Pengiun 2.1 Update - 5 Things you can do today about Pengiun 2.1

Penguin 2.1:

In case you hadn’t heard, Google rolled out a significant Penguin update on Friday October 4, 2013. To recap, Panda updates mainly concern your on-page SEO (on your website/s) whereas Penguin updates are about off-page issues (your backlinks, basically).
If you missed it, here was the industry chatter about Penguin 2.1:
http://searchengineland.com/penguin-2-1-and-5-live-173632
http://www.seroundtable.com/google-penguin-2-1-17474.html
BTW, one of my fave tactics for getting additional insight on a topic like this is to read through ALL the comments. In fact, I often pick up more gems in the comments area than in articles themselves.
And, you can read some early analyses of Penguin 2.1 (e.g what it’s targeting) on Traffic Planet here:
http://trafficplanet.com/topic/7282-penguin-21-launched-today/
So if you have been slapped by Penguin 2.1, here are some response options for you:

1. Don’t give up on SEO.

Usually when there’s a high impact algo update and stories emerge like this:

the temptation is to totally abandon SEO and shift over to a paid traffic strategy. However, before doing that, keep a few factors in mind (these are from my anecdotal observations over the years and/or research I’ve come across):
[a] AdWords ads get (probably) less than 5% of clickthroughs on Google’s SERPs
[b] Most ad campaigns lose money – banner clickthroughs are shockingly low
[c] Paid traffic is a specialist area that requires proper study, analysis and fine tuning i.e. time commitment
[d] Visitors clicking on ads probably have higher levels of resistance to salesy messages than those coming from a referral or Organic listing
Now a no-cost but time-using alternative is Forum Marketing but that doesn’t suit every niche (try Forum Marketing for clients like funeral companies, local dentists, locksmiths or real estate agents!) – it’s best for the expert/information/software type operations.
SEO has always been in a war with Google and constant adaptation has therefore been essential. It’s simply a fact of life with SEO. Paid traffic also requires constant trial-and-error plus changes to platform rules (plenty of mega-spending Internet Marketers have been booted out of AdWords over the years too).
Before long – it’s too early yet – we’ll have a better understanding of trigger factors on Penguin 2.1. Plus, don’t forget that there is ALWAYS variation in Google results (deliberate on their part I believe) to avoid 100% accurate reverse engineering by SEOs. In SEO, we’re always working with generally consistent trends that MOSTLY work, not 100% foolproof blueprints (there are always exceptions).

2. Get your traffic back in 48-72 hours.

What you really want is the targeted traffic more than specific rankings. To that end, depending on your niche, an Authority Parasite Strategy could work.
What’s that exactly?
It’s where you bring traffic through a page on a site that Google ALREADY regards as high authority. Using  my normal SEO methods, I’ve gotten inner pages on Authority Sites to Page 1 in about 48 hours and often they outrank the relevant category page on that same Authority Site (because the category page wasn’t SEOd).
Examples of sites suitable for this approach include:

• YouTube videos (obviously)
• PRWeb press releases
• SB Wire press releases
• LinkedIn profile pages
• Pinterest pages
• Amazon product pages (e.g. if you have a Kindle book)
• Udemy product pages (e.g. free/paid mini-course on Udemy.com, Udemy pages rank fast and high with good SEO)
• Facebook pages
• Forum thread pages (e.g. Warrior Forum, Traffic Planet or major forums in your niche – don’t forget to keyword optimize your title when starting a new thread)
• Twitter profile pages
• Storify inner pages
• Yahoo Answers
• Lynda.com
• Appsumo.com
• Groupon deal inner page
• Tumblr (riskier option)
• Squidoo (riskier and has been slapped by Google in the past)
• Rebelmouse.com page e.g.

Basically, just keep an eye on the SERPs and see what the Google darlings are.
If you want to pursue this option, email me at support(at)terrykyle.net and I’ll go over what you need to rank your Authority Parasite page/s.
Plus, take a look at what this past (accidental) traffic win did for one of Shoemoney’s sites:

From that post:
It reminds me of when I started my mobile ringtone website. I did it because it was fun. Then one day it appeared on digg.com and went from 1,000 visitors a day to 150,000 and remained a consistent 75-100k unique visitors a day for years. This is where you see my famous 134,000.00 adsense check from. That site made next to nothing for years.
http://www.shoemoney.com/2013/02/07/how-ray-lewis-made-deer-antler-spray-lucky

3. Create new sites ASAP.

Instead of being too emotionally attached to that site that was just slapped by Penguin 2.1 (and it may or may not be coming back), setup several new smaller websites and get those to Page 1 in 3-4 weeks (email me on your SEO strategy).
That’s my current average for most new sites and 5-10 pages of content is plenty (my British writer is $22 per 1000 word article so the re-entry cost isn’t high – the cost of waiting and hoping for your slapped site is WAY higher). Yes try to bring your site back (see below on the Link Detox tool) but ALSO get some new sites moving, at the same time.
Spread the risk around across several traffic-bringers to minimize (but not eliminate) the risk of future slaps (that’s also where the Authority Parasite Strategy above is very useful).

4. Check out the Link Detox tool from Chris Cemper.

We’ll be testing this software tool out  a lot more in the next couple of months but Chris and his software users have a bunch of interesting case studies up here (nothing on Penguin 2.1 of course yet but several on Penguin 2.0). Interesting:

http://www.linkresearchtools.com/case-studies/

5. Stay up to date on analysis of Penguin 2.1

Basically, by monitoring threads like these, you can track where the SEO community is up to on this latest Penguin update.
http://trafficplanet.com/topic/7282-penguin-21-launched-today/
http://www.webmasterworld.com/google/4614730.htm
Stay tuned on Penguin 2.1 because we’re going to be hearing a lot more about it…
Have a great Sunday.
Terry K.
My SEO Agency – Blogsurge.net (password required) – Traffic Planet – High PR Kingdom – Rankmaxx

Read more: http://sundayseo.net/5-things-you-can-do-today-about-penguin-2-1/#ixzz2h11Vhx00

Google Penguin 2.0 Algorithm Update May 2013 - Infographic, SEO Update May 2013

New Face of SEO in 2013 & SEO Trend in 2013

Google Hummingbird Update, Hummingbird Algorithm, Seo Hummingbird Update

There were two cataclysmic events in the SEO world last week; one we all saw coming (eventually) but the other arrived unannounced and set the search world alight with speculation and discussion. The first was the total encryption of keyword referral data from organic traffic to Google Analytics, something that many marketers and brands relied on for feedback regarding rankings and visitor traffic for certain key phrases. The second was the introduction of a brand new search algorithm from Google, Hummingbird, which makes the search engine more capable than ever of handling complex queries. Google wants to understand the user's intent behind a particular topic search rather than just literally interpreting the keywords used in that search. It's huge and it's going to change almost everything about Google search as we know it. Let's take a look at the new features and what they mean for video marketing.

Hummingbird: User Intent vs. Actual Keyword Phrase Used

On September 26th, Google announced the release of their new algorithm, Hummingbird. The fact that they choose to do so from the the garage where the company started 15 years ago should have been a clue to the importance to them of this update. Hummingbird isn't just an algorithm update, it's a completely brand new algo, built on the feedback gathered from previous updates and Google estimates that it will affect about 90% of search queries worldwide. So what's changed? Essentially, the emphasis is now on ‘answers’ rather than ‘results’, with Hummingbird paying particular focus to conversational search. Conversational search, or semantic search, takes into account they way users phrase their queries while actually talking to each other (or to Google) as opposed to the way we phrase a question while typing.

SEE ALSO: Keyword Optimization for Video: 4 Great Tips to Maximize SEO Benefit

Earlier this year Google introduced the 'conversational search' feature to Chrome, allowing users to search Google by asking it a question rather than typing it. It's a safe bet to assume that the feedback gathered from this new feature all went towards shaping the new algorithm.

Google wants to change the way that you interact with it and it wants to change the way it interacts with you. More and more of us are turning to software like Siri to do our dirty search work for us and our reliance on mobile devices means that Google as a search engine needs to adapt to us, the end user, if it wants us to continue to use its services. Users on mobiles will often ask a question in a different way from the one they might ask if they were sat in front of their PC.
Also, Google themselves confirm that 15% of the billion searches a day have never been seen before - I would suggest that this figure is made up entirely of long tail key phrases, something that the search engine has never been that great at returning results for. With a change in user behaviour regarding search queries plus the need to understand the long tail better, the goal of Hummingbird is to not only supply you with the best information you requested, but also the best information you didn't request but which enhances your experience.

There are some key elements to the new algorithm which need to be understood if you want your content to be served to the people who are searching for your products, your services or any other information you provide.

Content Needs to Completely Satisfy The User's Intent

In the past few years, Google's algorithms have adapted to serve the user with the best content they think you are searching for. If they consistently served up bad or irrelevant results than you are going to go elsewhere, somewhere like Bing for instance, and Google will suffer (as will their Adwords revenue). The Caffeine, Panda and Penguin updates all had this goal in mind but Hummingbird drills down even further at the first query by effectively personalising the results based on location, context, Knowledge Graph data, device, local factors and platform. Suddenly, user intent has become far more important than the actual keyword phrase used. 
For example, if I search "how do I clean a silver necklace?", Google should return a set of results that understands that I'm looking for information or a way of doing something NOT a sales pitch. Whereas in the past the words "silver necklace" would have been the triggers, Hummingbird is now taking into account "How do I" and "clean". We know that video results have always tended to do well on informational searches but now, more than ever, creators need to think about just how they can answer a user question with video content so that they have a chance of ranking well in the blended results. Hummingbird will anticipate the user's intent and so must you.
Video SEO Takeway: Think about what question are you answering with your video. If you're not answering a question then what exactly are you offering the user?

Content Needs to Be Rich and Multi Faceted 

In order to survive the long night of the knives and make it through to the first couple of pages of Google, content (all types) has to be the most relevant for that user at that given time. Websites that offer true value - as opposed to pages and pages of thin content - will be at a distinct advantage. An easily navigable site that is rich in all types of optimised, fresh, useful content should do well from the new algo (as long as they haven't been caught up in the Panda/Penguin horror show that has affected so many).
Video SEO Takeway: Understand how your on site video content works for the user. Is it easily found? Do you have unique video landing pages? Are your videos in context? Are they surrounded by relevant, informative text? Are they linked to from other pages? Do they link out to other similar pages? No? Then, you'll need our handy guide to creating the best video landing page more than ever.

Schema Mark Up Is Going To Become Increasingly Important

Schema/Rich Snippets/Structured Data are all terms for informational about information that sends a very clear message to the search engines about the focus of your content. The more info the search engines have, the more inclined they will be to return your content to the user.
Video SEO Takeway: Users are searching for video content so mark up your individual video landing pages and submit video sitemaps maps via Webmaster Tools.

Keywords (not provided): The End Of SEO?

In the good all days (pre September 2013), you were able to gather data on the organic visitors to your site and to confirm the keywords they used to find you. This was extraordinarily useful for two reasons: #1) it was an easy metric to measure whether your rankings in Google were driving traffic on certain key terms and #2) it gave you clues as to the other search terms that people were finding you on which you could choose to optimise further if it suited your marketing goals.
In October 2011, Google announced that they were "encrypting searches" made by users logged into to the Google network (inc. YouTube, Docs and Gmail) to make those searches more "secure". This meant that this information would never reach Google Analytics and the site owner would be served the (not provided) phrase instead. At first, this averaged anywhere between 5-15% of non paid searches, depending on the site, but slowly the percentage increased until Google announced last week that it was making 100% of these referral terms private. Yippee!

There's a way around it of course, pay Google to push you onto the front page via an Adwords campaign and receive as much keyword referral data as you like. This feature is still available in AdWords and looks like it will be for the foreseeable future but you are going to have to spend some of those hard earned advertising dollars to access it. Arguably, PPC has always had the edge when it comes to hard ROI and now it holds absolute power when it comes to giving you the facts and figures about your own keyword data. However, Google is a business and for all its altruistic mutterings it exists to be financially viable. Pushing budgets towards paid advertising to get the data that was once free makes total business sense and I'm surprised they gave it away for free for so long.
Video SEO Takeway: Don't optimise solely for key phrases. Optimise for the whole user experience. Think about your target market and in what context they may search for you and create content around that.

Conclusion

Is SEO dead? Nope, I'd argue that it's far from it but it did just get a whole lot more complicated. Keyword rankings as a metric may be devalued but search engine optimisation, as a discipline, is needed now more than ever. As users and search engines get more sophisticated, marketers need to work harder to understand what it is going to take to get their content visible. Optimising for video means the creator and the publisher need to understand what the user is looking for. It's no longer the case that you can produce a video and people will come and take a look. Post-Hummingbird, creators and brands needs to seek out the questions that are being asked and answer them with relevant, informative, quality videos. The landscape has just changed and we need to change with it.

FAQ aboutGoogle Hummingbird Algorithm

Google has a new search algorithm, the system it uses to sort through all the information it has when you search and come back with answers. It’s called “Hummingbird” and below, what we know about it so far.

What’s a “search algorithm?”
That’s a technical term for what you can think of as a recipe that Google uses to sort through the billions of web pages and other information it has, in order to return what it believes are the best answers.

What’s “Hummingbird?”
It’s the name of the new search algorithm that Google is using, one that Google says should return better results.

So that “PageRank” algorithm is dead?
No. PageRank is one of over 200 major “ingredients” that go into the Hummingbird recipe. Hummingbird looks at PageRank — how important links to a page are deemed to be — along with other factors like whether Google believes a page is of good quality, the words used on it and many other things (see our Periodic Table Of SEO Success Factors for a better sense of some of these).

Why is it called Hummingbird?
Google told us the name come from being “precise and fast.”

When did Hummingbird start? Today?
Google started using Hummingbird about a month ago, it said. Google only announced the change today.
What does it mean that Hummingbird is now being used?
Think of a car built in the 1950s. It might have a great engine, but it might also be an engine that lacks things like fuel injection or be unable to use unleaded fuel. When Google switched to Hummingbird, it’s as if it dropped the old engine out of a car and put in a new one. It also did this so quickly that no one really noticed the switch.
When’s the last time Google replaced its algorithm this way?
Google struggled to recall when any type of major change like this last happened. In 2010, the “Caffeine Update” was a huge change. But that was also a change mostly meant to help Google better gather information (indexing) rather than sorting through the information. Google search chief Amit Singhal told me that perhaps 2001, when he first joined the company, was the last time the algorithm was so dramatically rewritten.
What about all these Penguin, Panda and other “updates” — haven’t those been changes to the algorithm?
Panda, Penguin and other updates were changes to parts of the old algorithm, but not an entire replacement of the whole. Think of it again like an engine. Those things were as if the engine received a new oil filter or had an improved pump put in. Hummingbird is a brand new engine, though it continues to use some of the same parts of the old, like Penguin and Panda
The new engine is using old parts?
Yes. And no. Some of the parts are perfectly good, so there was no reason to toss them out. Other parts are constantly being replaced. In general, Hummingbird — Google says — is a new engine built on both existing and new parts, organized in a way to especially serve the search demands of today, rather than one created for the needs of ten years ago, with the technologies back then.
What type of “new” search activity does Hummingbird help?
“Conversational search” is one of the biggest examples Google gave. People, when speaking searches, may find it more useful to have a conversation.
“What’s the closest place to buy the iPhone 5s to my home?” A traditional search engine might focus on finding matches for words — finding a page that says “buy” and “iPhone 5s,” for example.
Hummingbird should better focus on the meaning behind the words. It may better understand the actual location of your home, if you’ve shared that with Google. It might understand that “place” means you want a brick-and-mortar store. It might get that “iPhone 5s” is a particular type of electronic device carried by certain stores. Knowing all these meanings may help Google go beyond just finding pages with matching words.
In particular, Google said that Hummingbird is paying more attention to each word in a query, ensuring that the whole query — the whole sentence or conversation or meaning — is taken into account, rather than particular words. The goal is that pages matching the meaning do better, rather than pages matching just a few words.
I thought Google did this conversational search stuff already!
It does (see Google’s Impressive “Conversational Search” Goes Live On Chrome), but it had only been doing it really within its Knowledge Graph answers. Hummingbird is designed to apply the meaning technology to billions of pages from across the web, in addition to Knowledge Graph facts, which may bring back better results.
Does it really work? Any before-and-afters?
We don’t know. There’s no way to do a “before-and-after” ourselves, now. Pretty much, we only have Google’s word that Hummingbird is improving things. However, Google did offer some before-and-after examples of its own, that it says shows Hummingbird improvements.
A search for “acid reflux prescription” used to list a lot of drugs (such as this, Google said), which might not be necessarily be the best way to treat the disease. Now, Google says results have information about treatment in general, including whether you even need drugs, such as this as one of the listings.
A search for “pay your bills through citizens bank and trust bank” used to bring up the home page for Citizens Bank but now should return the specific page about paying bills
A search for “pizza hut calories per slice” used to list an answer like this, Google said, but not one from Pizza Hut. Now, it lists this answer directly from Pizza Hut itself, Google says.
Could it be making Google worse?
Almost certainly not. While we can’t say that Google’s gotten better, we do know that Hummingbird — if it has indeed been used for the past month — hasn’t sparked any wave of consumers complaining that Google’s results suddenly got bad. People complain when things get worse; they generally don’t notice when things improve.
Does this mean SEO is dead?
No, SEO is not yet again dead. In fact, Google’s saying there’s nothing new or different SEOs or publishers need to worry about. Guidance remains the same, it says: have original, high-quality content. Signals that have been important in the past remain important; Hummingbird just allows Google to process them in new and hopefully better ways.
Does this mean I’m going to lose traffic from Google?
If you haven’t in the past month, well, you came through Hummingbird unscathed. After all, it went live about a month ago. If you were going to have problems with it, you would have known by now.
By and large, there’s been no major outcry among publishers that they’ve lost rankings. This seems to support Google saying this is very much a query-by-query effect, one that may improve particular searches — particularly complex ones — rather than something that hits “head” terms that can, in turn, cause major traffic shifts.
But I did lose traffic!
Perhaps it was due to Hummingbird, but Google stressed that it could also be due to some of the other parts of its algorithm, which are always being changed, tweaked or improved. There’s no way to know.
How do you know all this stuff?
Google shared some of it at its press event today, and then I talked with two of Google’s top search execs, Amit Singhal and Ben Gomes, after the event for more details. I also hope to do a more formal look at the changes from those conversations in the near future. But for now, hopefully you’ve found this quick FAQ based on those conversations to be helpful.
By the way, another term for the “meaning” connections that Hummingbird does is “entity search,” and we have an entire panel on that at our SMX East search marketing show in New York City, next week. The Coming “Entity Search” Revolution session is part of an entire “Semantic Search” track that also gets into ways search engines are discovering meanings behind words. Learn more about the track and the entire show on the agenda page.

future of mobile search

Read more at http://venturebeat.com/2013/10/02/things-not-strings-how-googles-new-hummingbird-algorithm-sets-the-stage-for-the-future-of-mobile-search/#QX6DQizP4pfuH6wL.99

future of mobile search

Read more at http://venturebeat.com/2013/10/02/things-not-strings-how-googles-new-hummingbird-algorithm-sets-the-stage-for-the-future-of-mobile-search/#QX6DQizP4pfuH6wL.99

future of mobile search

Read more at http://venturebeat.com/2013/10/02/things-not-strings-how-googles-new-hummingbird-algorithm-sets-the-stage-for-the-future-of-mobile-search/#QX6DQizP4pfuH6wL.99

future of mobile search

Read more at http://venturebeat.com/2013/10/02/things-not-strings-how-googles-new-hummingbird-algorithm-sets-the-stage-for-the-future-of-mobile-search/#QX6DQizP4pfuH6wL.99

future of mobile search

Read more at http://venturebeat.com/2013/10/02/things-not-strings-how-googles-new-hummingbird-algorithm-sets-the-stage-for-the-future-of-mobile-search/#QX6DQizP4pfuH6wL.99

Google AdWords Adds New Paid & Organic Report

Google AdWords is introducing a new feature for advertisers to give more data right within the AdWords interface, even when it isn't paid ads specific. This is part of their campaign to connect data between the Google AdWords, Google Analytics, and Webmaster Tools.

The new paid & organic report, which can help advertisers see their search footprints and enable them to determine if there are keyword areas that can be supplemented with paid advertising. It also allows you to view detailed reports to show for particular keywords, how much organic traffic as well as how it advertising traffic you are getting or have the potential to get.

Google suggesting several ways for advertisers confined to the inclusion of organic traffic information beneficial to their business. You can:

• Look for additional keywords where you might have impressions on natural search, but without any related ads.
• Use it to optimize your presence for your most important high-value keyword phrases, so you can see where you need to improve your presence.
• Use it to test website improvements and AdWords changes, as you can compare traffic across both AdWords and organic in the same interface, which enables you to adjust accordingly.

In order to take advantage of this new report, you need to have a Google AdWords and Webmaster Tools account, and you will need to verify and sync them.

In unrelated AdWords news:

• Google has introduced a new option for reporting trending traffic. Now, you can toggle between daily, weekly, monthly and quarterly so you can quickly and easily see any resulting trends during those time periods.
• And finally, Google will officially retire the AdWords Keyword Tool on August 26. However, the keyword planner has been out for several months so you can easily get all the same data in their all-in-one tool.

Facebook Advertisers Can Access Professional Photos at No Extra Charge

Facebook puts content front and center again with its latest update; Facebook advertisers will now have access to millions of stock photos that are commercially licensed and available for all Facebook ad formats at no additional cost.

"High-quality, engaging photos often increase the performance of ads, particularly in News Feed. And now, through our collaboration with Shutterstock, it will be easier for businesses to integrate beautiful photography into their Facebook ads," Facebook said in its announcement.

Advertisers can also create multiple ads at once with several images. From Facebook:

When creating a group of Facebook ads, our new image uploader allows people to select a range of Page photos, images from previous ads and Shutterstock images. The ability to simultaneously upload multiple images means advertisers can now create multiple ads at one time (with multiple images) for a single campaign, and test images to increase performance of their campaigns.

This new effort seems to be connected to Facebook’s initiative to streamline its advertising with the hopes of making ads look and feel more consistent.

The performance of news feed advertisements can be particularly challenging for advertisers when they don’t have the right imagery. As users scroll through photos of people and brands they know and like, a bad ad with imagery that doesn’t seem to quite fit can be jarring or even ignored.

So something for advertisers to keep in mind as they scroll through their now endless options at Shutterstock is to not just think about the "beautiful" aspect of photos, but the "fit" for the type of advertisement – especially in a News Feed. Ask: Does it feel authentic?

Content Curation & SEO: A Bad Match?

Many publishers continue to seek cheap and easy ways to publish lots of pages and get them up with a goal of bringing in incremental search traffic. One method many people look at is content curation.

However, content curation could be a very risky practice for you. There may be a role for curated content on your site, but there is a chance that you should be placing noindex tags on those pages.

Two forms of content curation that can potentially be useful to users are:

• Posting a list of links of the latest news.
• Building pages listing the best resources you can find on a particular topic area.

But, what does Google think about it?

The Content Curation Spectrum

For some background on this, it is useful to watch this video in which Matt Cutts answers the following user provided question on whether sites are better off removing sections creating duplicate content, such as press releases or news:

Cutts said the answer is probably "yes." He then goes on to draw a line representing a spectrum beginning with really poor quality sites and ending with the New York Times. I've taken the liberty of greatly enhancing his chart as follows:

The New York Times will be fine with curated content, as are certain other major media properties. Why? Getting in the New York Times is hard. They have a strong editorial process.

Let's break this down a bit and look at how Google may algorithmically determine these things:

1. Brand: Obviously the New York Times has a highly recognizable brand. One of the reasons they have a strong editorial policy is that publishing poor quality content would damage that brand. A simple algorithm approach to evaluating brand strength is counting the number of searches on an entity's brand name. Lots and lots of searches is a quick indicator for you of brand strength (I'm not suggesting that Google does this by the way, but you can use it as a crude measure for yourself).
2. Links: The link graph remains alive and well. A rich and robust link graph that can be an indicator of an authoritative site. One of the most important patents in search engine history is the Jon Kleinberg patent on hubs and authorities. Regardless of how search engines determine authority today, the concept of using the link graph to do so is likely the major way they do that. Link graph shows a lot of authority? Then you move to the right of our Content Curation Spectrum.
3. Quality of the Linked Resources: This is something that they could use as well. For an extreme example, if your curated list includes links to obvious spam sites, or really poor quality pages, than the whole list is called into question. Of course, there is a whole spectrum from obvious crap to obvious awesome stuff.
4. Publisher Authority: Here I'm specifically referring to the potential use of rel=publisher tags on the content you create. While the tag has been known for a while, little was known about how it might be used until Google's announcement of in-depth articles. Consider the possibility that Google will use this as a tool to help it track the overall quality of the content published on your site.
5. Author Authority: Google has been actively using rel=author as a way to show rich snippets including the author's face in the search results for some time. I wrote about Author Rank as a potential signal in March, and predicted that it would become a ranking signal this year in January. The in-depth articles announcement may even have been a step in that direction. For our purposes, Author Rank is a signal that isn't tied to a given website, but to a specific author, and can travel with you wherever you as an author publish content.

These are all signals that can clue Google into where a given site is on the Content Curation Spectrum.

How Will Google Use These Signals?

As explained in "Google Doesn't Care if it Ranks Your Site Properly", Google really isn't targeting your site individually (unless you're penalized). Google's primary focus is on improving the quality of their product.

Perfect ranking of each individual site is fundamentally not an achievable goal for them. They operate a different level, and they work hard at making their product better. But, how it impacts organic search traffic to individual sites is a side effect for them.

As it relates to content curation, the main point is that Google already has a curated list of content. It's called their search results. Yes, this list is algorithmically curated, but it's a curated list nonetheless.

Google's curated content is backed by an extraordinary amount of scientifically-driven testing. If you're using software to curate content for you, the chances that your machine-generated list is better than Google's is basically zero.

Curated Content vs. Search Results

Your hand-curated content isn't that much different than a set of search results. Long ago Google made it clear that they don't want to show your site's search results within their search results.

Unless there is some clear differentiation, it is my opinion that curated content is in the same boat as a site's search results. Google has little reason to show it, because a different set of search results, hand picked or not, doesn't really add any value to people over what they get in their search results.

Don't get me wrong, truly expert humans can probably pick a better list than Google, or perhaps even just a comparable list, with a somewhat different focus. But how might Google actually detect that added value?

Google can clearly detect the New York Times. They can clearly detect the people on the far left of the Content Curation Spectrum.

But what if you're in the middle? If I were a Google engineer, I'd place no value on the middle either, and I wouldn't rank it, unless other signals gave a clear indication that something was different about it.

The curated content list may be great stuff, but there's no way to know really, and it isn't worth the risk. Besides, there may be one or two highly authoritative lists of curated content in their search results (more power to you if you're one of them!), so showing another one from someone of unknown authority doesn't make sense for their product.

What Should Publishers Who Want to Curate Content Do?

Now, the curated content you create isn't necessarily resulting in a poor quality page for your site, but for purposes of this discussion that doesn't matter. From an SEO perspective, what matters is whether that unique and differentiated quality is detectable both by users and Google.

In the video, Cutts gives some indications of what this might take. Here are three key phrases he uses:

• "a lot of effort into curation"
• "editorial voice"
• "distinctive point of view"

He also talks about including access to information that isn't otherwise generally available. Here are some ideas on how you can make it quite different:

1. Recognized Expert Analysis: In addition to producing the list of resources, add commentary and analysis from recognized experts and cement that with rel=author tagging. This is where the "editorial voice" and "distinctive point of view" come in.
2. Unique Expert Reviews: Include expert reviews and commentary on the curated content. The key here: these reviews aren't published elsewhere. Rel=author tagging is a good idea here, too.
3. Data Sources: Accessing data sources not available to Google is also useful. Bear in mind, though: it's critical that these data sources be very distinct and differentiated in a way that will be immediately obvious to both users and Google.
4. Freshness: If you have a method for updating this in real time, and significantly faster than Google does, this may work as well. Note: a regurgitated news feed fails this test.

Conclusion

If you can meet one or more of these tests, great! Or you may want to publish the page anyway because you think your users will value it. That's fine, but if the Google perceivable value isn't there, I would noindex those pages.

SEO Link Building - 11 types of backlinks that Google does not like

Google has updated the link schemes web page that shows examples of backlinks that Google considers spam. New to the list are article marketing or guest posting campaigns with keyword rich anchor text links, advertorials that contain paid links, and links with optimized anchor text in press releases and articles.

There are more backlink types that might get your website in trouble. Here's the list:

1. Google does not like paid links

Buying or selling links that pass PageRank can negatively impact your website's ranking in search results. This includes exchanging money for links, or posts that contain links; exchanging goods or services for links; or sending someone a 'free' product in exchange for them writing about it and including a link.

Do not buy or sell backlinks if you don't want to risk your rankings.

2. Google does not like excessive link exchanges

Exchanging links with other websites is fine. Actually, it is normal for most websites. For example, websites about dolphin research can cross-link to all other websites about dolphin research without getting in trouble.

If the cross-linking looks unnatural (the dolphin research websites links to a shoe shop and vice versa), Google might think that you're trying to build unnatural links.

Use common sense when exchanging links with other sites. As long as the link exchange makes sense for a human website visitor, everything is okay.

3. Google does not like large-scale article marketing or guest posting campaigns

It's okay to publish your articles and guest posts on other websites as long as you don't do it in bulk. If you do guest posts just to get keyword rich backlinks, your website might get penalized.

Only publish articles and guest posts on other websites if you really want to contribute a valuable article.

4. Google does not like automated programs or services that create backlinks to your site

You've probably seen the ads for tools and services that promise hundreds (if not thousands) of backlinks with very little work. These tools that help you to 'dominate' the search results are a sure way to get your website banned from Google.

Avoid tools and services that automatically build backlinks to your website. If you were able to find these services, Google's spam team can find them, too.

5. Google does not like text ads that pass PageRank

If you run a text ad on another website, make sure that is uses the rel=nofollow attribute in the link. Otherwise, Google might think that it is a manipulative backlink.

6. Google does not like advertorials and ads that include links that pass PageRank

As are rule of thumb, always use links with the rel=nofollow attribute if you pay for an article or an ad. If the ad includes a paid link that passes PageRank, it might trigger a penalty.

7. Google does not like links with optimized anchor text in articles or press releases

If your article contains paragraphs that look like the following, you might invite Google's spam algorithm to take a closer look at your website:

"There are many wedding rings on the market. If you want to have a wedding, you will have to pick the best ring. You will also need to buy flowers and a wedding dress."

8. Google does not like links from low quality directories or bookmark sites

If you're submitting your website to hundreds of Internet directories that will never send you a single visitor, you don't need to bother. These links won't help your Google rankings.

If a directory sends your website visitors, it's worth getting the link. You can ignore other directories.

9. Google does not like widely distributed links in the footers of various websites

Some websites put keyword rich links to other websites in their footers. These links are always paid links and you should not use them to promote your website.

This does not apply to 'About us' or 'Privacy policy' footer links but to backlinks such as 'buy flowers' or 'buy wedding rings.'

10. Google does not like links that are embedded in widgets that are distributed across various sites

Some widget developers offer free widgets that contain links to other websites: "Visitors to this page: 1,234 - buy wedding rings"

If a widget developers offers you to advertise your site through these widgets, make sure that the links use the nofollow attribute or do not use the links at all.

11. Google does not like forum comments with optimized links in the post or signature

Some tools automatically post comments in forums:

"That's really great information! Thanks a lot!
Peter
buy wedding rings buy flowers best wedding"

Do not use this method to promote your website. Google does not like it. Avoid tools that automatically post your links to forums.

It's really simple: Google does not like bulk links and they also don't like artificial links. To get good backlinks that lead to lasting results, use the link building tools in SEOprofiler.
The link building tools in SEOprofiler help you to find related websites from which a backlink actually makes sense to real visitors. In addition to the link building tools, SEOprofiler offers many more website optimization tools that help you to get better search engines rankings for your web pages.

If you haven't done it yet, create your SEOprofiler account now:

Create a free trial account now or test the full version for only $1.

2. Search engine news and articles of the week

Matt Cutts: only use .cc domains if the content is relevant to that country In a video on YouTube, Google's Matt Cutts said that you shouldn't use .cc domains for international websites: "If you go and pick a really weird novelty domain that nobody else really uses, and mostly is used by this other country, we’re still probably going to assume it’s most relevant to that particular country." Editor's note: Top level domains that are treated as generic top level domains by Google can be found here. Google changes how AdWords Quality Score is reported "Under the hood, this reporting update will tie your 1-10 numeric Quality Score more closely to its three key sub factors -- expected clickthrough rate, ad relevance, and landing page experience. We expect this update to reach all advertisers globally within the next several days." Google patents anchor text snippets "Does that last one mean that its more likely that a Web Quote with a link pointed to a page is more likely to be a snippet for that page if it’s on the front page of the New York Times, than if it were on the the front page of my local paper’s website (The Fauquier Times)? Maybe. The patent does tell us that how relevant a Web Quote is to the search terms used be a stronger consideration than a quality value like PageRank." Google searches mined to uncover our true opinions "Every time you ask Google to help solve your personal problems, you are taking part in one of the largest social science experiments ever conducted. [...] People are more likely to be honest in searches than in polls." Search engine newslets Google+ Local iOS App to be retired August 7. Yandex reports revenues of RUR 9.2 billion ($281.2 million), up 35% compared with Q2 2012. Changes in Yandex.Direct design positively reflected in company revenues. Yandex co-founder dies at 48 in London. Discussion: was there a Google update over the weekend? Back to table of contents - Visit Axandra.com

3. Recommended resources

How to get an in-depth review of your website

Doing a regular audit of your web pages is important if you want to make sure that search engines can index all of your pages. The more pages your website has, the more likely it is that there are many errors that have to be corrected.

The website audit tool in SEOprofiler automatically checks your web pages once per week. Then you get a report that shows all the issues that should be corrected. By correcting these issues, you make sure that search engines can index all of your pages correctly. Here’s a screenshot of the overview page:

You can get the website audit tool and all other tools in SEOprofiler for our special offer price:

Leveraging Pinterest for SEO and E-commerce

Pinterest has quickly evolved from a simple idea to one of the most popular, revenue generating social media platforms. In the last 5 months alone Pinterest has grown its user base 43.7 percent to more than 70 million. These users aren't merely pinning pictures; they're buying products.
Most social media channels lack the ability to drive non-assisted conversions and rely on attribution to justify spend. New studies are constantly being released showing that referral traffic from Pinterest converts directly into e-commerce conversions.
So how can SEO professionals and e-commerce companies unlock the potential of this new channel?

SEO: Acquire More Links

Building relationships is at the core of any ethical, results-oriented link building campaign. Identifying related bloggers and key influencers is the first step toward building these relationships and acquiring new links.
Pinterest is a great way to discover new blogs for your outreach campaign. Pinterest's search functionality makes it easy to find relevant boards. For example, if you work with or for a lawn care provider you may search on Pinterest for “weed control” boards and get the following result:

There are so many related boards and pins that I could have scrolled for hours.
In order to boost your outreach program it's important to only focus on Pins that were linked from a website as opposed to simply uploaded by a user. Every website you find is now a potential site to get a link from.
It's also important to pay attention to key influencers even if they don't pin from a website. Most users will link other social media handles with their Pinterest account. If you identify a popular user in your niche, check to see if they have a Twitter account that may include a website that they own or blog for.

E-commerce Brands: Sell More Products

The vast majority of online retailers aren't capitalizing on the revenue potential that exists on Pinterest. Images are an extremely powerful tool that can increases sales exponentially.
What channel is seeing the largest budget and click growth amongst online retailers? What's driving all of Google's incremental ad revenue? Answer: Product Listing Ads! (For more information on the growth of PLAs check out this post.)
Pinterest is slowly but surely moving to a paid model that will mimic Google PLAs. A few months ago they introduced Rich Pins, which give advertisers the ability to include price and availability information for various products (and now Pinterest will alert users when prices drop). They have also expanded their analytics package to give advertisers more information around how users interact with their pins (translation: products).
To maximize your revenue on Pinterest, it's critical that all of your products are pinned.
Utilizing rich pins will increase your conversion rate and attract users who are buy mode. To take advantage of this new feature, companies have to format their product in one of two ways:

• oEmbed
• Semantic Markup using Open Graph or Schema.org

Once your formatting has been validated using the Pinterest validation tool, simply apply for inclusion in the rich pins program.
If you don't have the dev resources to implement the proper formatting or get rejected by Pinterest, there are still other options to get your products listed. The boards for your brand should mimic your category and sub-category structure.
Below is an example for Dick's Sporting Goods golf category. Any of their golf categories or sub-categories would be great candidates for potential Pinterest boards.

In addition to pinning your own products, it can be beneficial to share other quality content that provides value to your user base. No social media user wants to be spammed tons of products by the brand that sells them. This type of mass product pinning can also hurt the brand image.
Ensure that your verified brand Pinterest account is focused on creating value for the community via posting related and sometimes competing products and images.
So where can you upload all your products? One option is to create a branded user name such as “NikeShop”. All product images would be uploaded under this account.
Another alternative is to create a non-branded persona. Note that if you sell a large number of SKUs it's critical spread out your pins. You don't want to simply spam Pinterest by uploading 5,000 SKUs in a day.
Prioritizing which products you upload based on revenue and order volume is a great way to slowly roll out your product pins while maximizing incremental revenue.

Conclusion

Pinterest represents a virtually untapped marketing channel for online retailers and brands. It's capable of driving incremental revenue, improving SEO performance, and increasing aided/unaided brand awareness. It also provides brands the ability to serve PLAs for free and diversify their online revenue sources.
Many companies are investing to reduce their dependence on Google. Given its growth and user purchase behavior, Pinterest deserves to be at the top of your consideration set.

SEO - Need a Timer? Use Google

Google has a new fun tool built within their search. If you ever need a quick timer for something, grabbing your phone or a regular timer isn’t always convenient when you’re sitting at your desk – and you might not want to install one of the many web apps that do it.
But now you can type specific search query into Google's search box, and Google will create a timer for you right on the search results page.

To create your timer, simply type "timer for [duration]" such as "timer for 30 seconds" or "timer for 1 hour 30 minutes". It has a stop and reset option and it plays a beeping sound when the timer expires. You can have it open in one tab, and use another tab and you will still hear the audio alarm.
Google's timer will also give you a warning if you have an active timer and you try to close that tab or window. It does seem to work in all browsers, so it’s not exclusive to Google Chrome.
It is unknown how long it has been available for, but it seems to have been first pointed out on Reddit last week.

SEO Videos

Watch the video and let see how many comments.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U3lN6nFmEUM

SEO - July 2013 Monthly SEO Update

Find out what update happening in previous month.watch the you tube and update your site.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0kP0sKIjucY

SEO: 2 Months of Algorithm Updates

If your organic search metrics have been fluctuating more than usual recently, you’re in good company. Google rolled out four notable algorithm updates in the two months between May 21 and July 15, including a Panda update and the much-anticipated Penguin 2.0 update.
Each of the updates shares a focus on improving the quality of search results by detecting and removing factors that give some sites unfair advantage over others in the rankings. This summer’s updates focus on low-quality link signals, content quality and domain advantages. In each case, Google’s intent is to combat the low-quality or spammy search results that can gum up its search results and lead to poor searcher experience.

Penguin 2.0: Next Generation Link Spam Weapon

On May 21, Google released a new version of its anti-link-spam technology, dubbed Penguin 2.0. This update has been anticipated for months, with Google warning that it would be a big one. Approximately 2.3 percent of English queries are noticeably affected by this update. That may not sound like much, but the largest reported impact to search results was 3.1 percent of queries noticeably affected with the first Penguin update in April 2012.
According to Google’s Head of Webspam Matt Cutts, the Penguin 2.0 update is more comprehensive and deeper-targeting than the previous iteration of the algorithm. Sites that have struggled with devalued link profiles since April of last year will likely have more issues with this update.
In many cases, sites that have been around for years have amassed link profiles that contain links from sites that are considered spammy today. For example, article marketing was once a popular SEO practice. However, sites began churning out low-value articles full of links just to manufacture link authority. Today the phrase article marketing makes SEOs cringe and the links built in the past through article hubs have been devalued algorithmically.
It’s important to understand two things about Penguin. First, sites aren’t technically penalized retroactively for link building practices that were legitimate in years past and are now considered dodgy. However, the value that those now-dodgy links provided is removed, so the effect is still a decreased ability to compete in search results. Second, link authority is removed automatically and algorithmically when link spam is detected. Because no manual, human penalty is applied, sites cannot submit for re-inclusion.
To recover from the effect of a Penguin update, sites need to focus on regaining the link authority they lost when those now-dodgy links were devalued. Simply manufacturing new links won’t do the trick, though, as links need to be earned naturally to have lasting value. It may also be beneficial to examine your link portfolio via Google Webmaster Tools to identify and disavow obviously spammy links.

Payday Loan Algorithm: Spammy Queries

In June, Google began targeting link spam on sites ranking for notoriously spammy queries, such as those related to payday loans, pornography, and gambling. These sites tend to have unique link schemes that violate Google’s Webmaster Guidelines. These updates will be rolling out slowly worldwide over the next couple of months. In the U.S. only 0.3 percent of queries will likely be affected. But countries like Turkey with more webspam issues are expected to see as high as 4 percent change in queries affected.
As with the Penguin 2.0 update, the key to recovering from the Payday Loan Algorithm is focusing on earning links naturally.

Partial Match Domain Update

Many ecommerce marketers are frustrated by the relative ease with which sites that purchase keyword domains compete in rankings. In September 2012, exact-match domains were devalued as a ranking signal. SEO industry blog Moz reported a 10 percent decrease in the number of exact match domains — like "www.teethwhitening.com" — that ranked in the dataset they track daily.
The partial match update takes things a step further by devaluing domains that partially match the search phrase. For instance, if the domain www.betterteethwhitening.com ranked for a search for “teeth whitening,” it would be considered a partial match domain and could see the signals sent by its keyword domain name devalued.
To be clear, the keyword domain algorithm updates don’t penalize sites with exact or partial match domains. As with Penguin where specific links lose their value, the strength of the keyword signal that the domains send is devalued in an attempt to level the playing field. This is a logical update because the presence of keywords in a domain speaks more to which sites have cash to spend on expensive domains than it does to the actual value of the site to searchers.

Panda Detuning

The most recent of Google’s updates includes a more-finely targeted Panda algorithm. Starting July 14 and rolling out over the next couple of days, this update reportedly softened or dialed back the Panda effect a bit. Originally released in February 2011, Panda’s goal was to demote low-quality sites and those with thin content.
Keeping track of Google’s algorithm updates and deciphering which may have had an impact on your site can be very challenging. The Panguin Tool is one of the easiest ways to look for correlations between your Google Analytics and the Panda, Penguin, and other Google updates. Just log in with your Google Analytics account and Panguin Tool shows your organic search visits overlaid with a timeline of algorithm updates. Moz also offers a handy list of algorithmic events with links to relevant articles describing each.

Read More

• Search Result Domination with Social Media
• Understanding Google’s Algorithm Updates
• YouTube’s Time Watched Algorithm Update

Google yahoo, Bing & Other Profile Page Creation Site List

http://www.google.com/+/business/
http://local.yahoo.com/profile
https://www.bingplaces.com/
betaflow.com
thebizblitz.com
uploads.biz
my.opera.com
aboutus.org
inclistings.com
enteryourprofile.com
inclauncher.com
https:smashwords.com
myopenid.com
firstwebhub.com
fiverr.com
corporatesyncweb.com
thecorplist.com
gatheringsource.com
companyblitz.com
incracing.com
crunchbase.com
webmastercoffee.com
zorghost.com
ataraxa.com
slideshare.net
zimbio.com
venturebeatprofiles.com
alexa.com
rhizome.org
blogtopsites.com
smashwords.com
profile.yahoo.com
finest4.com
pinterest.com
stumbleupon.com
800review.com
teluga.com
idealist.org
tugranproyecto.com
theinfocompany.com
google.complaces
wishpot.com
ehow.com
salespider.com
londinium.com
leeds.yalwa.co.uk
smartclues.com
inc1000.com
japantradepages.com
asianbuyersguide.com
bebo.com
23hq.com
aminus3.com
artlimited.net
deviantart.com
dropshots.com
apsense.com
authorstream.com
knowem.com
foro.l2express.net
stockniche.com
houstonsteaknight.com
simplexhacks.com
xitclub.com
xtravagance.nl
soundcircuit.com
kingmedia.tv
biggestmenu.com
jaman.com
acapella.harmony-central.com
magentocommerce.com
ibibo.com
bleacherreport.com
getsatisfaction.com
multiply.com
fiql.com
caloriecount.about.com
stockpickr.com

Business Directory Site List, B2B Portals

www.indiamart.com  https://www.tatab2b.com  india.alibaba.com  www.businessmartindia.com  www.tradeindia.com  www.timesb2b.com  www.eindiabusiness.com  www.postoffers.in  www.indiamarkets.com  www.indiantradecenter.com  www.bizzglo.com  ebusinesszone.net www.trade4india.com www.tradekeyindia.com indiab2b.co.in www.aluminium-india.com www.made-from-india.com www.indiacon.com www.infobanc.com www.ficci-b2b.com www.thegreatindianbazaar.com b2bmarketingpartners.com  www.btobonline.com  www.marketresearch.com 

www.btobonline.com/‎ 

Document sharing sites list - 2013

Top Doc share site list

1. scribd.com
2. docstoc.com
3. slideshare.net
4. crocodoc.com
5. Issuu.com
6. docshare.com
7. wepapers.com
8. myplick.com
9. powershow.com
10. slidesix.com
11. empressr.com
12. filesave.me
13. fileden.com
14. wikiupload.com
15. slingfile.com
16. zippyshare.com
17. filesend.ca
18. adrive.com
19. sharesend.com
20. smashingapps.com