A subdomain is usually a section a root website that has a different DNS alias. An example of the root domain of a website could be “example.com”. An example of a subdomain would be “subdomain.example.com”. Subdomains should generally be used when there is enough content to support a standalone website, but when the content is still closely associated with the main subject or theme of the website. When using subdomains, the SEO has to be careful, though. Depending on the algorithm of the targeted search engine(s), they might not rank as high as when the content is segmented into a subdirectory of the site. They are effectively treated as a separate website by search engines, and multiple sites with the same root domain with similar content do not generally rank as high as multiple pages inside the same website. If you include the same content in multiple subdomains, the search engines will quickly catch on and start degrading the search result ranking because they will be considered as multiple sites with the same content.

Organizing content into subdirectories is generally easier to maintain than if the content belongs to different subdomains. The content is inside the folder structure of the root website so it can be easily moved without having to modify the DNS settings of website. This is not true for a subdomain. The DNS records must be changed to preserve the integrity of the link. Subdirectories are the best choice when you want a page to target specific keywords that are related to each other and the root domain’s theme. Subdirectories can rank higher in SERPS (Search Engine Rank Pages) since they are closer to the host domain.

Subdirectories also add content to your website, which can be good for new websites because they give search engines more content to help them judge how pertinent they are to the keywords the user is using for their search. A page that is a wealth of keywords, for example a blog, should be contained in a subdirectory of the main website since it is closely related to the main domain and can be used to increase the ranking of the main site.

Both content organization methods are useful tools in the SEO’s repertoire. Both are equally valid in certain circumstances. The SEO should take the algorithms and practices of the targeted search engine(s) into consideration when deciding whether to use either method of structuring their website content. Depending on their target audience, page ranking strategy, and the organization of the content, one method might be more useful given the current situation. As in most subjects dealing with technology, it all depends on the problem at hand to determine which one is better than the other.

Basically, the Vault enables fans to search for individual plays and highlights from their favorite NCAA men’s basketball teams and athletes from NCAA Sweet Sixteen® games through the championship games of the last decade (2000-2009).

I think one of the coolest features is that you can post comments about specific moments within the Vault’s game timelines and share them through links or Twitter and Facebook.

Comments will show up on their Twitter and Facebook pages with links back to the exact moments in the Vault games they selected, creating conversations among millions of March Madness fanatics.

You have to play-around with the site to really appreciate how it works. And it will give me a great excuse to ’spend some time at the local sports bar’ during March Madness.

http://bit.ly/9XnbMk

Remember, this is outside of compelling content that will go ‘viral’ and assumes that no competitor research or link building strategies have been developed.

It is meant to be a quick list of the basic and standard link building tactics…I know there are a lot more options, but if you see something that I ‘really’ missed, be sure to add it to the comments or drop me an email.

1. Write articles and place them on other websites as a guest writer in exchange for a link back to your website. Example – http://www.ezinearticles.com
2. Use online directories, both free and those that charge a review fee, to list your website.  Example – http://dir.yahoo.com
3. Place links on social sites that accept news, events, etc to create a link back to your website. Example – http://www.digg.com
4. ‘Guest Post’ or ‘Guest Write’ on industry blogs & websites in exchange for a link back to your site.
5. Placing links on social bookmarking sites to create a link back to your website. Example – http://delicious.com/
6. Write 3rd party content on hosted websites and place links back to your website.  Example – http://www.hubpages.com
7. Setup a 3rd party hosted blog (or buy a domain), then write content and place links back to your website – Example – http://www.blogger.com
8. Issue a press release on a product or service and place links back to your website. Example – http://www.PRWeb.com
9. Review popular online resources and either edit existing information OR create new information about your business or website – http://www.wikipedia.com

Like many people, I suppose I make ‘blogging’ more complicated than I should.  I keep waiting to see if I can break a ‘hot story’ or say something ‘remarkable’.

I send over 50-75 (maybe even 100) emails a day, have multiple chat sessions at once, and constantly use my written words to communicate my ideas and thoughts….but I still struggle with finding time to blog.

I read over over 200 blog posts a day, have over 500 tweets and 3,000 followers via @chuckaikens and Twitter…but still I don’t blog.

When talking to a wide range of SEO clients, my team and I advise people that they need to commit to blogging and no matter what, be sure to commit..but still.

I watch the amount of time and energy that industry leaders like Rand & Aaron Wall put into communicating via blogs and how incredibly powerful their sharing of thoughts has become…yet.

All I can say…is that I hope to find a way to blog  more and maybe I have a chance at successfully honoring my self-proclaimed resolution since I am making this resolution in February and not on New Years Eve

Real time search and social search are two different things. The main things that make them different are the timeliness of the information they provide and the sources from which they are obtained.  Twitter, Google, and Bing respectively have their own ways of providing the ability to run either one or both of these types of searches.

One example of a social search engine is Google’s Social Search. It doesn’t include results from Twitter and was actually developed before Google’s new deal with Twitter was even conceived. The way it works is that Google looks at contacts and services that are defined in Gmail, Google Reader, Google Chat, and the user’s Google Profile to find out about their social network. For example, If you list social networking sites such as Twitter, Flickr, and Digg in your Google Profile then Google will be able to pole those sites to find out who you are connected to in order to build your social circle.

Google mines the links of your social circle members in order to figure out what information is relevant to your search by using their normal link ranking algorithm. For example, if you have a friend on Twitter and they link to their blog and the blog links to their Flickr account, then Google can analyze those links and return links to the content that is relevant to your search.

Real time search means looking through material that literally is published in real time. In other words, material where there’s practically no delay between composition and publishing. For example, a person uses Twitter to “tweet” about an event that they are currently experiencing or they take a picture and publish it immediately for the world to see.

Publishing in real time involves a process called “micro blogging”, which is where an event is experienced and the person experiencing the event quickly types a description or observation into a box and submits it immediately. Some micro blogging examples are tweeting on Twitter, issuing status updates on Facebook, or submitting posts to FriendFeed.

Twitter is the real time publishing leader and is considered to be the micro blogging service. So much material is published by so many people so quickly through Twitter that real time search is largely synonymous with searching tweets. In order for a search engine to successfully index all of the real time data that streams through Twitter they need access to the actual “fire hose” data stream. Google and Bing have struck deals with Twitter to receive this fire hose data so that they can integrate it and index it as part of their normal search results.

Since Google and Bing have both struck deals with Twitter for real time search and have already either constructed their own social search algorithms or in Bing’s case struck a deal with Facebook, we should see the two search engines become much more powerful. Internet search will become a method of obtaining information that is more relevant since information can be obtained in real time and will mostly come from people that we already know and trust. It will be very interesting to see how powerful and influential Internet search might one day become. It might even gain enough strength and exposure to effectively phase out some of the news, entertainment, advertising, and information sources that most of us current use on a daily basis.

Probably the most obvious practice is to use customized keywords, content, and language in order to increase the ranking of sites by localized search engines. This might mean having multiple sites written in the languages indigenous to the targeted geographical regions. When running an Internet search a user will almost always use keywords from their native language. If those keywords aren’t in your website then it will most likely not rank at all in the results returned from their search.

If you have multiple sites that have essentially the same content, but are written in different languages, then they can be linked to each other without being penalized by search engines. If two sites are for different regions but are written in the same language then try to restructure the content of the sites. One way to do this is to use local phrases, keywords, and spelling conventions to make the site more readable for the user and change the content in the process. Don’t overuse linking between sites, though, or search engines will interpret this as a linking network, which will degrade search rankings.

Another strategy is to register the site with a TLD (Top Level Domain) that is descriptive of the region that the site is targeting. One example would be that if a company that has an office in both the U.S. and Canada is trying to increase the visibility of the Canadian site they could register it with a TLD of .ca, for example marketingsite.ca. The .com domain name is by far the most common, but often gives the impression that the site is a U.S. business site for commercial use and is not for a specific region. Often search engines will rank a site higher that has a non .com domain if there are multiple sites having similar content. Make sure that there aren’t any restrictions to registering domain names that are associated with a specific country, though. Sometimes countries require that the company have a business office in that country before allowing you to register a site with a country specific domain.

Where the site is hosted could also play a part in search rankings. Some search engines will rank links higher if the site is hosted closer to the region where the search is initiated. They can tell where the site is hosted by analyzing its IP address. It might make sense to acquire a host in the region if you know that local search engines take this factor into account. Also, make sure that search engines are allowed in countries before employing a strategy to maximize the effectiveness of that engine. For example, most public networking sites, especially the ones belonging to Microsoft (Bing), were banned in China leading up to the anniversary of Tiananmen Square.

The main thing to remember when marketing sites internationally is to provide specific content that pertains to the geographical regions that are being targeted. This might be achieved through the use of language, keywords, technology such as domain names and collocation hosting, and possibly multiple sites if they need to appeal to a large diversity of users. Another useful technique is to research the area to find out what search engines are used most and develop strategies that will maximize the search rankings of your site for that audience.

The new alliance should increase competition in the SEO market. At present, Google maintains an eighty to ninety percent market share. With the number two and three search engines combining forces, they hope to be able to erode Google’s market dominance. Developing a link building strategy for the Bing search engine will become increasingly more important over the next 2 years when the two search engines are targeting the completion of the technology integration.

One new idea being put forth for the combined search is that it will likely not focus on the old search box in the browser method, although it will be included. The focus will instead be more of an advertising approach where a user can utilize a search box that is part of an advertising ad, an image, a map, or even a video. This will give the new search engine more visibility than if it were just sitting in a list of available search providers in a browser. It could also provide a more targeted in-line search with the media being viewed. Users will have the ability to fire a search from almost anywhere while they are browsing.

What most consider a benefit is that the new sales and advertising model will not include paid inclusion for links. This is the process by which advertisers pay to have their links displayed higher in search rankings. Instead, the pattern will more closely resemble that of Google and rely mainly on web crawler technology for link rankings instead of the economic standing of the companies submitting links.

At first glance the alliance between Yahoo! and Microsoft seems like a favorable change of events that could provide several new attractive features for the SEO market. Search technology should be more accessible, powerful, innovative, and competitive as a result of the technology merger of two of the biggest and oldest players in the search engine arena.

It’s been a little while since the announcement, feel free to share your thoughts on what the Yahoo! and BING agreement means to SEO & PPC going forward.