The Future of SEO Consultancy

Posted on May 2, 2010 by admin

I run a SEO Company, and I constantly question the future and how stable it is. I personally believe that pure “seo consultancy” is a shrinking market and that if you don’t diversify your business you’ll find yourself without a company in the next year or two. It is truly a frightening place to be at the moment. This is because Google’s algorithm is each day becoming slightly more resilient to people trying to manipulate the results for their own gain this is partly down to: Google is reducing the area within a particular webpage from where it counts and trusts links and has other factors to determine whether a link is trusted or not. I estimate that 97% of links that are “purposely” built do not pass PageRank and only the very best link-builders are able to create links which can reliably pass PageRank in any sort of volume. There is a very fine line between ROI and not when it comes to paid links in any sort of competitive vertical market, I don’t have any moral or ethical issue with paid links, all my decisions are based on the amount of margin I can make and I don’t think that paid linking with aggressive anchor text linking is where it’s at anymore in terms of securing a long-term future.

Around 30% of my new business enquiries are for Viral Marketing and Social Media Marketing and this number is growing quickly, people are starting to look past the “free listings on Google” and are starting to diversify their online marketing budgets. Pure Search Engine Optimisation is so competitive these days and the diminishing ROI from a clients point of view makes them not want to commit such large sums of money chasing some top terms which may or may not ever appear, makes investing in pure SEO not appear very prudent now or tomorrow.

SEO agencies need to diversify into full service agencies that offer a full bouquet of services and make SEO just one of the 4, 5 or 6 main services that they offer. I predict the term “SEO” will die in the next few years and we’ll talk about Google rankings and traffic growth from a far more holistic “Online Marketing” standpoint which will include everything from Google Organics, PPC, Social Media Marketing, Viral Marketing to video marketing. A company wanting to grow with search traffic and social traffic will need to participate in nearly every form of online marketing to stand a reasonable chance of success.

There are more sharks and less fish these days and the trend looks to continue for many years to come.

Whinge Post: Why Does Google Penalize Sites that Get Updated?

Posted on August 3, 2009 by admin

There is something that has been bugging me for a while, Google penalizes sites that change more than a little at once. It’s hugely frustrating to see your site disappear for months just for updating or adding content. This could be just one page that gets totally changed or an entire site for changing the homepage or adding a substantial amount of content – say > 50% in one go.

I have seen this happen to a wide range of sites, some owned by me and managed by myself and some that are totally unrelated. There is only one pattern: That’s change and get dropped for three months. It’s totally absurd to penalize legitimate sites for updating their content, I mean what does Google want – a bunch of old content in it’s index?? (I know this has been the common moan for years)

Google really needs to tweak it’s algo so it realises that a site mostly the same has not been sold or switched for spam. How hard can it be? Example: Site A is still on topic and only 60% has changed, the likelihood is that it’s the same site, not some dodgy spam. These filters seriously need to be relaxed by a great deal in my opinion.

We all know that their are exceptions, if the site is trusted massively, then it’s probably not going to drop – but for most sites, they are not authority sites that have that trust box checked and thus are going to take a long absence from the SERPS.

Matt Cutts: I implore you to review this nano part of the Algo and let sites have more flexibility to update and keep themselves current.

Google Algo UK Brand Update

Posted on June 29, 2009 by admin

Google pushed it’s algo update in the UK this weekend, it leans heavily towards ranking big brands highly in the SERPS over the teeny tiny guys who took years to get there. Just one click of the mouse and boom, Big Brands up, people who have invested huge money in their rankings obliterated.

It’s a sad day for sure as it spells the beginning of the end of traditional SEO. If you though SEO was hard before, it has now entered a whole new dimension and the gravitational forces are ten times stronger. Many of the weaker SEO companies will be wiped out which will release some of the clients back into the SEO market. (Good for the better ones, bad for average ones with families to feed)

Sure many SEO tools are free, but links are not getting any cheaper and building a brand can take years and a good chunk of change.

I’ve put out my feelers as to how to turn your little website into a giant that can compete with the rest of them, and the answers I have been getting back are less than encouraging. Most people are saying “forget the short-tail, focus on the long-tail”. While this is a solution, it’s a pretty bad one as it means we’ll be targeting less traffic, just to stay alive. Personally, I will not stop targeting the highly competitive keywords, as I don’t want to miss out on that traffic. I will turn some of my sites into “amazing brands” and let them compete with the traditional companies that now occupy the lucrative spaces on Google.

I’ll be creating jaw dropping sites, with super content and usability along with incredible tools and then marketing the hell out of them. I think YOU CAN still compete with the big names, but you have to be highly creative and work your ass off to get those authority links. (This is obviously ideal for Google), and the long term future of your sites.

So don’t panic, there is hope but you’re going to need to sit down and work out a hard hitting strategy along with some aspects to your site that are very interesting for your visitors.

Whacky Google Shakeup in the SERPS

Posted on June 7, 2009 by admin

Google is tweaking is algorithm as it does regularly, we seems to get one of these “large” shakeups every two one three months now, where the results are significantly mixed up.

However, I can’t believe what’s going on at the moment is going to last, the results are truly weird and have some irrelevance creeping in. For example:

1. A number of US based sites creeping in financial based searches and ranking well, this is totally pointless in the UK as we can’t buy their products.

2. Duplicate results for the same search on the same page. eg: “SEO” on Google.co.uk

This may just be testing, and this post maybe largely irrelevant tomorrow, but I do hope it changes soon.

Google’s Best Spam Weapon is it’s Indexing Intelligence

Posted on May 30, 2009 by

Just a short post on how Google combats spam with it’s indexing, or lack there of. Anyone that’s been around for a while will know that it’s better to target long tail traffic for several reasons:

1) It converts very well
2) It’s easier to get that the competitive phrases

As your skill develops, you start to build these “mega spam sites” that offer little value to the web in general and are just built out of pure greed. You build them in hope of capturing a lot of long tail traffic, stuff that is highly unique, three four and five word phrases. Because, there are so many option and variants, you build hundreds of thousands of pages, as you try to cover every possible angle, as people searching for purpose built pages will almost certainly find yours first and visit your site. It’s a magnet for traffic and business.

And then you run into a problem…Google will only index a very small percentage of your site, and try as you might you just can’t get it to index a meaningful amount of the pages to deliver the traffic you so badly want.

If you are really on top of your game you can get around it without too much expense or time, but it closes the door to many spammers having a go.

How Google can reduce its paid link spam by 25%

Posted on March 24, 2009 by admin

I don’t know why Google hasn’t done this before, but it would be incredibly easy for Google to reduce its paid link spam. As we all know, Google is the master of FUD and has thus created a culture of fear amongst link buyers and sellers. Google and/or Matt Cutts could reduce the number of links being sold by sending out a friendly message to the link sellers through webmaster tools and through the contact details on their website. A friendly message might include:

“Dear Webmaster, we noticed that you are possibly selling links on your website. As you might know, selling links is against Google’s guidelines and you risk having your site penalised or removed from the index completely, this would result in your website not showing up in Google and you getting now traffic at all…”

Now, most people getting this message will **** themselves and would probably remove all paid links straight away.

There you are Google; your index now has far less spam than it did previously

Google Rankings Highly Unstable

Posted on July 7, 2008 by admin

I’ve noticed recently that Google’s rankings are particularly unstable. This has happened before. Previously the rankings went through a period of changing up to twenty times in a single day.

Alas, this volatile period seems to have returned with even more fury. We’re seeing some of our sites on the first page and then another search shows them on page two or three. Never before have I managed to affect the rankings so dramatically by just pressing F5.

I noticed a comment posted by Jeremy Luebke on Aaron Walls community forum:

“Forget a daily shuffle, I can hit search and get one SERP, and then hit the button again and get a different set of results. So I am seeing instant shuffling all day long.

Here is another weird thing.

When I talk about a SERP I mean from 1-1000 for each search with it being pages to 10 listings per page. I click search and get a set of SERPs. I click to go to the 2nd page and get a different set of SERPs. In other words, the 2nd page may contain results that where on the first page because the results shuffled between pages. Also results that should have been on the 2nd page are nowhere to be found because the SERP of the 2nd page actually ranks the site on the first page.

This happens logged in or not on 3 different machines & 6 browsers, one of which is my testing box which has never once logged into Google and always clears cookies so this goes way beyond personalization or web history.”

Strange times at the moment, lets hope things become more stable soon.

10 Google Easter Eggs

Posted on July 1, 2008 by admin

An Easter Egg is best described as a message or feature which is hidden in a piece of software, be it a DVD, CD, program, or video game. Below I’ve listed 10 Google-related Easter Eggs in no particular order, they are:

1. It’s been fixed now, but it used to be possible to ask Google Maps for directions from – for example – Providence, Rhode Island (in the US) to Rome in Italy (in Europe) and be told that you would have to swim many thousands of miles across the Atlantic Ocean in order to get there.

2. Famous photographer-evader Nessie the Loch Ness monster has been spotted just off the coast of Google. If you set your browser to the Beach iGoogle theme and wait until 3:14am, Nessie will surface from the sea for approximately 60 seconds. The rumour is that Google developers wanted to create a tribute to the mathematical quatity Pi (roughly equal to 3.14159). Similar instances that occur at this time on other themes include the Aurora Borealis appearing in the Seasonal Scape, or kitsune (mythical fox spirits common to Japanese folklore) appearing in the Tea House theme.

3. The Google calculator facility can often be a useful tool, but it is not without its fair share of easter eggs. Have a search for the “answer to life the universe and everything” and see what you get. Ever wanted to know the “number of horns on a unicorn”? Try searching for it now, and the calculator will let you know.

4. Ever wanted to momentarily pretend you were Elmer Fudd? Google gives you that chance with Google Elmer Fudd. Further possibilities include Pig Latin and even Klingon.

5. If you open up Picasa – Google’s free image software – and use the shortcut Ctrl-Shift-Y, a teddy bear will show up. The more you press it, the more bears will pop up, until they eventually take over the screen.

6. Included in the Spam folder in Google Mail, just above the “Delete” button and where you usually come across advertising spam of some sort, you’ll find various recipes that include Spam as the main ingredient.

7. Hidden within the Google Earth program is a flight simulator. Accessed by pressing Ctrl-Alt-A on the keyboard (or Command-Option-A for Macs), you’re given the chance to try your hand at piloting either a propeller-powered plane or an F16 jet. You’re also given a choice of starting from a number of famous airports. Controls are available, and I recommend you read them, as I crashed even before I’d taken off. Hopefully you’ll fare better, good luck!

8. Google Maps has a tiny character called the Pegman show up whenever you zoom in close enough to experience Google Street Views. Occasionally, depending on the time of year, Google dresses the Pegman up in different costumes. For example, at Halloween he becomes a witch, and at Christmas he becomes a snowman.

9. If you type in “google easter eggs” and hit the”I’m Feeling Lucky” button, you’re treated to a minigame in which you control a rabbit and have to catch eggs which then spell out the word “Google”.

The following isn’t really an easter egg as such, but I thought I’d include it anyway.

10. As part of an April Fool’s joke in 2007, Google decreed that it would be launching Gmail Paper. This system would allow a Gmail user to print their entire account’s worth of emails and have it shipped to them as a hard copy. No amount would be too much, as it was possible to “print one, one thousand, or one hundred thousand of your emails”.

Google Delivers Better ROI than Major Sport Sponsorship By a Mile

Posted on June 24, 2008 by admin

Formula 1 (F1) is the highest class of open wheel racing and is a very popular motor sport in Europe, which is becoming globalised. Each seasons eighteen races will be watched by more than a billion viewers. It is also a multi-billion dollar industry. For those in the USA who are less familiar with F1, the cars look similar to Indy cars, except they race on a circuit as opposed to an oval. While Indy is a Burger and Beer type of atmosphere, F1 is Champaign and Caviar.

F1 is an abundance of excess and glamour, many major A-List celebrities are seen at every race rubbing shoulders with their favorite team and drivers.

So you would think you would be safe to believe that sponsoring a team would be great for your business and make your sales shoot through the roof? Not so. Notice the traffic trends below, kindly supplied by Robin Goad from Hitwise.

This chart shows two companies that sponsor one of the oldest teams, Williams F1. They have been racing successfully for thirty years.I chose two companies who haven’t sponsored a team before and don’t have a well know brand yet. This would give us a good idea as to how effective the sponsorship actually is.

The blue line shows a clothing fashion label called www.allsaints.co.uk, it shows a doubling of traffic at the start of the year. It is unclear what marketing efforts account for this at the start of the year. However, it is well before the F1 season starts and doesn’t seem to be associated with it. The traffic is still comparably low, suggesting they are getting less than 200,000 visitors per month.

The next company is called www.mydiamonds.com, a high end jewelry retailer. Unlike the previous example at the start of the season you can see a rise in traffic. However, the traffic does not really climb to any sort of substantial level. This would indicate that they only have a couple of thousand visitors per month looking at the graph. Take into consideration the amount they are paying to be a major sponsor of the team, and you’ll see that the direct return is extremly poor and does not represent good value in terms of ROI. My understanding is that they are paying between $5 Million & $10 Million dollars PER SEASON. Their web address is placed prominently on the rear wing of the car and gets a significant amount of TV time.

Give me a $10 Million dollar budget and I’d give you a return which is thousands of times better than what they are currently getting. I also checked their backlinks and they have fewer than 100!

Think carefully before investing in offline advertising or sponsorship which is costly. One maybe wiser and make a much higher return in a shorter timeframe to use Google and other major traffic generators.

PingPongPie.com

A few cynicals and internets mixed in with a couple of randoms.

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