It is very easy to scan lists, which makes them ideal for the web. Also, people love to see things ranked and ordered. Structured information is best suited for our brains.

Below is an excellent example of a top-x list: timely, controversial, ubiquitous (if you are reading this you are online)

Here are Media Metrix’s top 15 Web properties from April 1999. Monthly unique visitors rounded to the nearest million.

1. AOL (46 million unique visitors) Yes the newbie network really was #1 in 1999.

2. Microsoft (32 million unique visitors) Being a big monopoly has its advantages online.
3. Yahoo (31 million unique visitors) started out as a human edited directory.
4. Lycos (29 million unique visitors): Sold more often than a fruitcake at Christmas.
5. Go Network (21 million unique visitors): Disney’s star crossed attempt to dethrone Yahoo
6. GeoCities (19 million unique visitors). animated gif hosting for the masses.
7. The Excite Network (17 million unique visitors): Once-mighty Excite collapsed years ago, but its site remains in business as part of Mindspark, a minor outpost of the IAC empire. IAC controls the Ask Network, which is the sixth largest Web property with 73 million unique visitors.
8. Time Warner Online (13 million unique visitors): Not counting AOL, which it owns today, 2009’s Time Warner network is the 33rd largest Web property, with 25 million unique visitors.
9. Blue Mountain Arts (12 million unique visitors). famous for selling itself for nearly 1 billion dollars while earning nearly zero revenue giving away digital goods.
10. AltaVista (11 million unique visitors): The original hot search engine is now a sad front end for Yahoo Search, and therefore presumably rolled up into Yahoo’s ComScore numbers.
11. Amazon.com (10 million unique visitors) remember when they only sold books?
12. Xoom.com (9 million unique visitors) a miniature empire of Web services, including free hosting, clip-art downloads, and psudo-social services.
13. Snap (9 million unique visitors): CNet’s attempt to build a Yahoo-like portal, then became a joint venture with NBC.
14. Real Networks (8 million unique visitors): The online media company with ubiquitous media player adware software.
15. Cnet (8 million unique visitors): tech site network was bought by NBC

The new additions for 2009

1. Google (151 million unique visitors): The super simple search system and do no evil philosophy has led Google to become a ruthless competitor, leaving hundreds of unfortunate web properties in the deadpool.
2. Fox Interactive (85 million unique visitors): MySpace is the heart of this online empire, but it has arrhythmia at the moment.
3. eBay (70 million unique visitors): How many more online garage sales do people need?
4. Wikimedia Network (61 million unique visitors): RIP Encyclopedia Britannica, Encarta, World Book Encycopedia – welcome to collective user sourced facts.
5. Facebook (61 million unique visitors). Could potentially be the site with the longest user engagement.
6. Apple (53 million unique visitors). sneaking iTunes in through the backdoor of the record labels was a genious move.
7. Glam Network (52 million unique visitors). Ad network of more than 500 independent pop culture sites. Gossip and fashion FTW, we might as well paint the Tubes pink.
8. Turner Network (47 million unique visitors): Online news is hot, no matter what Sam Zell says.
9. Viacom Digital (47 million unique visitors): MTV is the standout

The top 15 Websites in 2009 are Google, Yahoo, Microsoft, AOL, Fox, Ask, eBay, Wikimedia, Facebook, Amazon, CBS Interactive, Apple, Glam, Turner, and Viacom. Which ones will still be strong in 2019, and which will be in the deadpool?

Read more details about the top 15 web properties at
technologizer.

Thanks for reading our web design and SEO blog. Get the full post online The Beauty of Top 10 Posts and tell us your thoughts. Netpaths Guide to SEO & Web Design - Simple Search Engine Optimization Steps

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These are 10 things you worry about with your SEO campaign but shouldn’t:

1. Obsessing about number one rankings – being #1 for one keyword is nowhere near as good as being #5 for 25 keyword phrases.
2. Focusing on PageRank – Google’s little green bar means nothing to your website. It does not control your website any more than little green men live on Mars.
3. Worrying about who is linking to you – so your enemy submitted you to 500 automated top 100 websites, spam directories, and link farms? There is no problem as long as you do not link to any of these unsavory web properties.
4. Worrying about what other people tell you – usually SEO salesman or well intentioned but misguided friends
5. Outranking Wikipedia – For most generic keyword searches Wikipedia will be in the top 5, and they may even push your website to the bottom of the search results page. There is nothing you can do about this, and the almighty Wiki is likely to remain an authority site indefinitely. Be creative, join them by submitting images to the Wiki commons and link them to your site.
6. Trying to rank in Microsoft/Yahoo/Ask – they don’t matter, really. Google is the traffic king.
7. Banging your head over DMOZ listings – DMOZ is a powerful free directory – or not. DMOZ editors ignoring your passionate pleas? Join the club. The web is simply too big for the volunteer editors to handle so the open directory is becoming less relevant, and this trend will continue into the future. A better idea is to be listed in smaller topical directories that are directly related to your website.
8. Meta Tags – using a meta description will allow you to control your website snippit, but meta keywords are as useless as shoes on a fish.
9. Stressing over Alexa or Compete.com rankings – Seriously would you trust a robot to run your business or make decisions for you? These automated systems make sweeping generalizations about web traffic and are only accurate for spproximately the top 5000 web properties.
10. Changing rankings & temporary position loss – change happens, and this can be a good thing. Google is constantly refining the way they count and score backlinks and evaluate duplicate content, so as long as your links come from trusted quality sources and you only use original copy any rankings drop should only be temporal

More details courtesy of SEL.

Thanks for reading our web design and SEO blog. Get the full post online 10 Rest Points for Search Engine Optimization and tell us your thoughts. Netpaths Guide to SEO & Web Design - Simple Search Engine Optimization Steps

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