Is This Proof Directory Submission Still Works?

Posted on January 23, 2011 by Shaunzo

I often look for false positives in Google.

A false positive (in this sense) is when a site appears for a keyword search it is not relevant to. It’s like looking for microwave ovens and seeing a page for oranges. The page about oranges isn’t supposed to be there. A false positive in Google SERPS that sticks around is sometimes the VERY BEST way to getting a glimpse of how Google works under the hood.

False positives are usually caused by webmaster error, not really an error of Google. It can be caused by a misplaced 301 redirect or canonical tag screw ups, but that’s not what I am talking about here.

I’m talking about plain old linkbuilding tactics apparently causing these false positives. This is what I am on the look out for.

It’s like in (is it Eugenics?) when you are trying to prove genes influence a person’s behaviour more than environment, and so you need to find two twins who were seperated at birth to prove a case. I think that’s ball park correct. Anyway – sometimes hard to find….

This is one example (I think).

I see a lot of seo saying directory submissions don’t work anymore –  or that it depends which ‘quality’ directories you submit to, so I thought I would, rather than theorise, share a false positive that might indicate differently. THis might show directory links can still count, and directory link building might still be worth it.

Personally, I think a lot of so-called ‘out-of-date’ tactics still work sometimes….. no matter what some say.

Here’s the SERP for “keyword stuffing” – see if you can spot the odd one out – i’ve made it kind of easy – though this is what I look for when I am not working:

Keyword Stuffing

Keyword Stuffing

Did you spot it?

False Positive

False Positive

My first reaction is always….

I wonder why that is?

I usually look at Google cache just to ensure those key words aren’t hidden on the page, though just because Google says it is in ‘links’ to the page, that can often be totally misleading too.

Google Cache

Google Cache

So I look at the website link profile using nothing more than Google itself, and here’s what i find buried away:

Directory Submissions

Directory Submissions!

OOPs! Perhaps that webmaster should keep an eye on his directory submissions lol – I mean he even ranks no1 for ‘Keyword stuffing not allowed’ lol – above Wikipedia – (which also shows you proof a focused anchor text approach beats down even all the powerful relevance of Wikipedia – for all those seo who claim relevance beats links.)

Keyword stuffing not allowed

Keyword stuffing not allowed

Things to think about:

  • You don’t need to use seo tools – in fact, you probably should not pay for any seo tools until you can USE Google properly
  • The directory links have aged
  • They are interestingly not incurring a keyword penalty – which is probably more to do with how Google views a link profile as part of the whole (I might discuss this later)
  • The links beat out relevance of Wikipedia – proof LINKS beat RELEVANCE in this instance
  • All the links *seem* to come from directory submissions that have gone wrong
  • Pick any seo tool on the market today and they will tell you these links are next to worthless – (I might share something else which embarrasses most seo tools on the market today later on this week)
  • What if, the fact that because these directory pages had “Keyword stuffing not allowed” in their titles too, and then linked to the target site, gave an ‘impression’ of relevance for that term? Who knows but it is always worth keeping an open mind.

I thought it was an observation worth sharing. Feel free to have a look and see if you can spot something I missed.

———-

NOTE – I am never comfortable discussing somebody else’s seo strategies in public. This is a site I think I can discuss – cited as an example in

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/money/property_and_mortgages/article2071068.ece

A Home Office spokesman says that the Government is concerned about the practice: “Individuals producing or selling such documents are liable to investigation and prosecution by law enforcement agencies.”

Anyway – the tactic employed used to be advised by Google – ‘submit your site to directories‘, I believe. I wouldn’t recommend your entire linkbuilding activity consist of just directory submissions, but there may just be a place for it as part of a wider link acquisition strategy.

PS – If you have any false positives you want to chat about, get me on Twitter or leave a comment below.

Posted in Hobo SEO Newsletter, Linkbuilding Tips | 37 Comments

January 2011 Google Toolbar Pagerank Update

Posted on January 20, 2011 by Shaunzo

Google Pagerank Update January 2011 (@Jan 20th) Details:

There seems to be some rumours on various forums today that Google Pagerank Update January 2011 is underway. I can confirm a wider pr update seem to have been rolled out on my sites too – still, it doesn’t FEEL like a pr update of old – it just doesn’t seem as EXTENSIVE or DEEP (with inner pages for instance). If there is a pagerank update in progress it might take a few days for it to be fully rolled out.

google_pagerank_explained_500w.gif

I usually wait till I see a network wide Google pagerank update before I tell my RSS subscribers, so I will keep you informed. Remember, we’re talking about Google Toolbar Pagerank here, not real Google Pagerank, which is calculated constantly. Getting a higher Toolbar PR score will typically have ZERO impact on your site rankings in Google. Google usually outputs a new Toolbar Pagerank every 3 or six months, and we are sort of due one. I usually keep a history of network wide Google Pagerank updates here, with the last major PR update in April 2010. Image Credit – Graphic by Elliance, an eMarketing firm specialising in results-driven search engine marketing, website design, and outbound eMarketing campaigns. First sourced at Search Engine Land

For more see Google Pagerank Update History.

Posted in Google Pagerank Update, Snippets | 1 Comment

Dynamic PHP Copyright Notice in WordPress

Posted on January 5, 2011 by Shaunzo

it’s simple to display a dynamic date in your footer in WordPress, perfect for dynamic footers so you never need to change your copyright notice on your blog when the year changes.

This little bit of code will display the current year. Just add it in your theme’s footer.php and you can forget about making sure you don’t look stupid, or give the impression your site is out of date and unused, at the beginning of every year.

&copy; Copyright 2004 - <?php echo date("Y") ?>

Simple and elegant php copyright notice for WordPress blogs.

Posted in Snippets, Wordpress SEO | Leave a comment

Website Content Writing Services in the UK

Posted on January 4, 2011 by Shaunzo

Why Choose Us To Write Your Website Content?

Well, as industry recognised seo experts, we know how people search for your services and products. We use specialist seo tools to identify your important keywords, and create rich content around those keywords, for your website, blog or linkbuilding articles. We know how to write copy for the web that converts visitors to your website!

Prices:

Required number of articles per month
Package Number of words per article
20 to 50
51 to 100
101 to 250
251 to 500
501 to 1000
1000+
Package 1 250 words
£9.00
£8.50
£8.00
£7.50
£6.50
£6.00
Package 2 500 words
£15.00
£14.00
£13.00
£12.00
£11.50
£11.00
Package 3 750 words
£20.00
£19.00
£18.00
£17.00
£16.00
£15.00
Package 4 1000 words
£25.00
£23.00
£22.00
£21.00
£20.00
£19.50
* Website content writing prices displayed are per article, and exclude VAT at 20%

Publishing and syndicating fresh up-do-date, unique, and original website content is essential and the easiest way of generating more traffic to your site from search engines, and improving rankings for multitudes of keywords.

Website content management and website content writing (copywriting) can be time consuming though – and free website content you can find on other websites will trip the Google duplicate content ‘penalty’ or more accurately duplicate content ‘filter’  - so why not let Hobo organise all this for you?

Content management for websites and ecommerce systems is all the more easier for you in 2011, with the plethora of free content management systems and software packages available. You probably instructed the website content writer to supply your basic info on your home page, your about page, and your contact page, but did you know your product pages might not rank at all because of how little UNIQUE content is on the page? or your services pages might well not be optimised AT ALL to take advantage of the way people search for your products or services? And what happened to your news blog you were going to add up to date news on? It’s probably a bit out of date…. isn’t it?

We can also help by assessing website content for seo purposes. We write content for websites based on professional keyword research – yes – our website content writers find out what your customers are searching for, and what keywords they use, and weight your articles accordingly to take advantage of the free traffic Google and Bing can send you. Website content analysis includes using keyword tools, and traffic analytics packages, and competitor research tools to understand which keywords and keyword phrases people currently find your site and your competitors.

We create:

  • content for your website
  • content for your news blog
  • content (and syndication services) for your linkbuilding articles

We even advise on which keywords you SHOULD be targeting via a free keyword targeting audit and report, and our core writing team are UK based, with English as their native language.

Need website content? Contact us today!

Posted in SEO Services, Snippets | Comments Off

Scam! domainregistratservice.com / registrationdom.com Domain Renewal

Posted on December 31, 2010 by Shaunzo

Re: domainregistratservice.com / registrationdom.com Domain Renewal Scam! A timely reminder that you should always be wary of the myriad of scams on the internet these days.

I just received an email from domainregistratservice.com that led to a payment gateway on registrationdom.com and it has all the hallmarks of a scam.

The send you a domain renewal notice for your domain (which they don’t have anything to do with) and they offer:

Attention: Important Notice
Domain: xxxxxxxxx.COM
Bill To: xxxxxx Invoice # 1293760816
xxxxx Invoice Date Dec 30, 2010
xxxxx Terms Net 15
xxxxx Due Date Jan 14, 2011
+xxxxxx P.O. #
SECURE ONLINE PAYMENT
Domain Name Registration Price Term
xxxxxxxx.COM Dec 30, 2010 – Dec 30, 2011 $75.00 1 Year
Attn xxxxxxxx

This letter is to inform you that it’s time to send in your search engine registration for xxxxx.COM.

Failure to complete your search engine registration by Jan 14, 2011 may result in the cancellation of this offer (making it difficult for your customers to locate you using search engines on the web).

Your registration includes search engine submission for xxxxxx.COM for 1 year. You are under no obligation to pay the amount stated above unless you accept this offer by Jan 14, 2011. This notice is not an invoice. It is a courtesy reminder to register xxxxxx.COM for search engine listing so that your customers can locate you on the web.
This Offer for xxxxxx.COM will expire on Jan 14, 2011. Act today!

For Domain Name:

xxxxxxx.COM

SECURE ONLINE PAYMENT

Spam & Scammers! Watch out.

Posted in Snippets | Leave a comment

WordPress How To Install Using cPanel

Posted on December 1, 2010 by Shaunzo

WordPress how to install using cPanel:

If your hosting provider supplies the cPanel hosting control panel, you may follow these simple instructions to create your WordPress username and database. A more complete set of instructions for using cPanel to create the database and user can be found in Using cPanel.

  1. Log in to your cPanel.
  2. Click MySQL Database Wizard icon under the Databases section.
  3. In Step 1. Create a Database enter the database name and click Next Step.
  4. In Step 2. Create Database Users enter the database user name and the password. Make sure to use a strong password. Click Create User.
  5. In Step 3. Add User to Database click the All Privileges checkbox and click Next Step.
  6. In Step 4. Complete the task note the database name and user. Write down the values of hostname, username,databasename, and the password you chose. (Note that hostname will usually be localhost.) >>>
Posted in Snippets, Wordpress SEO | Leave a comment

How To Track 404 Not Found Pages In Google Analytics

Posted on November 29, 2010 by Shaunzo

How To Track 404 Not Found Pages In Google Analytics:

Sometimes visitors will reach a 404 or “Not Found” error page from your site. This may happen when they type in a filename that they think is available on your site, or reach a deleted or non-existent file or directory from an obsolete link on one of your pages.

It’s valuable to see these requests so you can learn what visitors are looking for, and consider adding new content or fixing the broken link.

Please follow the steps below to obtain reporting on missing or error pages:

  1. Add the Google Analytics tracking code to a custom 404 error page.
  2. Modify the tracking code on the 404 page as follows:<script type=”text/javascript”>
    var gaJsHost = ((“https:” == document.location.protocol) ? “https://ssl.” : “http://www.”);
    document.write(unescape(“%3Cscript src=’” + gaJsHost + ” google-analytics.com/ga.js’ type=’text/javascript’%3E%3C/script%3E”));
    </script>
    <script type=”text/javascript”>
    try{
    var pageTracker = _gat._getTracker(“UA-xxxxx-x”);
    pageTracker._trackPageview(“/404.html?page=” + document.location.pathname + document.location.search + “&from=” + document.referrer);
    } catch(err) {}
    </script>

    This code sends a virtual pageview of “/404.html?page=[pagename.html?queryparameter]&from=[referrer]” to your account, where [pagename.html?queryparameters] is the missing page name and referrer is the page URL from where the user reached the 404 page.

  • Look for /404.html in your Top Content report.
    • Posted in Snippets | Leave a comment

    About Our SEO Company

    Posted on November 24, 2010 by Shaunzo

    The Hobo SEO company was co-founded by Michael Bonnar & Shaun Anderson in April 2006. We optimise websites to improve rankings in search engines and get more targeted traffic to a website from Google, Bing and Yahoo – the world’s most popular search engines.

    Our Glasgow-based seo team been mentioned on some the most influential seo industry related sites accross the world.

    Mentions

    Alexa rate us as the 15,496 most popular site in the world (at the time of writing and that is out of tens of millions):

    Technorati rank Hobo SEO company as one ot the top small business blogs Technoratiin the world too, and we have been awarded an ADAGE POWER 150 STATUS – as one of the most popular advertising blogs in the world.

    Adage Power 150

    Our search marketing company is well known in the industry, and members of our seo team have been acknoledged by peers as experienced industry experts:

    Most Influential Marketers 2009

    Our agency staff have been voted amongst the Top 100 Most influential marketers of 2009, and amongst the most influential seo practitioners in the UK in 2010:

    In The Press

    SEO Services

    Hobo specialises in the following internet marketing services:

    • search engine optimization
    • information architecture optimisation
    • keyword research
    • web marketing strategy
    • website promotion
    • ecommerce seo and web development
    • content-based linkbuilding
    • stylish, accessible web design
    • wordpress web design and development
    • Google Adwords, Analytics and Web Optimiser
    • Corporate SEO
    • Affiliate SEO

    Hobo is a UK based seo company. Our offices are in Greenock, just outside of Glasgow, in Scotland.

    We are not a secretive seo company and as such the Hobo seo company website  is one of the most visited seo companies’ website in the UK with 60,000 visitors from search engines and social media every month. Our seo blog is one of the most subscribed search marketing blogs in the world with nearly 15,000 subscribers reading our free seo newsletter.

    Hobo newsletter subscribers

    are currently subscribed (in fact according to Feedburner there are over 15,000 subscribers by email alone).

    Our seo company has never paid for advertising. Ever. 100% of our traffic and leads are generated from free traffic sources.

    Our search engine optimization company is staffed by 13 creative individuals, each an expert in their respective fields, and we have a staff retention rate in nearly 5 years of 100%.

    Within our company has a diverse range of skillsets ready to deploy for companies of any size and to nearly any budget. Our experienced SEO consultants can advise on the best seo strategy for your business, while our web development studio can deploy innovative php-based web designs and web applications to the latest standards in CSS & HTML.

    Are we the best seo company to win your business? Our professional seo firm has clients from Edinburgh & Glasgow in Scotland to Manchester and London in England, and to Ireland, Russia, Australia and even as far away as Bermuda – we are truly a UK seo company able to service local and word-wide markets. We do not outsource any aspect of our core online marketing strategy or web development to foreign marketing companies – all key facets of our operations are managed in Greenock, Scotland. All of our clients have been won by either word-of-mouth recommendations from satisfied clients, or through our own search engine optimization techniques that ensure our services are presented to a visitor when they are, for instance, searching for the best seo company in the UK for their business.

    Ethical SEO

    We are an ethical seo company. Our agency link builders do NOT:

    • spam personal blogs for comment links
    • spam forums for signature links
    • buy links

    …or engage in any cheap seo practices that clearly violate search engines rules for inclusion – unethical seo – or more importantly knowingly illegally hurt another site or cause another webmaster inconvenience.

    As an ethical seo agency, we do NOT make false guarantees like guaranteed top ten rankings or 24 hour no1 rankings we can never honour. We aim to build a site using best practice seo practices and techniques. Our seo endeavours are clearly tracked via Google analytics

    Our intent is ALWAYS to promote REAL businesses through quality, accessible, relevant content creation. We do NOT optimise websites with any intent that could be seen as licentious, exploitative, or illegal in the UK.

    This seo company looks to place our clients in a dominate position in Google natural listings, Google Places, Google Images, Google Video, Google social search and Google Adwords.

    We are an expert wordpress seo company too, in fact, our seo blog is powered by WordPress.

    If you need a seo company to come in, audit your online marketing activities, and improve search engine rankings and traffic – contact us today to see how we can help you dominate your niche! We have experience in many markets, and can offer cost effective seo services to small businesses, SME, big brands, multi-national corporation, the NHS and charity organisations.

    Call us today on 0845 094 0839.

    Posted in SEO Company, Snippets | 82 Comments

    Speed Up Contact Form 7 Plugin For WordPress

    Posted on November 23, 2010 by Robert McKenzie

    Note: Google said site speed is a factor. Contact Form 7 plugin for WordPress is quite bulky in terms of external scripts it’s loads.

    You can speed up how fast Contact Form 7 loads (by loads) by ensuring the associated javascript files load ONLY on the contact form itself.

    Quickly optimise your contact form 7 wordpress plugin by just adding the following code to the end of your functions.php – you can take 70kb off your load time.

    NOTE: Be sure to wrap the following in PHP tags in the example illustrated below:

    add_action( 'wp_print_scripts', 'my_deregister_javascript', 100 );function my_deregister_javascript() {if ( !is_page('Contact') ) {wp_deregister_script( 'contact-form-7' );}}add_action( 'wp_print_styles', 'my_deregister_styles', 100 );function my_deregister_styles() {if ( !is_page('Contact') ) {wp_deregister_style( 'contact-form-7' );}}
    Posted in Snippets, Wordpress SEO | Leave a comment

    IE Test – Check how Website Looks in Different Versions Of Internet Explorer

    Posted on November 22, 2010 by Shaunzo

    {smartads}Test IE – If you are a website designer, you might want to test your web design and see how it looks in different versions of Microsoft Windows Internet Explorer. You’ll especially want to test how your new web page looks in IE6!

    The most common versions of IE are:

    • IE 8
    • IE 7
    • IE 6
    • IE 5.5
    • IE 9 (Coming Soon)

    {smartads}The following online test sites enable you to view your website using IE:

    IE NetRenderer

    IE NetRenderer allows you to check how a website is rendered by Internet Explorer 7, 6or 5.5, as seen from a high speed datacenter located in Germany.

    http://ipinfo.info/netrenderer/

    Browser Shots

    Browsershots makes screenshots of your web design in different operating systems and browsers..

    http://browsershots.org/

    Test your website design in different browsers like Internet Explorer, Firefox, Opera, Safari and Google Chrome. Using Browser Shots is an excellent way of testing how your website design looks accross different browsers and screens / platforms.

    It is an essential element of good website design that you test your website and how it looks or ‘renders’ in as many web browsers as possible – though it is worth remembering it is impossible to design a website to look exactly the same in all browsers.
    We use standards compliant code as laid down by the W3C. This ensures the future proofing of your website and puts the onus on web browser developers to make their applications standards compliant. Shout out to James at Floortel for the question.

    Posted in SEO Web Design, Snippets | Leave a comment