Links

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Web tools

New services are transforming the way people use the Internet, do business and live their lives. If you aren't familiar with some of these, they might be worth a look.

Del.icio.us is a place to store and share you favourite web links.

If you have photos to share, you need Flickr.

I use Wikipedia for looking up just about everything. No, it's not authorative and there's a risk of innaccuracy. On the other hand, it's very up-to-date, generally well-written and informative. You can always double-check facts elsewhere. But for a general heads-up on almost any topic, it's a great place to start.

Squidoo is still new and a bit patchy but, where content has been loaded, it can be a fantastic shortcut to information and web links that a real human being recommends. It could become an unvaluable search tool.

Basecamp is a web-based project management tool. I haven't used this yet, but it looks interesting.

Writely is a browser-based word processor that looks ideal for posting to blogs. It also allows several people to work on a document, so could be great for taking copy through an approvals process. It doesn't work for all browsers, though.

Search engine optimisation

Getting your keywords right is essential - but not as straight-forward as you might think. Optimisation includes finding relevant keywords that people are searching for but without too much competition. Wordtracker is an invaluable tool. Even the free trial can be very informative.

You can check what words and phrases your website uses the most using the Google rankings tool.

The spider simulator tool will tell you what the search robots see when they examine your site - and helps you identify any problems.

Use the keyword analysis tool to check your keyword density.

If you've recently launched or updated your website, it can take a long time for its Google PageRank to improve. There's a tool called Live Pagerank which claims to accurately predict what your Google PageRank will be in the near (?) future. There's an explanation of how it works on the site (which might make sense to some of you - please don't ask me to explain).

Want to check/parse your own html? This PrettyPrint tool may help - it lays out the code in a nested format that's really easy to view.

Analog is a great tool for analysing traffic to your website - and it's free.

Search Engine Watch is a great way to stay up-to-date with developments in SEO.

DivineWrite is run by an Australian copywriter who includes masses of useful information on his site about search engine optimisation, and much more besides.

Creating back links is vital for SEO. There are lots of places you can create quality back links - especially directories such as Yahoo and DMOZ. Also consider Splut and ezilion.

Language, writing and communicating

Seth Godin writes intelligently and provacatively about marketing and all sorts of other stuff as well. And best of all, he has even less hair than me...

The urban dictionary is indispensable: a must-read if you still think "phat" is cool. Be warned: this could waste the rest of your day. (Not for the easily offended). On a serious note, quite a useful site if you're branding a product or service, and want to check that word you just made up doesn't have an unfortunate slang connotation.

Can branding become a straight-jacket? Is your tone of voice too corporate? The cluetrain site caused a stir a few years ago - but how many companies were listening?

There are some interesting articles on copywriting, in particular website writing, on the Site Scribe combined blog / article site.

I'm listed in the Exeter, England Copywriters Directory at Marketingtool.com.