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marți, 15 noiembrie 2011
The Campaign to Cut Waste is Saving Billions
Quantifying the Impact of Google's Keyword Referral Data Shutdown
Quantifying the Impact of Google's Keyword Referral Data Shutdown |
| Quantifying the Impact of Google's Keyword Referral Data Shutdown Posted: 14 Nov 2011 02:53 PM PST Posted by randfish On Tuesday, October 18th, Google announced they'd be hiding search referral data for logged-in Google searchers. When questioned by Danny Sullivan of SearchEngineLand, Google provided the following estimate on the impact to search referral data: "Google software engineer Matt Cutts, who’s been involved with the privacy changes, wouldn’t give an exact figure but told me he estimated even at full roll-out, this would still be in the single-digit percentages of all Google searchers on Google.com" Tragically, it appears that Cutts was either misinformed or gave misleading information, as "(not provided)" became a major referrer for many websites, climbing into double digits in early November. Now, that percentage has risen even higher, into the 20%+ range on many sites. Hubspot's Brian Whalley reported that the average website using their analytics lost 11.36% of keyword referral data and 423 sites lost more than 20% (15 unlucky souls lost 50%+, which seems almost crazy). In an attempt to better quantify the impact, we ran a small survey last week, asking fellow marketers to supply information about the impact to their sites. Here's a visualization of 60 sites' analytics data, showing the self-reported percent of their Google search traffic that used keyword "(not provided)": Our average in the 6 days from Nov. 4-10 almost exactly matches the average of the several thousand Hubspot customers (11.36% vs. 12.02%), and thus makes me feel pretty good about that data from the survey-takers. A little more about these 60 respondents:
Approximately 1/5th of those surveyed reported no impact on their content/marketing efforts, which likely suggests those folks don't typically use keyword-level data to help them improve OR the change hasn't cost them enough data to have a negative impact. Another 1/5th claimed a strong impact, which is likely how I'd describe this change for our internal efforts. Granted, we don't actively use this data every week, but we've relied on it heavily for reporting and in the past for audits around content optimization and the generation of new content (or updating/refreshing of old material). Here's numbers and a visualization of the referrer encryption data specifically for SEOmoz.org: From Oct. 19th - 30th, Google sent 163,909 visits from organic search to our website. 3,762 of those visits, or 2.3%, were via keyword "(not provided)". We didn't sweat this too much. As per Matt Cutts' promise, it was in single digits and, while frustrating, had a very tiny impact on our analytics, marketing and content optimization efforts. But from Oct. 31st to November 13th, Google sent 191,726 visits and 35,168 of these came via keyword "(not provided)," 18.34%. This has a serious impact on our ability to make our website better for visitors (in particular, identifying keywords that are sending traffic but potentially not having a great experience that we should be making new blog posts, videos, updates, etc. to help). To me, that's the most tragic part of this change. The underselling of the change as being "single digits" was lame. The hypocrisy around keyword privacy sucks. And their motivations are questionable at best. But the crummiest part is the impact the change will have. It won't put any black hats out of business, won't stop any malware or hacking, and won't add a shred of value to the Internet. But it will make it harder for marketers and site builders to measure, understand and improve for their audience. The net impact will be a slightly worse web, and Google's claim of privacy will only protect them from criticism because it's a far easier explanation than the truth. Sometimes, it sucks living in an ecosystem with an 800-pound gorilla.       |
| Brainstorming Your Link-Building Strategy Posted: 14 Nov 2011 04:00 AM PST Posted by JonQ This post was originally in YOUmoz, and was promoted to the main blog because it provides great value and interest to our community. The author's views are entirely his or her own and may not reflect the views of SEOmoz, Inc. Often when client arrives in need of links, it can be fairly daunting trying to figure out how the heck you’re going to get the link juice you need. Coming up with a structured plan that works is something I’ve been trying to improve over the last year or so, and I’m pretty sure it’s something I’ll be refining for many years to come. At the start of every campaign I’m involved with, I try to sit down and thrash out a load of ideas in an effort to come up with a link-building ‘road map’ to follow for the coming months. I find having a solid plan useful in two ways. Firstly, for the client, I think it’s really good for them to understand what you are doing with the time they are paying for. In my experience, it really helps to sit down with them and say I’m going to be doing this much of ‘x’ and this much of ‘y’ because of ‘a, b, and c.' Being able to report back on this structured activity will definitely go down well with your clients. This open explanation of your plan creates a good transparent relationship with the client, and hopefully, one that will also stand the test of time. Secondly, having a clear plan to follow is brilliant for me. Having a clear set of tasks allows me to manage my time much more effectively and ensures that I don’t fall behind on anything. Being freelance, I don’t have a boss to keep check on me so it’s vital that I keep track of what I’m working on and what I need to work on before the month is over. Sure, things are likely to change along the way, but it’s always useful to understand what you’re changing and why. Here are some of the things I like to think about when coming up with a game plan. 1. Requirements – What Links Do I Need? The first part of any solid link-building strategy should be trying to establish what links your client needs. Depending on the situation, you might either need to do a full backlink analysis or alternatively spend half-an-hour or so getting a quick ‘feel’ for things. Either way, it’s a step that shouldn’t be skipped. For me, this falls into two stages: Checking existing links – Using both Open Site Explorer (OSE) and Majestic SEO, I try to build up a good picture of what links are already coming into the website. How many linking root domains are there? What’s the anchor text balance like? How have they been building links in the past? All of these questions will go some way to determining what type of links I might want to prioritise. For example, if your new client has a brand new domain with no links, then you will probably want to tread extremely carefully with your link-building. However, you might find out that your new client has gone way overboard with exact match anchor text, which will mean that balancing out the anchor text should become a focus for you. Checking the competition – This is where things can start to get really interesting. Checking out the competition is a vital step in understanding what you might be going up against. Armed with that information, you can start to get an idea of what you might need to do in order to rank well, and how long it might take you to get there. Having some good insight into your competitor's link profile will also help you to track changes and understand shifts in the SERPS; all great information to be armed with! I usually start this process off by tracking who’s ranking in the top ten for a variety of my main keywords. Once I’ve got a good idea of who’s hanging around, I’ll then download a full OSE report for the top ten results for each keyword. I can then look at numbers of linking root domains, anchor text spread, and many more things that will help determine what I might need to do. Justin Briggs wrote an amazing post on link analysis that goes into some great detail on the subject; I strongly suggest you read it! Key Questions:
2. Timescales and Budgets This is sadly one of the biggest factors that can affect your potential link-building strategy. It’s important to get a good idea of how much budget and time you will have available to you before you start thinking up a load of wonderful ways to build links. There’s no point in dreaming up ways to start promoting your amazing infographics and embeddable content if you don’t have any budget to create anything. That being said, there are always ways to build content and links for any budget (within reason of course!) If the budget is tight, then it might be worth considering writing some great guides and resources to help establish your client as a trustworthy source of information. So long as you have the time to research and be creative, writing a good piece of link-worthy content shouldn’t have to cost the earth. Key Questions:
3. Resources By resources, I mean anything. Anything that you can draw on to help enhance what you’re doing. This is where being sociable, friendly, and a little bit persuasive can really help with your link-building. Do you have great designers you can call on? Do you know some fantastic writers? Does either you or the client have specialist knowledge that could be called on to create some useful resources? The word "resources" doesn’t just have to mean financial resources and number of staff; in my book, it means ANYTHING that could be useful in creating content, spreading the brand, and of course, gaining some juicy links. Key Questions:
(Figuring out a plan getting to you? Just don’t end up like Crazy Harry... Photo credit) 4. Content – Post or Host?! We all know that hosting great content on your website can help establish you as a great source of information, and hopefully start to bring in links naturally. So it’s definitely something you need to think about. But placing content on other websites is also a great way of building links, especially if you’re a new website trying to build a reputation from scratch. Hosting content on your own site – Personally I see this as a must for any website. If your content and website sucks, then your success is going to be relatively limited. Writing great resources and promoting your own great content will help you build traffic, links, and social activity. However, can the website easily facilitate new content? Is your client willing to promote free content? These are a couple of things that could stand in your way, and working out how to get round them should definitely be planned for. Posting content on other sites – If you’re working on a new website, then it might be some time until the links start to build up naturally. Going out and placing content on other websites is a fantastic way to build links and reputation. Using services like MyBlogGuest will help you to find some really good websites that are looking for content in your niche. Key Questions:
5. Specific Tasks By now, you should be gathering a few pretty decent ideas together of where you might be headed with your link-building campaign. The real skill is turning all of this information into realistic tasks that can fit into the timescales the project allows. I think the key here is being ‘realistic.' Your strategy has to work for the project and give the client as much value as possible, but also not cause you to be overworked and underpaid. I don’t think it’s very valuable to say ‘we’re going to make some link bait.' It’s far better to come up with specific tasks such as:
Going back to the point I made at the beginning, it’s always really useful to have a list of tasks to keep yourself in check and also to help feedback on progress to the client. Knowing what you need to do and when should help keep the wheels rolling. There are plenty of project management tools out there, but I tend to use a simple spreadsheet with a tab for ‘each task area.' Each tab can then contain specific month-by-month details of each task, with a detailed breakdown of the steps along the way: Spending that little bit of extra time making some detailed plans should help you to work more efficiently and to keep focused throughout. 6. Don’t Fear Change Whatever your plan includes, try not to worry about changing it along the way if you find that something isn’t working out as well as you might have hoped. It’s often the case that some things work out really well and produce more than what you expected, while other things simply never take off. Try to carry the mantra of ‘fail fast.' If something’s not working out, then tweak, change, and tweak again until you hit that magic balance. Having a detailed plan will mean that you can track everything you’re doing, so any changes you make will hopefully be well-informed. As a last note, I thought I’d mention a few of the best resources I’ve read recently (SEOmoz and others) that have definitely helped shape the way I plan and research link building strategies. If you haven’t read these then go and do it now!
About me: I run my own SEO consulting business Go Search Marketing and have worked with a large variety of clients in different industries. I also have the pleasure of running my own ecommerce site The Jewellery Boutique. Feel free to come say hi and pop me any questions on Twitter @jonquinton1.     |
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Seth's Blog : After you've done your best
After you've done your best
(and it didn't work)
...then what do you do?
Slamming your six iron into the ground, yelling at yourself, cursing out your staff, second-guessing, berating bystanders—there are plenty of ways we demonstrate our frustration that our best didn't work this time.
But is it helpful?
Learning from a failure is critical. Connecting effort with failure at an emotional level is crippling. After all, we've already agreed you did your best.
Early in our careers, we're encouraged to avoid failure, and one way we do that is by building up a set of emotions around failure, emotions we try to avoid, and emotions that we associate with the effort of people who fail. It turns out that this is precisely the opposite of the approach of people who end up succeeding.
If you believe that righteous effort leads to the shame of personal failure, you'll seek to avoid righteous effort.
Successful people analytically figure out what didn't work and redefine what their best work will be in the future. And then they get back to work.
Let the guys at ESPN do the racket throwing.
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luni, 14 noiembrie 2011
Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis
Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis |
- Country by Country Per Capita Retail Space Comparison; Lowe's Takes 44% Earnings Hit on Store Closings; JC Penny Reports 3rd Quarter Loss; Retail Store Closing Roundup
- Global Wheat Glut; Prices Drop, French Exports Plunge; Reflections on Agricultural Commodities; "No Food at Any Price" Revisited
- Bond Market Stares Down Technocrats as 10-Year Yields Climb in Italy and Spain; Technocratic Showdown in Greece with Troika Already?
- Economic Idiocy or Self-Serving Bullsheet from Deutsche Bank Chief Economist and UK Business Secretary? General Rule Helps Sort This Out
| Posted: 14 Nov 2011 06:16 PM PST Lowe's reported a 44% decline in store profits today and blamed store closings. What are other retailers doing? First consider Store Closings Slam Lowe's Profit Lowe's Cos.' fiscal-third-quarter earnings fell 44% as store-closing charges masked the home-improvement retailer's slightly improved same-store sales.Reduce Size of Organization The key phrase in the above article is easy to spot "reduce the size of its organization". Will other stores do the same? JC Penny 3rd Quarter Loss Please consider the decline in profits came on the heels of an outright 3rd Quarter Loss at JC Penny. J.C. Penney Co., the retail chain led by the former head of Apple's retail operations, reported a third-quarter loss, citing costs from an early-retirement plan amid weaker spending.Innovation to Lead the Way? Inquiring minds are mocking the idea New J.C. Penney CEO Counts On Innovation J.C. Penney Co.'s new chief executive, Ronald Johnson, said Monday that he is out to "re-imagine" the department store, using current operations as his starting point.Will innovation help JC Penny? How? Why? Certainly innovation is a major force at Apple. However, is innovation going to help the average brick-and-mortar store that competes against Target and WalMart on some items and Amazon on others? If anything, that set of silly statements by CEO Johnson should cause investors to dump the stock. JC Penny is not a technology company. It needs to stock products at competitive prices that consumers want. Retail Store Closings Roundup Inquiring minds are also investigating the 2011 Retail Store Closings Roundup Even though the number of retail store openings by major U.S. retail industry chains is expected to far outnumber the number of store closings in the 2011 calendar year, both large and small retail chains will still be struggling to hold onto their domestic retail presence, keep stores open, and grow sales and turn a profit. The number of U.S. retail industry store closings planned for 2011 will not be insignificant, particularly in an economy that is still plagued by high unemployment.Per Capita Retail Space Comparison
It seems to me stores have a major problem here. The problem is increasing competition for customers who have no job and/or retirees with little need for anything but food and shelter. Store Closings
That is a partial list. The report did say there are far more store openings than closings. However, they are all competing for the same customers. No Driver for Jobs I keep stating, housing is not coming back in a major way nor is commercial real estate. So what is the driver for jobs? There is no driver for jobs. However, there is a driver for more store closings, increased competition, and falling prices. Expect all three as deflation kicks in again with a vengeance. Mike "Mish" Shedlock http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com Click Here To Scroll Thru My Recent Post List Mike "Mish" Shedlock is a registered investment advisor representative for SitkaPacific Capital Management. Sitka Pacific is an asset management firm whose goal is strong performance and low volatility, regardless of market direction. Visit http://www.sitkapacific.com/account_management.html to learn more about wealth management and capital preservation strategies of Sitka Pacific. 
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| Posted: 14 Nov 2011 10:27 AM PST Wheat prices are down over 50% from 2008 high and 37% since early this year in a global glut of wheat. Please consider Wheat Shippers Battle for Sales as Global Grain Glut Expands. France may lose its place as the second-biggest wheat exporter after failing to win more than a dozen tenders in Egypt, the world's biggest buyer, as shipments from Russia, Ukraine and Kazakhstan overwhelm markets.Reflections on Agricultural Commodities Wheat prices rose on account of crop failures in Australia, a global drought, and export restrictions in Russia. Wheat prices have now fallen on abundant supplies and lifting of export restrictions in Russia. Here are charts of wheat and soybeans. Wheat Monthly Chart  click on chart for sharper image Soybean Monthly Chart  click on chart for sharper image Is wheat a good short here? I really do not know. The news of a glut is out. The time to short wheat was before the news of a glut was out. Prices have fallen in half. So what's holding up the price of soybeans? Once again, I don't know, but I doubt it lasts. I could be wrong. So what's the point of this "I don't know post?" My point is in regards to inflation. Food Prices vs. Inflation 2003-2006 Inflation was rampant 2003-2006. One only has to look at housing and commercial real estate prices to see it. Housing prices exploded. The price of wheat went nowhere. The price of soybeans went nowhere in an interesting way. Now we have a housing bust and there is no credit expansion. Yet "inflationistas" point at commodity prices as a sign of inflation. I keep asking "where is the inflation?" I keep answering "China where credit expansion is 30% annually." In the meantime, prices of grains move up and down with the weather more than anything else. When prices move up inflationistas scream at the top of their lungs. When prices drop, the inflationistas crawl under a rock. The reality is much of these movements are noise. Weather is not Inflation Inflation and deflation are about the expansion of money and credit, not about weather, crop failures, export cutoffs or government rules and tariffs that drive up prices. However, if you are a misguided soul who thinks rising prices are tantamount to inflation while ignoring prices movements to the downside of 40% in housing ($400,000 on a $1 million home, or more), then go ahead, stick to your belief. Scream about prices and you will be right more often than wrong even if you miss the big picture or what is really important (credit expansion, asset prices, and jobs). No Food at Any Price Reflect on that for a moment, then reflect on the absurdity of Jim Rogers' July 2011 preposterous statement "No Food at Any Price" I suggest there is a glut of wheat. Moreover, I think there could be a glut of corn were it not for inane ethanol policies in the US. In contrast, Rogers thinks there will be no food at any price. The idea is patently absurd. Mike "Mish" Shedlock http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com Click Here To Scroll Thru My Recent Post List Mike "Mish" Shedlock is a registered investment advisor representative for SitkaPacific Capital Management. Sitka Pacific is an asset management firm whose goal is strong performance and low volatility, regardless of market direction. Visit http://www.sitkapacific.com/account_management.html to learn more about wealth management and capital preservation strategies of Sitka Pacific. 
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| Posted: 14 Nov 2011 07:55 AM PST The technocratic governments in Italy and Greece are not off to a smooth start judging from the action in the bond market. A quick glance at the 10-Year note in Italy shows the yield is up 25 basis points to 6.70% and the Spanish 10-year note is up 24 basis points, soaring through the 6% mark to 6.09%. Meanwhile, Greek 1-year bonds are trading at a mere 250%. Any bets on when they exceed 300%? German Chancellor Angela Merkel says Europe faces toughest hour since Second World War. What Merkel says is irrelevant so let's instead focus on a few other snips from the Telegraph article. Papademos succeeds George Papandreou, whose proposal to hold a referendum on the country's bailout terms prompted EU leaders to raise the threat of a Greek exit from the currency bloc.No New Measures, Nothing In Writing It will be interesting to see how long Samaras sticks to his pledge of "no new measures" while refusing to give anything more than a verbal agreement to measures already in play. Who can but the bond market could possibly doubt the words of Greek politicians? After all, everyone knows that politicians everywhere always keep their word. Putting things in writing cannot possibly make a difference. Sheer Stupidity of it All Notice the sheer stupidity of it all. The Troika may potentially throw another 130 billion euros at Greece on top of over a hundred billion already spent, in an attempt to prevent a default (that has already happened) that may have resulted in a loss to the banks of perhaps 50 billion Euros had banks simply taken their losses a year ago. Supposedly Greece was bailed out to prevent contagion. However, throwing money around helped speed up contagion. Portugal and Spain will be next. Mike "Mish" Shedlock http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com Click Here To Scroll Thru My Recent Post List Mike "Mish" Shedlock is a registered investment advisor representative for SitkaPacific Capital Management. Sitka Pacific is an asset management firm whose goal is strong performance and low volatility, regardless of market direction. Visit http://www.sitkapacific.com/account_management.html to learn more about wealth management and capital preservation strategies of Sitka Pacific. 
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| Posted: 14 Nov 2011 12:47 AM PST Sometimes it is extremely difficult to tell the difference between economic idiocy and self-serving bullsheet. I am a big fan of Occam's Razor which says the simplest explanation, the one with the fewest assumptions, is likely to be best. However, which explanation is simpler - stupidity or self-serving propaganda? While pondering that question, let's take a look at how the question arose. It comes from a statement made by the Chief economist at Deutsche Bank in an article written by Ambrose Evans-Pritchard for the Telegraph. Please consider Pressure on the ECB grows as Mario Monti rides to rescue "The ECB must make it clear that it will not allow Italy's bond yields to rise above 5pc, however much it costs," said Thomas Mayer, chief economist at Deutsche Bank.Idiocy or Self-Serving Bullsheet? Are these people really dumb enough to believe central banks can impose their will on the markets? I have to ask because former ECB president Jean-Claude Trichet empahtically said "We say no to default". He also said no to soft-default. Well guess what? Greek debt was restructured and the ECB is holding a ton of it. Eventually the markets impose their will. It may be by destruction of the currency, something that both Vince Cable and Thomas Mayer fail to consider (or simply ignore) or the markets may impose their will with interest rates as has happened with Greece and Portugal. To be sure, it is theoretically possible (at least for a while) for the ECB to print enough money to drive rates in Italy to zero. However, such action would be in violation of the Maastricht Treat, it would put German taxpayers at risk, and it would eventually make the Euro worthless if done long enough. I do not know what if any stake in the matter Vince Cable has, so it is easy enough to think he is a complete economic idiot. The situation is more complex with Thomas Mayer. He may be talking his book, scared to death what happens if debt held by Deutsche Bank blows up. Perhaps he would be fired if that happened. Nonetheless, a general Mish rule says "when stupidity is one of the choices, give it the benefit of the doubt". There may be a combination of factors at play here (and probably is), but to pick a single answer "economic idiocy" rates to be the best choice. Mike "Mish" Shedlock http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com Click Here To Scroll Thru My Recent Post List Mike "Mish" Shedlock is a registered investment advisor representative for SitkaPacific Capital Management. Sitka Pacific is an asset management firm whose goal is strong performance and low volatility, regardless of market direction. Visit http://www.sitkapacific.com/account_management.html to learn more about wealth management and capital preservation strategies of Sitka Pacific. 
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