Well Mists of Pandaria is almost upon us. It is released on 25 September. So I have been busy rewriting parts of my New to World of Warcraft website to encompass the changes to the game. There have been some fundamental changes, but incredibly this has meant relatively little had to be altered on the site.
The changes make the game much simpler for new players, meaning that you don't now need a degree in maths to understand the game mechanics ;-) It is still very layered though and older players will still have a knowledge advantage, especially with regards to game add-ons such as Bartender4.
World of Warcraft is a role-playing computer game once played by over 12 million people worldwide. It is a complex game with various aspects of the game a new player will have no idea about. Follow me and obtain a comprehensive easy to understand guide.
Friday 21 September 2012
Wednesday 1 August 2012
Is Clickbank a Scam?
I know all about the controversy about Clickbank not accepting Paypal payments as verification of your financial identity, but I'm wondering about the honesty of the recording of sales made through affiliate advertising.
My site has had 19,500 visitors to the home page alone, and I know adverts have been clicked on a few thousand times and yet there is no record of me having made a single sale. This seems very odd and I would have thought the statistical odds would have produced at the very least one sale.
I have been very careful to target my ads to my readers interests, so it's not as if that would be a particular problem, and as I said these ads are being visited. I have also been very careful to exclude sellers who are only harvesting follow up email addresses. Of course what I cannot do is stop my viewers from recording the web addresses for later viewing, but it seems to me they are just as likely to revisit through my website. I would love to hear from successful Clickbank affiliates so I know money can be made this way :-)
Which brings me on to Google Adsense and a site I saw saying how much money can be made from them. Remarkably the guy had no Google ads, only ads from companies paying him for the ad space! Now that is the way to make money, it's just a pity he has to lie to his viewers about how he makes his site pay. I left a comment, but I will be incredibly surprised if it gets allowed. It was along the lines of it would take hundreds of thousands of hits, on thousands of websites, to make Adsense a significant revenue producer at a penny per click.
My site is doing OK in the search engine page ranking and can be found under a number of search phrases on either the first or second page, but I have run out of ideas of how to publicise its existence. Social media is often quoted, with Facebook and Twitter highlighted. But it seems to me it's the same old chicken and egg syndrome as to how I find "friends". Once upon a time it was so easy, but nowadays requesting friends is just as likely to get you banned. So I'm a bit baffled to how people can still get thousands. Obviously well known people always will, but how do us normal folk achieve it?
My site has had 19,500 visitors to the home page alone, and I know adverts have been clicked on a few thousand times and yet there is no record of me having made a single sale. This seems very odd and I would have thought the statistical odds would have produced at the very least one sale.
I have been very careful to target my ads to my readers interests, so it's not as if that would be a particular problem, and as I said these ads are being visited. I have also been very careful to exclude sellers who are only harvesting follow up email addresses. Of course what I cannot do is stop my viewers from recording the web addresses for later viewing, but it seems to me they are just as likely to revisit through my website. I would love to hear from successful Clickbank affiliates so I know money can be made this way :-)
Which brings me on to Google Adsense and a site I saw saying how much money can be made from them. Remarkably the guy had no Google ads, only ads from companies paying him for the ad space! Now that is the way to make money, it's just a pity he has to lie to his viewers about how he makes his site pay. I left a comment, but I will be incredibly surprised if it gets allowed. It was along the lines of it would take hundreds of thousands of hits, on thousands of websites, to make Adsense a significant revenue producer at a penny per click.
My site is doing OK in the search engine page ranking and can be found under a number of search phrases on either the first or second page, but I have run out of ideas of how to publicise its existence. Social media is often quoted, with Facebook and Twitter highlighted. But it seems to me it's the same old chicken and egg syndrome as to how I find "friends". Once upon a time it was so easy, but nowadays requesting friends is just as likely to get you banned. So I'm a bit baffled to how people can still get thousands. Obviously well known people always will, but how do us normal folk achieve it?
Thursday 12 July 2012
What is SEO now?
With all the recent changes made by Google I wonder what search engine optimisation really means anymore? No doubt the huge business structure that grew out of the early clamour to please the search-engine bots will try to convince us to buy their expertise and products, but do we really need them now content is King, or supposed to be?
To be perfectly honest I am more confused than ever. I have run around like a blue-arsed fly trying to make sure my sites are in order and that the links I have built up are not over optimised, and so considered as spam. It would be nice to report that all this effort has suddenly propelled my site, Learn to Play World of Warcraft (https://learn-to-play-wow.blogspot.com/), zooming up the page rank and sees me at the top of Google search results, but it has not :-( In fact it seems some of my apparently spammy links are the best for traffic hits, and that the long tail is just a story.
I still cannot understand why my site name does not show up on search results. The actual name and not the web address. I know there is a lot of competition, but many of the search results shown are poor content sites, or sites that have not had any new content added for years. This whole business has got me baffled and thinking it is just for insiders, and is just another big con.
What do you guys think? Are you currently successful? If so, what are your secrets?
To be perfectly honest I am more confused than ever. I have run around like a blue-arsed fly trying to make sure my sites are in order and that the links I have built up are not over optimised, and so considered as spam. It would be nice to report that all this effort has suddenly propelled my site, Learn to Play World of Warcraft (https://learn-to-play-wow.blogspot.com/), zooming up the page rank and sees me at the top of Google search results, but it has not :-( In fact it seems some of my apparently spammy links are the best for traffic hits, and that the long tail is just a story.
I still cannot understand why my site name does not show up on search results. The actual name and not the web address. I know there is a lot of competition, but many of the search results shown are poor content sites, or sites that have not had any new content added for years. This whole business has got me baffled and thinking it is just for insiders, and is just another big con.
What do you guys think? Are you currently successful? If so, what are your secrets?
Tuesday 29 May 2012
I have been very busy this last month running around removing all of my keyword linked phrases from all over the net in a bid to make sure I don't get penalised for what Google now considers spam. Content is, so we are told, the only criterion for deciding the fate of your website now. I am not convinced!
It seems posting the same article everywhere is also problematic. Sites like HubPages only want unique articles and the Google bots will ignore, or so we are told, a duplicate article posted anywhere else. Of course there is still a benefit in posting the same article in various locations because it will have a much larger audience. The link may only be counted once for Google search engine placement, but the link will be visible and garner traffic.
Talking about HubPages they seem to be being more awkward recently. I have never had a problem posting there until this week when one jobsworth got into their head that I was over promoting my website. There was one small paragraph at the end of the article and only one link. I didn't waste time querying the problem or pointing out that in the past I had used the two links allowed. Instead I removed the article and posted it on another site, one with just as high a PR. The problem may have been too many words in bold, but there was no specific mention of that being the case. If Google are now just using content as the criterion then presumably the bots ignore emphasised words and phrases? So again where was the problem? Oh well it was HubPages loss.
It seems posting the same article everywhere is also problematic. Sites like HubPages only want unique articles and the Google bots will ignore, or so we are told, a duplicate article posted anywhere else. Of course there is still a benefit in posting the same article in various locations because it will have a much larger audience. The link may only be counted once for Google search engine placement, but the link will be visible and garner traffic.
Talking about HubPages they seem to be being more awkward recently. I have never had a problem posting there until this week when one jobsworth got into their head that I was over promoting my website. There was one small paragraph at the end of the article and only one link. I didn't waste time querying the problem or pointing out that in the past I had used the two links allowed. Instead I removed the article and posted it on another site, one with just as high a PR. The problem may have been too many words in bold, but there was no specific mention of that being the case. If Google are now just using content as the criterion then presumably the bots ignore emphasised words and phrases? So again where was the problem? Oh well it was HubPages loss.
Wednesday 25 April 2012
Wednesday 18 April 2012
Google, Google, Google!
Why do they make it so damn hard for us new website owners to get noticed?! Have good content they say... I have. Write articles and press releases we are told... I have written numerous. Use linking phrases in your articles we are told... so I do. Use linking phrases for the terms you want to be searched for... so I do! But now we are told we cannot use the same linking phrases because they will be considered spam.
This is the point at which I started hysterically screaming and cursing. The big boys do not have to jump through the numerous hoops that the little guys do and their sites are guaranteed constant exposure. Of course they advertise on Google which helps, but they do not need to do this because their brand name is all they need.
If you have read my previous blogs you will know I have been attempting for a while to get my site noticed and reap the rewards with thousands of hits. Blizzard will be releasing an expansion to World of Warcraft very soon and it is unashamedly targeted at the Chinese market. I would like to be very visible for this launch but I really don't know what more Google want from me.
Most of the sites I am competing against do not market the brand new player niche and many of the guides that are written have very poor content. Indeed some of the sites are appalling and the content is threadbare, yet I cannot compete for the term "World of Warcraft Guide" or even "New to World of Warcraft". The latter is the name of my website, so you would have thought that it would be a fairly simple process to rank on the first page for it, but the last time I searched I could find no trace of my site! As I said in a previous blog, these two terms are the only ones that have significant traffic for my niche so it is imperative that I rank highly for them. However "world of warcraft guide" is so damn generic I have no chance whatsoever of ever being able to rank for it, and the term is not very useful anyway because most of the traffic will not be new players.
According to the Google keyword tool my previously favoured search terms "new world of warcraft player guide" and "world of warcraft beginners guide" do not get searched for. To be frank I cannot believe people do not refine their searches to try to find what they are looking for. I know I do and surely I am not unique?!
Anyway back to Google's decision to penalise websites for spamming the same linking phrases. What I want Google to tell me is what the damn difference it makes? How is it any less spammy to use "world of warcraft guide for beginners" than "world of warcraft beginners guide"? The point I am making is; how the hell do I get the right exposure and traffic for my hard work without getting penalised? I feel Google are unfairly restraining my right to "trade" and are creating barriers to entry into the market place. Apart from Google's obvious domination of the search engines, and hence the Internet, what legal right do they have to restrain trade the way they do?
I know we do not want the Internet to be dominated by useless affiliate advertising only websites and that quality should be the objective of all website developers, but I seriously wonder whether it is right that Google alone should decide. I would like to see a bit of democracy in action and I'm not talking about democratic capitalism, because money is not the webs raison d'etre.
This is the point at which I started hysterically screaming and cursing. The big boys do not have to jump through the numerous hoops that the little guys do and their sites are guaranteed constant exposure. Of course they advertise on Google which helps, but they do not need to do this because their brand name is all they need.
If you have read my previous blogs you will know I have been attempting for a while to get my site noticed and reap the rewards with thousands of hits. Blizzard will be releasing an expansion to World of Warcraft very soon and it is unashamedly targeted at the Chinese market. I would like to be very visible for this launch but I really don't know what more Google want from me.
Most of the sites I am competing against do not market the brand new player niche and many of the guides that are written have very poor content. Indeed some of the sites are appalling and the content is threadbare, yet I cannot compete for the term "World of Warcraft Guide" or even "New to World of Warcraft". The latter is the name of my website, so you would have thought that it would be a fairly simple process to rank on the first page for it, but the last time I searched I could find no trace of my site! As I said in a previous blog, these two terms are the only ones that have significant traffic for my niche so it is imperative that I rank highly for them. However "world of warcraft guide" is so damn generic I have no chance whatsoever of ever being able to rank for it, and the term is not very useful anyway because most of the traffic will not be new players.
According to the Google keyword tool my previously favoured search terms "new world of warcraft player guide" and "world of warcraft beginners guide" do not get searched for. To be frank I cannot believe people do not refine their searches to try to find what they are looking for. I know I do and surely I am not unique?!
Anyway back to Google's decision to penalise websites for spamming the same linking phrases. What I want Google to tell me is what the damn difference it makes? How is it any less spammy to use "world of warcraft guide for beginners" than "world of warcraft beginners guide"? The point I am making is; how the hell do I get the right exposure and traffic for my hard work without getting penalised? I feel Google are unfairly restraining my right to "trade" and are creating barriers to entry into the market place. Apart from Google's obvious domination of the search engines, and hence the Internet, what legal right do they have to restrain trade the way they do?
I know we do not want the Internet to be dominated by useless affiliate advertising only websites and that quality should be the objective of all website developers, but I seriously wonder whether it is right that Google alone should decide. I would like to see a bit of democracy in action and I'm not talking about democratic capitalism, because money is not the webs raison d'etre.
Monday 2 April 2012
So it has to be World of Warcraft Guide!
Oh well back to the drawing board... I decided to have a look at the Google Keyword Tool and duly entered the keyword phrases I told you I was targeting in my last post. Well according to the tool my searches do not register at all, so it seems it is pointless to be top of Google for the phrases I am using, because no one actually enters them into Google :-( Apparently the phrase people enter 823,000 times globally per month is "World of Warcraft guide". I would have thought that this term is far too generic for a new World of Warcraft player to actually find a guide tailored to their needs? Actually it is far too broad, which is why I thought my phrases were more likely to attract the right people to my website. It seems however that Google shows people are not that logical in the way they use the search engine. So it appears these linking keywords to my site will be my best bet: -
New to World of Warcraft
World of Warcraft guide
Well I hope this will soon come to fruition and I find myself on the first page for these phrases and get a share of the 823,000 monthly visitors :-)
New to World of Warcraft
World of Warcraft guide
Well I hope this will soon come to fruition and I find myself on the first page for these phrases and get a share of the 823,000 monthly visitors :-)
Thursday 29 March 2012
I'm Top of the Search Pages
Yeah! Well seems my hard work is starting to pay off, at least in terms of visibility which is the first obstacle in establishing a successful website.
I have a number of search terms I have been targeting for my niche, which is aimed at new World of Warcraft players. If you copy and paste the following terms into Google you will find I am listed at number one:
If you are a new WoW player and need some good easy to follow advice then I highly recommend visiting my site. Even if you have been playing a short while you might pick up some useful tidbits. Just click on link below and take a good look at the various pages...
http://new2worldofwarcraft.com
I hope you like the site and pick up oodles of helpful World of Warcraft tips :-)
I have a number of search terms I have been targeting for my niche, which is aimed at new World of Warcraft players. If you copy and paste the following terms into Google you will find I am listed at number one:
- best free guide for new World of Warcraft players
- best free World of Warcraft beginners guide
If you are a new WoW player and need some good easy to follow advice then I highly recommend visiting my site. Even if you have been playing a short while you might pick up some useful tidbits. Just click on link below and take a good look at the various pages...
http://new2worldofwarcraft.com
I hope you like the site and pick up oodles of helpful World of Warcraft tips :-)
Monday 19 March 2012
My New Wordpress Blog
Can be found at: New to World of Warcraft Blog
I have started this up solely because of the need to have fresh regular content on my website. Google Blog is great but it is not entwined within the actual web structure of my site and therefore it is not recognised by the bots as part and parcel of the New to World of Warcraft website. I am hoping a Wordpress blog will increase the SEO value of my site and improve its page ranking.
I have started this up solely because of the need to have fresh regular content on my website. Google Blog is great but it is not entwined within the actual web structure of my site and therefore it is not recognised by the bots as part and parcel of the New to World of Warcraft website. I am hoping a Wordpress blog will increase the SEO value of my site and improve its page ranking.
Monday 27 February 2012
World of Warcraft Battlegrounds, a Series Continues
I have been very busy since I last wrote here promoting the site through link building, primarily through writing articles and publishing them on various sites.
I have met a few obstacles on the way, nothing new there then, the main one being that article publishing sites are claiming that Google Panda means that they can only use articles specifically written for them. This Guardian newspaper article explains it well...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2011/dec/05/google-panda-update-endangered-species
The problem this creates for me and thousands and thousands of other site owners is that we have to have back links from other sites in order for Google to list our sites. We have to be on page one of a chosen search phrase to have any chance of getting the numbers required to make the site a viable business. The advice has always been to write articles and to syndicate them. Now Google is playing silly buggers because its search engine monopoly is being threatened by EU and US government scrutiny. Quite how article sites can still have contracts with publishers like me saying they reserve the right to circulate my articles, is a bit of a contradictory mystery.
The whole point in writing the article is to have that back link to my site. Google bots pick up on and follow the link back to my site. The reputation of the article site enhances the link and gives my site a higher page index. To show you what I mean: in the author resources box of an article I am allowed to to use phrases you would would put into Google to find information you are after. I use the following linking phrases to my site:
new World of Warcraft players
new World of Warcraft player
World of Warcraft beginners
World of Warcraft beginner's
World of Warcraft beginner's guide
World of Warcraft beginners guide
Oddly enough each of those terms will give different search engine results. Try them yourself to see what I mean. Just look at the number of search engine results. The link itself goes to my site of course but I'm referring to the phrases used. What the link tells Google is that I want people to find my site using those phrases Google tell us that we need lots of legitimate back links to our sites.
Be very wary of companies offering to give you thousands of back links. If Google does not like the back link it will hurt rather than help your page ranking. Quality is better than quantity, although Google wants quantity as well :-(
Anyway the latest articles I have written in my World of Warcraft Battlegrounds series can be located on HubPages:
Not any more as I've moved them to here https://game-guru-4-you.blogspot.co.uk/ and here https://learn-to-play-wow.blogspot.co.uk/
I hope you enjoy them and can find enough people to listen to you in the Battlegrounds!
I have met a few obstacles on the way, nothing new there then, the main one being that article publishing sites are claiming that Google Panda means that they can only use articles specifically written for them. This Guardian newspaper article explains it well...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2011/dec/05/google-panda-update-endangered-species
The problem this creates for me and thousands and thousands of other site owners is that we have to have back links from other sites in order for Google to list our sites. We have to be on page one of a chosen search phrase to have any chance of getting the numbers required to make the site a viable business. The advice has always been to write articles and to syndicate them. Now Google is playing silly buggers because its search engine monopoly is being threatened by EU and US government scrutiny. Quite how article sites can still have contracts with publishers like me saying they reserve the right to circulate my articles, is a bit of a contradictory mystery.
The whole point in writing the article is to have that back link to my site. Google bots pick up on and follow the link back to my site. The reputation of the article site enhances the link and gives my site a higher page index. To show you what I mean: in the author resources box of an article I am allowed to to use phrases you would would put into Google to find information you are after. I use the following linking phrases to my site:
new World of Warcraft players
new World of Warcraft player
World of Warcraft beginners
World of Warcraft beginner's
World of Warcraft beginner's guide
World of Warcraft beginners guide
Oddly enough each of those terms will give different search engine results. Try them yourself to see what I mean. Just look at the number of search engine results. The link itself goes to my site of course but I'm referring to the phrases used. What the link tells Google is that I want people to find my site using those phrases Google tell us that we need lots of legitimate back links to our sites.
Be very wary of companies offering to give you thousands of back links. If Google does not like the back link it will hurt rather than help your page ranking. Quality is better than quantity, although Google wants quantity as well :-(
Anyway the latest articles I have written in my World of Warcraft Battlegrounds series can be located on HubPages:
Not any more as I've moved them to here https://game-guru-4-you.blogspot.co.uk/ and here https://learn-to-play-wow.blogspot.co.uk/
I hope you enjoy them and can find enough people to listen to you in the Battlegrounds!
Monday 23 January 2012
Is Blizzard's World of Warcraft Cash Cow in Decline?
Players are, some would say at long last, becoming cheesed off with Blizzard constantly milking them for more money, and it comes at a time when World of Warcraft has been losing large numbers of customers. Blizzard are facing more and more competition and in harsh economic times people will look to spend their hard earned pennies more frugally.
World of Warcraft's monthly subscription must be the company's biggest income generator by a huge margin and it would seem sensible to start listening to the customers before more people vote with their feet. One of my biggest gripes with the game is that it is a constant grind to achieve anything. Why should it be the case that my PvP gear is not good enough for Dungeon raiding at higher levels? And why should people who like PvE Raiding not be able to use the same gear for venturing into World of Warcraft Battlegrounds?
I know the answers already, they were rhetorical, but it's making the point again that Blizzard are far too deliberate in their efforts to maintain those monthly subscriptions. Blizzard need to concentrate on putting "having fun playing" at the top of their agenda. I would love to try out a dungeon or two (masochistic tendencies you see ;-) but I'm too busy trying to get the gear so I can compete on a level playing field in Arenas. By the time I accomplish that we will already be into a new season and I will need to get the new gear so I can...
The point being I haven't got the time to get both sets of gear necessary to enjoy the different aspects of the game, solely because Blizzard keep moving the goal posts so I will spend money to keep on the treadmill. What Blizzard should be doing instead is creating more real content and tweaking the current content. For example some of the Battlegrounds are nothing more than PvE rushes rather than PvP competitions. Now we all know Blizzard are good at producing RTS games and it cannot be beyond them to develop PvP along similar lines. Although I suppose that they might not want to compete with their Starcraft and Warcraft products, but I don't see that as a credible view point.
World of Warcraft's monthly subscription must be the company's biggest income generator by a huge margin and it would seem sensible to start listening to the customers before more people vote with their feet. One of my biggest gripes with the game is that it is a constant grind to achieve anything. Why should it be the case that my PvP gear is not good enough for Dungeon raiding at higher levels? And why should people who like PvE Raiding not be able to use the same gear for venturing into World of Warcraft Battlegrounds?
I know the answers already, they were rhetorical, but it's making the point again that Blizzard are far too deliberate in their efforts to maintain those monthly subscriptions. Blizzard need to concentrate on putting "having fun playing" at the top of their agenda. I would love to try out a dungeon or two (masochistic tendencies you see ;-) but I'm too busy trying to get the gear so I can compete on a level playing field in Arenas. By the time I accomplish that we will already be into a new season and I will need to get the new gear so I can...
The point being I haven't got the time to get both sets of gear necessary to enjoy the different aspects of the game, solely because Blizzard keep moving the goal posts so I will spend money to keep on the treadmill. What Blizzard should be doing instead is creating more real content and tweaking the current content. For example some of the Battlegrounds are nothing more than PvE rushes rather than PvP competitions. Now we all know Blizzard are good at producing RTS games and it cannot be beyond them to develop PvP along similar lines. Although I suppose that they might not want to compete with their Starcraft and Warcraft products, but I don't see that as a credible view point.
Friday 13 January 2012
Wow Nearly 2000 Visitors Already This Month
But this is because of an Adwords campaign and there is very little evidence that the visitors were interested in the site :-(
I decided to only go with two keyword phrases "world of warcraft beginners guide" and "new world of warcraft players" so that I did not attract generalised world of warcraft searches, but I am not sure how successful this particular aim has been.
Because of copyright it is not allowed to use World of Warcraft or WoW in the actual advert text, which makes life difficult in targeting traffic. However, the title of my website should give the purpose of my site away, shouldn't it?!
Oh well, I soldier on in trying to get my site noticed.
I decided to only go with two keyword phrases "world of warcraft beginners guide" and "new world of warcraft players" so that I did not attract generalised world of warcraft searches, but I am not sure how successful this particular aim has been.
Because of copyright it is not allowed to use World of Warcraft or WoW in the actual advert text, which makes life difficult in targeting traffic. However, the title of my website should give the purpose of my site away, shouldn't it?!
Oh well, I soldier on in trying to get my site noticed.
Tuesday 3 January 2012
World of Warcraft Battlegrounds; a series: Arathi Basin
You can find my latest World of Warcraft Battleground series here:
Game Guru
This one is about Arathi Basin and like all of my guides is aimed at new World of Warcraft players.
Game Guru
This one is about Arathi Basin and like all of my guides is aimed at new World of Warcraft players.
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