I’m happily filling in the boxes when I get to the description box which required a 25-30 word description of the website being submitted. I had a 50 word description, so pasted that into the box and started deleting sentences so that I could make sure I didn’t break the submission guidelines.

5 minutes of deleting and re-phrasing and I’m happy with the abbreviated description. So far so good! Completed the rest of the form and doubled checked, then triple checked everything as DMOZ is a pretty tough cookie to crack. Hit the submit button and……what is this…..

Please verify the text in the image

The text in the image and the text you submit in the input field must match.
If you cannot read the text, refresh the submission form.

Please go back in your browser if you need to resubmit the form.

I click the back button and find a nice blank submission form waiting for me! Arghhhhhhhh, all my entries are gone and the nice concise description I created is just a memory hanging on for dear life. So I fill it all in again, but this time copy the important bits to a notepad file just incase the same thing happens again.

The second submission attempt was successful, as expected, but when things like this happen it’s always an annoying waste of time. My little tip is therefore to make sure you take a copy of anything important you might type into a submission form that cannot be found elsewhere if something were to go wrong.

Another little tip for DMOZ is always check the directory first to make sure you are not already listed. They don’t like duplicate submissions.

Wondering if they had done the website and curious as to who it was and what kind of job they might have made of the site, I popped over to the CAD Delta website to take a look! What I found was some flashy intro graphics which proceeded to complete its animation to reveal a full flash site. Now, Flash technology is great for certain multimedia applications and can create stunning things in the right hands, but full Flash websites for business…I’ve never been fond of that.

So, as content is my favourite topic and for any content to be useful it really needs to be findable by people, I decided to check-out what Google thinks of this Flash website. The image below is a screenshot of what Google can see when it looks at the CAD Delta website:

What this screenshot shows is that for the CAD Delta website,  Google sees 5 pages.  Based on the content that is actually ‘contained’ in the Flash site, CAD Delta have between 40-60 potential pages, ranging from information on their services, testimonials, case studies of projects and information about their company. On Google however, ony 2 results are relevant to their business, remaining 3 are complete gobbledegoop from Flash file settings that exist. Those 40-60 potential pages, would have given them a great chance of appearing in results for searches such as ‘Isle of Wight Architects’, ‘Isle of Wight Surveyor’, ‘Isle of Wight Building Plans’, ‘Isle of Wight Extension’, ‘Isle of Wight Building Advice’ etc etc.

Flash sites do look good there is no disputing that, and having one is fine if the client knows what they are getting and that is what they want. Now, I have no idea whether CAD Delta were made aware of this issue before they agreed to having a pure Flash site, but if you are thinking about having a website built and want the information you publish to be found by people who might be searching for relevant topics on the Internet then consider the situation of CAD Delta and ask yourself this question:

Do I want Internet users to find my website when they are typing in searches related to the services and information I will be putting serious effort into putting on my website?

If the answer if yes, then you need to take seriously the technologies that are used to create your website and discuss the pro’s and con’s of each proposal your website developer makes.

All customers on Plus or Premium website maintenance packages will have their websites updated with this new release as soon as I have installed it on a test site to make sure it is stable with WordPress 2.7.1.

For those customers not on a website maintenance package, the existing version of the tool kit will continue to do its core job without issue, but if you are interested in having your WordPress installation upgraded anyway, please contact me for pricing.

If you have a WordPress installation without the SEO Tool Kit installed and would like to enjoy the benefits of its features, then feel free to contact me for details.