If this market is starting to leave a bitter taste in your mouth you might wanna check out these fellow friends who have it even worse off then yourself. If this doesn't brighten up your mood then well heck you need some more serious help possible a 1LB bar of Chocolate... ;-)
Please post any other great silly photos in the comments if you feel so inclined. Hope you got a bit of a laugh and releaved some stress, I'm about to go try a lemon myself and see if I can get that much entertainment out of it ;-)
This morning brings news from around the web of losses to the Google Toolbar PageRank (the little green pixels displayed in the toolbar) for a myriad of sites. The best coverage I've seen comes from Andy Beard, as well as SEJournal and SELand (which has a comprehensive list of sites discussing the update).
If you didn't know already PR IS USELESS!!! ;-)
Seriously PR is just a pretty graphic for entertainment and now that is basically officially proven with the help of the lastest PR updates. Some of the largest websites ON THE INTERNET had their PR mostly slashed in HALF!...
I've gone through many of the threads and tried to pull together an accounting of websites that have been "reportedly" affected by the update. Hopefully, by collecting this data, and combining it with reports in the comments, we can have a relatively comprehensive view of the landscape and make educated guesses and hypotheses as to the root causes:
This was just to funny to pass up and though I would share it with everyone whos helped a friend or even a client before and it just doesn't always turn out how you thought it might :-P
Also a reminder of all those great family bonding moments not always going how we try to plan them out. :-P
As Braveheart put it so nicely...
"You can copy my
ideas, BUY YOU'LL NEVER COPY MY RRRRRRREEEEEEESSSSSSUUUULLLLLLLTS... <-Results"Oh wait maybe it was "You can take my life! But You'll never take my
FREEEEDOOMM".
Alright I just finally couldn't take it
anymore and had to throw down. Dawg know what I'm saying Yoh :-P I
recently took an ActiveRain break for about 2 months or so while I tired taking
my Real Estate career in a different direction...
While I was away some un-named Rainer's
decided that since I was away they would basically copy my ENTIRE AR profile and
setup down to the naming of my blog and even the content I have within my
profile. They didn't think about the fact that my background is Search
Engine Marketing and
RESULTS ARE OBTAINED BY WHAT YOU DON'T
SEE...
Just because I was able to obtain my
rankings quickly doesn't mean they can be copied quickly. It means I took
the bloody time and did the research. For your entertainment are the
pictures to prove it.
Even after two months break I was able
to get my rankings back up to almost normal in about 1 week...
By the way the 1 high lighted is 7th place. Used to
have 5th but coming back ;-)
If you're looking for someone whom
actually knows SEO and would like to help out a broke new agent. I'm
looking for some SEO jobs at least until I get my first couple listings, my
prices are reasonable actually dirt cheap compared to some of these companies
online saying they'll get you top rankings and charge 1k and up...
If you could be so kind
please subscribe to my blog feed as well, I'm going to start getting back into
the habit of publishing a couple tips every couple days.
This is an amazingly hilarious virtual tour that my brother actually e-mailed to me. Its great when your family starts helping you with marketing ideas :-P
Just thought this had to be thrown up on GoodO'L AR :-D For all you pros out their who really like the extremely difficult deals..
To start this post off... I've gotta say uhhh WOW!... :-P Its almost funny to see how many local Realtors have copied my ideas and SEO creations :-D
I'm proud to see that I've made such and impact, yet I do finally understand how all those bloggers and website builders feel when their works are copied TO THE TEEEE... But they couldn't exactly copyright it so there isn't much they could do.
Oh well I'm happy to see that others are learning from my articles and my account here on ActiveRain as well. At least I hope those whom have clipped an idea or two from my articles or maybe for an example title of their accounts are subscribed as readers to my blog :-D
Just goes to show just because you can copy an idea if you don't improve on it or know fully how the creation was implemented then it won't do you much good.
P.S "Overland Park Real Estate" on Google is helping to show that most things really do require work. Not just the ability to copy and paste.
P.P.S Sorry for the rant just had to pop in a express a bit of frustration.
By the way hello to all those out their whom have been reading and thank you. Sorry I feel off the ActiveRain wagon for a bit. I'm hopping back on soon. ;-)
Pagerank is the most famous system for ranking sites. It's used by Google algorithm as an indicator of the importance of a webpage. The exact algorithm is keep secret, but we have an idea of how it works. This post will introduce the basics of Pagerank.
Google interprets a link from page A to page B as a vote, by page A, for page B. But, Google looks at more than the sheer volume of votes, or links a page receives; it also analyzes the page that casts the vote. Votes cast by pages that are themselves "important" weigh more heavily and help to make other pages "important."
Basically this means that each time a page links to your homepage, your homepage's pagerank is increased by an amount that depends on the pagerank of the linking page. (that's the reason why webmasters often buy links from pages with high pagerank)
The pagerank increment depends also on the number of outgoing links a page has (a link from a page with thousands of outgoing links is worth less than a link from a page with few links)
Toolbar
Google continuously update the pagerank of each webpage, but values are published every three or four months and can be seen in the google toolbar, with a green bar with integer values between 1 (less linked sites) and 10 (very important sites), with 0 that means "not yet classified" The pagerank value shown in the toolbar it's not the actual and real value for the page you're visiting, it's just a rough estimation of the pagerank at the moment the values were published (every 3-4 months)
The PageRank value shown in the toolbar is not linear, that is, going from PR3 to PR4 is easier than going from PR4 to PR5 (it should be a log function, with base > 5).
Nofollow
This system of votes increased spams in comments or webpages, as spammers wanted to collect as many links as possible to have better pagerank... so google proposed the nofollow tag to be added to the "untrusted" links (i.e. in comments or places where everybody can add links). There's an ongoing debate on the benefits of the nofollowtag, and the use and abuse of it (wikipedia recently started to use the nofollow tagfor all its outgoing links), but what you have to know is that a link with rel = nofollow will not give pagerank to the linked site. Here's how a normal and a nofollowed link look like in html:
That's true Pagerank it's good, easy to understand and evaluate, but it's just one of the multiple factor used by google to rank a site: it should not be your first priority, your priority should be the content, then making sure spiders can find it. If you've good content the backlinks will follow because users will be happy with your content and link back to it... thiswill bring higher position in the SERPs. (Actually, this and avoiding some common mistakes we'll talk about in the future)
Resources
After this brief introduction, you may be intrested in some further and more technical readings about google pagerank and related stuff:
I responded to a post today and wrote possibly the longest comment I've ever written before so I figured heck, might as well turn it into my own post. Instead of just wasting it or under-utilizing the information.
Michele my blog is mainly focused on Search Engine and website oriented content. I hope you can find something useful I've got over 13 SEO posts right now and add more all the time. http://activerain.com/blogs/overlandpark/tags/seo
If you have a specific topic or questions, send me an e-mail and I'll try and get a post thrown up for you.
I wonder if it is better to find a niche and work hard establishing great , steady content to blog and web pages or is building linking better ?
It depends on how you would like to be found. My A.R blog is a mis-mash of tons of different content pulling in all kinds of people. All depends on how you like to play the game.
Is RSS important and well, what does it actually do ?
RSS stands for (Really Simple Syndication), its extremely important in todays blog driven world. On all the websites I create I make sure I've got a blog on the site somewhere now, because it really helps for Search Engine crawlablility as well as allows people to read your content without having to visit your website.
Is Google really king and is it worth worrying so much about anymore?
Yes Google semi-sadly really is king, I've got a picture in my SEO group of this years COMScore break down and Google has 46-52% of the market share.
I feel like I am covering the basics and getting an audience- at least good hits BUT what is it that makes them stick, and come back ?
Constant content, make sure and start writing articles ahead of time. If you don't have daily article or updates try and at least make sure you've got every other day or so. Its a really good idea to write articles in draft mode and just store them up when you've got time to write so in times when you don't you can easily get a well written post up.
How often should I freshen up website content ?
Uhhh, stated in the previous question ;-)
Is it ok to blog on ActiveRain but also post it elsewhere or is that double dipping and a no-no?
Is it ok? I would suggest it more as a must. If you don't have multiple avenues for pushing out your name its a good idea to not bother at all :-P Kind of like Robert G Allen's idea of "Multiple Streams of Income". Always have multiple blogs at the same time. Even if you have to post an article on one blog and then re-syndicate it onto your other blogs just make sure you link to the original article.
Welcome to Downtown Overland Park,
home of the Downtown
Overland Park Farmers Market, Clock Tower Series Concerts, and other
family-oriented events.
Located just off Metcalf between 78th and 83rd streets in the heart of
Overland Park, Historic Downtown Overland Park is an integral part of our
community's heritage.
Situated on the historic Santa Fe Trail where it originally bustled with
horse-drawn traffic, the famous Steam Electric Interurban Railroad Line, gravel
streets, a dance hall, restaurant, dry goods store, blacksmith shop, The
Aviation Park and other popular amenities that people enjoyed daily.
A century later, Downtown Overland Park's charming past and
small town flavor are thriving through a vast array of
300 locally owned and operated shops, where the business owner
still waits on you. Services include eateries, antiques, art and gift galleries,
specialty shops, and assorted business services.
Prior to incorporation, Overland Park was part of the Mission Urban
Township, which included the cities of Mission and Prairie Village.
William B. Strang Jr. 1905
In the early 1990s, city officials focused their efforts on renovating the
historic downtown area. The Clock Tower Plaza was dedicated and
the
Farmers' Market Pavilion was constructed.
To help you discover some of the highpoints for yourself, self-guided tour
material is available at the Carriage House, 8445 Santa
Fe Drive in the Santa Fe Commons Park and at the Downtown
Overland Park Partnership office, 7315 W. 79th Street.
Strang Aviation Park Pavilion Building 1913
The City of Overland Park traces its roots back to
1905 with the arrival of its founder William B. Strang, Jr., who
platted subdivisions along a military roadway. Strang envisioned a
"park-like"community that was self-sustaining and well
planned. He also sought strong commerce, quality education, vibrant
neighborhoods, convenient transportation and accommodating recreational
facilities.
Strang platted several subdivisions and named one "Overland Park." Many of his
other subdivisions had "Overland" in their names as well. There soon
were more than 21 homes and plenty of businesses.
His limestone car barn at 79th and Santa Fe Drive
is now the site of Traditions Furniture. The Carriage House at
Santa Fe Commons Park, is the site of the Overland
Park Historical Society. Each building is open for tours and
located within the downtown Overland Park business district.
Before Strang's death in 1921, he established several housing developments, an
interurban railroad and an airfield. Remnants from Strang's interurban line
remain today.
Located on Marty between 79th and 80th Streets, the Downtown Overland Park Farmers Market is a thriving open air market offering produce, flowers, specialty foods and entertainment for the entire family.
Open Wednesdays from 7:30am through sellout and Saturdays from 6:30am until sellout, this market offers the best of the best from local growers under the Farmers Market Pavilion.
On the sidewalks near the clock tower, patrons can find fresh pies, gourmet pasta, locally baked bread and other specialty food items.
The Clock Tower Series provides entertainment for the entire family and is the perfect opportunity to bring lawn chairs and gather at this central point in the Historic Downtown Overland Park Business District.
Take a walk through this Historic District and experience the ambiance of Historic Downtown Overland Park!
A easy to use list of all the vendors located at the Overland park Farmers Market :-D
The links provided below take you directly to your chosen vendors Web site allowing you to take a peek at where your produce or flowers are grown.
I'll help guide you through your Overland Park real estate experience step by step, with my Internet Marketing experience and my team of KW Professionals backing me.
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Disclaimer: ActiveRain Corp. does not necessarily endorse the real estate agents, loan officers and brokers listed on this site. These real estate profiles, blogs and blog entries are provided here as a courtesy to our visitors to help them make an informed decision when buying or selling a house. ActiveRain Corp. takes no responsibility for the content in these profiles, that are written by the members of this community.
This morning brings news from around the web of losses to the Google Toolbar PageRank (the little green pixels displayed in the toolbar) for a myriad of sites. The best coverage I've seen comes from 
I responded to a post today and wrote possibly the longest comment I've ever written before so I figured heck, might as well turn it into my own post. Instead of just wasting it or under-utilizing the information. 
Welcome to Downtown Overland Park,
home of the Downtown 
quality education, vibrant
neighborhoods, convenient transportation and accommodating recreational
facilities. 
Located on Marty between 79th and 80th Streets, the Downtown Overland Park Farmers Market is a thriving open air market offering produce, flowers, specialty foods and entertainment for the entire family.
On the sidewalks near the clock tower, patrons can find fresh pies, gourmet pasta, locally baked bread and other specialty food items.
;)
;)
