SEO Quiz

[crankydave]

How SEO savvy are you?

Here's an interesting quiz. There's 75 multiple choice questions so be sure and allow youself a bit of free time before you start.

Link bait? Ummmmm... I kinda think so but what's nice is that after completing the test, for any wrong answers you may give, you're provided with the correct answer as well as brief explanation so it can be a learning tool for some as well.

SEOmoz | SEO Expert Quiz

Have fun!

Dave

[incrediblehelp]

I saw this last week, but have not taken it yet. I really liked Vanessa Fox opinions on the quiz:

» Why the SEOmoz SEO Quiz Is [Almost, in a Philosophical Sense, Somewhat] Completely Wrong | Vanessa Fox. Nude.

"But why is this quiz so wrong? Too many of the questions go beyond the science and into the art of SEO, where things are fluid and changing and open to interpretation. The quiz is more accurately a test of how much of your personal SEO philosophy matches that of SEOmoz. Like a match.com compatibility test. You and SEOmoz, sitting in a tree. Romantically optimizing title tags."

Maybe it is one reason I havent taken it yet.

[crankydave]

Personally, I disagree with Vanessa on several levels. And from the looks of it, several of the folks that commented as well.

I won't disagree that much of SEO is an art and fluid in nature. Lot's of things in life are. So because of that you cannot create a quiz or test? I'm sure there would be a whole lot of philosophy or psychology majors very happy to hear that.

As far as it being an indication of whether or not one shares the same philosophy as SEOmoz... Sure, if it was an essay test that they graded but it isn't. It's a multiple choice quiz that requires selecting either the most correct or least correct answer available. It doesn't mean that there's no grey areas.

Of course there are questions that have grey areas. It's not a math test. It goes back to what I said above, using what one knows to try and select the most or least likely answer to question posed. There were several questions where I could think of other "right" answers. Any question that made you think served a purpose. It made you think. Yes, there were questions they had wrong.

Now, I don't think anyone should go into to the test thinking that it's going to give them some sort of definitive measure of "how good they are", but I don't think this kind of test or quiz should never be constructed because of grey areas nor do I think it should be constructed to only have black or white answers.

SEO is not black or white.

Dave

[incrediblehelp]

Well that is my point Dave tests are pretty much black and white. They have to be. They are tests. This is one reason colleges probably cant create a proper curriculum around a SEO degree as of yet. The "SEO degrees" online thus far from places like SEMPO seem lacking as well. Well at least as far as the weight they carry in the industry.

Now I am not saying it is impossible to create a decent test for SEO, but you would really have to update this test weekly and then have those re-test and test again considering how much changes in this space daily.

I would love to see standardized testing of all SEO's. I think it would really lend credibility to industry that has a many scammers floating around, just don't see it happening anytime soon.

[crankydave]

That's where you and I disagree Jaan.

Test's are not black and white. No they don't have to be nor should be. Colleges create proper curriculums around philosophy and psychology and they are most definitely not all black and white. And what about art majors? Humanities and the arts?

Sure there are black or white issues but there are grey areas too. Grey areas are what require you to think, to interpret, to theorize, and not just memorize.

Dave

[ctabuk]

I took it and we all know how technical I am but over 50% correct - where I failed was on the redirect numbers - I guessed

Self edit
» Why the SEOmoz SEO Quiz Is [Almost, in a Philosophical Sense, Somewhat] Completely Wrong | Vanessa Fox. Nude.

I know that that has been posted, but after reading it - I felt much better about my score

[crankydave]

David... Do you better know the redirect numbers now?

Dave

[ctabuk]

Oh yes -give me your main sites code access -and I'll have you top on Google in a jiffy.

[crankydave]

Originally Posted by ctabuk

Oh yes -give me your main sites code access -and I'll have you top on Google in a jiffy.

LOL David!

If you took it again, would you score higher than you did the first time?

Dave

[mjtaylor]

I liked the test and got a low B (80%) ... I tended to miss ones like which is the most popular search engine in other countries ... and what happens when there are too many vote at Digg for a given post ... and now I know what Oneboz answer is ... sort of.

I also thought most of the questions were rather black and white ... though, of course, things will change, but for today the quiz seemed valid to me ...

I am sure Webnauts will not like this one:

Question 13/75
Which of these is NOT generally considered to be a highly important factor for ranking for a particular search term?
· Link popularity of a page within the domain (internal link popularity)
· Quality and quantity of external links to the page
· Keyword usage in the title tag of the page
· HTML Validation (according to W3C standards) of a page
· Temporal relevance - the number and quality of links pointing to a page over a given time span

#13 Which of these is NOT generally considered to be a highly important factor for ranking for a particular search term?
Your Answer: HTML Validation (according to W3C standards) of a page
Correct Answer: HTML Validation (according to W3C standards) of a page
As this document would indicate, W3C validation is clearly the odd man out in this bunch.

Cheers, MJ

[ctabuk]

I did -I Did - Idid

Yippee

I have No Vices - Non Whatsoever - it said you have scored 1 you are a Novice

See - I told you I could crack SEO

Now Webnauts -about your site

[thegypsy]

Interesting convo .... my question is.. 'Why should I care?'

As ya know oviously CD, this 'quiz' has made the rounds the last while, so I have seen it.... I just don't know why I should care? It's certainly link bait.... that's what I took for it and it worked great....

... but much of SEO is supposition since the 'secret sauce' is closely guarded. I care less about what some quiz thinks as I do what my accountant thinks of my SEO Skilz....

As you know Cranky much of MY personal beliefs in SEO come from technical stuff I pour over, not what is 'commonly accepted' (obviously testing and experience is part of my understanding).

I have learned nearly as much from Black Hat as I have technical stuff, the commonly available information is generally rudimentary for me at this point.

So, to me it is a SEO test according to SEOmoz ..... I am pretty certain (haven't taken it) that many of the points would be debate-able....

2c

[crankydave]

Originally Posted by thegypsy

Interesting convo .... my question is.. 'Why should I care?'

As ya know oviously CD, this 'quiz' has made the rounds the last while, so I have seen it.... I just don't know why I should care? It's certainly link bait.... that's what I took for it and it worked great....

... but much of SEO is supposition since the 'secret sauce' is closely guarded. I care less about what some quiz thinks as I do what my accountant thinks of my SEO Skilz....

As you know Cranky much of MY personal beliefs in SEO come from technical stuff I pour over, not what is 'commonly accepted' (obviously testing and experience is part of my understanding).

I have learned nearly as much from Black Hat as I have technical stuff, the commonly available information is generally rudimentary for me at this point.

So, to me it is a SEO test according to SEOmoz ..... I am pretty certain (haven't taken it) that many of the points would be debate-able....

2c

Link bait? You bet. And after having taken it, I asked myself the same question... Why should I care?

I can't say precisely what, if anything, SEOmoz intended other than that, but the funny thing was it reminded of a psych prof I had and caused me to take a step back and take a second look.

Some of the questions made me think. Didn't really make a difference as to why, just that they did.

Dave

[mjtaylor]

Originally Posted by thegypsy

I am pretty certain (haven't taken it) that many of the points would be debate-able....

2c

Funny. I am pretty certain, having taken it, that few, if any, of the points are debatable ... why don't you back up this assumption with the facts?

[thegypsy]

Originally Posted by mjtaylor

Funny. I am pretty certain, having taken it, that few, if any, of the points are debatable ... why don't you back up this assumption with the facts?

Uhhh.. because I could care less??? It's a forum and I am simply chatting... I am not looking to be some bloody big shot dear. A great deal of SEO is open to dabate.... Ever looked at their ranking factor page? More than a few debateable points in there....

I stated I hadn't taken it and wasn't about to... and I am still not simply to appease you. You know why? I can only guess at the reponses I would get from what I BELIEVE is dabateable... this is a light hearted chat about some link bait. Why are you worried about it?

... I can give you this fact... A lot of folks around this board sure like to have an attitude and challenge others.... What's up wid dat???

I have been around the game since 1998... I know what I know and others are free to their opinions. I simply stated mine. I also stated it was a loosely based since I hadn't bothered with the 'quiz'... so why the beef? I thought forums were a place to help folks and exchange ideas?? Not to constantly challenge them....

yeeesshh.....

I like what Vanessa said about it

It’s impossible to know everything about SEO because some things aren’t hard and fast rules. You also have to pay attention the trends, see what works, keep evolving your tactics. And anyway, I would bet that there’s no one person who even knows 100% about how a search engine handles each step of the crawling/indexing/ranking process. Even those within the search engines don’t know all the parts to to the process. Yes, even him. Go ahead, ask him. I’ll wait. He’ll tell you the same.

Go argue with her about it then.... she doens't know jack about search right?

[incrediblehelp]

Originally Posted by thegypsy

Go argue with her about it then.... she doens't know jack about search right?

LOL.

[thegypsy]

Originally Posted by incrediblehelp

LOL.

Hiya Jaan ... long time no see... I am back out and about.. and ranting of course.... Nice to C U ..er...read U...

[incrediblehelp]

Glad to see you back around WPW thegypsy!!

[crankydave]

Guess I'm in the minority when it comes to the quiz based upon the majority of opinions. While I certainly respect Vanessa's opinions, I disagree with the notion that it's "philosophically" completely wrong.

Philosophically, IMO, there's a whole lot of good things about the quiz that make it "right".

I just looked at very differently than most I suppose. Made me think. I like those kind of things regardless of what is intended.



Dave

[incrediblehelp]

Dave I don't think it is right or wrong. I don't think we need to label it as such.

I was just pointing out it is hard or impossible to quantify all SEO skills into a test or quiz.

SEO is a weird animal. I liken it to chefs in the kitchen. The world has many great chefs, with varying recipes of the same meal and dishes. They all use their own "special" skills and talents to reach the same point. A very delicious email the consumer will enjoy.

We as SEO's do the same thing.

[crankydave]

Originally Posted by incrediblehelp

Dave I don't think it is right or wrong. I don't think we need to label it as such.

I was just pointing out it is hard or impossible to quantify all SEO skills into a test or quiz.

SEO is a weird animal. I liken it to chefs in the kitchen. The world has many great chefs, with varying recipes of the same meal and dishes. They all use their own "special" skills and talents to reach the same point. A very delicious email the consumer will enjoy.

We as SEO's do the same thing.

Hmmmmm...

I wasn't the one who labeled it as such.

I believe the post you said you liked, and quoted, did. Labeled it "wrong".

Dave

[thegypsy]

Originally Posted by crankydave

Guess I'm in the minority when it comes to the quiz based upon the majority of opinions. While I certainly respect Vanessa's opinions, I disagree with the notion that it's "philosophically" completely wrong.

Philosophically, IMO, there's a whole lot of good things about the quiz that make it "right".

I just looked at very differently than most I suppose. Made me think. I like those kind of things regardless of what is intended.



Dave

I don't agree with that statement from Foxy either, I think I have simply taken too many test/quizes over the years and debated SEO minutia ad nausea ... so I am tainted.

For example, the patent Bill and I are playing with at the moment I kind of went against the LSI over PaIR concepts in my analysis and Ol Bill just sent me some MORE (freakin) patents which he believes may mean otherwise (that BOTH may be in play at Google).... so once more, who knows right?

There is a post at SEOmoz today where he said;

I struggle to understand patent applications (one of the big reasons that Si is part of our staff). However, Bill Slawski doesn't and it's made our collective lives in the SEO world (and the mozplex) considerably easier.

So they have some mad respect for him. Meanwhile B and I are debating the implications of various technologies and he is ALWAYS open minded as to what is going on with the SEs. This leads me to the belief that even the gang over at SEOmoz don't know everthing about SEs either .. just like me.

This in turn leads me to think that much of what ANY quiz is about is open to debate.... we simply don't know WTF is going on completely.

..honestly, this thread really ran away some IMO, if you like quizes... this is a great one. Is it the definative source of establishing what is right and wrong or what level your SEO knowledge is at? Probably not.....

That's all I was really getting at... don't know about the rest O ya.... I am probably just jealous cause it wasn't MY linkbait.... bwaaa ha ha ha ha ha.....

[incrediblehelp]

Originally Posted by crankydave

Hmmmmm...

I wasn't the one who labeled it as such.

I believe the post you said you liked, and quoted, did. Labeled it "wrong".

Dave

Here we go again with semantics at WPW, LOL. Vanessa labeled it as such and I was simply quoting some points from her posts that I agreed with. Of course the title of her post said "wrong" which I posted to.

[thegypsy]

ha ha ha ha... yeah, U guys realy like to dabate around here huh? I am pretty sure we all know that no one knows everything that is going on.... I remember when I was researching some stuff earlier this year I came across a patent ol Matt worked on and mentioned it to him.... he had forgotten all about it and had no idea what I was asking... he he...

He's forgotten more about Search engineering than I even know about it... he he..... So I gotta figure if folks like Bill, Matt and Foxy don't know it all.... we certainly don't.

So there is no right and wrong ultimately... just layer upon layer of tweaks to the algos... They are trying to figure out ways to improve the results and we're trying to figure out how they are going about it....

[crankydave]

LOL! Jaan... Semantics? Wrong! hehehehehe

Originally Posted by thegypsy

...Is it the definative source of establishing what is right and wrong or what level your SEO knowledge is at? Probably not.....

I'd say definitely not. If someone were to look at it from this single perspective then they'd likely have plenty of things to pick apart.

Linkbate aside, AFAIC... It succeeded if...

...anyone taking it learned something.
...it made you think
...you were able to come up with more plausible answers than what were listed
...it started discussions and debates
...it made you theorize something new
...if it made you rethink something old

BTW... I scored well over 100 because I gave myself "extra-credit" for the things I listed above that the quiz didn't score.

Dave

ETA... Oh yeah David, I like quizzes-tests-puzzles and the like. Not for what they measure but for what they make you do because sometimes that's worth more than the score.

[thegypsy]

I think for noobs/rookies it is a great thing.... Outside of that, as long as U had fun.

As for debate, it is never ending in this biz.... arggggg.... it's a good thing I have lot's o hair....

[crankydave]

Originally Posted by thegypsy

I think for noobs/rookies it is a great thing.... Outside of that, as long as U had fun.

As for debate, it is never ending in this biz.... arggggg.... it's a good thing I have lot's o hair....

Of course I had fun... Ummmm... did you mean fun taking the test or debating?

Bwahahahahahhaha

And the hair thing... ball caps. Works for me.

Dave

[thegypsy]

I'd imagine at this point in yer illustrious career that the test was no major eye opener for ya….. on the other hand, all us cranky/volatile Dave’s enjoy the debate…..

OFF TOPIC – I made a small version of Feyd’s ‘Bad SEO’ logo.. I am gonna put it on my Blog.. want a copy? Gotta spread the love ya know

[crankydave]

Originally Posted by thegypsy

I'd imagine at this point in yer illustrious career that the test was no major eye opener for ya….. on the other hand, all us cranky/volatile Dave’s enjoy the debate…..

OFF TOPIC – I made a small version of Feyd’s ‘Bad SEO’ logo.. I am gonna put it on my Blog.. want a copy? Gotta spread the love ya know

LOL! and yes.

Dave

[ctabuk]

TheGypsy - Hi buddy -how's it going?

[full house]

oh! that quiz is all aver SEO forums!

[thegypsy]

Originally Posted by ctabuk

TheGypsy - Hi buddy -how's it going?

Hi there David.... I am well thanks. and trolling the SEO world once more. I figured ya'll just needed ANOTHER Dave around here right??? HA!


Anyways troops I was reading a post JonJon made that fit into Feyd's Bad SEO world and came across a comment Danny Sullivan made about the quiz (in the comments of the post) ... So I decided to stop over here and post it;

If you go back to the SEOmoz quiz, one of the biggest issues I had with that was how stuff I felt was opinion or based on their own experience was somehow positioned as fact. I really try to be very careful to qualify anything I write — and I well know that two different people can have opposite opinions on a particular tactic and both be right.

Another opinion on this great debate.. he he...

L8TR

[mjtaylor]

Well, Gypsy, you certainly have a lot to say about something you don't care about. or know anything about. I have heard that called contempt prior to investigation. Having not taken the test, you aren't really qualified to express an opinion. Free to, yes, but qualified, no.

The Breakroom is for chit-chat; this part of the forum is for sharing information.

I can see we are going to be very good friends.

[thegypsy]

Originally Posted by mjtaylor

Well, Gypsy, you certainly have a lot to say about something you don't care about. or know anything about. I have heard that called contempt prior to investigation. Having not taken the test, you aren't really qualified to express an opinion. Free to, yes, but qualified, no.

The Breakroom is for chit-chat; this part of the forum is for sharing information.

I can see we are going to be very good friends.

Well, yer good for a laugh at least ..... Folks either love me or hate me... I am pretty sure where U shall end up. It's a convo about a silly little quiz ..why are ya geting so worked up about everything I post??? A secret crush like high school maybe? hee hee

[crankydave]

Okay. Since I'm running in and out of the house this morning watering flowers, I've got the garden hose out.

How bout we conserve water instead?

Dave

[thegypsy]

Originally Posted by crankydave

Okay. Since I'm running in and out of the house this morning watering flowers, I've got the garden hose out.

How bout we conserve water instead?

Dave

Yeah... beat me with it baby!! mmmmmmmmmmmm.......

Hey wait a minute, ain't that 'chit chat'???
BAN HIM! BAN HIM! -

[mjtaylor]

I beg your pardon. Not sure about the high school crush, but I did get sarcastic and that's a character defect I would prefer to not display.
I am sorry, Gypsy. I was out of line.

Sincerely and well doused,

MJ

[thegypsy]

jeez MJ... now yer makin me feel bad. So ..no crush??? DAMMIT!!! A guy can always dream.... *sigh*

[mjtaylor]

I said I wasn't sure about a crush; please feel free to keep dreaming ... you never know. Since you are where I least expect you to be, I have a feeling we may meet very soon. *Then* we will both be sure.

Dream On, MJ

[ctabuk]

MJ - The Gypsy is a very, very good SEO guy - we used to meet up over at Warriors - he is a 'acquired taste' but once you have 'acquired' the taste you will be pleased that you did.

LOL Cranky

[thegypsy]

Originally Posted by ctabuk

MJ - The Gypsy is a very, very good SEO guy - we used to meet up over at Warriors - he is a 'acquired taste' but once you have 'acquired' the taste you will be pleased that you did.

LOL Cranky

bwaaaa ha ha ha ha... dats funny Big D... Warriors can drive a guy mad!!! I went on a rant there last week. I just couldn't take some of the blindness that those folks will buy into .... and lazy - they think buying some SEO garbage will get rocking the ranks over god old fashion hard work.... arggg....

'Aquired taste' - I like that one. I do my best to be a pleasant fellow, I just get a little passionate at times (need ager management training prolly).... thus I am a ranter.... whaddya gonna do?

[erikko]

i just took the quiz and even if i got a poor grade, it guided me to what i still need to know about my chosen field i want to thank you guys for posting that quiz

[mjtaylor]

Originally Posted by ctabuk

MJ - The Gypsy is a very, very good SEO guy - we used to meet up over at Warriors - he is a 'acquired taste' but once you have 'acquired' the taste you will be pleased that you did.

LOL Cranky

I am smacking my lips, (we need a new emoticon), while I roll the taste around my mouth. It's tasting better all the time.

Aquiringly, MJ

[crankydave]

Originally Posted by erikko

i just took the quiz and even if i got a poor grade, it guided me to what i still need to know about my chosen field i want to thank you guys for posting that quiz

Good! And YW.

IMO, it's not important what you scored but what you got out of it.

Dave

[ramsaytom2]

i have taken it and scored 49% and i will try again