Ryan Evans (@ryanevans) is the owner of Rand Media Group, an online marketing firm. Ryan ordered three dozen cupcakes; I delivered them so we could have a nice chat on his doorstep.
Fast forward 36 hours and we both ended up at the same coffee shop in Lincoln Park. And because both of us had work we wanted to procrastinate work for ourselves, we started talking business. Well, I let him do most of the talking, because I had all of the learning to do.
He ran through some of the basics of SEO and search engine ad placement. And although what he was sharing with me was really basic to anyone who has ever owned a web-based business, it was brand new to me. The stickiest?
“Get as many links to your site as possible.”
Links to your website boost its credibility among the algorithms Google uses to determine which sites are good and which sites are crap. Â Good sites with high rankings get higher placement and more visits. Which, duh, lead to more sales.

I can’t wait to figure out how we’ll implement this strategy in 2010. It’ll be interesting to track and measure our efforts.
Thanks, Ryan, for sharing all two hours worth of conversation and information with me. I really do owe you more than just cupcakes.