We studied together, we learned together, we researched together; together we’ve been flabbergasted by moves that Google has made, have wondered why they killed a good site but boosted a dirty one to the top. We shared compliments and ducked out of the way when mud was being slung.

Together.

And now, frankly, it’s enough.

No more taking; we want to give back to the community. More than that: we want to invest in the community.

When we started it was about e-groups, Yahoo groups, forums (which we sometimes refered to as Web boards). There were just a few Names in the industry and everybody knew them.

These days we’re scattered all over the place: we’re at Sphinn, Twitter, forums, and of course we write on our own blogs.

We’re scattered, we’re divided.

It’s harder than ever for a newcomer to find her place in the industry, to make an impact, to build her name. Unless you know somebody who knows somebody it’s really hard to get a break somewhere, somehow.

We want to turn SEO Scoop into that break; we want SEO Scoop to be that somebody, that somewhere, that somehow.

To begin with SEO Scoop will be used as a platform for new SEO bloggers, to give them a podium and provide them with an industry respected audience so they can showcase their knowledge and grab the chance to establish themselves.

Additionally, continuing Donna’s brilliant initiative of highlighting search bloggers, we’ll continue to put the spotlight on people who’ve already established themselves and deserve some extra attention.

Together we’re of course going to establish a solid team of regular contributors. In fact, you might be one of them, right?

Throughout 2009 we’ll continue to roll out ideas and changes that we think will benefit the SEO community as a whole.

That said, those are our ideas; the ideas of Search Engine People and some of our friends.but what do you think the SEO community really needs? What do you need? What do you want, what would you like?

As Barry Schwartz would say, discussion continues at Sphinn.

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Meet Jeffrey Smith, the Search Blogger of the Day. Today I’d like to highlight a post entitled, The Value of Aggregators, Syndication and Hub Pages. Sometimes SEOs and webmasters have to be reminded that leading people away from your site isn’t always a bad thing. But only a really good explanation as to “why” that can be beneficial is likely to convince someone that they should consider it. Luckily, Jeffrey’s post contains that really good explanation. It’s a good read, and one that maybe everyone needs to be reminded of from time to time. Yes, even you.

If you want to know more about today’s Search Blogger of the Day, check out Jeffrey’s about page.

That’s the Search Blogger of the Day. If you are a search blogger, and aren’t on the list yet, go here to find out how to be included. I plan to promote everyone on the list in various ways. Some will be informative, and some will be just plain fun. Don’t miss out.

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Meet Jeremy Rivera, the Search Blogger of the Day. Today I’d like to highlight a post titled, SEO Prayer. Ok, ok, this one is strictly fun, and is in no way useful for anything but a chuckle, but I couldn’t pass it up. Actually, I can imagine it might offend some of the more sensitive folks, but hopefully everyone’s sense of humor will override any offense they might feel. I won’t spoil it for you. Go read it for yourself, and tell me it didn’t make you smile!

If you want to know more about today’s Search Blogger of the Day, check out Jeremy’s about page.

That’s the Search Blogger of the Day. If you are a search blogger, and aren’t on the list yet, go here to find out how to be included. I plan to promote everyone on the list in various ways. Some will be informative, and some will be just plain fun. Don’t miss out.

© DazzlinDonna for SEO Scoop, 2008. | Permalink | 5 comments | Add to del.icio.us
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SEO Scoop does not necessarily agree with or condone any tactics mentioned by guest posters.

Link building is widely known as one of the hardest search engine marketing tasks out there. Of course, there are a few link building (dare I say it) Gods…out there like Eric Ward who just seem to have the knack. And thank the universe for them! So much to be learned in our short lives and they have many, many things to teach us grasshoppers.

Right, so link building.

There are a lot of ways you can build links actually. And it isn’t very hard to do; what is hard is getting it right. For instance, you can submit your site to directories that suit your market niche, you can join forums and take part in social media, you can send emails to sites you think are relevant to yours (you can even spy on your competitor’s links! Use this operator - link:(website) in a search engine search box and you will see what links your competitor is getting and target those sites for yourself). There are different ways to do these different practices and while they may work for some instances, they may not work in all instances. Each industry is different, sites are different - what works for one, may not work for another. Some practices you can use to build reputation, others for pure traffic. Research and practice makes the world go round, why wouldn’t this apply to link building? You will only know what works by trying, trying and trying again.

This post is going to touch on the emails you send to relevant site owners. As a treat, here is an example email you could send to the owners of sites you hope to get a link from.

—————

Dear Mr. Balthazar,

I thoroughly enjoyed looking through your dog grooming website, especially the ‘Bathing Bloopers’ page. I have a website on a related subject and I think it might be of interest to you and your readers. It’s “Love your dog’s teeth too” on dogaholics.com. This page contains a canine mouth care plan, including healthy teeth snack suggestions, good gum care, with a bonus section on ways to get your dogs to eat their mouth friendly food. You can find the page at http://www.dogaholics.com/toothygrins

I thought a good place on your site to link from would be on your “links” page, here: http://www.groomathon.net/links*

Here is a description that you can use if you like:

Groom your dog’s teeth too
Instructions for dog mouth care and how to keep your dog’s teeth healthy.

I hope that you find this link relevant and useful. We (and our dogs!) would certainly appreciate a link from your site. Please feel free to contact me with any questions.

Sincerely,
Charlie Brown
Online Marketing Manager, Dogaholics

—————-

*you may be able to find a better page if you look around the site - which you should be doing.

Why this letter?

- It’s personal and specific - by using the person’s real name and giving them the linking details they need.

- It’s not coming across as a sales letter.

- A link exchange is not requested. It is entirely up to the content of your site as to whether you will receive the link or not, so it better be good!

- You get to decide what keywords you want in the anchor text.

This is by no means absolutely foolproof; you will always get people unwilling to link to you even if your site or email is written well, just to do the best you can. The success of your email attempts would also depend on the type of person receiving your email and the industry you are in - some are more open than others.

It does take a lot of time investment, but when you see that traffic coming from those referring sites…it makes your heart glad and it all seems worth it. Plus you have the opportunity to make some really good connections in the niche of your choosing.

Remember to research each site you want to email. Be sure they will find your page appropriate otherwise you are wasting your time and theirs. Find the most relevant person to contact - using a contact form is ok too. No seplling mistakes! It looks unprofessional. (See?).

Time consuming advice aside - the most important thing you need to get links is your website. If your site sells itself, people will be much more willing to link to you. Quality is king and content is queen.

Author Bio:

Leila is an online marketing specialist working for a SEO software company called Interleado. Any knowledge gained has been earned by many hours toiling on pages made of internet and paper alike and is shared whenever possible.

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Here’s a quote from Jeff:

The intent of this purchase is to expand on Donna�s significant efforts to date, and make SEO-Scoop one of the hubs for information in the search and social media industries � the HuffingtonPost of the search indsutry if you will. The vision is not yet fully flushed out, but a good number of industry personalities will be involved helping to mold and guide the future of the site (including Donna, who will continue to be a regular blogger by the way). Its also envisioned (as per Donna�s original initiative) that the site will give industry newbies the opportunity to post and create a name for themselves.

I hope you’ll stick around to watch SEO Scoop flourish under its new management. I know I’ll be having fun watching it grow.

© DazzlinDonna for SEO Scoop, 2008. | Permalink | 16 comments | Add to del.icio.us
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Meet Jim Hedger, the Search Blogger of the Day. Today I’d like to highlight a post called Search Marketing Is A Marathon, Not A Sprint. Have you ever needed to explain the intricacies of search marketing to a client? Did you try to help them understand what it takes in time and commitment to not only achieve goals, but to continue meeting goals into the future? If you did, and wished you’d done a better job of it, you should read Jim’s excellent explanation. It’s one even a client can understand, and that’s worth sharing.

If you want to know more about today’s Search Blogger of the Day, check out Jim’s about page.

That’s the Search Blogger of the Day. If you are a search blogger, and aren’t on the list yet, go here to find out how to be included. I plan to promote everyone on the list in various ways. Some will be informative, and some will be just plain fun. Don’t miss out.

© DazzlinDonna for SEO Scoop, 2008. | Permalink | 3 comments | Add to del.icio.us
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The metrics used to rank the blogs include:

• Feedburner RSS Subscribers
• Alexa Rank
• Compete Rank
• Technorati Rank
• Google PageRank
• Yahoo Inbound Links
• StumbleUpon Reviews
• del.icio.us Votes
• Links from Winning the Web
• User Votes

The rankings will change (looks like weekly) based on the changes in the metrics. If this was nothing more than a simple list of ranked blogs, I’m not sure how news-worthy it would be, although it would still be worth checking out. But there’s an extra feature that I’m looking forward to. You can subscribe to a newsletter that will get sent weekly and which will show an analysis of the top movers on the list. I’m not sure what that analysis will look like, but I’m interested to see it. Why? Because I think I could learn a few things about analyzing data such as this. I’ve got some thoughts about how I could use this type of data analysis, but I won’t share them just yet. Anyway, I thought it was interesting enough to pass along, in case you wanted to check it out too.

Oh - SEO Scoop is currently ranked #28 (as evidenced by the badge below). Will be interesting to see how that changes over the coming weeks.

© DazzlinDonna for SEO Scoop, 2008. | Permalink | 9 comments | Add to del.icio.us
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Today’s tidbit comes from an old friend of many SEO’s, John Mueller (johnmu or formerly known as softplus before Google absorbed him into their fold). John gives a quick answer to a question asked by niemi over on the Cre8asite forums. niemi wanted to know if it was true that two people could get different results for the same search based on their surfing habits. John’s reply:

Yep!

There are all kinds of personalization that play a role in Google’s search results.

So there you have it, straight from the horse’s mouth. (No offense meant, John).

Run on over to the thread if you want more details.

© DazzlinDonna for SEO Scoop, 2008. | Permalink | 4 comments | Add to del.icio.us
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Meet Judith Lewis, the Search Blogger of the Day. Today I’d like to highlight a post sure to get a few tongues wagging or a few chicks clucking, entitled Has Google Become A Modern God?. Judith does a chickarrific job of entertaining us and educating us, while also making us go all inside of ourselves, be introspective and … well … you know … think! Seriously, read the piece and share your thoughts in the comments of her post.

If you want to know more about today’s Search Blogger of the Day, check out Judith’s about page.

That’s the Search Blogger of the Day. If you are a search blogger, and aren’t on the list yet, go here to find out how to be included. I plan to promote everyone on the list in various ways. Some will be informative, and some will be just plain fun. Don’t miss out.

© DazzlinDonna for SEO Scoop, 2008. | Permalink | 2 comments | Add to del.icio.us
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