Jamdo Marketing Blog

As many of us know, Michael Gray of Wolf-Howl.com doesn’t like it when people make sweeping accusations against SEOs. Hell, most of the time I agree with him. For example, Calacanis’ repeated attacks on the SEO industry are pretty lame and ill-informed and Michael’s responses to them were fair enough in my opinion.

Michael’s general message in his defence of the SEO industry is that there are good SEOs and bad SEOs, just as there are good mechanics and bad mechanics.

The “few bad apples” argument.

Fair call.

Presumably Michael would like to be included among the “good SEOs” and most people would regard him that way - certainly his blog is one of the most respected in the industry.

But recently, Michael has gone a little beyond the limits of cool.

Last week, the hapless Christina Warren of Download Squad was unfortunate enough to make some throw-away remark about the SEO industry. Michael Gray got upset about it.

This is the specific sentence that Michael quoted and the part he had a problem with:

There’s lots of talk within the tech community, especially the blogosphere about using SEO and how it’s GOOD for bloggers and doesn’t negatively affect readers/searchers/regular users. This is a lie. Instead of Search Engine Optimization, SEO should really stand for Search Engine Opportunism, because that’s what it really is.

Fair, enough. I would probably have a problem with that if I were a professional SEO too.

He also has a problem with this partial sentence:

we do object to gaming the system and using loopholes

But here is the entire passage in context:

There’s lots of talk within the tech community, especially the blogosphere about using SEO and how it’s GOOD for bloggers and doesn’t negatively affect readers/searchers/regular users. This is a lie. Instead of Search Engine Optimization, SEO should really stand for Search Engine Opportunism, because that’s what it really is. Look, we certainly don’t object to gaining revenue from ads or page-views on a web site, that’s why we are able to do what we do; we do object to gaming the system and using loopholes to insert web sites into search queries that really have nothing to do with the content. Techniques to make sure your relevant content shows up in corresponding searches is one thing — inserting back-door code that is aimed at getting higher page ranks and more page views, regardless if the targets are actually correct, is another.

Taken in context, those three sentences together in their entirety represent a reasonably balanced view of SEO.
Christina is pretty clearly aiming her attack at “bad SEOs” and ones who would attempt to insert irrelevant results into SERPS. (We’ll just ignore the flagrantly out of context second quote that Michael cherry-picks).

That is hardly a revolutionary sentiment by Christina.

Michael reacted to the cherry-picked sentences (60 words out of a 620 word post) by writing a blog post entitled “Christina Warren of Download Squad is a Clueless Idiot” (while quoting only the sentences mentioned here in isolation).

He then asked his readers to link to the post.

Now anyone familiar with even rudimentary SEO will know that writing an article on a well established blog with lots of trust and then getting a few inbound links to a that specific post will mean that the search engines will rank the post highly for the keywords the post was aimed at - especially if the terms are not so competitive.

At the time of writing, Michael’s post is ranking 9 in Google if you search for Christina Warren.

Now I am totally open to correction from Michael here, but this seems like a pretty clear attempt to get this post to rank well for Christina’s name.

As far as I can tell, it is an attempt to damage her online reputation.

Any future employer who looks up Christina in Google will be confronted by the assertion that their potential employee is a “clueless idiot.”

To add cowardice to insult, Michael has closed comments on the specific blog post, meaning Christina (or anyone else) cannot respond to his opinion on Christina at the source.

Michael seems to have decided that Christina deserved to have her name dragged through the Google mud and there isn’t much anyone else can do about it. Not many of us have either the knowledge or the influence to compete with him or rein him in and to top it all off, the victim is even unable to respond directly to the post regarding the accusations.

This might be called character assasination for the digital age.

Now let’s put aside the question of whether Christina deserved this treatment. I don’t think she did, but others might disagree. Whatever. There is a more pressing concern raised with this scenario.

Who exactly, is Michael Grey to assume he has the right to use his mini-celebrity and knowledge as an SEO to damage the reputation of whoever he deems deserves it?

Please Michael, tell us some more about “good SEOs” and “bad SEOs”. For Example, which one are you?

Is it ok for an SEO to rudimentarily take a disliking to someone online and take vengeance by publishing nasty things about them and getting those accusations to rank well in the search engines?

And to people who work in the industry, do you regard this as acceptable behaviour?

If it is fair enough to you as an industry, do you really not see why other non-SEO people might lose respect for your industry?

Now I am sure there have been far worse abuses than this example, but when a high-profile representative of an industry starts heading down the slippery slope of arbitrary online persecutions that have a very real effect on other people’s on and offline lives, isn’t it time for that industry to stand up and say enough is enough?

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Getting links to your blog or site is at the very heart of your SEO and traffic efforts. One of the better strategies for getting the links is linkbaiting - the art of producing content so good that other bloggers and sites are compelled to link to it without being asked.

Linkbaiting has become so popular among marketers and SEOs that some SEO companies charge up to $10,000 for a link baiting campaign and many believe that constant link baiting can be so effective that it will propel them to the top of the search engines in very competitive niches if done properly.

In short it is a good strategy to get links.

But do some people take that a bit too far?

Recently a fairly well known internet marketer made a post about an eploit he discovered in the search engines. The exploit allowed him to get his link on the pages of some very highly trafficked sites.

The post drew the attention of a few other bloggers and got him some incoming links and quite a few comments.

The problem?

He was lying.

This managed to upset a few people.

Now, this one post obviously had the desired effect - it got people talking and linking.

But was it worth it?

I don’t think so.

I think the post may have damaged the credibility of his blog and in the future he will probably have a harder time convincing people to link to him. He has damaged the credibility of his blog. (If the link bait was a one off page where long term credibility was not so important, this may not be such an issue).

Why would I, as a blogger,  link to a blog with a history of lies that makes me look like an idiot who fell for the lies in front of my readers?

In short, I wouldn’t.

I would therefore encourage people to be very careful about misleading linkbait on their blogs.

After all, the credibility of a blog is really its main value.

Technorati Tags: linkbait, seo

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Choosing the wrong keywords will destroy your online marketing efforts. I don’t mean to be melodramatic, but I can tell you from experience that spending weeks and months SEOing a page for the incorrect keywords can really take the wind out of your sails. So can dumping a bunch of cash on some PPC and not getting any sales conversions.

In fact, a few years ago, after SEOing a site  for the singular of a keyword and later discovering (by the complete and abject failure of that site) that the plural was where both the traffic and conversions were, I decided to make sure I always did my keyword research well.

But what makes a good keyword when you are trying to convert some type of affiliate offer?

There are several ways to judge a keyword, but it basically comes down to two main factors.

Traffic volume and conversion rate.

Traffic volume kind of speaks for itself. The more people searching for a specific keyword term, the more traffic you will get. Use a tool like Overture or the Wordtracker Tool to estimate traffic for certain keywords. ‘Nuff said.

But how do you know which keyword searches will translate into sales?

Basically, you need to seperate keywords into three categories:

• browse
• compare
• buy

For the purpose of this post, let’s use a few examples from the auto industry.

Browse Keywords

A browse keyword is a word that is searched for when the searcher doesn’t really know what they are looking for. “Cars” would be an example of a browse keyword and I guarantee that you would have a very hard time getting people to convert into sales or leads if what they typed into Google was “cars”.

Browse keywords are the enemy of the affiliate marketer. We need to get more specific than that.

Compare Keywords

Compare keywords are words and phrases that people type into search engines, usually when they are researching a specific product that they are considering buying.

This can be a good time to get them, offer them the information that they desire and convert them into a sale via an affiliate program. Product comparison sites are good for this.

An example of a compare keyword within the auto industry would be “compare car insurance.” In fact, if you could rank well for that term naturally, your site would be doing very well.

Buy Keywords

Buy keywords are words and phrases that a searcher will type into search engines at the very end of the buying cycle. At this point the searcher knows exactly what they want and will be very specific in their search.

An example in the auto industry would be something like “cheap 1999 Toyota Landcruiser roof rack.”

Note that the keyword is very specific. If you can put exactly what the searcher is looking for infront of their face at this point, then you will have a very good chance of making a sales conversion.

Free Tip: Branded products with model numbers are great keywords and convert very highly.

Show me the money!

The problem of course is that most “buy keywords” with high traffic are very competitive to rank for with PPC and natural SEO.

For an affiliate or a blogger on a limited budget, your easiest course of attack will be to go after the long tail “buy keywords” and going after lots of them. “Compare keywords” also offer a lot of opportunities. Just be sure to track which keywords are turning into conversions (there’s great tutorial on using PHP for conversion tracking at Jeremy Palmer’s blog).

But whatever you do, don’t neglect the keyword research stage of your site building or PPC efforts.

Technorati Tags: seo, ppc, affiliate marketing, keywords

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I have found that I learn far easier by looking at examples than by reading theory.

That has also helped out a little in learning about SEO, so I thought I would share a great article that was written by one of the best in the business - Jim Westergren. Of course, this article has nothing to do with how to apply SEO.

It is SEO.

This article on smartlinkbuilding.com called World of Warcraft Gold, was written by Jim for (presumably) one of his clients - http://buywowgold.co.uk in order to optimise their site for certain keywords.

It is a great example of how to give good, relevant links to a site.

There are a bunch of features about this article that you should check out (and apply them to your own projects).

For starters it is unique content. No posibility of duplicate content issues for the article that Jim wrote.

The content is also highly relevant to the client’s site

The links to the client’s site are from within the body of the article. No sitewide or collumn links.

The links have relevant, but varied anchor text. The search engines will get suspicious if every link was the same anchor text and they will possibly discount the links.

There is a link from a heading - that’s a nice powerful one.

The links are both to the homepage of the client site and the internal pages. You don’t want every link to go to the homepage.

The article is at least 300 words long - anything too much shorter may have issues. 300 is a good length.

He has even linked to the article on smartlinkbuilding.com from articlehub.com to improve the ranking of it (which in turn passes on good ranking to the client site).

Now Jim has performed this service for his client with several different unique articles placed on several different unique sites on unique IP addresses.

It is a very good example of the proper way to get great back links.

The trick is really finding as many different sites as possible to place your unique content on. (Hint: there are plenty - start searching).

Now Jim charges $1500 for his service (and people pay it) which should show you the value of what he is doing. It is a very powerful way to build links and you should try to emulate it for your own sites if you are interested in ranking well in the search engines.

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Most searches using a search engines do not use a single word. In fact using a single word to find what you are looking for on a search engine is a great way to be bogged down in a quagmire of irrelevant search results.

Ignat over at SEO Blog recently brought to my attention some statistics that reflect these facts. The vast majority of searches on the main search engines are carried out using two, three and four word phrases. Certainly that is a better way to narrow down a search and get some relevant results.

But what does it mean to us bloggers?

A few months ago, I started a blog on a newsy type of topic. It wasn’t a money making venture - more a labour of interest. It is starting to get some nice search engine traffic, but there is something that I have noticed by going through my statistics and logs (I use AW Stats and Performancing Metrics).

I get a lot of searches for people’s names.

In fact, the vast majority of the search engine traffic I get are from people looking for information on the people I am blogging about.

The great thing too, is that because my blog is a news type blog, I have a very good chance of getting to the top of search results for the names of people that I write about - largely because nobody else has written much about them or possibly hasn’t optimised their pages to show up in the search results for those names. That is because it is a breaking news blog - to an extent.

So how am I doing it?

When I find a blog-worthy story about a person, I optimise my post for their name. I will always use their name in the title, the first sentence and liberally throughtout my post. If there is some interesting online information about the person, then I make sure that I link to it, using their name as the anchor text, if possible. I also make sure that my internal linking strategy has links that point to my new post using the name of the person as anchor text. Basically solid blog SEO.

One other thing is that if the person’s full name has three names - like John Adam Smith, then it is easier to rank for the full name rather than just John Smith. This brings in more traffic as most sites will optimise for the shorter version.

Then I forget about it and move onto the next thing.

The great thing is that Google spiders my site daily, because there are always new stories. The indexing of a new story rarely takes more than 3 days and usually my site is in the top three for the name of the person I optimised for.

That’s a very easy way to get a lot of search engine traffic.

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Gettting incoming links to your site is going to be the lifeblood of your blog - second only to good content. It will bring referral traffic, increase your standing with the search engines and help build your blog’s reputation. The trick is to first find sites that you would like to get a link from. That’s when a bit of research is in order.

The Setup

To start things along, get organised and set up a spreadsheet. You can use Excel if you like, but lately I have been using a very cool online spreadsheet service over at iRows so I can save my spreadsheets online and access them from any computer anywhere.

You will need columns for the following categories. URL, Contact Name, Email Address, First Contact, Notes 1, Second Contact, Notes 2, Third Contact and Notes 3. That’s 9 columns altogether. So, if you were contacting Jamdo, the relevant row would be something like:

http://jamdo.com | info (at) jamdo.com | Rob | July 12 | No response | July 19 | Promised a link from his blog. | July 25 | Success!

If one of my contacts in my spreadsheet has taken the action I hoped for, I then give a green background to that row. If they say no, I give it a red background. It’s just an easy visual so I can tell by glancing at the spreadsheet how I am going.

I only put in three potential contacts, because if you haven’t got them by the third contact then you probably won’t get them.

The Research

Now that you have a way to organise your contacts on your spreadsheet, you can start to research sites that you would like to get a link from. At this stage you will want to fill out the URL, Contact and Email columns of your spreadsheet.

    Competitors

Most bloggers are a decent people. You should probably have a list of competing blogs in your niche - you know - the blogs that inspired you to get into the same niche. Many of them will probably be happy to give you a link to your site if you just ask them. List all of your competitors in your spreadsheet for later.

    Competitor’s Links

If somebody has linked to one of your competitors, then they will probably be interested in the content of your blog too. The trick is finding the people who have linked to your competitors. That’s not really a drama. Just go over to Yahoo! and type in linkdomain:yourcompetitor.com and you will get a list of people who have linked to that website.

Now you need to visit each of those sites and note down the URL, Conact and email of each of those sites.

By now, you should be getting a decent list of sites that will potentially link to your new blog.

    Technorati

It is far easier to get links from other blogger than it is to get links from “normal” sites. Blogs should be one of your primary focusses in link building. Luckily Technorati has taken most of the pain out of finding other blogs and lists almost 50 million of them.

Go over to technorati and type in your main keyword. Click on the “tag” option and it will tell you everyone who has tagged a post with that keyword for one of their blog posts. You should have a mamoth list of blogs. Now visit each one and continue filling out your spreadsheet with the relevant information.

Note: You can also see which blogs are commenting on your competitor’s site just by searching their site URL in the Technorati search - another great source of people who might be interested in linking to you!

    Google

Getting links from the top ranking sites for your keywords is one of the most powerful strategies for ranking well for those keywords. It’s usually also the most difficult as these sites usually guard their rankings jealously. Even so, it’s worth a try.

Just head over to Google and type in your keyword. That will give you a list of sites to visit and get relevant contact details for. Easy!

    Software

If you have some spare coin, then there are a couple of pieces of software that are very good for finding other sites that might link to you. They don’t really do anything you couldn’t do for free, but they do do it a hell of a lot faster. Check out my SEO Elite review or visit their site (aff.) and also take a look at Arelis (aff.) software. Not cheap, but if time is a factor for you then they are worth it.

What Then?

In most niches, just these simple research strategies should give you a list of several hundred sites that might be interested in your blog. The next step is to go out and start contacting those webmasters!

Further Resources:

Where to get Links
7 Tips on Emailing Other Bloggers
SEO Elite (Aff. link)
Arelis (Aff. link)
iRows

Technorati Tags: links, seo, blogging, marketing

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