As our site grows every day we want to share some information with you on the way we are operating the project. We call this section «Business Blog» as it is similar to doing a log book where data is recorded in a chronological order. «Blogging» is gaining popularity with more and more people picking up the habit of publishing their experiences and thoughts on the Internet. Our Blog covers various topics — from TOEFL, TOEIC, MBA, GMAT, ESL/EFL test preperation to cultural traditions and current political events.
There will also be some Internet marketing terminology and if you have any questions regarding the information simply let us know.

The Business Blog is written by Torsten Daerr and edited by Alan Townend.

2003 — September 22
Sometimes I go back and forth with the subjects I'm dealing with here in the NetLog. It's for this reason that I'm planning to compile a guide on «How to establish an internet business». This manual will be written in a very simple yet clear language with explanations of internet business terminology. It's my hope that people who speak English as their second language can easily understand the information too. The book will also cover essential points such as why the internet makes it possible for people to start a business with very little or even no financial investment as well as the challenges an internet entrepreneur will face especially in the start-up phase of their business venture. The book's purpose is to bridge the information gap between internet users living in highly industrialized countries such as the US or Canada (whose mother tongue is English) and people who are learning English as their second language in order to get access to business education resources. I will keep you up to date regarding the book here in our NetLog…

2003 — September 19
My friend Clark Zhen sent me a very interesting SEO article with an intriguing headline that hits the nail right on the head: «Designing Websites for Humans in a World of Robots». I think this phrase pretty much sums up what SEO is all about: Bridging the gap between software driven robots (also known as bots, crawlers and spiders) and their counterparts — the beneficiaries of all these sophisticated search systems — human beings. We have so quickly adopted new vocabulary (such as «search engine»), that oftentimes it doesn't occur to us that technology has been created to serve humans and not vice versa. The author of the above mentioned article, Darrin Ward, describes the current search engine situation very precisely by stating that there are a constantly increasing number of documents available on the internet. This forces website owners to modify their pages to meet the search engine requirements for high rankings. And therein lies one of the most serious pitfalls many webmasters stumble into: They focus on optimizing their pages for robots, while forgetting that the documents have been designed for human beings. No matter how sophisticated software might be, it will never reach the level of a human being…

2003 — September 18
There are a number of steps to be taken in order to achieve a top ranking in the major search engines, so let's examine some of them briefly. All of these techniques are only as good as your website's content because in the long run there will be «site indexing systems» that are sophisticated enough to determine the value of a listing. As we mentioned before, Google has always put emphasis on search result relevance and therefore has the edge over its competitors. Search Engine Optimization starts with picking an appropriate domain name. We noticed how important this was when we had submitted our site to Google. Within a few days of doing so, we received a fairly high position for the search terms «english test» and «english tests». I think this is due entirely to our domain name which consists exactly of those two key words. So before you register a new domain, you should create a list of words and phrases your prospects are likely to search for. An excellent example is Fred Kelly's website «quitsmoking.com». He registered both versions — with and without the dash (also «hyphen» or «minus»). This domain name has a number of advantages because it is self-explanatory, easy to memorize and the result is that most search engines give the site a higher ranking. As of September 2003, there are more than 24 million dot-com domains registered which will make it difficult to find a name made up of valuable keywords. Still, with some creativity there is always a way to find a good solution…

2003 — September 17
Before we go into Search Engine Optimization, I'd like to give you some numbers that will once again stress the importance of the subject. As of autumn 2003, Google will processes 200 million search requests per day — three years ago it was 40 million! This steady growth has translated into profit: Google's revenue this year is expected to range between $700 million to $1 billion. There was a time when the dominating factor for a company's success used to be the quality of its products and services. Today an excellent product or service is the entry ticket that allows you to take part in the competition. However, in order to succeed, you also have to make sure your customers and clients will find you and your company. So whatever you have to offer will only be as useful as the amount of exposure it gets! Over the next few years, we will be seeing a dramatic growth in the media and information industries and SEO might be playing a major part in this development…