Page Rank Update.....

Looks like Google is in the process of updating their data centers for back-links and Page Rank. For those of you who don't know, Pinbottle.com was born on June 13th, 2006, and has been in the sandbox so far. But a "future page rank" tool has shown that Pin Bottle will have a PR of 2 when the data centers fully update. This is pretty cool considering I just heard about a guy who lived in the sandbox for almost a year......Still, it could take Google anywhere from a week to two months to fully update, so we'll have to wait and see.
"Why do I care?"

Good question, especially since Page Rank has very little to do with actual search engine results. But most sites won't trade links with you unless you have a Page Rank, in fear of losing points for linking out to a PR 0 site.

"But I thought reciprocal linking was dead?" you ask....

That's what everyone says, but a few affiliations can't hurt (by a few I mean somewhere around 10 high quality trades), especially if you have 10 times as many one-way links. But most of all, a high quality affiliation will work toward increasing traffic, which is the whole point of the game anyway....

Page Rank

When it comes to Page Rank, it bothers me a little bit that the system can be so easy manipulated. Some site with high PR (including W3.org) sell links to sites looking to improve their own PR. These links aren't cheap, and are too expensive for most small business owners. That's why the system is biased! If you ask me, Google should trash the system altogether....
Just a little self-promo:
Have you visited our Boston based website design small business company? It's called Pin Bottle Boston Website Design and can be found at http://www.pinbottle.com
Hope to see you soon!
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Free Press Releases/Forums/Article Writing

Worked on some free press releases today (ironically announcing this blog). I didn't find many sites offering completely free service, but I did manage to submit around 15 of them. I submitted a few before announcing pinbottle.com, and ended up with a few quality backlinks, so I figured I'd try a few more times to a few more sites.

Joined a new forum tonight, and I now officially belong to two. Seochat is still the bomb, and I really only joined the other so I could drop some backlinks in some posts. I believe in doing this the ethical way though, so I'm going to contribute regularly and not just be one of those losers who shows up just to spam the forum. In fact, I didn't even drop any yet in my new forum because I don't want to rub anyone the wrong way. In addition to getting some great advice, hopefully I'll get some quality backlinks out of the deal. Oh, and that reminds me. My next article will be focussed on defining what a quality backlink actually is (I'm currently working on an article that exposes the myth behind Google's Page Rank system. As soon as it's finished and published, I'll be sure to hook everyone up with the link).
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Duplicate content, article submissions

Finally checked duplicate content percentages between my pages. I checked every 2 page combination, and luckily every page was under 25% except for one pair, so I've got some writing to do. I also did some more article submissions. I probably submitted to over 150 sites. This is the first time I've done this (written free re-print articles) so it's still somewhat of an experiment. It will take some time before Google indexes these pages and, most importantly, finds my link.
The last thing I did was some more directory submissions. It's a pain in the ass, but since some links aren't even real (read "Bad Practices with Reciprocal Links"), I figure bulk is best when it comes to directory submits. One directory allowed me to choose 30 towns within MA, which generated 30 backlinks instantly. This was pretty cool. Hopefully Google will find the pages......
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Articles Moved

After submitting the two articles I wrote to a few publishers, they were suddenly being posted all over the web. This was great news, but I started to wonder, if Google's finding my articles everywhere, will it penalize me for having duplicate content? I mean, one of the reason's I started this blog in the first place was to make Google happy with fresh, original content..... I'm still a little confused when it comes to the "duplicate content" rules (I mean, what if you want to quote someone, and it happens to be a long quote?"). But I figured it was best to play it safe. Sorry for the inconvenience.
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Saturday

I hate Saturdays.....mostly because I'm a huge sports fan but not college sports (which is pretty much the only thing on all day). But the best thing about Saturdays is that Sunday is one day away, which means NFL FOOTBALL!!!
Anyway, didn't do much today in terms of SEO besides write some new content. I did a little bit of reading in seo chat's F.A.Q., but didn't get to optimize any of my code. There's always tommorow (or maybe Monday).....
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Keyword Density

Today I worked a little on keyword density. My keyword's were up around 7%, and after some forum reading, I found it best to drop it down to around 3. I certainly don't want to get penalized or banned so playing it safe seems like the way to go. Plus, I can't imagine Google would penalize a website for 3% or lower (I mean how low do they expect?). Here's my take on it......
Regardless of your keyword density, as long as there is a noticeable difference in density % between your keywods and other words, the serps should be able to determine your keyword. For instance, if your denisty is 3% and your next word is 1.5, then it should be enough of a difference.....
I currently have a #10 ranking in MSN, and know this will drop once my site is indexed showing less density, but Google's my real goal anyway, and once MSN catches up with Google and Yahoo in terms of the complexity of their algorithms, high keyword density won't work anymore anyway.......

Tommorow's project: analyzing duplicate content %'s :)
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It's a miracle!

I finally figured out the .htaccess mystery....
Here's the backstory:
I wanted to create/edit my .htaccess file so I could redirect some of my pages safely to a new directory. Creating the file with the correct commands wasn't the problem though, it was uploading it to my server (which happens to be Bravenet, who I'm not exactly thrilled with). When I tried to upload it, I kept getting an error message telling me that I didn't have permission to over-ride the file. So my first question was answered: Bravenet had a default .htaccess file already stored in my root directory.

Fast Forward....
I openend a support ticket with Bravenet asking them to grant me permission, and days later, with no response, I finally got a tip from a dude in an SEO forum. He suggested I use an ftp client that allowed access to hidden files and to take it from there. My current (and favorite) ftp client Smart FTP didn't seem to have this option, so I Googled "ftp view hidden file" and after downloading 3 programs, I finally got one that allowed me to view the .htaccess file. But that was only the start. After several trial and errors (mostly errors), I finally figured out that instead of creating the file and saving it as .htaccess, I needed to create the file with a .txt extension - then rename the file once I had uploaded it. When I finally got this to work, I though I hit the jackpot, but wait....why wasn't it working? All this effort to finally be able to manipulate the file and I still couldn't get it to work!!! But after a few breaths, I played with the 301 command a little bit and suddenly it worked! To many, this may seem like peanuts, but after all the thought I had put into this thing, it felt like a major breakthrough had occured. I guess that's why I love this stuff. It's like a big puzzle that you put together piece by piece, and when you see the end result, it's amazing....
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301 update

Turns out java script is out in terms of playing it safe (my forum boys came through, maybe I judged them to quickly). PHP is still a big mystery to me, so I need to pursue the .htaccess route. My web host Bravenet is restricting access to the file, so I'm either going to gain access through request or switch to another host. I need access because there's some other cool things I'd like to do via .htaccess.....

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The Title Attribute

Today I spent most of my time optimizing P.B.'s pages, which seems to be a never-ending process considering the constant changes in SEO. I'ver read about alt text in images, but what about title attributes? Should these be combined to mean the same thing to the algorithms? Who knows... I'm just going to play it safe and consider them the same thing and stick to a total of three in terms of how many times I insert my keyword into them (which happens to be Boston Website Design).

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Creating a 301 Redirect

I spent an enormous ammount of time today trying to figure out how to create a 301 redirect. I understand how it would work in an .htaccess file, but apparently I don't have access to the file. I wrote my web host a request to allow me to gain access to the file so we'll see what happens. I'm still confused, however, how 301 redirect works in PHP. I've been able to find the code on the web, but how to I implement it? Do I place it in the HTML file that I want to redirect? The whole thing is quite confusing because I tried to do just that and it didn't work. I've tried to get some answers from a forum I joined recently but everyone seems to be above the subject (pretentious nerds!). Hopefully I'll figure it out but for now I'm going to use a JavaScript to redirect the pages I want. Hopefully it's safe.....

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