David Leonhardt’s SEO Marketing Express

Some people might wonder why I do not approve their blog comments. There are a few reasons.

1. The comment is pure spam. Sorry, that does not contribute to this blog so the comment gets nuked. Kaboom!

2. The comment is pretty useless, not contributing much and it’s pretty spammy and I am not in the mood to give a free keyword rich link to someone who is not really contributing. Sorry, but that’s my prerogative.

3. The link is to a website that is either in itself distasteful (my personal, subjective opinion) or is in a category that I don’t want to link to, either because of personal views or because of the message it sends the search engines (such as gambling, for instance).

Point #3 should be noted. From an SEO perspective, who you link to matters. A lot of people comment on this blog because they know I use the Do Follow plugin or because they found me on the list of Do Follow blogs.

On another note, if you do come here to comment because you know the link is good for SEO, please do me the courtesy of either linking back to my site or at least social bookmarking the post. When you social bookmark the post, you are also helping yourself, because it increases the authority of the page that is linking back to your site. And it is sooooo easy to social bookmark each post. See the icons across the bottom of this post? Just click those icons at the bottom of any post and you can bookmark at dozens of popular sites. If you want to make it easy for your visitors to bookmark your blog posts or web pages, you can get this social bookmaking cut-and-paste script at http://www.seo-writer.com/tools/bookmarker.php.

A couple days ago I blogged about SEO for reputation management.  Today, as I was reading Kimberly Bock’s blog, I was reminded by her It All Comes Out In The Wash post of all the work that goes into protecting one’s reputation before it ever gets to the point where an SEO defense is needed. 

Reputation management starts with communicating your values and sticking to them.  It means being the reputation you want to have.  If you want to be seen as a square dealer, you have to be one.  If you want to be known for excellence, you better have excellence.  SEO is a protection against the odd fool who will strike as the good and the bad alike.

There is nothing more precious than your reputation. What happens when one jealous ex-lover, disgruntled employee or unsatisfied customer decides to get nasty and post something snarky on the Internet about you. And horror of horrors, it shows up #4 at Google or Yahoo when somebody searches for your name or your business name?
That’s when you need an SEO campaign for reputation management. While every campaign is unique, there are a few key steps you should take.

1. Make sure your own website comes up first.If you have more than one website, first and second is even better.
2. Maximize the reach of your website(s); optimize two pages on each to show up in the results.
3. Analyze those positive web pages already in the top 20 for your name and determine which ones could have an extra page optimized for your name.
4. Analyze which positive web pages already in the top 20 for your name and determine which ones could be pushed above any negative pages through changes to the pages or through link-building.
5. Analyze those neutral web pages already in the top 20 for your name and determine which ones could be made positive.
6. Analyze those negative web pages already in the top 20 for your name and determine which ones could be made positive.
7. Create, optimize and promote profile pages at popular user-generated content websites, such as Squidoo, MySpace and StumbleUpon.
8. Create blogs in your name. If your main SEO goal is how your name or business name comes up in the search engine, host your blog at BlogSpot and/or Wordpress.

Depending on your unique situation, there might be numerous other tactics you can use, as well. This list should help you get started if you want to do it yourself, or if you wish, we can help you with your online reputation management SEO campaign.

First, this post is not what you think it it.  By the way, just what do you think it is?

This post os about My Aunt Is Hot, a blog with a stated purpose to manage the reputation of the blogger’s family name.  It seems that his “aunt” stole his name (Ziering) and he wants it back: www.MyAuntIsHot.com - Because Ziering on Google doesn’t have to be porno.

It’s actually a story worth reading.  However, I did a Google search for Ziering and so far the aunt is still hot and the blog is not.  It looks like Mr Ziering could use a fair amount of SEO to reach his stated goals.  In the meantime, at least he is having fun with the concept…and I like that.

SEOMoz has come out with some superb information once again that every SEO specialist and every webmaster should read.  The Google Search Engine Ranking Factors Report summarizes the opinion of all the top SEO specialists (except me…hmmm, I guess I am not quiote at the top yet), many of whom I personally admire.  The report rates various factors for their importance to Google rankings.

Below is the lsit of the top 10 most important factors, according to these esteemed SEO specialists.  I would probably rate the factors in a similar order.

Yikes! It’s been two weeks since I posted SEO for Reputation Management: Part II.  So your patience has earned you a good post.

In SEO for Reputation Management: Part I, we made the strategic decisions of what Amanda wanted people toi see when they Search Google or Yahoo for her name.  In Part II, we took inventory of what is already on the Information Highway that she can use to that end.

Now it’s time to put together the plan. Time has slipped through my fingers, and Amanda (not her real name, remember?) has already begun implementing some of the plan.  At the end of this post, I’ll share with you her interim results.

I won’t go through all the details, but some of the major recommendations were…

1. Her blog was being used very, very sporadically.  More frequent posts, occasionally speaking in the third person, would help (I probably should mention that this is David Leonhardt’s blog in every post and put my name in the Blog Title above as Amanda does, but I never put together a reputation management plan for myself!).  In fact, I recommended a post about herself, something I should do one of these days, too. This should secure a second listing in Google’s top 10 for her blog.

2. She owns the domain of her name, but it points to her blog.  I recommended developing her domain to include certain content that would help her get double listings Google’s top 10 for her name.

3. I suggested ways to make her two blogger profiles work to her advantage.

4. I suggested ways to boost the rankings also of a few of the various places where she has articles right now (or then) on the Internet.

5. I suggested a few places where she could build a good reputation directly, that could also rank highly in the search engines or support the rankings of her other pages.  For instance, I pointed out my pages at MySpace, Zaadz, Squidoo, MyBlogLog and TagWorld.  I haven’t done near enough with any of these, mind you, but I will.  Honest.

6. I also recommended a multi-faceted linking campaign, geared to the various types of pages Amanda was trying to boost in the rankings.

SEO Reputation Management Plan Progress report.

On Google’s top 10 right now…

1.  Amanda’s Blogger profile.  She has another Blogger profile, but it has not been worked on yet and it is not ranking.

2. Her blog.  She has been doing more posts, but not yet what is needed for a second page to rank.  I have offered some additional details.

3. One of the pages I mentioned in item #4 above.

4. and 5. A new appearance by another offensive blogger, posted two years ago. How these two postings got up in the rankings is anybody’s guess, but it is likely the result of something that happened sitewide (as opposed to something related to these two specific posts).  As the linking campaign kicks in, the two offensive posts should sink.

6. Amanda’s MySpace profile.  More can be done to make this a double listing.  Possibly.

7. Amanda’s under construction and 99% unoptimized site on her own-name domain.  When the site is finished, there should be two pages from this domain in the top 10.

8. and 9. Two more of the pages I mentioned in item #4 above.

10. Amanda’s MySpace page. More can be done to make this a double listing.  Definitely.  I’ve made some additional suggestions.

So there you have it.  Some promising interim results.  One can do much to manage one’s reputation using sound, responsible SEO techniques.

We’ve been following Amanda and her quest to manage her online reputation when a potential client searches for her name.  We covered the first part of her strategy in SEO for Reputation Management: Part I.

Now it’s time for Amanda to take inventory.  She is actually in an enviable position.  She starts out with her own domain name, a blogspot.com blog with a blogger.com profile, contributions at a couple other group blogs, and several articles she has written (Amanda is a writer, remember?)

Remember that search engines will list one or two pages from any single domain, so to make sure the right information fills the first page (top 10 results), it requires at least five domains and at most 10.

In Amanda’s case, her domain points to her blog, so she is wasting an obvious opportunity.  If she develops her domain, she should be able to occupy two of the top spots for her name.  Her blog should be able to occupy two of the top spots and her blogger.com profile should be able to occupy just one. 

That leaves five more pages required, ideally her own writings or testimonials to her writing.  The problem with working to get some of Amanda’s best writing to the top of the rankings is that she cannot control the content or format of the pages…nor can she even be sure they will exist six month hence.

We identified those articles and group blog posts with the most likelihood of lasting, as well as a page where readers debated the merits of one of her articles, given that there is no better testimonial to the quality of a writer’s work than it’s ability to generate interest, even debate. 

Anyone whose business depends on trust and credibility needs to be concerned about reputation management.  Most people don’t give two thoughts to the search engines when they think of protecting or enhancing their good names.  But consider where you would go to check up on someone you plan to trust with a valuable project.  That’s right…Google, Yahoo, Ask, MSN.

This SEO for reputation management blog series will interest you if you are… 

• an accountant   

• a lawyer   

• a therapist, naturopath or any other health service provider   

• and SEO specialist   

• a consultant of any kind   

• a personal trainer   

• a writer or editor   

• an artist of any kind   

• a web designer or programmer   

• a virtual assistant    

• a home inspector   

• anyone else in the service sector   

What do people find when they Google your name?  One writer (let’s call her “Amanda”) came to us because they found her blog in the top two spots, but in positions 3 and 4 they found a very disparaging blog post.  (Blogging is about being real; it does not have to be about being rude!)  

Obviously, she wanted to move that blog post down, out of Google’s top ten for her name.  That’s not how SEO works.  SEO is about moving a website up in the rankings, not down.  The only way to move a website out of Google’s top ten, is by moving ten web pages ahead of it into Google’s top ten.  We told Amanda that we could help restore her maligned reputation using SEO techniques.

We knew what Amanda did not want potential clients to see when they Googled her name. Amanda’s reputation management SEO campaign began by identifying what she did want them to see:   

• Her own website that lays out her credentials in a professional manner, so that potential clients see that they would be dealing with a professional in whom they can trust their project.   

• Samples of her work, so that potential clients see the quality of her work (easy for a writer, as well as for an artist; much harder for a medical practitioner or an accountant.   

• Testimonials.  Better yet, rave reviews.  Any third-party testaments to the quality of her work and her professionalism. 

 This is David Leonhardt, of The Happy Guy Marketing.