Well not recently but within the past 2 weeks I did.
Here is the Link - Dustin Ma's Article on SEOmoz.org
The article is titled - Does Google Care about Legitimacy?
Go ahead and take a look and I'd love to hear thoughts about it!
I also wrote another article for the SEOmoz.org it's about Social Media Marketing ( their article theme of the month) it hasn't been published yet but I'll post up the link when it does.
Thursday, May 21, 2009
Thursday, May 7, 2009
Social networking profiles mixing business with pleasure
The biggest, latest, and greatest method of S.E.O. and S.E.R.M. is social networking. What seems like something new and freshest thing for about the past year or 2, is something some of us have been in on for quite some time. All of my social networking accounts are personal, including my Twitter. My Twitter account I made for 0 means of Search Engine Optimization... but if you Google my name Dustin Ma, I have the first 2 spots of Google because of my Twitter. I have 2150 updates and I created it January of this year. Every single social site I have currently are all personal.( that is about to change because I need to start networking for S.E.O. clients)
So currently I have all my profiles open and I have never once regulated anything on them, I had no reason too. What am I to do now, I created my Myspace back in my sophomore year of high school, I was 15 at the time. You want to talk about a Social Networking or Media expert who remembers or was even around when Tila Tequila (used to be Tila Nguyen) was just making her network and hadn't even broke records yet. Myspace used to run smooth, then they had a huge increase in users and you constantly displayed error messages. (Twitter in the next 6 months anyone?)
So now what do I do, do I change everything I have, do I put everything on private, or do I leave them on public? Most experts say make everything private and I completely understand why, what if a potential client sees it, what if a co-worker sees it, etc. But making everything private leaves room for suspicion. Why do they need it private, what is he hiding, this cover it all up mentality can backfire. The approach I am telling everyone is to make it public and moderate, moderate what you do and say. Almost every single social network site puts the creator in a position to delete comments, and edit everything on there. Imagine an employer goes to your Myspace, Facebook, etc. and they see some questionable material, whether it's you hitting the clubs Saturday night, or that little get together you had on thirsty Thursday. Most employers want to get a sense of honesty with their employees, at least they know who you are and what you do. Now imagine they go to your site and see a "You have to be this person's friend to view their profile" type message. Most people assume the worst and they think they are hiding something, then they use the company acct. to send you a friend add. Now instead of a client or employer just looking at your site, they want to be friends, so all those fun surveys you post and all those dumb quizzes you do, will be known. Sure you can ignore the add but then it really can hurt your potential new job.
My take from someone who has had profiles much longer than many others is keep it open, just moderate.
So currently I have all my profiles open and I have never once regulated anything on them, I had no reason too. What am I to do now, I created my Myspace back in my sophomore year of high school, I was 15 at the time. You want to talk about a Social Networking or Media expert who remembers or was even around when Tila Tequila (used to be Tila Nguyen) was just making her network and hadn't even broke records yet. Myspace used to run smooth, then they had a huge increase in users and you constantly displayed error messages. (Twitter in the next 6 months anyone?)
So now what do I do, do I change everything I have, do I put everything on private, or do I leave them on public? Most experts say make everything private and I completely understand why, what if a potential client sees it, what if a co-worker sees it, etc. But making everything private leaves room for suspicion. Why do they need it private, what is he hiding, this cover it all up mentality can backfire. The approach I am telling everyone is to make it public and moderate, moderate what you do and say. Almost every single social network site puts the creator in a position to delete comments, and edit everything on there. Imagine an employer goes to your Myspace, Facebook, etc. and they see some questionable material, whether it's you hitting the clubs Saturday night, or that little get together you had on thirsty Thursday. Most employers want to get a sense of honesty with their employees, at least they know who you are and what you do. Now imagine they go to your site and see a "You have to be this person's friend to view their profile" type message. Most people assume the worst and they think they are hiding something, then they use the company acct. to send you a friend add. Now instead of a client or employer just looking at your site, they want to be friends, so all those fun surveys you post and all those dumb quizzes you do, will be known. Sure you can ignore the add but then it really can hurt your potential new job.
My take from someone who has had profiles much longer than many others is keep it open, just moderate.
Tuesday, May 5, 2009
Duplicate Information/Articles with Google's new Algorithm
In years past most of the duplicate "information" on websites that hurt your S.E.O. mostly lied in the titles. Previous Google crawlers, bots, spiders whatever you want to call them, only really "had time" to check titles, that is why they developed the 301, 302, etc. re-directs and now the even more effective canonical tag. However, I recently experimented this and figured titles are not the only thing being crawled for duplicate information, but content as a whole.
It only makes sense that as time goes on, the crawlers for Google in 2000 would not nearly be as advanced as the ones we have in 2009. That simply content as a whole is being checked for spam not just titles or links, etc... For one of my clients I did an experiment on this, a blogspot blog and a wordpress blog. The blogspot I sent to multiple blog directories, and social bookmarking sites, and the wordpress I did that to many only 3 sites. I had made about 12-13 posts on the blogspot and I copied each and every post exactly the same including titles to the wordpress, which means they have similiar URL's.
One day I checked Google and the blogspot was on the front page with yelp.com then I checked later that day both yelp.com and the blogspot were pushed back to page 4. The wordpress was on page 2 or 3, it fluctuated and it was definitely above the blogspot. At that point I used,
http://www.webconfs.com/similar-page-checker.php
they were roughly 79% similiar. I went in and changed articles, keywords, tags, and titles, to a point of 19% similiarity.
Roughly a day or 2 later... blogspot was not just on page one but was in a decent spot on the front page. However the wordpress is seemingly non exsistent on Google searches. Now this is just one case and definitely something I am going to continue experimenting with, but becareful on article submissions and profile submissions. I am currently changing text for almost everything so nothing is really "identitcal" especially with Google's new algorithm original content is becoming more and more crutial.
It only makes sense that as time goes on, the crawlers for Google in 2000 would not nearly be as advanced as the ones we have in 2009. That simply content as a whole is being checked for spam not just titles or links, etc... For one of my clients I did an experiment on this, a blogspot blog and a wordpress blog. The blogspot I sent to multiple blog directories, and social bookmarking sites, and the wordpress I did that to many only 3 sites. I had made about 12-13 posts on the blogspot and I copied each and every post exactly the same including titles to the wordpress, which means they have similiar URL's.
One day I checked Google and the blogspot was on the front page with yelp.com then I checked later that day both yelp.com and the blogspot were pushed back to page 4. The wordpress was on page 2 or 3, it fluctuated and it was definitely above the blogspot. At that point I used,
http://www.webconfs.com/similar-page-checker.php
they were roughly 79% similiar. I went in and changed articles, keywords, tags, and titles, to a point of 19% similiarity.
Roughly a day or 2 later... blogspot was not just on page one but was in a decent spot on the front page. However the wordpress is seemingly non exsistent on Google searches. Now this is just one case and definitely something I am going to continue experimenting with, but becareful on article submissions and profile submissions. I am currently changing text for almost everything so nothing is really "identitcal" especially with Google's new algorithm original content is becoming more and more crutial.
Monday, May 4, 2009
Google's Tweak in it's Algorithm and Twitter Monetization
Back in March, 2009 it become known that Google slightly modified their algorithm. Many S.E.O. specialists had noticed for almost up to a year (depending which industry they were looking at) that big name companies were raising the ranks without real reason or purpose. It seemed like just because they were "insert big company name here" they were getting to the top. Matt Cutt's take is that it's not about brand but; "trust, authority, reputation, page rank, high quality." This is where the argument comes, does a blog or website about a genre of a product is it higher quality than a specific website selling you a product. Most corporations don't even have that many back links or if they do have back links quite a few of them are negative. One negative online story would be the 6 year old that was given a Sony PSP for Christmas from Walmart that had "adult material" on the memory card. Now almost every single article that is written about that has a back link to walmart.com, a distrusting, bad reputation article I guarentee you turned into something positive on Google's search engine.
Big brands also pay out a lot of money for pay per click programs, radio and T.V. advertising. Many S.E.O. specialists are believe those who pay for Google Adsense, and get into Google's Radio ( they now have ads with Pandora, Slackers and a few other sites) and their T.V. advertising might be getting pushed to the top as well.
Now how does all this tie into the second part of my title... Twitter is dying for answer to monetize it. Advertising such as facebook and myspace wouldn't work that well because Twitter apps have already been created. These apps simply cut out the advertising. Unless something changes probably the easiest route to monetize Twitter, would be to take the route of many directories, have people pay for higher search spots. Many companies would love for an easy way to get success with Twitter, getting your company or just an individual right on page 1 of a Twitter search would make some companies shell out big bucks. I'd say within the next 6 months to the outside of a year Twitter is going to have to come out with a plan to make some money, so we will just have to see what happens.
Sources: ArcherSEM Article on March's 09 Google Algorithm Change
and Current.com's Report on the 6 year old, his PSP x-mas gift and walmart
Big brands also pay out a lot of money for pay per click programs, radio and T.V. advertising. Many S.E.O. specialists are believe those who pay for Google Adsense, and get into Google's Radio ( they now have ads with Pandora, Slackers and a few other sites) and their T.V. advertising might be getting pushed to the top as well.
Now how does all this tie into the second part of my title... Twitter is dying for answer to monetize it. Advertising such as facebook and myspace wouldn't work that well because Twitter apps have already been created. These apps simply cut out the advertising. Unless something changes probably the easiest route to monetize Twitter, would be to take the route of many directories, have people pay for higher search spots. Many companies would love for an easy way to get success with Twitter, getting your company or just an individual right on page 1 of a Twitter search would make some companies shell out big bucks. I'd say within the next 6 months to the outside of a year Twitter is going to have to come out with a plan to make some money, so we will just have to see what happens.
Sources: ArcherSEM Article on March's 09 Google Algorithm Change
and Current.com's Report on the 6 year old, his PSP x-mas gift and walmart
Youngster in the S.E.O./S.E.R.M. field!
This is the first of many blogs to come, recently I've landed myself a job in the Blogging/S.E.O./S.E.R.M. field and I figured I might as well make a personal blog so I can voice my own personal opinions.
It is interesting being in a field where I am much younger than my peers. Many would think I lack the experience needed to properly understand and implement S.E.O. techniques let alone S.E.R.M. Thank the heaven's though for Social Networking. I have been using Social Networking for roughly 6-7 years now. Whether it was Xanga, LiveJournal, Myspace, Facebook, or Twitter, my experience with social networking levels the playing field right now in S.E.O. It seems the more they are tweaking Google's Algorithm the more they favor to social network sites. Social network sites are also the absolute easiest way to backlink w/ credible sites.
Anyways, here it goes my 1st business blog. ^_^
It is interesting being in a field where I am much younger than my peers. Many would think I lack the experience needed to properly understand and implement S.E.O. techniques let alone S.E.R.M. Thank the heaven's though for Social Networking. I have been using Social Networking for roughly 6-7 years now. Whether it was Xanga, LiveJournal, Myspace, Facebook, or Twitter, my experience with social networking levels the playing field right now in S.E.O. It seems the more they are tweaking Google's Algorithm the more they favor to social network sites. Social network sites are also the absolute easiest way to backlink w/ credible sites.
Anyways, here it goes my 1st business blog. ^_^
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