Searchlight

Seeing how it is nearly Thanksgiving here in the States, what better time to take a look at the SEO industry and give a little thought for some of the things that I give thanks for.

Search Engines

First and foremost would have to be search engines themselves, since without them, SEO would not be as important as it is. This isn't to say that SEO's value is only tied to the existence of search engines. SEO has really become much more encompassing than the acronym it is as SEO continues to evolve more as an extension of traditional marketing.

Ability to Rank

While every client and site owner feels challenged when it comes to ranking...... Read More

Seems ironic that a billionaire who owns such trifles as a G5 private jet could have unmet wants due to the fact that he can't afford them. But that's exactly the case for Mark Cuban, owner of the Dallas Mavericks and the HDNet television network. Not familiar with Mark Cuban? You'll probably know him best from his fancy footwork on Dancing with the Stars (he was just eliminated last month) and the short-lived reality show in which he starred, The Benefactor.

Mark spoke to attendees in the afternoon keynote at the Blog World and New Media Expo yesterday (Friday) in Las Vegas. (Great conference, by the way! And great parties too, including the bash that Zappos threw right after Mark's keynote!) During the Q&A, there was one comment that Mark made that peaked my interest in particular. Mark shared with BlogWorld attendees two companies he would love to buy. Alas, he confessed he can't afford either one of them. One was Facebook. The other was Verizon.

• Facebook
  I agree with Mark's assessment that Facebook is hot. So I have to admit that, at the right price, I think Facebook would be a great buy. But Internet users are fickle, and so it could be a risky purchase. For example, MySpace isn't as hip — particularly with teenagers — as it once was, whereas up-and-comer Bebo has gained a lot of ground with the teenage set, especially internationally. Will users see Facebook as old and tired in a year or two? Will Google's OpenSocial initiative level the playing field and thus lure users away to other social networks, taking market share away from Facebook in the process?

• Verizon
  From Mark's talk at BlogWorld, it was clear he sees immense value in the pipes bringing high-speed data (Internet, video, voice,..) into the home. Could Verizon be the one to deliver on the dream of HD (high definition) video over the Internet? YouTube's video resolution sure does su... um, leave something to be desired. Personally I'd love for Mark to own Verizon and drive it hard towards that nirvana for all us bandwidth-hungry entertainment consumers.

I feel bad for Mark that he can't afford these two companies. Perhaps we could all pitch in with a few bucks of our own and lend him a hand so he can buy at least one of them? ;-)

Concerned about what your customers say about you online? Well, you should be.

You probably think you have your bases covered by allowing product reviews and client testimonials through your Web site, but the truth is that the blogosphere can make (or break) you as a company if Google includes a customer's blog post in the SERPs (search engine results pages).

Prominently positioned customer blog posts in the SERPs that either love you or hate you can be more powerful than product reviews for several reasons, the most obvious one being that many blogs act as word-of-mouth advertising when things go right--and when they go wrong.

While some bloggers may have a reputation for always pointing out things that are wrong with the world, make no mistake about it: "acts of kindness" do get talked about, in a big way! You may have already overheard some of the positive buzz about Zappos, a fashion retailer of shoes and handbags, probably due in part to its free overnight shipping, very liberal return policy, and enthusiastic customer reviews. Here's a blog post you may not have heard about, "I Heart Zappos."

We all understand that sometimes bad things happen to good people, and Zaz LaMarr (the writer of the post) could be any one of us. In her post, she described how she purchased several pairs of shoes for her ill mother. Some didn't fit, but she didn't get around to returning them. Shortly afterward, her mom passed away and LaMarr still hadn't gotten around to mailing them.

When Zappos followed up on the shoes, LaMarr wrote back and explained the situation, ending with: "I'd send the shoes as soon as I could." Not only did Zappos arrange for UPS to pick up the shoes, but the company also sent a floral arrangement with condolences.

The result of Zappos' kindness? The customer that it treated like gold also happened to be a blogger with readership. Word of this good deed is spreading around the Web faster than the speed of a T-1 line, and her post is currently in position No. 12 in Google for "Zappos," and in position No. 9 in Yahoo.

Still not a believer that blogs are powerful? One commenter to her post declared, "I am going to go buy something from them and refer them to this post as the reason for my purchase. If only more companies acted this human."

What better way to build your reputation than to get back to basics and be nice to people?

On the flip side, some companies are earning their reputation as unfeeling, corporate giants. I can't think of another industry that has more problems with that image than the airlines. Search Google for "Spirit Airlines" and the No. 3 ranked result is a blog post headline that reads, "Do Not Fly Spirit Airlines."

What started out as a complaint over a $5 fee attracted a blogstorm; not only were several other horror stories relayed in the blog post's comments, but other posts like this one about the "Spirit Airlines Story" have attracted attention outside of the blogosphere in places like The Chicago Tribune, consumer complaint groups and more.

What was so bad?

Spirit CEO Ben Baldanza reacted to a well-written customer complaint letter by saying "Please respond, Pasquale, but we owe him nothing as far as I'm concerned. Let him tell the world how bad we are. He's never flown us before anyway and will be back when we save him a penny." The customer got ahold of the comment because Baldanza hit the "Reply to All" button.

Instead of apologizing or trying to deal with the situation in a better manner, Spirit Airlines blew off its customers and people reacted. While airline execs could have done something to resolve the issue, blogs don't seem to be important to them. Company spokeswoman Alison Russell was quoted as saying, "We wouldn't respond to a blog post. She goes on to say: "This goes back to the larger question of the veracity of everything you read on Internet blogs. Our customer service is great."

I'm sure you've heard the saying, "De Nile is a river in Egypt." How many travelers do you think are going to steer clear of Spirit Airlines after they read that damning post (in a No. 3 Google position)?

The lesson here, folks, is that the cliches you've heard about being kind to one another holds true--even (or especially) on the Internet.

As the tail end of the year comes around, many Internet retailers gear up for what will hopefully be the busiest part of their year. Of course, this is also one of the most nerve-racking times of the year as well, especially for those who have a disproportionate amount of their business relying on the success of only a few months of the year.

As you gear up for the holiday season, SEO blends more than ever into all of your other marketing efforts. Here are a few tips to help you on your merry way.

Audit Time

If you haven't already, now is the time to do a quick audit of your site. For many, a code freeze is or will soon be in place, so there won't be any changes to the site, but this is hopefully an opportunity to fix anything that isn't working right. Especially if you just underwent any major changes in the last few months, this is a critical time to find anything that slipped through the cracks. And if you aren't under a regimented code freeze, it may not be a bad idea to implement a self-imposed one as this can be a dangerous time to make major changes to your site.

• Double check your contact form, live chat or other mechanisms that are in place for customer contact.
• Review the last couple months of log files or your site analytics, looking for any 404 errors for missing files... moved or removed pages, broken links on your site, or missing graphics.
• Make note of your most active pages. While you probably won't be making any major changes to these pages, they might be good targets for including links to other key site pages to route holiday traffic.

Reach Out to Friends

An existing customer is much more likely to be receptive and to buy than a brand new customer. If you have an existing customer list and permission to contact them, now is a great time to kick off the season with a pre-holiday email or two. If you have a list but don't have a delivery mechanism in place, look to solutions such as ExactTarget or GravityMail to do the heavy lifting for you.

Map Your Blog

Hopefully you've already implemented a blog on your site. If not, then you've already found your New Year's resolution. (What a relief to have that out of the way, eh!) The future of Internet retailing is about being more than just a retailer. Today, anyone can setup shop online. The retailers that will thrive will be those who connect with and deliver more than a shopping cart experience.

For those who do have blogs in place, map out your blogging for the season just like you map out your sales and advertising calendar. Plan posts now and start working on them for publishing later so that you can keep on top of them during the busy holiday season. But make sure that your blog isn't just another sales pitch. Your blog should be about connecting and communicating with your readers. Share some holiday stories, maybe your favorite recipes, or offer helpful packing and shipping tips. Any product mentions should be done carefully and subtly and in moderation.

Go Social

If you've been waiting for your film debut, here's your chance. A light-hearted video on YouTube could be just the thing for a little extra traffic boost. Or if you have products that require complicated assembly, some short and helpful videos might be unexpected holiday hits.

Connecting Offline and Online

If you live and breathe SEO or web marketing, offline may be the furthest thing from your mind. Of course, there are other angles to the offline world. Hopefully you have the basic fundamentals covered, like making sure that your web address appears in all your mailings, advertisements, and anywhere else you may be marketing offline. If you have brick-and-mortar locations, it doesn't hurt to remind people that you also have a website.

Don't forget that many of the traditional offline entities now have online presences themselves. TV news, radio stations, and newspaper reporters are often looking for interesting holiday stories, from the "most unusual" gift ideas to how to entertain for the holidays. Come up with an interesting story idea and you may not only get valuable airtime or print mention, but a link from their site to yours.

Be smart, get creative and this holiday season could be your most successful yet.

At the BlogHer 2007 Conference in Chicago last weekend, I was a proud dad, on-hand to support my daughter, Chloe, who presented her "Ultimate Neopets Cheats Blog" success story to a packed audience of bloggers, online marketers, and SEO enthusiasts attending the Professional Blogging: Ways and Means session.

Check out some highlights of Chloe's presentation at the BlogHer Conference 2007...

In early 2006, when Chloe was 15, she decided to devote a blog to Neopets, a virtual pets site popular with kids the world over. After performing some keyword research through WordTracker and Google Suggest for her blog's title and section headings, she discovered that "neopets cheats" was a hugely popular search term to target for her blog. So she settled on the name: the "Ultimate Neopets Cheats Site." She then used the free WordPress.com service to start the blog. Chloe's site was able to ride on the coattails of WordPress.com's trust and authority in the eyes of Google, thus sidestepping the "Google Sandbox" and jumping to page 1 in Google for the term "neopet cheats" within two weeks of launch.

Wanting to capitalize on her success, Chloe attempted to place Google ads on her WordPress.com blog, only to find that she was unable to monetize her blog due to WordPress.com's restrictive Terms of Service. So Chloe migrated the blog over from neopetcheats.wordpress.com to her own domain, neopetsfanatic.com, powered by the WordPress software. She then went about building links through places like Blogger Stories.

By spending just a few hours per month, Chloe earns through Google AdSense between $20 and $30 per day--and it's sometimes even as much $40. If you do the math, that's somewhere around $700 to $900 a month for very little work. If Chloe wanted to earn a similar amount of money through a part-time job--at her age, this typically means flipping burgers, babysitting or operating a paper route--she'd have to work somewhere around 25 to 30 hours per week (assuming minimum wage). And best of all, because Chloe has an income generating asset (versus working dollars-for-hours for "The Man"), Chloe can take a paid vacation whenever she wants and still earn the same amount of money.

Currently, Chloe is planning what she will do next with her blogging. By branching out into new topic areas with other blogs and adding a forum to her Neopets blog, she will expand her reach in the blogosphere. A sister project of WordPress called bbPress is Chloe's platform of choice for her upcoming discussion forums; it will be a more suitable venue to host the plethora of comments that have been posted to Chloe's blog (some of the pages on Chloe's blog have thousands of comments). Her link building efforts have also evolved to include face-to-face networking at conferences in order to build links and create invaluable contacts. Thanks to her blog's strong rankings for Neopets related terms (including a page 1 ranking for "neopets"!), Chloe watches over an ever-growing college fund.

Hopefully Chloe's story will inspire other teens to seize the opportunity to build assets, whether online or offline. Her story also teaches us that SEO is not inaccessible; in fact, it's so easy, that a child can do it!

I'm an evangelist when it comes to blogging as a way to build brand, thought leadership status, and links. Heck, I've written a lot about making blogging pay off in terms of SEO (here, here and here, for example). However, my enthusiasm does not carry over to spamming the blogosphere. Not through comments. Not through trackbacks. Not through spam blogs (a.k.a. splogs). Not through payola.

There are firms out there that hang out their shingle as "blog marketing firms," that take your money and promise many links from other blogs to your site or blog. Buyer beware! It may be nothing more than a link farm wolf in a Web 2.0 sheep's clothing.

How can you know? Go to in Yahoo Site Explorer and start digging through their inlinks and their clients' inlinks. For example, from this sponsored post you will find mention of a company in the business of acquiring blog links for SEO. A quick peruse through their inlinks revealed the sorts of keyword-stuffed blog posts they'd be acquiring / manufacturing on your behalf. Here's a representative sample:

• http://rvincoletto.multiply.com/links/item/81
• http://shoppingmum.blogspot.com/2007/06/website-optimization-firm.html
• http://timworstall.typepad.com/419_er_watch/2007/05/looking_for_a_w.html
• http://adsensead.blogspot.com/2007/05/sponsored-blog-posts-marketing.html

Yuch! Such stellar prose, eh? And it doesn't take a rocket scientist (or a Google algorithm!) to figure out the search term they've targeted ("website optimization firm").

Not only is this a red flag to the search engines (notice their site doesn't rank in Google in the first 100 results for the targeted term), this is a red flag to you, the prospective buyer of such seedy services. Think of it this way: you could buy the supposed miracle diet pill for the quick fix, OR you could buy REAL blog consulting, where it's eating right and regular exercise for the eventual, hard-earned payoff.

A legit blog consultant wouldn't buy you a bunch of links that -- by some strange coincidence -- all happen to have the same exact anchor text from an array of blog posts that read like machine-generated content. A real blog consultant will instead help you shine in the blogosphere as a thought leader, help you engage in honest and open conversations with your market, help put a human face to your company name, help you craft entertaining/helpful/insightful "link baits" that attract high quality/trusted/authority links like a magnet.

Links (and higher rankings) will follow from hiring the the second type -- the true breed -- of blog consultant. Importantly, those links won't be flagged by the search engines as suspicious, because they will arise organically, they will have been earned by merit -- rather than having been engineered. Just ask a blogger like Steve Spangler (disclosure: he's a client of ours at Netconcepts) about the hard work involved in blogging for real. It's a serious commitment you can't back down from. While you're at it, ask Steve about the rewards he's reaped: Steve attributes over 15% of online sales to his blog; he also credits his blogging to him getting nominated by the Time Magazine editorial staff for the Hundred Most Influential People of 2006.