Stop! Don't Move - One of the Most Common SEO Mistakes Website Owners Make

I used to think that this was obvious because I have been doing SEO for too long. *lol* But I found that there are many clients that still do not know the single most important SEO strategy for content:

Once you publish content, don't move it!

What I mean is, don't change the URL where the content lives. I have recently had a client who has an internal content management and production system that causes URLs to move (change) after a certain amount if time. They couldn't understand why their search listings kept fluctuating so much. They have since developed a migration strategy for their content (which consists of setting up a 301 redirect from the old URL to the new one) in the event they have to change their URLs.

The point is though, changing your URLs disconnects your link connectivity unless you implement 301 redirects. Search engine rankings, especially those of Google are hugely dependent on links, especially relevant external links. But moving the content means that any links that you might have had, are no longer seen unless you implement a redirect. And even though 301 redirects work, they take time to do so and can quickly become tedious, if not difficult to manage. But make sure you use a 301 redirect (permanent) which passes Page Rank versus a 302 redirect (temporary and bad for SEO) which does not pass Page Rank. If you don't know what kind of redirect you have, use this http header check function on your URL with the redirect to find out.

The best idea though, is not changing the location of your content once its published.

Update: Please note that we are not saying that all missing pages should 301 to a certain page. Pages that do not really exist should still have error 404s and not 301s. Only moved pages that existed in an old URL should 301 to a new URL.

The Paid Links Debate - Why Buying Links for SEO is BAD

So today the debate about Google's heavy hand in regard to paid links continues. I read Michael Gray's blog today where he posts a scathing review of Google's policies about paid links and point's out the hypocrisy of their position. I like Michael and think he is an excellent blogger but I have to take issue with his stance here. You may accuse me of drinking too much Google Kool Aid, but I think Google's stance on paid links is the right one. The ability for companies to buy their way into the top of organic search results completely devalues the algorithm for both Google and it's users.

Google is who they are because their algorithm is the best that we have so far for getting relevant information from the Internet. You can argue the point if you want, but its a moot point because the overwhelming majority of Internet users use Google search. And the reason they do is the trust that they have that Google will find them the best information for their query based on relevancy, not how much a business is paying.

If you let paid links influence organic search, the whole engine becomes pay per click. And that is clearly not what users want. And that is really the bottom line. Google's stance on paid links reflects what search users want. And giving searchers what they want is how Google continues to dominate search and make billions of dollars. And since it's Google's search engine, they can rank sites however they want. That's why I don't understand why some SEO's continue to maintain that buying links should be an acceptable SEO practice.

Search engine optimization is not about manipulating search engines to rank you ahead of your competition based on your ability to understand link algorithms and buy links that exploit those algorithms. Search engine optimization is about maximizing the signals that you are sending to the search engines about the keyword phrases that your content is relevant for and letting the engine decide based on it's algorithm where you stand. Then depending on the gap between where your site ranks and where you want to rank, you develop a strategy to improve the quality of your content and market your site to increase your visibility. In so doing, you build the link connectivity and trust factors that are essential for top search engine rankings.

Focusing your SEO efforts on paid links results in efforts that do nothing to improve user experience is not a good long term strategy as it relates to SEO. The more sophisticated search engine technology gets, the less ROI these techniques will have going forward. Using those resources to create a better user experience, more authoritative content and a better marketing campaign, is a better bet for your long term SEO strategy.

Surviving BMA in Vegas - Thoughts on Corporate Blogging

I was in Vegas last week at the annual Business Marketing Association conference in beautiful Lake Las Vegas. I had never been there before and even though its odd not to be on the strip, it was both beautiful and relaxing. Our resort (Lowes) is a very nice place with ZERO slot machines or gambling so it almost feels like Palm Springs here (never fear though, we did manage find a casino or three..lol). But before all the late night Vegas fun at TAO in the Venetian (which I am not allowed to blog about..LOL), I had the opportunity to catch the corporate blogging session at the conference, which given the fact that I am a blogger, was of interest to me. It was the only session I got to attend as I was doing SEO Labs most of the time I was there.

I thought it was a good panel with a lot of different perspectives on blogging. It was more centered around the case for corporate blogging versus the tactical execution (which was a little disappointing since I am obviously already convinced that blogging is a good idea). But some of the things I did take away from the session I thought were interesting.

I thought it was really interesting, especially given the traditional makeup of the audience, to see so many hands when the moderator asked who in the room was on Facebook. And also surprising was the number of hands that went up who were on Twitter. Equally as important was the fact that the moderator was recommending to all these people that they integrate Twitter into their marketing programs as another channel to directly communicate with their audience.

All in all, I didn't learn any new strategies for blogging really, but I did realize how mainstream Web 2.0 technology is becoming. Although, no one there I talked to knew anything about Plurk, but I imagine that will be a hot topic at next years convention ;) Of coarse by then, we will have some new service to talk about (like Jolt for example). The Web 2.0 world changes quickly and understanding how to leverage the newest, emerging technologies is critical to understanding how to get the most out of your blog.

Stay tuned for my new Social Media Broadcast System post where I will detail how I set up my own social media sites to interact with one another and maximize my ability to broadcast my message across my social network.

Top 6 Reasons I Like Plurk More Than Twitter

So in effort to stay on top of the latest Web 2.0 trends, I gave Plurk a spin today (editors note: I almost spelled spin sphinn, I think I need a break from social media..lol). Plurk is like Twitter in 3D. Here are the 6 things I like most about it:

1) So far it doesn't go down as often as Twitter.

2) It's easier to follow conversations because of the interface.

3) You can organize your friends into cliques in order to keep your work and personal life separate (which is key, whenever I am on Twitter I feel like the guy in Lethal Weapon II who has two phones - one to the bad guys and one to the police...lol).

4) It's easier to share (embed) videos from YouTube and pictures from Flickr using Plurk's interface.

5) You can use emoticons in Plurk (which I think is good for better text communication)

6) The timeline helps you put conversations and comments into better perspective than Twitter's linear interface.

bonus features -

1) because it's so new, I got the user name I wanted..lol.

2) the funky characters are pretty amusing

I am sure I will come up with some more although Plurk like Twitter has no direct SEO value because you can't (so far I can't..lol) get a URL to show up on your profile. But this is a really cool new tool that everyone should check out. Especially if you like Twitter! Have a great weekend!

Catfish

Why a Top 10 Listing in Google Continues to Mean Less in SEO

So you're thinking, Catfish you must have had way too much to drink at your birthday show Saturday night if you think that top 10 listings in Google are not important. Well I will plead the 5th on the extent of my celebration except to say I had a blast and I was very appreciative of so many of my friends coming out to celebrate with me. Turning 39 isn't easy...lol. But, my original point in the title of this post still stands. A top ten listing in Google continues to mean less. And the reason is, because it gets harder and harder to measure what a top ten listing is.

Now don't get me wrong. Maximizing your visibility on the front page of Google for your related keywords to as many users as possible is still the end goal of any good search engine optimization campaign. But the truth is that its getting harder to know what users see. In the old days, if you were #1 for a particular keyword in Google (and for us old timers, Altavista), that was consistent across the entire users base of the search engine. And it was good to be King! But in today's search engine technology landscape, there are a number of factors that change what users see for their search results.

Currently the biggest cause of two users seeing different results for the same query is geography. Google serves different data to different users in different locations in order to try to best serve that user. So someone in San Diego that searches for pizza would see different results than someone in New York.

Another big differentiator is personalization. Users who are signed into their Google accounts when they do a search, will have their results colored by known preferences and past search history. And as Google continues to grow, so does the number of users that this affects.

Universal search is another recent development that has impacted the value of a top ten listing because their is more competition within the top 10 for the click. Now that images, videos, news results, maps and reviews have all been incorporated into the front page real estate, it is harder to capture the attention of the user.

Still another factor in all this is that Google has a number of different data centers that it uses for load balancing, and these data centers are not always in sync. It is not uncommon therefore to do a query in Google, hit refresh, and see different results.

So what does all this mean? Well not much in terms of the way you optimize (except for obviously making sure you have elements of image optimization, video optimization and local optimization built into your over SEO campaign), but it impacts the way that you measure a successful search campaign.

For those of us who grew up on Webposition software, search engine rankings have always been the natural barometer of our success. But because of the shift in technology to less homogenized search results, it makes more sense to place greater emphasis on analytics like search engine referrals and conversions (which is really where it always should have been to begin with). Search engine rankings are going the way of Toolbar Page Rank. It will always be a barometer, but it will continue to mean less.