Tell Google What You Think! - PubConference VI, Day 1

[jackson992]

hmmm I do nothing in any way that could be considered spammy yet my Google results still suck. Yahoo is by far leaps and bounds above Google right now

[CLBridges]

(quote)webmasters need Google but Google also needs them. (end quote)

That is simply NOT true. Google does not need Webmasters it needs Webpages. What Webmaster in his right mind would disallow googlebot?

Not just webpages, Dave.. but **high-quality, content-rich, spam-free, search engine friendly** webpages. This type of webpage is most often created by a professional (ahem) webmaster.

Only time will tell whether Google can maintain it's highest usage share in the world (55.2% back in July of 2003) which accounts for the "you'd be crazy to disallow googlebot" mentality you're speaking of. But the SE wars are heating up fast. When the dust finally settles the SE offering the most relevant results will be victorious. If Google can't keep their users happy they'll go somewhere else, which pretty much translates into Google looking for **high-quality, content-rich, spam-free, search engine friendly** webpages (created by professional (ahem) webmasters.) Almost sounds as if they need us webmasters more than we need them.

Almost.. (sshhhh.. hear it?)

Carrie**

[Mel]

This is a redletter week IMO since both Google and Yahoo reps have made noises that sounded almost like peace overtures towards SEO, noting that SEO can actually improve relevance.

My, my, my wonder what brought that about. Can't be Spring yet so it must be something else.. How about competition?

[activebiz]

This is a redletter week IMO since both Google and Yahoo reps have made noises that sounded almost like peace overtures towards SEO, noting that SEO can actually improve relevance.

My, my, my wonder what brought that about. Can't be Spring yet so it must be something else.. How about competition?

comment on transitions: well, since ethics has always been the preferred - it will hopefully outlast a competition ****-fight this time too - it will be interesting to see which direction the general visitor public will go - ha, what a show and tell to know where mankinds minds are heading to - ethics or what ever goes.

Michele

[CLBridges]

..ha, what a show and tell to know where mankinds minds are heading to - ethics or what ever goes.

My thoughts exactly. I wonder exactly to what lengths they all might go to get the upper hand. Like you say.. ethical, or whatever goes?

Carrie**

[mythman]

Google just has to remember that they shouldn't find everything for people; because no one wants Google to be the place they go to look for some things. E.g. People got a product I sold them through a direct-link. They don't want to then find it on Google for a percentage of what they paid—now, I wouldn't mind if Google operated under a "no-prices" clause with any representatives that post, (and maybe they do ... I dunno).

Really, I'm not into selling-and-sales too much (unless you're interested in paying upfront-payments for some fine Arizona-oceanfront), but I've just written a little bit (see my blog) on the wisdom of burying treasure that I think applies here.

[mythman]

This may also be a good suggestion for Google.

I understand that there are "bad" things that people can do with Link Cloaking (as I'd never do any of these things, I'm only guessing that they include things like making your site seem bigger, like trapping a browser in some sort of repeat-ance trap, etc.)

However, good things can also come of Link Cloaking. I cloak a lot of my links in order to avoid server-name prejudice. (When people look at an uncloaked link to one of my Yahoo-groups, for instance, they immediately think, "Oh, some kid had free time;" and no matter what I write to accompany that link, the "free-time-kid" thought lingers like the smell of morning-coffee in one's mouth at lunch. And submitting a Redirect-URL usually misdirects the spider-program long enough to be deemed "false.")

I only ask that Google save its blacklisting for the pornographers.

To make my off-the-Net reasoning clearer, one example: the butcher's blade, known for its sharpness, makes an excellent murder-tool. With that in mind, anyone seen with a butcher's blade is a future-suspect. Further, you might suspect anyone in butchers' garb (the uniform) to have been with a butcher's blade, and thus to have will be having been (I was sick on tense-day in grammarian-college) a future suspect. So you should blacklist all butchers, castrate them, and have them beheaded in order to prevent the crimes committed with butchers' blades.... No?

[mythman]

Google does seem to be focusing more on content than in the past. They can still do more; they will do more eventually, and any I don't control will end up a bad idea.

[minstrel]

First, mythman, I'm not sure how you are using the term "link cloaking" in this post, but any time you have someone click on a link that they expect to be taking them to site A (or page A) and instead they end up at site B or page B, that is not only likely to be annoying to search engines but also to your visitors. Quite frankly, unless it's an honest redirect because a page has moved, when I see that happening to me it's a fast "Stop" + "Back" sequence - face it, that's a technique too often used by the malicious or unscrupulos to be trusted - how do I knw what's about to be downloaded by my browser?

Second, if what you're wprried about is just people seeing the "yahoo.com" part of your link, you can use a link like this:

<a href="http://www.yahoo.com/mysite/index.html">
Myth Man's Website</a>

No one is being fooled here - if a potential visitor hovers a mouse over the link and is bothered for whatever reason by seeing "yahoo" in the link, it seems to me that that visitor isn't going to be any less bothered if you trick him into visiting that page by some sort of intricate redirection or cloaking strategy.

[Dave Hawley]

webpages (created by professional (ahem) webmasters.)

Me thinks you are confusing Web designers etc with Webmasters (the administrator of a website).

BTW, I often find the most useful pages ae those NOT created by professional Web designers, but rather WYSIWYG editors. Example, you want know about fishing in a certain area. One page is written by a professional Web designers (who knows jack about fishing but the page looks great!)The other, by a local who has fished the area all his life and knows jack about Web designing and can just use Frontpage.