spencerhoyt.com

Google is debuing their new much-anticipated Gbuy system today which has been refered to as the PayPal killer. Gbuy is Googles attempt to create an online wallet to save you time from entering the same finacial information into multiple websites.

Is this anything new?
10 years ago Microsoft created a simplified system called MS Wallet and you also have this ability with the Google toolbar so I have to ask, what is new about Gbuy??? The press seems to get their panties in a twist any time Google launches a new service, but will Gbuy really make a difference?

I am watching Gbuy with a close eye, but as of now I see no reason to celebrate this new “revolutionary” system.

The last few months many people have speculated over what Google Base actually is. Google Base was launched quietly about 3 months ago and much confusion has spread as to how we can actually utilize this new feature. In a nutshell GB is a free online classifieds that allows anyone to list a product for sale. That got me thinking, doesn’t Froogle do something similar? Well with today’s news that Google Base Replaces Froogle Merchant Center it is now official that we know Google’s intentions.

What will this bring?
Many Exciting things will happen with the merger of these 2 features. Google Base will easily allow almost anyone to offer their products online without much SEO work. The downside is that few people shop Froogle, but in time this will be a major plus for you bargain hunters.

Thinking Outside the Box
Every SEO Professional must be in touch with society and the current trends to stay on top of the game. This can be a difficult thing to do since most people in the SEO industry are let’s call them “Computer Guru’s.” Most Computer Guru’s are usually not in touch with reality and current events. Keeping up with the new trends allows you to focus in on new ways to target visitors to your website.

But How?
There are many ways that help you tap into the minds of pop culture some ways that I like are reading other peoples Blogs, or watching Current TV.

I like to watch Current TV to give me ideas about what is going on in the world because it gives me different views other than what is presented in the mainstream media day after day. Current also features “Google Current” every half hour which tells you what people are searching for and why they are searching for it. It’s kind of like a window into whats happening in the world.

These 2 simple steps are ways that anyone can easily tap into the hearts and minds of what the world is feeling.

But Why?Well if you know what is on people’s minds then you can create targeted content to drive traffic to your website. Remember Link Bait!

Aaron Wall’s mentions on his blog the importance of Current events. He suggest creating a flash cartoon game featuring Dick Cheney shooting people on it as a way to build links in a viral way.

Bottom line is you need to think outside the box to be a better SEO.

Good Luck,
Spencer Hoyt

The terminology between these varies somewhat depending on who you talk to, but generally Link Popularity is a count of links pointing to your page and Link Reputation involves the analysis of the text that point to a page.

Why do I care? Well link popularity is somewhat easy to achieve. The Internet is filled with FFA (Free For All) directories that anyone can get a link on furthermore, it is easy to get a link like Comit Technologies to point back to your website.

Wouldn’t you rather get a link like Fantastic Web Site Design to point back to your website. Or better yet Louisiana Web Site Design to point back to your site.

I am often quoted as saying “Every link counts as a vote! The more votes you get the higher you rank!” While this saying is accurate I would like to take it one step further. When you get a link like Nimlok pointing to your site it counts as a vote, but one vote is not going to make you rank high for your target keywords. To truly rank high you must get “votes” with your keywords pointing back to your site. With the keyword rich text links the search engines not only see a link which increases your link popularity, but they see keywords that link to your website which will increase your websites relevancy for Your Keyword Phrase on top of increasing your link popularity.

Directories are very useful tools that helped to form the Internet, but have little importance today. The biggest directory on the net is Yahoo and they have changed their policy in the last few years to move away from the human edited directory to a spidered search engine approach like Google.

Why?
For a directory to become successful you mast employ hundreds of human editors to review websites and approve what categories to place them in. With the speed of the Internet’s growth this approach is not financially feasible anymore. So now most of the search engines are moving to automated ways of doing this.

As an SEO you can spend countless hours finding and submitting your website to directories or you can focus that time on Real SEO Techniques. Your time is better spent building a spider friendly website and getting the search engine spiders to find your site naturally.