I have not put much effort into following most directory type sites that use redirect links (especailly if they are not ranked well in the related search results), but will engines eventually count many weird links as votes if they notice that the users click on a link and like what is on the other end of the series of redirects? Will those links ever count as much or more than static links that never get clicked on?

Part 2 of an ongoing series, the future mini articles will shift away from blogs and into other areas, at the end there will hopefully be a point to all these :) if not well then sorry ;)

Blog Blog Blog Blah Blah Blah

I run an SEO related blog which sells a guide to doing SEO, and yet despite the chronic hate toward SEO many authoritative bloggers recently linked through to my site because I was sued by an SEO company for blog posts & comments. As of writing this I am unsure of the specifics of what made my site worth suing, although those lack of specifics pissed off many people.

Most likely Traffic Power thought they could scare me silent, and since I was a blogger with a few good blogging friends that story backfired rather badly for them. It is an easy story to link at, and many people did. Adam Penenberg painted a rather accurate picture of the situation. The story spread far and quick. There was much syndication of the story that my site started ranking for the word sued.

Traffic Power Sucks.com was sued along with me, and yet they got minimal coverage because: they did not want to talk much, and more importantly, they had a static site. Method of publishing plays a hugely important role in whether or not ideas will spread, and how quick they spread.

Smarter Content

Sometimes what makes you / your site comment worthy is what others do there, and how people react to that (just look at Threadwatch to see how important the comments can be). Allowing others to add content to my site allowed them to make the content smarter and more complete. It also was the exact reason why the lawsuit became so comment worthy.

People wanted to save the right to comment on blogs without needing to worry about others cutting off their feedback loops. It is a large part of the reason some think blog comment spam and trackback spam is so nasty: feedback about an idea is sometimes worth far more than the original idea.

Ease of Link Acquisition

By giving people something to talk about and reminding them to regularly visit your site it is much easier to build linkage data. It also is easier to reference old stories that once again become relevant as more news emerges.

The viral behavior of blog posts in a large social network benefits those who can figure out what stories would spread & why people would want to spread them. Arbitrarily answering questions like "How much is my blog worth?" is an easy way to get links.

Someone created a blog called anti-blog to say how lame blogs are. As soon as I found it I made a quick mention of how I thought they were a bunch of lamers. They quickly linked back saying how dumb I am. Easier and quicker than a link exchange, and that link is much more likely to be up in a year than most link trades, which usually turn out to be junk.

Echo Chamber

When you have a regular site and are stuck asking for links one at a time it is an arduous task. Blogs have an echo chamber effect. After stories are above radar they spread without effort, and sometimes how stories spread makes them linkworthy.

Examples:

• SEO Inc cease and desist letter, as Danny Sullivan states:
  

  That last thread we actually pulled from our forums back in mid-April. No, not because of a cease-and-desist letter or any message. Instead, our forums have a policy about public spam reporting. We don't allow it, unless a site is incredibly well-known or the issue has become discussed in a variety of public forums. Ironically, with the many blog comments now about the cease-and-desist, the thread that previously was pulled now qualifies for restoration.

• Google onsite dentist blog is a hoax
• MC Hammer visits Google - how hard would you normally have to work to get authoritative topically related links from sites with a quality level as high as SEW?

I was not trying to pick on Danny with those examples. I used his site as the example because he is the most authoritative voice on search, has a journalism background, and a long history of spotting the future trends in search before they emerge.

Everyone likes to have a bit of fun. The often informal nature of blogs make it easier to reference somewhat random topics, especially if you get to be the crazy frog. Having a blog lets you tap the flow of linkage data from other related sites, for serious or fun stuff.

Hard to Reproduce

When you do link exchanges most of the sites that exchange with you will gladly exchange with your competitors. When your site garners linkage data from authoritative sites that are not heavily directly interested in making money or search rankings it is hard for competitors to reproduce your linkage data. In fact, if they prod too heavily on that front they stand a good chance of damaging their brand value and credibility.

Quality of Links

When you get links from within the content of an actively read channel typically

• the individual archive pages have few links on each page
• the links are the type that drive direct traffic. If search engines bias relevancy based on user data and link activity more then these types of links will become more powerful
• the Google Sandbox concept really does not matter much if all the high ranking active channels are referencing you anyway
• many links in social networks lead to secondary links

Google to report proforma earnings, not just net

Google Inc. has agreed to meet Wall Street halfway in how it reports quarterly results, seeking to dispel confusion created by a strict adherence to accounting standards, the company said on Thursday.

The Web search leader said it would present its third-quarter results next Thursday, October 20, in net terms but also, for the first time, in operating terms, excluding the after-tax effect of expensing employee stock options.

Who could blame Wall Street for wanting to know the cost of stock options when Google is giving away huge ones.

With all the economic uncertainty that has been floating through the economy I am betting Google has a soft quarter compared to all the home run quarters they have been announcing.

I am guessing the stock may go down to $250 to $275, at which point it might be a good time to buy Yahoo! if they go down in tandem. I say all this while not having the money or guts to short Google's stock ;)

I was writing a longer article and decided it would be better in pieces. This first one is about marketing, profit, and why I think most bloggers hate SEO.

Let me know what you think of part 1. Tomorrow I will post part 2.

Algorithm Manipulation & Constant Change:

In the forums recently there has been some whining about Google being an out of control beast with no relevancy, etc. I guess when you look close enough there is always some amount of that.

People are also comparing the new Yahoo! algorithms to the Google Florida update. We tend to think the relevancy is not there when our own site disappears, even if it is temporary. Admittedly the algorithms may be jacked for a while, but if people like your site and sites like yours are not in the search results it hurts the relevancy and brand of the search engine when those results do not show up, even if some of those sites were banned long ago.

Search algorithm manipulation may still be beneficial, but is not necessary to succeed if others are interested in what you offer. Those who take a holistic approach to marketing do not need to worry as much about the ups and downs associated with changing search algorithms or search business models. If people believe in you enough they will push you to success even if you do not know what you are talking about.

There is nothing wrong with creating content with the intent to spread it. That is all SEO is focused on: spreading content, ideas, and websites for profit.

What is Profit?

Profit can be:

• money
• feeling important
• knowing others are reading what you write
• getting feedback
• knowing you helped others
• settling a score with someone you are pissed at
• doing something which others stated you could not
• or a variety of other things

Bloggers are SEOs?

When a blogger Google Bombs a person they are doing nothing more that a souped up blog version of SEO. In spite of the fact that bloggers do the same things as SEOs (and sometimes even far worse) many bloggers like to tell you just how much scum the average SEO is.

Why is everyone and their dog launching or partnering in a blog network? Money. Plain and simple.

As NickW would say:

I suspect the ratio is more like 95/5 with regard to who's making reasonable money at blogging.

Personally, i see this as the new seo if you like - and the old guard, who can get their heads round the new medium, are all set to rake in what they want pretty much - it's open season out there...

While many bloggers and designers claim they absolutely hate the topic of SEO - and SEOs - much of the bad SEO advice offered is given by bloggers and web designers who never studied the topic.

At one point in time I had to tell a content rating website to stop hiding content on their own site. They were handed that dubious hide the content tip from a web designer (who ensured them that it was search engine friendly). Even outside of search think how poor it sounds for a content rating website to hide their own content. Where does the credibility go with moves like that?

Why Do Bloggers / Designers Really Hate SEOs?

Many people who are chronically pissed at anything remotely related to SEO are probably in that mode of thought for one of a few reasons:

• Envy: I remember when I just started out on the web and was doing economically bad because I had few connections, limited experience, and minimal business savvy. I am not ashamed to admit that for a period when I was barely getting by I felt envious of people with better business models. Many web developers, bloggers, and designers whom are barely getting by like to push the blame of their lack of marketing skills and low wages on budget shifts toward marketing and spammy results clogging up the engines.
• Sick of blog spam: Whenever a blogger talks about comment or trackback spam, or any webmaster gets referral spam many of them blame that annoyance on SEO in general, although the software developers are at fault for selling software with holes in it. Some people have even been known to blog spam for a competitor to hurt a competitors website, just because the software vendors make it so easy.
• Sick of low quality search results: Search engines have spent a ton of money, time, and attention marketing their faults as belonging to a third party.
• MicroSoft was caught cloaking.
• Google was caught cloaking.
• Some search engines actively buy tons of links.
• The Yahoo! Directory sells links.
• The pay per click business model is based on selling links. Some search engines make a killing supporting search spam. Google AdSense has been one of the most lucrative search spamming opportunities ever created. Even when you point out specific examples to Google they claim NO responsibility.
• Google will also let webmasters buy AdWords ads to sell things that are inappropriate to list in the regular search results.
• Some of the best search spammers also help search engines clean up the search results by explaining some of the common search spam techniques that are hurting search relevancy, but that is not something you see search engines heavily marketing.
• Quality of Content: Some people believe that SEOs aim to do anything necessary to avoid creating useful websites or content. While some people just aim to exploit algoritmic holes, some of these same people later go on to do SEO for many legitimate websites. As an SEO, if you have clients, it is ideal to have clients that give you a performance based cut (affiliate programs) or clients that have naturally authoritative sites which can easily rank for their official name and related terms. Some of the better SEOs refuse to work for a company unless they are deeply interested in that companies products and market.

  Most blogs are not of amazing quality. If the average blog's content quality was high people wouldn't be failing the Turing test as often as they are.

• Web Standards: Many sites follow no standards other than putting money in the pocket of the author. That would occur whether or not there was a field called SEO. Sadly most of my sites are not yet standard compliant, and it would probably cost me about $100,000 to even attempt that. I may eventually try it, but you can't learn everything all at once. Learning is a process. Just as many designers are bad at marketing I am bad at designing and web standards related stuff.
• Easy to pick on: XYZ marking firm is a bunch of knuckleheads is an easy story to spread. Web mob justice means those stories spread fast. Did you know that Gillette now has a 5 blade razor?
• Selective Memory & Anchoring: How often do you hear a person thank an SEO for placing a relevant result at the top of the results? Never. How often do you hear of SEOs being $@&*ers? Much more often.

Peter Morville is a well known information architect, who co-wrote Information Architecture for the World Wide Web. He recently wrote Ambient Findability, which is an O'Reilly book related to search, so I had to read it.

I was a bit uncertain exactly what the book would be about when I bought it. Ambient Findability is primarily about how people interact with the web & information, and I was well pleased to find that the book looked at search from a some perspectives I have not read before.

Most the time I look at search I am thinking rank rank rank. I find how people interact with information to be a fairly interesting topic, and Peter went in great detail about a number of things I don't usually think about.

Peter talks about:

• tying the web & real world together

• the history of wayfinding
• how we interact with information
• the limits of language
• push vs pull
• sharing & tagging information & the semantic web
• some of the reasons for bad information consumption habbits
• and one of my favorite subjects: how our views on authority change as we are able to solve more of our own problems

In the push vs pull chapter he talked about striking the balance with marketing, and I think this quote is useful to marketers:

Markets are conversations. People exchange goods, services, ideas, and values in an intricate dance of push and pull. And as technology disrupts and transforms the marketplace, only those who listen carefully will profit from this persistent disequilibrium between supply and demand. - p. 117

In SEO it is common for people to want to rank #1 at any cost and then have a site that wastes the traffic it gets. Peter does not talk about marketing as a stand alone product, but mentions how it should be integrated holistically into the site.

This User Experience Design article on his website has a picture of what he calls The User Experience Honeycomb, which shows how he believes value is strung together through the combination of assets.

Ambient Findability is a cool read.