This section will review some of the free PDF convertors and readers currently available and look at whether they offer any accessibility benefits for users.

Convertors

A document created using Microsoft? Word, structured using the inbuilt styles and headings and incorporating images (with alternative text) was converted to PDF using each of the convertors below. The resulting document was then checked in Adobe? Reader for a number of the accessibility benefits that the format can offer.

Cute PDF Writer

• Downloadable software or web-based service? Download.
• Are there any print preferences? No.
• Is text recognised as text? Yes.
• Are bookmarks transferred? No.
• Is the document structure (e.g. headings) maintained? No.
• Is the reading order maintained when the text is reflowed? No, blocks of text are merged into one another and images are merged into the main text.
• Is the alternative text for images maintained? No.
• Can the document be read using the Read Out Loud function? Yes (but affected by reading order).
• Can the accessibility preferences be changed? Yes, document colours can be changed.
• Other comments: A commercial version (CutePDF Professional) is also available with additional functionality.

  Cute PDF Writer

Pdf995

• Downloadable software or web-based service? Download; this is a suite three programmes (Pdf995, PdfEdit995 and Signature995) each offering slightly different functionality.
• Are there any print preferences? No.
• Is text recognised as text? Yes.
  Are bookmarks transferred? No, but bookmarks can be inserted using PdfEdit995.
• Is the document structure (e.g. headings) maintained? No.
• Is the reading order maintained when the text is reflowed?No, blocks of text are merged into one another and images are merged into the main text.
• Is the alternative text for images maintained? No.
  Can the document be read using the Read Out Loud function? Yes (but affected by reading order).
• Can the accessibility preferences be changed? Yes, document colours can be changed.
• Other comments: Can upgrade to a commercial version; the free version contains pop up adverts.

  Pdf995

PrimoPDF

• Downloadable software or web-based service? Both software download and web-based services available.
• Are there any print preferences within the downloaded software? Some relating to image properties.
• Are there any accessibility options available in the web-based service? No.
• Is text recognised as text? Yes.
• Are bookmarks transferred? No.
• Is the document structure (e.g. headings) maintained? No.
• Is the reading order maintained when the text is reflowed? No.
• Is the alternative text for images maintained? No.
  Can the document be read using the Read Out Loud function? Yes (but affected by reading order).
• Can the accessibility preferences be changed? Document colours can be changed.

  PrimoPDF

Do PDF

• Downloadable software or web-based service? Download.
• Are there any print preferences? Yes, scale and resolution can be changed.
• Is text recognised as text? Yes.
• Are bookmarks transferred? No.
  Is the document structure (e.g. headings) maintained? No.
• Is the reading order maintained when the text is reflowed? Yes.
  Is the alternative text for images maintained? No.
• Can the document be read using the Read Out Loud function? Yes.
• Can the accessibility preferences be changed? Yes, document colours can be changed.

  DoPDF

Doc2PDF

• Downloadable software or web-based service? Web-based.
• Are there any accessibility options? No.
• Is text recognised as text? Yes.
• Are bookmarks transferred? Yes.
• Is the document structure (e.g. headings) maintained? Yes.
• Is the reading order maintained when the text is reflowed? Yes, but with some of the text merges incorrectly.
• Is the alternative text for images maintained? No.
• Can the document be read using the Read Out Loud function? Yes.
• Can the accessibility preferences be changed? Yes, document colours can be changed.

  Doc2PDF

GoogleDocs

• Downloadable software or web-based service? Web-based.
• Are there any accessibility options? No.
• Is text recognised as text? Yes.
• Are bookmarks transferred? Yes (if created in GoogleDocs originally).
• Is the document structure (e.g. headings) maintained? Yes but may require some correction.
• Is the reading order maintained when the text is reflowed? Yes.
• Is the alternative text for images maintained? No.
• Can the document be read using the Read Out Loud function? Yes.
• Can the accessibility preferences be changed? Yes, document colours can be changed.
• Other comments: Some images were missing from the PDF produced.

  Google Docs

Well Thats it. Of course you could use Open Office that has the pdf converter already available and is a great alternative to Microsoft Office.

As the search engines continue to improve, your SEO needs to as well. A ranking tumble for your website can be devastating. You need to recover as soon as possible – it’s not the easiest task in the world, but it’s not as hard as you’d think. The most important thing to keep in mind is that you cannot panic. You have to keep working on your SEO projects and you need to remember that  listings and rankings come and go spiratically at times but that search engines won't let you down if your site is useful.

The experts’ advice to websites that have lost their ranking is usually to start over, following current and good SEO information. Look over your entire site and insure that you haven't done something that would have caused this sudden change in listings and rankings. Normally if you haven't done anything wrong, your links will slowly begin to reappear again especially if you have a nice sized linking network that is listed well.

One step that you can take is to narrow your site’s focus and work hard on one or two keywords. It doesn’t seem like a lot, but it’s sufficient. Make sure each page of your site includes good enough navigation that someone can get anywhere from anywhere else, and make sure you do this with plain ‘a href’ links, not fancy JavaScript.

If you are using frames, now is a good time to dump them. You can replace them with scrollable <div> tags and have similar looking pages that search engines can index more easily. The most important concept in recovering from a ranking tumble is to perform damage control. Any SEO operation that you have performed that could be deemed as controversial you should immediately disband. If you are lucky, your web site hasn't been permanently deleted from any important search engines.

Once you have performed all of the local damage control that you can it is a good idea to insure that your file sizes are relatively small. Make sure that you don't have any excessive images or large external files that will cause a search engine to give up on its attempt to index you. Make sure that you haven't created a linking loop that Google's bots can't find a way out of.

Links are very important to your website’s rankings, and you need to consider finding good link partners to improve your targeted traffic and keyword relevancy. If you have a decent corp of link partners already you can request that they move their links to your site to a higher traffic page for a short period of time so that you can get re-indexed. They may be willing to do this if you remind them that the links from your site to theirs are more valuable once you've been indexed than they are when you are unindexed.

If you submit to the search engines properly the first time and you have a good SEO maintenance plan, you’ll only need to submit your site once. You might consider hiring someone to keep your site regularly updated, as regularly-updated sites rank higher. If you have recently suffered a ranking tumble, use Google Sitemaps to get your page back into Google. This is the fastest method available and is the strongest damage control that you will be able to perform.

Build great content around your keywords or phrases. Remember that content is King for both visitors and search engines. Your content must be extremely relevant to your key words at this point. You don’t want to try to pull a fast one because this was probably the reason that your ranking tumbled in the first place. Remember: When you are recovering from a rank tumble, you are at the search engines’ mercy. You cannot possibly recover if you try to do anything that doesn’t seem right to the search engines.

Submit your website properly to each search engine and directory by hand, making sure you understand each site’s rules. Using automatic submissions is just not a good idea. There are so many things that can go wrong and you just don’t know what goes on behind the scenes. Work by hand and if possible, contact the search engine or directory and ask them if there is a specific reason that your site was suddenly removed. Ask them if there is any action that you can take to make up for any mistakes that you may have made.

Get as many one-way links as you can from directories or pay to have good websites link to yours. One-way links are better than two-way ones.

Monitor your results regularly to find out what’s working and what’s not. Don’t be afraid to make changes.

Keep all these things in mind and you can recover from a rankings tumble easily.

Before you can evaluate your site’s SEO profile, you need to understand what an SEO profile is and how it works. An SEO profile for a website is just like a marketing plan or a business plan – basically, it’s a strategy document, putting your decisions into words. This is best performed on a computer program such as Microsoft Word as these programs do provide the best bang for your buck. All else aside, Microsoft does put out some excellent business oriented software so take advantage of it!

Writing your SEO profile should consist of the following:

An introduction - This should include a BRIEF description of your company as well as a purpose statement of some kind. If you can describe your company in a neat, tight format, you will be one step ahead of most in the SEO game.

Goals relating to your Search Engine Status - What do you want your page rank to be? Where do you want to be listed under specif key words? top 50? 25? 10? How many pages of your site do you want search engines to index? Do you want to pay for listings? These questions will get you started, but you must go more in-depth into your SEO goals. Also include the search engines and directories that you feel are necessities such as Google, DMOZ, Yahoo!, and MSN.

Information regarding SEO actions and achievements - This one is pretty self-explanatory. List everything that you do regarding Search Engine Optimization as well as any successes caused by these actions.

Once you’ve written an SEO profile, you can compare it from time-to-time with what’s going on with your site, before either adjusting the site to reflect your strategy or adjusting the profile to reflect a strategy change. Generally, it is wise to stick to the plan, but occasions may arise when you find that this is simply not logical anymore. In these cases, you must re-evaluate your entire plan because one change can effect the rest of your strategy. If you have an extremely intricate strategy that depends on one thing going well, you may want to diversify your strategy. Your profile should especially focus on special things you plan to do that aren’t standard SEO practice.

Standard SEO work can get you only so far. Every one of your competitors is probably doing the same things so get creative. This is one place where doing something for yourself can really push you to the top. If you already have a high-ranking site, you should use your profile to document the reasons why it has happened, to help you maintain your high ranking.

Keeping your SEO profile updated will allow you to stay current not only on what’s going on with your website, but also on what’s going on in the SEO industry. The SEO industry is very fickle. It can change suddenly without warning to reflect what a search engine or directory believes to be the opinion or benefit of the market. Remember that search engines are always in competition with one another to deliver the most results of the highest quality. If you stay on top of your quality, changes in the SEO industry will have minimal effect on you.

It is still important to track these changes in order to ensure that your site gets maximum exposure. Evaluating your website and profile regularly give you an advantage in the market – you should never let a profile get older than 3 months, and you should refer to it and update it every time you make major changes to your site. These changes include additions of services or removal of services as well as design changes and SEO work.

There is software available online that can help you evaluate your site's SEO profile. Some of these software are very useful, others are very overrated. The difference that these programs will make in your fight for page rank and listings depends on your interpretation of the results nearly as much as it depends on the value of the software itself. In order to find some software simply google for SEO software. Reading the reviews and making judgement calls is the best way to determine the worth of SEO software. If you think that its worth going for look at the cost of it. If the cost seems to high, it probably is. You can generally evaluate your SEO profile on your own once you have learned what to look for in an Search Engine Optomized page.