Article Directories

Help increase a website’s visibility as well as increase page rank:

• Ezine Articles – One of the Internet’s leading free article directories.
• Articles Base – Free article directory.
• Go Articles – Free article directory.
• Squidoo – Though not exactly an article directory, “lenses” can be created to increase website visibility and gain the appearance of expertise.
• HubPages – Similar to Squidoo, though less well known.
• Niche Directories – List of article directories for specific topics.

SEO Software Tools

• WebPosition Gold – Leading provider of keyword optimization software and website submission information.
• WebCEO – SEO Software tool for keywords, optimization, website submission and other research tools.
• Optilink – Software tool for understanding back-links and how they help your search engine ranking.

Social Networks

• LinkedIn – Social Networking for professionals. Most popular with individuals 30 to 50 that are looking to expand their networks.
• Facebook – Easy to use social marketing website. Good targeting tools. Started for college students only but has since opened up to everyone and is popular with individuals of all age groups.
• MySpace – Larger than facebook but slightly less user friendly. Giant in the social networking industry. MySpace is especially popular with individuals that did not go to college (because facebook targeted college students), as well as for those looking to market themselves, as MySpace profiles are open for search engines.
• Friendster – Lost a great deal of ground to Facebook and MySpace but has a large market share in Asian countries. Mostly individuals under 30 years of age.
• Bebo – Blogging social network site. Good for marketing, but has no specific market yet to target.
• BlackPlanet.com – Social network site for African Americans.
• Mixi – The most popular social network in Japan. Those that are targeting the Japanese market may be interested in utilizing this network.
• Ning – A website with the ability to create your own social networking website. Finding a specific niche in relation to your business may be popular here.

Twitter

• Twitter – Free social messaging utility for staying connected in real-time.
• Twitter Search – Provides instance searches in real time (without having to log in).
• #FollowFriday Video – Education on how to use #FollowFriday and how you can increase your network of followers
  
• TweetGrid – Provides a dashboard of Twitter searches that update in real time. Helps you monitor multiple topics at once.
• BudUrl – Statistical link tracking for social networks and beyond. Shrink. Track. Grow.
• TweetChat – A online tool for tweeps (people on Twitter) which enables you to focus on one conversation, or thread, as it’s being discussed online.
• TweetStats – Graphs ones stats in daily, weekly, monthly.
• 99 Essential Twitter Tools & Apps – Maybe not essential, but a great resource of tools and apps by Smashing Magazine.

Websites for eCommerce

Methods for doing business online:

• PayPal – One of the leading methods of doing business online. Considered, in general, to be an online bank.
• Verisign – Providers of Secure encryption for businesses.
• 2checkout – Easy to use Internet merchant.
• Fast Charge – Online payment gateway for Internet businesses.

Content Management Systems (CMS)

• Joomla! – Award winning content management system.
• Mambo – Extremely powerful open source CMS.
• Drupal – Open source content management system with access statistics and logging.
• pHpNuke – Php CMS with customizable blocks and news publishing.
• TYPO3 – A basic open source CMS written in pHp. Template based.

Online Office/Collaboration Programs

• Basecamp – Leading Project Management (PM) and collaboration software with extremely high approval rating.
• Google Docs – Free, quick and easy, Google Docs allows you to share modifications of online spreadsheets and word processing. Not the most high tech program in the world but useful for simple collaborative efforts.
• activeCollab – Generally identical to Basecamp, except Basecamp uses their own hosted servers and activeCollab allows you to host the product yourself.
• ProjectPier – Based on a previously open sourced version of activeCollab, but has since been developed and continues to be open source.
• OpenGoo – Another open sourced collaboration software, OpenGoo struggled at first but has continued to develop into a good collaboration tool.
• Goplan – Newer project management software with a better user interface than many of its competitors.

Online Meeting Programs/Web Conferencing

• LiveMeeting – Giant in the web conferencing industry, allows the easy sharing of desktops for presentations and discussions.
• WebEx – WebEx is a company devoted solely to web conferencing products, and thus far it has easily been one of the most successful in the industry.
• Intercall – Similar to WebEx. Also provides video and audio conferencing.
• GoToMeeting – Both an online meeting program and a conferencing service.

Technologies

• Ajax – Short for “Asynchronous JavaScript and XML,” Ajax is a combination of several different web development techniques.
• DOM – Short for “Document Object Model,” the DOM language is necessary for Javascript and often used for HTML, though not necessary.
• RSS – Refers to web feeds, often produced by constantly updating sites like blogs and news organizations.
• SOAP – Short for “Single Object Access Protocol,” SOAP is designed to help exchange information on computer networks.
• XHTML – A form of HTML that also uses the syntax of XML.
• XML – XML is a standardized language for computer programs and the Internet to make the customizable languages run more smoothly.
• XSLT – A language used to turn XML documents into other XML documents.

Blog Platforms

• Blogger – Owned by Google, Blogger allows users to create their own blogs using the blogger server, though it can also be hosted under another site name (www.nameofblogger.com). Everything is completely free.
• WordPress – Provides free, easy to use and customize templates for those wishing to start a blog, though it often needs to be hosted elsewhere.
• TypePad – Currently one of the largest blogging platforms in terms of the number of individuals using it, TypePad is often used by News Organizations and for businesses that have decided to start their own Blog.
• Windows Live Space – Used for both blogging and social networking, Windows Live Space is relatively new (introduced in 2004) and is decently customizable with “gadgets” created directly by Microsoft.
• Xanga – One of the first Blogging platforms, Xanga is customizable and used primarily by those 25 and younger. Allows for extras like photo storage and private messaging, as well as the rating of posts.
• LiveJournal – Much like Xanga, LiveJournal is still popular with youth, though it is not used for marketing as often.