JimWorld Gazette Issue #67 11/13/1998

JimWorld Gazette - Issue #67 - November 13, 1998

I've posted 20 new awards to the site, and I'm very pleased. I got a bit behind posting them, but a belated 'Thanks' to everyone that found enough value in the community to recognize it with their awards.

CONTENTS

• Are You Ready For The Virtual British Invasion
  
• New JimTool - World Currency Conversion
  
• Search Engine Happenings
  
• An Opinionated Way To Promote Your Site
  
• Shut Up And Do Business
  
• Promoting Your E-zine
  
• Get Linked
  
• Snippets

Link to this issue of the Gazette as http://gazetteworld.com/go/to.cgi?l=g67

ARE YOU READY FOR THE VIRTUAL BRITISH INVASION?

Since most of you reading this are fluent in the English language (or at least in the American version thereof), the information coming out of England should be of real interest to you.

We all are constantly looking for an ever-bigger audience for our Web efforts. It is the primary motivation of the creative mind. More and more pounds of eyeballs (as we call it in TV land.) And since most of us are unable to deploy sites in several different languages, we need to dig out those eyeballs that can read English.

So, we fight on the virtual battlefield of search engines and such, trying to find more eyeballs in America. It's a battle to e-death, or at least the death of such things as spare time, family and relaxation. Vacations are for wimps, not for the CyberWarrior.

But how many of us really put any real effort into marketing our content to 'that other group of English reading eyeballs?' You know. The ones over there in England. They speak English, don't they? Wouldn't they be interested in what we have to say?

While you might not think that England is a hot bed of Internet growth, you would be surprised.

The latest reports from the BBC (that's television in England) reveal a vibrant, healthy and rapidly growing Internet community in England.

Hot-off-the-presses figures reveal that there are an estimated 1.86 million British subscribers and that number is growing rapidly. AOL recently signed up their 500,000th subscriber, putting them at the top of the heap followed closely by Compuserve at 400,000.

But to reach this growing pool of potential traffic, you have to go get it. You have to add some content that will draw them to your site. Talking about things that only happen in America won't draw large numbers of those British eyeballs. You have to promote in the search engines 'over there.' You have to put forth some effort. You have to 'make it happen.'

One thing you might consider is that on-line time is fairly (actually, very) expensive in England. Much more so than here in America. You need to make your sites fast loading and hosted on a good server. If your site is hosted on TurtlePod or SnailCities, you need to move it (which is more than their servers do.) You might even consider offering some of your content in a format that can be read off-line. Can you say Autoresponder? Or 'Zip files?'

How about making your e-commerce site Brit-friendly? Prices in both U.S. and British currencies. Shipping rates and information for delivery in England? We can ship our products anywhere in the world, so why not send them to England?

Maybe we can develop a robust industry selling tea to the British. We could even add some extra tax, couldn't we?

A NEW JIMTOOL - WORLD CURRENCY CONVERSION

Holy smokes! What a segue!

I can hear the whining already. "Jim, how can you expect us to quote our prices in Pounds and Dollars? That would mean updating our web sites every day."

Not so.

There is a handy service available called The Universal Currency Converter. http://www.xe.net/currency/

You can add this feature to your site for - FREE. You can automatically convert to and from just about any currency in the world by just linking to the Converter. Use a pop-up window in the browser, and you don't even need to worry about getting your traffic back.

Or go a step further. Put a British flag next to each price on your site. Code the link to automatically bring up a new window, supplied directly from the Universal Currency Converter site, with your product's price already converted to Pounds, using today's currency exchange rate.

The same trick can be used for any currency. Automatically.

The Universal Currency Converter site has many services available. When you use their free service, you get a banner on the page shown to your potential customer. They have to pay their bills too. Or you can pay to have a more custom, advertising free service available for your site.

The Universal Currency Converter make it entirely too easy for you to reach out to new markets all over the world. Think that might help? If you don't need the extra money, send it to me. I have a few uses for it. I'll even thank you in the Gazette. Or anywhere else you care to name.

SEARCH ENGINE HAPPENINGS

This week's search engine 'heads-up' is about Lycos. Everyone has been complaining about not being able to get listed in Lycos lately. Take heart. It isn't personal.

I was planning to call them this week to get a reading on what is going on when what should arrive in my in-box but the Search Engine Bible update newsletter. And Clyde had already made the contact and gotten the skinny, so I'll run it here, totally without his permission. But I'll make it up to him by telling all of you that you really should buy a copy of the latest Search Engine Bible and the Update service for a year. It tells the story of search engine promotion in terms that mere mortals can actually understand. Check out the review I ran a while back: <http://www.jimworld.com/sebiblereview/> or just go order it at <http://www.softwaresolutions.net/sebible/>

Anyway, here is the letter Clyde received from Lycos. It says it all.

"I understand that you have been submitting URLs to the Lycos search for several weeks and have seen no results. Because of internal technical issues at Lycos, your experience is universal.

"The searchable Lycos catalog is normally updated every 2 to 3 weeks, but the current release has not been updated since July 1998. Therefore, any submissions since that date will not be reflected in the search results at <http://www.lycos.com>. This does not mean that you are required to submit your page a second time. You may rest assured that all pages submitted since July 1998 have been examined by Lycos and included in our OFFLINE catalog. When the technical issues are resolved, Lycos will merge the two databases and put the updated catalog into service. Lycos Customer Service has not been given a specific date when the update will occur.

"Lycos considers this to be a critical issue, and we appreciate your patience and understanding. The Lycos Operations staff are working hard to assure that the fresh catalog is brought into service without losing critical data from the current catalog. We are sincerely sorry for this inconvenience.

"Thank you for using Lycos."

--Jim-- Just for the heck of it, I went to Lycos and ran a search for 'jimworld'. The JimWorld site came up 12th. Go figure.

The search showed 225 listings for 'virtualpromote' but wouldn't it be nice if the site itself came up first in the list? Makes sense to me.

AN OPINIONATED WAY TO PROMOTE YOUR SITE

One of the most effective ways to promote your Web site relies on a time-honored practice used by aspiring writers to get noticed and break into print. It's the humble "letter to the editor" approach. It's easy -- and you'll be amazed how effective it can be.

There are something like 8,000 newspapers available online, most of which also have print editions. It's a good bet that right now -- today -- one of those papers is running a story on a subject that neatly ties in with the purpose of your Web site. It's also a good bet that you have something valuable to share with the readers of that story. A different opinion, perhaps, or a factual correction. Something that will interest readers without coming across as an overt pitch for your site. If you write a letter to the editor and it's published, voila, you'll likely get new visitors to your site. If the letter isn't published, you've at least established "mental shelf space" in the mind of the writer, who may consult you, and possibly quote you, in a future story.

Now, the question is: how to find relevant stories in the vast ocean of online newspapers. That's easy, too. There are numerous news "agents" that will scan newspapers and other online journals for you, picking out stories that match your criteria. A good Web based service is Excite's News Tracker, which follows about 300 different sources. You create a topic, add your keywords and include a few rules for topic inclusion/exclusion, and you've got an instant list of links to current stories that have a high probability of containing relevant content.

You can also use agents that harvest stories from the Web and deliver them to you via email. News Index is a good free service, but if you want really broad coverage, I'd pop for an account with Inquisit. Inquisit tracks more than 600 sources, and costs $12.95 per month -- a bargain if you consider how much time you'd have to spend searching all those sources manually. Inquisit will even bring you stories from sources that charge subscription fees, so you effectively get "free" access to otherwise costly publications.

Excite News Tracker:
http://nt.excite.com/ntd.gw?page=create
News Index:
http://www.newsindex.com/delivered.html
Inquisit:
http://www.inquisit.com/

Once you've found a story you want to respond to, you need to figure out if you're going to write to the editor, to the writer, or both. This is an important decision. If you write to the editor, your style should be somewhat formal, and you should craft your words for publication. You should always include your home city, state, and phone number, otherwise your letter may not be considered for publication. In some cases you'll need to spend time with the publication's Web site to get guidelines and the email addresses to use for your letter. If a story has come to you via email, you can usually find the publisher's Web site in the directory of online world newspapers published by AJR Newslink: http://www.newslink.org/

If you write directly to the journalist, you can use an informal style that might come across as a tad friendlier, prompting a personal response. Writing for both editor and writer is trickiest. Here you run the risk that the editor doesn't publish the letter and the writer dismisses your letter because it wasn't addressed to them personally. My only advice is to follow your instincts based on what you observe about the writer and the publication.

Now, concerning what you write. Repeat after me: I WILL NOT WRITE AN AD. That's not your purpose, and I guarantee you, in the mind of busy journalists and editors who receive hundreds of them, ADS ARE SPAM, no matter how well written or informative. Instead, your purpose should be to offer thoughtful commentary ABOUT THE STORY from the point of view of an expert. Be short and concise. It's OK to disagree with the writer, or point out errors of fact, but be tactful and polite. If it's relevant, mention your Web site, but only in passing and only in the context of the subject at hand. Your goal should be to leave the reader tantalized and intrigued enough that the first thing they want to do is fire up their browser and type in the URL of your Web site, which of course you considerately provided along with your name, home city and phone number.

Remember, journalists need interesting people like you to provide them with fodder for stories. Give them what they need and they'll return the favor. An excellent primer on the fine art of dealing with members of the media is "The Care and Feeding of The Press," by Esther Schindler. For an opposing viewpoint from a jaded, cynical writer reacting to "inept" attempts at PR, see Alan Citron's "The Great E-Mail Myth." Consider both points of view, but strive to develop your own unique voice. As with a Web site, quality content is what commands attention in a letter to an editor or journalist.

Schindler
Citron

Though it may not be as fun as playing keyword roulette with the search engines, this approach works. In my case, it's almost a better option than spending a lot of time tweaking pages for the search engines, because my site is dedicated to Web search strategies and techniques. The word "Web" is a stop word for most search engines (meaning it's ignored), and the word "search" is so generic it's nearly worthless as a keyword. Other related keywords are also so common that it's virtually impossible to achieve high ranking without an inordinate amount of effort that will be for naught the moment the search engines change their relevancy algorithms yet again.

Another advantage to the letter-writing approach is that it works like an investment that earns compound interest. Here's an example. One of my news agents sent me an article from the Washington Post about how hard searching had become because some theorist "discovered" that search engines indexed only a fraction of the 300 million pages on the Web. I wrote a personal note to the writer and suggested she try a couple of metasearch engines to broaden her search coverage, and added the observation that it didn't really matter that the indexes were incomplete because so many Web pages (politely speaking) sucked, and weren't worthy of cataloging anyway.

The writer called me on the phone, mostly to talk about metasearch strategies, but then asked if she could quote my "sucked" comment. It turned out she agreed with me, but wanted to use my words rather than her own so she wouldn't have to take any heat for expressing that "politically incorrect" opinion! Of course I agreed. To my surprise, she not only quoted me, she also wrote a very nice review of my site, including a screen capture with the site's URL.

This review was read by a writer for Family PC magazine. He called, and ended up quoting me in an article and included a link to my site (which is now permanently archived at Ziff-Davis' highly trafficked site). A radio talk-show host in Cincinnati read the article in Family PC, and he invited me to be his guest for an hour-long show where he repeated my URL over and over again. The "compounding" effects from this single letter continue to this day.

Though it's certainly not as intellectually challenging as outwitting the search engine indexing algorithms, writing letters to the editor is fun and can be a highly effective way to promote your site. So take a break from your page -optimizing efforts, get some agents to scan a few online newspapers for you, and sharpen your pencil. And get ready for a virtually guaranteed increase in traffic to your Web site.

----------

Chris Sherman
Mining Co. Websearch Guide
mailto:websearch.guide@miningco.com
http://websearch.miningco.com

SHUT UP AND DO BUSINESS:

Why the FrankelBiz subscription list continues to explode

I don't know about you, but I grew up on a web where all these high priests of puritanism shunned any discussion about anything having to do with making money. Hey, I'm no Sanford Wallace, but being the opportunistic branding guy that I am, I knew it was only a matter of time until someone, somewhere created a list devoted to doing business instead of just whining about it.

So I did it. And being the consummate branding guy, christened it "FrankelBiz" (see more at http://www.robfrankel.com ) And as the Moderating Dictator, the first edict I issued flew right in the face of the internet elite: No public discussion -- of anything. See, the way the list works is that FrankelBees (as they refer to themselves) can introduce themselves, offer reciprocal discounts on their products or services or look for opportunities to their hearts' content.

There are only a couple of things that FrankelBees can't do: one is respond publicly to the list. Every response must be directed to the FrankelBee who posted the offer. This keeps the list uncluttered and response rates shooting through the roof. They also can't promote any enterprise where recruitment is involved in the prime business model, nor can they post dopey contests where "the first five responses win a framed posted of Pamela Anderson."

At the time I was toying around with this concept, I was writing for Ziff Davis internet Computing and a bunch of columns around the web, building a fairly loyal readership. Well, loyal may not be entirely accurate. How about rabidly motivated? Yes, that's more like it. Within a few hours of announcing a list that actually fostered an environment where business could flourish, we had hundreds of subscribers -- not to mention a couple of sponsors.

Realizing I had a highly motivated, highly responsive readership on my hands, I had to think fast. The first thing I did was duck into a religious uniform shop and anoint myself the Patron Saint of Small Business on the Web. The big hat still slips when I'm marching in a procession, but the purple robe fits like a glove.

Anyway, FrankelBiz offers affiliate and referral programs for sponsors, each of whom has been blown out of the water by the fact that people really would rather make money than yak about whether ".tv" is a viable extension for domain names. Yeesh.

The point, I suspect, everyone else out there seems to have missed the Small and Micro Business boat: people with a cheap PC, unlimited dial up and a 28.8 modem who see the web as their Ultimate Salvation. The fact is that there are more than a few of them. In fact there are more than a few million of them. And judging by our numbers, I'd say they've found a pretty happy home.

Now, you may ask, "Sure, Rob, you claim FrankelBiz is an active business community, but how qualified are your subscribers?"

Oh, you cynical dog.

Alright, you want the high, hard facts? Here they come, bucko: Our turnover rate is way under 1%. In fact, most invalid addresses result from server crashes and are reactivated within a week. Our growth rate since March has been roughly 25% every month -- despite the fact we're not advertised anywhere. And we're probably the only list that can sell a sponsorship or affiliate program without even getting near a CTR model.

Our subscribers are a good mix of webmasters, developers, retailers, manufacturers, wholesalers, advertising and media people. You know how I know that? Because every subscriber fills out a form with that data, along with zip code and first name. Now THAT'S data that sponsors want to know about.

So why am I ranting on about this? Well, a couple of reasons. First, I want to invite all of you aboard to meet the FrankelBees because, without question, these are some of the sweetest, most ethical people you'll ever find online -- and all of them are serious about making the web their premium business channel. Second, Jim asked me if I'd write something for him, and I couldn't resist the opportunity, especially after he sent me that fabulous bottle of wine. But most importantly, I thought more people should know that the days of talking about doing business on the web are over.

And FrankelBiz is the living proof of that.

----------

Rob Frankel
Big Time Branding (SM) http://www.robfrankel.com
Subscribe to FrankelBiz for FREE at: http://www.robfrankel.com/frankelbiz/form.html

PROMOTING YOUR EZINE

eZine Database
http://www.dominis.com/Zines/
Huge directory of ezines You have to be listed here.

EzineZ
http://www.e-zinez.com/index.html
Submit your ezine to this index.

Zine-O-Mart
http://www.argusig.com/zine-o-mart/add/
Add your zine to this directory of ezines.

Zine-World
http://www.oblivion.net/zineworld/
A new zine directory for you to visit and submit.

E-Zine-List
http://www.meer.net/~johnl/e-zine-list/
One of the bigger lists where you can submit.

The Etext Archive
http://www.etext.org/services.shtml
Submit through the email link.

Low Bandwidth
http://www.disobey.com/low/
An excellent resource in support of Zines as the 'real' push technology. Get listed.

E-Zine AdSource
http://home.earthlink.net/~blitop3/
A comprehensive directory of "advertiser friendly" E-Zines and newsletters

ListCity
http://list-city.com/
Several services and directories for ezine publishers. Help in finding advertisers for your zine.

e-Journal
http://www.edoc.com/ejournal/info.html
Lists all types of ezines, but special focus is on academic ezines.

Australian Electronic Journals
http://www.nla.gov.au/oz/ausejour.html
This is a current listing of over 1,000 Australian electronic journals, magazines, webzines, e-mail fanzines, etc. - including overseas works with Australian content, authorship and/or emphasis.

The E-Zine Web Ring
http://zring.hypermart.net/
Find subscribers as they tour the ring.

ListsNet Directory
http://www.listsnet.com/
The Search Engine for Internet Mailing Lists

New Ezine Directory
http://foxcities.com/webpromote
A brand new directory (launching today) of e-zines that accept advertising. Get in on the ground floor.

That's about enough for you to do this week. A comprehensive list of places to submit your ezine is nearing completion in CommunityBuilding.com.

GET LINKED

Here is this week's list of directories you should submit to. Submit to all of them. Most are Hyperseek directories, so they are very high functioning and likely to be well promoted.

Helpware Sites (of course)
http://helpwaresites.com/

You must display the Helpware button on your page to be listed.

PartyFinder
http://partyfinder.net/

Any site is eligible, but main focus is on party and event related sites, products and services. Excellent place to submit travel sites, hospitality sites, venues, entertainment and entertainers. Also any products that would be appropriate as gifts.

Healthlinks.net
http://healthlinks.net/

Healthcare related sites only.

SpiderBot
http://www.spiderbot.net/

All types of sites listed.

NetSurprise
http://www.netsurprise.com/

Submit all webmaster resources.

Linkcentre
http://linkcentre.com/

Any and all sites. Updates instantly.

Internet Resource Guide
http://www.thrall.org/guides/

Developed by the Middletown Thrall Library with selected sites screened for content appropriate for all ages.

OneMission
http://oneMission.com

Submit your URL for indexing. You can also sign up to manage a section of the directory.

PageHost A2Z
http://www.pagehost.com/AtoZ/

Submit any kind of site into this directory.

Free Vault
http://www.freevault.com/addasite.html

A brand new site (not even open yet) that is accepting submissions from sites that offer anything free to their visitors. Be sure to submit each 'free thing' as a separate listing. That will get you more listings and more traffic. This is a 'Must List' tip. Gazeteers get a chance to be on the ground floor of a new directory.

Shareware Updates
http://www.sharewareupdates.com/

This nicely done directory lists other shareware sites. You can submit your shareware site for free. The sites that are in the directory appear to actually get spidered and new and changed shareware is shown for each directory. This is a very cool place to keep track of the new information on many of the top shareware sites on the web.

The Free For Alls Directory
http://gbbaker.hypermart.net/ffadir/search.html

If you have a Free-For-All page on your site, add it to this directory of FFA sites. Free for all, of course.

----------

"Jim:

"It's a measure of my feeling about the worth of JimWorld that I've gone from starting the browser with a blank page to save time to starting at VirtualPROMOTE. It's a reminder to me that I need to do something every day to promote our site (and will, once I get the thing re-designed and a whole lot of new features running).

"Which brings me to something you might like to add to your "Get Listed" section.

"Courtesy of your tip in the last Gazette I went on over to Hyperseek and downloaded their free version of a directory script. I installed it with some trepidation because much simpler scripts have caused days and days of headaches, but I had it up and running in a few hours - even configured to look like the rest of the site.

"Now I'd like to offer an exclusive chance for Gazette readers to list their sites before the directory goes public. It is currently in beta mode - navigation is rough or non-existent and it's not linked from anywhere else on our site yet.

"It's a directory for political and politically-related sites. I've come up with as many categories as I can think of, but if a Gazeteer wants to suggest a new category that's part of the reason I'm beta-testing it, so feel free to ask.

"The URL is: http://www.polemic.net/directory

"Feedback and suggestions to: polemic@polemic.net"

Rex Widerstrom,
Director, Polemic Political Consultants
http://polemic.net
Manager, 'Politics on the Web' web ring
http://polemic.net/webring.html

----------

Peeeepers Days of our Lives Megasite
http://www.geocities.com/~peeeepers/

Apply for their Megasite award and add your site to the Free-For-All page at this extensive Helpware community.

----------

The ToolKit
http://the-tools.com/

Submit your Webmaster resource site to this directory - free.

----------

WebSection.Com
http://www.websection.com/

List your site in their business-to-business (mostly) directory. Free listings remain online for 60 days. Paid listings remain online longer and will appear above free listings for both directory listings and search results.

SNIPPETS

You may have noticed (if you've been good boys and girls and visited the VP home page each day) that the Bumper Snickers that was at the top of the page is now gone. I had put it there to test it out for a review. It has a rotating list of 'cute' bumper sticker jokes which I'm a sucker for.

After many emails from Gazeteers I took it down. It loads too slowly and doesn't seem to have new jokes each day as they claim. I don't understand why it is so sluggish. The applet is a bit too big and their server seems to be slow (guess they aren't using iServer). It is a great idea and deserves to be done properly by somebody. Hint-hint.

----------

With the 5.0 browsers on the near horizon, we can all stop fighting to simulate some degree of design and proper layout techniques for our pages. No more stuffing everything into tables and using invisible GIFs to force placement. Microsoft's release of the 5.0 beta with full support of Cascading Style Sheets and Netscape's promise to support CSS1 standards 100%, life will be good.

Not.

The IE5 beta doesn't even come close to supporting CSS1 as Microsoft promised. So even if Netscape keeps their promise, we are still nowhere. Under that scenario, the browser that first embraced the CSS standards will be the one with the worst implementation. But they do seem to be giving full support to their own in-house invented CSS elements.

It would appear at first glance that the IE team is intent on making webmasters choose to develop just for the IE browser. I can't imagine that Microsoft would ever try to exert that kind of pressure, can you?

There is no excuse for Microsoft to do such an amateur job of programming. One has to assume that there is another agenda here.

If you want to see just how far they missed the mark, head over to The Web Standards Project at http://www.webstandards.org/ie/ It will break your heart.

While you are there, take 2 minutes and show your support by Joining the movement for browser standards. It's free and at least 10,000 should sign up just because it is important. http://www.webstandards.org

Netscape - here's your chance. Don't blow it.

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CashPile
http://www.cashpile.com/
If you have an affiliate program, you should submit it to CashPile.

AssociateCash.com
http://www.associatecash.com/
Get your affiliate program listed at this new directory.

Also, submit to the following:
http://www.refer-it.com
http://www.associateprograms.com/

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InterNetActive
http://homebusinessgroup.com/inter.html

Need a list of thousands of free classified sites and places to submit your site? Want it for free? Armand has it for immediate download. Go get it.

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CoolGraphics
http://www.coolgraphics.com/

Lots to do at this Helpware site. Like pick up some free graphics for your site. Or submit for their site award. I haven't won it yet, but surely that is just an oversight on their part. Probably got lost in the mail. Or their dog ate it.

If you want to win $300 worth of free advertising, take their monthly graphics challenge. They lay out a task and pick the best solution each month. Each month brings a new challenge, so keep on trying. You're bound to win sooner or later.

Use their HTML tag index or read the 10-Step web site design tutorial. Or submit your webmaster resource site to their directory.

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"Hiya...

"I just finished reading your intro to web-promotion... I must say, you've come up with some ideas I probably would've taken a year to come up with. I just wanted to thank you for the ideas... probably the #1 idea that I read was to view the meta tags and content on the site that lists #1 in the area I want to target.

"I run a Freebie site, but I've had the dilemma of being listed on the 3rd or 4th page at every search engine. I will try out the methods you've described. If they are as successful as I think they will be, I'll be sure to let everyone know that you were the one that deserves the credit. I created a Freebie site to give visitors the advantage of coming to a site to gain the information they need to follow their individual needs. Your site is without a doubt the most informative towards my needs. You deserve an "atta-boy" for this one!

"Take Care :)"

Cocoa and G (Charlene and Gary)
http://members.cts.com/crash/g/gap/
http://CocoaAndG.findhere.com/

--Jim (blushing) responds-- Thanks Cocoa and G. I visited your site and found some stuff I've not seen listed elsewhere. Nice job.

I found mach.org <http://www.mach.org/cgi/index.html> on your list.

They provide free cgi script hosting and the server seems to be fairly peppy. You can sign up for the following - free - and they don't run any advertising on your pages and scripts. Just for free.

--Guestbook
--Web Board
--Redirection depending on browser
--Countdown Timer
--Form to Mail
--Random link
--Random quote
--Menu redirection