Rand Fishkin vs Aviva - Page 4

bobmutch · 07-25-2007, 01:26 AM

>>>So you are saying that a properly optimized page, not ranking, is indicative of absence of authority.

No again that is not what I have said.

Here is what I have said.

<<<...in general the level of competitive keywords you can rank on the first page of the SERP, with out getting inbound links to that page shows the level of authority your site has.

>>>So we must assume that there are less than 100 websites on the web with authority.

No. First I am talking about more than one keywords. "the level of competitive keywords [plural] you can rank on the first page of the SERP"

>>>And a lot of sites rank on the basis of SEO, not authority.

When you rank for competitive keywords and it is not from off-page SEO it is always a combination of on-page SEO and site authority. I don't see how there is any way around that.

While on-page SEO is required it will only take you so far with competitive keywords where you are not using off-page SEO.

So to me it is very clear that site authority is going to make the difference when off-page SEO is not used and the level of on-page optimization that is used from site to site is equal. I don't see how there is any way around that.

>>>Furthermore, the qualifier you mention is that a site is properly optimized. Did somebody go ahead and determine that Aviva is properly optimized, and then announce that Aviva is worthless? Or did they assume?

I appear to me that Rand just took the title tag and I presume because that tag holds the most weight in his view.

I do thing that Rand's test is still valid. But I hold that a better test is to optimize the category pages with competitive titles that relate to the page and to do all on-page optimization and then see how well the pages rank.

One of the things I have started doing with my blog is to pick a keyword I think I can rank for on the first page and use it as a title and optimize the blog post page for that phrase. If I don't get to the home page in the first week I will go and look for another keyword and change the page so it is optimized for that keyword and do a 301 of the old page to the new page.

John Scott · 07-25-2007, 01:31 AM

Quote:

One of the things I have started doing with my blog is to pick a keyword I think I can rank for on the first page and use it as a title and optimize the blog post page for that phrase. If I don't get to the home page in the first week I will go and look for another keyword and change the page so it is optimized for that keyword and do a 301 of the old page to the new page.

Are you suggesting that Jeff should be forced to go through his directory and rename all of the categories to include keywords he is likely to rank for, in order to appease you and Rand?

bobmutch · 07-25-2007, 01:34 AM

>>>A better way would be to link to an off-site page with unique anchor text and see how it affects that page's ranking.

I totally disagree. It would be very hard to measure this metric. How well you rank is very easy to see.

>>>And why would you use ranking as a metric?

Because that is what it is all about. How well you rank in the SERP.

>>>It's entirely unscientific.

I disagree. It is completely scientific as we have a metric of items that give site authority and we have a metric for the results -- placement in the SERP.

>>>Those rankings could be due to a number of different factors.

Not at all. If you put up a page and don't give it off-page SEO. And you equally apply on-page optimization. There is only one thing left and that is site authority.

I am not sure why you are not seeing this : )

John Scott · 07-25-2007, 01:36 AM

http://dmoz.org/Regional/North_Ameri...ates/New_York/

Doesn't rank in the top 100 for New York. So by your standard and Rand's, dmoz has no authority.

Glad we finally settled that.

bobmutch · 07-25-2007, 01:36 AM

>>>Are you suggesting that Jeff should be forced to go through his directory and rename all of the categories to include keywords he is likely to rank for, in order to appease you and Rand?

Not at all. I think you will search in vain (even if you use Google) to find where I have suggested that. With Rand I will let me speak for himself, but I think that you can guess the answer as well as I can : )

bobmutch · 07-25-2007, 01:40 AM

>>>http://dmoz.org/Regional/North_Ameri...ates/New_York/
Doesn't rank in the top 100 for New York. So by your standard and Rand's, dmoz has no authority.
Glad we finally settled that.

New York is to competitive a keyword to use as an example. I think even you know that : )

There is no way you can rank for a high competitive keyword like "New York" with out off-site SEO.

Any way I think I have laid my position out clear enough and we don't seem to be moving ahead here : )

I think I need a bit of sleep.

John Scott · 07-25-2007, 01:46 AM

Quote:

New York is to competitive a keyword to use as an example. I think even you know that : )

Funny how the excuses roll out for dmoz, but everybody is eager to crucify Jeff.

For the record, Jeff does have awesome organic linkage. He also has awesome non-organic linkage. He promotes like hell, and in my opinion he has respectable amount of authority.

I know that isn't as much fun as crucifying the poor guy, but it is factually correct.

tantantin · 07-25-2007, 05:32 AM

Just asking a question here. Why and there are so many web directories such as DMOZ, BOTW, Skaffe, and the example that you have to give Rand is Aviva. Is there anything about Aviva and needed a club to swing at Jeff's Aviva ? Or is it about the blog post of SEOMOZ being a QBC and have to swing back ?

Thanks

jhnrang · 07-25-2007, 06:03 AM

Ooops --it took me 1 hr. to finish reading all the posts since I left the last time

@ Bob Mutch --

I can now understand what authority site means. But you have not yet stated the exact criterias -for example -

Domain Age -- How Long?
Site Age -- How Long?

Also .gov, .edu, links means no more importance according to Matt Cutts.
How many of those links you want? There is one PR8 .edu site that sells footer links as sponsored. List it there --and your IQL tool will pull 10000 .edu links. Is it called authority?

Now back to the subject---

I have one PR4 directory -- Titled "Page Rank Luck Directory"
I tried some combinations --with the title like

Page Rank
Luck Directory
Page Directory
Page Rank Directory
and few more --

I rank inside top 100 for all. Not only that --I also rank well for different categories on the directory.
There is a sitewide advertisement -- "Links Factory Strong Directory"
I rank on 1st page for that Keyword too.

I usually hit this DC -- http://72.14.235.104/

So according to your definition of Authority ranking --by site qualifies for all of them. It only shows around 18000 Yahoo backlinks and 200 -odd G backlinks.

Do you or Mr. Rand want me to believe that my site has much much higher authority than Aviva has?

I don't live in a dream SEO world. I am not a SEO expert too. But SEO is nothing more than optimizing the keywords you rank for --- isn't?

But I never optimized -- All those keywords .

The concept of determining a Directory ( Please mark the word Directory) - on the basis of Search Engine Ranking is totally false. While SERPs is what every site looks for -- it is not for directories. Because the main role of directories is to help other sites get quickly indexed, help them to rank better.

SEROMOZ/Mr. Rand has to prove scientifically and logically why they don't think Aviva is quality. It has attacked one of us --and now there is no looking back for us --directory owners --to soon blog around how cheap a route SEOMOZ is has taken to get traffic and perhaps links by attacking one of our leaders.

OR is it because SEOMOZ/Mr Rand wants Jeff as their clients?

There was a post by Mr. Rand --where he states that he is working with Jeff to rank better.

I hope Jeff does not fall in the TRAP.

Quote:

Originally Posted by tantantin

Or is it about the blog post of SEOMOZ being a QBC and have to swing back ?

Thanks

Hey Old Maaann-- thats probably the reason Rand Fishkin is mad at Jeff and his Aviva.

I'll try to soon blog about SEOMOZ and how it sucks on my BLOG --I hope Rand will rubbish my directory too.

Just for info -- Google is loving my BLOG as its posts are ranking even for a fraction of the titles.

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q...es&btnG=Search

So -- I'll title a very relevant keyword while choosing SEOMOZ.

tantantin · 07-25-2007, 06:13 AM

Quote:

I'll try to soon blog about SEOMOZ and how it sucks on my BLOG --I hope Rand will rubbish my directory too.

<<<<<<< - Ditto.

bobmutch · 07-25-2007, 08:29 AM

>>>Funny how the excuses roll out for dmoz, but everybody is eager to crucify Jeff.

I don't see may people here eager to crucify Jeff. All I see is Rand noting what many professional SEO consultants all ready know and many directories owners with a vested interest may not want to acknowledge -- most directories don't have much site authority and in most cases they are just a glorified link-sell under the guise of a directory that have had their home page Pagerank artificially pumped up by link rentals instead of won links.

You can get Pagerank this way and look good to the Pagerank hounds that are 2 years behind the times and still buying links based on PR but it is very hard to win site authority with purchased links.

While Rands position, right or wrong, is a view that many SEO professionals hold I fail to see the reason to take his critical analysis of Aviva and other similar directories personal and to charge his critical analysis report or methods as "very dishonest".

>>>For the record, Jeff does have awesome organic linkage. He also has awesome non-organic linkage. He promotes like hell, and in my opinion he has respectable amount of authority.

What matrix are you using to measure site authority.

I hold that site authority can be directly measured by how well a site rankings for competitive key phrases when no off-page SEO is used.

>>>I know that isn't as much fun as crucifying the poor guy, but it is factually correct.

Now I have been wrong more than once and am always willing to be taught and have my views upgraded. What factual information have you provided that is measurable that the said directory has a respectable amount of authority (note that I have not stated that it hasn't).

Bernard · 07-25-2007, 08:38 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by bobmutch

... what many professional SEO consultants all ready know and many directories owners with a vested interest may not want to acknowledge -- most directories don't have much site authority and in most cases they are just a glorified link-sell under the guise of a directory that have had their home page Pagerank artificially pumped up by link rentals instead of won links.

Yep, except I would refine that to say that the category pages don't have much topical authority.

randfish · 07-25-2007, 09:04 AM

Hey gang, just FYI - I wrote about directories again last night - http://www.seomoz.org/blog/the-wisdo...-link-building

With regards to choosing Jeff's site - I actually picked it out because I knew of it. Jeff's done a great job with branding and he and I had exchanged some emails. I've also seen his site mentioned on Digg a few times.

When I began the post, I had no expectation of finding that Aviva would have ranking problems, I just wanted to show the process that I use to check the value of a directory (or any web page for that matter).

As Bob argues, I think there's a lot of value in checking out a page's rankings for its own targeted keywords. When investigating Aviva, or any specific brand, you'd need to remove the brand name itself to make the "can you rank" test worthwhile.

BTW - With Aviva specifically, they're under a penalty - there's no other explanation for why they can't rank for even the names of their articles that have made it to Digg - http://www.google.com/search?q=99+ti...d+on+the+cheap - not even in the top 10, when every site that is listed links to them.

I'm actually working on helping Jeff out with that issue.

John Scott · 07-25-2007, 09:14 AM

Rand, I see them at #1 for the title of the article:

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q...ap&btnG=Search

John Scott · 07-25-2007, 09:17 AM

Quote:

As Bob argues, I think there's a lot of value in checking out a page's rankings for its own targeted keywords. When investigating Aviva, or any specific brand, you'd need to remove the brand name itself to make the "can you rank" test worthwhile.

The test seems a bit of a mystery. Evidently, DMOZ fails the test, or the the test is only valid with non-competitive keywords, in which case the application of the test to Aviva was flawed.

I really am speechless here. I am not trying to be antagonistic, but would appreciate some further light shedding on your part.

This test of yours, non competitive keywords only? Word sequence butchered is ok?

John Scott · 07-25-2007, 09:25 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by bobmutch

>>>Funny how the excuses roll out for dmoz, but everybody is eager to crucify Jeff.

I don't see may people here eager to crucify Jeff. All I see is Rand noting what many professional SEO consultants all ready know and many directories owners with a vested interest may not want to acknowledge -- most directories don't have much site authority and in most cases they are just a glorified link-sell under the guise of a directory that have had their home page Pagerank artificially pumped up by link rentals instead of won links.

You can get Pagerank this way and look good to the Pagerank hounds that are 2 years behind the times and still buying links based on PR but it is very hard to win site authority with purchased links.

See how you did that? See that word, "purchased links"? Yes, he does spend a ton of money promoting his site, but he also has a very very respectable amount of organic linkage. But the way you state it totally denies that, and misleads people into thinking he has "artificial" value.