Keith Goodrum

Read something very interesting at PageTraffic Blog the other day. It looks like Google has remove the recommendation to add your site to Yahoo directory…

Brian Ussery reported that Google has dropped two of the most relevant and vital bullet points from the Google Webmaster Guidelines. Those bullet points include:

* “Have other relevant sites link to yours.”
* “Submit your site to relevant directories such as the Open Directory Project and Yahoo!, as well as to other industry-specific expert sites.”

Over at Google Groups they showed what the page looked like before & after the changes…

Google Webmaster Guidelines

Used to say:

Have other relevant sites link to yours.
Submit it to Google at http://www.google.co.uk/addurl.html.
Submit a Sitemap as part of our Google Webmaster Tools. Google uses your Sitemap to learn about the structure of your site and to increase our coverage of your web pages.
Make sure that all the sites that should know about your pages are aware that your site is online.
Submit your site to relevant directories such as the Open Directory Project and Yahoo!, as well as to other industry-specific expert sites.

Now says:
When your site is ready:

Submit it to Google at http://www.google.com/addurl.html.
Submit a Sitemap using Google Webmaster Tools. Google uses your Sitemap to learn about the structure of your site and to increase our coverage of your webpages.
Make sure all the sites that should know about your pages are aware your site is online.

Yup, I saved screen shots, as I do because they change these things
without notice, ignorance of the law is not a defense in Googleland.

Could one of the reasons be that the old version was in conflict with them cracking down on blogs selling text links. After all to get your links on Yahoo you have to pay $299… A paid link.

Tough to tell others they are being slapped for selling text links, and turn around and recommend the Yahoo directory on their webmasters guide.

Hmm… food for thought!

Back in August I went to a seminar put on by Ross Goldberg, Howie Schwartz, Simon Leung & Lee & Robin Collins called “Three Sides Of Traffic”.

One of the best benefits of attending seminars is the networking. You get to get out from behind the computer and meet folks. Its fun to meet new people, catch up with folks you already know and mingle with the same people you follow online.

This seminar was kept small for this reason. We got to learn from people who are on the cutting edge of traffic generation, and hang out with them during breaks.

It was cool to have lunch with Ross, and pick his brain. That alone was worth the price of the seminar. Awesome stuff.

Here are a couple of pictures with some of the speakers…

Me and Ross Goldberg:

Me and Simon Leung:

I learned a lot from this seminar, but my two biggest take aways had nothing to do with traffic… here they are…

1. Fail Fast - Get out there and start taking action. You will make mistakes, and that’s OK… just make sure you learn from these mistakes, and don’t repeat them. It’s all about taking fast action

2. Focus on one idea/project – This is probably one of the most common mistakes around. We are all guilty of making this one. We have an idea, and jump into action… then a new shiny thing passes by. We drop the current idea/project & jump on the new one. Unfortunately the 1st idea/project is left unfinished. The new idea/project gets started until another can’t miss newer shinier idea/project strolls by… We drop the current idea/project to take advantage of the newer shinier idea/project… See a pattern?

Finish your current idea/project before moving on to the next one.

Now, I can’t give away all the traffic secrets I learned… but they were powerful. Some stuff I’ve never seen before. I’ve put them into action, and seen some awesome results.

You can head on over to the Three Sides of Traffic and learn how to get a copy of the seminar DVD’s with resale rights.

As an added bonus for checking out the site is you will get to see my video testimonial on the sales page.(It’s the last video testimonial on the page… They saved my testimonial for the end because it is strong enough to hold the entire sales letter up! )

Go ahead an check it out today.

Found out about a cool plugin for WordPress today from The 30 Day Challenge. It’s really cool you can add video comments to your blog. It’s from Seesmic.com, and adds a great way to expand the interaction with readers.

I’ve been playing around with it today, and have already posted a comment on the 30 Day Challenge blog. It’s easy to post a comment with this plugin. I also found it easy to setup in the blog.

There is a nice feature to this option. Video blog comments get added to the Seesmic public time line. That means you could grab some traffic from people searching Seesmic. Cool beans.

One thing I like about this plugin is you don’t have to have an account with Seesmic. Anyone can post anonymously. Of course to prevent morons from posting insulting or spam videos you can have them held for moderation. I’m doing that for the time being.

You can grab the plugin at Seesmic’s Wiki page. On the wiki page they show you how to install it & how it works.

I’ve added a video comment to this post, so you can see how it works.

How about posting a video comment yourself?