Fixing Supplementals With Blogger

So previously I had an issue with one of my sites going supplemental and the homepage disappearing. The advice I gave resolved initially looking at your server's uptime, how your CRM or blogging tool created pages, whether it'd be scrapped etc. But now it's back up and ranking very well for the phrase "euro 2008".

Unlike many webmasters I didn't panic (I've been around too long for that - eek thinking about it I've been SEO'ing for 9 years). I simply thought of the elements I was too lazy to solve in the first instance.

I looked at duplicate content:

• Firstly I got rid of the Euro 2008 qualifying league tables that I had on every page and just reduced them to the homepage.
  
• I got rid of the labels feature on new posts and just had them when they were off the first page.
  
• I got rid of the archive as I didn't want posts on the post page, homepage and label page.
  
• I changed the link to the site's feed from being the on site RSS/Atom to the FeedBurner (thanks Vlad)

I also took some other steps:

• I looked more at natural internal linking rather than forced.
  
• I changed the Meta Description from being a copy of the page title to the site's title. When I've got my head round the intricacies of the Blogger templating system I'll try and create more variation.

So if anyone's having any problems with duplication it's probably worth starting with these steps - but obviously all sites are different so the required solutions to remedy you're own problem may be a collection of the usual ones that are resident in the SEOers toolbox, or you may need to do a fair bit of digging around various fora.

A little bit of knowledge is dangerous - SEO Mind Crimes

A fellow Warringtonian, Anthony Fallon caused a bit of a stir by saying that "Search Engine Optimisation Is A Waste Of Time and Money" in his "SEO Mind Crime" blog post.

Many people missed the trick when they criticised his comments. Basically he was espousing the view tha SEO is only one aspect of Internet marketing and that there are many other ways of gaining traffic - not least the method he used to get his views noticed in the first place.

But the way he proved his case is as flawed as George Bush's case for going to war with Iraq. To prove that SEO wasn't necessary in the Web 2.0 era he asked people to search for "SEO Mind Crime" in Google. He claimed that his 3,4 & 6 positions within a couple of days after sending out a press release to PRWEB proves that you don't need SEO to get ranked. Anthony made the assertion:

“The new distribution technologies like RSS will get your message out there without any magic or manipulation of search results. The quality of Google’s Search technology is really coming on in leaps and bounds. If businesses can get in front of their customers without stuffing their content with keywords, it has to be a good thing. As for the SEO Industry, good riddance I say.”

To be totally honest, this is complete bollocks!

First off it's not exactly difficult to seo for that phrase as it's no "golden ticket"as SEO is all about the proper display of information, about correctly interlinking your important content, about hierarchy of content and, wait for it, encouraging your content to become an authority, or at the very least, a useful resource for your given topic.

His miss-understanding of SEO is astonishing, dare I say "ignorance" about SEO. Or is he? Is he simply link-baiting, is the "fool" really the clever little %$%^ that just says what is generally being regarded as false-hoods just to get every industry commentator linking to his site?

I do agree with many of his comments about the importance of PR, link-baiting, RSS distribution. But saying SEO has no place to play in internet marketing based on his view that SEO is just keyword stuffing is pure ignorance. If it were that simple then that's all of us would be doing. But because increasing the occurrence of the right keywords on a page is what virtually all SEO'ers do, then they need other factors to increase their page's "score" against those search terms.

For those that can't grasp the concept, I'll put it more simply:

Because SEO is fundamentaly about Keyword occurrence and that is where virtually where every SEO'er starts, we have to do more to increase that site's/page's attractiveness.

Furthermore, if SEO has no part to play in ranking then why does he have his title in a H1? it's not always the most popular way for non-seo'ers. Using the generally is. Also it's obvious that having "SEO mind Crime" linked from every internal page would add SEO "weight".

What Anthony is focusing on is the other fundamental aspect of SEO, namely linking. Purely because his press release has been syndicated on many sites that publish PRWEB press releases he gained many links very quickly which increased the crawl rate of the site.

So my challenge to Anthony is this?

Change SEO mind crime is this:

• Get rid of the H1 and change it to font styling
• Change the internal links to some other text, such as "SEO Doesn't Work", no scrub that - change your internal links to images
• Get rid of the nofollow's to the social links
• Add some hidden links to some porn sites on there
• Also add some links to some betting and casino sites
• get rid of your meta data

It won't have an effect will it? Seeing as "SEO is a Waste of Time and Money"

Why I Love Google Webmaster Tools

Google Webmaster Tools is the dog's mutt's place to spend some time productively learning about how your site interacts with Google.

I've been using it for a while now and it's getting better all the time.

So why should all webmaster's use it?

Well it's a very quick, easy way to see how often GoogleBot's crawling, how many pages they take and where they're having problems.

I've used it on a client's site recently to spot problems when we transfered over to a dynamically created site. Moving from perl to php caused some problems in relation to the case of directories and filenames. Using Google Webmaster Tools we quickly spotted the areas of concern and with a conference call this morning we fixed them.

You can also choose your prefered domain in Google. Would you want your site to be crawled and displayed as www.domain.com or domain.com - it makes a difference!

You can also very quickly see what your site is ranking for and what people actually click on - allowing to rethink your <> and page content so what is displayed encourages people to click.

But the bit I love the most is this new feature which Matt Cutts has blogged about: A proper backlinks tool.

Previously doing link:www.domain.com has pulled out loads of rubbish and certainly wasn't a filtered list. Now they've got rid of all the duplication and given you a distinct list of all the pages (they know about) on the net and which pages they link to on your site! Simply awesome!

But it's best to read the official blog on the matter to find out more - Using Webmaster Tools to Find your backlinks.

But what do we really want next?

I'd recommend some sort of similarity tool. I know there may be legal implications of Google saying publicaly "we reckon this site has ripped you off". But we need some way of spotting sites that are scraping or stealling content before it becomes an issue with a site in particular.

Word From Venessa Fox about the Google Webmaster Tools, Sitemaps, Page Rank, the new link data (her comment was before the launch) etc - it's well worth watching!

The interesting fact is I know a fair bit about body language and it was so interesting watching her talk about the link data. Whilst she was saying that she knows people are wanting it etc, she was rubbing her hands away from her. This is a clear indication of her washing her hands of what she's saying. When's she's flapping her hands around a lot, she believes what she says. A good SEO should be a good body language reader too!


If you can't view iframes, click here to watch it.

But what would you want?

A Miserable Failure No More

The Google Webmaster Central Blog has given an Webmasters advanced notice that they're if they're stillpartaking in "Googlebombing" that they could expect their sitse to be affected by an algo change.

Well I did it a few Christmas's ago and was #1 for "Christmas Presents", it was easy then. Just whack up 40,000 thinks on another of your sites pointing to your other one with your chosen keyword in the anchor and you're away.

I stopped doing crap like that a couple of years ago in favour of taking time off from the "net" and then to (trying to) build decent, information based sites.

If you're doing this sort of stuff you're well worth changing (or enhancing) your tactics.

Good luck.

Google: "We've got rid of scraper sites" - My ...

I recall that Google say they've cured the effect of scraper sites. But all I can say is "I don't think so"!

I had a site I was going to do something with ages ago called Movovo. Back then I'd try throwing loads of rubbish up there and see what happened. Now it's no where in Google, the "site:www.movovo.co.uk movovo" command doesn't work, nor does link:www.movovo.co.uk. But when you just search on that word, movovo, there's loads of sites that reference it and link to it.

But you do find sites like those below.

So why the heck should I bother spending my time developing "white hat", "content rich" sites (I do have them) when I can go back to knocking out 40,000 pages a day and plaster them with ppc ads?

I'm fed up with the good guys spending their time building quality sites whilst the spammers out there rip us off?!

Matt Cutts' team, imo, should be doing more to make the Google search results a far more compelling offering - somehow ;-)!

They blatently haven't fixed the 301 redirect scraper sites and are happy to kick out sites that replicate navigation or boiler plates within their content sites but are happy to leave the utter shite in!

BTW. I've set the domain and hosting to cancel on the end of the contract (this year I think). As I just want to get rid of all that rubbish I used to have.

find-cameras-online.info » Blog Archive » Cameras - Movovo - A new ...

Movovo - A new breed of search html. 6. Olympus Digital Cameras UK - Olympus Camedia - Samsung Digital Cameras - Cheap Olympus Digital Camera - d380 olympus ... find-cameras-online.info/ 23/cameras- movovo -a-new-breed-of-search/ - 11k - Supplemental Result - Cached - Similar pages

Movovo - Christmas Presents

Search:. Top 10 Searches:. AEG American Fridge Freezers. Baumatic Electric Hobs. Creda Gas Ovens. Hoover Vacuum Cleaners. Panasonic Combination Microwaves ... www.78y.net/nph-6.cgi/001000A/http/www. movovo .co.uk - 87k - Supplemental Result - Cached - Similar pages

acer pd525

Movovo - A new breed of search. Acer PD525 -2600 Lum,XGA,zoom (9797400063) DLPTM, XGA 1024*768, 2.4 kg. Acer PD523 -2400 Lum,XGA,zoom (9797400061) Acer ... ester.php5.cz/acer/acer-pd525.htm - 17k - Supplemental Result - Cached - Similar pages

uk shopping,?????????? ?? Veranika

UK ricoh digital cameras Also Try Here Movovo : ricoh digital cameras. ... digital zoom cameras, which digital cameras, digital cameras buy uk, . ... www.ljfind.com/search/uk%20shopping/ - 22k - Supplemental Result - Cached - Similar pages

uk shopping,?????????? ?? Veranika

UK ricoh digital cameras Also Try Here Movovo : ricoh digital cameras. ... digital zoom cameras, which digital cameras, digital cameras buy uk, . ... www.ljfind.com/search/uk%20shopping/ - 22k - Supplemental Result - Cached - Similar pages

Dell

Movovo - A new breed of search ... allen cater dell arte commedia dell axim dell x5 axim ... http://www. movovo .co.uk/computing/DELL.html 29. Olympic Athlete ... dell-info.blogspot.com/ - 102k - Supplemental Result - Cached - Similar pages

Tee & Co Gloucester Accountants, GL1, 01452 500050

Movovo - We're listed on movovo .co.uk UK Online Store - A helpful ... http://www.thespiceoflife.co.uk/Links.asp. 9. NBC10.com - InstaweatherAutomotive: ... www.accountants101.co.uk/ r9217/tee-co-gloucester-accountants.html - 16k - Supplemental Result - Cached - Similar pages

Car Insurance For Northern Ireland :: pearlies.co.uk

Movovo - A new breed of search ... uk cheap insurance companies cheap holiday insurance uk where can i find cheap car insurance very cheap car insurance ... www.pearlies.co.uk/results/ Car_Insurance_For_Northern_Ireland.html - 23k - Supplemental Result - Cached - Similar pages

Anti-Virus Bulletin: 04/23/05

Movovo - A new breed of search ... program download anti virus program anti virus ... http://www. movovo .co.uk/computing/ANTIVIRUS.html 28. ZDNet UK: spybot ... antivirusbulletin.blogspot.com/ 2005_04_23_antivirusbulletin_archive.html - 250k - Supplemental Result - Cached - Similar pages

Savapoint Voucher Codes and Discount Coupons

... Make Up MP3 Players MP3 Players Apple Savapoint Savapoint Online Savapoint Sale Savapoint Sh... http://www. movovo .co.uk/shops/3/EPC-Buyer-Extra.html ... www.promotional-code.co.uk/promotion-code/Savapoint.php - 25k - Cached - Similar pages

Dissecting Affiliate Marketing

Ok - this is an attempt to sum up all the ways affiliates make money and my take on them.

1. PPC
   Pretty damn obvious what this is, but there are so many flavours of affiliate ppc'ing.
   
   a. First off you've got the traditional PPC'ing using landing pages on your site which you expect people to use fully. With this you have to make the offer and call to action extremely compelling to prevent users being distracted by your content. There are advantages of this form off PPC as search providers don't particularly like "Made For Adwords sites". But there is the advantage of allowing users a true alternative to the merchant or product you're offering.
   
   b. "Made for Adwords" Sites, I know a number of highly successful affiliates that do this they'll create landing pages that don't offer any other content than to get the user to click on the affiliate link. They're successful for now, but I see the SE's putting pressure on to make the site's more useful.
   
   c. "Mimic-sites". I've seen this recently with Virgin Atlantic on Affiliate Future where someone bought a domain similar to the virgin-atlantic.com one and copied the site and then ppc'd. I'm not sure how long it lasted, but I can't see it now. This is a risky approach as you pick a merchant that is hot on it's brand you could be in hot water.
   
   d. "Direct-to-merchant". This approach has variable results and 90% dependent on the products you choose to promote, 10% general merchant factors such as the buying process etc. It is crucial to talk to the merchant or network first to find out what is selling and jump on it ASAP.
   
   e. "Brand-bidding". Awe "brand bidding", many have made a nice mint out of it (I've made a few quid too), but it's slowly unravelling. Merchants are getting more clued up about it. It's always worth giving it a go when you're allowed, but don't be stupid. Be careful with your budget before you get too far out of pocket. Know who you're up against and get to know their tactics. Each affiliate competitor has their own approach and when you've got enough experience you'll know how to beat them.
   
   f. "Arbitrage". This is where you pay say 5p per click and hopefully earn multiples per click on your own site. I don't like these sites as they generally don't ad value to the user.
   
   
2. Respectable SEO
   
   This is my preferred route, there's so much to write about it that'll have to a full-length post to get my thoughts across.
   
   But the basics entail:
   
   a. Start off by working out if you want to create a site around a topic, product or merchant.
   
   b. Look ahead for what's going to be big in the next year, 2 years, 3 years etc and get building.
   
   c. Think about your hosting, 1&1 has it's hosting in Germany think about how this will affect your GEO-location in the search engines.
   
   d. Think about how you're going to create it. Do you need a CMS, will a Dreamweaver site do the job? Will you need a bespoke solution created for a price comparison site?
   
   e. How much competition is there?
   
   f. How much work will you have to put in?
   
   g. How much do you expect to earn per visitor? Will the site make money for a week, a month or for ever?
   
   etc. etc.
   
   
3. Community Sites
   
   a) Work out what software you'll need? Blogger, WordPress or Drupal.
   
   b) Can you really create "buzz" about your site?
   
   c) Do you have the features to create a community site?
   
   d) Do you really have what it takes to spend hours with no return for the first few months?
   
   e) Can you keep it going?
   
   I love these sites when they're done right, if not, they just end up being the belly-button fluff of the Internet.
   
   
4. Web Spam / Made for AdSense / Blog spam
   
   Ooh this used to be good for me. I used to earn shed loads knocking up thousands of pages a day and waiting a few days for the Google listings. Now I suppose its a case of "Poacher turned Game-keeper" as they really annoy me now. There are still way too many of these, create some good content and you'll be loved for ever! Well nearly!
   
   
5. Email Spam
   
   Will you bugger off now please! I've had my main Hotmail account for 10 years now and it's just bombarded with spam now that I've moved over to Gmail. But it does pay! There's a serious amount of cash to be made if you've got the data and the technology. If you can sleep at night knowing you're sending lonely, single men adverts for Viagra then good for you. Just leave it.
   
   
6. Spyware / adware / malware
   
   It's been many a year since I got vocal about affiliates fighting together against spyware. And today we've seen a massive improvement. But I do think we're due another audit on spyware and how/if merchants are working with those companies. Cue Fraser ...
   
   
7. Affiliate Referral
   
   This where you get loads of affiliates into your second tier and let them earn for you. This reminds me to get my backside in gear over my "affiliate marketing India" site. I've even got a kick-ass domain for South Africa for the World Cup and must get round to setting something up.

So the basics are:

• think months and years ahead,
• think about creating sites that you can easily manage,
• think about SEO from the outset,
• think about playing by the rules - there are advantages in it,
• think about listening to sucessful affiliates,
• think about creating an affiliate business built to last.

What I'm listening to: Fasten Seatbelts - Space

PPC for Link Building

It may be a novel concept, or perhaps I've been missing the boat for the past few years but ...

... i ran some ppc promoting the new england football shirt on my Euro 2008 site just to get a gauge of the CTR's of the ads and the effectiveness of the landing page.

And even though I realised that the ad's were fantastically effective and the landing page crap there was a side effect that I didn't really think of all that much and that's the next day when I looked at the Google Analytics stats and saw a absolutely stupendous increase in traffic.

At first I thought it was that my request to pause the ads didn't go through, then I thought Google had added loads of pages after I messed around with the templates, and then thought MSN or Yahoo! could be the culprit. Then I looked deeper ...

... there were loads of fora that picked up my ads and posted my site with comments saying the image of the new kit I had were fake.

What do I care, loads of extra traffic, loads of extra bookmarks and some nice cookies set.

Q: So what could any Noob learn from this?

A: Don't be afraid to think of PPC as a long term, brand-building tool as well as an instant commission method that most other think of it as.

And is the image fake? I dunno!

WordPress is good enough for Matt Cutts ...

... but why aren't I using it?

Well probably for the same reason that Matt's using WordPress - it's what I started using and with about 60+ blogs it'll be too much of a ball ache to move them!

Well 1&1 now have WordPress configured for you. They say "what domain do you want a blog on" then you set a UN & PW and then you're away.

So, here we go. I set up a site about DVD Rentals and better get posting.

It'll be an interesting experiment as to the relative SEO-flexibility between the two as, to be honest, "on-page" seo is great with Blogger, but when it comes to managing the links and archiving it's not as good as I'd like.

I've realised that 1&1 don't publish the blog files anywhere obvious on your server so you can get to it via ftp. I suppose I better read them damn instructions!

So, does anyone have any tips using WordPress? Well I'm taking advice from WordPress-Supremo ;-) Jimbo who's using it to set up an Unfair Bank Charges website.

Matt Cutts Leaving Google?

David Naylor believes Matt will be leaving Google. I've been thinking for the last couple of months that Matt has obviously made a huge wedge from the "big G" and that he works just too damn hard.

David comes to his conclusion because of what Matt recently posted:

I love working at Google, but at some point my wife is going to wake up and smell the coffee. She’ll say “Hey, we agreed we’d try this Google thing for four or five years, and then I’d get to pick what to do next. It’s been like eight years now! When do we move on to our next adventure?”

It doesn't take a rocket scientest or SE-developer to get to the meaning of this comment.

It would be pretty damn interesting to find out what Matt's notice period is like and what he's gone planned for his "next adventure"!!!