| LED Digest 2660: Cheats and Lies and Brilliant Marketing |
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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 .............................................. June 10, 2008 Issue no. 2660 .............................................. .....IN THIS DIGEST..... ==== CONTINUING ================= --== SEO Hats at Conferences ==-- ~ Michael Linehan "Since when is telling a bald-faced lie brilliant marketing?" --== SEO Standards ==-- ~ Tom Aman "...there does seem to be a certain amount of numerology involved in SEO." ~ Dirk Johnson "We don't buy into SEO fads and theories." ~ Al Toman "All I get is negativety, a whole bunch of sortas, and conjecture." ======== CONTINUING =============================== From: Michael Linehan Subject: SMX grey to very shady parts Some of what was presented at the recent SMX Advanced Expo was on the grey to very shady part of the continuum. And it has provoked considerable discussion. As a sample, here are two comments and my replies. > Black hats get under my skin because (a) > they're not SEOs (b) they very often > provide a bad experience for users and (c) > they make the rest of us look bad by > association. - Lisa Barone - http://tinyurl.com/52cyb5 [bruceclay.com] I was surprised at how much there was - some of the extreme being the praising of the completely fabricated 13-year-old's story as brilliant marketing and statements like, "We're not here to be moral; we're marketers" and "You're not going to get creamed, the site will, so don't worry about it." Since when is telling a bald-faced lie brilliant marketing? And for morality I think, do you have no morality? None? You'll just help child pornographers, arms dealers, tobacco companies, etc.? If the answer to that is "No", then there clearly is a moral line that even the blackest hat will draw. So then the question is just a matter of where the line is drawn, and how the line is decided. [Other comments in the thread on Lisa's post]: > There's a market for it. Somebody will > fill that void. Why not SMX? By that logic, it's fine to have a session on how to - carry out an email "pump and dump" stock scheme - develop a Nigerian email scam - get past the spam filters and send at a million emails The fact that there is a demand, does not mean it should be presented at a conference purporting to represent a professional industry. Part of the mistake being made is in how the discussion is framed - right or wrong, immoral or not. We get emotionally loaded obfuscations like, "Let's keep church and state separate" and logical contradictions like, "Don't tell me what to do." I think the most useful framing is strategic. Where does the industry want to be in five years? Then make decisions according to that goal and plan. It cannot be based on "anything goes" or "whatever we can get away with". I think that just deepens the perception of "they're just fringe geeks with their own rules and no morals" --- which to most people with money means "jerky little twerps" --- which means the companies with big money are going to go to Ogilvy for their web stuff. (Simplistic on Ogilvy, but I think you know what I mean.) I am sure that most of the professionals on LED want to build solid, professional, long-term success for our clients, and for ourselves. And most consumers of services here want that built for them. I don't think that comes from pump and dump stock schemes --- or by making making completely fabricated news articles --- or by any "what we can get away with for the next month or two" tactics. If you are interested in reading more, head on over to Bruce Clay's site, and check the post by the very excellent writer, Lisa Barone. www.bruceclay.com/blog/archives/2008/06/smx_advanced_goes_dark.html Michael Linehan, Marketing Alchemy www.marketing-alchemy.com ============ Sponsor Message =========== New Blog from Larry Chase Online Marketing Strategies, Inc Introducing "Internet Direct Marketing Tip of the Day" from Larry Chase's Web Digest For Marketers. This blog features: * Short, time-tested tips from traditional direct marketing that also work well online * Tips Larry Chase finds effective from publishing Web Digest For Marketers since 1995 View these tips, submit your own tips, and subscribe to the RSS feed at: http://www.wdfm.com/internetdirectmarketingtips ============ Sponsor Message =========== -------- new post - new topic -------- From: Tom Aman Subject: SEO standards I'm commenting on an earlier post by Alex Hughart who said: > In that regard, SEO is no different than, > let's say, numerology - fortune telling > based on obscure mathematical calculations > - and it's understandable why some people > are so frustrated with the process. This is > also the reason why it's so easy to > categorize everything under "snake oil" > peddling and wish for the "exact math". in LED 2659, Shari Thurow said: > I am sure the gentleman and ladies who have > their doctorate degrees in computer > science, information science, > human/computer interfaces, artificial > intelligence, library science, usability, > cognitive psychology, etc. would greatly be > offended at being labeled as numerologists. But Shari, there does seem to be a certain amount of numerology involved in SEO. For example, I am developing a some software that is intended to analyze Web sites and the question has arisen about whether or not it is necessary to store the complete content of an HTML page - i.e. Do search engines actually index the entire page? My initial research on the Web gives a wide range of answers - some info says the Google engine only deals with the first 65K, other info says that Google only indexes the first 101K (or may stop after the first 100 links, if that happens sooner), still other info says that the limits have been removed by Google. While comments are few, other limits (or no limits) are suggested for other engines. Knowing the limit, if there is one, would be important since all the stuff (like META tags) in the HEAD of the document would reduce the amount of actual page content indexed. Do any LEDers have definitive information on this? Item of interest: one of the pages I ran across doing this research was titled "The Anatomy of a Large-Scale Hypertextual Web Search Engine" by Sergey Brin and Lawrence Page in which the abstract starts with "In this paper, we present Google, a prototype of a large-scale search engine...". Yes, this is from the origins of the Google we all know and even back then they talked about PageRank. While Google is always being updated, improved and otherwise tweaked, this paper is worth reading as it contains some thoughts that probably still apply to SEO work today. Tom Aman -------- new post - same topic -------- From: Dirk Johnson Subject: SEO standards Shari Thurow said: > ... truly expert SEO professionals know > about this research... I do not assume that Shari was talking about me, but I'd like to think so :). Everything that we do here with respect to advising our clients is based upon proven methodologies that appear to work well in a large number of similar situations. We don't buy into SEO fads and theories. Specifically, we regularly "reverse-engineer" the link profiles and site optimization of well-ranking sites, especially in real estate markets. This provides us with reliable guidance as to what works consistently, but it ALSO allows us to compare the "total cost" of getting there. Some methods of building links are substantially more expensive than others. Our research shows us the return-on-investment decisions that were used to get there. We also get see some outright SEO gaming techniques, and avoid them. All of this brings us to some simple conclusions... 1) Far too many SEO gurus want to imagine what Google engineers might be thinking, and they can concoct some very compelling fiction to back it up. Unless they can point to demonstrable and repeatable results in competitive markets, then it just noise. That alone makes the creation of "SEO standards" virtually impossible. Here, we rely upon our own research, and we have no intention of complying with someone else's unproven theories, just to get some kind of "good housekeeping" seal. The SEO industry is not "Underwriters Laboratories", by any stretch... 2) Our own research indicates that return-on-investment considerations DO matter in SEO. Many in this industry seems to take the stance that SEO decisions are immune from it. I never see the ROI of various decisions discussed by anyone. Many corners of the SEO world imagine that expensive, complex link building techniques are somehow "better". Our research of real SERPs indicates the exact opposite. The legitimate but mundane link building techniques that have worked for years continue to work well for most sites, in most situations. Best regards, Dirk Johnson DomainDrivers LLC -------- new post - same topic -------- From: Al Toman Subject: Learning Web Page Optimization Marketing Showing me the money isn't necessarily related to "cash" as many may believe. Especially when related to "show me the math". Since the mid nineties I learned scripting html and such almost entirely from the Internet, from the good, the bad, and the ugly, finally landing on W3C and its TOP names in the business. It, they are my mentors to this day. They showed me the money, showed me the math (and no cash was seen). I've been attempting to learn this seo phenomena only since 2005. No mentors. No TOP names. No validation. One would think that if TOP names existed in the industry that they would at least attempt to uplift it. We all know how difficult that is, the W3C being a model and example. I've been told, "come on Al", we ALL know what seo is. Yet those who espouse seo have the same difficulty, knowing what seo is, however, they know what they think seo is. There are billions of bytes across the Intnernet attesting to that. That "not knowing" can be read right here, on the LED. I'm sorry. If I knew what seo is, I wouldn't need to ask. Most clients know what a web page is, have an idea what html is. Say "seo" and they respond, "huh?". For the seo industry being comprised of marketers, it sure is a poorly marketed commodity. Yup. It (seo) all sounds good when discussed amongst those within the "circle". Step out of the circle and see what happens. My clients, most all of whom are well established successful business people, want to be shown the money (put your wallets back into your pockets for heaven's sake) and I cannot because I asked and have not received myself. All I get is negativety, a whole bunch of sortas, and conjecture. I can sorta explain seo to my clients, but they are smart enough to hold onto their cash instead of buy "sorta". Showing me the money is relative to cash, as well. LEDers have responded right here, on the LED, that that may be difficult because there are so many things going on at once. Exactly, where did the money come from? Others responded that they've made billions overnight implementing seo, most who imply "I have no idea how but you can bet that it happened". Okay. I'll go with that. Sounds solid. I've heard the "trust me" line way too many times. My dollar bill says "In God We Trust", not "In SEO We Trust". That dollar stays in both my clients hands and my hands until the "trust me" is backed up with some clean green. Al Toman studio9 web design (c) Copyright 1995-2008 Orange Wheel, LLC. All Rights Reserved. ----------------------------------------------------------------- "Happiness lies not in the mere possession of money; it lies in the joy of achievement, in the thrill of creative effort." - Franklin D. Roosevelt |
