Internet Marketing Blog

Quickly uncover related sites for link building & SEO

Ian — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 18:22:38 +0000

There are scores of free SEO tools on the web, but here is a very quick way to uncover some direct competitors, industry-related sites, and web sites that link to your competition. In Google type: “related:www.somedomain.com”. (Note that there is no space between the “:” and the domain name.) That’s it. Try it with a [...]

Misguided FTC blogging guidelines

Josh — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 01:25:12 +0000

Karen Anderson recently blogged about the FTC’s plans to draft new rules that allow them to go after bloggers for false claims and conflicts of interest. These plans have been in the works for months, but widespread awareness and concern seems to have only blossomed in the last few weeks, leaving little time for action [...]

Another adCenter bug

Josh — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 01:39:54 +0000

We’ve found several bugs in Microsoft adCenter, usually related to their web interface. This is a keyword addition bug. When entering keywords, either through the online interface or CSV import, certain keyword combinations are ignored if other variations with conjunctions exist, such as those containing “for” or “on”. Example: If “butter for toast” has been [...]

SMX Advanced: the more things change…

Josh — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 18:07:35 +0000

I’m glad to have attended SMX Advanced here in Seattle over the last couple of days. What did I learn? Mainly that the old cliche still applies: The more things change, the more things stay the same. As noted in my last post, SEO is still a collection of best practices, most of which have changed [...]

SMX Advanced: Classic SEO (still) rules

Josh — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 22:50:26 +0000

The first afternoon presentation, “SEO Ranking Factors in 2009,” brought together a large number of SEO luminaries, largely through soon-to-be-released survey results conducted by SEOmoz. Also on the panel were Yahoo!’s Laura Lippay and the always entertaining Marty Weintraub of aimClear. What is the state of SEO ranking factors for 2009? About the same as for [...]

SMX Advanced: Social media and Twitter

Josh — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 18:43:56 +0000

I have spent the morning in two social media sessions. The number of platforms for sharing information is still pretty concentrated: Twitter, Facebook, Digg, StumbleUpon, delicious, and Reddit. Note how similar this list would have looked one year ago, which is forever in this segment of online marketing. What has changed dramatically is the number [...]

Highlights of SMX Advanced to come

Josh — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 18:43:46 +0000

We will be attending SMX Advanced here in Seattle tomorrow and Wednesday. We’ll try to post some highlights that we observe. Please let us know if you plan on attending and would like to meet us there, or if you have a particular question that we can try to pursue with attending vendors.

Miva Merchant and Google Analytics

Josh — Sat, 23 May 2009 00:11:23 +0000

Why reinvent the wheel? If you have an online store based on Miva Merchant, you’ll probably want to know where your buyers are coming from. Miva Merchant 5 does not include this capability by default, and it can take a good working knowledge of both Miva and Google Analytics to create your own solution. Or, you can [...]

AdWords trademark permission application

Josh — Thu, 21 May 2009 21:06:35 +0000

If you need permission to use a trademarked term on AdWords, you can go to https://services.google.com/inquiry/aw_tmauth to apply for a waiver. As we noted last week, Google will be loosening the AdWords trademark policy.

AdWords trademark policy changes bring fairness to advertising

Josh — Fri, 15 May 2009 18:01:47 +0000

After recent news from Yahoo Sponsored Search and Microsof adCenter that both programs are shifting to draconian trademark protection policies, it is a quite refreshing to hear Google breathe some reason back into search advertising. For years trademark owners have objected to the use of their marks in competitive advertisments, some going so far as to [...]