Hello my DP family ... you have all been so very good to me since i've become a member here and i have come to rely on the expertise from so many members here - so here i am again asking your much valued opinions. I have begun really digging into the affiliate marketing end of the spectrum and have decided to apply all my SEO knowledge and tricks since google has - again - changed the rules, placing the obvious, more emphasis on the seo. I am, by no means an expert or a guru, but i do feel confident enough in what i DO know to be able to have a discussion with almost anybody regarding the matter - Let's just say, i know enough to get it all it all going One month ago, i completed an acai berry site : www (DOT) BuyAcaiBerryForFree (DOT) com that has been climbing through the ranks. This has pleased me much, especially considering that this is a very competetive industry right now. Like a good marketer, i spent some time doing the research and learning my product. I had a gameplan and applied it. I bought a rather kick ass URL and things have been very promising since that time. I have targeted five main keywords (keystrings) that are now sitting no lower than page eight, and one of them as high as page five - organically in google. In a matter of a month's time, legitimate seo - no blackhat - no dirty tricks - i'm fairly proud to see my climb and consider my potential. About two weeks after the launch of the acai berry site, i began immediately on a new affiliate site for nail fungus treatment. www (DOT) NailFungus-BeGone (DOT) com Once agian, i dug in and did the research on this ugly condition and proceeded almost the same as the above site, with a few experimental changes. It has since, been two weeks since that day and i am nowhere to be found on google for my five chosen keywords - yes, both sites HAVE been indexed, but the nailfungus site is taking a little longer to climb. Is it something i did or didn't do? I will list my breakdown for the two sites and ask for your expertise as to what was the BIGGEST difference - was it the seo? ... and if maybe - JUST MAYBE, i'm being a little unrealistic to think that this nailfungus site should be within the first 50 pages of google this quickly (i saw the acai berry site on like page 18 after the first two weeks) ok... see if this helps: acai berry - main targeted keywords: • bu.y acai • buy a.cai ber.ry • a.cai be.rry for fre.e • ac.ai be.rry we.ight los.s nailfungus - main targeted keywords: • N.ail Fu.ngus • Na.il Fun.gus Trea.tment • On.ycho.mycosi.s (i know - too broad) • Fun.gal Na.il • N.ail Inf.ection Site Differences: • BOTH sites are Joomla sites - two different templates • The Acai Berry site was installed into the parent folder, while the nail fungus site was installed into a SUBFOLDER named, 'nailfungus' (url - nailfungus-begone(dot)com/nailfungus/) • The nailfungus site has a redirect from the home page (to the 'nailfungus' subfolder - the Acai berry does not (i'm thinking this is the biggest strike against me?) • both sites have sitemaps that have been acknowledged • Both sites have robots.txt file (Originally, i had DISALLOWED the modules folder in joomla - then i later deleted this line to make it allowable... this is true for both sites. Reason being, some of my content is within the modules) • the acai berry site doesn't use tags, but the nailfungus site does • the nailfungus site has a left side menu and the acai berry site does not (this is important in the sense that everything gets read, from left to right, pushing my main content further down in characters) • both sites have unique content, written by me, on the home page - some of the relevant, interior pages are still yet to be REwritten for my own site - it's on the 'to do' list! • BOTH sites debuted on adwords... (the acai berry site was getting much more traffic than the nailfungus site through adwords... not to mention, the regular conversion rate from adowrds on acai was like 3.8% and total conversion for nailfungus was in the low 1% range - sometimes, even under for the 'targeted' keywords listed above... both accounts had the same budget • google adwords considers my nailfungus ads a 7 out of 10 and is airing them in regular rotation, whie the acai berry site has been one of the casualties of google's new crackdowns on affiliate marketers, and has not been 'allowed' to run an ad for about two weeks now, although, i keep climbing organically (i know the 7/10 doesn't have much to do with anything, but just thought i'd list it) • graphics on both pages were custom created by me • the load time on the nailfungus site is slower (not so much graphically, but watch the status bar when it's trying to load - back n forth - back n forth .. waiting....etc..) Is this because of the redirect or a not so well connected joomla template being used? • 'whois(dot)net' rates the acai site better than nailfungus site... but not in overall seo (again, not majorly important, but still another eye) There's probably a few more subtle differences throughout, but these, i think anyway, seem to be the biggest ones up for debate. I went with what i knew in the acai site... and experimented with the nailfungus site.... the goal, obviously, is to take the best from both sites and incorporate that into the NEXT one... refine my craft and learn. I know MORE than a few of you will offer up some brilliant and great idea's and insight that i am eagerly awaiting to hear. I have yet to be disappointed here. So thanks to everybody in advance -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-- www (DOT) BuyAcaiBerryForFree (DOT) com www (DOT) NailFungus-BeGone (DOT) com