google: Long Tails and Long Shots
- 05/15/08 02:59 AM
I use Site Meter and Get Clicky to track search terms people use to miraculously land on one of my sites. Search terms like San Diego Real Estate, or Carlsbad Real Estate or Luxury Homes on Google's revered Page One are logical and rewarding, but it's the odd stuff that snares fancy and fascination. I mean, what are the chances of ending up up on Google's Page One for something as cool as golf ball stats--all because of a tongue-in-cheek blog on California's Errant Golf Ball Disclosure (written at the urging of Kevin Boer and Pat Kitano). Cheez...I wonder how much … (14 comments)
google: Beware of Duplicate Content Penalties on Your Blog
- 01/16/08 03:51 PM
I write for two separate blogs in addition to Active Rain: San Diego Previews (a real estate blogsite) and Luxury Home Digest (blog). Both are run on the open source WordPress platform with custom tweaking from the gurus at the Real Estate Tomato. I participated in an Advanced SEO class with blogging coach Justin Smith last week and picked up a very important tip: Beware of garnering duplicate content penalties from Google by placing your blog articles into too many categories. Immediately after class, I checked both blogs and cringed. Hundreds of entries were placed into multiple categories on my blogs. If I wrote … (79 comments)
google: Great Gossip: Google Going for GoDaddy?
- 09/05/07 03:04 AM
Rumors and gossip are are madly swirling around a possible Google and GoDaddy marriage. Around two years ago, Google became accredited as a domain name registrar. Meanwhile, GoDaddy, the world’s largest domain registrar, has been busy filing patent applications for search, VOIP and other technologies that would make it an attractive buy to acquisition-hungry Google. Several of GoDaddy’s recent and interesting patents would help propel one of Web 3.0’s suggested features: Online reputation. Onlline eweek says that GoDaddy’s search results could be filtered and sorted according to the “reputation score of a domain name or that domain name owner’s reputation.” … (21 comments)
google: Real Estate Bloggers in the News
- 04/10/07 06:42 AM
"Blogging has become a key marketing tool for real estate agents." Michelle Mowad, a talented writer for the San Diego Business Journal, called last week inquiring about real estate blogging and the impact it is having on our San Diego real estate business and life. We talked about Web 2.0 social networking sites like MySpace and how blogging is such a natural communications platform for real estate agents and potential clients. We had a great discussion, and covered a broad range of topics including long tail searches, how Google loves blogs and how a busy Realtor finds time to blog (I arise earlier and have pretty … (6 comments)
google: MLS: Time for a Name Change?
- 10/15/06 05:38 AM
I decided to do some research on how our local MLS systems fell asleep on the job. The situation is even worse than I thought. It appears that the controlling powers, who protect our interests, have grossly failed to protect the MLS name. Some random findings: http://www.chicagomls.com/ is privately owned and is available for $9613.00 (Perhaps the Chicago Board of Realtors could pick it up on behalf of membership???) http://www.losangelesmls.com/ --as well as http://www.californiamls.com/ and http://www.sanfranciscomls.com/ are privately owned by Virtual Office Realty and Bill Bastine, the "designated broker"--neither of whom appear to be licensed by the California Department of Real Estate. http://www.coloradomls.com/ and http://www.denvermls.com/ are also privately owned and the … (20 comments)
google: Research Nuggets
- 09/27/06 02:31 AM
In a mood of curiosity, I searched “real estate blog” in the Google toolbar. At the top of the organic list was http://houseblogger.typepad.com/ , Tim O’Keefe’s Real Estate Marketing blog. Some attributed nuggets: 1. Eight out of ten buyers who used the Internet to find a home, used an agent to help complete the transaction. 2. A September 2006 survey of consumers by Discover Small Business Watch found that 61 % of home sellers said they would prefer the services of an agent versus only 4 percent who said they would prefer an online service to help sell their homes. (What about the other … (4 comments)
google: Click Fraud: The Dark Side
- 09/22/06 08:16 AM
There has been some discussion in the Active Rain forum about the pros and cons of pay per click (PPC) versus organic searches, whereby your site shows up naturally when certain search terms are entered into various search engines. Click fraud has become a very hot topic in the PPC world, and www.Businessweekonline.com devoted an interesting article to this issue. The controversy lies not so much with the PPC advertising on Yahoo or Google sites, but rather the extensive fraud that occurs when these ads are recycled to millions of other sites. These can run the gamut, say, from cnn.com or foxnews.com to … (4 comments)
google: Quirky Search Terms
- 09/21/06 04:25 AM
Bob Pavey asked in my earlier blog how our website ranked for area searches. I responded that search term ranking is a lot like juggling and it depends upon the search term and the search engine. I also wish that every term for every city or community or neighborhood or home could lead to me. That, regrettably, will never be. But sometimes, visitors land on our site using some pretty strange search terms. We use Advanced Access, because it is robust and allows for some pretty cool web statistics and search minutiae. Once in awhile, I browse search terms to see what lead a … (6 comments)
google: Link for the Day: Google Talk
- 09/04/06 03:44 AM
Perhaps this has been addressed previously, but it appears Google is at it again. This time, they are offering a beta download for Google Talk, which will allow for a connectivity button within your gmail account. http://www.google.com/talk/ I haven't explored it fully, but there appears to be a way to access MS Outlook via gmail. Anyone here done this yet? … (6 comments)
google: Duplicate Content
- 09/02/06 03:26 AM
I am struggling with the duplicate content issue. Would I be penalized by Google and other search engines if I were to republish writings from ActiveRain to my website or other blog and vice versa? I am not speaking of the plagiarism issue that is raging here now (and rightly so), but rather the republicaton of one's own work. I have researched the issue and find lots of discussion: http://www.searchenginejournal.com/?p=1886 http://searchengineoptimism.com/SEO_Tutorial/google-duplicate-content.html http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?answer=35769 http://www.seobook.com/archives/001230.shtml Still don't know the answer and am hoping those more knowledgeable can shed some light. TIA! … (4 comments)
google: Spiders for Dummies
- 08/30/06 02:57 AM
As I understand the process, search engine "spiders" crawl the web incessantly and do little other than index web pages. The data they gather is stored. Later, using some obscure and esoteric algorithms, it is determined how pages and websites will be ranked with Google, Yahoo, MSN and other search vehicles. Many in this forum might wish to understand (hah!) and learn how to attract these spiders. But to divine what words and text could woo these critters, it might be helpful to see how your site is seen through their eyes. This cool tool (Search Engine Spider Simulator) will allow you to evaluate your … (9 comments)
I use Site Meter and Get Clicky to track search terms people use to miraculously land on one of my sites. Search terms like San Diego Real Estate, or Carlsbad Real Estate or Luxury Homes on Google's revered Page One are logical and rewarding, but it's the odd stuff that snares fancy and fascination.
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