Natural Search Blog


Quova Awarded Patent for Improved Geotargeting

Quova Logo - Location MattersQuova recently announced that they were awarded a patent for various methods which improve geotargeting accuracy and capability. My understanding is that Quova has been using these methods for quite some time already, prior to receiving the patent.

Here’s Quova’s description of the innovations:

“Quova’s newly added patent describes a method for determining the geographic location of an Internet user based upon combining trace routes, user registration information, host names with textual patterns that reveal geolocation information and Internet Service Provider (ISP) service area information. These trace routes describe the pathways by which data moves through the Internet. Each node or ‘hop’ in the trace route is identified by an IP address. These interconnected nodes can be used to recreate the topology of the Internet. Each geolocation can then be assigned to these IP addresses in order to determine the location of each node, up to and including the end user’s IP address and the geolocation of that end user.”

I previously have written about Quova in my extensive article, (more…)

The Future Of SEO

Today’s post covers a very interesting topic – The future of SEO and is based on a Whiteboard Friday discussion by Rand Fishkin at SEOmoz. The search marketing industry is today poised on the brink of explosive growth and is seen to be the major source of advertising eclipsing the likes of the traditional mediums such as television and print media.

It is an interesting trip to the future and Rand’s views are equally interesting on what would be relevant in 5 to 10 years from now. He admits these are his personal views and is not an indicator of things to come. But it is a good reminder to be ready for it if it materialises in future.

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Social Media Marketing Goals

As more and more companies have adopted SEO practices in optimizing their websites, though there is still plenty of room for improvement, it’s no surprise that they have begun turning more attention to social media marketing (SMM). Of course, with all the attention these new venues have gained and become more mainstream, this only makes sense.

However, this has also lead more into jumping in head first without using their heads. Perhaps this is due to the added pressures of a challenging economy or feeling behind the curve. While social media isn’t exactly new, there is plenty of curve left, and using a challenging economy as a catalyst to jump onboard and sinking precious resources into something that you don’t understand or have any idea how to measure is extremely short-sighted.
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Google Image Search – Second Only To Web Search In Size

This post is based on the interview between Eric Enge and Peter Linsley, Google’s Product Manager for Image Search. It reveals some interesting aspects of image search which is growing at an accelerated pace.

A recent survey by Hitwise in February 2009 shows Google Image Search as part of the troika of top web properties owned by Google in terms of traffic and revenue.

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Measuring Link Bait

Last week, Stephan Spencer talked about The Social Media Underground over at Search Engine Land. While the broad brush strokes of the article were across social media, the technique of link baiting however was very much at the center. Of course there are endless ways to paint on the link bait canvas, but in many cases, there will be an element of social media involved, which may also mean time and/or money.

Link bait can be a powerful tool, especially when used in conjunction with a powerful social media network. Like many things however, it generally comes at a cost. Even if there aren’t any direct costs, such as engaging writers or paying for services directly, there will at least be direct time if you or your company creates the link bait yourself, and potentially in-kind costs, such as helping to return the favor or similar for someone else within your social media network.

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Domain Diversity – Key Metric For Higher Google Rankings

Domain diversity is an important SEO factor that is crucial for a site in order to rank well on the Google SERPs. This is achieved by the site gaining inbound links from a diverse set of domains. This is a daunting task as it is not easy to get inbound links. The best way to achieve this is for the site to contain top quality content that makes it a standout in the industry in which it operates.

Research done by the experts at SEOmoz indicated (above the 95% confidence level) that domain diversity is a key metric that helps a site achieve top rankings. The diversity here refers to the number of links coming from a variety of root domains to the site in question.
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Search Engine Crawling and Indexing Factors

The post today is about getting a site crawled and indexed effectively by the major search engines. It can be frustrating for a site owner to find that her newly built site with bells and whistles is just not appearing on the Google SERPs for a search query relevant to her business.

It is a good idea to have some knowledge of the factors that influence the crawling of a site and its successful indexing before the site ranks on the SERPs. The site can be built in a user friendly way that allows the spiders to know what to crawl and how frequently to crawl.
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Natural Search Marketing is Just in Time Conversation

I had the extreme pleasure of presenting to some of the biggest brands around at the 2009 Brandworks University. This year represented 19 years that Lindsay, Stone & Briggs has put on this annual branding conference. Brandworks is very unique in many ways as conferences go: attendance is mostly done by invitation, but attendees still pay a fee to attend; rather than elective presentations running simultaneously, there’s one block and presentations flow back-to-back and are formulated to relate to and support each other as well as the underlying theme; rather than a typical podium setup, presentations are done “in-the-round;” and it isn’t hard to find attendees who are able to claim 5, 10 or more years of attendance. Needless to say, if you ever get the opportunity to attend or are invited to speak, I highly recommend it.

This year’s talk was around the core theme of the “conversation economy” and how marketing, branding, and business in general is being shaped by and around conversations. Not surprising, there was a fair amount of talk around social media. Of course, my portion was to focus on natural search as part of this conversation, which thanks to blended search, crosses over and intersects all marketing channels. While my view on natural search hasn’t changed much over the years, preparing my presentation for the conference helped me frame it up with the exact message phrasing that I’ve been looking for – “just in time conversation.”

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