This Past Week in SEO (5/20/13)
Once you get a chance to go through them, be sure to leave a comment and let me know which link was the most useful to you!
- Viral Content Buzz: Why Social is The New Backlink Find out nine different places where you can promote your website or blog, as well as how you can use Viral Content Buzz to promote your blog’s best posts.
- 15 Things You Need To Know About The #NewGooglePlus “Infographics will display in a nearly-useful size, A Hangout is now any form of group communication & You can now send money through Gmail/Google” are just three of the fifteen topics covered in this image and video rich post.
- A Facebook Update In Real Life: If you’re in need of a good laugh, this 2.5 minute will do the trick!
- What should we expect in the next few months in terms of SEO for Google? Although 7.5 minutes may sound long for a YouTube video, since this one comes directly from Matt Cutts and addresses several important issues, it’s definitely worth watching the entire thing.
- SEO Experts Interview: What’s the Hottest New SEO or Social Media Tool This Year? Ann Smarty, John Rampton, Ashley Moreno, Jon Henshaw, Alexis Grant, Viktar Khamianok, Tyler Shannon, Scott Langdon and myself all share the SEO or social media tool that we’re currently the most excited about using.
- Penguin 2.0 and Future Google Updates Kev Massey covers several topics related to Google’s Penguin 2.0 update, including hacked sites, authority authors and result clusters.
- 5 Clever Ways Your Business Can Use Video to Drive Traffic Steve Young discusses how creating a parody, your own whiteboard animation and three other video strategies can help you drive traffic.
- Klout Integration Pushes Human Powered ‘Expert’ Answers Atop Bing’s Search Results Greg Finn goes over Klout’s official entry into the social answers space, as well as the impact this integration will have on Bing.
- Great Comment on “Repurposing Content: The Definitive Guide” If you missed this guide when it was originally published in January, bookmark and read the entire thing when you have some time. But even if you already checked it out earlier this year, be sure to check out the very thoughtful comment Eugene Farber recently left on the issue of “over-repurposing” content.
- How To Add Google+ Comments To WordPress Easily Find out how to add Google+ comments to your WordPress blog by using code, code for the Thesis theme or one of three plugins. Also get Just Ask Kim’s opinion on how this type of commenting system will impact a blog’s SEO efforts.
Gerald Weber
I founded Search Engine Marketing Group in December 2005. More recently I co-founded viralcontentbuzz.com. which is the free platform that helps bloggers generate REAL "social buzz" on their best content.
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This Week in SEO (4/26/2013)
If you’re signed up to my weekly newsletter, you know what to expect from this post. If you haven’t had a chance to sign up for it yet, I’ve been using the newsletter to put together links to the best SEM & SEO content I’ve come across during the last week.
Since I’ve been really pleased with the feedback I’ve received about the newsletter, I decided to expand the format and publish the links & summaries here.
So without further ado, here are the six links you don’t want to miss:
- How to Contact Google Whether you have an issue with Google+, a Google Business account, AdWords, Analytics, Webmaster Tools, GMail or even YouTube, Kristi Hines has put together an incredibly useful post that will help you get in touch with an actual human being at Google.
- Will Multiple Internal Links with the Same Anchor Text Hurt a Site’s Ranking? According to Matt Cutts, “typically not.” To get the full scoop on this issue, be sure to watch his full video, which is just under two minutes in length.
- Meet AdWords Keyword Planner – The New Google Keyword Tool and AdWords Traffic Estimator Mash-up! This post from WordStream provides lot of great information and tips about how to use Google’s new AdWords Keyword Planner. In case you haven’t heard of this tool, it combines the Google Keyword Tool and AdWords Traffic Estimator into a new interface to make it easier than ever to find keywords for PPC and/or SEO.
- Getting the Most out of Facebook Custom Audiences In this post, the always informative Amanda DiSilvestro discusses the past, present and future of Facebook Custom Audiences. Throughout the post, she explains exactly how you can reap all the benefits this feature has to offer.
- 21 Things SMBs Can Do To Make Google Love Their Website This is a guest post that I actually wrote. Since I specifically targeted it at beginners, feel free to bookmark it or even print it out to use as a reference when you’re talking to someone about SEO/SEM for the first time.
- Penguin 2.0: How Guest Blogging Will Be Affected As Neil Patel discusses in this post, while he has no doubt that guest blogging will remain a valuable online marketing strategy, he does believe there will be five significant changes to it. Those changes are social signals, author rank, devaluing links, devaluing sites and co-citations.
While we’re on the subject of guest blogging, I just wanted to share that we’ve expanded our guest blogging service to offer Silver, Gold and Platinum packages. This makes it easy to get exactly the type of posts you want based on specific metrics like domain authority, PageRank and “social signals”. If you’re interested in getting all the details and pricing info, shoot me an email and I’ll send them to you.
Once you get a chance to check out all the posts, be sure to leave a comment and let me know which one you thought was the most informative!
Gerald Weber
I founded Search Engine Marketing Group in December 2005. More recently I co-founded viralcontentbuzz.com. which is the free platform that helps bloggers generate REAL "social buzz" on their best content.
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What’s New with Viral Content Buzz
I have to say that I’m quite proud to look back and see just how far Viral Content Buzz has come in a little less than seven months. But while we’re really happy with what we’ve accomplished, that doesn’t mean we’re going to sit back and coast. On the contrary, we’re happy to announce the rollout of a bunch of new features!
Since we’ve been gradually testing and adding some, here’s a look at everything we’ve added over the last few months, as well as our brand new features:
- Pinterest Support: Share any infographics or other images that you want through Pinterest. This VCB post has some tips that Pinterest newbies will find especially helpful.
- StumbleUpon Support: Just like Pinterest, we’ve now made it super easy to use VCB in conjunction with StumbleUpon. And as with all the sites we support, you have full control over exactly what you promote and share.
- Bookmarklet: If you want to use VCB with a single click in Firefox, Chrome, IE or Safari, all you need to do is grab the VCB bookmarklet here. And if you’re on your iPad, you can get a bookmarklet for it here.
- Scheduling Tool: This makes it really easy to control exactly when you want sharing to happen.
- Customizable Dashboard: Easily switch between a traditional scrolling layout and a Pinterest-style layout that puts multiple stories on each row.
- Labels and Folders: Under “My Projects,” you can use labels and folders to keep everything organized by topic, site, client or any other structure that you want.
- Karma: Our one-liner for this feature is “the more approved posts you have, the closer you are to being a trusted member.”
- Project Report: Easily see who shared what, and when they shared it. We’ve also made it dead simple to download and/or email a report.
Last month, Ann published a post detailing what the Labs section of Viral Content Buzz is all about. While I highly recommend reading her post, we’ll go over a quick summary now.
VCB Labs is all about coming up with tools and resources to help content marketers. Currently, there are three free tools that anyone can use. They are:
- Pinterest Analytics: Get stats for all images on your site that are being shared. This tool also provides features to help you encourage Pinterest users to share your images.
- Activity Analyzer: Put in any URL (including an RSS feed link), and you can see detailed information about its performance on Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, LinkedIn, StumbleUpon and Google+.
- Twitter Chat Client: Makes it easy to start and engage in a Twitter chat simply by using our Twitter chat application.
That’s Not All
In addition to all the new features that are live and ready to use, we’ve got several more in the pipeline. Keep an eye out for:
- Facebook Page support
- Google Plus support
- Being able to create & send multiple Tweets at once, and then they’ll automatically be spaced out based on the settings you choose (similar to Buffer)
Ann and I truly appreciate all the users who are helping to build VCB into an awesome platform, so be sure to let us know what you think about all the new features in the comments!
Gerald Weber
I founded Search Engine Marketing Group in December 2005. More recently I co-founded viralcontentbuzz.com. which is the free platform that helps bloggers generate REAL "social buzz" on their best content.
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A Bid Farewell to 2012
Well it’s that time of year again folks. Christmas is over and we are about ready to bring in the new year. Since 2012 is coming to a close and the new year is mere hours away, I thought it would be fun to post a short video outlining some of my New Years resolutions for 2013. Enjoy!
Gerald Weber
I founded Search Engine Marketing Group in December 2005. More recently I co-founded viralcontentbuzz.com. which is the free platform that helps bloggers generate REAL "social buzz" on their best content.
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End of the World Guest Blogging Special
It’s the end of the world as we know it and I feel fine!….
Que the music…
Since it’s a the end of the world as we know and we aren’t going to be here tomorrow anyhow I have gone absolutely crazy with the pricing on our guest blogging services.
Guest post today are $75. per post. That’s a whopping 50%. discount off the normal rate.
To get started simply call 281-727-0848 ext 5 or contact us.
Have a happy and safe Armageddon!
Gerald Weber
I founded Search Engine Marketing Group in December 2005. More recently I co-founded viralcontentbuzz.com. which is the free platform that helps bloggers generate REAL "social buzz" on their best content.
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Looking for an AdSense Alternative? Consider T3Ads
Whether your site falls outside of Google’s AdSense program or you’re simply not happy with your current payouts and are looking for an alternative, T3Ads wants to help you maximize the value of your traffic.
What is T3Ads?
Although T3Ads is a new concept, the team behind it has a lot of experience. The platform was developed by T3Leads, which is a company based in Encino, CA. Since 2006, they have provided affiliates and merchants with the tools they need to maximize the value of their marketing efforts. T3Leads’ areas of expertise include US and UK payday loans, debt settlement, home loans, auto finance, home insurance, debt relief and home improvement. They’ve built an especially strong reputation around their payday affiliate program.
Because T3Leads has been working with affiliates for over half a decade, they have seen just how difficult it can be for publishers in many verticals to properly monetize their sites. As the company grew to over 20,000 active affiliates, they had the opportunity to talk to more and more publishers. During these discussions, they noticed that the same issues came up time and time again. Common complaints included lack of human support, unclear policies, low payouts and constant fear of accidentally doing something wrong that would immediately result in a permanent ban.
After continuing to hear these complaints and realizing that Google was in no hurry to change their AdSense policies, T3Leads decided to tackle the problem on their own.
5 Reasons to Use T3Ads
Because the entire platform was built around feedback they received from actual online publishers, T3Ads has several key features that set it apart from other advertising program. Whether you have a single blog or a network of websites, here are five reasons to test out T3Ads:
- 24 hour live support means that if you ever have a question, instead of waiting for days to receive an answer (or never getting one at all), you’ll have an answer within minutes.
- Instead of constant fluctuations, you’ll receive transparent information that explains exactly how your payouts are calculated.
- The easy to use platform makes it dead simple to create ad units and place them on your site.
- T3Ads is far more open with the types of sites they accept, as well as sources of traffic.
- Publishers get full control over how they monetize their site thanks to the ability to easily customize ads.
If you like what you’ve read about T3Leads and their new advertising program, all you’ll need to do is visit their site and complete their simple signup process. And since the company truly cares about taking care of its customers, if you have any questions when you visit the site, all you’ll need to do is grab your phone and call the number in the upper right corner of the site.
Gerald Weber
I founded Search Engine Marketing Group in December 2005. More recently I co-founded viralcontentbuzz.com. which is the free platform that helps bloggers generate REAL "social buzz" on their best content.
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Santa’s Making An Early Run: Save Big on Guest Blogging
Even though the temperature is rising towards 80 degrees outside my office today, I’m still a sucker for the all things Christmas. So, in the spirit of giving, I’ve decided to run a special guest blog post offer. Our standard rate for guest blogging is $150 a post. But because nonstop Christmas music and more glasses of eggnog than I can count have revved up my Christmas spirit to full blast, I’m offering discounts as big as Santa’s belly through the end of December:
- $75 a post for agencies
- $100 a post for individual site owners
That’s a massive savings of up to $75 per post!
(since I don’t want to end up like Bob Cratchit, this deal requires an order of at least 10 posts)
I’m no Grinch, but this deal really is going to end on 12/31. Since the last thing you want is to start 2013 with regrets about not saving money on a proven service, order today so you don’t miss out!
To get started simply call 281-727-0484 ext 5 or simply contact us.
Gerald Weber
I founded Search Engine Marketing Group in December 2005. More recently I co-founded viralcontentbuzz.com. which is the free platform that helps bloggers generate REAL "social buzz" on their best content.
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Black Friday Special Offer: Guest Blogging Blowout!
Hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving! Just wanted to share a quick announcement about a very special offer we’re running:
Black Friday Special Offer: Guest Blogging Blowout
From Black Friday to Cyber Monday (Nov 23 to 26)
- Only 5 Slots Available
If you’ve been thinking about our guest blogging services or know someone who has a guest blogging need, this is the deal to take.
Our normal rate for guest blogging is $150 per post. But from Black Friday though Cyber Monday, we’re knocking $100. off this rate. The first 5 customers who order at least 10 guest posts will get them for just $50. a piece. I must be loco! This offer will end as soon as the 5 slots are taken, so don’t miss out on a chance to get some great links and awesome exposure!
Thanks for reading, and have a great weekend!
Gerald Weber
I founded Search Engine Marketing Group in December 2005. More recently I co-founded viralcontentbuzz.com. which is the free platform that helps bloggers generate REAL "social buzz" on their best content.
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Viral Content Buzz – Take Social Media Promotion to the Next Level (For FREE)
You spend hours researching and writing a great blog post. After editing it several times, you finally hit publish. Shortly after tweeting out a link to it, you notice some of your friends and colleagues sharing the link on Twitter and Facebook. Thanks to this push, readers start coming and you receive several comments on your post. Unfortunately, just as everything seems to be moving in the right direction, it all stops! No more comments, visitors or Tweets. You’ve hit the point where your buzz has completely fizzled out.
Wouldn’t it be great if there was a way to keep the momentum going for posts that you put so much effort into creating? Since myself and everyone else I know within the blogosphere has experienced this problem, I decided to do something about it. With the help of my amazing friend and co-founder Ann Smarty, we created a new social media promotion platform: Viral Content Buzz.
Viral Content Buzz 101
The one sentence summary of this platform is that you can get more social promotion for the great blog posts you write by sharing other people’s great posts through your social media presences. This is done by earning and using credits. You get credits for sharing, and can then use those credits to get your best posts promoted. Keep in mind that all of this is 100% FREE!
In addition to being free, we feel that our focus on quality is what’s going to make VCB incredibly effective for users. Because we want to create the best platform possible for our users, we:
- Manually review submissions to ensure they meet our quality guidelines
- Only allow real social media accounts to share (no bots)
- Reward users who have taken the time to build a strong social media presence with more credits
- Tailor the posts in your dashboard to your industry and interests
Now that you know what Viral Content Buzz is all about, watch this great video that Ann made so you can see the site in action:
The Start of Something Big
Viral Content Buzz is up and running, so you can go sign up now. While we’ve already got a lot of great features, we’re committed to continuing to build on our solid base. Here are some of the additions you can expect to see in the coming weeks and months:
- Support for Google Plus, Pinterest and StumbleUpon sharing
- The addition of a table view layout and the ability to easily switch between both layouts
- Email notifications of project approvals, rejections or stoppages
- Click through reports that detail how much traffic came from users’ shares
- A browser bookmarklet for one-click project additions
- The ability to see the Wuzzrank (social buzz authority) on existing projects
As always, I want to thank you and all of my readers for your amazing support! Once you sign up and try out Viral Content Buzz, be sure to leave a comment with what you think about it!
Gerald Weber
I founded Search Engine Marketing Group in December 2005. More recently I co-founded viralcontentbuzz.com. which is the free platform that helps bloggers generate REAL "social buzz" on their best content.
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I Just Sent Out My First Ask Gerald Newsletter
I’m excited to announce that everyone who’s already signed up for my Ask Gerald newsletter should now have the inaugural edition in their inbox. If you haven’t had a chance to sign up yet, it’s not too late to become part of my free newsletter.
The point of the Ask Gerald newsletter is to make it as easy as possible for you to directly ask me questions. While you will continue to see great content on the blog, I wanted to create a place where people feel comfortable asking direct SEO questions. After evaluating several options, I decided a newsletter was by far the best. Not only does this format allow me to answer individual questions, but it makes it possible to share that information with an entire community of people who truly care about SEO.
Once you sign up, don’t forget to send in your SEO questions. Whether you’ve got a question about building links, increasing your social media presence or dominating a local business niche, I want to provide you with answers. So, be sure to send your questions to askgerald at sem-group.net so I can start answering them in the next newsletter!
Sign up now so you don’t miss out on the next Ask Gerald newsletter:
Gerald Weber
I founded Search Engine Marketing Group in December 2005. More recently I co-founded viralcontentbuzz.com. which is the free platform that helps bloggers generate REAL "social buzz" on their best content.
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