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31 Dec
29 Dec This post is from from my other blog here The quiz is complete, the answers have been graded, and we have a winner! 250 of you took tried to take the 2007 Search Marketing Quiz over the past couple days, and only 10 people … yes, 10 people … answered all 11 questions correctly. So, either my industry peers aren’t as up on the latest news as I expected, or I just way overshot with questions that were too difficult. Hmmm. (Note to self: Easier questions next year.) I purposely made the last question difficult, but didn’t realize the others would be such a challenge. Since 10 people tied with 11 ...
28 Dec
28 Dec This post is from from my other blog here The search marketing industry is remarkable for how much writing, sharing, and helping we do collectively. Think about it this way: A business owner with zero knowledge of search marketing could use the material we all give away on our blogs and message boards to save (tens of) thousands of dollars by learning it all him/herself. So, while it may seem self-congratulatory, I think there’s plenty of value in all the year-end awards we do. (And I’ll be putting my money where my mouth is on that count in a couple weeks.) Small Business SEM is currently nominated in two awards:
28 Dec This post is from from my other blog here I really dig this time of year when so many people stop and reflect on what’s happened in the past 12 months. Right before Christmas, I started saving a few of my favorite 2007 Recap posts, and then decided to go whole hog and save everything I could find that was at least somewhat related to the search/Internet industry. My list is below, and you’re welcome to add more in the comments if you know of anything I missed. Best Blog Posts
Internet Industry
Blogger’s Choices
Top Searches
27 Dec This post is from from my other blog here 
Hehehehe. Kinda clever & kinda lame. Can’t decide if I should click that button at the bottom…. This is a post from Matt McGee's blog, Small Business SEM. How to Use Yahoo Answers to Make Money
26 Dec This post is from from my other blog here If you think you know your search and marketing industry news, and want to win a $25 prize just for being smart, this is the quiz for you. It’s called the 2007 Search Marketing Quiz, and it has 11 questions that will test your knowledge of news and events over the past 12 months in SEO, social media, online marketing, and more. Here’s How It Works1.) There are 11 multiple-choice questions. 2.) The clock starts ticking as soon as you click the link below. 3.) As soon as you get one wrong, the quiz is over for you. 4.) The winner will be the ...
24 Dec This post is from from my other blog here
(Making the jacket/sweatshirt even cooler is that I don’t think Tamar has one!) That’s not the only reason this is a “become-ing” Christmas. ...
23 Dec This post is from from my other blog here For those of you who are new SBS readers & subscribers, here’s a list of noteworthy posts you probably missed from one year ago. I try to put together a post like this each month. Scroll to the end to see previous Flashbacks.
Don’t Miss: SBS Flashback: November 2006 SBS Flashback: October 2006 SBS Flashback: September 2006 SBS Flashback: August 2006 SBS Flashback: July 2006 SBS Flashback: June 2006 SBS Flashback: May 2006
21 Dec This post is from from my other blog here Let’s see if I can crank this out on a quick lunch break… What We Know: This is Awards Season. Every year, in many industries, the end of one year and start of a new year is a time for giving and receiving awards. It’s also the time for reviewing the year with Top 10 and Best Of lists. What Might Happen: You might win an award! Or get included on someone’s “Best of” or “Top 25″ list. What That Means: Generally speaking, if you win an award, or get included on someone’s list, you’re going to get a link, and, it’ll ...
19 Dec This post is from from my other blog here The end of Google’s supplemental index means webmasters have one less tool to help determine overall site quality (in Google’s eyes). This “tool” was essentially rendered useless months ago when the green label disappeared from the SERPs, but many found different ways to get at the same data. Though I didn’t know it at the time, I suspect some data that I shared last month was indicative of the supplemental index. To wit: On November 8, I reported some staggering drops in “pages indexed” by Google for many high-profile web sites. Today, Google announced that the supplemental index is gone. Result? ...
18 Dec This post is from from my other blog here Cold weather, crowded shopping malls, and industry awards: three signs that tell you it’s the end of the year. For the third time, Loren Baker is running the Search Blog Awards at Search Engine Journal. These awards are geared toward honoring the best blogs in the search industry, and I’m flattered to have been nominated by a couple people in a couple different categories. Use the link to learn more and make sure your favorite blog is nominated. Meanwhile, Performancing is also taking nominations for its 2007 Performancing Blog Awards. This covers a variety of blog industries such as Best Sports Blog, ...
18 Dec This post is from from my other blog here It’s beginning to look like Christmas in my office and family room. The mailman just brought me a little black box with the familiar racing logo that belongs to Pole Position Marketing. I opened it up and found this super-cool USB Cup and Warming Plate, complete with the PPM logo and everything. Sweet! Thank you to Stoney and the whole PPM gang. 
Out in the family room is more search schwag — this time it’s a huge and comfy bean bag chair from the Gooruze online marketing community, where I’m ...
17 Dec This post is from from my other blog here
16 Dec This post is from from my other blog here Last week was probably the best ever for articles and posts about local search. Several things that caught my attention, which I’ll list and discuss as needed below. Greg Sterling: TheFind Introduces Local Shopping
Ages ago, I wrote about real-time inventory being the “killer app” for local search. That’s the holy grail, at least where local search and e-commerce meet. In his post, Greg Sterling writes about how TheFind is trying to solve this by matching products on retail web sites to the physical addresses of the retailer’s stores. What’s not clear to me is if TheFind is actually showing real-time inventory; ...
15 Dec This post is from from my other blog here
15 Dec This post is from from my other blog here It’s been forever since I’ve done one of these, so here’s a themed roundup of previous posts on SBS that I hope will be beneficial to the growing new readership, and even to long-time readers who may have forgotten about some of these from the archives. Today’s theme is Local Search. These are ordered from newest to oldest.
I’ll do more of these in the future on other topics. And I invite you to add additional Local Search links (from other sources) in the comments!
14 Dec This post is from from my other blog here
13 Dec This post is from from my other blog here
This service isn’t open to the public yet. I’m assuming that if/when it does launch, it will function like Squidoo in this sense: When you create a Knol, you’ll get to choose the URL where your Knol will live. So, with that in mind, here’s what you should do right away if/when Google Knol launches: 1.) Sign up and create a profile. ...
13 Dec This post is from from my other blog here
A Small Business Year-End Web Site Checklist And it looks like the column is also on Sphinn.
12 Dec This post is from from my other blog here
10 Dec This post is from from my other blog here
09 Dec This post is from from my other blog here
09 Dec This post is from from my other blog here Top 4 Things I Did Last Week (in hours spent) 1.) Worked. 2.) Slept. 3.) Moderated Sphinn. 4.) Read Pubcon and SES session recaps. Numbers three and four are a direct result of the bozos that decided to schedule two conferences at the same time. (Thanks for nothing.) Since Danny Sullivan was (I think) the only person to attend both conferences (update: Simon says Li Evans did, too), I’m guessing a lot of you want to know what you missed at the other one. Well, how’s it feel to want? Touché! Oh, alright. I see how it works: I stay home. I read. I write recap. ...
08 Dec This post is from from my other blog here I’ll admit to not using MSN Search … err, “Live Search” … very often, so I was surprised to see some new content appearing in the SERPs over the past few days. By all accounts, it looks like a very early version of what has now become “Universal Search” (Google’s term) or “Blended Search” (everyone but Google’s term). It all began when I did a search for [furniture] on Live Search. Right below the sponsored listings is a small, hard-to-see green arrow pointing to “Top local listings for furniture near kennewick, washington“. 
The arrow is so small and so lightly-colored ...
07 Dec This post is from from my other blog here
03 Dec This post is from from my other blog here I’ve never recommended that a small business client sign up for Digg and start using the service with the goal of social marketing there. Maybe I will someday, but I don’t think the time and effort that would be involved to start from scratch at this point justifies the potential rewards. As I said in the recent interview I did with Karl Ribas: I think it’s probably a waste of time for most small businesses to spend six months playing on Digg, trying to create a “power user” profile.
01 Dec This post is from from my other blog here As Danny Sullivan points out, Search Engine Land is a year old today. First and foremost, congrats to Danny, Chris, Barry, Michelle, and everyone else involved in an ultra-successful first year! I consider it an honor to be one of SEL’s columnists, and have become a big fan of the SMX conference series and the Sphinn social community, too. Putting together three creations like those is a lot to accomplish in just 12 months! Now, on to the good stuff… (stay with me on this) If you turn back the clock 16 months to August, 2006, there was a lot of uncertainty ...
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Okay, small business owners … you may have read already about the new 
It’s been a while since I’ve had a byline on Search Engine Land, but my latest “Small Is Beautiful” column is there now. The advice in there includes a few things I need to do with this blog and the other sites I manage (my 
If you’re going to become a valuable member of a social community, it’s ...