Posted by randfishFor the next few weeks, my blog posts will primarily consist of re-authoring and re-building the Beginner's Guide to Search Engine Optimization, section by section. You can read more about this project here.Understanding the Visuals of Search Results PagesIn order to gain a full understanding of how search engines and searchers interact, it's critical to take a look at the pages the engines return to fulfill a query. In the search marketing field, we call them 'SERPs' for Search Engine Results Pages. Each engine returns results in a slightly different format and will include vertical results (specific content targeted to a query based on certain triggers in the query, which we'll illustrate below).Google - currently the world's most popular search engine, Google's simple interface has changed little over the years. Yahoo! has a similar layout, but they organize things a bit differently and include an additional section:MSN/Live (Microsoft's search engine) is very similar to Yahoo!Each of the unique sections represents a snippet of information provided by the engines. I've listed them below with definitions of what each piece is meant to provide:Vertical NavigationEach of the engines offer the option to search different verticals like images, news, video or maps. Following these links will perform your query in that more limited index - in our example above, we might be able to see news items above stuffed animals or videos featuring stuffed animals.  Search Query BoxThe engines all show the query you've performed and allow you to edit or re-enter a new query from the search results page. They also offer links to the advanced search page, the features of which we'll discuss later on in the guide. Results InformationThis section provides a small amount of meta information about the results that you're viewing, including an estimate of the number of pages relevant to that particular query (note that these numbers can and frequently are wildly inaccurate, and should only be used as a rough comparative measure). Paid Search AdvertisingThe "Sponsored Results," to use the engines' terms, are text ads purchased by companies who use the various search ad platforms - Google AdWords, Yahoo! Search Marketing & MSN AdCenter. The results are ordered by a variety of factors, including relevance (of which click-through rate and conversion rates can be both be a factor) and bid amount (the ads require a maximum bid, which is then compared against other advertisers' bids). Organic/Algorithmic ResultsThese results are pulled from the search engines' primary indices of the web and ranked in order of relevance and popularity according to their complex algorithms. This section of the results is the primary focus of this guide. Query Refinement SuggestionsA relatively recent feature, query refinements are offered currently by both Yahoo! and Microsoft (and on occassion by Google as well, depending on the search). The goals of these links is to let users search with a more specific and possibly more relevant query that will satisfy their intent. Be aware that the SERPs are always changing as the engines test new formats and new layouts. Thus, the images above may only be accurate for a few weeks or months until Google, Yahoo!  and Microsoft shift to new formats.These "standard" results, however, are certainly not all that the engines have to offer. For many types of queries, search engines show "vertical" results and include more than just links to other sites to help answer a user's questions. Below, I've illustrated a few of these:Above - a search for my favorite local Greek restaurants brings back a direct map with an address and the option to get directions.It looks like New Yorkers are in for some unseasonable warm weather (as I search, it's October 17, 2007), and via a Google search for weather plus a city name, the engine returns a direct answer.A Google search for the famous painter, Edward Hopper, returns image results of some of his most memorable works.This Yahoo! search result for Green Bay Packers quarterback, Brett Favre, shows not only query refinement options, but a slough of information on the infamous gunslinger.A query on Yahoo! for Chicago Restaurants brings back a list of popular dining establishments from Yahoo!'s local portal, including cuisine choices, neighborhoods and top-reviewed establishments.Searching Yahoo! to find the number of pounds in a ton brings back an instant answer of 2000 pounds.Asking Live.com (Microsoft's search engine) for the Republican presidential candidate, Ron Paul, returns news results that center around the politician's recent activity.When querying Live for the famous early 20th-century actor, Charlie Chaplin, we're presented with a "celebrity rank" (Live's own calculation of a celebrity's relative popularity) along with a set of images.A Digital Cameras search at Live brings back popular products, along with prices, star ratings and links to Live product search results, as well as a list of guides & reviews.As you can see, the vast variety of vertical integration into search results means that for many popular queries, the standard set of 10 links to external pages is no longer the rule. Engines are competing by providing more relevant results and more targeted responses to queries that they feel are best answered by vertical, rather than web results.As a direct consequence, site owners and web marketers must take into account how this "vertical creep" (as it's frequently referred to in the industry) may impact their rankings and traffic. For many of the searches above, a high ranking, even in position #1 or #2 in the algorithmic/organic results may produce far less traffic and referrals than placement in search results where vertical options like these are not presented. The vertical results also signify opportunity, as listings are available in services from images to local search to news and products. Inclusion in these results will be covered later on in this guide.As a sendoff, observe what Ask.com has done with their search results:Ask has gone beyond the other engines to display vertical and refinement options of all kinds on the sidebars of the organic results in the center. This forward-thinking display functionality has been dubbed "Ask 3D," and represents one potential of how the future of search results might look.As always, comments and feedback are strongly encouraged and appreciated. Thanks for being patient while I put this together.Do you like this post? YesNo

  Posted by rebeccaAfter a quick break, we're back at SMX Social Media with "A Marketer's Guide to Social Bookmarking & Tagging." Guillaume Bouchardfrom NVI is up first. He starts off with his token in-joke for French speakers. People laugh (in French: "hoh hoh hoh"). He talks about how all of the social platforms leverage one another and cites an example of how he got a link bait piece on reddit that moved to Digg, StumbleUpon, and other social sites. He says you can leverage a popular story and get a few more good stories out of it. For social media marketing, you need a group of friends. He has several hundred friends on MSN Messenger that he leverages. Guillaume defines social bookmarking as a way to allow Internet users to store, organize, search, and, most importantly, share bookmarks. Del.icio.us, StumbleUpon, and Furl are examples of popular social bookmarking sites. Within social bookmarking there is tagging, which is the "web 2.0" way to say "keyword." Tagging helps you to organize and categorize content. Popular tagging websites include Flickr and Technorati.The benefits of social bookmarking are that it helps your site index better in search engines, it achieves a high amount of natural incoming links, it creates a presence in online social communities, increases brand awareness, builds traffic from alternate sources, and influences traditional media. He provides some tips on how to tag effectively. Check how other people are tagging the sites you like and want to remember. When in doubt, pick the most relevant or popular tag in the tag clouds. Avoid separating your tags with commas. Get together with your friends and collaborate on how to match up your tagging efforts.Next, Guillaume talks about manual vs. automatic tagging. Manual tagging maintains a presence on the web for several years (through hyperlinks, anchor text, and keywords). You can create your own set of tags to represent your content. Manual tagging works best with images and encourages high participation due to personalization. Examples of manual tagging include de.icio.us, StumbleUpon, Flickr, YouTube, etc. Automatic tagging is an algorithmic system that extracts tags from the content. There's a lack of creativity from a human standpoint. An example of auto tagging is Facebook. Problems with tagging include abuse and content degradation. As social bookmarking and tagging sites become more mainstream, the added incentive for manipulation will result in decreasingly reliable content (unless the algorithms get smarter). Guillaume does a quick overview of various tagging sites. He begins with Technorati and later discusses Flickr, YouTube, and Facebook. He finishes with some Beatles references that get some chuckles. Michael Grayis up next. He's focusing his presentation on del.icio.us. He defines del.icio.us and dissects a bookmark on the site. Different people interpret your page in different ways, which gives you clues about what people think are important. The advantage of common tags is that they can give you an idea of a tag for that page that you hadn't thought of. Posting history identifies the people who have bookmarked your page. This is important because people who bookmark first may be industry leaders, which is why they're discovering the content.You can get social on del.icio.us by adding friends to your network. You also have the ability to subscribe to certain tags on del.icio.us. If you're interested in travel, for example, you can subscribe to the "travel" tag and keep track of those related stories. You can also share links with your friends. The del.icio.us home page changes more frequently than the popular page. You get screenshots of the featured pages on the home page, how many people are bookmarking the pages, and all the different tags being used. The advantage of del.icio.us over Digg is that Digg is a young male, tech-centered audience, whereas del.icio.us is more worldwide and embraced as general use. You can have non-tech-related success on del.icio.us. What's interesting about del.icio.us tags is that there is no wrong tag. It's all about what makes sense to you. As a marketer, you want to find the tag that most people are using (singular vs. plural, for example). Spacing can be an issue--the most common thing Michael sees is people will separate two words with a plus sign (e.g. "new+york+city"). Michael touches base on what tag clouds are (the ones that are bigger are more popular, while the ones in red are those that Michael has used). To expand your exposure, identify tags that are popular and active and tailor your content to fit into those tags. Add bookmarking widgets and buttons to your pages, and be sure to enhance the bookmarking with optimal titles, timing, and tagging. Time your bookmarking efforts to take advantage of update times (the del.icio.us Popular page is updated about every four hours), and use your friends to help influence the suggested tags. Don't create multiple accounts, as they can get discounted.Lastly, Neil Patelis up once again to talk about how to leverage StumbleUpon. StumbleUpon doesn't really get you links, but it does drive lots of steady traffic. You won't get 12,000 visitors in one day, but you will get a nice, ongoing stream, which provides a great branding opportunity. Step one is to install the StumbleUpon toolbar. If you like a page, thumb it up; if not, thumb it down. After you've created an account and installed the toolbar, add lots of friends. Step 3 is to submit new sites. Titles aren't that important since users are just getting a random piece of content. Neil recommends adding keywords that are rich in search to your title. Step 4 is to leverage your friends. Use the "Send To" feature and send a message to all of them by saying "Hey, check out this new site." Your friends will see a little "(1)" next to their Stumble icon, so they have to visit your page before they can start stumbling. Step 5 is that your friends will have to see your page and will probably thumb up the content. It's *technically* not spam because it's a feature StumbleUpon has provided, so you're just taking advantage of it.Q&A time. I'm going to drink more water. (By the way, more SMX coverage is available at SERoundtableand Search Engine Land.)Do you like this post? YesNo

  Posted by rebeccaHaving just wrapped up my presentation for Linkbait: Chumming for Traffic on Social Media Sites(I linked to Vanessa Fox's session coverage on Search Engine Land in case you want a recap), I thought I'd turn the tables and live blog Extra! Extra! The Social News Sites. (Side note: My allergies have been a pain in the assever since I got to New York, and as such, I guzzled two and a half bottles of water during my session to minimize Scratchy Throat Syndrome. As a result, I may have to make repeated runs to the bathroom, so coverage for this session could be a bit fragmented. Thanks, tiny bladder.)Neil Patel, co-host of SMX Social Media and Digg extraordinaire, starts off by talking about porn. He said something about how he loves Digg like boys love porn. I bet he loves porn, too. Don't lie, Neil. Okay, now he's swearing. A lot. I think he's part pirate. Neil gives a quick overview of Digg and says that if the story gets a ton of buries, it'll get knocked off the front page. Why should you care about Digg? The average story that makes the home page gets 129 links and great branding benefits. It also gets a ton of traffic--some of Neil's clients have gotten over 10,000 visitors in one hour.Now Neil is going all mimbo about being in The Wall Street Journal. I can't believe people take this guy seriously.Requirements for being on Digg are having a website. He actually said that. Well, he clarified by saying you need content, pictures, video, or audio, and he specifically recommends leveraging the video section. Important factors include the number of votes, the amount of time it takes to collect votes, voters (have them be active, diverse users), the submitter, and friends (act like a "Tom Cruise" and befriend everyone out there). Unwritten rules: no self promotion! If you are going to do it, be smart about it. Use a non-company specific user name. Also, don't pay for votes. Digg doesn't like it when people pay for votes. Don't spam, either. Oh, and Digg hates SEOs. Neil provided an example of how some dude outed him as an SEO/"spammer," and for a couple weeks after that all of his submissions got flooded with "This dude's a filthy SEO spammer" comments. Fun facts about Digg: .7% of all stories get to the home page. Yikes. He then cites Rand's SEOmoz post about how the top 100 Diggers control 56% of the content on the home page. Thirdly, you can't control what people say. The reality is that you can't control the comments on Digg, so you might as well embrace the attention you're getting and hope to get votes. Very eloquent, Neil.Tamar Weinbergis up next. She looks nervous. It's her first public speaking gig and apparently Danny made her appear on the panel so she can talk about how much of a Digg Rockstar she is. I bet it'll be a while before she forgives him. She'll be talking about Digg Tips and Tricks (she practiced her presentation on me the night before, which was quite adorable).She starts off with some advice for content that wins. Viral content is key, such as lists, games and quizzes, controversy, tools, breaking news, videos, pictures, and tech/science-related stories. She reiterated what Brent focused on in the earlier session, which is that a solid title and description are extremely critical. Don't put unrelated content on a salesy site. Diggers are pretty savvy and will see that a story about blogging tips looks funny being on a mortgage website.Next, Tamar gives advice for promotion as a Digg user. She recommends making yourself identifiable by getting an avatar and providing contact information (such as a link to your blog, your email address, IM screen names, etc). Befriend users and Digg their stories before they get popular. Also, comment on stories early--the snarkier, the better. If you're going to try and promote your Digg stories, do it privately to be safe. Pownce, Twitter, and Facebook are popular networks for leveraging diggs, but they're a bit riskier. Tamar recommends a couple tools to enhance your Digg experience, such as the smart Digg button, the Digg Alerter, and the Social Media add on for Firefox (which Jane blogged about). She talks about things to note. (Tamar, use less text next time. I'm in the back of the room and can barely read these!) First, Diggers hate "marketed" or "SEO'd" content. Avoid jargon/terminology in titles and the descriptions that can kill your story's potential. Also, don't just ask someone to digg your story when networking. Become friends and have similar interests--don't just spam people and ask for votes all the time.Also, Digg's algo plays on the diversity of the number of Diggs per story within a specific time frame. Don't get the same people to digg your story over and over again. Also, don't promote your story too quickly, or it will seem unnatural. Check out the stories in the Upcoming section to promote your stories to the front page. Once you're on page 1-2 of Upcoming, you're usually on the path to getting on the home page. Some lesser-known tricks she recommends are promoting your Digg content elsewhere (e.g. StumbleUpon). Also, subscribe to the Digg RSS feed and check it regularly for dupes and trends (you can do the same by browsing through the Digg archives). Focus on categories when submitting. Certain categories require fewer diggs than others to get to the front page. A really interesting tip Tamar shares is that if you become a popular user, you'll require more diggs from more users to get your stuff to the home page. You can either stop submitting for a few days to reduce your popularity (so you'll need fewer diggs again), or you can just continue to submit as-is (but you'll need a lot more votes). Newer users have a better chance of hitting the home page since they'll require fewer diggs.And she's done! Well done, Tamar. You're no longer a presenting virgin. Wahoo.Next, Chris Winfield talks about how to Digg Your Way to the Top. Why would you want to be on the Digg home page? Well, for traffic and exposure (and, of course, links). Chris asserts that sales are also a big incentive. People can come into your site and realize that it exists and what it offers, which can potentially lead to sales/conversions. Chris recommends that you understand the Digg landscape. Know the language (e.g. "ftw," "i can has?", "RTFA"). Also, know what Diggers like (Apple products, Heroes, The Office, Ron Paul). More importantly, know what Diggers don't like (the RIAA, Fox News, George W. Bush). Don't do press releases--they're boring and don't work on Digg. Also, don't overtly sell anything or "fake" it.What does work? Know your audience. Digg loves Chuck Norris, videos, and seeing things get destroyed. Chris submitted a video that answers the question of "Will Chuck Norris Blend?", and there you have it, Diggers ate it up. Also, get featured on a popular blog--it's easier to get on the Digg home page that way. He mentions as well that sometimes all it takes is a creative idea to get on Digg (e.g. one company buys Radiohead's newest set-your-own-price CD for $1,000). Chris goes into some more case studies, but he's zipping through them pretty quickly (though I did catch him making fun of Michael Gray'sobsession with all things Disney). Chris stresses the importance of crafting good titles and descriptions and choosing the appropriate category. His case study resulted in over 20,000 visitors from Digg in a 24 hour period. Successful Digg stories spread to other social networks (he gets a ton of traffic from StumbleUpon) and to influential blogs. Lastly, Chris gives one Digg tip to live by: have good hosting. We talked about this in our link bait panel, so I'm sure the audience will get this hammered into their heads over the next two days. GOOD HOSTING GOOD. BAD HOSTING BAD.Okay, time for Q&A. I have to blow my nose. And go to the bathroom (again).Do you like this post? YesNo

  Posted by mystery_guestINTRO From Rand:Tonight's post comes from my beloved fiancée, who's generously donated her time to help keep the blog going while I'm out of town at SMX Social Media.As many of you know, Rand travels quite a bit for his work, leaving me at home with Raul, the cabana boy. All is well for the first few hours, until I grow tired of Raul's deep tissue massages and the peeled grapes he insists on feeding me. After that, I tend to get a little bored and lonely. I'm assuming the other conference widows out there feel the same way, and as such, I've composed a list of ways to pass the time when your fiancée is away and your rippled Ecuadorian paramour is dehydrated.  Try to name all the countries in the world. Realizing it is hopeless, try for all the states of the union. Fail pitifully yet again, and get even more depressed when you realize you can name a greater quantity of characters from the Simpsons. To wit:_Bart, Maggie, Lisa, Homer, Marge, Abe, Patty, Selma, Mrs. Bouvier, Uncle Herb, Chief Wiggum, Ralph Wiggum, Sarah Wiggum, Snake, Lou, Eddie, Dr. Julius Hibbert, Mihouse Van Houten*, Nelson Muntz, Otto, Sherri and Terri, Principal Skinner, Superintendant Chalmers, Gladys Skinner, Comicbook Guy, Mrs. Krabappel, Krusty the Clown, Rabbi Krustofsky Corporal Punishment, Sideshow Mel, Sideshow Bob, Cecil Twilliger, Dr. Nick Riviera, Bleeding Gums Murphy, Gil, Troy McClure, Jasper, Bumblebee Man, Moe, Cletus, Jimmy Joe-Joe Junior Shabadoo, Lenny, Carl, Kent Brockman, Rainier Wolfcastle, Professor Frink, Lindsay Nagel, Cookie Kwan, The Flanders (Ned, Maude, Rod, and Tod), Reverend and Helen Lovejoy, Luigi (of the pizza place), Jimbo Jones, Kearny, Dolph, Uder (the fat German foreign exchange student), Groundskeeper Willie, Lunchlady Doris, Wendell (the kid who throws up all the time), Hans Moleman, Apu, Manjula (and the octoplets), The Sea Captain, Jaque, Mindy, Tom (Bart's big brother), Pepe (Homer's little brother), Smithers, Mr. Burns, Mrs. Burns (Mr. Burn's mother, who he never forgave after she had that affair with Taft), Judge Constance Harm, Barney Gumble, Duff Man, Bea (Grandpa's dead girlfriend), Ray Magini, Disco Stu, Arnie, Lionel Hutz, Mayor Quimby (and his wife). Also Sophie (Krusty's daughter), and Luke Perry (who I include because he is Krusty's half brother on his mother's side)._Weep, because you still have no idea where the hell Ohio is.Rather than doing your spouse's laundry, hide his or her clothing around the house. Place dirty socks inside the pockets of a favorite blazer as a gentle reminder that leaving them on the floor near the hamper is not the same thing as putting them inside the hamper.Plan out the outfits you intend to wear at the next conference  you do attend. Walk around the house in them to check viability, comfort, transition from day to evening events, and warmth. Don't dwell on the fact that it's 11pm and you're changing your clothes and doing your make up.Watch television programs your spouse finds unfit for human consumption. Namely, Chuck, because despite being incredibly stupid and poorly written, you sort of think the lead is dishy. Also, VH1's Rock of Love , where, as one reviewer put it, one contestant can say to another "I don't really think you're a whore", and it's one of the most endearing things to happen all season.Invite your girlfiends over for a pillow fight/malt liquor tasting. Explain to your spouse that you would have documented the event, but someone decided to take the camera to the conference. I'm sure those pictures of Dave Naylor were totally worth it.Commit perjury.Call around to every Nordstrom Rack in King County, vainly searching for the Coach Sara bootsthat you saw at the downtown store but that they didn't have in your size. Realize that you don't really want the boots, per se, but are enjoying the thrill of chase, a sensation which you can only assume is the remnant of the driving force that kept your ancestors alive when they were hunting and gathering food thousands of years ago. Use this reasoning to justify more shopping.Institute a dress code in your apartment. Break it by failing to wear shoes. Argue with the management and threaten to throw yourself out.Dinner: peanut brittle and ice cream. Any questions?Put on your pajamas and turn off all the lights in your apartment. Proceed to jump and down violently, stomping on the ground, throwing around small woodland creatures, and basically doing whatever you can to annoy the neighbor who lives below you. When she finally comes up to ask what the hell is going on, pretend she just woke you up and reprimand her for her rudeness.Write several emails to your editor friends, making simple mistakes like confusing "your" with "you're" and "it's" with "its". See how long it takes before there brains brake.Revel in the delightful irony of how Google would need to design its webpage to rank better at Google itself. Watch as your delight slowly turns to frustration and anger when you realize this hypocritical behavior is microcosmic of Google's policies as a whole, and accept that no matter how nice he is to you, Matt Cutts isn't really your friend. <sniff>Miss Rand.  *I left off Milhouse's parents because I couldn't get their names right. I thought they were Cliff and Leanne, but are actually named Kirk and Luann. I also left off Homer's mother, because I couldn't remember her name (it's Mona), as well as Ling, because I thought that she was Patty's daughter (she's actually Selma's) and that her name was Li. And naturally, this list is not complete because there were a few names I couldn't recall or get right. Feel free to add (names must be off the top of your head. No looking up info other than to check spelling).Also, Rand and I don't actually have a cabana boy.Do you like this post? YesNo

  Posted by great scott!As many of you probably know, today, October 15th, is the first annual International Blog Action Day. Thousands of blogs are joining together to write about one topic in many different voices: the environment. It's a fantastic idea that's gained some tremendous support from the United Nations, Google, LifeHacker and thousands of other partners big and small.SEOmoz is very proud to have been the first blog-based companyto sign on to join this effort. We were and are more than happy to lend whatever influence wemay have to get an effort of this magnitude and importance rolling. The timing of Blog Action Day seems a bit uncanny what with Al Gore and the IPCC winning a joint Nobel Peace Prize just last week for their work in expanding climate-change awareness. However, when it comes to issues like the environment and the climate-change crisis, there's no such thing as too much attention. We tend to shy away from political issues here on the blog, but I don't consider the current environmental crisis to be the least bit political. It's a humanitarian issue that everyone should care about regardless of political leanings.  Climate change, industrial pollution, deforestation, carbon dioxide emissions...these things affect all of us, regardless of nationality, skin color, tax bracket, religious beliefs or voting history. There is only one thing that truly separates people when it comes to the world's environmental problems: those who are willing to do something and those who aren't. And that's really what Blog Action Day is all about, bringing thousands of voices together to talk about what they've done and what others can do. To show that there are a ton of ways you can make a difference and they don't have to be expensive, or time-consuming or difficult...every little bit really can count.So, soapbox aside, what has SEOmoz done to be part of the solution? Over the last several months, since Collis, Leo and Cyan contacted us about joining Blog Action Day, we've been auditing our records and calculating our annual carbon emissions for all of our business activities.  We are proud to say that today, to commemorate Blog Action Day, we made a contribution of $340 to Carbonfund.orgto offset 62 metric tonnes of CO2 emissions (slightly more than the 56.2 tonnes SEOmoz generated in the last year) to make SEOmoz officially Carbon Neutral.Fun Facts:73.7% of SEOmoz' carbon emissions are the result of air travel! Jeez, all of those conferences add up!Our office energy consumption is surprisingly low. We're virtually paperless around here and try to be really good about turning off lights and monitors at night (also, almost all of our light bulbs are compact fluorescents).How can you become Carbon neutral also? It's actually really easy, just go to Carbonfund.org and use their handy calculators to figure out how much carbon you produce as an individual, family or business. It doesn't take long and only requires you take the time to review your power bills, travel records and a few other figures from the past year, or even a few months to get an estimate.  The calculator will then tell you how much CO2 your activities generate each year and how much you'd need to donate to offset your carbon footprint.  Organizations like Carbonfund accomplish this by using your donations to invest in renewable energy, reforestation and efficiency programs. It's basically a credit system: your donation will fund a project that will reduce carbon emissions somewhereby the amount that you produce at home, the result: carbon neutrality. While we're proud that we've gone Carbon Neutral, and we hope everyone reading will consider taking a little time and a little money to do the same, we're not stopping there. As part of Blog Action Day, SEOmoz will donate 25% of all sales made todayto the Nature Conservancy, the leading conservation organization working around the world to protect ecologically important lands and waters for nature and people (they also have a carbon footprint calculator). This is a great conservation cause that we're happy to contribute to. Want to help them and make an impact today? Well, all you have to do is purchase a Premium Membership. Along with all of the great features and materials you'll get, you'll also effectively be donating $100 (on a 1-year membership) to a great environmental cause and joining the thousands of folks participating in Blog Action Day!Again, we couldn't be happier to be a part of this momentous event. We send thanks and praise out to all of those bloggers and blog-readers the world over who've come together to make this happen and do their part to raise awareness and make a difference by helping to protect the environment and reverse climate change. We humbly invite all of our readers and members to join the movement and do what you can to help.Cheers,Scottp.s. FROM RAND:A friendly reminder that SEOmoz's blog comments are NOT a good spot for political debate. Thanks!Technorati TagsSEOmoz, Carbon Neutral, Blog Action Day, Carbonfund, Nature Conservancy, Climate Change, EnvironmentDo you like this post? YesNo

  Posted by randfishI'm halfway through my next post on rewriting the Beginner's Guide, but I'm just too tired to go on. Losing three hours coming over to New York doesn't help, either. So, I've turned my attention away from the project for now and thought I'd ask something a bit more participatory of the crowd here...What are the 5 industry-related websites (excluding the search engines themselves) that you learn the most from - the 5 that you couldn't live without (orat least, couldn't earn as much without)?I'll share my answer:TechmemeIf I visit Techmeme a couple times a day, I can be virtually assured that there will be no "big" conversations in the blogosphere or the tech world that I'm missing out on. That alone is worth its weight in gold. I really can't remember how I survived without it, but I'm pretty sure I had to do a lot more skimming to find the signal. SearchEngineLandIn search, there's no better source for industry-sepcific news. The columns on advice are occassionally good, too, but I find the majority of the value comes from Greg, Barry & Danny, who won't let any of the big or important stories fall through the cracks. SEOBookAaron's ascerbic take on the engines' motivations and his solid understand of the economics of web properties make his advice the most valuable single source I read. Cre8asite ForumsWhen I need help with a topic or a resource where I know plenty of folks smarter than I will rush to the rescue, I turn to Cre8. Kim Krause has built a property that is 100X better than forums 100x its size, thanks to the quality of people and contributions - no small feat. RedditI know, I know, technically it's not in the search or technology industry. However, the stories I find there, particularly some that never make it past page 3 give me a view into what the influencers of the web are enjoying and reading, even if it's outside the insular world of blogs & tech. It's also the best way I've found to have good stories to share at dinner conversations when everyone gets tired of talking about the latest top blog list. Sites that even I'm shocked didn't make the list include Roundtable, MarketingPilgrim, ResourceShelf, Sphinn and about 3 dozen others. Maybe I'm just not the kind of guy who can only live with 5 sites.Now it's your turn - which 5 sites would you be unable to live without? Feel free to leave live links to the URLs and don't worry about needing to explain your choices if you don't want to.p.s. My guess is that 50% or more will list Facebook #1.... <sigh>...Do you like this post? YesNo

  Posted by randfishIt's late, and I should be wrapping up Q+A (or at least blogging on my promised topic of the Beginner's Guide) and getting some shut eye, but I simply couldn't resist sharing some thoughts about the web-based fervor for Republican Presidential candidate Ron Paul. For those who don't know, Paul's supporters are possibly the most organized and galvanized web community in the modern political spectrum. Here's just a sample of their accomplishments:How a Fringe Politician Took Over the Web - from WiredRon Paul Has Lots of Money- from the NY ObserverThe Ron Paul Effect- ABC NewsI felt this quote, in particular, was impressively insightful:So are the polls missing a Paul boomlet? Is the famously contrarian ob-gyn -- a libertarian nicknamed "Dr. No" because of his propensity to vote against anything he believes contradicts the Constitution's original intent -- poised to surge into contention in the GOP field? Not likely. What's more likely, based on Web traffic over the past week, is that Paul supporters have mastered the art of "viral marketing," using Internet savvy and blog postings to create at least the perception of momentum for his long-shot presidential bid.Paul's supporters certainly have a knack for driving traffic and dominating online polls, as well as flooding mainstream media with calls for more attention to the long-shot candidate. The problem is, the networks running those online polls are starting to get savvy. Here's Allen Wastler, Managing Editor for CNBC.com with An Open Letter to the Ron Paul Camp:I haven't seen him pull those kind of numbers in any "legit" poll. Our poll was either hacked or the target of a campaign. So we took the poll down. The next day, our email basked was flooded with Ron Paul support messages. And the computer logs showed the poll had been hit with traffic from Ron Paul chat sites. I learned other Internet polls that night had been hit in similar fashion. Congratulations. You folks are obviously well-organized and feel strongly about your candidate and I can't help but admire that. But you also ruined the purpose of the poll. It was no longer an honest "show of hands" -- it suddenly was a platform for beating the Ron Paul drum. That certainly wasn't our intention and certainly doesn't serve our readers ... at least those who aren't already in the Ron Paul camp.If Paul's supporters really were as savvy about viral marketing as they claim to be, they would have long ago discovered the power of anchor text, link bombing and taking over the search results. Imagine - if the thousands of bloggers, hundreds of forums and handful of social networking sites all took it upon themselves to boost Paul's visibility through search engine rankings, they could achieve an effect far greater than the dominance of online polls - they could truly start to influence the campaign by marketing information for their candidate.Say the Paul supporters were savvy enough and dedicated enough; there's no limit to the pages on Paul's sitethey could get ranking for hot button issues and important, politically relevant queries - everything from Iraq Warto Immigrationto Health Insuranceand 2008 Electioncould have pages on Paul ranking in the top 1-5 results. With control of the search results, it's likely he'd have considerably more brand recognition than his current 29% (note the Reddit thread - If you don't read Reddit, there's a 70% chance you don't even know who Ron Paul is). The best part? Those Ron Paul supporters are very frequently armchair generals of the web - their fanaticism extends only as far as their blogs' collective RSS readers, but through this strategy, they would, in fact, leverage that weakness into a strength. After all, if you had an army of bloggers at your bidding, wouldn't you distribute a search strategy to rule Google's blue link lists?Naturally, this brings up a fascinating debate - if biased parties start taking advantage of the search algorithms' love of editorial blog links to wage information wars in the SERPs, how high might it escalate before the engines are forced to block or alter the results? If one search savvy political camp were to seize control of the results for a rival faction (picture if every search for George Bush in 2004 had returned a Kerry-based attack or vice versa), how long would it be before bloggers the web over joined the campaign? Perhaps in the future, we really will be voting over the web, but we'll do so with hyperlinks, not checkboxes. Maybe it's best to keep that Pandora's Box shut.And, of course, may the best SEO'd candidate win... p.s. Although this post does discuss political figures, SEOmoz IS NOT a forum for political discussion or the merits of particular beliefs or candidates. Myself, Scott, Rebecca & Jane are likely to quash comments that cross into the realm of political debate.Do you like this post? YesNo

  Posted by great scott!Hey Gang,It's been a crazy week here at the Mozplex, what with interviewing for a few new positions, all kinds of work to do and, well, let's just say a little lingering controversy from last week.  So it's definitely time to lighten things up with another installment of Whiteboard Friday.  This week, Rand discusses different roles bloggers and blog readers can play to make themselves visible online.PS - I forgot to screencap the Whiteboard before I left the office tonight in a mad dash to get to the local pub quiz, so I'll put up a picture of the board when I get in Friday morning. Cheers!Here ya go, all better...Technorati TagsSEO SEOmoz Rand Fishkin Whitebaord Blog Search Blogger Do you like this post? YesNo

  Posted by FluxxThis is just a quick update for those of you commenting on the blog via Internet Explorer 7.  Over time, more and more of you have been emailing me about a JavaScript bug where when a user would click the link to add a comment to a blog post, nothing would happen and IE would tell you there was an "Error on Page," with an essentially random line number that really tells you virtually nothing.  For anyone doing JavaScript development on IE, you know how hard debugging is.  There was a time where this affected no copy of IE7 in the office, at home, or anywhere else I checked, while we still received reports of it happening to users out in the wild. In any event, recently (for some inexplicable reason) this bug started happening to some computers in the office, so I was able to start testing and come up with a fix.  For those of you interested, newer updated versions of IE7 don't play nicely with certain animations in the script.aculo.uslibrary.  Attempts to upgrade our version of script.aculo.us did more harm than good, so the only real solution we have is to slightly limit the user experience for IE7 users.In English, this means that while on Firefox your comment box will gracefully fade in above the comment thread and be dragable, on IE7 your comment box will just appear at the top of the comments and be stationary.  Hopefully IE7 will soon have better support for script.aculo.us animations, or vice versa, but until then we're stuck with a slightly "less cool" commenting system for those of you on IE7.Technorati TagsIE7, javascript, script.acaulo.usDo you like this post? YesNo