It seems that Google is currently experimenting with new robots.txt commands. If your robots.txt file accidentally contains one of the new commands, it might be that your robots.txt file tells Google to go away.

What is a robots.txt file?

The robots.txt file is a simple text file that must be placed in your root directory (http://www.example.com/robots.txt). It tells the search engine spider which web pages on your website should be indexed and which web pages should be ignored.

You can use a simple text editor to create a robots.txt file. The content of a robots.txt file consists of so-called “records”.

A record contains the information for a special search engine. Each record consists of two fields: the user agent line and one or more Disallow lines. Here’s an example:

User-agent: googlebot
Disallow: /cgi-bin/

This robots.txt file would allow the “googlebot”, which is the search engine spider of Google, to retrieve every page from your site except for files from the “cgi-bin” directory. All files in the “cgi-bin” directory will be ignored by googlebot.

Which new commands is Google testing?

Webmasters have found out that Google seems to be experimenting with a Noindex commands for the robots.txt file. It basically seems to do the same as the Disallow command so it’s not clear why Google is using this command.

Other commands that might be tested by Google are Noarchive and Nofollow. However, none of these commands is official yet.

How does this affect your rankings on Google?

If you accidentally use the wrong commands then you might tell Google to go away although you want them to index your pages.

For that reason, it is important that you check the content of your robotx.txt file.

How to check your robots.txt file

Open your web browser and enter www.yourdomain.com/robots.txt to view the contents of your robots txt file. Here are the most important tips for a correct robots.txt file:

1. There are only two official commands for the robots.txt file: User-agent and Disallow. Do not use more commands than these.
2. Don’t change the order of the commands. Start with the user-agent line and then add the disallow commands:
   
   User-agent: *
   Disallow: /cgi-bin/
   
3. Don’t use more than one directory in a Disallow line. “Disallow: /support /cgi-bin/ /images/” does not work. Use an extra Disallow line for every directory:User-agent: *
   Disallow: /support
   Disallow: /cgi-bin/
   Disallow: /images/
   
   
4. Be sure to use the right case. The file names on your server are case sensitve. If the name of your directory is “Support“, don’t write “support” in the robots.txt file.

You can find user agent names in your log files by checking for requests to robots.txt. Usually, all search engine spiders should be given the same rights. To do that, use User-agent: * in your robots.txt file.

What happens if you don’t have a robots.txt file?

If your website doesn’t have a robots.txt file (you can check this by entering your www.yourdomain.com/robotx.txt in your web browser) then search engines will automatically index everything they can find on your site.

Checking your robots.txt file is important if you want search engines to index your web pages. However, indexing alone is not enough. You must also make sure that search engines find what they’re looking for when they index your pages.

[Source : Axandra.com]

User-generated content has taken over the Internet and much of Google’s first page rankings.To see just a quick example of their power, go to Google and search for “Google Assassin”, which is a product that was just recently released by Chris McNeeney And Ken X.The front page results are dominated by sites like Blogspot.com, hubpages.com, and
Squidoo. “Web 2.0? properties have enabled this kind of Google domination.In future blog posts, I will be outlining exactly how to dominate the front pages of Google using social media sites. In the meantime, I’m going to give you a list of 100 Social Media Sites that Pass Page Rank so you can start playing around with them now.These sites range from social bookmarking sites like Digg to blogging platforms like Blogowogo.com. They have been listed in order of descending Alexa rank.

Here is a list of over 250+ DoFollow Blogs. Don’t know what a DoFollow Blog is? DoFollow Blogs are Weblogs that have DoFollow Plugin installed. DoFollow Plugin removes the “NoFollow” tag from the comments. It means that if you submit a comment with your home page to these blogs then Search Engines will count that link as a back link. If you don’t use ‘DoFollow’ Plugin then search engines will ignore those links.

When submitting comments to these blogs please write some relevant and useful content. Don’t Spam! If you submit just one comment to all of them then it gives you more than 250 back links to your Website/Blog. And these 250 back links alone can get you a PR of 1 assuming you have quality search engine friendly articles.

 Steps :

1. Find a decent blogging provider that appeals to you. Some may include MuseCrafters.com, Livejournal.com, JournalHome.com, Blogger.com, WordPress.com, TheDiary.org, Mindsay.com, Blog.com, Diaryland.com, Blogdrive.com, or Xanga.com. Most of these sites are pre-made with templates and push-button publishing that don’t require much technical know-how.
2. Once you sign up, you’ll have a gallery of ready-made templates to choose from. Select one and personalize it. Add your name, interests, images, etc.
3. Add blogging freebies like buttons, images, blog chalks, imoods, tagboards (for example, myshoutbox.com), guest maps, guestbooks, comment boxes for readers’ input, etc.
4. Explore other blog sites that offer more features for a small fee, such as Typepad.com.
5. Decide on whether or not you want your blog to be private or personal: do you want any Internet visitor to be able to read your blog, or do you just want your friends and family to be able to read it? Most blog sites offer the ability to password-protect your published posts so only those who you approve of can view what you’ve written.
6. Decide on how you want your blog to look. You can pick a color scheme and layout. Most sites come with a set of predefined layouts and schemes that you can choose from, or you can edit your own.
7. After you’ve set up your blog, write a few posts to test it out, and make any adjustments to the layout or style that you see fit. At first, it will seem tough to figure out what to write, but once you get into a routine of daily blogging, you will find it addictive. Write about your day, your thoughts, events, ideas, fears, pleasures, the news, current affairs, art, or anything you are interested in!
8. Visit other blogs to build a blogging circle. When you leave comments, add your blogging address so they can visit you too.
9. If you want to make your blog look more attractive, there are some sites up that have many “skins” that might make it look better. One example is blogskins.com, which also comes with Photoshop and HTML tutorials.
10. Publish your blog by sending the URL to your friends or publish the URL on your website. Add the URL to posts you make on other blogs. Done

 Tips :

• If you update your blog frequently, more people will return on a regular basis to read it. Establishing a reader base will motivate you to write more and in turn more people will read your posts.
• Get into a routine of blogging. Make it part of your day. Soon, you will notice things during your day and think, “Hey, I’ll blog this.”
• Personalize your blog. A pretty blog always catches the eye. Visit blogger.com for ideas; they have a list of their 10 most recently updated blogs.
• You could Google for “blog California” or “blog Shakespeareans” (or anything else), depending on location, interests, etc. For instance, if you have a blog on lawns, you may want visit allaboutlawns.com’s forum and other similar type blogs. Circles of interest are the essence of blogging, and it can start to develop you as an authority in the “blog-o-sphere” on lawns or whatever area of interest you choose.
• Keep the posts interesting. Try to avoid focusing on things that most readers won’t find worthwhile (such as “I went to the mall today and saw Kelly.”) Write about things you noticed, thoughts you had, and feelings or ideas. Blog about a recent trip to Spain. Write about the chemical explosion during class.
• Spell check your writing before posting.
• Some sites allow you to make money off your blog by using an Amazon Associates ID or by placing Google AdSense advertisements. If popular enough, your blog could start to pay your bills.
• Don’t feel bogged down if no one visits your site for the first few months. As with communities this large, it will take some time for your blog to get noticed.
• If you want a broad (international) readership, do not use too many abbreviations or slang terms that might not be easily understood by people who are not from your country/area.
• Get interesting news from Yahoo Oddly Enough…, other Yahoo stories, Crayon.net and other websites that you frequently read.
• Blog on a specific subject. You can’t please everyone, so target a specific audience and go with it.

 Warnings :

{Source : http://www.wikihow.com/Start-a-Blog}

This is a common problem. Your web designer has created a beautiful page with nice graphics and great Flash animations. Unfortunately, it seems that search engines won’t list your website no matter what you do.

  This can have several reasons:

  a) The HTML code of your web pages is meaningless to search engines

  Search engines use very simple software programs to index your web pages. A web page that looks great to the human eye can be totally meaningless to search engines.

  Search engines cannot see content that is presented in images (GIF, JPEG, PNG, etc.), Flash elements, JavaScript and other script languages or other multimedia file formats.

  If you use JavaScript links for your website navigation then search engines might not be able to find your website page.

  Solution: Check your web pages with a search engine spider simulator. Spider simulators will show you how search engines see your web site.

  If you use IBP’s search engine spider simulator, you can even enter the name of the spider, so that you can test if Google and Yahoo get different results when they visit your web pages.

  b) The HTML code of your web page contains errors

  Some HTML errors can prevent search engine spiders from indexing your web pages. While most search engine spiders can deal with minor code errors, some of them will send faulty information to search engine spiders.

  For example, your web page could contain a tag at the top of the page that tells search engines “the web page ends here” although your main content has not been reached.

  Solution: Check the HTML code of your web pages with an HTML validator tool. You can find an HTML validator in the free IBP trial version.

  c) The HTML code of your web pages doesn’t contain the right elements

  If you want to get high rankings for a special keyword then this keyword must appear in the right places on your web page. For example, it usually helps to use the keyword in the web page title.

  There are many other elements that are important if you want to have high rankings.

  Solution: Check the HTML code of your web page with IBP’s Top 10 Optimizer. IBP’s Top 10 Optimizer compares your web page with the top ranked pages and it will tell you in detail how to change your web page so that it can get top 10 rankings.

  d) Your web server sends the wrong status codes

  Some web servers send wrong status codes. When a search engine spider requests a web page from your site then your server sends a response code. This should be the “200 OK” code.

  Unfortunately, some servers send a “302 moved” or even a “404 not found” response code to the search engine spiders although the web page can be displayed in a normal web browser.

  In that case, search engines will think that the web page doesn’t exist and they won’t index the page.

  Solution: Use the search engine spider simulator to find out which response code your web server returns to search engines. If the response code is not “200 OK”, IBP’s search engine spider simulator will return a warning message.

If you want to get top rankings on Google and other search engines then you must make sure that search engines don’t misunderstand your pages. Use the tips above to make sure that search engines see what you want them to see.

[Source : axandra.com]

Do you have a WordPress Blog? How many Ping Services are in your List? I had around 20 Ping Services. Today, I have come across this post it has around 50+ Ping Services so I merged that with mine. So now I have over 60+ Ping Services in my WordPress Update Services List.

Go to WordPress Dashboard > Options > Writing and paste the following URLs under Update Services field.

List of WordPress Ping Services

http://1470.net/api/ping
http://api.feedster.com/ping
http://api.moreover.com/ping
http://api.moreover.com/RPC2
http://api.my.yahoo.com/RPC2
http://api.my.yahoo.com/rss/ping
http://bitacoras.net/ping
http://blog.goo.ne.jp/XMLRPC
http://blogmatcher.com/u.php
http://blogsearch.google.com/ping/RPC2
http://bulkfeeds.net/rpc
http://coreblog.org/ping/
http://mod-pubsub.org/kn_apps/blogchatt
http://ping.amagle.com/
http://ping.bitacoras.com/
http://ping.blo.gs/
http://ping.bloggers.jp/rpc/
http://ping.blogmura.jp/rpc/
http://ping.cocolog-nifty.com/xmlrpc
http://ping.exblog.jp/xmlrpc
http://ping.feedburner.com/
http://ping.myblog.jp/
http://ping.rootblog.com/rpc.php
http://ping.syndic8.com/xmlrpc.php
http://ping.weblogalot.com/rpc.php
http://ping.weblogs.se/
http://pingqueue.com/rpc/
http://pinger.blogflux.com/rpc/
http://pingoat.com/goat/RPC2
http://rcs.datashed.net/RPC2/
http://rpc.blogbuzzmachine.com/RPC2
http://rpc.blogrolling.com/pinger/
http://rpc.icerocket.com:10080/
http://rpc.pingomatic.com/
http://rpc.technorati.com/rpc/ping
http://rpc.weblogs.com/RPC2
http://services.newsgator.com/ngws/xmlrpcping.aspx
http://topicexchange.com/RPC2
http://trackback.bakeinu.jp/bakeping.php
http://www.a2b.cc/setloc/bp.a2b
http://www.bitacoles.net/ping.php
http://www.blogdigger.com/RPC2
http://www.bloglines.com/ping
http://www.bloglot.com/rpc/
http://www.blogoole.com/ping/
http://www.blogoon.net/ping/
http://www.blogpeople.net/servlet/weblogUpdates
http://www.blogroots.com/tb_populi.blog?idhttp://1
http://www.blogshares.com/rpc.php
http://www.blogsnow.com/ping
http://www.blogstreet.com/xrbin/xmlrpc.cgi
http://www.lasermemory.com/lsrpc/
http://www.mod-pubsub.org/kn_apps/blogchatter/ping.php
http://www.newsisfree.com/xmlrpctest.php
http://www.popdex.com/addsite.php
http://www.snipsnap.org/RPC2
http://www.weblogues.com/RPC/
http://xmlrpc.blogg.de/
http://xping.pubsub.com/ping/

Did I missed some service(s)? If yes, feel free to add those URLs as a comment below and I will include those URLs to the list.