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SEO & Bull$hit

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google althogram update... I also know of a guy who was affected by this... he was basically making auto generated blogs with random text in them and hyperlinks back to websites and spamming blog comments.

Google penalised him like no tomorrow!
 
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RedEvo said:
Penalised him or simply stopped valuing the links that were helping him to rank?

d
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Penalised, i saw drops of his clients from top pages to outside top 100 and even when more genuine white hat SEO was applied, the sites didnt budge and google webmasters was full of messages saying they were violating the quality guidelines.

Of course the links have also become worthless.

Lot of conmen out there, promising white hat seo and delivering a lot of rubbish and taking peoples money for it.
 
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altwebdesign said:
Lot of conmen out there, promising white hat seo and delivering a lot of rubbish and taking peoples money for it.
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Which like i say, people don't quite understand how important the issue is. If you own a hobby site then it isn't as important as a company that has 5 retail outlets with 50% of annual turnover coming through online. Any mucking up in the SERPs and the company can be wiped out and people can lose their jobs.

Although i haven't seen much on actual retail sites being hit by Google updates and such. Just article and affiliate sites etc.
 
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Esk247 said:
Which like i say, people don't quite understand how important the issue is. If you own a hobby site then it isn't as important as a company that has 5 retail outlets with 50% of annual turnover coming through online. Any mucking up in the SERPs and the company can be wiped out and people can lose their jobs.

Although i haven't seen much on actual retail sites being hit by Google updates and such. Just article and affiliate sites etc.
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Exactly, some of these 'SEO experts' suffer from what my friend gordon gekko calls morale hazard - you give them you're money and they dont act responsible of it.

Which is why I think its improtant for a web design company or SEO company to have a very strong brand that is built around a simialr theory to 'love marks' love your clients website as though it were your own.
 
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Esk247 said:
Which like i say, people don't quite understand how important the issue is. If you own a hobby site then it isn't as important as a company that has 5 retail outlets with 50% of annual turnover coming through online. Any mucking up in the SERPs and the company can be wiped out and people can lose their jobs.
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Hence why SEO's are nervous wrecks.:)

Earl
 
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Esk247 said:
Although i haven't seen much on actual retail sites being hit by Google updates and such. Just article and affiliate sites etc.
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I know of a few etail sites which have warehouses and real staff have been hit and a few claims management company sites have been hit too. This is over the last week.

And Panda was a kick in any ecommerce site which uses the stock product descriptions.
 
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I don't get at all nervous with client's websites. I do onsite SEO but I am not an SEO specialist so I offer no ranking or traffic guarantees on new websites. I tell my clients what I think may happen and I am honest about this. It costs me some jobs but I can sleep at night.

When a client wants updates (where appropriate) I warn them that this could have an adverse effect on their ranking.

The problem in SEO is often caused by selling unrealistic expectations.

.
 
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SEO boils down to attempting to actificially curry favor with the search engines via manipulation. A bit like the annoying child at school who hops up and down in front of the teacher with their hand up until they get attention (or in Google's case, kicked out of class).

These days I tell people to create quality web content for their intended audience. NOT the search engines. The search engines that really matter are now intelligent enough to know when your pages are legit.

Spinning articles from others, or robotically gaming the system is now punished with a crack from Thor's hammer. You really don't want that.

Social factors are a plus too. Traffic volume, bounce rate and mentions on social networks (by others, not by you trying to push yourself) all help.

Activity within Google's mail, online docs and other digital real estate which involves your site(s) is all added into the mix.

Play well with Google by adhering to their TOS, increase user engagement and they will throw you a sugar lump.

Ever survey your customers to see what they actually want from you and your site, rather than what you think they want? That can work wonders for user increased user engagement and increased traffic flow. 'Build it and they will come' does not work. Take a look at some online help with this like surveymonkey.com or something similar.

Good luck!
 
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Graham Nichols said:
SEO boils down to attempting to actificially curry favor with the search engines via manipulation. A bit like the annoying child at school who hops up and down in front of the teacher with their hand up until they get attention (or in Google's case, kicked out of class).

These days I tell people to create quality web content for their intended audience. NOT the search engines. The search engines that really matter are now intelligent enough to know when your pages are legit.
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You mean you tell poor people.:|

Shame on you.:)

The day search engines become intelligent ain't gonna happen.;)

Earl
 
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Curry favour ???? - is this a dig at all the indians selling seo :D

Ever survey your customers to see what they actually want from you and your site, rather than what you think they want? - Yes all the time! - unfortunately the all answer the same - wanna be top of Google for "Keyword x"
Then you say "keyword A, B, C, and D will also be beneficial"
They say "x"
Then you say "a gets twice as much traffic - B has half the traffic but will have a high volume of conversion"
they say "x"
you say " x = £1000 - abcd +x = £1000
They say "x"
Then you say "goodbye idiot"
6months later they say " can you do abcd - only"

yes listen to the client - but they are 90% of the time ill informed by the mate who knows something about a turkey who flew over from Gibraltar and broke his leg in an elevator accident whilst juggling a tomato, potato and an orange and that turkey knows what SEO is.

Graham Nichols said:
SEO boils down to attempting to actificially curry favor with the search engines via manipulation.

Ever survey your customers to see what they actually want from you and your site, rather than what you think they want? That can work wonders for user increased user engagement and increased traffic flow. 'Build it and they will come' does not work. Take a look at some online help with this like surveymonkey.com or something similar.

Good luck!
Click to expand...
 
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We have found a lot of SEO companies have been hit hard recently. Many SEO consultants use link building software (spammy) that you can get hundreds of links with on a daily basis. By using these products all of the time they failed to understand the true concepts of SEO.
Most of this software available will provide you with poor quality links. The difference is to rank well you will need manual link building with QUALITY links. You can rank a good site with 100 quality links against a site with 2000 poor quality links easily.

If an SEO company is not working with you at the start of a campaign to conduct full keyword research and advise on all your onsite seo tasks then avoid them like the plague. Your site structure and content, blog posts etc are critical to ranking and should be able to advise on this.

In this case like with many others recently. SEO companies and consultants have hit the panic button as their client site have all lost ranking due to algorithm updates and they quite simply do not have the skills or knowledge to provide a solution and work to Google guidlines to rectify this.

Good luck moving forward
 
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redalien said:
We have found a lot of SEO companies have been hit hard recently. Many SEO consultants use link building software (spammy) that you can get hundreds of links with on a daily basis. By using these products all of the time they failed to understand the true concepts of SEO.
Most of this software available will provide you with poor quality links. The difference is to rank well you will need manual link building with QUALITY links. You can rank a good site with 100 quality links against a site with 2000 poor quality links easily.

If an SEO company is not working with you at the start of a campaign to conduct full keyword research and advise on all your onsite seo tasks then avoid them like the plague. Your site structure and content, blog posts etc are critical to ranking and should be able to advise on this.

In this case like with many others recently. SEO companies and consultants have hit the panic button as their client site have all lost ranking due to algorithm updates and they quite simply do not have the skills or knowledge to provide a solution and work to Google guidlines to rectify this.

Good luck moving forward
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You have obviously never sold SEO. Most clients want SEO for pennies, what you describe costs pounds... It's not necessarily skills that are lacking...
 
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The search engines that really matter are now intelligent enough to know when your pages are legit.
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You used the plural there. Can you tell us what search engines really matter?

.
 
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Of course it is skills like in any trade. Why should an seo provider not be skilled and knowledgable? If you want someone that only knows how to press buttons on seo software this is very different.
You wouldnt have your car repaired by someone that only knows how to change the oil?
As for the cost of SEO, this is for you to negotiate and show the value of your services like in any industry. SEO cost is representative of the keywords that are being targeted.
 
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WeblinkPlus said:
You have obviously never sold SEO. Most clients want SEO for pennies, what you describe costs pounds... It's not necessarily skills that are lacking...
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Prove your value to their business like every other service has to. It's a competitive world out there you know. Not everyone goes for the cheapest plumber do they so they wont always go for the cheapest SEO consultant if you offer a quality service with results.
 
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The search engines that really matter are now intelligent enough to know when your pages are legit.
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Google, Yahoo, Bing, YouTube (its' a SE for video) and Ask.
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As someone has already pointed out Yahoo and Bing are now the same. YouTube is not a search engine. And Ask is ... well forget it.

There is only one search engine that matters in the UK and that is Google. The rest are also rans. http://theeword.co.uk/info/search_engine_market.html ;)

.
 
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YouTube is, depending on which datasource you use, either the #2 or #3 search engine. It's not all cuddly animals or amusing industrial accidents. People use it for educational purposes too. Which is why it should always be included in any SEO work.

The bottom line is to get your message out to the widest audience, regardless of platform. Not an easy task.
 
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People use it for educational purposes too. Which is why it should always be included in any SEO work.
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There's not much point in including YouTube in SEO work if the site you are promoting does not appear in YouTube. Real search engines will find the information on YouTube anyway.

.
 
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Graham Nichols said:
YouTube is, depending on which datasource you use, either the #2 or #3 search engine. It's not all cuddly animals or amusing industrial accidents. People use it for educational purposes too. Which is why it should always be included in any SEO work.

The bottom line is to get your message out to the widest audience, regardless of platform. Not an easy task.
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YouTube isn't a search engine though - its a video upload site with a search feature. It doesn't list any external sources, only YouTube content.

For 99% of SEO campaigns you can safely ignore YouTube, it effectively doesn't exist.
 
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Graham Nichols said:
YouTube is, depending on which datasource you use, either the #2 or #3 search engine. It's not all cuddly animals or amusing industrial accidents. People use it for educational purposes too. Which is why it should always be included in any SEO work.

The bottom line is to get your message out to the widest audience, regardless of platform. Not an easy task.
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You'll be telling me directories are search engines too next!!
 
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