(Continued)     The Rank for $ales Weekly Newsletter, Jan. 20, 2007. Page 18

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Our two featured articles for the week ending Jan. 19, 2007:

1) Moving a Web Site from One Server to Another

For some reason, you aren’t happy anymore with your current Web hosting provider. Possible reasons might be there’s too much downtime, their servers are overloaded and too slow, or maybe you found a better deal with even more features and more Internet bandwidth elsewhere. Whatever the reasons, moving your Web site from one server to another IS a very simple and easy process, provided you keep a few important things in mind. If you follow the step-by-step instructions in this article, I assure you all will go smoothly.

Please click here to read the article.

2) Search Engine Marketing and Trademarks

In today’s competitive markets, it’s a well-known fact that trademarks and well-known brand names can achieve a much higher conversion rate than with generic keywords. In fact, the direct response television (DRTV) advertising industry estimates that about 21% of consumers watching commercials for an “As seen on TV” product, type the brand name of the product directly in the search box of Google and Yahoo, etc. In the first four or five listings that come up, they then click on the link that will bring them to a website that sells that product. It is also conservatively estimated that about 20% of the people that click on one of those websites will actually buy the product. These statistics are really impressive and prove that trademarks work, not just in TV advertising, but equally as well on the Internet.

Please click here to read the article.

What to expect for in 2007

As I sometimes do on our first newsletter of the year, here are my predictions on what to expect for the next 12 months of 2007:

Google to dominate search
I predict that Google will continue to dominate search and just about all other aspects of its business model. It will continue to impress, both in the field of technology advancement, a vastly superior search engine than all of its competitors combined, and it will increase its overall R&D spending for the year. It's incorrect to call Google a search engine. Google now is widely regarded as a technology company and a technology company is only as good as its R&D. Eliminate R&D and you will rapidly dwindle.

Leasing links will greatly increase your visibility in the search engines

Google will also continue to innovate as it has done since the day it was born in a garage back in 1998. With close to 10,000 employees, Google only hires the best and the brightest engineers, scientists and technicians. While Microsoft is still trying to dominate the operating systems for over 90 percent of the world's personal computers, Google already dominates search and, by default, the Internet itself. Expect a lot more from a company that isn't happy standing still and that constantly wants to innovate.

Will Yahoo remain No. 2 or will it fall to No. 3?
With all the recent changes done at the executive level at Yahoo, observers are impatient to see what will happen next. Clearly, Yahoo has to reinvent itself. For the past two years, its search market share has been constantly eroded to the benefit of Google. Yahoo will have to commit a much greater portion of its revenue to R&D if it wants to better compete against its number one contender, Google.

Another area it will seriously need to reconsider and improve is its Yahoo Publisher Network! I find it difficult to believe that, after more than a year, that program still is in beta and won't accept any advertisers outside of the U.S. The year 2007 will be an important one for Yahoo. Let's hope the big executive shuffle done in December wasn't "too little, too late" and that the company will really pull itself together for 2007.

MSN (or is it Microsoft Live?)
It isn't easy being number three, especially when your search market share is constantly falling. Microsoft can say all it wants, numbers don't lie. They were good at creating Windows and some useful computer software that we use everyday, and I think the company should focus on its core competencies.

Search Engine Optimization and Search Engine Marketing by experts

Unless there are drastic changes in this company's vision and leadership in the highly specialized industry of search, and unless the Redmond company clearly identifies what dosen't work in its current strategy, I predict that Microsoft's search market share will continue to erode in 2007, to the benefit of Google and Yahoo.

Social media
There isn't a day that goes by where I don't read about social media and the large impact it has on the Internet today. Some call it Web 2.0, others social media or some variant. I prefer to call it Media News on Steroids, because that's exactly what it is. Social media is defined by Wikipedia as "the online tools and platforms that people use to share opinions, insights, experiences and perspectives with each other." "Social media can take many different forms, including text, images, audio and video. Popular social mediums include blogs, message boards, podcasts, wikis and vlogs.

It has not yet been determined whether the term "social media" will end referring to charitable works online specifically, or community-driven participatory content sharing generally. Examples of social media are: