Penguins and Pandas: A Black and White Issue
The news this week was that the Google “over-optimization” penalty that was fervently discussed over the past month or so is alive and kicking, and goes by the name of “Penguin.”
This morning, I was chatting with Bruce, and he said:
Did you notice both the notable algorithm updates were named after animals of the same color?
To which I said:
That’s because it’s a Black Hat/White Hat issue.
The lesson? Don’t do spam. Plain and simple.
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How to Do SEO Web Design and Development
In a perfect world, site owners would consider SEO from the very start, before the Web design and development of the site was even a twinkle in their eye or a symbol in their code. We all know this isn’t the case, but every once and a while, we get lucky enough to build SEO in the site from the ground up, and it’s a beautiful thing.
When people think “Web design,” they often think of the look and feel of the site, the colors, the graphics, etc. From an SEO perspective, the design of the site includes that and so much more. It’s the architecture of the site that ensures it’s as search engine-friendly as possible, and it touches everything from the code to the content to the navigation and more. In this post, we’ll look at what it takes to build SEO into Web design and development.
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April 25, 2012
Who’s Doing Social Media Right? Weigh In Here
Here’s an interesting mid-week read for you: Social Media Advertising Is Set to Explode. Who Will Control It?
The short story: Industry watchers, really everyone reading this, saw social media marketing cut an unprecedented fast track for business adoption and budget. Now all hands are reaching for a piece of the pie; that’s PR, advertising, digital media, and social media agencies all staking a claim to the financial bounty that comes with controlling the new media budget. But which arm of media management or communications would best serve social on behalf of business? Before any business can choose, the AdAge article warns of three social media misconceptions that can muddy decision making.
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April 24, 2012
Is Your Company SEO Ready?
If you’re getting ready to integrate search engine optimization into your business for the first time or perhaps revisiting it, preparation is half the battle. Trying to manage competing initiatives, departments and goals within your company takes a lot of prepping so everyone works in tandem to ensure SEO is done right organization-wide. Add to that the working relationship between an agency and in-house team (if you’re looking to hire consultants), and you have a lot of people who have to brace for the impact SEO on the organization. In this post, you’ll find recommendations on how individual teams within an organization can prepare for the SEO initiative that’s coming their way.
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April 23, 2012
Understanding Over-Optimization and Google Social Analytics: April SEO Newsletter
April’s SEO Newsletter is ambitious, offering readers the usual round-up of notable industry news from the month along with several action-oriented articles.
- Bruce Clay’s SEO Action Items for Google’s Assault on Aggressive SEO [Video Interview]
- Google Cracks Down on Over-Optimisation and Unnatural Linking
- Getting to Know Google’s Social Analytics
- Take SEO Training on Your Holiday in Milan
What are you waiting for? Get reading!
April 20, 2012
SEOs ♥ Drama: Why Our Industry Thrives on Gossip and How the Over-Optimization Issue is a Perfect Example
It’s true; the SEO industry feeds off of the hearsay, the juicy gossip, the scandal of algorithm changes and their effects. But it’s not our fault. The environment that we operate within – the constant feeling of never quite knowing whether or not we’re playing by Google’s rules creates a paranoid culture, where we’re constantly seeking answers from one another, sometimes obsessing too much over the “what if” details we know nothing about.
This gossip can escalate to the point of causing mass hysteria, but our little SEO society can’t seem to get enough. We propagate it further by creating more and more content surrounding said topic because, hey, people want to read it. And the vicious cycle continues.
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April 18, 2012
Google Social Analytics: How the Pages Report Can Boost Content & Social Performance
Google’s new social reporting in Analytics rolled out recently and many site owners are pleased to have data that tracks social media ROI integrated right into the analytics they use every day. With six new reporting functions, there’s lots of ways you can assess the value of social media in conversions, the value individual social networks have and how your content is shared across networks. In this post, we’ll hone in on the Pages report and how you can use it to track content performance across social networks and grow community.
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April 12, 2012
Why Is Google Allowing Rich Snippet Spam?
A couple months ago, I read a great article on how to get an extra rows of stars in Google Places by inserting the new hReview markup code onto a page of your site.
One of the new microformats for the in-progress Semantic Web, hReview lets webmasters markup customer reviews for products and/or services so search engines can understand what product or service is being reviewed, who’s reviewing it (or how many reviews there are if it’s aggregated) and what rating they’ve given. The rating shows up on SERPs as a row of golden stars.
The hReview format just looked too good to be true, especially because it could work for any listing on the SERP, not just local listings. I thought to myself, all you have to do is stick a scrap of code on your site and Google will give you a row of stars beneath your SERP listing?
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April 11, 2012
Using Data to Drive Your Google Plus Program
Now that Google+ has been around for a while now, businesses are taking notice. And if they haven’t already, many are considering marketing programs using the G+ community. But like any social medium in its infancy, it’s a Wild West type environment where creativity rules in how to best engage your audience. Luckily, there are companies out there that are offering up data (Google included) to help better steer your efforts. If your business is just getting started on G+, there’s lots to think about. But let’s take a step back to some basics, and look at tools that can help you get a better understanding of who’s on Google+ and what’s working for others.
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April 10, 2012
6 Online Marketing Problems Local Business Owners Face and How to Fix Them
If you own or manage a store or business that depends on customers coming in the door, you’ve probably wondered the best way to use the Internet to drive more foot traffic. Regardless of your place in the spectrum of web-savviness, there are things you can do to establish a web presence that can be found online and leveraged into new customers.
If you’ve considered how investing in a website, social media profiles or even daily deals like Groupon might help your business, there’s a good chance you’ve faced one of the following questions of local business owners making a name for themselves online. Here are six common problems local businesses find online along with the info and resources you need to solve them.
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