I heard about you through your articles on Search Engine Guide. You provide some great info in those articles. Thanks. I am new to all of this. In fact, my site just went live last week.

If I could afford to use your services at this point, I certainly would. I will definitely keep your name handy so that when the time comes, I will remember it.

My question at this point is: I have an initial budget of about $300-$500 I can spend on advertising and promotion. Where would you recommend I invest it? It looks like I should avoid LookSmart, but the $300 that Yahoo costs would use most of my advertising budget. I am also looking to use a Google AdWords campaign. What would be your suggestions?

P.S. I was laid off in November and am currently unemployed, so I would love to get off to a good start with the web site. I hadn't even used FrontPage until mid-December and think I have done a fair job of creating a good web site.

- Stan

Hi Stan,

If I were you, I would start by reading all the free stuff that I provide at my site, such as the articles and the past newsletters, so that you can make sure to optimize your site to be the best it can be. That won't cost you anything. You may also want to purchase a copy of Shari Thurow's Search Engine Visibility book. It's geared towards those just starting out, and will help you make sure that you've created your site in a way that's search-engine-friendly.

Currently, the beauty of optimizing your site for high rankings yourself is that it's still pretty much free! Of course, you have to have the time to learn how to do it correctly, and you need to sort out the good information from the bad. If you stick with the info on my site and Danny Sullivan's Search Engine Watch site you won't have to worry about getting too confused. You can also sign up for a paid membership to Search Engine Watch if you want some more in-depth knowledge.

If you don't have the time or inclination to figure out how to achieve high rankings in the free listings, Google AdWords may be your best bet. To be sure you're getting the most bang for your AdWords buck, I would highly recommend that you first spend a little time reading Andrew Goodman's "21 Ways to Maximize Your Google AdWords Campaign". The cost is $49, which you'll get back very quickly once you implement his ideas. Generally, you should be able to tell in the first month or two whether you can make a good return on your AdWords investment. If so, keep at it; if not, keep tweaking it or simply end the campaign.

You may also want to invest in a day's subscription of WordTracker. This will help you for both your regular optimization work and in choosing good phrases for your Google AdWords campaign. A day's subscription should be all you need, and it only costs about $6.

If you decide to rewrite your pages to focus on the keyword phrases that people are actually searching for (as laid out by WordTracker and AdWords), you may eventually want to purchase my "Nitty-gritty of Writing for the Search Engines" special report. It will help show you how you can get your keyword phrases into your copy without making it sound stupid.

That's all I can think of right now!

Good luck.

Jill

P.S. In the interest of proper disclosure, many of the above links are my affiliate links. All sales help in my efforts to give you all the best SEO information I can possibly give -- for free!