Avoid Unsolicited “Reciprocal Link Exchange” Requests from Link Builder Vendors

by Jonathan Ginsberg on November 15, 2008

If you have a web site, there is a good chance that you will receive unsolicited emails from “link managers” working on behalf of other web sites looking to exchange links with you.  Often the link manager will be from India or Pakistan and his/her English will be overly formal or contain spelling or grammatical errors.

Frequently, the email solicitation will state that your link has already been posted on the other web site, with a link that looks something like www.abcwebsite.com/links_2.html.  If you should happen to visit that page, your link will be there along with a few dozen other links that may or may not be in your business category.

My advice is to ignore these requests for link exchanges.

Years ago, the major search engines gave some credit to links on “link directory” pages on a web site.  Back in 2000 or 2001, a “reciprocal link exchange” might have some value to both parties.  Unfortunately, those days are over.  Search engines generally do not give any authority credit to a link that exists in a link directory – at least that has been my experience.

Link directories that exist solely to pass “page rank” or site authority defeat the purpose of a good search result – to indentify authority sites that provide topical and relevant information.  This bias against link bartering is why some search engines are punishing links sold by link brokers.  Take a look at an article by bodybuilder Mark McManus entitled “Google Slashes MuscleHack’s PageRank.”   Mark earned $18.95 by selling space on his blog to a text link ad company, only to see his ranking in Google plummet.   Mark happens to have a legitimate blog that contains fresh, original content that is frequently updated, yet he got slapped.  Take heed.

If you are going to “exchange” links with another web site, ask the other site’s editor if he/she add an article that you have written to his/her web site.  The article you write should be topical and relevant and it should contain a relevant link text phrase back to one or more pages on your site.  You would never want to use “link here” as your link text.

At this point it does appear that the major search engines are still giving authority credit to “blogroll links” on blogs.  In theory blogroll links don’t differ much from link directory pages on web sites, but obviously Google and Yahoo must see some reason to still consider blogroll links.  Don’t be surprised if this linking tactics disappears at some point.

I’ll post about some of the link building tactics that I use in a future post.  For now, however, don’t waste your time or your site’s credibility exchanging links with link builders who are using 10 year old tactics and putting links on link directory pages.

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Adverbs Often Mask Poor Writing

by Jonathan Ginsberg on October 15, 2008

As a licensed attorney in the State of Georgia, I am required to attend continuing legal education classes yearly.  Several years ago, I attended a seminar taught by Steven Stark, a writer and consultant who taught a CLE seminar about how lawyers could improve their written communication skills.  Although I chose this seminar because I needed some credits for that year and it was already December, Mr. Stark’s seminar turned out to be one of the most useful and practical programs I have ever attended.

I was reminded of Steven Stark by an article in the October, 2008 issue of the Georgia Bar Journal.  Entitled “The Road to Heaven is Paved with Good Verbs,” authors Karen Sneddon and David Hricik echo many of Mr. Stark’s suggestions when it comes to using adverbs and adjectives.

Specifically, Ms. Sneddon and Mr. Hricik, as well as Mr. Stark, argue that adverbs should be used sparingly, and that strong verbs will produce significantly more impact.  Ms. Sneddon and Mr. Hricik note that less effective writers use adverbs as intensifiers – words like “really,” “clearly,” and “very,” and they give examples:

Less effective: “The police officers ran really fast across the lawn.”

More effective: “The police officers dashed across the lawn.”

Mr. Stark takes the same position with regard to adjectives.  He argues that strong noun and verb combination create a much more vivid mental picture in the reader’s mind.   Mr. Stark also advises writers to avoid using weak verbs like “is,” and “was.”

I think that if you sensitize yourself to how much adverbs and adjectives are overused, you will discover that sentences with strong nouns and verbs make for much more enjoyable reading.

As a marketing consultant I find myself writing a lot – blog posts, web pages, articles for republication, autoresponder series, and sales letters – and I make a conscious effort to think about my choice of verbs and nouns and to limit my use of qualifiers and intensifiers.  You will likely find discover that your writing will improve when you keep these suggestions in mind when for your writing projects.

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Another Reason to Add Multi-Media to Your Web Site or Blog: Google Adds Audio Indexing

by Jonathan Ginsberg on September 18, 2008

For several years, I have advised clients and colleagues to add audio and video to their web sites and blogs.  From a user’s standpoint, audio and video personalize the experience and help establish a relationship between you, the publisher, and your visitor.

I also suspect that audio-visual content will serve to establish your site as an authority site for search engine purposes.  While I obviously am not privy to Google’s search algorithm, I do find that on my own sites, the ones with audio or video tend to climb the search engines faster and go higher than the sites that are purely text.

Now, Google has begun implementation of something called “audio indexing.”   According to Google Labs:

Google Audio Indexing is a new technology from Google that allows users to better search and watch videos from various YouTube channels. It uses speech technology to find spoken words inside videos and lets the user jump to the right portion of the video where these words are spoken.

Right now, Google is only using audio indexing on political videos and election related videos.  But I suspect that within the next few months, Google and the other search engines will add audio indexing features to all video and audio content.

If you would like more information about adding audio or video to your web site, please feel free to contact me.

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How Much Will it Cost to Optimize my Website?

by Jonathan Ginsberg on August 17, 2008

It is no surprise that the question of cost often comes up early in my discussions with potential clients of my search engine optimization consulting practice.  This is perfectly understandable – there is something of a “wild west” element to the search engine optimization business, and there are no real standards about what it should cost.

This past week alone, I discussed SEO with two friends – one is a lawyer who lives in my neighborhood and the other is the promoter of a non-profit charitable organization.  Both could benefit from improved search engine positioning and both asked me early in the conversation “what is this going to cost me?”

Asking an SEO consultant how much his services cost is like asking a travel agent how much a business trip will cost.  The travel agent will respond “where do you want to go and what is the purpose and length of your trip?” which is exactly what I would ask.   Generally search engine optimization involves modifying or creating web site pages so that they will appear in the top five to ten search results for one or more desired search phrases.  Search engine optimization is not a “thing” – instead it is a process that includes among other things:

  • site topic market evaluation
  • search phrase (key word) research
  • site structure outline creation
  • content creation and planned release of new content
  • existing content modification
  • on-page optimization (adding title tags, header tags, page description tags, etc.)
  • Yahoo search monkey codes (new technology)
  • quality link building
  • site conversion analysis
  • adding analytic software and setting up conversion funnels and tracking reports
  • sitemap creation and submission
  • content rewriting services for article marketing and press release marketing
  • blog development
  • creation of audio and/or video segments for web site

A web site in a minimally competitive niche may only require a few of these techniques and a minimal investment of time.  A more competitive niche may require many months to fully implement the SEO strategy.

The cost will also be a function of who generates new content.  If you can provide the content and/or the underlying research material, your cost will be less than if I have to write or outsource the content creation.

Generally the optimization process will take a minimum of three to six months to produce noticeable effects, although this could be longer in more competitive niches or for more competitive search phrases.   Once the initial optimization is done, most clients will benefit from a maintenance program that keeps your web site in the top 10 or higher for specific search phrases, and that expands your exposure for additional search phrases.

Examples of SEO projects in which I have been involved:

  • local law firm looking to increase search engine visibility in one small geographic market for less than 10 search phrases – I have worked with this lawyer for close to 18 months, added video to his site, created a blog and provided new content for the blog ongoing – the initial cost was $1,500, the video components were $750 and the blog maintenance works out to $50 per month
  • local medical practice with three web sites looking to increase patient numbers – I have generated multiple pages of new content and worked to incorporate existing video into the various web sites.  This project started 6 months ago and the cost to this client so far has been $2,500.
  • national home remodeling contractor looking to expand into a new (large) city.  I was retained to set up a pay per click campaign and to create topics for new content – my fee for this project totaled $750
  • regional law firm with multiple offices retained me to create new web sites for their new markets and blogs for their new markets.  My job also involves writing the content, rewriting the content on existing sites, adding analytics, and many of the other elements identified above.  I personally visited this client’s new office in another city and recorded multiple video clips.  This client now has #1 position on the major search engines in five large cities and we are generating dozens of potential clients weekly.  This client pays me a signficant monthly retainer for on-going services
  • local jewelry store with two web sites looking to improve search engine positioning for less than 10 search phrases – I took over the SEO from another vendor who was using “black hat” techniques.  The annual cost to this client will be around $2,000.

The starting point for any SEO project is for you to take a few minutes and brainstorm about what you want your site to do for your business, and what you expect from your site as a marketing tool – in three months, in six months, in a year, in 2 years.

When I practiced law on a daily basis, I learned early on that you can’t possibly convince a judge or jury about the merits of your case if you don’t have a working theory of your case and a defined goal for that case.  You need similiar goals for your web site.  I can certainly help you firm up your vision of where you want to go, while my main task is to identify the techniques that will help you fulfil your strategy in the least amount of time with the lowest possible cost.

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How Long Should Your On-Line Video Last?

by Jonathan Ginsberg on July 3, 2008

Over the past year or so, I have been recommending that my clients add video to their web sites and blogs.  Thanks to sites like YouTube and other free video storage sites, consumers have become comfortable viewing videos on web sites and in some cases, potential clients expect video on web sites and blogs.

I work with lawyers and other professionals and very few of these service providers use audio or video.  Thus, for the time being at least, you can really stand out by adding video to your site.

My colleague Jay Douglas has been creating professional videos for clients for over ten years and he tells me that a web site video should not last more than 3 or 4 minutes.   Time Magazine columnist Bill Tancer notes that the average YouTube session lasts no more than 20 minutes.

When I videotape and produce videos for law firm clients, I generally limit the segments to one to three minutes.  If I have an hour’s worth of information to convey, , I’ll create 5 to 7 minute segments and stack them on the web page.  I have seen knowledgeable web developers post 90 minute videos – this makes no sense to me at all.

Columnist Tancer contends that web information consumers are not willing to spend a great deal of time viewing video on a computer or laptop screen.  This does make sense, given that most people consumer video on television, where content (the shows) are broken up by commercial breaks every 7 to 8 minutes and the quality of the video feed can be high definition beamed to a 55″ monitor.

So, the bottom line for me: put video on your web site, but keep the segments as short as possible in easily digested chunks.

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Don’t Throw Money at Your Online Marketing Program

by Jonathan Ginsberg on June 10, 2008

Earlier this week, I ran into an attorney friend of mine who owns a thriving personal injury practice in the Atlanta area.  He told me that he was in negotiation with a “pay per click” (PPC) management firm and that he planned on testing PPC to attract personal injury cases.   He would be testing this tool to the tune of $3,000 per month for a minimum of three months.  What did I think of this?

I responded by asking him if he had tested his web site for conversion.  It turns out that his web site is not yet live – it is in production and will be produced by a friend at no cost.   I just took a look and, yes, the domain is registered, and the “in production” version of the site is there.  The designer is using a template downloaded from Free Website Templates, and the site looks to be about 10% complete.

Now let me stop right here and say that I have nothing against a free website template.   In my view money spent on expensive design is often money wasted as one can have a very effective web site with a free template that displays good content.

My point here is simply that before my friend even thinks of signing on for $3,000 per month of pay per click traffic, he needs to have a live web site up and running and he needs to test that site to verify that live visitors are responding appropriately.  If live visitors don’t like your site, and if they don’t follow the path that you have set out for them, you are wasting your money with paid advertising.

I explained to my friend my concerns about marketing for personal injury online and that in my view his target ought to be the “researcher” type who will spend hours online looking for a vendor who will provide extensive information.

I also suggested to my friend that he should capture names and email and add a sequential autoresponder to his site to communicate with past, present and future clients.

Now, my friend is a very smart and successful lawyer.  But this episode shows that even smart, savvy, trained minds can fall prey to the hype of a good salesman and the excitement of wanting to tap into the Internet gold rush.  My friend needs to either educate himself about how the Internet might work for his practice or he needs to associate a consultant like me to advise him.  Otherwise the $9,000 he plans on spending will do him no good at all.

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Blogs and Web Sites – How Many Should You Have?

by Jonathan Ginsberg on June 8, 2008

During the course of my consulting work with lawyers and other small business service providers, an issue that often comes up has to do with how many web sites or blogs should the business owner maintain.  My response: as many as you can maintain.

In my view, the Internet functions as a research tool.  This is especially true if you are offering professional services.  People go to Google, Yahoo, MSN etc. to learn about a particular topic, not necessarily to choose a vendor or to buy that service right now.

Contrast this to the visitor dynamic in the yellow pages.  Yellow page browsers are not researchers.  They know that they will not find extensive information about a topic.  Yellow page buyers tend to be visual people who will respond to large, dramatic ads.  This is why in the lawyer market, yellow page ads work well for practice areas like personal injury, DUI, uncontested divorce and bankruptcy.  A significant percentage of buyers for these services are looking for any reason to make a buying decision – price, location, immediacy, social proof.

Internet browsers generally look for more detail.  I have had a great deal of success with my bankruptcy sites because I offer extensive information.  The people that respond to my bankruptcy web sites tend to be better educated, have more complex situations, and are less price conscious.   I have had much less success with personal injury web sites because most people involved in soft tissue auto accidents are looking for quick settlements and they do not perceive that there is much difference between Lawyer A and Lawyer B.

Therefore, before I will agree to work with a lawyer, I have a long discussion with him/her about his market – are his clients people who are looking to research?  If so, I will give those clients more information than any other competitor in the market, and my client will dominate this “researcher” part of his market.  I use blogs, podcasts, web sites, wikis, forums – whatever makes sense for the particular market.

Fortunately, the search engines also like extensive, relevant content.  So, in the ideal scenario, I can map out a multi-site approach that will please both the search engines and the client/researcher and, as a result, keep my client extremely busy with new business.

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Eliminating Comment Spam – Part Two

by Jonathan Ginsberg on April 8, 2008

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Yesterday, I uploaded a screen capture video that demonstrated how you might get rid of comment spam by using the "mass edit" mode moderation function in WordPress.  Of course, not all comments that appear in the moderation queue are spam – how do you quickly identify which comments are spam and which are legitimate.

If at all possible, you should download and install the Akismet plug-in for WordPress.  Akismet is free for personal use and carries a nominal charge for commercial use, and it can block most spam using a sophisticated spam detection algorithm.

What happens, however, if you just learned about Akismet and you have hundreds or thousands of spam comments, or you inadvertantly changed a WordPress setting that let all this spam in.  Is there any hope?

The short answer is "yes" – there is hope.  In this video, I show you how to use the search function in the mass edit mode to identify likely spam by keyword as well as by IP address.  Hope you find it helpful

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How to Deal With 10,000 Unmoderated Spam Comments in WordPress

by Jonathan Ginsberg on April 7, 2008

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Comment spam can take a lot of the enjoyment out of blogging.  Comment spammers operate in the same manner as email spammers – they use automated scripts to disperse their wares.  Comment spammers use the comment capability of most blogs to distribute links to their web sites.  If your blog has the "no_follow" attribute of comments disabled, then you may be unwittingly providing the comment spammers with some of your "link juice."

At a minimum, every blogger should enable the moderation feature for all blog comments.  If your comments are unmoderated, you will soon see hundreds, if not thousands of irrelevant, spammy, link-filled comments on your blog posts.

Most blog platforms have spam filtering either built in or available as a plug-in.  WordPress, which is my blogging platform, has a plug-in called Akismet, which is a very good spam filter.

Many of us learn about comment spam the hard way.  What happens if you did not previously enable spam blocking and now you have 10,000 spam comments in moderation, or worse, showing up as comments on your blog posts?   Fortunately there is an answer to this problem and the video demonstrates how to go about clearing spam posts in volume.  The blog I use for my example is the Bankruptcy Law Network blog.  This is a multi-contributor blog that accepts contributions from a select group of lawyers.  The blog has been very successful in educating consumers and those in the legal community about Chapter 7 and Chapter 13 bankruptcy, but, as a group, we did not plan very well to when it came to moderating and processing comments.

Over the course of the past year, we found ourselves with over 10,000 unmoderated comments, most of which were spam.  Worse, the size of the unmoderated comments table in the SEQL database that manages the WordPress blog made the manual, one-by-one processing of comments very slow and cumbersome.

After some looking around, I figured out how to deal with the spam comments in bulk and I show what I did in this screen capture video.

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Linking Techniques for Bloggers

by Jonathan Ginsberg on March 29, 2008

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If you blog frequently, you will have many opportunities to link to other web sites and blogs.  I created the following video for my colleagues in the Bankruptcy Law Network.  The BLN consists of a group of bankruptcy lawyers who work in various cities throughout the country.  The BLN blog is a collaborative effort to provide consumers with multiple perspectives about the bankruptcy process and to allow member attorneys to showcase their knowledge.

Some of the BLN bloggers are experienced and comfortable with the "technical" side of blogging, while others have no technical experience at all.  In reviewing some of the BLN posts, I noted that some of the attorney authors were not maximizing the value of the network.  This video demonstrates how I approach linking and trackbacks.

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