SEO For Real

I was reading my usual forums today when I came across this post:

Here is a good thing to keep in mind - not just in beta but throughout your entire life.  No matter how right you might be and no matter how good your ideas are they immediately get diminished by using inflammatory language.  Saying "go back and change whatever you screwed up" just makes you sound like you are a chicken little.  The statement is not necessary to your post.  By overstating you are undercutting your own credibility.  You have some really great feedback in some of your posts and it is too bad you don’t communicate it in the most useful way

In addition to that, I’ve been talking to Kimberly for the past few days in e-mail.  And while speaking with her I’ve learned "the other side of the story".

Without going into her personal details, I’ll just say that she is sincere in her beliefs and never intended anyone any harm.  In fact, I would go so far as to say that she’s more concerned about her own well-being as well as those of her clients.

When I originally posted about her e-mail, I did so rashly.  In retrospect, I should not have posted what I did.  I have now come to the opinion that there are lines to be drawn…

Specifically, it’s ok to take someone to task or debate with them about a topic if they’re a public figure or representing a company.  For instance, writing on spam and how they’re clogging the internet and targeting me would not be a bad thing.

On the other hand, targeting someone who may have a website and sent an e-mail to you that may have been harsh does not mean one needs to respond in kind.

Since I took Kimberly to task in a public blog I feel that the apology should come from the same place. 

So, Kimberly and anyone else I offended with that particular post, I apologize.  I never intended any harm but I think I may have caused some.  I’ll be more careful in the future.

And for what it’s worth - those of you who are posting modified pictures of her on the net and/or sending her e-mails.  Please stop and let this die - ok?

A More Humble G-Man

I’ve been working over Labor Day weekend a bit, reviewing sites for clients (and friends) and continually find that site architecture best practices are being ignored. Since Monday isn’t a holiday globally, I thought it would be worthwhile to provide a quick peek into what I’d recommend on the structural side of SEO:

• Dynamic URLs - If it’s even remotely possible, avoid them completely. From what we’ve seen, a couple of the search engines actually have different trust metrics or ranking criteria they apply to dynamic URLs. It’s not as big a deal for Google as for others, but why take a chance? ISAPI and mod_rewrite are simple to implement and certainly worth the time.
• 3 Clicks to Any Page - Normally, webdev industry insiders consider this a rule for usability, but it’s also critical to successful SEO. If you want spiders to quickly find your content and engines to rank it well, make your sitemap page accessible from every page on the site, and if you’ve got a monstrously huge site, use sub-sitemaps for unique sections to ensure that thousands of pages can be accessed in 2-3 clicks/links.
• Avoid Unneccessary Subdomains - It’s up for speculation as to whether each of the engines applies the entirety of a domain’s trust and linkjuice weight to subdomains. Some think it’s on a case-by-case basis, which I find reasonable, and others thing they are generally devalued as compared to the primary domain. In either case, unless you’re looking to dominate the SERPs via a subdomain takeover (like this guy), subdomain content can easily go in a subfolder.
• Internal Anchor Text Bombing - The funny part about this tactic is - it used to work. You could change the link to your site’s home page to read "denver mortgage refinance" and actually rank for it. Luckily, Google & Yahoo! got smart right around the same time and actually started penalizing sites that used this tactic. Your best bet now is to write internal anchor text for visitors, not engines. If you run a Denver real estate site and link to your refinance page, it might be fine to use that anchor text, but for primary site navigation, this technique is more likely to hurt than help.
• PageRank Flow - Two words will suffice - ignore it. PageRank flow through a site used to be a valid tactic, but these days, you’re wasting valuable time determining the number of links, where they point and attempting to modify your site based on the 7-year old formula. Similarly, keeping a careful eye on your outbound links doesn’t pay - just think of the human user and deliver what they’d want (it’s remarkable how far this will take you).
• One Piece of Content, One URL - This probably trips up more big, commercial sites than any other. The issue is that the same content is accessible in multiple ways and on multiple URLs, forcing the search engines (and visitors) to choose which is the canonical version, which to link to and which to disregard. No one wins when sites fight themselves - make peace and if you have to deliver the content in different ways, rely on cookies or session IDs so you don’t confuse the spiders.

Hopefully, these suggestions are already issues you’re familiar with and apply without a second thought. If you’ve got others to suggest, I’m all ears (even though I’m technically taking the day off).

The most common question I receive after I’ve written any of my posts is:

How can I get started and learn what you know?

And that’s a difficult question to answer. Not because I don’t think it’s possible but because there is so much that you can do in the SEO field.

Let’s take black hat out of the discussion for a moment because what I think people are really asking is:

How can I make money on the Internet?.. Because my sites don’t seem to be making me anything.

Again, that’s not an easy answer.  I can certainly fire off a response to that that says something like:

Find a topic you like, a nice, start writing quality content about it and people will find you and link to you and eventually you can monetize that site and make some money.

That’s all well and good but what people usually need is some type of mentor. They need to be able to ask questions at any time and get answers. Typically however, mentors are quite difficult to find for one of several reasons:

1. Inability to follow instructions. There are quite a few folks who will ask questions, learn the answers and then do absolutely nothing. Why? I dunno - that will be debated for ages I suppose
2. Time or rather, the lack of it.  Usually a mentor that is worth having is going to be quite busy. They simply don’t have the time to coach a lot of people. Just like you, they want to make money. A mentor will sometimes do it out of the goodness of their heart but more often than not they’d like to be compensated in some way for their time.
3. Don’t know who to ask. It’s very difficult to find someone who not only would be willing to mentor you but also be competent enough to actually teach you something. It’s quite easy to say on a forum, "I made $30,000 last month in Adsense" but of those people who have said that, how many can you trust to be telling the truth?

So, usually my conversation with the people who e-mail me has involved answering the questions that they have and since they don’t know what to ask next and I’m not giving them a footprint to follow they give up pretty quickly. To those folks I apologize. It’s never been my intent to bar anyone from finding out information.

I believe it was Randfish who pointed out a while back that we all wear hats of many colors. On some of the forums I frequent, this isn’t the case. Take for example, the syndk8 where you’ll find lots of black hat information but usually nothing that’s white hat.

On the other hand, there is a different forum that I’ve been watching for the past year that has taken a different approach. Initially they started as a site that would teach you everything you needed to know about scraping and using various programs to do it. They also gave away keyword lists every month.

Well, times change and so has this forum.  In fact, I find it ironic that the "new" stuff they are teaching are a lot of white hat techniques and building less spammy content. 

When you can couple the white hat techniques with the black hat techniques is when you can come up with some truly powerful combinations.

I think it’s fair to say that most of us are looking for ways to improve our websites and their ranking.  That’s why we spend so much time doing what we do.  I sincerely hope that all of you who are looking for a mentor take a look at that forum so that you can get the tools, techniques, tips, etc. to succeed. 

Oh, and for what it’s worth, it’s not the ONLY place that you can get the information but it’s one place that definitely has a growing amount of information and is also the only one that I publicly endorse.

One other thing before I close…There are a few people I’d like to mention that have helped me grow in the past few years in one way or another.  Here’s your chance for the spotlight (in no particular order):

• Randfish - your long thought out posts and analyses make my brain hurt, but I usually get more out of them than I think you put in them!
• Earl Grey - You’re a tosser but I enjoy your debates on various subjects.  I never quite know when you’re selling me a long yarn or telling me the truth.  I am a better person for it either way because it makes me stretch further.
• Dazzlindonna - Thanks for all your kind comments on SEOChat when I hung around there.  I’m still amazed you put up with me.
• Kerry Cianos - My best friend for like 16 and counting years. It’s time to rewrite our scraper and start doing some Markov chains!  I’ll even let you use .NET 3.0
• l3vi - Our nightly discussions, brainstorming, marketing, etc. have continually pushed me to work harder.  You might be making more than me but I’m still planning on catching up!

If I forgot to mention you, rest assured your help was still appreciated - it’s just that those few brain cells were wiped from my memory during the chemotherapy!
G-Man

P.S.  Who has been a mentor to you and helped you in a significant way?

Edit: Removed affiliate link

I have built a lot of niche directories through the years.  But the process is no longer fun for me.  Much as I love to browse interesting Web sites, it seems everyone has a homegrown directory these days.  Most business sites build directories from reciprocal link partnerships.  Some people build quickie directories in the hope of generating adclick revenue.  Over the past couple of years, I’ve developed what I call Elite Directories.

An Elite Directory is built on passion for a topic.  It is not all-inclusive.  It is very small.  Many people might argue it’s not a "real" directory.  An Elite Directory will have fewer than 100 listings.  I think 50 listings is pushing the limit for an Elite Directory.  You can have categories or not (I prefer one page per category).  All that really matters, however, is that you only include the creme de la creme for the topics you select.  You have to review dozens if not hundreds of Web sites and winnow them down to fewer than 10 per category/topic.

The purpose of the Elite Directory is to point the spotlight of your opinion at a handful of truly unique, useful Web sites.  Your opinion is expressed through mini-reviews crafted for each listing.  I also include a sidebar article, 2-3 paragraphs long, that may describe how I selected the sites, or which may profile a very special site.  Or the sidebar may offer interesting facts and anecdotes about the topic.

Let’s say your Web site sells horses.  Would an Elite Directory benefit you?  I think it would.  You could review Web sites for the 5 best stables in your country, the 5 best farriers (blacksmiths), the 5 best saddle makers, the 5 best trainers, the 5 best veterinarians, the 5 best jockeys, etc.

That’s 30 high quality Web sites you can write about; and in the process you provide a great service to people interested in the care and ownership of horses.  Your Web site becomes more visible for highly relevant queries, and naturally you’re going to cross-link back to the main page from each of your Elite Directory pages.  I do not require or ask for reciprocal linkage with Elite Directories.  I only create indexable, reputation-passing 1-way links in Elite Directories.

If yours is the first site in your niche to offer that Elite Directory, no one will be able to take that distinction away from you.  But let’s suppose someone else has already created that first Elite Directory for horse-related industries.  You can still provide a unique directory by writing about the 5 newest, up-and-coming stables, farriers, etc.  Or you can write just about the people in your area.  The point is that you can determine the type of quality that governs the sites you list in your Elite Directory.

Elite Directories provide highly relevant, easy-to-create, unique content for a broad selection of Web sites.  The more content pages a Web site has, the more queries it can potentially rank for, the more likely it is to benefit from Golden Pages.  A good Elite Directory provides substantial commentary about Web sites, at least 2-3 sentences per listing.  These are not 25-word-or-less directory descriptions.  They are self-evident explanations of why the sites were selected for inclusion in the Elite Directory.

Have you used Elite Directories?  Let us know about your experiences and preferences.

I can’t believe I’m about to do this, but I also can’t resist. Eric Ward, aka "Link Moses," aka "The Link Building Expert," wrote a post last month about drinking the linkbait kool-aid and I’m forced to take issue with his stance. From Eric’s post:

…Nowadays I guess the term content has become quaint. I hear people saying, “I don’t have time to add real content, I need is something quick that will make everyone want to link to my site.” And I say, “Like what, the Diet Coke/Mentos fountain video? But I thought your site sold ball bearings?”

Funny, but true. People are getting so caught up in their quest for viral, user-generated links that they will do anything. Who cares if it has nothing to do with your long-term business success, your site was on the Digg homepage yesterday! Cool!!

I say you’re drinking the link bait Kool-Aid…

He goes on to say:

There’s nothing necessarily wrong with link baiting. It’s the term and the tactics I don’t like. If you are creating Link Bait for no other reason than to attract links in hopes of also attracting search engine rankings improvement via those links…well, good luck. That’s what EVERYONE is doing. And those types of links wont help you long if at all. But go ahead and try it. While you do, why
not also add some really useful content and tools to your site that will help your users accomplish something? 

OK. Here’s where Eric and I strongly disagree about the definition of linkbait and the value of the links & buzz generated via its creation. Let me first give my own abbreviated definition of linkbait:

Linkbait is a content element on a website that is created for the purpose of appealing to bloggers, journalists, webmasters, social media enthusiasts and writers.

Unlike content that is primarily targeted at industry insiders (from whatever sector/niche you’re in), linkbait should be universally valuable, memorable and compelling. The higher quality the content you create and the more targeted you make it, the better your chances for keeping a percentage of the traffic you initially attract and getting a higher number of links from your effort.

Linkbait IS NOT manipulation. You’re not trying to fool anyone into linking to you or con visitors into coming to your site. The content you’ve created through linkbait should be the kind that others are proud to link to. If a blogger links to your content, it should be because their audience benefits directly from that link - they learn something new, have access to a fantastic tool, get a hearty laugh or discover something that provokes discussion.

Eric is right in the sense that linkbaiting is merely content creation, but with a new twist. The existence of portals like Techmeme, Fark, Digg, Del.icio.us/Popular, Reddit, Boing Boing, StumbleUpon that aggregate what they (or their visitors) consider the "best of the web," has created a new channel for quick delivery to a massive audience. One could argue that this ability to promote content rapidly has always been on the web, in the form of site like MSN.com (whose homepage will occassionally have a story about a new website), Yahoo!’s Site of the Day, Macromedia’s Site of the Day, Slashdot, etc. These newer entrants are merely expanding the ability of clever content providers and marketers to have a big splash in the online world.

There’s a second (and some would argue, less altruistic - though I’d disagree) goal of linkbait - ranking at the search engines. When a viral meme makes its way across the blogosphere, it picks up hundreds and sometimes thousands of links. These links often feature the keywords used by the site to describe its linkbait content, thus providing powerful, high quality link popularity to a page that’s now very likely to rank well for its featured content. Is this ethically questionable? Do search engines abhor this kind of behavior? NO!

From a logic standpoint, this is exactly the type of content search engines would want to rank well in their index. Hundreds (possibly thousands) of people have literally voted with their links (and at places like Digg, Del.icio.us and Reddit, with their accounts) to say that this content rocks. If users love it and it provides value to them, aren’t the search engines inherently passionate about making that content rank well, too?

Let’s put it another way - will people who search for "page strength" be dissapointed when they get to the SEOmoz tool? Will users searching for "Web 2.0" get frustrated when they see the spammy, low quality awards site? Are homeowners who search for "real estate values" getting fed up with finding Zillow’s service? NO! Users get great value from these pages - they perfectly fit the query and deliver information the users want. Linkbait isn’t just for bloggers or search engines or social taggers - it’s for anyone who needs solid, high quality data to answer their search.

Not all linkbait is valuable, and not all of it is content that the search engines would want to rank, but in theory, the goal is to create content that fits all of these criteria. Let’s see if I can’t get Link Moses to come around to my way of thinking

Almost everyone in the industry who’s had a chance to interact one on one with a Googler in the past 6 months has probably noticed that it "feels" different from the interactions of the past 3 years. Robert Scoble did a good job describing it with regard to his recent visit to the ‘plex:

…every interaction I had with Googlers this time was different than the last time I was on campus. They seemed more humble. More comfortable. More inquisitive. And, when I gave them chances to say “you’re an idiot” they didn’t take it (and I gave them many opportunities). This is a different Google than I was used to. And it’s the small things that I noticed.

One other small thing I noticed? A lot more blog listening behavior. Carl Sjogreen, who runs the Google Calendar team, told me that the first thing he does every morning is do this search: “Google Calendar.” He says he answers everyone’s questions, even if you’re a kid in another country with only four readers.

There’s a lot of other very good examples of this shift in behavior, including:

• Matt Cutts’ blog
• Vanessa Fox & the Webmaster Central team’s blog
• The private invitations to tour Google during the SES San Jose show (Matt & Rebecca from SEOmoz went and Bill from SEO by the Sea was there, too)
• Googlers (who aren’t Matt) interacting after hours with SEOs
• The hiring of Adam Lasnik
• Googlers reading and participating in blogs and forums

Personally, I’m thrilled to see this change. I honestly did not expect that they’d go down this path until they were faced with a loss or failure. Google’s communication structure has gone from hubris to relative humility in a remarkably short period of time.

Do you get the same sense? What have been your experiences with Google of late?

I’m an analytics junkie. Along with my constant monitoring of email and the blog tracker, I have to admit that I watch referring URLs, unique visitors and Feedburner stats like a hawk. Sometimes I’m on it several times before lunch. This unhealthy obsession has lead to some valuable discoveries over time, including one that I discussed during my sessions in San Jose called "the linkbait bump" and another that everyone who runs a site should be paying attention to - action tracking by referral source.

Action Tracking by Referral Source

In the screen capture above (from our analytics provider - Indextools), you can see a list of domains that sent us traffic over the last few weeks, along with the number of SEOmoz membership signups those referrals led to. We only recently began tracking this information, but already you can see some clear patterns, including:

• Digg, StumbleUpon & Reddit are sending traffic, but fewer than 1/10th of one percent of those visitors sign up for membership (they might be subscribing to the feed, which we don’t currently track through Indextools).
• The domains that point primarily to our tools (like SEOCompany & WebRankInfo) are responsible for the highest number of signups, but this is to be expected since you have to register to use Keyword Difficulty in particular.
• SearchEngineWatch, Stuntdubl & SEOBook are amazingly on-topic sources of traffic, which directly bears out in the higher percentages of referrals who become members.

Action tracking is one of the most valuable things you can do on any type of site. Most folks limit its application to e-commerce, but you can see from the data above how valuable it can be, even for a simple blog. Even if you don’t have a membership signup, you could attach the action tracking to your "add comment" link in a blog or to a newsletter signup on a content site. Segmenting that data by incoming referrals (search engines, direct type-ins and links) gives you an even better picture of who’s sending you truly valuable traffic.

The Linkbait Bump

I first talked about this in my SEM via Communities, Wikipedia & Tagging session in San Jose (Barry covered it here). The idea is that after a big piece of linkbait that draws thousands of visitors to your site, a small percentage of those folks will stick around and continue to visit on a semi-regular basis (this is particularly true if you’re delivering fresh, valuable content on a regular basis).

In the screen capture above, we can see that around week 13 of 2006, SEOmoz had some big linkbait that helped to give the site’s visitors a bump that lasted all the way until week 29, when we had another big piece (and we’ve been on a bit of a roll since then, too). This traffic "bump" after the spike is another of the great benefits of creating viral-worthy content, and is a terrific way to grow the popularity of a site.

In my honest opinion, most of the traffic growth from this blog can be attributed to this phenomenon almost entirely - the pattern of spike, bump, coast has repeated itself to varying degrees across our 3 year lifespan. The tricky part has been to continue to deliver great content after a viral piece and maintain the creative energy necessary to prove to visitors that you’re worth coming back to again and again. It’s not an easy sell - people’s time is valuable. You have to make your content so targeted, interesting and worthy of their attention that they can’t look away. It’s challenging and time consuming, but it’s a great way to build a successful site.

When Jeff mentioned the page strength tool helper monkey he pretty much gave out the recipe for our secret sauce.   Rather than trying to cover up this incident, I put together a diagram showing exactly how page strength scores are calculated.   Enjoy!

Today I’m going to sappify (yes, I just made up a word. Deal with it!) this blog. Why? Well, first of all I’m currently the only female SEOmoz blogger, and even though I tend to fall more on the tomboy side, I can still girly it up a bit from time to time. Secondly, work has been going really well for me lately, which caused me to reflect on exactly why I’m so happy with how things are going. Behold, from not-so-important to super-important, I will share with our loyal readers why I love working for SEOmoz:

1.  I love our office.

I think that the quality of your work and mood are contingent on the environment you’re in. That being said, when I started working for SEOmoz, we worked in a tiny two room office that was rendered even tinier due to the copious amounts of dust and must. Turning my head to sneeze resulted in spraying Matt with spittle (which, by the way, makes for a very cranky web developer). Add in the fact that we were located in a building frequented by shady folks who would hole up in the bathrooms and the stairwell to get drunk or sleep off a hangover, and, well, it wasn’t an ideal work space.

Thankfully, we found a gorgeous office that is more attuned to the young, hip SEOmoz vibe. Now I have to stand up and walk five feet over to Matt in order to sneeze on him (which I do every once in a while in order to help build up his immune system). We have our own  bathroom (complete with a shower, though we’ve currently re-dubbed it the Place Where CRT Monitors Go to Die). Rand has his own office (how snazzy CEO of him!), Gillian and Brandon have their own office, and the rest of us are comfortably sharing a large, spacious room in the middle. I love walking to work and immediately feeling at ease once I step through the door. There’s less tension among everyone because, well, there’s more space between us. If I need to mentally veg out for a minute, I can get up and walk around without disturbing anyone.

2.  SEOmoz treats me like a capable human being.

As Jeff mentioned in an earlier blog post, Rand’s lenient with the work hours. He could give a crap if we come in at 7:00 or at 10:00, as long as we’re willing to make use of the time while we’re here. Most days I go to the gym in the morning and come to work at 9:30 or 10:00, then I stay until around 6:00, sometimes a little earlier, sometimes a little later. If I have a doctor’s appointment and have to come in late or have plans in the evening and need to leave early, it’s no problem because there’s a high level of trust within the company. Rand understands that we have lives to live outside of work, and as long as our work isn’t compromised, he’s okay with being lenient.

Why is this totally awesome? Well, I am largely in charge of my own schedule, and as long as I don’t exploit that freedom and start acting irresponsibly, I’ll continue to be in charge of my own schedule. Rand continually impresses me with how much faith and trust he regards his coworkers. Which leads me to my next point…

3.  I’m appreciated at work.

Most people fear landing some corporate gig where they are rendered a nameless, faceless, unappreciated worker bee. When I was in college, I had the same fear. I was afraid of spending X amount of money on my college education, only to land some entry-level job where I’m treated like dirt.

I applied for a job at SEOmoz before my last quarter of school, and while I didn’t get the position, I did persuade Rand to give me an internship. Hiring an intern is like having a modern-day slave, only instead of getting paid with whip lashes they get paid with college credit. An intern’s Underground Railroad is getting a job offering once the internship is over. I very badly wanted SEOmoz to offer me a job, and I was prepared to swim through a half mile of sludge (much like Andy Dufresne in The Shawshank Redemption) in order to land one.

Did Rand exploit the opportunity of having a desperate-for-a-job college student work for free? No; he treated me like a colleague. In fact, everyone treated me like a coworker and like a friend. When I got hired on as a permanent, full-time employee, their faith in me continued to grow. Yes, I did my share of mundane tasks, and yes, I still do. However, no matter what task I do, be it something mind-numbingly tedious or frustrating but exciting and engaging, my coworkers don’t hesitate to encourage me to do the best possible job I can do.

I don’t want to toot my own horn, but I’m constantly told that I’m doing a great job and that I can quickly pump out consistent, high-quality work. The same goes for Matt, Jeff, and Brandon; we’re all made to feel welcome and appreciated here, whether we spend weeks building a new SEOmoz tool, build a new website for a client, research keywords and build links, or even check the mail and book airfare and hotel rooms. In Rand’s opinion, everyone contributes to the success of SEOmoz. The company is an embodiment of a collaborative effort, and he acknowledges this fact and appreciates us all for it.

4.  I love what I do for a living.

I’ve always stood by the notion that I would rather do something I love, even if I don’t get paid much to do it, than make a ton of money but hate what I do for a living. I still stand by that rule today, and working at SEOmoz allows me to continue to hold onto those beliefs. I couldn’t have asked for a better job right out of college. I’m in an industry that’s constantly shifting and growing. New trends cause me to stay alert and on my toes, and I love working in an environment where I am learning something new every day. I love that Rand is aware of my abilities and constantly gives me new tasks that he knows I’m capable of learning how to do. I love how my job involves the mixture of working independently and collaborating in a group to brainstorm ideas. I have never dreaded coming into work; rather, I come in every day excited to tackle a new project, solve a new problem, and learn something new in the process.

5.  I have the best boss and coworkers in the world.

Here’s where I act like a sap and rave about the people I work with. We’re a small company, so it’s crucial that we all at least tolerate each other enough to work with each other in close proximity five days a week. Luckily, not only do I get along with everyone at work, but they’ve all become my close friends.

Jeff and I have the same taste in movies and in television, so it’s nice to work with someone who shares my love for Freaks and Geeks. Brandon’s sunny disposition is contagious, and he always makes me smile. Gillian is a warm, caring person who always makes sure that everyone is being taken care of and is doing well. It’s nice when Si’s in town because he has a clever sense of humor and a laid-back personality, so it’s incredibly easy to get along with him despite the large age gap between him and the other SEOmozzers. I often refer to Matt as the Third Brother I Never Wanted, in that we take great pleasure in mock-torturing each other. (Case in point: he once put mustard packets on my keyboard because I think it’s the grossest condiment ever, and I drew pictures on his whiteboard of him getting devoured by a shark when he took a day off from work to go surfing.)

Which brings me to Rand. I guarantee you that Rand is the greatest guy you will ever meet. It’s like Rand is subconsciously perpetually campaigning for the Most Selfless Guy in the Universe award. He always puts the well being of the company and of his coworkers first. His generosity and commitment astound me. Rand is the first to grab the check when we’re at lunch, he’s pumping out blog entries at 2:00 am, then still shows up to work at 10:00, he’s willing to fly from city to city in order to meet with clients (often with as little as a few days between each trip), and even though his cell phone is practically welded to his ear because he’s on the phone all day long, he’ll still eagerly wave me into his office whenever I have a question. I couldn’t dream of a better boss and friend than Rand (and his girlfriend is no slouch, either, for being so understanding and supportive of his drive to succeed).

In conclusion, why do I love working for SEOmoz? We’re like a happy, dysfunctional family! Seriously though, I keep expecting to get hit by a car or mauled by a dog, because I can’t believe that at 23 years of age I can have the good fortune of loving my job, having a great group of friends, and actively contributing to an engaging and dynamic industry. That’s why I love working for SEOmoz. Jealous? Yeah, you are.

Every search I’ve run on Google this morning through Internet Explorer has generated redirectional URLs in the Google SERPs.  I thought at first, “Okay, another random test”.  We’ve all seen these click-tracking URLs before.But they wouldn’t go away.I closed all my browser windows.  I deleted my files (cleared the cache).  I cleared my history.  I suspect there is a cookie tied in to it but I don’t want to clear my cookies or manually edit the list right now.I also changed my Google settings (I had the results opening in a new browser window).Nothing makes the icky URLs go away.  So I opened up FireFox.&n…

I have been whining over the past few weeks about my inability to verify my long-standing domain with Google Sitemaps.  Today when I decided to log in and see how things are doing, I saw a change in status.  They say I am “Pending Verification” and there is a link to a page that says they are a bit overwhelmed.
http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?answer=35231&hl=en
Cool.  At least now we know there is an official “Something may be wrong” position.
Meanwhile, they have rolled out a whole new look, according to their bl…

To many, the CPM (Cost-per-Thousand impressions) model is what kindled over-valued companies in the late ’90’s and created the dot-com crash. The savior, conversely, was Overture’s cost-per-click model that resulted in greater accountability and profitability across the web. So, why would Rand be proposing a comeback of the tried-and-failed CPM model?
Because it has value and a purpose.
CPM is an ad model that relies on brand visibility and brand awareness. It’s not the kind of campaign that Joe’s Custom Electronics should run, but it is the kind of campaign that Motorola, Dell, HP, Compaq and Apple should run. The problems these big advertisers encounter with TV, radio an…

I figured that some creative Silicon Valley types could use a prod in the right direction about areas of search verticals that are still lacking major players (or high-quality players). Here’s just a few that I think would be great to add to the search repertoire:

Sports Search - Browse by year, team, sport, championship, stats, college, professional, etc. There’s a built-in ad model and it’s an idea ripe with possibilities for expansion, sponsorship and cross-promotions.
Legal Search - My understanding from recent law school grads is that none of the major portals are currently up to the task. Obviously, some of that is d…

It’s been a long time coming but a picture is beginning to emerge of how the Big Four search engines really differ from each other in terms of ranking algorithms.  Yahoo! remains the most secretive of the engines.  Google’s increasingly complex algorithm is the best documented, though least well-understood.
When Yahoo! brought out its own search engine (April 2003), it supposedly combined the best features of Altavista, AllTheWeb, and Inktomi’s technologies.  Inktomi was the first major search engine to place significance on linkage.  Inktomi relied on true, unweighted link popularity.   Altavista’s chief strength, in my opinion, lay in its ability to…

It seems a lot of people have been able to sign up with Google sitemaps and verify their information.  Good for them.
I, on the other hand, have been unable to verify my site.  I’ve uploaded files per Google’s instructions and inserted a meta tag per Google’s instructions and Google turns a blind eye to everything.  It’s a simple cut-and-paste job, Googlers.  You should be able to find the first tag after “head”, right?
I wondered to myself, “If it’s this brainless about my site, how good is the information it provides about other sites?”
So I added a few other sites to my list, such as seomoz.org, cnn.com, and google.com.&nb…

Rather than make criticisms myself, I’ll just quote what others have written in the past and let you make up your own mind.
From O’Reilly’s blog post on the cease and desist letter sent to IT@Cork:

“Web 2.0″ was coined when we were brainstorming the concept for the first conference in 2003. As noted in the letter to IT@Cork (sent from CMP’s attorney, but with our knowledge and agreement), “CMP has a pending application for registration of Web 2.0 as a …

For no reason at all, I thought I’d post some of my favorite search phrases that have brought traffic to SEOmoz this year. After all, if it’s interesting to me… it’s probably boring the pants off you, which is why I posted it on a Friday afternoon, when you should be spending time with loved ones and the June sun.

Hot Young Things26 referrals this yearThis must be because of the age group of the staff we’ve assembled and the fact that it’s often warm near the windows.
Animals in Pants Commercial28 referrals this yearDue to legal issues, I won’t be commenting on this one, but I can say that w…

I’ve been thinking it’s time for an “old-school” SEOmoz blog post. These are some of the rarer, but occassionally highly effective techniques for rooting out links in a challenging campaign.
#1 - Mentioned without a LinkThis one is surprisingly effective. Your goal is to identify sites/pages that already mention your brand/product/service/website but have failed to provide the direct HTML link. Just shoot them a pleasant, personal email and request the link - success rates can be very high. To find these willing linkers, you can use Yahoo!’s advanced search parameters, i.e. …

SEORoundtable has a great blog tip on how to get into Google News.  I’ve seen quite a few people ask how it’s done through the years, and this is the best discussion of the do’s and don’ts that I’ve seen in a long time.
Of course, not just any site can get into Google News.  You should be producing real news content on a daily basis, in my opinion, before you even consider submitting your site to Google News.  I’d prefer not to see snarky SEO sham sites get past the editorial filters in place.
Remember: Only YOU can prevent Search Engine Spam.  …

Matt McGee is just begging to be put on the speaker circuit for local search with his exceptional Guide to Local Search Marketing. Matt’s done an excellent job of showing (not just telling) where results come from in the local and map search engines and helping marketers to navigate the waters at major local search sources:

Guide to Google Local Search (Google Maps)
Guide to Yahoo Local Search…

Are those pesky search engine robots crawling your site too much? Does the sight of even one result from a “site:” command at the engines boil your blood? Are you tired of seeing visitor after visitor trickle into your website from referrers like “Google”, “Yahoo” and “MSN”. Well worry no more, because below, I’ve listed the top 10 ways to keep those spiders far, far away.
#10 - IP DeliveryNot just for spammers anymore - there are now dozens of legitimate uses for delivering content based on the IP address of the visitor. One of the best things you can do for spiders is to put California (and Washington) on your l…

There are a whole range of news items and goodies that I missed over the past two weeks. Here’s a rundown of the ones I think are most valuable:

MSN AdCenter Labs Tools - Aaron thinks this one is particularly cool and he’s got very solid coverage of the whole bunch here.
One of the best ever posts explaining how duplicate content works from Todd Malicoat.
Watch out kids, Google’…

At long last, I’m back in Seattle, and after reading through and answering just over 600 emails (and deleting/ignoring another 12-1500), I’m finally ready to start blogging again.
The trip, I have to say, was fantastic. I’ve amassed some photos from the London SES show here, but they represent only a small fraction of the more than 450 photos total I took on the trip. My only regret is that a week out of touch (after the conference) is fairly severe. I nearly missed an interview with USA Today (not sure when that might be published, but I did manage to get in touch with the reporter via pho…

Note: If you are unaware of The Project topic, please read the previous parts: The project: In the beginning (pt1) The project: … there was Silence. (pt2) Pretty often I hear people complaining about how hard it is to generate revenue from low traffic websites. In this part of the case study I’m going trough some methods to increase AdSense revenue for low traffic sites (yes, I’m not going to talk on how to increase traffic, but how to utilize limited assets more efficiently). The project site (…

Somehow, in the past few weeks, I was looking at how I could monetize the new videoblog that we’re launching this summer (for the curious ones, go sign up for the beta release by visiting Yodivi - Videos for People). I was getting somehow worried about how YouTube (now reported to be getting 50 000 uploads / day) and other major vlogs startups can generate enduring growth AND great cash flow… I mean, I want the project to work, I think it can bring a lot to the community, so I want to keep my client on top of this money pit vlog platform.
I might not h…