Spider-Man

Understanding the perspective of your target audience is critical for any marketer. For search engine marketers, this means getting inside the head of not just people, but also search engine crawlers. A simple Firefox plugin, the Web Developer plugin, will help you see with spider vision in three easy steps so that you can weed out search-engine-unfriendliness from your site like a superhero. Here’s how to use it.

• Disable CSS styles. Search engine crawlers believe it’s what’s on the inside that counts, so strip your website of its outer beauty! Disabling styles show you the real prioritization of the content on your page, a particularly interesting exercise for sites in a columnar or grid layout. It will also remove background images that may have contained text visible to a human.
• Disable JavaScript. Spiders ignore JavaScript, so you will, too. This will reveal whether your cleverly-designed, jQueried UI is hiding content from crawlers. And without JavaScript, your embedded Flash modules will disappear, too.
• Replace images with ALT attributes. How do crawlers read your beautiful GIF navigation and headlines? Find out! Do a quick replacement. If your images are replaced with nothingness, then you’ve got some ALT tag writing to do.

Congratulations, Peter Parker: you’re now viewing the web in spider vision! Now go use your newfound “web-slinger” powers for good!

Over the past few months, there’s been a fair amount of speculation across the cybersphere regarding whether there’s any future for SEO. Some have boldly claimed that SEO is destined to die. But these few aside, the consensus seems to be that the discipline of SEO will remain alive and well.  And why? Well, because search will remain alive and well.

Search has permeated our mentalities as a (arguably, the) primary method of gathering information.  We “Google” to find information on the web.  We use the search feature on websites as a means of navigation.  Sometimes we even use search in a retail context–for instance, searching for that best seller at Barnes & Noble. Search isn’t going away anytime soon, because we depend on it too much.

Necessarily, SEO will not die.  For the sake of time, I’ll provide a very oversimplified justification: search engines will always depend on algorithms to determine the relevance of content (well, until artificial intelligence comes along and computers take over the world, but then I’ll be more concerned about my life than my job security), algorithms that rely on content meeting a set of standards that, in reality, the average Joe does not understand.  This is where SEOs come in.

Though search may be here to stay, it will evolve to adapt to our demands.  Remember when a Google search results page was simply a list of 10 sites with some ads on the side?  Now your search results page can contain anything from news results to local listings.  Search evolved because information demands did.

So what’s next for search?  Twitter believes they are.  They claim to have grand plans up their sleeve for a social search engine that allows consumers to search “what’s happening–right now.”  It will serve as a Wiki, aggregating the thoughts and opinions of the entire Twitterverse on current issues.  Read the full article here.

If this is truly where search is heading, what will this mean for SEOs?  How will our jobs evolve?  Share your thoughts!

A great challenge among web analytics practitioners is establishing credibility. With relatively few standardized industry certifications available to individuals, experience tends to be the mark of expertise. Of course, in order to build a track record, you first need clients. But to get clients, you need a track record. This Catch-22 can be demoralizing to even the most ambitious web analytics ninja.

But guess what, there’s good news: Google Analytics is now offering a certification for individuals. For just $50, you can take the Google Analytics Individual Qualification Test. What are you waiting for? Take the test and prove your Google Analytics mastery to the world. Good luck!

Criticism, though sometimes painful to swallow, is a good thing.  It challenges our preconceptions.  It pushes us to be something better than we are.  I like criticism, but not when it’s unfounded.  I ran across such an unfounded critique this past weekend in which SEO Theory writer Michael Martinez attacks SEOMoz writer Rand Fiskin’s video post entitled “The Microsite Mistake.”

Here’s the gist of “The Microsite Mistake.”  Rand advises against the tactic of creating a “link-bait” microsite for the purpose of funneling links to your main/corporate website through targeted anchor text.  This is a poor SEO strategy, he argues, as it eliminates the domain diversity of your linkbacks–and hence, diminishes the value of the linkbacks.

That was Friday morning.  Just hours later, Michael’s criticism hit the blogosphere.  In his post, Michael accuses Rand of “a diatribe against the corporate use of microsites” among other things (but we’ll get to those other things in a minute). 

Really?   A “diatribe against the corporate use of microsites?”  That’s an awfully bold claim, a claim which implies that Rand sees NO inherent value in a microsite strategy whatsoever.  But Rand isn’t taking that position.  In fact, he isn’t even addressing the question, “Should you use microsites?”  Rather, he is making the assertion, “Don’t misuse microsites!”

Michael Martinez is a very confident, persuasive writer.  So persuasive, in fact, that I was hard pressed to uncover any fault in his assessment.  But take a look at both posts for yourself, and I think you’ll conclude with me that Michael’s critique falls short of addressing the actual point in Rand’s post.  Have at it.

The Microsite Mistake:
http://www.seomoz.org/blog/whiteboard-friday-the-microsite-mistake

Michael’s Critique:
http://www.seo-theory.com/2009/01/23/the-microsite-mistake-mistaking-microsites-for-mistakes/

200%?!  It doesn’t take a mathematician to reveal the absurdity in that statement.  And yet it’s true: I have seen a 200% goal conversion rate in Google Analytics with my own two eyes.

But fear not, for there is a logical explanation.  Google Analytics uses a flawed mathematical technique in calculating what it labels the “Goal Conversion Rate.”

Even the most novice Google Analytics user is likely familiar with the concept of “goals”.  GA allows you to identify key site actions as goals and measure each goal’s conversion rate (goal completions divided by site visits).  But GA also calculates what it calls “Goal Conversion Rate”, a metric that masquerades as an aggregate conversion rate for all site actions.  In reality, this metric is nothing more than the sum of the conversion rates for each individual goal.

Why is this problematic?  Well, first let’s say that XYZ.com has two primary goals, A and B.  And let’s say that all 10 visitors to XYZ.com completed both A and B.  Well, by Google’s calculations, XYZ.com’s Goal Conversion Rate would be 100% + 100%, or 200%!

But it gets even trickier when the equation doesn’t produce results that are blatantly ridiculous at first glance.  Now let’s imagine that 2 of the 10 visitors to XYZ.com complete goal A.  And let’s say that those same 2 visitors complete goal B.  Goal A’s conversion rate is 20%.  Goal B’s conversion rate is 20%.  And the website’s total Goal Conversion Rate is 20% + 20%, or 40%!  40% sounds great, but it’s a lie.  Only 2 of our 10 site visitors were goal completers–that’s 20% of our visitor base.

I could outline several more scenarios that illustrate the flawed nature of GA’s Goal Conversion Rate.  I could also explain how to manually calculate your own accurate Goal Conversion Rate of sorts.  But for now, I’ll leave you with a question: is an aggregate “Goal Conversion Rate” even a useful, actionable metric?  I’d love to hear your thoughts!