David Leonhardt’s SEO Marketing Express

I’ve always enjoyed Jeff Foxworthy and his “you might be a redneck” jokes, so…

 Most SEO specialists seem to live in big metropolitan cities like Boston or London or Toronto.  Not me.  I live out here in the sticks.  Which I guess makes me a bit of a redneck SEO., so…

If you think you might be a redneck SEO, I have devised this handy little test, with 50 signs that you might be a redneck.  Please feel free to share this with your friends colleagues and even friendly city-folk you might know. And don’t be shy to add to this list if there are important signs I missed.

By the way, it helps to imagine Jeff Foxworthy’s voice when you read these.  Here is a video of Jeff Foxworthy doing his you-might-be-a-redneck routine to get you in the mood (Sorry, they turned off embedding on this, but the link is good.)…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7sKtkdDJe5s&NR=1

Top 50 signs that you might be a redneck SEO

1. If Yahoo! Is something you holler when your horseshoe rings the post, you might be a redneck SEO.
2. If you’ve ever tried to change the transmission in your computer, you might be a redneck SEO.
3. If you don’t Digg because digging sounds too hippyish, you might be a redneck SEO.
4. If your idea of link-building is getting a longer chain for your wallet, you might be a redneck SEO.
5. If you have to put on boots to go out to your home office, you might be a redneck SEO.
6. If you look for scraper sites to clean the bottom of your boots, you might be a redneck SEO.
7. If you find on-page optimization a challenge because you can’t write on your computer screen, you might be a redneck SEO.
8. If you think GrayWolf, theGypsy and Neoblog are race horses, you might be a redneck SEO.
9. If you spit for good luck before you click “submit website”, you might be a redneck SEO.
10. If you re-use your spit … never mind.  Next!
11. If you don’t like title tags ‘cause titles are for uppity city folk, you might be a redneck SEO.
12. If you like to Sphinn your partner at the local barn dance, you might be a redneck SEO.
13. If you refuse to take on a client with a pink website, you might be a redneck SEO.
14. If your other Mac is a truck, you might be a redneck SEO.
15. If you prefer black hat SEO because real men don’t wear white, you might be a redneck SEO.
16. If you have a Dukes of Hazard screensaver , you might be a redneck SEO.
17. If wonder just what blade Matt cutts with, you might be a redneck SEO.
18. If you agree that bounce rates are becoming a big SEO issue because gopher holes are damaging your ATV, you might be a redneck SEO.
19. If every time a client mentions conversions you shout “Praise the Lord and pass the ammunition!”, you might be a redneck SEO.
20. If the words “viral content” send you running to the barn ‘cause you lost some 30 chickens to a flu bug last spring, you might be a redneck SEO.
21. If you don’t care for link bait but you sure would love to help your client with his trout bait, you might be a redneck SEO.
22. If you place the “home” button on your website between the “barn” button and the “outhouse” button, you might be a redneck SEO.
23. If the word “blog” sounds just messy to you, you might be a redneck SEO.
24. If you think Twitter is where they send all the twits, you might be a redneck SEO (but you can follow this SEO at @amabaie.)
25. If a “search engine” means the 4 x 4 you take to chase away the foxes, you might be a redneck SEO.
26. If you say you work from a mobile device and mean that you work from your home, you might be a redneck SEO.
27. If you try to trap your mouse with cheese or peanut butter, you might be a redneck SEO.
28. If you bill clients not by the hour, not by the links, not by the rankings, but by the six-packs consumed, you might be a redneck SEO.
29. If your home page is set to AutoTrader or MonsterAuto, you might be a redneck SEO.
30. If adding video to your computer means buying an eight-track player, you might be a redneck SEO.
31. If you think Sticky SEO is when you drop your keyboard in the pig pen, you might be a redneck SEO.
32. If your office wall is decorated in very tasteful velvet Elvis, you might be a redneck SEO.
33. If you bring your laptop to the family reunion hoping an eligible cousin will sit on it, you might be a redneck SEO.
34. If your favorite ringtone goes ma-aa-aa-aa, you might be a redneck SEO.
35. If your personal assistant also goes ma-aa-aa-aa, you might be a redneck SEO.
36. If your car sports a worn bumper sticker reading “SEO or bust”, you might be a redneck SEO.
37. If you wear jeans and a toothpick to a client presentation, you might be a redneck SEO.
38. If your computer desk demonstrates that you are an environmentally aware operation because it is built from a used outhouse, you might be a redneck SEO.
39. If you have more than one tattoo on your butt reading “SEO”, you might be a redneck SEO.
40. If you sing in the shower “Thank God I’m an SEO Boy”, you might be a redneck SEO.
41. If you own one computer that runs and five cars that don’t, you might be a redneck SEO.
42. If you try to buy used links at the local flea market, you might be a redneck SEO.
43. If your Avatar at Zoomit Canada is a picture of your belt buckle, you might be a redneck SEO.
44. If organic search is what you do when you lose a rifle in the corn field, you might be a redneck SEO.
45. If don’t do SEO contests, but would rather like to try an SEO drag race, you might be a redneck SEO.
46. If you think sites rank well because they have “#1” in the title tag, you might be a redneck SEO.
47. If you ask your clients to pay with ammunition or fireworks, you might be a redneck SEO.
48. If you respect motherhood, apple pie and meta tags, you might be a redneck SEO.
49. If your idea of social media is a telephone – the kind with a dial that turns, you might be a redneck SEO.
50. If you think a cell phone is what you do when you don’t need a telephone with a dial that turns anymore … you might be right!

I hope you enjoyed this little test to see if you are a redneck SEO.  Did you pass?  Really?  Great, welcome to the club.  And if you come up with any other signs that I have missed, please add them to the comments below

Just for fun, I went back through 2008 to see if I could narrow down the top 10 best blog posts I published during the year. It’s amazing how much writing a person can do in one year. I looked for those posts that are the most substantial and useful, and hopefully will stand the test of time.

It was not easy to choose just ten, but the following are my top 10 picks, in reverse order by date:

1. Bounce Rate SEO Fallacies
Regular readers might be getting tired of hearing from me on this topic by now, so I will simply say that this story already continues in two posts I have made in the past 24 hours, and this post spurred a debate at Sphinn

2. Website Optimization for Telephone Leads
This post is one that fills a pretty unique niche. In fact, I don’t think I have seen a handful of blog posts or articles in my life linking SEO and telephone leads. This is a very practical how-to post.

3. You Need Sucky Links
I get tired of all the emphasis on PageRank and how some website owners try to avoid getting sucky links. I don’t mean links from really bad neighborhoods, just low quality links that don’t count for much. But these are pretty important, nonetheless. Read the post to find out why.

4. Offline Links Count, Too
Folks in the online world tend to forget that there is a real world out there, and “links” in the real world can do wonders for one’s business.

5. Earlybird Link-building
File this one under “advanced SEO tactics”. Why wait until your website is completely developed and launched to start building your links? Give the search engines a taste of what will be on your site before it actually is. This is another how-to post, which drew a pretty good discussion.

6. How to get More Value from Your SEO Consultant
This is the one “SEO business” post I selected for the top 10 of 2008. It is important not to lose site of the client-consultant relationship.

7. New Google Rank-check Tool Is Released
Call the title a spoof or a prank, but topic is some seriously good advice for the search engines.

8. Why Blogs Are Good for SEO
Prospective clients almost always get this piece of free advice: “Get a blog.” This is one post that I expect to be just as valid in 2012 as it is today … and that’s an eternity in SEO.

9. Yahoo Violating Nofollow Attribute
I chose this post because it seems even truer today than it did back then. In fact, just prior to Christmas, I found several new batches of “nofollow” backlinks showing up in Yahoo. It might be that PageRank is not passed along through “nofollow” links, but I am pretty sure they count for quite a bit. Although best practice is to make sure I get nofollow-free links for my clients, I jump at good nofollow links, too.

10. Link Exchanges: It’s Not the Size of the PR but How You Use It
If you love that pesky little green bar on the Google Toolbar, don’t read this post; it will only irritate you. For newbies, a welcome to a sneak peak at how this SEO specialist evaluates possible link exchanges.

So that’s it. A whole year of SEO advice condensed into a single post. If you like any of these posts, please Sphinn them or Digg them of Mixx them or Stumble them so that others might enjoy them, too.

Happy 2009!

Last night I posted about what Google has to say on SEO and bounce rates.   You can  view the post here. A great question was posted by Wilson: “David, I was wondering, why Google want to have two different answer for the bounce rates…? ”

Even broken down into four parts, my response was longer than allowed for comments on this blog, so I decided to make it a post on its own.  Here is my answer to Wilson’s question:

Great question. I will get to that, but let us look at another misunderstood part of the Google algorithm.

We have been wondering for years why Google has three different measures for PageRank. The real PageRank calculation used in their algorithm is a complex logarithmic calculation. All other things being equal, a link from a PR4.12964 page is probably worth many links from a PR3.45294 page, for instance (We have no idea to how many decimal spaces the real PageRank is calculated, not whether this has remained steady over the years or whether it fluctuates over time).

Then there is the PageRank in the Google Directory, which supposedly is on a scale of 8. I can’t find any reference to the 8-point scale in the Directory, but the Wikipedia article on PageRank is a good reference on this point. Interestingly, the Google Directory states that…

 ”The green ratings bars are Google’s assessment of the importance of a web page, as determined by Google’s patented PageRank technology and other factors. These PageRank bars tell you at a glance whether Google considers a page to be a high-quality site worth checking out.”

Note the “and other factors” wording.

Finally we have the famous Toolbar PageRank, a green bar on a scale from one to ten. This is what most webmasters mistakenly refer to as Google’s PageRank calculation. However, it is just an estimation that makes a PageRank of 4.0001 look the same as a PageRank of 4.9999, even though the latter might be worth many times the former. Meanwhile, it makes a PageRank of 4.9999 look much less valuable than a PageRank of 5.0001, even though the two are almost the same. Furthermore, everyone involved in SEO can recount numerous instances where a page “should” have a much higher or much lower PageRank than another page, based on the number and value of incoming links, but the Toolbar PageRank does not reflect that. (For instance, I have noted on many sites that a “links” page with identical link juice to a PR3 content page might nevertheless have a PageRank value of zero.)

What does this tell us about bounce rates?

Just like PageRank, bounce rates is a metric Google shares with its users. PageRank is viewable to everybody; bounce rates are viewable only to the website owner. In both cases, Google is showing a very simple calculation … a number people can use to quickly make comparisons between pages, between websites, between last month and this month, etc.

As I wrote above, “It would be a ridiculously simplistic algorithm that calculates bounces using such simple calculations.” Any serious calculation of bounces applied to a search engine ranking algorithm would have to be such a complex multidimensional equation that it would be useless to you or I as humans viewing it with our eyes (unless you happen to be a mathematical genius - and I mean genius - which I am not by a long shot.

Except to the extent that a search engine chooses to reveal how it treats bounces and other actions in its algorithm, we will never know for certain what plays a role and what does not, nor how big a role each factor plays. This is par for the course with ranking algorithms.

It is also totally possible that Google and the other search engines do not include bounce rates and related user actions yet in their algorithms.  Adam Lasnik’s comments quoted in my previous post are good hints, but they are hardly official.     Google engineer Knut Magne Risvik speaking in Norwegian at Digi.no and saying that  Google can measure how many seconds it takes from when a user clicks on a link to click back to Google, and if it is a short time that visit was a failure, is not quite an official Google statement either.  The only search engine that has released anything official is MSN through its BrowseRank paper … and that is not a statement current practice but of future intentions.

As this very young field matures, Google might also change its Google Analytics definition of “bounce rate”. SEO aside, the raging debate over whether a high bounce rate could sometimes be a good thing (depending on the nature of a website) makes a good case for changing the Google Analytics definition, too.

The summary to all this is that I have to answer Wilson with a simple “I don’t know”.  But, just like defining “bounce rate” and “PageRank”, such simple answers are really a lot more complex than they look.

Regular readers will know that I have been in a somewhat involved debate on this blog and over at Sphinn on the issue of bounce rates as they might now or later on apply to SEO.  I maintain that is a matter of business necessity that search engines would try to more precisely measure user satisfaction with each result of each search phrase, and that bounce rates would be one metric they could use.  Frequent readers will also know that I do not view “bounce rates” as a simple number or as a static pass-fail type of calculation.  It would be a ridiculously simplistic algorithm that calculates bounces using such simple calculations, in my humble opinion. 

Recently, Web Pro News  reported that Google answers bounce rates questions.  In fact, two separate answers were provided, one that relates to SEO and the other that relates to Google Analytics.  Many webmasters will confuse the two and we all know that’s how false rumors get started — the kind of false rumors that years from now will be reported as fact by many people calling themselves “SEO expert”. 

It is possible that Google Analytics and SEO are related or will be related, but don’t bank on it.  Here is what Adam Lasnik of Google has to say specifically about bounce rates and SEO.

If you’re talking about bounce rates in the context of Google Analytics, I’m afraid you probably know as much as I do. I love the product, but don’t know the ins-and-outs of it very thoroughly.

If you’re talking about bounce rates in the context of Google web search and webmaster-y issues, then we really don’t have specific guidance on bounces per se; rather, the key for webmasters is to make users happy so they find your site useful, bookmark your site, return to your site, recommend your site, link to your site, etc. Pretty much everything we write algorithmically re: web search is designed to maximize user happiness, so anything webmasters do to increase that is likely to improve their site’s presence in Google.

The bottom line is that you want to do all the things that we talk about in Sticky SEO to keep people on your website, to engage them in your website, to send Google and other search engines signals that they found your website to be useful.  And, of course, you want to reduce the number of visitors who send the search engines signals that your website is useless.

Just for information, here is my post on objections to ranking based partially on bounce rates.

My Christmas Tweet for you. 

Of late there has been a lot of discussion about bounce rates and whether or not the search engines count these in their algorithms.  A few days ago I posted some pros and cons on this issue.  Today I would like to share with you 9 common objections I have seen to using bounce rates as part of the search engine algorithms, and refute 8 of those.

As far back as late 2007, there were reports that webmasters were seeing a difference in their rankings for major keywords within a few weeks of drastically changing their bounce rates.  However, none of the tests and reports seem to be complete enough or repeatable enough to constitute “proof”. 

As a result, there are plenty of naysayers who believe that such things as bounce rates are not now and probably never will be part of the search engine algorithms. 

I am of the opposite view; bounce rates will certainly be a major part of search engine algorithms and probably already are to some degree.  That is in large part – but not completely - the premise behind Sticky SEO.  Let us not forget that Microsoft has been spending a fair amount of energy on what has been called BrowseRank, which is in part based on bounce rates.

Objection 1, there is no definition of “bounce rate”. 

Response. This is the flimsiest of arguments.  A bounce is when someone leaves a website, going back where they came from.

Objection 2, I don’t like how Google Analytics defines a bounce.

Response.  Sadly, Google doesn’t ask me for advice, either.  But cheer up, the bounce rate in Google Analytics might not be the same as they use in their algorithm, just as the little green bar is not necessarily the PageRank they use in their algorithm.

Objection 3, many sites don’t have Google Analytics turned on, so Google would have very incomplete data.

Response (scratching my head in confusion).  What does Google Analytics have to do with anything?  This is about Google (or Yahoo, or MSN, or Ask, or some other) tracking their own traffic and how their own users move about and – most importantly – how their users return to their website.

Objection 4, what is the threshold for a bounce?  After 5 seconds?  After 10 second?  After 15 seconds? This is a mess!  (This is often part of the how-do-we-define-a-bounce debate.)

Response.   A bounce is a bounce, whether it takes a person one second or one hour to bounce back, it is a bounce.  How the search engines choose to treat bounces with varying lag times is another matter.  Let’s be clear; they won’t tell you, just as they won’t tell you how many links on a page they index, how many they follow and how many they count in their ranking algorithms.  Furthermore, it is a moving target.  Just like every other algorithm input, bounce rates and bounce lag times will not be treated in the exact same way one day to the next.

Objection 5, what if people quickly click on an external link and leave my site?  They found the site useful because they found a useful link on it, but they bounced.

Response.  That is not a bounce, that’s a referral.  A bounce is when someone hits the back button.

Objection 6, what if the user quickly closes the window?

Response.  That could be any number of things, but it is not a bounce.  Who can guess how the search engines might treat that, or even if they treat it at all?  However, it need not be considered a bounce unless the search engines believe it should be.

Objection 7, doesn‘t a bounce mean the person has found what they want?  Can‘t a bounce sometimes be good?

Response.  Sometimes, perhaps, but rarely.  After 5 seconds, a person has no time to read a page.  After 30 seconds, they might have found something useful.  So lag times matter.  More importantly, the search engines can determine what a person does next.  If a person returns to the search results and clicks on another link, that is a sign they did not find what they want.  If they return to the search results and conduct a similar search, that might also be a sign they did not find what they want.  If they return to the search results and conduct an unrelated search, that might be a sign that they found what they want.  Search engines can weigh various bounces in light of the user’s next action.

Objection 8, for some searches, people look for multiple sources, such as comparing prices, comparing products, seeking varying opinions, etc.  Too many sites would be penalized if all those bounces were to be counted in the rankings.

Response.  This is an example of false logic.  If someone clicks on one website, then bounces, clicks on another website, then bounces, clicks on another website then bounces…all the high-ranking websites for that particular search query would be equally affected.  Nobody would suffer a ranking disadvantage because rankings are relative.  On the other hand, if one site typically bounces and the others don’t, the bouncy site clearly is less useful than the others and should be demoted.

Objection 9.  Can‘t I just set up a bot to visit all my top competitors and leave their site after varying numbers of seconds to make it appear that their sites are all bouncy?

Response.  Yes, you can.  And you can get very creative.  I have even heard of couriers in China travelling from one Internet café to another to click on a particular site as a means of increasing its rankings.  I have no answer for this, other than that the search engines will have to control for this, just as they have found ways to control for automated link-building.

So have no fear.  Good websites that provide what their visitors want or who help them find what they want will prosper.  Sticky SEO looks at conversions and stickiness as integral elements to SEO.

Cheap sites that do a lot of link-building - bouncy SEO - counting on large volumes of traffic to offset poor conversion rates, will suffer - because the search engines will stop sending them that traffic. 

It’s just a matter of time.  Or perhaps it has already started.

Earlier today I was on Webmaster Radio talking about Sticky SEO. You can listen here:

Webmaster Radio
	Universal Search Algorithm Show: SEO 101

Do Google and Yahoo include bounce rates in their algorithms?  Ever since I released Sticky SEO, it seems there has been a growing debate on whether bounce rates factor into search engine algorithms, or even whether they should in the future.  I think you know where I stand; they probably already do to some degree and they surely will count for much more in the future.  And not just bounce rates, but various other user activities.

I seems that my view is not universally held, but there is a robust debate on this topic.

Some people feel that there really is not a definition of what a bounce is, so that makes it difficult to determine bounce rates.  That just means the search engines have to define what a bounce is, and I gave them some tips here.

Some people feel that a high bounce rate is a good thing –  the person found quickly what he wants and returns to search for something else.  To quote one observer on Sphinn: “If the page is highly relevant to what the searcher is specifically looking for, they can get their info and leave without going to any further pages - fully satisfied. A Big vote for relevance.”

On the other hand, some people feel that if Google is now using bounce rates to rank its PPC ads, why would it not use that same information in its organic listings?

Others have argued that it would be too easy to send robots to the competitions’ websites and create a lot of fake bounces.

This issue is certainly not over, but I simply cannot see the search engines ignoring what I believe is the ultimate measurement of customer satisfaction.  There is no way that a quick return to the search engine is a good thing.  At best it is neutral, if someone is doing research and visiting numerous websites.  But in that case all top-ranking sites would have their bounce rates affected equally, so there would be no disadvantage resulting for any of them - those bounces would not affect rankings.  One way or the other user activity has to be an important measurement the search engines cannot afford to ignore.

Regular readers might notice something different on this blog. If you are the first to read this post, you will have to go to an older post to view it. It’s called the Intense Debate Plugin for WordPress. It offers some really cool features that this blog did not have before:

• Avatars for those people registered (not sure where). You can see this at http://www.seo-writer.com/blog/2008/11/10/you-need-sucky-links/
• Voting up or down on the quality of the comments
• Ability to respond directly to somone else’s comments (much more conversational!)

Sadly, when I first installed it, the plugin nixed my WYSWYG editor, until we could load the new WordPress 2.7.  It looks like any comments posted in those few days between initial installation and making it work have been lost.  I am still trying to recoup them, but it doesn’t look good.