Search Engine Considerations for Entrepreneurs: Things You May Not Have Thought Of

When Google changed their ranking algorithms a few weeks ago, it threw both the SEO (Search Engine Optimization) industry and the entrepreneurial community into a turmoil. While the larger sites remained fairly stable, thousands of small businesses and web entrepreneurs who rely heavily on search engine traffic found themselves suddenly slipping from top spots into search engine limbo, and losing collectively millions of dollars in traffic. Of course, let's keep in mind that thousands of others suddenly found themselves with a windfall of new traffic!

There are plenty of resources available out there to help entrepreneurs learn about search engine placement, but the basics remain fairly constant: keyword research, keyword density, keyword placement, and link popularity. A great starting point is with our Web Search Guide, Jennifer Laycock, who maintains lists of SEO resources, SEO tools, and a guide to SEO 101.

This week I'm featuring three articles about some lesser-known aspects of search engines and how you can best leverage them for your business:

Google Yourself: Maximize Your Visibility—What does Google have to say about you? If you don't know, you'd better find out. Those skeletons in your closet may not be as hidden as you think. Or worse yet, you may have someone else's skeletons!

Getting Found: Achieving Visibility Without Spending a Lot of Money—Marketing communications expert Jim Schakenbach shows you how search engine marketing considerations affect even how you write white papers and other marketing pieces.

Case Study: Using a Weblog to Achieve #1 Rankings in Google—Lee LeFever of Common Craft Consulting shares his best practices in using a weblog to achieve #1 rankings in Google. This is great stuff—cutting-edge research.