5 Things You’re Doing Wrong with Social Media (And Life)

By jeff loquist | Published: May 11, 2013

There are a LOT of blogs out there telling you what you need to be doing on social media to “build your presence” or “build your fan-base”, There are even way too many out there telling you what you you’re doing wrong, and how you should better interact with people to not offend them or whatever…

twitter bird says you suck!

And sure, there is probably some merit to that, but for the most part that just makes social media boring.

I’m no social media expert, and I don’t claim to be (hint, none of the people out there claiming that title are either), but social media is fun for me. This is because I don’t really care who is following me or what the people who are following me think. I’m that way in real life too, and to be honest, it makes life in general enjoyable too.

  1. Caring About How Important Your Friends Are - I get it; everyone wants people in power or celebrity to like them. Okay, maybe not EVERYONE, but enough of you that countless blogs are written about it. People spend actual time commenting and trying to interact with these people to try to get them to recognize their presence. The truth is, most of those people are boring as Hell and won’t do you any good anyway. This is especially true on twitter. Care less about following people who are “influencers” and simply follow people who are interesting. I follow something like 400 people (I don’t really keep count) and I definitely don’t care how many people are following me. Remember what they told you about friends? It’s not how cool your friends are or how many you have; what’s important is if they are good. <–That shit is totally true.
  2. Caring About Offending People - Want to know what is boring as shit? People who worry about what other people think about them. You know you have those friends in life; those people that are constantly watching what they say and worrying about whether they offended someone. Do you know what those people are doing? Not. Having. Fun. If you are worried about what people think, you are going to spend all of your time worrying and no time actually contributing to anything – in life or online. This is part of the reason I like to follow people like Kris Roadruck, NetMeg, and Julie Joyce. They say what they want and it’s entertaining and insightful most of the time. Heh, and actually, all of those people are in the online marketing field, but they don’t always talk about marketing and even when they do they don’t seem to care if they say the things that people want them to say.
  3. You’re Simply Rehashing Other People’s Crap - One of the great things about social media is the ability to instantly share things with others that you find interesting, funny, or whatever. Unfortunately, way too many people take this to the extreme. It’s cool, man. Share things you like, but for the love of GOD find your own voice as well. Don’t simply share something useful, SAY something useful. You have it in there, you’re just thinking too hard about point number 2.
  4. You’re a Follower Backer - Good God, you people annoy the shit out of me! You know who you are, Hashtag TeamFollowBack. Screw you. And you’re not just on twitter, you are the asshole on Facebook trying to friend every person that shows up in the “People You May Know”. I used to have a strict “Only if I know you in real life” rue on Facebook, but I now realize the Internets have made that a pretty dated philosophy. However, if I have not interacted with you in some fashion, don’t expect me to follow you back. This isn’t to say you shouldn’t follow someone who is interesting; just don’t expect them to follow you back. Oh, and if you follow someone, they return the follow, and then you un-follow them, that makes you a douchebag.
  5. You ALWAYS Have a Response - Yes, social media is about interacting with other people, but much like life, it is always important to know when to shut the Hell up. do you know what makes a great website or content? It’s not just the images and words. It’s also the white space; that beautiful area between the other stuff that helps the other stuff stand out. Social media – and life – are very much the same. Social media is a very cluttered place; know when to be the words, but also know when to be the white space.

And that’s it (well, maybe not IT, but I am done with it right now. I’m just going to go ahead and be the white space for a bit.

Posted in Facebook, Google, social media, Twitter | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

The Physics of Online Marketing

By jeff loquist | Published: May 4, 2013

If you’re a geek like me there is a good chance your interest falls outside of the world of online marketing and into other areas, such as science. For me, the area I find most intriguing is physics. I devour books on the subject probably more-so than anything to do with SEO, PPC and other areas related to the online world.

Physics of Online Marketing

One thing I’ve realized over the past couple of years is that I tend to use a lot of physics ideas and concepts when doing marketing work, so I began considering a post on what physics has taught me about marketing. While considering the idea I did a quick search on the subject and turned up one result – a very good TED talk by Dan Colby.

He offers some great ideas in the above video and definitely worth the watch.

However, this also fueled my desire to take it a step further. While Dan Colby makes some great points, there is still a lot of physics theories and scientific concepts that can be used when thinking about marketing.

1. Newtons Laws of Motion -  In the world of physics there is probably no one more important than Sir Isaac Newton (possibly “as important”, but not “more”). Of all the things that Newton gave the world of science, the most known (if not notable) is the laws of motion.

  • - According to Newton’s first law, “Every object persists in its state of rest or uniform motion in a straight line unless it is compelled to change that state by forces impressed on it.” For marketing this should be fairly obvious: if you have an object – say, a piece of content or video – and you do nothing to promote it or place it into the view of the public, it will continue in its inherent state of rest until you act upon it.

  • - The second law states “Force is equal to the change in momentum per change in time. For a constant mass, force equals mass times acceleration.” Depending on the size of the project (and the size of your company), it will take a certain amount of force to accelerate the object you are promoting enough to be noticeable. For a larger business, such as an Apple or Coca-Cola, the marketing campaign better have a lot of force behind it, or it will go unnoticed in the world and in the company. For a smaller company – such as a local shoe store – even the smallest of marketing force can make a huge impact on the acceleration of your company.

  • - Law three states “For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.” This could be either good or bad, but if you are placing an marketing message out into the world, you better be ready to face the consequence of that action, and you better know which direction the force of your message is moving.


2. The Big Bang & Deceleration - Before I get nasty comments, yes, I am well aware that the theory of deceleration has given way to the modern accelerated universe theory. I don’t care. For marketing, it’s still deceleration. Anyway, roughly 14 billion years ago all the matter of the universe was contained in a single, small-ish point. There was a gigantic explosion (not “actually” an explosion, but nonetheless) and the universe expanded outward at an extremely fast rate. After the initial bang the universe slowed, but continues to move forward infinitely through space and time. This is viral marketing. An idea or marketing effort explodes onto the scene and gets shared at an alarmingly fast rate. Over time the rate at which the content or idea moves outward slows, but continues infinitely. Also, once it’s in the world, there is nothing you can do to get it back.

3. Theory of General Relativity - Of course, we could not talk about physics without mentioning Albert Einstein. The question, though, is how the hell can general relativity relate to marketing?! According to the theory, an object moving in a straight line will be subject to the gravity and curvature of the Earth. So an object moving East would actually be moving East and South. To move directly East, you would have to take into account the curvature of the Earth and actually head East and slightly North. Marketing works in much the same way. When we conceptualize the goal of a marketing effort, we tend to think in straight lines (i.e. if I perform A, it will get me to B).

Nothing in life will work exactly like that, however, and we need to take into account other consequences and resources before taking action. If I create a video content and upload that content on YouTube, and then embed that video on your site, and then utilize social media to promote that content, you may drive people to your site. YouTube, however, is the second largest search engine on the planet, and there is a very good chance people will find your video there instead of your site. While you were hoping to get directly from point A to B, you need to consider C, meaning you will also need to consider how you will drive traffic from the YouTube site to your site.

4. Evolution & Natural Selection - Okay, so maybe evolution is not necessarily a physics concept, but it definitely plays a huge role in the world of marketing – if you think about it for a minute. The online world is a pretty level playing field. As marketers, we all have access to the same basic tools. A small mom and pop shop really does have the ability to compete with larger companies. Of course, the more money you have and are willing to put into your efforts, the better the payoff will likely be; but the ability to use the tools is there.

The issue comes when a company, or marketer, gets set in their ways and refuses to change with the rest of the world. The Internet moves very quickly, and if you have been around longer than six months you’ve noticed it, or you simply aren’t paying attention. What makes the difference is how willing we are – and how quickly we can – adapt to the ever changing landscape. Just like the peppered moth, you must evolve or die.

How to Use the Scientific Method in Marketing

How can you not love something as perfect as the Scientific Method? You learned it in grade school, yet it amazes me how many people never use it and basically fly blind in the marketing world.

The Scientific Method for Online Marketing

We can sit around all day long thinking we’re artistic, or writers, but if you are not utilizing something like the Scientific Method to gauge the results of your efforts, you are doing it wrong and you should probably get back on your VW Minibus…hippie.

Everything starts with a question. “If I create this blog post, what will be the goal? How will I get it in front of people? What will happen if I raise my CPCs in my adWords campaign by 25%? What if I target region specific? Etc. Etc. Etc.

We could always just throw things out there. Set it and forget it if you will.  But if we do these things it is very likely we will be unemployed, and enjoying that Minibus.

The Scientific method is simple.

1. Ask a Question. I just did this in the previous paragraph and am not going to give more examples here.

2. Do background research. Has anyone tried your idea before? What were the results? Just because something failed doesn’t mean it will fail for you. What did they do wrong? how could you improve upon what they did?

3. Form your Hypothesis. Think about what you want to do and what the likely outcome(s) will be. Get this down on paper (or computer screen) and save it.

4. Test, Analyze & Test Some More. This is where we drop the “set it and forget it” mentality. Figure out your starting point, what your goal is and then test your efforts over time. Did your hypothesis fail miserably? Figure out what went wrong, fix that and try again. Was your hypothesis true? I bet it wasn’t perfect. Make a change and test that. Keep doing this until the end of time.

5. Track & Report your Results. Your bosses (or clients) will appreciate this. It will also allow you to understand over time what works and what does not works, as well as how things change over time (see Evolution & Natural Selection above).

And that kids, is why physics is not only fun, but can help you be a better marketer.

How about you? What do you enjoy outside of the online world that helps you be better at your job?

Posted in adWords, Analytics, marketing, PPC, Random Internet, SEO | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

The Impermanence of Search (& Our Attachment to It)

By jeff loquist | Published: March 6, 2013

On February  6, 2013 Google announced their plans to unroll Enhanced Campaigns inside of the AdWords platform. This was by no means the first time the search giant has announced major…erm…upgrades to one of their products, but it is – by far – the biggest changes to their paid platform.

impermanence in search

Via BoundryWatersGuideService.com

And of course there was a giant uproar.

I admit, I was – and still am – a huge opponent to the changes coming in the next few months.

Will any of this outcry change the course of events, however?

The answer to this question is – of course – no. If the recent past has taught us anything about Google, it is that they are going to make the changes they feel are best for their customers, and no one – not even their customers – are going to make them change their mind.

But this blog isn’t necessarily about Enhanced Campaigns, Panda, Penguin, or any other update the search engines decide to make.

This blog is more about us as marketers, and our reactions to events like these.

What is Impermanence? 

In Buddhism impermanence is simply the fact that nothing on Earth belongs to us. If human beings cannot accept this fact, they become attached to things and will undoubtedly suffer.

And suffering sucks.

We are Attached to an Impermanent Thing

It’s funny that one of the things online marketers say they love about the search industry – whether you are talking about paid or organic – is that everything is constantly evolving and changing. Yet, every time there is a major change we throw our hands up and claim foul.

This is because search is no different than life.

We become attached to concepts and ideas just as easily as we become attached to material things. Just as in life, we need to loosen our attachments to the way we do things.

We need to learn to flow along with the changes  that come like the riverbed changes with the stream.

Just like the river, the change is coming whether we resist it or not.

This is not to say that the change is always good or beneficial – at least for us.

Google (and Bing for that matter) is a business, and as a business they are going to do what is best for their bottom line. They will surely mask their intentions as customer-focused, even when the changes are obviously for no other purpose than their bottom line.

What we can do is learn the systems, find the loopholes (going with the flow DOES include learning how to make things easier, right?), and wait patiently for the next “upgrade”.

Because it’s coming.

And we can either keep stressing ourselves out every time it happens, or we can take a deep breath, relax, dive into the rapids and enjoy the ride.

Posted in adWords, Google, marketing, PPC, SEO | Tagged , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Google Enhanced Campaigns | Don’t Believe the Hype

By jeff loquist | Published: February 7, 2013

If you are in the online marketing community and haven’t heard of Google’s new Enhanced Campaigns that will be rolled out in Beta shortly to a few “lucky” marketers and then to everyone around the June timeframe you have likely been in a coma or are living under a rock (if you actually just woke up from a coma, I apologize).

Now, I will say that when something big like this rolls out I usually don’t post about it. With Enhanced Campaigns, however, it really hits close to home and my need to rant a little has superseded my desire to be a herd animal, so here we are…

What are Enhanced Campaigns?

What Google says:

According to the official Google adWords Blog Enhanced Campaigns will give marketers the ability to bid on multiple devices more easily by allowing for segmented bidding from within a single campaign. According to the Goog, users are utilizing multiple touch points when making purchasing decisions and are moving seamlessly between devices. They even offered a snazzy slideshow and infographic to show how this is happening:

Google's New Multi-Screen World infographic

While this is all true, if you think for a moment that Enhanced Campaigns is some altruistic present from the search giant you are sadly mistaken.

What I think:

I’ve said it before, and I will never stop saying it; Google likes to make money. While they insist that these “upgrades” are going to make life easier for the average marketer, Enhanced Campaigns are going to make bidding across multiple platforms a lot more wonky & will drive up the CPCs on mobile devices unless you really spend some time making your campaigns awesome.

Oh, and if your campaigns are already awesome, get ready to start from scratch on many fronts (specifically mobile & tablet).

All that said, Enhanced Campaigns do offer quite a few niceties that add a little sugar to the meds. Here are my thoughts on the goods and the crap that are coming our way in the near future (Believe it or not, I am a glass half full kind of guy (my Buddha nature almost requires it :) :

The Awesome

  1. Sitelinks at the adGroup Level (And Enhanced Reporting) – This is actually how my Google reps actually sold me on the whole Enhanced Campaigns last week on a call (they knew that adGroup level sitelinks was something I have been jonesing for for quite some time. Not only is Enhanced campaigns going to allow for the addition of sitelinks at the adGroup level (so you no longer have to break out individual campaigns), but it will also allow marketers the ability to see individual sitelink performance for improved optimization. There is literally nothing bad about this. Nothing.
  2. Location-Based Bidding – This feature is just basically awesome. In a nutshell, you will be allowed to increase or decrease your bids based on locations you enter manually or by linking to your Google + account. This will be especially cool for those who have more sales coming from a particular area or local businesses that would like to stagger bids based on how far the searcher is from your location.
  3. Extension Scheduling – Only looking to run certain sitelinks or promotions at certain times of the day? You’ll soon be able to. ‘Nuff said.

The Bad

  1. Contextual Ad Placement – This will allow you to place ads separately across devices based on how and on what the user is searching. I’ve seen a lot of people posting goodness about this feature, but I am not sold. Basically, you are allowing Google to decide which ads to show your potential visitors based on what they determine in their algorithms. First, you can already do this by breaking out your campaigns into mobile only. Second, you are leaving this up to Google, as if they understand your businesses and customers better than you do. They think they do. They tell you they do. If they actually do, however, you need to re-evaluate what you do for a living.
  2. Say Goodbye to Tablet Bidding – This literally blew my mind. According to Search Engine Land, “Google says its data shows that search behavior on tablets is very similar to computers, and ads on tablets perform comparably to ads on desktops and laptops.” I am calling COMPLETE BULLSHIT on this one. When I attended a Google Learn event late last year, Google repeatedly drilled into us the need to break out mobile and tablet due to the performance differences. AND THIS IS ABSOLUTELY TRUE! Not only is traffic distribution different (as seen in the image below), but tablets tend to have higher click-through-rates and conversion rates
  3. Percent Based Mobile Bids – Seriously. With the new platform, all mobile traffic will be bid from the same campaign as the new (improved?!) desktop/tablet segments by increasing the bids or decreasing the bids by X% compared to the standard desktop/tablet bid. Sure, if you do not want to bid on a keyword in mobile, you can simply drop the percent to 0% and call it a day. But, what if you want to bid a term on mobile only? The biggest problem here is the inability to NOT bid on a keyword on the desktop if you want to bid on it with mobile (Google knows that search behavior is way different). Shorter key terms that may not perform on desktops can do better with mobile based on search behavior. But hey, who needs that, right?
  4. Addition of Phone Revenues and Store Revenues – This isn’t necessarily bad, but Google has been talking about this for years. While it would be cool, I really don’t see how they plan to do this and make it accurate.

Reactions

Enhanced campaigns have likely garnered some of the strongest reactions I have seen from the paid search community. While there were a few positive reactions, I am of the opinion Google pays certain people off to say nice things when they do something crazy. That said, here are some of my favorites from today:

If they are going to start naming updates, I suggest going with fruits or vegetables.

The above is totally true.

There absolutely will be workarounds, and the smart ones out there will find them. The problem is we really shouldn’t have to deal with this nonsense in the first place.

Google knows what they are doing. It is no secret that mobile traffic is becoming a bigger and bigger part of search and that average CPCs for mobile are much lower than desktops. The cynical side of me sees nothing but a company looking to make a buck and banking on the fact that most people will be either too lazy or not educated enough to make the appropriate changes to their accounts to make things work the way they should.

Google recently did the same thing with product listing ads (PLAs). They disguised a money-making scheme behind a veil of “improvement”. Not much has changed in Google shopping except people are now paying for traffic that used to be free. Sure, PLAs are nice, but from what I have seen, and what others are saying, PLAs are stealing a lot of traffic from traditional search with their shiny objects in the upper right corner of your search results.

I also wonder about 3rd party management systems. Every one of them will now have to update their systems in order for this all to work smoothly. How long will that take? Who knows, but it won’t be tomorrow. My best guess is months. I see a lot of people having to de-sync their management systems until upgrades are made.

Bottom line, Google is basically trying to make adWords for Idiots…and idiots probably shouldn’t use adWords in the first place.

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Baa Baa White (Hat) Sheep: Online Marketing & the Follower Mentality

By jeff loquist | Published: February 5, 2013

There is a huge problem in the online marketing community – especially under the umbrella of what is known as Search Engine Optimization.

hipster sheep

Hipster sheep doesn’t care about your online marketing.

Like most industries, we have a few “industry leaders” who are well known for their forward thinking and innovative ideas. And, like in most other industries, these men and women have developed a rather large following (as well they should). Unfortunately, the problem lies not in these folks, but in the people that follow them and take every single word they say as the gospel truth.

Unlike other industries – including paid search where most of what a person states can be easily tested – the SEO community is built largely upon hypothesis. Now, you can argue this all you want, but the truth is the truth, and while as a community we have gotten really good at understanding how search engines operate, most of what we “know” is actually a collection of educated guesses.

I admit, when I first started in the industry I made the mistake of taking the words of top experts as gold. Over the years, however, I have come to understand that the opinions of these people are simply that: opinions. And opinions need to be tested.

Blindly following has never gotten a community very far. history has proven that over and over again.

Today a new hep cat to the SEO community posted the following to Twitter:

And this is an SEO truth. Quite possibly the most important SEO truth you can learn.

Learn the best practices. Follow the industry leaders, they are in that position for a reason. But for the love of all things, question EVERYTHING!

The Buddha understood that. And if a new SEO can understand that, there is no reason the rest of us shouldn’t as well.

If you enjoyed this or any of my other posts, follow me on twitter and like the Zen Search Marketing facebook page.

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6 Marketing Buzzwords I Hate

By jeff loquist | Published: January 27, 2013
I have done a lot of jobs in my life, and while I have of almost always liked what I did, some of the people in the industry have annoyed me…A LOT.

Whether I was in the Marine Corps, truck driving, or bouncing in strip clubs there were always people working in that industry who perpetuated the stereotypes that give the normal, hard-working, and professional people a bad name.

Well, with the exception of strip clubs, because, I mean…c’mon.

I am going to admit something that I am sure is mostly obvious. I am a marketer who is often annoyed by other marketers. We like to complain about getting a bad rap, but at the same time do and say things that make us appear…bad rap-worthy, especially in the fields of online marketing, and ESPECIALLY in social media.

Come on now…you know who you are.

1. Guru…or Rockstar…or Ninja…or (Insert Whatever Moniker is Popular Right Now) - No you’re not. not even in the slightest. You are more than likely a slightly nerdy guy or girl who has some understanding of analytics, html and marketing initiatives.

A guru is a Hindu religious teacher. This is not you.

A rockstar is a famous person who plays an instrument or sings in a rock and roll band. This is likely not you as well, unless you have a side rock band. But then, why the Hell are you sitting in an office optimizing websites or writing ads.

A ninja is a person in Japan who dressed in black and mostly attempted to assassinate people in power, but usually failed miserably. That is why “Marketing Ninja” is by far my favorite term. Ninjas mostly sucked at their job. But hey, if that’s you, good on you.

2. Game Changer- I’ll admit it, there a definitely things that happen that change the game, so to speak. Unfortunately, your idea to add alt tags to your sites images or to actually interact with your customers is not it. They’re good ideas, and that is all. Thanks to every damn speaker at every damn conference calling every damn thing a game changer this term has lost all meaning. You know what would be a game changer? If everyone would stop using all these stupid buzzwords. Maybe people would respect us more.

3. Content Marketing – I am going to preface this by saying that there is nothing wrong with writing great, engaging content on your website. In fact, it is probably the single most important thing you could be doing. Unfortunately, our community has ruined content marketing by labeling it that. What happens, and is already happening, is people think that they HAVE TO find a way to cheat the system. That there has to be an easier way. Some of us used to call it writing and have been doing it forever; back when most Internet marketers were still “link building”. The problem is that we have given it a name, and therefore it is only a matter of time before we ruin it (it’s already happening).

4. Verbiage – We used to call these words.Now you’re just trying to look cool.

5. Humanization – There was a time when business was inherently personal. You simply knew that if you had a business and wanted to make money, you had to be personable or people wouldn’t use your product or service. Somehow we have gotten so far away from this concept we had to assign the act of answering the telephone and interacting with others its own verbiage (see how I did that).

6. Evangelist – I am going to be completely honest here. If you call yourself an evangelist I really want to punch you in the face. By definition, an evangelist is a person who evangelizes a religious doctrine. These are the sleazy guys you see on the television every Sunday morning begging poor people for money. But hey, again, if that’s you, good on you.

My biggest question to you is this. Did you get into this industry to act like a used car salesman? Because that is exactly how you are coming off.

Here’s an idea.

Be an awesome marketer. Strive to be one of the best at what you do and stop looking for stupid buzzwords to make it sound cool. Because it doesn’t sound cool.

 
If you enjoyed this or any of my other posts, follow me on twitter and like the Zen Search Marketing facebook page.

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The 8 Fold Marketing Path Part 2: Right View

By jeff loquist | Published: September 15, 2012

This is the second in a series of 9 blog posts on Zen Search Marketing discussing the use of the 8 Fold Path philosophy in search marketing efforts.This series of blogs is by no means endorsing any religious viewpoint.

In Buddhism, Right View is considered the beginning and the end of the 8 fold path. It simply means to see things as they really are. To understand that things are both imperfect and impermanent. This understanding helps followers of the philosophy to avoid attachment, which is the path to suffering.

8 fold marketing path.-Right-View

So, how can understanding right view and utilizing it in our marketing efforts help us become better marketers?

When you begin to plan a marketing initiative, whether it is a new landing page on a website, an email campaign or a home page redesign what is your main objective?

For many, the answer will probably be to increase traffic or improve the conversion rate on the site. While there is nothing inherently wrong with this way of thinking, it is flawed at the foundations. No matter how much you try to build upon it, you will never truly achieve the maximum returns for your efforts because you are focused too heavily on the bottom line.

And the bottom line doesn’t care about you.

The bottom line is just that…the bottom; and no matter how low it sinks it will continue to be the bottom.

Compassion

Let’s talk about compassion for a minute.

Compassion is at the heart of all Buddhist teachings. When you consider the needs of others and place those needs above your own, everyone will benefit from this.

The Dalai Lama has said “If you want others to be happy, practice compassion. If you want to be happy, practice compassion.” This makes perfect sense. And not only does it make sense, it actually works – in life and in business. Businesses that care only about their bottom line and not the needs of their customers often make quick gains, but these companies always find a way to fail.

Maybe not now, but down the line they always will.

Impermanence & Imperfection

The world is not perfect; neither is the world permanent.

Your house is not permanent. It weathers away and will one day be rubble and then dust. Your car will one day be scrap metal. Every breath that leaves your body is a symbol of how impermanent even your life is.

In Buddhism none of this is seen as bad. It is not seen as good, either. It just is. We have no control over these things, so what is the point of stressing out about them.

The same can be said for search engines.

We have no control over how search engines determine which results they place on the first page of the SERPs. We also have no control over how often or how they change the way they do this. If the past year, with the Panda and Penguin updates, has taught us anything it is that search engines are as impermanent as anything else in the world.

And with results pages like in the image below (looking at #2 result here), one could argue that imperfect is also a proper term to use in this day and age.

vagina for ghosts search results

Now, never you mind why I was searching for “woman finds ghosts in attic proof”, but the fact remains that Google decided that the new Naomi Wolf Vagina book was highly relevant.

Even with this result, however, the truth is search engines do a fantastic job of finding relevant information in their billions of indexed pages. So we just have to try ou best to make sure that the search engines understand just how relevant we are.

And how do we do this?

By going with their flow. Just like in life, where it is much easier to flow with it than fight, understanding how the search engines work, what they want and making the appropriate changes to conform is the easiest and best way to make sure that you are steady at the top of the results.

People will find ways to game the system. They always do. But these SEOs will always get knocked down sooner or later and then they will scramble to find a new way to cheat their way to the top. sometimes they will be ahead of you, sometimes they wont. But you will be steady because you have chosen to put your visitors needs (finding great information or products) ahead of your own (dominating the search results no matter the cost).

And this happens because you had right view the entire time.

Check back next week when we discuss right intention and how we can utilize that concept in marketing online.

If you enjoyed this or any of my other posts, follow me on twitter and like the Zen Search Marketing  facebook page.

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SEOs Will Ruin Content Marketing (Just Like Everything Else…)

By jeff loquist | Published: August 26, 2012

Let’s say someone found out you liked puppies and gave you one. That would make you happy, right? Now let’s say they went out and told everyone else you liked puppies and they all decided in order to make you happy they would get you a puppy too.

Now you have a million puppies. You have to feed the puppies and pick up a million piles of puppy poo. And the puppies are starting to stink and chew everything up.

Not as good of a deal, is it?

This is exactly how the SEO community treats Google and other search engines.

Let me preface this post by saying that I love search engine optimization.

Creating marketing initiatives that help websites promote their products and services is a highly rewarding business. Through SEO we can help business and website owners compete and succeed where they otherwise may not.

That said, there is a problem in the SEO community. And it is a problem we have created for ourselves.

That problem is the creation of new types of Spam.

It goes like this:

  1. A marketer has a great idea for a new marketing initiative that will help their website become more relevant.
  2. The search engines love this new idea and reward the marketer and website with better rankings.
  3. The SEO decides to share this new idea with the rest of the marketing community.
  4. Other SEOs love the idea and begin implementing it on their own websites.
  5. Search engines provide similar love to those websites.
  6. Those SEOs also share the idea through social networks, blogs, etc.
  7. More SEOs jump on the bandwagon and soon the Internet is overrun with websites doing the exact same thing.
  8. Search engines realize the once good idea is now being overused and label it spam.
  9. SEOs scream and shout about how unfair the search engines are.
  10. A new and better idea is tossed into the mix.
  11. The cycle continues…ad infitinum

I have created a quick image to visually show how the process works:

How SEOs Create Spam - Infographic

Unfortunately, it is simply human nature to deny that we are part of the problem. And when the problem does arise, we try to distance ourselves from it as much as possible.

Take the current talk about link spam.

Up until the recent Panda and Penguin updates there were a LOT of marketers who simply called themselves “link builders” or “link specialists”. You don’t really see that as much anymore. In fact, many of those same people are now touting something many of us have been saying all along…”build great content that people want to share and let the links come naturally.”

It really is a change of tune. And for now it is a good one.

But here is the issue:

The soap boxes are coming out. People are starting to talk about “content marketing strategies” and how you can create tons and tons of content to build a better rapport with the search engines and improve your rankings and traffic.

Does anyone else see the two major problems with that?!

  1. There isn’t a lot of talk about doing what’s best for the end user. It’s still mainly about the search engines (especially Google).
  2. There is an element of trickery in this way of thinking. We are worrying more about ranking manipulation.

Let’s say you build out a hundred new pages of relevant content for your website. And let’s say that every one of your 2,000 competitors does the same thing. Let’s also say this is done VERY quickly.

How is that NOT GOING TO RAISE RED FLAGS?!

And we cannot blame Google or any of the other search engines for this.

You have spam…and something else to complain about with the search engines.

  • It’s the reason the keyword tag is given no weight.
  • It’s the reason many links are given no weight or used as an indicator for spam.
  • It’s the reason sites like Pinterest are nothing more than a future link farm.

As SEOs we have a tendency to say (without really saying it): “Hey, there’s a cool avenue. LET’S EXPLOIT THE SHIT OUT OF IT!”

Now, is the answer to stop marketing our websites? Of course not. But how about slowing it down a bit and not beating every single marketing tactic into the ground? Maybe?

And stop giving Google so many puppies.

If you enjoyed this o any of the other posts, follow Jeff Loquist and Zen Search Marketing and like my facebook page.
Posted in Google, SEO, SEO for Bloggers, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , | 3 Comments

The 8 Fold Marketing Path Part 1: The Zen of Search

By jeff loquist | Published: August 22, 2012

This is the first in a series of 9 blog posts on Zen Search Marketing discussing the use of the 8 Fold Path philosophy in search marketing efforts.This series of blogs is by no means endorsing any religious viewpoint.

Have you been disillusioned by bad search marketing practices?

Many of us are from time to time. There are a million different people spouting off rhetoric about the “right way” to do SEO, PPC or any of he other areas that fall under the umbrella of search.

I am not going to lie to you. The field of search is highly competitive and it is understandable how so many people develop the idea that the only way to survive is to kill or be killed in the SERPS.

It’s no wonder many of these marketers have dubbed themselves “evangelists”. They view the world of search as a battlefield and every new visitor as a convert to their path.

And much like the real evangelists, when we look at search like a kind of battlefield, we often lose sight of what’s important. We begin to have tunnel vision when it comes to site visitors and forget about things like ethics. We stress over things that don’t need to be stressed about.

And we suffer for it.

No pain, no gain, right?

Maybe.

But who the Hell wants to suffer over anything?

In Buddhism, the 8 Fold Path is followed as the way to end suffering.

8 fold marketing path: zen of search

 

This is by no means a post about religion, but over the years I have used this path in every area of my life – search marketing included – and it has proven time and time again to provide the best outcome.

I used to be one of those guys.

The ones who stress about that head term that would provide huge traffic if I could just get into that top spot. I used to worry that if I lost my rankings in the organic listings everything would fall apart. In my last post , Google Really Does Hate SEO, I stated that the best advice I ever got was “promote your website like Google doesn’t exist”. The use of the 8 fold path as a marketing device is actually what derived from that advice. It has shaped the way I look at search and marketing in general.

So what is the 8 Fold Marketing Path?

Just like in Buddhism and the 8 Fold Path, the 8 Fold Marketing Path are 8 very distinct aspects that need to be looked at in relation to one another for them to work properly. While each one is an independent principle, they cannot and should not be looked at as steps. And you cannot ignore one. The other areas, as well as your marketing efforts, will suffer for it.

However, each principle does need to be understood by itself, so in the upcoming series of blogs I will explain how each principle relates to search marketing and then tie them together so they can be understood as a whole. The name of each principle is the same as in the Buddhist teaching; they include:

  • Right View
  • Right Intention
  • Right Speech
  • Right Action
  • Right Livelihood
  • Right Effort
  • Right Concentration
  • Right Mindfulness

When we as marketers run head-first into a project without thinking about it, we can easily fall into bad habits. These could be as simple as focusing on the wrong on-page elements and bad linking opportunities or focusing on the wrong keyword altogether.

Just because a keyword has a high potential for traffic does not mean it would benefit you to try to rank for it.

Especially in the beginning when your site may or may not have the gumption to support such a lofty effort. The Zen of Search and the 8 Fold Marketing Path can hopefully help make those observations come easier…and ease the suffering of misguided intention.

Much like life, a marketer can choose one of two paths –  the hard path, or the easy path. Neither path is necessarily right or wrong. What the 8 Fold Marketing Path helps determine is which of those paths is the right one. Sometimes – actually, most of the time – it will be the easier of the two, but sometimes it is not. And even when it is the more difficult, this philosophy could help cut away the fat so the marketer can focus on what is most important and will provide the most benefit for their site or business.

Check back next week when we will discuss Right View and the benefits of using this principle in your marketing efforts.

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Google Really Does Hate SEO (And This Shouldn’t Matter to You)

By jeff loquist | Published: August 18, 2012

When I was a kid I had a friend. His name doesn’t really matter to this story, so we will call him Gary. Gary was one of those kids that would always come over to the house to play with toys or on the Atari and would be very pleasant while he was at the house; he would say very nice things, eat my Twinkies and other such pleasantries.

Gary is Google and Google is eating your Twinkies

Over time, though, I started hearing rumors that Gary was doing and saying not-so-nice things about me when I wasn’t around.

Of course, as time went on this started to irritate me more and more. I liked Gary. He had things I liked and needed from time to time and was always a good source of information and stories. So I continued to hang out with Gary because even though he was kind of an asshole, the relationship was mutually beneficial.

Which, I know, kind of makes me an asshole too.

But such is life.

After a while, however, Gary just got ballsy.

He started to do and say things contrary to his original nice guy stance right in public. All the while still telling me he thought I was swell.

This is a completely true story. In fact, the kids name actually was Gary. And we have all known a Gary in our lives. Truth is, we probably know one or two right now.

And you know where I am going with this, I hope.

Gary is Google and Google is eating your Twinkies.

This has been going on for some time. And while many of Google’s updates and general doings are mostly good for the end user, many are so blantantly self-serving or anti-SEO that you’d have to be a complete idiot to think their monicker “do no evil” really holds any water within the company.

From their addition of Google + results into the search results without including other social networks with the same amount of face time (which it sounds like they are now pulling back on) to the more recent addition of Gmail in search results (which is just idiotic, even if it is only if requested) the Big G is showing more and more where its interest lies as a company…itself.

Truth is, I don’t hate Google for any of this. Contrary to what most of us think, Google is a business and in business you are going to look out for numero uno.

And that’s cool, man. It’s cool.

What irritates me is the utter lie Google as a company perpetuates that this is not the case, when many of the things they do show the complete opposite.

And they do the same thing with the SEO industry.

In Matt Cutts recent Keynote address at Search Engine Strategies San Francisco, he once again repeated what we have all hear on several occasions; Google doesn’t hate SEO.

Simple.

Once again, however, I read something just yesterday that completely contradicts this statement. In his article, Google Rank-Modifying Spammers Patent, Bill Slawski writes about a 2010 Google Patent which highlights how the search engine may respond if it feels a website use utilizing spam to enhance its rankings.

While I agree with all of the highlighted areas which are referred to as spam, such as keyword stuffing, meta tag stuffing and hidden text, what I don’t agree with is the shady way in which Google is dealing with it or the fact that it makes no exceptions for solid SEO practices.

Example:

Let’s say you are trying to rank for the term “Puppy Kisses”. Good solid SEO would state that you create a website around the subject matter. Create highly relevant content related to that term, add and optimize images and video content so that the search engines can read them properly and optimize the meta title and description tags to help entice users to click on your listing.

I mean, there is a whole lot more to it than that, but in a nutshell…yeah, that’s what you would need to do.

So let’s say a month down the road you are ranking in the 7th position for that term and you would like to make a couple changes to my listed page to maybe bump it up a bit to get more visibility. So you maybe change my title tag a bit, or change your on-page content slightly. By no means keyword stuffing, but maybe making the page a little more relevant to the term based on your competitive research of those in the top positions.

You check a few days later and my page is now on the bottom of the second page in the 17th position.

“Holy crap!” You say to yourself. Did you do something wrong? Should you change those things back to get back to the 7th position and try again?

Nope. That’s just Google screwing with ya!

See, according to the patent…and it has been something I have noticed over the past couple of years, Google saw you make those adjustments and went ahead and dropped your page just to see if you would take those adjustments away so they could label your practices as Spam and penalize you.

The problem is what you did was not spam it was good SEO.

And this is where it becomes apparent that no matter what Matt Cutts or the rest of the Googlers say, they hate you. They don’t want you to improve your site so you can improve your business.

And I am not talking about spam here. Spam is bad. I am talking about SEO.

And guess what? Google didn’t invent SEO, so I have never and will never take their word on what is best for my site and visitors.

I will read the webmaster rules and I will do my best to adhere to them. But I’ll be damned if I am going to tiptoe on eggshells to make something happy that only cares about its own self interest.

And you should do the same.

Truth is, all spam is is something that was okay a few months ago.

Like link building.

And what I am guessing will happen to Pinterest…or content development.

They will all become spam techniques as soon as Google feels people are abusing them.

Whether they are or not.

So, what can you do? How the hell can you overcome something which seems to inherently hate the things you do?

Stop caring about them.

Some of the best SEO advice I ever received was this (and I wish I could recall where I heard it):

Promote your website like Google doesn’t exist.

What would you do to get your website noticed without Google? Networking? Utilizing social media? Building your brand presence so people just know who you are?

Do those things. And build your website to be the best it can be for your customer-base or visitors.

And stop caring what Google thinks about you. Because it’s when we do that we spend too much time trying to beat the system.

And it’s when we try to beat the system that we screw up and the system hates us.

Posted in Google, Karma, SEO, SEO for Bloggers | Tagged , , , , | 23 Comments