So as part of my contribution to the Linux community, I’ve been trying to help in the Wine project. This software attempts to allow you to run Windows programs in a Linux environment, and is completely free. The list of applications they have working is impressive and the work of the Wine community has definitely enabled many people to cross to Linux.

One of the first tools I have managed to get working there, is GSiteCrawler. This program will scan your site and automatically create and upload an XML sitemap for Google or Yahoo! Once uploaded, their location can be added to the respective webmaster panels.

How to Install GSiteCrawler for Ubuntu

If you already have Wine installed then jump to point 4.

1. Add the Wine respository to your system:
# sudo wget http://wine.budgetdedicated.com/apt/sources.list.d/hardy.list -O /etc/apt/sources.list.d/winehq.list

2. Update your system package information:
# sudo apt-get update

3. You can now install Wine by clicking this link. Alternatively, you can install by going to Applications->Add/Remove and searching for Wine.

4. Install the following at the terminal:
# sudo wget kegel.com/wine/winetricks && sh winetricks jet40

5. Download the full installation copy of GSiteCrawler from here and save to your desktop.

6. Right click the program install file and select “Open with Wine Windows Program loader”.

You’re done. Of course, any of my Windows readers can also download GSiteCrawler and install this handy application. I’m building a list of Ubuntu-friendly SEO/SEM tools as a reference for online marketers who have crossed over or are thinking about the switch. Feel free to list any must-have Windows tools in the comments and I’ll add them to my list for testing.

Technorati Tags: Google, GsiteCrawler, JohnMu, Sitemaps, Ubuntu, Wine

I first met Jill during the days of ThreadWatch when, as Graywolf writes, “website owners had cajones”. It’s a pleasure to be interviewing someone I respect both as a marketer and a friend. Enjoy.

Ethics has become a hot subject again. What can you tell us about your ethics or methods as a marketer and how/if that perspective has changed over the years?

My feeling is that ethics are a personal thing. It’s something you can’t really fake, at least not for very long. It doesn’t just apply to one part of your life, but permeates into every part — from your personal life to your business life. To me, being ethical and having integrity, whether it has to do with search marketing or not cheating on a spouse, or any other thing that may come up in your life — simply means doing the right thing, even when no one is watching.

What effect has Google moving the goal posts had on you, as a first generation online marketer?

Google has moved the goal posts? :D See, the beauty of the type of search marketing that I’ve always tried to practice and teach is that it makes your website fairly impervious to routine algo changes. Google changes their algorithm in order to close loopholes that search engine spammers exploit. So if you’re making your site the best it can be for your users as well as the search engines, you’re pretty safe!

As the philosopher George Santayana once wrote, “Those who cannot remember the past, are condemned to repeat it.” Based on your experience in the industry, what mistakes have online marketers made in the past and what should we have learned from these?

Well, it really goes along with both of the previous questions. I’d say the biggest mistake is in trying to trick the search engines rather than just fixing your site. I compare that to putting a band aid on a broken arm! Now, that said, I only work with existing, legitimate companies. I do believe there may be different rules at play when you work with affiliate sites and the like, but that’s not where my area of expertise lies.

That said, it really is great to see that so many people have indeed learned from the past and are working to create great websites these days, rather than chase their tail with spammy tricks.

Many of the old-school marketers are keeping out of the limelight these days. Are they just too busy with work or are there other reasons?

I imagine the reasons vary between the people. Those who have been in the business for a long time have an easier time gaining clients, so yes, they may certainly be too busy to be in the limelight. And it may not be a necessary piece of their marketing plan. After all, being in the limelight is just a form of marketing and PR. Other search marketers are growing their companies, and have let some of their newer employees have the spotlight for awhile.

For me and High Rankings, being involved in the SEO conversation has always been an important marketing component, as well as the part I love the most, so it’s unlikely that you’ll see me disappearing anytime soon!

With the arrival of social media it sometimes seems to me that presentation has become more important than content. The loudest voices can drown out the more experienced ones. Past or present, which three online marketers do you wish we could hear more from and why?

One of my early online mentors was John Audette who ran the i-Sales newsletters (among other things). He was always someone worth listening to, which he proved often as he sold a number of companies. He’s basically retired from online marketing, but interestingly enough, his son (Adam Audette) is carrying the torch and continues to put out the LED newsletter and is becoming a voice in search marketing in his own right.

I also miss hearing the smart and witty common sense online marketing advice from my old pal, Scottie Claiborne. She’s still in the biz to a certain extent, but is focusing on her job as the Webmaster for her local library. She occasionally pops into our forum now and then and when that happens she still provides the same great advice as always!

I believe anyone else that I’ve paid attention to over the years such as Jennifer Laycock, Debra Mastaler and Kim Krause Berg, are still out there fighting the good fight. I can’t think of anyone else at the moment that I’d like to hear more from.

You’ve always worked hard to dispel SEO myths. What do you think are the biggest myths about social media and SMO?

For starters, the biggest myth is that social media is something new! Social media is just a fancy name for online communities, and they have been around since the Internet’s infancy. In fact, I got my start online using social media. First, on a BBS playing an online game (generally with teenage boys!) where you could leave messages for the others playing. Then through the IRC (Internet Relay Chat) where I created a parenting chat room.

That was not only social, but a way to gain business. My first clients were parents/friends that I met through our chat room. I think even old-fashioned email discussion lists would be considered social media. It was through those that I was able to establish myself as an SEO “expert” of sorts, way back in the late ’90’s. I also met other search marketers like Danny Sullivan, Marshall Simmonds, Shari Thurow and Detlev Johnson through those lists (and then later through in-person conferences).

So for anyone who thinks that social media or the use of it for business purposes is new, please think again! The thing about social media that seems to escape many people, is that it works best as a lead generator or a way to get links only when it’s used first and foremost for true social purposes. If you are using it because you think you have to, or as a duty, you’ll never discover its full impact. You really need to love it and be a real part of the conversation to get the most out of it. I would recommend choosing just a few social media sites that have the sort of community you are interested in, and stick with those, rather than trying to take part in all of them.

For instance, while many people seem to like Digg, that’s one I’ve never had much interest in because the discussions there are simply too nasty. I prefer to hang in communities that have some heavy-handed moderation which keeps the discussion on topic.

Currently, I’m finding Twitter to be one of the more interesting communities as you get to pick and choose whose information you see. If someone says stuff you’re not interested in or don’t like, you simply unfollow them! It’s a totally customized chatroom or forum discussion. I’ve discovered interesting websites through Twitter, as well as gained new subscribers to the High Rankings Advisor newsletter, and new members to the High Rankings Forum. I don’t use Twitter for that purpose, however, and really only participate because it’s fun!

The new search engine Cuil has been trumpeted this week as the next “Google Killer”. Do you see this attempt succeeding and if not, can you see anyone managing to dislodge Google from the top position?

It’s way to soon to know what will happen with Cuil. Their initial attempt left a lot to be desired, that’s for sure. I’ve been saying for many years that it’s really Google’s game to lose. Since they’ve permeated through the popular culture it will be extremely difficult for another company to dislodge them from the top position. They’d have to really start sucking big time, and another engine would have to be light-years better in terms of relevancy. While it’s not impossible, I don’t see either of those things happening anytime soon.

In the true tradition of the SMX “give it up” session, can you tell us one marketing tip you’ve managed to keep secret so far?

As I said as a panelist on the first give it up session, the biggest secret is that there are no secrets! There may be some new tricks out there that people keep to themselves, but since I believe that tricks are a silly way to optimize a website, I’ve got nothing for you in this respect. As with everything in life, there are no quick fixes. Search marketing is all about hard work, dedication and to a large extent, passion!

You can catch Jill Whalen speaking at Search Engine Strategies in San Jose in August or at PubCon Las Vegas in November. You can also follow her on Twitter.

Technorati Tags: High Rankings, Interview, Jill Whalen, Old-School SEOs, PubCon, SEO, SES, Social Media

From Mashable.com:

You can follow different topical news groups – which are a collection of activities from people interested in the same topic (called News Networks) - or subscribe to updates from other users (called Newsmakers). On your homepage, you can then filter between the activities in your News Networks and the activities among the Newsmakers you’re tracking. Activities tracked include “Clipping” a story (akin to Digg with bookmarklet and all) or commenting on something on Socialmedian.

Looking beyond those features – which on the surface seem like a hybrid of Digg and Friendfeed – is where Socialmedian potentially gets very interesting for news junkies, and it comes in the form of providing feedback to the service. You can vote on each story’s relevance, rank topics in the order of importance to you, and upgrade the frequency at which you’d like to see stories from specific sources.

So SocialMedian has got a bit of everything in there; social submission, voting, news aggregation, sharing and groups. I’d also mention that it delivers a handy email summary of articles every few hours or daily. KillerStartup suggested these notifications would be via Twitter but they either got this wrong or this feature will be coming in the future. I hope it’s the latter. On the face of it this mashup is doing nothing new but the way they have combined the features works.

Who’s Using SocialMedian.com?

SocialMedian.com was launched publicly on the 31st July but already reports 5537 users. More importantly, the site has attracted some well known early adopters, such as Steve Rubel and Robert Scoble and Louis Gray. The owner Jason Goldberg is also very active on the site and doing a heroic job at drumming up the activity. To start you off, here’s a list of 25 SEO/SEMs on the system. Feel free to add your SocialMedian URL in the comments.

http://www.socialmedian.com/dannysullivan
http://www.socialmedian.com/tamar
http://www.socialmedian.com/pageoneresults
http://www.socialmedian.com/danielthepoet
http://www.socialmedian.com/dazzlindonna
http://www.socialmedian.com/nickwilsdon
http://www.socialmedian.com/NikkiPilkington
http://www.socialmedian.com/onreact-com
http://www.socialmedian.com/charlieanzman
http://www.socialmedian.com/martinbowling
http://www.socialmedian.com/discuit
http://www.socialmedian.com/marysam
http://www.socialmedian.com/jimspencer
http://www.socialmedian.com/hugoguzman
http://www.socialmedian.com/bwelford
http://www.socialmedian.com/danperry
http://www.socialmedian.com/nishan
http://www.socialmedian.com/toddmintz
http://www.socialmedian.com/brian-chappell
http://www.socialmedian.com/bhartzer
http://www.socialmedian.com/DavidWallace
http://www.socialmedian.com/theGypsy
http://www.socialmedian.com/semscholar
http://www.socialmedian.com/debramastaler
http://www.socialmedian.com/YoungMaster

SocialMedian themselves encourage new sign-ups to follow the most active users on the site, so early adopters can use this to their advantage in building their network.

Articles are delivered via newsgroups. These are some of the most active SEO/SEM and Social Media groups I found with user numbers in brackets. Follow the links to sign-up.

http://www.socialmedian.com/network/seo (79)
http://www.socialmedian.com/network/search-engine-marketing (60)
http://www.socialmedian.com/network/seo-2-0 (39 - well done Tad!)
http://www.socialmedian.com/network/social-networking (859)
http://www.socialmedian.com/network/social-media-watch (909)

Enough Good, What About the Ugly?

I’ve experienced some strange activity on the site. Once where a news item was sent to the wrong newsgroup and another time where I was unable to edit a comment. Also SocialMedian.com is having some obvious issues with the current load, this reduces the site to a crawl at times and is probably the underlying cause for these other issues. More than once I’ve been left staring at the default Ruby on Rails error page. Hopefully the fact they have not chosen to customise this with a Fail Whale indicates this problem to be temporary.

Another issue which bugs me is connected to the sharing story functions. If you choose to tweet or email links from SocialMedian, the recipient is required to sign-up to follow the link to the source story. This is true for any non-members casually browsing the site. As Paul Silver twittered back to me, “that smacks of link hoarding/user grabbing”. I think he’s right. I won’t be using that function again to send links to my Twitter feed.*

On the subject of nofollow, the site is sea of pink using the Search Status Plugin for FireFox. However links to the source article are left followed. With so much nofollow plastered about I’m not sure how much linkjuice will flow down to the article pages but hopefully this is a show of respect to the original content producers rather than an oversight.

Conclusion - Should I Sign Up?

I was impressed with the site. As I wrote before, it brings something new to the table in an already overpopulated niche. I really like the level of maturity and number of professionals in this community. These are articles on venture capital rather than LOLcats or iPod rave reviews (although there is already an Apple group). I haven’t read their policy on submitting your own material but the audience looks receptive to commercial sites or marketing related posts.

SocialMedian also encourages you to explore topics through their grouping system. After you read an interesting article you can subscribe to that group feed. It maybe the early adopters but I found myself reading posts on marketing, investment and blogging that wouldn’t be in my usual news sources.

While SEO/SEM/Marketing communities are always going to be my passion, I enjoyed the way SocialMedian pushed me in other directions. With all the banal blogging recently this was a breath of fresh air and an exciting opportunity to meet people outside my immediate SEO/SEM circles.

In my opinion, SocialMedian is a serious contender.

Update: Jason has just twittered me to say they are working on removing the signup requirements. He’s also acknowledged the speed issue. Thanks Jason. You can follow the SocialMedian twitter account here.

Technorati Tags: Beta Launches, Jason Goldberg, News Aggregators, Social Media, SocialMedian, SocialMedian.com, Twitter

1. Non Disclosure Contract (NDA)

An NDA is an essential tool for a search marketer, or anyone in a consultancy role. This contract creates a confidential relationship between two parties and prevents either side discussing sensitive information to third parties. This obviously comes in handy when quoting on a project but I have also used an NDA with industry peers when asking for advice. You can read more on NDAs here.

2. Presentation Backgrounds

Giving talks and presentations are an essential part of marketing yourself or your company in the search world. It may not be SMX, SES or PubCon but sooner or later your going to find yourself knee-deep in PowerPoint. Larger client contracts often require you to make a presentation to their team.

3. Company Newsletters

These templates can give you or your client the push they need to start email marketing to their customer base. Not only is the R.O.I. higher when marketing to existing clients but as Garrett French writes email marketing can form part of your linking strategy.

4. Basic Google Adwords Proposal

Google’s released two templates to help you with their Adwords system. This one is a basic proposal document for a new Adwords client. You can show trends to clients, sample keywords/creative and give estimated costs for the campaign.

5. Adwords Creative Generator

This template will help you create adverts for your Adwords campaigns. I’m not well versed in PPC but it looks like the aim of this sheet is to auto-generate advert headlines based on your Ad Groups. It will mix custom terms with Ad Group keywords and highlight adverts that exceed the character limit. Once you have finished here, you paste into Adwords Editor or a bulksheet.

6. Travel Expenses and Itinerary Templates

Going to conferences is an essential part of the search industry. It’s a great way to get a beer pick up clients. These templates can help you keep track of your travel details and expenses. Having them on Google Docs is perfect when you’re on the move.

7. Video Christmas Template

It’s depressing to think about Christmas already but for many of us involved in e-commerce the planning starts soon. Assemble your mailing list and send out this card at the start of the season, with a reminder of the month’s best deals.

The template wording needs tweaking but it comes in 5 colours and the embedded video is an interesting angle. Alternatively use it for your own marketing clients or just to give your designer some inspiration.

Technorati Tags: Adwords Templates, Google, Google Adwords, Google Docs, NDA, Powerpoint Templates, templates

Some of the feed addresses in WordPress, namely wp-rss2.php, wp-rss.php and wp-rdf.php no longer work in these versions. The www.yourblog.com?feed=rss2 or www.yourblog.com/feed/ addresses still work. As Otto42 one of the WP Moderators writes:

The fix for this will be in 2.5.2.

And you should never have been using wp-rss2.php in the first place. The correct feed URL, for all WordPress blogs, is either ?feed=rss2 or /feed. It has been that way for all versions since 2.0. The wp-rss stuff is a left over from the old 1.5 days, over three years ago. We really should remove it, IMO.

BTW, if you are using non-default permalinks, then you can simply DELETE the wp-rss.php and wp-rss2.php file, and all your feed users will get redirected to the correct URL of /feed the next time they hit the site. Those got integrated into the permalinks, there’s no need to keep those files around anymore. This will fix it right now, no waiting around.

Of course this issue is a major problem if you are feeding one of these ‘legacy’ addresses into FeedBurner, as I was on this blog. Update that to yourblog.com/feed/ immediately. Deleting the problem files as Otto42 suggested didn’t work for me, returning a 404 “page not found”. Instead, I’ve updated my .htaccess file as follows to point everything to /feed/ and then onto my FeedBurner URL


# BEGIN Redirect Feeds
Redirect 301 /wp-rss2.php http://yourdomain.com/feed/
Redirect 301 /wp-rss.php http://yourdomain.com/feed/
Redirect 301 /wp-rdf.php http://yourdomain.com/feed/
Redirect 301 /feed/ http://your-feedburner-url/
# END Redirect Feeds


You could probably do the same job with the FeedSmith Plugin but you would still have ensure that you are not using a legacy feed URL as the source in FeedBurner.

Update 30/06/08

Grrr…just realised that updating the empty FeedBurner URL may have sent some of you some of the old posts your missed. Sorry about that, didn’t mean to flood you.

Technorati Tags: Blogging, Feeds, WordPress

What are Google’s Safe Browsing Blacklists?

If Google detects malware or phishing attacks coming from your website they will put the URLs onto their blacklists and take steps to warn their users. They will place a message next to your results listing, an interstitial warning page when the user clicks the result and a pop-up alert if the Google Toolbar is installed. You can view examples of these warnings here..

This is a useful initiative to stop innocent users infecting their computers but being listed by Google in this way can have a serious effect on an online business. Users will be worried about the warnings shown to them and rankings/traffic can drop noticeably. The quicker you deal with this situation the better so early alerts are essential.

Introducing SERPGuard

SERPGuard is a Ruby on Rails project using the new Safe Browsing API that Google has helpfully made available. We built this application as part of our in-house client suite but decided to release it publicly.

Why would I use this tool?

Google has made their API available for exactly this kind of real-time reporting. Although they are already sending emails out from Webmaster Central you may want an additional checking mechanism. When it comes to something as serious as lost rankings, clicks or sales; you can never have enough alerts.

This tool will also be useful for webmasters who did not want to link up their entire portfolio within Google Webmaster Central. Our tool provides an independent and relatively anonymous way of checking all your sites in one place.

SERPGuard is RSS-powered. You will have a unique RSS feed which will update should any of your sites become infected. This gives you more choices in how to be alerted. One suggestion would be to create a new account at Twitter and feed the SERPGuard RSS stream to that account via Twitterfeed. Just follow that new account to receive instant updates by RSS or SMS to your mobile.

Technorati Tags: API, Google, Google Toolbar, malware, phishing, safe browsing

Strangely enough there is a much easier link opportunity on the system. Although Twitter has carefully applied nofollow to your Web entry in the your profile, you can slip a handful of URLs into the Bio fields (see here). The key is putting “www” in front of each one and a comma between entries, i.e. www.domain1.com, www.domain2.com

For some reason that converts the URL into a link. My guess is that Twitter forgot to remove some RoR formatting on this input field. This is almost the same behavior you see in tweets when you enter a web address.

Although profile pages have no TBPR (marked unranked) by default, some have built up a visible score and all are indexed by the search engines. I’ve not tested the link juice but considering that 90% of the page content is nofollowed it looks tasty. So get your signature links in there while it lasts.

Why do I need to know this?

SPF records are increasingly being used as a filter for email. That means that failing to put one on your domains (or that of your clients) can result in email being sent directly to the spam bin, bounced back or even deleted.

How does this connect to online marketing?

Well the obvious connection is email marketing. If our client mailouts never make it past the spam bin we have already impacted our conversion rate but this has wider implications. Not using a SPF record can hamper any email communication including support/sales follow-ups and forum/blog thread updates or other user notifications. This is a technical issue for server or domain administrators but many are yet to implement this standard. As the marketer you can suggest and push this good practice.

SPF records and Google/Gmail

Gmail is quickly emerging as one of the main email providers, especially as they push us all towards the utopia of “cloud computing”. They are definitely taking note of SPF as a method to fight spam and have already implimented an SPF test for all incoming email. If you open any email there and click “Show original” from the right hand menu, you will probably see something like this among the blurb:

Received-SPF: neutral (domain.com: 238.38.32.00 is neither permitted nor denied by best guess record for domain of user@domain.com) client-ip=238.38.32.00;
Authentication-Results: mx.domain.com; spf=neutral (domain.com: 238.38.32.00 is neither permitted nor denied by best guess record for domain of user@domain.com) smtp.mail=user@domain.com


That means Google can’t get any positive authentication for this email, i.e. no SPF record exists. The best it can do is be neutral about the test, “neither permitted nor denied”. Now if we have an SPF record set up we get something a lot more positive:

Received-SPF: pass (domain.com: domain of mail@domain.com designates 238.38.32.00 as permitted sender) client-ip=238.38.32.00;
Authentication-Results: mx.domain.com; spf=pass (domain.com: domain of mail@domain.com designates 238.38.32.00 as permitted sender) smtp.mail=mail@domain.com


Much better, we’ve passed the SPF test at Gmail and our emails have improved chances of avoiding the spam folder.

How do I add SPF records?

Very easily as long as you have access to the DNS settings for the domain. SPF records can also be entered as text (TXT) records which are standard entries for DNS providers. Here is a handy wizard which will generate the SPF record for you. This will probably look something like this:

v=spf1 a mx ~all

So the record you would end up in with in your DNS zone will be similar to:

yourdomain.com. IN TXT "v=spf1 a mx ~all"

If you are using scripts to send out emails automatically (i.e. forum or blog) you may need to add settings for your server IP and the account it sends from. Again check the headers on these emails to see the sender details you need to authenticate (“Show original”).

To check if a domain currently has a record use this SPF validation tool. If you want to test a positive result, use this domain (nickwilsdon.com). Any questions, feel free to ask below.

Technorati Tags: DNS, email, Email Marketing, Gmail, SPF

This new initiative will mean a complete redesign of the site. Under their current subscription model, only a small part of their content is published on the web. They intend to add editing tools and incentive programs to encourage expert contributors and users to contribute, expand and update the work. These contributions will be taken on board by the Britannica editing team and fact-checked before being added to the encyclopedia.

Encyclopaedia Britannica itself will continue to be edited according to the most rigorous standards and will bear the imprimatur “Britannica Checked” to distinguish it from material on the site for which Britannica editors are not responsible.

Should Wikipedia be worried?

This is a direct challenge to their authority in the niche but Wikipedia has a substantial userbase. Britannica has been quite clever though in allowing more direct attribution to the contributors. While Wikipedians are nameless outside the core community, Britannica authors will receive full honors and accreditation.

Readers and users will also be invited into an online community where they can work and publish at Britannica’s site under their own names. Interested users will be able to prepare articles, essays, and multimedia presentations on subjects in which they’re interested. Britannica will help them with research and publishing tools and by allowing them to easily use text and non-text material from Encyclopaedia Britannica in their work.

We will publish the final products on our site for the benefit of all readers, with all due attribution and credit to the people who created them. The authors will have the option of collaborating with others on their work, but each author will retain control of his or her own work.

These terms are bound to appeal to many of the academics and serious core contributors of Wikipedia. Moreover, as the works are controlled by the contributing author it may eliminate the fustration of having to continually defend your material from other editors.

Opening up to the masses will greatly increase the volume of the website, again reducing the available real estate on popular SERPs. With Google placing so much stock in authority sites, Britannica is bound to do well. However, it’s not all bad news, allowing UGC on an authority site usually presents an opportunity for online marketers.

Technorati Tags: Britannica, Encyclopaedia Britannica, Wikipedia

In summary, Lyndon Antcliff posted a satirical story on a client’s site, which ended up being quoted on several mainstream news channels. Critics have claimed that Lyndon manipulated these sources by not labeling the material as fake, in order to gain links for his client. In his defense, none of these news channels or reporters seem to have tried to check the legitimacy of the story.

This is hardly the first time news channels have carried fake news. For example, FoxNews, the main channel to carry Lyndon’s story was reprimanded in 2004 for placing fabricated quotes attributed to John Kerry on their website.

In this thread at Sphinn, Matt Cutts has now suggested that such behavior comes under the jurisdiction of Google.

My quick take is that Google’s webmaster guidelines allow for cases such as this:

“Google may respond negatively to other misleading practices not listed here (e.g. tricking users by registering misspellings of well-known websites). It’s not safe to assume that just because a specific deceptive technique isn’t included on this page, Google approves of it.”

There’s not much more deceptive or misleading than a fake story without any disclosure that the story is hoax.

Does this mean penalties for misleading information on websites? This certainly opens the doors to a whole host of issues, from fake reviews to less than honest product marketing. Also, can we expect to see the FoxNews website suffering any penalties in the near future?

Technorati Tags: Fox News, Google, Matt Cutts