"miserable failure" no longer illustrates link power!

"Because of the changes Google made to its formula, searching for 'miserable failure' on Google now pulls up a news story by the BBC about Google bombing as the first result, followed by a Wikipedia entry on the topic and another article in an industry publication. The White House page no longer appears in the top 100 results."

The best (easiest to illustrate and understand) example of the power of link anchor text has been countered! As we have pointed out many times in our clinic, the text that links are anchored on (that is, the text that is "hot"), has a powerful influence on what phrases the targeted page ranks on in search engine results. That principle is still true, but the issue has been clouded somewhat by Google's latest actions.

For those of you not familiar with the example, the phrase "miserable failure" was linked to the biography of George W. Bush in so many places on the web that a search on that term in Google resulted in a first place ranking for that page. Now, the search brings up a listing of articles that describe the technique.

Discussion I have seen so far about what exactly the change is does not clarify what happened. The best explanation seems to be that Google has identified certain phrases that have been "bombed" and penalized them. Google says they have altered the algorithm that influences the ranking. Perhaps we will learn more later as this story continues to be discussed on the web.

At the moment, the phrase "french military victories" still produces the "bombed" results. By the time you read this, that may have changed also. I will have to continue to search for examples to illustrate the principle in class (and would appreciate readers notifying me of good examples that they come across).

In spite of this change, webmasters should remember that the phrases that they use to link to their pages (on all links, internal to the site and from external sites) is, and remains, important to the terms that the page will rank on. Do not discard the technique!

Internet Marketing is Marketing!

"I often find myself talking to people who still believe ranking at search engines is all about some technical voodoo done to Web pages. I try to explain doing some basic tech-tweaking to Web pages to get them indexed isn't difficult, but getting a decent top 10 rank is. And there's this kind of astonishment from them when they discover that instead of instantly wanting to talk about technology, I first want to discuss marketing.

... So talking to anyone who seems to believe that ranking at search engines is still something you achieve via a technical process, I'm sorry, but get real!"

Here is a realistic look at what it takes to succeed in Internet Marketing. It is not a technical issue. You cannot "tweak" the pages on a website and make it an effective marketing tool without doing the basic work of making the site itself an effective marketing instrument.

In my discussions with clients about their sites, I emphasize that they are entering a publishing business. In order to succeed, they have to publish useful information the web.

In addition, they really need to look first at the competitive arena that they are entering. Every search result is a competition for attention. If you are competing against sites that have done a good job positioning themselves, you are going to have to work harder to compete effectively than if you are competing against sites that do not understand the basics of search engine operations.

No matter how much I emphasize these points, the client does not seem to begin to understand the requirements until it is time to begin adding information to the site. That is when the realization hits home. Success in this business results from persistent and effective work on the site, not magic tricks!