At the special request of my students, I've taken a long look at WebPosition Gold 3 (http://www.webposition.com), and I can honestly say I'm amazed at how this software program has matured and developed through the years.

Let's take a tour of the most popular software program in the search engine marketing industry, and let's see "what's new" in WebPosition 3.

The New Interface . . .

When you first open the software, past users of WebPosition will be surprised at the totally new interface. It's clean, simple, and quite appealing. You can still click on New or Open on the top toolbar to start a new project or open an existing one, or you can click on any of the icons on the left-hand side of the screen.

Important: If you experience any problems connecting to the Internet via WebPosition, try adding WebPosition to your accepted programs list in your firewall software. Or, you could try temporarily disabling your firewall to see if it's related to that. If you still have any problems, simply write to help@webposition.com. WebPosition is well known for having a top- notch tech support department.

Wordtracker Keywords . . .

With WebPosition 3, you can now conduct keyword research with Wordtracker right through WebPosition 3! If you don't have a Wordtracker account, you'll be using the free trial version of Wordtracker, which means you'll be researching using the MSN search engine and Keyword Universe. If you have a Wordtracker account, you can enter your Wordtracker username and password by clicking on the Edit menu on the WebPosition toolbar and choosing, "Wordtracker Settings."

Important: Since WebPosition 3 now has the Wordtracker keyword area, if you have a Wordtracker account, should you cancel that account? No! Unless you're going to be happy with the free trial version of Wordtracker, don't cancel your Wordtracker account. Instead, use the WebPosition 3 interface to pull up your existing Wordtracker account.

Reporter . . .

Though this feature isn't new, my favorite part of WebPosition has always been Reporter, and it still is. This one area is worth the cost of the entire software program.

As search engine marketers, it's important to keep up with your search engine rankings. You need to know which pages are ranking in the top 30 for which keywords.

While it's important for you to know your rankings, remember that you don't need to check your rankings every day or even every week. Once a month or once every other week is sufficient.

Use moderation! Don't check hundreds or thousands of keywords across several domains. Don't hammer the search engines. Remember that you're using their resources when you check rankings. Run ranking reports at night PST.

Page Critic . . .

After creating your pages, you'll want to run them through a software program for some last minute checks.

For example, is the page too long? Too short? Are you overusing your keyword phrase? Underusing it?

WebPosition 3 offers some very helpful suggestions that you may want to consider.

With WebPosition 3, they've introduced a "Generic Search Engine," which I'm particularly pleased about. Over the last few years, many search engine marketers no longer create engine specific pages, so having a generic choice in Page Critic will be extremely helpful.

Tip to make Page Critic easier to use: When you first begin using Page Critic, you may find it easier to focus on

But, if you can't make the change or if it doesn't work for you, move on. Don't spend hours stressing over it. If you want to work with other sections of Page Critic after you get used to the program, you can certainly do so. But by cutting down on the amount of information you're focusing on in the beginning, you may feel it's not as overwhelming.

Mission Manager . . .

I'm very impressed with this new addition to WebPosition! But first, let me explain what "missions" are.

Every time you work on a project in WebPosition, you're creating a "mission." For example, when you run a ranking report on a particular domain, you're running a Reporter "mission" on that domain.

When you run a page through Page Critic, you're running a Page Critic "mission" on that page.

Mission Manager lets you manage those missions from one central location. I can see where this area will be particularly handy for those people who manage several domains. You can see at a glance which missions are scheduled to be run and at what times.

WebTrends Analytics . . .

This one area of WebPosition is a little confusing, mainly because WebTrends has many different software and Web-based solutions.

However, please don't let the choices stop you from trying WebTrends. Analyzing the traffic to your site is a crucial "next step" to success for your online business, and WebTrends has always been a leader in log analysis solutions.

In the beginning, why not try WebTrends On Demand, which is a Web-based service where you're given a small amount of code to cut and paste to the bottom of each of your Web pages. When you want to check your log files, you can log into their Web site. It's an easy-to-use, cost effective solution that you'll certainly want to consider. (Trial version: http://www.netiq.com/webtrends/products/webtrends/trial.asp)

Cost Remains the Same . . .

One thing that has really impressed me is that WebPosition has kept the cost of this new version the same, though they certainly could have justified a price increase. Plus, if you have a current version of WebPosition, you can upgrade at a 50% discount. Very fair! (Trial version: http://www.webposition.com/order/trial.asp)

In Conclusion . . .

WebPosition Gold 3 (http://www.webposition.com) has once again proven to be the leader in search engine marketing software. This exciting new software program deserves a long look by anyone in the SEO industry.

Robin Nobles teaches hands-on search engine marketing workshops (http://www.searchengineworkshops.com) and online search engine marketing courses (http://www.onlinewebtraining.com). They have opened a networking community for SEOs called The World Resource Center for Search Engine Marketers (http://www.sew-wrc.com), and they have expanded their workshops to Europe with Search Engine Workshops UK (http://www.searchengineworkshops.co.uk).

robin@searchengineworkshops.com