The latest ‘SEO Book’ blog post is titled “Have We Reached Peak Advertising?”.Peterd says, “The internet runs on advertising. Google is funded almost entirely by advertising. Facebook , likewise. Digital marketing spends continue to rise:Internet advertising revenues in the United States totaled $12.1 billion in the fourth quarter of 2013, an increase of 14% from the 2013 third-quarter total of $10.6 billion and an increase of 17% from the 2012 fourth-quarter total of $10.3 billion. 2013 full year internet advertising revenues totaled $42.78 billion, up 17% from the $36.57 billion... [...]

The latest ‘SEO Book’ blog post is titled “The Rigged Search Game”.Peterd says, “SEO was all about being clever. Still is, really. However, SEO used to reward the clever, too. The little guy could take on the big guys and munch their lunch by outsmarting them.It was such an appealing idea.The promise of the internet was that the old power structures would be swept aside, the playing field would be made level again, and those who played the smartest game would prosper.Sadly, this promise didn’t last long”.The Rigged Search Game‘SEO Book’ Blog [...]

The latest ‘SEO Book’ blog post is titled “Please Remove My Link. Or Else”.Peterd says, “Getting links removed is a tedious business.It’s just as tedious for the site owner who must remove the links. Google’s annoying practice of “suggesting” webmasters jump through hoops in order to physically remove links that the webmaster suspects are bad, rather than Google simply ignoring the links that they’ve internally flagged, is causing frustration.Is it a punitive punishment? If so, it’s doing nothing to endear Google to webmasters. Is it a smokescreen? i.e. they don’t... [...]

The latest ‘SEO Book’ blog post is titled “Google Helpouts Twitter Spam (Beta)”.Aaron Wall says, “Google is desperate to promote Helpouts. I first realized this when I saw the following spam message in my email inbox”.Google Helpouts Twitter Spam (Beta)‘SEO Book’ Blog [...]

The latest ‘SEO Book’ blog post is titled “Learn Local Search Marketing”.Aaron Wall says, “Last October Vendran Tomic wrote a guide for local SEO which has since become one of the more popular pages on our site, so we decided to follow up with a QnA on some of the latest changes in local search.Q: Google appears to have settled their monopolistic abuse charges in Europe. As part of that settlement they have to list 3 competing offers in their result set from other vertical databases. If Google charges for the particular type of listing then these competitors compete in an ad auction,... [...]

The latest ‘SEO Book’ blog post is titled “The Positive Negative SEO Strategy”.Peterd says, “There’s a case study on Moz on how to get your site back following a link penalty. An SEO working on a clients site describes what happened when their client got hit with a link penalty. Even though the link penalty didn’t appear to be their fault, it still took months to get their rankings back.Some sites aren’t that lucky. Some sites don’t get their rankings back at all.The penalty was due to a false-positive. A dubious site links out to a number of credible sites in order... [...]

The latest ‘SEO Book’ blog post is titled “Bing Lists ‘Alternatives’ In Search Results”.Aaron Wall says, “Bing recently stated testing listing ‘alternatives’ near their local search results.I wasn’t able to replicate these in other search verticals like flight search, or on an iPhone search, but the format of these alternatives looks similar to the format proposed in Google’s ongoing monopolistic abuse case in Europe:“In effect, competitors will have the ‘choice’ either to pay Google in order to remain relevant or lose visibility... [...]

The latest ‘SEO Book’ blog post is titled “Handling Objections From SEO Clients”.Peterd says, “If the current war on SEOs by Google wasn’t bad enough if you own the site you work on, then it is doubly so for the SEO working for a client. When the SEO doesn’t have sufficient control over the strategy and technology, it can be difficult to get and maintain rankings.In this post, we’ll take a look at the challenges and common objections the SEO faces when working on a client site, particularly a client who is engaging an SEO for the first time. The SEO will need to fit in with... [...]

The latest ‘SEO Book’ blog post is titled “Keep Visitors Coming Back”.Peterd says, “Facebook. A mobile phone. Email. How often do you check them? Many of us have developed habits around these services.The triggers that help create these habits can be baked in to the design of websites. The obvious benefit of doing so is that if you create habits in your users, then you’re less reliant on new search visitors for traffic.How To Build Habit Forming ProductsI recently read a book called “Hooked: How To Build Habit Forming Products” by Nir Eyal. Eyal is an entrepreneur who has built... [...]

The latest ‘SEO Book’ blog post is titled “Optmizing Against Competitors”.Peterd says, “You’ve got to feel a little sorry for anyone new to the search marketing field.On one side, they’ve got to deal with the cryptic black box that is Google. Often inconsistent, always vague, and can be unfair in their dealings with webmasters. On the other side, webmasters must operate in competitive landscapes that often favour incumbent sites, especially if those incumbents are household names.Sadly, much of the low hanging search fruit is gone. However, there are a number of approaches to optimization... [...]