Watch for Mark C. Robinson's new column in the top ranked online renewable energy publicaton -- RenewableEnergyAccess.com

In this letter and in his articles, Mark C. Robinson, with over 30 years experience in computer technology as well as a pioneer in the renewable energy field offers a few basic concepts that
will bring you new customers.
Put Your Website to Work!

The Energy Grid offers your company Website Design, Hosting, and Marketing Services to the renewable energy industry.

Table of Contents for this Letter:

1. The Three-Second Rule: You have three seconds to inspire your website visitor to say:
   "I'm in the Right Place." Are you positive your website accomplishes this? (Read on for more).
2. The Power of Change: How often do you update and change your website? Did you know that Google gives a higher ranking to pages that update frequently? Read on to find out why and learn how you can make changes to your own website without paying your web-designer.
3. Text Buttons: Many website navigation buttons are graphic, rather than text -- pictures of words rather than the words themselves. This looks nice, but Google can't read them and their indexing agent will skip pages on your site, making them invisible to searchers.
4. Get Googleized: If your site appears when someone searches for your company name, that's good. If it appears when your potential customers search for your product, that's great! Understand how to get, and keep a high position on the search result pages.
5. Pay-Per-Click: There are a few search phrases that you cannot afford to be missed on. Make sure you appear with strategic pay-per-click ads.
6. Is the Internet Thinking about you? See what Google, and the internet think about you with these simple internet commands.
7. What are people searching for? There were 27,500 searches for "Solar Energy" on Yahoo in December and 500 searches for "Energy evil genius project solar". Find out what people are looking for and use this in your marketing strategy.

The Three-Second Rule. Actually, this isn't new to the internet -- it's been around since the dawn of advertising. If your customer, in seconds, doesn't think he's in the right place, or can't figure out where to click, he's history! Just observe your own web habits. Internet marketing involves understanding who is coming to your page, why they're coming, and how to speak to them. Determine the 'goal' of your website and what's on your prospect's mind when he gets there. Then address that thought with words that say "You're in the Right Place, and it is easy to get the answers you're looking for. Click here to learn more/get pricing/schedule a survey/sign up/contact us." A website can have several 'goals' and different pages that address them.

The Power of Change: Google's goal (along will other search engines) is to put the best page first and pages that change frequently are better. Who wants yesterday's news? Our websites are "User Managed Systems." This allows you to make changes to the text as easily as you edit a Word document -- without paying a web-designer every time you want to add an article or make a change.

Text Buttons:

Get Googleized with a professional partner: Getting top rankings in search engines is an art and a science and questionable tactics will get you banned from Google. It happened to BMW! A search engine optimization partner knows your business, the industry you work in, and how your customers think.

Pay-Per-Click: If you're selling PV systems in Hoboken, how badly do you want someone who types "PV Systems Hoboken" to be directed to your site? Mouth Watering Badly! Regardless of how Google ranks your sites, or who else comes up, you can be assured a position with bolded words on the front page by offering to pay (usually between $0.15 and $1.00) when that searcher clicks your ad. But pay-per-click is fraught with fraud and dead-ends. You want to know what you are doing, or work with someone who does.

The Internet is Thinking about You!
Google site:www.YourSiteName.com to see what Google thinks your site is.
Ideally, you should see every page of your website here, along with clear titles and descriptions of every page. If not, minor changes to your website can have major impact on your rankings... or perhaps you answered a "top ranking..." spam ad and got blacklisted for trying to trick Google.

Google link:www.YourSiteName.com to see who is linking to you.
When Google looks at the internet and sees that just about every renewable energy website has a link to you... what assumptions do you think that Google makes about your site. Right! You have one of the most informative sites in the industry. Who links to you, and why, is a critical factor in getting good rankings. Who are your link partners?

What are people searching for? Yahoo makes a valuable resource available at inventory.overture.com. If you type in a phrase like "Solar Energy" you'll see how many people searched for this, and for similar words. These results from Yahoo are mirrored in all other search engines. It's a clue into what people are searching for and can help you determine profitable goals for your website.

The point here is that internet marketing is a key to success. Mark C. Robinson of The Energy Grid, with a strong background in renewable energy, computers, and the internet, can help you design and position your website for success.

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