Is Alexa definitive... no. Is it a great giuideline... yes.

[Warren Cottis]

OK... I know I am going to regret this tomorrow and I may never appear here again but if forum members are going to refer other people to people who don't know any better then maybe check their Alexa ranking first.

Take a look at www.alexa.com which is a site that gives world rankings for sites based on traffic and content. Just type in your site and you will see your current ranking.

To give you some perspective, Flying Solo is currently ranked about 106,933 which is fantastic and there is a web design guy who posted here who ranks in the high 300,000s. I tried to find his post so I could tell you who he is but after 5 minutes trolling the posts I have given up. However, he now has an excellent opportunity to identify himself AND I have never met him, do not know him .... so I am telling you about a competitor. Figure that.

My point is that there is so much grey area re the internet in Australia and "pub talk" so if you are referring someone who is cheap but who ranks 3,000,000 with their own site, are you really referring someone who has the answers.

I now say this at every meeting ... if you are just looking to buy a website you are buying one leg on a big table. So I am not saying this to put down website designers but more to give an Alexa guideline on the designer you choose and what other resources you might need if their site does not rank as well as the guy who commented on a website here .... I cannot believe that I am being so good to this guy... and for any skeptics it's not me under another name ... no doubt he will respond

[Robert Gerrish]

A great post, thank you Warren. I totally take the point that web design is but one part of the online jigsaw. Increasingly, and rightly, what we can see emerging are a range of services that are critical to online success. One part on its own is simply not enough.

If ever there was 'industry' that needs to forge meaningful alliances with other providers, the online industry is surely it.

[Burgo]

Well I just had to check and the associations ranking is 14,410,700

the carpet cleaning site is 10,796,875

concidering this is world ranking I dont see any need to worry at this point

[Ric Willmot]

Caveat: My words are to be read in a friendly and inquisitive tone with a smile.

So Warren, to confirm I have understood your point ...
You are educating us on choosing an internet professional?
And that when choosing a "web-site" design consultant we should "alexa" her?

Or are you speaking of any manner of business?
Such as dentists, lawyers or business consultants.
Because my site doesn't rank; does that mean I am not a good business consultant?



Rgds,
Ric

[Tristan Boyd]

Hi Warren,

I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that you are referring to me. (We have a ranking of 391,887.)

I appreciate the invitation to respond, but I have to say that I am not such a big fan of the Alexia ranking system. From what I understand it is based on data captured from browser toolbars, which makes it possible to manipulate the ranking by installing the tool bar. (Quite a clever promotional device for the tool bar.)

For example, if I had an office with 100 employees, and installed the tool bar into all the computers and set my corporate website as the home page in all the browsers on those computers, I would have a site ranking in the top few hundred thousand relatively quickly on the strength of the few hundred visits per day from my own office.

That is by no means to say that all the data is corrupt, it is certainly a good guide, but I think Page Rank is a better measure. Although not perfect, it is much harder to manipulate.

You can check the page rank of anyones website in a tool like this one: http://www.showpagerank.net/pagerank-checker.php

[Ric Willmot]

Tristan,
Your submit a link is not working.
A page full of errors every time.
Hope you can find out what the trouble is.
Good luck.
Rgds,
Ric

[Tristan Boyd]

Hi Ric,

Not really sure what you are referring to there. The link above is not to my site, just a service that I found on the net. It seems to work OK when I test it. Can you PM me the details and I'll try to help.

[Ric Willmot]

It's okay, Tristan.
I thought the Sydney Corporate Blog was yours and so I thought I would help you by letting you know it wasn't working.
Seeming it's not yours there's no issue.
All the best,
Ric

[Warren Cottis]

Phew... looks like it’s safe to stick my head up.

Thanks Robert for the comment. I think that there is an enormous opportunity for you to have the “go to” site for quality information. Perhaps, you might like to start a thread telling us where you are going with the forum and what your thinking is based on the interaction so far.

For Burgo, the current version of the 360 Digital Performance website launched November 2008 with an Alexa ranking of I think 12 million. Today it ranks 385,267 and you can do that too. So being happy with 10 or 14 million in the world is laid back for sure but what about making some money. I already know that the current 360 Digital Performance website needs a new version. It is a living growing process.

Ric, I had to think about your comment because there were some different elements in play .... on face value there is no question that you are a good business consultant but are you a lazy internet marketer by choice because you already have so much business?

Whether offline or online the biggest determinant to the growth of everyone's business is the quality of the people we choose as our employees, suppliers, mentors ... so I guess my comment applied to everyone including dentists ... this could be a whole new thread from my point of view ... cheers and no caveat needed

Hi Tristan... yes you are he. I hear what you are saying about page rank but I think that it is a much higher next step for most people.

I strongly recommend that everyone puts a free Google Analytics code on your site and every morning you look at the information that it gives you. Visitors... by country, city, most visited pages etc etc... heaps and heaps of info. Absorb that free knowledge and match any changes you make to your site to the movement in your Alexa ranking after each change and you will see improvements in your internet presence.

I think the most important foundation stone is that it has to be really easy for you to immediately and constantly update your website every day if need be. Just as I am going to change the 360 website soon and I am no techno genius guru ...

[Tristan Boyd]

Originally Posted by Ric Willmot

C
Because my site doesn't rank; does that mean I am not a good business consultant?

Ric, your site does rank. It is a very good website.

To highlight my point about the limited value of Alexia, have a look at Rics site. It has a terrible Alexia ranking, however it actually ranks number one in Google Australia's World Wide search for the terms "Strategies for Business Excellence" and "executive wisdom".

This looks like a site that has been quite well optimised, with a page rank of 3. I would say that compared to most small business operators Ric is a very active internet marketer. Far from lazy. You can see this by the 170 incoming links that he has generated to his website. He is also running an active blog.

Sorry to harp on, but all the Alexia ranking tells us is that none of his visitors have the Alexia tool bar. 90% of people don't and most of the people who do are programmers and web designers, not the majority of business owners that are Rics target market.

Sorry to use you as an example Ric, hope you don't mind :-)