It hasn’t happened yet – but wishful thinking. The word “scam” is used by your competitors in link building and content efforts (and by manipulating search behavior with Amazon Mechanical Turk) to inject the keyword modifier into your branded search results.

Autocomplete Example

Arm and Defend Yourself

Have some fun with your online reputation management (ORM) campaign. Create funny, goofy, useful, and authentic content on top level domains like Posterous, Tumblr, etc. Use your name as much as you can without annoying the reader. Name your images with you full name, and use ALT and TITLE attributes. Get some fans to your Facebook and Google+ profiles. You get the idea.

For more on this, visit Beat the Autocomplete, a definitive guide to influencing what shows up in Google Search Suggest (or Google Autocomplete). Definitely share your thoughts below.

Posted from Brea, California, United States.

Refactoring is a term used in programming which refers to the process of taking a piece of code and rewriting it. The different here is that you aren’t re-writing that code in order to achieve a different end, rather you are re-writing it to do the same thing that it already can do. So what’s the catch?

Well while the code will still do the same thing after refactoring, the idea is that it will do the same thing more quickly and more efficiently. When programming a large program such as business to business software, this then allows the program to run on a machine while using up significantly less RAM and other power which means it runs faster on older machines and is less likely to crash or otherwise go wrong. At the same time refactoring can also help you to decrease your file size, and to make it run faster and be more compatible. For us SEO geeks, decreased file size and faster performance could result in few “returns to search engine results”, a major behavioral signal of relevancy to Google and other engines.

While a lot of refactoring goes on in software engineering and computer game programming however, it is significantly less common for website design. The reason for this is largely because people often don’t view website programming as ‘real’ programming as it is really just a series of indicators for how the page should be organized on the screen by the browser – there are fewer logic testers and less input/output.

Why Refactoring for Websites?

However this isn’t the case all of the time, and actually there are several examples where website coding is a lot larger and more complex than just that. For instance if you are making a website that has profiles, a forum, or a comments box then this will involve PHP and Java and instantly be far more like coding a piece of software.

However even for a website that still relies only on HTML and CSS there are ways and ways of programming so that it will be as fast and as efficient as possible. Faster load equals better user experience, which ultimately results in few bounce-back’s to Google and other SERPS, and potentially higher ranking over time.

If you have lots of pages with unnecessary code and annotations, and if you have programmed each page individually, then you’ll find your site is slow to load, that it taxes your bandwidth allowance heavily, and that you struggle to find your way around it when you come to make changes.

Some Examples

So how would you go about refactoring a website? Well one thing would be to reduce the size of each HTML file as much as possible which you can do easily with an include file and a CSS style sheet if you don’t already have them.

Meanwhile you might choose to use Ajax in order to dictate the order in which your page elements load, and to therefore create a better experience for the user. Thumbnails should be thumbnails and not just large images with the attributes dictated in the code which are slower to load.

For PHP and Java things become a lot more complicated. Tiny differences like using a Boolean (a ‘true or false’ variable) rather than an Integer (any whole number) can increase the speed of the software and reduce the memory expenditure minimally. Either way though, this is highly worth doing and will help you to end up with a website that is more stable, that will be more relevant going into the future and that you can easily find your way around and edit.

John Russell is part time blogger and webmaster at web hosting reviews blog. Recent review by him is on webhosting provided by bluehost with complete specifications/analysis.

Posted from Los Angeles, California, United States.

It happens to the best of us: the temptation to buy links. I get emails all the time and am lucky to be one of the few marketers immune to the impulse some of these offers can create. Below is a screenshot from one email I received recently from BackLinks.com that made me fall out of my chair:

Wow, just imagine, 500 instant links, 10,000 forum posts, and 1,000 Facebook Likes! Okay, now imagine what Google will think of you next month, when your website only gets 7 new links from some fans who like your blog posts. See an unusual pattern of behavior here? So will Google, Bing and other search engines. Worse, get caught trying to influence search results and you could face banishment or lose your job if you’re the resident SEO guy.

Buying Links Exposed in the NY Times

I’m not going to talk much about the Overstock Wall Street Journal post, because I believe what they did was grey hat not black hat SEO. I believe they were attempting to earn links a little too aggressively, as opposed to J.C. Penny’s exploit in the NY Times who I can only assume did what you see in the comic included with this post; buying links from a broker en mass to game search results.

The consequences were far worse than pages just being buried in Google search results, as now the company carries with it a reputation for participating in questionable marketing tactics and will forever be watched with a sharp eye. There’s no ounce of grey hat SEO J.C. Penny can do now without thousands of marketers immediately criticizing and scrutinizing each effort to improve organic traffic.

The Right Way to Buy Links

I know, oxymoron, right? No matter what you do to get links to your website, there is cost involved. Whether you invest $2,000 into writing and deploying the most likeable, shareable, linkable, embeddable, tweetable page on the planet for link bait (uh hem), spend time and resources interviewing experts, or spending money on developers to create freebies that come locked in with links (such as free WordPress themes); anyway you look at it, you’re buying links.

Having the best product in the world will absolutely help, but the catch 22 with this idea is that you must first be known before you can be viral. In other words, you need traffic to get traffic. In other words, it takes money to make money. In other words, you’ve got your work cut out for you.

Alternatives to Buying Links from a Broker

I’ve listed some alternatives to buying links in what many are calling the Best SEO Audit List. It doesn’t get much traffic yet, though it ranks well already. If you find it useful, help me get the word out. If you don’t, let’s just put a pin in my request and we’ll revisit after the next Google update.

Cheers!

Here’s a video of me from Westwood College. If this doesn’t inspire you to get your degree, I’m not sure what would. Let me know what you think.

Posted from Los Angeles, California, United States.

There’s nothing more frustrating on the planet than having someone pay you to help them, but not take action on simple tasks that require their attention. You know what I mean, right? For you, it may be getting an approval or sign-off, or potentially you just need your client to make a decision or selection. What happens? Procrastination happens. Well, with search engine optimization it’s not too different. Only there’s a Catch 22 for those of us who try to go the extra mile. I’ll explain below.

Before I do any SEO work for a client, I try to educate them on the 3 Basic Principles of SEO, so that they understand the importance of keyword-themed content, inbound links, and user selection within search results pages. For many of my small business clients, I might as well be explaining the theory of relativity or use the term “flux capacitor” when I explain SEO.

This whole One Page idea is something I came up with to help increase the percentage of clients who lag on delivering content after I deliver my Content Tracking Spreadsheet. Okay, here’s the Catch 22: MOST smaller business clients (plumbers, carpet cleaners, etc) will NEVER touch a keyboard. I’m sorry, but it’s the truth. So what do you have to do as their SEO Expert? That’s right, you have to write the content on their behalf, and they will be pissed off when they discover that you actually don’t know a damn thing about their industry or niche (so be prepared to receive a big fat “F” on your write up of their service or product).

Outsource you say? Nay, I think not my friend. Have you seen the quality of the content from an outsourced vendor? It’s perfect for Wikipedia if you outsource to India, perfect for a kindergarten picture book if you outsource to the Philippines. You won’t find any copy in the writing you get back that will convince a visitor to purchase your client’s products or services. Can you say garbage boys and girls? I knew you could.

Just One Page – It’s About Content

There’s some screenshots in this video that fly by fairly quickly, so here they are with their explanations. The first is an example of how David Mihm’s idea of coming up with “Local Ranking Factors” using leading experts as contributors was the one of the top examples of Link Bait to ever exist. This screenshot shows the thousands of backlinks this One Page earned, in part from the contributors and their fans, and in part from just being kick-ass content that all of us SEO’s reference when we train and practice our craft.

Here’s a screenshot of Yahoo! Site Explorer. Domain data was provided from OpenSiteExplorer.org.

The next screenshot shows the dozens of contributors David was able to get to participate in his study. Note the one most important element from this page (buttons to make linking easier).

Then there’s Mark Robertson and ReelSEO.com, the best resource on the planet to get training on SEO for Video. His videos section attracted over 3 thousand inbound links from over 600 domains.

The theme here should be obvious: great content produces great volumes of organic, non-explicit inbound links, thus producing higher ranking in the search results. It also doesn’t hurt to make it easy to link and/or share a page if you like it:

And Then Came Me

If you’ve been to one of my Orange County SEO Meetups, SEO Seminars, or have had a consulting session with me, then you probably remember my story about how it took over 6 months to get to the first page for the term “SEO Expert”. Unlike the #2 guy at the moment, who as I understand it, is looking for ghost writers to game the system, I gave away free strategy, ebooks, tips, wrote for and got featured in popular magazines to earn my position.

Below are some screenshots of what I did on my website, beyond all the off-page SEO:

The Result? Well, at the moment, I’m still doing okay. However, it’s not the RANK that’s important with SEO, it’s the traffic and leads. Based on this snippet of data from Google Analytics, do you think I really care that much about my rank for the term “SEO Expert” as opposed to other terms?

Can You Write One Page?

If you’ve downloaded my SEO Content Writing Guide, then yes, yes you can. Should you write at least one page about every product, service, technique, definition, and subpages about each of those topics? Yes, yes you should. The more “unique” content you can produce, the higher probability you will have to get ranking – so write until your hand falls off. Be sure to link to every page you create from the appropriate category on your website, otherwise the web crawlers will not have a way to access your pages, and please do not use “click here” as the link text; instead use the keyword that best describes the page.

Okay, I made some bold statements, acted a little goofy, gave you a ton of free stuff, and threw in a controversial comment about a peer. Your gears have to be spinning, so spill your guts and respond below will ya? Thanks for reading!

Posted from Los Angeles, California, United States.

Before you pay $5 for a terrible article on your website, consider reading my newest SEO Content Writing Guide. Why? Well, if you think about it, there could be some extremely negative ramifications to posting crappy content.

Why You Don’t Want to Use Garbage Content

1. Your reader will know it’s garbage and they’ll return to Google
2. Google will learn from bounce-backs that’s it’s garbage, and penalize you
3. Spun, wrangled, mixed, or reused content usually spits out garbage
4. It’s just lazy. If you can’t commit an hour a week to your website, turn it off

Get My New Writing Guide on SEO Below

No opt-in’s or registration required. Click, download, and share all you want. If you decide to share the information in the Guide on a webpage outside of the PDF, please be sure to link back to this page, that’s my only request.

Benefits of Optimized Content

There are hundreds of reasons why you should create awesome content and tweak specific focal points to include keywords. In general, here are several benefits of creating SEO-enhanced web content:

• People will link to great content (think of Wikipedia)
• Good content educates, informs, and SELLS your stuff
• Unique, hand-typed content won’t be filtered by Google
• Bing is an ORGANIC search engine that looks at keyword prominence
• Bing will have 30% market share after the Search Alliance concludes
• People will tweet and “like” (Facebook) a noteworthy page
• It’s the right thing to do

So what are you waiting for? Grab Version 1 of my SEO Content Writing Guide and get to writing great content! Need a way to keep track of your content? Try my SEO Content Tracking Spreadsheet, designed to take the thought out of the individual focal points by creating columns for each SEO attribute you’ll want to include on every page.

Let me know what you think in your comments below. Thanks for reading!