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Keywords I am Targeting

Find your keywords I am targeting resources listed below I get a lot of site review requests for sites that recently took a dive in Google where the page generally follows the above format. Every time their main keyword phrase exists on the page it exists in the exact same format, and it exists about everywhere.

There are two major problems with that format

1. Over optimization: if a page is obviously targeting a phrase then Google may not want to rank that page for that phrase. When people write naturally (ie: for humans, not engines) there tends to be variations in it. Now some content management systems will cause some parts of the page to be fairly repetitive, but where you can mix it up.

   I see some examples of where Google is ranking a page focused on topic A for topic B just because topic B exists as a navigational element on page topic A. The same site has a more relevant page about the search query but the wrong page ends up ranking sometimes. While that is trashy relevancy from Google, to me that hints at where Google wants to head with their algorithms, showing me that Google is trying to figure out natural writing and reward pages for not being too repetitious or overly focused. They still need to do some serious work on how they interpret navigational elements into the relevancy algorithms, but when they do you can expect them to only get even more aggressive with favoring natural writing over spammy optimized content.

2. Wasted opportunity: assuming you took the time to create unique content for each page it only takes an extra minute or two to mix things up to help the page rank for a much wider net of keywords.

If you can find a way to mix up your keyword phrases, like:

• sometimes leave one of the words out

• sometimes just use one or two of the words isolated from the others
• use alternate version of the words
• switch up the word order
• use modifiers and semantically related text
• make the internal anchor text slightly different than what you focus the page content on
• use variation in anchor text from external link sources, and focus it on slightly different words than you focused the internal linkage on

you will end up ranking for a lot more phrases and will rank more consistently and reliably in Google. Others will bitch about the updates giving them the raw deal and Google being a power grab while you keep getting more and more traffic.

I posted a rant post over at TW about the current state of Google.

It seems like their priorities are screwed at the moment. Am debating selling all my Goog shares as their SERPs are just so bad that it seems like they are driving themselves into irrelevance.

Will users stick to using an irrelevant Google with broken search operators? That is the question Google's current search results are asking right now each time you search. Lucky for Google the competition is deeply lacking at the moment, but I can't see it staying that way forever.

A friend of mine that goes by the nickname aojon and posted some of his phat affiliate earning stats on Sitepoint a while ago. He recently launched his new affiliate marketing forums.

If you are a forum junkie you may want to add Wickedfire.com to your list of daily visits. Be warned though that Jon might be a bit rough around the edge and like to curse from time to time. But then again, the world would be a better place if political correctness was thrown in the trash can in favor of fucking honesty. :)

A while ago I wrote about some of the reasons SEO is given a bad wrap in general. Rand also posted today about how being an SEO is like being a plastic surgeon. I think another key issue which is not typically discussed much is the concept of authority and how it plays a role in media influence. If search may have the power to undermine many locally monopolistic publishing companies it benefits those companies to state that search has holes in it and that people manipulate it. Don't trust search - trust us, your reliable honest trustworthy truthful blah blah blah media source.

Circulation is directly proportional to revenue at large media companies. A story about some evil manipulative ____ is doing __________ is easier to spread than a story about how wonderful SEOs are.

Large media companies are owned by corporations with ties to other mega corporations. They have a long history of sticking up for one another even when they are 100% in the wrong, and have went as far as syndicating public relations garbage to the general populous to sell bogus wars.

Television stations present unoriginal sponsored pre-packaged content as though it is original home grown reporting.

Even some school text books and prestigious journals are created or sponsored by ultra biased self-interested companies.

From the Wikipedia public relations page:

Instances of the use of front groups as a PR technique have been documented in many industries. For example, the coal mining corporations have created environmental groups that contend that increased CO2 emmissions and global warming will contribute to plant growth and will be beneficial, trade groups for bars and beer distributers have created and funded citizens' groups to attack Mothers Against Drunk Driving, and tobacco companies have created and funded citizens' groups to advocate for tort reform and to attack personal injury lawyers.

I believe that for the most part unbiased content will grow less and less profitable and decrease in quality and availability as time passes and more publishers are forced to become more aggressive with their monetization efforts. Google's drive for efficiency will train many independent publishers how to replace traditional media. Social networks and media consumption habits will also be heavily tracked and greatly replace the role of traditional intermediaries.

Clearly the current US government is not interested in the concept of free speech, as displayed by their disregard for net neutrality and their relative over-taxation of VoIP:

"The FCC's efforts on VoIP are like trying to solve traffic and energy problems by stifling the rollout of energy-efficient hybrid vehicles, while subsidizing SUVs," he said.

If you are exercising influence to dupe people it is fine if you are already in a seat of power, but if you are not then they want to expose you to make it look as though they are more pure - when it is rarely the case.

As corporations increasingly are able to embed themselves into the genes of humanity and create communication roadblocks while syndicating spin is there a way beyond it all? Will popular opinion be nothing more than people expressing how they are trained to think?

Sorry for all these cryptic rant posts. They are primarily driven from the following elements

• I have a killer flu / strep throat / headache / etc

• Last weekend offered many experiences which made me realize a general lack of purpose and a lack of passion I have been living with for a while, which sucks. I not only saw the passion with which some others live with, but also broadened my perspectives in a few other ways, and that made me feel great guilt for my lack of passions and living less than optimally for far too long.
• I went from being a total failure to pretty successful pretty quick (at least financially), but I feel the learning curve has leveled off to where I have become pretty bored recently, and still need to do a lot of work on the social / physical / mental aspects of life.
• I think it is important to question my own actions and authority MORE than I question anything else. I generally have a distaste for authority, and in the last month I have
  • worked with people who are true mentors (though I feel they think more of me than I think of myself)

  • been mentioned on my favorite marketing blog (thanks Seth)
  • been asked to co-author books by well known publishers
  • been asked to review papers for well known journals (when I don't know shit about peer review processes, etc.)
  • been asked to talk to deans of a couple schools about how I would modify their courses (when I never went to college and only started learning about the web less than 4 years ago)
• That sort of opportunity has gotten to feel a bit surreal when coupled with a feeling of stagnation and lacking purpose.
• I recently started reading A Thousand Years of Nonlinear History, and it is probably the most powerful, insightful, and worldview changing book I have ever read. And I am only like half way done with it.
• I have been thinking on some of Chomsky's philosophies
  

  So does misrepresentation bother me? Sure, but so does rotten weather. It will exist as long as concentrations of power engender a kind of commissar class to defend them. Since they are usually not very bright, or are bright enough to know that they'd better avoid the arena of fact and argument, they'll turn to misrepresentation, vilification, and other devices that are available to those who know that they'll be protected by the various means available to the powerful. We should understand why all this occurs, and unravel it as best we can. That's part of the project of liberation - of ourselves and others, or more reasonably, of people working together to achieve these aims.

  Sounds simple-minded, and it is. But I have yet to find much commentary on human life and society that is not simple-minded, when absurdity and self-serving posturing are cleared away.

So enough of my current rants and conditions... How do you fix this? Does the web help? What else is needed?

Not really SEO related, but I got back from Bonnaroo, and have to say it kicked ass. My favorite reason to go to big festivals is not just to hear the music, but more to see the human interaction and the display of passion associated with it. Sure some marketing agencies can push garbage on the radio enough to get some people to like it, but you don't get to the level of a group like Radiohead without having some real passion behind what you do. I think art is one of the hardest things to market, and even harder to keep producing with the same high quality and authenticity after success had produced a feedback loop that heavily influences the artist's life and work.

How does Radiohead stay fresh after over 800 shows? Never playing the same set list twice. They played 28 songs at Bonnaroo.

A few of my favorite Radiohead songs

Fake Plastic Trees (live @ Glastonbury 2003)

Karma Police

From the Bonnaroo set

Lucky

Jonny Greenwood is known to play guitar so aggressively that he had repetitive strain injury in his right arm and had to wear an arm brace for playing. Thom Yorke has broke down crying after recording a song. On top of being absurdly talented and working hard they also display more emotion than most would dare do.

Their blog kicks ass and this post sums up why I think they are so successful:

im not supposed to put any of this here. so thats why i am.