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Posted by rebecca For the four of you who aren't aware, The Dark Knight is a pretty big deal for a multitude of reasons:
- It was the first movie to film large chunks of the film with IMAX cameras.
- It debuted on the largest number of screens in cinematic history (4,366).
- It also debuted on the largest number of IMAX screens (94) and broke IMAX debut records ($6.2 million).
- It beat the record of most money made from Friday midnight shows ($18.5 million).
- It holds the record for the best opening day/single day ($66.4 million).
- It made a record-shattering $155.3 million its opening weekend.
- It has a 94% Rotten Tomatoes ranking.
- Fandango reported that 64% of the people who have seen The Dark Knight plan on seeing it again in the theater (I've seen it twice).
- And, of course, the film marked what could be Heath Ledger's final performance, which is so engrossing that there is buzz that he could be the seventh person in history to receive a posthumous Oscar acting nomination (and if he were to win, he'd be the second person to win after death).
Whew! That's a lot of stats I just threw at you. Sorry about that. I just wanted to convey the magnitude of this film's success. You can argue that plenty of other films have made lots of money, but many of these movies are specifically targeted (e.g., big budget action flicks that skew overwhelmingly male), overly stylized/injected with CG, or just not very good (making money but disappointing movie critics). But how many times do you see a film that's critically acclaimed make serious bank at the box office, have strong holding power, appeals to various demographics and both genders, and generate substantial awards buzz?
Not very often, which is why when you do have the fortune of catching lightning in a bottle, you better figure out the reason behind its success. I think The Dark Knight had a lot of things going for it, and these positives are all things that can be translated over to your site's content and marketing strategies.
1. Have a Good Product/Idea
This seems like a no-brainer but is nonetheless often overlooked (ahem, Flooz.com and their "online-only currency"). Batman is a good product, and he always has been. He's a regular guy (okay, a billionaire, but hey, he has no super powers) who just wants to make his city a better, safer place. We can all relate to that, right? A successful product or service is one that appeals to its audience. We need it. It triggers nostalgia. Makes our lives easier. We identify a fun aspect to it. We feel that we can't live without it. Great products and services trigger these emotions, this sense of urgent "I need this, and I need this NOW."
With The Dark Knight, the film built itself around a good product: Batman. Bruce Wayne. Gotham City. Evil villains. Delivering justice. And who finds that appealing? Well, naturally the built-in audience of comic book fans and graphic novel readers--folks who are most familiar with the product. Even people who aren't hardcore Batman geeks are attracted to the product if they saw previous Batman films and had a positive experience (excluding Batman and Robin, of course--nobody had a positive experience from that rubber nipplefest). When it comes to marketing your product or services, success will come much quicker if you actually have something good to offer.
2. Focus on Stellar Content, Not Necessarily on Dazzling Effects
A lot of big budget summer action flicks try to dazzle you with millions of dollars' worth of CGI, special effects, gigantic explosions, and bullet-time this and green screen that. However, oftentimes these films over-rely on special effects and use them as their main selling point, and unfortunately special effects can't replace a poorly written script or a ridiculous plot.
Compare The Dark Knight to Spiderman 3. The third Spidey movie was a CGI barf-o-rama: you had the Sandman, some Venom scenes, Spiderman's wall climbing--the list goes on and on. And guess what? That movie freakin' sucked because while everyone was off rendering effects over at ILM, nobody realized that the script was horrendous. The Dark Knight, in comparison, doesn't build its movie around computer generated images, it uses CG to supplement the story. Many of the big action scenes were even done the good ol' fashioned way (meaning "no CG effects"), and the non-action scenes hold up on their own because the script is very well-written. As a whole, the movie's plot is realistic, compelling, entertaining, tragic, and exhilarating.
What about your website? Well, think about it. Do you need intricately developed games and widgets and this mega-huge budget and whoozits and whatsits in order to rank well and drive traffic? Well, no, not necessarily. There are tons of bare bones sites that enjoy mass appeal because they offer great content. Clever ideas like Postcards from Yo Momma, Stuff White People Like, and GoFugYourself attract readers, no matter how simple the layout. So, the next time you see a flashy (or Flash-y) website that has impressive-looking features, don't instantly jump out of your chair and exclaim, "I need that too!" You don't. A cheaper option is good copy, plain and simple. Start with that. Good copy is indexable, too!
3. Be Topical
This applies more to the content side of things, though it can go for products as well (I don't see too many beeper product sites popping up right now...unlike what the Beeper King says, technology isn't cyclical). The Dark Knight addresses some real-life concerns that are plaguing many Americans today, such as terrorism. Likewise, if your site can offer a product or some content that ties in with current events or the latest trends, it can capitalize on what's popular nowadays. This doesn't necessarily mean, however, that you should exploit an opportunity...which leads me to my next point...
4. Don't Be Shameless
Obviously, the studio and producers behind The Dark Knight could have gone the shameless route and capitalized on Heath Ledger's sudden death by touting it as "His final performance!" and milking his passing for all it's worth. They didn't, though. The marketing department approached the subject very delicately, consulting with Ledger's family on how to appropriately market the film. Some movie posters displaying the Joker were removed or edited/blurred, and it seemed like the studio did an admirable job of focusing on promoting the film as a whole rather than highlighting an unfortunate incident.
Your website can have controversial content or take a ballsy stance on an issue in order to attract links. As you're likely aware, being the "villain" is a good link bait tactic. But are you willing to compromise your integrity in order to gain some exposure? Do you want to hurt your company's reputation? Is it worth it in the long run? Would you rather have users say "Oh, that site has an awesome blog" and "I love your company's products," or do you want to hear "Yeah, I know that blogger. He's a real asshole" and "I'm not familiar with their products, but I know that the CEO is a jerk"?
5. Widen the Appeal
Think about how you can widen your site's appeal. Obviously, many sites have a target demographic. Imagine, however, if some sites and companies tried to open up to other audiences. Do guys like pink iPods and red Dell laptops? Some might, but the colors are probably more appealing to women. Think of little tweaks you can make to your site or products in order to widen their appeal. The Dark Knight skewed 48% female. Pretty damn good for a comic book movie, right? How'd it attract the fairer sex? It could be a number of factors. Maybe these ladies were comic book nerds too. Or maybe they were curious about the buzz gathering around the film and wanted to see what all the fuss was about. Or maybe it's because Christian Bale and Heath Ledger are both, well, hot, and have also appeared in dramas that are appealing to women, and thus they've built up a female fanbase. Either way, the movie clearly did something right because people young and old, male and female, geek and non-geek flocked to the theaters in droves.
6. Don't Insult Your Userbase
The Dark Knight didn't try to dumb down the plot or pull any Fantastic 4 bullshit. Its plot was dark and often depressing and tragic. There was no happy ending. And you know what? Audiences seemed okay with that. They applauded the film's realism and appreciated the fact that "comic book movie" doesn't have to equate to bubblegum bright colors, bad guys being vanquished, and good guys saving the day and getting the gal. The movie didn't insult the audience's intelligence, and you shouldn't insult your users', either. That's not to say you shouldn't provide good, intuitive usability; rather, you should offer quality products and content that your users expect.
7. Don't Neglect Your Early Adopters
One thing that irked me about the X-Men movies (let's not even talk about the embarrassment known as "the Brett Ratner fiasco") was that many character origins and original plot points from the comic books were ignored or changed entirely for the movie. Tweaks like these irk comic book purists and early adopters. The Dark Knight kept the character's integral points intact and as a result kept die-hard Batman fans happy.
Think about your early adopters. What about your site, its products, or its content do these folks love? What features do they adore? Why have they stuck with you for so long? You should appreciate your long-term users and customers because if it weren't for them, you wouldn't be where you are today. Listen to their feedback and suggestions. Deliver (within reason, of course) things that meet or exceed their expectations. Acknowledge and thank them every so often, for they are your die-hard fans, and there's nothing worse than a lover scorned.
8. Be Smart with Your Launches/Product Debuts
It wouldn't have been smart if The Dark Knight debuted in theaters in January or February. It's a huge budget Hollywood blockbuster--why would it be released during the slowest box office time of the year? Big budget action flicks and other movies that aim to rake in the benjamins are typically released over the summer, which is when box office earnings are at their highest.
Similarly, think about appropriate times to debut new products or tool launches. Maybe you should wait for a major industry conference so you can unveil a new tool or feature in front of thousands of people. If you have a great new product coming out that would make for a perfect gift, think about promoting it during the holiday shopping season. Got some romantic products? Unveil them leading up to Valentine's Day. Have a great blog post? Don't publish it on a Friday night! If you think about it, there are lots of ideal times to debut new material.
9. Make Your Ads Stand Out
The Dark Knight did a pretty damn good job creating compelling movie posters that pop out and attract attention. They also had some really great movie trailers and teasers, and they even aired the first seven minutes of the film at IMAX theaters before other attractions. The studios' efforts paid off: these marketing tactics generated buzz and created anticipation for the film. Likewise, think about how you can make your ads stand out. If you have banner or display ads, brainstorm how they can stand out among the other ads being displayed. Use different colors or font sizes or a compelling graphic. For your organic and paid search results, consider your title tags, meta descriptions, and ad copy. How will you get searchers to click through? What can you do to make yourself stand out among your competitors?
10. Handle Negative Press Promptly and Professionally
Shortly after the film was released, there was stunning news about how Christian Bale was arrested for allegedly verbally assaulting his mother (apparently you can get arrested in the UK for "verbal" assault, which is pretty frickin' odd). This scandal could have potentially hurt the movie's positive buzz and Bale's squeaky-clean reputation, but the film and the actor's publicists handled the situation well. Bale cooperated with authorities and official statements were made to the press, and there was no ugly behavior, screaming arguments, or diva demands.
What if someone gives your product a negative review? Or if a blogger writes a nasty post about your site? Negative press can be handled appropriately if you act fast and diffuse the situation. Acknowledge the blogger or the user's concerns and see if there's some way you can extract some constructive criticism. Kill the meanies with kindness and let them know that you appreciate the feedback. If you take the higher ground, you'll do wonders for your reputation.
Okay, this post ended up being way longer than I wanted, but hopefully you stuck with me and were able to see the parallels between the movie and a great content/marketing strategy. As always, weigh in with your thoughts...or you could just say, "Eff this, I'm going to see the movie now!", which is, of course, a viable option as well. :)
P.S. This is my 200th blog post at SEOmoz. Bust out the champagne!
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Posted by randfish This week marked the arrival of Cuil on the search engine scene. Being a huge fan of search technology and how search engines work in general, I've been spending some time playing around with the new service and thought it would be valuable to expose my data on how the classic market leaders - Google, Yahoo!, Live & Ask compare to the newcomer.
When judging the value and performance of a major web search engine, there's a number of items I consider critical to the judging process. In order, these are -- relevancy, coverage, freshness, diversity and user experience. First, let's take a quick look at the overall performance of the 5 engines, then dive deeper into the methodology used and the specific criteria.
Interesting Notes from the Data:
- I'm not that surprised to see Yahoo! come out slightly ahead. Although their performance on long tail queries isn't spectacular, when you weight all of the items equally, Yahoo!'s right up there with Google. There's a reason why people haven't entirely switched over to Google, despite the far stronger "brand" they've created in search.
- Google is good across the board - again, not surprising. They're the most consistent of the engines and perform admirably in nearly every test. To my mind, despite Yahoo! eeking out a win in the numbers here, Google is still the gold standard in search.
- Ask has some clear advantages when it comes to diversity and user experience, thanks to their 3D interface, which IMO does provide some truly excellent results, particularly in the head of the demand curve.
- When it comes to index size, Yahoo! appears to have the win, but I think my test is actually a bit misleading. Although Yahoo! clearly keeps more pages on many of those domains indexed, I suspect that Google is actually both faster and broader, they simply choose to keep less in their main index (and that may actually help their relevancy results). Google's also excellent at canonicalization, an area where Yahoo! and the others all struggle in comparison.
- The biggest surprise to me? Microsoft's Live Search. I'm stunned that the quality and relevancy of Live Search is so comparatively high. I haven't done a study of this scale since 2006 or so, but the few dozen searches I run on Live each month have always produced far worse results than what I got this time around. Clearly, they're making an impact and getting better. Their biggest problem is still spam and manipulative links (which their link analysis algorithms don't seem to catch). If they fix that, I think they're on their way to top-notch relevancy.
- Cuil doesn't permit a wide variety of very standard "power" search options like site:, inurl:, intitle:, negative keywords, etc. making it fairly impossible to measure them at all on index size (though the lack of any results at all returned for terms & phrases where the other engines had hundreds or thousands speaks volumes). It also put their technical and advanced search scores in the doldrums - none of the "technorati" are likely to start using this engine, and that's an essential component of building buzz on the web Cuil's missed out on.
- Cuil was foolish to launch now. Given the buzz they had and the potential to take market share (even a fraction of a percent is worth millions), they should have had lots of people like me running lots of tests like this, showing them how clearly far behind they were from the major engines. You only get one chance to make a first impression, and theirs was spoiled. I won't predict their demise yet, but I will predict that it will be a long time before Michael Arrington or anyone in the tech or mainstream media believes their claims again without extremely compelling evidence. Their index, from what I can see, is smaller than any of the major engines and their relevancy is consistently dismal. I feel really bad for them, personally, as I had incredibly high hopes that someone could challenge Google and make search a more interesting marketplace. Oh well... Maybe next time (assuming VCs are willing to keep throwing 30+ million at the problem).
Methodology: For each of the inputs, I've run a number of searches, spread across different types of query strings. This is an area where understanding how search engine query demand works is vital to judging an engine's performance. Some engines are excellent at returning great results for the most popular queries their users run, but provide very little value in the "tail" of the demand curve. To be a great engine, you must be able to answer both.
In most instances, I've used search terms and phrases that mark different points along the query-demand scale, from the very popular search queries (like "Barack Obama" and "Photography") to long-tail query strings like ("pacific islands polytheistic cultures" and "chemical compounds formed with baking soda") and everything in between. You can see a full list of the queries I've used below each section. During the testing, I used the following scale to rate the engines' quality:
Now let's dive into the lengthy data collection process...
Relevancy
--------------------
Relevancy is defined by the core quality of the results - the more on-topic and valuable they are in fulfilling the searcher's goals and expectations, the higher the relevancy. Measuring quality is always subjective but, in my experience, even a small number of queries provides insight into the relative value of the engine's results. To collect relevancy, I simply judged the degree to which the top results resolved my inquiry, and weighted those that provided the best answers in the first few positions higher than those that had better results further down.
The following are the queries I used to judge each of the engines on performance:
- Top Buzz: gas prices, iphone, facebook, dark knight, barack obama
- Popular: laptops, photography, rental cars, scholarship, house plans
- Mid-Range: fire prevention, calendar software, snow tires, economic stimulus payment, nintendo wii games
- Long Tail: pacific islands polytheistic cultures, chemical compounds formed with baking soda, genuine buddy 50 scooter reviews, google toolbar pagerank formula, getting a novel published
- Technical: metalworking inurl:blog, cricket -site:.co.uk -site:.com.au, dark crystal site:imdb.com, top * ways, definition sycophant
Coverage
--------------------
Coverage points towards a search engine's index size and crawl speed - the bigger the index and faster the engine crawls, the more pages it can return that have relevance to each query. To judge this metric, I focused on the coverage of individual sites (both large and small) as well as queries in the tail of the demand curve.
Queries used for evaluation:
- Large Sites: site:government.hp.com, site:research.ibm.com/leem, welsh rugby site:bbc.co.uk, search engine optimization site:w3.org, tango tapas seattle site:nytimes.com
- Mid-Size Sites: site:seomoz.org/blog, site:news.ycombinator.com, site:education.com/magazine, bumbershoot site:thestranger.com, snowboards site:evogear.com
- Small Sites: site:downtownartwalk.com, site:amphl.org/, site:totebo.com, dockboard site:loadingdocksupply.com, site:microsites.audi.com/audia5/
Freshness
--------------------
Although coverage can help to indicate crawl speed and depth, freshness in results shows a keen effort by the engine to place relevant, valuable news items and other trending topics atop the results. I used a number of queries related to recent events both popular and long tail (including new pages from relatively small domains) to test the quality of freshness offered by the engine's index.
Queries used for evaluation:
- Top Buzz: los angeles earthquake, obama germany, gas prices, ted stevens, beijing olympics
- Popular Queries: new york city weather, dow jones average, seattle mariners schedule, cuil launch, nasa news
- Mid-Range Queries: warp speed engine, unesco world heritage, movie times 98115, comic con 2008, most charitable us cities
- Long Tail Queries: melinda van wingen, over the hedge comic 7/28, seomoz give it up blog, scrabulous facebook, internet startups that failed miserably
Diversity
--------------------
When search queries become ambiguous, lesser engines often struggle to provide high quality results, while those on the cutting edge can serve up much higher value by providing diversity in their results or even active suggestions about the query intent.
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Queries used for evaluation (I've only used 3 queries per level here, as more ambiguous query strings are very challenging to identify):
- Highly Ambiguous: mouse, ruby, drivers
- Moderate Ambiguity: comics, shipping, earth
- Relative Clarity: ibm, harry potter, graphic design
- Obvious Intent: seattle children's hospital map, color wheel diagram, great gatsby amazon
User Experience
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The design, interface, features, speed and inclusion of vertical results all play into the user experience. An engine that offers a unique display may rank well or poorly here, depending on the quality of the results delivered and whether the additional data provides real value. Rather than separate queries, I've judged each of the engines based on their offerings in this field (using both the data from the previous sets and my own past knowledge & experience).
.gif)
User experience was based on each of the following:
- Query Speed - the average time from hitting the search button to having a fully-loaded results page
- Results Layout - including the organization of results, ads, query options, search bar, navigation, etc.
- Vertical Inclusion - the inclusion of valuable vertical or "instant answer" style results where useful
- Query Assistance - the use of disambiguation, expansion, and similar/related queries
- Advanced Features - the ability to conduct site specific searches, search for terms only in specific URLs or titles, and narrow by website type, a given folder on a domain, etc.
For those who'd like to provide their own input about how to judge a search engine, Slate.com is running a reader contest to ask How do we know if a new search engine is any good? - I'd strongly encourage participation, as I know the audience here can contribute some excellent insight :-)
If you're interested, here's a screenshot of the Google Docs spreadsheet I created to conduct this research (and I've published the doc online here):
This kind of thing is a lot of work, and although this isn't scientifically or statistically significant, and clearly biased (as I'm the only one who did the judging), I think the results are actually fairly useful and accurate, though it would be fascinating to run public studies like this on a defensible sample size.
p.s. Want to use any of the images or content from this post? Go for it - just please provide a link back :-)
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There are many web sites for nonprofit organization online that could use a little direction, a little help from people in the web design and internet marketing communities.
I came across a site this weekend that works to connect professionals interested in helping non profits with organizations that need their help.
The Taproot Foundation is a non profit that partners with corporations, universities and trade associations to help provide pro bono marketing, human resources and IT consulting to non profit organizations.
The term “pro bono” means “for the good,” and Taproot has been working to connect business professionals with non profits since 2001, enabling those professionals to provide a few hours a week to help organizations that can benefit from their experience and expertise.
Many of the Taproot projects involved creating or updating web sites for non profits. Here are some of the names of non profits that have been benefitting with Taproot, on projects involving basic or advanced web sites:
Brooklyn:
Brooklyn Center for the Urban Environment
Children’s Arts & Science Workshops Inc.
New York City:
Disabilities Network of New York City
Hamilton-Madison House
Jamaica Service Program For Older Adults
Washington, DC:
Ayuda
Alexandria, DC:
Carpenter’s Shelter
San Francisco, Ca:
CARECEN San Francisco
Community Legal Services in East Palo Alto
Conservatory of Flowers
Oakland, Ca:
Fred Finch Youth Center
Friends of the Urban Forest
Hamilton Family Center
Hand in Hand Parenting
San Mateo, Ca:
Legal Aid Society of San Mateo County
Chicago, Il:
Chicago Communities In Schools, Inc.
Council for Adult and Experiential Learning (CAEL)
Deicke Center for Visual Rehabilitation
Housing Opportunities for Women
Latinos Progresando
Literacy Chicago
Chelsea, MA:
Chelsea Collaborative, Inc.
Seattle, WA:
ECOSS - Environmental Coalition of South Seattle
Center for Strengthening the Teaching Profession
Hanford Challenge
Parent Trust for Washington Children
Taproot appears to be limited to 6 regions around the US:
- Bay Area
- Seattle
- Chicago
- New York
- Boston
- Washington DC
In addition to helping organizations that really need help and are working to help change the world for the better, by getting involved with Taproot, you have the opportunity to meet other professionals and get involved with people from corporate partners such as Microsoft, Yahoo, TimeWarner, Idealist.org, Deloitte, and many others.
If you are outside of Taproot’s regions, there are other places to learn about volunteer opportunities. For instance, a “virtual” search on the VolunteerMatch Website for web designer reveals 166 opportunites from organizations like:
Family Crisis Center of Baltimore County, Inc.
Common Peace, Center for the Advancement of Nonviolence
Harvest Home
Silence the Violence, Inc.
Want to help change the world and peoples’ lives? There are plenty of opportunities.
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Posted by randfish In June of this year, I presented on the "Give It Up" panel at SMX Advanced. Although some of the material shared by panelists during that session was gray and black hat, my presentation was nearly entirely white hat, and I think that these tips should prove valuable for anyone in the SEO industry. This presentation was broken into 3 parts, and I'll maintain that segmentation here on the blog.
#1) Searching for Links
In this section, I walked through many query parameters and operators, along with advanced combinations of searches to illustrate how they could be applied to a link acquisition campaign.
- Basic searches applied to link acquisition:
- The related command at Google
Use to identify sites that are most connected with your own, or, more valuably, your competition.
- The intitle parameter
Find sites and pages that focus directly on your keywords (or include phrases like "add url," "suggest a site," etc.)
- The inurl parameter
As above
- The intext parameter (and how it's possibly broken)
I showed a few screenshots here to illustrate a query that returned a single result for the "intext" search, but then said that the terms were only found "in links pointing to the page." When I tested without "intext," pages appeared that had the terms on the page... Who knows? This inconsistency of this parameter lead me to believe it's not particularly accurate or useful.
- The inanchor parameter
Sadly, as with intext, it appears that inanchor produces inconsistent and generally useless results
- Using the "allin" series
To save time with multiple intitle/inurl queries, you can use allin, but beware because it won't combine with other parameters
- Wildcard usage in searching
Using the * in queries serves as a wildcard, so you can see all the pages that contain a particular phrase missing a keyword, e.g., top * ways to, the best of *, submit your *, etc.
- Temporal-based searching
I really like temporal searches in Google for competitor brand names and for link submission searches like "suggest a site" site:edu for the past 60 days.
- Linkfromdomain on MSN/Live
Using this query, you can see all the domains that a given domain has links out to - linkfromdomain:seomoz.org
- Competitive links searches:
There's a false assumption that only Yahoo! Site Explorer offers link information - not the case! There's a number of sites that show link data (granted, Yahoo!'s still the best).
- Yahoo! Site Explorer - example
- Yahoo! Link & Linkdomain - example
- Google Blogsearch Links - example
- Exalead Links - example
- Alexa Links - example
- Technorati "Reactions" Links - example
- Link searches with a specific region - example (you can also use europe, africa, asia, centralamerica, downunder, mediterranean, mideast, northamerica, southamerica, southeastasia) credit to Ann Smarty for the list
- Experiments in Advanced Queries:
- LinkfromDomain + Linkdomain
First use linkfromdomain at MSN/Live, then to find where those links are coming from on the domain, use a linkdomain:domain.com site:sourcedomain.com - example.
- Pages in order of importance
We've talked about this in the past, but using a query like inurl:www site:seomoz.org will give you list of pages ordered generally by importance (it's not perfect, but still good for finding important pages on the domain). You can also try inurl:tld (like "com" or "org) +site: and you should always use &filter=0 in the URL string on these to get accurate results.
- Brand mentions with no links
At Yahoo!, try a brand search plus a negative linkdomain, e.g., "seomoz.org" -linkdomain:seomoz.org to find people who've mentioned your brand/site but haven't provided a link.
- Linking to multiple competitors but not your site
This is one of my favorites - you can see who's linking to 3 or 4 competitors on a single page, but doesn't have a link to you. Oftentimes, these are prime spots for link requests or submissions - example.
- Competitor domain + "add url" style searches
Who's linking to your competition and also has the text "add url" or "suggest a site" on their page - those are probably prime targets for link building - example.
- Keyword + inurl "directory" style searches
If the word "directory," "resources," or "links" is in the URL, your chances for finding a link opportunity are pretty high. Adding your keyword just enhances the chance of an on-topic link source - example.
- Shameless Plug:
If you haven't tried SEOmoz's Juicy Link Finder Tool, it's pretty darn good for this kind of thing. You can use basic searches or try some of the more advanced ones above (particularly those that are likely to produce results where you can submit or suggest a link) and get a list that can be re-ordered by domain PageRank or domain age, then be taken to SERPs that contain likely link sources on those sites.
- Tracking Manual Link Building Efforts:
My favorite tactic here is to create a new, nonsense word or use a phrase ordering that's particularly unique and drop that wherever I perform manual link building. I can then search for that term/phrase-in-quotes and see all the pages that each of the engines have spidered that contain my link building efforts. It's a very handy way to show off your link building work in an SEO contract, too.
NOTE: My blog posts A Long List of Link Searches and the older A Long List of Competitive Link Searches are both good fodder to continue along this route.
#2) Google Local Ranking Tips
In this segment of my presentation, I went through a list of factors ordered by personal opinion of most important to least important for earning high rankings in the Google Local SERPs.
- Register with Google Local (and use your business type in the name you register with, e.g., "Cascadia Restaurant" rather than just " Cascadia")
- Be "close" to Google's perceived "city center"
- Have a high number of local reviews (in Google Local itself)
- Get links from other local sources (other sites/directories in your area code)
- Have a local phone number
- Participate in online menu services (for restaurants; the ones Google uses most appear to be Zagat, AllMenus, Menutopia & Menupix)
- Get good ratings in your local reviews (surprisingly, though, more reviews, even with low ratings, appear to carry more weight than good reviews but few ratings)
- Get your city name included in the anchor text that points to your site
- Get listed in the non-Google directory sources the engine uses (Gayot, Zagat, Citysearch, Lilaguide, Superpages, etc.)
- Include your address on your site's pages in spiderable, HTML text
- Use your keywords/city name in your business name
- Build up domain authority and PageRank
NOTE: IMO, this was a poor man's version of a project David Mihm (who was in the audience and probably thought my advice was amateurish compared to his vast local ranking experience) completed a few weeks later - The Local Search Ranking Factors.
#3) Reputation Tracking Queries
These are the actual queries I use on a regular basis (not as regular as I'd like, but I'm trying) to keep up with who's talking about or linking to SEOmoz on a daily basis. I think that, taken together, they give you remarkably good insight about where your brand is going on the web and how it's being perceived.
- Google Web Search (with 24 hour temporal specificity) - example
- Google Blog Search (ordered by date) - example
- Google Blog Search for links - example
- Google News Search - example
- Technorati Broad Search - example
- Technorati Link Search - example
- Shameless Plug #2: SEO Analytics is a really good service for watching the counts of these types of queries as well as indexing and displaying link numbers over time (and all you have to do is plug in the sites you want to watch).
- Summize/Twitter Search - example
- Blogpulse Search - example
Whew... I covered a lot in 7 minutes on stage, eh? Actually, to be fair, I think I took almost a full 10, even though I boasted that I'd be through within the time limit (oh, that cardinal sin of pride).
At the end, I also gave one entirely black hat tactic, though I think it could be useful to know as a white hat. I noted that by pointing the DNS of a very naughty/banned site to another domain, that site on the receiving end would sometimes inherit the penalty and be tossed out of the index (or made to rank at the back of the results for most every query). The folks who showed this to me noted that it only worked some of the time and only when the domain being pointed to was relatively low on the domain authority scale (few inbound links, not much trust, etc). When I observed it in action, I got the same sense. Also - since it's passed the 30-day window after SMX Advanced, it's entirely possible that Google has closed this loophole.
Hopefully this has been valuable - I know I talked pretty quickly up on stage, so perhaps this can serve to help all those who gave up on taking detailed notes :-) For those who are interested, here's the downloadable PPT file (warning - it's 5.5MB).
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Posted by Sarah Bird, Esquire May It Please the Mozzers, | |
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