Web Log for InfoNorway

The purpose of this web log is to note and make comments on changes made to InfoNorway. Feel free to send feedback and/or comments to fredrik_nygaard@hotmail.com.

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March 20 2010

I have moved to Portugal to be with my girlfriend, and InfoNorway has not gotten very much attention lately, but I still add the occasional URL, answer the occasional e-mail and look through my links now and again. I may have left Norway, but I'm still very much a Norwegian at heart!

December 26 2009

I added Norway > Recipes > Fish > Bacalao to the index, and included an essay on the origin of the word Bacalao, as well as several recipes. Although Bacalao are Spanish style fish dishes, the fish ingredient is from Norway, and since the word Bacalao comes from Norway, at least according to my theory, I figured it correct to add Bacalao to the InfoNorway index.

December 18 2009

I added a wood carver to Norway > Art > Wood Carving, and uploaded an improved set of images to the story by Olav Brakstad on the teatcher's resistance agains the nazies, during the second world war.

November 3 2009

I am back to putting new links into InfoNorway after a rather long break. I have written a few essays since last time, and put them into the index. They are mostly rants against our socialist government that seems determined to run the country into the ground, by increasing public expenses and taxing thrift and honest work.

InfoNorway has slipped back to the 7th page on Google, when using the single search word "Norway". Maybe that is my punishment for criticising the government? :)

June 28 2009

It has taken me 4 evenings to go through 400 of the 8600 links I got a few days back, and I've put about 50 new links into InfoNorway as a result of this, so I can expect to have 1000 new links in InfoNorway by the time I finish going through the list, some time towards the end of the year.

InfoNorway has reached 4th page on Google, when using the single search word "Norway". This is the best ranking ever, and is probably due to the links to InfoNorway that I've left behind on various blogs that I follow and comment on. The blogs have nothing to do with Norway, but that doesn't seem to upset Google. So far, it's been an easy way to improve the ranking.

Links are submited to InfoNorway a few times every month, which is better than it used to, but total traffic is still signifficantly lower than last year. My hope is that the extra 1000 links that will be included over the next few months will restore the traffic to where it was before I changed the structure of InfoNorway, and that traffic will continue to grow steadily after that.

June 24 2009

I got hold of a list of 8600 Norway related URLs a few days ago, and I'm now going through the list, putting the URLs into InfoNorway. The list is unsorted and many of the links are either no longer functioning, or in Norwegian only, or links I already have. However, some 10% of the links are new and relevant. It will take quite a long time before I manage to get through all of them, putting the good ones into the right place in InfoNorway. Since I'm only working on this in my spare time, this project will probably take a few months to complete.

June 9 2009

I'm now selling one item a week through the Amazon search links on InfoNorway. Although very little, this is more than I did while having ads on the pages.

June 8 2009

I got another request for a link today. The site is called Map of Norway, and although it contains only two high level maps I decided to add it to the top of Norway > Maps, since it works all right as a sort of introduction to the other maps on my index.

May 25 2009

The main purpose of InfoNorway is to present hightly relevant information in a simple and ordered manner, and since ads are not always very relevant to each page, I have decided to remove these from InfoNorway. The only exception being the Amazon search link that appears at the bottom of each index page, since these are actually quite accurate in finding relevant books and products, and can therefore be kept without violiting the principle of only showing relevant information.

I don't expect this to do anything for visibility on Google, but I expect visitors to appreciate the lack of ads and the clear and straight forward layout, and this will hopefully result in more traffic in a longer perspective.

It looks like Google has finally found its way around the new ASP structure of the site that I finished implementing on October 30 last year. However, I still have a long way to go before I'm back up to having the traffic I used to get from Google. I'm still down 50% from a year ago! Google is definitely a very concervative search engine that doesn't like things to change.

May 24 2009

I added Jon O'Connell's home page to Norway > Travel > Relocation. His experiences with living in Norway will be useful to others who plan to live in Norway for a while.

May 5 2009

I got another URL submission today. This time from a flower shop, and although it looks suspiciously much like another flower shop and gift shop, I've added it to Norway > Shops > Gifts. It's called The Flower Expert. Compare it to the two other shops sending flowers and gifts to Norway, to see what I mean. Clearly some sort of affiliate program.

April 26 2009

I suspect the improved ranking of the InfoNorway main index on Google is related to the fact that I've been posting little comments on various blogs, and have added a link to InfoNorway wherever that was possible. This increases the number of links to InfoNorway, and is a likely cause for the improved ranking on Google. If this is right, I can expect further improvements provided I keep up my recent activity on the blogging scene.

April 25 2009

Recent feedback I've had on InfoNorway seems to indicate that adding a URL suggestion link to all the index pages has worked as intended, so I have now also added a general Feedback link to the same pages to see if that will increase further the number of useful comment and suggestions.

The search engines seem to have responded favorably to the changes I made on April 12. However, there's still some way to go before the traffic is back to where it was before I made the decision to phase out the old structure.

An interesting development is that the main index has moved up to page five on Google when searching for Norway. Although I have had highly ranked sub-pages for word combinations like "Hallingdal Norway", this is the highest ranking I've managed to get on the keyword "Norway" on its own.

April 23 2009

I got another link suggestion today. This time form a home exchange web site called "Live My House". I didn't actually find any homes for rent in Norway on at their site, but their intention is clearly to build some sort of community around their website, and they aim to cover the world, including Norway, so I added them to Norway > Travel > Accommodation > Booking.

April 22 2009

I got a link suggestion from a master carver today, and he used the URL submission link I added to InfoNorway on April 13, so this is hopefully the start of a more active use of InfoNorway by the webmasters out there.

The link to master carver Rolf Taraldset's fine web page can be found on Norway > Art > Wood.

April 13 2009

With more than a thousand unique visitors every day, one would think that people would be eager to submit their Norway related pages to InfoNorway, but in the ten years I've had this site only a few handfuls of people have bothered to suggest their site to InfoNorway. The vast majority of stuff on InfoNorway has been added by me during lazy evenings, when I've had nothing better to do than to browse the web for Norway related stuff.

People clearly don't realize the value of links, and think that Google will find their site and rank it highly quite out of thin air. Not so, of course. If no pages link to a site, Google will never find it, and you need more than one link from a crummy link farm for Google to rate a site highly. How else is Google to figure out that your site is any good?

However, since so few people realize the value of links, I guess I'll just have to shout louder. I have therefore added a URL suggestion link at the bottom of every link page on InfoNorway. Yes! Don't go off making a Norway related site, blog or web page without adding it to InfoNorway! We're talking free advertisement here!!

Now, let's see if that wakes some people up.

April 12 2009

I revisited the dead links that I blocked during the clean up I finished March 16, and found many of the links to be back online. They are now available again through InfoNorway. Many of the other links that were still dead have been replaced with alternative pages, containing the same information that the dead pages used to have.

The new ASP based system that I finished on October 30 is slowly finding its way into Google and other search engines, but I'm finding the search engines extremely slow to figure out the new structure of my site. I've tried using sitemap.xml and robot.txt, but seemingly to no effect, so I have resorted to what I assume is the only safe way to move from one structure to another, and that is to replace all the old pages with an automatic forward to the relevant page in the new structure. I tried simply removing the old structure but this resulted in such a dramatic loss of traffic from search engines that I've been forced to replace the old pages with automatic forwarding.

March 16 2009

I have completed an inspection of all the links in the InfoNorway index, so the web site is once again completely up to date.

March 7 2009

I have added a generated link to YouTube from every index page, and placed it under the Google search link at the bottom of the pages.

I have also made an Amazon Associates store that I link to from the ad at the right hand side of the page.

I have checked all the links under Norway > People.

March 1 2009

I have added a generated link to Amazon from every index page, and placed it under the Google search link at the bottom of the pages.

February 28 2009

I have checked all the links under Norway > Regions.

January 13 2009

I added Pickup Flowers, an international flower delivery, to Norway > Shops > Gifts.

January 10 2009

I have added the Palestinian artist, Mohammed Joha, who lives in Norway, to Norway > Art > Galleries > Artists.

October 30 2008

I have now moved all the fixed HTML files over to the dynamic ASP platform. The new environment is a big improvement on the old one, so this will make it a lot easier for me to make changes and improvements to InfoNorway

October 26 2008

I have started work on moving InfoNorway from a fixed HTML platform to a dynamic ASP platform.