They are testing a concept where users can remove items from search listings (presumably that are not relevant or desired as opposed to removing say a competitors listing from the listing).

The concept here is that they want to gain the intelligence of why people do or do not like a listing without any scientific backing from it.  This social media application on Google’s search engine listing could radically change the way search works as well as radically expose Google’s rankings to manipulation (hence the need for a long drawn out beta).

I don’t expect to many of us will be given the opportunity to see an Orovo review on this anytime soon, but eventually this might well be an alternative search option for users that want to use it.

Its called Associated Content.  This is typically a site that pays people to write and create news and how to articles.

They do not encourage link building at all, however, if you have a good resource or supporting source, you can include a link or two with your articles.

Please understand, I am not indicating that you should use AC like a link farm, but it can help.  Plus, its also important to consider that they can provide you with a world wide audience on a large platform.  Its important to keep this in mind so that you don’t bring any unnecessary luggage to your writing or articles.

Why do Search Engines Offer Toolbars?

First you have to understand why search engines offer free toolbars in the first place.  They do it for 2 reasons:

1. To help you use their search engines more often
2. To gain information about what you are looking at on the internet even when you are not searching

Now, that second one is the item that can bring you more traffic!

Search engines gain information from a number of areas including things such as analytics code that sit on websites.  Absent analytics code they often rely on free toolbars. 

If a search engine can not see the activity that is taking place on your website because their analytics code is installed on your site, then they can not give you credit for the traffic you receive.  Running your browser with their free toolbar installed however can give them the ability to see what is going on when you view your sites and when your readers view your sites when they have the toolbar installed.

You do not even have to have the Toolbar turned on all the time.  I run toolbars from Google, Yahoo!, Alexa, MSN and 10 other companies.  I usually only have 3-4 running at most at a time.

So give it a try, encourage your readers and visitors to try the toolbar as well.  Let Yahoo! see how popular your site is and this will help you increase your ranking within their search listings. 

Example:  Maybe you run a small business and have a website and a blog where you sell TV stands and tv wall mount fittings.  Offer your visitors and customers a free toolbar or contact us and we can help you set up an unrelated landing page to offer them a free toolbar.  Then when they visit your site or your blog, the search engines will be able to see the traffic successfully landing on your website from the Toolbar gathering metrics.

If your sites importance is invisible to Yahoo! or any search engine, odds are it is not going to rank well at all.  That means fewer referrals from natural search, fewer visitors and readers and less business in general.

So try the tool bar out today and start helping yourself get some more traffic.

Now, the single hosting plan is something that I signed up for years ago.  I tend to collect domain names like I collect checking accounts.   My old hosting plan keeps auto renewing each year at the same price that I paid when I signed up.  The rates for the same plan have come down since then, but they keep charging me the historical rates.

I have thought about transferring everything from the server the site sits on and pushing it to my own server to consolidate things and save about $100 per year.

The only thing is that this is not always a good thing to do for Search Engine Optimization purposes.  Search Engines can view sites all sitting on the same server that happen to link to each other as one collectively controlled group and therefore discount the value of the links.

Now, I don’t use the sites to build up links between each other.  They just happen to sit where they sit and they just happen to link where they link, but for some people this is a decision that they must make and a situation they should consider in their strategy.  Consider where you put your sites, how you group them together on servers and under common IP addresses.  You might even consider mixing their placement with multiple hosting companies and in some situations you will want to take a look at hosting your sites or backups in different countries or geographical regions.

There is a time and place for each of these actions and you should review which options are right for you or your clients.

Some of these tools include Directory Submission tools.  Some of these you can pay for and some of these you can do yourself.

My advice is that if you are building up a blog, you should use this list of over 125 blog related directories.  It takes some times, but can definitely benefit your blog.

If you are building up a website, especially a business website, then you should consider having your business site submitted to the primary directories the right way.  For this I suggest PrioritySubmit.com.  Let them do the work, cross the T’s and dot the i’s and insure that you get into those major web directories in the way that you want to be listed.  You can attempt it yourself, but odds are you will have to submit and resubmit multiple times if you don’t follow the red tape just the right way.

	Priority Submissions
	48 Hour Inclusion to all major search engines and web directories with PrioritySubmit.com!

If you are blogging about football or the Super Bowl, that is one thing and the right avenue is to get listed in directories that target blogs and the people that are looking for information on those blogs.

If you are running a site that sells Superbowl tickets, then a blog directory listing isn’t going to fit well (unless you have a related blog to promote too).  In this case you will want to insure that your site is listed in DMOZ and Yahoo and Ask to name a few.

Your domain name could be xyz.com and your domain title could be “ABC Information and Sales”

To give you a real life example take a look at MoreMouse.com, they focus on Orlando rental home and condo sales and leases.

With a name like MoreMouse and a focus on Orlando you might be thinking a disney theme, but they are working to focus on real estate.

Site Title

Orlando Vacation Homes, Florida villa, condo and town house rental – Lowery’s Vacation Homes

That’s a long title, but for title relevancy Whois scores them a 100%!

Note that when you look at the actual site, you won’t see that long title provided for the search engines.  Instead they use a graphic image.

So they enjoy the best of both worlds.  Good site title, simple domain name and a graphical image on their site to convey who they are and what they are about in a simple way.  (note the  repetitive use of the domain name in the graphics.  You do want people to remember how to find you!)