Kate Morris

There has been lots being debated about ethics in SEM, and I do mean all of SEM. We have all gotten the question “so what do you do?” and tried to explain to no avail. People always resort to the “oh, you’re one of them???” And I spend the next 10 minutes explaining that I do not spam, make pop-ups, or otherwise annoy the hell out of people.

With a recent piece of link bait it went further: there was a debate about whether Google should be anyone’s mother. This was brought up because Matt Cutts, the lead of the webspam team at Google, noted that he was disappointed in what I assume is a friend for saying that she supported the link baiter and his tactics. Everyone got up in arms and the big debate started. These are my thoughts

Point 1: Matt has said numerous times that he is not Google. He works for them, but he is not the entire company. Sometimes what he says is just him. I have got to get on a soapbox for a minute … The man deserves a life. Let him just voice his PERSONAL opinion without it being “Google’s” opinion. Tons of people started saying “Google said” when in fact Matt said it.

Point 2: What I understand as Matt’s point on Sphinn (where he was asked what Google thought, not what he thought) is that Google doesn’t want to trick people. And that is just what this story did. Was it the writer’s fault? Not entirely, it was written as a satire and people picked it up as truth. But was it misleading, yes.

Point 3: I don’t think there is anyway Google can “find” things like that algorithmically, but I think it was a scare tactic. Do we as an industry want everyone trying this? Making up stories to see if they stick? Not really.

Point 4: The idea behind making up a story to get links is a bad one. It worked REALLY well for this person, but let’s not get people to duplicate it. Google’s mission, Matt’s mission, and a personal belief of mine is that we should do things for the good of everyone. I always understood link bait to be cool stories, features, things that made people go “wow.” But never something deceiving. If you want to use a satire as link bait, cool, but label as so.

Point 5: Did this hurt anyone this time? No. Was it kinda funny? Hell yeah. But give the idea the right power and the right people talking about it, people will start to use it as a tactic. Then you have something that can hurt the ENTIRE industry. Who is going to trust any of us then?

I’ve got a meeting soon, but I need to get this out while it’s fresh on the mind.

Last year I sat in Seattle at a Google Dance, and watched the beginning of blended search. It wasn’t on Google. It was on the new Ask.com. I was stoked. The interface was smooth, easy to understand, and put everything in one place.

A few months ago, Ask announced that it was dropping out in the race for search dominance, and focusing on women. What everyone in the industry heard is “we give up.” People cried, some went into hiding (kidding), and most just shook their head. A search engine that was doing everything right, developing ideas that were changing search as a whole, just dropped out.

Then the whole Yahoo thing came up and I mentioned that I thought a combination of Yahoo/Ask/AOL would be a killer. Great ideas, great community, great search.

Now what is Ask doing? Acting like the teenager in a new relationship saying “But I didn’t mean it!” Ask is now saying they were misunderstood. They are not dropping out in the race for search dominance. In fact, they are buying up other companies to build out their holdings.

What does the internet community think? The general consensus is that this newest release is a “we messed up bad” bit. But they did more than that. As Micheal Gray says, they missed the role that brand evangelists play. Lisa Barone at Bruce Clay was ready to die for Ask if they asked her. Now she won’t have anything to do with them. And that’s just ONE relationship, albeit a BIG one.

There is a huge need for graveling and innovation for Ask to fix that “erroneous communication” back in March. A few months is a LONG time in our world. You have to think about what you’re saying before you say it. Hire some great developers Ask, and a better PR team. You’ve got some relationships to rebuild if you want back in good graces.

I haven’t been writing much I know, but really I have, just for another blog. I’ve been sending a few posts into SEOmoz so I can get my 100 points. What can I say, a true link from SEOmoz is a good one.

So in case you missed it here are the posts I did. If you’ve never read SEOmoz or their YouMoz section, you should. There is some great information in there. I’ve always found great tips and tricks from not only the mozzers but also the readers who submit posts.

SEOmoz
YOUmoz

My Posts:
Words, Words, Words
It’s About Passion

It was probably smaller than it could have been, but the Meetup was only for about 35 people. I’d say we had about 20-25 there. Everything from internet marketers from communities outside Austin to CEOs of major SEM and Analytics firms. Most people were there to learn. Some to connect with possible partners.

I had one request to give a Top 10 SEO and SEM Myths list. I have seen tons, but that list changes depending on what you know. So I’ll work on one for beginners. Starting with there are NO tricks in SEO. What we do doesn’t change much, if you do it right the first time and build good content, you will have no issues ranking. Try to cut corners, you’ll have issues.

There were some good debates, lively characters, and great conversation. I can’t wait for the next one, though I think I’ll be in Seattle at SMX Advanced during the next one.

Just glad people are finally getting together.

Here you go Cirian This is the website of one of the many kick-booty people in SEO. And since his last name is so close to mine, I’ll be nice and link to his site. Twitter is such a great resource!

Ciaran Norris

I promise to get back here soon and give my comments on the MicroHoo stuff. I can’t wait for Seattle! I got my invite to the SEOmoz party this year. Heard about it last year, but wasn’t invited. So I’m stoked now. I’m a dork, I know.

Okay, I’ll admit it, I did it too. I am addicted now. But for someone in SEO, I think being on there is very important. It’s another news avenue … but really, if I keeps growing like this … well the top industry people are gonna get annoyed. But for now it’s great.

http://www.twitter.com/katemorris

More updates as I get time. Things are pretty hectic at work. We have gotten some good MSN rankings for a new project. Don’t know how seeing as the website is a month old, but I’m not complaining, I swear.