What Happened To Scroogle and Scroogle Alternatives

If you were a scroogle user, then you already know how useful tool it was,for those of you who do not know, scroogle allowed you to search without your own bias and preference, meaning you got more better view of your ranking. If you search your own site in google, Google gives it more preferential treatment for your own site, having search and worked on it. For example, if I were to search for “Home Business Ideas” in google my site would come up much higher ranking on my computer, compare to say someone else truly searching for home business ideas search. It would be inflated ego boost to see my site ranking higher but it would not be right ranking. So if you want a unbiased ranking, scroogle was a great and free alternative to other paid services that many Internet marketer used.

I have been relying on scroogle to find out my site ranking for free. Yes, you can find your website ranking with market samurai or other paid tool, but scroogle did that perfectly with ease and simpleness to use for anyone.

I knew once in a while scroogle goes offline so after days when I was unable to get any searches done in scroogle, I had to find out what happened to scroogle and why it was not working for more than a few weeks.

What Happened to Scroogle?

Whenever scroogle was down, people used to see “google is mad at us” type of message. This time there was no message but it said scroogle is not found. I had to find out that what happened and I found out that it was not Google who shut down the site, it was shut down by its own owner after much frustration, read here : Daniel Brandt at Betabit Article. Nice, free alternative site was attacked by hackers to create denial of service issues. God knows why any hackers want to ruin a good, free service like scroogle is beyond me. But scroogle is gone this time and unlike 2010, it seems scroogle is gone for good.

Find Scroogle Alternatives:

So, if you used scroogle or interested in scroogle alternative, that let you do annyomous search and find your website ranking, what a person to do? I did little research and found a few alternatives which may work as scroogle alternative for now.

What Page I am On:

This is a neat little free search engine tool. You enter your keyword and website URL, it will tell you what page your keyword is sitting on. It does not tell you ranking by number, but you will know page it is sitting on. Currently, what page I am on site is able to do first 10 page searches and be able to tell you if you are there or not.

What I like about What Page I am on:

Free
Enter keyword and URL to know your ranking
Easy to search

Things to consider:

Only first 10 pages search
Does not tell ranking # such as #35 or #1, just tells the page URL shows up

Page Wash dot com:

Page wash is free search engine tool where you can do specific search, for example, google.com or google.co.uk for UK based search and so on. You also will have an option for remove all cookies, scripts, remove ads and so on.

Things I like about Page Wash:

Anonymous search
Free
Country, place based search result if you want
Can clear cookies, scripts
remove ads and hide referrer information

Things to consider:

It does not tell you ranking, you have to find it

Duckduck go:

Duckduck go claims to have more privacy than Google and it surely has less ads and spam ads above compare to Google. Seems pretty neat for searching online.

Things I like about duck duck go:

Pretty neat name for a search engine: seems like we are playing a game 🙂
Free
Less ads and spam
Private searches

Things to consider:

For ranking you will have to dig and search through your site info
Search engine results are bit different than google ranking

Start Page:

I am beginning to like start page a lot. You can do private search through ixquick proxy, it does not record and keep your IP information and search are based on unbiased google search. What is not to like;

Free
Anonymous search
No IP recording: protecting your privacy
Unbiased search results
Quick

Things to consider:

Ranking have to be manually searched in

Additional Choice:

There is Encrypted Google for those who may trust google to give unbiased search result. I have used it and it tends to give US based search which is fine for me, as I am US. However for those outside US may not get clear search result for their countries.

Top 10 Simple and Doable Traffic Ideas for your Blog

Blogs are popular ways to create an online presence for personal and business reasons. You can build a blog for free and begin posting content right away. But, what good is that content if no one is reading it. Here are ten ideas to bring in the traffic your blog needs to survive.

Of all the successful blogs on the Internet, hundreds more have failed. Running a blog is like running a business website. Unless you are willing to put the time in and treat it seriously, you won’t be blogging long.

That is not to say that the failed bloggers weren’t serious about blogging. Mostly, new bloggers aren’t prepared for the work that goes into creating a successful blog. Just building the blog doesn’t mean that people will necessary come to you. You pursue the audience and give them a reason to see what you have to say.

1. Fresh Content – no one wants to visit a blog day after day and see the same posts. Update your blog content at least twice a week. This will be easier if you write several posts ahead of time and upload them at the appropriate times.

2. Article Marketing – the niche you’ve chosen for your blog is one that interests you. If it is interesting you will spend more time doing it. Create content not only for your blog but also to be submitted to article directories. Use the resource box to advertise your blog so people can find you.

3. Social Networking – these sites are everywhere. Join Facebook, MySpace, Squidoo, Twitter or a dozen others and make connections. You can join groups of likeminded people who are also bloggers or entrepreneurs.

4. Viral Marketing – this is where you spread the word about your blog. Talk to friends, family and even strangers. Give out business cards that have your blog address on them.

5. Use RSS Feeds – RSS stands for “Really Simple Syndication.” Readers can subscribe to your feed and get email updates when new content is posted. It is an easy way for them to keep up with your blog without spending all day online.

6. Submit Blog to Search Engines – doing this allows your blog to be ranked. Google and Yahoo! are two of the most popular search engines you want to crawl your blog pages. It doesn’t guarantee top ranking, though. You’ll have to do a little more work for that.

7. Joining Forums – as a blogger you are a budding entrepreneur. Right now you are marketing yourself to find traffic and then profit. Become a member of business forums, work at home forums and others to meet new people and share ideas. You can add a link to your blog in the signature line so others can find you.

8. Visit other blogs – show your appreciation to those who visit you by also posting comments on their blogs. It is a kindness that shows others you are not just out to advertise your blog alone. Add links to your blog in your comments.

9. SEO Marketing – whatever you write, use relevant keywords. Keyword density between three and ten percent is good for getting higher page rankings in search engines. Base your keywords on a research you do to find the most popular words used in search engines for your niche.

10. Social Bookmarking – submitting posts to social bookmarking sites allows others who are members of those sites to track you back to your blog.

Using any of these ideas will start the traffic moving in your direction. It takes time but you will build the readership you want.

Top 5 Quick Tips To Get Website Traffic Quickly!

Online, one of the most significant keys to success is getting website traffic. The more visitors you have, the better your sales and profits. Presumably you have a niche and you know your keywords, and regularly conduct keyword research to stay on top of what’s popular. Based on those assumptions here are five quick and easy tips to get website traffic fast!

Tip #1 Make sure you’re actually tagging your keywords.

Do you spend a lot of time optimizing your content and then neglect to tag them on your webpage? Tags are where search engines look and if there are no tags they’ll pass right by your web pages. Here’s a quick brief on tags.

There are a number of tag types including,

* Title tags. Title tags are quite possibly the most important place to situate your keywords. Here’s what they look like -Primary keyword phrase here.

Your title tag is where you place your primary keyword or keyword phrase. The sentence will describe your business in less than 90 characters.

* Header Tags. Header tags are next in order of importance to search engines. They’re ranked in order of importance and look like this –

Primary and/or Secondary keywords here

The “1” designates this header as the most important header on the page.

* Meta Tags. Meta tags provide the small descriptive text found underneath the title tag on the search engine results page. Like title tags these should be kept brief, informative and up to date.

* Alt Tags. Alt tags are used to provide a text description of a graphic. Each graphic on your site should have a description and an alt tag.

Tip #2 Add content to your site daily

Content is essential for traffic and a top search engine ranking. Content is what search engine spiders look for and index – without it there’s nothing to index or rank. Give visitors and search engines a reason to visit and index your site. Make a commitment to provide daily, optimized content and your traffic will soar.

Tip #3 Procure valuable and relevant incoming links

The more websites which link to your webpages the more valuable search engines perceive you to be, though not all links are created equal. Search engines give more leverage to links from sites which are popular and credible and from sites which are relevant to your website topic.

There are different types of links.

– A direct link looks like a basic website address, for example, www.yourwebsite.com

– A text link occurs when the webpage address is embedded in the text. Readers simply click on the link and are redirected to a new website page.

– If the link is to an internal web page, for example an article published on a website, rather than the home page, it is called a “deep link.”

You can encourage linking to your website by:

* Adding content to your site.
* Submitting to article directories.
* Publishing press releases.
* Blogging and participating in social networking forums, chat rooms and social networking sites.

Tip #4 Be Social!

Now more than ever before, internet marketing is about building a community. Whether you offer a forum on your website or you participate in social networking sites, social networking is a valuable traffic generating tactic. Sites like Facebook and Twitter can be powerful tools for generating links and traffic to your site – create a profile and then post comments, links to your site and ideas which generate conversation.

Get involved – many chat rooms and forums are industry specific, find those which cater to your industry, and begin participating. Speak to and connect with a highly targeted audience.

Tip #5 Advertise for more exposure and traffic

Advertising, when handled strategically, can be used to promote your content and products or services. PPC advertising is often the tool of choice because you control the advertising budget on a daily basis and have the tools to test and track your advertising efforts. Once you’ve honed your PPC ads the return on investment can be phenomenal in terms of traffic and purchases.

For maximum results, create a traffic and SEO strategy. Outline your plan and your goals and then take the necessary action. Take advantage of these five traffic and search engine tips to boost your business.

Google Ranking: 5 tips to Rank High

Most Google ranking tips deal with getting incoming links (or backlinks as they are also referred to) to your website. And for good reason. The more quality incoming links (determined by the rank of the site that the link originates from and the relevance of the keyword) you have, the higher your Google Page Rank will be and the more visible you will be to your prospects and/or customers. Here are some tricks to build your incoming links.

Submit your site to search engine directories. some directories charge a fee but many of them are free. If you’re on a tight budget, stick to the free ones. These can get you some free links back to your website. Sign up with as many as you can. The more links you have into your site, the better your page rank.

This is one of the most overlooked but best of Google ranking tips. Join forums that are relevant to your industry. When you participate in forums and include the link to your website in your signature, you will get links back to your website. This is a very effective way to establish your reputation in your industry and raise your page rank at the same time.

Create an ezine (or newsletter). Taking the time to create a newsletter that you can send out to subscribers is definitely worth it. This keeps your visitors up to date with what you are doing and brings them back to visit your website on a consistent basis. You can also submit your ezine to an ezine directory which will link back to your website and give you more free incoming links.

Take advantage of article marketing. If you can create (or hire someone to do it for you) articles that pertain to your business, with your website information at the bottom, and submit them to article directories, you will get more traffic and links.

Ask for links from other related sites’ webmasters. This is a rather “old-school” tactic but is still effective, albeit frustrating and time-consuming. Find sites that are related to your industry and write to their webmasters requesting that they link back to you. Some will not answer you. Some will say “no”. Some will ask you to link to them as well. And others will just link to you.

You have higher chances of getting the results you want with this if your site contains valuable information. While your ultimate goal is to have high-rank sites linking to yours, you can start out with any rank (as long as the content is valuable and relevant to what you have to offer). As you bring in more links, your rank will go up as well and you will be able to attract the higher ranking sites.

Hopefully these five Google ranking tips will help you achieve the ranking and traffic you’re aiming for.

Backlinks and Link Popularity Tools

Everyone in blogging and internet marketing knows the importance of backlinks and tools that people use to gain backlinks, are they worth it?
Before discussing the link popularity tool, let’s discuss link popularity itself. What is it? Link popularity basically refers to the total number of web pages which link to your web site or any of its individual pages. The reason it is so important is because this is one of the main factors that search engines use to evaluate your website and where it will be ranked. If your website is ranked high with the search engines, you will come up in the first results when a potential customer goes online and searches for what your business offers. That’s why webmasters are concerned with their link popularity.

So what is a link popularity tool? It depends on the tool. There are many facets to link popularity and link building so there are tools that correspond to those aspects. Some tools will perform an analysis on the various search engines to show you how many pages are linking to your site. They can also tell you which pages are linking. Some will actually give you a score so you can judge how well you are doing. Some will give you the opportunity to compare your site to others. Most free tools will only give you the results from the biggest search engines like Google, Yahoo and MSN.

You’ll probably notice that the amount of links varies significantly from search engine to search engine because the figures displayed represent the number of inbound-links that are known to each search engine in particular and will vary based on the size of its database. Search engines also figure out certain inbound-links (again, this varies according to the search engine) so certain backlinks may not figure into the total.

While you don’t want to become obsessed with using this tool or checking the data all the time, it is important to keep tabs on your links. You want to keep your links as high-quality and relevant as possible and knowing where they are coming from can help you manage that information.

After you analyze the information that you get from your tool, you can then continue on with your link building strategy. Many tools are also connected or related to other services that can help you with this realm of link-building as well. Just remember that the same rules apply if you should decide to go with a link building service to take care of that aspect of your business. You want to get a quality service so make sure you do your research in order to get the most bang for your buck. While many link-building tools are free, link building services are definitely not. However, what they save you in time and effort could very much be worth it in terms of cash.

By all means, take advantage of a link popularity tool and then decide if you plan to go as far as to hire someone else to handle your backlink strategy.