There were not this many sites related to "pine springs golf course" but to pine, springs, golf and course there were. This is a matter of understanding how string matching works. You are absolutely correct in that the average searcher either does not know to use quotes or is not willing to trouble themselves to. For this reason we optimize for what we expect they will search for.

It is apparent, then, that your optimization is adequate for those search engines. It can be noted that Yahoo and MSN are more similar to each other than either of them are to Google in how they determine what is and isn't relevant. In your case, this is a good thing. In many cases this is not which is why Google holds the title of best search engine. It hits the mark more often than the others do, although it is certainly true that those others, like Google, continue to improve.

This is a good start. It is questionable whether Google reads far enough through your code to reach your keywords within the body of your site. In most cases I wouldn't question this at all, but your source code is horribly bloated with unnecessary tags and such.

Whether or not Google (or any SE presently) cares about code validation is unknown, but they should. (Valid code is more likely to display properly in all browsers and pages that don't display properly will turn off searchers.) Validating your code and correcting any errors could be of some help, though I doubt it would be a big boost. It is, however, good practice that everyone should adhere to at all times.

Those two things are fairly basic 'quick fixes' you can deal with over the course of a couple hours fairly easily. What would make the greatest difference for ranking in Google, however, would be getting quality inbound links. Like I said earlier, some form of cooperation with other golf courses would likely result in benefits for all involved. The hard part about this is that you have to get other people to do some work.

Personally, I would get 5 other golf sites interested in doing 2 things. First, have them trade links with you. These can be basic text links at the bottom of your front page and theirs. Second, have them find 4 others to do the same thing with, who will also find 4 others and so on. Assuming you don't all link to the same people, you then get the effect of a large number of golf courses linking both directly and indirectly to each other which brings the overall ranking of all the golf courses up.

The results that are higher than yours are better optimized and have better linking strategies. As Google is based on popularity based on links and string matching, there is no way for Google to know that you really are what the searcher is looking for. All Google knows is that these other sites ranked higher than yours for these phrases are linked to by others who say they are what the searcher is looking for and that their content matches equally or better.

Checking links is a method to determine value. It's certainly not perfect, but it is used. Whether you like the method or not is irrelevant. What is important here is that you want a higher position on Google. To do so you will need to get links, and some links are more valuable than others.

The complex equations used by Google to determine the value of links is what makes the idea somewhat more feasible as a rating system for web sites and is one of their closely guarded secrets. A little common sense, research and a basic understanding of the principles of organic search helps us to make some assumptions about what Google looks for in links, however.

I'm not sure what you think this has to do with adsense?

How does Google benefit from me purchasing a link on another's site?

In a strictly pay for play or reciprocal sense this is to some degree correct. However, if you are going to pay for links to get a higher ranking in Google, why not just pay for Google's adsense program and guarantee your spot? In the case of swapping, I have theorized that Google looks at your links in and checks whether or not you link back to that site and gives less credit for those links which do provide a link back. This is, of course, based on experience and the ideology of organic search.

Now, if I were a golf course or a golf magazine web site and I linked to your site without you linking to mine, what would you think of that? I would think this means that I see some value in your site, otherwise why would I be doing it? If I am a highly recognized site and I do so, should that not also show that your site is valuable? These are the very basic concepts and the most valuable links, in my opinion.

The topic of links, of course, could easily take over (and does) several threads of it's own and is one which epitomizes the mysteries of Google. The best strategy? Get all the links to you that you can, but be careful who you link to. Linking into what have been termed 'bad neighborhoods' can cause you trouble. Being linked to never will.

I refuse to pay for links, although were I starting a brand new web site I might consider doing some amount of this for a number of months to jump start getting listed and ranked, but would stop once I had managed to pick up a reasonable number of good links which don't cost me.

You can, actually, get free, relevant text links if you are willing to do some work. Work which, happily enough, will help you in your relevance as well as appeal to your visitors.

My favorite way is to generate content that applies both to your site and to other sites like it, let those other sites know you have it and that you are willing to let them use it in exchange for a link to the original article and credit for it. (Some would even prefer to just link to the article rather than have it on their site at all.)

My second favorite way is to do press releases. Television, newspapers, magazines, radio - They all have web sites, and many of their sites rank very well with Google because they are chock full of content and people link to them freely for various reasons. No matter what it is you are doing in your business, send out press releases to anyone you can. If you are lucky, they will do something in their regular publication or a show or what have you, but even if they just post your release, exactly as is or with some commentary with a link to your site, it will help you.

Both these cases work best with professional level writing skills and if you aren't up to the job you can always hire someone to take care of it, whether an advertising agency or a freelance writer. (Or an aspiring writer, which can be mutually beneficial.)

Hmm... Most of these are certainly possible. Of them all, the one I would bank against is Google being derailed. It continues to, despite your own grief, provide the best result sets for the greatest percentage of searches. Until other search engines provide better results, Google will be king. I'm certainly not saying it isn't possible for the other search engines to catch up. If they do, they then have to compete on extra services (google mail is looking rather attractive) and then they have to fight against the history of Google being the best.

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Jay Drake
jdrake@planhouse.com
www.planhouse.com