Of course your Search Engine Optimization (SEO) efforts should be targeted towards high search engine ranking for your keywords, but you must beware of the over optimization penalty. This happens when the search engines consider your page has been designed for the unique purpose of ranking well.

Most SEO experts teach you how to optimize a web page for good search engine ranking, but very few tell you what you must NOT do if you want to avoid over optimization penalty and see your page rank drop or your site get de-indexed.

Here are 10 things you should consider if you are serious about SEO:

1 – Website Content Theft:

Never steal content from other websites. If you are reported you will immediately be banned. Not to mention other legal issues.

2 – Standard Language:

Do not use slang or rude words in your copy as it can get you de-indexed.

3 – Outgoing Links:

Do not exceed 100 outgoing links, always link to good quality sites and never link to farm links. Extra tip: you must check your outgoing links on a regular basis to make sure they are still working and the quality of the sites you are linking to is still good.

4 – URL Length:

Keep your URLs less than 100 characters long and avoid using more than 3 hyphens “-” in your URLs.

5 – Keyword Density:

Keep your keyword density under 5% or it could be considered keyword spamming.

6 – Title Tag:

Your title tag should contain less than 60 characters and should not contain any special characters.

7 – Description Tag.

Keep your description meta tag under 200 characters or your site ranking will drop.

8 – Keyword Tag.

Put less than 10 keywords in your keyword meta tag and make sure every keyword appears in your web page copy. Also, avoid putting the same keyword twice in your keyword meta tag. The fact is that nowadays search engines (mainly Google) do not really consider the Keyword meta tag for ranking, but if you do not follow these simple rules, you will get smacked in the face!

9 – Proper use of Alt Text.

If you use pictures and put your keyword in the alt text, your alt text must describe the picture. You could write something like: “keyword header”, “keyword image” or “keyword logo” but never stuff lots of keywords in your alt texts. Again, this would be considered keyword spamming.

10 – Cloaking.

Never, ever, use cloaking. Cloaking consists in coding the page in such a way that parts of the content will be seen by search engines but will not be displayed to users. If you do that, you will get banned!

Finally, remember that search engine algorithms change frequently. So keep up to date by browsing the SEO sites and forums.

These 10 simple rules are no guarantee that you will rank well in the search engines, however one thing is sure, if you break these rules you will be penalized in the search results, lose page rank and maybe even get de-indexed altogether.

Affiliate marketing is one of the best ways to quickly make money from your own home-based Internet business.

The reasons for this are many, including the facts that you skip the research and development stage, the product creation and the copywriting for not only the sales page but all the subsequent ads. By not having to invest in these early stages of product development you save not only money but time as well.

This leaves you, as the affiliate, the task of simply marketing the chosen product or service. Easy enough, right?

Well my friend, this is where it gets a little sticky.

The fact is that there are many people just like you entering the Internet ring every day looking for the so-called easy dollar. And since that is exactly what affiliate marketing promises, there is a lot of competition for the same buck in most niches.

The trick to affiliate success, no matter which market or niche you may choose, is to separate yourself from all the other affiliates who are using the exact same marketing materials as you are.
One note of caution - make sure to check the affiliate rules for each program to verify that the tactics listed here are permitted.

The first order of business is to get your own web site along with a domain name closely associated with the niche of choice. If you are targeting the home stereo niche you may want to choose something like homestereoguide.com or the like.

Next, you will want to find a template that you can use as a basis of your site. It is very important that the look and feel of your site stays consistent through out the site if you have more than one page.

Here is where you will really set yourself apart from all the other affiliates. Write a special report or review of the product or service you are going to promote. This is the real focus of your marketing, getting this document out to as many prospects as possible.

This piece should be given away as an enticement for the prospects name and email address, which should be left in an autoresponder. Set up several messages, optimally 7 to 10, to go out at 2 to 3 day intervals. Each message should give an explanation of the benefits derived from the product along with your affiliate link.

The autoresponder form should be prominently displayed on all of the pages of your site along with the sales pitch telling your visitors why they should download the free report. You can easily set this up in a sidebar on the template of choice, usually on the left hand side.

By building this list of potential buyers you can communicate with them as often as you want. Send them alerts when a new product comes out, when upgrades are available to existing products or when sales on their favorite products are being offered.

There are many reasons to build your list but by offering a special report you label yourself as an expert in your field, you thus set yourself apart from all the other affiliates.

Just do it. Put on your Nike shoes and run with it. Yeah! Jump on it. Go for it. Right now is the moment. Apply the wisdom from Confucius, “A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.” Use the philosophy of Ansonius who says, “To begin is to achieve.”

So start with zero hesitation. Dare to live your dream. Use initiative to annihilate procrastination. Heed the words of Edward Young about procrastination, “Procrastination is the thief of time: Year after year it steals, till all are fled, and to the mercies of a moment leaves the vast concerns of an eternal scene.” Procrastination is stasis and stasis is the clammy frozen death of dreams.

Ponder and learn from these words of William Shakespeare’s King Richard the Second. “I wasted time, and now doth time waste me; For now hath time made me his numbering clock: My thoughts are minutes; and with sighs they jar Their watches on unto mine eyes, the outward watch, Whereto my finger, like a dial’s point, Is pointing still, in cleansing them from tears. Now sir, the sound that tells what hour it is Are clamorous groans, which strike upon my heart, which is the bell: so sighs and tears and groans Show minutes, times, and hours.”

Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe who is Germany’s “Shakespeare” is attributed with the statement, “Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back. Concerning all acts of initiative (and creation), there is one elementary truth, the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then Providence moves too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred. A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising in one’s favor all manner of unforeseen incidents and meetings and material assistance, which no man could have dreamed would have come his way. Whatever you can do, or dream you can do, begin it. Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it. Begin it now.”

It is said that everything is attitude and attitude is everything. You have just read five quotes, but think of them as tools for shaping your attitude. The correct attitude is a can do, will do, right now is everything, can’t wait to get started attitude. Throw on Van Halen’s song “Right Now” and crank it up for even more inspiration. Joseph Addison sums it up with this proverb, “Swift and resolute action leads to success; self-doubt is a prelude to disaster.” That is from the 1713 work called “Cato.”

What work is it you want to do? Do it now! Without question! Do not wait, for you will wait forever, and it will get done never. No mistake about it, the simple choice comes down to two. Do it or lose it. Positively YES is the answer that moves mountains and simultaneously makes them into molehills. Take action. Here is the sublime mantra of magical manifestation - DO IT, DO IT, DO IT, JUST DO IT NOW!

It has been said that “If you give, you shall receive”. This saying is often used to refer to giving of your time, your effort, your money or other material things before you can reasonably expect to receive any of these things from others. All of these things can be very valuable, but one of the most powerful things to share, and also one of the easiest, is thoughts and ideas.

When we consider sharing something, we often think of this as parting with something. Share some of your money and you will no longer be able to spend it yourself. Share some chocolate and whoever you share it with gets to taste this delicious substance, not you. At least you won’t taste all of it. Sharing, in these cases, means parting with. It means you give something away that you will no longer benefit from directly. This is not the case with thoughts and ideas.

When you share a thought or a good idea that doesn’t mean you lose it. It doesn’t even mean there is any less left for you. As a matter of fact, quite the opposite is true. You can truly be enriched by the thoughts and ideas you share with other people. Share some wisdom with someone else and now two can benefit from it. Even though there was no cost involved for you in sharing it, to the person on the receiving end it could represent a huge value.

Unfortunately we often try to keep things for ourselves in order to keep a competitive advantage. To ‘keep the edge’ so to speak. This is understandable and can sometimes be a good strategy. Certain information can be extremely valuable and if it really gives you this ‘edge’ then keeping it to yourself may be the smart thing to do. In reality however most of us don’t possess any information that really offers sustainable advantage over others.

The truth is that the real advantage in this day and age, with the Internet at everybody’s fingertips, is no longer in any single piece of information. The people that have been most successful have done so by combining ideas and concepts into combinations that others haven’t thought of. From this perspective not sharing your ideas may actually rob you of many opportunities and as such cost you a great deal.

In business, as well as in personal life, breakthroughs often come from a combination of ideas. Rarely is one man’s creative idea completely fabricated by his own mind. The tossing back and forth of ideas and concepts usually plays a critical role in the development of new ideas. In discussing the potential application of a certain technology with a customer, this customer can come up with ideas that you would have never thought of.

After all it’s the customer’s business and he probably knows more about it than you do. Especially when you’re talking to an entrepreneurial type of individual. Most entrepreneurs are always looking for new opportunities to improve their bottom line and expand their business. Now why would he share his ideas with you if you haven’t shared anything with him? Good question. You could of course turn the situation around; why share anything with him if he hasn’t shared anything with you?

Although this may be a fair question, it isn’t really relevant. After all this is exactly the deadlock situation that hampers so much creativity. Of course there is always a risk of someone running off with one of your ideas. So it wouldn’t be a bad idea to protect your idea or at least a part of it. You could for instance leave out some details that aren’t necessary to paint the big picture but would surely be critical in bringing the idea to fruition.

The human brain makes connections based on our frame of reference. Since every persons frame of reference is unique it’s possible for a group of 1000 individuals to listen to one and the same speech, talk or idea and yet, have all of them interpret it differently. As a matter of fact, this is not just possible, it will inevitably be the case.

Since no two persons share the exact same background, body of knowledge and life experiences. These differences in interpretations could therefore lead to very different concepts and ideas a person could come up with. That is where one of the most powerful aspects of sharing comes into play. Your ideas may spark a new idea in someone else that you would never have thought of by yourself, which in turn sparks another idea in you that they would never have thought of by themselves. Of course this doesn’t have to be a conscious sharing of ideas.

Most of the time it will happen without you actually being aware of it. A thought will come up that you think is your own when in fact it was initially put their by someone else. In your quest for ideas your mind dug up this idea and perhaps linked it to some other fragments in your memory banks that, put together, formed a new breakthrough idea.

Even though this is mostly unconscious, it’s still a good strategy to share more ideas on a consistent basis. Think of it like this; every time you share something a number of things happen. For starters, you deposit something into someone else’s memory bank. You never know what this little piece of information, this concept will do for the person you share it with.

Perhaps it does nothing for them but it eventually does for someone else they share it with. This person may or may not share something with you in return. But there is a universal law that states that: “If you give out, something is coming back”. The law doesn’t say that it’s coming back on Thursday morning at 10.00, when you might need it the most. It just says “It’s coming back”.

In many cases when you share something, that person will feel obligated to share something with you. Perhaps right away, perhaps a month from now. Not necessarily out of obligation, but out of human nature. This is the law of reciprocity at work.

Whenever they share something with you, that concept will be stored inside your head. Perhaps you may not see an immediate use for it. In many cases you probably never will. However you never know when and in what situation their idea may turn out to be useful. Perhaps in combination with some other ideas that have yet to be shared with you by other people.

But guess what? If you don’t share your thoughts with them, they may not share theirs with you. And because you didn’t share you missed out on that one little idea that you needed to put everything in its place. Who knows how much you will miss out on because of that? It’s safe to say that not sharing could cost you infinitely more than keeping it all to yourself would ever earn you. And that is just too much of a price to pay. So whenever you have the opportunity to share some worthwhile thoughts with another person, do so. It may work wonders, for you and them, and it won’t cost a thing.