Posts by Mindy Gofton on Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)

When people find out I work in search engine optimisation I get two reactions. The first is confusion from people who have never heard of SEO. The second is disgust - from people who have. SEO consultants are like the used car salesmen of the internet, or so people seem to think. Even other... read more

Small businesses looking for their first professionally designed and developed website do not usually have a internet marketing expert on staff - or a web developer - and very often don't really know what things should cost. They may have a rough idea based on what friends or business... read more

So I went to my first social media cafe last week. Manchester's version of London's Tuttle Club has been running once a month since the end of 2008, but this was the first one I've actually been able to get to. What I was hoping for was an event which would allow me to meet others doing... read more

The web has been buzzing about Google Local Search being folded into non-local results. Never mind the inaccuracies of the results local search is currently delivering, the morass of information that Google is now serving for some SERPS is starting to create a real usability problem. Have a... read more

I love of a bit of Twitter spam on a Monday morning! There's nothing quite so entertaining as to logging into email to receive three notifications that "internetmarketer" is now following us on Twitter. I dutifully clicked on all three - to rule out that they weren't real people with... read more

There is now an ad service called Magpie which hooks up advertisers with Twitter users. The Twitter users get paid to post links in their Twitter streams and the advertisers get exposure on the social media site of the moment. This pay-per-view Twitter advertising a bad idea for both users... read more

I recently blogged about my concerns for privacy as social media and lifestreaming become the norm. As Google launches its Streetview product in the UK, my concern about privacy has intensified considerably. With lifestreaming over social media it is our choice (usually) about what private... read more

Yesterday I taught a training course for a new client about basic SEO. During the course, the company's web developer wondered if I found it frustrating having to spend 3-4 hours answering very basic questions about SEO so another business could decide what aspects of its optimisation to... read more

A public relations fiasco erupted online for Ryanair a couple of weeks ago when a blogger found a bug in their booking system and wrote a cheeky blog post about it. Instead of thanking him for taking the time to point the error out, a member of Ryanair staff instead chose to abuse the... read more

Matt Cutts, Google's spam cop and chief PR blogger posted a response yesterday to an article about "sponsored" blog posts. According to Cutts, paid blog posts are fine - as long as they don't pass page rank. Simply put - if someone pays you to review their site/product/service you have to add a... read more