1. If People Respect You They Will Pay You for Your Time

    1 week, 3 days ago

    Every day I still get lots of emails and phone calls asking me to answer SEO questions and how to build their businesses for free. I get far more email than I could possibly answer, but much of it is from people who place a $0 value on my time - which does not scale as a 1 person business, especially after the failure of communism.

    There are a couple great things about running a paid members only forum in a marketplace dominated by the cheaper faster free mindset

    • When people pay they value and appreciate what they pay for and are more likely to act upon it. The act of paying for information increases its utility and value.
    • Lots of people dig up scoops and have a wide array of experience that make the forums far more valuable than they could ever be with just the experience of one person or a small group.
    • The pricepoint filters out people who do not value my time or their own time. This has multiple benefits, a couple of which are listed below.
      • Rather than being chuck full of the self promotional hype, affiliate offers, and misinformation that dominate most public forums our private forums have a much higher signal to noise ratio.
      • Rather than rushing through hundreds of emails just to finish them, I can take time and do the best job I can answering the questions of the people who actually value my advice.

    There is no such thing as pricing pressure. You just need to focus on the people who care about what you have to offer, and ignore the 99% of the market that does not.

    Aaron Wall

  2. Wordpress Hosting

    1 week, 4 days ago

    Wordpress Hosting recommended by Wordpress
    I kinda just had a big argument with a client and I need to vent a little, after setting up a blog on Pair.com on my reseller account, the client rings me and asks which preferred wordpress hosting company did I chose. I asked “what did he mean2 and he pointed […]

    Dave Naylor

  3. Bill Gates: How a Geek Changed the World

    1 week, 4 days ago

    If you missed it, it on BBC Iplayer here
    I love the get the Old team together, and how they worked in the early days.

    then Today :

    Ther’s a great bit with Sir Alan Sugar.. classic..
    Dave

    Dave Naylor

  4. $100 of FREE Text Links

    Recently

    The friendly folks at Tet Link Ads are offering all new customers

    Text Link Ads

  5. Google AdPlanner Media Buy Planning Tool

    1 week, 4 days ago

    Google announced AdPlanner, a tool to help ad agencies find where desired demographic audiences are active online. The WSJ highlighted how the new Google tool can help make the ad marketplace more efficient:

    The Web-audience data could be combined with the ad-serving system, so that advertisers would be able to find out whether they would reach the right audience before they committed to placing an ad.

    In addition to AdPlanner, Google will launch another tool that compares consumer response to ads against a control group of users who did not see the ad:

    Separately, Google this week is expected to roll out a new tool aimed at showing how Web surfers respond to online ads. It will compare groups of people who are exposed to an ad with others who haven’t seen it, taking into account such factors as search activity and site visitation.

    Update: Search Engine Land Reviewed AdPlanner.

    Aaron Wall

  6. Is Microsoft Disruptive

    1 week, 5 days ago

    Disruptive Technology
    Disruptive technology is a term which I first heard at a Microsoft event,which in turn made me dig a little deeper, basically it describes a new technology that unexpectedly knocks out an established technology.
    The more I thought about it a few things hit home. Take VCR’s when I was a kid these were the […]

    Dave Naylor

  7. Yahoo makes me so mad !

    1 week, 5 days ago

    Tomorrow will be 13 weeks since Yahoo acquired Indextools, and another week goes by where I have to tell a client that Google Analytic’s is the best fit for them, until Yahoo pulls it’s thumb from it’s arse.. and starts offering the ability of people to trial it again for free..
    DaveN

    Dave Naylor

  8. Uk Top Seo Blogs 2008

    1 week, 5 days ago

    What are the Top Seo Blogs in the UK.,, According to Google Trends thats is..
    I have been playing a little today, at the Moment It’s Davidnaylor.co.uk and Blogstorm.co.uk are the front runners.. andybeard.eu is third at the moment

    I have tried redflymarketing.com, cornwallseo.com, timnash.co.uk, distilled.co.uk
    so any ideas make a list of who I should check
    DaveN

    Dave Naylor

  9. AdsSpy, Google Trends, Yahoo siteexplorer

    1 week, 5 days ago

    I got an email from Gleb at seoquake asking me if I wanted a Demo (30 day free account of AdsSpy.com), seeming how I love free stuff I said yes and started to play..
    DoshDosh has189 domains wow ok ..
    Jimkarter.com 37 domains ok..
    calacanis.com and Mahalo.com .. nodata .. pfffftt
    Then I got thinking, about how we […]

    Dave Naylor

  10. Google Website Trends & The Death of Privacy

    1 week, 5 days ago

    Google launched a new version of Google Trends which includes website traffic estimates, and highlights….

    • visitor locations
    • top keywords
    • related sites

    You need to be logged into a Google account to get a numerical scale on the traffic graph, but you can still get the general trend graphs and other data without logging in. Google also allows you to compare up to 5 sites at any given time

    Search Engine Land reported that Google Trends…

    This tool bases its data off Google search data, aggregated opt-in anonymous Google Analytics data, opt-in consumer panel data, and other third-party market research.

    Those who wondered why using Google Analytics is a bad idea just got a taste of why it is a bad idea! Sure the data is only aggregated anonymously, but with Google owning 70% of the search market and having access to your analytics data you never know how deep they could decide to go through the data for competitive purposes. Is your site a keyword source for AdWords? How much of your data will appear on Google Trends?

    You can’t export the data yet and it only shows data for high traffic sites, but it is a great free tool for marketers.

    • If sites do not show any data then they are probably either low traffic sites or penalized.
    • The related sites feature lets you know how related your audience is to other sites, which is useful for determining how familiar their audience is or if you are reaching a new audience when buying ads.
    • The top keywords shows you what competing sites are getting traffic from, and if those terms tend to be more brand oriented or more generic in nature…which is useful when thinking about the stability of a website you may want to purchase.

    Fred Wilson did a review of Google Trends, comparing Google Analytics to Compete.com and comScore across 3 high traffic websites.

    Since we are investors in these three companies and know what their internal numbers are saying, I can safely say that ComScore and Compete are lower but directionally correct. Google is like Alexa in that they don’t report absolute numbers but even if they did, they are not directionally correct on this particular set of companies.

    The fact that Google is even compared to the analytics firms with years of experience and algorithmic tuning shows how easily they could take a leading position in this market if they wanted it. Google will improve their accuracy, and at any point in time they could chose to expand the top 10 keywords to the top 100 or top 1,000.

    The AP threatened to sue a blogger for quoting small passages, and at the same time the mainstream media is trying to redefine copyright for their own benefit. Eventually much of the mainstream media will start looking like eHow and Mahalo. Your content compiled and slightly rewritten by a third party. Your keyword list is their money list. Thousands of people are competing against you while you read this sentence. As your data leaks it is going to be tough to stay competitive unless you are often the topic of conversation. Public Relations is the only PR that matters.

    I am probably a bit less pessimistic than Michael is at the moment, but firms are using G.P.S. data to create “reality mining” for offline analytics, predicting everything from traffic patterns, where to buy an ad, and where to place another store. A recent NYT article highlighted some such services:

    Tony Jebara, also 34, the chief scientist and another co-founder of Sense, said, “We can predict tourism, we can tell you how confident consumers are, we can tell retailers about, say, their competitors, who’s coming in from particular neighborhoods.”

    The idea of staying competitive through obscurity is obsolete. So you may as well be a loud mouth, encourage users to be loud mouths, and build a big brand that helps protect your plot from competitive market forces.

    Aaron Wall

  11. Niche SEO Advice

    1 week, 6 days ago

    As a field get saturated one of the easiest ways to stand out is to take generalized tips from one field and apply them to another niche. Recently Rebecca mentioned this Recruitment SEO guide, and a friend of mine named Dave spotted this real estate marketing guide.

    Some resources are niche specific while others are applicable to many industries. Ping Pong Pie (nice domain name) compiled a list of top social networking sites by category. The Zip Code Guy blog offers a 27 MB database of US cities, counties, and states which works great for local keyword generation for AdWords when used in combination with tools like Speed PPC.

    Aaron Wall

  12. What’s Wrong With A Universal Google Icon

    2 weeks ago

    When Google switched to a single universal icon a few weeks back they created problems, the icons on my bookmarks toolbar are now … (wait for it) … IDENTICAL. The last two on the right are Google Analytics and Google Webmaster Central, so I have no idea which is which. Compare that to the Google […]

    Michael Gray

  13. Google’s Two Tiered Internet World Sinks to a New Low

    2 weeks ago

    Today Google released an new feature that gives away traffic stats and keywords for most websites on the internet. However what everyone failed to notice is that Google laid everyone else bare, naked and exposed but kept their own stats locked up and private.
    Here you can see the stats and keywords for my website, while […]

    Michael Gray

  14. Firefox 3 Download

    2 weeks, 1 day ago

    OK which Firefox plugins have you found that don’t work with the new Firefox ? Personally, I think the new version looks pretty good, but already people are talking about its flaws regarding plug-ins. What about page speed is it faster / slower ?
    I’ve experienced some issues on secure connection failure with Firefox 3 but […]

    Dave Naylor

  15. SEO Focus vs Website Size

    2 weeks, 1 day ago

    A website’s size can often be overwhelming especially when there are so many aspects to consider SEO wise. That’s why it’s important to have a clear focus as to what the client really wants from you even if your main role is to lead with knowledgeable direction to site architecture and indeed SEO strategy.
    Here we […]

    Dave Naylor

  16. Hey Matt Cutts Be Fair if You Are Going After Paid Links

    2 weeks, 1 day ago

    Really I wasn’t going to post this but since Matt Cutt’s asked people to snitch on paid links again I thought I’d bring up another case of Google’s double standard and two tiered justice.
    CASE A
    A public relations person starts working for a Bed & Breakfast in New England. The person comes up with the idea […]

    Michael Gray

  17. Sponsored Links

    Recently

    Google

  18. Defending Your Brand From Shadow Brands & Email Spam

    2 weeks, 1 day ago

    If you build a clean trusted brand many people will emulate your brand and leech off it. Everything from wrapping spam in the Google brand right on through to registering a domain name that sounds just like your name and doing mass email spam with it. You can’t stop all of it (or even most of it) but you can defend yourself from a lot of it by:

    1. Registering a couple of the more common alternative domain extensions (like .net and .org). This also has the benefit of locking out some competition if you own a keyword domain.
    2. Adding the word the to your domain name and buying it
    3. Adding an s to your names and buying the .com versions (the person who bought seobooks.com wanted $25,000 for it…I should have spent $8 instead)
    4. If you own a 2 or 3 word domain name consider buying the version with a hyphen between the words
    5. If you have an affiliate program you either need to actively monitor the search results or prevent affiliates from registering your brand in the URLs
    6. If your brand domain is not generically descriptive then buy not only your brand name, but also buy the name with your brand name + your field of trade in it. Just recently one well known SEO firm was the victim of brand dilution due to someone registering theirnameseo.com and doing a massive email spamming campaign.
    7. Given that the April 2007 version of Google’s remote quality rater guidelines defined social sites as vital results if they rank then it is best to register your brands on the major social sites before others do. (Someone else is already seobook on twitter and I don’t think it would be cheap or easy for me to change that at this point.)
    8. For each major product launch or linkbait launch you may also try to get at least the matching .com name (advice I wish I would have gave myself in the past).

    Some companies may also go so far as to check for other domain names containing their keywords, monitor recently registered names containing their trademarks, or pay a third party to do so. You probably do not need to go that far in most cases, but if you are going to put a lot of time and effort into building a brand then carrying an extra couple hundred dollars a year in registration costs is a negligible fee to help protect your offering from brand dilution from unsavory market competition.

    Aaron Wall

  19. flickr ads

    2 weeks, 1 day ago

    not sure how long is been happening, but I noticed canon camera ads on flickr tonight

    could be old, but I just can’t remember seeing them in the UK
    DaveN

    Dave Naylor

  20. Wordpress Theme Evil Fun

    2 weeks, 3 days ago

    No it’s not the add links at the bottom, this is better evil but better..
    get your designer to create a wordpress template as standard :

    style.css - index.php - comments.php - comments-popup.php - single.php
    page.php - category.php - author.php - date.php - archive.php - search.php

    but before the you package it up and ship it out : edit […]

    Dave Naylor


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