SEOmoz Daily SEO Blog

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Brand New Open Site Explorer is Here (and Linkscape's Updated, too) Posted: 27 Jul 2011 01:23 AM PDT Posted by randfish This morning at Mozcon, I announced the launch of Open Site Explorer v3, a long-awaited upgrade to one of the most popular marketing tools on the web. I'm more than a little excited about all the progress, hard work and remarkable features that are included in this upgrade, so let's get right to them. The first thing you'll notice is the new design (of which I'm a huge fan): This continues into the top view of link data and now, social metrics. I've always wanted these to be side-by-side, and it's great to finally be able to see both at the same time. The menus of filters have improved, and there's now a new visualization to show links as groups in domains or as separate links (like the classic Yahoo! Site Explorer view). Social metrics are also included in the Top Pages reports, so you can see how the most-linked-to content has performed on the social web. This is particularly cool for popular blogs. The anchor text and linking domains tabs have a new feature that lets you see a sample of the links that come from that domain (or with that anchor text). Beware that right now, there's a small bug where we're sorting those links we do show in some odd ways. This should be fixed in the next Linkscape update. Comparison reports have also taken a nice step forward, and feature the ability to side-by-side compare metrics for pages, subdomains and root domains on up to 5 sites simultaneously. They match the metrics you can get in the PRO web app, as well, which is very cool. And last, but not least, the new advanced reports tab lets you query like a SQL master! Without having to write any complex logic against our API (though you can still do lots of awesome stuff with that), you can grab any combination of link sorts, filters and keywords you'd like (and exclude data you don't want). This is particularly excellent for link builders looking at competitive or industry-related sites' link profiles, and I expect we'll see a number of blog posts in the near future with strategies on how to employ this tool.   In addition to all the amazing new features in Open Site Explorer, Linkscape's index just updated using a new infrastructure that's allowed us to crawl much deeper on large, important sites. For many pages/domains, this will mean an increase in the total number of links we report, but likely a lower count of linking domains (unless you've gained a lot of links in late June/July) since we're excluding many domains that are low-quality/not-well-linked-to. We'd love your feedback on this index, as it's the first one of its kind, and will continue to see tweaks/improvements over the next few updates. 58,273,105,508 (58.2 billion) URLs +47% from June (our largest index growth ever from one month to another!) 637,828,397 (637 million) Subdomains +71% (it appears the domains we're crawling have more subdomains) 91,013,438 (91 million) Root Domains -23% (due to the depth vs. breadth focus of this crawl) 456,474,577,597 (456 billion) Links +14% Followed vs. Nofollowed 2.28% of all links found were nofollowed +5% 60.44% of nofollowed links are internal, 39.56% are external Rel Canonical - 9.50% of all pages now employ a rel=canonical tag +20% (my guess is higher quality domains are more likely to employ rel=canonical) The average page has 78.64 links on it (+30% from 60.67 last index) 65.33 internal links on average 13.32 external links on average We're looking forward to your feedback on the new features and the new index (which we plan to continue iterating upon). There's actually even more new features coming in September, so stay tuned  and thanks so much for all the support and use of OSE; it's run more than a million reports, and we hope the next million are just around the corner. Do you like this post? Yes No

Leveraging your SEO for Search Retargeting Posted: 26 Jul 2011 03:09 PM PDT Posted by JoannaLord Here at Moz we work hard to break down those silly silo things (frankly they scare us). We believe that the different pieces of marketing should constantly be communicating with each other. Cyrus (our SEO lead) and I try to communicate on what we are seeing, where we might be overlapping, dropping the proverbial ball and so on and so forth. We know that leveraging each person's daily activities for maximum impact is the key to any company's success. In the past, on the blog, we've talked about ways to leverage one of your tasks for related gains. Just a few days ago we talked about utilizing your analysis in GA for eCommerce SEO, and a few months ago we talked about how you can repurpose your on page SEO techniques for off page SEO success. These are great examples of how we should all be looking at the work we do daily and ask ourselves, "who else could use this?" and "how can I leverage this information for more gains?" I've never liked the phrase "kill two birds with one stone" (cuz why are we all so cool with killing birds?) so instead I'm coining the phrase "eating two cupcakes with one fork" (cuz we all love cupcakes). Working off that approach, today I'm going to talk about another way you can leverage your SEO duties for marketing success.  "It's like killing two cupcakes with one fork" (just go with it)      angry fork photo credit SEO & Search Retargeting: A Perfect Pair Specifically I want to outline a few ways we can take all of the data mining and reports we work on and extend their value by using it for search retargeting. But wait, what the hell is search retargeting? Good question my friend. To understand search retargeting, we need to first understand retargeting. I wrote a post a while back that defined "retargeting" as "a form of marketing in which you target users who have previously visited your website with banner ads on display networks across the web." Search retargeting is a subset of retargeting, and takes it one step further. It is a paid acquisition channel that allows advertisers to reach back out to users who have previously searched for their brand name or target keywords. The difference between the two makes for a huge opportunity. The visitor doesn't have to have visited your site to be added to your audience to target with ads. For those of us that aren't ranking #1 for every word they want to, and are possibly losing visits to our competitors, you can target those lost visitors simply by going after people that searched for words in a category, industry, service, etc. You can quickly see why it would be beneficial for me to know (when setting up these campaigns and my targeting) what Cyrus is up to, and what he has been working on in regards to keyword targeting, our rankings, and more. In fact let me show some fun stats to really sell you on the value of search retargeting. Did you know that "retargeted consumers are nearly 70% more likely to complete a purchase as compared to non-retargeted customers." Couple that with the fact that a number of reports have come out saying that retargeted customers also spend close to 50% more than those that weren't retargeted, and you got yourself a hot little thing happening. Ways to Recycle Those Hours of SEO Work Okay now that we have shown off just how effective search retargeting can be, lets talk about how we can repurpose some of that hard work us SEOs do to help our search retargeting efforts succeed. #1 Ranking Reports (the "obvious" candidate) How much time do you spend looking at ranking tools (possibly even ours ) in gauge the performance of your target keywords? Hours upon hours are spent by SEOs looking at their rankings, or lack thereof. This information helps us all understand where the actual visits to our site are coming from, and subsequently what keywords are driving conversions. But what about the rankings you can't seem to conquer? For a second let's focus on the words you simply haven't been able to make any headway on. Those are prime candidates for a search retargeting campaign. What if you pass that list of words off to your paid marketer counterpart and told them to focus their energy (and budget) on targeting those people with highly targeted ads? That would not only help supplement your SEO efforts nicely, but you would be spending your retargeting budget on a prequalified audience. Often paid marketers spend a great deal of budget trying to isolate out a solid audience to go after, you'd be saving them time and money. Much like passing those words off to your PPC manager, you can quickly gain visits from these high converting, targeted keywords you are having a hard time ranking for. Example time: The phrase "free seo tools" results in a lot of conversions for us, but as you can see below, we don't rank in the top five for it. Our efforts in increasing our rankings here have been slow to respond. While we continue to work on SEO efforts here, we can supplement with highly targeted ads. Target: People who search for "free seo tools," "seo tools," "cheap seo tools," etc. with ads like this: They directly speak to the searcher's intent, "free seo tools" and would likely produce both high CTR for us, as well as increased conversions. This can help us grow our free trial numbers while we figure some things out on the SEO front and get our rankings up for "free seo tools." #2 Second Tier Keywords (a "little less obvious" candidate) Oh keyword research, how we love thee. Okay maybe some of us don't loveeee it, but it's a huge part of the process. SEOs spend hours pulling likely keyword targets, pulling traffic data, and competitive data to help them decide what to go after next. In that gold mine of keyword data are dozens of likely search retargeting candidates. SEOs know that not every word they deem valuable can be a priority right now for their company or their clients. These get pushed into some second tier keyword bucket, that often doesn't get as much content, link building, or other resources allocated to it. My advice? Send that list on over to your paid marketer. Ask them to target these topics, site categories, etc. with their search retargeting ads until you have some more time and resources available to go after them. Example time: Let's say we are ranking well for "seo tools" and "seo software" but we don't have the time to build an SEO campaign around the idea of "SEO resources." We know there are a number of people searching for this niche (SEO newbies, SEO students, etc.) and we know we have a ton of valuable content around the topic. So how can we help people find our resources, and associate us as a SEO resource if they have never heard of SEOmoz or visited us before? Target: users that visit {seo blogs, seo training sites, and seo tool providers} with the below ad: By using the word "resources" we are speaking directly to this user's need for more SEO learning material. We also get the added benefit of lining our logo up with this type of value add, which hopefully, down the road could result in a visit to our site and possibly a free trial signup. #3 Competitive Research (a "no one out there is really doing this, so go kick some butt" candidate) My favorite part. I don't know what it is about competitive research that has us all thinking the information we gather is context specific, but it's true. I remember the first time I mentioned to a PPC colleague they should look at SEMrush's SEO results for one of our competitors to build out our PPC campaigns, you would have thought I just smacked a puppy. She was in shock. The truth is we are all playing on the same field here guys. A lot can be gained by studying your competitors total efforts, not just their paid or organic ones. Next time you spend time spying on your competitor's organic efforts, pass that information off to your paid marketer and ask them to build a search retargeting campaign around it. Because let's be real, we all have limited time and resources, and some of their targets will never make it onto your prioritization list. Plus, often you will see brand association start to shift through retargeting, which will reciprocally help your SEO efforts. Whoa, cool huh? Example time: Look at the below results when I used SEMrush to view some of my competitors top keyword rankings. While we perform well organically for "seo software", "best seo software", etc. we don't necessarily have many SEO campaigns around the concept of "powerful" and "easy/simple." This tool is showing us that our competitors are cleaning up here, and we know we need to at least be building some brand sentiment around these adjectives. Search Retargeting can help. Target: We can set up search retargeting ads for people that are searching online for these terms, and then target them with ads that directly speak to this. Below you can see we have incorporated these words to help build our brand association with them. Given the size of these networks and their amazing targeting capabilities, you can rest assured that you will likely be in front of these users, even though your site is nowhere to be found. This retargeting bridge can be very powerful. The moral of the story is an important one -- we can't work independent of other channels in marketing. While search retargeting has been around a while, it's only recently gained a bunch of attention. It's like advertisers are just starting to realize its potential. I suggest quickly jumping ahead of them and taking it a step further--leverage your current and past research to produce more targeted, more creative, and highly effective search retargeting campaigns.   Do you like this post? Yes No

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Where Does Our National Debt Come From?

Wednesday, July 27, 2011   Good evening, Chances are you’ve caught bits and pieces of the debate over our debt and deficits here in Washington over the past few weeks. It is important to understand what the deficit and debt ceiling debate is all about, so we’ve put together a few resources to help explain how we got here and what needs to happen in the next week. If you have questions about the ongoing debate, be sure to check a brand new series called White House “Office Hours,” where you can ask senior administration officials your questions about policy issues via Twitter. Infographic: Where Does Our National Debt Come From? We put together a graphic that helps explain where our national debt comes from. It shows the impact various policies have had over the past decade, shifting us from projected surpluses to actual deficits and, as a result, running up the national debt. You can view the full-size image by clicking below. President Obama's Speech President Obama gave a speech this week calling on Congress to come together and find common ground. He also called on the American people to make their voices heard in this debate. Check out the video and read some key passages from his remarks. Check Out White House Office Hours Starting this week, senior staff at the White House will hold regular "Office Hours" on Twitter, answering your questions in real-time. We held our first Office Hours this past Monday, and you can check out the entire conversation here. Don’t miss the next Q&A - follow @WhiteHouse for the latest updates and use the hashtag #WHChat to ask administration officials your questions on President Obama’s speech and the ongoing deficit debate. Here's the schedule so far: Thursday, July 28 1:00 p.m. EDT: Office Hours with Jason Furman, Principal Deputy Director of the National Economic Council 3:00 p.m. EDT:Office Hours with Brian Deese, Deputy Director of the National Economic Council Friday, July 29 10:00 a.m. EDT:Office Hours with Jason Furman, Principal Deputy Director of the National Economic Council 4:00 p.m. EDT: Office Hours with Brian Deese, Deputy Director of the National Economic Council Please note that we will do our best to stick to this Office Hours schedule, but times are subject to change.  Stay Connected     Facebook Twitter YouTube Flickr iTunes   This email was sent to e0nstar1.blog@gmail.com Manage Subscriptions for e0nstar1.blog@gmail.com Sign Up for Updates from the White House Unsubscribe e0nstar1.blog@gmail.com | Privacy Policy Please do not reply to this email. Contact the White House The White House • 1600 Pennsylvania Ave NW • Washington, DC 20500 • 202-456-1111

Interview With Chris Boggs of SEMPO Graywolf's SEO Blog

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Interview With Chris Boggs of SEMPO Posted: 27 Jul 2011 10:30 AM PDT For today's post, I present Chris Boggs, the current  president of SEMPO.  When we spoke about SEMPO recently, I mentioned that one of the things that put me off about the organization was the membership fee. When I initially discovered SEMPO years ago, the corporate membership was the one suggested to me and, to be honest, as person just starting, out $5,000 seemed like a lot of money to join. You mentioned that there is more than one level and that individuals can join for as little as $125 a year. So what are some of the benefits of the different levels? We have recently made the individual level membership more affordable, bringing it down from $299/year to $125. In my opinion, the primary benefits at the individual level are the discounts to industry events, the ability to join any of our working groups or committees, and the networking. Some people also find the job request leads to be valuable, but I have heard mixed feelings on that, since not all leads are well qualified. Having a corporate ($1,000) or Circle ($5,000) increases the amount of users you can have tied to the account. So if you have multiple users they can be involved in different committees or working groups and have unique logins to the back end system. The primary breakdown of membership differences is found at http://www.sempo.org/?page=join. The primary differences between individual and corporate are the ability to present a webinar, post job openings, and submit guest columns to the SEMPO newsletters. Circle members also have the ability to promote company intern programs directly to graduates of SEMPO Institute courses, and they get 30% off institute courses versus the 20% that individual and corporate members get. The next question may seem a little selfish, but it's one that most people are going to ask. What is the benefit of joining SEMPO? My personal feeling on this is that by being part of SEMPO, you are helping to educate and form the perceptions of search marketing and all its related facets worldwide. I feel that being part of the largest formal group of search marketers in the world, with members on every continent, is invaluable for networking and career growth. As SEMPO continues to grow, programs including certification and advanced level training will further improve, and the value will increase as well. I see that SEMPO puts out a lot of research papers. What's some of the most valuable or popular research you put out, and how current is the information in them?  Our primary research is known as the "Annual State of Search Survey." We have been doing this since 2004, and past reports are available for free to non-members. The 2011 version is currently only available to members. We had a total of 920 respondents from 66 countries take part in the survey, with US-based respondents accounting for almost half of the total. The sample included 325 advertisers and 595 supply-side respondents (mainly agencies) carrying out search marketing and social media activity on behalf of clients. This report gets us most of the press we receive each year, and provides some outstanding information for use in search marketing business development pitches as well as strategic planning. Other reports that have proven to be valuable include our Salary Surveys (both for in-house and agency roles), as well as some of the internal research that has been conducted. With a greater number of members participating on the Research committee, we really feel we can grow the value of our research even more. There's also the SEMPO institute with training programs, with a lot of different disciplines. What type of people will get the greatest benefit from this type of training? Typically the SEMPO Institute training is divided into beginner/intermediate and advanced topics. Since we strive to keep the content fresh, we often retire courses until they can become updated. The "Insider's Guide" is actually a great fundamentals course for everyone from junior analysists just getting their feet wet in search marketing to experienced Executives that have to manage the program and determine budget/resources. This course provides a solid overview of Paid and Organic search, along with guidelines on measurement/reporting. Currently the other courses being sold include Advanced SEO, which is valuable for someone with less than 2-3 years' experience; Social Media, which is pretty much for everyone as well; and then the Linking and Keyword research courses, which are probably more for SEO specialists. We do offer 50% discount on all courses to Students and active military members. As a former Marine, I can tell you that I couldn't have picked a better job coming out of the Corps with not-too-valuable artillery skills. When we were talking, you mentioned that members are only going to get benefits if they are willing to put something in, which is a variation on the giver's gain approach. What are your suggestions for things that people can do to become part of SEMPO, help themselves, their businesses and their clients? As I mentioned above, I fully buy into this idea. I feel that the more people we can have involved with our committee and working groups, the better research and information we will be able to generate. Our industry is still at an early point and is continuously slammed by those that don't fully understand it, or that have had an experience with a shady consultant or company. The more that we can do to educate all marketers about the value of properly performing SEO or Paid Search, and to better their ways of measuring their activities and developing testing, the better Search will become. Additionally, there is great opportunity for Social Media "experts" to become part of this community, since the two are so closely intertwined. Thanks Chris for taking the time to talk to me today. We will be talking to Chris again soon so, if you have any questions, feel free to send them to @graywolf or @boggles on twitter Related posts: Justilien Gaspard – Local Search Interview For this interview we’re talking to Justilien Gaspard. Justilien is... SMX Advanced Interview So while I was at SMX Advanced I did an... Rae Hoffman – Local Search Interview For today’s interview were talking with Rae Hoffman. Rae could... Merrick Lozano – Local Search interview Today we’re talking with Merrick Lozano of PRLeap.com. This is... Interview with Steven Wyer of Reputation Advocate The following is a sponsored post. For this post we're... Advertisers: Text Link Ads - New customers can get $100 in free text links. BOTW.org - Get a premier listing in the internet's oldest directory. Ezilon.com Regional Directory - Check to see if your website is listed! Need an SEO Audit for your website, look at my SEO Consulting Services Link Building- Backlink Build offers customized link building services Directory Journal - Get permanent deep links in a search engine friendly directory LinkWheel SEO - Get Web 2.0 Backlinks Links From PR9 Sites - Get In Top 3 Google ASAP RevSEO High PR BackLinks- Private High PageRank Homepage Link Network Limited time offer! World's #1 SEO toolbox at 63% off: Get Your Copy Now TigerTech - Great Web Hosting service at a great price. This post originally came from Michael Gray who is an SEO Consultant. Be sure not to miss the Thesis Wordpress Theme review. Interview With Chris Boggs of SEMPO

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