"Hi Mr. Taylor! I have just finished reading your book, "growing your business with google". I must mention that I like the aura of the way you write. What I mean is, the way you write makes people want to approach you and they don't feel 100% intimidated. You made me feel much better about making my online store more "findable". I just wanted to say that I enjoyed reading your book.

I wish that you had a book that was more "basic". I did get the feeling that a person must take computer classes first and then read your book. I just learned how to "copy and paste"! Anyway, I will reread it how ever many times it takes because I feel that you are an internet genius and hopefully my business will benefit from your book.

Thank you for being the warm person that you are. I definitely got that from reading your book and that you care about small businesses succeeding."

In his recent presentation Blogging for Creative Businesses, Mark McGuinness says:

"As I said in my presentation, Dave Taylor’s book “The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Growing Your Business with Google is the most useful book I’ve ever bought on marketing - it covers a lot more than blogging, and explains how to make yourself ‘findable’ via Google and other search engines. At the very least you should make sure your web developer reads the chapter on building a Google-friendly website."

"Your new book, Growing Your Business with Google, was fantastic. I must say that it is the most comprehensive guide I have read on the subject. It is rare that I read a "How To" cover to cover. Your book was exactly what I was looking for to give me the steps to create my website and build my online business. It was the first time since college that I took out the highlighter. I have an MBA and this was certainly better than any E-Business course I ever took! Thank you!"

I can't add anything to that other than to say Thanks!

The old saying "build a better mousetrap and the world will beat a path to your door" may have been true 100 years ago, but I doubt it. If customers can't find you on the Web today after one quick search, your better mousetraps will rot in your warehouse. That's the premise behind The Complete Idiot's Guide to Growing Your Business with Google by Dave Taylor (ISBN 1592573967). For many businesses today, success hinges on keywords, adwords, a good domain name, and whether your Web site appears on the first page of a Google search result.

Even strictly local retailers and service businesses need to hone their search quotients. Multiple studies have shown that a majority of customers for many products search on the Web before heading to a local store. If you provide information and develop some awareness in the customer's mind, they may take a drive over to see you rather than order online. Take a gander at how you rate on Google. If you rate poorly, Taylor's book will help.

[ref]

Every graphic designer who earns part of their living designing websites for clients should be required to read at least chapter 14 of Dave Taylor's book Growing Your Business with Google.

Tip: Copywriters who want to learn to craft search engine-friendly copy should read this book too.

Craig's note: That's my own copy shown at right. I read it on vacation in early 2006 while we were planning our own CreativeIQ blog. I thought I knew a fair bit about web design before. The dozens of post-it notes and highlighted sections are a testimony to how much I didn't realize I should have known about designing sites that work well with search engines.

While supporting Seattle-area design studios, we'll often find ourselves talking with studio owners who are frustrated or confused with why their website don't rank well on online searches. Or worse, when sites they've designed for their clients are largely invisible to searching customers.

Recently, I read this book and I was amazed how many small and simple changes can be applied to my website to be better visible and findable on the Internet. Moreover, I contacted Dave Taylor, the author, by e-mail asking him some questions. I got immediate answer that was both very informative and amusing. I like his attitude towards his clients and his type of humor. I am recommending this book to everybody who wants to have a better and more successful company and website.

Thanks Dave for your great book!

Enough disclosures. I read Dave’s book and do strongly recommend it. In fact, I liked it so much that I promptly gave my copy away to some of my friends at ArchitecturalDesigns.com, and I plan also get a copy to my mother, who runs Dancetime Publications.

First, I should mention the title is a misnomer. It’s really The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Growing Your Business With Search Engines. Of course, putting Google in the title spikes book sales, so I understand why Dave used that title, but 95% of the book is relevant to all issues around using search engine in your business.

This is an excellent, easy-to-understand overview of the basics of Internet presence, marketing, and advertising. He goes in depth into some issues that we skim only very briefly in our own book, e.g., maximizing search engine visibility and how to use Google adwords most effectively.

The book is well-organized and easy to follow, particularly because of Dave’s extensive use of callouts and other devices to make the content as bite size as possible. My strongest criticism is that the book is based primarily on Dave’s (extremely extensive) experience. I would have liked to have seen more analysis of other peoples’ revenues earned from following his counsel. Also, I think that the book is somewhat short on financial analysis: what is the ROI from following all of his advice?

With all that said: if you work with any sort of business that needs to be visible to the search engines, and are interested in monetizing your traffic, The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Growing Your Business With Google is a very useful book.

As published on David's blog The Virtual Handshake

Has the Internet become such a big place that a niche exists for marketing strategies just involving Google?

Dave Taylor provides the truthful evidence that is a resounding "Yes" with his new book, The Complete Idiot's Guide to Growing Your Business with Google. Dave is no stranger to the Internet. He wrote the second book about online marketing back in 1996. I wrote the third book. He's since gone on to write 15 books and create four extremely successful web businesses while still maintaining a balanced life, which includes his award-winning photography talents. His sites include Ask Dave Taylor.com.

I've just finished reading Growing Your Business with Google, by Dave Taylor, and it is excellent. Taylor, who writes a highly regarded technology blog, column and many other things has spent the last decade developing the experience and insight for this book. And it shows. The book, whose title doesn't do justice to the content, is really about how companies can -- and will -- use search engines to maximize their business in the future. It provides a great deal of insight into how Google operates, how search engines find you and "promoting and growing your business online."

Taylor says, it's about visibility or how easily a company can be found or what he calls "findability". "On the Internet," says Taylor, "visibility revolves around the question of when people search for your product or service, do they find you or your competitors? How you achieve and use that findability is the essence of his new book.

[Link to Robin's weblog]

Dear Mr. Taylor

I carry around business cards that I give to bright people that I meet who have an interest in business.

One side of the card has printed... Knowledge speaks, but wisdom listens. Jimi Hendrix.

On the other side is printed my list of the top five business books that I've read over my lifetime, in order of valuable useful insight & information.

The Next Great Bubble Boom - Dent, 2002
The Innovator's Dilemma - Christensen, 1997
Growing Your Business with Google - Taylor, 2005
Natural Capitalism - Hawken, 1999
Go For Growth - Tomasko, 1996

My list once has over time included authors such as Slywotsky & Morrison, Peter Drucker, Michael E. Porter and Jack Welch, Hernando De Soto.

I'm sorry you didn't make my #1, but you came VERY close. I thank you very much for sharing your knowledge with me.

Having just finished "The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Growing Your Business with Google", by Dave Taylor, I figured I’d keep my promise and write up a review on it!

The book is well written and on an important process into today’s on line market place. It covers the arena of search engine processes and ways to help get your place on those search engines; you guessed it mainly Google, inched up some.

Dave’s writing style is easy to follow for me, so I can recommend it to technically sophisticated people, and I have a feeling those that are less technically sophisticated people will have no problem as well. I’m far from an Idiot, no comments Jodi and Polly!, so don’t let that part of the title fool you! I learned a lot from this book. Things a person that does Information Technology consulting should probably know. (Now I do, thanks Dave!)

The key items I got from the book were content is king, and how you present the content is just as king. Expect changes to (some have already started) the TDBell Enterprises, Inc. Web Site soon! Next what you do to get that content seen by the search engines is talked about as well.

I highly recommend this book to any person that has a Net presences in business or personal areas and wants to be seen!

FORGET "Failure" - Get Dave Taylor's Book on Google for SUCCESS!

At the very moment I was in the middle of reading Dave Taylor's comment on "failure" and "Googlebombing" here on My LinkedIn Power Forum yesterday, I was handed a nondescript package that turned out to be anything but nondescript in its
contents.

Indeed, the contents of the package have left me as excited as I remember being as a 12 year old boy at Christmas time: uncomplicated, undiluted joy! :-)

Folks, as always, I don't want to pretend that I'm a book reviewer - so think of this post as my attempt to offer you encouragement to grow your business.

Bottom line: Using my best "Evelyn Wood" impression to read the book as fast as I could, I tell you that Dave's book, "Complete Idiot's Guide to Growing Your
Business with Google" is a rock solid winner that's had me smiling all day long!! :-)

Dave's "Guide to Growing Your Business with Google" is a good book - a REALLY good book - a really SMART book, too!

Beyond Dave's wonderful ability to explain Google and peripheral services in clear, sensible language, what I especially like about the book from a design/organizational/conceptual perspective is Dave's abundant usage of "call outs" in the form of extras labeled, "BizTips", "Beware" "Memo", and "BuzzWords".

For me, the call outs helped to accelerate my going through the book. (This is contrary to how I used to view call outs just a few years ago.)

Dave has put a lot of thought, experience, and consideration into designing a book with Google as the key component to growing your business. Without
hesitation, I recommend that you get Dave's book! - And that's the best encouragement I can give you today.

To find out more about "our own" Dave Taylor, please check out the following links:

Dave's Linkedin profile

Dave's technical blog

One of Dave's 6 weblogs

The weblog for his Google book

Here's to growing your business by linking in to Dave's book!

Inspired Coaching from a Seasoned Pro

I had the pleasure of reviewing this book before it came out. I was pleasantly surprised! You see the Complete Idiot in the title and you think it'll be boring. Nope - not here.

Dave has put together a detailed instruction manual for getting more out of your online business. Much of what he describes refers to Google, but that's not the point really. The excellent part here is that Dave has a unique voice. Because he's a seasoned entrepreneur and connected member of online communities, there is a highly credible "don't make the mistakes others have made" feel to this guide. Dave is a true *online citizen* in that he is an avid communicator. He's up to speed on a lot of different areas because he knows how to tap into community resources. Thus, he leads by example; a businessperson from the Usenet-junkie era who is reminding people of what the Internet's promise is really all about.

An abiding concern for *communications* and content is what is so often missing from online entrepreneur's grand visions. Dave keeps coming back to this theme.

I've read a number of e-books and such that purport to be comprehensive everything-you-need-to-know guides to online marketing. They are usually nothing of the sort, and guilty of a lack of critical analysis. And most are quite outdated now.

This book is one of a very few current guides to online marketing, intended to get businesspeople up to speed on how online business works and what kind of mindset and skill sets will propel them forward. As far as I know, it's the most comprehensive one available at this level, which is not really for COMPLETE idiots but is for solid businesspeople who don't have this background. I'd be willing to bet, though, that the bulk of the current crop of online business folks have already studied some of this subject matter, so they'll only be interested in the more advanced sections of the book. I walk into a prospective client's office and he hands me printouts of data and theories about it... sure I can help him, but I don't need to start at Square One.

At some point then, publishers are going to have to come to grips with the fact that info is out there and this means that fewer and fewer readers will come to the table as Idiots.

As this guide was so comprehensive, it's a bit of a shame this was shoehorned into the "with Google" format. To me, it was a great survey of a range of nitty gritty's of online marketing, and a great reminder of all the headaches I personally went through on the guerrilla's path. Really a pleasure to read.

As reviewed at Amazon.com.

When I first heard about Dave Taylor's new book -- Growing Your Business With Google -- I thought it would be just another book that details in different words what I've read many times before. But it's not.

This book is first and foremost a book about doing the right things on the internet to both establish your business and then grow it by using findability concepts.

Part of the Idiot's Guide series, it's not an idiot's guide at all. It's a common sense step by step guide that would be useful for any small business. What makes this different from other small business books I've read is that Dave's technical background contributes some interesting techniques for digging through the search engine muck.

And what's really neat is that Dave has set up a companion blog for the book to help readers. It supports the tips and tools that are shared throughout this book.

Here's Denise's original posting, at AllBusiness.com.

As you probably know, I like books. And there are a number of books I think should make an appearance on a person's bookshelf depending on their area of expertise. But there are a small number of books I think are absolute musts to be read, digested, and applied. I had the pleasure of reading one of those books this week. The Complete Idiot's Guide to Growing Your Business with Google by Dave Taylor. It is truly that good...

Kevin Farnham, author of the surprisingly interesting Mathematical Analysis Blog, had some kind words to say recently about Growing Your Business with Google:

I’ve just finished reading a book that I think will be very interesting to “micro-entrepreneurs” like myself: Dave Taylor’s “Complete Idiot’s Guide to Growing Your Business with Google”.

Dave is a successful entrepreneur who has applied diligence, smarts, and hard work to build a multi-faceted business that supports the life he wants to live — a life that provides independence, flexibility, and self-sufficiency — the kind of life many people who are devoted to giving their children something extra would surely like to live. I fit into this category, which is why I took an independent consulting path as far as I could as my children were growing up.

Perhaps that’s all beside the point, though, since Dave’s book is very instructive for any microentrepreneur, regardless of why you’re doing it.

In the coming weeks/months, the MathematicalAnalysis.com site will be modified in ways that illustrate what “Growing Your Business with Google” teaches us. For starters, I’ve got the navigational links on the left side of all of my non-blog pages. Dave’s book tells us why that’s a very bad strategy! Who would have guessed?

I encourage you to buy the book, and I’ll post new entries as MathematicalAnalysis.com is updated to incorporate Dave’s excellent advice!

Review posted on Amazon.com and duplicated here.

[5 stars] A definitive guide to marketing through Google
August 9, 2005, Reviewer: David Karlins

Exposure on Google is essential to accessibility, not just for entrepreneurs, but for organizations, causes, branding, and just generally reaching the world. While Taylor's book is primarily aimed at small businesses, anyone with a message to spread will find it indispensable.

As the author of Build Your Own Web Site, and a dozen other books on web design, I very much appreciated that the approach of the book is rooted in developing good the site-content - Part 2 - Building Your Google Plan, actually functions as a carefully designed approach to developing a web presence. Similarly, Part 3's emphasis on building a solid business site has applicability well beyond simply exploiting Google. None of this is to say that this is a generic web design book - but it is, in many ways, three books in one: web development, online sales, and Google (and search engine in general) maximization.

The last third, or so, of the book focuses in a more defined way on squeezing the most out of Google for online sales. Here, the reader gets a detailed analysis of options - including "pay to list" options from Google. The entire book is spiced up and brought to life by Taylor's own experience, but this section includes a higher level of detail, sharing his results from Google AdSense, AdWords, and other options.

This book is a definitive guide to marketing through Google.

"Dave Taylor's book is a fabulously useful read on business blogging and Google, a World I hold dear. I'm a 62-year-old ‘Guru’ who has had my life changed by Blogging! Read! Absorb! Act! (And don't say we didn't tell you so!)"

-- Tom Peters
Blogging Management Guru
author of Re:Imagine, In Search of Excellent, &c.

"Dave Taylor's book takes the confusion and the hype out of Internet marketing. Written for business owners - not computer geeks or direct marketers -- the book makes clear the importance of a web presence and explains the steps you must take to put your business on the web, get it found, and make your web site a profit center. Keep this book near your computer. You'll want to refer to it frequently. It's your roadmap to success."

-- Janet Attard
CEO BusinessKnowHow.com

"When you find an individual who understands the Internet from the ground up, has an instinctive grasp of marketing, and a unique ability to communicate, it pays to pay attention. Dave Taylor explains how Google works - for your business - without getting lost in algorithmic science. This book is straight forward, useful, and designed for the entrepreneur - because you are the one who needs to understand this well enough to make it work, make the most of it and then well enough to know that others are doing it right on your behalf. Does Dave know his stuff? I've been learning from him since 1993."

-- Jim Sterne
President, Web Analytics Association

"You better stock up the refrigerator with Diet Coke, Skittles and sandwich meat before you crack open Dave Taylor's book "Growing Your Business With Google" for the first time...because once you start reading, you're not going to want to stop! You'll be amazed at what you learn, and you'll want to get started applying what you've learned right away. No matter how much you think you know (or think you don't know) about marketing on the Internet...this book is a real eye-opener, and a real page-turner. "

-- Gregg Stebben,
co-author of Internet Privacy for Dummies

"Dave Taylor has written an inspired book on growing your business online. By placing Google center stage he is striking a blow for common sense and pointing the way to a foolproof approach to succeeding online. How come? Because Google's algorithms demand a visitor-centric approach to web site creation. When you create pages for Google, you also create pages that are optimized for your visitors - with relevant, useful and informative content. In other words, when you create your online business with Google in mind, you are creating a business that serves the needs of your prospects and customers. And that's the best and only route to growing a successful online business."

-- Nick Usborne
Author of Net Words
www.nickusborne.com

"Are you trying to build a business on the Internet? Then this is the book for you." I've become the number one Microsoft Geek (not to mention the number one "Robert") by using these techniques. Google (and other search engines like Yahoo and MSN, which now really work very similarly to Google) today are the modern-day equivalents of the Yellow Pages. Think about it, if you're looking for a plumber, or a car dealer, how else would you find one? This book will ensure that customers find YOU instead of your competition."

--Robert Scoble
Microsoft Evangelist

"How can a company known best for its search engine possibly help a business? Google AdSense changed my publishing model (of five years) in less than five minutes. Google has created a powerful system for you to use, but without a guide like 'Growing Your Business with Google," you'll lose money making opportunities instead of making money. Dave Taylor isn't just the author - he's an experienced user and a believer. You'd be a complete idiot if you ignore the advice found in this book."

-- Chris Pirillo
Technology Evangelist, Lockergnome.com

"Dave provides tools and strategies that you can use tomorrow to increase the 'findability' of your business. A must read for everyone looking at leveraging the web to grow their business"

-- Rajesh Setty
President, CIGNEX Technologies
Author of "Beyond Code"

"Today, people are literally searching for what you sell. If you want to be there when they're looking, get this book now. (And hope your competitors don't!) Dave Taylor has cracked the Google code and he's offering you the keys to the castle. Be smart and take them."

-- Brad Fallon
Host, Search Engine Radio

"In usual form, Dave's insights and ability to distill obvious trends into actionable and understandable steps help readers easily transition to the new Google frontier. Thinking like an online entrepreneur" is the new requirement for small business owners and it requires planning, observing, and many hours of research to become more successful as an Internet business. The Complete Idiot's Guide to Growing Your Business With Google is a launch-pad that will get your ideas aloft and in the shortest time possible. This is a "must-read" book for anyone who must compete on the Web.

-- Bill French
Co-founder, MyST Technology Partners

"The most intelligent book I've seen on how to leverage the power of Google for your own business. Focus on "findability," follow Dave's insightful tips on content -- and you'll win"!

-- Debbie Weil

President, WordBiz.com, Inc. and publisher of BeginnersGuidetoBlogging.com

"Google plays an important role in attracting new visitors to your website and your online marketing needs to take this into account. Dave Taylor's book 'Growing your business with Google' provides that much needed guidence and insight when tackling Google for the first time or when trying to increase your current traffic or conversion rates"

-- Andy Mindel
cofounder of Wordtracker

"Given the choice among your smart nephew, that friend from your reading club, the person who designed your website, the slick, unsolicited sales pitch from a "search engine optimization" company, or Dave Taylor, whose advice should you trust when it comes to marketing your business online? Dave's, of course!

"When prospective clients approach me, I find it difficult to help them if they lack a solid grasp of these fundamentals. Although it focuses on Google and is purported to be for "idiots," this book should be required reading for all online entrepreneurs."

- Andrew Goodman
  Author, Winning Results With Google AdWords

Boulder, CO (2 August, 2005) -- A critical component of success in the business marketplace is creating and maintaining both a strong online and offline presence. Yet most businesses have found out the hard way that simply establishing a web site doesn’t mean customers will find you: and if they can’t find you, they can’t purchase your products or services.