Hi Guys,

Google (Matt Cutts rather ) dropped another bomb after last weeks declaration about Turning off a method of link evaluation that had been around for many years. Now they say they will

Penalize websites for OVER SEO Optimization

Well, as usual, there was an uproar over the issue for a while. Now it is back to business as usual. I am noting down some great points from a discussion from SEO Chat.

In a discussion with Matt Cutts ( head of Google anti web spam team) and Duane Forrester (Manager, Product Marketing, BING) Danny Sullivan of Searchengineland wriggled it out of Matt.

Here is the Audio. I got it from SearchEngineLand. Thanks Barry.

You can go through the full audio it is very informative. But the BOMB we are talking about Matt Saying -

We are trying to make GoogleBot smarter, make our relevance better, and we are also looking for those who abuse it, like too many keywords on a page, or exchange way too many links or go well beyond what you normally expect.

We are left with the following questions.

• What exactly demarcates Optimization from Over Optimization?
• How can we stay clear of Over-Optimization?
• What is the future of SEO?

What exactly demarcates Optimization from Over Optimization?

This is the most important question. To make it simple for you I will say anything that is NOT natural or anything that appears to screw the Search Engine algorithms are going to land you in trouble.

Take the case of keyword stuffing.

How many times do we come across search results like these?
“Delhi tour package, Tour package delhi, New Delhi India tour package, Cheap best fantastic exotic Delhi India tourism”
If Google marks such practices as over optimization, then so be it. I would love to see such sites die. Kick them out of the SERPs all together.

Cases of Link Spamming

Face this rapid fire round of SEO practices questionnaire. When it ends, if you are a smart SEO, many of your questions about the penalty system proposed will be addressed automatically.

1. Do you think it is natural that 100s or may be 1000′s of backlinks materialized to your site in a week?
2. Do you think it is natural when all the links carry the same anchor text?
3. What sense does it make when most of the links point to the sales page with almost no unique information?
4. Why would a dozen blogs from the same IP link to your website? Are they a part of a link scam? Possible is it not?
5. How is it that almost all links to your website are from Social Bookmarks? If you are so popular why dont people mention them anywhere?
6. Is anyone talking about you on Social Media? Why not?

User behavior

Search Engines have evolved drastically over the last few years. Unfortunately most of the self proclaimed SEO experts live 10 years behind their times.

One of the simple things that some people do not understand is User Behavior and its effect on SERP rankings for a website. This is today a strong signal that tells the search engines if a particular result is worthy of its current rank. One such factor is Bounce Rate.

Google and Bing need not have access to your analytic software to calculate your bounce rate. For instance if the User clicks your search result, goes to your website, finds it unusable or not what he was looking for, and returns to the search engine – its a Bounce. (there are exceptions though)

Other things that are important in User behavior is Time spent on site, deep navigation etc.

One thing to remember is what Google keeps saying – Google Does NOT hate SEO. In fact SEO is that what tells Google what a page is about. But spamming the web to screw their algorithm is what Google cannot digest easily and that is why they are considering penalizing such spammers.

I have always believed that factors that are not directly under our control should not result in a penalty against us.

So, I still maintain that a link profile, how ever shaddy should not effect a penalty. It should rightly be devalued. Now, we must see DEVALUATION and PENALTY in different lights.

While devaluation means that you still rank for whatever is rightly yours, a penalty means that you would rank further below for whatever is rightly yours because you crossed a line somewhere.

In no circumstance Google/Bing will want to leave a system open that will allow us to build tons of crap links to new websites that have really great content and blast them out of the competition.

The SEO Industry news got hot last week as Google Rolled out 40 new changes to its Search Algorithm. For those who do not read properly and keep scream ‘Panda – Panda’ the Panda update and Search Algorithm are not one and the same thing.

The Search algorithm is way boarder in scope and complexity than the Panda. Read more about Panda and Inside Search.

Well let’s get back to the hot story. Out of the 40 changes listed the one that made the most noise was ..

Link evaluation. We often use characteristics of links to help us figure out the topic of a linked page. We have changed the way in which we evaluate links; in particular, we are turning off a method of link analysis that we used for several years. We often rearchitect or turn off parts of our scoring in order to keep our system maintainable, clean and understandable.

Now what has been bothering me and a big chunk of the SEO world is what refers to as “method of link analysis that we used for several years” <- this one is probably ‘anchor text’ signal. Here is a reference to a discussion on WmW.

Over the last few months there have been several independent tests by SEOs to determine the role of anchor text today as a signal to SERP rankings. Here is one I remember. Now with the recent declaration that one of the signals is being turned off, we SEOs increasingly feel that its the Anchor Text signal. I mean the ‘exact anchor text’ signal.

Our Link Building activities for the last month has confirmed the suspicion. We got almost no results from ‘exact anchor text’ links generated through social bookmarks. Please note that the bookmarks were the highest quality possible with 100% unique test descriptions in proper English. With about a 100 links to each target keyword we failed to hit the SERPs as hard as we used to do two months before in November.

So, in the eventuality that ‘anchor text’ signals are now dead, what are our options to tell the search engine what is this link about.
How does google calculate what ‘keyword’ to generate for that link in question?
Consider this situation,

We have a great page on “lens making”. So does that mean the link with anchor text “photo films” will carry no benefit at all for the keyword “photo film” because the page that links it is not exactly about it???

In the past we have bragged how related niches that are not competitive provide strong links. But what now?

A lot remains to be answered. We are devotedly researching these developments and we assure you we shall update you with more information that will assist you in keeping your business alive in the face of tough competition and Google Quality standards.

Well yeah, NewDelhiSEO is now in Rajouri Garden. We shifted our office from Patel nagar to Rajouri Garden about 6 months ago.

I won’t waste your time talking garbage. If you need Internet Marketing Services (SEO, SMO or PPC) we are there to help. If you like to sit with your marketing consultant to discuss business growth feel free to place a Visit Request here. We will meet you where ever you want in Rajouri Garden.

We have satisfied clients in California, Boston, New Delhi, Mumbai, Hyderabad and Bhubaneswar. Our expertise has been the Travel Domain though the largest clients hail from Optical Scientific Instruments, Automobiles, Consultancy etc. We compete against some of the top names in Industry like Olympus, MakeMyTrip, Hertz. NewDelhi SEO has helped many fresh start-ups with minimal budget to grow using Internet marketing and outstanding technology (analysis, planning, development, maintenance) consultancy.
Rajouri Garden is a great place to build your business. After moving in to Rajouri Garden we haven’t looked back again.

We have been actively involved in SEO for Travel Industry for the past 4 years. Since some of my team members and I were previously employed by a Canadian Travel company we have a natural inclination towards the industry. People from this sector find it easier to work with us thanks to our years of exposure to this travel concepts and user behavior.

Today I would like to point out a particular problem with Travel Industry. Almost every client we have handled yet has been plagued by this problem. The Problem of Content. For those who are alien to travel trade let me tell you what sells on a Tour and Travel site is a ‘Holiday Package’. Content wise it is basically and Itinerary with photos packaged with some descriptive content to help sell the product.
The problem is we have a zillion travel startups in Delhi (seems like it). Most of those startups begin with very minimal funds. I dropped the count of queries wanting us to develop a travel website for 100$. Even with a 500$ budget its hard for a development company to provide you great content worth promoting. (we are not talking about a handful of pages, rather a full blown website) So what we have are beautiful pages with crap content on them.

While most of the time it is content copied word by word from popular travel companies in other instances it is poorly spun text of the same stuff. When cheap writers try to re-write something original they either infect it with poor grammar and sentence structures or misrepresent facts. The end result, which they claim as ‘Unique’ content, is actually crap that will not only make sure you are flagged as a content spinning site (ref to Google Panda Algorithm)  but guarantee that the visitor gets pissed off and closes the page for good.

copied - copied - copied

We are not interested in fooling anyone and everyone. Take a minute to understand if you really need this course.

This is everywhere. Every forum I visit, my blog, my facebook wall, my google+ stream – everywhere, they ask you what is the Google Panda 2.2 ?

I will use some pictures to explain exactly what is this Google Panda.

Way back in February Google was gifted a Panda. It was a parting gift from Baidu when google failed to continue their operation in China in the face of hostile government policies and hacking attacks. Here is the Panda -

It looks like submitting articles is today a favorite method of link building for many. In this post we will learn how to evaluate / measure the value of an article directory. Do not waste your time submitting to any rif-raf article site. Find the valuable ones and work with them.

Wait before I tell you how good is an article directory we need to know that in this case we are talking about submitting unique informative articles and including our backlinks in them. I am not at all talking about re re-writing useless bits of content and spinning them to get more useless content. This graphic explains my thought better.

Test No 1

Is it a human edited articles site?

If your posts are approved instantly then it is not Human edited.
Are your posts sometimes rejected owning to insufficient information, inappropriate justification of title, bad grammar and language or similar such reasons?  This is good. It would mean human editors are at work and they are closely monitoring your work.

Search engines massively favor such article directories, the ones that are human edited. Even if your article takes a week or two to get approved I would say it is worth the wait. E.g GoArticles Sucks while EzineArticles rocks.

Test no 2.

Are the Links dofollow?

We are doing all this labor for back links. Well there may be other reasons like trust building, branding, talent showcasing but lets not beat around the bush. It always is about the backlinks. So are they dofollow? If not it not worth wasting time on them.
e.g Hubpages sucks while Squidoo Rocks.

Test no 3

How good is the linking structure?

Internal linking is what will add value to your article page. If your article page gathers PR dust and linkjuice then it will send some to your linked pages. That is why you should pay serious attention to  the site navigation or linking structure on the article site. Make sure your articles are reachable in 4 or less clicks from the home page.

Test no 4.

What is the Google PageRank of the Site?

Many people will argue with me that PR is not important. Well it is important. So the higher the PR of the linking domain the higher is the degree of trust it has (generally) and easier it is for you to get some link juice passed to your target pages. When the no of linking domains is accounted for high PR linking domains out weigh lesser PR ones very drastically.

Recently Google and Bing have acknowledged the importance of social media votes as a strong indicator of SERP rankings. It had been previously confirmed by tests done by SEO Moz and Hubspot in separate case studies. Here are some references you might find handy.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ofhwPC-5Ub4

Now some of you may be wondering what has social media got to do with SERP rankings?
Well its got a lot to do there. Hell No I don’t mean those crappy profile links or what they call Angella Paul links. Lnks are a different thing. When we are talking about social media effect we are talking about followers to your brand.

Google blasted of to prominence with their patented technology where they used backlinks to measure the importance of a page. That has remained to this day the most effective ranking parameter for Google SERPS. But things are changing. Social media has caught the attention of the world and more people spend time everyday on the virtual world and connect to their friends. They are real people with real opinion. And this opinion is the new Ranking factor that search engines are crazy after. How much crazy ? Sorry I cannot quantify.

Like we had a world war out there among SEOs over link building we have a similar war breaking out there over getting Twitter followers and Facebook likes and LinkedIn connections. I was recently shocked when I found out people offering me 1000 twitter followers for 5$. Similarly 500 Facebook followers for 5$.  How good are they?

I have always stood by the saying what some free is not very useful and whatever comes cheap is definitely crap. This time I will beg to differ a bit. But still that saying is a fantabulous one you must incorporate. Now we have been strongly adviced against any spamming techniques to follow in getting Social media followers. But how do you think can someone provide 500 facebook likes for meager $5. They will definitely use dummy accounts or illegal methods to use compromised accounts to like your facebook page.

How does that harm you?
Like its easy enough to track when you are linked too much from paid linking sites and bad neighbourhoods, its easy enough to see that you are being heavily followed by inactive followers or compromised accounts. That will bring negative reputation to your brand and might bring down the SERP results as well.

But they are not in direct control of the Brand owning the facebook page or twitter account. So I cannot say if such activity will directly hamper you rankings.

Now lets comeback to my original thought that – I don’t think this is a completely dangerous thing to do. It has some advantages to top up the disadvantages mentioned above.
It has been seen in studies that people prefer to like a page more frequently it there are a larger number of people already following it.
It adds a fair degree of trust to your site when you have thousands of social media followers.
It increases you chance to sell if one user finds a friends face in the facebook box of Fans on your page.

keeping these factors in mind I would say its a PLUS to get some twitter followers and Facebook likes to boost your brand value, even when you know most of them are phony accounts in reality. You need a platform to grow big and this could be that platform.

If Dhirubhai Ambani could melt coins to make a profit out of metal trade then we can definitely use some phony social media accounts to make a profit on our business. Enjoy

Every now and then we hear claims .Info domains are bad for SEO.

How much of it is true?

Did I make a mistake buying the all those .info domains?
Can I compete with other websites like .com and .org with my .info site?

Lets do a quick analysis of the fad that many SEOs (Sex Education Officers) proclaim beating their chests like Orangutans. If you are a monkey in the SEO (Search Engine Optimization) jungle, you need to consult the big Gorillas, Baboons, Chimpanzees, Pandas etc before you jump to conclusions and start monkeying with your website. Well you are free to do that. But Please (please please please …n times) don’t share your expert knowledge with other monkeys. Thats how AIDS (Acute Intelligence Deficiency Syndrome) spread.

Terminating my Monkey Philosophy, we return to the main question about .info (dot info) domains being monkey shit in SERPs.

Well that is NOT true.

I strongly believe (post consultation with experts) that .info .com and .orgs and any other domains are equally good as long as you do justice to them. Each one of them is intended for a special purpose. While .com mean companies; .orgs are organizations; .info are informative sources.

For example if I wanted to make a website on AIDS. I would prefer AIDS.INFO. Why? That is because AIDS is not a company or an organization and when I am talking about it I mean to share information about that concept and of course I am in no mood to sell AIDS to you even as a non profit organization.

It is a matter of Perception, as one of my friends, a reputed Mumbai based SEO points out. He had this real life analogy to share.
He says his close friend had to relocate to a new location in Mumbai because a ‘Red Light Area’ evolved around his ancestors property. Some times you have no other option but to succumb to the pressure of misinformation. Unfortunately we still have Asses as our leaders because there are more illiterates around and the literates are too busy to vote.

But even as I say all that there is one recent trend in domain booking that support the fads to some extent. Some major companies are selling .info at dirt cheap rates. So some people buy them in bulk and slap them on to their websites (301 redirect) expecting a gallop in SERP rankings.
Again these registrars fool you with marketing gimmicks about Consolidating your Brand by buying .info along with your .com. People mostly fall for the .info choice as it is cheap.

There was a post on SEOBOOK some a couple of years back when the .info domains disappeared out of SERPs for a day. Since then many people are obsessed with .info being bad for SEO fad.
The truth being spammy site continue to be given heavy discounts irrespective of the tlds. Its just that more of them happen to be .info because right now they are the cheapest in the market.

Now every now and then people ask me to prove it? The easy way out is to challenge them to Disprove me. LOL. But those are poor AIDS (Acute Intelligence Deficiency Syndrome) patients so we gotta co-operate.

Here is my Proof Why dot info domains are as good as any other TLDs. Normally we see three situations – Is the key word competitive? Is there a TLD advantage? Are there enough results?
http://www.google.com/search?q=check+pagerank&sourceid=navclient-ff&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1B2GGGL_enSG202SG202

Next try these key words – whois info, domain info, ip info where are your F***king .coms and .orgs? LOL

http://www.google.co.in/search?hl=en&rlz=1C1SKPL_enIN409IN409&q=seo+buster&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&oq= 3.8 million results for that. When you are looking in country specific google then the .ru is weeded out in most cases that appears in google.com as the top result.