I have been saying this for well over a year now that the entire <nofollow> strategy in SEO is bogus.  It just doesn’t make sense to me.

Some History of Google’s NOFOLLOW HTML Attribute

Let’s go back in time.  Way back in history, in the dark ages of 2005, Matt Cutts from Google introduced new HTML code called the <nofollow> HTML tag.  This HTML tag was introduced to add to the HTML code of a webpage in front of a link.  The goal was to tell complying search engines to NOT index the link and in turn, do not follow that link.

It wasn’t long before SEOers discovered how this could benefit them in rankings.  It was determined, for example, that if a link had a nofollow attribute attached to it, the page’s value (aka link juice) was passed to only links that did not posses the nofollow attribute.  In other words, outbound links with the nofollow tag passed zero page rank.

This gave us control of page rank on our own sites!

This meant we, SEOers, had control of the internal ranking juice on the sites’ we controlled.  We could manipulate page rank from one page to another, in turn increasing our rankings simply by controlling and understanding how to properly use the nofollow attribute.

This was widely argued as white hat.  I argued otherwise.  The nofollow HTML attribute was NOT designed for this, and this made zero sense from a user’s marketability standpoint.  SEOer’s continued to push and created strategies like the 3rd tier push (pushing page rank from 3rd tier pages to 2nd tier pages) and link schemes that truely did help.

Here’s the problem.

Since Google is always looking to enhance the value of the visitor, then why would nofollow help the user?

1. Used properly, for example adding a nofollow to a terms and conditions page, make sense.  We would not want to rank or market our internal T&C’s.  They have no value to market.  Companies do not promote or market their contracts to prospects.  They market their marketing material, their business cards, brochures, etc.
2. When using nofollow to manipulate page rank, you’re in turn manipulating the search engines, removing the democratic value of the Internet and in turn, decreasing visitor value.

So, I’ve always asked the question, when is Google going to update their algorithm to stop this false manipulation and restore democracy in the link building scheme.

Most teach us to avoid NOFOLLOW sites

I’ve been taught to look at sites that will not use the nofollow for a link to my site, including directories, blogs, forum, social sites, article and video sites.  I’ve argued, while with no proof yet, that the search engines must give some sort of validity to a link, or a reference to a site.  Sure, the value changes depending on the nofollow, anchor text, site’s authority, trust, etc.  But I still argue that that there is still exposure and transparency.  Regardless of the webmaster’s desires.

It’s like handing out a business card to one person and a brochure to another.  Both are references to your business, but the business card doesn’t depict a clear picture of what you do, your brochure is much more detailed.  We still hand out card though and hand them out more willingly than a brochure.  This is the same as links.

I don’t and now I have proof

Here’s the link (with follow!) http://www.cnn.com/2009/SHOWBIZ/Music/06/26/jackson.presley.blog/index.html

The world of local SEO is moving towards links and citations, along with theme and geographical sites.

I found an article on CNN that proves this theory, at least in theory.  This is not hard evidence, however based on my philosophy that Internet Marketing can always be directly related to old skool marketing, this makes complete sense.

See, in this article from CNN to a blog of Lisa Marie Presley, CNN knows the immense value of a link from their site to another.  They do not want to provide SEO value to this blog.  They do not want to promote this blog.  They do not want to help this blog monetize itself, if there was a monetization strategy in place.  They do however, want to mention the reference cited from the blog.

Therefore they added a reference.  Not a link.  The link is not spiderable.  In theory with the nofollow tag, they merely needed to add a nofollow to the link, however because of the alleged theory, even that would add some SEO value.  So they didn’t even make it a link.  Not only that, cause under my theory, this is still a citation, a reference, if not a link.  Therefore, they used a URL shortner (www.bit.ly) and removed the link.  So now it’s just unrecongnizable text.  The search engine can not follow a link nor does the search engine know the originating domain.  The value to the CNN reader is still there, by copying and pasting the link.  A search engine won’t copy and paste text to determine if its a link.

So there you have it.  The value of the democratic Internet is restored.

Ask yourself this question

If you are adding value to the democratic Internet by posting valuable information on theme related blogs, and these blogs use nofollow, why would a search engine give value to your competitor in their index if they only posted on follow blogs and not yours, even if you 5x times the valuable posts?

I believe that websites that have used this strategy in the past and use nofollow today to manipulate page rank, will have created a clear footprint of manipulation and it’s pretty obvious.  I believe that the search engines will soon penalize these sites that have clear objectives to manipulate the SE’s.  I recommend to never look at sites code and use the nofollow as a determining factor to acquire a link.  Don’t consider it at all, only use it for pages on your site that make no sense from a marketing standpoint.  I believe the SE’s will soon work all this out and you’ll be much further ahead of the other SEO’s who chase the algorithm.

PR: wait… I: wait… L: wait… LD: wait… I: wait… wait… Rank: wait… Traffic: wait… Price: wait… C: wait…

Google Wave Logo, a tool to change the way small businesses will market themselves on the Internet. Local Business is changed forever!

It’s pretty amazing to think that email as we know it today is still the predominate form of communication on the Internet today, yet it’s 40 years old!  F-o-r-t-y years old!  Email existed before the Internet, before Facebook and before all other means of electronic communication.

 Email is Dead!

Now take your small business for instance.  Most small business owners have always pushed back on technology.  Most small business owners I speak with think Twitter is just dumb, they don’t get it.  Then I share my analogy of Twitter and the real world and it’s like a light bulb goes on.  They get it.  Then they start thinking about how they can use Twitter for their small, local business.

Google Wave WILL Change the Small Business forever

Most businesses have communication among their employees, customers, prospects and partners.  Communication in the form of voice is synchronized two way, meaning back and forth communication happens.

Email is slow!  Remember how slow snail mail was?  Google Wave will make email seem just like snail mail.  Google Wave can not, however, be compared to email.  This is an entire different animal.  Google Wave will replace email as we know it, however it will replace many day to day functions as you know and use in business every single day.

You know how Facebook is now the 6^th largest country in the world, if it were a country?  MySpace, Twitter, LinkedIn to name some other extremely impressive collaboration sites?

Google Wave incorporates the collaboration features of these Web 2.0 sites.  The question is, what else can they do?  This is just getting too much.

Folks, I watched this video and my jaw dropped.  My wheels are spinning on how this is going to change everything.  This change, in my opinion, will be bigger than Facebook, MySpace, Twitter and LinkedIn combined.  Period.  Much Bigger.

Google Wave mimics the real world electronically.  Google has found a way to remove the cons of electronic communication and use the benefits of the Internet to allow us to communicate in ways I never thought were possible.

I am going to be researching this tool heavily over the next month and expect me to deliver to my paid subscribers ways to use this tool and get more business.  I promise, this tool is huge for Internet Marketing for Small Businesses.  Google Wave will change the way local business markets themselves using the Internet.  Local Internet Marketing is changed forever now.

Watch this video.  It’s long.  You only need to watch the first 35 minutes and I promise you that this 35 minutes spent will be an amazing investment in your time and education.

This is one of those posts that here for education, and prompt Google to index both my site and another site quickly, since this blog has authority.

First, let me explain the situation.  I’m involved with a company named Naparex.  I googled that name on May 15 and discovered it listed a website, www.dy-law.com, but included my meta tags, descriptions and title.  Once clicked, my site came up!

After some time I realised this wasn’t affecting my business, only affecting my rankings and perhaps conversion, but the company is not operation at the moment so it wasn’t a big deal.  The whois for that domain listed an attorney’s office in Atlanta.

So, I called the attorney’s office and explained our situation.  I was told I would get a phone call back.  Never did.  I called the hosting company, GoDaddy, and they said there was nothing illegal happening and there was nothing they could do.  I’ll never forget it, I was on the phone pacing outsite the Red Rock Resort in Vegas, in 100 degree heat with my long sleeved business attire on, with a slight hang over.  I was upset.

On May 25th I called the attorney’s office again.  They confirmed it was updated 4 days prior.  Sure enough, it wasn’t.  Apparently her secretary never gave her the message.  Apparently her IT guy didn’t know what he was doing.

A long email and still no call back to me.  WTF?  I’m getting traffic to MY site looking for her business, over 100 unique hits!  What if these were potential clients?  This mistake and lack of incompetence on the part of her employees could have cost in the $10’000′s for both our businesses!  I’d fire them.

So, an empathetic phone call to GoDaddy today got some action.  Go figure, I gave them my other business account number, by which I’m a VIP customer with my own account exec, later providing the right account number.  Sure enough, once I was in my other personal account which is not VIP, they looked into it much, much further.  Apparently I had two supervisors looking into this, and after 15 minutes I was given the confirmation that www.dy-law.com would no longer point to www.naparex.com.

So, add some fresh new content, add some fresh links and we’ll wait and see how long it takes Google to update this mess!

OK, you’d never expect this title to be used in one of my blog posts.  I’ll explain why this is here and why I have a post like this.

I”m getting annoyed at all the wonderful quotes people use on Twitter.  You see, the best Twitter strategy is to simply participate in the conversation and ADD value.  To many people whore themselves out.  They simply tweet just to tweet.

I see Twitter just like a BIG room at a conference.  I can yell accross the room and get attention or I can participate in the little conversations.  I can ethically get on stage and people listen.  They think I’m a moron if I just yell or walk into a conversation and say “Business is like … blah blah”.  Who the hell are you to walk into my conversation and give me advice!

Now, don’t get me wrong.  A quote from Anthony Robbins, who I follow, is welcomed.  He offers value.  Those that simply give crap…I know where the no follow button is quickly!

Anyhow, I’m annoyed at those people shamelessly pluggin their product hourly.  I’m annoyed at the abundance of advice through quotes from people that simply don’t have successes under their belt.  I’m tired of the crap.

We all make the same face on the Shitter – Bruce Farrant

So there is a quote that I like.  See, I’m Canadian and I reside in America right now after marrying a wonderful American girl.  When asked whether Canadians are different than Americans, sure, on the surface we are, but deep down ‘we all make the same face on the shitter’.  Whether you’re royalty or a pauper, we all make the same face on the shitter.  Whether you’re from India or Japan, we all have red blood.

So, since it’s one of my favority quotes, I thought I would use that as something of value I can to the abundance of garbage conversation on Google.  Now, before I hit the SEND TWEET button, I decided to Google that phrase to see if anything came up, just in case I was trying to claim something of mine that wasn’t mine!

Nothing came up!  Whooya!  Now, once I hit publish on this post, in less than 10 minutes Googling the phrase “we all make the same face on the shitter” will show this post (using the quotation marks when you Google).

So, there ya go.  Take any phrase you want, put quotation marks around it, Google it, and if no results come up, it’s yours!  Also, remember that there is a time factor and duplicate content factor, so being first is big!

Sitting at a computer by day is where I love to be.  I can talk about SEO, SEM, SMM, eMail Marketing, links, authority, copy writing, websites, conversions, online videos, algorithms or marketing all day and night long.  Internet Marketing is my life, my passion and my future.  The only thing more important to me in my life is my family and a few select friends.

Unfortunately Internet Marketing, my business, friends and family leave me slightly empty.  Humans require a certain mix of love and compassion, and we were designed to learn and grow, build and conquer, love and give.  I have recently realised that I was missing something in my life.  Sitting down in front of a screen all day left an emptiness and actually getting up off my ass and using my hands and body to build something other than a virtual following has brought a tremendous joy.  I set out to build a queen sized loft bed for my children from scratch!

Ok, so I’m not a philosopher and you haven’t come here to learn spirituality or carpentry.  I felt this post is important because as human beings we are programmed to do a lot of things, think independently, grow and give.  I wasn’t getting enough joy of giving or creating, so I built a simple loft bed and I have found a new hobby.  I was able to give something to my children that brought joy that I never expected, and that, hands down, is infinitely more important to me than Internet Marketing.

So I started with plans that I paid $10 for from OP Loft Beds, a simple little website I found online using Google.  I bought their plans because of their diverse testimonials on their site.  As I teach, it’s not only about cosmetics, but rather content.  They have great content, provide valuable free content and sell their expertise for a fair value.  While I don’t know these guys, I also want to plug them for their marketing efforts.  I ended up buying the fasteners from them as well, for $40, two day shipping and was more than half the price of home depot.  I’m so much about value, when I bought the wood at Home Depot I had some dude price out the fasteners for me, it was over $100.

My children were so pumped about helping in this project that I wasn’t sure what I could get them to do first.  I had these diagrams with what seemed like 1000′s of measurements in a language I was unfamiliar with and knew I had to start cutting, measuring and drilling.  My father, who is an exceptional hobby carpenter (financial planner by day), reminded me, measure twice, cut once.  With a three year old son and 11 year old daughter, I wondered how they could help.  They couldn’t use the saws or drills yet, so I decided to change things up and stain first.  Backwards, I know, but I surely didn’t care, we had fun!

Madison and Ashtyn loved to help.  Here they are staining the first of the boards, and they ended up staining over half of the 24 2×4′s and 2×6′s.  What an incredible time spent for a few hours with the jewels in my life.

Thanks to a good friend of mine, DJ Witchie for letting me use his tools and garage, he’s a carpenter by trade and had everything we needed.  You’ll notice some spillage on the ground, and thankfully it’s a garage and we let them have fun.  Again, while backwards, staining first isn’t the best idea.  Did you know that cutting wood with a circular saw sometimes chips the wood?  Or that pencil marks aren’t seen very well on the dark red oak stain?  I think I also ruined a pair of Ashtyn’s pants, but who cares?  There is no price for the memories these kids developed.  I know, because Madison wanted to help in every step, and the time arguing to motivate her to empty the dishwasher is twice as long as it would take me to do it myself!

The motivation to help did wear off and provided me the necessary time to do all the measuring, cutting and drilling.  It provided me a different sense of peace and serenity that I haven’t found since I was a child.  Between staining, measuring and cutting, there was maybe 12-15 hours spent, and few nights of a sore back.  It sure felt good to do something with my hands!

All in all, it was an enlightening experience.  I have decided with the left over wood I’m going to build a desk to match the bed.  The picture below is tiny, but this bed isn’t!  It’s a queen sized loft and the desk isn’t going underneath.  That may turn into a play area, a cabin, for the kids.

Now Madison has asked me if we can ‘modify’ her bed to be a queen bunk, she has a twin sized bunk bed.  Oh boy, I can see the project requests starting to come in.  I guess I’ll need to buy my own tools now.

This is just fun video I put to demonstrate how this video could, and should be used to promote a courier company.  Go figure, a great video here that any one of your courier companies could get, contact the owner, reproduce the video with you link at the bottom and syndicate it over the internet, market it through your business networks and I bet this would generate traffic to your site.  Imagine creating a video that promotes your company and goes viral?  Think about creating a video for your local city that has an idea to capture local’s attention, say something funny yet has something to do with your business.  Create a two minute video and I promise, if you make someone laugh, it’ll spread around your town like wild fire.  Contact me at 1.800.775.3514 and I can help make the video and get it posted on 200 plus sites for you, heck I’ll tell you exactly how to do it and won’t charge you!

Even better, sign up on this blog right now and in January 2009, I’m releasing my training course.  There will be a paid course and free course.  There will be a series of free training videos as well, like the one found at Email Marketing for Small Businesses.  If you’re on my list before the course is launched, my ENTIRE list is getting the course FREE.  All I ask is a testimonial once you’ve completed it.  You WILL learn how to do this.  Its awesome.