If you do not know where to start, and do not have a lot of money to spend, it is obvious that you should start with the free tools. Something you may have stumbled upon when you are a Pay-Per-Click advertiser are the free keyword search tools that Google AdWords, Yahoo and MSN provide.

Competitive Analysis: Free PPC Keyword Search Tool

If you want to find out more about the companies that you are bidding against, then maybe you should consider the free PPC Web Spy software. This Mozilla Firefox plugin will show you which phrases your competition is bidding on. If you do not have this Mozilla browser yet you can download the latest version of Firefox here.

More interesting links include:

• The Google AdWords Keyword Selection Tool
• Wordtracker - the research tool of professionals
• Micro Niche Power - A very intuitive tool that builds on Google AdWords data. Very flexible!

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Search Engine Optimization, or SEO, has changed a bit since I first started in the field back in 2001.

Google’s prominence has grown to stellar height, and both Yahoo! and MSN are still trying to catch up. Ways to trick the search engines still exist, but many of them have stopped working.

But on the other hand, optimizing for the search engines is still an art that involves insight (get yourself trained, even if it is just an e-book), experience (don’t just read - ACT! implement that knowledge) and tools. Good search engine optimization software can help you a lot to get better rankings. …click here to read more

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The first snow flakes fell today, here in Fergus, Ontario, Canada. So this seemed like a fitting subject ;o)

OK, I said “snow flakes” - not winter storm. We still have to wait for a few months before the busloads of white stuff will arrive…

Anyhow,

when seasons change, you have to prepare yourself. Did you rust-proof your car, clean out your eavestroughs, stock up on salt?

Fall is here, and Winter is near.

…click here to read more

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In a previous post I mentioned that almost 1 million Canadians tried to get onto the national Do-Not-Call-List - only 334,000 succeeded. Today I read that the registry now holds nearly 2.7 million telephone numbers.

That is for the I think 35 million people that live in Canada.

Pretty amazing.

If you want to register: go to www.lnnte-dncl.gc.ca or call 1-800-580-3625.

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Wow.

More than 1,000,000 Canadians (out of what, 35 million?) tried to register for Canada’s national do-not-call-list yesterday. The CRTC (Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission) had to put a note on the home page of its website: please try again later.

As of 4:00 p.m. today, 334,000 people managed to register, either online or by phone, according to CRTC spokesman Denis Carmel.

But don’t give up - try again if you did not manage to register yet.

After all, once your name is on that list telemarketers are not allowed to call your number anymore, punishable with fines up to $15,000.

To be continued…

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“Tooooooooot [ship horn honking]. Congratulations! You have won…”

By then I have usually hung up the phone.

Telemarketers.

One of the most annoying forms of interruption marketing: interruption telemarketing.

To the rescue (?):

[drumroll...]

Canada’s New Do-Not-Call List

…click here to read more

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Finding an affordable web site hosting plan is not that hard - there are plenty of them. But that in itself is the problem: there is too much affordable web site hosting…

So what you need is the advice of someone you trust. I have researched a number of web hosting companies, and want to share my recommendations with you.

…click here to read more

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