The Internet has now surpassed all media except television as a news source, according to consumers surveyed in December 2008 by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press.

In December 2008, 40% of respondents said they got most of their news about national and international issues from the Internet, up from just 24% in September 2007.

Pew said it was the first time since it started surveying that consumers relied more on the Internet for news than on newspapers.

Television was still the main source for national and international news, at 70%.

For young people, however, the Internet now rivals TV as a news source. Nearly six out of 10 Americans younger than 30 said they got most of their national and international news online; the exact same percentage said TV was the main way they got their news.

Like you, I get the occasional email asking if I would be interested in swapping links. I usually politely decline. But that’s not to say that I’m against link swapping. I think there is one situation where link swapping can be a good idea. This article will look at when to swap links and when not to swap links.

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So you decided to do your own SEO? Good for you! You’ve embarked on quite the adventure.

This is part 2 in the “Do It Yourself SEO” series. In part 1 we tackled the issue of whether you should do your own SEO or hire it out. In doing so we looked at four questions and now in this article we will revisit those questions and take a closer look at what it will take to make your website successful.

Before we begin it’s probably fair to give my background as it pertains to search engine optimization. For starters, I am not the smartest guy in the room. I hold no certifications or formal training in SEO/SEM; everything I know has been learned in the trenches over the last eight years. So what follows are some observations that I have learned during my call of duty.

You won’t find advice in this article like: “use heading tags in your copy” or to “make sure you have keyword-rich title tags on each page” or the “significance of landing pages” — while all are good advice, this would turn into a book if I went that route. Instead we are going to look at the skill sets involved in making a website successful. My hope is that by the end of the article you will have a greater appreciation for SEO/SEM.

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We all know how important links are.

They are to websites as sunlight and water are to flowers.

With this in mind it is critical we all understand how to attract links. There are several strategies, from begging other webmasters for links through to viral marketing. The problem is many people get stuck at the begging stage and become frustrated with the whole thing and then never make it past this initial stage.

I believe there is one main cause of this and I think I can clear it up in a sentence …

It’s not all about you!

Really, this is the best advice I can give on generating tons of inbound links to your site.

Put your ego in a jar and lock it tight. You can get it back out after your links have arrived. For now, ignore the ego monster, instead listen to your audience.

• What does your niche really need?
• What do they already link to?
• What do you link to?
• What gets attention from social media?
• What has worked before?
• What is evergreen, consistently attracts links over time?

In a nutshell, think about what your audience wants, not what you need.

The more you give, the more you get back.

The odds of opening a successful restaurant are not good. In fact, 1 out of 5 restaurants fail within the first 6 months of operation and 9 out of 10 are gone after 2 years.

Since there’s no Chapter 11 for blogs to file – we really can’t measure the success rate of a blog. What we can do is look at some common reasons why your blog might be struggling.

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“What’s in a name?” – Well hopefully your keywords, that’s what!

One of the biggest mistakes you can make in blogging (or on any website for that matter) is to not fully utilize your title tags. The title tag has been and will continue to be one of the most important elements in search engine rankings. Title tags are the over-arching descriptor for the page; they communicate with the search engines telling them what each page is about.

So then why is it that so many websites fail to optimize their title tags?

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The question has been asked more times then I care to count: “How do I promote my blog?”

My answer: “One post at a time…”

It’s not sexy, it’s not a quick fix, it’s not a secret URL that you submit to and the rest is done for you. I’m sorry – I have no secrets for you – I wish that I did. The only way that I know how to make your blog a success is “one post at a time”. I will say that I think there’s more to this answer than meets the eye. The answer actually consists of two parts – that’s what we’ll look at in this article.

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