There are a lot of misconceptions about what SEO experts know and what they don’t know. What they can do and can’t do. I hope to clear up a little bit of the misinformation because when you hire someone for a couple thousand dollars to help your site get where it needs to be. To increase sales. To increase your new business… all the things that SEO can do for your business you’d better understand the topic a little bit first.

1. Programmers that build your site know SEO.
This is probably the most common belief and it’s completely false. There are programmers that have studied SEO inside and out and know what they’re doing. Most of them? Haven’t. This goes the same for the company that builds your website. Nearly all of them have some kind of add-on SEO service they try to get customers to buy. The talk will sound good - but, probably they don’t have any great experience or plans for getting your site to the top of Google. Why do I say that? There are too few GOOD SEO people out there. I started in 1997-1998. I have learned so much over the years that I could write a book. SEO takes a monumental effort when done correctly. For a small site that might mean $1500. For a large site? $100,000+ easy.

2. SEO takes place on your website.
This is true to some degree, but you know what? Even for a small site there are another hundred hours of effort as “off-site SEO” that is every bit as important as what is done on your site. If I’m doing a comprehensive SEO project for a site I tell customers straight off that $2,000 will be allocated to off-site SEO efforts specific to the focus of your website. That’s doing it right. There aren’t any shortcuts. I can prioritize my work for clients that just can’t budget $2K but if I’m doing it the way I want it will take 100 hours and $2K.  I’ve recently started to create a comprehensive list of things I do when I fully optimize a site. I am amazed at the list and it keeps growing as I remember things I’ve done in the past and things I find out as I go along.

3. I can get SEO that works for $595. (insert a figure under a couple grand). Or, “I can get something for nothing!”
Unless it’s your good friend, what you’re getting for under $1,000 is likely incomplete and you’re better off to open the window of your mid-size or SUV as you’re blowing down the road and throw it at some pigeons. Really.

Here in Thailand I can do SEO for $20 per hour. Top quality, my best effort SEO. In the mainland US, I know nobody with my expertise can beat that rate - nor would they try. SEO experts with my skills go for $60-100 per hour in the states.  So, if someone offers to give you a complete SEO package to “optimize” your site for Google or anywhere else I think they couldn’t legitimately get past the on-site optimization of your site for $1000. The off-site would suffer. Or, worse the on-site would suffer. If business website owners understood the amount of time and effort needed to get a website to the top 10 in Google - and keep it there, they would spend the extra money that would make the difference. I really hate to see any ads for SEO under a couple of grand because I know, something will suffer at that rate. Probably you’re wasting whatever you spend at that level.

4. SEO stops when my site is optimized.
This is a very common belief. I’ve done work on sites that brought them tremendous traffic and sales, and then they ignored SEO for six months until sales had completely fallen off and realized they needed help again. And FAST! SEO done correctly is an ongoing effort. Everyday something must be done to add to the attractiveness, functionality, and/or link popularity so the search engines consider your site one of the best in it’s niche.

5. Getting your site ranked in the top 5 in Google is “The Goal”.
False. Getting your site ranked 1st on the keyword phrase, “Jeremy and Jeds Illinois Ice cream” is really not that awesome. It’s child’s play. Now, getting your site ranked 1st on “ice cream”, now that is awesome. Be careful what your SEO is promising you, typically there is that blanket, generic and quite meaningless promise, “Your site will rank in the top 10 of Google!” Make sure the keywords are the best you can get.

6. SEO means optimizing my meta tags, links, and text on my pages so I have a lot of instances of my top keyword represented.
It used to mean this to some degree. Now, it’s a new game. The industry has changed so much over the past 10 years and it’s in flux now - it’s always dynamic and never static. Another reason ongoing SEO maintenance is a must or you’ll find your site trailing your competition. Your competition could be someone from Guam now. Competition has become Worldwide now - it’s not limited to your city, state, or even your country anymore. There are many Canadian sites coming up in searches for SEO now. Go figure!

7. “My friend is going to handle the SEO…”
Unless your friend has spent a few thousand hours reading about and experimenting with live sites for him/herself you’re not going to get anything at all.  There’s a reason SEO experts charge what we do - we have an advanced degree more valuable than my master’s degree even. I’ve acquired what is equivalent to a PhD in real life search engine optimization. While I help friends, I usually can just discount the first project for them and hope I can convince them how important the ongoing maintenance is so they contract me long-term.

8. White Hat SEO is the only way to go.
White hat seo refers to seo experts using optimization techniques that are Google friendly and that won’t cause any penalties for having used them. Google is pretty clear about what can and can’t be done. I use white hat seo techniques for every project and it was the only way to go for a while.

Now? It’s not good enough. I’ve created what I call the “Clear Hat SEO” initiative. I’ve written more about it at that Google knol linked above.  Basically it has something to do with being more transparent to the customers that hire me to optimize their sites. I keep an ongoing Google Doc going in which I detail out things I’ve done for their project. SEO shouldn’t be secretive. Everything I do in the course of an SEO project should be in the open for clients to view. Otherwise how do you know what you paid for? I’ve done this with two recent clients and it seems that they appreciate knowing what is going on. Of course they don’t understand much of it - but I’m open to questions about anything written in the spreadsheet they want to learn about. White Hat SEO is almost OK, but, insist on Clear Hat SEO.

Here are some more articles on SEO that might help you get your head around the topic…

What kinds of things does an SEO specialist know?

Search engine optimization process mind-map >

Vern’s Search Engine Optimization Credentials (resume/cv)>

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Information >

Search Engine Optimization Process Outlined in Mindmap >

Web site / Blog designs by Vern >

Vern’s Recent SEO Success Page

Best of Life!

Vern

Moving 1 inch might set you free to travel an eternity...

I was reading something from Tom at Mindhacks about an experience he has while rock-climbing and I started to relate it to other life situations that it also applies to.

Tom was saying that he frequently has an experience while rock-climbing in which he finds himself stuck in a situation that doesn’t offer any good hand holds to help him move forward. Nor backward even. In his mind - he’s stuck, there’s no real option that exists at that moment in time because his mind is limited to not seeing any options. Everything that he wants to advance toward is just out of reach by only a little bit. Enough that he knows if he tries to go for a big stretch he’s going to fall.

I’m no expert, but I climb some simple routes. Climbing rocks is strange because you really don’t have all that long to find your next hold and get there before you run out of strength. It’s always a matter of time… superman would run out of strength at some point if he was stuck.

As the mind searches - confidently at first and then frantically before the body runs out of energy to hold him where he is… something must happen.

What happens is he realizes he has feet. He stops looking for handholds - which might be two or three feet away and starts looking for a new foothold to support him. A new foothold means he can move just a little bit. Maybe it’s only an inch or so. That might be ALL IT TAKES to enable him to see new hand holds from that new vantage point.

One inch in any direction might the the key to getting the whole way up the mountain, ridge, whatever he’s climbing.

You too.

One inch in any direction starts the ball rolling and it brings to the surface new possibilities… If you are truly stuck where you are - and you probably aren’t, you’re just blind to the possibilities that exist, you might need to move an inch in some direction. Doesn’t matter what direction - go backwards if you can’t go forward or parallel to where you are.

I was sitting here at my notebook computer thinking about how I should post something to Aim for Awesome because it’s been a few days. I have been smashed between some big SEO projects and I really want to give my clients the best I can so I’ve been consumed by them for the last week.

I didn’t have the slightest idea what to write about ten minutes ago. I was stuck. I stepped an inch by telling my friend what my problem was. Not expecting any answer, just wanting to share with her the strangeness of not being able to switch gears from SEO mode and optimizing websites for Google and being creative enough to write an article about something interesting for all of you.

She said immediately, “Don’t you have a stock of article’s you’ve already written that you could use?”

Initially I tried to play it off… “Yes, but I just don’t feel like editing one and making it live.”

Then I realized - wow, she gave me the answer… let me take the ball and run (or jog at least).

I said, “OK, let me open up the folder and see if anything jumps out at me.”

This article did. It reminded me of climbing, which I’m really starting to love… that was just enough to get me interested in reading Tom’s article again and then writing up this one for you.

Go an inch - any direction and see what happens.

If you’re ever stuck in any situation try it. Move an inch.

Moving an inch might equate to:

• Making one phone call.
• Talking to a friend about it.
• Taking one less sip of your bottle of scotch tonight.
• Trying a different style ad on your web site.
• Cutting your hair off.
• Picking up the next phone call instead of ignoring it.
• Giving a pregnant woman begging for money $10.00.
• Going outside to exercise instead of on your stationary bike.

It could mean anything, depending on the situation you find your self “stuck in”.

Frequently I think we’re not really stuck - we’re blinded to possibility. Possibility exists in every situation. Sometimes we’re just blind to it.

Open up your eyes by moving an inch any direction and see what happens…

“Eventually, there comes a point in every life where you can no longer ignore the enormous and expanding gap between the life you could be living and the life you’ve settled for…. Every day of your life that you’re not actively engaged in staying fit, eating well, and strengthening your body the gap grows.”

- Strength for Life, by Shawn Phillips, page 10 From Selfhelpdaily.com

I really liked this quote because it makes a lot of sense to me. Even in my teens I realized there were people that I knew that weren’t living up to their potential. Amazing people. Selfless people. Brilliant people. Fun people. The best kind of people… and they weren’t being all they could be.

I wasn’t going to be one of those people. I knew it back then.

Did you settle or are you living the life?

Best of Life!

Vern

Networking with others is one of those things that most people have a hard time with. I’m one of them. I don’t really know what I’m supposed to be doing while I’m networking.

What is networking? Why do I need it? Why should I go somewhere I don’t want to go to meet people I don’t want to meet?

With the exception of working with adults and teens with schizophrenia, multiple personality disorder and traumatic brain injury (TBI) for six years during undergrad and graduate study I wouldn’t consider myself a “people person” at the workplace. When I’m working I do it best alone, working on my projects… optimizing them so I get the highest number of visitors to the websites of those I”m working for - or for my own sites as half the time I am self-employed and have numerous websites and blogs going.

In 2002 I thought I wanted to make the transition from Internet Marketing Consultant, working on my own and doing short 2-6 month contracts with companies that needed help with their online efforts to “Marketing Manager” with a resort management company on the Island of Maui in Hawaii.

It seemed like a perfect match at first. I was well-versed in everything they needed to get cranking online and they had done virtually nothing over the years to keep up with other major resorts on Maui like Hilton and Sheraton. I knew I could help them a LOT. That was exciting for me because if I take a project on I want to be able to help a lot. To be a token player isn’t what gets me excited about going to work everyday, it’s all about how much success I can bring to the company with my efforts.

Part of the job involved meeting people in the community that my employer already had established relationships with. I was invited for cruises and helicopter rides gratis in the hopes that I would influence visitors to our resorts when it came time for them to choose fun things to do on Maui.

I realized after a short time of meeting people in the course of my work that I really didn’t enjoy most of them that much. There we were on Maui, one of the most naturally breathtaking and relaxation inducing islands in the world and these people were like amped up real estate agents. They were there on Maui to make cash and climb the corporate ladder in whatever organization they belonged to. There were attempts by some to be manipulative and domineering… there was backstabbing by some. In general I found it be a very strange experience. I thought I was going to be surrounded by ‘real people’ that genuinely cared about each other and were wrapped up in living an awesome lifestyle on Maui. What I found was quite a different reality, one that sucked quite frankly.

The sales director had asked me to create an online marketing plan so they could get an idea what needed done in order to remain competitive in their market online. I focused more on that - on the numbers, on the possibilities and I really enjoyed that. I realized - I’m NOT a Marketing Manager at a resort management firm - it’s just not me. I’m a geek on the computer - that’s what I love. That’s what I do best. I manipulate pluses and minuses, Google Search and sales flow… not people. I don’t have an interest in people games. I am too genuine a person to play games in my own personal life and I’d never think of doing it and getting paid for it either. It just isn’t enjoyable. My life has been focused on the “enjoyable” for as long as I can remember. It wasn’t going to change with this plush position.

I created the plan and gave it to the sales director. Her face dropped as she read through it. After review by the three owners of the company she told me that it was quite an extensive plan that they would get started on - but that there was no way they would be spending anything close to the $150,000 USD on internet marketing I recommended for the coming year. I explained that this was the minimum they needed to begin to make back some ground the competitors were already running all over. I tried to get them to understand the urgency of it - and they couldn’t grasp the concept. I quickly handed in my resignation. This was only a couple months after joining them.

I must be successful if I’m staying in a job. Especially a job I don’t really care for. How can I stay and pretend to be marketing manager if the company doesn’t believe in the reality of their online situation? I need to shine like a supernova - not a star in the Little Dipper. They weren’t taking online marketing seriously and to me it was everything.

It was good that at that same time I realized I wasn’t cut out for a job that involved serious networking with people I didn’t like while working as an employee.

I’ve never particularly enjoyed it while working for myself either but recently it’s taken a new turn.

When I arrived in Thailand I thought I’d find lots of go-getters from countries all over the world looking to make their mark in a place that afforded them a lot of free time to do as they wished. That was me anyway. I was looking forward to relaxing for a year, erasing decades of stress, and then getting started in earnest on the focus of the rest of my life - writing online.

What I found here in Thailand was a lot of people that also came to relax and erase the stress of living back in their home countries. They wanted to really relax. And relax. And take it easy. Relax some more. Have a beer. Smoke some pot. Relax a bit. Take it easy some more…

There are not that many motivated people or people concerned about their own personal development in this country at all - least of all the Thais! I think most expats living in Thailand consider it a life-long Spring Break. They’re living a never-ending party that their $1200-3000 checks every month afford them. You can live like royalty on $1200 per month in Thailand. You can have a car, house, and drink every night and watch soccer on TV. You can eat out at restaurants everyday - enjoying some of the most amazing Thai food you’ve ever had! If you’re sixty years old you can have a 20 year old girlfriend - it’s become the norm here. One never really gets comfortable seeing it this way. It’s almost like Walt Disney World for old men.

In almost four years here I’ve met a small group of expats and visitors I’d consider friends. I’ve met about four people I’d consider motivated to achieve something more in their lives.

I realized that I needed to start networking with other people online or I was going to be resource bankrupt by the time I got back to the USA. I’d not kept in touch with many people I formerly had business or professional relationships with. I could name 100 people right now that I should have stayed in contact with at least a few times a year.

Enter Facebook.com. Originally I thought it was a dating site and ignored it. Then I got a request from a male friend to join it. I thought - hmm… OK, maybe it’s not a dating site. I joined. I was overwhelmed with the nonsensical outlay of it all. What to do with it? I think it’s pretty unintuitive - and only recently have I found out how to add photos that didn’t change my avatar to whatever photo I uploaded.

Now I’ve been on there for maybe 6 months. Only recently have I really started to take a look at what I can do with it. I’ve found some old friends and contacts. There’s a lot more people to contact, but I’m actually enjoying finding these people that used to be close friends - even family. It’s amazing to me that finally we’ve reached a place in the online development of things where we can add friends and business contacts to a group online and it’s not a business environment at all. It’s friendly.

If you’re one of my Facebook.com friends you’ll see that I share blog posts from Aim for Awesome on there regularly. I’ve already had comments from friends about videos and articles I’ve posted. My mom even found one of my posts and wrote a very long comment about her own experience with life that I’d never have known had I not written about it on AfA.

At least once a week I’m blown away by a friend request from someone I haven’t heard from in decades. Recently it was a girl I met in Hawaii when I was 19! Wow, she remembered my last name? Unbelievable. Then there are the photos that are easily shared. Facebook updates your own page when one of your friends updates with photos or writes on their own wall - like a status update. I’m constantly reminded that my friend is there and living life like I am here. I learn new things about them as I sign in and see what they’re up to. It’s non-intrusive because you could choose to cancel notices if you wanted - but what for? Might as well see what everyone is up to.

So - why do you need this?

The other day I found a friend on Facebook - I had sold him a couple online businesses years before and I was just trying to add him to my friends group.

We’ve been talking through email and as it turns out he really needs a lot of help to get one of the sites back up in Google. He tried some other companies for SEO and found success for a while but realized another major effort was needed.

I haven’t done much optimization for other people over the last year because I choose who I do it for now. I only really do it for past clients and friends that I want to help. If you get to know me as a friend and need something in this area - I will probably offer to do it for you. Maybe. Lol.

If I wasn’t available to do something for my friend I know other people that could do it for him that I trust - that I could refer him to.

Networking is a MUST because of this one idea… you need to TRUST someone to do important things for you - whenever possible. Use someone that you know or that knows someone that they trust to do something for you.

In a business you need to do MANY things. Those things that you do with others that you trust are no-brainers. They don’t stress you out and you can leave them go with the person you trust and the piece of the puzzle gets done correctly and you don’t give 2 thoughts to it.

It’s the pieces of the puzzle you leave to people you don’t know (or trust) that cause the most brain aneurysms, anxiety and lead to the most problems.

What if you knew personally every person you needed to know to be a success at your business?

That’s the power of networking. Even if you only know 75% of the people you need to accomplish pieces of the puzzle that make your business enterprise work. Grow. Thrive. Those 75% probably know the other 25% you need and can refer you to them.

Networks of good people that know each other and that wouldn’t think of using dishonest tactics in a business or personal transaction is the ultimate!

If you started writing out all the people you know, you could come up with 100 people. I KNOW you could. Think about it…  You could come up with 100 people probably as a minimum from your high school graduation class. You could probably come up with another 10 that lived on your street. From there you could come up with another 30 you’ve worked with. 10 you’ve dated. 10 relatives.

That’s 160 people minimum you probably know and can try to find in Facebook or other social networking platform. Facebook is kind of like the MySpace for adults. There are other sites coming out almost weekly… I tried LinkedIn - but I don’t enjoy it nearly as much because it seems to be all business… I do business with friends. I want to know - what their kids are doing, what they look like, what their hobbies are - where they’ve traveled. Facebook gives me all that.

Networking need not be a chore. As I said, I do networking online only a few places and never really in person here in Thailand in person because it’s tough to meet like-minded people. Online can be where you do all your networking. Start with Facebook and see who you’re able to re-establish ties with. You may find friends of friends that can do pieces of the puzzle for you. You might find strangers and then realize you’re connected by one friend in common - you write that friend and get an assessment of the person. “Could I trust Joe Schmo with a $15,000 SEO campaign? No? Ok, thanks a lot I appreciate it.” This thanks was worth $15,000.

Networking need not be work and it need not be uninteresting. You need not put yourself in places you don’t want to be. There is a critical mass of people online - your friends are there. If they’re not - they probably can’t do anything for your business, your aspirations. Not that they aren’t worth having as friends - but I’m just saying…. Those that can help are out there somewhere online - they can help and you can help some of them too. USE YOUR FRIENDS. Your network IS your group of friends. Use your friends to make more friends you trust. There’s no better way to do business than with people you trust.

Look at the alternative… Going to a company that does SEO or whatever, cold - without them knowing you or you knowing them. They use black hat SEO techniques, charge you a lot of money and you’re happy for a few months until Google penalizes your site and you lose more than you gained. You also lose what you paid the strangers to optimize your site.

Don’t do business with companies. Do business with people that know you and that have a vested interest in keeping you happy.

Give your money repeatedly to those that care what’s happening with that money. Don’t trust strangers to do the right thing…

:)

Best of Life!

Vern