Online Marketing Blog

A while back I wrote an article about whether SEO firms should offer a guarantee or not. The just of it was that search engines are in control, not SEOs. Some overzealous SEO consultants may have you think otherwise. With all the hype about rankings, many companies lose sight of what’s really important, conversions and sales.

Here’s a slightly edited exchange I had yesterday. I removed specific references:

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Here I thought maybe Andy Beal was going to go with andybeal.com as his new blog. That’s not the case according to an email I just received from him. Andy has launched a new search engine marketing blog called Marketing Pilgrim, “your guide to search, interactive and new media”.

No hint as to what he’s up to though. I’m sure lots of people will be watching. Here’s the RSS feed. Nice to have you back Andy!

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I had a chance to try out the latest version of MSN’s Start.com this am and noticed the “Search for feeds” option under the “Add Content” area, which is basically a blog search. Results are not bad.

This is the MSN Start.com Blog notes several other improvements.

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Google Turns 7 Today - Search Engine Roundtable

Google Synonym Patent - Better search for Google? And potential optimization strategies in response - Threadwatch & Search Engine Watch

Blog Link Tracking - Ranking, tracking and discovering blogs. Technorati has been sucking a lot lately, so who’s up to the task? - Blog Herald & WSJ

Phishing OK with Yahoo? - Search Engine Journal

Google Backlink Update and Yahoo Updating - So what? “A watched pot never boils.”

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Since yesterday was a U.S. holiday, I did not see Andy’s email until today that his beta Multilingual Search Blog that I posted about back in www.multilingual-search.com

Andy Atkins-Kruger who is the Managing Editor has this to say about the launch:

“We felt there was a gap in the information available to search marketers who are targeting the non-English speaking world in particular. Very quickly we discovered there was a lot going on which was under-reported. Using local search marketers ?Ǭñ we can get the news worldwide as it happens. The blog user can choose to view posts by country which is something marketers asked us for to facilitate their planning and research efforts.”¬î

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At the last SES conference in San Jose, Chris Pirillo interviewed long time SEO guru, Jill Whalen where she talks about how she started out in search engine optimization and what she’s doing with her newest initiative, Search Creative.

Jill’s High Rankings Forum is one of the first Forums I started interacting with. Actually, I had been following Jill’s threads at Kim Krause’s Cre8asute Forum prior to that. When Kim announced Jill was starting her own Forum, I made sure to sign up. Jill is known for her practical and straight forward communication style. She has always promoted long term, content driven optimization tactics.

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Now here’s a concept! Google Talk ads a PageRank style bar for each person you talk to with the Google IM system.

“Much like how people unfairly judge websites by their page rank, you can now judge who you‚Äôre talking to by their Google TalkRank!”

Nothing like some good Friday fun from Blog on a Stick

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I had not noticed this until today so I am not sure how new it is. There is a new tab on Technorati called Blogs Beta for a new blog search tool called Blog Finder.

When you login you can now do several more things with your claimed blogs including: Edit the blog description, add or edit Blog Finder tags and edit the embeded display.

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By now you’ve certainly read about the BS lawsuit Traffic Power has issued against Aaron Wall. The Wall Street Journal, Slashdot and many others have picked up this story.

Aaron has a Threadwatch has a post about those details and about how you can contribute to this cause.

Somewhat Frank has posted some very useful links regarding what blogger rights. Also, I don’t want it misconstrued that my support for Aaoron means I think it’s ok to defame or libel companies on blogs, because I don’t. The issue here is that there is a big difference between explaining your personal opinion and experience and doing the things TP is alleging.

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Every day I get emails from PR people or companies that are letting us know about products/services they would like mentioned on the Online Marketing Blog. Sometimes it’s a great match and you can tell they’ve read the blog at least a few times. Sometimes I’m left wondering, what in the world does that have to do with marketing online?

Anyway, here are links to a few of those from this week as well as some search engine news:

Audio video live support chat - PLMEDIA

Bluetooth marketing - Cool Demo - Jellingspot

Reputation marketing - iKarma

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