The Google Mayday update caused quite a stir in the affiliate community. Why? Because it was said by webmasters to be, and was then later confirmed by Google to be, most heavily impacting long tail traffic.
Many affiliate marketers running sites generated by affiliate datafeeds (that traditionally drew decent traffic from long tail searches) saw a heavy negative impact on their search traffic from Google as a result.
We (myself and the other panelists speaking on the “SEO Vets Take All Comers” panel) were asked about the Mayday update at SMX Advanced in Seattle a few weeks ago.
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The crappy thing about being laid up is that you miss awesome search conferences. The silver lining is that you get to catch up on your reading or re-read old classics to suck out extra nuggets. As search marketers, many of us learn by reading. It’s why we take to blogs. We read, we get ideas, and then (hopefully) we go out and test those ideas. This industry grew from forums and sharing information and books are another way to do that.
With the summer upon us, you’ll be traveling more, hitting the beach and you may need something to throw in your beach bag (or your Kindle. iPad?) to accompany you on your trip. With that in mind, here’s Outspoken Media’s summer reading list. As always, if you have something you think the community should read, please add it in the comments. I’m a book nerd so I’m always looking for more good stuff. [read the full post…]
Good morning, world! Do you know what time it is? It’s Summer time! Okay, well, it’s almost Summer time. And that means we’re about to kick off yet another conference surge filled with search shows, clever speakers and lots and lots of liveblogging. With that in mind and with Rae, Rhea and myself all currently in North Carolina for Search Exchange (can you hear the yelling from where you are?), I thought perhaps an update was in order.
If you’re looking for Outspoken Media this summer, here’s where you can find us. You should come hang. We’ll totally FourSquare our locations and earn cool badges together. Or maybe just grab dinner.
Search Exchange (May 17-19)
Hey, what are you doing? Get on down to Search Exchange. Right now!
If you’re in the area, hopefully you’re already planning on attending what’s surely going to turn out to be a great conference over the new few days. Rae will be giving a keynote on the Evolution of SEO at 3:15pm today (Monday) and Rhea will be kicking some butt with Wednesday’s afternoon keynote discussing the Online Reputation Management Landscape. You’re going to want to attend both of those.
Even though I’m in the area, we won’t be liveblogging this one. We’ll make it up to you next time.
SMX Advanced (June 8-9)
It’s hard to believe it’s almost time for the big SMX Advanced show out in Seattle! I know this is lots of people’s favorite show all year and it’s definitely one of mine. Rae will be out speaking on the veteran Mega Session with a whole bunch of SEOs you’d probably wet yourself to buy a beer at the bar. Meanwhile, while she’s being a veteran rockstar, I’ll be in town to provide complete liveblogging coverage for the big show. We’ll be posting our liveblogging schedule early next week so keep an eye out for that. It will help you know what to expect from us and how to plan your conference napping accordingly. :)
SES Toronto (June 9-11)
If you missed her original adventures as a first time speaker, you can catch Dawn rocking her awesome at Search Engine Strategies Toronto. She’ll be speaking on Day 2’s Tough Love: Get Your Site Tuned Up panel so bring your site and watch Dawn lovingly kick its butt into fighting shape. If you haven’t yet registered for SES Toronto now seems like an excellent time to do that, don’t you think?
Affiliate Summit East (Aug 15-17)
Toward the end of the summer, Rae and I will be heading down to New York City to get our affiliate on during Affiliate Summit East. If you’ll be attending (register), you can find Rae doing an SEO site clinic. Once again, bring your site and a bottle of courage and learn how to tighten everything up. If you’ll be watching this one from home, I’ll be offering up full liveblogging coverage.
And that should wrap up our summer. Which conferences will you be hitting this year? Let us know when and where we can meet up.
Also worth noting – we’ll be repeating Expert Week here on the Outspoken blog late June/early July to bring some new voices in while I take some time off. Look for that announcement, as well!
After a VERY quick break we are back in action. Speaking we have Jessica Bowman, Laura Lippay, Michael Martin, and Everett Sizemore. There’s no banter as Everett Sizemore hops right in because we’re a little behind. Okay, fine, a little banter. Fun story: According to a few people, Everett and I were standing next to one another for at least 20 minutes the other day and I had no idea. I’ve never officially met Everett. Hopefully we’ll change that soon.
Okay hopping right in!
How To Succeed As An In House SEO
Just because you bring SEO in-house, doesn’t mean it s going to work. Both situations require the right people, tools and skills. He says the word of the day is going to be value.
You Are Only What It Costs To Replace You
Ouch.
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So, this is probably going to hurt. Me, not you. I always pick the technical panels because I think you guys will find them most interesting… but I forget that I am not a technical SEO so trying to decipher the slides is often like performing brain surgery… on a rock.
A very sick Vanessa Fox is moderating speakers Adam Audette, Patrick Bennett, Gabe Gayhart, and Brian Ussery. I spent ten minutes chatting with Vanessa and I can already feel the germs congregating in the back of my throat to ruin my day. I’ll be starting the #blamevanessa hashtag tomorrow when I wake up sick and unable to move. Things to look forward to!
Okay, we’re starting. Let’s go. Vanessa really sounds like death. She needs a stretcher. Or a hot towel. Or to maybe stop traveling so damn much. [yeah, Vanessa, I said it.]
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Good morning, SANTA CLARA! Sorry, I’m super hyped. So hyped that I was waiting outside the keynote room at 7:45am because I knew they were opening the doors up at 8am for a 9am keynote. Yeah, I’m THAT girl, but I do it all for you. It’s because I pretty much love you. And because CNBC, Kara Swisher and all those other “real” media outlets are coming and I am just a little competitive.
So here’s what’s going on. Danny Sullivan has been given free reign to ask Steve Ballmer anything he wants. Anything! I’m fairly certain Danny’s been chasing Ballmer for years and this is the first time he’s ever agreed. So he’s gotta have something up his sleeve, right? Let’s find out what it is.
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Hey, hey, it’s the last session of Day 2. Hang with me people. We’re going to talk about how to do cool stuff with a college kid’s budget. Remember those days? When you survived on Ramen, Pop Tarts and a healthy diet of self-rightousnes? Those were the days, my friends. Those. Were. The days.
Leading us through our mission of mayhem are Marty Weintraub and Brett Tabke. There was surprised to be a third but he couldn’t make it. I think that may be the 3rd or 4th canceled speaker today. That’s sad.
Anyway, get out your paper and Number 2s. Marty is about to take the stage. Lord have mercy on us all. [love you, Marty.]
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Ah, it seems like it was just a few days ago that I was returning home from liveblogging SMX East – wait, it was…
In one of the quickest conference turnarounds ever, I’ll be making the pilgrimage to BlogWorldExpo on Wednesday to reconnect with some of my blogging friends and provide a bit of coverage for Outspoken Media. Because I value my sanity and don’t wish to be completely carpal-tunneled by age 30, I won’t be liveblogging. Instead, I’ll be acting as your quality filter and handpicking a few of the best sessions each day and doing daily write ups on those.
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I was reading the recap Shawn Collins did of his trip to SMX on day one and a comment he made within it got my attention:
Some interesting revelations in the duplicate content session, such as Google’s Joachim Kupke saying there is no duplicate content penalty and that Google is “working on something to help ID a site as the original provider of content.”
Now, this actually isn’t a new revelation. Google has been giving explanations about how duplicate content doesn’t really cause a penalty for years now. When that statement was first made, webmasters were up in arms, and those with clients knowledgeable enough to attend conferences and read official Google blogs were receiving phone calls in droves. And it left those of us, who’d known this all along, with “some splaining to do.”
The problem is it really boils down to semantics to an extent. Let’s take a look at some hypothetical examples.
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