The first edition of Aardvark was written back in April of 1995, simply as an experiment in the embryonic field of online publishing. Since then it has continued non-stop to this very day, with only a few changes in format and frequency over the years. That's over 1,500 published editions totalling almost a million words.

That's not counting the numerous news stories, reviews and feature series that have also been written and published on the Aardvark site during that time.

Who Is Aardvark?
The man behind Aardvark is one Bruce Simpson, writer, author, publisher, jet engine developer, entrepreneur, outspoken commentator and former software developer.

Simpson works from his home in the countryside about an hour from Auckland, New Zealand's largest city.

Who Reads Aardvark?
You'd be surprised at the long list of people who read Aardvark!

Amongst the ranks of regular readers you'll find politicians, CEOs, IT managers, web-designers, programmers, the rest of the print, broadcast and online media, government departments, the police, and thousands of ordinary Kiwis, expats and interested people from around the globe.

Server logs indicate that Aardvark's front page gets (on average) between 100,000 and 130,000 visits per month, with about another 20,000 views of previously published columns via the archives. This figure is still growing however, and the site is on target for around 180K front-page visits per month by mid-year. (Sever Stats for week ending 25/01/2003 PST or 26/01/2003 NZDT)

An NZ web-traffic measurement company has advised that Aardvark is the second most visited site in NZ under the category "News and Media - IT Media". This is a pretty impressive result when you realise that Aardvark goes head-to-head with heavyweight competition such as IDG and Netguide, both of which have the benefit of a large print-media presence with which to promote their websites; and Infotech which is 49 percent owned and operated by media magnate Rupert Murdoch's NewsCorp.

How Does Aardvark Earn A Crust?
As well as writing for print and other online publications (example) and writing the occasional book, Simpson is also a very accomplished and experienced online marketing consultant of enviable repute.

Unlike most of the other "consultants" who talk a lot but often can't offer real examples of their effectiveness, Simpson has a powerful track record of developing and implementing very innovative and succesful online marketing strategies.

For example, by designing and implementing a very clever viral-marketing strategy, he successfully turned 7am News from a small 200-visitor a day website into the world's most widely syndicated web-based news service (60 million sessions a month) in just three short years -- without spending a penny on advertising.

Likewise, the Aardvark website enjoys a popularity far beyond its modest beginnings and budgets thanks to some smart marketing tactics.

When he started selling jet engines over the Net, he actually did too good a job of marketing and ended up being totally swamped with orders from around the world.

As part of this consulting work Simpson also helps people get their websites highly ranked on the most popular search engines.

Check out how effective his techniques have been in getting this site well ranked under some simple and relevant keywords and phrases. The Aardvark site is ranked either "number one" or in the first page of results for all these:

• Google Search for Internet News and Commentary (1,230,000 matches)
• Google Search for NZ Net news (635,000 matches)
• Google Search for PC-based PVR (853 matches)
• Google Search for homebuilt jet engine (3,580 matches)
• Google Search for jet engine (1,280,000 matches)
• Google Search for getting highly ranked (198,000 matches)
• Google Search for using bulk email (745,000 matches)

And best of all, these rankings were achieved without resorting to unethical techniques (which can get your ranking massively demoted if discovered) such as keyword-stuffing, hidden text, the use of multiple aliased domain names, etc.

Just a hint -- if you're planning on paying someone to help you get your website well ranked, check to make sure that they've been successful in getting their own site up near the top of the rankings. And check it using simple search terms -- not just obscure phrases. If they can't get their own site on the first page, how will they get yours highly ranked?

Of course Aardvark is always looking for new opportunities and (paid) outlets for his unique writing style so, if you've got a newsletter, website or other publication for which you'd like some top-quality, insightful and thought-provoking copy then please contact Aardvark and find out how he can help.