Anyway for people like my that want to customize every aspect of their site here is a quick copy paste code that you can drop to your pages in order to get the buttons for  facebook like and send, tweet button, google plus and linkedin share

<style>
#pageshare {position:fixed; top:50px; right:5px; float:left; z-index:100000;}
#pageshare .box {border: 1px solid #ccc; background: transparent url("/sites/all/themes/hausfay/images/white60.png") repeat 0 0 ;  
border-radius:5px;-moz-border-radius:5px;-webkit-border-radius:5px;padding:0 0 2px 0; margin-bottom:5px;}
#pageshare .sharebutton,.visit a{margin:5px 5px 0 5px;}
.sharebutton tbody{border: none;}
#pageshare strong {font-size: 11px;margin:5px 5px 0 5px;}
.visit a {display: block;}
.visit img{vertical-align: middle;margin-right:5px;}
</style>
<div id='pageshare' title="Share This With Your Friends">  
  <div class="share box">
    <strong>Share</strong>
    <div class="sharebutton fl">
      <div id="fb-root"></div>
      <script>(function(d, s, id) {
        var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];
        if (d.getElementById(id)) return;
        js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id;
        js.src = "//connect.facebook.net/en_US/all.js#xfbml=1";
        fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs);
      }(document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk'));</script>
      <div class="fb-like" data-send="false" data-layout="button_count" data-width="" data-show-faces="false"></div>
    </div>
    <div class="sharebutton fs">
      <div class="fb-send"></div>
    </div>
    <div class="sharebutton tw">
      <a href="https://twitter.com/share" class="twitter-share-button" data-via="GiorgosK">Tweet</a>
      <script>!function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];if(!d.getElementById(id)){js=d.createElement(s);js.id=id;js.src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js";fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js,fjs);}}(document,"script","twitter-wjs");</script>
    </div>
    <div class="sharebutton gg">
      <g:plusone size="medium" annotation="inline" width="95"></g:plusone>
      <script type="text/javascript">
        (function() {
          var po = document.createElement('script'); po.type = 'text/javascript'; po.async = true;
          po.src = 'https://apis.google.com/js/plusone.js';
          var s = document.getElementsByTagName('script')[0]; s.parentNode.insertBefore(po, s);
        })();
      </script>
    </div>
    <div class="sharebutton li">
      <script src="http://platform.linkedin.com/in.js" type="text/javascript"></script>
      <script type="IN/Share" data-counter="right"></script>
    </div>
  <a style="font-size: 10px;" href="http://geoland.org/2012/01/share-buttons">Get share buttons</a>
  </div>

If you need to customize your buttons go to the following urls

http://developers.facebook.com/docs/reference/plugins/like/
http://twitter.com/about/resources/tweetbutton
http://www.linkedin.com/publishers
http://www.google.com/webmasters/+1/button/

If you inspect the webpage code (html source) you will find following interesting information on each result’s code
< a class="l" onmousedown="return rwt(this,'','','','1','AFQjCNFsMZyfvJ4P55xJMFgxW9PDgnx0fQ','S0iD7nu7jD1AyUSoW_djvA','0CD8QFjAB')" href="http://geoland.org/" >


onmousedown defines the action (function call) that will happen when someone clicks that link.
The call to rwt will probably report to a google central database the search phrase, url clicked, position it was found in (1 in this example), and all other information that google considers important in order to rank websites

This is the code for one of the results, each one of the results has a similar function ready for action when you click on that link.  If the same user comes back to the search results then google probably has a way of reporting a bounce rate to complete the report for that click …

Some people report that google is using analytics for bounce rates but I highly doubt it since it would not be fair because not all sites are using analytics for their statistics and they would only have incomplete records.

Product ID basics

Just about all of the world’s best-known products are based on their identity. Apple, Microsoft, Google, YouTube, Facebook and a range of other product names are literally parts of the furniture online. They’re built in to public perception, and they achieved it by getting a lot of attention with their unique characteristics.

A brand profile is created by information, both directly sourced from the product base and from media information about that product. This process takes time, but it also builds brands. For websites, there are a series of dos and don’ts that define the site identity.

A case in point is the Huffington Post, the major online news and views site. This site uses a combination of celebrity articles, news, gossip and views to maintain a steady stream of content for its users. The Huff Post, as it’s known, was started by Adriana Huffington, using her access to US big names and her reputation in the industry to create from scratch a very high profile, very conspicuous website which receives millions of hits. It’s seen as a sort of “socialite New York” news site, which is pretty much a guarantee of hits from a very wide range of interest groups.

The website identity issue

The average website may not start from an upmarket range with a lot of built-in sources, but the principle remains for successful sites. Range and scope of content are the big drivers for a site which gets attention and rankings. It’s also the key to commercial success, making site advertising and sales far more effective.

So- How to create a site identity which is unique?

The basics are very simple, but they’re also hard work:

• Unique layout and strong visual identity: Visual keys are the initial brand recognition methods.
• Original content: Made in-house or outsourced, content quality is the major driver for real interest.
• Media: This needs to be a strong, targeted and high quality media with good sourcing and very high consumer values. Ironically, diversity is one of the big selling points in this area, with new content and good information values.
• Search Engine Optimization: This isn’t some sort of “mystic technical ritual”. It’s the difference between getting hits and watching the grass grow around your site stats. Good SEO is an extremely effective tool, and largely responsible for new hits.
• Forums and interactions: These are very high value features and attract and keep core users. They’re also a lot of fun, and produce a lot of valuable engagement.

Talent- Going with your strengths

Talent is the best possible asset in website management. If you’ve got a pet subject where you’re a real expert, can produce excellent content, and interrelate with site users on forums, etc. Focus on your strengths, and you’ll find a unique site will create itself. Have fun!

and that you access your site from a browser like this
http://localhost/folder/domain.com/

Mind you not all links and images will be broken in the following situation depending on the way they are input in the body areas.

I have tried numerous modules from drupal.org such as search and replace scanner and pathologic but to no avail (probably due to my bad configuration). I decided to find an easy way to solve little mishap that arises quite a lot.

Here is the SQL commands that will do the trick to correct the paths on the src and href attributes of all node bodies and teaser as well as the block bodies

UPDATE `boxes` SET `body` = REPLACE(`body`, 'href="/', 'href="http://localhost/folder/domain.com/');
UPDATE `boxes` SET `body` = REPLACE(`body`, 'src="/', 'src="http://localhost/folder/domain.com/');
UPDATE `node_revisions` SET `body` = REPLACE(`body`, 'href="/', 'href="http://localhost/folder/domain.com/');
UPDATE `node_revisions` SET `body` = REPLACE(`body`, 'src="/', 'src="http://localhost/folder/domain.com/');
UPDATE `node_revisions` SET `teaser` = REPLACE(`teaser`, 'href="/', 'href="http://localhost/folder/domain.com/');
UPDATE `node_revisions` SET `teaser` = REPLACE(`teaser`, 'src="/', 'src="http://localhost/folder/domain.com/');

I am not an SQL guru thus those 6 lines didn’t come easy for me thus I am putting them down for anyone that might find them usefull.

Just in case anyone wants to go back from localhost to Live environment the opposite should be run on the live SQL server

UPDATE `boxes` SET `body` = REPLACE(`body`, 'href="http://localhost/folder/domain.com/' ,'href="/');
UPDATE `boxes` SET `body` = REPLACE(`body`, 'src="http://localhost/folder/domain.com/' ,'src="/');
UPDATE `node_revisions` SET `body` = REPLACE(`body`, 'href="http://localhost/folder/domain.com/' ,'href="/');
UPDATE `node_revisions` SET `body` = REPLACE(`body`, 'src="http://localhost/folder/domain.com/' ,'src="/');
UPDATE `node_revisions` SET `teaser` = REPLACE(`teaser`, 'href="http://localhost/folder/domain.com/' ,'href="/');
UPDATE `node_revisions` SET `teaser` = REPLACE(`teaser`, 'src="http://localhost/folder/domain.com/' ,'src="/');


Site details before the experiment

The site had the following characteristics 1 month ago right before the link building started

• site has been running for more than 4 years
• site has 8000+ indexed pages recently
• the site has had a history of dropped PR from 3 to 0 because of google penalty 3 years ago which had not affected its traffic at all (the penalty was probably because of questionable outgoing links from the footer which have remained there actually)
• the PR is currently 2 for the last 1.5 years with no SEO done (self adjusted)
• link building was done on it only on the first 3 months of its existence mostly link exchanges with similar niche sites
• site has had 200-400 daily visitors from google organic for the last 3 years with no SEO done on it
• site has had pretty much steady top 100 positions for the same period in VERY competitive niche (probably more than 10K sites of the kind must exist)
• the content of the site can be found elsewhere but its not an exact clone of any other site
• the site is monetized with adsense mostly but not significant earnings

The link building test

Well I have been seeing a lot of talk on Profile links on many webmaster forums (especially the ones that are colored mostly grey to black) and just wanted to see if I could boost the rankins a little bit.  I have ordered a package (as they call it) of more than 8000+ profile links with extra actions that would get them indexed faster from a guy that promises to deliver in less than 5 days.

I know that those are low quality (very low actually) X Rumer links but with the price offered I figured it would be an experiment I could not resist to make.  The links were delivered in 5 days period.  Checking today I can see that about 42% of those pages (3404) ever carried the link and I will see if I can report later the count of how many have been actually indexed, since the package included high ratio of indexation.  Edit: 61 out of the 3404 (2%) where indexed by google and 2404 (70%) where indexed by Yahoo.  My take on this is that google has seen more pages than they actually index.  Webmasters suggest that google might have actually seen the pages and deemed that they are not worth to index since they carry no content and just counted the backlinks on them.

The only other changes made to the site were corrections for more descriptive Titles and 20+ extra footer links that pointed to important internal pages.

The consequences

25 days after this profile link building took place I have seen

• Gradual drop in traffic from google for the last 5 days
• Today most of the google rankings have dropped 300-500 places with some of the rankings completely dissapearing
• Not all rankings/traffic have dropped though
• The site still has 8000+ pages indexed

Could it be coincental ? After all the content is not super unique in any way with more than 10K sites doing the exact same thing. Could it be other webmasters doing a better job at their SEO efforts.  I think not because the site has not had any SEO done to it for last 3 1/2 years.

Could it be something that will self-adjust soon ? I doubt that too.  My take on this is that google has deemed those as bad/paid links and has penalized the site – especially if the fast indexation promised has worked well – what some people I think call it the “google slap”.   Most of these links are on the forum profile of a member and with no other content surrounding them and therefore are probably easy for google to spot and note.   I will keep an eye on this and update this post when I see changes.

The unexpected results

Among the bad google results there is good results too that have actually made my friend happy.  Yahoo and Bing have been giving lots of traffic to the site consequently the adsense earnings have 5x increased.

Here is the details:

• All rankings in yahoo and bing have improved dramatically
• Top 10 positions gained in bing and yahoo for main phrases of link building thus bringing lots of traffic
• 5x increase in traffic from yahoo and bing within 20 days
• Google adsense earnings have more than 5x increased with better CTR, CPC and PPM
• Increase in traffic/rankings/earnings is gradual and not sudden for the last 7 days

Why are those unexpected ?  I have been used to perform SEO with google only in mind since it brings more than 90% of the traffic to the sites I am managing that I had forgotten that yahoo and bing can carry traffic too.  Can this traffic last ? I hope so otherwise my friend might not trust me with his domains again.  It remains to be seen.

What could that mean for SEO

What concerns me most, if my findings are correct, is the future of the rules SEO’s play by.  In the past I was under the impression that a backlink could not hurt, I was so advising in the webmaster forums too.  Logic behind it is that anything outside of the control of the owner of a site could not be held agaist his domain.  Otherwise “BAD SEO” could be done to competitors’ sites.  In other words if google found a good link they could give credit but if fould a bad link they SHOULD not take credit away otherwise this situation could make SEO’s even more manipulative then they already are.

Well this experiment has reversed this belief of mine.  Similar accounts have been found.  John McElborough on Can bad links hurt my site ? in which he shares almost the same concern of SEO professional playing the BAD SEO game in the future.  Another account on Search Engine Watch Can links hurt ? where there is a lot of mixed feelings about the matter.  I am sure more accounts can be dug up but the fact is that not many SEO professionals talk about this topic.  Why is that ?

What is your take on this matter, can links hurt ? Please share your experiences.

EDIT: It appears that google has gone through a major update on 24/2/2011 which I was not aware of which affects 11.8% of the search results and supposed to get rid of non quality sites from the results.  This probably is a better explanation of the sudden drop.  Even if that is the case the post above might still be valuable in certain cases.

The problems with IE and how they don’t support the standards most modern browser support are pretty much known to advanced internet users.  Especially web developers have to struggle endless hours to make their designs fit the “standards” of each different IE flavor.  Yes each IE that comes out has its own quirks (take a look at http://www.quirksmode.org/compatibility.html to find out how compatible is your version of Internet explorer).   The fact that IE6 was preinstalled onWIN XP systems has made it the “browser of choice” for many internet users who don’t know what a web browser is … windows 7 (the successor of Vista) will ship in Europe without a browser installed according to this article but, the fact remains that as of today some 50% of the internet users use IE for their browsing.  Its hard not consider it when designing/developing a site. When developing a site a lot of time is wasted on making sure each and every browser sees it the same way and that includes seperate tests for IE6, IE7 and IE8 and in google’s own words.

Developers can’t afford to ignore IE — most people use some version of IE — so they end up spending lots of time implementing work-arounds or limiting the functionality of their apps.

hopefully either IE developers come out finally with a standards compliant browser or IE users don’t buy into the Microsoft claims and install the plugin …

Have you considered offline promotion methods? True that your business may be essentially online but the people browsing your site and buying your products have a non-internet presence too! Have you ever tried to reach out to them when they are not connected to the internet? This is an area of promotion that falls into the blind spot of most webmasters. The simplest offline promotion would be business cards and classified advertisements.

It is considered customary to put your signature when you post on forums and someone not doing so is viewed as one who is losing some traffic everyday. So, it comes as a surprise to me as to why so many of us shy away from putting our business urls on our business cards. In fact, the business card will last longer than the forum threads on search engines and are potential business hooks whenever the need arises.

When it comes to classified advertisements, the usual reaction is “but then no one reads it”. You could not be further from the truth. Offline classified advertisements are far more popular and read more than their online counterpart. Also it is possible to target the audience better with newspaper and magazine classifieds. Visit your local newspaper office and find out their readership volume. Assuming that even 5% of the people read the classifieds and I am sure you will start believing in a good return on investment. This is because of the low costs involved.

When you do decide to place a classified advertisement, try to keep the information as clear and as short as possible. This is critical and difficult since every word costs in the offline world. This is unlike the online classified sites where 100 words and above are very common. The next mistake that most classified advertisers do is to provide long and complicated urls. Remember that people cannot copy and paste from newspapers to their browser’s address bar! Keep the urls simple and human readable. It should not be that difficult if you are able to use some redirecting software on your website.

Remember that online promotion expenses are more linear in that you keep spending regularly (everyday?) while in case of offline advertisements, the expenses come in spikes (weekly/monthly?). This usually gives the impression that offline advertisements are prohibitively expensive and is suitable only for large establishments. This may not be true if you can set your objectives of the campaign and keep track of what you are doing and how much you are spending.

Earlier, you have learned how an ad marketing package can be built to encourage ad space; now its time to understand the techniques to find advertisers for the website.

The most important thing is to get organized. It is paramount to keep a track of contact details of an advertiser. This helps in development of a system that lets you pursue your ad pitches.

Personally speaking, a basic spreadsheet on excel suits me fine. I set a basic table with a list of advertisers and their contact details. I also put the date when I first made contact with them. This is for future referencing.

I also believe a lot in follow-up dates. I usually like following up a week after the initial contact. The table is my talisman for not making errors of repetition. It is also highly effective to use additional columns for recording history and time-duration for each sold ad space. You should also remember to include eventual ad selling price.

Time-management is imperative. Usually it’s enough to allot 30 minutes to an hour each day even if you are looking for potential advertisers. This would include the time that is utilized in researching and phoning.

Once you are done with an advertiser and time management system, you can safely arrive at the five methods that I am going to discuss.

1. Learn to use Publisher Inventories in Advertising Networks

Networks and advertising marketplaces have a huge website chain to cater to. These websites and blogs sell ad space. Publisher inventories can be very handy in obtaining advertisers. I have written about setting your own ad rate earlier. There I have tried to neatly mention Text Link Ads and Adbrite as two marketplaces that can be used for finding out optimum ad price. In the given case, the two marketplaces also comprise of publisher inventories that help a lot with finding advertisers.

Let’s first use the instance of Text Link Ads. By now, most of you know what it is.

• First sign up for a free account. The account lets you browse the marketplace.
• Next, you can go to a particular category which is associated with your website
• Base your website selection according to the pricing and then navigate to pages with link prices which are quite identical with advertising rates that you have chalked out for your website.
• Further, it is important to look out for those websites which have identical prices. Jot down their names next. Also check whether any ad slots have been sold. It is really helpful to make a website list that has done half the business of selling available link slots.
• For visiting the advertisers, just put in Google, all the names that you have recorded, then you have to click on the sponsored links.
• You can finally contact an advertiser and put across your direct ad marketing package.

This method is deemed good for all the advertising marketplaces online. It might sound time-consuming but then the success rate accorded to it is also high. This is because of several factors.

• Ad and Site Relevancy- publishers are classified as niche. This is why an advertiser buying links on those particular websites will be drawn towards buying links from your site.

• Your ad rate is identical to the link prices that they are already buying. This obviously increases the chance of selling ads to advertisers with a nice conversion rate.

• This goes without saying that the advertisers will be focused on buying links and advertisements. The method spares us unwarranted time loss as we do not have to counter advertisers who shy away from run ad campaigns.

• The method offers great rates. You can verily suggest a lower ad rate if you are using Text Link Ads as a publisher.

2. Look for Advertisers through Search Engines and Competitors

It is among the most fundamental methods of finding advertisers. How to start? Just start searching for keywords that can be associated with your website. For instance, iPod accessory or spy gadget can be the right keyword if you are a technology blog.

Make a list of companies that advertise on your peer websites. Throw them your ad marketing packages. This can include a cover letter or rate card from your side. If your site is frequented by visitors then an e-mail pitch can come in very handy.

3. Sell Links through Webmaster Forums

There are few webmasters forums presently that hold marketplaces which allow buying and selling links. For instance, Digital point’s link Sales marketplace is free to use and many webmasters sit all geared up to purchase links from the website.

The marketplace is full of peer websites and uses SEO techniques. This is why optimal link positioning is rendered meaningless.
Webmaster and affiliate marketing forums is a link marketplace formatted on a forum.

4. Start an Affiliate Program

This is a no-sweat way of finding advertisers. Just lure your traffic. Tell them about a percentage based commission for each advertiser that shows compatibility to your ad rates. Affiliate programs offering 20 percent commission rate are just as good.

5. Approach Other Webmasters/Bloggers in Your Niche

Webmasters look for expansion. So show them related tags. For those selling auto insurance, it would be foolish to sell links of web designing.

People in the game might recommend you against selling ad space to your peers. I believe it is not that shoddy a move as eminence of a site depends on many things. This may include actual content and off and on-site marketing.

Now you know everything about Direct Advertising Sales

This post is my last submission to direct ad sales as a source to generate extra revenue. Hopefully what you have grasped here will hold you in good stead for making more money with your websites or blogs. You are most welcome to come up with your thoughts about how you felt about the series. A note or a comment would be appreciated.

With general link building/English directory submission you can tell the search engines your English keywords by putting them in anchor texts.

How do you promote non-english words that you want to target ?
You have to build links with the words in the anchor but the links have to be on sites built on the language in question otherwise they are of no real SEO use. Thus, specific language directory submissions and article submissions can ensure that the non-English links/anchors are found on the appropriate language pages.

Lately there has been a lot of demand for optimization of non-English keywords and thought it was the perfect opportunity to create a network of partners which can handle specific language submissions.

Interested in partnering ?
If you or anyone you know is offering non-english directory or article submission services  please contact me or have them contact me.

I am looking for people which can also handle the translation of the submission details (description, keywords, categories) into their service language therefore you have to have a good command of the language.

Currently I am mostly looking for European languages (due to my clients sites) which include German, Italian, French, Spanish, Dutch, Norwegian but any other language you master I would be interested to know for future reference.

Please send me your language reading/writing knowledge level, your experience with such a service, directories you have in your possession and the price you are asking for submitting to all or portion of them.

Thanks for your interest.

• Firstly, we can cut the mediators. This increases the money that we can generate. If you sell text link ads through a company, they will take half the price. When you do it on your own, you will have the whole amount to yourself.

• Large networks have the advertising issue well sorted out but independence is another key to succeeding in this area. So if you can chalk out all the requirements, you can sell your ads just like the efficient networks.

• When you sell ads yourself, you tend to have greater control over how the ads should look, what may be the correct blend of content and appearance.

• If you have direct advertisers on your blog, you will be helped greatly with your credibility. When good companies look for your blog site, it is a sure sign that you have quality.

• Some webmaster forums let you buy and sell links. They can help as they are always ready to purchase links for the website.

Nothing in this world is perfect. There are few negative points as well.

• Selling direct ads consume time. This time can otherwise be used for optimizing website, finding major advertisers, and taking care of administrative matters like payments, report delivery, stat track.

• Many things need to be looked after. It is not a ready platform like Google Adsense. You will have to look after the blog, its design, software and so on.

• Sometimes you might need to keep seeking for advertisers every month or as soon as one drops from your list. This can get tiring and the long deals are not that many.

Musts for direct advertising

• For getting advertisers, you must first have traffic in-flow. 1000 unique real visitors are generally good enough. Till you touch this mark, it is time to build traffic rather than looking for advertisers. Google page rank and Alexa ranking are also great help.

• Sometimes a site is very nice, but it does not have a niche audience. Generic sites which cater to many topics do not attract advertisers like niche blog sites. So focusing should be specific.

• If you wish to earn revenue through a site, you must first spend something on formatting it well. Professional designers help with designing the sites brilliantly. No advertiser likes to align his products with a website that is ugly in appearance. For this purpose, you can have flash pages and flash splash pages. Such pages add to the appearance of a site. There is a problem though; they needed to be used with a lot of subtlety as they can hinder texts. If the texts are hindered, Google does not read them and the site is not used by Google.

• For serving your ads, it is important to rotate banners and do stat track. For this purpose, you can install AdServer. A simpler solution is WP-Ads. WordPress plug-in is a great help in serving ads for particular ad zones. But WordPress does not count clicks. Open Ads is a solution that functions even better. It is not very easy to use but once you understand how to use it, it can work the best among all the software’s.

• You must have a page specifically devoted to “Advertise Here” campaign. Here you give all kind of details about the website. The potential investors need to know about certain information before they put their money in a website. Also, make sure that you have some link to that page in the navigation bar. It is better if such link is close to the place where the ads will be displayed. Copyblogger.com shows a great example of such a link.

• Few advertisers may look to contact you after seeing the” Advertise Here” page. The remaining still need to be approached by you. For achieving this purpose, it is nice to have a standard letter. The letter can include your introduction, your reasons for contacting them, site information and advertising options.

• You need to have a cash sending/receiving unit which feasibly transfers money both ways. PayPal is a good option in this regard. It is one of the best online money transfer units today. Look at it this way; if an advertiser is not surefooted about your revenue structure, he might have to think again before investing in the site.

Where to get in touch with the advertisers

• If a company sends back links to your articles, it might also be willing to advertise through you.

• If a company owner leaves a comment on your website, he can be interested in putting ads on your website.

• Many companies know nothing about online advertising. If a company is attached with ad word advertising, then it stands a greater chance of coming to you.

• Type certain keywords and send it to Google. You will find sponsored links that have used similar keywords. This means those sites deal with similar products. You can contact them. Look at it this way. If you sell auto insurance then there is no point in getting back links from a hotel chain.

• Advertise through other networks apart from Google Adsense. Ad Brite and Text link ads are a couple of big names.

• Bookmark a potential advertiser.

• You can also offer a visitor a part of the advertising commission if he finds an advertiser for you.

What to charge

• Make sure that your advertising deals have a high success rate. If an advertiser spends money on attaching himself to your website, he would need monetizing in return. So make sure that your impressions and leads are in place.

• You can cross-check the costs at which you are advertising. It can be done through AdSense. Just evaluate what you might gain with Ad Sense and adjust your rates likewise.

• Offer discount for long deals. Also try fixing deals on a monthly basis.
• If you are sure about your product, offer the advertisers test periods. If it works out for them, you can always look to compensate later.