It seems the more tricks I learn about SEO (Search Engine Optimization), the more surprised I am at just how much time it takes to implement some of these strategies. All that time spent just to crawl a few steps up the first page of Google. In the last couple of months, I started thinking about what is the 'cut-off' point where I would simply spend money or time in order to boost rankings. It's something any good SEO marketer considers when tackling a new genre or niche, sort of like PPC.

In this example, our company came out with a new product, Dr. Torgo's PC System Inventory. Actually, it's a program I wrote about 6 months ago that my cohort Steve took and finalized and has been bugging me to put it up for sale, which I eventually did. Anyway, when I put it up on the site I immediately went into SEO mode and started marketing the product as a direct link to our site. It took a couple of days until I finally noticed we were listed at around 7 or 8. I started wasting more and more time trying to up it a couple of notches. I then submitted it to a download site called SoftPedia. Within a couple of days, I was somewhat shocked to see that my new SoftPedia entry made it before my actual site page on page 1 of Google!

We tried the same thing with eMail Scraper. I got decent (page 3) listings direct to our site but could never crack the first page with "email scraper" as a keyword without a PPC campaign. But after submitting the download link to a couple of sites I found that they did the work for me:

So for next time, I'll simply post it to various software download libraries and get first ranking on certain keywords rather than bust my rear for hours trying to beat them. The download sometimes comes from their site, but I still handle all of the payments with no commission to them, so in this case... I couldn't beat 'em, so I'll join 'em!

A couple of notes:
1) A Google search on "email scraper" yields about 1.5 MILLION results, so to be listed on page 1 (or 2) is no small task.
2) Believe it or not, Torgo (and all it's variations a-la MST3K, IMDB, etc.) is still an incredibly popular search word. Every time I run Google, Yahoo, or Bing stats it ranks among the top 10 search words to my site every time. I used to have a posting about Torgo and the redirects to that page were consistently high. So, even though they're looking for the movie version of Torgo, they'll still hit my site!

A few years ago, eSource Development created a software pack that contained popular free virus and spyware programs, but also included a neat little system inventory program written in house. Since our service center closed, we stopped supporting or updating the starter pack program and let it fall into the ‘abandonware’ category.

Well, we decided to pull it out of the time capsule and give it a new face for Windows Vista and Windows7. The new Dr. Torgo’s System Inventory program will give comprehensive and in depth system information. It is an advanced System Information tool that gathers detailed information about your system properties and settings and displays it in an extremely comprehensible manner.

Dr. Torgo’s System Inventory can create a report file (CSV, HTML, TXT or XML), and is able to run in batch mode (for Computer Software and Hardware Inventory, Asset Inventory Tracking, Audit Software Licenses, Software License Compliance).

Look for it soon. The program will sell for $49, but you can get an early bird coupon worth $20 off. That means you get Dr. Torgo’s System Inventory for only $29. Now that’s something the Master would approve of (it’s a reference to the movie from which Torgo originated).