Webmaster T's World of Design
Bulletin #3 June 28, 1997
This is not Spam if you have received this you have either requested it via the form on
the site or neglected to turn off the request for the newsletter when you submitted a
request for a review for the award on the site.
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New Format for Newsletter
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Hi All,
Thanks to information I received from another newsletter I am announcing a new format and
frequency for Webmaster T's World of Design Bulletin. The list is now being hosted for
free by the fine people at coollist.com
From what I've seen so far the service is great and all it costs is the little ad at
the bottom. I get to choose from a list they have on the site. I will be checking out the
sites for the ads and will only choose those that may be of interest to you the readers.
This is not an endorsement of any advertiser, I'm just trying to keep everything as on
topic as possible. If it's an endorsement you'll know because I will tell you.
Moving the list has allowed me to add interactivity to the newsletter and give you a
chance to participate and have access to to the wisdom that is present on the list. The
list will be a moderated list and I plan to keep the signal to noise ratio very high.
The frequency of delivery will depend on the input from the list and information that I
find that is on topic and useful. I will also be posting topics for discussion and sites
related to Website Promotion, HTML Tips and Tricks and Internet Advertising. Basically
what's on the site. There will be a new list shortly devoted solely to search engine
placement, placement management and submission but more about that another time.
In regards to HTML please limit your posts to tips and tricks not questions like how do
I put a form on my page? Or look at my site and tell me what you think. These will not be
posted but I will do my best to either direct you to appropriate information, or help you
as much as I can. If you want to participate in lists of this nature I would recommend
hwg.org
The basic and critique lists helped me a lot when I started out.
Webmonster Lists
is another great list with a number of the best designers on the net participating. This
list is quick to respond to questions and has saved my bacon on more then one occasion.
I will add that participating in these lists has been a big factor in the traffic to
certain parts of Webmaster T's World of Design.
This format is going to allow me to inform you of updates to the site in a more timely
manner. In the past I waited til the end of the month and told you all of the updates at
once. Now, I plan to let you know as I finish each article and there is enough new
information or good posts to warrant a new bulletin.
I'm going to post introductions of list members so we can help one another out and
become familiar with one another. Just one caveat! No blatant advertising just an
introduction of your products or services in passing. A good way to do this would be to
tell of a good experience with a certain promotion or marketing method and in passing tell
a bit about your product or service. An advertisement won't get you anywhere, remember I
read every post before it sees the light of day.
Now, that I have told you about the list I guess I should give you posting
instructions. This list will be a digest so if you put your info at the top it will make
the digest more readable and get you more responses if you want them directed to you.
Here's an example
Terry Van Horne mailto:iwb@globalserve.net
Subject: New format
or
Subject:re:New format
if you're adding to a thread. Posting in this manner will make my job as moderator much
easier. Also watch the word wrap so your post doesn't require scrolling. If you don't once
again you won't see the light of day because I find this very annoying.
Other no no's would be the usual list stuff no attachments this includes those annoying
cards in the new browsers. HTML formatted mail (which most programs other then those built
into browsers don't support anyway) will be deleted on sight. If you're giving a site
location use the full address preferably on a separate line like this:
http://www.globalserve.net/~iwb/world/ Mail with incorrect URL's or addresses that don't
work will be deleted as well.
Lastly my pet peeve, no asci art or sig files over 4 lines. I will give some slack in
the amount of lines in your sig by not counting the line with your name on it. Posts with
these indiscretions won't get posted even if there was a hundred dollars in it for me! Yes
a hundred bucks, that's how much I hate that cute asci art and if you can't get all your
info into 4 lines <gentle plug> I wrote ad copy in a past life</gentle plug>
. =============================================
For the first topic of discussion I want to start a discussion about submissions to search
engines and directories. Personally I feel the multi submit sites are a waste of time. The
best results I have gotten are about 60% going through.
So if you figure in the time I spent going to the site and doing the initial
submission, the time wasted looking for the site at the 40% that it wasn't listed with,
then, re-subbing it by hand, how have I saved any time using this free resource? I won't
even go into the quality of the submission to a directory where the category is very
important..
My main point here is, if I can submit my site to the 12 biggies in about 3 hours
(that's multiple pages to some, not just the index) how have I saved any time using a
multi-submit. If you don't believe I can submit my site that fast then you haven't read
the submission tips
Another advantage is by being at the site I have the benefit of reading the FAQ on the
submission page and I know exactly when I have to go and check to see if the submit
resulted in a listing. I use the pages I have up for the Mega List of free places to list
which is designed so you can track your submissions.
Here is another site I used with not much luck or noticeable traffic increase.Broadcaster Free multi-submit. It says it submits
to over over 200 but when I used it the report said my site was only listed with 103. Spam
to ham was terrible. I received a lot of mail selling this, that and the other and can't
seem to stop some of them!
Do you know of any other multi-submit and what kind of results have you had with these
types of sites. Most notably what was the ham to spam ratio.The one above was 10:1 or 1
spam for every 10 listings. This is being generous believe me!
I have never used multi-submit pay service (like submit-it) either and if anyone would
like to comment on this I'm sure there are listees who would like info as to how good the
pay system works. Do you get a better rate of sites being listed ? This may be a clue as
to how the engines view the sites submitted by these free services.
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What's New on the Site
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Meeting Your Sites Goals
This is an article to go with the form on setting your goals for a site. It supplies
information for implementing your goals so the site will meet your criteria for success.
This article will be further updated with material from IWB's Integration and Marketing
Manual as it becomes available.
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Mega List
Not really mega now but I have seen a number of these sites and am starting to go to
each, evaluate it, and add it to the list. My hope is to have 2,000 free places to list
and advertise with for free. Currently there are a hundred or so mainly awards and
announce sites and lists.
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Suggested Surfing and Useful URLs
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Speaking of awards sites here's one I won for site of the day. Even got
some free software.
Link Monster Site of the Day
There is some real neat stuff going on here if you have an award you're offering. I have
already signed up for it and it looks like it is going to be a good promotion once it
starts. There isn't any info at the site yet but Larry is keeping me updated. I will have
more info soon. In the mean time go to the site and submit your link and try to win the
award. I got some pretty good traffic the day I won.
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DevSearch
A search engine that retrieves articles from some of the best HTML references on the net.
Here's a blurb from the site:
DevSearch
Tired of searching the web for the information you need to build web pages? We're
compiling indexes of the most useful developer oriented web sites right here in one easy
interface. So far we've indexed the following sites: Project Cool's Developer Zone
World Wide Web Consortium (w3c) Standards
Netscape's DevEdge
Web Developer's Virtual Library
Webreference.com
Some of these are my favorite reference sites so I will be using it frequently when I'm
looking for HTML info. They are asking for submissions too so if you have a good resource
give it a shot it can't hurt and you'll definitely be in some pretty good company.
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This site recently won Most Favored Site Status From Webmaster T's World of Design
Graphx Kingdom
The Graphx Kingdom is maintained by Andrew Sain. The Gallery has 3,000 icons to download
in several categories ranging from insects and Sports Teams to seven pages of
miscellaneous icons. There are some .zip files for easy download at this well laid out
site.
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Quarterdeck WebCompass
WebCompass by quarterdeck is a great piece of software for researchers and finding
those quality reciprocal links. I learned of this one from a great publication for VARs up
here in Canada. This product got a rave review and my limited use showed it to be all they
cracked it up to be. It comes with 35 search engines installed and you can add more if you
like.
Here's the good part this software really narrows a query and allows you to be exact
about the information, then it goes to all the engines, gets all the information and rates
that information meaning you don't have to wade through the chaff to get to the wheat.
From the report you can bring up your browser and start going to the sites. It's
shareware so if you are ready to start the push for reciprocal links I can't think of a
better way to find the best information. You'll still want to do the method on the site
because this doesn't rate by placement but by relevancy. Remember the highest traffic is
probably going to come from the sites at the top of the list on the search engines.
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I hope to hear from all of you on the list. Participate, it definitely can't hurt and who
knows maybe it will be your good deed for the day.
May the java gods smile on all of you and the demon viruses be few and very, very, far
between!
Best regards
Webmaster T and the World of Design Team
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Sorry you can't tell me I'm full of it anymore! If you must, do it to
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