| LED Digest 2301: What Questions to Ask SEOs? |
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================================================== The LED Digest Moderated Discussion List "Effective Online Advertising, Since 1997" Data > Information > Knowledge > Wisdom pair Networks: The LED's Web Host Hosting and Domain Registration 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 .............................................. December 5, 2006 Issue no. 2301 .............................................. .....IN THIS DIGEST..... ====== NEW ====================== --== Questioning SEOs on their Methods ==-- ~ Pieter van der Vyver "Gimme one word to ask a business owner who wants to sell me SEO services..." ==== CONTINUING ================= --== The Email Crisis ==-- ~ Tom Aman "If you use a contact form you should make sure that..." ~ Shel Horowitz "If I blocked all non-whitelist mail, I'd be out of business." ~ James Miller "So who do I blame for all this spam. I'll start with the US Government and the SEC." ~ Adam Audette "I'm sure that if I went to single opt-in for the LED I'd have twice as many new subscribers..." ==== BILLBOARD =================== --== Yahoo Blocking Email ==-- ~ Tom Anson --== Resource for Mobile Sites ==-- ~ Al Toman ========== NEW =================================== From: Pieter van der Vyver Subject: Questioning SEO's about their methods Hi, As a permanent newby that never seemed to grasp Websites and seo's and whatever... I would like to ask a question... As you might know there is ample website designers and seo's, but to find the right person that works hard to get your rankings high is the problem... as per your forums. Gimme one word (if possible) to ask a business owner who wants to sell me SEO services on his website that I can use to ask him the pertinent questions about: 1. What does this chap do to improve rankings 2. What does the chap do to get as many times as possible the website name on the Web. I am very much aware the best person will be the one paid best, but gimme a "word" or two that I can "test" the owner. You will know the story. Please spend some of your valuable time to let me know. Waiting in anticipation to hear from your goodself :-) Regards Pieter van der Vyver ======== CONTINUING =============================== From: Tom Aman Subject: Email > The only reason I switched to RSS on my contact forms, is > because of the threat of spammers using my contact forms > to send spam email to thousands of people! I actually caught > quite a few of them attempting to do so - after I switched to > RSS, but that stopped them cold. - Joe Halbrook, LED Digest 2299 - http://www.led-digest.com/content/view/1386/55/ The switch to RSS is an interesting approach. I handled this differently. I just made sure my contact form could not be used for sending SPAM to anyone but me. My form used to send a confirmation email if the person filling it out included their email address. I had to discontinue doing that because the spammers could then use the form to send SPAM to others by filling in multiple addresses. As has been mentioned before, spammers will often try to inject unexpected headers (like CC: or BCC: entries) into a form in hopes that the form handling CGI routine will mistakenly include them in generating the email, thus making it possible to send spam by using the contact form. To avoid this problem, my form handling routine only sends one email and that email is sent to me. If you use a contact form you should make sure that: 1. The only email it sends is one sent to you, and that the "TO" to do this is not part of the form, but is generated within the CGI, thereby preventing a spammer from using your form to send email to anyone else. 2. If any part of the data in the form becomes part of the email headers, the routine should ensure that it cannot use faked data to generate additional emails. My form happens to include the "Subject" line but, if a spammer tries to subvert this by sending a "Subject" line containing other data (as has happened recently), the CGI routine removes all "new line" characters and limits the length so this cannot be used to generate spam. When I get a chance, I will be removing this item from the form and putting it within the CGI so even this small potential hole will be plugged. 3. The CGI writes out the "To" using a hard coded email address in the CGI, the "From" using another hard coded email address and a "Subject" (mine is presently from the form, but will be changed to hard coded), then some data lines, then the form fields. Including some data lines (I use the date and time the form was submitted, then a line of dashes) ahead of the form field data prevents a spammer using any of the form fields to generate unexpected headers. I have seen some attempts at CC or BCC but, because of the way the email to me is generated, these just become part of the body of the email. My form processing is also set up to capture some other data about the sender, including the exact time of the event and the remote IP address, so I can report attempts to use my form form SPAM to the owner of the IP address. Usually this is an ISP or some private organization (often a .edu domain) and the report is frequently acknowledged and acted upon. Tom Aman Aman Software http://www.cyberspyder.com -------- new post - same topic -------- From: Shel Horowitz Subject: EMail > Switch to a whitelist-based filtering system. This > kind of system looks only for the good (based on > your preferences), amongst the sea of bad (unwanted) > email. Everything else gets filtered. - Joe Halbrook, LED Digest 2300 - http://www.led-digest.com/content/view/1388/55/ Ah, but not all of us have that luxury. The vast majority of my clients approach me with an email; a few call first. I may recognize the name as a member of a discussion list, or I may not (if they lurk, or if they found me through a book or via Google). And even if I do, I get my discussion lists as digests, and therefore only whitelist the sending address of the digest itself, rather than individual members. If I blocked all non-whitelist mail, I'd be out of business. BTW, Joe, I have looked at your program and like what I see, will probably take a trial after some upcoming travel is completed. Shel Horowitz http://www.business-ethics-pledge.org -------- new post - same topic -------- From: James Miller Subject: Email I may be mad but I collect spam! Typically, I get about well upwards of 6,000 messages a day. And the number is rising. Seriously, though it's because I advise people on strategies on how to fight spam. At present, I get about forty messages in my InBox every day, the rest go into Junk E-Mail. This is all achieved using the standard processes of Outlook 2003. I find that very few messages of any use end up in the junk. I have in the past tried other things like Thunderbird and they fall apart with this amount of spam. The only thing that works well is POPFile, which effectively acts as a helper to your e-mail program. But that needs a lot more work to keep it going properly than Outlook 2003. I haven't tried later versions of Outlook, but they should be better. I once tried one of the challenge e-mail systems and I spent all my time looking for messages that have got blocked. You should note that in my business, I get dreadfully spelled e-mails from places like Kazakhstan and Liberia offering me money for software, which are totally genuine. Any hard spam filter system stops them dead and I lose the business. Every so often I analyse what sort of spam I'm getting, so I can see any long term changes. On November 3rd, I got 1,234 Pump/Dump scams, 2,680 Drug adverts, 476 Bank Phishing e-mails, 420 Luxury Fakes and about 1,000 others. Interestingly, I only got 24 trying to sell me cheap software, as Microsoft and others have really started pushing hard to stop these. So who do I blame for all this spam. I'll start with the US Government and the SEC. They have the power to stop the pump and dump scams overnight. If any company is pushed in this way, then it's listing and share dealings should be immediately suspended. This probably wouldn't hurt the company if they were the innocent party, as the publicity would probably sell their goods. But what would be the point of pushing a company you can't deal in. The drug adverts are more difficult to deal with, but if you look at them, they fall into about four or five distributors. The trouble is that Pfizer has no interest in stopping the e-mails, as most of these companies probably sell genuine drugs. So stopping the e-mails means it cuts corporate profits. And with drugs it's not easy to tell someone they should boycott a particular company. Perhaps, we should make most of the drugs more easily available in pharmacies, but then the doctors would object. Incidentally, I use Cialis and have to see the doctor for a prescription every time. Usually, she just adds it on when I see her for something else, so she doesn't check that the drug is doing me any harm. Quite the reverse! So to stop this drug spam, someone has got to take out the spammers and the companies, which is not an easy process. Bank phishing e-mails are a curse here in the UK, but the banks seem to be winning or at least getting to grips with it. But they are not cooperating with each other and this would help. Luxury Fakes come and go, as the companies crack down on them. But just as with software, the manufacturers have an interest in fighting the e-mails. Lastly, the Others were high because of masses of the Athens Financial spam. Again, this is spam that it's in no-ones interest to fight. Except the poor sods like us who get it. So we can cut a proportion of the spam, through government and corporate action, but vested interests will mean that very little of the other will get cut out, unless the world decides to impose a few rules to help us all. Interestingly, it is said that every company in the UK wastes a 1,000 UK pound a year per employee dealing with spam. The first thing I would do is tidy up domain registration. At present there are no checks and registrants can put any sort of rubbish they want into the fields. This must be stopped. Perhaps even we impose a seven day period before any domain name goes live. But things like that are just tinkering. The only real cure is education of PC users around the world, so that they have the proper virus protection so that they don't inadvertently become distributors of messages and they deal properly with spam. They should also bombard their politicians with letters asking them to do something about the problem. Letters could be an interesting tactic. What would happen if 20% of US households sent one letter a week complaining about pump and dump scams to the SEC once a month? Perhaps we also need a World Anti-Spam Day, where newspapers and broadcasters run a themed day about the Internet and how to protect ourselves from the evil spammers. I've put a lot more of this with graphs and other finding in my blog. http://www.jamesmiller.com/mtmblog/blogger.html James Miller Daisy Analysis -------- new post - same topic -------- From: Adam Audette Subject: Email I want to jump in here with some comments. (I've done a lot more commenting these last few months than I ever have in the past 8 years. I'm sensitive about that and don't want to impinge my own views on the list - never want to make it a platform for me. So I'm posting here instead of at the top - if that matters. I think it does... so there!) I thought Steven Rothberg's comments were very interesting in issue 2298: > My point isn't to bemoan the recruitment advertising campaign > that we ran. My point is that double opt-in is an extremely high > standard and I believe one that is unrealistic for us to expect > of typical users. This is a very important point. I've been doing a bit of thinking since this post ran and have to admit being surprised this didn't stir up the bee's nest. It's a pretty controversial issue with email publishers, always has been really. I remember when Ann Holland of Marketing Sherpa really let me have it for saying that confirmed opt-in was "the only way to go for professional e-mail publishers." She replied in part, ----------------------- "Professional publishing means running your company as a business. It's smart business to not put barriers in front of a sale (or opt-in). Every barrier reduces the opt-ins, even from very willing folks, by a big percent. "If I changed my company's policy to double opt-in -- which would reduce our new monthly opt-ins by perhaps 50% -- I would then lose substantial revenues. Not smart business." ----------------------- (This discussion took place on a private list called ePublisher that Adventive hosted back in the old days.) I have to admit that Ann raises some critically important points. I can't really find fault in her choice, either. My ethical standards are not anyone else's, and the bottom line in business is ROI regardless of the aims of best practices. I'm sure that if I went to single opt-in for the LED I'd have twice as many new subscribers each day. But I'm also wary of opening that door to the possible abuse, and moving backwards in the pursuit of an ethical publishing standard (if there can be such a thing - what I really mean is "part-of-the-problem or part-of-the-solution - say that 3x fast!). L-Soft (the huge software company) runs a list called SPAM-L and they take spam very seriously. The company and list advocate against single opt-in lists and consider them "spam machines." They have declared war on these single opt in lists. Next, consider the large email providers you have to comply with. AOL, Hotmail, Yahoo want me to publish SPF records or Domain Keys or, in Hotmail's case, a version of SPF that is confusing at best. I'm all for complying. But then there is no guarantee on their end that LED will get through to my subscribers. And there's absolutely no transparency in the processes involved or the status of my email. Gmail is much better (for now). It seems pretty defeating to go through all the trouble of playing nice with these email services, then running a list as single opt-in and possibly adding to the spamming problem. And alternatives? RSS was encouraging when it first came on the scene as a new channel for email publishers, but unfortunately it's more of an alternative browsing method than anything else. RSS is fantastic to keep the signal-to-noise high in the saturated blog space, but it's not going to rescue email. I don't know what will. Adam Audette too much yerba mate ==== BILLBOARD =================================== From: Tom Anson Subject: Mailings blocked > Do you send one with all the names listed under > a "To", "CC", or "BCC" or are they sent as an > individual email to each recipient? - Tom Aman, LED Digest 2300 Hi Tom, I really don't know what all the technical stuff is involved with my mailings. I use the mailing service provided by my web host, ICServ (EZ-Net Tools). I do know this: the names are NOT all listed in the "To", "CC" or "BCC" fields. When I looked at the details of the email sent to me (I'm on my own list), my email address appeared by itself. By the way, I have at least 104 email addresses for Yahoo! (I actually have three lists that I send out together, and these are on the one list), and only 47 of those were blocked. Any help would be appreciated. Tom Anson Anson Aromatic Essentials http://www.therapeutic-grade.com <Moderator Comment> Tom, Check out this discussion related to this topic: "Email Delivery Fall-offs and Open Rates" http://www.led-digest.com/content/view/609/54/ I have a post on that page that mentions SPF records. Read this and the references I cite. After that if you still have questions please contact me and I'll try to help. -Adam -------- new post - new topic -------- From: Al Toman Subject: Mobile sites I thought that this might be a good resource for the LED folks who need to market on mobile devices... I'm not one to suggest "web design out-of-a-box" or other weavers of dreams tools, however, I'm directing your attention to one, in case you're interested. Heck, it's all in the name of marketing: http://www.mobisitegalore.mobi/ I have yet to take the time to test "this" in my scrootinizer, however, I think it's a look-see if you require your web site to be accessible on a mobi device. Personally, I don't own a cell phone and the string on my can-2-can communicator ran out at 600 feet. Firstly, it espouses web-compliancy. No weaving-faux-pas-dreams, here! Secondly, even I was able to follow some simple step-by-step instructions and create a mobi web site within minutes and that's an accomplishment in itself. You can host your own or they provide (some obscure subdomain) free hosting. I sat mine on studio9.ws root directory. I suppose if you have a can-2-can communicator you can view studio9.ws on your mobi and let me know how it looks / functions. It creates XHTML files of which you can view their SOURCE DOCUMENTS in your browser here: http://studio9.ws/index.xhtml http://studio9.ws/Products_2.xhtml http://studio9.ws/Services_3.xhtml http://studio9.ws/Contact_Us_4.xhtml Me being me, I'll simply pass-by www.mobisitegalore.mobi and modify my mobi-pages on my html editor and ftp, as needed. So, if you're out whale hunting and the whale is winning, dialup studio9.ws on your can-2-can and I'll give you a 50% discount in designing your "How Not to Hunt Great White Whales" web site. Can U Hear Me now? Al Toman studio9.ws ------------------------------------------------------- The LED Digest is sponsored by pair Networks: pair.com for Hosting | pairNIC.com for Domains Copyright 1995-2006 Orange Wheel, LLC. All Rights Reserved. ----------------------------------------------------------------- "...guilt is a rope that wears thin..." - Ayn Rand |
