Industry Standard WebPosition Gold
Keeps Getting Better and Better
Part 1

By Robin Nobles

If you were to look in the toolboxes of professional search
engine optimizers, Web masters, and Web site owners from around
the world, what one software program would appear as a staple in
virtually every arsenal?

WebPosition Gold.

Those of us in the industry have watched its beginnings as
WebPosition Analyzer and stayed by its side up to its present
power-packed form, WebPosition Gold Version 1.60
(http://www.acws.com/wpg). In fact, WebPosition has been a
household name since "search engine optimization" first became an
industry!

Like many software programs that have made it to the top, Gold
has weathered a few ups and downs, including the recent criticism
of automated querying software by some of the engines. Through it
all, First Place has continued to try to reach an agreement with
the engines, because their philosophy hasn't changed. Gold was
created for the do-it-yourselfers who want to work on their sites
themselves-the "little" guys like you and me. We deserve to be
able to check our rankings, and First Place Software is
determined to let us continue doing just that.

We mentioned that Gold is a power-packed program, which is even
more evident with its latest release, version 1.60. After working
with the program myself, I knew the time had come for me to
highlight Gold in an article by itself.

Let's begin with an overview of Gold's seven major features, for
those who might not be familiar with it.

* Reporter

I've always said that WebPosition Gold is "worth its weight in
Gold" with its Reporter feature alone.

Think about it this way. Without knowing the rankings of your Web
site, you have no idea what changes you need to make to boost
traffic to your site. Knowing your rankings is crucial to an
online business, and Gold's Reporter feature has always handled
this task with the utmost efficiency.

* Page Generator

It's time for a little honesty here. When Page Generator was
first introduced in the initial version of Gold, I wasn't
impressed. Pages created using Page Generator all looked alike.
Even back then, when we weren't as concerned with spam filters
and the problems with duplicate or mirror sites as we are today,
I still wanted doorway pages to look like any other page of a
site, rather than "cookie cutter" pages.

Believe me, Page Generator has come a long way from its initial
release!

You can now create your own template that's based on the general
format of your site. Then, answer a few choice questions from
Page Generator, such as what keywords you want to focus on, which
engine, title of the page, and so forth, and then cut/paste your
page's unique content into your own template. Click Start, and
your page is instantly created for you, but in your format!

* Page Critic

Page Critic is just that: a "critic" that offers pointed
suggestions based on the engine of your choice.

We all know the importance of comparing our pages to top ranking
pages for our keyword phrase, but it's very time consuming to do
it manually. Page Critic makes it simple, and it gives you a
choice.

You can compare your page to a specific page, or you can compare
your page to the top 10 pages under a particular keyword phrase.

But with so many of the engines placing other results at the top
of their search results, does Gold know to go through the GoTo
and Direct Hit results, for example, to the actual top 10
listings?

According to Brent Winters, President of First Placement
Software, the answer is yes. Winter explains, "WebPosition
intelligently skips the analysis of any listings that are not
indexed based on the content of the page. We are continually
updating the product to keep pace with what listings to analyze
and what listings to skip."

* Upload Manager

When working with numerous pages, it's easy to miss uploading a
few here and there. With Upload Manager, forgetting to upload
pages isn't an option, because it tracks new pages and changed
pages since your last upload.

* Submitter

Gold has its own Submitter feature. But, haven't we always been
told to submit to the major engines manually? Will using this
feature get you in trouble with the engines?

Winters explains, "WebPosition's Submitter does everything
possible to emulate manual submissions and in some cases, improve
upon it.

"The latest version of WebPosition Submitter (version 1.60) even
includes advanced technologies that can give you an advantage
over manual submissions in the browser. For example, some search
engines will pass you a cookie (i.e., a tracking code) when you
submit. If they feel you are submitting too much, they might
label you as a spammer. What are these `user' limits? Nobody
knows for sure, and they could change at any time."

(Continued in Part 2)

Robin Nobles is Director of Training for the Academy of Web
Specialists. Robin has taught well over a thousand students in
her online and onsite search engine positioning courses during
the past several years. Her latest books, Web Site Analysis and
Reporting and Streetwise Maximize Web Site Traffic, can be
ordered through Amazon. Visit the Academy's training site
(http://www.academywebspecialists.com/more_info) to learn more
about their search engine ranking courses and software solution.