Now, while his story is a modern morality tale, his words – taken out of context and with a sly wink – apply powerfully to SEO.

Lunch is for wimps

Google never sleeps. Round the clock, the algorithm works, finding new flaws and opening up new loopholes. Knowledge is out of date faster than an overripe banana. If you’re not checking your rankings every day, if you’re not reading the latest thoughts

It’s a zero sum game, somebody wins, somebody loses.

In SEO, there is only one #1 position. From #2 on down, you’re picking up the crumbs from someone else’s table. Those crumbs can be enough to make a living – but you should always, always be driving for that #1 slot. If that means someone else gets hurt, who cares?

Greed, for lack of a better word, is good.

Always want more. If you have a million organic visits a month, you have to be greedy for 2 million. Without that drive, you find yourself sliding back without even noticing it. If you’re not hungry enough, you can be certain that someone else is – and unless you want them to eat your lunch, it’s better to eat it yourself first. Even if you’re not hungry.

What’s worth doing is worth doing for money.

If you’ve got a talent – for building links, driving traffic or getting better rankings – it’s worth money. If you can’t find someone to pay your commercial worth, go create your own value. Every day, billions of queries run through Google alone  – every one of them can be monetised if you’re smart. Find a niche and dominate it. Your time and knowledge is money – treat it accordingly.

The most valuable commodity I know of is information.

Data. Data. Data. It’s the lifeblood of SEO. If you don’t what links the competition have got, how they got them and what they’re worth, then you’ve got nothing. You need to know how websites work – from the front end, through the back end, and through to the very infrastructure on which they run. You need to know how and why Google do what they do. Research, test and discuss: there is no other way.

Sheep get slaughtered.

If your only strategy is to follow the competition, you’ll lose. You get no prizes for finding the same loophole that your competitor found last week. By that time, he’s cleaned up and you’re just chasing his tail.

It’s all about bucks, kid. The rest is conversation.

A number one ranking is great for bragging rights. But if that isn’t creating money, who cares? Ranking is only a means of getting traffic. And traffic is only a means of getting money. If all you’ve got is a ranking, then you’ve really got nothing. Turning that into cold, hard cash is the name of the game.

Many people do not consider that they need to think hard about the types of search terms people are using to reach tehir website and make sure that they come high on search engines for those search terms as well as for others which are relevant. It can be a lot of hard work analysing all of the data with regards to traffic to the site and you will have to go back to basic marketing principles to work out who your potential customers are, what your competition is and how best you go about finding a unique selling point to put you above them.

When planning a new business or website, think hard who your competitors are before you start as if you cannot get high enough on search engines to get much traffic, then it might be worth considering a different business.

They have had Google’s backing on this and it will not include organic search results unless they are to be used in any marketing content. It could be confusing to therefore work out exactly what is included in this. Examples could be if Google has a search result with an incorrect price in it, due that price recently changing. This could be a big problem if the price has increased but the ASA would consider it to Googles responsibility to check the details and therefore there would be no action taken.

However, the type of things they are interested in is if there are paid links which are undisclosed. An example of this would be an SEO company buying a link from a blogger in order to increase their rankings in search engines and directories. They will not be banning this type of thing but want to make sure that people using the blog would easily know that it was a paid link.

This has consequences in that it is unlikely that SEO companies would want bloggers to reveal that their link is a paid one. In fact many SEO companies that buy blog posts and links at the moment specifically ask, in their guidelines, that the fact it is a paid link should be kept quiet. We all like them to be well hidden within an article or list of links and look like a genuine part of the blog.

It is obvious why we need to do this, but with other advertising, it does have to be clearly labelled. Such as an advertising feature in a magazine or a television advertisement that runs for longer than you would expect and is in a documentary type style. It is easy to see why they think that the Internet should not be managed in a similar way.

This will mean that certain links that don’t current fit Google’s guidelines will not be acceptable by the ASA’s standards and vice versa.

Many people complain about the way Google operates especially with regards to the way they do not take action against larger brands. Although they claim that they do, it is most likely that the ASA will do so as they risk no financial loss in doing so.

The impact this investigation is going to have is not easy to predict, there are already companies such as the Office of Fair Trading who take action to ensure disclaimers are appropriately used. For example many companies that currently pay bloggers for posting have a rule that the blogger must state in the terms and conditions that some of their posts are sponsored. However, this may not be enough to satisfy the ASA.

If the ASA do start acting and forcing these changes then more people are likely to highlight the problems to them and it is likely that they will be more influential than Google in these matters.

The bottom line is – this could potentially hurt SEO a lot!

My opinion is based on a couple of local key phrases I’ve been working on which were always organically positioned at number 1, but drowned out by the traditional Google Local listings and map. The change is (again) in my opinion an update to the algorithm.

My trail of thought:

• My organic result which was positioned number 1 organically got merged with my Google Local listing, therefore the site is now Position 1, without a map above it. I.e. we are now being seen an awful lot more which is awesome.
• The people who had optimised for Google Local are still on page 1, if they have a website. Which tends to make me think the ranking factors used in Google Locals top 10 map listings are now part of Googles main algorithm. Thus a local company would stand a better chance of ranking locally because of these new “credits” Google is giving local companies for there target phrases.
• However what this also means (and is being observed) is national companies which have strong pages can build past the new merged local results.

I could be wrong, but I actually think this is a beneficial change which will benefit SEO’s as Local SERPs are now open for play again within Google’s main algorithm and most importantly the top slots which were previously dominated by Map listings have now gone.

Why would they do that?

You may be wondering, well to me it seems obvious. The map listings alone without the rest of the Google algorithm were extremely easy to gain/weak. A lot of affiliates were cloaking the crap out of it for terms such as “Dating in London” which would should channel you off to Adult Friend Finder .. Dirty Affiliates.

So to incorporate Local as a “bonus” to local companies within the main Organic Results seems like an obvious solution.

Of course I haven’t tested it nearly enough to confirm this, but I know if I were Google, this is what I would do.

It has been estimated that the Central Office of Information (COI) provided over two fifths, (£40 million) of I-Level’s revenue until earlier this year. Despite their best efforts, teaming up with top media agency, Starcom, the COI awarded the renewed, premium contract to WPP’s GroupM.

Andrew Walmsley, co-founder of I-Level, and group chief executive, Stephen Rust, have called in the help of Zolfo Cooper as administrator following a severe cash flow crisis as a result of losing out on the government contract.

Zolfo Cooper’s, spokesman Alastair Beveridge, released a statement saying that, ‘the joint administrators will be assessing the business, before gauging and evaluating the interest in the company, with their main priority being with the companies’ creditors.’

Created in the late 1990s by Charlie Dobres and Andrew Walmsley, the founders have expanded the marketing agency by taking on a further 120 employees. Furthermore, in early 2008, the firm sold a 60 per cent stake to private equity group, ECI, in a £45 million deal.

I-Level have won numerous awards and have an impressive roster of clients including: Sky, Procter & Gamble, The Sun, Macmillan, Samsung and Renault. Their marketing activities include: social media and mobile marketing, display ads and search marketing.

As of this date onwards, affiliates are not allowed to acquire links for the brands bingo site terms from any third part sites for the purpose of deep linking to their own affiliate website.  According to the two networks, any affiliates found to be breaching these new rules will have their affiliate commissions withheld.

The reasons for the rule changes, according to the networks, are so that the brand owner can have greater control over the quality of the reader experience when a user searches for their branded terms in the search portals.

The decision is understandable in terms of the brands wanting to control the user experience, but they don’t control the search engines that use their own algorithms to decide how to rank sites and the reader experience.  Perhaps a better solution for the bingo site owners is to improve their own SEO strategy for the brand, instead of trying to artificially control the SERPS.

The question on everybody’s lips now is how are the merchants going to monitor the acquisition of third party links? And does acquiring mean getting a free link because someone has read your site and genuinely links back to you? Whats stopping the affiliates brand link building and then advertising a competitor?

Test Multiple Design Formats –

If the merchant offers a variety of different banner designs then test each one to find out whether they make a different in terms of click-through rates (CTR). Research has shown that complex banners generally get the highest CTR.

Animated banners also outperform static as internet surfers are more likely to notice banners that are bright and flashing.

Positioning –

The saying   ‘location, location, location’ is none the truer than with online affiliate banners and Adsence.  Test different positions to figure out which area of your site gives you the best CTR.

Size of Banners –

Size does matter! Research has shown that banners of larger size are more likely to create click throughs’ than smaller pixel banners. When selecting a size, consider loading times and overall page design.

Banner Loading Time –

Only use fast loading banners. If you use slow loading banners, you will not only miss out on clicks but also page visitors as it will slow down how long your entire site takes to load.

Brand Name

Choose a reputable dating site to promote. People are less likely to part with their cash if they don’t trust the site. Select dating sites that are well known in the public domain such as Dating Direct, Match or eHarmony.

Payouts

Simple advice, but select an affiliate-dating program that has the biggest payouts. Consider how much traffic you expect to get on your site. Some affiliate dating programmes will pay out more when you get over a certain number of sign ups a month whereas others will have a set rate no matter how many new members you send.

Some will also pay for registrations (such as Dating Direct & eHarmony do) whilst others like Match.com will only pay for sales, but usually at a better percentage.

Cookies

Consider the affiliate programmes cookie period. Not everyone signs up to a dating site the first time they visit. The longer the cookie lasts the better the chances of you getting paid. For example, a 30 day cookie means you will get paid so long as the person signs up to the dating site within 30 days of first clicking your link or banner.

Conversion rates

The majority of affiliate networks provide conversion data. This allows you to see which dating sites are great at converting visitors into fully paying members. You can also measure conversion rates yourself by testing each dating site until you find one which works best with your website.

Its important to remember that the content of your website is going to attract a certain type of visitor and that visitor is likely to convert into a sale better on a certain type of dating / relationship website so test test and test some more!

Why do I think these could be beneficial? My research is based entirely on observations of successfully ranked sites in competitive areas. Feel free to submit others and I will add them in and link back to you.

Meta Description

The meta description tag should contain one or more sentences describing the page. Search Engines will display this under the Page Title, therefore it’s extremely important make it interesting to encourage potential visitors to click through.

Example:

<meta name=”description” content=”A description of your page goes in here.”>

Meta Keywords

Meta Keywords are also used by some Search Engines although they have been written of by most people,  it is still a worthwhile cause as it could count towards an overall page Quality Score in Google and older Search Engines still use them.

Example:

<meta name=”keywords” content=”Your phrase here, another phrase here” />

Meta Robots

This tells the Search Engines what it can and cannot do on a particular page.

This can be a very good one if used correctly even if others don’t say so. Its used throughout a few of my websites to ensure the Content gets indexed. This and the use of nofollows prevents Link Juice being passed to Tag Listings etc.  So on each “Post” every internal linked is nofollowed and on each Tag listing I use the Meta Robots tag like this:

<meta name=”robots” content=”noindex,follow,noodp,noydir,noarchive” />

Meta Robots full list of Attributes:

• Index – Index this page please Googlebot (or other search engine).
• NoIndex – Don’t index this page Googlebot
• Follow – Follow all the links on this page
• NoFollow – Don’t follow anything on this page
• Noopd – Don’t use the description from the Open Directory Project (DMOZ)
• Noydir – Don’t use the description from the Yahoo Directory
• Noarchive – Don’t show a cache of this page please

Meta Distribution

This tells Google who your target audience is and would usually be set to Global.

Meta Distribution Attributes:

• Global is intended for all users.
• Local – for local IP block of your website
• IU – Internal Use Only not for public distribution

Example:

<meta name=”distribution” content=”Global” />

Meta Author

This should contain the owner/author of the page being displayed. It is an optional tag which you may or may not want to use. I will add that most SEO people seem to have it in their header, if they do it can’t be bad right?

Example:

<META NAME=”Author” CONTENT=”Anthony Shapley”>

Meta Generator

This is used to show what Content Management System is being used to Generate your website and is used by the software distributors to track the reach of their product. Whilst this is fine, I do highly encourage everyone to remove Version Numbers because if an exploit is found, it’s easy to work out if it applies to your website.

It makes no difference to your Search Results, you may or may not want to use it. Personally I would just remove it.

Example:

<meta name=”generator” content=”WordPress 2.6.2” />

The day started with Joost’s presentation on Blogging, which was awesome. Covered some quite technical bits that some people would perhaps usually overlook (including me) so I’ve been spending sometime improving loading times which were surprisingly bad. They still aren’t great, but it was a superb presentation and anyone who wants to blog seriously needs to read Joost’s blog.

Immediately after Joost’s presentation we had Julian from the Telegraph discussing big site SEO, which was also great, covering SEO from a Newspapers perspective was a very useful.

We then had superb Judith Lewis covering Universal Search – Judith’s presentation was very insightful for anyone starting out learning SEO covering all aspects of getting in the index including, web pages, images, products, videos and beyond.

After that Joost, Judith and I decided to head back to the hotel to freshen up (I was concerned I wouldn’t be able to find it) and I’m glad I went with them because I never would have!! We then went back to watch Zoe Piper talk about the Content Network. In case you’ve forgotten what the content network is, its what us SEO’s use to find relative back links. Uh I mean its how we advertise sites..

I then met a whole bunch more people (so many) including The Hodge who organized the whole event! It really was non stop all day until the early hours of Sunday morning by which point I’m ashamed to say I’d got so drunk I ended up being rather ill.

All in all, superb day and I highly recommend everyone considers visiting the next one in 2010 – I will be there!