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Flash movies are a great way to add multimedia elements to a web site. Unfortunately, Flash cannot be indexed by most search engines. For that reason, it is very difficult to get high search engine rankings for Flash sites.

Even Google officially tells webmasters that it is difficult to get ranked with Flash sites: "If fancy features such as JavaScript, cookies, session IDs, frames, DHTML, or Flash keep you from seeing all of your site in a [simple] text browser, then search engine spiders may have trouble crawling your site."

It doesn't help much to optimize your Flash pages

It is very difficult to optimize Flash pages for high search engine rankings. You can use tricks like the <object standby="your message to show while loading"> attribute or the <object title="your movie title"> attribute to add keywords and text to your Flash elements.

However, this doesn't allow you to create enough content so that search engines consider your web pages relevant to a special keyword.

You can also create special text pages that are only presented to search engines. In that case, search engines might ban your web site from their index because you're cloaking.

Is it absolutely impossible to rank well with Flash sites?

Although it is very difficult to get high rankings with Flash sites, it is not impossible. The trick is that you don't have to optimize your web page content. You have to optimize the links to your site.

The top result on Google for the search term miserable failure is not on position one because the web page had been optimized for that search term. The web site is on position one because very many web sites link to that web site with the text miserable failure in the link text.

That means that you can get top rankings on Google without optimizing your web pages. The problem is that you have to get many incoming links that contain the keyword for which you want to get high rankings in the link text.

You can get top rankings on Google without optimizing your web pages

To get your web site to the top of Google's search results, search for web sites that are related to your site. Ask the webmasters of these web sites to link to your web site and ask them to include your search term in the link to your site.

The more links you get, the higher your rankings will be. As getting links is a time-consuming task, we developed ARELIS to make the link-building process as easy and efficient as possible. ARELIS helps you to locate related web sites, ARELIS tells you how popular these web sites are, ARELIS helps you to contact the other webmasters, ARELIS creates your link pages for you and much more. You can download the demo version here.

If you cannot change the contents of your web pages than it is very important that you get many inbound links to your web site. If you have many good inbound links, then you can get high rankings without optimizing your web pages.

Of course, it is much easier to get high rankings if you have many inbound links and optimized web page content. If you want to learn more about the way inbound links and outgoing links influence your search engine rankings then take a look at our free link popularity eBook.

Google launches 'Checkout'

"Google’s new service enabling consumers to make purchases from online stores using payment and shipping information they keep on file with Google, officially launched with the name of Google Checkout, rather than the rumored GBuy."

U.S. sponsored search listings no longer on MSN

"MSN's U.S. search distribution agreement with Yahoo! Search Marketing ends this month, and Yahoo! Sponsored Search listings will no longer appear in MSN's U.S. search results."

Microsoft on Click Fraud: pay per percentage ads 'highly robust to fraud'

"Microsoft Research is studying advertising methods that are 'highly robust to fraud' and ways to eliminate 'the incentives for click fraud in a system that sells clicks.'"

Google afraid of becoming too successful

"We also face risks associated with our trademarks. For example, there is a risk that the word 'Google' could become so commonly used that it becomes synonymous with the word 'search' If this happens, we could lose protection for this trademark, which could result in other people using the word 'Google' to refer to their own products, thus diminishing our brand."

Search engine newslets

• Ask.com rolls out new search tools for blogs.
• Yahoo-MSN IM interoperability behind schedule.
• Watching Google's margins.
• Google's costly rebellion.
• Uninstalling Google Desktop can break the Internet.
• Google invents its way into the future.
• Disposable Google products left and right.
• Take a look at fake web site flags (humor).

Google tries to have page-ranking suit dismissed

"Google can use any criteria it wishes to rank Web sites, including downgrading competitors, a lawyer for the search giant told a federal judge [...]

Any Google user knows the rankings are opinions, and Google can make them using any criteria it wants - including giving poor rankings to competitors - without telling users."

 

Inside Google's new-product process

" For outsiders looking in, Google's flurry of product releases can appear random and a bit confusing. [...]

[Google's] track record outside of search has been tepid. Does Google have a case of product attention-deficit-disorder? Or is there a method behind this apparent madness?"

Related: So much fanfare, so few hits

The Google risk list: Eight vulnerabilities impacting Google

"In the latest publicly available 10-Q statement, first quarter, 2006, Google identified a myriad of risks it faces, as it seeks to maintain its search dominance and its revenue growth rate."

The final IBP version 9 is now available. IBP 9 helps you to get more visitors, more customers and more sales.

IBP 9 offers everything you need for web page optimization and inbound link optimization. Just take a look at the free demo version.

We're looking for feedback to the all-new IBP/ARELIS version.

Tell us how the new IBP/ARELIS version has helped to improve your web site.

The names of all participants will be entered into a raffle for an iPod Shuffle. Thank you for helping us make IBP a better product!

The winner of the iPod Shuffle (who accepts the prize) will be listed in this newsletter. This offer is valid until 31 July 2006.

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