For search engine optimisation there are distinct advantages to using an SEO professional rather than managing the process yourself.

For a start, SEO companies will have extensive knowledge of the latest developments in SEO and will be able to tailor-make a campaign to meet your specific company needs. And, very importantly, an SEO professional would know better than to indulge in certain practices that can seriously damage your brand reputation and get your site demoted or even blacklisted by search engines.

There are a number of practices that could bring this about. They include cloaking, using stacked titles, keyword spamming, using duplicate content and linking to awful sites.

SEO experts should be able you to research new keywords and relate these to web pages on your site, all the while ensuring that the right keyword density is maintained. They may well have good connections to help you get in-links from highly trafficked, relevant third-party sites – a heavily weighted factor in Google's search algorithm.

When in doubt it is always better to consult a professional to ensure you achieve a high search engine ranking without incurring any risks. With your reputation and the financial stakes so high, the risk of going it alone if you don’t know what you are doing is just not worth it. There are plenty of reputable SEO companies to turn to.

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TradeDoubler has announced that it has signed another two year contract with Expedia, the online travel company.

Expedia will continue to use TradeDoubler’s affiliate marketing services in all public and private publisher segments by means of TD Affiliate and to track performance of other partner activity by means of TD Integral.

The contract renewal covers the Expedia brand in 12 European countries and the Hotels.com brand in a further 16 European countries. It follows a reported 60 per cent growth in Expedia’s business transactions during Expedia’s initial 2 year contract with TradeDoubler, which was signed in 2008.

EMEA Online Partner Marketing Director at Expedia, Alex Gisbert, said, “By renewing our agreement for 2 more years, we will be able to leverage TradeDoubler’s local expertise in our European markets to double the size of our network affiliate business across the region.” He went on to say: “We continue to invest heavily in this channel and strive to continually drive bigger and better network affiliate partnerships.”

Dominic Trigg, vice president for International Sales and Marketing at TradeDoubler also voiced his satisfaction at the contact renewal and the results achieved so far. He commented that they: “are looking to now build on this momentum by further increasing penetration and market share of flights, hotel bookings, car hire and holidays through the Expedia brand.”

A poll carried out by KPMG has found that people now spend more time watching television, reading news items, playing video games and interacting on social networking sites than they did six months ago.

Expenditure in this area has decreased over the same period, however, as individuals are increasingly expecting access to be free of charge. This means that online media publishers need to be inventive in terms of charging for their online news and other content.

The Media and Entertainment Barometer, published by KPMG, revealed that the most significant decrease in expenditure was on traditional news media. In March, some 21 per cent of newspaper readers who took part in the poll said that they had not paid for the newspaper they read, an increase of 15 per cent on 6 months ago. In London where the Evening Standard became free of charge following its acquisition by Alexander Lebedev, that figure rose to 41 per cent, up from 23 per cent 6 months ago.

Online news companies will be pleased to hear that approximately ten per cent of people polled, who do not hold a subscription at the moment, said that they plan to become a paid subscriber of online content in the coming year. Of this ten per cent, around 31 per cent stated that they plan to pay for online news or magazine content.

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