[MikeEagle12]

-Over the last few weeks, I've been trying to promote my new forum, www.bikecoalition.com. I've been emailing, used word of mouth, submitting to directories, and trying to submit it to search engines. I've been doing it manually which has proven to be very tedious process. I was just wondering if submission sites are a good way to go? Could it be a bad thing to do, possibly labeling my site as a spam? Has anyone used these or similar programs in the past and had good experiences with them or do you guys just prefer to do it manually to both directories and search engines?

http://www.networkcow.com/freeblaster/index.html

http://www.website-submission.com/gg...FQhXGgodRHOYPQ

-I also have another question. I'm sorry if it sounds stupid but I'm still pretty new at this. When I'm submitting my website to directories does it matter if I use the URL www.bikecoalition.com or www.bikecoalition.com/ interchangeably? I'm sure the back slash doesn't matter but just want to make sure.

-Another thing I was confused about is when I put in the URL, http://www.bikecoalition.com/ pops up on the address bar. But when I click home or on the banner, http://www.bikecoalition.com/unm pops up. UNM is the forum service I'm using, but not submitting this as the URL to directories and search engine, will it cause problems for the page rank?

Sorry for the list of questions, though I would appreciate any answers,

Mike

[fattony]

Hey Mike,

Firstly, from what i've read its not good to submit your site to too many internet sites. It seems that google takes into account how many search engines that your site is listed in and can hurt your ranking. (people can correct me on this)

Secondly, the forward slash makes absolutely no difference, you and your visitors will still get directed to exactly the same page. Theres nothing to worry about.

Thirdly, the last thing you mentioned about your url being http://www.bikecoalition.com/ and then changing to http://www.bikecoalition.com/unm when you click home. This is nothing to worry about.
For instance when I clcik home on my webpage, it adds index.php to the the URL. It's still the same page and it doesn't mess with ur your page rank

Hope this helps.

-Oisin

[MikeEagle12]

Really appreciate your help man.