Posts on State of Search about ‘Books’

Book Review: Outsmarting Google – Evan Bailyn

Outsmarting Google
SEO Secrets to Winning New Business
By Evan Bailyn with Bradley Bailyn
Book Website | Amazon UK | Amazon.com

Outsmarting Google is a book that’s been out since 2011, so I’m late with this review. And due to the fast-moving nature of the SEO industry, some parts of the book are expectedly out of date.

In the interests of full disclosure, before I began reading the book I was fully prepared to dislike it. Over the years I’ve developed a mild allergy for what I’d call ‘self-help business speak’. We all recognise this type of hyped-up copywriting when we see it: ‘Killer Strategies to Success’, ‘Hidden Secrets To Become an Instant Millionaire’ – books with such titles are a dime a dozen, and usually worth even less than the paper they’re printed on. (more…)

SEO: The Secrets of Closing the Sale

As part of my new years resolution, I have promised myself that I will read more. This does include a number of highly recomm ended digital marketing and SEO reads, but I have also promised that I will branch out a little reading things that aren’t necessarily focused on SEO. I believe that many SEO’s, like me, can spend too much time reading everything and anything to do with SEO using services like Buffer, Instapaper and Reeder. However, doing this gets us trapped in our own filter bubble the information being shared restricts you from seeing the bigger picture. My reasons for focusing on some non-SEO reads is a selfish one, I’m aiming to broaden my knowledge and learn things from others that I may be able to apply to my profession. (more…)

How non-SEO Books Have Taught me to be a Better SEO

I really enjoy reading books that aren’t strictly related to my job as an SEO but can be applied in some way. The truth is that we’re often overwhelmed with the amount of SEO content that is thrown at us everyday, I purposely try to avoid a lot of it and try to do catchups at certain points of my week rather than getting distracted from the task I’m on. Although that is easier said than done! I do wish that there were more posts from SEOs about non-SEO elements of their job, I’m talking about things like:

Managing people
Managing projects
Working with clients
Selling projects
Influencing change

There are more but I’m sure you get the idea. It is this side of the industry that I wish people wrote about more, so in the spirit of this I wanted to share some of my learnings on non-SEO issues and introduce you to the books that gave me those learnings. This is a good time to point out this list that Sam wrote not too long ago which talks about business and marketing books that SEOs have found useful. (more…)

Five Tips for Five Star Reviews

So you’ve done the hard work of getting someone to review something. Job done? Not at all.

‘This jar of honey may be in a revolting looking pot, but it’s scrumptious”, contains the same information, worded differently, as ‘This jar of honey is scrumptious, but the pot it’s in is revolting”. There’s little to choose between the semantics and the facts. But whilst Google may not differentiate between the two, potential customers can.

And a good review is likely to be placed and promoted more prominently than a bad one. So here are five PR tips for getting to honeypot one. (more…)

Awesome Marketing and Business Books – Recommended by the State of Search Team

Over the past couple of years I have been to a number of conferences and always come away with a list of books that have been recommended by the speakers. This got me thinking about the types of books that people in the industry read, whether they are directly related to online marketing, SEO or business in general so I spoke to the State of Search team and have compiled this amazing list.

I hope you find some of these useful and would love to hear what books you would recommend so if you have anything to add, please leave a comment at the end of the post to share with all the State of Search readers.

(more…)

Book Review: Global Search Engine Marketing by Kristjan Hauksson and Anne Kennedy

At SES New York a few weeks back I got a copy of the book “Global Search Engine Marketing” from Kristjan Mar Hauksson. His co-author Anne Kennedy wasn’t there, but I have known both of them for quite a few years now and I can tell you that these two know their international stuff. They travel the world, do business around the globe and have done global work, including some voluntary work at SEMPO. You can trust these two to write a book about International Search allright!

The moment that Kristjan gave me the book was nice, because you could see how proud he was with the book. He had been working really hard on it and it had paid off. So off course I started reading the book with anticipation. Not just because I personally like Kristjan and Anne, but also because I am someone who has an ‘international hat’ on. I am Dutch, but focussed on search world wide. So this book might just be made for me! Find below my review of the book with an overview of what you can expect from it. (more…)

Critical Thinking for the Discerning SEO – an ebook by Doc Sheldon

I’m a total sucker for marketing ebooks, having downloaded my fair share of corkers (and stinkers) in my time.

There’s definitely something to be said for the format of the ebook given the propensity for fast paced change in the field of digital marketing. Additionally, the absence of lengthy lead in times for publishing means the content can be completely ‘up to the minute’, and this combined with low production costs, and no minimum runs makes it the format of choice for many writers looking to launch their content upon the world.

When I saw Barry Adam’s tweet announcing the launch of Doc Sheldon’s book I clicked straight through… (more…)

Review: Ontolo – The Linkbuilding Book

As our connections to each other are the stuff of human relationships, so are links between sites the very stuff of the web.

I was therefore overjoyed to read Ontolo, and to find that here is a documented guide; from concept to objective to methodology to realisation; for pretty much every quality method of building and attracting the links that matter. (I felt I’d found a kindred spirit and something of a validation of our more PR focused approach at theMediaFlow too.)

Authored by Garrett French and Ben Wills Ontolo – The Linkbuilding Book, is possibly the most thorough documentation of linkbuilding to success. It is important to point out that the foundation of the Ontolo mindset reads to me as one of “links as business-driving” endeavours, rather than purely “links for rank sake”. On the other hand, if you’re more into this kind of crap, then this book isn’t for you. (more…)

The 5 Best SEO Books That Aren’t About SEO

I get asked quite often what beginning SEOs need to do to become advanced practitioners of our craft. Specifically they want to know which books to read.

There are a handful of good books about SEO out there – I recently reviewed Danny Dover’s new SEO Secrets book – but no matter how good they are, none of these books will make you an advanced SEO.

When I pondered this question in detail, I realised that the books that have shaped me the most as an SEO, and have helped bring my skills to higher levels, aren’t actually SEO books. Yet these books have been vital study material in my continued development as a SEO professional.

Here I will share the five best books for SEOs that aren’t actually about SEO. (more…)