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SEO News Tip of the Day!I thought it would be nice to make this post and more to point, share my joy with all three of you that may be reading it. Over the last few weeks I’ve started experimenting with writing articles and distributing them to see if it would help with SEO. What is Article Distribution for SEO? In short, article distribution is writing articles that are focused on your market sectors target audience. The articles could be news worthy stories or anything else you feel people would like to read about. You then submit the article to websites that display them. There are even services dedicated to distributing articles. I would recommend Articlesender which is one of the best distributors I’ve used and completely free. When submitting your article you can normally add what’s known as a bio box. The bio box is displayed at the end of the article and is your chance to inform people who wrote the article. You can add a link to your site in the bio box. If your article is accepted and posted on the site, it should be indexed by the search engines. So you will now have a new one way link pointing to your site. People who are looking for content to publish on their site or ezine may find your article and choose to use it. The rules are if they do use your article they have to include your bio box with the links. Does it work for SEO? I don’t know? Not yet anyway. I’m still tracking the results of the few articles I’ve wrote and distributed so far (some of which I’ve posted on SEO Forum Watch). There is a good thread over at WebWorkShop discussing the same question and I came across an interesting discussion on Matt Cutt’s blog. Matt didn’t directly say article distribution doesn’t help Google SEO but did say he felt sites that simply reproduced articles where not adding any value to the web. Whether that means Google discredits links from article distribution sites or sites reusing the content I don’t know. But as mentioned before I’m tracking the articles to find out if any SEO benefit is happening on what search engines. Other Benefits of Article Distribution The last article I published did however produce significant traffic. The article titled “The SEO Snowball Effect” was picked up and used by both WebProNews.com and WebProNews.co.uk. This had the effect of referring traffic from their site through the bio box link on the article to the company I work for. Looking at our stats I could see in two days WebProNews had referred just over 180 visitors to our site. We even had someone requesting a SEO campaign because they read the article. In my opinion this is where article writing is going perform. If you can write articles of such quality, that the authority sites in your sector use them. Then your going to get both targeted traffic and recognition of being an expert because of your association with them. I will be posting more on this when I get evidence of whether article distribution has any SEO benefit. I’ve got a feeling it will work on Yahoo and MSN but not the big G. If I fail to make another post before Christmas or you fail to make it back, have a great Xmas and a good new year. 
SEO: The Good, The Bad And The Ugly
I seem to have created quite a stir, on a particular SEO forum recently. In fact, rumor has it, at one point, my article, "Google's Trap, DMOZ's Nap, And Yahoo!'s Crap" was the hottest topic discussed on this particular forum. The aforementioned article was also bestowed the title of, "Worst SEO Article Ever" by someone on the forum. Why all the animus? I have no idea. Perhaps they view me as a threat to their livelihood. Whatever the reason, certain SEO's seem to be taking my articles personally. That's their problem! My articles are not aimed directly at SEO's or search engines per se. My articles are aimed at the people who utilize their services. I'm trying to get these people to realize, they can't depend solely on search engines and search engine optimization. You have to have a multi-pronged attack. I don't depend on the search engines! I never have. I refuse to play that game. My traffic comes from the dozens of articles I've written that have been picked up and published on popular web sites all over the Internet. I also get traffic via word of mouth, newsletters and ezines that my articles are published in, and a few other secret methods that I use. And you can do the same thing. You just have to get out of that search engine mindset. There are many other proven and effective ways to market your web site. Here are just a few: e-zines, newsletters, forums, online magazines, sponsor listings on other web sites, exchanging links. Here are a few offline options: magazines, direct mail, shopper newspapers, cable television, radio, flyers, hospital newsletters, card decks, trade journals and directories, bulletin boards, tabloid newspapers. Yes, I know Google and Yahoo! are the biggest, most powerful search engine and directory on the planet! Forget about them! Why? Because despite what certain corrupt SEO's may claim, they CANNOT guarantee you a top ten listing in either Google or Yahoo! No legitimate SEO would ever make that kind of guarantee in the first place. They couldn't, because they know they wouldn't be able to deliver on that promise. Now they may be able to get you to the top of the search engines with certain less popular keywords. However, what good does it do you to rank number one for keywords that nobody searches for? I want to make one thing perfectly clear, right now. I am not suggesting that all SEO's are corrupt. I don't believe that for a second. There are many fine, honest and hardworking SEO's out there, who are doing a wonderful job for their clients. I have the utmost respect for people like Jill Whalen, Bruce Clay, Robert Woodhead and many, many other fine and reputable SEO experts. These individuals don't over-hype their services or your expectations. They also have excellent rankings on the search engines. So, they definitely know what they're doing. Then, there's the other end of the spectrum--the companies that give good SEO's like the aforementioned a bad name. I'm sure you've all seen some of these headlines: "Top 10 and Top 20 Rankings Guaranteed!" "Guaranteed Number 1 Ranking!" "Guaranteed Top Ranking!" "Top 10 Placement Guaranteed!" Well, the next time you see this kind of advertisement, make a mental note to check out that company's ranking. You'll be shocked at what you find out. Some of these companies making these outrageous claims are ranked at number 3 million. That's not an exaggeration! Now let me point out something very important to you. A company's search engine ranking doesn't always tell the whole story. I know of many companies making a nice living on the Internet that aren't ranked that highly in the search engines. You probably know a few yourself. You may even be one of those companies. However, if you're considering hiring an SEO, I think where they rank is very important. Why? Because if they aren't capable of getting their own web site a high ranking, how can they possibly achieve a high ranking for someone else? They can't! You should bear that in mind, when checking out SEO's. About The Author Dean Phillips is an Internet marketing expert, writer, publisher and entrepreneur. Questions? Comments? Dean can be reached at mailto: dean@lets-make-money.net. Visit his website at: http://www.lets-make-money.net
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