done by social websites, blogs, articles, or on websites using the company link, if someone buy using that link the affiliate gets paid.

• It is a mutual win-win situation as advertiser gets sales, and affiliate gets return benefit if the sales occur.

Affiliate Marketing is a part of Internet Marketing Benefits of Affiliate Marketing

• It is an easy and extra way to generate income without affecting one’s job.
• Affiliate does not need any capital investment to start marketing other’s products.
• It does not involve very technical knowledge and can be done by people of any age; even students are making good money only through affiliate marketing.
• There are no geographic constraint, one can do this marketing sitting anywhere in the world with the help of internet connection.
• It is new and modern way of online marketing.
• The Business or company gets wider promotion.
• Affiliate advertising leads to more sales for any company.

Future of Affiliate Marketing

• As the products and services in the market are increasing so as the Affiliate online marketing scope is increasing.
• An online study from Forrester estimated that online retailers are going to increase their share in affiliate marketing by 16.7% per year by 2016.
• This huge growth is estimated due to affiliate channel’s ability to produce new to file customers, increasing sales and attracting customers who are spending more pocket than average online shopper.
• It is actually giving sales and benefit to affiliate and businessman and thus it will last forever.
• Online marketing is increasing due to advent growth of Smartphone’s and tablets and the rise of Facebook; affiliates have more options and places to advertise.
• As the competition between publishers and business man are increasing they need more affiliates to increase their sales.
• Website owners also welcome affiliates as it make the website popular, and increase traffic on websites.

Black hat SEO, Gray hat SEO and White hat SEO Techniques

Various techniques are used for search engine optimization, or SEO. One way to group these techniques is with hat terminology: white hat SEO, black hat SEO, and gray hat SEO. White hat SEO is considered ethical SEO, while black hat SEO is considered unethical SEO. Gray hat SEO walks the line between the white and black hats of search engine optimization.

For eg: anyone can get famous either by doing very good things or by doing very bad things. Both will make you popular but in different circumstances. The situation is very much similar here as in SEO also you need to make your website popular among users and search engines. This can also achieved in two ways: one is the right way that is by following all the guidelines of search engines and then optimizing accordingly. Second one is the wrong way that is going against the guidelines and trying to pass through some of the loopholes in search engine algorithms.

So based on their procedure they are categorized into Black, Gray and White techniques. Let’s get into the details of that:

1) Black Hat SEO

It is the wrong way of getting famous by doing something against the rules. In other words Black hat refers to the illegitimate way of optimizing your site going against the guidelines of search engines. It is intended to trick search engines to rank particular pages higher in search results without considering the actual value of the page. Its only aim to rank higher no matter what it takes to do so.

Examples of Black Hat SEO Technique:

• Link Stuffing.
• Hidden Content.
• Keyword Stuffing.
• Paid Links.
• Doorway Pages.
• Cloaking.
• Parasite hosting.
• Manipulative redirects.

Pros 

• It works for all major search engines (till search engines do not find out).
• It gives fast results compared to other techniques.
• Black Hat services are much cheaper than other techniques.

Cons

• It is a short term strategy (will work until you are not caught by search bots).
• If you are found by search engine your site might be banned.
• Bad User experience.
• High Risk level.

2) White Hat SEO

White Hat SEO is the ethical SEO. It is best and the honest way of optimizing your site by following all the guidelines of search engines. These are targeted to improve the position in search results keeping the user prospect in mind, that is the site should be valuable to the user following all the guidelines. It is a time consuming process but long term results are good and permanent.

Examples of White Hat SEO Technique:

• Guest Blogging.
• Link baiting.
• Valuable Content.
• Internal Linking.
• Title tags and Meta tags optimization.
• On page keyword optimization.
• Adding fresh content regularly.
• Sitemap creation.

Pros

• It is a long term strategy.
• It provides the best user experience.
• No risk is involved as all the guidelines are followed.

Cons

• It is a time consuming process.
• White Hat SEO Services are the costliest of all techniques.

3) Gray Hat SEO

As the gray color falls between white and black, this technique also lies into the questionable category of search engine optimization. I called it “questionable” because neither it involves the high risk of site banning as Black Hat nor does it get into complete valid search engine guidelines. It is a shady approach to optimization which does not break any rules but bend them to say the least. This would not give you a serious risk like a Site ban but might curse you with a penalty. Any technique which is considered Grey might become black in future.

Examples of Gray Hat SEO Technique:

• Three way/ Reciprocal link exchange.
• Buying links for Page Rank.
• Duplicate Content.
• Irrelevant links.
• High keyword density that sounds unnatural but of level of Black Hat.
• Article Spinning.
• Purchasing Old domains.

Pros

• Time-frame involved is not very high.
• Good user experience.

Cons

• It is also not a permanent strategy.
• Medium level of risk is always involved.

Conclusion

After reading out the definitions and the Pros and Cons of different SEO Techniques, you might think that White Hat is the best and should be followed for all sites irrespective of their domain of business. But this might not be true in every case. For eg: if you are trying to promote phone accessories, you need to promote your site as soon as the phone gets launched. As we all know mobile industry is the most frequently changing industry so deploying white hat SEO techniques might take up 4 to 6 months which might not be give you the value for money which you invested in White Hat (because a new version or its competitor might overtake). For this we need a short term and quick technique which might be Black or Gray.

Do you agree with my conclusion or you have some other opinion on these techniques. Share your thoughts in the comments section below.

What are On Page SEO and Off Page SEO?

Search engine optimization is the term used to describe a set of processes that aim in optimizing a website for search engines. SEO is important not only for getting high quality visitors but it is also a way to increase the credibility of a website and to expand brand awareness.

Search engines are using complex algorithms to determine which pages to include in their index and the order they show these pages in the search results. SEO is the way to ‘speak’ to search engines in a language they can understand and provide them with more details about a website.

SEO has two major components, On Page and off page SEO.

On Page SEO: -

On Page SEO refers to settings you can apply on the website so that it is optimized for search engines. The most important on Page SEO Tips are:

• Optimized titles and descriptions
• Proper URL Structures
• User friendly navigation (user sitemaps)
• Optimized internal links
• Text formatting (use of h1, h2, bold etc)
•  Image optimization (image size, proper image names, use of ALT tag)
•  User friendly 404 pages
•  Fast loading pages
•  Google Authorship verification for all pages
•  Top quality fresh content (This is always the most important SEO factor!)
•  External links (no broken links or links to ‘bad’ sites)

Off Page SEO

Unlike On- page SEO, off-page SEO refers to activities outside the boundaries of the webpage. The most important are:

•         Link Building
•         Social Media
•         Social bookmarking

Why is Off-Page SEO important?

Search engines have been trying for decades to find a way to return the best results to the searcher. To do that, they take into account the on-site SEO factors (described above), some other quality factors and off-page SEO.

Off page SEO gives them a very good indication on how the World (other websites and users) perceive the particular website. A web site that is useful is more likely to have references (links) from other websites; it is more likely to have mentions on social media (Facebook likes, tweets, Pins, +1’s etc.) and it is more likely to be bookmarked and shared among communities of like-minded users.

What are the benefits of ‘off-site SEO’ to website owners?

A successful off-site SEO strategy will generate the following benefits to website owners:

Increase in rankings – The website will rank higher in the SERPs and this also means more traffic.

Increase in PageRank – Page rank is a number between 0 and 10 which indicates the importance of a website in the eyes of Google. It is the system invented by Larry Page (one of Google’s founders) and one of the reasons that Google was so successful in showing the most relevant results to the searcher.  Page rank today is only one out of the 250 factors that Google is using to rank websites.

More exposure – Higher rankings also means greater exposure because when a website ranks in the top positions: it gets more links, more visits and more social media mentions. It’s like a never ending sequence of events where one thing leads to another and then to another etc.

Link Building

Link building is the most popular off-Page SEO method.  Basically by building external links to your website, you are trying to gather as many ‘votes’ as you can so that you can bypass your competitors and rank higher. For example if someone likes this article and references it from his/her website or blog, then this is like telling search engines that this page has good information.

Over the years webmasters were trying to build links to their websites so that they rank higher and they ‘invented’ a number of ways to increase link count. The most popular ways were: -

Blog Directories – something like yellow pages but each entry was a link back to a website.

Forum Signatures – Many people where commenting on forums for the sole purpose of getting a link back to their website (they included the links in their signature).

Article Directories – By publishing your articles on an article directory you could get a link (or 2) back to your website. Some article directories accepted only unique content while other directories accepted anything from spin articles to already published articles.

Shared Content Directories – Websites like hubpages and infobarrel allowed you to publish content and in return you could add a couple of links pointing to your websites.

Link exchange schemes – Instead of trying to publish content you could get in touch with other webmasters and exchange links. In other words I could link your website from mine and you could do the same. In some cases you could even do more complicated exchanges by doing a 3-way link, in other words I link to your website from my website but you link to my website from a different website.

SocialMedia

Social media is part of ‘off-site SEO’ and if you think about it, it’s also a form of link building. It should be noted that almost all of the links you get from social media sites are “nofollow” but this does not mean that they do not have any value.

Social Media mentions are gaining ground as ranking factors and proper configuration of social media profilescan also boost SEO.

SocialBookmarking

Social bookmarking is not as popular as it used to be in the past but it is still a good way to get traffic to your website. 

Conclusion

Off-page SEO is as important as on-site SEO. If you want your SEO campaigns to be successful you have to do both. When thinking about link building doesn’t take the easy way, but try to get links from hard-to-get places. The more difficult is to get a link, the more value it has.

In the past you could easily get thousands of links and rank higher but nowadays you have to do more than that.  My advice is to forget about link building all together and put all your efforts in making a great website, promote it correctly and everything else will follow.

What is SEM?

SEM stands for Search Engine Marketing. 

Search Engine Marketing(SEM) is a type of Internet marketing associated with the researching, submitting and positioning of a website within search engines to achieve maximum visibility and increase your share of paid and/or organic traffic referrals from search engines.

SEM involves things such as search engine optimization (SEO), keyword research, competitive analysis, paid listings and other search engine services that will increase search traffic to your site.

Contrast with SEO

SEM is a broader term than SEO. Where SEO aims to provide better organic search results, SEM helps you successfully target users of search engines via advertising (paid) links in search results in addition to organic search to send targeted traffic to your website.

SEO and SEM are not competing services. SEO is considered a subset of SEM services. Today, if you want to conduct business on the Internet you need to be visible in both organic and advertised links, which means you need both SEO and SEM.

Organic / Natural Listings: - Any good search engine, such as Google or Bing, has “editorial” or “organic or “natural” listings. These are listings that appear without anyone paying for them. They are provided as a core product of that search engine, in the same way that a newspaper has a core product of writing stories about topics it believes are of interest to its readers, rather than to its advertisers.

Paid Search / CPC / PPC Listings: - Search engines also have paid search ads, sometimes referred to as “CPC” or “PPC” listings. Those acronyms come from the way advertisers are charged for these ads, on a Cost-Per-Click or Pay-Per-Click basis. You pay, you get listed. When you stop paying, your listing goes away. Similar to newspapers, these ads typically appear alongside – but – separate from the editorial content. They are also not supposed to influence the editorial coverage.

SEM thus involves use of marketing principles, only in a way that the strategizing is around reaching out to your consumer via search listings.

When this term is used to describe an individual, it stands for “Search Engine Marketer” or one who performs SEM.

The Difference between SEM and SEO

The phrases SEO (search engine optimization) and SEM (search engine marketing) are similar and sometimes used interchangeably, SEO and SEM are different services.

SEO helps users find you based on search results. The results often vary by market, yet the competition is stiff. Unless you rank high so that your company is on the first or second page of the results, chances are most users will not always find you. There are usually no fees that you pay to the search engines for SEO.

With SEM, you place your advertisement –that you pay for– in the search engines above or next to the search results. Users placing a search will see your ad. SEM gives you more control over your advertising than SEO. Plus, SEM can send more targeted traffic to your website than just SEO.

10 Ways to Get Traffic for Free

Getting traffic is one of the most important tasks for any web master. What is more, you can't get traffic once and then just reap the benefits. Getting traffic is an ongoing task and you must be constantly doing it, if you want to get traffic and keep it.Here are some of the ways to get traffic for free:-

1 Optimize your site for search engines

Search engines have always been a major way to get traffic for free. That is why you need to do your homework and optimize your site so that it ranks well for the keywords you target. SEO is still the most powerful way to get traffic for free and you really need to invest some time and efforts in the optimization of your site.

2 Frequently update the contents of your site

If you expected some shocking secrets revealed, you might be a bit disappointed. One of the first steps in getting traffic for free is trivial but vital – get great content and frequently update it. In terms of SEO, content is King. If your content is good and frequently updated you will not only build a loyal audience of recurring visitors, who will often come to see what is new, but search engines will also love your site.

3 Take advantage of social bookmarking sites

Social bookmarking sites (especially the most popular among them) are another powerful way to get traffic for free. If you want to learn how to do it, check the How to getTraffic from Social Bookmarking sites article, where we have explained what to do if you want to get free traffic from sites such as Digg, Delicious, etc.

4 Use your Twitter and Facebook accounts

Social networks are also a way to get traffic for free. If you are popular on networks, such as  Twitter or Facebook, the traffic you get from there can easily surpass the traffic from Google and the other search engines. It is true that building a large network of targeted followers on Twitter and supporters on Facebook takes a lot of time and effort but generally the result is worth.

5 Get links with other sites in your niche

Another way to get traffic for free is from other sites in your niche. Getting links with other sites in your niche is also good for SEO, especially if you manage to get links without the famous nofollow attribute. But even if the links are nofollow (i.e. they are useless for SEO), they still help to get traffic to your site. If you manage to put your link in a visible place on a site with high volumes of traffic, you can get thousands of hits from this link alone. If you need list of sites within your niche where you could get backlinks from, check the Backlink Builder tool. However, be careful if you exchange links because linking to bad neighbors can do you a lot of harm.

6 Use any chance to promote your site for free

Free promotion is always welcome, so don't neglect it. There are many ways to promote your site for free and some of the most popular ones include free classified ads, submissions to directories, inclusion in various listings etc. It is true that not all free ways to promote your site work well but if you select the right places to promote your site for free, this can also result in tons of traffic.

7 Create a free product or service

Content drives most traffic when you offer something useful. There are many types of useful content you can create and they largely depend on the niche of your site. You can have articles with tons of advice, or short tips but one of the most powerful ways to get traffic is to create a free product or service. When this product or service gets popular and people start visiting your site, chances are that they will visit the other sections of the site as well.

8 Use viral content

Free products and services are great for getting free traffic to your site and one of the best varieties in this aspect is viral content. Viral content is called so because it distributes like a virus – i.e. when users like your content, they send it to their friends, post it on various sites, and promote it for free in many different ways. Viral content distributes on its own and your only task is to create it and submit it to a couple of popular sites. After that users pick it and distribute it for you. Viral content can be a hot video or a presentation but it can also be a good old article or an image.

9 Use offline promotion

Offline promotion is frequently forgotten but it is also a way to get traffic for free. Yes, computers are everywhere and many people spend more time online than offline but still life hasn't moved completely on the Web. Offline promotion is also very powerful and if you know how to use it, this can also bring you many visitors. Some of the traditional offline ways to promote your site include printing its URL on your company's business cards and souvenirs or sticking it on your company vehicles. You can also start selling T-shirts and other merchandise with your logo and this way make your brand more popular.

10 Include your URL in your signature

URLs in forum signatures are also a way to get traffic for free. There are forums, which get millions of visitors a day and if you are a popular user on such a forum, you can use this to get traffic to your site. When you post on forums and people like your posts, they tend to click the link to your site on your signature to learn more about you. In rare cases you might be able to post a deep link (i.e. a link to an internal page of the site) rather than a link to your homepage and this is also a way to focus attention to a particular page. Unfortunately, deep links are rarely allowed.

Getting traffic for free is a vast topic and it is not possible to list all the ways to do it. However, if you know the most important ways – i.e. the ways we discussed in this article and you apply them properly, it is guaranteed that you will be able to get lots of traffic for free. 

Social Bookmarking in SEO

Social bookmarking is a method for web users to store, organize, search, and manage bookmarks of web pages on the Internet with the help of tags or keywords. This helps you in accessing bookmarks from any computer with online access. These bookmarks can either be public or private. If public, your favorite bookmarks visible for others to view and follow as well, hence the social networking aspect. 

Social bookmarking has become a great tool in building web presence and promoting a business on the Internet. In addition, if you place your links wisely and know which social bookmarking sites offer dofollow links, this strategy will also help your search engine optimization (SEO) efforts.

What Does Social Bookmarking Do For Businesses?

No social bookmarking definition can be complete without an analysis of what it can do for businesses. Obviously, social bookmarking has some excellent marketing qualities, or nobody would do it. Some of the ways that social bookmarking helps businesses include:

•       Building relevant incoming links
•       Draws visitors
•       Draws new clients or customers
•       Helps people find the business
•       Helps businesses find other businesses
•       Draws a lot of traffic

Social Bookmarking Sites List:-

http://instoma.com/

http://epitab.com/

http://simslook.com/

http://multioptik.com/

http://acliran.com/

http://jeetools.com

http://finxit.com/

http://cmstate.com/

http://edulpul.com/

http://sitensite.com/

http://acujess.com/

http://aeunia.com/

http://itsaus.com/

http://cyrhen.com/

http://accury.com/

http://imigpix.com/

http://riskpi.com/

http://elseopen.com/

http://gqtuk.com/

http://weswook.com/

www.techsfordummies.com

herpingdo.com

noormahalrestaurant.com

seedoctorv.com

onlinefoodsgrocery.com

oldtrailfamily.com

cheater411.com

emergencyjew.com

waltergatusart.com

lockboxland.com

mtlstk.com

murskacorp.com

sapientsync.com

partialoxidationfilters.com

shite.me

www.bookmarkingbase.com

www.electronic-trading.com

thetogbox.com

planningitsmarter.com

www.pixador.net

What is SMO?

SMO = Social Media Optimization / Search Marketing Optimization

SMO. Some call it social media optimization. Others refer to it as search marketing optimization. Either way, it is the next wave of online marketing, the perfect marriage between search engine optimization (SEO) and social media. As a business in the Internet Age, you can’t exist without addressing the critical issues of online visibility and customer interaction. That’s exactly what SMO is designed to do.

When used effectively social media can be one of your greatest assets for improving your site’s organic search results. By connecting with people in various online venues, you extend the reach of your business and increase opportunities for people to link to your main business page. Social media optimization helps connect all of your social media accounts in a cohesive, consistently branded network that points your potential customers where you want them to go. SMO Pros employs a strategic, multi-point process to build your successful SMO foundation, boost your SEO, and drive more potential customers to your site.

Social media optimization includes using RSS feeds, social news and bookmarking sites, as well as social media sites and video and blogging sites. SMO is similar to SEO (search engine optimization) in that the goal is to drive traffic to your Web site.

Some Popular Social Networking Sites List              

     

http://www.twitter.com                                              

http://www.facebook.com                                          
http://www.linkedin.com                                             

https://www.pinterest.com/                                         
http://www.myspace.com          
http://www.delicious.com/
http://www.slashdot.org/
http://www.tumblr.com
http://www.reddit.com/
http://www.digg.com/
http://www.plaxo.com
http://www.folkd.com/
http://www.diigo.com

http://www.hi5.com/