It took me a few years to get gapingvoid to the point where I was happy with both the size and quality of my “audience”. Most marketing dorks don’t have that luxury of time, so I can see why SEO would appeal to them…

So yeah because of the keywords etc your comments ended up in Akismet, but I fished them out this morning (SF time). It’s only been 8-9 hrs since I published that blog post but I had to wade through almost 300 spam comments to find yours I get that much spam…

Arhh so where do I begin.

Most of your first comment I appreciate and understand where your coming from, I just disagree.

The idea with social media is that people write stuff, make stuff, create stuff, whatever and then, on it’s own merits, the network decides whether to Digg/whatever it or not.

You/Nick/SELand seem to think that creating content specifically targeted for those networks is fine, I don’t. It’s not organic and whilst many could argue the ‘wisdom of crowds’ should bury it if they don’t like it, unfortunately that over-hashed concept isn’t applicable-in-all cases and in this Digg environments we get more of the ‘herd mentality’.

That’s an issue us practitioners of social media need to try to address better, but it’s ultimately human nature.

You close your first comment with:

I think the various networks are just find [sic] in making a collective decision of what they like or dislike.

I actually think it’s a great example of a line which many people in this industry are scared of refuting.

Digg, for example, is not a collective decision of what people like… it’s a collective decision of what a specific, non-representative demographic of people like who end up being influential as many more people use the site in a ‘read-only way’ to get news, links etc. Of course, we should try to encourage everyone to participate in Digg (and other social media services) to redress the balance but it’s not in every one’s nature to – that’s the first fault in the system the SEO/LinkBaiting crowd are able to subvert. But unlike a search engine, that’s not something that’s easily fixed. My mother is simply never going to use Digg.

There are better examples of social media working, but I raise Digg because it’s one of the popular propositions with the linkbait industry (because it’s so easy to subvert). I’m also not a big fan of Digg, mainly for that reason.

In your second comment you asked whether I was ‘gaming the system’ by titling my post “On linkbaiting, SEO’ing and all that other crap” and not simply “Linkbaiting Concerns Me”.

I can honestly say that I came to my headline in a very organic way, like I do most of my post titles. I simply say to myself “what is this post about?”. And I wrote “linkbaiting, SEO’ing and all that crap”. I admittedly added “on” and “other” to round off the title.

The use of the word crap maybe considered ‘hype’ but if you’ve ever heard me speak, I’m known for my use of such ‘fruity language’ in normal conversation.

huge part of SEO is making a site search engine friendly, solving some of the problem that actually do come up and aren’t easily solved by many people.

Maybe I’m missing out on a trick but I actually don’t do any conscious optimization of my blog. I try to write does-what-it-says-on-the-tin headlines and I ensure that my templates are well-formed HTML (that’s how I originally got into this business). But I don’t stick specific things into specific h1, h2 tags etc – I just let the search engines make their natural decision

When I worked at the BBC we never did any SEO on our pages. Sure, you could argue that the BBC doesn’t exactly need a leg up on the search engines but equally many of it’s competitors do. At BBC News Website, where I spent most of my coding days, it was just something we never thought about, and looking through the HTML on the site now they still seem to be using the same templates that I helped build when I was there.

Again, it’s not an area I’ve ever been compelled to pursue in any of my sites – both personal or business.

On search engines you write:

“It also serves as an incredible check-and-balance on search engines when they don’t operate in the way that they say they should.”

I simply don’t believe you guys are doing what you are doing ‘to address the checks an balances in the search engines’ – sorry for being a broken record but to say so sounds once again disingenuous. Equally, who’s holding the checks and balances against you, esp in social media?

The social media optimization industry that’s growing isn’t one to be feared. You’re not going to shove it back into a bottle.

Those two sentences jar for me – and that’s direct quote from your comment, not spliced from two separate parts.

So look Danny, of the people I know of in the SEO world you seem to be one of the good guys and from what I know of you from your writing you seem less inclined to explore the more shady parts of the industry. I also thank you for responding on behalf of the industry.

If you do have an SEO conference, I’d love to come along – it’s a whole area I’d love to grok more and equally attend as an advocate of the social media space.

Thanks for reading my blog post,

Ben

It seems you either didnt read it, or in your zeal missed the point.

Feel free to contact me if you’d like to discuss it, I’ll be happy to explain it to you on the phone/skype/email/im or however you choose.

thanks

ps: Im credited with inventing the term linkbait from back in 2004, but recently (as you ntoiced) have stopped using it as its started to pick up the wrong vibe. Really good viral link building is all about building stuff that people find so cool, so useful, so remarkable that they naturally link to it.

Really, where’s the problem with that?

Excellent post, you summarized what a lot of folks are thinking and feeling. I do suspect that the ‘people’ together and collectively will figure out how to filter out the crap from the gold. People like you will help lead this, thanks.

Excellent post

You’re failing to understand that at the core of what Nick talks about is that some content needs to be deserving of attention in some ways.

IE — you can have a great story, but if you fail to communicate it properly, no one might notice. Take the headline of your article. You could have called it something like:

Linkbaiting Concerns Me

But instead, you’ve gone with one that’s designed to attract attention. Are you gaming the system by doing this? I don’t think so. You’re simply understanding how particular mediums operate.

When you write that “the whole SEO buisness simply disappoints me beyond belief,” I’m just saddened that you did read my article but still come away thinking SEO is linkbaiting and “subverting.”

Honestly, I’d really love to have you come to a conference some time and sit on a panel where people have to answer questions about SEO issues in terms of site design. I’ve done that for years and years now. A huge part of SEO is making a site search engine friendly, solving some of the problem that actually do come up and aren’t easily solved by many people.

You do address this in part. But when you talk about “disingenuous lists,” that’s also called content. Who are you to judge that someone making an interesting list to appeal to the Digg masses is disingenuous. In case you haven’t noticed, that tends to be what they like. And people are writing to that new audience. If it’s crap, the audience will know it.

Indeed, you say you worry less that the search engines will make tolerances. Of course — and they have, and they’ve done that in part with the help of the SEO community that’s often so slammed. It also serves as an incredible check-and-balance on search engines when they don’t operate in the way that they say they should.

And that was the concluding part of my article. The social media optimization industry that’s growing isn’t one to be feared. You’re not going to shove it back into a bottle. You can complain, and should complain, about abuses you have in social media. But having people who understand social media doesn’t mean shitting in the nest. It can actually mean having people who also help keep the nest clean.

Read it again, Ben. Read more of what Nick’s written. He’s been pretty clear you can’t just “trick” people with lies and stuff. He’s very strong that you need to have good content, compelling content — and that particular article is about how anyone can potentially make compelling content. What’s wrong with that? What’s black hat about people thinking about how they can attract visitors and others through various medium? Surely television ads should cut out things like music and nice visuals, ’cause that’s very misleading. And what’s up with people sending press releases to newspapers. Clearly word-of-mouth should be enough to grab a reporter’s attention.

And let’s clarify the example he was making — purely made up — but still since you turned it into a pushing pesticides type of thing. He actually said:

> Let’s say that your client is an industrial, environmentally friendly pesticides manufacturer whose target market is the agricultural community and government food agencies.

IE — let’s say perhaps you are a small company that is coming out with a way for farmers and others to control pests with little harm to the environment but you can’t get attention easily because you don’t have the budget like a big bad pesticide company. Hey, perhaps social media is a channel you should consider.

Anyway, sorry your blood boiled. I read it differently and saw nothing blood boiling about it. That’s because ultimately, I think the various networks are just find in making a collective decision of what they like or dislike.

Hope all is well in SF….