Building A Macro To Download Webpages With Excel
When conducting research, it’s not uncommon to perform repetitive tasks like downloading a group of webpages. A favorite tool I use to automate this is iMacros — it’s free and powerful. Just be sure to use the Firefox version, as its capabilities are limited in other browsers like…
Please visit Search Engine Land for the full article.
Link Sellers Full Of Shit
With paid links staying one of the most reliable (albeit quite risky) methods of acquiring links, there is no shortage of those catering to the industry of selling links. There is no shortage of scams, either. However, some are just …
Forum Spam – A Practical Guide
If you’ve landed on this page hoping to find tips on enhancing your forum spam strategy, I’m afraid you’re out of luck. This guide is intended for those poor souls tasked with cleaning up the aftermath of a merciless spam campaign that has plastered your lovely domain across countless hell-holes of the internet with all […]
The post Forum Spam – A Practical Guide appeared first on SEOgadget.
Rise of the New School SEO Professional
There’s a gold rush under way as brands allocate big budgets to build and optimize their presence in emerging search and discovery channels. How can SEOs stake their claim in this new mobile, local, social, and content marketing territory?
Key Considerations for International Content Creation
Creating decent content in multiple languages is going to take time and cost money, but doing it right will bring rewards.
Post from Gemma Birch on State of Search
Key Considerations for International Content Creation
10 Vital Steps to Building Social Influence
Most seek to build influence; measure influence; and yes, some will even attempt to sell influence. Yet, few will achieve action-inspiring influence without planning and effort. Here are 10 lessons in how to influence and inspire others to action.
International Expansion: Break Down Barriers With Google+ Hangouts
Expanding internationally is extremely challenging.you have to deal with different time zones, languages, and cultures. Google+ Hangouts can help break down the barriers separating you from your clients, customers, or your own staff.
2013 Australian Roadshow – Interview with Columbus Search in Sydney
Jo Turnbull interviews Columbus Search, part of Aegis Media in Sydney, as part of her Australia State of Search Roadshow.
Post from Jo Turnbull on State of Search
2013 Australian Roadshow – Interview with Columbus Search in Sydney
ebay On the Wrong (and self serving side) of the Sales Tax Issue
I received this email from ebay this morning. I think that ebay is on the wrong side of this issue. I was in retail for many years and struggled with sales tax issues at every turn. “Struggle” is putting it mildly as at one point the NY State government came after me with guns a […]
Video, Journalists & PR: 3 Keys to Local Small Business Marketing #Pubcon
Competing with the big names can be challenging for any SMB. Video can be one of the easiest ways to market your business to local, repeat customers. Also, make the media your friend. And why you should consider releasing press releases on weekends.
Enterprise SEO Strategy Tip: Don’t Roll Back Your Canonicalization
enlarge If you don’t have a good SEO QA process, make sure you let the SEO guy know when you push new stuff live. You’re likely to break something. Better yet, let him know before you push it live.
The post Enterprise SEO Strategy Tip: Don’t Roll Back Your Canonicalization appeared first on Local SEO Guide.
7 Things My Girlfriend Taught Me About SEO
Looking at non-seo’s when they search will give you great insights into how ‘real people’ use the web and how you should really optimise.
Post from Ben Holbrook on State of Search
7 Things My Girlfriend Taught Me About SEO
Using HARO to Create Fresh, Compelling Content
Being a reporter on HelpAReporter.com can be a source of great well-crafted stories, quotes from company CEOs, and opinions from recognized experts that are right on topic. Here are some best practices to get the most from a fabulous content source.
Yahoo Bing Network: New Details on Searchers Not Using Google
ComScore data shows that some 47 million U.S. searchers can be found exclusively on the Yahoo Bing Network, not on Google. Additionally, these searchers unique to the Yahoo Bing Network spend 30 percent more than the average Google searcher.
The Future of Search: Marketing Analytics, Real Life and Links
What lies ahead for the search marketer? At IonSearch 2013 many speakers looked ahead. A wrap up about what to expect.
Post from Clarissa Sajbl on State of Search
The Future of Search: Marketing Analytics, Real Life and Links
Guy Kawasaki Talks Content Marketing, Social & Google+
With so many sources of original content, it’s getting increasingly difficult to stand out from the crowd. You have to create, curate, and share content, but you must also position yourself as an expert and genuinely interact with your communities.
Google Are Testing Layout Changes – Green Arrow Dropdown
As you can see from the screenshot above, the green dropdown arrow appears at the side of the URL and contains “Cached”, “Similar” and “Share” links. Interestingly – this appears to get rid of the Google Instant Previews… Here is a slightly larger image, which may be a bit clearer:
The post Google Are Testing Layout Changes – Green Arrow Dropdown appeared first on SEO Blog by Dave Naylor – SEO Tools, Tips & News.
Location & Lifestyle Key Drivers for the Mobile Path to Purchase in UK, U.S.
Marketers must tailor their mobile ad strategies to reflect each country’s distinct mobile user populations. This includes considering varying search patterns, timing, and device usage – many of which are impacted by lifestyle differences.
Getting Granular With User Generated Content
The stock market had a flash crash today after someone hacked the AP account & made a fake announcement about bombs going off at the White House. Recently Twitter’s search functionality has grown so inundated with spam that I don’t even look at the brand related searches much anymore. While you can block individual users, it doesn’t block them from showing up in search results, so there are various affiliate bots that spam just about any semi-branded search.
Of course, for as spammy as the service is now, it was worse during the explosive growth period, when Twitter had fewer than 10 employees fighting spam:
Twitter says its “spammy” tweet rate of 1.5% in 2010 was down from 11% in 2009.
If you want to show growth by any means necessary, engagement by a spam bot is still engagement & still lifts the valuation of the company.
Many of the social sites make no effort to police spam & only combat it after users flag it. Consider Eric Schmidt’s interview with Julian Assange, where Eric Schmidt stated:
- “We [YouTube] can’t review every submission, so basically the crowd marks it if it is a problem post publication.”
- “You have a different model, right. You require human editors.” on Wikileaks vs YouTube
We would post editorial content more often, but we are sort of debating opening up a social platform so that we can focus on the user without having to bear any editorial costs until after the fact. Profit margins are apparently better that way.
As Google drives smaller sites out of the index & ranks junk content based on no factor other than it being on a trusted site, they create the incentive for spammers to ride on the social platforms.
All aboard. And try not to step on any toes!
When I do some product related searches (eg: brand name & shoe model) almost the whole result set for the first 5 or 10 pages is garbage.
- Blogspot.com subdomains
- Appspot.com subdomains
- YouTube accounts
- Google+ accounts
- sites.google.com
- Wordpress.com subdomains
- Facebook Notes & pages
- Tweets
- Slideshare
- blog.yahoo.com
- subdomains off of various other free hosts
It comes without surprise that Eric Schmidt fundamentally believes that “disinformation becomes so easy to generate because of, because complexity overwhelms knowledge, that it is in the people’s interest, if you will over the next decade, to build disinformation generating systems, this is true for corporations, for marketing, for governments and so on.”
Of course he made no mention in Google’s role in the above problem. When they are not issuing threats & penalties to smaller independent webmasters, they are just a passive omniscient observer.
With all these business models, there is a core model of building up a solid stream of usage data & then tricking users or looking the other way when things get out of hand. Consider Google’s Lane Shackleton’s tips on YouTube:
- “Search is a way for a user to explicitly call out the content that they want. If a friend told me about an Audi ad, then I might go seek that out through search. It’s a strong signal of intent, and it’s a strong signal that someone found out about that content in some way.”
- “you blur the lines between advertising and content. That’s really what we’ve been advocating our advertisers to do.”
- “you’re making thoughtful content for a purpose. So if you want something to get shared a lot, you may skew towards doing something like a prank”
Harlem Shake & Idiocracy: the innovative way forward to improve humanity.
Life is a prank.
This “spam is fine, so long as it is user generated” stuff has gotten so out of hand that Google is now implementing granular page-level penalties. When those granular penalties hit major sites Google suggests that those sites may receive clear advice on what to fix, just by contacting Google:
Hubert said that if people file a reconsideration request, they should “get a clear answer” about what’s wrong. There’s a bit of a Catch-22 there. How can you file a reconsideration request showing you’ve removed the bad stuff, if the only way you can get a clear answer about the bad stuff to remove is to file a reconsideration request?
The answer is that technically, you can request reconsideration without removing anything. The form doesn’t actually require you to remove bad stuff. That’s just the general advice you’ll often hear Google say, when it comes to making such a request. That’s also good advice if you do know what’s wrong.
But if you’re confused and need more advice, you can file the form asking for specifics about what needs to be removed. Then have patience
In the past I referenced that there is no difference between a formal white list & overly-aggressive penalties coupled with loose exemptions for select parties.
The moral of the story is that if you are going to spam, you should make it look like a user of your site did it, that way you
- are above judgement
- receive only a limited granular penalty
- get explicit & direct feedback on what to fix
SearchCap: The Day In Search, April 23, 2013
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the Web. From Search Engine Land: Google Pulls Related Searches Filter Due To Lack Of Usage Google has quietly removed the “related searches” option from the search tools menu within the Google…
Please visit Search Engine Land for the full article.