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The SEO Interviews e Interviews AARON MATTHEW WALL Search Engine Optimization Book © Aaron Matthew Wall 150 Caldecott Ln #8 • Oakland • Ca 94618 Phone (401)207-1945 • E-mail: [email protected] Last Updated: Monday, November 5, 2007 Table of Contents Why All These Interviews? 1 Interview............................................................... 112 Questions, Comments, & Concerns .......................1 Dan Kramer 119 Shawn Hogan of Digital Point 2 Interview............................................................... 119 Interview....................................................................2 Bob Massa 124 David Naylor 6 Interview............................................................... 124 Interview:...................................................................6 Scott Smith: Caveman 131 NFFC 11 Interview............................................................... 131 Interview..................................................................11 Brian Clark: Copyblogger 140 Dan Thies 17 Interview............................................................... 140 Interview..................................................................17 Digital Ghost 143 Peter Da Vanzo 25 Interview............................................................... 143 Interview..................................................................25 Frank Schilling 148 Jason Duke 32 Interview............................................................... 148 Interview..................................................................32 Michael Mann 153 Jim Boykin 44 Interview............................................................... 153 Interview..................................................................44 Danny Sullivan 157 Nick Wilson 50 Interview............................................................... 157 Interview..................................................................50 Eli – Blue Hat SEO 163 Lots0 54 Interview............................................................... 163 Interview..................................................................54 Debra Mastaler 171 Frank Watson 60 Interview............................................................... 171 Interview..................................................................60 Jason Lexell 66 Interview..................................................................66 It is usually far easier to create an idea worth spreading than it is Eurotrash 73 to spread an idea not worth Interview..................................................................73 spreading. Matt Cutts 82 Interview..................................................................82 Disclaimer: Since search engines are Andy Hagans 92 constantly changing and keep their Interview..................................................................92 algorithms as closely guarded secrets, there is no way to know the exact Greg Harnett 97 algorithms at any given time. This Interview..................................................................97 information was compiled from my Lee Odden 102 observations of search engines over Interview................................................................102 the past few years. Hopefully part of what this book teaches you is how to Seth Godin 107 make informed observations as things Interview................................................................107 continue to change. Kim Krause Berg 112 With enough experience and observation one can deduce patterns and figure out pieces of the puzzle. This guide was created to help you solve that puzzle in much the same way others have. While following this guide should help improve your rankings, the author of this book shall not be held responsible for damages because of the use (or misuse) of this information. SEO BOOK Why All These Interviews? ne of my biggest advantages on the web is that I had almost zero business knowledge off the web before jumping on the web. This means that I had to learn the social network that is the web well enough to make up for all my other failures: no idea of how to run a business, no idea O how to sell myself, no idea how to build brand, etc etc etc. Having such a limited real world experience and being so young also means that I am likely to miss telling you some important ideas or concepts. What works for me may not work for you, and I might be ten times more successful than I am if I broadened my horizons and had experience in some other fields. These interviews are of some of the most important voices in search. Some of them are my best mentors which have helped me more than anyone else, while others have years of experience more than I do and have worked on thousands of websites. These interviews are from a wide variety of people, from the world’s largest search spammers to small business owners that have built leading brands using almost nothing but the web these interviews should help broaden the perspective of this ebook. Questions, Comments, & Concerns Some of the terms might be a bit confusing to people new to the web. Some of the topics covered in some of these interviews might be a bit more advanced than what is needed for the average new webmaster. If you have any questions or would like to see me interview anyone in specific please let me know and I will try my best to accommodate your needs. Best of luck with your sites, -Aaron [email protected] 1 SEO BOOK Interview 1 Shawn Hogan of Digital Point hawn Hogan is the founder of Digital Point, a high end software development company which also developed some of the best free SEO S tools on the market and one of the most active SEO forums. The reason I interviewed him is he built one of the largest and most scalable SEO communities and SEO toolsets as a side hobby project with a $0 marketing spend. By making his tools and community free, open, and scalable he was able to extract greater value without needing to worry about how to profit from his efforts. Interview 30 June 2005 What is your background and how & when did you get into the SEO scene? I'm a developer. The main thing I like to do is develop things that are completely new ideas (preferably things that people tell me are impossible). My "real" work is developing high-end accounting/billing/business management software. For example: http://www.digitalpoint.com/products/isp/ I'm not sure I would exactly say I'm in the "SEO scene" (I know maybe 4 people in the industry, I don't offer any services (SEO or otherwise), I don't go to trade shows/conferences, etc.) I am usually pretty quick to discount Alexa, but when you are in the top 500 or so (like DigitalPoint.com is) that is impressive. Do you spend much on marketing your site, or does the traffic come through free referals? I don't do any marketing for the site. It was less than 2 years ago when I first heard the term SEO or had any idea what search engine marketing was. And I 2 SEO BOOK had a distinct advantage because when I first heard the term PageRank, my site was PR7 with a few hundred thousand links (natural links from people linking to my billing software or whatever other stuff). For about a week I tested the AdWords CPM ads, and your site had at least 5 times as many ad displays as any of the other forums I advertised on. Does most of your traffic come from the forums or tools? Do you think the traffic is much higher because you offer both? I think the forums are getting close to passing up the free tools in terms of raw traffic. Funny because the main reason I started the forum was so people would stop calling and emailing me for support on the free tools. :) But the forum has a lot of content at this point, so I get ~10,000 unique visitors a day coming into the forum from random search engine searches, some of which convert into normal users, and some of those end up turning into users of the tools as well. Your free SEO tools are flat out best of breed. Why did you create them? How did you know what the market wanted / needed? Are you surprised at how well people responded to any of the tools? Are you surprised at any tools that did not take off quickly? The tools I create are really just for my own use to make my own life easier. I just decided to let other's use them. :) The first tool was the keyword tracker, which really was thrown together in a morning because I wanted it for myself: http://forums.seochat.com/showthread.php?t=5281 Of course, I never expected the keyword tracker (or any of the others) to be so popular. I made it for myself, and thought maybe if I let others use it, maybe a few hundred others would use it (at the most), and now it's past 30,000 users tracking just under 750,000 keywords. I'm not surprised people like the tools, but I am surprised how big they have gotten so quickly without any marketing what-so-ever on my part. I guess "If you build it, they will come." applies in this case. hehe One thing that's really nice about having such a large active user base (from tools and forum) is now I can make something new, and instantly have a ton of users (the ad network for example was launched and was live on thousands of sites within a week with no outside marketing). 3 SEO BOOK Your cooperative link network spread faster than any other SEO network I have ever seen. Does it still work well in most of the engines? Is there anything you would have done differently with it if you started it over today? Well believe it or not, the intention of the ad network was never to be a link network. Some reading about what the intentions and purpose of it can
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