I have not been able to continue on the “How to Promote CPA Offers” series. Nevertheless will now be able to spend some time completing the series. I will get into the details on both white hat & black hat techniques. Remember, I will share the black hat techniques only for educational purposes. I do [...]

Posted by Dr. Pete

Warning: This post contains tactics that may be considered black-hat. SEOmoz does not condone these practices. I have simply done something dumb to my own website to prevent you from doing something dumber to yours.

If you believe the rumors, we all now live in something called the real-time web. The once steady trickle of user-generated content became a torrent, and search engines face the difficult task of drinking from a fire hose without drowning. It only stands to reason, then, that fresh content is becoming more important, and anecdotal evidence seems to back that up. Every day, blog posts and Tweets seem to get indexed and ranked a bit faster.

Freshness seems important, but what signals does Google use to determine freshness? Beyond the original cache date, do the spiders pay attention to on-page signals, such as dates in body content or URLs? I thought it might be fun to try and find out.

1. Manipulating URLs (non-301)

My plan started out simple: manipulate a URL on my blog and rename it to use a date-based format (as some blogs do by default). So, for example, a URL that normally looked like this:

http://www.mysite.com/topic-goes-here

…became something like this…

http://www.mysite.com/2009-09-01-topic-goes-here

I chose a blog post that was recent enough to still be archived and spidered but not so recent or popular that it was likely to attract new inbound links. I chose 3 long-tail keyword phrases to track for that post, and then flipped the switch and changed the URL. In part 1 of this experiment, I did not 301 the old URL to the new one. By not 301’ing, I was hoping to nudge Google into updating the original cache date. The graph below shows what happened:

The rankings axis is inverted to show low rankings at the top, with 1 line for each keyword phrase. Here’s where things got weird. Even after spiders indexed the new URL, that URL showed up in rankings on 3 different days for the 3 phrases (indicated by the gray, dotted lines). Some rankings dropped before the new URL appeared, others after, until they eventually stabilized slightly lower than the original URLs. Oddly, the one keyword that hit #1 after the switch also managed to cache the 404-error (so, that ranking was completely useless).

2. New URLs, Take Two (301)

Of course, outright changing a URL without 301 redirecting it is a bit unusual, and would mean that I lost whatever inbound link juice I had flowing to that page (it wasn’t much, but it still can’t be ignored). So, not generally one to learn from my mistakes, I tried again, this time with a new blog post but with a 301 in place.

Not surprisingly, the spiders were a bit better behaved, with all 3 rankings reflecting the new URL on the same day. Somewhat surprisingly, though, some keywords lost ranking, some gained, and the overall average ranking change was roughly a wash. Not a promising sign for my URL-based freshness theory.

3. Mad Science Is Science, Too

So, what can we learn from my little experiment in freshness? I’m not entirely sure, but I’d like to offer a few takeaways to trick you into believing that reading this post was a good idea:

(1) Google Isn’t That Dumb
If you were considering changing all your URLs to trick Google into thinking that your posts are brand, spanking new, here’s some advice: don’t.

(2) Always, Always 301
Although I had my reasons for not using 301s in the first experiment, don’t ever rename an important URL without redirects in place. If nothing else, Graph (I) should be a lesson in what can happen if you do.

(3) Proceed With Caution
Even if you do rename your URLs for a perfectly good reason, and you put 301s in place, expect some short-term consequences. Rankings may fluctuate, and where you end up when you’re done might not be exactly where you started. Changing your URL structure is a big job – sometimes, it’s necessary, but don’t do it just to make a minor SEO tweak.

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Posted by jennita

This past week at SES San Jose 2009 gave me the most mixed emotions of any conference I’ve attended yet. There were parts I loved and parts I was disappointed in. Add that with trying to complete regular work plus cover the conference for SEOmoz, believe me it was a bit crazy. Some of you may have also heard about the rough start I had to the conference… I booked the wrong flight home, had to find a hotel last minute, wasn’t on the list for a press pass (which they fixed right away), the list goes on and on really. Still, I didn’t let this stop me from learning new things, meeting new people and on the last day (after 2 full days of stalking), I nabbed an interview with Matt Cutts.

As with anything in life really, you can’t please all of the people all of the time. This is true for search marketing conferences and for SES San Jose, it was no different. Whenever I attend a large conference or even small meet-ups, I’m in awe of the people who organize the event. It can’t be easy to coordinate everyone from speakers to attendees, from booth setup to making sure everyone is fed (more on that below). You would have to know that as you’re working your butt off to get everything done, that there will be people who love and others who hate certain aspects of the event. For me, that is the beauty of it, I mean how boring would it be if we all loved everything all the time? So please, follow along, as I bring you the good, the bad and the downright funny from the conference.

The Good

The types of speakers you have in any given session can either make or break it. The topic could be something as exciting as Black Hat vs. White Hat but if the speaker is as dull as dishwater then the entire session comes to a screeching halt (and people fall asleep in the first row). However on the flip side, when a speaker is so dynamic that he or she can keep a crowd of several hundred people interested in analytics right after lunch, then you have a winner in my book!

If you’ve ever seen Avinash Kaushik from Google speak, then you’ll know what I’m talking about. Right after lunch on the first day, Avinash spoke at the session "How to Turn Your Web Analytics into a Money Making Machine." This is one of those sessions where you know you’ll probably learn some good information but only if you can keep yourself awake long enough. Not in this instance. Avinash started with great one liners like "Life is not a one night stand" and one of his slides was labeled: "Sexy: Search + Display." He knew exactly how to keep the audience interested and laughing the entire time. The biggest take-away by the audience seemed to be when he was asked what tool he used to find all his data, and he said he used Google Ad Planner. I’m pretty sure Google saw a spike in usage soon after!

I went to the "SEO Tools of the Trade: What’s in your Toolbox?" session a little miffed that SEOmoz wasn’t represented and was ready to ask the speakers about it. With six speakers plus the moderator there wasn’t time to ask any questions (see "the bad") but I made sure I made myself known by sitting right up front with my SEOmoz T-Shirt on. Although not one of the speakers mentioned SEOmoz (boooooo) I actually walked away with a few additional tools in my toolbelt because of it. It was interesting because many of the speakers had tools of their own, and most pitched them. What I liked though was that Bruce Clay spoke about what to look for in a tool and what kinds of tools to look for. He didn’t preach about how awesome his tools were, but gave excellent, useful information about finding the right tool (it would have been even better had had the chance to explain how we have a tool for every one of the points he made.

In the "Search: Where to Next?" session, I loved that Chris Boggs mentioned SEOmoz as one of his favorite blogs. Woot!

Although the speakers can make the sessions, there were a few other gems that made my "thumbs up" list. As usual, the exhibitors had great schwag. I loved that the first two rows in each section were reserved for the press. This allowed all the live bloggers and others to have a place to sit and type their hearts out. I’ve seen many people trying to live blog with their laptops in their lap. And speaking of live bloggers I have to give a shout out to my roommate Keri Morgret who I coined the name "best roommate ever" for bringing chocolate muffins, coffee and other yummies to the room.

I can’t forget to mention the great networking and evening events that took place. For me, networking was one of the most valuable aspects of the conference. Searchbash that was put on by WebmasterRadio.fm and the IM Charity Party were great fun and I loved meeting new people and spending time with friends.

The Bad

Every conference has its issues, and let’s be honest here, you can never please everyone. SES San Jose had a few "thumbs down" in my opinion. There were the poor people at the superpages.com booth who had to wear bright yellow capes (as torture of manning a booth for two days). Or the very nice lady at AOL who stood alone while most of the other booths were packed with people. I hate to even mention the food since really I’ve seen many blogs already talk about this… but sheesh! They served us the SAME FOOD for 3 days in a row. It was also strange that around 11am every day, the coffee seemed to disappear. Uhm, hello! We need coffee to keep us going through the full days (and some to get over that hangover).

Then there are the speakers. Often times in a tech oriented industry you’ll get a speaker who knows her business but come on, she really has no right speaking to large audiences. Other times you may find someone who knows his information so well he seems to get lost in the speech and forgets he is supposed to be talking to the audience and not just within his own head. Or what about the moderator who feels she has to ask each speaker a question after their presentation to ensure everyone knows she paid attention? This conference also seemed to have more speakers than most sessions could handle and several times there was no time for Q & A, which in my opinion is usually the most valuable aspect.

There were a few who seemed a bit nervous and others who read straight from the Powerpoint presentation (this is when the afternoon coffee would have come in handy). I can definitely understand being nervous; speaking in front of hundreds of people is quite nerve racking, even if you know the topic inside and out. But one thing I had a hard time with was hearing a speaker give outright bad (or at least, incomplete) information.

Now, I’m far from perfect, and I’m positive I’ve lead people down the wrong track before so I’ll give Stoney deGeyter from Pole Position Marketing the benefit of the doubt that perhaps I misinterpreted him. However in the "Search on a Dime" session he told the audience that the meta description was not valuable, and that if they didn’t have time to do it to just let the search engines find the content of the page and determine what to put there. EEK!

This was said to a group of small business owners who were looking for ways to rank well without spending a ton of money. They should have been told how the meta description is unimportant for ranking factors but that it is UBER important for the ever-important click-through! Small business owners should know that having unique meta descriptions is essential and making sure that they’re created to entice users to click that link in the SERP and pull people into their site. The idea that leaving anything up to a search engine seems rather ridiculous. (It also didn’t help matters that when asked how he suggested getting developers to make the necessary changes on the site his answer was "Tell them to make the change and if they say no, fire them." As a former full-time developer this really left a bad taste in my mouth.)

By the way, the entire session wasn’t bad, in fact David Mihm’s presentation was spot on. He gave us excellent information about local search without so much as pimping out his ridiculously awesome site GetListed.org. Even Matt Van Wagner showed us step by step how he put together a local search campaign, although I wasn’t too sure how that related to search marketing on a budget, but it was still good information.

The Funny

There was one particular quote that seriously made me laugh out loud. It really tickled my funny bone when Pavan Li from Microsoft was trying to get something to work on her computer while she was taking questions and she said "We’re used to making simple things complicated." The room lit up with laughter after that one!

Later that same day, after Avinash had explained how rich old men search for Paris Hilton more often than other groups, Mike Grehan the moderator, took the mic to announce the next speaker and said "I’m just an average guy looking for pictures of Paris Hilton."

The highlight on the last day, was the "Extreme Makeover: Live Site Clinic." With Matt Cutts, Greg Boser, Elisabeth Osmeloski, Tiffany Lane and Vanessa Fox reviewing websites, it could have been pretty straightforward and down to business. However the session started with a review of mypleasure.com and ended with hookah-shisha.com. Let’s just say there were many blushing faces throughout the entire session and at one point Vanessa said, "and I would listen to what Matt says because he started in porn" to which Matt responded (after a few seconds of the audience laughing), "What Vanessa means by that is the first thing I did at Google was that I worked in safe search…" Hah!

I’m sure there were many more funny moments but as a one woman show I couldn’t be in all places at one time. With that, I’ll end with my favorite quote which came from Chris Boggs on the first day, "SEO is alive, long live SEO!"

PS: Most images courtesy of Dana Lookadoo, Search Marketing Optimizer, Yo! Yo! SEO. (She took tons of great photos at the conference)

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Posted by randfish

I’m not always a fan of Guy Kawasaki’s work, but really enjoyed his post on the OPEN Forum – A Dozen Don’ts for Entrepreneurs. I thought I’d take a stab at replicating it with some of my biggest warnings for those in our field.

For the list below, the word "clients" is interchangeable with "marketing manager" or "executive team" for in-house SEOs.

1. Don’t Create False Expectations
   Clients are just like everyone else – when you exceed their expectations, they love you. When you disappoint, they’re angry. Make it easy for yourself and don’t oversell. If anything, undersell your abilities to do great things and let them be surprised. It’s a hard thing to do, particularly in a competitive bidding environment, but humility and hard work often shine through in presentations and good clients will see that and honor it.
   _
2. Don’t Ignore Analytics
   Website analytics, both visitor traffic and third party metrics, are important parts of SEO. When things are going well, even if best practices aren’t being followed, it can be wise to match up data and trends to see what’s made a real difference. Don’t undertake an SEO project unless you have at least the essential data points (this also comes in handy once changes have been implemented and your work starts to have an impact).
   _
3. Don’t Always Take Your Client at Their Word
   If you talk to lots of clients, you’ll find that none of them have ever spammed the engines, bought a link, accidentally cloaked for Googlebot or hidden text, yet the statististics tell another story. Never assume your clients are being dishonest, but always watch out for activities they might not be aware of (or might not have realized were problematic). This goes beyond just white and black hat – we had a client who thought they had a couple dozen active domains; turns out they had nearly a hundred – canonicalization alone has been a big project and a big return.
   _
4. Don’t Get Into Projects with People You Don’t Like
   If ever you get a "funny feeling" about a client, move on if you can possibly afford it. Some people just don’t click together, and when interpersonal relationships aren’t working, projects have a way of not working out, either. It’s always better to get out before something’s signed than after.
   _
5. Don’t Give an Unqualified Answer Unless You’re Extremely Certain You’re Right
   If you’ve been reading SEOmoz lately or hearing me speak at conferences, you’ll notice that my advice comes with a lot more caveats than it used to. It’s been a tough lesson, but there’s very rarely a "this is ALWAYS better than that" in the field of SEO. Exceptions abound, so cage your language accordingly.
   _
6. Don’t Confuse SEO & Sales
   If your client comes to you wanting to drive sales with SEO, make sure they’re keenly aware of the multiple responsiblities inherent in such a request. Yes – SEO can drive lots of high quality, targeted traffic at the perfect moment for capturing the sale. But NO – SEO cannot convert that visit into dollars. If the website sucks at turning visitors into leads, do the right thing and recommend CRO (Conversion Rate Optimization) before they dive into SEO.
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7. Don’t Rest on Your Laurels
   If you’re not paying attention in the SEO world, even for just a few weeks, you can miss massive changes. Look at June! We’ve had a reversal of position on nofollow and Javascript links from Google, a new engine/algorithm/brand from Microsoft, adoption of rich text formatting in the SERPs, evidence that header tags may not be as valuable as we thought and data suggesting that alt attributes are highly correlated with good rankings. Stay ahead of the curve and devote some resources to industry news – you owe it to your clients and yourselves.
   _
8. Don’t Undervalue Your Work
   SEO is hard work. For every consulting hour, there’s days of research, testing, reading, surfing and experimenting. Don’t undersell your services or accept that what you do doesn’t provide tremendous value. If you’re being undervalued now, consider how terrificly trackable SEO really is and show them the data. It’s almost always on your side.
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9. Don’t Believe Everything You Read
   Yes, even here at SEOmoz! We certainly try our best to provide high quality, accurate information, as do many other great sites on SEO, but no one is right 100% of the time, and, more importantly, not every piece of advice is applicable for every business or every situation.
   _
10. Don’t Underestimate Dev Contributions
    I was recently asked "what’s the biggest roadblock to SEO," and didn’t need to think for 10 seconds before quoting Mr. Ballmer’s infamous adage "Developers! Developers! Developers!" If you get bandwidth cycles for SEO projects, use them wisely. If the developers have made critical SEO errors, don’t be quick to criticize – you’ll make enemies, and, oftentimes, be guilty of hypocrisy. Stay humble, prioritize the big pieces and make sure you have the resources before you commit to improving traffic.
    _
11. Don’t Overstate Your Influence or Abilities
    Just because you have the ear of some important minds at Google/Yahoo!/Facebook/etc. doesn’t mean you can influence change within these large organizations. I’ve heard a lot of stories from companies that worked with SEOs of how they promised to get their penalty lifted or special treatment from an engine because they got a response to an email they sent to a search engineer. Perhaps an even better rule is – don’t promise something you can’t personally control and deliver.
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12. Don’t Get Overconfident and Dismiss Other Marketing Channels
    OK, yes – SEO rocks. But don’t forget how valuable other marketing activities like email, PPC, CRO, affiliate programs, even display advertising can be for the right scenario. Once you’ve found the SEO hammer, it’s easy to see every problem as a nail – I’ve certainly been guilty of it. If you can resist, think holistically and provide the best answer from a strategic (rather than tactical) level, you’ll become even better and more valuable to your clients.

Your turn – any "don’ts" you’d recommend to fellow SEOs?

p.s. If you haven’t read the whole Malcolm Gladwell vs. Chris Anderson with Seth Godin weighing in thing, it’s pretty worthwhile

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Posted by Danny Dover

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Once every 100 years, a technology is developed that changes the way that people view their world. Today, I am fortunate enough to be able to introduce one such technology. Internet, please make way for Webfluence, the world’s first and only search engine by SEOs for SEOs.

Background:
At SEOmoz, we have been trying to reverse engineer the search engines for years. Up until now, our biggest breakthrough had been the creation of Linkscape. Through studying the Internet’s link graph via our flagship product, we have been able to make several observations that have helped us write algorithms that are far superior to those used by modern day search engines.

This new software coupled with the easy availability of cloud computing has given us the ability to build a world class search engine. But don’t take our word for it, read the information below and try it out for yourself!

Key Features:

Never Link Build Again – Webfluence is the first search engine that enables any user to add any website to any search result. If you don’t see your website in a given search result, simply click "Add result" and provide us with information about your website.

Your addition will instantly be added to our index and will propagate throughout our system so that your addition can be viewed globally.

Remove Your Competition – See a result that you don’t like? Simply hit the "remove" button and that result will be completely deleted from our index.

We are providing the power of the most sophisticated black hat techniques with the push of a button.

Technical Feats:

• 1 Trillion and 1 URLs – Our index is the biggest in the world. We accomplished this by utilizing our superior intellect (We Googled " * ") and our patented technology (See Steves below) to find the one page on the Internet that our competition couldn’t. Our next planned milestone is 1 googol pages. Given the rapid explosion of copycat Digg/Facebook/YouTube sites, we expect this to happen on Tuesday of next week.
• Our Algorithm – In much the same way that PageRank ® was named after Google’s founder, Larry Page, Webfluence’s algorithm was named after our founder Rand Fishkin. The secret sauce behind RandRank ® is the use of time to help determine results. This is a metric that is generally overlooked by information retrieval experts.
• Recommended Results – Astute users may notice that on some queries, Webfluence automatically suggests pages that don’t seem to be related in any way to the user’s original query. This is the result of our manual reviewing staff. A long time ago a strange unidentified man in a tuxedo dropped a basket on our porch containing two twin boys. Eventually, the two youngsters, who we affectionately named Steve and Steve, grew up to become our manual review team. Now, whenever we need a page to return to a user, we just Ask Steves.

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