Zorba

Most folks haven't - which is why I try to get the word out!

Another way to keep SPAMbots from getting your email address is to have a contact form that is filled out right on your site. Its a bit complicated to set one up, and you do need to put some kind of captcha to stop SPAMbots from using it to send you SPAM - but they work well once in place.

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-Zorba
"The Veiled Male"
http://www.doubleveil.net
"There is nothing sadder than a veil, that is for sale."

Samira_dncr

Personally, I've seen proximity make a difference in a number of searches. So I tend to be an advocate, but it's also one of those things that you begin to pay attention to when you've done all the basic work.

Here's an example.

Assume someone does a search for "learn to belly dance".

Let's consider the title tags of two potential sites that google could rank for this search. Site A has a title tag called "Dance Lessons in California: learn Tahitian, Belly, Latin, and more" and Site B as a title tag "Belly dance classes: learn from the best teacher in California".

Neither of these sites contains the exact phrase "learn to belly dance" in the title; however, both contain the words learn, belly, and dance. This is where proximity matters. Site B is more likely to rank higher in this search because it has at least 2 words that are in close proximity to each other...and the 3rd word is pretty close too.

Savvy SEO folks will fine tune their title tags to take advantage of multiple phrases. I know one studio that used to use the following title tag "Learn to Dance: Lessons, Classes, Workshops in Salsa, Jitterbug, Latin and more." They took advantage of the "learn to dance..." phrase as well as the over lapping "dance lessons..." and then used proximity to maximize each of those.

But again, proximity is something that you start to pay attention to once you've done the basic work of researching your phrases and targeting specific keyword phrases.

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Samira, Las Vegas Bellydance Intensive

Ankebuzz

Wow, I'm thinking SEO (Search Engine Optimization) could be quite a fun job.... anyone here do it a lot?

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Ankebuzzzzzzzzzz

Samira_dncr

I have a small web design company and so we do some SEO work for clients. I used to do more of it. It's a ton of fun, but it is really hard to stay on top of all the changes. Sandbox filters, PR distribution...blah blah blah.

The one thing I learned that I found to be very valuable was that the actual layout and design of your site makes a big difference. Very few web designers know this. Frankly, most designers I know could care less about SEO, and most SEO techs I know are really lousy designers.

I try to do both for my clients, but honestly, there is so much work that goes into good SEO that very few people really appreciate the amount of $$ that it would take to get it done.

It's more fun when you are working on your own site too.

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Samira, Las Vegas Bellydance Intensive