<p> What great fun examples - simply business is a fab idea. </p> <p> Best ideas usually come from the customers themselves. Memes are also a great low cost strategy, you just need the social presence to make them work and spread the word. </p> <p> IMO Video will open up so many more angles for businesses with less than interesting content. </p>

<p> The best advice I could give to an SEO person would be to have your own blog. So many of those free written answers are exactly how I feel when I get requests to add links to my blog. The impersonal nature and the obvious play that an SEO has only skim read the last post is sometimes cringe making. If an SEO has their own blog or could try some visualisation they'd see that this is something that took many times thousands of man hours to create and curate, you're asking us to put a pin on our baby, and you're in a line of 10 others asking the same. </p> <p> Do your research, pick out the blogs that really share the a certain sympatico and just make a total effort to target these blogs, it will take less time and be more successful than compiling SS after SS of potential blog links. </p>

<p> Top article Rand and really interesting to do a retrospective, seems like Google will move to 100% keyword data not found but saw the recent WBF on how to combat. Facebook still needs to send out way more data help target ads better in 2013. Still the privacy shark to jump. </p> <p> <strong>#8: The social media tool market will continue a trend of consolidation and shrinkage</strong> </p> <p> The man who puts this stuff together with a bow will be vrery rich indeed, every month there is something new to learn and understand before usually dismissing it. </p>

<p> Can you really outsource link building? I think it really depends on your vertical and the experience of the consultancy firm within. If you can get in with the .edu and .orgs I'd spend so much more time not building at scale but picking out 10 super links and doing whatever it takes, favours wise, to obtain those specific links. Ego bait is your friend and with that you will need to create content </p>

<p> Hadn't though of point 5 but of course it's right, that's why we sometimes outrank bigger and better funded sites because our on-page is up to scratch, their sucks, but they've got the links, our links, so we need to check them out too. Good point, I always had stuck to the SERPs for research but correctly it may not be the sole "competitor" for links. Obvious, but i'd missed it. </p>

<p> Even today I have done my own study on external linking from within our page and with this change alone we did notice an improvement on our site ranking just by linking out, not excessively and we found that linking out even to reputable but no wiki style pages also helped. So we link out everywhere that it offers value. </p>

<p> Wow, remember when this was difficult. Now even Moz has followerwonk. How we've come on in 2 years. </p>

<p> Trying to install the php script for PR recovery. But how? Copy the PHP code, paste into a word file and name to xxxx.php place in root dir? Confused </p>

<p> Can we gain historical data from the API yet? </p>

<p> It can be very tempting indeed to try and game the system, especially when even today there is so much low hanging fruit, but gaming is rarely within Google interest, I feel really badly for the niche sites that grew into more products and decided to take their niche and make 100 sites because they thought their KW in the domain name would be an advantage and now they have the costly work of moving all that content to a master site and building from scratch. Doing what they thought Google wanted, because Google had rewarded it before, has caused many companies to go the way of the dinosaur. What makes most sense for the user will always win out it seems. </p> <p> Rightly so! </p>

<p> And as for rel publisher, since Authorship came out we can say that using Rel+Pub helped move us up the serps (but only ever by a spot at the most) comparing it to Rel-Author and the CTR pay off from +author worked only where it seems as though the page could have an opinion piece. Think there will be an almighty G-Slap for publishers using Auth were Auth not ought to be used. For the CTR they hope to achieve. Stick to Pub and add video for the CTR, unless Google soon add the avatars for Publisher and then we're back to brand and the richest people in the world will be those who can create beauty within 50x50 pixel box! </p>

<p> Love the idea of the suggestion fly-box. We've already put this in force on our site. </p> <p> Another great idea: "We included a spell checker on the moving review form. We are also planning to correct the mistakes on all old reviews in the future." </p> <p> Luckily we didn't get chewed by panda or penguin or sunk by Venice, its boring, but content &amp; partnerships win out. </p>

<p> Lets hope Google WMT continues to warn before more sophisticated algorithmic fixes become common place. </p> <p> Of course, top quality listings can be useful, esp if real, real people reading, real people approving, and no cash changes hands. Paid Directory listing will continue to go the way of the dinosaur, at least as far as Google counting and awarding them highly goes.. </p>

<p>Hi</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>Thanks so much for this, I will see if there are a couple of deirectories that are applicable, but I would refrain from a mass sign up, many of these look super dodgy which is my new page rank!</p>

<p> that's great thanks. Have heard that twitter is going to come down hard on bulk unfollow programmes so, better this way, thanks, a very useful tool </p>

<p> And how about unfollowing those people who haven't tweeted in 6 months for example, I have seen the report on the numbers, but don't see how to take an action? </p>

<p> Hi </p> <p> Im able to segment my followers but are there tools for the pruning actions you suggest? I know there is justunfollow and others, but does followerwonk allow us to act on the segmentations? </p> <p> Thanks </p>

<p> How do you get onto the Discover Tab, we've had several tweets retweeted hundreds of times, yet we never seem to get there? </p>

<p> Isnt, just pushing towards Google's own products </p>

<p>This is particularly pronounced in the travel industry, and if I were a skeptic, I'm quite sure 7 tripadvisor results would force a person onto the paid Ads, or even.... Page 2... or hopefully, a better search engine!<br><br><br>

<p> Brilliant content and free! Thank you very much. Downloaded, printed and stuck on the wall. genuine thanks </p>

<p> Oh dear! For those of not blessed with the good looking stick, I may consider using the face of someone else, but not Rand. </p>

<p> OK, and as a PPC person as well, we are spoilt as we can filter (at least in terms of time of day, location and device) what a potential "intention" might be. However, for SEO, what more can you do, surround the keywords with other words that indicate the specific intention (ie keyword) you were looking for? What else? </p>

<p> Ummm, hit and miss, some certainly better than others. </p>

<p> OK... that seems strange that the algo would somehow work out diff (ranking factors), or is it just that when analysing we concentrated on those? Needs more investigation, I cant believe th algo works differently </p>

<p> Awesome, the last 7 days of posts on Moz have been the most helpful. Another bookmark. </p>

<p> This is an awesome post. Segmentation to drive marketing initiatives is the simplest process and yet so many companies miss this and lose out on revenue that could be repumped. I've bookmarked this for a forward. Great. </p>

<p> Absolutely annoying agreed. Interestingly Google's are the ones i struggle the most with, just one word but so squidged together I can never make it out! </p>

<p> I love how many articles talk about mailing for links, I must have mailed thousands of relevant prospects, even from companies the individual link prospect worked with and I'd say about 2-5% will link to you even at great advantage to them, most people simply do not reply. Yet if you pick up the phone, you can x that success rate by 10. </p>

<p> Agree </p>

<p> Interesting, hadn't thought to have an instagram channel but this would fit perfectly with a vertical im looking at now. </p>

<p> Most success Ive had has been using the frequency link on Open Site Explorer to competitors, tend to find blogs who would be just as happy to link out. </p>

<p> Another tick for the established guys with the big money then. </p>

<p> Bookmarked! Excellent wrap up and many points i didn't know. </p>

<p> Brilliant, I have to complete a slideshow in the next couple of days and have already started using your storytelling technique. </p>

<p> Lack of organisation and an ability to follow KPIs to the business bottom line. True Say. </p>

<p> Well bang goes my weekend, there are several here I've never heard of so need to go and get the skillz! </p> <p> Incredible resource, thanks so much. </p>

<p> Your graphs worry me, at what point in time will sites 1through10 (or 1through7) simply be a rundown of those with the biggest pockets </p>

<p> Got the email, super excited, will get the popcorn in and have a field day :D </p>

<p> Love the idea of retargeting, can't sell it with any gusto because attribution is still so difficult to accurately measure across media, devices and platforms. Of course it's cheaper! </p>

<p> Those are some awesome glasses, but unfortunately I still don't think they'll stop the question "Why the HECK do they outrank me!" - nice try though :D </p>

<p> Great Article and really useful links to link building strategies/processes, it's a great wrap up and nice to have this bookmarked so all in one handy page. Thanks! Useful. </p>

<p> Awesome </p> <p> But interesting how this report is really only emphasising what has been held as common theory for quite some time now, there's nothing really new in here (at least in this entry) that i'd think "aha" too although I am pleased to see Page Rank and not domain rank being the key. </p>

<p>Good to hear, am sure it will help seal new accounts.<br>

<p>A great round up of retargetting companies and very much app. at this moment in time.</p>

<p>At the end of the day - this is the point "No matter if it's posting the URL to a website, sending it in an email, or writing it on a notepad for later, the dynamic URL is something that is distinctly unfriendly for users."</p>

<p>Interesting isn't it! From 2005 and we're still talking about these factors.</p>

<p>"we want Apple to be the 4th actor specially in the mobile space" - Agree, I see this being the threat to Google in the mid term.</p>

<p>Here Here Let's hope so!</p>

<p>Really enjoyed it, and it's right, Google has to get bad, but looking at Dr Petes assesment yesterday, that is already happening with lots of queries, first page coming out with just 2 or 3 domains in the top 10 places...</p> <p>&nbsp;</p>

<p>Im in the super lucky position of overseeing both but its super important that one understands the other and are working together esp in terms of kw scores for within PPC and of course optimisation.</p>

<p>Thanks for this, really useful tips and back up data.</p>

<p>Agreed, spend the lion share of your time creating the content, make it actually really awesome and people will naturally want to share it, cos its cool and it makes them look cool and they keep the cool in their cool bank.. like a finders fee! :D</p>

<p>Really timely post for me, Im evaluating several guest blog opps at the moment and could tell some were really not great so useful to see this post.</p>

<p>Try "Malmaison Aberdeen" for Google.co.uk.</p> <p>Obv a branded search but there's not a look in here for anyone... oh well, better pay &pound;1.00 + per click then.</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>(Incase you get a different result 9/10 brand + 1 tripadvisor)</p>

<p>Dr Pete,</p> <p>Good to see a confirmation of what Ive been seeing from my monitored results, also around June 4th, I saw the same thing with repeated domains, in my field that repeated domain goes</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>Tripadvisor</p> <p>Tripadvisor</p> <p>Tripadvisor</p> <p>Tripadvisor</p> <p>Taking 3/4 of the top 5 spots for several searches, and the content can often just be a photo from a guest. If you can hold onto page 1, I think people will just scroll, but if you fall onto page 2 this will seriously hurt... and does.</p> <p>I think Google seriously need to quit it with repeated unindented domains occupying these spots. Yesterday I did a search for one property and the entire of page 2 was trip advisor, every single position.</p> <p>Come on Google, sort it out.</p>

<p>Really cool tools,</p> <p>I would love to see (if it exists can someone please point it out) a thorough guide in how to rank well on Bing. I have a few (especially 1-2yo sites) that rank great on Google, but are absolutely nowhere on Bing.</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p><strong>Is there a recent resource out there on optimising for Bing?</strong></p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>Thanks</p>

<p>Wow</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>Honestly, this is awesome, just got over half way thru going thru my site with this and all the tool suggestions. Bookmarked and thoroughly well done! Thanks so much for creating this, top job.</p>

<p>Can you do another one and help those poor old derivatives boys?</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>Or, do one on the iminant departure of Greece from the Euro and my mortgage will go down :D</p>

<p>True! But i do wish I could magically clone myself once I have these scaleable content/link building solutions. Im currently building quality content videos, what a long process that is! Hoepfully worth it! I can see the attraction in link farms!</p>

<p>Agree with James, the most positive thing I can think of regarding SEO and start up is the cost. The start ups that I've worked for had, as start ups without major invest. tend to have, low overheads and so no cost SEO is super appealing. The fact that, unlike PPC, the cost is purely one (time) and the reward can come over and over again, day on day, month on month.</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>I've never talked to anyone who thought of SEO as the devil, more of an untouchable and unlikely possibility. Not only "too hard" or "too time consuming" but also etheral and impossible as well as Google, pre-determined brand, untouchable.</p>

<p>This has answered a couple of my headaches recently about reciprical links and footer links.</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>Thanks Rand</p>

<p>Hi Jim,</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>Great tool, bookmarked and ran.</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>Sarah</p>

<p>Solid pointers and good reminder of the basics.</p>