The new Yahoo homepage unveils in the US on Monday and will be open to other regions in July. The new page utilizes “Web 2.0″ functionality such as Ajax, personalization, collaborative filtering.

New versions are available in Brazil, Canada, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Korea, Malaysia, Mexico, the Philippines, Singapore, Spain, Thailand, UK & Ireland and Vietnam.

In July Yahoo! is running a homemade video competition to celebrate the event. They arranged for students from leading film schools to create video shorts, based on a series of scripts about Yahoo! changing. Anyone who wants to participate can make their own videos - using the Yahoo logo. You can submit their videos to a “New Yahoo! Campaign“. The best of these videos will be run in ads across the web.

Yahoo commented on the new homepage claiming it is “the most significant re-design of its flagship destination since the site first launched in 1994″. Yahoo is the biggest Web property having 500 000 000 users worldwide.

To see the full article go HERE

[tag] Yahoo, New homepage, New Yahoo! Campaign, web 2.0 [/tag]

Offpage optimization has no doubt outranked onpage. Link popularity is the offpage factor #1 when it comes to ranking pages in Google (I think other search engines go the same way with every algorithm update). It makes next to impossible for a webmaster to manipulate search engine rankings. As a result, the search results are more relevant and the Internet users are happier.

Techniques for building links are limited, as well as the number of link types:

• natural links/ link baits (the most desirable ones),
• purchased/ rented links,
• article syndication,
• directory links,
• press releases,
• reciprocal links,
• forum signature links,
• blog comments,
• expired domains,
• and a few more.

Apparently, not all links are equal. It is up to you if you would like to allocate some of your precious time for link hunt/ exchange process or will prefer renting a few authoritative links or will keep yourself from any link trade.

I have selected a few resources (from my point – they are best resources on link popularity available on the Internet). Some ideas and points are likely to be outdated as the Internet scene and search engine algorithms change at a fast pace, but the links are worth checking:

www.jimwestergren.com/link-building-guide

www.webmasterworld.com/forum30/34106.htm

www.stuntdubl.com/2005/02/25/tips-to-valuating-text-links

www.stuntdubl.com/2006/04/05/how-to-write-successful-subject-titles-for-link-requests

www.stuntdubl.com/2005/08/31/link-training

www.stuntdubl.com/2006/05/10/link-test

www.thegooglecache.com/?p=15

www.webmasterworld.com/forum12/2956.htm

www.webmasterworld.com/forum12/2876.htm

www.searchengineworkshops.com/articles/leglinkpop.html

www.jimboykin.com/cherry-picking-links-believe-it

www.jimboykin.com/text-around-your-linkskeeping-it-natural-looking

www.jimboykin.com/tips-for-finding-the-best-pages-to-get-links-from

www.jimboykin.com/part-two-tips-for-finding-the-best-pages-to-get-links-from

www.highrankings.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=21788

www.seomoz.org/blofdetail.php?ID=935

www.seomoz.org/articles/advanced-link-building.php

www.seobook.com/archives/001470.shtml

www.linkingmatters.com

www.performancing.com/node/38

www.sitepoint.com/article/delegate-link-development

www.seocompany.ca/derectory/top-web-directories.html

www.text-link-ads.com/link-buying-guide-redirect.php

www.textlinkbrokers.com/wiki/Main_Page

[tags]link popularity, link building, links, seo, optimization, traffic, website promotion, internet, search engine, social bookmark, social bookmarking websites, affiliate marketing, work from home, home based job, affiliate marketing, link trade, text links, link buying, web directory[/tags]

One of the webmaster headaches – where to get traffic for the website. Even if you are doing fine with search engines you would like to steadily increase your traffic. A few extra traffic sources are social networking websites and Alexa Top 100 online giants.

Recently there was a series of discussions on EarnersForum:

Spammin and Jammin on CraigsList
Spammin and Jammin on Digg
Spammin and Jammin on MySpace

When the forum members discuss Digg and CraigsList they agree it should be a good source of traffic, but there is no any example or algorithm how that traffic to get.

I mean it is clear that if your story gets on Digg home page you will get tons of traffic, but the question how to get on that page remains unanswered.

Another discussion ‘I digg you, you digg me’ shows that it is a topic that interests webmasters, but there is no general agreement if Digg.com is a great website or scam. The idea ‘I digg you, you digg me’ was rejected, but the discussion has turned to this - some stories that are placed on Digg home page do not deserve it and Digg site administrators are not objective.

MySpace, website #1 in traffic in the USA, is the most popular topic discussed in that series on EarnersForum. Marketing on MySpace is not much different from e-mail spam – you just send out tons of spam bulletins with the links to your website or to the websites you are affiliated with. Friends are accumulated automatically with some special software. To make the process faster, set up a few accounts. Yes, they can ban you from MySpace, but you should really try hard.

MySpace attracts many webmasters. There are a lot of blog and forum posts. The one that comes to my mind is the recent post on this topic from Todd Malicoat with a few links on MySpace optimization:

• Myspace: Good for more than just hanging out
• Getting to know Myspace
• MySpace gold at MarketingVOX
• Myspace marketing
• My Social Marketing
• Much more on “myspace marketing”

Summary: MySpace, Digg.com, CraigsList look like good sources of traffic at this moment. They are worth your time for experimenting and checking they are working for your niche.
[tags]MySpace, Digg.com, CraigsList, alexa, social bookmark, social bookmarking websites, affiliate marketing, work from home, home based job, affiliate marketing, digitalpoint, earnersforum[/tags]