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Jeff's FAQs
These are questions I get asked all the time. Chances are, if you have a question, you'll find the answer right here. If not, please ask...		 Jeff
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Q: How long does it take?

You'll start to see a noticeable improvement in your traffic at the 2-3 month mark. It'll continue to steadily increase until the 4-5 month mark when it'll start to flatten out.

If you have a fresh site that hasn't been promoted before, it'll be quicker than if you have a previously-promoted site. This is because we have to push out all of your old, weaker listings before we can establish new ones.

META Tags/Tuning for larger jobs

Pages:1020304050100100+
Prep/submit:$399$677$999$1326$1640$2858Please
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Maintenance:$125

Q: What's wrong with frames?

A normal site can have one listing for each page on the site. A framed site has only one URL and therefore can only get one listing, which usually only contains frame info (no keywords). To see what I'm talking about, go anywhere on your framed site and view the source code (in Netscape, CTRL-U). You'll notice two things. First, it'll be the same page wherever you are on the site. Second, it'll most likely contain only 'FRAMESET' info. This is exactly what the search engine robot will see when it visits your site. Now you can see why you'll end up with one weak listing, if any.

Next, you'll point to some famous site and ask why they're using frames. Answer: because they're not interested in search engine placement, since they have thousands of dollars to spend on other promotion, like TV advertising and banner campaigns.

Solutions:

  1. List all your framed pages anyway.

    I can get all your pages listed regardless. However, this means that when a user finds your search engine listing and clicks on it, they'll end up on a naked page that should be viewed within a frame. So, this method makes the whole purpose of having frames in the first place redundant.

  2. Make the best of what you have.

    This involves optimising your home page using <NOFRAMES> tags that you may have heard about. However, with this method you can still only get one listing, whereas your competitor who has a non-framed site with ten pages can get ten listings and therefore, in theory, has ten times more potential than you.

  3. Gateway pages.

    Now we're getting on to the satisfactory solutions... I can create powerful keyword-loaded pages for you designed specifically to 'suck in' targeted traffic. Users would arrive at these pages from the search engines, which would in turn link to your main (framed) site. You wouldn't need to modify your main site at all. Please ask me about 'Gateway Pages' if you're interested.

  4. Get rid of the frames (the ideal solution).

    If you'd like a quotation for us to do the job of redesigning your site without frames, please ask.

If I still haven't answered your questions about frames, try visiting our message board and search for frames. The topic has been discussed ad nauseam. Message search page.

Q: What's wrong with CGI?

CGI applications are excellent for taking your site to new levels of user interaction, making your life easier etc. However, CGI-generated pages cannot be promoted, sadly.

CGI-based shopping cart systems are perfect examples of sites generated on-the-fly. The key fact is this: search engine robots ignore URLs containing a question mark.

So, the reason your pages are created on-the-fly by a CGI script is because you need to introduce dynamic info into your pages (in other words, you want to show the user a customised page depending on various conditions). The two traditional methods of getting the dynamic info (the INPUT) are:

  1. Via a Web form - search engine robots cannot fill in forms nor click submit buttons, so this is out of the question.
  2. Via a URL query string - you guessed it, a question mark, which will cause the robot to ignore the page.

Cookie-based carts are fine for promotion since they allow you to use static product pages, but those types of cart only work with cookie-enabled browsers which introduces the possibility of losing sales [groan]...

Q: What's wrong with splash pages (graphics only)?

Search engine robots cannot see graphics, only text.

Try disabling the graphics auto-load in your browser, then view your pages in text-only mode. If you're now looking at a blank page then you're in trouble because that's exactly how search engine robots will see your pages. How are they supposed to keyword-rank your pages if there are no keywords?

If you've done a bit of research you'll now be asking "what about ALT tags?" Well, yes, they're useful to have as a finishing touch but they're by no means a full solution to the problem.

Solutions:

One way or another, you must have plenty of text on your pages otherwise you're doomed. So, you have two choices:

  1. Add text to your pages.

    Quite apart from improving your chances on the search engines, it makes sense to sell your product with text. They used to say "a picture is worth a thousand words" but that was before the Web! Trust me, text sells much better than graphics, online at least.

  2. Ask me to create gateway pages for you.

Q: Do you guarantee top ten placement?

No, we do not.

If you've ever seen this phrase, chances are it was in an unsolicited email sent to you (spam). This should tell you something in itself: if the company in question is so brilliant at site promotion, why do they need to resort to the seedy practice of sending spam?

Guaranteed Top Ten Placement is the new buzz-phrase born from Make Cash Fast. It's designed to attract starry-eyed newcomers who don't know any better. Roughly translated into reality it means:

"We'll charge you $40 then show you a #1 listing for some phrase that nobody will ever search on and therefore will bring you no traffic. If we fail, we might refund you but we're more likely to ignore you since we have 10,000 other suckers who responded to our spam message".

We at deadlock prefer to treat you as if you do have some intelligence. We're in the business of getting traffic to your site. We want you to watch your counters/tracking systems first and your listings second, out of curiosity.

If you're matching us up against another company, the reason you should choose us is because we're a solid, highly experienced, professional company with a proven track record, not fly-by-night cowboys.

  • The Art Of Business Web Site Promotion is one of the most comprehensive tutorials available. We wouldn't be able to write it unless we knew what we were doing.
  • Chances are you found this site via a well-ranked search engine listing, so you know that we practise what we preach.
  • Read what our clients think of us - all comments are posted on an independent site where we can't tamper with them.
  • We've been around since 1995. We were already experts when we started our message board in 1997 to give people free advice.

Our refund policy

... we admit is rather vague. Unlike the fly-by-night brigade, who can afford to offer a 'no-questions-asked' guarantee because they don't do anything for their money anyway, we invest a lot of time and effort in your promotion campaign right from the start (especially at the start). This leaves us wide open to people having us set up their site for them, then demanding their money back for no apparent reason.

We're reasonable, honest people. If you're genuinely dissatisfied (having discussed the reasons with us) then we'll gladly refund you. We're well-established professionals, we don't need to rip people off.

Q: I have a counter and I'm getting no traffic!

So you have a counter eh? Does that mean you have one counter, presumably on your home page?

If I'm promoting ten of your pages, why are you only counting one of them? That's right, users can enter your site at any of your pages. In fact, since your home page is likely to be a splash page without much textual content on it, this probably means you're tracking your weakest page.

Taking this topic a bit further, what you really need is a comprehensive tracking system that will show you full details of your visitors, for example which page they clicked in from (on another site), which pages on your site they visited, which keywords they used if they found you via a search engine, and so on. We can set up a full tracking system for you, just ask.

Q: What do you actually do for the first payment?

I could simply submit your URLs to the search engines and leave it at that. Indeed, that's exactly what most submission services do, so if you're looking to save some money (read: throw some money down the pan) then you won't have to look very far for a company that will be happy to do that for you.

The secret to getting better listings/more traffic than your competitors is to do a lot of careful research and preparation of your pages before submitting them to the search engines. To find out how I prepare and submit your site initially, go here. Your first payment is for points 1 and 2.

Q: What do I get for this $125 charge each month?

Monthly Maintenance means exactly that: maintaining your search engine listings. If I just submit your pages once, within a few weeks they'll drop lower and lower down the list and eventually disappear. In order to keep the traffic flowing to your site, I need to keep a close eye on your listings and if they start to slip I need to resubmit them, or in some cases make minor alterations and then resubmit.

Search engine listings are not like a telephone directory where once you're listed, you're in. It's more like once you're listed, you're in for a few weeks, then you're out unless you resubmit.

Q: I am an engineer and my site sells nuclear reactors. How will you pick the keywords?

You know your own business in great detail, and therefore you may think this makes you an authority on which keywords to target. While there's some truth in this, in my experience business owners sometimes blind themselves to the fact that I'm looking from the other side of the counter. I've studied the sort of keywords people actually type in to the search engines, and these keywords won't necessarily match your more specialised list.

To cut a long story short, please help me out by suggesting keywords, but leave the final decision to me. I'll study your site and your own keyword list in detail and then target the keywords I think will bring you the maximum amount of targeted traffic.

Q: Please let us know if you're making any major design changes.

I am not your webmaster, I will not be making any design changes.

Normally, I'll send you a list of page <TITLE>s and META tags for you (or your webmaster) to paste into your pages, with perhaps some suggestions for extra headings and other tweaks. This way, we avoid a too many cooks situation with one person overwriting the other person's work, designers complaining about corrupting their work... ad infinitum.

If you're HTML challenged I'll be happy to do the work myself, as long as you can give me the correct login info and then leave me to get on with it.

If your site requires any major redesign work (a common example: if your site is in frames) we can do the work as an extra service.

Q: It's been almost two weeks and I haven't seen any traffic yet! What's going on?

Search engine registration does not happen overnight, it can take 2-5 months before the robots visit and index your site. There's nothing I can do about this. However, when your traffic does arrive, it won't be a trickle, it'll be a flood.

If you're not happy with the waiting, feel free to go to one of our competitors who promise to list your site instantly. We'll be happy to accept you back as soon as you realise they were lying.

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