Central Perk

marți, 11 ianuarie 2011

Seth's Blog : "I've got your back"

[You're getting this note because you subscribed to Seth Godin's blog.]

"I've got your back"

These are the words that entrepreneurs, painters, artists, statesmen, customer service pioneers and writers need to hear.

Not true. They don't need to hear them, they need to feel them.

No artist needs a fair weather friend, an employee or customer or partner who waits to do the calculus before deciding if they're going to be there for them.

No, if you want her to go all in, if you want her to take the risk and brave the fear, then it sure helps if you're there too, no matter what. There's a cost to that, a pain and risk that comes from that sort of trust. After all, it might not work. Failure (or worse! embarrassment) might ensue. That's precisely why it's worth so much. Because it's difficult and scarce.

Later, when it's all good and it's all working, your offer of support means very little. The artist never forgets the few who came through when it really mattered.

Who's got your back? More important, whose back do you have?

• Email to a friend •

•

luni, 10 ianuarie 2011

Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis

Brown Seeks 10% Pay Reduction For State Employees, Unveils $12.5 Billion Spending Cuts; Suggestions to Eliminate the Gap
Steve Keen: The Credit Impulse
Australia's "Tulip Mania" About to Crash; 44% Jump in Property Listings Proves the Proposed Housing Shortage is Gargantuan Myth; Playable Actions
Campaign To Recall Illinois Governor Pat Quinn Underway

Brown Seeks 10% Pay Reduction For State Employees, Unveils $12.5 Billion Spending Cuts; Suggestions to Eliminate the Gap

Posted: 10 Jan 2011 02:50 PM PST

Governor Brown has a budget shortfall of $28 billion. He seeks to get $12.5 billion from spending cuts. That is 44.6% of what needs to be done.

Please consider California's Brown Unveils $12.5 Billion in Spending Reductions

California Governor Jerry Brown's budget will cut spending by $12.5 billion, including as much as a 10 percent pay reduction for most state employees, aides said.

The largest U.S. state by population faces a $25.4 billion budget gap over the next 18 months, Brown said in a statement. The 72-year-old Democrat, who took the oath of office last week, has vowed to reach a budget agreement with state Legislators over the next 60 days.

"These cuts will be painful, requiring sacrifice from every sector of the state, but we have no choice," Brown said in the statement.

His plan will chop an amount equal to 10 percent of the current year's $125.3 billion in spending. Cuts include $1.7 billion from Medi-Cal, the state's version of the Medicaid program for the poor; $1.5 billion from CalWorks, a welfare-to- work program; and a combined $1 billion from the University of California and the California State University systems, which together serve 663,000 students.

Additional cuts will be made to prisons and the courts. Spending on kindergarten through 12th-grade education will be spared, Brown said.

Voters will be asked to extend increases in sales and income taxes as well as vehicle license fees in a special election in June, Brown said.

Eliminate Waste Not Just Reduce It

The Governor should plan on 100% of what's needed to come from cuts, better yet 150%. I have not seen any proposals to eliminate unneeded departments.

I talked about that in California Budget Balancer Interactive Map from LA Times Misses the Mark. Here is a repeat of that post for convenience.

I just took the interactive LA Times California Budget Balancer exercise.
I vehemently protest.

This was a blatant effort to force people into accepting a need to raise taxes. To balance the budget I made every possible program cut offered. It was not enough. To balance the budget I had to raise sin taxes and gas taxes.

There are worse solutions of course, like hiking income taxes or corporate income taxes.

Exercise Misses the Mark

Where was a proposal to privatize the prison system using non-union labor?
Where was the proposal to eliminate prevailing wage laws?
Where was the proposal to eliminate defined benefit plans for all government workers?
Where was the proposal to virtually privatize every conceivable government job to the private sector?
What about programs that could be eliminated entirely?

California Agencies

Look at this disgusting list of California Agencies.

I sorted out some but not all of the more ridiculous ones.

Does the state need a ....

Acupuncture Department
Office of AIDs
Air Research Board
3 different agencies for alcohol and beverages
2 Apprenticeship Councils
Art Council
Asian Pacific Islander Legislative Caucus
Bureau of Automotive repair
Barbering board
Biodiversity council
Calvet Loan program
Climate Change Portal
Coastal Commission
Cool California
4 Delta agencies
Digital Library
Bureau of Electronic and Appliance Repair
Employment Training Panel
Energy Commission
Equalization Board
2 Fair Employment agencies
Film Commission
Flex Your Power
Healthy Family Program
Hearing Aid Dispensers Bureau
Home Furnishings Bureau
Humanities Council
Independent Living Council
Indoor Air Quality Program
Economic Development Bank
Interagency Ecological Program
Labor and Workforce Development
Latino Legislative Caucus
Learn California
Little Hoover Commission
Maritime Academy
Managed Risk Board
Museum for History
MyCali Youth Portal
Native Heritage Association
Natural Community Planning Program
Naturopathic Medicine Community
Outreach
Peace Officer Standards Board
Postsecondary Education Commission
Prison Industry Authority
Privacy Protection Office
Psychology Board
Railroad Museum
Recovery Task Force
Refugee Branch
Regents of the U of C
Save Our Water commission
Smart Growth Caucus
Status of Women Commission
Take Charge California
We Connect
Wetlands Information System
Workforce Investment Board

California does not need ANY of those. Moreover I assure you I missed dozens more that could be cut back if not eliminated entirely. What the heck do those cost? And how much can be saved by my suggestions above.

I propose the LA Times re-do their preposterous exercise meant to convey the idea that taxes have to be raised. They don't. In fact, I bet they could be lowered.

Here is the LA Times Discussion Thread on California Budget Balancer

For more ideas on how to Fight California Tax Hikes please visit the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association

Screw The Tax Hikes

Until the governor gets serious about eliminating waste, not just cutting it, there should not be any discussion of tax hikes.

California voters should tell Governor Brown to "go to hell" on those tax hikes. In the meantime, I would like to see the legislature agree to those $12.5 billion in spending cuts. Then after voter rightfully reject his proposals to hike taxes, Brown can try again to find the remaining $15.5 billion.

Here are some suggestions

Eliminate defined benefit plans for all newly hired state workers
Increase the required contribution rates for existing members of defined benefit plans
End collective bargaining of public unions
Eliminate prevailing wage laws
Privatize the state prison system
Eliminate dozens of useless California Agencies in the list above

If the governor does all that, he can cut taxes not hike them.

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com
Click Here To Scroll Thru My Recent Post List

Steve Keen: The Credit Impulse

Posted: 10 Jan 2011 12:04 PM PST

In response to Australia's "Tulip Mania" About to Crash; 44% Jump in Property Listings Proves the Proposed Housing Shortage is Gargantuan Myth; Playable Actions Steve Keen added this comment to the blog.

Spot on as always Mish. One factor that I'm following closely in all this is what Biggs, Meyer, and Pick called "The Credit Impulse".

This is the change in the change in debt, expressed as a percentage of GDP, something I've covered in a couple of recent posts:

A Fork in the Road?

Deleveraging, Deceleration and the Double Dip

It follows from my argument that aggregate demand in a credit-driven economy is the sum of GDP plus the change in debt, since it also follows that change in aggregate demand is the sum of the change in GDP plus the acceleration of debt.

Australia got out of the crisis in 2009 by exploiting the upside of this factor: if you can encourage people into debt, then aggregate demand grows as debt accelerates--so even slowing down the rate of deleveraging gives a positive boost to demand (this stuff is a bit hard to get one's head around, but it's correct and aligns with the impact of inventories on aggregate demand).

That's how the USA looked a bit better in recent months--you slowed down deleveraging. But since Australia went from marginal deleveraging to releveraging, the acceleration in debt was all the more extreme--and we had a apparent boom.

That appears to be ending now, since though the Credit Impulse is still positive on a yearly basis, it's turned negative in the last few months. So this should be a leading indicator of an "unexpected" (don't you love that word from the mainstream?) slowdown in Australia.

Thanks Steve

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com
Click Here To Scroll Thru My Recent Post List

Australia's "Tulip Mania" About to Crash; 44% Jump in Property Listings Proves the Proposed Housing Shortage is Gargantuan Myth; Playable Actions

Posted: 10 Jan 2011 08:36 AM PST

For years I have been hearing about a housing "shortage" in Australia. That myth has been shattered by latest stats that show a 44% jump in property listings.

The property market could be set for early-year price falls due to a build up of unsold properties, with new figures by property research company SQM Research showing the number of listings swelled 44% over 2010.

Managing director Louis Christopher says overall the huge number of listings means prices are now hanging by a thread and a market downturn is imminent.

"It's still very clear to us that they are now at levels that would suggest a downturn in the housing market, although the stock levels have fallen seasonally. The overall number is up now by 44% across the nation."

"I wouldn't like to see another interest rate rise anytime soon – it will accelerate the downturn."

The new figures suggest that the shortage has been overblown. Residential property listings were 328,270 during December, representing an increase of 44.9% over the year.

"In Surfer's Paradise, for instance, I know there are now over 2,000 properties on the market in one postcode – just one. That area is really struggling at the moment, and it is now the equivalent of Florida in the United States."

Christopher also says he is concerned about Darwin, which recorded the largest increase out of all capital cities at 57.3%. Listings increased in Brisbane by 59.4% and Perth by 54.8%. Melbourne followed closely with a 42.7% rise, although Canberra recorded a rise of 46.5% as well.

The region with the highest growth in stock levels was North Queensland, with an increase of 216.3%. The region with the highest month-on-month stock growth was Launceston, with 18.1%.

Australia Heads For Economic Crunch

The Daily Telegraph reports Australians sinking under debt burden

AUSTRALIA is heading for an economic crunch as family finances collapse under the burden of record debts, rising interest rates and utility bills.

With banks warning they will be forced to raise mortgage rates by 0.50 per cent in 2011 and Sydney rents forecast to rise by between $160 and $190 a month, according to analysts Residex, householders look set to suffer.

Repossessions and tenant evictions are expected to rise sharply. "It's going to be tough" said Shane Oliver, chief economist at AMP Capital.

According to the Reserve Bank, Australians have added almost $220 billion to household debt levels since the beginning of 2008, taking our borrowings to a record $1.3 trillion.

"Unlike the rest of the world, Australia has slipped back into its old habits," said Steve Keen, professor of economics at the University of Western Sydney.

"We're spending ourselves right back into trouble. With so much extra debt to service, we don't need interest rates to reach anything like the 9.6 per cent they hit in 2008.

Mr Oliver has estimated that debt will become unmanageable for many households when mortgage rates rise from 7.80 per cent to about 8.50 per cent.

"At that stage homeowners could hit a wall," he said.

Economists are forecasting three 0.25 per cent rate hikes for 2011, taking the typical mortgage rate to 8.55 per cent.

Australia's Tulip Mania

I rather doubt those interest rate hike are coming. I would guess there is one more hike at most. Then at some point there will be panic cuts by the Reserve Bank of Australia.

History suggests it will not matter one bit once.

Remember the housing "shortage" in Florida? People stood in lines overnight and entered lotteries for the right to buy condos. Others were going door to door making offers on homes that were not even for sale.

From that aspect, it sure looked like there was a shortage. There wasn't. It was nothing more than a speculative mirage much akin to the shortage of quality tulip bulbs in the year 1635 during Holland Tulipmania.

So anxious were the speculators to obtain them that one person offered twelve acres of building ground for the Harlaem tulip. That of Amsterdam was bought for 4600 florins, a new carriage, two grey horses, and a complete suit of harness.

Housing mania did not get as far out of hand as tulip mania. Nonetheless, many lives were ruined in Florida, Las Vegas, Phoenix, and dozens of places in California and elsewhere in the US.

Until the bubble pops, speculative manias always make it appear as if there are shortages and infinite demand.

Playable Actions

The day of reckoning has finally arrived for Australia. A day of reckoning awaits Canada, China, and the UK as well. It's too late now to do much of anything except

Exit the Australian stock market
Get out of the Australian dollar
Pick up some popcorn
Stay on the sidelines and watch the collapse unfold

Addendum:

Steve Keen added this comment to the blog.

Spot on as always Mish. One factor that I'm following closely in all this is what Biggs, Meyer, and Pick called "The Credit Impulse".

This is the change in the change in debt, expressed as a percentage of GDP, something I've covered in a couple of recent posts:

A Fork in the Road?

Deleveraging, Deceleration and the Double Dip

It follows from my argument that aggregate demand in a credit-driven economy is the sum of GDP plus the change in debt, since it also follows that change in aggregate demand is the sum of the change in GDP plus the acceleration of debt.

Australia got out of the crisis in 2009 by exploiting the upside of this factor: if you can encourage people into debt, then aggregate demand grows as debt accelerates--so even slowing down the rate of deleveraging gives a positive boost to demand (this stuff is a bit hard to get one's head around, but it's correct and aligns with the impact of inventories on aggregate demand).

That's how the USA looked a bit better in recent months--you slowed down deleveraging. But since Australia went from marginal deleveraging to releveraging, the acceleration in debt was all the more extreme--and we had a apparent boom.

That appears to be ending now, since though the Credit Impulse is still positive on a yearly basis, it's turned negative in the last few months. So this should be a leading indicator of an "unexpected" (don't you love that word from the mainstream?) slowdown in Australia.

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com
Click Here To Scroll Thru My Recent Post List

Campaign To Recall Illinois Governor Pat Quinn Underway

Posted: 10 Jan 2011 02:37 AM PST

I have exciting news this morning. I am launching a campaign to recall Illinois governor Pat Quinn.

This is not a frivolous effort. It is a serious undertaking and one in which I intend to see to the end. It will take hard work and lots of volunteers but we will be successful.

I need volunteers to ...

Gather signatures
Talk to state legislative representatives to get them on board
Provide legal help
Design a website
Help with advertising

I will pay for website hosting and domain names.

We need to be successful because Governor Quinn has plans that will destroy Illinois.

Massive Tax Hikes Will Drive Businesses Out Of Illinois

The Chicago Tribune reports Governor Quinn has reached a deal with top Democratic lawmakers including Senate President John Cullerton to ....

Hike the state income tax by 75%, from 3% to 5.25%
Hike the corporate income tax rate by 75% from 4.8% to 8.4%
Hike the cigarette tax by $1 a pack
Use the tax hikes to borrow more money to fund pension plans

The Tribune notes "As a measure of how desperate state government's finances are, Cullerton said the state would use the income-tax hike to borrow $12.2 billion. Of that, $8.5 billion would pay overdue bills and $3.7 billion would cover a government worker pension payment lawmakers skipped when putting together the current budget, he said."

Raising corporate and personal income taxes to borrow $12.2 billion is not "desperation", it is fiscal insanity. It will drive businesses out of Illinois and push many struggling taxpayers into bankruptcy.

Quinn is unlikely to get all of those measures passed, but it does not matter. Those are his intentions and they they show his blatant incompetence and disregard for both taxpayers and businesses. Moreover, he will try again.

Enough Is Enough

John Tillman at the Illinois Policy Institute says ...

Amazingly, the deal will also hike the corporate income tax rate. Combined with the personal property replacement tax and the federal corporate tax, Illinois would have one of the HIGHEST corporate income tax rates in the world. You don't have to be a rocket scientist to figure out this means bad news for job growth in Illinois.

With high property taxes, high sales taxes and now high income taxes, the flight to low-tax states will only pick up speed.
Enough is enough.

Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels On Quinn's Plan

The Illinois Policy Institute is not the only one who thinks Governor Quinn's proposal would be horrid for Illinois. So does Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels according to The Northwest Times of Indiana.

"We already had an edge on Illinois in terms of the cost of doing business, and this is going to make it significantly wider," Daniels said.

The Tax Foundation, a nonpartisan tax research group in Washington, noted if the proposed corporate tax hike becomes law, Illinois businesses will pay the highest combined national-local corporate tax rate in the industrialized world.

That is the wrong course for Illinois to take, Daniels said.

"It does show that you can make very different choices, and the contrast between the choice we've made and the one they have is stark," he said. "Obviously I think ours is wiser, but self-governance means people get what they vote for."

Indeed, people get what they vote for, but how did Quinn win?

Governor Quinn Bought The Election

Governor Quinn barely won the election against a very weak opponent in spite of an amazing 85% vote turnout for Quinn in Chicago. Sadly, Mayor Daley did nothing to stop this, although the mayor is complaining mightily now about the Governor's proposals.

"It's worth remembering that Governor Quinn only found one program—out of thousands—to veto outright when he signed this year's spending bill in July. Had he taken a closer look at structural spending reforms and not agreed to politically motivated "no layoff and closure" deals with public employee unions, we could be on the path back to recovery instead of being stuck in ever-mounting debt," noted John Tillman at the Illinois Policy Institute.

Those "no layoff" agreements bought Quinn votes. So did other union-pandering deals. It did not matter that Illinois could not afford those deals. Quinn did what he could to get elected, taxpayers be damned.

There still is no serious discussion from Quinn as to how to rein in exorbitant taxpayer giveaways to public unions. His only "solution" is to raise taxes.

Four Big States - Four Big Problems

California, Illinois, and New York all have massive fiscal problems. They all have other things in common.

Collective Bargaining
Prevailing Wage Laws
Illinois, California, and New York are NOT "Right to Work" states

In essence, Public unions own Illinois, California, and New York.

New Jersey Governor Chris Christie is starting to turn things around. Wisconsin and Ohio also have newly elected governors willing to take on public unions.

In Illinois, Governor Quinn remains beholden to public unions, not taxpayers, in spite of massive voter rejections nationally of tax-and-spend policies.

Organized labor contributed mightily to his campaign, and Governor Quinn wants to pay them back. His proposals will do that by taking money out of your pocket so that the public unions get wages and benefits that most taxpayers will never see.

Quinn bought the election, even if barely.

Constitutional Amendment To Recall Governors

Last November, Illinois voters were presented a chance to vote on a constitutional amendment allowing governors to be recalled. I am pleased to report the Illinois Governor Recall Amendment Passes With Two-Thirds Of Vote.

The Illinois constitution was changed last night, with an amendment swept in by a wide margin.

Over two million voters approved a process for the public to recall governors during their term, giving the measure well over the 60 percent of voters required for its passage. The amendment is widely viewed as a reaction to the corruption charges against former Governor Rod Blagojevich.

What Does A Recall Effort Take?

A voter has to file an affidavit stating his or her intent to circulate petitions to recall the governor. The affidavit cannot be filed until after the governor has served six months in office.
Permission from lawmakers: The affidavit has to include the signatures of 20 members of the Illinois House and 10 members of the Illinois Senate. Half of the signatures from lawmakers have to be from Democrats and half from Republicans.
Petitioners have to gather signatures equal to 15 percent of the number of people who voted in the last gubernatorial election.
Of those signatures, organizers would have to get at least 100 signatures in each of at least 25 different counties. Petitioners would have 150 days to get them and the State Board of Elections would have 100 days to certify them.
When would the recall election be held? No later than 100 days after the State Board of Elections certifies the signatures.
Passage: A majority of voters have to vote to recall the governor in order for him or her to be removed.
Who becomes governor: If the governor is recalled, the lieutenant governor becomes acting governor until a special election is held. If there is no lieutenant governor, the attorney general becomes acting governor. If there is no attorney general, the secretary of state becomes acting governor.
Special election: A special election to select a new governor has to be held within 60 days if the governor is recalled. That process starts on the day of the recall election if multiple candidates from the same political party file for the office. If that's the case, a special primary election would be held on the same day of the recall election. Candidates must gather 5,000 signatures in order to run in the special election. The new governor will serve for the unexpired portion of the recalled governor's term.
The Better Government has noted that nothing in the amendment prevents the recalled governor from running in the special election after he or she is recalled. It also noted that the amendment does not require grounds for recall.

The above bullet points are from the State Journal Register.

Note that the amendment does not require grounds for a recall, but we have them: Blatant fiscal incompetence and vote buying.

The state House of Representatives consists of 118 representatives elected from individual legislative districts for a two-year term with no limits. The Illinois Senate is consists of 59 senators with staggered two- or four-year terms.

Thus, getting approval from 20 members of the Illinois House and 10 members of the Illinois Senate (half from Democrats and half from Republicans) is not a prohibitive task.

Governor Quinn Supports Recalls

It is a fitting sense of irony that Governor Quinn Trumpets Recalls.

"I think the ultimate way to get ethics in Illinois is have the power of recall in our constitution," Quinn said.

I could not possibly agree more with Governor Quinn. It is perhaps the only major political stance he has taken that I can endorse 100%.

Will You Stand Up To The Injustice?

We have to wait six months to file, but there is no sense in waiting. There are many tasks to be performed and I will need volunteers from every county to gather signatures. I estimate we need about 520,000 signatures. My goal is to get 700,000.

If you can volunteer, time, web design, advertising, legal help, or any kind of general assistance, I would appreciate it. We need to put a stop to Quinn's proposals that will drive businesses and jobs out of the state and massively raise your taxes as part of the bargain.

Please email Recall Governor Pat Quinn Today (RecallQuinnToday@gmail.com) and lend your support to the effort to save the state of Illinois from Quinn's fiscal recklessness. Please let me know what you can do to help.

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com
Click Here To Scroll Thru My Recent Post List

SEOmoz Daily SEO Blog

The Problem With Being An SEO Consultant - It's Always Your Fault

Posted: 09 Jan 2011 12:04 PM PST

Posted by Paddy_Moogan

Quick disclaimer - this post contains advice on getting SEO done whether it be within your company or for a client as opposed to hands-on SEO tips.

Just before the start of 2011 I published a post on my personal blog titled - "Why Knowing Everything About SEO Doesn't Mean $#!^". I genuinely didn't expect the type of response the post got. I thought it may annoy a bunch of people, in particular SEO Consultants! However the reaction has been great and as a result, I wanted to write a follow on for you guys which contains more of an actionable list of items as opposed to me just having a rant.

Also in this post I wanted to take a different angle. My previous post talked more about how knowing everything about SEO doesn't matter if you don't actually make sure the SEO gets done. In this post I want to address some of the excuses that SEO Consultants use when tasks don't get done, specifically, why it is always your fault if these tasks don't get done.

I could probably generalise this a bit and say that things not getting done is a common problem amongst consultants in many industries. Quite often we're paid to consult and give expert advice, not necessarily do stuff. In my opinion though when it comes to SEO, if the SEO you recommend doesn't get done - it's your fault.

Yes it is. It isn't the fault of -

The client
The developers
The designers
Your boss
Your dog eating it

When I first heard this at a training session I went to a few months after I joined Distilled, I was ready to argue. Something like this was going around my head -

"But if the client doesn't do what I tell them, thats their fault"

"But if the developers don't have a clue what a title tag is and can't change it, thats their fault"

It was my fault, I shouldn't be pointing the finger and blaming someone else.

Why is it my fault?

Because the client is paying me to make a difference to their business and give them an ROI. They're not paying me to tell them stuff and leave them to it. Whilst many consultants in other industries do work like this, I don't think SEO Consultants should. SEO is still evolving and is still a relatively new concept to a lot of people and they need that extra bit of help to get it done. The best SEO consulting in the world doesn't mean anything if it doesn't get done.

To try and explain this further, I've got some examples below of scenarios which are quite common in the world of SEO consulting, these also apply just as much to in-house SEOs. Each one of these is a case of where you think you have done your job, but in reality, you haven't.

1) You Deliver a Report and Think Your Job is Done

I've made this mistake. I've spent hours upon hours producing a report for a client. At the time, I didn't realise it was a report, I thought it was a strategy. Here are a few examples of the types of reports -

Technical site audits
Competitor analysis
Link building strategies

Within these reports was loads of great information, SEO tips and recommendations for the client. I was totally confident that all of the stuff I recommended would give the clients website long term SEO benefit. Sometimes these would be 30 pages long! Wow - tons of info!

Did the client read it? Nope.

They didn't want a 30 page report from me, all they wanted to know was what they had to do. What would have been better, would be to deliver them a small, actionable list of items that if done, will do x, y and z for their business. It can be as simple as -

Submit your website to local business directories in the attached spreadsheet
Add a call to action to your website to get people to leave reviews on your Google Places account
Create an XML sitemap and submit to Google Webmaster Tools

All of these things are tasks that can go onto the clients to-do list. The simplicity makes it much more likely that they'd get done. This is much better than writing a long paragraph explaining how having more reviews on their Google Places account can help their rankings and how they should add a call to action to get them.

I also deliver a document which elaborates on each of the actions, this is still necessary in order to give some context to what you're saying. This can include things such as links to help files on Google on how to do stuff like XML sitemaps etc. But the to-do list is the focus and what becomes the deliverable, it is then your job to get this list of jobs done.

Action -

Don't deliver a report document, deliver a strategy along with an actionable list of tasks - then make sure they get done

Leading onto my next reason why it is your fault, this style of delivering advice would work for most clients but not all of them. It depends on the type of client they are and how well you know them.

2) You Don't Get Close Enough to the Client

Again, I'll hold my hand up to this one. I've never been a fan of using the phone and probably never will be, but I've got better in the last few months. The point of what I'm saying here is that you can't rely on email alone to keep up-to-date with your clients and expect to know what is going on in their business. Only face to face conversations and chats on the phone can do this for you.

If you work in-house, hey you don't get away with this one! :)

Working in-house, you should still be trying to get close to the people who you need to help you get stuff done. This could be developers, designers or writers, you need to know how they like to work so that you can get them to do stuff for you. If the Senior Developer in your company isn't a morning person, then don't go and ask them to rewrite 3000 URLs for you at 9am! They'll probably look at you like this -

Whoever it is that matters in your company or client, you need to be getting close to them. Find out who it is that matters and who makes the decisions further up the ladder. A great way of doing this is by working from a client's office for a day or even a few hours. Getting to see how they work and sitting in on meetings can be very valuable in working out how best to get stuff done.

The thing that amazed me on this one was that just being around (even if you're doing other client work) has a lot of value to the client. It can help staff in knowing you are there and can answer questions instantly rather than over email. Also just being in meetings where SEO is discussed can help get SEO shifted up the agenda a little bit and you have the perfect opportunity to argue your point. You can also be there when developers start on SEO tasks so you can answer questions straight away and make sure changes are implemented properly.

Actions -

Talk to your client either on the phone or in person at least once a week
Work from your client's office once every few weeks

3) The Client Doesn't Like You

Yep this is your fault too :)

I think this is a rare one, but it can happen. Afterall the client has come to you for help with their SEO so they should be quite welcoming and like having you on board. However there are instances where there may be some resistance to your presence -

There is already an in-house Marketing / SEO person who feels their position is threatened
Developers or designers are worried their already full workload is about to get bigger because of you

There are a couple of ways of overcoming resistance from these people.

In-house SEO or Marketing People - Make them look good

If there is an in-house person already, then it is totally understandable that they may feel threatened by you. So try and reassure them that you're not looking to get rid of them and enforce the fact that for an SEO campaign to be successful, you need their help more than anyone. Keep them involved right from the start and work with them as much as you can, this is a classic example of where working at a clients office can reward you.

Another tip here - make them look good in front of their boss. Get them to work on something which you can then show to their boss which can get them a pat on the back. This can really help their morale too. Asking for their help on a task can also make them like you.

Developers, Writers etc - Demonstrate the results of the work they did

In terms of other members of the team such as developers, designers or writers, the approach is similar. With developers, don't drop a huge list of jobs on their desk in one go unless they ask for it. They are busy people so it can be best just to give them a few small jobs initially and let them see the results, when they can see the value of what they are doing and see that "hey this SEO stuff really works" then it is easier to give them bigger jobs to do.

When it comes to writers, it can be very easy to demonstrate the value of their work. Just show them Analytics stats on the traffic that their content pulls in, tweets about their content or the links that it generated. These stats can be a great motivator to get them on-board with your efforts.

Action -

Make your client look good in front of their boss to get them on-side with you
Tell people when they do work that results in an increase in traffic or links etc. CC in their boss on an email too.

4) You Didn't Own the Problems

This is a huge one for any project. It is nice and somewhat easy to take ownership of solutions. We all love coming up with a great new idea for a client then managing that idea through to completion. But what happens when something goes wrong? Do you take ownership of that too? There aren't many SEO projects that don't hit problems at some point, so taking ownership of the problems and making sure they get solved is important.

The last thing you should be doing is seeing a problem and just assuming that someone else will take care of it.

When a problem arises, make sure that the solution is on someones to-do list. This should ensure that the problem gets solved.

Action -

Don't wait for someone else to take charge of problems, put it on your own to-do list or make sure it's on someone elses

5) You Didn't Work Closely Enough With Other Agencies

It's quite common for multiple agencies to be working for one of your clients. You could have the following -

SEO
PPC
PR
Developers
Email Marketing
Affiliate Management

Sometimes you can make recommendations that may lead to tasks for another agency to implement. The common one above has been to developers. But lets take another example. Perhaps you are working with another PR agency who are being employed by your client.

As I'm sure many of you are aware, PR work can result in some fantastic high quality links. But not all PR agencies are aware of SEO and the value of links. So they may be getting lots of online brand mentions of your URL but not thinking to follow this up with a call to see if it can be made a live link. This is where you need to be proactive in working with them to ensure that the client is getting as much SEO benefit as possible from all agencies they work with.

Working well with other agencies and getting to know them is just as important as getting to know the client. Again, you should be making an effort to get close to them and see how they work. A good idea here is to setup regular "all agency" calls where you can keep each other updated on your work and get status updates on things that you have asked for. Work closely with them so that you don't end up like this guy:

Action -

Have a weekly status update with the agencies that you work with to check on tasks you've given them

Conclusion

All of this isn't easy, I'm by no means perfect at it. So it takes time to change the way you work and get yourself into the mindset of delivering change to a client rather than a report. But once you get it, you'll notice a huge difference in the way you approach problems and try to solve them. In particular with SEO where the clients are relying on you as the expert, you need to make sure you're delivering change. Otherwise no SEO is going to get done and ultimiately they'll blame you.

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A Moment of Silence

Your Daily Snapshot for
Monday, Jan. 10, 2011

A Moment of Silence

Today at 11:00 a.m. eastern standard time, President Obama is calling on Americans to observe a moment of silence to honor the innocent victims of the senseless tragedy in Tucson, Arizona, including those still fighting for their lives. It will be a time for Americans to come together as a nation in prayer or reflection, keeping the victims and their families closely at heart.

The President, First Lady and White House staff will observe the moment of silence on the South Lawn of the White House. You can watch the live stream at WhiteHouse.gov/live.

President Barack Obama talks with Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer concerning the shooting of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords and others, on a cell phone in the hallway outside the Situation Room of the White House, Saturday, Jan. 8, 2011. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)

SEOptimise

10 Tips to Improve Your Social Graph for Google

Posted: 09 Jan 2011 12:01 PM PST

It was great to present at the Sphinncon conference today alongside Kelli Brown, Tal Siach and Miriam Schwab – I’ve posted my slides and tips below to share with everyone online:

10 tips to improve your social graph for search

View more presentations from Kevin Gibbons.

The idea behind this was to provide actionable ideas based upon Matt Cutts’ announcement in December that social signals are a ranking factor. Here are the tips:

1) Use social media buttons – encourage your users to share content on facebook and twitter by using the social bookmarking button plugins.

2) Build a Facebook fan page – build a presence on Facebook where people can subscribe to updates and you can publish latest content. Ideally you’d want to build up a strong number of fans so that people can frequently “like” your posted links.

3) Use images – Facebook walls display photos far more frequently than other updates, such as statuses. So make sure when you publish links they contain an image where possible as this may improve it’s chances of being featured as top news on facebook homepages.

4) Fake it until you make it – firstly make sure you don’t overdo it and this doesn’t suit all brands. But on Fiverr.com you can pay $5 for someone with lots of friends to invite people to like your fan page. The idea here isn’t about targeting quality, it’s a numbers game so that you can get towards the tipping point which boosts the popularity and trust that people have when visiting your page in order to become a fan.

5) Promote via social bookmarking – while seemingly not a social signal itself, if you can promote your content via sites such as StumbleUpon, this is likely to indirectly lead to facebook shares/likes and retweets. Especially if you are already using the relevant social button plugins.

6) Create a branded Twitter profile & build relationships – firstly this gives you a platform to tweet your links. But by interacting with and retweeting other users you will greatly improve the potential coverage of retweets for your own content.

7) Use hashtags – a great way of finding popular discussions to contribute to is to follow the latest hashtags and trending topics. Again don’t overdo this and keep it relevant – but many people monitor and search the latest trending topics, so by tweeting about these it could be a good way of getting some extra retweets and picking up some new followers along the way.

8) Use great headlines, but leave space for retweets – make it easy for twitter users to retweet your posts by ensuring it is concise enough that it doesn’t need to be edited when adding an “RT @username” etc. And of course headlines are not only the first thing people see on facebook and twitter, but normally the only thing. Poor headlines means these won’t get clicked, great ones are gold!

9) Run social media competitions to give incentives – compared to Facebook advertising, the ROI of getting signups to a fan page should be greatly increased when running a competition. iPad giveaways have worked very well recently and it’s a great way of boosting your social media presence. Just make sure you read the terms and conditions as Facebook and Twitter do have rules on how these should be run.

10) Most importantly, have great content – the above tips are all very limited if your content is average. Look at top performing sites on Tweetmeme, such as Mashable, who consistently write great content with a social media audience in mind. Top lists, infographics, how-to posts etc all generally perform very well.