Here's a nifty, quick way to find out where your website appears in the SERPs (search engine results pages) of Google. Search engine visibility is important if you want your website to be found, and Google is the most popular search engine.
There are programs available that make automated queries and they usually require a piece of code known as a Google API key. Google discourages automated queries, plus there's a limit to the no. of automated queries that can be performed in a given period. I have also heard that some of these automated searches may not be that accurate. So, the Google simple interface search provides an alternative way to see your websites position in the search results pages for a particular search term. This is because it only lists the titles of the webpages returned, making it easy to spot what position your site is for a particular search term. For the purpose of demonstrating lets see where my website ranks for the search term Naj - Naj is not the most important search term for my website which is centred around art, but I would like my site to be found if someone searched using this term!
On Google UK my site is at no. 6: 
And on Google.com pages from my site are at no. 16 and 17..
One thing to remember is that the Internet is ever-changing, so results pages are also. I've included searches from Google UK and Google.com to show how the different data centres used impact the results.
Google.co.uk Simple Interface Search
Google.com Simple Interface Search
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Tips for Checking Where Your Website Ranks
Pug and Peacock ACEO on Youtube
Here's a short slide-show movie I've posted on Youtube. It shows an ACEO work in progress (WIP). The ACEO is a caricature, whimsical portrayal of "Jordan Vs the Peacock" (if you watch this, you'll see where I'm coming from). That was posted in response to this fun Pet Video Contest, set up by fellow eBay artist "Debcoart".
As this was small format artwork, I opted for scanning the image at various stages - this meant a frustrating wait for paint to dry. Its much more convenient to photograph a WIP. Unfortunately, my digi camera is not good enough to take clear pictures of something this small!
Contests are one way of encouraging viewers and subscribers to your Youtube movies, a quick browse around Youtube and you'll see it's quite a widely practised tactic. Why not have a go at making your own slide show movie.
Update: My artwork was chosen as winner of this contest!
British Bulldog Flies the Flag?
No, this isn't an apathetic response to Prime Minister Gordon Brown's request to fly the flag. Nor is it a laid-back response to the Sun newspaper's current Proud to Fly the Flag campaign! By sheer coincidence in timing, the Animal Loving Artists eBay.com group's July theme is "Dogs and Their Country's Flag". I'm not generally very inspired by flags, but I was up for the challenge. Maybe there was some influence in the fly the flag news story....I decided upon the obvious subject choice for a Brit.
I felt more inclined to portray a British Bulldog lounging on a flag, rather than the cliched portrayal of one standing proud on the Union Jack. I'm not quite sure if this was a subconscious decision. Perhaps it was a very British decision, for in the UK there are strong patriotic connotations associated with that image and, sadly, many people in the UK feel there is some kind of stigma attached to displaying the Union Jack. Here, our flag and patriotic images seem to have become associated with extremest political groups.