Comments on: WordTracker Interview and Resulting Article

By: Ryan @ Linkbuildr

Ryan @ Linkbuildr — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 19:44:54 +0000

Brent…the interview was inspiring! The link strategy for the Michael Jackson stuff was brilliant, I wonder how much traffic alone you siphoned to that.

Can’t wait to see what’s next mate!

Cheers,
Ryan

By: Tom Lynch

Tom Lynch — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 21:48:23 +0000

Thanks for the speedy reply – yah makes a lot of sense… Though scary, we (as in searchers or “real” people) prefer the tools to be smart so we don’t have to be. It has got to be part of the scary algorithm – right? Google’s trends influences SERPs and CTRs, and emerging links confirm or or deny relevance. Broad searches will percolate hot news items. The playing field is skewed to the big player with lots of content and link juice unless you can get an exclusive, I guess… And even then once the mega-pubs get coverage the little guy loses out.

Thanks again for your reply.

Regards

Tom Lynch

By: BrentDPayne

BrentDPayne — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 21:30:16 +0000

The key reason I chose ‘Michael Jackson dead’ was due to previous experience with ‘Bernie Mac dead’, ‘Paul Newman dead’, etc. But, the gut response was backed up by Google Trends data that was happening at the same time. I’m seeing a trend though (and historic trends data will also confirm) that people are querying just the person’s name more often than putting any type of identifier term on the end of it. They let ‘Google figure out’ what they ‘really want’. It’s scary . . . scary as hell. PLUS . . . it makes it a lot more difficult to get a decent cross section of results in the SERPs. Only the top sites that already had a ton of inbound links for ‘Michael Jackson’ did well on that query. A new blogger or a new voice will have a really hard time being heard if this trend continues and big media will begin to gain a foothold. Good for my role at Tribune if it happens but bad for the information sharing.

By: Tom Lynch

Tom Lynch — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 18:50:58 +0000

Brent – really nice results – much respect, and thank you for the article…

Instead of the Nike example used on the article – if you could please elaborate on steps 3 & 7, and how you used Wordtracker to help you specifically identify the words used, and why you selected the targeted keywords you did – a big help to many…

The challenge with breaking news and Wordtracker’s backward looking (historical) database may force a leap of faith. Did you have hard data, leap, or possibly did you use other tools to help? (No offense intended to Wordtracker please…)

I love Wordtracker, long time user, fan and prophet for the tool. This is not intended as a negative post, just trying to solve an information gap for our colleagues you may have cracked.

“Michale Jackson dead” may seem like a no-brainer to some folks, but you chose that primary phrase for a specific combination of reasons I believe. Was is simply that it had the highest search counts with that day’s snapshot of the Wordtracker database? I think it will help a lot fellow compatriots if you can explain the “what”, “why” AND the “how” too.

Thank you for your time.

Regards,

Tom Lynch

By: Mark Nunney

Mark Nunney — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 22:11:22 +0000

More linking fun: Earlier today I couldn’t find you in the top 300 for ‘bald seo’ and now I’m seeing you at 24th. Perhaps a little on-page will take you to page one.

By: Mark Nunney

Mark Nunney — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 21:58:43 +0000

Hiya Brent. Just like at the Trib, we have a team at Wordtracker too and it took all of us to make you look like a pro

Glad you like the on-page SEO. This’ll kill you. From where I’m typing, wortracker.com is beating brentdavidpayne.com for ‘tribune company seo’. Not that any one is searching for it, of course.

But there must be thousands a day searching for ‘brent d payne’ keywords, right? And we’re catching you up for that already.