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Getting the attention to get your article into the wrap up posts

Linkbuilding is still regarded as one of the most important factors when it comes to getting your site ranking well in search engines, especially Google. How to get those links always is one of the big issues. There is always the option of e-mailing websites trying to get a link on them, but that in most cases is a lot of work, plus you really need to do that right, doing it wrong is a waste of your valuable time. Other options are off course doing “linkbait” or there is the option of using services like Eightfold Logic Linker, which helps you find ‘suitable’ linkpartners. But still the best way to get the most valuable links is to write great content which others will pick up.

The question however is: how do you know what others will pick up? There are many “wrap up posts” out there, posts which give you a quick overview of what has been written around the web. The big sites are doing it on a daily basis, others weekly. These kind of wrap ups are very useful, for the readers to filter out what was important to read in the enormous amount of blog posts out there, as well as for the blog owners who through these posts have a way of spreading their content. And getting links…

But getting your article mentioned in these posts isn’t that easy. There are a lot of factors which decide if your article is worth it to be mentioned. Which factors? Well, why not ask the sources directly? I asked Barry Schwartz, who is responsible for the “Searchcap” wrap up on Searchengineland and who makes wrap ups for SERoundtable, Danny Goodwin, who collects stories for the “Search Week in Review” on Searchenginewatch and Susanne Koch, who does the weekly “Pandia Search Engine News Wrap-up” together with her husband Per Koch, on Pandia.com. Combined with my own experience on this (I’ve made these kind of posts several times, the State of Search news roundup which will return in 2011 is an example of that) you can get a pretty decent overview of what you should be doing to get ‘in sight” of these influentials. (more…)

When Did You Last Google Your Name?

Ok, let’s be completely honest here. When was the last time you Googled your own name? Not too long ago, wasn’t it? And how often do you do what they call an ‘ego-search’? Probably more often than you are willing to admit.

Social Media Monitoring tool Trackur asked 725 people if they had Googled themselves within the last 24 hours. The response? A cracking 46% admitted to have done so.

Trackur followed the question up with the question who had Googled themselves in the past month and the number went even higher to a mere 73%. Less than 6% said they had never Googled their own name. (more…)

Yes, Google Was Down, Don’t Panic, Google is Cleaning

Some excitement on Social Media this morning, something which rarely happens seemed to be happening at the moment: Google seemed to be down for many. It was first noticed when Gmail couldn’t be reached, but it seems more Google products were down, even Google.com.

The ‘glitch’ took only about five minutes, but there immediately were responses on Social Media of people being worried about what was happening with Google. It showed once again how reliant people are on the Google services. The last time Gmail was down was in April when about 400.000 people were out of Gmail for about 2,5 hours. This time it was just a few minutes.

It could be that the outage had to do with the closing of some products by Google today. (more…)

Friday Talk: Jer Thorp: the Weight of Data

Big Data. There is a lot of talk around that lately. Our friend Bryan Eisenberg talks about it a lot as well and apparently it’s ‘hot’.

But where Big Data focusses on using that data to better target the audience there is much more you can do with data. Just look at this TEDx talk by Jer Thorp about the weight of data. It’s pure art!

Bing ads Facebook photos, Wolfram Alpha Analyzes your Data

Facebook and search, there has been said a lot about that topic in the past few years. Could Facebook be a Google competitor? Their search is not good enough for it, but more importantly: people don’t go to Facebook to search, so it doesn’t make sense. The combination between Facebook and Bing makes sense, something they upgraded this week as well (see below).

But combining their social elements with search engines could be a very interesting angle. Facebook already has a deal with Bing and Bing is now making their search results more social with the help of Facebook. Another deal which Facebook has now made is with Wolphram Alpha, the knowledge engine based on structured data. It now lets you analyse your personal data on Facebook. (more…)

Bronco and 10 Yetis to Partner in PR and SEO

PR and online are getting integrated more and more. Our bloggers Claire Thompson (PR Expert) and Nichola Stott can tell you all about that. So it makes sense that the two are being combined more and more.

SEO Agency Bronco, owned by our friend and long time SEO celebrity Dave Naylor has also acknowledged that and is now entering a partnership with tech and consumer PR Agency, 10 Yetis.

From the press release:

“In practical terms, the partnership now also sees the two companies opening up their respective offices for each to share, meaning that Bronco can now have a presence in the South West of the UK and the same for 10 Yetis in the Leeds and Yorkshire region. There will also be an employee exchange programme set in place, so that skills and best practice can be shared.

The two companies now collectively employ 37 staff and offers everything needed from a full service digital agency including design, web development, SEO, PR, video production, ad buying & creation, social media and affiliate solutions.”

Dave Naylor himself, who is as hardcore SEO as you will find them, says:

“There are exciting times ahead for the two companies, and it’s been really refreshing working with 10 Yetis over the last few months while we have been getting this all in place. We identified some time ago that we needed to align with a digital PR agency that not only had a clear understanding of the search sector, but had a strong history in delivering online media campaigns and 10 Yetis, fit the bill perfectly”.

We off course wish the friends over at Bronco all the luck with their new found partnership!

Want your news about your agency published on the site? Get in touch!

SEO The Game

Some people believe SEO is a game. Others believe it’s all shady tactics and sorcery. It isn’t off course, but it has been like that for centuries: if people don’t understand things they will blame it on ‘black tactics’, whether it’s sorcery or SEO.

This infographic brings things nicely together: the games, the sorcery and the ‘black and white’ technics. Quick Note since there were some responses about this on Twitter, this is NOT my view on SEO or affiliates. In my view this has to do with irony. In fact it’s very much what I say above: if people don’t understand you get that they think it’s a game. SEO is not a game. Look at this with the necessary irony .

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Ten Years of Internet

Ten years ago I was reaching the end of my twenties. And I was already working in the industry business for half a decade before. It seems just like yesterday. But it also seems like the middle ages if you think about what happened in these ten years. We are now using WordPress for example for many bigger and smaller sites. Over ten years ago we were building the first content management systems. All custom made off course.

A lot has changed! So what do you remember from the past ten years? What is the biggest change in your view? Let us know after this (long) infographic which shows some of the changes we have seen in the past ten years. (more…)

German Privacy Fighters Now After Facebook

Germany has always been a country in which privacy matters are very important. Some say it’s the result of the countries history, others say it’s just how the Germans are. We’ve seen the Germans ‘fight’ Google over privacy matters the past few years, from Streetview issues up to the point where they almost banned Google Analytics, something which is recently been followed by Norway.

With Google things seem to have calmed down a little after the Hamburg Commissioner for Data Protection and Freedom of Information struck a deal with Google, but now another Internet giant seems to be the target: Facebook. (more…)