An interesting thing happened this morning relating to the Social Buzz around this article. Two different people submitted the article to Sphinn.com using two different URLs. This happened because SEJ changed the URL to a more SEO friendly one very shortly after publication. Both versions of the submission became very popular very quickly with each having 14 or more votes after the first 2 hours. If there had been only one version of the URL submitted the article would have went “Hot” within those first couple of hours.

One of the moderators at Sphinn corrected the issue by keeping the first submission and deleting the second. This meant that all of the votes and comments associated with the deleted version were lost. The loss could have an impact on the judging of the SEJ contest. Its unfortunate, but things like this happen.

I wanted to point this situation out as an example of how duplicate URLs to the same content can impact your marketing efforts in more ways than you might generally think about.

If you like the article BTW .. Give it a Sphinn, Stumble It, Mixx It or whatever. This is a contest and I can use all the help I can get. Here’s the post again in case you don’t want to scroll up … “14 Things You Didn’t Know About Real SEOs“

Here’s one that just made me laugh out loud. All the SEOs I showed it too laughed as well…

A hosting company, www.sultanhost.com is currently running a promotion offering Free Hosting to sites with a PR of 5 or better. Seriously, here’s the page http://www.sultanhost.com/freehosting.html

The higher the PR is the better hosting program gets. Of course there is a catch, you must place a link back to the host on EVERY PAGE OF THE SITE. Does anyone else see a problem with this? I can tell you I have seen sites penalized for aggressive linking doing less aggressive tactics than this. These guys seem to know just enough about SEO to get their asses handed to them.

Ok … I can see some non-search related benefit to this tactic, but if you want links like that, please don’t base the program on a useless metric like PR and if you do, use No-follows. For those who think I am full of it and that tactic is cool, here’s are the main reasons it is not…

1. Run of site links are just plain dangerous
2. They are all using the same link text
3. All the links are probably on the same IP block because they are all hosted at the same place
4. Potentially 1000s of links showing up at the same time
5. All the above = a ranking penalty

The odds are, by trying a slick PR based promotion these guys are probably making things worse than ever. Page Rank trickery is not going to fix your web ranking problems magically. You need real naturally generated links cultivated by great content. This is so basic, you need to get it or let someone who does smack you.

And if you ask me, Social Media is going to cure cancer, not PR.

My friend Irina of SpiderFriendly has written a very thorough and detailed article on the sandbox called “Google’s Effect on New Domains” and it is a must read.

Recently a company put out a press release claiming that a recent SEO contest “Shatters Google Sandbox Myth”. While I do admire the thought they put into their idea, they forgot one key factor that makes their entire claim invalid; Competition or Relevancy comparisons. The terms they claim shattered the myth were previously not in the index at all and there for had no competition at all. This is a rather large issue and one that many forget when speaking about the sandbox.

I tend to think of the sandbox more in the terms of an “Aging Delay”. Think of it kind of like “Seniority”. A site which has been in the SERPs for a while has seniority over newer “freshman” sites. When a site makes significant changes, they may reset their seniority which could explain why some existing sites fall into the sandbox after major changes. This seniority would not be a stand alone ranking factor however. It would be applied in relation to relevant search terms or “the competition”.

When a search phrase has a history of relevant sites being returned for queries, the sites themselves have built a history within those queries as well. New sites entering that arena may be subject to qualification relative to its keyword peers. In the press release sited above, the terms being searched for had no competition therefore each site was an equal .. there were no “Senior” sites, nothing to measure against. Common thinking is that the more competitive the industry, the longer a site will stay in the sandbox and this fits nice within this theory. Additionally, it is well know that aged domains will perform better in the SERPs … the “Senior” domains.

And a theory is all it is. Why not add one more I say. The engines will not likely give us the true answer to this issue any time soon, but we know that some sites are given Hub or Authoritative status; lets just look at the sandbox as the opposite of that.

SEO Pier Pressure – “If Your not #1, your a Zero”

Many new SEOs or Clients looking to purchase SEO for the first time are naturally going to check out rankings. They are pushed into many rank checking tools which are “needed” for SEO and often asked “Where do you rank for {keyword}?”. The average perception of SEO is a skill set used to optimize a site to place higher in the search engines. They are told checking rankings the best way to validate SEO. They are basically pressured into a life of rank checking and fluctuation stress. What they don’t understand, but will hopefully learn with experience, rank checking only exposes a very small portion of the information they need to understand their traffic.

Sure, it is a “Cool” thing to say “Woo Hoo, I’m number one for {keyword}!” and everyone wants to be in the Cool crowd. But for those who really understand search traffic, its much “Cooler” to say “Woo Hoo, My traffic is perfectly targeted!” or “Woo Hoo, I have 150% ROI!”. Ever notice that the real Cool people don’t worry about being Cool, they just are.

But then they say, “Higher placement means more traffic.” Ok, this can be very true. How does checking your ranks help? Which terms are you checking? What about other terms? There are many more paths to “more traffic” than higher rankings and most of those paths will provide higher rankings naturally in time. SEO is not about rankings. Its about providing exposure to a site via the search engines and rankings are only one small portion of that goal.

Rank Checking is Limited Knowledge

Ok… your not convinced. I do understand, rankings is a mantra that has been beaten into SEOs for quite some time now. It wont be given up so easily. Can we at least agree that the bottom line is getting people to your site so you can accomplish your site’s goals. Yes? Good.

Now if you are a rankings checker, common sense tells us we can assume that you are tracking the most of the common key phrases people use to find your site. You will check a phrase on the engine and look for one of the pages on your site to show up. Easy. What might be of interest to you at this time, is that those base keyword combinations probably only account for about 25% of the terms surfers use to look for your product or services. One site I work on has about base 150 basic keyword combinations. That site usually is found by surfers using over 10,000 different search terms a month. If you are only tracking your base phrases, you only know what is happening on those phrases, which might only be a very small section of your incoming traffic. You would be surprised at the weird searches that people make to find you product.

Still not convinced? The owner of one site I work on likes to check rankings. He used to complain to me that we were not moving up as much as he wanted. (he wants #1 on everything too) Last week we reported in 2005 we had a 300% increase in organic traffic over 2004 and he didn’t understand how since the rankings had not changed much. I explained to him that since the improvements we made to the site were not based only on the 50 keyword phrases he tracks, he did not see the areas we were improving in. Again, if you are only tracking a base set of keywords, you only know what is happening on those words, not all of your incoming traffic.

The “Cool” SEOs Alternative to Rank Checking

The only way to get the “big picture” about your site is to learn to love your log files. Most log analysis software packages include the ability to identify incoming traffic by keyword used. In many cases you can even click the live referrer link on the keyword and be taken to the exact search results page the surfer came from which would include the rank of your page. The important thing here is the programs will show you ALL of the keywords surfers used, not just the ones you think are important. Would you have thought to track “Blue Widget that fits in the closet” or “Widget closet sized Blue”? Surfers get VERY creative when forming search phrases and most are very different even when looking for the same thing. Your log files will show you every one.

You can get much more information from your log files than you ever could tracking rankings.

What about searches that surfers make that you don’t show up for. How can you get this information. I guess you could track a phrase that you don’t place for, but then what about all the variations on that phrase. It’s just not practical. This is where SEO gets tricky. If the site has a “site search”, track those results via your log files too. You can then identify search phrases within your site which returned “no results” and BAM, you have a new key phrase or topic to build a page around. You can’t do this type of advancement with just rank checking.

The Dark Side of Rank Checking

I pointed out earlier that new SEOs and Clients are basically steered towards rank checking via peer pressure. However, there is a growing number of SEOs and non-SEOs who use rank checking as a sales technique to sell their services. Most of the time these are via cold calls or email spam, so they should be suspect right away. However, those folks may have one or two phrases where they have been able to get good rankings then tout these as examples of their great work. Most of the time these examples are on obscure or misspelled terms. But the forceful sales pitch and “obvious examples” via rank checking can wear down resistance. More than one webmaster has been duped into purchasing a sub par service due to rank checking examples. Examples that someone more knowledgeable in the industry would have seen as bogus right away.

Some unscrupulous individuals take advantage of the general belief that Ranking is the most important benchmark in SEO. It is not.

Rank Checking is not Completely Useless

Ok sure I will admit, I know where I place for most of my basic terms. However, I do not spend a chunk of time every day checking those rankings or creating reports on ranking movement. The search engines fluctuate on a regular basis. One site which tracks movement in Google of their top 1000 key phrases {RankPulse} shows none of the top thousand have a “TOP 3″ which is historically fixed. Everyone is constantly changing their sites to place better so movement is inevitable.

I will also admit that rank checking is one way you can evaluate how well SEO changes made to your site perform. It can also be used to gather information on competitors or alert you to any problems you may have in your indexing. However, these are specific tasks to determine specific results. A quick check every once and a while is probably a good idea, however, no need to schedule X hours a day or create a system of weekly reporting on rankings. That kind of focus on ranking checks is a huge waste of time that could be better spent elsewhere.

Yes, take some time to see where you rank for some terms. But don’t focus on it, you can find much more productive ways to spend your time improving your site to get more traffic and better conversions. Rank checking only shows you a small portion of your traffic picture. Learn to utilize your log files to see your whole traffic picture.

Please don’t get me wrong, relevancy is still a huge part of the ranking algorithms. However, to combat the spammers and provide even higher quality search results, engines are starting to look harder at other factors to determine which sites should be placed at the top of the rankings. They are looking at “Page Quality” now combined with Relevancy.

“Page Quality” as a concept is a measurement of how well a page can represent the relevant content searched for by the surfer. This can encompass a variety of measurable benchmarks. Some probable indicators off the top of my head could include; code validation, text to code ratio, quantity and type of ads, page layout and the amount of content. As with relevancy issues relating to search algorithms, no one knows the exact factors which determine a pages “Page Quality” (PQ).

This has actually been going on for a while now in one form or another. Googles’ Page Rank (PR) system was an early shot at developing process to determine the quality of a page. It worked well for a while and propelled Google towards its current 500 lb Gorilla status. Then the Google Toolbar indicated a specific ranking of pages. The search spammers jumped on the PR band wagon and took a perfectly viable system and corrupted it beyond usefulness. Today PR is no more important than other basic SEO techniques. The importance of PQ is growing.

Need a concrete example? I found one over at Google’s AdWords of all places. AdWords has long used a two part system to rank ads in a results page. First part is how high the bid is for a specific term. This counts for 50% of the placement. The second was CTR or click-thru-ratio which was also worth 50% of the ranking score. CTR is a measurement of how many times an ad is clicked compared to how many times it was shown. 10% CTR means every 10 out of 100 visitors clicked on the ad.

Well in the past couple of months the CTR factor of the equation has been replaced with a factor called “Quality Score”. This includes a number of items related to the Quality of the ads landing page. Now if the worlds largest and most popular search engine can analyze a page to determine its quality from within is advertising system, wouldn’t common sense tell us they can and would do the same to their primary product; Search Results. My opinion is yes they do and will continue to increase its importance. The great thing about this, it when you work towards PQ, you are building a better website and most likely a web site which sells better. It’s a win–win situation.

Moving forward, relevancy will continue to become only part of the puzzle. New conditions will arise and when all is said and done “Page Quality” will be a primary concern. So when formulating your SEO Plans, keep this in mind and shorten those meeting room arguments on relevancy related topics. Start a few new ones on “Page Quality”.

I have, more than once, played moderator between designers and SEO’s. One of the things I admire the most about the owner of this blog is that he values design as much as he does optimizing a site for the SERPS. It is rare that you run across a good SEO who is willing to take one for the team just because it “looks better that way”. A good SEO should give you multiple options for increasing your rankings. If there is a design concern about a particular SEO suggestion, a good SEO will attempt to find a workaround for you. I mention this because many SEO’s don’t do this.

As the world becomes more aware and educated about SEO technology, the “it’s my way or the highway” mentality that many armchair SEO’s possess will be their demise. I have often said that the biggest thing the SEO industry has going for it is ignorance. Most clients have NO CLUE what SEO is, how it works or what’s relevant. I have seen a lot of Johnny-come-lately firm’s pop up overnight who are more than willing to cash client’s checks for little to no work done. Those days are numbered, and we will begin to see the real SEO’s surface to the top and start standardizing the industry. It’s my hope that sites like this will aid in that effort. SEO to the people!

Here’s a sample of the code …

{KeyWord: SEO Integration}
Read About {KeyWord: Search Marketing}
Subscribe to my RSS Feeds.
www.AppliedSeo.com

This code for your ads will use keywords from your group in place of the {KeyWord} in your ads. This is still limited by the character limits for each line, so a default is needed in case the dynamic is to long. Here are some examples. If I had the word “Dynamic AdWords” in my keyword list for this ad, the ad would display as follows:

Dynamic AdWords
Read About Dynamic AdWords
Subscribe to my RSS Feeds.
www.AppliedSeo.com

Now if the ad is displayed for a term which would then exceed the character limit for that line, the default would text be shown ..

SEO Integration
Read About Search Marketing
Subscribe to my RSS Feeds.
www.AppliedSeo.com

There are a couple of things that make this great. First if you have a ton of related keywords, you don’t have to build targeted ads for each set, additionally, they are created dynamically to match the search terms used in the query on which your ad is displayed. This has the added benefit of creating a very targeted ad as related to the surfers interests which produces much better conversion rates.

Today this is fairly public knowledge for AdWords Professionals, however I rarely see it published. If this is your first time seeing this technique, give it a try, I think you will be surprised at the improvements it can make in your overall AdWords PPC efforts.

I think many new businesses begin the planning process with a domain search. They know ahead of time the want to have a website for their business and would like it to reflect the name or products/services they will provide. This search is usually a heartbreaking experience. They of course had ideas of what the domain might be, but the odds are that domain was already spoken for. Many times even finding a domain related to the industry you are in can be a challenge.

Is it possible to find a good domain with out having to give thousands of dollars to a domain broker? Yes it is. The trick is to be persistent and to know your options. It will take some time and a few hours racking your brain to find names to check. But it is possible.

I recently decided I needed an SEO related domain. As you might guess this is a very crowded field and almost everyone in it is familiar with domains and their value. My work was cut out for me. Well my first step was to surf to my favorite domain tool www.whois.sc. One of the great things about this site is they have a tool named “Name Spinner” which will search for available domains based of keywords you supply. I knew SEO was going to be to broad a term, so I thought about my site and the market I was planning on reaching out to. My site will focus on coordinating SEO through out all aspects of a website, not just design or content. So I did a search on “Complete SEO” .. taken.

Now might be the time to note that when you are searching for new domains for a site ALWAYS try and get the dot com version of your name. The others may be available, but from a SEO and Marketing stand point there are many advantages to a dot com over the others. Choose something other than dot com only as a last resort.

Since I write mostly on SEO, I will mention one of the SEO advantages to a dot com domain. First off, the suffix of a domain has zero impact on placement in the search engines or on its indexability. The engines treat all suffixes the same. I guess this is not actually SEO specific, but one of the main technical advantages of a dot com over the others is type-in traffic. When a person types a keyword into a browser address bar, if your site domain is the same and a dot com, the odds are good that the browser will guess it is your site the surfer was looking for and take them to it. This does not usually work for non-dot com domains.

Back to my search for a domain… To consolidate my efforts, lets just say I spent a few hours and had numerous unfruitful ideas and in the end, I had to take a break. I kept using variations on my theme, taking parts of the words or just related words trying to find a combination that I likes and worked for my site. I had names like “Super SEO” “SEO Creator” and “All Optimization”, however I didn’t like any of these. I actually decided to stop for a bit and clear my head to see if a fresh approach would provide any different directions. So I hit the SOE boards and while I was helping to explain “LSI” to a member, I remembered that Google’s “LSI” imitative was kick started when the acquired a company called Applied Semantics a few years ago. It about hit me in the head … I rushed to check and there was, my new, never before registered, domain… “AppliedSEO.com”. It took me about 2 minutes to get to my GoDaddy account and register that domain.

Other options you can try when looking for that perfect domain include using hyphens between words or adding short words like “the” or “all” in front of your desired name.

“Yes Virginia, there are still good domains available.”