Comments on: Good SEO Cannot Compensate for Faulty Business Models!

By: expired domains

expired domains — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 13:56:51 +0000

A year ago I heard on a seo forum “Some people still think that seo is html and content and everyone knows it’s all about backlinks” I think in a year we could say “some people thinks it’s all aboout backlinks and we know only unique content matter” 🙂

By: busby seo test

busby seo test — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 08:58:24 +0000

Links works something like that, but can be manipulated as we’ve seen on a mass scale. Its much much more difficult to manipulate friend recommendations and opinions … just imagine Google incorporating something like Stumbleupon and Delicious, or better yet more advanced social media yet be be deployed.
This is such an important subject, Jeff, and I’m not sure I’ve seen it written about before. I think it can be difficult to make judgments about the effectiveness of someone else’s business plan because, after all, you are an SEO, a designer, a PPC guy or whatever. You’re not in the coin collecting industry.

By: Singapore Internet Marketing

Singapore Internet Marketing — Sun, 23 Nov 2008 18:42:30 +0000

It is just a matter of time before link building loses its stand. Universal search, behaviour-based search and intent-based search are coming into play by the first quarter of 2009 and this will seriously affect many SEO business which do not evolve along with the search engine.
Anna Nguyen

By: Dudibob

Dudibob — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 08:57:26 +0000

@Jeff – Friend recommendation does like the best way to track something like that, but then again, doesn’t linking to somewhere work the same way? If you believe a site has value (information, good product, etc) then you’d link to it, pretty much the same as a friend recommendation but in the public face.

Also if we were to use a friend recommendation system, such as a widget that emails a friend the page your looking at, how would Google track this? would we have to install Google tracking code onto our site? will Google start monitoring every email (similar to what could be happening in the UK)?

Not trying to pick holes, I’m intrigued to see how Google could pull something like this off without tapping directly into our heads 🙂

By: MiriamEllis

MiriamEllis — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 05:10:37 +0000

This is such an important subject, Jeff, and I’m not sure I’ve seen it written about before. I think it can be difficult to make judgments about the effectiveness of someone else’s business plan because, after all, you are an SEO, a designer, a PPC guy or whatever. You’re not in the coin collecting industry.

You try to learn what you can from what you see going on on the web, but in the end, small business owners should see a small business advisor when forming their plan, as well as doing tons of their own research. No SEO can take on this job that the business owner needs to have done themselves, long before they start hiring folks like us.

Great article.

And, for the weird signs pile:

Kung Fu Veterinary Clinic

I swear, I actually saw this once.
Miriam

By: Carrie Hill

Carrie Hill — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 19:46:09 +0000

There was a prime example of this at Pubcon last week.

A real estate lisitngs website had a poor structure & business model – they asked for site reviews at least twice – and both times were told, by entirely different people, that their goal was unattainable due to some weird domain rules & issues.

One of the biggest obstacles I see in writing about small business – and in talking to small business owners is the lack of research and testing that should be done to determine the viability of their “idea.”

PPC ads pointing at very small & simple website is a great way to see if your idea is going to make money – before you sink a fortune into developing it.

By: Dudibob

Dudibob — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 16:33:37 +0000

Just curious, how would an automated system declare whether a business was successful or not? Not every website aims to make money from users, not every website displays prices on their websites.

By: paisley

paisley — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 16:21:39 +0000

i’ve almost always gotten in trouble for saying this in an intordutory meeting.. “i can bring people to your website, but if no one wants to buy your crap, we are wasting our money”

By: Submit Articles

Submit Articles — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 15:41:36 +0000

This is the most true statement i have read in a long time. I have people ask me to do seo frequently because there PPC campaigns aren’t working. For some reason they thing FREE traffic is going to make there websites work.

By: Mike | PlanetChiro

Mike | PlanetChiro — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 20:23:46 +0000

I love that picture Jeff. I remember once seeing a “chiropractor – marriage counselor” office. While I’m sure they could rank well for the combined term, I don’t think the business model worked out.