Search Engine Weekly Roundup #14
The Search Engine Weekly Roundup is a weekly instalment on the Wow Internet blog, where I give you a list of finest blogs from the week, revolving around SEO, CRO, Social Media, Marketing, etc. This week includes posts regarding link building psychology, Google link devaluation, a content outreach pyramid, keyword research tips and the best WordPress plugins.
How to be More Persuasive: Psychology 101 for Link Builders
Chris Dyson
Follow @ChrisLDyson
Starting things off, we have an excellent post provided by Chris Dyson via TripleSEO. This post details how different psychological theories and ideologies can be used in conjunction with link building. He starts out be speaking about how when you should aim to recognise people’s representational system, like how people who are more visual-based prefer infographics and photos, and people who are more kinaesthetic-based could be met face-to-face, perhaps at an organised meet-up. Chris also speaks about appealing to egos, prospect theory and the six principles of influence. This is a highly creative, well thought out post which is certainly a must read for anybody.
Tweet Chris’ Blog: Tweet
Responding to the Link Devaluation Google Update on January 17th, 2013
Pratik Dholakiya
Follow @DholakiyaPratik
After several websites keyword rankings had dropped after January the 17th, many thought that Google had made another algorithm change. Though, after seeing that these websites only had a few of their keywords targeted, sources such as Branded3 and Pratik Dholakiya came to another conclusion: that there was an on-going link devaluation, with Google targeting links as they’re being crawled, as opposed to everything coming in a single update. This post goes further into this subject, as well as providing information on link devaluation in general, as well as the effect it can have on rankings, common misconceptions, and how to respond to link devaluations.
Tweet Pratik’s Blog: Tweet
Content Outreach Pyramid
Matthew Barby
Follow @matthewbarby
Up next is a post on Point Blank SEO, provided by Wow Internet’s very own Matthew Barby. In this post, he speaks about a method of outreach he has developed which we use at Wow, called the Content Outreach Pyramid. This method is designed to find very high authority targets for your outreach by identifying which sources they see regularly and who influences them, and outreaching/connecting to them. Due to the sheer importance of outreach these days, this sort of creativity with it is great to see. Finally, a big thank you to Point Blank SEO for putting up this guest post (which Matthew attained through this very method!)
Tweet Matthew’s Blog: Tweet
How to Do Keyword Research: 17 Industry Experts Shared Their Methods
Rana Shahbaz
Follow @rshahbaz
Top keyword research is a cornerstone of any SEO strategy, so it’s always helpful to see just how industry experts ply their trade in this area. Rana Shahbaz of his eponymously name website has contacted several SEOs, including the previously mentioned Pratik Dholakiya, Brick Marketing’s Nick Stamoulis, and Zazzle Media’s Simon Penson. There is a feast of different ideas and tools mentioned in this post, with the obvious Google Keyword Tool getting a lot of mentions, as well as tools such as Ubersuggest and SEMrush. Mark Johnson of ThinkTraffic also raised this point:
“To gauge the competition I will normally Google each phrase and look at the top 5 or 6 results. I don’t worry too much about how big of a site I am up against; I just ask myself the question “can I create a page that deserves to rank above this?”
Tweet Rana’s Blog: Tweet
The ONLY WordPress Plugins You Need
Vinny La Barbera
Follow @VinnyLaBarbera
Getting the most out of WordPress plugins can be very beneficial for your site, so being able to utilise the plethora of plugins out there can prove to be key. This post, provided by imFORZA, details what they are, the benefits and negatives of using them, when to use them, and the crux of the post, their 7 chosen WordPress plugins to use. They have chosen a plugin for 7 components of a website, which all need to be catered towards for a successful site: Security, Optimisation, SEO, Forms, Comments, Commerce and Backups. This is a very handy post, and you should certainly take a look at this if you’re looking at getting the best out of WordPress.
Tweet Vinny’s Blog: Tweet
That wraps up this week’s round-up; I thoroughly hope that you enjoyed the work of the creators of the content who have been mentioned. Feel free to leave your opinions in the comment section, and if you’ve enjoyed the work which has been cited, you can share it via the corresponding Tweet button.