Yahoo, YouTube and The State of the Nation Address

Hi Folks

Those of you who are old-timers in the links program know that summertime is newsletter time! I hope you'll find some helpful info below.

Yahoo

In the SEO world these days, there are those who say that Yahoo is the superior search engine. I'm inclined to agree based on recent experiences. But there is one Yahoo issue I want to bring to your attention. Generally the engines are all about displaying the best results possible and writing their algorithms to make that so. There appears to be one wrinkle in that at Yahoo. Yahoo has decided to alter its algorithm to produce results that are distinctly different than Google. I don't know what that means in terms of quality, but quality is somewhat subjective anyway - surely there's room for 20 websites in the top 10. Anyway, it's no longer the case that someone is likely to be in the top ten at both Yahoo and Google. Of course, the engines have always had different ranking criteria (e.g. Google oriented more heavily to links) but apparently the differences are even more marked now.

What does this mean in terms of your site's optimization? Not much. One optimizes for Google and any other rankings are gravy.

But back to the quality of Yahoo. In my submission work I find that new sites get indexed at Yahoo first and I really like the way Yahoo deals with Youtube videos. Today, I want you to consider whether a Youtube video might help your web business. Based on my experience over the last few months, I've concluded that a video can give you an off-site doorway to ranking on the search engines, one that can help your business.

YouTube Videos

Don't be intimidated, a video can just be a series of still photographs with music but the formatting can bring it all to life.

I hadn't paid much attention to Youtube until one of my clients (Jack of AAA Safety First) showed up with a video. Then I had one done for myself using the same person, Gisele Veilleux. Today, Jack's Youtube videos are on page one of Google for things like 'self defense products for women', 'runt stun gun' and he has a #13 ranking (with a bullet) for 'bear pepper spray'. These are not his website rankings, these are rankings courtesy of Youtube.

I think a Youtube video may be the best way to exploit what's known now as Web2 - the multimedia Internet. We've talked about web2 in an earlier newsletter but think multimedia, interactive, social networking. Every Youtube video has a web address which means that it can rank along-side other websites. And, a Youtube video displays with a video icon or thumbnail making it click worthy. Of course, you can post the video to your website too but the Youtube listing itself can rank in web results and attract attention. It's like having a free second website. You can even direct PR to it to influence its rankings. Of course, your video will also be indexed and searchable at Youtube.com and appear when people specifically do video searches at the other search engines. But it's the regular web listings where one can score the biggest impact.

This is where Yahoo comes back into the picture. Even though Google owns Youtube it seems to take a very long time for a video thumbnail or icon to display alongside a listing. I've seen mine on Google.ca (as I'm in Canada) but not at Google.com. However, my listing, including the accompanying video thumbnail, appeared on Yahoo very quickly. Go to Yahoo and search for 'seo ebook'. Keep in mind that each engine has several different databases so we don't all see the same search results when we do a search. But with any luck, you'll see my ebook website listed #2, but that's not why I'm suggesting you do the above search. Scroll down further and around listing #9 you'll see my Youtube video in all its glory with a nice video icon right beside it and an invitation from Yahoo to click 'Play' (something you won't find at Google). Generally in any search, the top three listings get most of the clicks. But I'll wager that any listing with a video icon beside it, is like a top three listing no matter where it is on the page. Who can resist a good (or bad) movie!

You can do your own Youtube video if you've got the time and skill or I'm sure Gisele Veilleux (gisele2@earthlink.net) will be happy to do one for you. You can see some of her other videos here.

The Directories

If you didn't read my last newsletter about the directories then I suggest you do so but let me add one more directory to the recommended list. This one is a free one and I often see it listed as a credited back link at Google: Hotfrog. Remember, stay away from directory submission services. There are only a handful of recommendable directories besides Dmoz.org and the Yahoo Directory (which is different than the Yahoo search engine).

The Health of the Program (My State of the Nation Address)

Obviously, I have a vested interest in seeing everything 'good' about our program. But sometimes there are things I can't explain. Sites in some countries don't seem to gather PR as quickly as sites in the US or the UK. I've got a site in the Philippines that's showing no PR after two years but is ranked top five on Google for the main search phrase. I've got a few sites in Spain that are still only PR2 after just over a year. I'm not sure why. I suspect that links from one's own region carry more weight but I'm not sure. We've got plenty of sites in the US, UK, Canada, Australia (and I haven't forgot my New Zealand friend) but certainly fewer in other regions.

I was nervous last year after Google re-calibrated PR leading to a general lowering of PR scores across the board. Even though it wasn't affecting rankings, I wasn't sure how people were going to respond to that. And, we probably lost a few partners because of it. But things have stabilized and I've even seen some partners bounce back in the last toolbar update in January. But 'bouncing back' is the wrong term. In an absolute sense they've returned to their previous PR levels but in a relative sense they've improved. Simply, the PR4 they have now is better than the PR4 they had last year. There's no doubt that a PR4 even PR3 web page can rank on page one of Google for decent search phrases. The #1 site on Google for 'seattle real estate' is a PR3. People forget that there are thousands of new websites created everyday and millions of new web pages and those new web pages are all getting a piece of a limited amount of PR. There is natural tendency for PR scores to drop just due to the growth of the Internet. PR ranges from PR0 to PR10 but Google doesn't add another level of PR even when a million new websites have been added to the Internet. How many of you remember being a PR1 or PR2? There's a good chance most of you old-timers don't remember that as you went very quickly from PR0 to PR3. For the first time last year, after the recalibration, I noticed a lot more PR1 and PR2 web sites.

It's hard to evaluate our program's contribution to PR. The problem is that people are often taking several approaches to PR so teasing out the contribution of a single source of PR is challenging. In the old days, I could pretty much guarantee that a client would go from PR0 to PR4 in 4-7 months through our program alone. By early 2007, I'd suggest only that they'd probably get to PR3 in 4 months to one year. But then, with the recalibration, I didn't know what to expect and teasing it out is confounded when people join multiple programs or get link juice from directories or other sources such as text links. So, I was pleased to note the case of David Stone Books a few weeks ago. The Canadian book author's site has been in the program for exactly one year and is not engaging any other link programs or sources. He's gone from PR0 to PR4 in one year. If you check his backlinks at Google by doing this exact search link:www.davidstonebooks.com you'll see that every one of his backlinks is ours. For those of you who are newcomers, note that Google never shares more than a small sampling of credited links.

Then just yesterday I visited the website of a PR3 program partner. The most links he could have from us would be 200+ but he was showing over 600 links at Yahoo. Most of his non-program links were the much ballyhooed 'relevant links' from other real estate outfits. I knew we could be contributing no more than about 1/3 of his total external links yet when I checked at Google about 90% of the backlinks credited there were from our partners. Why is he only PR3 on Google when he has three time as many links as David Stone Books, many of his non-program links being so-called 'relevant' real estate links? I've seen it countless times. I don't know the answer for sure but maybe he got into a real estate oriented spam linking program (scripted or instant links). I genuinely believe that client participation in other links programs often dampens the effectiveness of our program.

I can't tell you how often I'm asked about relevant links. Let me just say this: relevant links are relatively irrelevant. That's an over-statement but let's just say it's a balancing over-statement. How many of David Stone Books backlinks are relevant?

I really feel our program is the only 'program' you need but I feel that you will also benefit by the judicious selection of other individual linking partners along with a small group of general directories and some local geographically oriented directories. Don't be in a hurry. Add one directory this month and another next month. Keep in mind that the legitimate ones tend to have a fee. Please see my last newsletter on the directories.

On-Page Versus Off-Page SEO

As most of you know, off-page SEO involves having your linking partners link to you with relevant keyword phrases. One of the great strengths of our program is that partners can provide up to 13 (recently increased from ten) different sets of anchor text which will then be randomly distributed to the linking partners.

Does any one remember on-page SEO? I don't think so. I get so many clients who will take great pains to send me 10 sets of anchor text and supportive descriptive text but I'll find little of that text anywhere on their targeted page. Anchor text should match the page it's linking to. If you are trying to improve your rankings for 'red burlwood' and your anchor text includes the phrase 'red burlwood' it would make a lot of sense to have 'red burlwood' as text somewhere on the page being linked to and 'red burlwood' is a lot better than 'red' here and 'burlwood' there. Don't forget that on-page SEO is half the ranking battle. For some reason these days, folks think it's all about links. It's not.

Relatedly, every page on your site (or at least those pages in the primary index) is a potential visitor landing page. Make sure your links partners pages have unique site relevant title tags (even description tags) and a couple of paragraphs of on-page copy relevant to your own site. Don't title your partner's links page 'Resources 1', title it 'Red Burlwood for Sale' or some other site-relevant phrase. Even your site's partner pages should be landing pages for your site minimally with navigation to your home page. I can't tell you how often I've been searching for a new client's listing but instead I find a page from one of their program partners ranking for THEIR search phrase. That's usually simply because the new client hasn't acquired enough PR yet while the linking partners page has significant PR. So maybe I'll search for 'sell house fast toronto' and I won't find the client's page initially but I'll find a linking partner's page sometimes right on the first page of Google. That listing can potentially help both partners. By the way, if you don't know what Google's primary index is, scroll down to the third newsletter (after you finish this one).

Our Status as an Artificial Links Program

Artificial links are insincere links, a link not because you're truly recommended but because you're in a links program. Every couple of weeks someone anxiously asks me "What will happen if Google finds out about your little program." My answer: "How could they not know about it? I was the first program-based one-way links service on the Internet. I am onewaylinks.com! I've been #1 for years." Google solves its problems via its algorithm in all but the most egregious cases. Google dampened the PR associated with reciprocal linking several years ago. People still reciprocal link even though everyone knows Google dampens reciprocal links. Those who reciprocal link still get a modicum of benefit from it, if only because some reciprocal links are sincere links and Google really doesn't know which are which on a link by link basis. Google looks at patterns and, as I've said many times before, if you got three new links last week and you get three new links next week but you get 100 new links tonight, Google will figure that about 97 of the new links tonight are spam links. But you'll still probably get some link juice for a few of those links just based on your site's general pattern of receiving links. In reciprocal linking the question is whether the cost is worth the benefit. Google doesn't say much about programmed one-way linking but one assumes that they've adjusted their algorithm to respond to it. But again, for the most part, Google doesn't know a legitimate link from a spam link and so they look for patterns of linking. Again though, Google can't respond too aggressively lest they devalue legitimate links while dampening the spam. It's generally agreed by SEOs that the key to a successful links program is to stay small. Not so much so you won't be detected but so that you won't exceed whatever safety is afforded by being small rather than egregious. Whatever safely is afforded by receiving a few new links each week as opposed to hundreds all at once or a steady stream of thousands per month (volume linking is suspicious). There are a half dozen reasons why our program succeeds. I think size is a factor and I've decided not to grow the program beyond nine pages. I already have one pod at ten pages but through attrition that will go back to being nine pages at one point and I plan to keep it there. The other two pods are at nine pages now. That decision will affect future pricing especially when it comes to any discounts related to multiple sites and such. They will become something from the past.

Program Fee Changes

As of July 1 2008 my optimization fee will increase from $128 to $148, the first increase in 5 years. But the secondary page rate and my bulk rates will remain as they are.

I will also increase the links program fee to $175 as of September 1, 2008.

That's All for Now, Folks!

Have a great summer everyone! Happy Canada Day to my compatriots here in Canada. Happy July 4th to all of you in the USA. I think I'm safe here as I've just Googled a bunch of other national days and I don't think I'm leaving anyone out but I know now that some of you have national days in October, January, February, etc.