Content is NOT king! [Archive]

pdstein

12-14-2005, 11:33 PM

Anyone who has spent 2 weeks in the field of search engine marketing knows that when search engine representatives are asked, "What does your search engine look for?" they always reply with, "Quality content." But is that really the case?

First of all, let's understand the motivation behind the response. When a search engine rep is asked "What does your search engine look for?" they understand there are two main groups of people listening to the answer.

One group is search marketers. To them "What does your search engine look for?" means "What do I have to do to get my site to the top of the rankings?" Search engines strive for relevancy. They don't want search marketers manipulating the results to get their site to the top. So by telling search marketers they are looking for quality content, they are hoping search marketers will stop trying to use gimicks to get their site to move up in the rankings.

The other group listening to the search engine reps is the search engine users. To them "What does your search engine look for?" means "What can I expect to find at the top of the results when I use your search engine?" As search engines fight it out for market share, relevancy is the #1 thing people look for. Saying their search engine looks for quality content is telling search engine users they put relevant, quality sites at the top of the rankings.

Does anyone really think search engine reps are going to tell search users, "We put sites whose owners have spent hundreds of hours exchanging links with other sites at the top of our results even if their content is bad?" Or "We put sites that have a keyword density of X at the top of our results even if no one has ever heard of the site?" Obviously not. So let's all agree that "quality content" is going to be the company line, regardless of whether it's true or not.

Second, "quality content" is more or less a matter of opinion. Two human beings can read a web page and one might think it's quality content while the other thinks it's crap. If human beings can't agree on what constitutes quality content, how is a computer algorithm suposed to measure quality?

It's tough. So, algorithms look at quantitative, measurable aspects of a web page that tend to imply quality - inbound links and the "quality" of those links being the most prominent right now.

It's analogous to diagnosing an illness by looking at the symptoms. If you want to know if a person has the flu you check their temperature, ask if they have a headache, look for a runny nose, etc. The closer those symptoms resemble those of the typical flu sufferer, the higher confidence you have that that person has the flu even though you've never done a DNA test on the organisms floating around in their blood stream.

It's the same way with search engines. They are looking for symptoms of a quality site. The closer the observable, measurable symptoms of a site resemble those of previously observed quality sites, the higher confidence the search engine has in the quality of that site and the higher that site will rank in the search enging results.

As anyone who has tried to play hookie by faking an illness knows, symptoms can be manipulated. Just touch the thermometer to simulate the symptom of a fever. Eat a couple chili peppers to show signs of a runny nose and watery eyes. In the same way symptoms of quality content can be simulated by search marketers.

The bottom line: quality content is NOT king - the apperance of symptoms of quality content is king.

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pdstein is an ordinary guy who while consuming beer becomes capable of extraordinary random thoughts on search marketing.

Dcrux

12-15-2005, 08:23 AM

Great post. And it sums up the SE position rather nicely. There might be one small point to add.

Many sites are not doing SE positioning for their health. Bad, or even fair content, doesn't convert to sales very well.

The point is cost ...and the more ineffective the content, the more you have to depend on SE gimmicks and SE companies. So let's all agree that "content isn't king" is going to be the company line of companies selling rank, regardless of whether it's true or not.

As guess what. The more vapid, ineffective, and interchangeable pages get, the less relevant search engines get. Google instinctively knows bad rank poisons the well -- a fact SE experts find inconvenient. Not to mention another inconvenient fact: good content generates linking without the hard work, or SEO expense.

True, everybody has a different idea of what good content is. But targeted traffic has to see certain things or they will leave. You can test content and headlines and see how long people stay, or not. You can see user defections in your web analytics, and your wallet. The ugly fact for the content camp: you actually have to target and understand your audience.

Something every sort of writer has had to come to terms with, from copywriter to information provider.

The message from the purveyors of raw traffic is predictable: more traffic. Make no mistake, high traffic low-conversion sales are not cost free, eating up bandwidth the client has to pay for.

As I've written in this section, not every "king" is a good one. Some deserve overthrow. So it is with bad content. Most content needs expensive and chronic SE gimmickry because it can't rank without it. You can see how this plays right to the content-isn't-king bottom line of SE firms. A more productive discussion might be to see how good content and good, targeted traffic, work to complement each other.

dburdon

12-15-2005, 08:40 AM

PDstein,

a good summation. I would agree, content is not king. But it should be.

Unfortunately all the major engines use a short-cut to ascertain content. They automated their content analysis. Its the only way that makes economic sense in a vast and dynamic world linke the Internet. In implementing their short-cuts the engines have allowed people to manipulate the results.

Whatever technique -on page or off page - the engines come up, with people will attempt to manipulate the results. Just look at the hue and cry immediately after Jagger. Now everything's gone quiet. Do you think that's becuase the SEO community is satisfied with the status quo? Of course not. We're all out there trying to crack the code.

The value of a top organic ranking makes cracking the code a lucrative business.

Faglork

12-15-2005, 09:11 AM

As I've written in this section, not every "king" is a good one. Some deserve overthrow. So it is with bad content. Most content needs expensive and chronic SE gimmickry because it can't rank without it. You can see how this plays right to the content-isn't-king bottom line of SE firms. A more productive discussion might be to see how good content and good, targeted traffic, work to complement each other.

Exactly ... very good point.

Additionally, "good" and "bad" content is NOT "more or less a matter of opinion". You can actually meter the success of good content - you just have to watch how your visitors behave after you improve the content. See
http://www.sun.com/980713/webwriting/
for an example.

Good content is content which generates ROI and does not detract from it. Whatever ROI may mean in a given case - it could spell "a better informed audience" as well (think consumer protection websites et al.). And mind you, we are not talking websites alone, on corporate intranets the quality of the content may save thousands of dollars as well.

faglork

MsLeigh

12-15-2005, 11:23 AM

Content IS king, and I'll tell you why.

Links may get you high rankings, but your CONTENT sells your products. Your CONTENT answers the question that your customers are asking. Is your content giving the answers you want?

Yes, you were talking about search engines, but all the traffic in the world wouldn't lead to anything if you weren't getting what you wanted in the end.

So high quality content is king. Professional content by a professional writer, not that 'writer' you paid $2.00 for a keyword filled article. A good copy writer/SEO writer that can sell what you're trying to sell.

And that is what makes content king.

DrTandem1

12-16-2005, 11:01 AM

With regards to Google's SERPs, no, content is not king. At least not directly. Google appears to deduce content from IBLs.

That being said, you can be #1 in your chosen SERP, but a lack of content or the ability of your visitors to find the content once they find your site is a deal breaker. No content, no sales.

I know of plenty of sites that are not found in the SERPs and do quite well with sales because of their content and products. How do people find them? Not through the SEs! They are found from traditional advertising and word-of-mouth.

Traditional internet marketing says traffic=sales. To a point, that is correct. No traffic will obviously get you no sales. However, the inverse is not true. It gives you the possibility of sales, but no content is about as bad as no traffic.

Furthermore, if your site takes forever to load, requires cutting-edge plug-ins, requires registration and has poor navigation, I don't care if it is #1 in the SERPs, your sales will be poor unless you have a hot widget that no one else has.

After all, the visitor is searching for CONTENT. Nothing is more annoying than going to a site that doesn't deliver what was expected.

pdstein

12-16-2005, 11:05 AM

Peaforabrain

12-16-2005, 11:19 AM

Yes, theres always an analogy, content is not a King but a Prince. I get the impression that all the other SE's go for page optimization whilst Google likes content, not necessarily good quality though. It especially likes lots of content and if you have ever competed with a big site such as Alibaba for keywords, you will know its difficult.

Big Article directories are the same and if you happen to compete with an article on an article site using the same keywords, the only way to beat it is to have thousends of incoming links. So with a new website, getting enough links is hard. Articles are the backdoor to SEO, you can promote your website and stand a good chance of beating the competition simply by submitting articles (http://www.freearticlesdirectory.com) relevant to your subject.

Obviously the best way is to have lots of good quality content, lots of links and SEO pages. This comes with time if you work at it.

Andilinks

12-16-2005, 11:25 AM

pdstein

You have indeed identified the SE company line and their rationale for it.

What you've neglected to say is that yours is a very good SE marketer's company line and your motivation for using it is much the same as the SE's. That is, to maximize profits by persuading your clients and potential clients.

Maximizing profits is a very good thing and I very much approve. :) However you may not always be creating wealth--sometimes maximizing profits means merely playing a zero sum game and transfering wealth. SE marketers usually don't care if they are creating wealth or transferring it, and often the search engine doesn't care either.

Those who don't care are just spam in the system. I don't want to appear overly moralistic, but I do think everyone should ask themselves this question: Am I creating wealth or just transferring it? Yes, I think SE marketers can create wealth by keeping the search engines honest. They also can engage in legal theft by stealing the best result from the searcher, I've seen it.

Andi

jackson992

12-16-2005, 11:27 AM

nashville

12-16-2005, 11:41 AM

It seems that it is really about 'balance' I agree that content alone is soley responsible for conversions but the challege is to play the SE games to get the traffic to then convert the visitor.

Most of the 'talk' on all this is because we humans seem to have the need to point at one or two things and say 'this is what we need'. And its just not that simple.

This reminds of talking about religion, it is very complex and not easy to understand but it is very real :-)

DrTandem1

12-16-2005, 12:08 PM

One thing that hasn't mentioned is what constitutes content. Do I have long written articles on my site? No . I am an affiliate marketers and my conent is in the terms of what products I have listed, the prices and what store sells it.

Anything can be considered content. "Good" content is simply what satisfies your visitor's interest. If my site has the word "widget" repeated 10,000 times (spamming issues aside) on a page and have 1,000,000 IBLs with the anchor text of "widget," there is an excellent chance that my site will be #1 in Google for "widget." However, it is doubtful anyone will find the site of much value.

If my widget site tells more about the widgets, shows some images of widgets and offers a competitive price and a point of sale, I could be well below the fictitious widget site in the above paragraph in the SERPs, but my sales would probably be far superior.

Therefore, it is quality content that drives sales, not simply being #1 in Google. The best scenario. would be to #1 in the SERPs and #1 in content.

Needabed

12-16-2005, 12:15 PM

I personally agree with this:

"good content generates linking without the hard work, or SEO expense".

Good" content is simply what satisfies your visitor's interest.

100%

the more relevant the better.

The problem is that with gimmicks you can still rank better by copying/rewriting the content of other sites... how can an algorithm prevent that?

Andilinks

12-16-2005, 12:24 PM

"Good" content is simply what satisfies your visitor's interest.
Exactly. What you consider to be "king" is dictated by your point of view. What is your objective, your motivation?

...the apperance of symptoms of quality content is king.

If you don't think content is king then why have a website? Why not just spam? Oh right, they're tossing people in jail for that now... BH SEM is still safe though. I think.

aviator67

12-16-2005, 12:26 PM

There is another factor, equally important to content. It seems to be that obtaining a critical mass of all of the factors related to site popularity is necessary. Until this event happens, you will struggle to survive.

You have to have a good idea, something unique and different, that makes it relevant. But that's not enough, the idea has to be viral, people have to start telling other people about your site, independant of your own marketing efforts. It has to work well, a buggy site will constantly be working against your promotion efforts.

Lastly, there is an unknown factor that I'm afraid that I haven't found yet. It appears to be some 'internet deity' that allows all the pieces to come together, press releases begin to be picked up and re-published, people start writing about your site, etc. Only then does the whole thing take off.

I've watched del.icio.us appear and take off, to be acquired recently by Yahoo, while a utility that I maintain (http://www.sync2it.com) offering more power and flexability exist in relative obscurity. I don't know that del.icio.us advertised, or even promoted themselves all that much. I know it's not the gods, but sometimes it seems like it.

maniactive

12-16-2005, 12:49 PM

Getting someone to visit your site from a search engine is no big deal (heck, you can always pay for it). But getting a visitor to keep coming back and to recommend the site to their friends...that's why content is king.

I just checked yesterday's stats on one of my sites: while one organic keyword phrase at Google elicited 147 visits to the site, 343 different organic keyword phrases each elicited only ONE visit to the site.

I'm not optimizing my site for these onesie, twosie, long tail searches. They happen as a result of having lots of content. It's content that people search for, and its content that people link to / bookmark / blog about when they find a page, an article, or a blog post that answers a question or otherwise fulfills some need.

Other "content is king" stats to look for: how many people bookmark your page and how many times they come back to your site within a week. So what if 1,000 people come to your site from a very popular search term? If you don't have quality content, your visitors/customers won't come back.

pdstein

12-16-2005, 01:07 PM

You have indeed identified the SE company line and their rationale for it.

What you've neglected to say is that yours is a very good SE marketer's company line and your motivation for using it is much the same as the SE's. That is, to maximize profits by persuading your clients and potential clients.

Except "content is NOT king" is not just a line to sell marketing services. It's true for the reasons I outlined in my original post. If you think it's just a sales line, please point out the flaws in the original argument.

Those who don't care are just spam in the system. I don't want to appear overly moralistic, but I do think everyone should ask themselves this question: Am I creating wealth or just transferring it? Yes, I think SE marketers can create wealth by keeping the search engines honest. They also can engage in legal theft by stealing the best result from the searcher, I've seen it.

I am not advocating trying to get bad sites to the top of the SERPs. The whole point of my original message was to point out what we all know - quality content does not always win in the SERPs. I'm just the messenger here. :)

greeneagle

12-16-2005, 01:15 PM

Content value is ultimately defined by the visitor. One of our SEO clients is one of the oldest and best established General Merchandise Wholesale companies on the Net.

He will rcv apprx 8 Million page views this month with an asp.net site, pretty much containing nothing but popular general merchandise items on dynamically generated pages.

On the other hand he will also gain several thousand "save as favorites" (bookmarks) from visitors, quickly compounding revisits over time.

His SE generated traffic is down to about .5% now.

Ken

incrediblehelp

12-16-2005, 02:05 PM

Authority will be King.

Developing a website that gives your end users everything that they want from your niche is the end goal. Getting links to get links is no the solution and creating content to create content is not the solution.

If creating a website that simply groups and compares the lowest priced products in an easy to search and find format is what you are looking to do then content could be less important. The purpose of the website itself is what creates the "authoritativeness" in the SE's eyes. Look at all the high ranking shopping search engines on all three SE's. MANY of those pages that rank high in the search engines don't have content. Of course the opposite can be true as well. You can find many examples where it appears content does have an effect on the ranking. Sure it plays a partial roll, but it is not the primary reason for the ranking. The overall value and Trust the website has earned is what counts. Having great content for the query is just a way to organize the data within the index, but not to judge what website ranks higher than another.

Whether you have content or not is not the point in ranking. Creating a website that makes the end user happy (which makes the search engine happy) is the point. Of course simply creating a great looking website is not enough, as we all know. You must develop some sort of PR (not page rank) campaign to let the world know that you are out there. This is where being the expert in your niche comes in or having the lowest priced product or service.

Some find it easier to let the world know by writing articles on the products and services that they offer on their website. Some find it easier to answer questions in niche forums (like WPW). Either way you letting the world know that you and your website provide value in the niche that you operate in. From there you get visitors to your website and they decide if it satisfactory. If the visitors like the website maybe he/she will post about it in their blog or website. Maybe they tell another person and then that person tells another person and so on. From the latest post (http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/text-link-follow-up/) on link building Matt Cutts is making it clear that Viral marketing is about the only way they want people to link to you. One way, natural links.

Adam_S.

12-16-2005, 02:54 PM

incrediblehelp

12-16-2005, 04:32 PM

Links are the King.

Adam your example will always be there even when old link building techniques (paid links, press releases, articles, reciprocal, etc.) don't work anymore or at least have less effect in the overall Google algo. The "miserable failure example" was a grass roots effort conducted by thousands of real websites, sending real one-way links to the Bush website. Google was basically fooled into making the Bush website number one for this keyword. In the whole scope of SEO it is a poor example of why a website ranks higher than another. If you try to get website(s) ranked in the same method as the Bush website was ranked, good luck to ya!

PR, links and content are not King. Besides have all the necessary on-site SEO conducted on your website...showing the search engines that your website is the Authority for the product, service, or niche you are targeting is or at least going to be King.

LOL, everyone needs to start thinking about what works tomorrow and not what works today.

JKomp

12-16-2005, 04:52 PM

imho Content is king, just a corrupted one lured from the richeous path by the promise of short term gain.

Remember power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

Seriously though, the human urge to personify things can often prove a useful device, however, it has its limits. A king suggests ultimate power over its domain - however it is the humble webmaster that has ultimate control over content.

Anyway, yes content is still very important but no quality content is not enough in itself to achieve high SE rankings and no poor content is not enough to exclude sites from the higher planes of SE ranking - at least not in the short term.

DrTandem1

12-16-2005, 05:37 PM

Good content will only help you if people can actually get to it. Who's going to link to your quality content if they don't even know it exists?

Links are the King.

If you search “miserable failure” on Google the #1 site is Biography of President George Bush. If you search the copy on the homepage you’ll find that the term “miserable failure” does not even exist on the page. If content is king how can a site rank #1 for a term that doesn’t even exist on the page? Isn’t this telling us that content really isn’t king and that link popularity is really the reigning power?

That points out that IBLs with specific anchor text are a strong factor in SERP results. So? If someone was actually looking for "miserable failure," it is doubtful that they were looking for the president's bio other than as a joke. Maybe they were looking for French military exploits, who knows?

That reinforces the point that without the expected content, a high position in the SERPs is meaningless. Therefore, "content is king" relates to visitor ratings, not SE popularity.

Dcrux

12-16-2005, 05:58 PM

I am a little lost on this example. Let me get this straight...

1. Somebody writes -- as in content -- that it would be a good thing to use link text to associate a term with a specific page.

2. Some two hundred odd people (initially) reading this content, come to the conclusion this is a good idea. And they are persuaded, probably in no small part do to the persuasiveness of the writing, to put the target phrase into the link text on their sites. (Probably writing content to accompany it, and to persuade others to perpetuate the plan).

3. The target page and term then become associated and rise to rank #1.

4. Other bloggers, probably reading about the intial plan, are curious enough to see if it worked. They search, find the page so linked, and then...

They write about it for others to read about, persuading more people to link (a behavior they would not have done without the content). Sure they might have linked some page with a term ...just not this one.

This proves exactly what then? To support the "link is king" side, doesn't this have to happen spontaneously -- without content (the plan to link this page with a specific term) being the catalyzing factor?

Again, to be more productive, it might be better to acknowledge content and linking work together.

espectations

12-16-2005, 06:53 PM

I agree on the one hand and on the other hand disagree.

The message is clear especially after Jagger update.

Design web sites for people, not search engines. So, let's look at this. Why would people visit a web site?

Either to buy something or to learn something - and then you have those that just have got nothing better to do than surf the web (LOL)

Whether or not the person wants to buy something, it is information that will keep them on the web site, let them add comments to a blog, bookmark the page etc.

So, without content which the user finds interesting, nothing will happen.

I think another point which is left out of this discussion is the way the content is presented.

Let me explain: I am in the SMS industry (http://www.smswarehouse.com)

It requires some technical knowledge. The other day, I looked at enquiries and decided that people do not understand http api's. I sat down, cleared my mind and wrote a non-technical explanation. Call it http api for dummies.

Response? "Best explanation of a http api I have ever seen" was one reader's comment.

So, enquiry for product resulted testing is on its way.... potential client, potential sale.

The bottom line here is that I did not write that explanation for the search engines, I wrote it because I saw that my clients had the need to understand it.

So, sales do come into play when we write thing whether we like it or not.

This is just one example - there are many more.

So in conclusion - from a search engine point of view content may not be King.

From a web site visitor point of view, content is King. Otherwise we will not be in business.

incrediblehelp

12-16-2005, 10:28 PM

This proves exactly what then? To support the "link is king" side, doesn't this have to happen spontaneously -- without content (the plan to link this page with a specific term) being the catalyzing factor?

Again, to be more productive, it might be better to acknowledge content and linking work together.

Well posted DCrux. This is what I am trying explain you did it much better than me in you step by step post. Linking and content do work together.

Of course one you control and the other you don't. You can control what you website looks like so you create a well optimized and built website. You have the best prices and you have great information available to the end user. You participate on forums, message boards, go to shows, etc. to push you products from your website. You become the "authority" on the products you sell. People start linking to you. They wouldn't link to you unless you had good content on the subjects they were interested in!! One cant exist without the other. Eventually the SE's see this and start rating your website higher and higher on the queries for you products or services.

You see linking and content are both not nearly a "king" in the example. Now their is that example of "miserable failure" in which the content doesn't match the query, which "fools" people to think that linking is king, but these examples are few and far between and as I have stated before is a horrible example to prove that linking is king. This type of result is also exactly what the SE's want to move away from. Totally dependency on link credit is bad. This is why all the SE' s are eager to move to personalization and geo-targeting to avoid results like this.

The problem I have with the SE's and linking are the Trust Rank value placed on certain websites over others. I don't feel that Amazon.com, Walmart.com, etc are any more relevant than a local mom and pop selling the same products. Sure they have more OVERALL IBL's than momandpops.com, but do they have more OVERALL IBL's for that specific product? Sometimes (actually a lot of times, NO!). If they do then they should out-rank momandpops.com, not just because they are trusted more. I know many momandpops.com that are much more relevant than a Amazon.com and have better niched one-way links than Amazon.com yet Amazon.com will out-rank the momandpops.com for a particular keyword. This is where I get upset at SERP's. Google does this more than anyone. Why? Because they need to have trusted results fro their end users. Google needs to be smarter then just defaulting to the most popular or safest SERP.

DrTandem1

12-16-2005, 11:32 PM

The point that I think was trying to be made was an illustration of a "Google bomb." If enough sites linked to a target site using the anchor text, "Crappy site," then searching for "crappy site" would result in a SERP for that target site no matter what the content is about.

The example given with "miserable failure" was a Google bomb by those who don't like Bush. As you may have noticed, it is followed by #2 Michael Moore. Obvious retaliation. For a time, if you entered "french military victories" Google responded with "Do you mean french military defeats?"

So, I think that it is clear that links with the appropriate anchor text are very important with regards to the SERPs more than content. Thus, SERPs have may have little relevancy to your intended search as the content is not heavily weighed.

incrediblehelp

12-17-2005, 12:44 AM

So, I think that it is clear that links with the appropriate anchor text are very important with regards to the SERPs more than content. Thus, SERPs have may have little relevancy to your intended search as the content is not heavily weighed.

OK this is where everyone is getting confused, Please don't compare Google bombing and a normal rankings. Using this psychology would lead some to believe that if I Google bomb I will get to the top. Show me a website that lives off of Google bombing? Ah yes, one form of it is called comment spamming. Don't think I want to do that, but if I did your right my content could basically be whatever I want. of course I would wake one day to realize that my website has been removed from the index.

My point is links are not king because these Google bombs don't work or even exist in "real world" situations like SEOing for clients and if you do do them you will eventually be banned. If not today or tomorrow, someday...and eventually the algo will be smart enough not to rank purely on anchor text and links.

Andilinks

12-17-2005, 01:02 AM

Google bombing works because oddball phrases like "miserable failure" and "crappy site" have absolutely no commercial value and these pranksters have no competition when Google bombing.

So unless you find some client who wants to rank for "miserable failure" this is no proof that Google bombing works for commercially valuable words/phrases.

a-1cellphones

12-17-2005, 04:40 AM

So content is mainly for customers not serp's. Is it me or does it seem like, the big web sites like amazon are always on the top of search enginges. Is it because they spend a lot in there PPC advertising? Look at the keyword t-mobile cell phones. Those same sites have been in the top 10 for years. How do you compete with them in ranking? You cant, Google gives them special treatment.

Faglork

12-17-2005, 06:00 AM

MsLeigh & Faglork, content IS king when it comes to conversions. Once a visitor is on your site it's content (and usability) that is going to turn him or her into a buyer. However, this topic about search engine rankings.

... then maybe you should have posted it in the "search engine optimization" forum ... if you post it in the "content discussion" forum, don't be surprised when your post is seen from a content producer's point of view. ;-)

On a side note, as has already been pointed out by various posters, quality content will bring you quality backlinks just through its pure existence. So, even from an SEO point of view, it makes sense.

To somewhat sum it up: The real art of content producing addresses all these points: Having quality content, presented in a usable, accessible format, easily spiderable, and caring for the SEs by being aware of the central field of keywords.

Actually, we are not very far apart in our points of view.

faglork

dkginternet

12-17-2005, 07:25 AM

If you search “miserable failure” on Google the #1 site is Biography of President George Bush. If you search the copy on the homepage you’ll find that the term “miserable failure” does not even exist on the page. If content is king how can a site rank #1 for a term that doesn’t even exist on the page? Isn’t this telling us that content really isn’t king and that link popularity is really the reigning power?

... maybe this will help with some perspective:

Ever since search engines first appeared on the World Wide Web, netizens have been finding ways to tie searches on particular words or phrases to web sites of their choosing, generally out of a profit motive. (Better results bring more traffic to a site, increasing advertising revenue and/or sales.) Search engine companies, meanwhile, have been busily at work fine-tuning their algorithms to eliminate rank-enhancing tricks and ensure their results more accurately reflect the relevance and popularity of indexed web sites.

The "fun" factor has come into play, too, as some people have manipulated search engine results either for the sheer humor of it or to make political statements — for example, for several months now a spoof 404 page (i.e., a "page not found" error page) has been the top-ranked page in Google when users search on the phrase "weapons of mass destruction." And now, since early December 2003, the top site returned by a Google search on the phrase "miserable failure" has been the biography of President George W. Bush from the White House web site.

How did this come about, especially since the phrase "miserable failure" appears nowhere in the President's biography? It was the result of a "Google bombing" project organized by George Johnston back at the end of October 2003, in which he used his blog to urge others to include links connecting the phrase "miserable failure" (a term used prominently by Democratic hopeful Dick Gephardt) with the President's biography in their own web sites and blogs:

Let's get everyone to link to http://www.whitehouse.gov/president/gwbbio.html with the words "Miserable Failure." Our goal is to make Shrubya the top google pick.

It's fun, it's easy just Miserable Failure (http://www.whitehouse.gov/president/gwbbio.html) in your favorite web page will look like 'Miserable Failure' (text link).

According to Mr. Johnston's progress report, by the last week of November 2003 the Bush biography was the #2 result on Google for "miserable failure," and — after more and more netizens implemented the same link on their sites and urged others to do the same — it reached the top spot soon afterward. (A #1 ranking at Google brings the added bonus of returning the targeted site when users select the search engine's "I'm Feeling Lucky" button.)

more at: http://www.snopes.com/politics/bush/google.asp
http://www.microcontentnews.com/articles/googlebombs.htm

... shows to go ya...

BTW, I agree with others that utilizing good relevant/quality content as well as appropriate technique is the honest/best approach...

DKG

Dcrux

12-17-2005, 07:52 AM

Once a visitor is on your site it's content (and usability) that is going to turn him or her into a buyer.

There's a misconception here. There have been many times I, and observed users, skip the number #1 rank on a search engine result page. And that happens when the excerpted text, and title, of lower ranking sites seem more relevant.

As more top rank sites look more like spam, users will change their behavior. And, of course, not all links come from search engines. An oft overlooked traffic building technique is article contribution, where the link often appears at the end. With articles, the content causes the user to click.

As link farms decline in their rank weighting, alternatives like article submissions may pick up the slack.

(You may resume the "tastes great" "less filling" debate now)

freehits

12-17-2005, 11:51 PM

I htink we are dancing different circles around the question?

Is the question, will good content useful to my visitors help in the ranking on google.com?

If thats the only question in this thread, then I think no is the answer. Whatever argument is made for useful body text, as in useful to anyone searching that term it wont matter when compared to other factors which are so much more weighted that the what is good content discussion makes little difference (in ranking).

As of the last update....put garbage pig latin on an established aged domain registered in 1996 and it will ran 10 pages ahead of exact useful content with perfect on page layout if located on a domain registered in the last year.

I am yet to see any trend that higher ranking sites provide more sueful information or content anywhere I look.

If this is the case...why do i get superpages.com aol cities. magicyellow.com and just about ever other site reprinting the exact same information over and over on page 1.

Other than names and phone numbers these pages tend to have very little, yet if you search for anything related to travel or restaurants they OCCUPY 50% of the page 1 listings.

No content is not but a drop in the pool, and every serp i look at seeems to support that there is no direct relationship. Just my 02

freehits

12-18-2005, 12:18 AM

Just typed in "zero apr cards"
and got this http://frenchfragfactory.net/ozh/typo-trap/zero-apr-credit-card/

So tell me about content being king.

On the other side, I can type in my daughters full name, and her blog doesnt even show in the top 10 pages. and its a unique rare name.

It was #1 before Jag of course, and is a Wordpress blog.

espectations

12-18-2005, 02:40 AM

During Jagger Google demoted blogs due to blog spamming.

That is most likely why your daughter's blog does not rank high anymore

She should just keep on updating it. Same happened to my clients' blogs - we kept on updating it and the blogs are back in top rankings.

ppayne

12-18-2005, 04:25 AM

I have noticed that my Blog traffic has gone down steadily, from 2000 to 1500 or so a day, so I agree this may be part of the last update.

In general, my own strategy is to be #1 in the minds of my customers (those who are looking for anime, Japanese snacks and other products), to be the most excellent provider of these products anyone could ask for. Since we have a huge selection of products with search terms that are rather unique (no one searches for "pocky" who is not looking for "pocky"), and since we get a lot of links from customers who like our authentic style, we do alright, IMHO. Actually I have yet to identify any changes, up or down, as a result of the big update. What is the exact date it started, so I can check my past rankings again?

nuttymarketer

12-18-2005, 08:31 AM

Great One. Great for Marketers. But you must understand that SEs are meant to solve the problem of the searchers not the marketers. Marketers have to learn to live with the changing market reality and that the hard part of the business. Otherwise a Boy could have gone in business and made tons of money. Nobody would have to work for someone else.

Whatever anybody says, Content is King and will stay that way as we all know Internet is all about the information. It is basically a business of information. No e-commerce or anything is possible if we deniy this fact.

And for information content is everything. So keep up the good work for common guy and provide him Good content. SEs will follow you. You must remember that most of business online is still not search marketing business and it will never be.

Marketing Tricks are always same. Provide usefull products and services and market like hell

Arvind Kumar

Dcrux

12-18-2005, 09:23 AM

Still having some trouble understanding. This is the SEO 2.0 forum section now -- right? The word "Content" in the name keeps throwing me off.

Anyway, let's step through another example, which may shed light on SEO:

Feel free to attempt this test:

1. You make a similar call to associate a term with a page. The term is fresh but synonymous with miserable failure, but this time we associate it to another biography page (http://nobelprize.org/peace/laureates/1979/teresa-bio.html).

2. Using a similar "pitch," will it be a replication of the first test? Why or why not? (Keep in mind, links matter, content ...not so much.)

If a schoolgirl with an unusual name ranks low, while other pages -- pages which might not even be about any person -- rank higher, what happened?

What's happening is link influence versus the limits of the language. There are only so many available terms. And if there is a higher number of people interested in Brittany Spears than are ever going to be interested in the design of spears in ancient Brittany, you are out of luck.

This is not about links, but the likelihood of being linked (link strategy). A schoolgirl named "Uriah" may not have a circle of friends large enough to avoid being crowded out by the exchange on a forum about Uriah Heep or even a funk-jazz bassist from Berkeley. Even worse, our poor schoolgirl is multi-faceted, being funny, a musical talent, and a great little clog-dancer, she will suffer in ranking as badly as she does for the name. The text used in descriptive text will be all over the place, even with exatly the same number of links.

You see, the content of anchor text matters too. Links and Content may both be king of their respective domains, but that doesn't matter.

Unanimity is Emperor, for now. But really this has stopped being about links or content. I suspect it is a "Green Lantern could sooo beat up Superman" playground scuffle. I suspect this has degenerated into political manuvering over which job title has more pretige, who gets to call the shots over the other, and other pecking order issues. None of this alters the small fact this is still a content forum. (Until they change the name).

vwebworld

12-18-2005, 11:25 AM

Ok another headline meant to reel us in to a discussion
that is NOT about content.

I guess the real subject of the post (What does your
search engine look for?) wasn't catchy enough.

Of course content is king... or is important or it means
everything. It is your means to communicate your
message... to sell your product, to inform your
target market.

SERPs and rank are affected by URL, page title, IBL,
description, H1 H2 tags...bold text, internal links,
and your text content.

The relative importance of the above items impacts how
your site gets found.

Sorry for stating the obvious.

~Roland

ADAM Web Design

12-18-2005, 12:29 PM

Content is important. Content is very important. Sites that succeed generally have good content.

But...is it "king"? No.

Exhibit A: The hidden web, or deep web. A very large percentage of content (usually accepted as the majority of content) is inaccessible via the search engine route, either directly or indirectly via hyperlinks from various results.

Many of these "hidden web" sites contain reasonably high-quality content, moreso than the spammers that get in, but aren't visible simply because there's no easy way to get at them.

Here's a classic example:

http://216.89.218.233/downtownkids

This was a site I did recently for a daycare center, on behalf of an ad agency.

Is there content there? Yeah, there's some. Not a lot, but a couple of pages. Certainly more content than a scraper site, I would say.

Would there be issues in getting this site indexed? Yes, there would. And I know some of you SEO types would cringe in horror at this, but it's very much by design. Without getting into too much detail, daycare centers in Ontario have certain limitations as it pertains to space and the number of kids allowed in the facility that are individually assessed. In the case of this particular agency, the number of kids allowed isn't very high and they don't have the funding for future expansion (they need to max out the daycare center first, roll their pennies, and possibly expand uptown from there.)

Yes, I could have put info into the alt tag of each "content" section to ensure that it could still be read but I was specifically asked not to.

So the "content" is not king. This site would never get found in SEs (although it's set up to at least be indexed, should the client ever need to change their mind...by the way, the site's on its own dawt com but I can't link to it for ad agency type reasons).

In this case, content + offline-only marketing plan + ensuring that the right amount of traffic, no more, no less + using the website as a means of reiterating their primarily-communicated offline message = king.

Many web hosts in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) employ the same types of tactics; they advertise in various offline channels, mostly because their pricing and service is so subpar compared to their global counterparts that they don't want to end up "overexposed" and deal with the resulting negative feedback.

There are quite a few websites besides hosting companies and the downtownkids website in the GTA, although the latter is the only one that I know of that has a legitimate reason for the design and development tactics employed.

So yes, content is important, but if your marketing plan doesn't work for you, then your content is pretty well wasted.

Needabed

12-19-2005, 12:38 PM

You have to have a good idea, something unique and different, that makes it relevant. But that's not enough, the idea has to be viral, people have to start telling other people about your site, independant of your own marketing efforts.

100% with this.

Getting someone to visit your site from a search engine is no big deal (heck, you can always pay for it). But getting a visitor to keep coming back and to recommend the site to their friends...that's why content is king.

content is king + information is power...if you knwo how to use it

wouldn't you link this post? here you go..good content gets links..

JKomp

12-19-2005, 02:08 PM

Some definition is needed. When we say content is king, are we saying it is king of SEO? England? The jungle? ROI? the Universe?

Like anything else content is mega important for some aspects of web development and of less relevance with regards to others.

pgaz

12-20-2005, 11:45 AM

I agree wholeheartedly with the premise of this article and will take it one step further. Content need not be relevant AT ALL to rank highly in Google. For 2 years now, including post Jagger, Google has maintained a DEAD LINK in the top 5 - 15 position for a very competitive search term (Google returns 4.5 million results on this single word term). And Google knows it is dead! Google only displays the URL (no title or description) and no cache, yet Google keeps it in this prominent position.

Google uses an old link to rank this site. Link contains this single word term. The link page has not been updated since 1996 and has a high page rank. Search term is only found on this page on this link. This speaks volumes about Google's search algorithms.

Now tell me who here believes Google thinks content is King???

Dcrux

12-20-2005, 12:08 PM

Content need not be relevant AT ALL to rank highly in Google.

Agree. But highly ranked content does need to be highly relevant for search engines like Google to remain relevant to users. Put a dead link(s) on most Google SERPs and people will start looking elsewhere. Put a majority of dead links on every search engine and people will avoid using search engines.

One dead link is does not make this case.

Adam_S.

12-20-2005, 01:07 PM

My mom wrote a book about chastity, sex and relationships. I created a website for my mom and have placed the whole book online in html pages and pdfs. The content is well written and obviously related to chastity. Does it rank #1 in Google, MSN or Yahoo for chastity? No. Why? Because it doesn't have the link popularity that other sites have.

Content makes for a nice foundation for SEO efforts, but it won't do it all by itself.

If you had ten books about chasity, all well written and relevant, and html optimized, how would Google decide which was most relevant? Google can't go
by the content alone or the html. They would have to go by link popularity or offsite influences to determine which was most relevant.

incrediblehelp

12-20-2005, 01:16 PM

If you had ten books about chasity, all well written and relevant, and html optimized, how would Google decide which was most relevant? Google can't go by the content alone or the html. They would have to go by link popularity or offsite influences to determine which was most relevant.

Sure we are all discussing what is MOST importnat Content or Links, but hundreds of other factors can greatly influence if you rank or not.

How long has the domain been online?
Is it on a spammy IP?
Does it have its own IP?
What are the quality of you IBL's like?
Are you using basic SEO principles on your website?
Is the website built so that is is easily indexed by all search engines?
etc...

For this discussion we are just talking about what is in fact the most important one (King) of hundreds of factors...or if their is even one King at all.

Adam_S.

12-20-2005, 02:35 PM

For this discussion we are just talking about what is in fact the most important one (King) of hundreds of factors...or if their is even one King at all.

IMO, links are the single most powerful SEO tool right now.

JKomp

12-20-2005, 02:35 PM

You cant get content out of links, but you can get links out of content. That would suggest content is the more important of the two.

pgaz

12-20-2005, 04:06 PM

"One dead link is does not make this case."

This is not an isolated example.

The fact that a dead link using a competitive search term can exist in a search result for well over a year (and still exists) says a lot about Google search algorithms.

Google states that it will not remove a web page from its index if there is an external page actively linking to it (unless the owner specifically asks for it to be removed). Google knows that it could not index the content - ergo it has zero content weight in the algorithm for this example. Considering all the factors that must go into this algorithm, the fact that a zero content weight can be listed that high in a serp tells me that Google puts little value in content.

Now I agree 100% percent with you that content SHOULD BE KING. That's what the user experience is all about. It is frustrating to be presented search results that make no reference to the term or topic that the user entered, particularly when there are thousands of pages whose content does reference these terms.

Google however very often puts out search results where the search term can only be found in links to the page and it acknowledges this when presenting the cache with the search terms highlighted.

joeblstrn

12-20-2005, 04:06 PM

I understand how some people may not think content is king. However, with out content search engines would never know what pages were about. Without content e-commerce sites would never be found. If it wasn't for people writing content about everything from how to's to news the Internet would be useless.
The Internet is driven by content without it it would be a sea of images.

Content is king. It isn't the content that is the problem. It is what search engines decide relevant that is. SEO is good because without people knowing how to optimize search engines may never find content that is important or useful. So, I feel content is important in every way shape and form.

incrediblehelp

12-20-2005, 04:17 PM

Google has maintained a DEAD LINK in the top 5 - 15 position for a very competitive search term (Google returns 4.5 million results on this single word term).

I give up....what is the keyword?

pgaz

12-20-2005, 04:51 PM

Search Term: IVR (94k searches/month - Overture)
Google returns 4.5 Million results

#12 result

virus1.virus.kyoto-u.ac.jp/

ADAM Web Design

12-20-2005, 04:52 PM

I just did that search and I don't see that result at all.

pgaz

12-20-2005, 05:02 PM

Just ran it on 48 different Google centers and it was on the second page of every one in roughly the same position.

sem-seo-pro

12-20-2005, 05:45 PM

Actually

I would have to say that from wishing to obtain rankings on Googles front pages, it is not anyone thing that will get a site ranked well, but a combination of solving as many parts of the algorithim that we are aware of.

In the pure reason the web exists content would have to be king as it is what the Internet was built upon.

When tcp/ip was first used in 1982 Colleges Universities Hospitals and Governements were transmitting content back and forth.

Without that initial content being distributed online there would be no links, no images, no Google ..

Content is king on the Internet just as it is on television.

Keeping the net from becoming television is the most important thing we should discuss!!
Clint

incrediblehelp

12-20-2005, 06:43 PM

Yes looking at the web archive (http://web.archive.org/web/*/http://virus1.virus.kyoto-u.ac.jp/) of the domain you can see that no page existed there for some time. Also by checking the backlinks (http://alltheweb.com/search?cat=web&cs=utf8&q=link%3Avirus1.virus.kyoto-u.ac.jp%2F&rys=0&itag=crv&_sb_lang=pref) you can see their has been a substantial level of trust Google has given this page considering the number of .edu domains linking to it, regardless of content or the fact the website is down. I don't feel this is any proof that links are better than content rather how Google algo is easily faulted on certain queries, especially when Trust Rank and Authority websites are invloved.

abuthepooh

12-20-2005, 11:26 PM

This is not right. as an amateur blogger all i have been able to gather in quest for a good rank is to have a good content. what other options do i have?
i have no money to pay to a SEO, no money to buy traffic, no money to use the services of fancy 'density of keywords' analysts, no money to have unlimited broadband for the hundreds of hours it requires to link to other sites.
Content was/is my only option. and now i am totally disheartened. hope google is listening.
mazhar

ADAM Web Design

12-21-2005, 12:46 AM

abuthepooh: www.bruceclay.com/web_rank.htm

There's a DIY keyword density analyzer about 1/3 the way down the page, and it's free.

As far as your blog goes, first and foremost lose the keyword stuffing. That won't help you.

Second, if you're worried about SEs bringing you traffic to a site like that, you're approaching it from the wrong angle. You need to build up your traffic base by doing two things in concert:

1) Adding unique content people can easily read and use.
2) Telling people about it (like you just did by providing us your blog link.)

You're weak on the first point. You only provide summary intros to the "articles" on your blog page, which you then link to "full articles" on another blog site that you appear to run. Merge the two...it's too confusing the way you have it now.

Also, it's okay to source information and quotes from other sites, but where is your content? Where are your thoughts and opinions? Where is the room for debate? There is none.

Once you've solved these issues, then post your blog wherever it's appropriate. Promote it by asking and giving help on forums. Write a few articles and submit them (try WilliamC's Article Distribution Center (http://www.articlesender.com) if you want to do it quickly).

From there, just keep adding content, growing your user base and don't worry that much about the SEs, and you know what will happen? They will come to you because others will start giving you backlinks, articles will start giving you backlinks, etc.

In other words, don't even worry all that much about the SEs for the first 3-6 months. Go after them when you've got the userbase. You'll find it's a lot easier this way.

OneMoreBite

12-21-2005, 07:19 AM

Getting someone to visit your site from a search engine is no big deal (heck, you can always pay for it). But getting a visitor to keep coming back and to recommend the site to their friends...that's why content is king.
Your site on Power Point Templates (http://www.maniactive.com) is an excellent example of this. You have tons of great content, lots of free power point template downloads, a blog, resource links, and so on. It's the type of site that once I find it, I go back time and again, and yes, I'd choose someone like you to bring my business because you obviously have passion for what you do.

If more sites were built around a person's interests or passions, then we'd see more organic content. I think Google pays attention, it just takes far longer to get noticed than it once did.

I've bounced around in Google for the phrase "weight loss" which has so many pages it's ridiculous to care. I'm found easily for more specific terms such as "eft weight loss," and "nlp weight loss," but my primary lead-in page is my before after weight loss pictures (http://www.onemorebite-weightloss.com/beforeafter.html) page, since that is what people apparently type in the Google search box.

So once a new set of eyeballs land on that page, what happens next is what matters Do they look and leave or do they look and get interested? That's my job: convert a viewer into a visitor, then into a frequent visitor and possibly a client. So when they say "Content is King," I think it means far more than just words on a page. If you don't have a balance between content and SEO, you may not be found in the search engines, or your site may be found but not convert, which is just as disappointing.

Kathryn