Is this a good way to market????

[glueboy]

Hello Everyone!

I have ventured into a new business investment and have taken a huge interest in web page development and marketing. Needless to say, I'm a complete novice. I have always had other people do this, however, I felt the need to learn as much as I could about the subject, and must say I have a new respect for what it is you all do. Anyway, for my question:
What are the pro's and cons of URL redirecting?? Secondly, Is it accurate to say that if I own the domain name, www.givememorebubblegum.com, and I register that domain/URL name with the major search engines When someone is searching for "give me more bubble gum" then chances are I will be at the top of the SE lists?? I would then want to have "givememorebubblegum.com" redirected to, say "BubbleGumBay.com", or the actual store. I'm sure this is a common question, but any feedback would be great. Thanks too all who reply.

[flood6]

To answer your questions in a general sense:

For the most part, redirecting will hurt your search engine positioning, at least with the majors.

In your "bubble gum example", that URL would not be at the top of the SE's just because of the domain name. If it is optimized for that phrase, than it might, only because that phrase is not competitive; no one will be competing with you for top positioning for "give me more bubble gum" on MSN. If the actual domain you are thinking of is something like "christmas-gifts.com", then you have exactly zero chance of getting on the first 50 pages of google for the search phrase "christmas gifts" when it will just redirect to another site.

I realize my explinations probably left you with more questions that answers, but that's kind of how it is going to be until you get a little deeper into the game. Read all you can about the topic. There are plenty of free articles and tutorials about SEO on the internet.

Good luck.

[glueboy]

Makes complete sense. If I search for Golf Clubs, www.golfclubs.com doesnt show up on the top. Now that I think about it, it was a stupid question. However, I thought the Title of the page and descriptions where very important as well. I guess the real key here is to find highly searched "phrases" and "key words" that may not be that competitve beacuse for one reason or another. Anyhow, you mentioned about "optimizing the URL". How do you optimize a URL that has not page, but is only used as a doorway "link" page or redirector?? I don't expect a long awnser, but if any of you have links to information on this, that would be great. Thanks again!

[bfranson@ebizmark.com]

You have a long road ahead of you but you have to start somewhere. Begin by getting your site listed at DMOZ.org. You will also want to put money into a PPC (pay-per-click) account. I would suggest using overture.com. You will also need to wirte content rich pages. The major search engines are very fond of these. You will obviously have to do research on the subjects I bring up. You will also want clean code and site navigation. PPC is going to be you quickest marketing reward. You have the right idea, use Wordtracker.com, determine non-competetive keywords (low biiding price at overture) and compare them to search counts at wordtracker. You want non-competive word with high search counts. Good luck!

[minstrel]

Begin by getting your site listed at DMOZ.org.

Good luck on that one! If that is step 1, I would strongly recommend that you don't wait for that to be completed before proceeding to whatever step 2, 3, and 4 are going to be...