How do you decide which answers to trust on here?
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Hi Mike,
Your question is extremely valid, since much of the time to know that an answer is valid, you'd have to already know the answer. Especially with SEO information that continues to change so quickly.
A recent example: I looked up a reference to use utilize for an answer I was giving, and found out it was "in the shop" according to SEOmoz. They now consider it invalid, but I had thought it was gospel for about 15 months.
The biggest thing would have to be the continuity with the other answers and familiarity with the poster over time. As a non-professional SEOer with excellent results for the projects I have taken on, I try to be careful to judge the source too quickly. In my case, I do not want to share my website publicly since it is my own business that has nothing to do with SEO, so in my case it's not a great way to judge my answers I believe.
Good question.
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When I ask a question I am looking for answers from experienced professionals.
I'd say that you will get the most reliable advice when you use your one private question per month. Then your answer is coming from an SEOmoz staff member.
When you ask a public question anybody can answer - experienced professionals, amateurs, kibbitzers and trolls. Those public questions fetch free advice and you know what they say about free advice?
You can even pay for advice and get really really bad stuff.
The problem that we all face is that search engines do not reveal all of the rankings details and even if they do those details can change over time without any notice. On that basis I consider every answer here to be a personal opinion - (but it is always nice to see an answer that links to a quote from a search engine representative like Matt Cutts or an SEO who has published verifiable data. Unfortunately those are not that abundant.)
The bottom line is... I am not going to agree with anybody on every topic. So, I read a lot and make up my mind on what I think makes the most sense from a search engine's perspective and then place my bets.
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Here is something to keep in mind.....
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Free advice usually isn't worth very much.
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Cheap advice is worth even less.
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Expensive advice is sometimes good.
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The biggest thing would have to be the continuity with the other answers and familiarity with the poster over time.
This is a very important point. Some posters can toss out sarcasm and people who don't know them read it as gospel.
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The Citation needed made me laugh out loud for real.
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If you have reason to question a reply, feel free to ask for a citation or other support.
For myself, I was lost in the SEO junkyard for a time. I read various websites and believed the "experts" who shared information. I was using meta keywords on every page and doing a lot of things wrong. Later, I learned from my own experiences along with many experiments. Also, you will begin to follow Matt Cutts and others who really are trusted industry experts and began to form your own ideas.
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But by asking here, how will you know who is giving you the right advice on which advice to follow! [brain asplode]
I think you should just use advice here as starting points and verify yourself that what they're saying is, as best as you can tell, correct.
Using sites linked in profiles isn't necessarily a sign that they know what the're doing (my linked sites aren't sites I work on, though I should really update them with decent ones) but even if they were awesome I have on occasion given 'bad' advice, or at least been lazy with my analysis of the problem, so assuming you took that into account it's still not guaranteed to be good advice every time.
There's obviously the good answers and endorsements on their Q&A profile, but then again, not everybody uses the Q&A much or can just blanket answer every question and pick up a number of Good Answers.
Links to 'official' answers are often the best knowledge the industry as a whole has, beyond experimenting themselves (you may or may not be surprised at what Google would like you to think they can do versus what they can actually do).
So, realistically, you can't. You can just see what looks right and verify to the best of your abilities. Ultimately anything you do is going to come down on your head, so, test or find something 'official' that backs up what's said.
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Well, if the answers are wildly off they would be taken to account by the other posters or the SEOmoz staff, and you can always drill further down into the problem once you get a reply
The biggest challenge on this forum is that the questions are very generic, leading to very generic answers. Be as specific as possible and you will get great advice
BTW Looking at my personal site would give you no indication of what I do, as I work in an Agency and my time is spent on client sites. Some great SEOs have pretty mediocre personal websites
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Good discussions from everyone, thank you! I had several motives in asking. One was of course to get all of your views, and they did confirm my intrinsic thought process, and the second was the test the assumption that only individuals who where pretty good at all this would answer (this proved to be true) and therefore giving me some insight into feeling more confident when I read your responses on here, and the last was to get more points, because I really like free stuff*.
- the later statement is a a partial truth.
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This is a great question and feel that some type of disclaimer or warning should be placed somewhere quite clearly on the QA.
I strongly recommend paying for advice - and make sure the individual has done what you are trying to do.
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Even if we don't always chime in, the SEOmoz staff and associates are here and we review the questions and answers. We'll add a comment if something isn't quite right, or endorse a good answer, or provide an answer ourselves. The thumb system is in place here like it is on the blog, so you can see if others have agreed or disagreed with a particular answer.
I second what Ryan Kent says as well -- if you need more information or an answer doesn't feel write, ask for the additional citation or more background.
Welcome to Q&A, and I look forward to seeing what you have to say. Please feel free to use the Feedback links for any comments to SEOmoz that you may have about the site!
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I strongly recommend paying for advice - and make sure the individual has done what you are trying to do.
It's unfortunate but the SEO industry does not have any proper credentials. There are TONS of SEO "experts" who may have a nice website, office, etc. but are quite frankly lost in the world of SEO. There are SEO professionals today who charge clients to update their meta keyword tags and advise clients to buy links.
I would trust free advice from EGOL or Alan above the paid advice from many other "experts".
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well you need to find someone good - and that is hard - i suppose its word of mouth - and now you have just endorsed EGOL and Alan - they may get more work!
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I don't think either of them will ever be without work!
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There are certain influential people on this forum (i'm not naming names) that give answers that don't answer much and are much more a response to a question rather than an actual answer.
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Sometimes "perspectives" are more valuable than "answers".
Since most of the people who post in public Q&A are donating their time to your question maybe it is best to view their response as a gift that can be ignored or accepted.
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I agree EGOL, it's very charitable for some of the forum members to give feedback in any capacity.
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It's a valid question. I've been a web developer since 1996 with an interest in search long before the term SEO was coined but am not very active on SEO Moz so my profile doesn't present me as being very knowledgeable.
Bear in mind that, as in life, people are participating in this forum for all kinds of reasons.
SEO Moz is a great resource, and as you take advantage of it you will start to form your own opinions. Ask questions when you are stumped, and look for a consensus among helpful answers. That's what I do.
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I think the concept of an influential person is an individual assumption. That's really the core of the question. I know I spend 30 minutes a day or so on the Q.A. and do try and give valuable answers. It's not charity, it's a business culture.
I feel that in In SEO there are many who feel they want to help, but don't want to give away there hard earned intellectual property or experience, which makes sense, so they have a tendency to teach people to fish, instead of handing them a fish (so to speak).
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Well I'm pretty sure, in fact I know, that I've answered questions before with an answer I thought was correct and then found out through others on here that it was in fact incorrect. I'd like to think that happens every time I'm wrong but possibly not (partially so the person who asked the question gets the right answer, but mainly because I like to know if I'm wrong about something).
So yeah, certainly I've given wrong answers accidentally but then there are people on here who are far more experienced than I am who I'm sure wouldn't make that same mistake. From spending time on here you get to know who the people are who really know their stuff and so I would trust their answers a lot. Also, I think most of us will be able to intuitively tell if something "seems wrong" and would question it.
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Haha yes EGOL and Alan, along with a couple of others on here... I would certainly trust their answers above any paid experts too. They should form some kind of SEO A-Team!
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