october 2007

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Google just walks into reputation management and trademark problems one after the other, and today is no exception.

Not too long ago it was their attempt to force people to give up domains legally registered using the acronym "g.m.a.i.l" or gmail, which Google uses for their email service.

The Polish Poets are still in business, and apparently Google also lost in other countries.

So today news is breaking about Google's new "Open Social" platform for social media web developers. The big problem is that Google don't own the trademark, or even a lot of the concept behind it, and they certainly don't own ...

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From the page: "Jonathan has built a ton of cool features into the client and one of my favorite is the the ability to reply to a tweet, send a direct message to a tweets author or mark a tweets as a favorite just by mousing over the authors icon."

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Dear Google Liz isn't a normal blogger, she is THE relationship blogger, and you seem to have rejected her and tainted her reputation. Maybe it is time to actually train those monkey's or pigeons you use for manual site inspection.

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Hamlet takes his usual intelligent geeky look at the latest PageRank Fiasco, and discusses intelligent surfers. Hamlet goes into depth discussing the current PageRank algorithm used by Google, and its computational efficiency. He also explores alternative methods.

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The quality of comments on a blog totally depend on the blog itself, the type of content you write, and the tools and method you decide to moderate content.

On Shoemoney, Pam takes a pop at the Ifollow Movement, the lists of links to dofollow blogs that traversed the Blogosphere 6 months ago. Whilst I was included on some of those lists, I didn't take an active roll, as the lists really didn't present any value to me.

I suppose Akismet is great if you don't care about the comments on your blog, or whether the good ones appear.

Comment moderation with Spam Karma ...

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From the page: "During hard times, it's difficult to appreciate and easy to feel like a victim. However, there are plenty of opportunities to observe appreciation and to give out goodwill during these hard times."

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From the page: "I don't get why Google are getting so hatey with the people who collectively, helped them become as strong and as wealthy as they have. Its like we all created a Frankensteins monster that is just out of control having swigged a bottle of A grade Vodka smashing up the laboratory, trying to get to Dr Frankenstein and wring his neck!"

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From the page: "It may even mean that we see text link selling become a more valuable thing to do as the supply of publishers willing to sell links dwindles. I know that even in the last month I've been approached on three occasions by individuals wanting to buy links on individual posts on my blogs - and the monetary value of these links was significantly larger than anything I'd heard of being achieved before for single links."

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From the page: "Scratchback is a new cool widget link selling affiliate thing created by Jim Kukral that is still in private beta. However i saw it in the public so I commented in the following video about what i saw:"

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Courtney stopped by to let me know about what appears to be a real PageRank update that is in progress, if there can ever be a real update again.

Many of the blogs highlighted in the update just a couple of days ago seem to have reverted to their previous position.

Now for anyone who might be thinking otherwise, there are still some obvious penalties in place for a few sites, but it is less obvious for the more vocal networks.

Some sites and networks still have a penalty, as do some sites.

Some of those penalties seem to be a carry over from ...

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From the page: "It's All About Networking One of the main reason this blog got so much traffic in such a short period of time (of course resulting in the 1261 rss subscribers) is because I spend about 2-4 hours a day stumbling posts, Digging, and networking with other bloggers. It would not have been possible to achieve those results otherwise I think. But anyway, I just love it :)"

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From the page: "Then look at their webstats and their site metrics, look at their published subscriber numbers. Look at their Alexa, compete and technorati numbers. Look at the people who are commenting on their stuff, look at how well they are linked to and on what sort of terms. Then ask yourself why that is, I tell you what, Iâ€ll save you the bother with the answer, as the answer is simple - All of the above are quality resources with something to say, it really is that simple."

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From the page: "What's even more troubling is how unconscious opportunity seekers are to this "blind inner idiot" controlling their actions. Is it only me who sees this? Am I the only one whose perplexed with the inherent disconnect between what people say they " understand and agree with" and what they go running to the back of the room to buy?"

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Andy Greenberg of Forbes got it totally wrong when he wrote Google Scares The Search Crowd

In many ways Google should be a little worried about the blogosphere reaction.

I was the centre of attention more by chance and timing than anything else, as I am sure it wouldn't have taken my worthy SEO colleagues long to make a list of sites that have been hit by PageRank penalties and spot some patterns.

As almost everyone discussing PageRank updates was linking to me, and I was trying to keep up with the Blogstorm, moderating trackbacks and comments, and even trying to respond both ...

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From the page: "Many of my subscribers I have targeted specifically by using social network ice breakers. I use these ice breakers to pick out key people in the SEO industry with the intent of them seeing me and subscribing to my blog. Once they I believe that they are getting to know me I will go farther and pick off one by one to become closer and enter their inner circles. Once I have reached these inner circles asking for an interview or other such favors will be that much easier."

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From the page: "So who got hit then? This PageRank update seems like yet another example of FUD. The only thing that has changed, is the TBPR. The PR-punished websites donâ€t see changes in rankings and the text link buyers also rank pretty high in most cases. So, what kind of penalty is this? The only ones that got hit are PageRank sellers. Their only selling point is PageRank, because they most often have a poor website with crappy backlinks. And with that PageRank sliced from 6 to 3, they have even less to offer to possible advertisers. And letâ€s be honest, is ...

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From the page: "I put together a list of charities and organizations that are accepting financial contributions intended to help those affected by the 2007 Southern California Wildfires. If anyone else has an organization or charity that should be added to the list, please contact me, by clicking on the yellow envelope above, and I'll get it added."

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Some of these badges people are creating have me in stitches. Looks like Google have become the joke of the blogosphere

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...if you want to

I was the first person to mention that the code used by Widgetbucks included a hidden link just a few hours after they launched, but the problem only really got noticed when Shoemoney wrote about this 2 weeks later.

Widgetbucks emailed their publishers today reporting an update in their code which you can include on your sites.

First of all they state:-

One of the concerns we've heard from many of you has been the slow loading times of our widgets. We really appreciate your feedback and comments in helping us improve in this area. So, today we addressed this ...

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From the page: "Growing to the Next Level Will Require a Different Skill Set What has grown this blog to the level that it is at today will not grow it to a million page views a month. I see that more clearly now than ever before. I canâ€t count on text link advertising at all anymore. Social Media wonâ€t cut it. Advertisers want more quality traffic than that. And Iâ€ve networked the hell out of the blogosphere - thereâ€s only so many ways to grow a blog inside of a relatively finite community."

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From the page: "Why - Delicious of course. Example: iBegin Source. I can immediately see what people associate the site with. Notice how no one mentions `yellow' for localeze, but mentioned multiple times for Amacai."

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From the page: "I've given yesterday's Google smackdown a bit of thought over the past 24 hours. I've been angry, sad, indifferent, resigned. I've gone through the entire spectrum of emotion over the deal trying to figure out how it would affect what I do and how I do it. After sleeping on the matter for the past day and reading the opinions of lots of other people who were affected, I'm inclined to let Google shoot themselves in the foot."

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From the page "PR Killer! v1.05 - Program used to target individual websites and lower there PR with a click of a button and a captcha code. Version 1.06 should be out soon and will no longer use captcha to validate the user, it will now use a retina scanner to ensure it is in fact Matt Cutts. Some rumors are floating around in regards to someone using this program without permission and lowering the PR of some websites that did not deserve it earlier in the week."

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From the page: "If you want to watch a bunch of A-list bloggers and business folks at big-name news sites go a little ape, I recommend observing them when their Google PageRank takes a hit."

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From the page: "Well guess what, Google? Those are the exact same people you are currently attacking. The people who supported you in your early years and the people who have the ability to influence the non-tech folks. It's not a wise move to piss them off in great numbers. Sure, you're currently top of the pile but with every one of your snidey little digs at the SEO community or the web development community or the blogging community, you chip away at your power base."

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From the page:"Due to Google's apparent assault on Paid Links resulting in some sites' PageRank being reduced, Digital Point forum members will have to be guarded 24 hours a day for the foreseeable future."

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For a company such as Google with a stock price based extensively on anticipated growth and public sentiment, it doesn't take a huge swing in goodwill to have a dramatic effect on valuation. Google has just slapped their biggest fans.

After the very controversial hit many sites took just 2 weeks ago for various degrees of selling PageRank or linking to clients, you might have thought Google would take a breather, but Google it seems hadn't even started its crackdown.

A number of sites have been hit yet again, including this one, but there is also a new element that has been ...

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What will you be wearing this halloween?

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The difference between SEO Friendly Web Design and Search Engine Optimization From the page: "Please note, a search engine friendly website design does not constitute a SEO Agreement between Hobo and any company. Our SEO clients in cases pay us tens of thousands of pounds on average to continually promote and tweak their site to generate leads from the new site and a seo agreement is 100% separate from any web development appointment. SEO is about competing in the search engines for keywords. This requires constant analysis over time."

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From the page: "Perhaps meta-blogging principles work better for informational websites who aim to teach. The different nature of entertainment sites have shown me that you don't need to do a whole lot of tedious work to make real, solid income from free content."

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Michael totally rips Mahalo apart from an SEO point of view demonstrating how little Jason Calacanis knows about SEO or SEOs. Jason should Fedex Michael a case of cool ones for this. From the page: "Want to see some really helpful sessions try sitting in on a site audit session you'll really get a much better understanding of what people in the real world have to go through. Now to prove my point I'll do a little mini review of Mahalo for you, free of charge no $199.95 or call me later at the office tricks …"

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From the page: "I just gained my 400th fan on Stumbleupon My growth rate on Stumble has been exponential the last couple of months. I think I had less that 100 fans 3 months ago. I changed the way I use Stumble and people seem to like it. I don't even call it a tactic, as the way I am using it is the way I would use it if it gathered no friends. Basically all I do is us it as a bookmarking tool and am very focussed on the topics I cover, which is online marketing."

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From the page: "Google Blog Search is currently flawed, and shows all your own posts as incoming links. This is a waste of your productivity, and also means that you must manually check Technorati to see the number of new blog reactions and incoming links your blog is receiving."

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An inspirational story From the page: "Michele Hoskins decided to create a product out of her great grandmother's syrup recipe. After she had it formulated and packaged, she took the products to local grocery stores, asking them to stock the product and if they sold, she would invoice them. This worked well, but she had bigger ideas. Her goal was to get the syrup into Dennyâ€s restaurants."

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From the page: "We close out each week with our "Who Said That?",where we give some link love to other blogs and regular websites that we feel you may find interesting. Letâ€s get started!"

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From the page: "Next time you choose a face to appear on the web or in an ad, consider where it draws the beholder's eyes. Ask yourself whether the image draws attention away from your persuasive message."

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From the page: "Watching how Gravatar changed and evolved over the years I saw a service with great adoption and potential, but facing some classic problems of scale that successful sites are often lucky to run into. Scaling happens to be something my company, Automattic, is very good at, and as we started chatting with Tom Werner of Gravatar it became obvious thereâ€s a lot of potential for combined forces, and I also saw a lot of parallels to Akismet, a product that does one thing, does it well, and has an open API so any platform can use it.So ...

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From the page: "First, you need to start with an initial list of arbitrarily chosen sources. I say arbitrary because the bot, scrapper, algorithm or what have you needed some place to start its journey. This type of seeding is likely how sites like the New York Times, Scripting, Techcrunch, Digg and the generic tech media got into the system. Alternatively, if you don't like the idea of an initial seed set of sites " you can assume that the algorithm pulled in a list of heavily linked sites that deal with technology news. I tend to believe the initial seed ...

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From the page:- "So when is a $600-a-share stock price not the best thing in the world? Well, apparently sometimes when you're Google. Netly News had an interesting assertion today upon seeing another Top Googler (that is, one who has risen through the ranks to become well enough known to actually have a story written about him leaving a company be the lead story on TechMeme) leave Google today: that astronomical stock price could very likely be pushing rising stars away because as good as Google is, there stock is at $600; it's not going to be doubling anytime soon ...

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From the page: "As a beginning entrepreneur, you need to be very careful about how you spend your time. Setting action goals and a daily schedule is vitally important to achieve internet marketing success. Yet many, if not most fail to accomplish this very important step."

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From the page: "Let me share the steps in the process first, and then I'll show how I used the process to develop a specific vision for Daily Marketing Ace. Perhaps you will find it helpful when you sit down to do the heavy lifting of clarifying and documenting your own vision. And I do mean "heavy lifting" this is, in no way, easy work, but the impact it can have on your business is profound."

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From the page: "Marissa chats with Om and Joyce about what she's most excited about at Google, taking maps, to the next level, the APIs, and privacy... ... along with Google's strategy in acquiring technology startups (or, why YouTube was worth 1.67B), and why Google chooses to acquire something vs developing it in-house."

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From the page: "Olthuis' solution? He created a page on LifeInsure's site listing "19 Things You Probably Don't Know About Death," and posted it to Digg. The list--which enumerated "facts" like a person's ability to remain conscious 15 seconds after decapitation--was a hit with Digg's users, who voted for the page 1,332 times. Those positive votes, or "diggs," pushed the list to the top of Digg's home page and drew tens of thousands of visitors to LifeInsure."

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From the page: "I'm not saying that untargeted traffic is better than targeted. All I am saying here is that all traffic has some value. If you are paying good money for untargeted traffic then you might want to rethink your strategy but if you happen to be getting it for free, then continue to celebrate it."

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From the page: "I felt the main points were largely ignored in the flurry of discussion that followed. To Randâ€s credit though, he contacted me and initiated a discussion which eventually evolved into the following discussion between Rand, Pops, and myself. Rather than interpreting or paraphrasing the discussion, thus allowing room for error and disagreement, we decided to publish the discussion for all to read and digest. While I donâ€t think this is a â€oeflowers and puppy dogs weâ€ve kissed and made up post” I do feel it was a productive discussion and Rand addressed each issue I brought up."

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From the page: "Be aware of how much youâ€re progressing through your current strategy. Quit dreaming that you will wake up one morning to find tens of thousands of search engine hits with no additional effort. SEO will probably not get you there by itself unless youâ€re willing to do more of what youâ€re doing. Change your path and you will change your future."

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From the page: "So Google lets its engineers decide what to put in the default bundles, and even include their own feeds if they want: no big deal, you might think. Except that there are only eight default feeds in that bundle: is there a popular soccer news site, perhaps, that lost out on inclusion? And despite its non-profit status, Footbag runs Google ads: if any of those RSS subs turned out to be real, then Footbag.org would generate ad revenue from the referred traffic. Additionally, if they ever wanted to sell ads based on their "74K" count, they couldn't: ...

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We are all marketers here on Gooruze, so trying to improve the quality of the message we offer the world through our Gooruze profile should be one of our highest priorities. I have spent a short while playing with the editor to see what is possible, even though many allowed HTML functions are not available in the editor toolbar.

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From the page: "Drag racer a.k.a. The Link Spammer These cars are built to only last a few hundred yards. You can't drive a dragster for a long time, they're built for sprinting only. While might be a lot of fun to drive these types of cars (man, these things are fast!), making it to the next gas station is out of the question. You'll never make it."

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Some tips on affiliate links when blogging - sometimes I am lazy

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From the page: "Today I will get more into the nuts and bolts of what I have actually done to set up this blog. This post series is based on Courtney Tuttle's great article called 5,263 Words on Starting a Profitable Blog."

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fron the article: "I'm a big fan of Google Analytics. I stand by my statement that it's good enough for 90% of the web analytics market. With the addition of these options, and the favorable price point-FREE-you really have no excuse for keeping an eye on your site's performance."