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I just came across an interview of NFFC from 3 years ago. It is just as good today as it was back then...maybe even better.

I recently finished reading Nicholas Carr's The Big Switch, and as a longtime fan of his Rough Type blog asked if he would be up for doing an interview. He said sure, and here is the interview.

What is The Big Switch about?

It's about the interplay between technology and economics and how it influences the way people live and work. I look at how the electric grid transformed industry and society a hundred years ago, which is a cool story in itself, and then I use that story as a way to explain the similar shift that's going on today with computing, as software applications and data storage shift onto the Internet's computing grid. I argue that the rise of "cloud computing," as it's called, will also have far-reaching social, cultural, and business effects - some good, some bad.

What inspired you to write The Big Switch?

It's been clear to me for a number of years that the Internet was going to transform computing - to turn it into a kind of centrally supplied utility. I guess I just wanted to put that shift into a broader context for readers, a historical and economic context as well as a technological context.

The web empowers many individuals. Yet in spite of all this innovation, the middle class in the United States is hollowing out. Why is that? As individuals how can we protect ourselves from that trend?

People with computers and Internet connections have enormous new opportunities to express themselves, and a smaller set of people have also gained new economic opportunities thanks to the Net. But I don't see any sign that the economic opportunities are being widely spread, as they were with industrialization in the last century. I think what we're seeing, in fact, is that software can take the place of labor on a broad scale without creating large new pools of attractive jobs. That's one of the main reasons the middle class has been stagnant in recent years and the divide between the very rich and everyone else has been growing ever wider. As the cost of computing continues to fall, software-based automation will only expand and accelerate. There will still be lots of good opportunities for individuals - the ranks of the rich are bigger than ever - but for the middle class in general things will likely get tougher.

With the publishing economy becoming more attention based, will most writing come in chunks so small and so fast that they lack context and the bigger picture? If so, how could this trend be reversed?

I think it's quite clear that the Internet is training our minds to take in information in quick bursts and that in turn we're slowly losing our ability to maintain the concentration and patience necessary to read extended pieces of writing. This is a phenomenon that many people who use the web a lot have noticed. I think we're probably at the start of a major shift in cognition, and I doubt it's reversible.

Sometimes I read TechMeme and 100 claimed thought leaders are all agreeing on the same thing. Then the next day (or sometimes two days later) you write about how all of them are wrong, and then 2/3 of them agree with you. What makes your contrarian blogging so captivating and buzz-worthy?

The wisdom of crowds is, I think, greatly overrated. Crowds are usually full of crap. So if you see a blog mob happily racing off in one direction, you can be pretty sure that if you go the opposite way you'll find something interesting.

TechMeme, by the way, is a great site to visit if you want to get a quick read on what's going on at the moment in the Internet end of the technology world. But it's a very dangerous site to spend a lot of time on if you're a tech blogger. It narrows your view and promotes rapid-fire me-too-ism. It's better to try to seek out interesting new sources of information, to give yourself some space to think rather than just reacting.

Some bloggers have called you cynical, but many of them fail to see connections that you easily make. What makes it so easy for you to identify relationships that others miss?

I don't really know. Being open to a broad set of influences is important, I think. To me, what's fun about writing - and about thinking, for that matter - is making unexpected connections. When most people write, they get very earnest. They approach writing as if it were work. It's better to be playful, to let your mind and your sentences take chances.

Is user generated content an answer to anything, or does it only accelerate the diminishing content quality problem?

People write blogs and upload photos and videos and tag content because they enjoy it. It gives them satisfaction. There's absolutely nothing wrong with that. But user-generated content does not exist in a vacuum. It competes with other content, and because it's cheap to produce and usually given away free it has a big market advantage. You have to ask yourself what's going to be crowded out of the market - what good stuff are we going to lose. A lot of people seem to think that new digital media represents a break from mainstream mass media. I don't see it that way. I think new media represents a continuation of mass media and a further amplification of some of mass media's worst qualities.

You mentioned studies about political blogs in The Big Switch. From those studies, it seems links, attention, and readership seemed confined and self-reinforcing in some ways. How may search engines (and other gate-keepers) promote the creation of balanced content when people typically vote for content that is aligned with their biases and identities?

That's a good question, but I don't have a good answer. I think what we're going to see is greater personalization in search and other filtering and navigation tools, and in time that will tend to further reinforce biases and push people to have less sympathy for views that are different from their own. I think media personalization is good for search engines and advertisers. I don't think it's a great thing for society.

Some publishing companies already use profit potential to guide what types of content they create and what topics they cover. Could this create a thinning out in many important fields where the economic viability of the publishing in the field is limited?

In the long run, all for-profit publishers are influenced by profit potential. How could they not be? That's not meant as any kind of criticism of journalistic ethics. It's just a simple observation that production shapes itself to the market. So, looking again at the longer term, you can expect that the combination of unbundled content and precisely targeted advertising will mean that some types of content, including some times of very serious, very worthy content, will fall by the wayside or be shunted to a small elite. We may come to look back fondly on the days of bundled content and lots of cross-subsidies.

How far will the shift to publishing profitable topics go. Might we see a weekly (or daily) NYT story on Viagra?

I think it will be more subtle than that, at least for the top papers. What we'll see is a slow but meaningful change in what's published and how it's published as publications adapt to the new modes of information consumption among readers and the new expectations of advertisers.

I just added a subscription based service to access parts of my website. Do you see publishing shifting to charging less for content (using content for marketing) and charging more for interaction? In what areas may selling content without interaction be a viable business model 20 years from now?

I think there will always be niche markets where specialized content carries a high value, and printed books and magazines will probably continue to sell well for a good long time. But for most online publishing, including interactive publishing, a subscription fee is an awfully hard sell.

Increasingly we let machines make decisions for us, which on the surface simplifies things. But what are the hidden costs?

When you let machines take over parts of your thinking, you start to think like a machine. This is the greatest danger posed by the Net. Computers get a little smarter, we get a little dumber, and eventually we meet somewhere in the middle.

Do you feel you have a health records problem, or was Google's recent move into the space guided by profit potential? At some point will people refuse to use the data hoarding ad networks?

There's a huge health records problem - a fatal problem for some unfortunate folks. I think Google sees this as a problem to solve, a problem well suited to its own expertise. I applaud them for their ambition. But I think that using health records as a platform for advertising is dangerous and unethical, and so while I don't doubt Google's good intentions I am very suspicious of how its program will actually play out.

If I was new to the web and wanted to write for a living, where would you suggest I start? What was key to helping you becoming a great writer?

First of all, thank you for the compliment. I think the best way to learn to write well is to read a lot, particularly when you're young and impressionable. If you want to write for a living on the web, your best bet is to find a niche market that's attractive to advertisers, start a blog, and then work like hell. You'll still probably fail, but you never know.

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Thanks Nick. If you would like to read more from Nick please check out his Rough Type blog. Go buy The Big Switch today as well, I promise you will like it.

A recurring theme in the 2008 link development panel was hand checks and the editorial nature of search, especially from Roger. Great article well worth a read. Thanks Rae!

I have been a longtime reader and fan of BlueHatSEO.com, and recently asked Eli for an interview. He said sure, and here it is.

What is your background? What got you into SEO?

I started around '95-'96. I had a lot of interest in music and games and stuff so I created a couple sites related to stuff I normally really enjoy and download a lot. I got in good company with a few guys who ran hosting and colocation companies who made quite a bit of money so naturally my focus started shifting towards how I can make as much as they do. From there it kind of spurred into researching and developing traffic generation and search engine related stuff in an effort to keep up with these guys who had quite a bit more resources and money than my broke ass did. From there it kind of escalated and apart from a short break in college I've been doing it ever since.

You have many original posts on your blog highlighting many interesting techniques I have never heard shared publicly before. How do you come up with all your new ideas?

Thanks, even though they seem pretty generalized and polished many of the techniques I talk about are developed from either a problem I've had to solve in the past or stuff I've encountered while dabbling in specific industries. For instance bloggers as an industry have a multitude of resources and methods they use to promote their blogs. While a lot of their techniques may seem like common sense to them and are well formed over years of experience and others fine tuning it, their methods and resources may not be so obvious to people in other industries. It's fairly safe to say that I have ADD when it comes to jumping around in various niches and markets so I get a good variety of the unique ways each one markets their sites. While it may be standardized stuff to them, many of the techniques can be spun and with a little creative twist can be applied to any other form of generic sites. So while many of the techniques may create a Why didn't I think of that moment, most are well practiced and many marketers within the specific industries they came from know no other ways of doing it. I just kind of twist them and collaborate them into a methodology anyone can use based on my own experiences and how I've applied them to my sites. Eitherway none of the techniques I talk about ever negatively affects my actual business and I usually have the techniques spun an even better way before I give out the old way.

Isn't the value of many aggressive SEO ideas inversely proportional to the number of people using them? What makes you decide what ideas to share and when to share them?

In many cases that's absolutely correct. I've shared several techniques that have died within days of posting them. Just to list a few examples, my Abandoned Wordpress series, Wikipedia Series, and Amazon.com exploits. In all these cases I know before I ever post it that it'll die moments after I do. So most of the time I'll post it out of greed. They are usually techniques I've been using for several years and have since retired them out and quit using them. Naturally with any technique others are bound to figure it out. When I start seeing them popup underground and are being used against me in increasing numbers when I'm no longer using them myself I might as well wreck it. There's a saying; If you're going to wreck a room, you might as well WRECK IT. So in those rare cases when a retired technique starts becoming this annoying little buzz in my ear I might as well squash it and help out a few of my readers at the same time. Win-win if you ask me. Most of my other techniques on the other hand are scalable and free range. I develop them to last, so whether I'm the only one doing it or everyone else on the net is doing it they're not something that can get stopped only suppressed. Often times through saying stuff like Don't do that, its sneaky and we don't like it. Existing propaganda and inherent difficulties in the technique itself usually take care of the rest and help weed out the people who just read for entertainment. There are a few people however that have been reading since the very beginning and after every single post actually do every technique and report back to me through email. They'll be the first to testify that the techniques almost never die, and just because many people know about them doesn't mean everyone is actually using them.

What are QUIT and SQUIRT? Is your system fairly scalable? What types of risks are associated with using them? What types of site should I consider using them on?

QUIT stands for Quick Indexing Tool and SQUIRT stands for Super Quick Indexing & Ranking Tools. My office is filled with wacky and weird acronyms. QUIT is the free one that basically employs several hands off indexing techniques I've developed over the years. It helps get the submitted site crawled by the search engines very quickly, and often times indexed within a day or two. It works off a very simple principle. How many ways can you think of to attract a search engine bot to a specific url? Make a list...figure out a way to do each one with a hands off approach (can't modify the site). You got yourself a Quick Indexing Tool. :) SQUIRT is the paid version and works much the same way. It employs all the techniques QUIT does plus a few extras that aren't scalable, so the membership must be limited. It also goes one step further and develops a bit of link worth to the site to ease it into better deep indexing and rankings. Lastly, it uses analysis of the site to counter a few shortcomings through hands off methods. Just as an example, if a page of the site doesn't have the targeted keywords in its title, then give that page a few backlinks with the keywords as the anchor text. Stuff like that. Most of it is very simple, there's just a lot of it in play at once.

If search did not exist what do you think you would be doing right now?

Lol, I'd be super sizing your Value Meal.

Currently it appears as though Google is heavily focused on domain age and authority. Do you see them staying this way for a long time? Does improving automated content generation technology make it hard to move away from domain authority? Where do you see them going next with their relevancy algorithms?

I'm going to have to politely disagree with that. I think Google is moving in the opposite direction. More towards LSI technology and content relevancy as it pertains to the domain as whole much like Yahoo has been trying to pull off for many years. I think the direction switch started taking place when MSN came out with its own engine. While MSN focuses heavily on age as it pertains to their index rather than actual domain age back when it first opened it had a very young and growing index. So the rankings were more determined by keyword relevancy. So there was a brief period where MSN had all these really nice fresh sites and while rankings were much easier to come by they had fresh results with newly updated content and newer sites with better information. Meanwhile Google, who was relying heavily on DMOZ (as a basic prerequisite for rankings) was finding themselves with SERPS that had a bunch of old stagnant abandoned sites. This was very apparent if you were developing sites in aged industries such as Real Estate. Just three years ago if you had a real estate site, no matter how good it was, it was constantly outranked by old agent cookie cutter sites, and unless your site was at least a year old it would have a hard time even popping into the top 100 for its keywords. Now you can see things moved in quite a bit different direction. You can get a site competing in an aged niche just as easily as long as the content fits properly and in a much shorter time (3-8 months as apposed to a full year minimum in certain cases). I do agree and see authority as a big issue though. Fortunately authority can be replicated and pushed. I did a post awhile back called SERP Domination that talked about ways to push authority and get a brand new site to compete in highly competitive niches. I think improving your automated content plays a big part in that.

Google is starting to move away from being a search engine toward being a content host. How do you see this affecting the future of spamming Google?

Absolutely. There is a breaking point in Google becoming a content host, which I'm certain is their overall goal. As long as they can reward the contributors with increased traffic to their site (ie. -negative rankings..above the top listing like with google base products) people will be willing to donate content to them. I for one will testify that Google Base is very difficult to spam on a mass level as apposed to their search. This is due to the fact that they have a very good hands on antispam team and their content levels are low enough for human checks to be possible. The way I see it is, as their content hosting efforts increase, so will the possibilities for spamming them on a mass scale. It's just a matter of time. Until then, I limit my spamming of them at a level just below getting caught. At the moment, unlike Adsense, their multiaccount banning capabilities are very well done and to be frank it works out well for them. Their content is very good and in all objectiveness very well kept as far as spam goes.

I have never done much overtly black hat SEO. I was not good at programming when I got on the web and after I had been online for a few years I decided to try to build things that can grow logarthimically. Can black hat techniques grow logarthmically? Do you have any strong branded sites to stabelize your income if the black hat streams come and go? How many different website marketing techniques do you use at any given time?

With beautiful domains like blackhatseo.com and seobook.com theres no doubt in my mind you have a nack for predicting the next big things in the industry. If I were you I wouldn't bother with black hat either. You obviously got it made with the skills you already have. I do preach a lot about programming and building sites through autogeneration. In fact a lot of people consider my style Code SEO. I have quite a few very high profile sites, you've probably heard of them and they do bring in good money but I don't ever really talk about them. I like to diversify my investments because not every investment is solid. As far as my blackhat network goes it is actually as solid as it gets. It's very rare when a black hat site of mine gets banned and if you saw one unless you have a really well trained eye you'd probably have a very hard time knowing it was black hat. Thats just part of the investment though. The more legit you can make things appear while autogenerating it the more income you can squeeze out of it in a site's lifecycle.

What is the longest timeframe you have seen an overt black hat site rank for in the various engines? How much have the lifespans of these types of sites changed over the past 5 years?

I think the lifespans of black hat sites increase as your skillsets increase. I have some black hat networks that are still around now and bringing in income and gosh I don't even remember when I made them. Thats also why I talk a lot of "hosted black hat sites" on orphan subdomains and such. Like in my recent SEO Empire post. They really help when making the obvious ones stick. I usually stick to the rule of thumb, if you can mimic the footprints of white hat sites and minimize the footprints of blackhat sites than theres no reason why they shouldn't last forever. Search engines can only ban a footprint that no legitimate sites use. So if you're interested in starting blackhat, as long as you stick by that principle you'll be just fine as far as investments go.

Are there some markets that are too competitive for automated marketing? How do you do successful black hat SEO in hypercompetitive markets like mortgage or insurance?

I don't personally compete in competitive black hat dominated markets, like you mentioned mortgages and pharmaceuticals and such. I feel a little more secure with my black hat sites roaming around the longtailed phrases and localities. It's just a matter of putting in the extra effort which in those cases I'm too set in my ways to sit down and accomplish. I know several people who do strictly that and make a very good living, but I personally have no strong opinions on the matter. So I leave those markets to the pros and if I want to get competitive I use my white hat sites to do it.

Do you do much client work? Have any AdSense sites? Do you mostly rely on affiliate commissions? Have any infoproducts or more tools coming out? What business model do you see as the best source of growth for established SEOs? What segment do you think looks best for new webmasters?

I've never done any client or paid SEO work. I couldn't imagine a worse form of hell to be honest :) I do answer a lot of questions privately though, or at least as many as I have time for. I have lots of adsense sites. I do mostly affiliate marketing and CPC, but I've spent a couple years of my career building actual ecommerce sites. Other than additions to SQUIRT I really don't have any new webmaster related products coming out. I had a few ideas I set into motion but it may be a looong time before they actually come around. I would like to do more though, but I'm afraid of spreading myself too thing. Internet Marketers as I'm sure you're well aware of can be very demanding of ones sanity. When it comes to business models though I wrote a post called SEO Empire. It is MY business model. I've always wanted to write a detailed article on web investments and that's probably as close as it comes to making me happy.

Given the offline macroeconomic trends and trends online what high growth markets do you think are currently less competitive than they should be?

Well of course I'd have to couple trademarked markets into that group, such as myspace, facebook, digg and such. As long as they are working hard to knock down the big boys in the coattailing markets theres always room for new growth. The biggest market I see right now that no one has yet to figure out a good way of capitalizing on is web episodes and webtv. Theres sites like tv-links and other show specific sites that give out streaming episodes of tv shows and movies that are in constant danger of copyright infringement and being shut down by their hosts. More often than not these types of sites get more traffic than they can handle very quickly just because they are in such high demand. Even just putting up a simple site for a small anime type show with all the current episodes available to stream can drive thousand of visitors a day within a month or two of being brand new. The only problem the industry has to figure out is how to keep from getting shut down and attacked constantly. This just goes in line with a theory I've started pushing my own company towards quite a few years ago that television and the Internet are increasingly having an effect on each other.

You seem to be quite outspoken about there being many scams and a lot of hype in the SEO market, complete with A lists and all that sort of stuff. Do you ever see these trends changing? Are these niche specific, or just a reflection of general social structures that cross all lands and industries?

Yeah thats definitely a topic I feel very passionately about. I think scams and hype only exist where theres opportunity. Our industry just happens to have a ton of opportunities for it to flourish. I just try to do my part, step up the plate and make a difference. I take it to a bit of an extreme though by attempting to cover the Advanced SEO topic which is kind of like the Antarctica of SEO, most know its there but how many have actually seen it talked about? The reality is, all I'm doing is making changes by example. I'm saying this is how I want SEO blogs to be like, the spirit can be applied to just about any aspect of our industry including newbie material. Persistently, instead of using the success of it to promote myself or advertisers I use it to promote other likeminded blogs. Many small blogs have made it big and exploded over night just by showing they have what it takes by writing a guest post on Blue Hat and getting it published. Thats where I'm seeing this trend go every day. I really don't think it'll be very much longer before the bloggers that work torwards being helpful start really showing that they are truly taking over. You can see the gurus that establish their expertise by bragging rather than showing are starting to slope and decline to make room for those that are mimicking the helpful spirit. It's just a matter of time and I think it'll come faster than people imagine :)

I am new to online marketing...what books, articles, blog posts, and blogs should I start reading?

Lol, ass kissing aside, i really do send nearly all new people to the industry that talk to me to SEOBook. SEO book gives it out clearly and explains the stuff they need to know. Everywhere else tends to be flooded with bait and switch tactics and misinformation that leads them to the exact opposite direction they should be going. Not only is it a good resource but it's miles ahead of the other blogs and books trying to attract "offer fillers." <- my affectionate term for John Chow readers (my words not Aarons). I also like several blogs where the writer is not only talented but is also in the thick of the industry just like his/her readers and trying to make his way. For instance JonWaraas.com does a great job candidly talking about his experiences and what he's learning at the moment. He's also cool enough to share his sites with you. A great step from there might be the late NetBusinessBlog.com where the new writer and past talk about nice little techniques that range anywhere from intermediate to advanced and are always a great read. Also can't go without mentioning EarnersBlog.com, busin3ss.name, and professionalmiddleman.com.

I am new to the web...when should I consider quiting my job to be a full time marketer/webmaster? What are the biggest attributes I need to succeed online in today's market.

By all means please eat. Three out of every four projects I develop fail overall. As a new person to the business expect to do much worse, so make sure to take care of yourself first and the business second. The added stress of having to pay bills while developing your business only escalates the toll off the inevitable failures that await you. Thats the beauty of the Internet business. hehe don't just dive into a pool without checking the water first. You can get started without a $100k+ startup cash and tons of risk. You'll still have to work just as hard as any other business startup, you just have the luxury of being capable of starting small. The only quicksand you'll run into is the myth that you can make money in your spare time. Many often figure out, who actually has SPARE time? You have to treat it just like a regular job. Make smart investments in both time and money. Build and escalate until your other job starts to phase out. When you can finally answer both of these questions with a yes you should be good to quit your day job. 1) Does your day job earnings supplement your online earnings? (or is it visa versa). 2) If you suddenly got sick and were taken away from your online work for three months, would you come back to a business that has grown?

What is the best keyword you have ever ranked for? What is the best keyword you ever ranked for using almost nothing but automated mareting free content?

Should have specified a time frame, but since you didn't we'll go old school :)

At one time or another in my career: Music, MP3, Downloads, Freeware, Real Estate, Games, WWW, Homes, Pamela Anderson, Internet, Bikini, Sites and College.

No, sad to say I don't have any sites that still rank for any of those terms. :( But I still do have some very competitive phrases amongst my sites today, they just can't compete with some of the million dollar ones from back in the day when SEO was relatively new.

Have you ever felt a search engineer was lying about something? If so, have you ever called them out on it?

I think we're being lied to about nofollow. Consider this the call out :)

It seems as though large branded sites are able to get away with far more than smaller newer websites can. What tools or features would you like to see search engines make available to help level the playing field? Do you think search engines are more focused on relevancy or profit?

I think they're focused on profit through relevancy, and currently they attempt to accomplish that with authority factors. The playing field isn't level because its designed not to be. I honestly wouldn't want it to become level and fair. I kind of see it as "I don't have to outrun the bear, I only have to outrun you."

Do you ever see search losing some of its importance? What might replace it?

Webmasters set the pace the web, they always have. What's important to the webmasters becomes important to the users. It was the webmasters that made Google, MSN, and Yahoo important not the other way around. Just throughout history, the moment webmasters quit caring about something it becomes obsolete and forgotten by everyone within no time, the opposite is also true. It's entirely possible that search will lose its importance. I don't see it happening anytime soon, but if the average webmaster gets frustrated enough with them and a good alternative comes out I'm sure it won't take very long from that point before its gone. A good way for them to begin that process might be to hand pick a couple sites like wikipedia and have them conquer every single result...oh wait.

Do you ever see Google losing their dominance? What might replace them?

Going along with the above question, there was a short time in Google's history right before Matt Cutts and Webmaster Guidelines/Tools where they started becoming very secretive about their algorithm and lost nearly all contact with webmasters outside of a submit url button. During that time a whole multitude of search engines and creative forms of search started popping up like crazy. It was like there was a new one almost every day. Some were really fun to play around with. None really had both the form and function that would of inspired a permanent switch for me, but it goes to show how easy it is and I doubt Google will make that mistake again.

Do you feel domains names have large synergies with SEO? I am currently not using the domain names BlackHatSEO.com and WhiteHatSEO.com to their full potential. What do you think I should do with them? What would you do with them if you owned them?

I think domains are a very large factor in SEO and I don't think many will disagree. I was always curious about those domains of yours Aaron. They're awesome. I'm sure you get asked 10 times a day to sell them. Why not throw up forums on them or even mashups? I understand your underuse of them though, I'd be all excited to get them but then I'm certain a hard reality would hit and I'd come up blank for what to actually do with them. I personally would love to some day see an AskABlank SEO site. I'm sure you've seen the format before, its like Ask A Midget(hypothetical, don't go searching for it). Then people get to submit questions and the midget answers and it gets posted publically covering various topics, but with SEO. An idea?

Why BlueHatSEO? Why not another word/color?

Completely, 100% random. I'm not even fond of the color Blue, Green is my fav. If you've ever noticed, the site is extremely generic. Default Wordpress template, No SEO, no link building (never even done a link exchange), no link bait, no nofollow tags, no submissions to social sites, no promoting...absolutely nothing from the very beginning. Very very -by- all definition and to the core... pure white hat. I did it intentionally to make a point. Interesting Trivia For Ya: Can you name the ONE other popular SEO blogger that has also done it? Minus maybe the ridding of nofollow tags. :)

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Thanks Eli. Be sure to check out his blog at Blue Hat SEO.com.

While being much less self promotional than others in the same field, Debra Mastaler is nonetheless one of the most well known and creative link builders in the industry. I have wanted to interview her for a long time since she has a unique way of working but she’s hard to pin down and not very good about returning interview questions…

Danny Sullivan has been covering search for over a decade and is known as the leading expert in the field of search. I recently asked Danny for an interview and he said sure. We talked about search, marketing, and doughnuts.

Michael Mann founded BuyDomains, and numerous other companies through his WashingtonVC incubator. He also launched Grassroots.org and the Make Change! trust, and authored the popular ebook Make Millions and Make Change! for entrepreneurs and non-profits. After reading his book I asked him for an interview and he said sure.

Why is confidence so important when starting a business?

Having coined the term domain investor, Frank Schilling is a recognized leader in the domaining field. He talks about domaining on his blog at Seven Mile.com

Although I don't read as much literature as I would like to, I have enjoyed Kurt Vonnegut's writing a few times. Cory Doctorow mentioned his passing. Kurt was interviewed here, here, here, here, here, and here.

Rae recently posted a 5 person interview about link building that is well worth a read. 5 experts are interviewed. Each answers a set of questions without seeing the other answers until after the interview.

Graywolf recently interviewed RC Jordan about SEO. Great interview of one of the true industry pioneers.

I have been a long time fan of Brian Clark. His blog, Copyblogger, is crisp, clear, and entertaining. He recently announced that he is a 2007 Bloggies award finalist.

Brian recently revised my salesletter, and I asked if he would be willing to do an interview. He said yes, and so it goes...

DigitalGhost is an odd fellow, in a good way. Always a blast to chat with, and a smart guy who gives me lots of good advice. He recently started blogging again, and that prompted me to ask him from an SEO.

Scott Smith, also known as Caveman, is one of my favorite personalities in the SEO business. I recently have done work with him on numerous projects (look for an official announcement of some sort soon), and Scott always seems to have a slightly different (and far more brilliant) angle than I on many SEO and marketing related issues.

I wanted to interview him for probably at least a year, and I finally got him to say yes :)

Bob Massa is one of the most eloquent people in the search marketing industry. I have wanted to interview him for a long time, and finally got around to it.

He was probably one of my favorite interviewees.

Paul Graham was recently interviewed on TechCrunch, where he said:

The easiest way to make something people want is to make something you want. What do you wish existed that doesn’t?

Every market has a ton of those opportunities if you know the market well and are passionate about it.

Not in German, but a bit of a focus on Germany in this 29 minute Matt Cutts podcast interview.

I recently asked Dan Kramer of KloakIt if I could interview him about some common cloaking questions I get asked, and he said sure.

A while ago I contacted Kim Krause Berg for a usability review, but I threw a curve ball in on her. I asked her how I could make this blog more usable. I believe Kim is the first person who has ever offered blog usability review services.

Her feedback was why I made the changes mentioned here, and many other site improvements. I asked her if she would let me interview her about blogs and blog usability and she said sure. The interview is in the extended area of this post.

I recently interviewed Seth Godin. Seth is a well known marketing guru who's blog and books have helped me become a more holistic marketer. I read everything he writes. He also did a video interview on AuctionBytes recently.

Here is the interview:

I will probably start doing a few more interviews in the coming months. I recently interviewed Lee Odden, who is a well known blogger, SEO and public relations expert.

Lee Odden interviews Stuntdubl and Lee gets interviewed here

John Battelle speaks to Google NYC

While I have grown to hate SEO contests I currently am the only advertiser for the phrase on Google AdWords and here is a free link for my brother v7ndotcom elursrebmem, although he is going to have to be a bit more innovative than that if he actually wants to win. I really would like to see Graywolf win the v7ndotcom elursrebmem contest.

Interview of Martinibuster

I recently interviewed Greg from BOTW. He chats about directories, blackjack, and running some of his other web based businesses.

He also offers a discount for BOTW submissions at the end of the interview.

Andy Hagans recently swore to the importance of his accessible white hat SEO techniques, and I asked him about his love for haggis.

Tips on blogging, outsourcing, link building, and other goodies in the Andy Hagans interview.

The man, the myth, the Mick Jagger of search, well I guess he doesn't really go by that name ;) but...

Matt Cutts was nice enough to answer a bunch of questions I asked him via email.

For the gray hat in the crowd, I asked Matt what fields SEOs should look at as search advances. He said:

If you're creative, I'd look at the marketing/buzz aspect of things. A person who is savvy about marketing will often have a good leg up on interactions with people. If you are a talented backend person, there's a ton of neat start-ups right now. 2-3 people in different places can collaborate on some nice stuff. If you're a button-pusher, I'd try to diversify that skillset. ;)

for tips on building a search engine & doing SEO read more of the Matt Cutts interview

Recently I got to interview Eurotrash. Fun, just don't ask him about bacon!

Thanks Jan :)

I have a bit of the flu, but I also have a marketing friend who is exceptional at selling ad space who somewhat recently let me interview him. He is not well known in the search space, but manages media sales and email marketing for a number of niche websites.

I am trying to get him to start a blog (we bloggers like to spread our disease) but for now his personal site is using an article manager, which is evil evil evil. Jason recently wrote a few short but high quality ebooks on improving email subject lines, creatives, and email marketing in general.

Check out the interview if you want to work on improving media sales.

I recently interviewed another one of the great SEO oldtimers, who goes by the name of Lots0. Lots0 talks Google Sandbox, SEO Ethics, & a bit of SearchKing.

Thanks for the interview Lots0.

Frank Watson is a good friend of mine, and just about any decent pay per click search engine. He manages some rather complex pay per click accounts.

I interviewed him asking about pay per click tips and strategies. Read it here: seobook interviews Frank Watson

Recently I interviewed NickW. I asked him mostly about community building and ThreadWatch. His replies were mostly about the importance of being authentic, timely, and being different. Surprisingly Nick moderately used curse words, although he did work some into the content. :)

Thanks for the interview Nick.

I wanted to interview Jim Boykin, from WeBuildPages a while ago, but some of my questions were evil and it took a while to get around to do the interview. I recently came up with a new list and asked Jim many SEO business related questions, in large part because he runs one of the few SEO companies that I feel comfortable refering leads to. At the recent WebmasterWorld conference I had not one, but two different people come up to me and thank me for refering them, which makes me feel great for recommending them.

In our interview Jim gives lots of good web design and link building tips, and he also confirmed the rumour that WeBuildPages will be entering the original content production market!

To me it seemed like that market was waiting for more competition, especially considering that some of the other networks that do it place competing ads on the same pages that webmasters pay to have create.

Read the full interview: Aaron Wall interviews Jim Boykin, founder of We Build Pages.

Jason Duke is a true lover of all things search, and that came through in his recent interview.

I think the interview flowed pretty well from question to question and is sorta hard to take out of context, but a good sample might be something like:

Whether it be an Amazon feed or the entire Gutenberg project you can get volumous amounts at no charge and it is all duplicate content.

But if you have rights to the content or the content is free contractually for you to do with as you want then there are software tools ... the so called "Button Pushing".... that helps turn that dupe content into a unique position.

Read Jason Duke's thoughts on the future of search, how algorithms work, and how you can get the most out of SEO.

I am a big fan of Search Engine Blog, and wanted to ask Peter a few questions about search, blogging, pants, and the web (ish).

He said sure and here is the Peter D interview. I think I have changed some of my ideas of how I should do stuff from about every interview I have done, and this one is no exception.

Thanks again Peter.

Dan Thies has been branded as THE keyword guru, and has a great background in business and marketing. I asked him for an interview and he said sure.

Doing SEO and selling SEO are two separate things, as explained by well by Dan:

SEO consultants, in particular the small firms, the one-person shops.... I've rarely seen a group of people with more talent going to waste, because they don't get marketing, they don't understand sales, they can't write proposals, they spend so much time chasing bad leads. If I had a dollar for every consultant who has asked for advice on how to get someone to spend $500 on SEO...

If $500 is an issue, you either have no credibility (because you haven't created it) or they just don't have any money. Most of the time, the budget is there, but the credibility isn't.

He then goes on to recommend resources and offers tips to help close sales and improve SEO business efficiency. Dan talks about keywords, proposals, and running an SEO business.

That is my fourth interview in the last month or so and all of them have been great. I feel somewhat silly for not doing more of them earlier. More to come...

So a while ago I bugged NFFC for an interview. He kept saying no, but then I gave him $50,000, naming rights to my first kid, and another copy of SEO Book [he said it was so good he wanted another] and he said yes. Amazing how that works.

Lucky for you, you get the interview free...and IMHO it's killer good.

I would quote a section, but it would not do NFFC justice. Interview of NFFC, Sexy SEO God

Get seen First:
DaveN posts about how Google duplicate content filters have a tendancy to reward the first spotting of content.

Interview:
Interesting stuff Dave. I should interview him, oh wait, I just did :)

I think the key takehomes from his interview are:

• trust & friendship are HUGE in the SEO space

• the importance of collecting data

but the interview is well worth reading for all. Thanks again for the interview Dave :)

A while ago I said that my ebook could be improved by interviewing a good number of industry experts to help build a more broad / diversified voice.

My goal is to interview about a dozen people who are doing well or I think really know their stuff. Recently via email I interviewed Shawn Hogan from Digital Point. He claims not to be an SEO, but his site gets far more traffic than most SEO related websites.

The biggest things that stood out to me from his interview:

• he created things that he himself wanted / found useful

• he threw it out there to collect feedback & added features people wanted
• he loves to automate as much as possible