Search Engine Marketing Blog: piloSEO

I just popped into Digg a few minutes ago (a bit after I got a message stating that they were updating and would be back soon) and noticed they have a new comment system. It looks a lot cleaner and seems to be quite a bit faster. I have not interacted it with the new system much but the look and feel is much more user friendly at first blush. Here is a screenshot of the new layout and you can check out the Digg Blog to learn more about the new system.

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Everyone who uses the Internet with any frequency knows that Google is the biggest player when it comes to everything online. What used to be a simple search engine has now grown to be the way many average users access and interact with the Internet. That means that any business that wants to be found believes that they must be indexed and ranking well in Google. In many cases this is true. Google search can deliver phenomenal traffic to a site that is well indexed. It also means that they face competition from a number of places and every other week I hear about another Google killer, usually in the form of a new search engine. I think it will be hard to displace Google in the short term but I have been thinking that Google may be the only entity that can kill Google. And one way they may be doing that is through their consistent insistence on using No Follow for certain links.

Why Does Google Push No Follow?

How you ask? Well, first we need to go back in time. One of the most important aspects of the original Google algorithm was links. Google treated links as votes and in the beginning many SEOs figured out that by getting a bunch of links pointed to a site could push it to the top of Google. This lead to all sorts of link schemes designed to artificially boost a site’s Page Rank and help it rank higher. One by one these link schemes stopped working and SEOs moved on to other link schemes. For the most part Google was able to identify these schemes and devalue the links. With the exception of one. That one was paid links. Paid links are hard to identify algorithmically. Sure, they could identify some paid links but the majority went undetected. So Google got a great idea. They told Webmasters that they should use No Follow (originally a blog spam fighting tool) on any links that were paid for. And to make their case their case they went out and punished some of the easily identifiable paid links. The SEO industry picked up on this and the No Follow revolution took off but…

How Can No Follow Kill Google?

Most of us in the SEO world understand what No Follow is and how it should be applied but Webmasters who are not involved in SEO are confused. They see penalties being applied, hear about No Follow, and begin applying it on every out-bound link, even those that are not paid. I recently spoke to a client who runs a popular and respected site about No Follow. They knew to place No Follow on their advertiser links but they also believed that it should be added to every link that went to a third party site. I explained that this was not the case but I wonder how many Webmasters out there believe that they need to add No Follow to all out-bound links? As more and more Webmasters learn about No Follow and apply it incorrectly it could cause a huge problem for Google.

Since Google’s algorithm uses links as a big component for ranking it could be harmful if all links are set to No Follow. If more and more sites start telling Google not to follow the links to other sites Google could face an issue in that they can either disregard all of the links or break the the No Follow attribute they developed and actually pass link juice to No Followed links. They could also take the link factor out of their algorithm and rank sites based on content only but I don’t see that happening soon. It may be far fetched but as more Webmasters misuse No Follow and hinder Google’s ability to crawl and index pages it might be the most viable Google Killer we will see in the near future.

Update: Michael Martinez has an excellent post, How search ruins the Web experience, that further explores this idea in much greater detail.

Popularity: 9% [?]

Snitches get stitches, except for in the SEO world. It seems that outing websites for selling links is becoming more and more acceptable. If you spend as much time as I do reading SEO blogs and forums you have probably noticed an increase in the number of sites being called out for selling links or buying links. Unlike previous outings there seems to be very little outrage. In the past when a big name outed a link scheme or questionable SEO practices it lead to some heated discussions across multiple blogs. One of the biggest dust ups was the blow back directed at Rand Fishkin after he posted about a number of obvious paid links that he found. To be honest none of this stuff has affected me or my clients personally but I question the motivation of some outings.

Most Snitching is not altruistic

Let’s face it, most of the outings that have occurred recently are not altruistic in nature. Sites were not outed in order to rid the search engines of spam. I would venture to bet that most were done because a site benefiting from the paid link was a competitor of the SEO who is leveling the accusation. Even if they are engaging in the same practice themselves. It’s kind of funny when an SEO who buys paid links outs a site for selling links. It’s also disingenuous and short sighted since they open themselves up for the same whacking when their network is discovered.

I Don’t Have a problem with reporting SPAM

If you see obvious SPAM, it should be reported. I have not problem with that. The problem I have is when leading SEO’s publicly call out sites for selling links especially sites that may not know that it can harm them. Sure, you can say that the webmaster or site owner should know how any advertising will affect their site but many publishers spend their time building their content not following the trends in the SEO world. To many of these people they are simply selling advertising and unaware of the influence it has over search engine rankings. The end result is they are punished for doing something they were unaware violated any guidelines.

At least give them a chance

I am not sure what the solution is but I would be more inclined to let the site selling links know that they are violating Google’s guidelines and give them a chance to fix the issue. If they refuse I have no problem with a SPAM report or calling them out publicly. At least they are armed with the knowledge that selling links can hurt them and chose to proceed anyway. At least give them a chance to fix their mistake before they are whacked for something they had no idea was wrong.

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When discussing SEO with clients and potential clients SEOs sometimes neglect to emphasize that they need to tell us about any changes they are planning for their site. Whether they believe the changes have any SEO ramifications or not it is imperative to let your SEO know. Even minor and seemingly unrelated changes can have major implications on SEO work. If we don’t explain and reinforce the need for complete transparency related to site updates our clients may make what they consider minor changes that can have a major impact on their sites potential to rank well.

Seemingly Minor Changes Can Destroy SEO Efforts

Even the most seemingly insignificant change can have a massive impact on SEO work. I recently worked with a client who decided to make a small change to their website without consulting with me about the impact of such a change. To be fair this change seemed totally unrelated to SEO so the client assumed that they could make the change without talking to me about it. When I checked their site and saw what they had done I immediately contacted them to explain the potential negative impact. I think I caught it in time but the damage could have been fairly significant if it had been allowed to remain active.

Tell Your SEO About All Site Updates

No matter what change you make you should let you SEO about it.  SEO is a two way street. SEOs are focused on providing site owners with recommendations on how to help their site perform better in search engines but those site owners should understand that they need to inform their SEO about any changes they will be making too. An open conversation is important and can be the difference between success and failure. So, even if you are adding a few new links or some minor feature make sure your SEO knows what you are doing so you understand the implications and verify those changes are search engine friendly.

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I had not checked into Yahoo Site Explorer for a while but when I did today I noticed that they have added some additional information to their listing of indexed pages and backlinks. Instead of just showing the title of the page and the URL they now show the page type as well. The few listings I have checked differentiate between Text/HTML pages and Application Pages (Like PDF Files). Here are a couple of screenshots of the new feature.

Application/PDF

Text/HTML

I am always happy to see more information being provided by search engines and this is a good step. I would like to see them continue to expand on this and provide more detail but I am happy to see them attempting to move forward.

Popularity: 22% [?]