I can remember back to my days in high school football when I attended my first practice.  The coach sat us all down and told us one of the most important things that I have learned in life:

There is no "I" in team.

I still hold that lesson close to my heart today.  A good example of this is what a few of my buddies and I are doing to win the SEO Challenge by Busby.  Instead of working separately and fighting against each other, we have teamed up and pooled our resources.

We would really like to win the $5,000 grand prize and by pooling our skills, it should be that much easier.  I’m better at article marketing, Steve is better at blog marketing, and Jeff has the resources we need to outsource the other marketing tasks.

Do we have a lot of work to do?  You bet.  But as a team, we will get things done quicker and stand a good chance of winning the competition.

A few years ago, I thought that I knew it all. I was going to use the Internet to make myself rich. This was not necessarily bad thinking, but I was going about it all the wrong way. I was arrogant and would not admit that I needed help from anyone. Back then, I knew it all and no one could tell me any different.

Obviously, I did not become rich and when, after two years, I was still living paycheck to paycheck at my job, I decided that I needed to go about this in a whole new way. Maybe, I thought, I could look for advice on what to do to make it better.

One of the best investments I have made so far is in some Internet marketing software. It has helped me tremendously and I know that I never would have thought about it two years ago. I am still at my job, but I am starting to make some money, so hopefully I can quit real soon.

While it would be cool to be a leader, sometimes it pays to follow the well worn trail of someone who knows what they are doing.  Not only does this save time, but it means that I can skip all the testing phases and just focus on what works.

For me, when I am going to market a new website, I make sure to check the latest SEO news so that I am aware of any new ways to market a site.  For example, had I not read the latest news, I would never have learned that you can use video to effectively market a website.

I would have to say that keeping up with the latest marketing methods has proven to be the most profitable path for my website and e-business, and without it, I wouldn’t be here, writing to you today.

In fact, part of the success of this blog is due to the feed submission that I did a number of months ago - these post are picked up almost as soon as I write them.

With the apparent failure of the company’s Internet marketing strategy, management has decided to outsource all of our marketing needs.  After taking care of the website marketing in-house for the past six months, our online sales are at an all-time low.

But, management didn’t want to send the business to another country - instead they wanted to find a local service that would be able to help them out.  Luckily for us, we were able to find a couple of Calgary Internet marketing firms that were interested in providing services for us.

It was decided that we were going to use an interviewing process to decide which company would have the responsibility of increasing our online sales.  We are still going through the presentations, and then the board will make a decision.

We need this process to succeed - the CEO has decided that if things don’t turn around in the next six months, we will be taking down the website permanently.

I just recently started a new website about locations where you can fill your car tires with nitrogen.  If you are unfamiliar the benefits of using nitrogen in your tires, you really need to visit my site.

Needless to say, there are not many websites that discuss the benefits of having nitrogen filled tires and I’ve been watching my site changing its’ search engine positioning multiple times each day.  Though we haven’t gone any lower in our rankings yet, I know that this trend of increasing our search engine positions cannot continue forever.

I just checked on the search engines and I see that were now number three.  I’m going to have to do a little happy dance to celebrate and then I think I’ll have to work on promoting the site so that I can squeak my way up to number one.  Though it may take some time, I know that the traffic and sales that I will generate to the site will be worth it.

I have talked in the past about using web directories to promote both this site and other sites that I own.  Not only have they been very effective, but it is one of my secret weapons in my Internet marketing arsenal.

One of my biggest challenges is to keep up with the new web directories that are coming out all the time.  It seems that there are many new ones that come out everyday, and I need to know about them - they are places just screaming to advertise my website.

I used to check out a web directory list that I had found online, but it was getting updated less regularly than I would have liked.  While I was looking for a new resource for new web directories, I found a web directory blog - which added new content each day.

Thanks to the blog, I am able to find new places to advertise my website each and every day.  By keeping up with this regular promotion, I have found that my traffic and income have been steadily increasing - which is just what I wanted.

For most people that are starting out with a website, setting up the site can be a challenge.  Not only are websites in a different language than regular English, but when you try something new it may be difficult.  Most people do manage to get something setup for their website and then expect the visitors to come.

But they don’t.

One of the most overlooked aspects of website creation is the marketing of a website.  If making the site is hard, most people don’t really have an idea of where to start when it comes to marketing.  Sure, you could go to a forum and read how to do it, but in most cases that still doesn’t help.

An increasingly popular option instead of doing the link building yourself, would be to hire a company that offers SEO services like SubmitEdge.com.  What they do for you is take care of the marketing of your site so that you can focus on building your business and making the money.

They can help you out by building back links through their directory submission service, or help you to establish yourself as an expert in the online community through their article submission services.  No matter what service you do use, they will help you develop a presence online, get traffic to your site, and generate as sales - which should be your goal right?

I am a website advisor for quite a few different people. It is a new thing for me, but as for creating and running websites has become one of my greatest hobbies, I thought I may as well help other people who are interested in starting, as I was a few years ago.

One of the big things that I push with my clients is keyword research. This is what will get you to the top of a search engine and it is one of the very best ways to promote your site.

Some of my clients have sites just for personal use and don’t care to promote it, but I offer them SEO services anyway. What they decide to do with the information is up to them, but I don’t think it hurts to promote something, even if it is not for business purposes.

I am also starting to offer article sites for my clients that would like to post articles that they have written, with links pointing towards their websites. This is new for me and some of my clients are learning right along with me, but it is more fun that way.

Now, I know that most of you are skeptical about things that are free.  We have all been duped by someone offering us something for "free" but then we are supposed to buy something else.  What really bothers me is that when we do run across something that is legitimate and free, we usually don’t take it, because we are afraid that there is some catch.  What I want to offer you today is something I found that is free that has no catch.  Keep an open mind as you read this article.

The other day I was submitting my site to a general directory and I noticed a sponsored link on the sidebar.  I usually look over ads as I really don’t care for most of the things that are being advertised.  But this one was something different that demanded that I take a look.  It read: "8000 Web Directory Listings".

I was shocked!  Now, I was sitting here working off my list of just 150 directories and there was a site that had a list of 8000?  Needless to say, my small list ended up in the garbage.  I had to click on the link to check it out.

What did I find?  Well, I ended up at a links directory resource site that had listings for a lot of free and paid web directories.  They had reviews, and a list of the best ones to submit your site to.  Would you like to know how much it cost?

It was free.

I know I am going to take advantage of this free traffic resource, and you should too.  This is one of those times that you do get something good for free.

I can remember when I first started promoting my first website, it was a lot of work.  You had to optimize your pages, do free directory submissions, add your site to your forum signatures, and add your site to your signature in your email software.  And that was just the beginning.  I found myself writing articles, participating in groups and pretty much anything else I could do to promote my site.  It was very stressful!

Learning from my past experiences I realized that it wasn’t very smart to do everything myself - there had to be a better way to do it.  While promoting one of my blogs, I came across a blog directory submission service that offered just what I needed.

Now, I still had to do a little bit of work coming up with titles and descriptions for my sites, but beyond that, I didn’t even have to submit my site to any free directories - they would do it for me.  The time that I ended up saving from each site, allowed me to work on building websites instead of marketing them.

So, you stressed out website owners out there, reduce your stress, and pay someone to market your site for you.