The kind folks at internet marketing company IM Ninjas (formerly We Build Pages) sent me some nice clothes including a tshirt, polo and sweater (can’t show pics since they went to my address in Canada and I’m living in Israel) and to Dixon Jones of Majestic SEO link tools and Receptional SEO for treating myself and a number of other SEOs to dinner during last week’s SMX Israel show.

Downloads For RSS Subscribers:

• Content Marketing Cannon WordPress plugin - Consolidates content for more links, PageRank and traffic. Details: New SEO plugin: Content Marketing Cannon
• Internal Link Building, a WordPress plugin. It optimizes your internal navigation so you rank like Wikipedia. Details: Check the Internal Link Building update page.
• Get a free chapter from my upcoming book on advanced seo.
• Backlink Analysis With Majestic SEO's Data
  
• ROI on SEO Calculator spreadsheet.

Want to know what I read? Here’s a partial blogroll, focused mostly on local SEO, advanced SEO, conversion, and friends. I’ve also long linked out to a variety of other sites in my blogroll posts category.

If I’ve overlooked you, and you should be on there, leave a comment. I’ll most likely add you to my RSS first, but it’s a way to get links and eventually be added to the blogroll possibly later.

Downloads For RSS Subscribers:

• Content Marketing Cannon WordPress plugin - Consolidates content for more links, PageRank and traffic. Details: New SEO plugin: Content Marketing Cannon
• Internal Link Building, a WordPress plugin. It optimizes your internal navigation so you rank like Wikipedia. Details: Check the Internal Link Building update page.
• Get a free chapter from my upcoming book on advanced seo.
• Backlink Analysis With Majestic SEO's Data
  
• ROI on SEO Calculator spreadsheet.

Web Pro News reports that Yahoo is modifying Bing search results, and discusses Bing serving ads on Yahoo.

Wayne Liew writes an excellent article on what the ideal strategy is for Twitter – and no, it isn’t mass following. The brilliance in this article is that it recognizes that social media is, first of all, a social tool.

Ian Lurie has a new, open-source script for fixing broken links on your site en masse.

Via SEO Smarty, here’s a new keyword research tool that mass-scrapes suggestions for you.

John McElborough shares some brilliant tactics to hide your backlink trail. I giggled out loud at some of it, it was that clever. Last guy who made me giggle like that was a certain shady character.

Alan Bleiweiss knocks it out the park with these tips on hiring an apprentice. Reminds me of something I saw via Problogger.com, Outsourced My Life.

Mr Green shares an interesting case study about FB ads and using two famous copywriters’ styles for inspiration. Here’s part 1 (hypothesis) and part 2 (results).

Long advocated by the likes of Diorex, exact match domains now have a study to prove that they boost CTR. Probably the simplest answer as to why Google boosts them in organic results, too.

A great item on longtail content types you can develop as an ecommerce affiliate.

I like that he emphasizes listening as a keyword research tactic. That was a big focus of my SMX Advanced 2009 preso, and the specific applications shared in that post are excellent. Combine that with crowd-sourcing your content (Mechanical Turk?) and you’ve got a winner…

Like this post with new ideas tools and more? Get my latest posts delivered by RSS or email.

Downloads For RSS Subscribers:

• Content Marketing Cannon WordPress plugin - Consolidates content for more links, PageRank and traffic. Details: New SEO plugin: Content Marketing Cannon
• Internal Link Building, a WordPress plugin. It optimizes your internal navigation so you rank like Wikipedia. Details: Check the Internal Link Building update page.
• Get a free chapter from my upcoming book on advanced seo.
• Backlink Analysis With Majestic SEO's Data
  
• ROI on SEO Calculator spreadsheet.

First, get familiar with the board. The dutch LinkBuilding.nl outfit have the link building board clearly laid out for your benefit.

Downloads For RSS Subscribers:

• Content Marketing Cannon WordPress plugin - Consolidates content for more links, PageRank and traffic. Details: New SEO plugin: Content Marketing Cannon
• Internal Link Building, a WordPress plugin. It optimizes your internal navigation so you rank like Wikipedia. Details: Check the Internal Link Building update page.
• Get a free chapter from my upcoming book on advanced seo.
• Backlink Analysis With Majestic SEO's Data
  
• ROI on SEO Calculator spreadsheet.

Sebastian is the technical genius and SEO behind Sebastian’s Pamphlets. This warm fellow’s well-known avatar is rather ironic – a crab! We’re continuing the Sphinner interview series that began with Dave ‘theGypsy’ Harry.

1) What benefits have you seen from your activity at Sphinn?

Sphinn is the best aggregator for SEM stuff (stories, links, discussions), ever. Despite the noise on the upcoming pages, Sphinn has all the news that matter. In other words Sphinn is a great time saver, although I didn’t dump my feedreader yet. Also I’ve met nice folks at Sphinn, people I wouldn’t know otherwise. Joining Sphinn was this decade’s best decision (besides moving my WebDev/SEO-pamphlets away from blogspot).

2) Share 3 – 5 key elements of your success with Sphinn.

Define success. I’m just a user, taking more than I can give back. Thanks to great Sphinners I’m pointed to interesting stuff, bookmark (sphinn) it, and every once in a while I submit a pamphlet and my fellow sphinners honor that with very nicely targeted traffic, thoughtful comments, and sometimes even links. I’ve no sphinny world SEM community domination plans.

3) What other social networks do you participate in (Digg/clones, Facebook/LinkedIn/Myspace, Ning-type sites, forums, specific blogs you comment on a lot)? Can you share your usernames there, and what type of content you’d consider sharing with the other members of those sites as well what you wouldn’t pass on?

I’ve spread my red-crab.ico under the “SebastianX” label everywhere, but besides Sphinn I use only Delicious and StumbleUpon as bookmarking tools, and Twitter for gossip and communication. Of course I vote elsewhere for a tiny fee when nicely asked, provided I like the content. I’m not in the social media game. I just use those services when they make sense for me. In my spare time I help out Google with Webmaster support.

4) What features (besides those announced, like “Mark as spam/Bury”) would you like to see on Sphinn?

On the submission form I miss the “bypass the new list” checkbox. Sometimes sphinn+save is not enough to praise an awesome piece, hence an easy way to manage a few dozens user profiles for power-voting would make sense.

5) Are you a socialist or a medium? [Me trying to be witty and failing miserably.]

I’m an anarchist. My code rules the chaos.

6) Define the term: “Sphinn doctor.” [Ditto.]

All sphinners properly feeding my ego deserve this title. Seriously, I nominate Michelle who keeps things running and makes Sphinn an even better hangout with every update. Having so many attention whores and probloggers in the community we tend to forget the seabees.

7) Besides only submitting their own stuff or only sphinning their own stuff, what are some common mistakes people make with social media?

Taking it too seriously.

Tell us a minimum 3 non-Sphinn items about yourself that people could use to catch your eye on Sphinn (i.e. to Sphinnbait you).

I won’t sphinn “how to get raped by aliens” items like “new version of MS Visual Studio is out” and crap like that. Titles like “Why TrustRank is way sexier than plain old PageRank”, “Increasing index penetration without abrading link condoms” or “Automating unpenalized paid link gangbangs” get my vote for sure, provided the article is geeky enough and makes sense. You see, sex sells, even to old farts crabs like me.

9) Which of Cialdini’s 6 principles do you feel most important to gaining influence and why? Can you share some anecdotes?

Social Proof. It might be wishful thinking, but I hope that applying a brutal zero-bullshit tolerance in combination with sharing knowledge and experiences can influence people and prevent them from crappy decisions.

10) What is the future of social media?

Getting plastered with so many ads that one can’t find the contents any more.

Thanks Gab!

Like I wrote above – this is part of a series of interviews with Sphinners. They were actually conducted years ago then left to rot in my inbox. Time to get ‘em out!

If you liked this, check out the interview with  Dave ‘theGypsy’ Harry, or get a free chapter from my advanced SEO book.

Downloads For RSS Subscribers:

• Content Marketing Cannon WordPress plugin - Consolidates content for more links, PageRank and traffic. Details: New SEO plugin: Content Marketing Cannon
• Internal Link Building, a WordPress plugin. It optimizes your internal navigation so you rank like Wikipedia. Details: Check the Internal Link Building update page.
• Get a free chapter from my upcoming book on advanced seo.
• Backlink Analysis With Majestic SEO's Data
  
• ROI on SEO Calculator spreadsheet.

It’s sad in a way, but one of the biggest businesses online is charity. Numerous sites out there will handle payment processing etc. for charities for ‘only’ about 3% of donations (the same as Paypal or any credit card processing company). I’m trying to set something up with student union of my university and accepting donations online is proving to be a challenge. For those who qualify in the UK, however, I’ve found one site that does this for free :

https://www.charitychoice.co.uk/CharityRegistration.asp

How does this relate to SEO? Pretty vaguely, in that the charity I’m trying to get set up would offer thankyou links to donors (stay tuned for details if that works out…). But in general it’s good to know what’s going on in the online world. There’s lots of business available around besides just big money categories like finance, the three Ps etc.

Add my rss feed to your reader if you want to stay updated on what happens with the charity project and whether you might be able to get an edu/charity link for your own project(s).

Downloads For RSS Subscribers:

• Content Marketing Cannon WordPress plugin - Consolidates content for more links, PageRank and traffic. Details: New SEO plugin: Content Marketing Cannon
• Internal Link Building, a WordPress plugin. It optimizes your internal navigation so you rank like Wikipedia. Details: Check the Internal Link Building update page.
• Get a free chapter from my upcoming book on advanced seo.
• Backlink Analysis With Majestic SEO's Data
  
• ROI on SEO Calculator spreadsheet.

The following is my favoured reading list when it comes to search marketing, especially on the SEO side. It includes PPC and usability/conversion optimization stuff too, because you can’t really become advanced in this field without focusing on the bottom line. Check out my description of each blog to see if it fits your interests.

I’m focusing on those that, while they may have some following (a few thousand RSS readers), are not mega brands in the space. On a related note, my own blog fits the generalist / link building categories, so if that’s your bag, add my rss feed to your reader.

Original & Creative Internet Marketing Generalists

The folks in this category will blog the gamut from analytics to social media.

Dave Davis’ of Red Fly Marketing’s Online Marketing Blog . Dave’s writing features some of the best material on AdWords you can find, as well as its frequent overlap with SEO. What’s great is that the writing is accessible, insofar as it’s not too heavy on tech jargon.

Marty Weintraub @ Aimclear Search Marketing Blog for ad agency, inhouse and PR . Marty’s got to be one of the most creative thinkers and writers in the business, and his writing reflects that. I can’t honestly recall reading a rehashed post here, while the original insights – which just share a fraction of the advanced stuff they do – are abundant.

Wil Reynolds and the gang @ Seer Interactive’s SEO Blog – Again, I enjoy the creative thinking a lot! The case studies and tactics they share often reveal a new approach to skinning the cat, which a tactician like yours truly just can’t get enough of. As with Marty’s blogging, it feels good to get confirmation for your own ideas when you see them show up on Seer’s blog [without having told the idea to the Seer guys], which has happened a few times.

Blogstorm search engine optimiSation blog (that’s UK spelling for ya!) – Pat Altoft runs a wonderful, well read blog that covers a range of internet marketing topics. While it’s generalist in scope, the posts are very much original and useful to your ordinary SEO consultant.

Tom Demers & gang @Wordstream’s Internet Marketing Blog – Out of nowhere, the guys at Wordstream keyword research have quickly emerged on the search marketing scene with a series of excellent interviews with insightful SEOs/PPC marketers. Of course, their own material

SEO Smarty’s SEO Consulting Blog – Ann doesn’t blog regularly, but when she does, you KNOW it’s going to be something valuable. She’s a pleasant woman to work with as well, and an excellent contact to have as she’s a connector in the “Tipping Point” social media sense.

Nick Wilsdon, UK/Russian SEO – Nick is experienced in foreign [SEO affairs] and his blog accordingly touches international SEO issues. You’ll also see him covering social media questions and tech/security stuff. Nick was one of the SEOs I spoke to regarding how SEOs deal with international currency fluctuations.

Stephan Spencer’s SEO & Web Marketing Blog (aka Stephen’s Scatterings, which is an unfortunate name imho, since it sounds kind of like what pigeons do…). Featuring a wide mix of content, Stephan’s frequently got advanced nuggets buried around his blog. It’s worth digging through his archives.

Richard Baxter’s London SEO Blog, SEO Gadget – Richard’s writing tends more towards the technical, covering particular tags, formats, Ubuntu etc. His interests are wide ranging though, and his own link building ideas and tips on the human relationships necessary for successful SEO are quite valuable.

Link Building Devotees

As the name suggests, these are the expert link builders.

Wiep’s Link Building Blog – Wiep’s monthly link roundups are must reads. You can’t really be following the latest in link building unless you pay attention to Wiep’s roundups, which canvas both the popular and the unknown [where lots of goodies are]. And Wiep’s own link bait content is is quality, too. I can’t say enough good things about Wiep’s blog, so to supplement, I’ll say something bad – he doesn’t publish frequently enough!

Debra Mastaler – Alliance Link Building Spiel – What more can I say besides that Debra knows link building inside and out and reading her blog is a great way to get up to speed in the field.

Justilien Gaspard’s Web Site Marketing blog / SEW column is another link building resource. While I’m still new to Justilien’s writing, it’s clear to me that he speaks with authority .

Local Marketers

Local SEO, search and related internet marketing tips and news get done by these fellows.

Understanding G Maps and Local Search – Mike Blumenthal is the de facto starting point for local SEO. I think many SEOs who ever practiced local SEO learned the trade from Mike’s site (including myself!), and it continues to be a reference today. From tactics to bugs and spam in Google Maps, Mike’s got the scoop.

David Mihm’s SMB Web Design and Local SEO blog – Another reference for anyone involved in local search, David Mihm has made a reputation for himself notably via his annual local search ranking factors linkbait, as well as his informed contributions to Search Engine Land and SMX.

SMB & Local SEO Guide – Andrew Shotland mixes the traditional local search marketing fare (comparisons with the Yellow Pages) with the latest in local tech, like social local search (yeah, I think it’s a mouthful, too).

Greg Sterling’s Screenwerk blog on Local Internet Marketing – Greg has got the lowdown on the Yellow Pages, having worked at one of the largest Yellow Pages publishers around (The Kelsey Group), but he’s also got the latest news coverage of the topic. No kidding – if it’s a story with any local connection, Greg’s on it.

Dev Basu’s Search Marketing Insights – My fellow resident of Soviet Canuckistan (that’s Canada for those of you who don’t know) shares a lot of the same interests with me: building a following, how to sell more effectively, affiliate marketing and local search. The topics range around, but Dev keeps it fresh.

Critical Thinkers

Not only do the folks in this group think critically, they take your hand and get you do so as well.

Michael Martinez’s SEO Theory and Analysis – Michael’s one of the deep thinkers in SEO. He’s one of the few people around who understand what the scientific method is (I’m guessing most SEOs who don’t have a math/programming/science background slept through those classes in high school), and that’s reflected in his critical thinking. I respect and really look up to Mike, but he at times turns others off with what is easily perceived as arguing for its own sake, and/or as nit-picking technicalities.

SEO Scientist – As the name implies, Branko Rihtman is cut from the same cloth as Michael and Marios. While he doesn’t publish regularly, Branko does run experiments to discover how the algorithms work in specific instances, and he also provides a great roundup of advanced SEO posts similar to what Wiep does with link building.

All Things SEM – Marios Alexandrou is one of those who, like Mike Martinez, understands the scientific method and can actually apply a/b split testing to discover ranking factors. When this guy publishes his research results, you are compelled to read… on pain of banning from the index . Now if only he’d publish more than once a month…

Tim Nash’s SEO consulting and techie/code blog is another writer in this category of standouts, who got my attention via Sphinn I believe, but also gained a lot of notoriety generally for his Flash indexing studies and tests on PDFs and the like.

Dave Harry’s SEO Blog feat. Search and IM News, at Huomah.com . A self-proclaimed patent and information retrieval (IR) geek, Dave helps make the techie speak accessible to the rest of us, though he’s still a bit heavy on the jargon at times.

Eli’s Blue Hat SEO – The goto man on blackhat techniques, Eli’s tactics have inspired more than one person’s creative thinking. In fact, his desert scraping combined with Slightly Shady SEO’s scrape of expired domains with Yahoo backlinks lead to my idea on resurrecting sites from the dead.

PPC

Easy Tricks For Great PPC by Dan Soha – If you’ve ever thought of a trick to use in AdWords… get over yourself, because Dan thought of it first. Between his background in math and his unbridled creativity, Dan is probably the most advanced PPC guy I know.

BG’s PPC Theory – If you’re looking for AdWords and conversion optimization nuggets, Brad Geddes is your man. I have to admit that I’m not a regular reader, but only because I don’t spend lots of time on PPC. Those times I played around in Brad’s archives, I had a big grin on my face like a kid with a birthday cake.

Conversion Optimization & Usability

All the work we do to get traffic would be useless if it didn’t convert, right? Well, that’s why you need to read these people’s blogs!

Malcolm Coles’ blog on newspapers, SEO, WordPress etc. – Malcolm’s take on things allows me to get a fresh perspective on several issues I wouldn’t think about on my own. For instance, I believe it was his review of various newspapers’ usability that led me to increase font size here.

Enquiro’s B2B Marketing Blog – Similarly mixing SEO and usability, Gord Hotchkiss’ outfit has a penchant for heatmaps and anecdotes. I like that he’s a big reader, too.

Ion Interactive’s Post Click Marketing Blog – I have a love-hate relationship with Ion’s blog. I love that they have great ways of explaining things that I find make more sense than, for example, FutureNow’s Eisenberg brothers. I love when they share new ideas or methods. But I HATE how they repeat themselves so frequently…

CLM’s Thoughts on Usability and Conversion – Closed Loop Marketing’s founders, Sandra Niehaus and Lance Loveday, really got me started on conversion optimization by giving me their classic book, Web Design 4 ROI. Their blog continues to innovate and shares a mix of tips on PPC and conversion optimization.

WiderFunnel’s Marketing Optimization Blog – I forget how I discovered Wider Funnel, but they have a great way of illustrating their posts and sharing case studies that just keeps you hooked. I find their site pretty impressive as well, so it’s nice to see the shoemaker’s kids wearing patent leather booties !

Tim Ash @ SEW – Tim shares a variety of ideas, and lately he’s been on a kick of helping conversion newbs get into optimization. What stands out to me about Tim and his writing – and this is also true of his book – is that he doesn’t accept assumptions easily, but is rather inclined towards critical thinking. And that’s a theme of advanced search marketing in my books… or book rather, as I’m working on an Advanced SEO book…

Usability Post – What’s neat is that this site talks about usability beyond the standard stuff that you hear over and over on other usability blogs. I’ve also found Dimitry’s ads exceptionally useful as I catalog usability tools.

The Conversion Doctor – Eric Graham is particularly focused on writing quality sales copy. And I don’t mean just any keyword stuffed descriptive text. I mean copy that sells. You see so many fluffy copywriter blogs full of posers online… Eric is at the opposite end and kind of goes overboard on the pushy sales technique side of things.

VigorFish – They’ve got case studies, tips and all sorts of goodness. Me likey .

Web Analysts Web Business and Conversion Optimization Blog -While this site features some great content, it’s really oriented to hardcore web analytics guys and gals. They’re not overly enamored of jargon, but you need to have your thinking cap on to follow. (For more blogs on conversion, check out this preso and the firms who ran these tests.)

Liked this post on advanced SEO blogs? Add my rss feed to your reader for more!

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• Content Marketing Cannon WordPress plugin - Consolidates content for more links, PageRank and traffic. Details: New SEO plugin: Content Marketing Cannon
• Internal Link Building, a WordPress plugin. It optimizes your internal navigation so you rank like Wikipedia. Details: Check the Internal Link Building update page.
• Get a free chapter from my upcoming book on advanced seo.
• Backlink Analysis With Majestic SEO's Data
  
• ROI on SEO Calculator spreadsheet.

Templates and Themes

Scriptorium Fonts, Art and Design

Landing Page Directory

Carrington – The CMS Theme Framework for WordPress

Opt-in Page

6 FREE WordPress Themes You Need Today.

40 Options for Converting PSD to HTML

WordPress Theme: ClockWorkSimple

Landing Pages R Us | Make simple landing pages in seconds

PSD TO HTML – Portfolio

HTML Portfolio: CSS Coding, HTML Coding, PSD Slicing, Markup Services

PSD to WordPress Theme – Theme Slice » PSD to WordPress

PSD to WordPress | Hand Coded | Professional Solution – PSDtoWordpress

Premium WordPress Templates For Thesis — WordPress Bandit

Free Landing Page Templates

Usability

Usability Testing Community – UsabilityTest.com

Usability Post

Architecture for Commerce with Dr. Pete

12 Tips For Designing an Excellent Checkout Process

Fixed vs. Fluid vs. Elastic Layout: What’s The Right One For You?

Low cost usability testing – UserTesting.com

Silverback — guerrilla usability testing

Video

Tim Seifert’s (Camera Tim) website homepage

Video Production Tips

Videography Tips

Kids’ Vid: Scripting Your Movie

eCommerce Video Production Tips from the Pros: eBags

Testing

How to A/B Test Your WordPress blog

How to A/B Split Test Your WordPress Theme: Plugin (Based on first post listed above)

How To Construct Rational Landing Page Tests

SplitAnalyzer A/B Split Testing System

Feng-GUI – Feng Shui for Graphic User Interfaces

Adaptive Multivariate Testing | Hiconversion.com

How To Construct Rational Landing Page Tests

Link Building

How to Get Do Follow Links from Wikipedia Articles in Four Simple Steps | WordStream

The Paid Link Blog Meme

Shaun Anderson’s link building tips for beginners

How Shaun built links for his company

Sales

Building Startup Sales Teams: Tips For Founders

Definitive Guide to Lead Nurturing – Marketo

Client Communications – The Old Black

Misc

Shaun’s SEO eBook for beginners

Downloads For RSS Subscribers:

• Content Marketing Cannon WordPress plugin - Consolidates content for more links, PageRank and traffic. Details: New SEO plugin: Content Marketing Cannon
• Internal Link Building, a WordPress plugin. It optimizes your internal navigation so you rank like Wikipedia. Details: Check the Internal Link Building update page.
• Get a free chapter from my upcoming book on advanced seo.
• Backlink Analysis With Majestic SEO's Data
  
• ROI on SEO Calculator spreadsheet.

One is at Search Engine Journal: http://www.searchenginejournal.com/seo-mythbusters-content/12810/

The other is at Blogue Marketing Interactif: http://www.bloguemarketinginteractif.com/flogue-collette-judy/ (in French)

Downloads For RSS Subscribers:

• Content Marketing Cannon WordPress plugin - Consolidates content for more links, PageRank and traffic. Details: New SEO plugin: Content Marketing Cannon
• Internal Link Building, a WordPress plugin. It optimizes your internal navigation so you rank like Wikipedia. Details: Check the Internal Link Building update page.
• Get a free chapter from my upcoming book on advanced seo.
• Backlink Analysis With Majestic SEO's Data
  
• ROI on SEO Calculator spreadsheet.

In June I spoke at SMX Advanced. Earlier this week I spoke at Affiliate Summit East. Time to show some love to the folks I met! Here they are,  in no particular order:

Igal of PartyPop Wedding Planning

Jordan Glogau, 1800 Flowers

Jeremy Dearringer, Slingshot Indiana SEO

Amir Rabinowicz, Etoro Forex Affiliates

Eric Adamowsky, Armitage Marketing + Consulting

Scott Brinker, Ion Interactive Landing Paths

Rotem Amar, Eran Horowitz, Yossi Shalom of Investhead / 10PIPS Affiliates

Liat Fuchs, Affiliate Ply (Video Aff Network)

Chris Pearson, Thesis

The Bosers, 3 Dog SEO / Consulting

Jonathan Treiber, RevTrax offline affiliate marketing

Alex Schultz, Facebook

Emily Boss of CSN Stores

Michael Gross, AJ Madison

Carolyn Shelby , Chicago SEO

Negev Nosatzki – Ava Financial

Carolyn Tang, David Zelken of ShareASale Aff Network

Joe Stepnieweki, Skimlinks

Lucinda Worsfold of GlobalDirect / Unanimis affiliate + display network

Jennifer Moor and Byron Taylor and Paul (? didn’t get your card) of Linkshare

Michael Ouellete and Leigh Rogers of CJ

Susan Bridgers, Link Connector Aff Network

EJ Hilbert of Online Intelligence Affiliate Fraud Detection

Graham MacRobie, Alias Encore

David Naffziger, Brand Verity

Josh Sloan, IM Consultant

Jamie Birch, JEB Commerce

Bryan Cockerham, We-Care

Eli Toron, NogaMarketing

Chris Rossiter, Offerweb Network

Catherine Duffy, DMI Partners

Shanti Beaurline, AKMG affiliate network

Andrew Coleman, Lead Qual(ification)

Jeremy Shoemoney, Shoemoney Tools

Mike Guida, Get Ads

Betty Hakes, RevMedia Marketing

Brenda, Face Formers

Holly Elkins, Shop At Home

Kim Salvino, Buy.At

Jennifer Reppy, See Vast ads

Brett BumeterSoft Duit Media

Stuart Silverberg, Tech Trainer and Consultant

Darrin Washington, whose cards cleverly were labeled with the show he went to, to help people recall where they met him, and probably for his own direct response measurement. Smart! (But no website listed = no link :s)

Slaven MandicSlavTech Marketing

Jerry MarkIndependence Media Group

Downloads For RSS Subscribers:

• Content Marketing Cannon WordPress plugin - Consolidates content for more links, PageRank and traffic. Details: New SEO plugin: Content Marketing Cannon
• Internal Link Building, a WordPress plugin. It optimizes your internal navigation so you rank like Wikipedia. Details: Check the Internal Link Building update page.
• Get a free chapter from my upcoming book on advanced seo.
• Backlink Analysis With Majestic SEO's Data
  
• ROI on SEO Calculator spreadsheet.

Is where fools rush away their gold for domain names.

Hello, and welcome to scratchpad! This is my completely irregular, unreliably scheduled column on whatever streams through my head. We used to call this silliness, but on the web today it’s valued as “transparency.”

Seriously though, I do believe in transparency, so here’s some food for thought:

1 – Last year, I spent hundreds of dollars on domain names. I’m letting many of them drop this year. Why? 2 reasons.

- Focus: You can’t be successful by doing a million projects at once.

- Trademark issues: I was a little aggressive in buying some domain names. While I was not quite squatting, the domains would probably be taken away if I ranked them and turned them into any kind of commercially successful sites. Oops!

2 – Focusing on providing great value can be a superior way to accumulating gold, as opposed to domain name speculation and praying for a greater fool to show up. Here are some great items of value I’ve found online:

Local Search Ranking Factors | Google & Yahoo Local SEO Best Practices – 2009

- RescueTime Solo: Free Time Management Software | RescueTime

10 Questions to Ask a New Link Marketing Client | Wiep.net

Better Coda Slider

Wordstream keyword management software

Getting started with landing page management – Post-Click Marketing Blog

3 landing page management metrics – Post-Click Marketing Blog

36 landing page management secrets for post-click marketing – Post-Click Marketing Blog

For Every Optimization, There’s a Pyramid, So Get Started | FutureNow’s GrokDotCom

Dilbert Teaches Reputation Management

Turn your stories into profits | The Total Package

The Daily Beatings Will Continue Until Response Improves | The Total Package

userfly — Web usability testing made easy.

The Link Builder’s Guide To Analyzing SERP Dominators For Link Opportunities

Setting up a New WordPress Blog for SEO | Internet Business Pro by Joe Perez

Hiding Content in Your RSS Feed

4 Video Optimization Experts Dish Killer Tips » aimClear Search Marketing Blog

Six Habits of Highly Effective PPC Managers

Aaron Bradley has had his own SEO blog for about 7 months now, though I just found out recently. Add his rss to your readers – you won’t regret it!

And if you liked this post, add my feed to your reader!

Downloads For RSS Subscribers:

• Content Marketing Cannon WordPress plugin - Consolidates content for more links, PageRank and traffic. Details: New SEO plugin: Content Marketing Cannon
• Internal Link Building, a WordPress plugin. It optimizes your internal navigation so you rank like Wikipedia. Details: Check the Internal Link Building update page.
• Get a free chapter from my upcoming book on advanced seo.
• Backlink Analysis With Majestic SEO's Data
  
• ROI on SEO Calculator spreadsheet.

I’ve got a new piece up over at Michael Gray’s Wolf Howl, rebutting Seth Godin on why journalists should or should not get paid.

How in the world does that relate to search marketing? It’s an example of critical thinking, and identifying a common form of argument – which is popular in SEO blogs – that falls flat in this case. The more critically minded you are (without being contrarian), the better an SEO you will be.

If you like what you read there, get my rss feed here!

Downloads For RSS Subscribers:

• Content Marketing Cannon WordPress plugin - Consolidates content for more links, PageRank and traffic. Details: New SEO plugin: Content Marketing Cannon
• Internal Link Building, a WordPress plugin. It optimizes your internal navigation so you rank like Wikipedia. Details: Check the Internal Link Building update page.
• Get a free chapter from my upcoming book on advanced seo.
• Backlink Analysis With Majestic SEO's Data
  
• ROI on SEO Calculator spreadsheet.

… posted at Search Engine Journal: Landing Pages On A SMB Budget.

Downloads For RSS Subscribers:

• Content Marketing Cannon WordPress plugin - Consolidates content for more links, PageRank and traffic. Details: New SEO plugin: Content Marketing Cannon
• Internal Link Building, a WordPress plugin. It optimizes your internal navigation so you rank like Wikipedia. Details: Check the Internal Link Building update page.
• Get a free chapter from my upcoming book on advanced seo.
• Backlink Analysis With Majestic SEO's Data
  
• ROI on SEO Calculator spreadsheet.

De-Fense! [Thump Thump] De-Fense! [Clap Clap]:

Alex Chudnovsky killed it with this awesome guest-post at Huomah, featuring 3 tools to find bad SEO neighbours and protect your site.

In the same frame of mind, Nick Wilsdon has 12 tips to protect your sites and income.

Not far distant topically, we have Malcolm on Court Orders Restricting Publication… in the Internet age

Branko Rihtman explains why Google News may drop your articles. It’s an issue my own theme has, and is something I know I need to fix when I redesign.

Mike Tekula shares mistakes he’s made and how to minimize risk in SMB internet marketing

Twitter takes on…

Sean Hacking on Email vs Twitter

Andrew Keen on Wolfram Alpha v Twitter

Random

Yahoo tees off another SEM, calls small customers “fools who we like to steal from.”

Changing speeds now, my friends and fellow Canuck SEO Dev Basu has great tips on Canadian SEO. Speaking of which, my friend Melanie Nathan owns Canadian SEO, literally and figuratively .

Hendry Lee On Working Smarter – Shoulda been obvious, but it only hit me when I read it…

Chris Sherman shares what being a conference guru is all about

Ben McKay rocks our collective socks with 80 (!) SEO Interview Questions.

Bob Potter has an interesting case study on the ROI of socializing your media.

Downloads For RSS Subscribers:

• Content Marketing Cannon WordPress plugin - Consolidates content for more links, PageRank and traffic. Details: New SEO plugin: Content Marketing Cannon
• Internal Link Building, a WordPress plugin. It optimizes your internal navigation so you rank like Wikipedia. Details: Check the Internal Link Building update page.
• Get a free chapter from my upcoming book on advanced seo.
• Backlink Analysis With Majestic SEO's Data
  
• ROI on SEO Calculator spreadsheet.

Nick Carr: Google is getting a little carried away with self-importance, maybe?

Chris Brogan: The ROI of Stories – A Case Study

Internet Evolution: Police Lawsuit Over Online Disclosure Rings Alarm Bells

2303.fr (French): Sokoz – A New Model for Ecommerce?

SEER Interactive show that Yahoo’s approach to revenue generation is to profit off advertiser ignorance.

Yours truly for Mike Gray’s Wolf-Howl: After Crashing 3500 Points, Web Says: “Follow My Lead”

Downloads For RSS Subscribers:

• Content Marketing Cannon WordPress plugin - Consolidates content for more links, PageRank and traffic. Details: New SEO plugin: Content Marketing Cannon
• Internal Link Building, a WordPress plugin. It optimizes your internal navigation so you rank like Wikipedia. Details: Check the Internal Link Building update page.
• Get a free chapter from my upcoming book on advanced seo.
• Backlink Analysis With Majestic SEO's Data
  
• ROI on SEO Calculator spreadsheet.

Been doing some local events lately. Last night I had the pleasure of meeting…

Rebecca Xing, a Supply Chain Management and importing/exporting expert, also a graduate of John Molson. (Picture needs to be rotated and it’s not working; will post soon.)

Martin and Tom from Izzit Green? I was really impressed by their ideas and savvy, so keep an eye on them.

Karen Tucker, who’s now starting her own administrative assistant recruiting company, as well as Bernie Li, a principal of iNovia Venture Capital.

Paul Dawalibi of Praized, a local services and software platform.

Kelly Rusk, community manager for Smart Hippo mortgage ratings n stuff. No picture unfortunately. You can also check out her own site at Web2DotWhat.com and find her on Twitter.

Francis Moran of inmedia, Matt (didn’t see the last name) of Backtype and John Beales of 4RoadService were other cool acquaintances, but somehow it didn’t occur to me take pictures of these folks. Go figure.

Downloads For RSS Subscribers:

• Content Marketing Cannon WordPress plugin - Consolidates content for more links, PageRank and traffic. Details: New SEO plugin: Content Marketing Cannon
• Internal Link Building, a WordPress plugin. It optimizes your internal navigation so you rank like Wikipedia. Details: Check the Internal Link Building update page.
• Get a free chapter from my upcoming book on advanced seo.
• Backlink Analysis With Majestic SEO's Data
  
• ROI on SEO Calculator spreadsheet.

Some awesome reading on conversion and time management:

http://www.ioninteractive.com/post-click-marketing-blog/2009/5/7/bad-landing-pages-and-badder-conversion-paths.html

http://www.ioninteractive.com/post-click-marketing-blog/2007/10/24/which-type-of-landing-experience-is-right.html

http://www.ioninteractive.com/post-click-marketing-blog/2009/5/4/a-modular-approach-to-marketing-automation-and-post-click-ma.html – Bit of a sales pitch, but informative nonetheless.

http://www.grokdotcom.com/2009/05/06/you-can%E2%80%99t-edit-your-way-out-of-negative-reviews/

http://www.grokdotcom.com/2009/04/30/on-a-scale-from-1-to-5-surveys-stink-heres-why/ Note that this is about Likert-scale surveys, not all surveys. Indeed, the author’s main beef is that they’re not qualitative – just the opposite of 4Q visitor surveys.

http://blog.mindvalleylabs.com/task-prioritization/774/

Downloads For RSS Subscribers:

• Content Marketing Cannon WordPress plugin - Consolidates content for more links, PageRank and traffic. Details: New SEO plugin: Content Marketing Cannon
• Internal Link Building, a WordPress plugin. It optimizes your internal navigation so you rank like Wikipedia. Details: Check the Internal Link Building update page.
• Get a free chapter from my upcoming book on advanced seo.
• Backlink Analysis With Majestic SEO's Data
  
• ROI on SEO Calculator spreadsheet.

I’m currently being worn out by a confluence of taxes, client work, personal projects and preparations for SMX Advanced. So please excuse the disorganization of this blogrolling post. Consider it a scratchpad link love post, if you will.

Is your site a one-visit wonder? by Ben McKay, UK SEO Consultant. See also SEP’s 3 Ways to Get PPL Talking About You – by Cindy Alvarez, product manager and user experience pro.

Google Maps: Manic Merging of Business Listings due to Algo Change

Reports: US Dept. Of Justice Looking At Antitrust Issues Over Google Books Lawsuit

10 Mistakes to Avoid While Creating Affiliate Banners

10 Reasons Readers Don’t Leave Comments – Well that clarifies a bunch of stuff! via:

27 Must Read Tips and Tutorials for Bloggers [Day 6 - 31DBBB]

Recovering Journalist: What Will Happen When the Presses Go Silent? Found via:

What Happens to the Local Ecosystem if the Local Newspaper Shuts Down

Do you know what heuristic means? It’s a stupid usability-slang word for ‘rules’ or ‘principles’. E.g. the ‘principles of usability’. A heuristic review is basically an expert checking your site’s usability against their checklist of best practices. Ok, that’s oversimplifying, and ignoring the [very real] value of usability pros, but anyways, now you know what it means. That bugged me forever…

Heuristic Evaluation

Heuristic Evaluation: How-To

Buying sites? Selling? Check out Richard Kershaw’s newsletter on the topic (via the ‘buying sites‘ link) .

Creating Passionate Users: What comes after usability?

3 ways to use an a/b split test (Billy’s Optimization Guide Part 1)

Proof: Spammer with Billions of Indexed Pages Moves Traffic – Old but awe-inspiring.

RedAlkemi : Google Hilltop Algorithm : Hilltop Update and Analysis Equally old but probably even more applicable today. Via SEO Book.

Think you know how to write a headline? I’ll bet this headline-copywriting video tutorial by my friend Paul Robb teaches you a thing or two. I learned a lot from it!

Also, my buddy Marty Weintraub got to interview Danny Sullivan. Nice read .

But perhaps the best of all is this interview with Ralph Tegtmeier aka Fantomaster. I LOVE this quote, in response to Eric Schmidt calling the web a cesspool: “My only reasonable comment on this one is: ‘garbage in, garbage out’…” ZING! Haha .

What blogs are you subscribed to? What tags or categories do you like stumbling? Are there particular advanced internet marketing topics you’d like me to cover?  Of course, this also allows me to slip in the mandatory call to action about how you should add my rss feed to your reader .

Downloads For RSS Subscribers:

• Content Marketing Cannon WordPress plugin - Consolidates content for more links, PageRank and traffic. Details: New SEO plugin: Content Marketing Cannon
• Internal Link Building, a WordPress plugin. It optimizes your internal navigation so you rank like Wikipedia. Details: Check the Internal Link Building update page.
• Get a free chapter from my upcoming book on advanced seo.
• Backlink Analysis With Majestic SEO's Data
  
• ROI on SEO Calculator spreadsheet.

You NEED to attend SMX Advanced. It’s that simple. The single best investment you can make in your search education and professional life this year will be happening in Seattle, June 2-3, 2009. Here are 5 sweet reasons to attend.

1) Marty Weintraub of Aimclear search marketing is on at least 2 panels. At SMX West, he schooled myself and the rest of the audience with such creative techniques that I couldn’t help but be entertained. I was laughing out loud and grinning like my mom does when dad makes dinner !

2) The networking promises to be off the hook! There’s a reception the night before the show, parties during the show and after, the attendees feature roomfuls and roomfuls of potential leads for my fellow consultants, and roomfuls of potential vendors/link sources/social media vote sources/knowledge sources for the inhouse guys. For example, last year I got a free tip about reputation management issues for a client I was handling SEO for.

Check out a sample of who went last year. 1800 Flowers, AT&T, Amazon, Godaddy, BusinessWeek, CareerBuilder, CNet, eBay, Duke University (I hear they pay their SEOs in basketball tickets ), eBay, Fox Interactive, GoDaddy, HP, IBM, Intuit, JP Morgan Chase, Monster.com, MTV, Nordstrom, Overstock, Progressive Insurance, Time Inc…

It’s a Who’s Who of leading online companies and online divisions of organizations. Plus it was attended by every SMB with their head screwed on right!

I also met a shitload of awesome people, including Brent Payne, Brett Borders (a Denver copywriter), Tom Critchlow, Eric Enge and Stephan Spencer. Eric and Stephan schooled me on closing SEO deals at SEOmoz’s party, but I unfortunately lost the notes/couldn’t read my handwriting when I got home…

Where else can you rub shoulders with geniuses like Todd Friesen, Jonah Stein, Jim Hedger, Sarah Bird and Gillian Muessig?

3) You can crash SEOmoz’s office for a little bit, and spy on their secret sauce. Spoiler warning… It’s barbecue. More seriously though, people at the show will share stuff like this collab Give It Up video at SEOmoz.

4) Third Door Media go out of their way to accomodate and help every last one of their attendees and speakers. They provide kosher meals. They organize networking lunches. They create a mini-network for you to contact SEMs you admire so you can make plans to meet.

At my very first show, I forgot my laptop and went off to the airport, clueless. At security, I realized what happened and my newly-minted SEOmoz friends (it was our first time meeting in person) put me in touch with people there to start the hunt. Luckily, it was found by Third Door’s folks and the incomparable Claire Schoen insisted that Third Door cover the shipping and handling to send it back across the continent to my frozen Canadian butt! Can you spell C-L-A-S-S A-C-T?

Guy Kawasaki has adopted “Be a mensch” as one of his favourite bits of business advice. Danny Sullivan, Chris Sherman, Sean Moriarty, Claire Schoen, Michelle Robbins and gang score a 10 on the mensch-o-meter.

5) These lovely mensches have agreed to put me on a panel again! YAAY! I’ll be speaking on “Keyword Research Artistry,” one of the show’s first panels on day 1. I’m also hopeful that I’ll be given a spot on the Ranking Factors panel, but with leaders like Rand Fishkin and Marty Weintraub already on the bill, it’s clear competition for that panel’s speaking spots will be fierce.

If you like my regular blog content, well then rest assured that this will be more of the same. In fact, some techniques I’ve been using but haven’t yet blogged will be shared at the show – and only there. After that, I’ll be saving the content for an extended document I’m writing. Maybe a whitepaper, maybe a short book… But it will definitely only be at:

6) P.s. Their early bird special is only good until May 1st. If you delay, you’ll pay more. Get started claiming your spot at SMX Advanced now!

Downloads For RSS Subscribers:

• Content Marketing Cannon WordPress plugin - Consolidates content for more links, PageRank and traffic. Details: New SEO plugin: Content Marketing Cannon
• Internal Link Building, a WordPress plugin. It optimizes your internal navigation so you rank like Wikipedia. Details: Check the Internal Link Building update page.
• Get a free chapter from my upcoming book on advanced seo.
• Backlink Analysis With Majestic SEO's Data
  
• ROI on SEO Calculator spreadsheet.

Thinking and Ideas:

Jimmy Wales is a big thinker, and I give him a lot of respect. The founder of Wikipedia recently did some great interviews:

http://www.bigoakinc.com/blog/interview-with-wikipedia-founder-jimmy-wales/

http://adage.com/brightcove/single.php?title=13778664001 – Jimmy Wales gets branding.

But perhaps the funniest thinking related to Wikipedia comes from XKCD, on Wikipedia’s neutrality requirement.

Another bright thinker I’ve recently discovered is Nicholas Carr, the author of “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” It’s an article that I think will be seminal in many books discussing the internet generation, of which I am a part.  He’s got a lot more greatness at his blog, Rough Type.

Carr on how social media has changed the profit structure of content creation:

http://www.roughtype.com/archives/2006/12/sharecropping_t.php

http://www.roughtype.com/archives/2007/04/the_sharecroppe.php

More Carr on Google.

http://www.roughtype.com/archives/2008/09/google_at_10.php

http://www.roughtype.com/archives/2009/04/google_in_the_m.php

The next bit is a little abstract stuff that ties in to keyword research. I first mentioned data mining on this blog after SMX Advanced 2008 – almost a year ago. Then again in The Trend Towards Data Commodification. Folks like Marty Weintraub of Aimclear have been running with the ball repeatedly, in his great buzz pocket mining and other keyword research posts, which I can’t get enough of .

http://datamining.typepad.com/data_mining/2009/03/strings-are-not-meanings.html

Internet Marketing Lifestyle

Well known affiliate manager Geno Prussakov is giving away copies of his latest book:

http://www.amnavigator.com/blog/2009/04/10/100th-blog-post-100-books-giveaway/

Meanwhile, affiliates can get their butts better organized like so: http://www.adotas.com/2009/03/an-organized-affiliate-marketing-life/

Shana Albert writes with such enthusiasm that, even though this isn’t especially actionable beyond ‘Go to IMSB’, I had to link to her great writing. Enthusiasm helps build relationships and relationships build brands…

http://www.socialdesire.com/2009/04/06/didnt-attend-im-spring-break-23-reasons-you-should-have/

How To Articles & Actionable Internet Marketing Tips

From the conversion rate and PPC geniuses at Closed Loop Marketing come the following sweet, sweet articles:

http://www.closed-loop-marketing.com/blog/2009/02/24/optimize-the-logout-thank-you-page/

http://www.closed-loop-marketing.com/blog/2009/01/21/optimizing-the-email-unsubscribe/

On a related note, see this crook’s understanding of his target audience (aka personas).

Then we get into PPC:

http://www.closed-loop-marketing.com/blog/2009/04/07/businesscom-great-results-new-enhancements/

http://www.redflymarketing.com/blog/new-adwords-networks-placements-view-long-live-the-content-network/

http://ppcvillain.com/2009/03/31/how-to-write-ads-for-women/

Blogs:

http://www.wolf-howl.com/blogs/thesis-date-hooks/

Searching by color:

http://www.alanataylor.com/2009/03/try-this.html

And training new copywriters, fast, without headaches (can also apply to other jobs, however):

http://www.makepeacetotalpackage.com/clayton-makepeace/from-zero-to-hero-in-record-time.html

Finally, some tools (copy-pasted direct from bookmarks, hence the different anchor text):

Twist – see trends in twitter

Search Chart: keywords

spy :: visualizes the conversations on Twitter, Friendfeed, Flickr, Blogs and more.

Audience Intelligence: Microsoft adCenter Labs

p.s. I promised some folks links that I’m forgetting about now, so if you’re one of them, leave a comment!

p.p.s. Wouldn’t you like to add my rss feed to your reader?

Downloads For RSS Subscribers:

• Content Marketing Cannon WordPress plugin - Consolidates content for more links, PageRank and traffic. Details: New SEO plugin: Content Marketing Cannon
• Internal Link Building, a WordPress plugin. It optimizes your internal navigation so you rank like Wikipedia. Details: Check the Internal Link Building update page.
• Get a free chapter from my upcoming book on advanced seo.
• Backlink Analysis With Majestic SEO's Data
  
• ROI on SEO Calculator spreadsheet.