Copyright © 2010 Advanced Search Marketing 2010-09-09T21:30:59+0100 2010-09-09T21:30:59+0100 http://www.i-com.net/blog/ Leading Manchester SEO, SEM and web design agency blog. http://www.i-com.net/blog/ http://i-com.net/images/icom-net.gif http://www.i-com.net/blog/ Leading Manchester SEO, SEM and web design agency blog. I-COM International blogmaster at i-com dot net Advanced Search Marketing Advanced Search Marketing en SEO, SEM, Web Design, Web Development 1440 http://www.i-com.net/blog/lda-latent-dirichlet-allocation-and-searcher-intent-393/ I'm no expert on IR (information retrieval, in case you're less of an expert than I am),  but I've always found, working in SEO, that it's important, to some degree, to understand the various ways that search engines may index and understand the data on a webpage/website.This week, SEOMoz has released a new tool to calculate LDA (Latent Dirichlet Allocation), a concept currently so obscure that I couldn't find a proper definition of "dirichlet" (it is, it would seem, a scientist, a crater on the moon, and has something to do with 'boundary conditions' relating to a mathematical equation).  For the purposes of IR and how search engines work, however, LDA refers to yet another way to understand what a webpage is about by calculating the probable topics covered on the page based on the words used and the relationships between those words. As SEOMoz explains, using the LDA model, theoretically you "can compute the similarity between any word or groups of words and the topics it's created." LDA = Topical RelevanceWhat the SEOMoz research demonstrated, to a simplistic degree, is that far from looking just at repeated mentions of a keyword and a few synonyms, the Google algorithm is actually calculating the degree to which a page appears to be about a specific topic based both on the number of words on the page that the search engine identifies with that topic but also the number of words that the search engine identifies as being about RELATED topics - topics you would expect to find covered at the same time. For example, if I produced a page of content about the new Grinderman album I might mention: Nick Cave The Bad Seeds Australia garage rock Warren Ellis The Dirty Three Jim Sclavunos The Birthday Party Heathen Child music videos John Hillcoat laser beams Roman Centurions guitars gigs You could then classify the words into topics in the following way: Grinderman - Nick Cave, Warren Ellis, garage rock, heathen child, guitars, gigs, Australia Nick Cave - Bad Seeds, Birthday Party, guitars, gigs, Australia Warren Ellis - Bad Seeds, Dirty Three, Australia, gigs Heathen Child - Grinderman, laser beams, Roman Centurions, music videos, John Hillcoat You can then see that a page about "Grinderman" is also likely to cover topics relating to Nick Cave, to the Bad Seeds, to Australian bands, to Warren Ellis, etc.  So a page that mentions Nick Cave, Warren Ellis and Heathen Child but doesn't mention Grinderman may be as relevant to a search for "Grinderman" as a page that mentions "Grinderman" 7 times but instead mentions "top 40" "album chart" "airplay" and "Rhianna" as it doesn't cover the same subset of topics - so even though both may be relevant to "Grinderman" the pages themselves indicate a very different searcher intent.Why It's Important to Understand LDAWhether Google is using LDA and how Google might be using LDA is less important perhaps than the fact that the research demonstrates yet another step by search engines to determine searcher intent and deliver the most relevant content - which should, quite rightly be based on the overarching topics or themes of the page rather than one specific keyword phrase. It's something which Google has demonstrated recently with changes to the blog ranking algorithm, according to a recent blog post on SEO by the Sea which essentially points out that Google is using a variety of new indicators to not only deliver relevant blog posts, but to try and understand the niches of blogs in order to also deliver a list of relevant blogs that regularly cover topics related to the searcher's query.   It's Still Links as Much as ContentI think, however, it may be premature to completely rethink the way we approach search campaigns based on the fact that in SEOMoz's testing, inbound links from different IP addresses appear to have less relevance than the LDA calculation.  Even today, when Google has outlawed paid links and has spent the best part of a decade pushing the notion that "content is king" to SEOs, it's blatantly obvious that content is only king if your competitors haven't found a way to game the link part of the algorithm. Just do a search for 'leather jackets' in Google.co.uk and check out the backlink profile of the site at #1. Low quality, paid, unrelevant links do appear to work in volume still. This is one example of many - we've seen again and again in the last 12 months sites shoot into top 5 listings for competitive keywords - and stay there - on the back of link building alone.LDA is a Mirror into What Google Wants to AchieveWhat this new metric may reveal is the best intentions of Google - or what should happen in an ideal search environment - it'sstill quite clear that if Google is using it, it's not using it terribly effectively and it's still just one factor amongst many. Focusing your content on delivering information that will help searchers, targeting keywords that searchers use when looking for the information on your pages and finding links from relevant sites back to your content is still the best formula for SEO success and that's not likely to change any time soon. Advanced Search Marketing 2010-09-07 10:37:27 http://www.i-com.net/blog/lda-latent-dirichlet-allocation-and-searcher-intent-393/ http://www.i-com.net/blog/is-it-ever-acceptable-to-break-the-rules-of-white-hat-seo-to-improve-your-search-rankings-300/ This morning I was trying out the new SEO Moz linking tool. One thing that struck me when examining sites in a particularly competitive niche was the aggressive nature of the link building strategies employed by the highest-ranked sites. When I say aggressive, I mean that the sites in question are not just pursuing links from high quality, relevant sites - they're pursuing links anywhere they can possibly get them, no matter the quality. The sites from which the links come are often quite keyword dense, with content crafted solely for rankings, not users. These are, in many instances, sites with which our clients would not necessarily want to associate their brands or whose traffic wouldn't be interested in the services sold by the companies to which they link.Clearly this type of activity can and does work - often long-term - despite search engines (read: Google) repeatedly telling webmasters not to do it - which is why sites still do it, particularly when things get competitive in a given niche for the most valuable keywords. Even though it's naughty, when you do this in tandem with a lot of equally naughty (and bad for users) keyword-dense text and keyword-heavy Titles and Meta tags, it often still works a treat - again, in the long term - even though Big G tells us is it shouldn't and it doesn't.If it doesn't work, then why else would a business title its pages "Widgets, Widget Suppliers, Green Widgets, Widget, Widget UK, Widget Manchester" and then pursue a link from a site which is, say, about drain cleaner, which has equally catchy Titles and Meta?We advise clients to avoid this sort of practice - a link should always bring greater benefit than just a bump in the SERPs, be it branding/advertising or traffic - and we certainly advise clients to avoid keyword stuffing on their pages as websites are for users - not search engines.The problem is, no matter how much search engines say "don't do it, " "it" continues to work a treat and doesn't generally bring a swift and decisive punishment. My question is then, is it ever acceptable, as a "white hat" SEO consultant, to use these sorts of practices to get rankings (where rankings=traffic=conversions, obviously) if it's the only way to get ahead in an uber-competitive SERP where everybody else is doing the same thing? e.g. If we can't  beat them fairly, is it ethical to cheat too?Are the odds of "getting caught" acceptable if everybody at risk knows the risks - particulary when considering the fact that should Google issue a penalty, that penality should be placed upon the whole SERP? Is it even worth Google penalising every site in that SERP if everybody's guilty of the same offence - which is why the risk itself may be considerably lower in this type of SEO environment?Any and all opinions and thoughts welcome. Advanced Search Marketing 2010-01-21 14:55:02 http://www.i-com.net/blog/is-it-ever-acceptable-to-break-the-rules-of-white-hat-seo-to-improve-your-search-rankings-300/ http://www.i-com.net/blog/googles-real-time-search-algorithm-293/ Naturally, we've been watching the development of Google's real-time search with interest. Everybody's probably familiar by now with the scrolling box they're inserting into search results:I was reading a bit about what people are speculating is behind the real time search algorithm and what Google decides to show. An article on eConsultancy got me raging.The author suggests three things that may be factors in getting Tweets to show in real time search results that I can't imagine are true - because if they are, they demonstrate that Google has no clear understanding of social media and they contradict everything I tell clients when providing training on how to use social media correctly and effectively.1. Keywords in user names = more relevant? Relevant to what?First, he writes, "User name. Like domain names, keywords may help. Note that Twitter allows you to choose a user name (unique) and a real name, so theres an anchor text thing going on here."Now, correct me here if I'm misguided, but social media accounts should be registered to either people, or organisations - and it should be clear which is which.For example, you may be "Paul" and you may be tweeting on behalf of "Sofas and Stuff" but if you call your account "Sofa Sofa Sofa" and you follow me on Twitter, I swear I will block you straight away because that just makes you sound like a spammer trying to get followers to game the algorithm. You pollute the timeline of the site and clog it up with garbage. If, however you actually call yourself "Paul from Sofas & Stuff" I may consider following you back - if I happen to need a sofa and depending what I find when I visit your page. If Google is using keywords in usernames as a factor then we're about to get a load of people registering names and descriptions that read "Sofa Sofa Sofa."Furthermore, a good social media account isn't about the name of the account - it's about the content. On a website, if you call yourself "Puppy Food, Inc." it's pretty likely that you won't ever have relevant content about sofas so keywords in the name can be an indication. If you call your Twitter account "Bob Smith"- or even if you call it "LeedsFan67" - you may at some point send out tweets about sofas which may actually be relevant and useful in response to a news story or piece of content relating to sofas. For example if a sofa explodes on Big Brother next week then Bob may be tweeting about it. Bob may even be a paramedic and able to discuss the dangers of exploding sofas in relation to fire or offer advice to victims on how to treat their burns. Clearly, keywords in user names isn't an indicator of relevance. In fact, they may be an indication of spam - someone who calls themselves "Sofa Expert" on Twitter, at least in my experience, is less likely to be responsive to people and to engage with the community, or do more than post links to his own spam web content, than someone named "Bob" who's excited about buying a sofa.If Google really is using keywords in user names to determine relevance of specific Tweets then they're going to find real time search besieged with garbage and Twitter is going to have to step up its efforts to weed out spam because it's about to be even more horribly abused than currently.2. "Hashtags = Bad." Or, should that be, "Hashtags=Relevance?"eConsultancy states: "One warning sign that Google looks at is whether or not a tweet includes a hashtag. Trending topics on Twitter largely measured by hashtag popularity can attract lots of junk tweets, so Google has adjusted its ranking factors for tweets that contain hashtags. It most likely applies some kind of negative weighting for tweets that contain hashtags, especially those that trend and hit the Twitter homepage (and all user accounts)." Hashtags are there to identify posts. For example, if you're at a conference and tweeting about the conference you tag  your posts with the relevant hashtag so even non-followers can see them. If you're responding to a particular story, you tag your tweet with the relevant hashtag. Hashtags represent relevance when used by real users - rather than auto-accounts or spammers. In fact, when hashtags are abused horribly (Google "Habitat Twitter" if you need an example"), the community reacts swiftly and angrily and a huge negative publicity machine wallpapers the internet with angry messages of derision. Surely hashtags, combined with other relevant words in a tweet, should be a marker of QUALITY, not the reverse? If Google has actually worked out ways of identifying spam accounts and sockpuppets then surely hashtags can help them understand relevance and semantically related words in tweets?3. Use your keywords a lot. But, is Twitter really about keywords?Finally, the suggestion which really got me fuming is this:"Keyword focused accounts. If all of your tweets refer to sofas isnt it possible that youll be seen as a sofa expert by search engines, and positioned accordingly? Staying on-topic may help."So, set up loads of accounts, each based around one specific keyword or set of keywords, use your keywords repeatedly, all the time, in every tweet, every, in the whole world and that will make you an expert - not a dirty spammer? Erm, it makes no sense in a social setting.If you're using Twitter well, interacting with people, then you aren't going to stay on topic. If you do stick to one topic, say, sofas, then you're not likely to ever really have many followers are you? Sure, there are exceptions to the rule like someone tweeting the weather report or football results or something. But if someone is buying a sofa they might follow you for a little while, but once they've done making their purchase, are they really going to care anymore?The way to make them care is by providing added value - talking about more than just that sofa purchases. Or, shock-horror, by getting to know your followers.Frankly this one is so open to abuse - and so against the whole point of real time search - which is to provide relevant, topical, time sensitive information - that I can't imagine it could possibly work as a factor. Plus, you'd miss out on the guy in Haiti tweeting about the earthquake as it happens because you'd be too busy looking for tweets from earthquake "experts"- erm people who use "earthquake" in every tweet, that is - and that would actually make your real time results LESS relevant.It was all summed up in a very pithy manner by someone on Twitter, as I was writing this:"Twitter is all about what is happening RIGHT NOW."He's right. Twitter isn't so much about expertise as about what people find relevant and important at a given moment.Social media is NOT SEO. Don't confuse the two.Let me make this clear - Search Engine Optimisation and Social Media are two different things. Social Media mentions may add weight to SEO efforts and help verify the quality of incoming links, but the way Social Media operates and the way relevance and quality should be established within social media is a very different beast to SEO. SEO is about explaining the subject matter of pages of a website and website hierarchies to a machine. It's about helping machines to understand the most important words associated with a given piece of content and ensuring that those important words also match what users type into search engines.Social media is about people. It's about interaction, relationships and communication. It is not about keywords. It is not about links. It is certainly not about how machines understand pages. So if Google is using SEO factors to determine quality within real time search then I'm guessing relevance is going to suffer - if not now, then certainly once SEO gets their hands into it. Advanced Search Marketing 2010-01-15 17:11:00 http://www.i-com.net/blog/googles-real-time-search-algorithm-293/ http://www.i-com.net/blog/google-caffeine-its-too-early-to-tell-235/ Like everyone else in the SEO world, I've been following the news on the Google Caffeine infrastructure update with interest, but as always I'm surprised by the rush within the SEO world to declare what's different, especially as Caffeine is still in Beta and is likely to continue to change - possibly quite a lot - as Google continues to test and tweak and take data provided from the Beta site into account. Is content still king? Looking at results from Caffeine - in a completely unscientific manner - reveals that initial differences in the index are subtle. This makes sense because it's not about an algorithm change, it's about a change in the way Google works and stores the information it has. The basic fundamentals on what makes a good site will not change - well-designed sites with good information architecture and relevant, unique content will continue to do well in the search engine rankings. They will always do well because Google can understand the subject matter of these sites. In other words, if you have a good, readable site and you've got authority and trust now, you probably will continue to rank well when Google implements Caffeine. A good site is a good site is a good site.   But what about the links? Well, this is where speculation sets in. We all know that for a while Google has been having difficulty identifying good back links from bad back links (even to the point where Google has asked people to contact them where dubious back linking may be apparent). By good and bad I mean links given out freely as recommendations of other good sites as opposed to links bought and paid for in order to "game" Google's PageRank algorithm. Webmasters gaming this vote-based system have been a problem for over 10 years now, and although Google has modified and changed its algorithm to take the emphasis off PageRank, added the LocalRank factor in and improved its ability to understand relevancy and provide block level analysis of pages, it still remains impossible to spot all the paid links on the internet in order to decide if they should pass link authority. Most recently, Google implemented update Vince and most people believe that this update gave a push to established brands because, frankly, people trust these brands. Google's Eric Schmidt said as much in an interview last fall. So how can Google possibly solve this quandry? Well, they can start using click through data and bounce rates to help determine which sites are considered most relevant. They can also start looking at sites which are updated on a continual basis by millions of users to determine who's saying what and about which websites in order to determine which sites people really do read and recommend. Social media, citations and speed The internet moves much quicker now than it did in 1997, or even 2007, with mobile web and lifestreaming enabling people to stay plugged in and updating the web 24-7. People now get news online in realtime through RSS feeds, social media sites and online video streaming. People are now empowered to review sites, products and services. Wouldn't it be a sensible move for Google to use these social media streams more and more, as a co-operative or an an 'army of reviewers',  tracking the information that they generate and incorporating it into their search engine ranking algorithm as part of the decision making process? Google initially updated its index roughly once a month or so, in the so-called Google Dance. Then the dancing stopped as Google began to do continual updates, rolling out data as it crawled and recalculated. Often, however, it still takes days, if not weeks, for Google to revisit pages and then several more days or weeks for changes to appear in the index. These days, this time lag is simply not good enough - not if Google wants to keep up with the likes of Twitter and Friendfeed providing real time news and popular links to people. If Google wants people to use Google News and Google Search to keep up to date then Google needs to be able to index relevant information on breaking stories quickly. One of the things many bloggers have noticed about the Caffeine update is that social media sites are gaining higher prominence in SERPs - without cached versions of the pages. Perhaps the new infrastructure will help Google to update its index in real time as it crawls the continuous stream of information coming through popular social media sites - thereby keeping them (almost) as up-to-date as the likes of Twitter and with the added benefit of offering blended results to news, blogs and images as well as older, more established pages that may be able to provide background information. How does this fit in with links though? Well, by placing more emphasis on crawling lifestreaming sites, video sites and other types of sites which respond and react in real time to the world, Google can tell what's really popular. If a website that has attracted 10,000 new links in a few days also has a lot of social media mentions, it's fair to assume that those links may be the result of people really looking at the site. To gain those links without any other citations elsewhere - without the word of mouth necessary for those to be real recommendations - that may look a bit suspcious. I wouldn't be surprised if Google is trying to find a way to compare online mentions by real people to link data in order to determine where in a SERP a site should sit based on what users think. Plus, this falls into line with Google's new opinion of trusted brands - won't trusted brands be the ones talked about most on social media? Won't these be the sites people are recommending to their friends and links to whose pages people will want to share? Of course. Will it still be possible for spammers to game this system by making sure their sites get loads of social media mentions? Of course. What does this mean for SEO? Well, it means that we're going to have to become experts at social media and online PR because having a presence in the right places and having people talking with you and about you is going to become increasingly important. It's not just about having the most mentions though, social means social so it'll be about engagement with genuine users who are willing to talk about your site and pass along links to your content. Your social media profiles will have to be useful and interesting - and you must use them to promote content rich websites that offer useful products and services. So, in the end, content is still king but if that content isn't meaningful, then consumers are likely to dethrone him. Advanced Search Marketing 2009-09-07 10:34:00 http://www.i-com.net/blog/google-caffeine-its-too-early-to-tell-235/ http://www.i-com.net/blog/what-do-i-look-for-in-a-profitable-market-141/ Before we enter into any relationship with a client regarding online marketing we look at two key factors: Visitor Levels - How many potential customers (web-site visitors) are there in this market, and; Visitor Values - What is each one of these potential customers worth? Together, they will tell you the QUANTITY, as well as the QUALITY of potential customers in that market. Here's what I mean... Visitor Levels Visitor Levels are simply the number of people who are searching online in a particular market. The more people search for keywords related to that market, the bigger the market must be; and the bigger the market is, the more potential customers there are! However, the problem with just using Visitor Levels as an indication of the quality of a market is it only gives you part of the picture. There are plenty of online markets that have high levels of traffic, but low levels of buyers! People browsing within these markets generally aren't "hungry" to buy. In most cases, these people are looking at websites for information! They don't want to spend any money. So while you may receive a lot of visitors to your web-site, it's unlikely that any more than a tiny portion of these people will buy from you. That's why it's not enough to just look at the traffic levels in a market. We need to find markets full of people who have money, and are willing to spend it. We want markets that are full of BUYERS - not just browsers. That brings us to the second key factor we should look for in markets... Visitor Values It makes sense to target markets where we can find the big spenders. Big spenders make big purchases - and for us that means big profits! However there are plenty of markets that spend big, but have only a tiny number of customers. Let's take the example to the extreme, and consider some really big-spending markets, like people searching for "private jet purchase". This is a HUGE spending market! Each market stands on its own merits, how many people do you think search for "private jet purchase" online? The monthly average according to Google's keyword tool is 46! So not many!! The issue that you have with low visitor levels it could take months to evaluate any marketing! That is why we look at what it is the client or ourselves willing to pay per sale. By using these two factors we can establish two key metrics, visitors and value to support the monthly online marketing budget and the potential for success. Advanced Search Marketing 2009-01-13 13:44:56 http://www.i-com.net/blog/what-do-i-look-for-in-a-profitable-market-141/ http://www.i-com.net/blog/in-the-end-seo-is-in-fact-all-about-the-content-138/ I was reading a blog post about the next big Google algorithm change on Conversation Marketing which states that searcher behavior is going to drive search rankings beginning in 2009. The post (unusually for an SEO blog) gave some evidence to back up this assertion, but frankly, this is one of the most patently obvious things I've read since I got started in this industry. Let's look at the facts: Google published a patent in 2005 saying it was working on this Google has started to personalise search results if you're signed into a Google Account Google recently launched SearchWiki asking users to vote sites up and down and leave comments as to why Google has been complaining about people trying to game inbound links to make their sites look more popular since, oh, about 2003 with very little ability to stop it Google has been trying to tell us that "content is king" since, oh, about 2003, with very few automated ways to differentiate between truly good content and content written with the right semantic markers. While it will still be possible for hardworking black hat SEOs to "game" a system that measures user behavior, it will be much harder and take more time and effort, especially where Google has all that free data streaming in from Analytics on top of what it knows from user accounts and click through rates on search results. So where does this leave traditional SEO? If we leave link building aside (as that's another issue entirely) traditional on-site SEO will remain as important as ever. Search Engine Optimisation is about making a site easy for search engines to understand so they can find the content and index it correctly - so pages load quickly and navigation is simple and logical; it's about putting in all the right markers so the page structure makes sense and adding the right tags so a site's listings on a search results page read well; and it's about using the words the searcher would use within the site's content. SEO is about building web pages that are relevant, useful to the searcher and easy to use. The average SEO, however, will also have to up his game a little because usability will be important to keeping people on the site and he'll have to do more than just add copy to pages so that the number of keyword mentions keeps a page ranking - he's going to have to start adding even more compelling copy that searchers want to read. Web analytics will also become key to optimising web sites correctly. Understanding searcher/user behaviour and acting on it (creating new content and offers) will help to improve the bottom line for the client and eventually improve search rankings. But these are all things that any SEO professional should be doing for his or her clients anyway - because it improves conversions. Advanced Search Marketing 2009-01-06 15:12:00 http://www.i-com.net/blog/in-the-end-seo-is-in-fact-all-about-the-content-138/ http://www.i-com.net/blog/using-google-insights-for-market-research-72/ Google Insights for Search provides additional features aimed to help advertisers and marketers understand search patterns and visitors' behaviour. Google Insights for Search allows you, for example, to determine the seasonality of any market, or establish the geographical distribution of a given search term. The ability to obtain this type of data is precious and surely gives you an edge over your competition, whether you need to fine-tune your pay per click ads, evaluate the market potential of your next business venture, or find popular keyphrases for your SEO campaigns. Below are some examples of how Google Insights for Search can be used for market research. Let's say this fictitious company - Gardening Outlet Ltd is enjoying great success in the UK and want to expand their business to the United States. In Google Insights, I've selected the "Locations" option under "Compare by"; the relevant geographical locations under "Locations", and in "Filter" I've used a popular keyword for the gardening industry. The graphical heat map pictured below indicates that there is a greater demand for "gardening supplies" in Wisconsin, Colorado, Oregon and Massachusetts than anywhere else in the US. Hence these states would be the ideal places for Gardening Outlet Ltd to begin their US campaign. Google Insights for Search also reveals search terms related to "gardening supplies" in the form of top all time searches and rising searches, the latter being useful to identify new trends. Gardening Outlet Ltd can also establish the seasonality of the demand for certain products using Google Insights. I've selected the "Time ranges" option under "Compare by"; the relevant years or time ranges under " Time Ranges ", and in "Filter" I've used "lawnmower". The "interest over time" graph pictured below clearly indicates that April and May have much greater demand for lawnmowers. To make things easier you can export your findings as a CSV file to your favourite spreadsheet editing software. It would be impossible to describe everything Google Insights does in this article. I will certainly continue experimenting with it for analysing potential markets for our clients' advantage. Anyway, feel free to leave comments below, highlighting how you're using Google Insights for Search or Google Trends. Advanced Search Marketing 2008-08-14 08:46:50 http://www.i-com.net/blog/using-google-insights-for-market-research-72/ http://www.i-com.net/blog/google-ranking-is-not-at-all-explained-50/ A headline on Search Engine Watch a couple of days ago proudly proclaimed, "Google Ranking (Partly) Explained." "Wow!" I thought, "Not only are they giving us search volumes for keywords now, they're starting to explicitly explain how they rank sites?"Well No -  actually they're not.Well, they are if you live in the land of magic where science is a mystery and logic doesn't function. Google have added a post on the Official Google Blog where they explain that they aim to rank sites that are most relevant, that their algorithm is simple enough for their engineers to understand (not the reverse where their engineers are clever enough to understand their very complex algorithm, something far more impressive) and that they believe in using the way humans link between sites and describe sites to put the editorial judgement into ranking so their algorithm is always automatic and they don't have to do any manual editing of the search results.Call me crazy,  but this isn't news. This isn't remotely new information. Any search marketing novice will have gathered this in the first day of their training, or at least I hope they will. And this certainly does not reveal anything about how Google really ranks sites that is more enlightening than the term "Don't be evil." Advanced Search Marketing 2008-07-11 09:25:32 http://www.i-com.net/blog/google-ranking-is-not-at-all-explained-50/ http://www.i-com.net/blog/how-long-can-social-media-survive-without-cash-26/ I attended a seminar recently where the founder of a niche social networking site was extolling the many features of his creation. After half an hour gushing about the great ways people can use his site to get recommendations and make personal connections - and make no mistake, the site is pretty cool - a lady casually raised her hand and asked him, since he was encouraging people to set up their own 'Web 2.0' properties, how he was earning money, since very few people can afford to throw themselves into such a large-scale venture without earning enough to pay the bills. The only answer he could stammer out was that he was funded by venture capital. The correct answer, which everybody in the room knew already, was that he didn't really care how the site got monetized in the long run as he set the site up because he was transfixed by the idea of social media and what he was aiming to do in the long term was build a popular website that somebody with deep pockets would take off his hands in exchange for an obscene amount of money. This problem of how to monetize a website seems to be a common theme for social media sites. Founded by people who are interested in innovation and new ways to use the internet, as these properties start to mature they are faced with the ongoing problem of how to sustain themselves. Some properties such as Second Life or Habbo Hotel were designed around the idea of a marketplace. Participants in these virtual worlds buy and sell objects like in the real world, and in the case of Second Life, entrepreneurs using the site have become millionaires trading in Linden Dollars, the currency of Second Life which can be exchanged for real dollars, presumably at a commission. Many Web 2.0 properties such as Flickr and YouTube have been bought by larger internet companies and folded into larger portals. Flickr makes Yahoo some money through subscriptions. Google is still working on ways to get adverts converting on YouTube. Much has been made of advertising on MySpace and Facebook, but recent figures suggest that advertisers are cutting back their spend on social media because it does not convert the people making money off these social media properties are participants, not advertisers. Although overall spending on advertising on social media is growing, the scale of the growth is slowing down despite the number of sites on which to advertise growing rapidly. These sites are constantly in the media through speculation as to how they will continue to grow when advertisers are cutting back their spending on social media advertising and increasingly turning towards social media marketing instead. Today, as I was teasing out the ideas in this post, I came across a post on Search Engine Journal about the possibility of Twitter including Google ads on their site. Currently Twitter, despite being wildly popular, is funded by venture capital. They either need to sell or to find a way to make money from their service. As more and more people begin to use social media in their daily lives and more and more businesses come to rely on social networking for marketing and branding purposes, it becomes ever more crucial to the internet economy that these sites reach financial maturity. But, how do they get there? One model would be subscription-based, where sites such as Bebo, Facebook and MySpace start charging us for the service, perhaps adding tiered subscriptions depending on what features are used so for example, basic social networking where you can build a profile and find your friends is a minimum charge, but making use of photo albums, video, live chat and RSS feeds will cost more. This would probably cause users to choose one service rather than spreading themselves out across the internet as they do now. Maybe for a little more you would be allowed to network or chat to people on another network. Another possibility is that the viable sites get bought up by larger properties so that we are left with two or three or four large portal sites with the full umbrella of services underneath so you could choose Googles services which might include social networking via Orkut, photo sharing via Picasa, video sharing on YouTube, blogging via Blogger and instant messaging on GTalk. Maybe theyd even buy Twitter and include microblogging. Or, alternatively, you could sign up to Yahoo and get, amongst other services, Yahoo Messenger, Flickr and Yahoo Answers and the social network attached to Answers. Under both of these scenarios, however, the vast majority of sites will eventually fold. Personally, I would hope that all of these great social media sites find a way to become financially viable because I think the internet benefits from choice and the more places and ways people have to interact online the better it is for everyone. Advanced Search Marketing 2008-06-11 10:09:07 http://www.i-com.net/blog/how-long-can-social-media-survive-without-cash-26/