| LED Digest 1793: The Linking Debate Lives |
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================================================== The LED Digest Moderated Discussion List "Effective Online Advertising, Since 1997" pair Networks: The LED's Web Host Hosting and Domain Reg. from a Trusted Leader pair.com for Hosting | pairNIC.com for Domains ================================================== List Moderator: Published by: Adam Audette LED Digest adam,led-digest.com http://www.led-digest.com ................................................ April 29, 2004 Issue #1793 ................................................ .....IN THIS DIGEST..... ==== CONTINUING ================= --== SEO - What to Pay? ==-- ~ Shari Thurow "...there are considerable differences between optimization and advertising." --== Reciprocal Linking: Dead or Alive? ==-- ~ Steve Pronger "Do you honestly believe that [linking] is not a factor in how your site ranks at Google?" ~ Pat McCarthy "It makes no sense for Google to drop link popularity." ==== BILLBOARD =================== --== Site Stats for Non-techies? ==-- ~ Mark Frank ~ Bill Davison --== Emails in Flash Files ==-- ~ Lee Roberts ===== CONTINUING ================================= From: Shari Thurow Subject: SEO - What to Pay? > What I'm after is some guidelines as to what I can expect > to pay for this kind of [SEO/SEM] service and maybe some > chest puffing from those of you who really know this business. - Gomez, LED 1791 Hi all- This is in response to Gomez's post. I'm going to do something different - I'm not going to pitch my services. Rather, I'm looking to protect "Gomez" and other companies in his shoes from unscrupulous SEOs. First and foremost, the service "Gomez" is looking for is search engine advertising, not search engine optimization. Both SEA and SEO (as they are commonly abbreviated) fall under the umbrella of search engine marketing (SEM). I have written a Clickz article entitled, "What types of search engine marketing does your site need?" available at: http://www.clickz.com/experts/search/results/article.php/3105241 This article should give you a basic idea about the different types of SEM available and what you should see in a proposal for each type of service. To save time and money, I would go to a company that specializes only in search engine advertising, not necessarily a full-service, interactive agency. You see, if you go to a full-service agency, you are probably going to get costs jacked up for overhead, and you don't need that. Additionally, many full-service SEMs will attempt to cross-sell. By dealing with an SEM that only deals with search engine advertising, you'll avoid the whole cross-sell conversations with sales staff. Believe me, there are considerable differences between optimization and advertising. Make sure you go with the most appropriate company. Best wishes, Shari Thurow, Webmaster/Marketing Director ~ Search Engine Visibility book now available http://www.searchenginesbook.com/ ------- new post - new topic ------- From: Steve Pronger Subject: Reciprocal linking > It goes on and on. Getting good rankings at Google is not > driven by link popularity. That hasn't been the case for ages. - Michael Martinez, LED 1792 Michael, a Google backwards link check on your site shows 242 sites linking to you. OK, a lot are from your own domain, but many are from high PR sites with a similar theme (whether you solicited them or not) to your site and with linked text that includes your targeted keywords. Do you honestly believe that this is not a factor in how your site ranks at Google? My experience is that for every site I've built it has ranked nowhere at Google no matter how well optimised the page is (unless there very little competition for keywords) UNTIL the site has established some good quality incoming links that include my targeted keywords. Most of the links that point to my own site include the keywords "australian web designer". Try searching it at Google. Good rankings at Google my not be driven entirely by link "popularity", but they sure are driven by quality theme-related links and link text. Steve Pronger http://www.stevepronger.com ------- new post - same topic ------- From: Pat McCarthy Subject: Reciprocal linking Michal Martinez wrote: > It goes on and on. Getting good rankings at Google is > not driven by link popularity. That hasn't been the case > for ages. and > This ancient theory needs to be put to rest. Google is > looking at in-page content more than anything else. If > you've been out there begging people to link to you in > the misguided belief that that is the secret to success, > get over it. Well, it's not so simple Michael. Google still relies on both. Just on the pure basis of it alone it makes no sense to mostly devise rankings based on content alone. That would make it extremely easy to just create a page that conforms as closely to possible to Google's algorithm and have it rocket to the top, regardless of anybody linking to it. I don't know if you've tried that, but for many of the competitive terms I've dealt with, it's very hard to get to the top of the rankings unless you've got the link popularity behind you. Of course it totally helps to do that now, but link popularity is still a big factor. On highly competitive terms, the top rankings sites for the most part do have a large amount of links, and often from quality sites. That's still a big part of Google's algorithm. It's easy to give examples though to support either side of the argument. You can point to sites without links that rank well, while someone else can point to sites that rank well with a lot of links. The key comes in just logically thinking about it. It makes no sense algorithmically for Google to drop link popularity. Regardless of people manipulating it, it's still the best way to figure out how the rest of the web "votes" or "thinks" about the quality of a site and what area of interest it lies in. If Google put little relevance on link popularity, it would solely rely on who can figure out the exact keyword density. That just simply isn't the case. For example, based on your page title "Science Fiction and Fantasy" is probably an important keyword for you. It's not a coincedence that the majority of the sites ranked ahead of you in Google for that term also have more links. So, while I agree that too much emphasis is placed on page rank, link farms, and reciprocal links with unrelated sites, there is really no basis to think link popularity is dead, dying, or even wounded. Pat McCarthy http://www.paloalto.com/ ==== BILLBOARD ==================================== From: Mark Frank Subject: Website Stats > ... I am ready to purchase a service or a program that > will allow me to gather and view each of my site stats > in a separate, neat, graphical format. The major programs > or services available are too sophisticated and/or too expensive. - Terry Riley, LED 1791 Terry, Several years ago I found myself with the same question - which log analyzer to use? I asked a lot of people and read a lot of reviews and wound up with more opinions and information than I could handle. I finally started downloading trial versions of some of the more popular analyzers. My selection criteria was, "Which analyzer meets my needs for the lowest price?" Lots of them had a lot of really snazzy features that I liked but wasn't willing to pay for. I finally settled on SurfStats Standard Edition. It did everything I wanted for under $100. Three years later I am still using it. They still offer a free trial download. Mark Frank http://www.websitedesignbiz.com ------- new post - same topic ------- From: Bill Davison Subject: Website Stats Lee Roberts did not state what type of server (Unix or M$). If UNIX type here are two excellent scripts for learning what/where is on your host server: MasterPreInstallationTester.cgi http://willmaster.com Perl Diver http://www.scriptsolutions.com/programs/free/perldiver/ Bill Davison bizwebpage.com ------- new post - new topic -------- From: Lee Roberts Subject: Flash email > Awhile back I picked up the great tip, from the LED, > of putting my email addresses in a Flash file. - Richard Graham, LED 1792 While that may be spam proof, it is just as much visitor proof. 1. Your visitor must support the version of Flash you developed in. 2. Not every visitor will be able to support Flash. 3. Do that and expect to be taken to court (read up on the requirements for disabled access in the UK, Italy, European Union and other countries). You're much better off using NMS FormMail available through SourceForge.com. NMS allows you to build forms that use alias recipient names thereby hiding your email address and keeping it off the web page. Of course, this NMS runs on Linux, but I'm sure if you are a programmer on Windows platforms you can program a script that does the same thing or even port NMS to IIS. Sincerely, Lee Roberts http://www.roserockdesign.com ------------------------------------------------------- The LED Digest is sponsored by pair Networks: pair.com for Hosting | pairNIC.com for Domains Copyright 1995-2004 Adam Audette. All Rights Reserved. ----------------------------------------------------------------- "Bad Command or File Name. Good try, though." - Anon. |
