Dan Nedelko

• RT @fantomaster: Google Calling – Google has your Web searches. Now it wants your phone number http://bit.ly/jeMfk #surveillance #privacy #

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• Spending Friday night with the babymama in the burbs and I’ve never been happier #
• I am consistently amazed at how many bullshit #seo “gurus” there are out there and how much of scam they really are. #
• Two of the best TV show intros ever: http://bit.ly/Rxr2H and http://bit.ly/Wse5Z – you have to see both! No kidding #
• #followfriday is nothing more than spam. let’s be real here. #
• Check out Brad Pitt on Dallas (yeah from the 80′s that’s right!) http://bit.ly/cJmAv – good family values! #
• @Miss604 The #Canucks are out of it by every means. Sorry! in reply to Miss604 #
• @teedubya #fakesxsw the thing is that the the real #sxsw is complete bullshit anyhow so the #fakesxsw is just as real! in reply to teedubya #
• I think it’s bbq and patio set purchase day – getting away from the computer is a good thing, go #spring. #

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• Hmmm I have 666 #twitter updates. Obviously by tweeting this I busted that up. #
• Good morning everyone – have a good #followfriday the 13th! @onreact_com @brucecat @missmcj@nicolelindaman #
• @onreact_com No problem – your first message came my way fairly laste in the day yesterday in reply to onreact_com #
• Some great people to follow: @fantomaster @graywolf @chrisgarrett @6s_marketing #
• Some great people to follow on #followfriday the 13th: @fantomaster @graywolf @chrisgarrett @6s_marketing #
• You have to check out the Surveillance Self Defense guide http://bit.ly/kHnGA and don’t forget to support the #eff #
• RT @mashable: HOW TO: Find a Job on Twitter (Please RT!) http://ping.fm/5FtLo #
• @chrisgarrett same here that’s what makes #wordpress amazing – a plugin for everything in reply to chrisgarrett #
• RT @guykawasaki: Facebook Vanity URLs Coming Soon? http://adjix.com/dtjg (see also http://facebook.alltop.com/) – interesting development #
• Just found an old case study done on me from my #bodog days. Clicktracks was great to use to grow #seo for #bodog http://bit.ly/WWL0R #
• RT @randfish: We all need a few Awesome links – http://is.gd/ndkR – they’re good for the SEOul (worst pun ever?) – very useful! #
• I’ve been waiting for MegaSpy for some time, I’m a die hard Pro user -> http://getclicky.com – live web analytics FTW! #megaspy #
• Just posted: “How I build great links for my sites” (http://twitthis.com/cj5eh2) #
• @mcuban Shell out a few bucks for a Tivo! in reply to mcuban #
• @randfish *groan* those are awesome! in reply to randfish #
• #followfriday @jdevalk @webaddict @laughingsquid @scobelizer @kimlitchford #

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Link Building is always a topic of conversation for anyone in the world of Internet Marketing. People who push only organic SEO tend to be quite focused on the overall process of building masses of links with target anchor text on sites which may pass link juice.

Personally that’s a narrow minded point of view that really limits your overall link building goals. The reality of the situation is that links drive traffic, reputation, new visitors and potentially new customers. A well thought out online promotional program will assist you in your organic SEO link building efforts. But you need to have a holistic view of link building.

We build links to achieve a number of goals:

1. Promote the site. We produce great content and we want the world to know about it.
2. Highlight other sites we think are great. We do this by commenting on articles we love, participating in discussions.
3. We are promoting a contest or promotion based around a product. This could be considered link baiting but it’s also showing people how creative and fun we might. When I was Director of Internet Marketing for BetUS we had alot of fun with this great link bait program – it was flattering that Rand Fishkin from SEOMoz thought it was genius marketing. We had fun doing it and it was very successful.
4. We are building links to increase our search rankings. When I was at Bodog we built links for SEO specifically but tracked it with Clicktracks and optimized from there – times were very different but it was (and is) an effective tactic – it certainly worked there. Check out the case study on Lyris.
5. We are participating in a community such as StumbleUpon, Facebook and Twitter. This isn’t for the purpose of building links directly. It’s promoting our product, service or just talking to people. We generate content, talk to people and they shockingly enough they may link to us directly but that’s not the initial goal (we don’t whack people over the head).

I just finished watching Rand Fishkin’s Whiteboard Friday on the same subject. I strongly suggest you check it out:

What other link building tactics do you use now? Let me know what you think of my take on link building awesomeness. Have a great Friday the 13th!

Cheers,

• @nicolelindaman go home rest Plus there’s a bachelor finale on tonight (if that does anything for ya!) #
• @problogger I haven’t but I’ll definitely have a look this evening. #
• @nicolelindaman You and me both ;o) #
• Check out the #bachelor Vegas Odds, rumors and predictions – http://bit.ly/OKZ9K – Enjoy the show everyone #
• @nicolelindaman ditto ;o) #
• Whos watching the #bachelor season finale right now? Message me if you’re watching and twittering… #
• It’s a bit of an interestin social media test on #twitter – how many people are watching the #bachelor finale and twittering…neato gang #
• @DomesticChicky haha whatever works I’ll try not to give away the end of the #bachelor for by twittering #
• @nicolelindaman ahh the West Coasters have to watch out for us on #twitter eh? We might let it the ending slip… #
• RT @webaddict: SEO Strategies for Outbound Links: Do not Be Afraid to Link Out http://bit.ly/MIuq2 #links – this is great advice and true! #
• @domesticchicky I am live blogging the #bachelor right now as well want the link? #
• @domesticchicky http://tinyurl.com/cgcz44 that’s the live #bachelor blogging link #
• @nicolelindaman Haha no kidding! #bachelor #twitter #
• Melissa wins the #bachelor! So far…. #
• #bachelor theory. There is a shocking twist. Is #molly pregnant with Jason’s baby? There was the tent night. Does Jason dump Melissa? #
• Jason Mesnick dumps Melissa after 6 weeks! #
• @nicolelindaman I know right! Jason needs a timeout. What a douchebag! Dumping her on live TV #twitter #
• @aaronjbates The Molly being pregnant theory? #bachelor #
• #bachelor Melissa quote of the year “You’re such a bastard”. Classic Reality TV. #
• @nicolelindaman Jason Mesnick is douchebag! #
• Ok after a little live blogging I’m beat. Three hour finales suck but it appears to have been successful. #
• RT @dooce: “The Bachelor” needs to be renamed “The Insufferable Asshole.” – that is the best quote I have seen on here all night! Too true #
• @dooce Good one And totally agreed rename it to “The Never Ending Adventures of the Incredible Douchebag” #
• RT @timelam: RT @podcacher: Happy Square Root Day, folks! (3/3/09). Coming up: Pi Day on 3/14 #
• RT @mashable: Flickr Photos Become Stock Photography at Getty Images – http://bit.ly/c3d05 #
• Using Stumbleupon.com effectively and points to take into account when formulating your social media marketing: http://bit.ly/bc4ZG #
• Using Stumbleupon.com effectively and points to take into account when formulating your social media marketing strategy http://bit.ly/bc4ZG #
• I would like to know who ordered this freezing cold wind and winter blast in Ontario….*sheesh* #
• @jeanneleez Thanks for the complement Jeanne, glad you like it! in reply to jeanneleez #
• Signing off for the night. Have a good evening everyone. #
• @megste I started Honeypot back in 2002 but really kicked it into gear 3 years ago and the blog I’ve had forever – glad you like it! in reply to megste #
• For some reason my #twitter followers is stuck around 225 but I have 5-7 new followers a day which means I lose 5-7 per day for over a week #
• RT @mashable: Reading: “100 Twitter Tools to Help You Achieve All Your Goals” http://bit.ly/16fKFJ #
• Idiocy in action http://bit.ly/63sP why jumping over #niagarafalls even a temptation? #
• #google rebrands #googlevoice but will they index your chats, conversations , voicemails and text messages? http://bit.ly/15m207 #
• RT @SilverOakCasino: Know Nothing About March Madness? Win $10,000! ( http://tinyurl.com/dxmz4p ) #ncaa #basketball #contest #
• @onreact_com aww don’t get mad. I’ll take a link what’s it all about? in reply to onreact_com #
• @onreact_com Sure lots Google Analytics info over here. Do you have a draft of the post or a link so i can preview it? in reply to onreact_com #
• #ellen #degeneris is talking about #twitter and #tweeting and now she has +36K #followers #
• #ellens goal is to get 1 million followers by tomorrow. The girl is a laugh a minute. #
• @onreact_com dan.neelko@gmail.com in reply to onreact_com #
• @onreact_com Sorry! My email is dan.nedelko@gmail.com – busy day over here in reply to onreact_com #
• OMG best #seo dumbass quote ever! H1 should be used once on a page H2 should be used twice on a page H3 should be used 3 times on a page #

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Ari Fliescher went at it with Chris Matthews yesterday. I think Chris Matthews is right, 9/11 did happen on George Bush‘s watch and for Ari to say Matthews should be ashamed to point that out is ridiculous. The fact is the biggest terrorist attack in US history did happen on Bush’s watch and there are numerous additional facts showing that the Bush Administration failed horribly in ignoring consistent and persistent warnings about an imminent attack.

The deregulation of Wall Street which admittedly began under Bill Clinton was accelerated by the Bush administration which is one of the major factors in the global economic crisis – which I think is going to be a long and deep recession.

Ari Fliescher does make some good points and some stupid points.

If the US gets attacked on Barack Obama‘s watch then yeah you would be able and justified to say that! That’s an idiotic statement by Ari Fliescher. This is a great back and forth!

In an interesting although expected move Google is about to relaunch GrandCentral as Google Voice with a few new features:

• Free voice mail transcription, which converts recordings into typed text. Users have the option to have these messages sent to themselves as emails or texts — enabling them to search through, sort, save, copy or even forward material from voice mails.
• Free conference calling.
• Cheap international calls, with rates competitive to online telephony leader Skype: $0.02 a minute to France or China, $0.03 to Chile or the Czech Republic, for example.
• Text message organization — texts are sent to whichever mobile phones you specify, including multiple ones at once. They are also collected into your Google Voice inbox, like email, and can be filed and kept — a first in mobile phone history, the NY Times observes. As is the case with Gchat on Gmail, back-and-forth texts will be kept as “conversations.”

Now that means that pretty much your entire digital communication stream can (and will) be captured by Google. It’s going to be in an index somewhere. I would be 100% certain that your Google Desktop Search will index these entries and Google will keep a cache.

I think I’ll stick with Skype. Is anyone else going to try this out? There is an inherent coolness factor but I’m not sure how much more information Google *cough* Big Brother needs about me. Check out http://voice.google.com

Social Network Marketing is currently a hot topic in the world of Internet Marketing. Many people want to integrate a social media and social networking component to their marketing mix. The most common problem I see is Social Media Marketing thrown together in an ad hoc fashion and poorly executed.

The key risk from a marketing perspective is this: poorly executed SEO will result in no rankings, poorly executed PPC results in wasted budgets, poorly executed Social Media Marketing can result in a bad reputation, negative buzz and angry users.

You need to be very cautious when executing a Social Media Marketing campaign – do not just throw something together and start talking to an online community, the ramifications could be not only worse than you expected they could be difficult to undo.

Planning, education and execution are critical to a successful social media program. I would suggest that you consider the following points before launching a social media marketing program:

1. Which social media sites will you be targeting? Is your content appropriate for that network? For example: Digg is extremely popular among technology and design audiences. StumbleUpon is popular for humor, entertainment and gaming audiences. Newsvine is popular among politcal junkies (these are fairly simplistic examples but you get the point).
2. What voice do you want to project for your product to these audiences? Direct marketing doesn’t generally work well. Informational, educational and interesting content is needed with a subtle hint towards promoting your product.
3. What are you trying to say to the audience? Social Media Marketing is really about starting an ongoing dialogue with an audience, it’s about building trust relationships that are subtle. Formulating a message is extremely important, continuing the dialogue in a genuine way is critical. If you are not going to do that then you need to reconsider leveraging this medium.
4. Social Media Networks are composed of and run by real people. Remember that. This is not traditional advertising. You are developing a conversation with real people.
5. Be prepared to hear things you may not like. You may get no reaction. You may in fact get a negative reaction. Ensure that you know how to deal with a negative reaction and always remember that someone who gives you a reaction is someone who cares. Engage them and sort it out, it will be worth it!
6. Be prepared to engage the community as a community member. Participate in a very real way, if you do any less your programs will not succeed.

Although I’ve gone off on a tangent slightly, I am laying the ground work for this screencast and discussing one of my favorite sites: StumbleUpon. I’m not going to introduce Stumbleupon in this article, I do that in the screencast below. You can also learn about StumbleUpon right here.

So enjoy the screencast and I’m sure I’ve missed something in my overview so let me know by leaving a comment. Click Play and watch my screencast on Stumbleupon, you might find it useful!

[media id=4 width=600 height=480]

If you are already on StumbleUpon or ready to join and get into it, add me to your friend list or subscribe to my stumbles.

Happy Stumbling!

I guess Barney Frank is not taking any crap from Bill O’Reilly which is awesome. This is how I look at this situation. Bill O’Reilly is not only a thug highlighting his lack of intelligence through bullying, he is an utter and complete disgrace to his profession. I would not even bring down the profession of Journalism by implying that he is a journalist, the way this utter and complete moron bring down fundamental principles of reasoned debate.

Dear Bill,

In order to give an individual with an alternate point of view a chance to speak you need to shut up. You violate everything that makes open systems of political speech and expression the amazing system they are.

You cover yourself in patriotic self centered ego driven media sensationalism and fundamentally have no common decency or respect for the alternate views and opinions of others.

You violate everything your country and your profession are supposed to stand for, degenerating to your level any further is just the thing you want people to do.

It’s sad, it’s classless and you are nothing more than a demagogue.

I have personally run into two people in my life like you personally. One of whom I’ve written about here, the other is not even worth discussing. Have a look and tell me what you think:

I am pretty active on LinkedIn and have been for quite some time. I really do my best to try to answer one question per week and participate heavily in that community. It’s a good way to connect with others, make contacts and also use it as a sounding board for input to my ideas and thoughts on SEO, Search Marketing, Internet Marketing and what I do for a living both with Honeypot Marketing and with my own projects.

I figure since I am posting there I should also share some that with this audience. So the question that was posed from LinkedIn was this:

“How can you calculate the ROI of further SEO Investments for online project? Is there a model that can be used?“

That is a darned fine question since typical ROI models do not stand up well when it comes to SEO and Organic Search for a couple of reasons:

1. Investments are indirect. You invest in link programs, content etc and it doesn’t directly drive traffic. The engines drive the traffic but the investments are there to help increase your authority in those engines. It confuses alot of people as to the logic.
2. Most companies fall flat in terms of customer acquisition models. They are not correctly tracking a converted visitor from search, which makes it impossible to optimize your converting terms from the engines. I have seen many instances where terms which you wopuld not think are big converters in fact are massive converters (especially in tail of search). If you dont know this information then throw out your ROI model, you’ll be guessing anyhow – you could lie I suppose but then again that would be even worse and since SEO’s never ever lie (I’m ducking from the lightening!) that would never be a problem.

Given those two factors I’ve come up with a fairly decent model that I find works and here for your viewing pleasure is the overview. If you disagree with me or if you think I’m wrong then register and comment or email me.

One of the key things to consider is that calculating ROI on Organic Search is different than traditional media. Here is the layout I utilize:

A Total Amount of Search Traffic
B Total Amount of Converting Search
C Conversion Rate from Search
C Life Time Value of a Conversion (is it CPA or LTV)
D Converting Terms (focus on these)

Determine total Search Traffic = 1000
Determine the Converting Search Ratio: B/A (10/100) = 0.10
Use the Total Converting Search Numbers = 100
Determine the value of the Conversion: C = $200

You have profited $20,000 from organic search.

Total current budget : Link Building $1500 per month plus other monies spent (I am not sure what these are)/

Your profit of $20,000 from all search engine optimization programs is being generated by $1500 of spend to acquire 200 customers. Your cost per customer is $7.50

Your spend is generating a 13:1 profit to cost ratio. Now you know your budget to work with and you can shift your overall tactics to increase the overall number search joins as you wish.

I’ve used this model (with much more detail) successfully in the past on numerous projects in the online gambling industry including online sportsbooks, casinos, generic ecommerce sites, online dating, lead generation and ebook marketing industries. It provides for a strong ROI model, justifies SEO budgets and keeps the business people happy since they understand what the goals of the program really are.

I would love to get your input, comments and suggestions on expanding the ROI model for Search Engine Optimization. Please comment below and let know, even if you think I’m completely wrong!

Cheers,