Search
Engine Optimisation Web Log (BLOG)
This News Blog is dedicated to bringing news, information
and innovations targeting the Search Engine Optimisation industry. |
Editor: Matt Paines
 blog@xseo.com
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Great content or just Link Baiting?
Last week we were involved in presenting
to a local Enterprise group on the merits of SEO. After the presentations,
having been accosted by various individuals as I attempted to get my
hands on the free grub and wine, one such attendee started to take exception
to something I'd said about Link
Baiting.
Switching IP Servers
A recent episode initiated by a phone
call to the office a couple of weeks ago has prompted me to put this
blog post up. A prospective client had moved servers to a completely
different IP address. The site had a reasonably high amount of traffic,
but during the change over his site stats plummeted...Switching
IP Servers.
So Lucky
A slight departure, but I've just won
the Spanish Lottery...or so a letter that arrived this morning would
have me believe. All I have to do is give them my bank details!!! Hmmmm...like
I just fell of the nearest Christmas tree. Don't you usually have to
buy a lottery ticket first?...winning
the lottery.
Can Web Spam hurt a brand?
Most definitely, the internet has become
a great soap box where anybody can say anything about anybody. Of course
the normal rules of slander, deformation, loss of earnings and copyright
apply. However all these elements only apply when you can pin down the
culprit. A recent example of this is in the timeshare industry....Crimeshare
Backlink and PR update in Google
Overnight Google made updates to its
BackLinks and PageRank displayed in the toolbar. Again pages that are
younger than a month old have not been been awarded the new status.
PageRank
History
Google..."Spam
is an Arms Race".
In an interview with the BBC
last week, Douglas Merrill (who looks after internal engineering)
explained "Spam is an arms race", and unlike spam e-mail,
web spam tries to trick search engines. He went on to say "Spammers
are highly motivated. There is a lot of money at stake" and that
web spammers exploit the way search engines work by bombarding blogs
(blog spam) and comments pages (guest book spam) with links to their
websites. Google prioritises websites in their search results if a particular
page is linked to by other sites.
Every conversation I've ever had with anyone at Google has always come
down to the subject of "blog spam" and "guest book spam".
The worrying thing is that it keeps being brought up, it's almost as
though the big "G" is struggling to get around the problem
so it issues a Press Release or an interview on the subject to rattle
a few sabres.
That said I certainly wouldn't suggest
anyone employ BlackHat techniques, the mere fact that it is on the radar
with Google, or any of the search engines, means that it is a target
of their attention.
Internet catching up with TV.
A study released by BMRB Internet Monitor
(January 2006) shows that Internet users spend a quarter of their weekly
media time on the Internet. The study was done in November 2005, it
shows that 26.5 million people during that month used the Internet.
The study also shows that media time of Internet users with broadband
is fast catching up with both Radio and TV.
Spare a thought.
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Not being prone to huge amounts of nationalistic
sentiment, or outbursts of emotion, yesterday, like many times
before, I found myself in the capital for a couple of meetings.
As I came into town I was aware that
Euston Station had a few more police than normal. On traveling
around both underground and over ground it became apparent that
the police presence was huge.
On any other day I'd be trying to dodge
the masses of tourists, but having a little bit of time between
meetings and being as the weather was particularly hot, I decided
to walk through from Victoria Station, through Westminster, adjacent
to the Abbey.
Yet another police car hurtled past with it's lights and siren
wailing, it was then the penny dropped that today, the 7th, was
the first anniversary of the London bombings. With this realisation
I looked up, and in front of me was one of the most symbolic features
of London and in many peoples eyes England.
Whatever your day holds for you, spare a thought for those who's
lives this tragic event has touched.
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Some SEO's still using Gateways!
This week, yet again, we had a particularly
distressed phone call from a business owner who, for the last year,
had been employing an SEO company to optimise his web site. He remarked
that he had some listings in Google
earlier in the year but they'd all but disappeared. He went on to explain
he'd been reading up on the Do's
and Don'ts at Google, realising that the SEO had breached their
rule about similar/duplicated Gateway Pages. On a website of approx
300 pages, 200 of them were Gateways. He made the point that he'd got
no idea that this had been done. If there is one thing this conversation
highlights, ensure you know the rules and insist on knowing what people
are doing for you. Whilst this issue can be rectified, the fact is that
not only has this guy spent money but he's also lost time and potential
income. more information from my post on Gateway
Spam from last month.
What's a Link Worth?
Anyone involved in promoting a web
site will understand the need to solicit inbound link popularity. Long
gone are the days of reciprocal linking so many SEO's have little choice
but to acquire their links buy paying for them. So
what is a link worth?
Should I Create Gateways?
This
is a question we are still being asked about. Gateway pages have long since been
a method of creating optimised content. Trouble is they often have content copied
from other places on a site. As the search engines will deep link into the most
relevant page would it not have been better to just optimise the original page?...
Gateway Spam
Google
Results Oscillating.
For virtually the
whole of this week, results in Google.co.uk have been oscillating between two
states. Several of our clients are seeing massive variations between searches
for their keyphrases almost minute by minute. This is probably because Google
is merging two "datacentres". Whilst the new regime under the "Big
Daddy" system is still somewhat of a mystery, under the older system Google
would wind up all week only to settle down at weekends, only then stabilising
to reveal its new results.
Google
could use Adsense to Identify Related Sites.
For
some time Google
has been identifying connected sites by looking at their registration, ownership
and hosts IP address. But why would it be interested? Webmasters having multiple
sites which interlink, in Googles eyes, gives those sites an unfair advantage
in the "ranking wars". So many Webmasters have been splitting up their
sites on different servers to disguise their connection. It has been long speculated
that Googles Adsense program (where Google displays paid ads across a network
of sites) could be used to identify connected sites. Well in discussions a SES
London last week the question was asked of Google staff if this was the case-
the reply for the first time was "that it has been considered".
Missed
me?
For those that have missed my postings
of obscure and purely futile comments - I've been away getting some
well earned R&R on a beach in the Mediterranean. Armed with little
more than a PDA and a phone I have no shame in saying frankly the last
thing on my mind has been SEO.
Ah well....play time is over and within 16hrs of touching down at Manchester
Airport I'm now sitting in the Speakers Lounge of the Search Engine
Strategies Conference in London. If you're at the show by all means
come and say hi, or attend one of the sessions I'll
be speaking at.
