Seven Short, Out-Of-Character Rants

This post is breaking format with tradition here at SEOmoz, but I think a good shaking up of the status quo is in order. I'm going to simply rant, in rough paragraph form, about 7 issues in the search world. I'm going to be generally more expressive, less forgiving and pull fewer punches (for which I fully expect to take some heat).

WebMasterWorld and Cloaking
I think that Matt Cutts' post was almost certainly a "shot across the bough" to Brett. I'd be surprised if Google didn't take some action against the domain in the near future - to make an example of them? What I would like to see is complete fairness across the spectrum - if you do it to Brett, Google, you've got to take folks like the NY Times and Nike to task as well. Either there are exceptions or there aren't - you can't have your anti-SEO cake and eat it too (well, actually, you can, but it's not particularly friendly). If I were Google, I'd probably leave things the way they are; the system isn't broken, and a few folks are getting "special" treatment, but the user experience is pretty reasonable. Danny has all the details.

Mobile Content
Mobile users aren't like people sitting at their desktops or laptops. They're not there to dive deep into content (though I do admit to browsing Reddit on my mobile while Mystery Guest is shopping sometimes). Mobile is about action - determining where you are, where to go next, getting answers to questions or fulfilling an immediate need. Sure, that need might be what three movies John Cusack starred in with his sister, or how late the zoo is open or what stores are having a sale on shoes right now, but it's not about browsing celebrity gossip (for most people). I think there's going to be some clear winners who play the content and UI game right for mobile and become the "Google" of that market.

Danny and SES
Honestly, I don't know how many of the speakers and heavy participants will continue to attend the SES shows once Danny's no longer a part of them? Nearly every 15+ minute conversation I have with someone in the search world touches on this topic, and almost everyone has the same mindset - wait and see what Danny does. If SMX is successful and that brand manages to attract the same level of press and attendees, I think we'll see a very quick migration.

The Cult of Personality
Is the search marketing world too cliquey? Are the well known names creating a level of exclusivity that hurts the industry or its image? No. I think 99.99% of people really don't follow search on a personal or gossip-type level. For most, this is a job - a fun job - but still just a job. I've always been a fanboy to the big names in SEO, and I expect I'll be doing it for a few more years to come; I can't help but idolize some of these people. But, I'd disagree when folks say that search marketers make themselves unapproachable - with the exception of a couple people, almost everyone in search is someone you can walk up to, introduce yourself, shoot the breeze about search and get an invite to dinner.

Death of Social Media
Is Digg a fad? Sure it is, but I don't think you can't put Pandora back in the box. Now that the web has been exposed to the power of collective intelligence and user-generated content, there's no way that we'll go back to the top-down, editorially-controlled content of Web 1.0. Recommendations are going to get better, social portals are going to improve and our ability to interact will only grow. Predicting that social media on the web will die is like predicting that the web itself isn't a valuable platform in the long term.

Shawn Hogan and Digitalpoint
When Digitalpoint forums launched as an SEOChat alternative, I don't think anyone could have predicted their success. Today, DP is one of the most popular on the web overall and still the fastest growing forum in the webmaster arena. The signal to noise ratio sucks, but there's enough quality and a large enough group of contributors that it easily overcomes this singular weakness. Bravo, Shawn - you've built something amazing.

AdSense & Contextual Ads
I read a study about how visitors exposed to a banner ad for a particular car were 20% more likely to buy that car in the next 6 weeks than their non-exposed peers. Banner ads apparently work (if anyone finds that link, please let us know). Direct e-commerce models work, as do Freemium models and pay-for-content sites. There are a lot of creative ways to monetize and, despite seeing evidence of contextual ads making people a fortune (especially Google), I still think it's a crappy way to do business. In my mind, you're basically relying on the ignorance of your surfing audience - the best ads are those that don't look like ads, that fool users into clicking them. Users don't "seek out" contextual ads, nor are they "exposed" to them for branding the way banner ads (or billboards on the highway for that matter) operate. They click them because they think they'll get the content they want "after the jump" and 9 times out of 10, they're dissapointed (probably even higher than that). We've run some AdSense campaigns with clients (or gotten to see the results), and while the occasional campaign will bring a positive ROI, the conversion numbers are incredibly low and the abandonment rates are staggering (even on sites that convert search visitors phenomenally well). I'm not saying you can't have success with contextual, I'm just saying that I, personally, don't buy into the logic behind it.

OK. Rants over - time to take my licks :) BTW - Can't wait to tell you all how Rebecca's first speaking gig goes tomorrow. I plan to hold up hilarious signs from the back of the room to attempt to distract her.