Hopefully you are running some statistical accounting method on your website and/or blog like Google Analytics. By tracking the information in and out of your site, you will also be made aware of pages that either got lost in the shuffle, were eliminated completely but still referenced elsewhere on your site (that you forgot to remove the link to), or pages seach engines like Google (for reasons unknown) expect to be there, but aren’t.

These are known as your 404 page errors, and letting them pile up can be a time consuming task to set straight and (potentially) hurt your standings.

Mostly they are just a pain in the neck to get search engines like Google to stop seeing. In fact, years ago on a completely different hosting server, I did use the cgi-bin (we don’t now). And, even though the hosting had changed numerous times, those cgi-bin 404 errors kept haunting me. So when I saw a recent incoming newsletter about this problem, I figured it’s a good time to give everyone either a heads up or reminder to track these down and eliminate them.

In fact, Mary Peng of Web Analytics World has recently put out an article on how to make the most of those inevitable 404 errors. She writes:

No matter what type of site you may have, 404 errors may cost you something. It might not be money, but it’s costing you something. Retail sites could be losing money. Other types of sites, however, may be losing something just as valuable… pageviews… return visitors… things like that….

The truth is, your site could potentially do that extra 10-25%, you just don’t benefit from it because your visitors are encountering 404 page not found errors. These visitors can be potential browsers and buyers, but once they hit that 404 page, they’ll leave and bring their money to another site.

Within her article, she also suggests another resource that gives you some great suggestions on how to fix up your 404 errors.

You’ll also discover some very interesting and creative ways you can make those dreaded 404 errors more entertaining. Here are more cool ways web owners have created their 404 pages.

So don’t wait too long. Do stay on top of these “lost pages.” Put them to valuable use and never lose another visitor to your site again.

Comments Welcome! Please Add Yours!

I’ve been so darn busy that it’s been a few days since I had the time to stop and do what I love… post something new on this blog.

However, it was worth the wait since we have several new resources you’re sure to find worthwhile, including information on how to start or get a job offline or on.

The first is Knol: A Unit of Knowledge. Not unlike a blog or wicki (or maybe just like a blog or wiki lol), Knol is a byproduct of Google where you can “share what you know and write a knol.”

With a PR of 7/10 (it’s Google’s own remember) and Alexa rank of 1 (again, it’s Google’s own), you can’t go wrong posting stuff you know and getting it listed and indexed in Knol.

The second item we’d like to share is a resource called Big Hit System, a pushbutton marketing resource run by a great guy named Steve Russell. Steve has put together the tools and resources you need to get the job done online. The best part? I’ve spoken with Steve and discovered another (gasp) online marketer willing to – yes – pick up his phone! He’s also been online long enough (since 2003) to know of what he speaks – another rare commodity and huge bonus for you! They even provide you with no obligation information on the home business right for you.

And while this next one is not new, if you’ve been hearing about the canonial tag and are still confused about whether you need to use it or not, that bolded link will take you straight to Google itself to read all about it. Best to get information like this straight from the horses’ mouth versus trying to interpret a third party’s interpretation. Website owners, article writers, and anyone with possible duplicate content on the same domain should read up on this “new” tagging system.

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Last but not least, if you’re looking for a job or a change in career, head on over to this information found at the AARP website. You do not have to be of retirement age to benefit from these job suggestions. They provide 10 ideas to help you make extra money fast. Again, these ideas are for ANY age and they even suggest “going rates” for what you can charge, how to get started, and more. Remember if you found this or any of our other posts and pages of interest, please comment. We love comments! (And it’s free marketing for you.)

Ugh Greymatter comes to the rescue again with this interesting post I found last night. Owen had updated some of his videos and the one that caught my eye, and turned out to be very entertaining was the one about “Twitter in Plain English.”

So thanks to Owen, you, too, can be entertained in the simplest of forms, this YouTube video:

Now for someone to come up with a way that tells me how to manage to Tweet all day and still get work done LOL!

Enjoy

Telling you video is huge is a bit redundant at this stage, however… video is huge.

The question you need to be asking yourself isn’t “should I be using video,” but “how do I get the most out of putting my videos online.”

That’s where this great sticky tips on videos comes in handy, compliments of Webproworld.

Your videos are found via “clues on the page” where your video file is embedded. The discussion does cover both hosting videos on third party web sites like Viddler and the all-famous YouTube and the pros and cons of self-hosted videos.

Spreading your videos around is also a good thing. We’ve found that while you could host the video yourself, viewing times are greatly “speeded up” for your viewer when they are hosted on sites optimized for video viewing.

In addition, pick your third party hosting sites carefully. For example, should you choose Viddler, you are able to edit the title (use your keyword in the title), provide a (keyword rich) description, and tag it. YouTube is great, but at the moment spots like Viddler top our list. And, search engines pick up your video very quickly!

Here’s a bit more about optimizing your video online, condensed, of what you’ll find when you visit the Webproworld forum link above:

1. Sitemaps …video sitemaps are a recommended way to give Google information about the video content of your site…

2. RSS Feeds …Google loves to crawl RSS feeds of various types, and this includes RSS feeds that focus on video content…

3. Metadata …metadata is the best source for search engines to determine what your video is about…

4. Provide a transcript …embedding a transcript in the video viewing page will provide the search engines with a wealth of content to index…

5. Optimize the video page …where the video is embedded focusing on the key topics of the video. Context seems to be an important factor…

6. Use friendly URLs …provide the search engines with additional clues as to the relevant topics of the video.

7. Be consistent when distributing your video …this will give you more opportunities to show up for your target term…

8. Prepare for the future of video search …By taking these steps now, your videos can remain relevant as search engines improve their scanning and indexing capabilities.

Again, a trip to the forum is in order to fill in the gaps of what I did not include.

Also, the responses to this sticky post on video optimization are worth the read.

Not everyone is prepared to jump on the video bandwagon at the moment, but arming yourself to use this immensely popular form of internet and social media marketing in the future is a sure winner.

Related articles

• Netvibes: The new social media dashboard (vator.tv)
• YouTube Video Alerts For Your Inbox (performancing.com)
• Viewzi Launches Site Search (centernetworks.com)
• Sitemap Submission Made Simple (googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com)