Many online forums on the subject of SEO (Search Engine Optimization) are available. They are useful for learning about changing SEO practices and discussing how to best implement different techniques. However, some forums are preferable to others, depending upon their level of activity and the subjects they cover. Read on to learn about how to find the most useful SEO forums…

To start, you can get a list of these forums on any search engine by searching for “SEO forum” or “SEO + Forum”. If you prefer, the DMOZ.org web directory also has a useful list of SEO and other internet marketing forums, which can be found under the subcategory “Computers / Internet / Web Design and Development / Promotion / Chats and Forums”. The next step is to separately evaluate these sites to see which one best meets your needs, works well on your computer, and has sufficient activity to be useful.

Some ways of determining whether or not a forum is active include checking how many members there are, how recently new messages were posted, and how many users are currently logged in. Check to see if SEO categories you find interesting are covered – different forums include specific subjects like web directories, small search engines, Alexa rankings, blogging, specialized searches (image, news, product, etc) or domain names. They might also feature other marketing topics like affiliate programs, PPC, or banner ads.

Certain search engine optimization forums provide useful boards for particular activities like offering to sell SEO services, initiating link exchanges, selling web sites, requesting paid SEO services from other members, or asking for web site reviews. Other forums don’t allow some of these actions. Make sure the forum doesn’t have a lot of offensive posts or “spam”; some boards have too few moderators to find and prevent this behavior. Looking around the forum will also confirm that its pages load fast enough for your internet connection and it is compatible with your web browser.

After reviewing these factors on each forum you find, register for membership in the active forum which offers the most useful features for you. Evaluating the individual SEO forums in this manner before signing up will save time, which otherwise might be spent registering for forums which turn out not to be useful for one reason or another. Finally, don’t forget to save your password and bookmark the site’s URL after registration.

Alexa.com ranks web sites based on how popular they are, with sites like Yahoo, MSN, Google, and eBay in the top twenty, and many others ranked among the thousands or millions. Good Alexa ratings can be of significant value in helping web sites gain advertisers and is also of value for comparing how popular similar web sites are.

To check your site’s Alexa ranking, visit alexa.com and click the “Traffic Ranking” tab near the top of the screen. Then enter the web site URL. The next page should show a screenshot of its home page, its popularity ranking, trends regarding traffic increases or decreases, which countries it is the most popular in, and other information. While ratings like 450,000 or 873,000 may seem poor to people unfamiliar with Alexa, they are actually fairly good; many millions of web sites are ranked by Alexa. Some or all of this information, including the traffic ratings, may not be available for relatively new or little-known web sites. If the home page screen shot is outdated, there is a way to request that Alexa update it; see their help section for details.

Alexa determines traffic ratings for web sites by monitoring the sites visited by people using their optional toolbar software, so their rating may or may not be an accurate reflection of how popular a web site is. The toolbar requires users to have Microsoft Windows and Internet Explorer 6.0+ or Firefox for a browser, so visitors with Apple, Linux, or DOS operating systems are never counted in the ratings. Also, IE 6.0 requires at least Windows 98. This puts web sites which cater to an audience with older computer systems or alternative operating systems at a disadvantage. The ratings are of little value or importance to sites which lack advertising or use services like Google Adsense or Yahoo! Publisher Network to generate advertising revenue.

Overall, while good Alexa ratings are of value and importance to some, they are not absolutely necessary for gaining advertisers. A web site’s Google PageRank and rankings on other traffic ranking systems (ranking.com, quantcast.com) might also be considered, and advertisers can be provided with information from the site’s own statistics as well. If your web site has a good Alexa ranking, this can be of great value and should be pointed out; if not, point to different statistics, and keep in mind that some advertisers may not have even heard of Alexa.

Web analytics software analyzes the characteristics of people who visit a website, how they arrive at it and the manner in which they use it. A number of websites offer services in which administrators of other websites add code to each of their pages and receive analytics data from the provider of the service. There are also resources which provide analytical data about the web in general; this can be useful for creating the initial design of a website and optimizing it for search engines, before any data is available about the people who will visit it. Read on for details about ten useful analytics resources on the web…

1. Google: Google offers a web analytics tool which is “free to all advertisers, publishers, and site owners” and “scalable for any size site”, according to its website.

2. Market Share: Located on the popular HitsLink.com website at marketshare.hitslink.com, this tool shows pie graphs on the percentages of people using each operating system, browser, and search engine. HitsLink.com also offers a website-specific analytical tool with a thirty-day trial period.

3. Omniture: The website omniture.com provides analytical data and other marketing services. It features a Resources section with a blog on analytics, as well as guides and case studies related to their services.

4. Alexa: While some may not think of it as an analytical website, Alexa.com offers more information than just a popularity rank, for many websites. It shows statistics on countries of origin, month/year traffic trends, and subdomain data. No membership or website code is needed.

5. WebTrends: A web analytics service provider, webtrends.com offers four different service packages of this type. It includes a Resources section with articles on the subject and links to related news reports.

6. WAA: The Web Analytics Association (webanalyticsassociation.org) is one of the more informational resources on this topic. It offers articles, news, event data, and other details.

7. OneStatFree: This website (onestatfree.com) offers a free web counter service which provides some analytical information; there is a paid service available with more features. A sidebar on the left of the home page links to a “Charts” section (doesn’t require membership) which compares traffic data from a variety of websites in various countries and subjects.

8. Books: Some online booksellers, such as barnesandnoble.com, offer books on this subject. Such titles include “Web Analytics: An Hour A Day”, “Google Analytics”, and “Actionable Web Analytics.”

9. VisiStat: Another analytic service provider, VisiStat.com includes such resources as an analytics blog, articles about the subject, and related case studies.

10. Web Analytics Demystified: Webanalyticsdemystified.com features blogs, a job board, a forum, some free chapters from a book about this subject, and other related resources.