Filed under: Big Site SEO Reviews, Mr. Ploppy by Stuntdubl SEO at 12:53 pm, 10/16/2006
There are so many SEO mistakes out in there in the WWW, that I figured it was worthwhile to showcase some of them to help people improve. I’ve been wanting to do this for a while when I come accross very BAD mistakes on large company websites, but until now haven’t really had the stones to do it. So after this, I bring you the first edition of Mr. Ploppy’s return as a Monday morning SEO Quarterback. If you’re upset that someone is hating on your website - please blame Mr. Ploppy, and not me:)
I will be picking large sites fairly randomly, and offering 2 - 5 suggestions for improvement, because some sites are just SO fubar, that frankly, they probably haven’t yet HEARD the term SEO. It’ll also give a chance to demonstrate some SEO fundamentals (mainly easy ones) that sites should generally always have in place. Hopefully the free advice will be worthwhile enough that the owners won’t get too pissed off at me. This is also my attempt to prove that if SEO is really SO easy - why isn’t everyone DOING it? Just because a company/site is BIG, doesn’t mean it DESERVES to be in the top rankings. Even the big guys should have to prove they know what their doing - it IS kinda simple stuff. Sometimes it’s easy to identify the mistakes, but not always so easy to remedy them.
Filed under: Business Issues, General, Mr. Ploppy, Tools by Stuntdubl SEO at 11:35 pm, 1/29/2006
I did some competitive tools a while back with competitive analysis and keyword tools, but I think the idea of competitive analysis is key to the natural search engine optimization space and is worth revisiting. Understanding your industry from an online perspective is critical to the success of an SEO campaign. There are a lot of tools to better understand your competitors available, and it is definitely worthwhile to use them to your advantage.
Competitive Analysis Tools
Questions from the competitor analysis form on Entrepreneur.com
- Where is your competitor located?
- What are your competitor’s annual sales?
- Who are the major managers and members of the board?
- Is the company owned or in partnership with any other corporations?
- What are the competitor’s strengths?
- What are their weaknesses?
- What is the company’s product line?
- How do the products compare to yours, in terms of functionality, appearance and any other criteria?
- What is their price structure?
- What are the company’s marketing activities?
- What are the company’s supply sources for products?
- What are the strengths and weaknesses of their sales literature?
- Is the company expanding or cutting back?
- Ten more competitive analysis questions
To these I would add:
- What does your competitor rank for?
- Where are the getting links?
- Where are they getting their link power?
- How old is their site?
- Do they have a network of sites?
- What viral marketing methods have they used?
- How large is their site? (how many actual pages?
- Do they have an affiliate program?
- How large is their affiliate program?
- Does their affiliate program pass link popularity?
- Do they use other methods of promotion?
- Do they use offline advertising?
- How well known is their brand?
- What do they do better than you?
- What are their SEM strengths?
- What could be better about their SEM campaign?
- What pay-per-click keywords are they biding on?
Competitive Analysis Discussion and Resources
I usually don’t throw in the sales pitch, but I figured I would today. I offer a money back guarantee on the web marketing competitive analysis report that is the first step for any retainer based We Build Pages clients (and I enjoy doing them).
Filed under: General, Mr. Ploppy by Stuntdubl SEO at 10:36 am, 11/28/2005
Okay folks, there are only so many free tools out there available. For the time being, I’m pretty much out of ideas. If you have ideas for tool lists (or would like to do a tool list) feel free to let me know. At some point, I’ll go back through and redo some of the lists in the compiled internet marketing tools archive, but for now I will just release the occasional tool as I come accross it.
*Blatant self promo - In the meantime, my favorite and most useful tool is the We Build Pages Cool SEO Tool. Here’s a slew of other SEO Tools as well.
Filed under: Business Issues, General, Mr. Ploppy, Tools by Stuntdubl SEO at 9:46 am, 11/7/2005
“Every sale has five basic obstacles: no need, no money, no hurry, no desire, no trust.”
- Zig Ziglar
Sales can be a tough but essential part of business for anyone interested in freelancing or consulting. Good sales can make or break a business. There are not a lot of “online tools” for learning to sell web design and search engine marketing, but there are a lot of fantastic articles and discussions on the subject.
There are a lot of subtle considerations to a sale. Time, budget, risk, likelihood for success, and margins being only a few of the many factors to take into account. As a freelancer just getting started, it is very tough to break it to someone for the first time that you will be charging them $50/ hr. It does get a little easier, but it’s always tough to deliver the blow the first time you decide to raise your prices. I generally only raise prices for NEW clients and give a nice long grandfathered period for older clients. Telling your new rate to someone for the first time is still tough. Not only do they have to decide if you’re worth it…YOU have to decide if YOUR worth it to them.
The number one rule in SEO and web development sales is to conduct yourself in a professional manner. Even if your a greenhorn frontpage webmaster working out of your parents basement, your conduct will leave a lasting impression. Wear a suit (or at least a tie)…it’s only for a few hours. Use professional letterhead, business cards, and contracts. Little details in regards to business go a LONG way when you are getting started as an SEO consultant or web developer.
SEO and Web Development Sales Tools
Resources and top reads on SEO and web development sales
Tags: Mr. Ploppy, SEO Tools, Internet Marketing, Internet Marketing Tools, Business Tools, Small Business, Sales, Web Design
Filed under: General, Internet Marketing, Mr. Ploppy, Tools by Stuntdubl SEO at 12:40 am, 10/31/2005
If you want to inspire confidence, give plenty of statistics. It does not matter that they should be accurate, or even intelligible, as long as there is enough of them.
-Lewis Carroll
I have listed below my favorite website analytics software packages. I must give the disclaimer that learning stats packages is not a fun experience. If a package is slow or frustrating, I generally don’t stick around too long. I value my time pretty highly, and I don’t want to spend it waiting for information that is only marginally important a large majority of the time. This is one reason other providers (of any software really) should take a page from Clicktracks and study usability first.
The below list is fairly biased from my experiences with stats packages. It’s also based on the criteria of needs I have an an analytics software. I won’t name the handful of packages that I have used that were brutally slow, unreliable, or difficult to interpret.
Statistics tracking is *critical*. For most companies, it’s not important in the sense that you dropped two spots in the rankings, or that a certain product does not convert as well three days before Columbus day. That level of granular reporting is sometimes a cause for the lack of usability in packages. Beware of “paralysis by analysis”. The more time you spend looking at your stats, the less time you are spending developing relevant content and links, which what will help to make you feel much happier during the time actually spent viewing your statistics.
What *is* absolutely important is consistency with reporting. To gauge improvement and trends, you need accurate data that is reliable. The integrity of the data needs to be high. If you switch packages too often, you will not have a good level of consistency and will be comparing apples to oranges due to the various idiosyncracies in each package.
Paid Web Analytics Tools
- Clicktracks Demo - Hands down my overall favorite. I am definitely an evangelist for their products. Any areas they COULD have been faulted on they have listened to their customers and improved. Not only a good stats package, but a good example of how to run a business.
- Net Tracker - Played with a demo and had a booth next to some of their friendly folks once. Nice product with some handy path analysis. Check out their free lite edition
- Visitorville - I haven’t used this extensively, but you gotta give them credit for a fun interface
Free Web Traffic Tools
Yes, there are probably many more tools available, and I’m sure some of them are even good. In this case, however, there are lots of CRAPPY tools that I’m always amazed that people have spent money on. Many of the web analytics packages are slow and clunky and don’t really assist with running a business (no wonder so many websites STILL don’t use their statistics more effectively). If you have a package that you’re adamant about (and are not a company rep or someone trying to use your affiliate code) please let me know.
Critical aspects to consider when purchasing Web Analytics Software
Speed of reporting
If I have to wait 5 minutes (or even 2 minutes) for my report it is too long. Initial parsing time is fine, but keep it snappy. Most times, statistical data is needed to backup a brainstorm. Waiting is not very conducive to good creative thinking.
Breadth and depth of reporting - Make it scalable but not overwhelming
You don’t need to know that record cleaning fluid doesn’t sell to Poland on Canadian leap year if you’re a record shop in NYC. You definitely CAN go overkill with setting up your stats packages. Try to start with a scalable product that will cover lots of areas of your statistical needs. Focus on the statistics that will HELP YOU TO IMPROVE ROI. Try to break out each area of your marketing campaigns when possible to get the best and most accurate return on ad spend for each.
Accuracy of reporting
Does the package track visits from your company netowork’s IP address (where everyone’s default start page is your homepage)? How does it determine “unique visitors”? Does it count search spiders and bots as visitors? Every stats package handles things differently, so if you change packages it is important to understand the data interpretation discrepencies, otherwise you might have BIG trouble when going to interpret the data to your BOSS (of course you could look like the HERO if you do it the right way).
Ease of use - Keep the learning curve low
Many people may potentially have to use the program. Probably at least several people should. They all need to know how to use and interpret the data. When a program is difficult to use, or difficult to remember it is very frustrating and counterproductive. You have 73 other things to do, pick a package that is going to make your life quicker and easier.
Know what you need
Your website technology architecture will play a role in which package you pick. I like LAMP myself because it’s less expensive and reliable. Linux/Apache/MySQL/Pearl - PHP - Python. Find out your web platform and how compatible all your elements are. Strategically reducing retrofittings saves lives.
Best Website Statistic Tracking and Logging Resources:
Tags: Search Marketing, Search Engine Optimization, SEO, SEO Tools, Analytics, Project Management, Web Stats, Business
