The whole idea of On-page SEO is based on keywords and keyphrases. “Keywords” is the name usually given to the words or phrases that best describe your page content/purpose and best match the words people use when searching for your content. Keeping this idea in mind, what you need to do to get your website optimized for search engines is to pick one of the most searched words or phrases which best match the content of your page.

For example, if you have a web design company, a good keyphrase would be “Web design”, because hey! it’s the most searched keyphrase all over the Internet related to your content (5.000.000 searches a month). So anyone would think that this is the best idea, but actually it isn’t. A very often searched keyword is more likely to have a very large amount of competitors (everybody wants the jackpot), which means that you will need to work harder and spend more money in the rest of the optimization (which is sometimes virtually impossible).

Now, you may be wondering, how can I know how many searches a month does a keyword get? This kind of information is provided freely by some ad systems like Google Adwords and Yahoo Overture (among others). In this article I’ll use Google Adwords keywords tool which I believe is the best to work with.

The URL for Google’s tool is https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal. There’s no need for registration, once you enter the page you can start searching for keywords. The tool usage is very simple, you just need to enter a term, for example “web design”, and fill the security code field. Once you submit the form, a list with searches related to your keywords shows up.

The resulting list will not only tell you how many searches a keyword gets on a monthly basis, but will also give you an idea of how many people may be targeting their optimization to that keyword (the more searches a keyword gets, the more optimized pages you will find). This is why you may not want to look at the top of the list. My advice is to pick up something with 1.000.000 searches a month or less (for the previous example, it could be “web design company”).

Besides, you can also use this list as a suggestion tool to pick up a more accurate keyword. For example, if you were looking for something like “web design” you may find that a more accurate keyword for your company would be “web design services”, just because “web design” is a very extensive topic that could go from tutorials to templates.

Lastly, take into account that search engines get cleverer everyday, so keywords shouldn’t look artificial anymore. This means that you shouldn’t repeat your keywords constantly all over the page. Instead you should make slight changes to the keywords so they keep saying the same thing but with different words. In the previous example, the variations could be: “website design”, “designing a website”, “design of websites”, etc.

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Here are some pointers we have collected to help you decide when registering a new domain name or buying an existing one.

1. The name passes the so-called “radio test.” By this is meant that the domain name can be understood if said on the radio. Try to avoid domain names with dash or hyphen (”-”) or underscore (”_”) as part of the names. One needs to spell out the whole domain name with the dash, hyphen or underscore which sometimes sound very awkward.

You must have heard of radio commercials of websites where the site names are spelled out. This is because they have the names with hyphen or the names have been so over-stylised that they need to be spelled out. For example: Some domain names use “ozzie” instead of “aussie” that the owner or whoever is saying it has to tell the listeners the domain name letter-by-letter.

2. Easy to remember. Like any product name, the domain name should be easy to remember. Which one would you easily remember? ONLYINAUSTRALIA.COM or ONLYINAUST.COM?

3. The domain name is descriptive. The domain should at least give an idea of the type of site it is. For example, a site name like INTERNETPROPERTIESBROKER.COM is quite descriptive.

4. The domain name contains keywords. SEO experts claim that getting a website listed higher in search engines is made easier if a domain as well as its content contain searchable keywords. And the less keywords a domain contains, more instances of it will be shown in search results. Example: SENDMAIL.COM.AU could generate more traffic than FASTSENDMAIL.COM.AU

5. If you have a choice, choose a .com extension (or for a regional TLD, example, .com.au) as this extension stands a better chance of being searched than the same domain name with different extension. This is simply because most people are more familiar with .com over other extensions. The .com has become sort of a household name. That said, it does not mean that other extensions will not work well. We know a number of successful websites using other extensions like .net, .org, and .info. An example of a successful website with a .net extension is TEXTCAFE.NET.

By the way: The websites operating under the domain names SENDMAIL.COM.AU, ONLYINAUSTRALIA.COM, INTERNETPROPERTIESBROKER.COM, and TEXTCAFE.NET are affiliates of this website.

The Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) recently released the results of a Newspoll survey which ACMA commissioned to explore community attitudes to unsolicited telemarketing calls and electronic communications, and the awareness and effectiveness of the regimes that regulate these communications.

The entire report, all 79 pages are available for download at the as a pdf or a Word doc.

A copy of the report (in pdf) is also available for download at .

A summary of the main findings of the survey will be reported on this site within the next few days.

Following St George shareholders approval last 13 November to merge with Westpac, management of St George has started sending letters to its customers to say that the bank will continue with its current number of branches even if a Westpac and St George branch are side by side.

The letter also states that St George customers will not be levied an ATM fee should they use Westpac’s ATMs, and vice versa.

That’s nice.

But what the letter of course did not mention is that this arrangement is part of the conditions on which Treasurer Wayne Swan on behalf of the Commonwealth approved last 23 October the acquisition of St George by Westpac.

In fact, it is not only branches that had been mandated to be maintained in their existing numbers but remain but ATMs as well.

We understand of course that the conditions which apply for three years from approval date have been adopted to prevent the current economic crisis getting any worse.

From a strictly business viewpoint however, allowing the existing retail branches configuration network of the combined bank does not make sense.

If the intention of the merger is to strike “the right balance between enhancing the competitiveness and the strength of our banking system” as Treasurer Swan said, then I doubt very much if the merger would produce the desired effect.

Not that I like to see people in retail branches losing their job.

But over time, the merged entity would feel the burden of maintaining redundant branch network.

There may be cost savings from redundancy in back office operations and technology-based infrastructure, but all in all, the merged unit may not be able to produce the level of efficiency which in the first place is a primary reason in any merger scenario.

I would not be surprised if Westpac and St George will return to the negotiating table, this time with Commonwealth Treasury, and start looking at the economics of the merger.

*** Romeo Cayabyab is director of Compucentric consulting and lead researcher and writer of techbusiness.com.au