Talk:Search engine optimization/Archive 2

message: Why not links to biggest help forums on SEO.
There is WMW, Digital Point, Site Point and many other websites. Comment was made by Dhaliwal on 18 Jan 2006.  
:Every SEO SEM company, forum, guru, professional would love to have a backlink from this article. The best way to avoid the possilbe flood of spam is to uphold the strict no link policy for this article. Wiipedia is not a directory, community forum or a collection of free for all pages--Synlighet 22:57, 1 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: External links, proposed again

message: I moved the following (and some linkspam) from the article:
:Optimize or Perish	 
:Believe it or not, there are still many who are of the opinion that they don’t need to use search engine optimization. Those who are technically inclined, will need very little convincing that search engine optimization is an integral part of any website trying to attract traffic. Advertisers who either haven’t heard of SEO, or don’t understand why they need to optimize their website spend millions on more conventional forms of advertising.	 
:Why focus on achieving a high ranking on search engines?	 
:Because 85 percent of all website traffic is generated by search engines and it has become the second most preferred online activity after email. The majority of all web traffic is driven by the three major commercial search engines – Google, Yahoo, and MSN (AOL’s search engine uses Google for its search results). In fact, these three account for about 80-90 percent of all search traffic. Various studies depict that most people prefer to click on organic search results rather than sponsored results by a very wide margin. And among the organic search or “natural” results, 90 percent don’t go beyond the first 30 results.	 
:This doesn’t mean that ads placed with search engine programs are useless; neither does this mean that this should be the only strategy of a company’s website marketing campaign. Search engine users tend to trust organic results more than paid ads, which means that they’re more likely to click on them – and more likely to convert. A good position in the search engines can’t be bought in the same way as a banner ad or a sponsored listing.
It reads like an advertisement for a SEO-company, but perhaps someone can salvage something from it. Rasmus (talk) 09:47, 6 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Moved from article 

message: As the original poster of the link to blog.searchenginewatch, I would like to apologize.  I have no affiliation with searchenginewatch, I merely was citing that as the source of my information (I was originally linked to it by Google News).  In retrospect, I understand that this was a poor choice of source, and will keep that in mind whenever making future edits.  I would like to reiterate however that, despite the fact that the action was wrong, it was made in good faith, and not an attempt to promote the blog at searchenginewatch.  If it appears to anyone that I am not comprehending this correctly, feel free to reply here or post it on my talk page.
Lordthees 03:50, 9 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  An Apology 

message: Should we add a sub-section about the common SEO scams out there?  For example, those SEO's that "guarantee" top billing?  I guess kind of similar to the information found in the Google Info for Webmasters SEO page? I'd think this would be an appropriate addition. 
Chernicky 18:22, 9 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Add a Consumer Awareness / SEO Scams Sub-section?

message: I have removed the following text, since it promotes spesific SEO-forums also this text look at bit unsuited for a encyclopedia.
There is another major issue with SEO. For each website that undergoes Search Engine Optimization, the keyword ranking in Search Engines takes some time and some SEO professionals make use of this for their benefit. They confuse novice internet merchants and give them wrong estimates. There are certain forums on which one can get tips on various issues related to SEO. Highrankings, SEOChat, Digital Point, IHelpYou, Webmaster World, Digital Point, Do Not Confuse SEO. The forums on Search Engine Rankings provide a platform for people to ask questions on various subjects related to their website rankings. One can get advice of various active users on these forums. The advice offered on these forums is of mixed value, as many novice SEOs often share ideas that they don't fully understand. There are also numerous diverse points of view among experienced SEOs regarding the importance of many factors.
--85.166.33.218 01:25, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Removed advertising

message: "…Flash animation (by placing a paragraph or division within, and at the end of the enclosing OBJECT tag)…" This doesn't make sense. How can you put a  inside an object tag? Can someone give an example? - Jmabel | Talk 02:55, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It's part of the W3 HTML specification.  You can put any container, such as P or DIV, as the last thing inside an OBJECT tag.  This is the alternative content that the browser renders if it can't display the Flash.  There is a second method that is popular but not part of the spec:  using Javascript to hide the alternative content if a Flash player is available.  This method is a hack, and it's not written up anywhere I know, so I did not include it.  Jehochman (Talk/Contrib) 06:13, 17 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Do you perhaps mean "in an OBJECT element" rather than "in an OBJECT tag? - Jmabel | Talk 02:12, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Hmm.  Yes, I think that would be more precise.  Jehochman (Talk/Contrib) 15:38, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Confusing phrase 

message: I just added an external link to my article located at: "goingware.com/tips/search-engine-optimization" White Hat Search Engine Optimization].  I am vividly aware of how this Wikipedia entry has been under attack by SEOs promoting their wares, and I completely understand why you might want to remove my link.  I just ask that before you do, please take the time to consider my case for why you should allow it to be there:
I am not in the business of search engine optimization.  My article (and the new sections I plan to add to it soon) explains some of what I learned optimizing my own website.  I want others to benefit from what I've learned.
I wrote the article in large part to spare others the misfortune that can befall one who hires a Black Hat SEO.  Not everyone knows that some SEOs are unethical, and even those who do may not fully understand why it's not to their advantage to hire them.  Many an innocent website operator has unknowingly gotten optimized the wrong way, only to be punished by having their site removed from the search engine indices.  
It doesn't have to be this way, and you will see from my article that I clearly explain the difference between ethical and unethical SEO, and why one should care even if one doesn't object to being unethical.
I do however earn money through advertising published on some of my other articles.  I understand Wikipedia's objection to linking to sites full of ads; I recall reading here a while back that some external links, while not containing advertising themselves, linked to other pages full of ads, and thus acted as surreptitious gateways to advertising.  Why should you consider me any different?
While I do earn money this way, if you explore my site, you will find that there are very few ads.  I value my readers, and don't want to drive away repeat visitors who might be turned off by excessive advertising.  I also value my reputation as an authority on the material I discuss.  This led me to track the performance of the ads on each individual page that I once published them on, and then to remove them from each page which didn't earn significant money.  The result is that now I have AdSense on just one page.
There are referrals ads for AdSense itself and for the Google-branded FireFox web browser.  I keep those not because they earn me much money, but because genuinely I feel they can benefit my readers.  There are also affiliate ads for each of the books I discuss in my articles.  In a year of publishing these, I have earned less than twenty bucks from them.  I keep them now mainly as a convenience to my readers.
I also want to emphasize that those who work full-time writing free content for their websites don't have the time to hold day jobs, yet cannot feed themselves on thin air.  My ad revenue allows me to devote more time to doing a better job writing helpful articles, many of which have Creative Commons licenses (not this one yet, though I am considering it).  I have another website devoted to a Free Software (GPL) project I'm working on, that again earns money through advertising.
My SEO article has just one ad, in the section called "Grab Their Attention", for Jakob Nielsen's Homepage Usability: 50 Websites Deconstructed.  If you object to it, I will alter the Amazon and Powells links so that they aren't affiliate links anymore, that is, so that I won't earn money if someone makes a purchase through those links.  This leads me to say:
If you will agree to keep my article's link, then I am willing to commit to never placing any ads in the article.
:Looks worthy to me. Simple layout. Lots of detailed information. Only a single ad at the bottom of the page. No objections from me. --GraemeL (talk) 15:01, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Hi MichaelCrawford.  I've removed your link for now.  I think it would've been best to get agreement here before you added it.  I believe your intentions are good but I have two objections.  First, this is one of the most heavily spammed articles in Wikipedia.  If we open the door even a bit, there's going to be a flood.  My opinion is that it's best to keep this strict policy in place so we all don't wind up spending more time cleaning this article.  Second, why not add your content directly to the article?  It would make a great addition and we could keep the external links in check.  Monkeyman(talk) 00:17, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The article contents wouldn't really have a place in the article as WP is not an instruction manual. If Michael was willing to contribute his information to Wikibooks, we could link to that as a sister project. --GraemeL (talk) 00:25, 31 March 2006 (UTC)

text: Every SEO would like to have a link to one of their articles and also the suggested articles does have advertising. It would be best not to link to your article.
So what that the article has advertising?  That's the most ridiculous criteria of what gets linked to and what doesn't.  The New York Times carries advertising, you know.  What matters is whether a page is relevant and useful.  And -- surprise! -- that's Google's criteria too!  Does Google care whether a page carries advertising?  No.  It tries to return the most useful and relevant pages, whether those pages carry advertising or not.  I suggest that we consider using the same standards.
That said, while the external article proposed above is very, very good, I have to say that I believe my SEO 101 article is way more comprehensive.  I won't link to my article because of the rule against self-promotion, but I'm linking to the other proposed article either because I don't think it's the best external article we could link to.  But I might eventually change my mind about that.  I really object to this "Oh no, that site has advertising!" snobbery.  Let's focus on serving Wikipedia's readers, even if that means (gasp!) that some webmasters wind up making some money off their hard work. -MichaelBluejay 03:04, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  My case for my White Hat SEO article link