| LED Digest 2651: Web Page Optimizers? |
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The LED Digest Moderated Discussion List "Effective Online Advertising, Since 1997" Data > Information > Knowledge > Wisdom http://www.AudetteMedia.com : the LED's Publisher Boutique Internet Marketing: SEO, SEM, Social Media http://www.SEOToolSet.com/training/ : the LED's Premier Sponsor Bruce Clay's Search Engine Optimization Training & Certification ================================================== List Moderator: Published by: Adam Audette LED Digest adam, led-digest.com http://www.led-digest.com .............................................. May 22, 2008 Issue no. 2651 .............................................. .....IN THIS DIGEST..... ==== CONTINUING ================= --== SEO Standards ==-- ~ Michael Linehan "What evidence do you want?" ~ Al Toman "...web page optimizers are only 'guessing,' regardless of which method they use..." --== Marketing Ideas Needed ==-- ~ Barry S Mills "I think Dirk knows a thing or two about marketing already..." ~ Shel Horowitz "...have in place...a no-cost newsletter signup on every page of your site..." ======== CONTINUING =============================== From: Michael Linehan Subject: SEO standards > Search engines are scientifically > engineered mathematical precision machines. > Show me the precise and concise > mathematical rule. - Al Toman, LED 2649 - http://www.led-digest.com/content/view/2064/190/ You make an impossible demand, Al. Yes, the search engines work according to precise mathematical rules. (I don't, however, think they are very concise. I imagine considerable complexity.) But none of us know those rules. And Google and the others aren't telling. > Apply it and demonstrate it. > Any SEO takers? > I didn't think so. A very challenging tone. What evidence do you want? I'm sure many specialists on this list could present case studies and offer testimonials (although it's not really the appropriate venue). We've all got clients, I'm sure, who we have helped gain considerable profitability. In other words, what you ask has been demonstrated many times, in many places. Or do you really think all the people who post here and call themselves professionals make a living doing nothing and producing no real results? Michael Linehan, Marketing Alchemy www.marketing-alchemy.com -------- new post - same topic -------- From: Al Toman Subject: SEO standards Art, Science, Mathematics, and Language > IMHO, advanced SEO has a balance of part > art, part science. So yes, I do believe > technical skills are requirement of an SEO > "expert" but not to the exclusion of other > skills. - Shari Thurow, LED 2650 - http://www.led-digest.com/content/view/2065/190/ Dear Ms. Thurow, I script search engines. Are they sophisticated? By no means a Google script but they do a heck of a job. Search engines are a combination of art and science. One must be artful in composing the search engine. The more knowledge about what is to be searched and the mathematics used to accomplish that search, the more OPTIMIZED that search engine becomes. Yes. I am truely a Search Engine Optimizer. I can and do actually create and precisely optimize a search engine. Yes. Search engines are mathematics and language. The Processor being a digital binary mean machine requires that language in a mathematic form. The mathematics must be precise in order to attain accuracy, that is, the precision of the "tool" built to do a specific job. Mathematics in itself is a language. Human behavior is a factor as Ms. Thurow nicely clarified. After all, search engines are CREATED by, OPTIMIZED by, and USED by humans. Well, their MAY be a few aliens amongst us, you know~! The least precise of these are the USERS, including myself. The USER gives the SEARCH ENGINE instructions and the SEARCH ENGINE does the searching premised on those instructions. It does what it is told to do. Further, the creator, being human, can apply certain edits to the script, such as, "did you mean apple (instead of aple)?", and second guess the USER. Search engines are being developed as to where they learn and teach themselves. Yep. Search Engine Optimization is art, science, mathematics, and language. How much more human can we get? The point being, is that their are SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZERS and there are WEB PAGE OPTIMIZERS for SEARCH ENGINES. There is a distinct difference. Google, let's say, is not about to reveal its optimal machine because it well knows that it would be "played". Besides, it is THEIR business (and MSN wants their business). Considering, web page optimizers are only "guessing", regardless of which method they use, premised on observation of THE search engine's behavior. They do NOT know the "thinking" of the search engine itself. Therefore, vicitims of SEO should follow Google's webmaster guidelines at the least and proceed with caution with these people who believe that they are SEO. Al Toman studio9 web design -------- new post - new topic -------- From: Barry Mills Subject: Marketing ideas > We thought that we'd put our situation out > the LED readership for some marketing > ideas...We're wide open to suggestions and > ideas, from the broad scope to specific > details. - Dirk Johnson, LED 2649 - http://www.led-digest.com/content/view/2064/190/ I think Dirk knows a thing or two about marketing already, since he's found a convenient way to post a detailed description of his service to a list heavily populated with his target customers! But it's a valid topic so I'll take the bait. Reaching SEO firms is not overly difficult. Forums, newsletters such as this one, blogs and mailshots (I would go for paper, it stands out more these days) can help you do that. But I think the DD web site proposition needs a bit of work first. Please note I'm not in any way intending to criticise the company or the service offered here, these comments are purely directed at the mindset of the likely buyer and how well your web site addresses their needs. Concerns I would have about using any link-building service include: i) Will I get something for my money (DD addresses that quite well with the pay per listing model) ii) Will the links be of real value iii) Will the link acquisition pattern cause Google's alert system to highlight it as unusual or spammy activity and disallow or downgrade the links iv) Does the company understand what a worthwhile link would be v) A charge per link doesn't intrinsically make sense to me, when one good link is worth a thousand (or more) crappy ones. This kind of fee structure encourages you to go for easy (crappy) links rather than ones which will make a real difference. You go some way to addressing point 2, but not far enough imho. I would publish a list of the sites you submit to. Your pricing is competitive, it's unlikely anyone will want to do it themselves, or at least for everyone you lost I think you'd gain more than one because of the increased confidence people would have. John Audette built the Multimedia Marketing Group in no small part on the back of the "webstep top 100" - a list of the best sites to submit to for generating traffic. This list was freely published on the MMG site with submission guidelines, so anyone who wanted to do it themselves could do so. But many more people paid MMG to do it for them - and they were far from cheap. The links and word of mouth generated by this valuable free resource brought in much traffic, and paid for any lost customers who went down the DIY route many times over. Points 3 & 4 really amount to "do you get SEO well enough to do something useful, and avoid doing anything harmful or wasteful". The DD web site doesn't convince me of this. As an LED reader, I've seen many posts from Dirk and he mostly seems to talk sense, so I might be inclined to put that down to "cobblers shows". After all, many firms don't do nearly as good a job on their own sites as they do for their clients, my own included. But if the web site was all I had to go on, it wouldn't convince me. It's not really optimised, and includes several basic SEO mistakes such as repeating the same title tag and using "click here" as anchor text, so that suggests that the people behind it either don't understand or don't care about SEO. That doesn't fill me with confidence that they can help me deliver an effective SEO program. The pagerank of DD is also very low, and if you were such effective link-builders, you'd be doing better than that surely? Maybe you didn't get round to "domain driving" your own site yet. If you did, and the result is PR=3, well I can impact SEO more with a single free link from numerous places, so you aren't going to be a lot of help. I'm not sure what to do about point 5, can't immediately think of a better pricing model. But I'm not convinced that there are many sites that will get rankings purely on the basis of generic directories, I think you need to look for sector-specific links as well. Maybe that's not your business, but it would make for a more complete and attractive out-source option to me, because otherwise I still have to find another resource to do the most important part of the link building task. You could also be clearer about pricing. I realise it is success dependant, but you could disclose typical and maximum costs, or even a fixed fee for a guaranteed number of links, with a partial refund if you don't hit the number. Nothing makes a service harder to re-sell than ambiguity over costs. Hope that helps. And if you want to mail me offline to answer the points raised please feel free, we could use some help with link-building. Barry S Mills Chairman, Netstep http://www.netstep.co.uk -------- new post - same topic -------- From: Shel Horowitz Subject: Marketing ideas Piggybacking on Eva's [Rosenberg] idea of doing articles in places like Advertising Age (and here are many others, online and off) -- have in place before the article is published a no-cost newsletter signup on every page of your site, with a blurb that talks about content and linking issues and positions you as an expert. Don't sell overtly except in the brief resource box at the end of every article in other mags and in this newsletter (monthly is not much to manage). Then archive all the old newsletters on your site: search engine juice. I'm actually in the process of putting together an e-book from stuff I originally published in one of my newsletters (Monthly Frugal Marketing Tips)--which in turn will both be a stand-alone info product (at a very low cost) and given away with orders of one of my books, to bring that eight-year-old kid up to date. Shel Horowitz http://www.frugalmarketing.com (c) Copyright 1995-2008 Orange Wheel, LLC. All Rights Reserved. ----------------------------------------------------------------- Happy Birthday Dad! |
