JimWorld Gazette Issue #81 08/30/1999

JimWorld Gazette - Issue #81 - August 30, 1999

New Thrills In The Forums
I Need A Break - And So Do You
New At JimTools.com
Doing Well By Doing Good: Ethos Comes Full Circle
Attract Visitors With A Learning Fountain
Spam, Scams And Choosing A Professional Search Engine Placement Service
Get Linked
Snippets

Link to this issue of the Gazette as http://gazetteworld.com/go/to.cgi?l=g81

NEW THRILLS IN THE FORUMS

http://gethighforums.com/
http://searchengineforums.com/

Are you getting less traffic this week from the search engines? Getting traffic from new search engines and nothing from your mainstay engines? Wondering what is going on?

Thousands of your friends and competitors know what is going on... they spend time in the Search Engine Forums.

The past two weeks have seen massive realignment of relationships within and between the major portals and indices. Changes in the way sites are spidered and ranked. Millions of sites and pages dropped and millions of new ones indexed daily.

The Search Engine Forums are THE place to stay ahead of the pack. Serious engine junkies research and discuss every big and small change in the health of the many spiders. It's all free and open to anyone that wants to contribute, or just lurk and gather the information you need.

Hot threads going on right now include:

Frames and Search Engine Indexing
http://searchengineforums.com/Forum21/HTML/000003.html

MSN + Alta Vista + Real Names = useless to cloak
http://searchengineforums.com/Forum17/HTML/000039.html

Need Inktomi Lessons Bad!!
http://searchengineforums.com/Forum3/HTML/000259.html

Web site advertising : I'm stuck and clueless! Need help on All fronts please!

http://gethighforums.com/Forum10/HTML/000239.html

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Have you noticed the newest Get High Forums addition, "Web Hosting Is Tougher Than It Looks"? http://gethighforums.com

Finding the right server is easy. Finding the right hosting service is not so easy. Join in what is sure to be lively discussions.

I NEED A BREAK - AND SO DO YOU

I've had about enough hardware and software problems over the past couple of months to last me for a while.

You know how the frustration just builds and builds and builds and.... off you go to http://members.aol.com/spoons1000/break/index.html for a look at The Illustrated Guide To Breaking Your Computer.

This one page experience is a hoot.

I know the temptation is great to follow the example of the host, but remember that you may need your computer again tomorrow.

Actually, I don't need Nick's computer tomorrow. Maybe I'll try some of it on his.

NEW AT JIMTOOLS.COM

http://jimtools.com/

In addition to the Search Engine Submitter, FFA submitter, directory submitter, search engine position analyzer, HTML special characters, generate HTML code for tables, generate Meta tags, generate OnMouseOver text links, OnMouseOver image changer code, multi-resolution window size viewer, open a new window at any size, convert HTML code to Javascript, Link Checker, convert decimal hex, color pickers, research keywords, analyze keywords, Whois, and Finger we now present two brand new tools.

Cascading Style Sheet Generator - Interactive session that even I can use to create state of the art CSS code for my pages.

Generate instant page sets using frames. No more guesswork. Just pick the style you want and save the code to your computer.

DOING WELL BY DOING GOOD: ETHOS COMES FULL CIRCLE

When Aristotle wrote his Rhetoric in the fourth century BC, he defined it as "the faculty of observing in any given case the available means of persuasion". Today, the term 'Rhetoric' is most often used to describe hot air emanating from politicians. Though Aristotle might lament the evolutionary direction his subject matter took, he would not be surprised to learn that it has, in fact, evolved. Indeed, to Aristotle, the Rhetoric was more of a working notebook than a final treatise on the subject. Despite Rhetoric's damaged reputation, Aristotle's observances on the art of persuasion are as useful today as ever - specifically for people who find themselves faced with the difficult task of writing a press release.

Those who remember nothing else from the Greeks usually recognize at least three Aristotelian terms: Ethos, Pathos and Logos. Sadly, recognition of these terms does not translate to effective use of the concepts they represent. Writing an effective press release requires not only a cursory understanding of the words that sound Greek to most, but also the knowledge of how much to use of each.

There's a reason press releases are also called news releases: they are supposed to contain news. Journalists tend to think of news as a disruption of the status quo. Press release writers would be well advised to adopt the same working definition. After all, journalists are their target audience.

Newsless press releases bear a striking resemblance to sales pitches. Lacking substance, they rely on emotional appeals - pathos - to fill their word limit. Typically, they are written in second person, referring to the reader as "you". Superlatives abound as the suffix -est attaches itself to words at will. Exclamation points multiply like wire coat hangers at the ends of sentences. Fluffy quotations from CEOs appear here and there, interspersed with glowing testimonials from "satisfied customers" who tend to go by their initials rather than their actual names. Contact information for the press release often directs journalists to send e-mail to sales@company.com.

Journalists' eyes glaze over when they read these releases. They do not fancy themselves potential customers easily swayed by emotional appeals. They are writers, and they want the facts. So a good rule of thumb to follow when writing a press release is to use pathos sparingly. In fact, writers who find themselves using superlatives and exclamation points have usually run out of news to report, which means it is time to stop writing.

While pathos is rightly relegated to a minor role on the press release stage, logos and ethos should be cast as leading characters with roughly equal numbers of lines. Logos - the use of logic - includes the information necessary to make a logical decision about the new web site, product or service being described in the press release. Statistical data, price, availability and distinguishing features deserve prominent placement and ample attention.

A large dose of logos is best accompanied by an equally large dose of ethos, though like Rhetoric, ethos' reputation has become somewhat soiled during its evolution. When Aristotle used the term, it referred to a person's character or ethics. Today, communication scholars learn a different definition: credibility. Rhetoricians are no longer encouraged to display their goodwill toward others to win the favor of their audience; instead, they are taught to establish credibility. Sometimes that strategy can be carried too far, as evidenced by commercial spokespersons who say, "I'm not a doctor, but I play one on TV." Sometimes, the line between credibility and viability becomes blurred, as when football star Joe Namath appeared on national television in nylon stockings selling pantyhose. Viability certainly counts on the world-wide-web, where even the most mundane news from Microsoft makes the front page of virtually every Internet news site.

Fortunately, the "customer-is-in-charge" nature of the Internet is effecting a positive change in ethos' evolution. Web gurus like John Audette, President and CEO of Multimedia Marketing Group (MMG), are finding that Star Wars sage Yoda had the right idea when he said, "Give, then take." Audette points out that the Internet "...may be commerce driven, but it's information led. Which means that those marketing information first, and commerce second, have an advantage over those leading with commerce." Taking the advice of its founder, the Internet News Bureau site offers resources such as a searchable archive of press releases for journalists and Media Relations Tips for public relations professionals. Other companies that "give" to their customers are finding that a display of goodwill on their part often translates to a display of loyalty on the part of their customers. This "retro-ethos" is the type to include in a press release, but only if it is also backed up by the company's web site and its customer s ervice policies.

Perhaps the "everything old is new again" attitude that is bringing ethos full circle will also raise Rhetoric from the flames. Aristotle would be proud.
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RenéeMenius is Editor of Internet News Bureau
http://www.newsbureau.com

ATTRACT VISITORS WITH A LEARNING FOUNTAIN

Yahoo! is a Learning Fountain. Amazon.Com is a Learning Fountain. The Motley Fool and Consumer World, which are in the top 5 of popular sites according to the Top100 List, are Learning Fountains. Almost all recommendations of Encyclopedia Britannica, which chooses only the best sites, are Learning Fountains.

What do all these sites have in common? They influence visitors by helping them learn. This is what a Learning Fountain does. And this is why a Learning Fountain is so popular and is key to the success of so many prominent web sites.

Why Learning?

Ever since the U.S. Vice President Al Gore called the Internet an information superhighway, this is what it's called by almost everyone. But it's not. TV deserves this moniker: elites dish out information to the rest of us. The Internet is not a highway, but a network, where all participants may interact. The emphasis is not on information, but learning.

The difference between information and learning is HUGE:

Information is something the VENDOR sends
Learning is what the VISITOR does

Carl R. Rogers, the preeminent educator, in his book "Freedom to Learn," says:

"Teaching, in my estimation, is a vastly overrated function.....I see facilitation of learning as the aim of education."

With reference to a website, disseminating information is similar to teaching. To truly help your visitor you should facilitate his learning by making your site a learning catalyst.

Learning Fountains

Learning Fountains, web sites that act as learning catalysts, may be divided
into 5 types. A brief description and the possible purposes of each are given:

REFERRER - This type of site sends the visitor to sources of information. Yahoo! and AltaVista do this on a universal scale. But the Referrer may also be used by an intermediary or service provider working with a fairly defined group. The College Grad Job Hunter <http://www.collegegrad.com> and Improvenet <http://www.improvenet.com> are examples.
INFORMER - This site is a source of information in the form of news, tutorials, articles. The information should be of practical use to the visitor. Use this type for selling high-tech products and services. It is a way to explain principles, demonstrate use, offer support, and show how what you're selling fits into the structure of a company. IBM has an outstanding website, IBM Intellectual Property Network <http://patent.womplex.ibm.com>, which is useful for patent research - something that is bound to attract prospects for IBM.
ADVISOR - Instead of helping the visitor make a decision, at this site you state your problem and are given advice. A very good type of Learning Fountain for a specialist or expert, because it enables her to show what she can do. A good example is Invest-O-Rama <http://www.investorama.com> which answers visitor questions about investing.
CONTEXT PROVIDER - Here the visitor is given the capability of solving her own problem with the aid of such tools as check lists, calculators, evaluators and simulators. If you're selling a tool or you're using a tool in the performance of your services, this is an excellent way to go. A real estate or a mortgage site may supply calculators to enable potential home buyers to figure their housing choices. Rank this <http://rankthis.webpromote.com> enables you to determine the position of your website on search engine results. nVestor <http://investorsleague.com> enables you to run a simulation to learn how to invest prudently.
LEARNING COMMUNITY STIMULATOR - The purpose of this site is to help the visitor develop expertise. With the aid of interactive activities, newsletters, forums, chat rooms, and discussion lists - and especially a helping attitude - useful discussions take place. This is an excellent stimulator of ideas and of loyalty. Use it if you can gather together a group of people with a common interest that impinges on your business. A good example is ParentSoup <http://www.parentsoup.com>.

Two Interesting Learning Fountains

An unusual Learning Community Stimulator is Frank Coppola's Workshop <http://workshop.fcoppola.com> where he develops good scripts for movies. A script writer submits a script. His script is reviewed only if he reviews 5 other scripts. The good scripts are published. The excellent ones are turned into movies.

Another unusual Learning Community Stimulator is the Cooperative Business Bookstore <http://www.capital-connection/bsbookstsore.html>. Here a group of authors formed a community to aid each of them in selling their works. The site is a community for discussion of books and business. The authors invest work instead of money. Each author has a task, helps run the site, and spreads the word about the bookstore.

Creating Your Learning Fountain

Creating a Learning Fountain takes a great deal of thought and effort. But you can do it if you follow these 3 steps:

DEFINE YOUR PURPOSE - This is the most important and most difficult step. But nothing else will work if you don't do this first. Essentially, you want to define whom you want to help and how. As part of this task you need to come up with 2 sentences, specifying:
- the learning needs of your chosen prospects
- the special abilities you have that enable you to supply these needs
DEFINE YOUR THEME - This too should be brief. It should be focused on the visitor.
DEFINE STRUCTURE OF SITE - After determining the type of Learning Fountain you want, develop a welcome message, and organize your site to allow as much choice as possible to the visitor. Develop interactive methods to engage the learner. Most important, open the way for future communication with your visitor.

Summary

The visitor comes to your site, not for information, but to learn. Make your site a Learning Fountain. If you do this, the visitor will not be merely receptive, but eager to do business with you. An interesting Learning Fountain will bring your site popularity and success.

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Paul is an Internet marketing consultant, trainer and speaker. He is the originator of the Learning Fountain: a website that influences visitors by helping them learn; see http://www.learningfountain.com. He is the moderator of LearningFOUNT, a discussion list on Business Strategy and Community Building; to subscribe, send a blank email to: mailto:subscribe@learningfountain.com. Because of his performance on the platform, he is called Paul "the soarING" Siegel.

SPAM, SCAMS AND CHOOSING A PROFESSIONAL SEARCH ENGINE PLACEMENT SERVICE

So, you've had your website online for a while now. You've worked hard and built what you feel is a quality site with valuable content, BUT, you're getting very little traffic, you're getting virtually no sales and you can't find your site anywhere on any of the big search engines. You've read free "reports" and "insider's secrets" until you're eyes ache and all you're learning is that the more reports you read the more conflicting information you get. This little scenario is exactly what is fueling the search engine top placement service industry.

I began my career as a search engine placement specialist in April of '96. Back then there were very few services available and it was relatively easy for people like myself to write pages that would actually get placed in the top results of major search engines and draw considerable traffic under targeted keywords. As the net grew, so did the number of websites in the databases of the search engines, which of course caused competition to become fierce, which of course made the services more valuable and of course the cost went up. It quickly got to the point that top search engine placement became lucrative enough to attract a lot of unscrupulous marketers to the industry. This is of course why you get so much spam promising to "get you in the top and bring thousands of hits to your site". While there are several companies that are honest, professional and reliable, there are an awful lot that exist for no other reason than to capitalize on your desire for success and to take advantage of you and your money.

The big question is, "how to tell the difference?"

Top search engine placement is a very important factor in almost any online business. As it becomes more and more competitive, there is an ever greater reason for hiring a professional placement service. The real value of a placement service is not that they are some kind of magician or that they have some secret weapon against the search engines. It is simply that it is their business to be aware of what search engines are looking for in terms of what is relevant and because of this knowledge are able to supply search engines with what they want the way they want it. This takes a great deal of time and effort and that is time and effort that you could be spending on servicing your clients instead of trying to figure out all the little quirks of each engine. This makes a top search engine placement service valuable to you as an online business person.

Due to my experience in this industry and the many contacts that I have made, I am in a better position than most to shed some light on some steps that you can take to insure that once you make the decision to hire a service, you are able to choose one that can actually do the job. I'm not going to tell you that I have all the answers or that there is anything I can do to keep you from having a bad experience, what I can and will do is tell you some things that you should look for to help determine if the company you are considering is really a competent, professional service or if you are about to send your money to a guy sitting in a prison cell in his underwear sipping a little raisin wine while his wife on the outside is running to the bank with your check.. OK, let's discuss a few things to watch out for first.

SPAM.

NEVER, I repeat, NEVER even consider responding to any spam e-mail you get claiming to submit your site or to get you in the top of the search engines. This is by far the easiest way to lose your money. I realize that some spam is very clever, well written and sounds really good. Remember that the secret to making spam work is to make it sound good. All those e-mails you get with subject lines like "Here's the info you requested" and "I couldn't find your site in the search engine" are trash! Personally, I absolutely hate spam and I don't want anyone to respond to it for any reason, but I can promise you that if this is the way you decide to hire a professional service, you will soon be saying, "Gosh, I should have listened to Bob."

SCAMS.

One of the most popular scams used by dishonest placement specialists is the old "show a keyword in the top" routine. You will run across web sites that will say something like "Here's Proof". then they will give you a little drop down menu that will take you to a specific engine with the keyword already typed in and sure enough, there that keyword is at #3 or whatever. If that was the keyword you were wanting, then maybe there is some value in seeing it at that position, but for the most part, it is usually a keyword that is #1 not that competitive, and #2 doesn't generate much traffic. If you're wanting to come under the keywords "stock market" why would you be impressed if I showed you a #1 under the keyword "how to buy stock in today's market"? Not quite the same thing is it.

Another popular trick is the old money back guarantee. Almost every placement service out there will offer some kind of guarantee. "So what's the trick, Bob?", you ask. The trick is simple, --- everybody gets a money back guarantee, but how many people ever actually get their money back? Giving a guarantee is not the same thing as giving money back. Just ask for a list of clients that have actually gotten a refund and see how many names you get. This is where finding a reputable company is crucial.

Maybe the most popular scam is the "we'll submit your site to 20,000 search engines." I find a lot of placement services that use this one. The catch to this one is that using an automated program, it takes about 5 minutes to submit any site to hundreds of search engines and free for all link sites. The problem is that this in no way does anything to get your site in the top of the results. So if coming up #957 on thousands of search engines is your idea of web site promotion, that company may be just what you're looking for.

The old "meta tag optimization" is another one. A lot of sites claim that they will optimize your meta tags to get you top placement. Meta tags are NOT the big answer to top placement. Search engine have become sophisticated enough to be able to use a lot more information from a site than just meta tags to determine relevancy. Meta tags are playing an increasingly less important role in top placement. Content is what rubs a search engine the right way and if your site is about shoes, stuffing the meta tags with "sex" will not get your site coming up in the top of the results when someone types in sex.

Forums and discussion groups are another thing to watch out for. I often find posts in different forums where someone asks if anyone knows of a good submission service. Invariably there will be a few posts from people saying these guys are good or check out this site. These references are usually of little or no value. How do you know that the person responding is not the owner of that site simply using a different e-mail address or login name? Also, there are a lot of services out there that pay commissions or referrals for leads. Beware the forum referrals unless you know the person posting them.

All right, that covers at least the surface of the spam and scams issues and how to find a company you don't want. Now let's talk about how you find a service that you do want.

First, go to the engine you would like to be on yourself. Type in keywords like search engine placement, web site submissions, placement services, top placement services and other things that you think a placement company would like to be found under. If the company doesn't know how to get their own site in the top, it stands to reason they probably won't do any better with your site. Now from the top results look at the titles and descriptions. Avoid titles and descriptions that simply repeat the keywords over and over. Any site with the keywords repeated several times is spamming and they don't care about their image, only about getting their site placed high. The few that "get away" with this technique won't be there for long. Spamming is NOT the way to get and keep quality traffic and all of these guys get caught. It's just a matter of time.

Once you find a site link that looks good to you, click on the link and check out their site. Is the site a quality site or just a bunch of keywords with big paragraph titles with the keywords in them? Keep in mind that if they do a poor job on their own site, it stands to reason they won't do any better on yours. If the site does not reflect well on that company, your site will probably not reflect too well on your company either.

If you are comfortable with the way the site looks, now read the text. Does the text make sense to you? Do they explain the procedures well enough for you to get a basic idea of what they do, how they do it and what it costs? If the site is a little vague, there should be alarms going off in your head. There is no reason on earth to be vague about any legitimate business. It is also very important that there is contact information on the site. I'm not talking about a webmaster@we'regonnatakeyourmoney.com, I'm talking about an address and a phone number.

Now look for references. A professional company should have a client list or contact information for at least some of their clients on their site. Avoid the site that says e-mail us for references. When you ask for references, how do you know they are not giving you the name of their brother-in-law? It is always much better to let you choose from a random list so that there is no way of manipulating the responses you get. Assuming you can find random references, contact them. Ask them how long they have been using this service. If it is more than just a couple of months, then obviously the company is actually doing the work they were hired to do or the reference wouldn't still be paying them. Ask them if the service is responsive and ask them what made them choose this company.

The next step you can take is to use the contact information from the site and contact them. Send an e-mail and see how long it takes to get a response. If it is longer than 24-48 hours -- RUN! If they won't respond before you become a client, they probably won't be any more responsive if you have a problem or a question. Assuming that they do respond by e-mail, we're not through yet. Now try calling the phone number during regular business hours. If it is a professional company, it should be operating as one which means there should be someone there to answer the phone from 9 to 5. If you get a recording, that is not a bad thing in itself, (it's definitely better to get an answer), because things do come up and sometimes people really are with other clients, so leave a message. The same with the e-mail thing though, if you don't get a response by the next day, I would scratch them from the list.

One last tidbit. Ask them how long they have been in business. You can verify the answer you get by checking out their domain name with Internic. See if what Internic tells you jives with what the person from the company told you. If the company says they've been in business for two years and they registered the domain last month, it's pretty likely they lied to you and that is no way to start a relationship.

Finally, I would like to point out that when you hire a professional placement service, don't expect more than they can deliver. A placement service can not make you rich. They can not run your business for you. They CAN generate traffic for you but that does not mean getting you #1 on every engine out there under every keyword you want whether your site is actually about that keyword or not. Try to remember that it is like renting a billboard on a busy highway. A professional service really can get you traffic by making your site found in the search engines, but what you do with that traffic is still up to you.

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Bob Massa
Searchking, Inc.
Where You Rule the Web
http://www.searchking.com

GET LINKED

Visit The1000 at http://the1000.com/ for 15 new places to submit your site for a free listing.

BigStuff.com
http://www.bigstuff.com/

A nice new directory that just came in, so go submit your sites while I add it to The1000.

SNIPPETS

Metrics from The Industry Standard
http://www.thestandard.com/metrics/downloads/

Speaking at a conference or meeting? Pitching new business? Need to justify lower than expectations results from your last project?

For those of us that just hate to prepare formal presentations, relief is in sight. Metric offers an extensive library of Power Point slide presentations from its popular Industry Standard Metrics Reports. You can get statistics on dozens of Internet related trends and industry size and spending. Regardless of the topic of your presentation, you'll find something here to add eye appeal and content.

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Falling Through the Net: Defining the Digital Divide
http://www.ntia.doc.gov/ntiahome/fttn99/contents.html

Just as I become accustomed to the sound of so many of you pounding on keyboards preparing your latest business plan, along comes the latest study of the Web by the U.S. Commerce Department. Now the rest of you will start hacking your funding plans to take your sites public and I'll have to accustom myself to a higher noise level.

This study gets to the heart of the Digital Divide in America. Charts to warm the cold heart of any investor. Charts of the growth of telephones, computer ownership, Internet access and more broken down by age, income, race, education, location... Who's "in" and who's getting left behind.

This study is also a great source for client marketing proposals. Keep it in your bookmarks. You'll need it.

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AuctionSubmit.com
http://www.auctionsubmit.com

Cool new free auction submission software for sellers using online auctions. The release of Auction Submit software gives online auction sellers using eBay, Amazon, and uAuction.com a professional tool for submitting and tracking inventory. It saves sellers time submitting products and gives them greater flexibility in managing their inventory. Looks handy enough that it makes me wish I had something to auction off. Send me your used airplanes, cars and boats and I'll let you know how it went.

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And now, if you have hung in there long enough to reach this point in the Gazette, here's a special bonus for you.

You have most likely heard of "cloaking" your web sites so that the search engine spider sees a different version of you page than the visitors see. This is a growing technique to let promoters get the highest possible ranking in the search engines while keeping their techniques secret and not making visitors look at ugly doorway pages.

I just hate secrets. They keep me awake at night on the rare occasions that I actually try to sleep.

Now comes UserAgent. A nice little on-line tool that lets you pretend to be one of several spiders and look at your competitor's "cloaked" pages. Doesn't work with every cloaking technology, but works with enough to let you get back in the game.

Enjoy. Just don't use it between noon and one o'clock. That's when I want it all to myself.

http://straylight.netmeridian.com/~delph/useragent/