You would be amazed at what lengths people will go to get that coveted top 10 spot in Google. Some strategies are outright evil, while others are legit but on the verge of being considered morally wrong. So how do you increase your page rank to get a top 10 listing in Google and other major search engines without risking your name, reputation and business? This article will detail the best and ethical ways to get back links, mainly one way links, to your website.

First of all, before I delve into the details, I must stress the importance of search engine optimization. You may think that this is an overused term and that it doesn’t concern you. Well, you couldn’t be more wrong! Without optimizing your pages for the search engines you are setting your website up for failure. Nothing else I explain here will matter, or more importantly help you, if you don’t optimize your website.

With that said, let’s continue. A commonly used form of marketing, and quite frankly the most effective, is article marketing. This is the easiest way I know how to get your website listed in the top 10 on the first page of Google, if not the number one spot, and at the same time increase your page rank. I have personally achieved this myself, all with just writing and distributing articles. Do a search on Google for “honest online income.” At the time of me writing this my website is currently ranked number two on the first page. I’m not a professional writer by any means, so if I can do it, so can you.

The key principle behind article marketing is getting as many one way back links as possible. The more websites pointing to your site, the more relevant and authoritative it looks in the eyes of Google. This is where search engine optimization comes into play. You want your website ranking high for the keywords that you have chosen. If you don’t know how to do this I suggest you do some research. I’ve written other articles that cover SEO and article marketing in more detail.

Now I will talk about other ways to get more one way links to your website. Again, remember that back links are what help your website to move further up in the search engines. In conjunction, this will increase your page rank at the same time. You want to get as many one way links as possible. With a top 10 listing in Google, your website will receive a lot of targeted traffic. This is essential for your business.

Other ways to get more one way links include social network sites. Sign up for a service like OnlyWire and when you post to your blog, bookmark the post with OnlyWire and your post will show up in all the major social network sites. This creates a lot of back links to your post. MySpace and Facebook are social sites that you can use to your advantage as well. There are places where you can advertise and place links to your website.

Become active in forums. Place a link to your website in your signature file. Every time you make a post, your signature will be at the end of that post. So, the more you participate and post, the more links you have pointing to your website.

Submitting your website is another way to gain more links. There are literally thousands of directories on the internet. Do some research. Find directories that have a higher Page Rank than your website. This will be very beneficial.

I hope by now you realize the importance of getting back links to your website and increasing your page rank. It is relatively easy to achieve. Start out small. Over time create more and more one way links. You can never have too many; the more the better. Eventually, your website will be in the top 10 listings on Google for your keywords.

I’ve already written about why it’s important to write articles, and it seems a lot of you agree because I keep getting emails saying that you want to write articles but don’t know what to write about.

It can be hard to decide what to write about, especially if you are trying to write a lot of content and get it out into the world.

Every industry is different and it is definitely harder to come up with topics in some industries - but if you get creative you can always find something.

Here are some suggestions I’ve given to clients recently:

Lingerie industry:

- How to care for lingerie so it lasts longer
- How to feel sexy even if you don’t have the perfect figure
- How to use lingerie to add romance to a marriage
- How to pick lingerie
- Best occasions to make sure you have new lingerie (honeymoon, his birthday, romantic get away, second honeymoon etc)
- Wear lingerie for yourself - it’s not always about looking sexy for a man, you can wear pretty lingerie under your clothes to feel good about yourself

Pest control industry:

- The cost of ignoring insect problems (especially termites)
- What to look for in a pest control company (or how to pick the best pest control company)
- What should you expect to pay a pest control company
- Common household pests and what they do - just annoying or do they actually damage your house?
- Insects and knitwear or clothing - how to protect your items

Tool industry: - How to pick the best tools for the job
- What tools you should always have on hand
- How to use a …(jackhammer, saw etc)
- Tool brands - their reputation, your insights and reviews
- Weekend projects you can do with a hammer (saw, table saw etc)

Those are just some ideas to show you that even if you don’t think your industry is all that interesting to write about, with a little creativity you can come up with topics.

Here are some general tips that apply to any industry.

Lists are popular, so you can always write articles that list important facts. For example:

- The top 5 things you must know before you buy a…
- The top 3 things your xxx (doctor, lawyer, florist etc) doesn’t want you know
- The top 5 most popular … (books, CDs, blade saws, shoes, bras etc)

“How to” articles are also wildly popular. Here are some samples:

- How to pick the right (plastic surgeon) for you (replace plastic surgeon with whatever is relevant to you: doctor, lawyer, psychic etc)
- How to pick the best xxx for your xxx (lifestyle, weight, height etc)
- How to spot a good deal
- How to avoid the biggest mistake most xxx buyers make
- How to spot a fraud/fake/dud etc

A couple last tips before I wrap up:

- You can always set a Google alert to see what people are Blogging about and see what the buzz is in your industry.
- You can also look at your FAQs (or create them if you don’t have any) and expand your answers into an article whenever it makes sense.
- Ask your site visitors and customers what their biggest questions are and then create articles responding to their questions.
- Write an article that teaches people how to use what you sell. Teaching people to consume your products is important.
- Share your experience or opinions.
- Take a newsworthy item and write your take on the situation.

I don’t believe there is any industry out there that you can’t come up with great article topics for. So, put on your creative hat and start brainstorming - and then get writing!

Whether you are a newbie or a veteran at internet marketing we all have the same problem objective and that is to get traffic to our websites so that people will purchase the goods or services we are promoting. If we are able to generate low or zero cost traffic consistently to our website or websites then we have created a wonderful potential business. The cost of gaining web traffic is obviously important and often makes the difference between success or failure of an online business.

There are, however, several different criteria that we need to consider before even deciding how to promote our business. Let us take a brief look at some of the considerations and business types below:-

1. We may wish to promote a product of our own. You maybe part of a corporate organisation or sole trader but you have developed a product you wish to promote. If you are part of a large organisation then clearly there are likely to be large promotional budgets either specifically for promoting a given product or your product benefits from the general promotion of the company or other products within the organisation. If you are in this position then each product sold generates 100% profit less direct cost of manufacture or distribution. You may even wish to take your product to market via affiliate sales and therefore looking to promote the product to encourage affiliate sales.

2. You may wish to promote affiliate products. There are a wide range of products to choose from and again this helps define the type of promotion you wish to adopt. Gaining free or low cost web traffic is very important here since there is a known margin or profit per sale. If for example you are promoting an ebook then you may receive 50 percent of the total sales price. If the sale price is $30 then your own profit would be $15. Ideally you want to retain as much of the $15 as possible and you certainly do not want to spend $20 in promotional or advertising costs to gain the sale. There individual companies with there own affiliate programs or specialist companies which handle hundreds of different affiliate programs (Clickbank is a very popular example).

3. You may wish to make commission sales, which could be achieved through an affiliate sales program. I differentiate here in a subtle way from the above because this could be an add-on sale. For example you maybe promoting world cruises and gain a small percentage commission based on each booking of a cruise. You could however have other add on business which maybe of interest once some one reaches your site and may, in fact, generate more revenue than the cruise booking commissions. In addition to you main promotion you may sell an ebook covering many aspects of cruising and you sell add on travel insurance, hotel bookings and possible vehicle hire. As you can see this situation would make it a little more difficult to access exactly how much money you could justify on spending and you’d need to monitor clearly what revenue was attributable to this site.

Having said all the above and you maybe able to relate your own circumstances to part or all of the one of the above classifications, you still need to consider how to promote your site to attract customers and attracting lost cost web traffic is a huge benefit.