A good idea

The author of the following letter sent this to me and I decided to post this on my blog because I think it’s an excellent idea:

To Whom it May Concern:

This is an idea I have for finding women and children who are believed to have been kidnapped and sold into the human trafficking / sex slave market of third world and other countries, including this one.

My name is Anna Maria. I am a 29-year-old woman. I am a born United States Citizen, and I currently live in Altamonte Springs, Florida. As a concerned US citizen, my heart goes out to the many families who have loved ones that have been kidnapped and are believed to have been sold into the human trafficking / sex slave markets, and I am writing out of a sincere desire to help.

I believe it may be possible to locate these victims by using the internet (particularly, search engine optimization) to specifically target potential, current, or past customers of the people holding these victims captive with information about each individual victim and each family’s individual search. This may be done by building separate websites providing full information on each victim individually, but optimizing the websites as if they were the same type of sex/adult friend finder/escort service/brothel/etc website that these customers would be searching for.

The websites would need to be optimized for any, and all, search terms that these customers would type into Google, or any search engine, in order to find the websites that provide these services in the locations they are looking for. The websites should be optimized and built in each of the likely languages that would be used when searching. For example: if it is possible that a victim may be held in a place where people may speak Spanish, English, as well as Portuguese, and if the potential customers would be persons who speak one or all of these languages, then that victim’s websites should be completely optimized in all three languages, for all of the differing search terms that someone would type in their own language.

In order to entice the potential customers to ‘click,’ the websites need to have URLs appropriate for what these customers would be looking for—example: http://www.best-brothels-in-south-america.com, or http://www.gorgeous-escorts-for-your-vacation.com, or http://www.exotic-girls-of-ecuador.net, etc.

The websites should also contain pictures of what the victim may look like now, with as many variations as possible in hair style and color, in facial expression, and in clothing, accessories, and makeup. Pictures or drawings of every single distinctive feature, such as tattoos, body piercings, and birth marks should appear as well. I believe that pictures speak louder, and faster, than words, and while full descriptions are important and should be provided, pictures and quick, easy-to-read bold statements must be prominent. This is especially important when considering that these customers would likely stumble onto these websites, and only remain for a matter of seconds or minutes.

I am a small business owner who has found search engine optimization to be key in targeting my own potential customers. I learned much of what I know about search engine optimization from another small business friend of mine, and from, believe it or not, Search Engine Optimization for Dummies by Peter Kent. It took me a year to finally digest the information and use it effectively, but once I learned to do this correctly, it has been very successful.

I know a lot about building websites, and search engine optimization, however, I am not a specialist. There are definitely people who are experts at web development and search engine optimization, however, not all web developers know how to optimize a website for search engines. If each individual family of these victims is able to employ a specialist in search engine optimization, I strongly encourage them to do so in order to best build, and optimize the sort of website I have mentioned in this letter. If they are not able to employ a specialist, and if they want to try to tackle this on their own, I encourage them to read Search Engine Optimization for Dummies, and any other search engine optimization book out on the market today for help and ideas.

This is a complicated process—especially for persons who are not used to thinking in terms of web development and optimizing pages for key words, but if the right people are targeted with the right keywords and phrases, the persons who actually have contact with the victims of kidnapping and human trafficking would very likely stumble onto these pages.

Usually, families of missing persons only build webpages that are targeted at the regular, law abiding, concerned US citizen—example: http://www.amybradley.net. This is a great site for providing information to people who know Amy Bradley, or for anyone who may have seen the Dr. Phil special which aired a few years ago and might be interested in reading up on her situation, but this website will in no way reach the people who could actually do anything about it! This site is not in any way optimized for reaching the would-be customers of various brothels in third world countries. Those customers are not going to type “Amy Bradley” or “Find Amy Bradley” into http://www.Google.com. They are going to type search phrases in their own languages that will help them to find the type of brothel or escort service they are looking for in their location, and whatever it is they type into Google, it will definitely NOT be “Find Amy Bradley.”

If possible, please forward this information to any families who have loved ones that have been kidnapped and lost to this industry.

Thank you very much, and best wishes to the grieving families of these victims.

Sincerely,
Anna Maria

© Anna Maria 2009 | This letter is posted here with permission by the author. For permission to write about this idea, or to reproduce this letter in part, or in full, please write for permission to Anna Maria here.