The Rank Magic Blog

Six Things You Should Be Aware Of Before You Buy "Guaranteed Traffíc"

September 29, 2006 ::: Site Pro News has a revealing article about services that guarantee traffic through your pay per click (PPC) ads. It seems some of these services are click fraud scams. Here are the highlights:

Inbound Links versus Outbound Links

September 25, 2006 ::: From a forum on Web Pro World recently, a reader asked a good question. "I was chatting to an SEO guy today who told me that outbound links, cancel out inbound links. i.e. if I have 20 links in, but 5 out, that leaves me with 15? Anyone know if this is the case? I always thought some good quality outbound links helped your cause!" 

It turns out that "SEO guy" was wrong. But there may have been some historical reasons for the mistake. You can read the whole thread here.

Google Opening Facility in NYC?

September 22, 2006 ::: I just came across this news story from about ten days ago in The Village Voice. Google's Senior VP of engineering and research was describing a new and urgent reality facing Google. "Can you build global products with a workforce that is only in Mountain View, California?" he asked, posing a rhetorical question to the several dozen assorted Wall Street types in attendance. "The answer is, no you can't. The technical talent that we need to solve the next generation of problems in search does not all live in Mountain View, California." Looks like he thinks it does exist in New York City. They're planning to move into a new office and networking and facility on Eighth Avenue in Chelsea. <Here's the full article>

Quick Chuckle

September 19, 2006 ::: Google returns MSN as number 1 result for a "search" search.

Update March, 2007: We see that Google got wise and now lists itself #1. Well, it was amusing while it lasted.

Pay Per Click Rant

September 18, 2006 ::: The usually unflappable High Rankings® Forum administrator Alan Perkins has had it with all three PPC providers and rants about it this week on the High Rankings Forum.

How do you think Google, Yahoo, and MSN are doing with their PPC programs? Visit the thread and share your thoughts.

The Effect of Outbound Links on Your Site

September 15, 2006 ::: Many web site owners understand how essential incoming links to their web site are for good search engine rankings. We wrote an article for Entrepreneur Magazine on the subject. What's not so widely understood is the impact that outbound links on your site can have on your rankings.

Outbound Links Influence Search Engines

Other web sites that you link to affect the "neighborhood" of your web site. If you link to online gambling web sites, the search engines will be more likely to think your web site is related to gambling. If you link to unsavory "spammy" web sites then search engines might think that your web site is also search engine spam.

Links to link farms and automated linking systems can actually hurt your rankings in Google and we believe also in Yahoo, MSN, and other major search engines. That's why it's always important to evaluate other web sites before you link to them.

Outbound Links Influence Visitors to Your Web Site

The web sites you link to establish the larger context of your web site for your visitors. If you link to high quality sites with useful content, visitors tom your site will associate you with those high quality sites.

You need to link to good, solid web sites with valuable information; that demonstrates that your web site can be trusted. You wouldn't send visitors to other pages if they could find negative information about your products or services. And you shouldn't send visitors to other pages that they will find offensive, amateurish, or a waste of their time. That's because all of those negative feelings will generalize back to your site and to your products and services.

Good links add value to your web site, they show your visitors that you have nothing to hide and that you have confidence in yourself.

What Goes Around Comes Around

Don't worry about losing visitors by providing links to other pages. Links to other pages that provide real value will bring you more and repeat customers. Everyone's going to leave your web site sooner or later. No matter how compelling your web site is, no one's going to stay there forever. But where do they go when they leave your site?

If you don't have outgoing links, then your visitors are likely to go back to the search engine they came from (where they may continue to search and find your competitors). If you offer your web site visitors good outbound links, you can send leaving visitors to other web sites that can send you their visitors in return.

One technique to try is to set up your outbound links so they open in a new browser window or tab. That way, visitors who follow those links still have a web browser window or tab pointing to your site, so when they finish with the other site, they're still connected to your site. For an example of that, click on the Borowitz Report link in the previous article.

Carefully chosen links to outside resources can improve the experience of visitors who visit your web site. The better that experience, the more likely they are to return. And the more they return, the more likely they are to end up a paying customer.

What's missing in most marketing plans involving TV commercials? A search component.

September 14, 2006 ::: Search engine research is now a routine part of everyone's shopping behavior, a surprising number of advertisers and advertising agencies have failed to consider that in their advertising campaigns.

If you have an effective ad on TV, consumers will go to the search engines in droves to find out more about your product. If you haven't optimized your web sites for the search terms they come away from your TV ad with, they can't find you or your product.

AT&T spent millions of dollars to introduce their new mobile product m-life in Super Bowl ads four years ago. Those are about the most expensive ad dollars you can spend. According to researchers, consumers flocked online to find out more about m-life. But since AT&T hadn't optimized for any search terms related to the ads, and hadn't provided a memorable web address in their ads, consumers remained clueless about the concept. AT&T was nowhere.

<Read more at RISMEdia>

Bush Vows to Google Bin Laden

Enlists World's Most Powerful Search Engine in Hunt for Madman

September 12, 2006 ::: In a nationally televised speech today, President George W. Bush issued his most direct threat ever to Osama bin Laden, vowing to use the search engine Google to find the al-Qaeda terror leader.

"Mr. Osama bin Laden, you can run, but you can't hide," Mr. Bush said, with his trademark steely resolve. "Google will find you."

Mr. Bush concluded his speech by warning the world's most wanted madman, "I'm searching you on Google right now, and I'm feeling lucky."

News reports that the CIA had recently disbanded a special unit dedicated to finding Mr. bin Laden suggested that the White House no longer saw his capture as a top priority, but the President's decision to use what he called "the most powerful search engine on the Internets" sent a different message.

But even as Mr. Bush announced plans to enlist Google in the search for bin Laden, he attempted to manage the expectations of the American people, warning, "The Googling of Osama bin Laden will be a long and arduous Googling."

Mr. Bush also acknowledged that he tried to use the auction site eBay last month to ensnare Mr. bin Laden, when news surfaced that the terror mastermind was a fan of the singer Whitney Houston.

The White House auctioned an autographed photo of Ms. Houston on the site, but the plan failed when the winning bid was made by North Korean dictator Kim Jong-Il.

Editor's note: After blogging last month about Google's efforts to keep people from using "Google" as a verb, I couldn't resist reprinting this piece from The Borowitz Report. If you enjoyed the satire, you can subscribe to a daily email feed of "news" stories such as this from their web site.

Vacation!

September 1, 2006 ::: Our annual "first week of school" vacation has struck. The blog will probably be a little light until we get back on the 11th.