Entries from Search Engine Roundtable tagged with 'seo'

Most SEOs Believe Competitors Can Hurt Your Google Rankings

About a week ago I ran a poll that asked Can Someone Hurt A Competitors Google Rankings With Links? I ran the poll because there is a lot of debate around this topic. So I figured, why not ask you...

Video Recap of Weekly Search Buzz :: May 11, 2008

In this special Mother's Day video recap, I discussed that landing page load time is coming to the AdWords quality score algorithm. The AdWords display URL policy is now being enforced. We noticed Google changes in terms of the floating...

Does Setting Your Geographic Target In Google Webmaster Tools Work?

search_engine981:http://www.seroundtable.com/archives/017091.htmlBack in October of 2007, Google launched Set Geographic Target in Google Webmaster Tools. It basically allowed you to tell Google if your site is based in a certain geographic location. For example, let's say you had a UK site,...

Poll: Do You Report Your Competitors as Spam in Google?

search_engine981:http://www.seroundtable.com/archives/017077.htmlAnn Smarty goes through the conflicts of reporting competitors as spamming Google search results. Yes, this is a topic we covered many times here, including: Reporting Spam: Is It EthicalHow Can I Report Spam to Google?Google Spam Reporting WorkingDoes Google...

Google Basically Admits to Minus 60 Penalty

Remember when I reported that we saw Google Sitelinks in position 60? I said then that it seems Google is admitting to the minus 60 penalty: What I do find very interesting is that Googler, JohnMu, tells the webmaster to...

Poll: Can A Competitor Hurt Your Google Rankings with Links?

Forums have been buzzing and buzzing about the possibility of a competitor being able to hurt your Google ranking for the past few years now. We have covered this topic time and time again, just see here for some of...

Video Recap of Weekly Search Buzz :: May 4, 2008

In closing out April and moving into May, we had a fairly slow week of search forum news. We discussed how Google leaked AdWords ranking scores, a Google PageRank update and a Sitelink update. We also saw how GoogleBot is...

Cool Keyword Research Tool: Search Radar

Want to do some keyword research? Check out this cool tool that Cre8asite Forums member eKstreme found: Search Radar and take a look at it in action: The tool looks like it pulls a variety of resources, so there may...

SEOmoz's Web Developer "SEO Cheat Sheet"

The SEOmoz team released a two page PDF based SEO Web Developer Cheat Sheet that I personally printed out and gave to my RustyBrick developers. I did make a couple changes to it, nothing major. For example, as a matter...

What are Some Questions to Ask an SEO Firm to Check their Legitimacy?

If you were interviewing an SEO firm to see if they're for real, what questions would you ask them? A High Rankings Forum thread touches upon some of the must-know questions, and they're outlined below: How long they have been...

Managing Duplicate Content In a World Where Google Can Crawl JavaScript

Now that Google admitted to crawling JavaScript and forms SEOs and Webmasters need to be aware of how to manage even more duplicate content issues. In the past, a good strategy was to build out filter pages (filter by color,...

Video Recap of Weekly Search Buzz :: April 25, 2008

In this week's recap, I discussed my sickness with the flu, announced the winners of the Twing schwag and how to win Yahoo schwag. Also, I discussed Earth Day and Passover. Yahoo, Google & Microsoft announced earnings. Microsoft offers paid...

What is Google's Stance on Image Replacement Techniques?

A WebmasterWorld member asks if there's any penalty for adding H2 text (4 words) for the search engines because his logo is displayed in an image. The answer seems unclear. Tedster responds that he's asked Google twice about this --...

How Google Views Four Ways Of Hiding Content

I would consider this Google Groups thread a "gem thread," since you don't always see a thread at this level - it is precious. A Googler, Wysz, discussed in detail four methods of hiding content and how Google may interpret...

Google Sitelinks in Position 60?

A Google Groups thread has discussion about one webmaster that sees Sitelinks for his site in position 60. The search is for vacation realty and in the 60th position. While, I do not see the Sitelinks at that position, the...

Webmasters Report Proxy Hijacking No Longer an Issue at Google

WebmasterWorld moderator posted a detailed thread at WebmasterWorld claiming that he feels the proxy hijacks that Google has suffered from in 2007, and was getting better towards the end of 2007 seems to be 100% cleaned up now. IncrediBill concluded:...

Video Recap of Weekly Search Buzz :: April 18, 2008

In this week's edition of the video search buzz, I talked about the Yahoo, Google and Live Search tax day updates. I also talked about the new Yahoo slap and a new AdWords slap. Google's bot is now crawling forms...

Google Offers Advice On Moving from Site A to Site B

Google has finally written a formal post at the Google Webmaster Central blog named Best practices when moving your site. It honestly is a nice place to send a client or webmaster when the question comes up. Does it give...

Why Don't Big Brands Have Good Search Engine Optimization?

The SEM Insights blog discusses four reasons why big brands don't have good SEO. They are: Requirement: ease of maintenance: Therefore, they may not be using CMSes that are SEO friendly. Requirement: personalization and tracking: They need quantifiable results, but...

Hosting Company Touting Server Speed As "Intrinsically Linked" To SEO

A Cre8asite Forums discussion pointed me over to a UK hosting company named UKFast that has a white paper on Server Speed and SEO. The paper makes the argument that server speed is a critical component to your SEO campaign....

Major Google UK Search Changes? 'Dewey' Crosses The Pond

I'll be honest, I keep watching the WebmasterWorld thread discussing the April 2008 Google update, code named Update Dewey. The latest thing that I noticed were recent reports from very senior members saying that Google is shuffling around the results,...

When Talking SEO, Be On The Same Page

A High Rankings Forum thread is a perfect example of how people can misinterpret SEO terms. In this particular case, because a site has lost its rankings, an individual is looking to build a "link farm." Well, sort of. A...

Corrected: Yahoo Search Stops Grouping Results From Same Domain?

A HighRankings Forum thread asks when did Yahoo stop grouping search results from the same domain together? We reported on an issue with Google not grouping certain results a few weeks ago, but it is rare to see Google not...

Search Engine Optimization Firm Sued, Required to Pay More than $100K in Fees

Kevin Heisler writes at Search Engine Watch that an "SEO agency" called Internet Advancement has been sued by Washington State and required to pay over $100,000 in fees for scamming its clients. Among the restitution includes penalties against offering services...

Google Now Crawling Content Behind Forms

We should have seen this coming, based on the number of reports that Google was submitting GET forms. But often, it is hard to validate those types of reports, due to people spoofing Googlebot and similar tactics. In any event,...

Video Recap of Weekly Search Buzz :: April 13, 2008

In this week's video recap, I discuss the major business turmoil Yahoo is going through with Microsoft, Google, AOL and News Corp. I also go through Flickr adding video, Yahoo acquiring IndexTools, Google's new AdWords policy, the guy who trademarked...

Is This Strange Google Site Command Behavior?

I don't think this is exactly related to Google mixing up titles and URLs from yesterday (if you have examples, please comment, so Matt can address them at Google). But over at Search Engine Roundtable Forums, PPCBlogger showed us an...

Google Search Mixing Up URLs & Page Titles?

There are reports from several sources including WebmasterWorld that Google is having a tough time mapping the proper URLs with the associated page titles for those URLs. One report says that Google is treating searches for portal A on a...

Subscribe To Our New Video Podcast: Hosted By Barry Schwartz

Over the past several weeks, I have been experimenting with producing weekly video recaps. You can view those recaps in the Search Buzz Roundup category. The main issue was that many folks were not able to sit and watch the...

Individual Files Trademark for "SEO"

I remember working as a private investigator and visiting the United States Patent and Trademark Office way too often as part of my job. And when I read Sarah Bird's post on SEOmoz about an individual named Jason Gambert who...

Should You Submit Your Site with an Optimized Title to Web Directories?

At High Rankings Forum, a member is looking to submit to web directories and wonders if it's worthwhile to submit the entire optimized website title to the directory. Will it go over well? Not usually, from what I've seen. In...

Questions You Should Ask When Hiring an SEO Guru

When you're in the hiring phase for an SEO expert, you should get to know a little about the potential candidate you're considering by asking the right questions. The SEOpranos blog has 10 questions that should be asked at every...

How To Penalize Your Competitor's Site in Google

Juicy title, isn't it? Well, that is the topic of discussion at a WebmasterWorld. A senior member decided to post some generic, not specific examples, ways to hurt a website's Google rankings. Here are some of the methods you can...

Is a Complete Website Makeover Bad for Search Engine Optimization?

Some great websites rank but have horrendous code. At Cre8asite Forums, a webmaster has been given the task of redesigning the website and cleaning up the messy code and adding standard SEO elements (robots.txt, sitemap, external CSS, etc.). However, since...

What Should You Look for When Hiring In-House SEOs?

My BFF Lisa Barone wrote a really great post about what companies should look for when hiring in-house SEO consultants. SEO folks should have some sort of technical skills and a little coding expertise too. They also should have an...

Is it Normal to Plateau When Doing Continuous Link Building?

A WebmasterWorld member has been applying regular search engine optimization and link building techniques and is noticing that the traffic hasn't improved as substantially in the latter months of the campaign as it did initially. Is this something normal? Actually,...

Guy Kawasaki's Alltop Features Prominent SEO Blogs

Less than a month ago, entrepreneur Guy Kawasaki launched Alltop, a site that combines the best of the best in an easy to read format. Over at Sphinn, Kalena Jordan acknowledges that a number of known SEO blogs made it...

Google's Cutts Asking for Feedback on March/April '08 Update (The "Dewey" Update)

On the last day of March, I reported on a major Google search index update which seemed to have impacted tons and tons of SEOs, as opposed to just a ton of SEOs (if you know what I mean). Yes,...

Rank Checker Tool Released by SEO Book

Aaron Wall has written a pretty awesome rank checker tool Firefox plugin that checks various keywords against results on Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft Live. Here's a sample screenshot of what you're expected to see: While it looks like it's pretty...

Google Search Index March '08 Update Underway?

The huge WebmasterWorld thread devoted to tracking Google changes over the course of March 2008 has sprung some late March legs. Reseller, well known at WebmasterWorld for tracking the slightest changes at Google, posted two data centers that are very...

Should We Have Search Marketing Standards?

Lately, we've heard a lot about the need for search marketing standards. Most people that I've encountered are overwhelmingly supportive of such a move. Not Jill Whalen, however. Over at Search Engine Land, she provides her four reasons as to...

What Belongs in a Search Engine Optimization Strategies Document?

At a Cre8asite Forums thread, a user is looking for guidance on how to compile a SEO strategic document. What would be contained in such a document? The first step in writing a document like this is determining your audience...

Is Search Engine Optimization a Bad Investment?

Julie Joyce writes on the SEO Chicks blog talks about the American Express believes that SEO is a waste of money. The idea is that there are snake oil salesmen (not all SEOs do this, though), but it ends up...

How to Launch a New Website With (and Without) SEO in Mind

Ann Smarty has written a post at Search Engine Journal about how the mindset of webmasters who launch sites with and without SEO in mind. If SEO is a priority, choose a relevant domain name and think over website structure....

Is There a Way to Prove ROI from Search Engine Optimization?

Some clients just need to know if their SEO investment is worthwhile. But how do you measure ROI, or rather, can you prove that there is a return on the investment? It's a hard question to answer. On the superficial...

How to do Local SEO from Facebook

Andrew Shotland aka Local SEO Guide has a very cool writeup on Facebook Pages and Local Search Engine Optimization. He explains that it's possible to do local SEO from your Facebook page and illustrates the process, which includes setting up...

SEO Clients Not Being Responsive?

What do you do when you have an SEO client but they refuse to give you access to their servers and do not act upon recommendations that you're giving nearly blindly since you have no access to their statistics? It...

Video Recap of Weekly Search Buzz :: March 23, 2008

Listen up, you have a chance to win a prize by watching this video. If you spot a "prop" during the video, comment below and star the video at YouTube. The following week, I will pull a name out of...

Does The First Anchor Text Link Only Count in Google?

SEOmoz posted results from a study he did where he concluded that only the first anchor text on a page is counted by Google as the anchor text for that link. For example, let's say you have a two links...

Competitive SEO Defensive Techniques

A Sphinn discussion thread led me to a post by Bill named Slow Down Nosy SEO's and Snooping Competitors. In short, he gives techniques to "slow down" a competitor from analyzing your SEO techniques and just copying what you have...

YouTube Adds Crazy APIs for Developers: Great Opportunity for SEOs

I am not sure why there isn't more discussion around this topic, but yesterday Google's YouTube announced new APIs to allow you to add YouTube's features, content and more to your own site. So let's say you wanted to create...

A Great SEO License Plate :

I Am Not a Doctor blogged about his new license plates. Yea, he got plates that read <H1>SEO<H1>, talk about loving SEO. Here is a picture: The Sphinn comments rock: Was 'SEONERD' Taken already? ;) So, I thought I was...

Why Link Pages & Directories Might Not Work

A WebmasterWorld thread touches on a simple topic, the topic of link pages. Many sites have them, a page that contains links to link partners. Some of these pages are labeled "resources," some are labelled "partners," some are "directory," and...

SEOs Can't Agree on the Value of an Image Link

Mid January I asked An image link is worth what percentage less than a text link? The question was probably not clear enough and I honestly don't blame the respondents. It is a hard question to answer, because there are...

Google Strongly Recommends 301 Redirect Over Meta Refresh Redirects

Moving document and file locations on the web is fairly common. So what do you do when you have to communicate the move to your users and the search engines? You set up a redirect. There is no question that...

Upper Case & Lower Case Searches May Return Different Google Search Results

An interesting thread has been brewing over at WebmasterWorld with reports of an unusual Go