SEO Rockstars: the shows I co-hosted
The handoff and the shows I co-hosted, 2014
Guest Blogging Penalties, Local Rankings and a New SEO Rockstar Coronated
This is the one where they hand me the show. Daron and Chris spend most of it on the guest blogging penalties that hit MyBlogGuest, and on how much more local rankings were starting to matter... then at the end they introduce the new SEO Rockstar, me, from Internet Marketing Ninjas. They spelled my name Boykn in the show notes and nobody ever fixed it.
Google and Bing Debunking SEO Myths; Acting on Paid Links and Content Farms
My first show as co-host, with Chris. Matt Cutts had put out a video knocking down a pile of SEO myths, and Google was saying out loud that they wished they had moved faster on paid links and content farms. We got into that plus Bing's take on unnatural links. Paid links were my world back then... this one was fun.
Conductor CEO Seth Besmertnik: Why Paid Media is Dead, Advocates Web Presence Management
Interview with Seth Besmertnik, the CEO of Conductor, on why he thought paid media was dead and why everything was moving toward what he called web presence management. He was launching Searchlight around then. Heads up... the audio file in the archive for this one is only a few seconds long, so the real recording looks to be lost.
Demise of Google Plus; Overlap Between Social and Search
Daron, Chris and me on Google+ getting demoted from a product to a platform, which was really Google admitting it lost to Facebook and Twitter. We spent a good while on where social and search actually overlapped, and Duane Forrester came on with his Behind Bing segment. The archive copy runs short, about 18 minutes.
Did Your Manual Penalty Disappear? Matt Cutts New Video on Ranking Content
Chris and me on something we were both seeing... sites coming back out of a manual penalty without doing a thing, like the penalty just timed out and expired. We had two of them. Plus a new Matt Cutts video on how Google ranks content. The archive copy of this one is short, about 7 minutes.
Google Will Not Devalue Links Soon; History and Value of Links
Probably my favorite topic of the whole run. Matt Cutts said Google was not going to devalue links any time soon, and Chris and I went off on the history of links and what they were actually worth. Duane Forrester closed it out with linkbuilding tips on Behind Bing.
Yandex Not Provided and Google Payday Loan Algorithm 3.0 Release
Daron, Chris and me on Payday Loan 3.0, which went after spammy queries instead of spammy sites, and on Yandex going all the way to encrypted search... which meant Russian traffic turned into not provided in everybody's analytics too.
Google Registering Domains and Offers Web Hosting; Adding Schema Markup Is Important
Google quietly testing a domain registration service and calling the new gTLDs domain endings, Panda 4.0 hammering sites that blocked CSS and JavaScript, and Bing's Duane Forrester telling everyone to get schema markup on their pages. The archive copy is only about 2 minutes... most of this one is gone.
Google Shuts Down Orkut; Removes Links Under Right to be Forgotten
Daron and me, and I brought two of my own people on... Ann Smarty and Thom Craver from Internet Marketing Ninjas. Google finally killed Orkut, its first social network, and started pulling links under the European right to be forgotten ruling. Nice having the Ninjas on the air with me.
Matt Cutts Takes Work Leave; Author Photos Being Removed in SERPS
Big week. Matt Cutts announced his leave of absence, and everybody in SEO was trying to read the tea leaves on what that meant for webspam. Also John Mueller confirming author photos were coming out of the results, the Google founders talking about ending the 40 hour work week, and Bing chasing exclusive Twitter search.
10 SEO Myths and Lies You Should Never Believe
Daron and Chris took this one, running down a MarketingLand list of lies SEO gurus tell... guaranteed number one rankings, magic links, duplicate content scares, keyword stuffing. Show notes do not have me on it, so this was likely a week I was out.
Effects Of Duplicate Content In Search; Cost of Google Penalty to eBay
John Mueller on what duplicate content really does and does not do, and the eBay penalty that people were pricing at something like 200 million dollars and still getting worse. We also looked at what Hummingbird had actually changed once the dust settled.
New Law Affecting Russian Bloggers Privacy; Long Tail Traffic Effectiveness
Chris and Daron on the new Russian law that stripped anonymity from bloggers and forced social networks to hold six months of user data, plus the argument going around that long tail traffic from Google was not converting like it used to. Show notes credit Chris and Daron, not me.
Google Penalties for Content Spam Guest Blogging; Targets Two European Link Networks
Google getting ready to swing at guest blogging content spam and taking out two European link networks. Also the ten year anniversary of the Google IPO, and manual spam actions showing back up in Webmaster Tools. Link network takedowns were required listening for me at the time.
Google Drops All Authorship; Amazon To Launch Their Own Online Ads
Authorship died. Completely gone from the results and from Webmaster Tools, after everybody had spent two years setting it up. Plus Amazon planning to run its own ad program against Google's, Eric Schmidt promising unbreakable encryption, and Google starting to crawl the rendered page instead of the static one.
Penguin Refresh Needed to Recover; Google Brings Product Listing Ads To Third-Party Sites
Google confirming you could not get out of Penguin without waiting for a refresh, which was brutal advice to give a client. Product Listing Ads showing up on Walmart.com and other third party sites, the 302 to 301 documentation change on mobile redirects, and Matt Cutts moving his own blog to HTTPS.
SEO Rockstars Celebrates 200 Episodes; Google Indexing Google Maps Search Results
The 200th episode. Two hundred shows is a real number for a podcast... nice to have been on the mic for that one. Also Google indexing its own Maps results pages, sitelinks search box notifications going out in Webmaster Tools, and a Google patent about ranking based on TV viewing.
Google Penalizes Private Blog Networks; Adds Structured Snippets To Search Results
The week Google went after private blog networks in a big public way, which had half the industry quietly rebuilding their link strategy. Plus Baidu's chief scientist predicting half of all search would be voice and images, tighter European delisting requests, and structured snippets in the results.
Goodbye Orkut and the Yahoo Directory
Chris hosted this one with Frank Watson of Kangamurra Media. The Yahoo Directory shutting down was the end of an era for anybody who did links for a living. Also Panda 4.1, and Google saying HTTPS alone would not lift your rankings. Show notes do not list me.
Thoughts About Pubcon 2014; Google Not Updating PageRank Anymore? How About Google PageRank Alternatives
Chris and I traded notes on Pubcon Las Vegas, talked about Google quietly walking away from updating toolbar PageRank and what people were using instead, and got into Penguin 3.0 and whether it was too late to disavow links once they already showed in Webmaster Tools. A good one.
Google Penguin 3.0 Worldwide Rollout; Google Deals with Spam For User Generated Content; Web Traffic Advisors Launched
No recording of this one has survived.
Duane Forrester, Matt Cutts and the SEO Spokespeople Changeup
No recording of this one has survived.
Google Search Results Are Free Speech in the U.S; Google Rolling Out Mobile Friendly Label
No recording of this one has survived.
Affiliates Learn About White Hat Black Hat SEO
No recording of this one has survived.
Bing and Yahoo Follow Google in Right to Be Forgotten; Google Confirms Penguin Thanksgiving Rollout
No recording of this one has survived.
Google Says New TLDs Have No Inherent Search Ranking Advantage; SEOs Required To Take Polygraph Lie Detector Tests
No recording of this one has survived.
Google Analytics Tracking and Link Acquisition: A Live Rockstars Roundtable
No recording of this one has survived.
Link Neighborhoods : From Finding Connections to Finding Partners
No recording of this one has survived.
Before that, on as a guest
Search Engine Share in 2011
Two and a half years before I came on as co-host, Chris Boggs had me on as a guest to go through search engine market share for 2011 and the research behind it. The show notes introduce me as Jim Boykin from WeBuildPages and Internet Marketing Ninjas, which dates it nicely... that was the era when both names were on the door.