Not what, but where

[John Scott]

http://blog.v7n.com/2007/03/19/top-t...ouple-of-days/

I wrote a brief seo course for beginners last week. Those posts are now ranked #7 in Google for the keyword term “SEO Course”, and for a variety of other related phrases.

Remarkably clever piece of SEO? Nah. Just demonstrates the truism “it’s not what you publish, it’s where”. Or “Content isn’t king, popularity is”.

Very true and very relevant to SEO.

[solidghost]

It's just too bad that what Search Engines say and what actually is happening aren't the same.

And they have been crying "Content is King" for years now.

[SeLFiE_12]

nice point...Content isn't King after all...

[Seo Madrid]

Google has definitely moved to an authority domain model... But good content can still be king as it is the best to get a naturally built popularity.

[Manish Pandey]

And again..."Content is king...content is king"... how long would we hear this old story. It's for marketing yourself! Your own sake.. It has nothing to do with rankings!

Win the trust of google. Be credible to it and there ya go...!!...

[Seo Madrid]

How do you win G's trust? By building a nice site with relevant content that gains the popularity within your own community. Is there any other way?

[AnaB]

Great piece John. And, you're absolutely correct. I was looking at a couple mini sites last night ( a page or two) and trying to reverse engineer their SEO. One of them was particularly interesting because I know the owner..

So, particular site that I cannot name, ranks number 2 after a wiki article for a term with a couple million results. Is in a domain that's not even it's own. Hasn't been updated for YEARs. (other competing sites are as old or older than this one in the first page so age isn't really the biggie) Half the content is duplicate (really, copied and pasted from the vendors website. This person is an affiliate for the product), yet ranks number two. Generates great profit. The domain and the site are no way related. it's like putting golf lessons in a speak spanish website. The owner hasn't looked at this site for atleast a year..Puts a lot of the popular seo beliefs into question. The only thing to really say is that the main domain is Strong.

Quite fascinating to say the least.

Best,

Ana

[Janna122003]

Originally Posted by Seo Madrid

How do you win G's trust? By building a nice site with relevant content that gains the popularity within your own community. Is there any other way?

Get more quality backlinks from trusted site.

[Seo Madrid]

Originally Posted by Janna122003

Get more quality backlinks from trusted site.

That's exactly what I mean. You need to provide something useful within your relevant community to get those links in a natural way. Obviously, if you buy the links you don't need any content, but if you want to gain the authority in a natural way, good content is necessary.

[thatguy]

That article is how I found V7N oddly enough. Great article and a valid point. Unique content from a trusted source will quickly make its way up the rankings ladder.

[maldives]

Originally Posted by Manish Pandey

And again..."Content is king...content is king"... how long would we hear this old story. It's for marketing yourself! Your own sake.. It has nothing to do with rankings!

Can you prove that? Getting relevent, unique content is vital for the success for better inexing of pages as well as rankings.

[Cricket]

I am going to put my neck out on the chopping block by agreeing and disagreeing all in the same response. I do not believe that content is king, but I also do not believe that links are king either.

The very best unique quality content is worthless if no one can find that page in the search results. On the flip side of that coin, all the traffic in the world is not going to make a bit of difference if no one makes a purchase (or other similar action) when they find the page.

I firmly believe that it is a combination of the two (incoming links and unique quality content) that has the highest impact on the ultimate success of the site.

Originally Posted by maldives

Can you prove that?

Do I have proof?

Heck, I don't know what kind of proof you are looking for, but I go by the bottom line - the results I receive.

For the same search phrase being discussed in this thread, a page on my primary site has been #2 or #3 (or both) pretty consistently. I am not naive enough to expect that to be permanent though. I know it can change even by the time you read this post. That is exactly why I don't believe in keeping all of my eggs in one basket.

No matter what happens during search engine updates, having a COMBINATION of solid high quality incoming links AND unique quality content is not going to hurt your efforts, so why leave either out of the equation?

[smarsh]

Originally Posted by Seo Madrid

Google has definitely moved to an authority domain model...

yahoo too... for the most part. but if you can't beat them, join them. nice thing is you can now get indirect traffic from these authority domains.

[QwkSand]

"It's not what you publish, it's where."

I'd say it's both what you publish and where you publish it. Bot are somehow arm to arm if you want to rank 'em.

It's logical. If you write good content, but put it where only a few only visit, well then, you're not getting much traffic and your content will only reach a few people and will reach them in a slow pace. If you don't have such great content but put it in the right place, sure you'd have visitors. But they won't be interested in you long enough to stay with you. They'll just go some place else if you don't deliver what they're looking for.

Now, if you combine the two, surely it's two thumbs up. Providing good content and providing it in the right place will get you not only lots of visitors but will also help you with your ranking.

[Cricket]

Which came first, the chicken or the egg?

[temyong]

I do agree with you Cricket. And I think the egg cames first before the chicken. I know that because I'm a man.

Originally Posted by Cricket

I am going to put my neck out on the chopping block by agreeing and disagreeing all in the same response. I do not believe that content is king, but I also do not believe that links are king either.

The very best unique quality content is worthless is no one can find that page in the search results. On the flip side of that coin, all the traffic in the world is not going to make a bit of difference if no one makes a purchase (or other similar action) when they find the page.

I firmly believe that it is a combination of the two (incoming links and unique quality content) that has the highest impact on the ultimate success of the site.



Do I have proof?

Heck, I don't know what kind of proof you are looking for, but I go by the bottom line - the results I receive.

For the same search phrase being discussed in this thread, a page on my primary site has been #2 or #3 (or both) pretty consistently. I am not naive enough to expect that to be permanent though. I know it can change even by the time you read this post. That is exactly why I don't believe in keeping all of my eggs in one basket.

No matter what happens during search engine updates, having a COMBINATION of solid high quality incoming links AND unique quality content is not going to hurt your efforts, so why leave either out of the equation?

[John Scott]

Originally Posted by maldives

Can you prove that? Getting relevent, unique content is vital for the success for better inexing of pages as well as rankings.

Yes, we all can prove that. Even you can prove it. All you have to do is link to a web page using a term that appears nowhere on that webpage, and when you get it ranked based solely on anchor text links, you'll know that links rule.

Content? Content? I mean, seriously, content? Your "unique content" idea- please expound on this. So I have an Ivy League writer on my staff writing for me, and Google is somehow supposed to telepathically know that the content is great? Does Google posses mystic powers?

No!

For the last time, Google knows quality content only because of the links it gets. Google determines what is good and what isn't based on the number and type of links a page has.

GOOGLE HAS NO ALGORITHM OTHER THAN LINK-BASED TO KNOW WHAT IS QUALITY CONTENT.

You cannot keyword density your client into a #1 spot for highly competitive keywords. You cannot page title your client into a #1 spot for highly competitive keywords. The only way you're going to get there is by way of PageRank and anchor text of inbound links.

http://www.seroundtable.com/archives/000089.html


I wrote that back in 2004. This is old, old ancient news folks. Get the the game, people: links still determine rankings.

[coolguy27]

For me, Quality Link building is better than quality contents. If you have simple contents and plenty of quality links sure your page will rank.... Because to google it doesn't matter whether you have quality contents or not. Google is base on the quality of links of your site...We are talking to number one search engine here Google.... If about contents Yahoo and MSN is after quality contents that's what from experience.....
"content is not king after all (I second the motion)".....

[WebGeek182]

Ok, here's my two cents:

1. Links rule for SEO. - The site with the strongest relevant link profile wins.
2. Content rules for conversions and sales, and it breaks ties when two sites have a similarly strong link profile. - You can have all the traffic in the world, but who will buy from a site that is poorly organized, confusing, or full of crap content? To get maximum conversions and sales, your site must be compelling and easy to use. So, once you get people to your site, make sure there is something to keep them there. Also, when two sites have similarly strong link profiles, Search Engines use what I call their "Plan B" rating - they will evaluate the content, and see which is more relevant to break the tie. This doesn't even come into play though if one site has far more (and relevant) backlinks.
3. Bad content will make it harder to get links, and conversely, good content *can* make it easier to get links. - Who wants to link to a crappy site? On the other hand, if a site has some awesome content, design, tools, or something else that people can't help but link to, you'll get more links. (But only if they can find your site in the first place.)

Originally Posted by John Scott

Google knows quality content only because of the links it gets. Google determines what is good and what isn't based on the number and type of links a page has.

John, you're right about this as a primary factor. I think the key word in your statement is "quality" - Google knows quality by the power of links.

Originally Posted by John Scott

GOOGLE HAS NO ALGORITHM OTHER THAN LINK-BASED TO KNOW WHAT IS QUALITY CONTENT.

I have to disagree here to some extent though that is has NO other factor...It does but it is a SMALLER factor and comes only after the links have been evaluated. I suspect this is what you mean though because you again mention "quality", and it's true enough that you could successfully optimize a page with link building alone.

However, I think that for maximum success with SEO, it would be wise for most sites to do some basic on-page optimization as a backup to the link building.

The Search Engine Algorithms give probably 90% weight to links and maybe 10% weight to content. There is SOME weight given to content. Otherwise sites wouldn't rank for anything at all. I think it could be best explained that they look first at links and then second at content optimization. The best SEO does both knowing that links are key and puts 90% of the focus there, but still does the content optimization, because content can be a tiebreaker.