Business Management Consultant - Stuntdubl Search and Marketing Consulting

Just wanted to do a quick post on the proliferation of twitter spam. It seems there is a group of people that are spamming twitter using people with a decent amount of followers and adding underscores before and after their names. Watch out for people like _stuntdubl_ or _stuntdubl following you - this isn’t me! Thanks to the many folks who let me know about it. If you run into this - just send a message to @spam on twitter and include the name and transgression of the spammer.

Fortunately, my imposter has been deleted, but I’ve had LOTS of smart people wondering if it really was me. This tells me that the spam is probably pretty believable, and likely needs to be stopped (I even had one person congratulate me on my spamming - Note: I am not a spammer - and don’t encourage this behaviour). The email you receive looks fairly convincing, as you don’t notice the underscore (see below)

Below is an example of a twitter underscore spammer squatting on Rand’s name. Don’t let it happen to you, and don’t fall for it either.

This has been a twitter public service announcement:) Thanks again to everyone who let me know right away what was happening.

After having a nice recent conversation with Jeff Liebert lately, I read his fantastic post in the WMW supporter’s forum about Are Businesses and People Adapting to the WWW Publicity Machine? As a brief aside, he had a note about declaring his emancipation proclamation for owning his own name online, so I thought I’d give a few tidbits, based on some of the stuff I’ve done. I had that same AHA! moment several years ago, when I noticed my resume online ranking for my name, and decided it was time to take a more proactive approach. Google results are your new resume whether you’re going on a date, getting a job, or representing your company. Reputation management is the new personal branding. Here’s some tips on emancipating your reputation. It’s not EASY - but it’s better than having a video of someone singing bad karoake ranking for your name.

1. Register your name on Naymz, Linkedin, Myspace, Facebook, Squidoo, Digg and other social media sites.
I repeat this often for good reason. These are great places to start for low competition names. If your name is more common, you will need to get a bit more creative with how you use these.

2. Have a friend interview you.
Do a reciprocal interview, or triangle link exchange interview if necessary.

3. Volunteer to write an article on something you’re good at.
Most sites would love to have some unique content (myself included). Ask them to give you a bio, and link to some of the sites in #1, or embed links yourself.

4. Own your .com, .net, and .org.
At minimum you should own one of these. Is your name Joe Smith? Tack something on the end. JoeSmithblog.com or Joe-smith.net. Don’t be afraid to get a little creative if you have to, just make sure your name is in the domain. Write a couple pages about yourself, put up some pictures.

5. Start a new site or 3 and put your name in the title tag.
Repeat above with alter egos or domain names you thought were cool and registered during a weak moment. Put them to use. Hosting is cheap. Be sure to put your name in the title, url, and any other place you can cram it.

6. Do a couple videos or make a podcast
You can do it with a freakin’ digital camera if you’re really lazy. With universal search, they show up right in the serps. Most industries have some podcasts now - the hosts are always looking for guests, be proactive and pitch a show idea to them.

7. Put a picture up, and make sure to use proper alt text and a caption
Bam! You’re optimized for image search. To be safe, hotlink to it from a couple different places

8. Sign up on a couple forums - Use your REAL name!
Why use an alter ego if you’re going to be a responsible community member anyhow? (you can always sign up with an alter ego for flaming and trolling)
There’s actually an interesting discussion of the topic of using your own name on message boards in the WMW supporter’s forum.

9. Do a press release about how you did something.
You just built a website! You just joined facebook! You just sneezed! Yeah! Yea it’s shameless. You’re optimizing for your name here you remember.

10. Speak at an industry event, local event, or at the local library
You’ll likely get a bio page and a link - and links rule.

Important notes:

• Quit being paranoid - I’m looking in your general direction tin foil hatters - I was that way too - accept it - people will google you, and you might as well be proactive
• Look for places you can publish where your name ends up in the title tag.
• The search results for your name is likely not that competitive unless you have a very common name.
• Use your name in urls, titles, headings, etc, whenever possible. Have a look at important keyword use factors.
• If you have a common name, focus on optimizing a single page versus owning EVERY page in the search result. Use the same techniques, but be sure to link them all back to your targeted high power hub page.
• Another technique with a common name would be to associate a location like Albany, NY or Frankenmuth, MI with your name.

More resources:

• Andy Beal’s reputation management guide
• Lee Odden on reputation management
• B. Pro’s guide to reputation management
• One step further - keywords you should own (wmw supporter’s forum)

What else have you done to "own your reputation" online more proactively?

Over the past two days, I’ve been working with a very sharp gent by the name of Andres Galdames towards earning a certification from Clicktracks analytics. I will spare the usual soapbox shouting for clicktracks and just tell you that they rock and you’re a fool if you’re using other analytics. During the course of reviewing the material, Andres mentioned that he’s been trying to coin a new term - “The father in law syndrome” - so I told him it sounded like a good post, and that I’d do my best to help out.

The search engine father in law syndrome
Let’s hope Andres’ father in law doesn’t get too upset when he reads this, but how many folks have father in laws, or other older relatives and friends that go to google to type in a web address that you tell them?

In simple form - the search engine father in law syndrome is not knowing the difference between a search engine and the address bar, and USING the SE’s as their address bar.

Think I’m kidding? Check out your stats for branded terms (or terms that include any variation of your web address that come from search engines) - that’s the percentage of your visitors that have SEFILS (if you can’t figure out HOW to do this - is just one more reason you should be calling up the fine folks at clicktracks).

So the conclusion becomes: You know your branded traffic can be incredibly valuable (it’s often your repeat visitors) - how can you POSSIBLY let someone else control the other spots in the top 10 for your branded phrases, and risk losing a small percentage of this valuable traffic due to not understanding SEFILS. Any company should DEFINITELY be proactively optimizing to dominate for these terms.

Just when I had hoped branding was dying, it reincarnates itself in new form. Time to start switching those budgets from billboards to branding for SEFILS. Even worse than NOT owning those results, is having something negative in them - the equivalent of someone hijacking your billboard and spraypainting hate slogans on it, or being allowed to buy the radio spot right after yours to tell everybody why your company sucks. I’m guessing someone’s getting fired if that goes down - so why then is it no big deal when it happens in the SERPS?

Unfortunately we can prevent or cure SEFILS, but we can help to treat it’s effects.

On a very related note was the excellent article on Google becoming the new http:

Guides:

• Brian Provost on Rep Management
• Andy Beal on Rep Management
• Li Evans - 31 Places to monitor your reputation online

Neil, Cameron, and I discussed this a bit today on their new show “Rush Hour”, which will hopefully bridge a gap in the two likeminded online communities.

10 Things Diggers have in Common with SEO’s

1. The run websites
2. Many have blogs
3. Willing to forego anonymity to participate in a discussion
4. Enjoyment of tech
5. Enjoying cool ideas
6. Both should agree that the Saginaw Stephen Colbeagle’s ROCK
7. Diggers appreciate links and their value
8. There are ethical and political differences within the community that make for good discussion
9. Diggers nor SEO’s will click on irrelevant ads
10. They’re not afraid to express an opinion

12 Reasons Diggers Hate SEO’s
1. Too many ridiculous acronyms and fast talk
2. Good SEO’s won’t take your money, and bad ones will bleed it from you.
3. Cold calls, and unsolicited mail.
4. Anonymous posts
5. Driveby blog and commmunity spam.
6. Affiliate arbitrage and economic theory can be ugly
7. Irrelevant results
8. Moral, cultural, policital, and ethical ambiguity
9. They don’t know or understand the foundations of the community, and the people that realized that search marketing was a school of thought 12 and 13 years ago.
10. We’re always right, and can’t agree on anything.
11. Comments out of context.
12. MFA FTW!

Why Diggers Really hate SEO

some stuntdubl self promtional spam

For all you other SEO’s who have already come to terms with self loathing - what do you think the reason a majority of diggers don’t post to my siteyour site, or your favorite SEO communities? Alternatively, what do the two communities have in common?

Okay REALLY - don’t digg my site unless I write something like this

Brian thought a contest for Ted Leonsis would be a good idea - and of course Michael’s always up for a bit of SEO experimenting. I think this “contest” offers a good opportunity to demonstrate the importance of rep management in a positive way. I created a Ted Leonsis page as well - so if that page manages to win - I’ll gladly donate Brian’s money to charity (Leukemia research). My plea to those that compete is that you keep it clean - focus on Ted’s accomplishments, and help teach people about the positive things he’s done instead of just being a wanker and tryin’ to get something to rank. I’ll gladly put up a bio or redirect after the first of the year, if Ted bothers to comment on the contest at all.

For the very short time I’ve been aware of Ted at AOL - he seems like a good enough chap. He DOES get SEO - at least he knows OF it. That’s honestly a lot more than most non-search executives I would venture to guess. I really couldn’t run AOL - I’d probably try for a little while and snap in about 6 months of having to wear a suit everyday, but I think Ted is giving the wrong message that ANYONE can do DIY SEO at a high level.

He’s honestly doing a pretty good job of improving the exposure of SEO - which is something I always appreciate. I hope that it will be kept a positive experience for all involved, however. Ted did us a solid by MENTIONING SEO to the kind of folks that know and listen to what he has to say. Despite not COMPLETELY understanding the wonderful world of search optimization and reputation management - Ted is aware of it, and should be somewhat commended, and not chastized for his beginner knowledge. Tagging a subdomain on AOL is a pretty easy way to do SEO - you have to admit - but there’s a LOT of other room in the top 50 or top 100. Please keep it clean folks.

There’s a gentleman by the name of Ted Leonsis at AOL that wanted to rank well for his own name - I’m sure he’s a decent chap - and thought I’d help out by linking to Ted Leonsis at threadwatch, and Ted Leonsis at Johnon, and Ted Leonsis at Wolf-howl.com He’s a great example of why folks should be proactive about rep management for their own names.

Other sites:
Teddie at scoreboard
Ted at squidoo
Ted Leonsis - via AOL
Ted Leonsis - via AOL corporate
Ted Leonsis - via washington capitals
Ted Leonsis - via wikipedia
Ted Leonsis - via Washingtonpost
Ted Leonsis - via Imedia
Ted Leonsis - via Edge
Ted Leonsis - via Technorati
Ted Leonsis - Richard - playing for blackbear soccer united.