Welcome to the Q&A Forum

We all agree that the comment to my client's site is spam.

The issue is whether http://apps.pathology.jhu.edu/blogs/pancreas/?p=121 is also a spam site. I initially thought it might be  sophisticated fraud: someone replicated actual content form an authentic Johns Hopkins site with the aim of raking in donations. But that doesn't explain the URL and seemingly legit links.

So I'm left wondering why the bad guy sent spam to my client's site, with an authentic site's URL. What was he hoping to achieve?

Okay, so based on common sense re: author name and generic comment...

...I'm pretty sure this blog comment awaiting approval is aimed at getting users to a phony site in hopes they will make a donation to a fraudster impersonating Johns Hopkins.

But if you check out the URL, you'll see they are not idiots. It's an .edu address with a high DA.

Two questions:

• Are my suspicions well founded?
• How would I go about proving this, in a less clear cut case?

Author : how to grow weed (IP: 173.208.91.231 , 173-208-91-231.ipvnow.com)
E-mail : Diekema@gmail.com
URL    : http://apps.pathology.jhu.edu/blogs/pancreas/?p=121
Whois  : http://whois.arin.net/rest/ip/173.208.91.231
Comment:
After study a few of the blog posts on your website now, and I truly like your way of blogging. I bookmarked it to my bookmark website list and will be checking back soon. Pls check out my web site as well and let me know what you think

Not sure of the technical answer. I'll leave it to others.

But why not publish slightly different versions on the company site and the press release site (unless there is a compliance or disclosure issue.)

Verbatim press releases on company websites often disrespect readers by including things best avoided:

• a hyperlink to a site people are already on
• an "about XYX company" that duplicates material already on the site
• boring, label-like headline wording done for SEO purposes, or to comply with the "news hook" requirement from some PR distribution sites

If I read one more press release headlined "XYZ Company Announces Launch of Super-Duper Widget" I'm gonna scream.

IMHO, best practice is to produce a slightly different version for the website.

Failing that, you can just summarize the news release and link to it on the press release site.

If practical, a better approach is to write different articles on the same topic for different sites.

I know of one subject matter expert who does this to great effect.

Yes, the manual searches are de-personalized.

Almost without exception, each data source is different on each occasion.

I think you should look at any single rankings report -- or even a group of them -- much as smart politicians look at public opinion polls: as snapshots in time subject to random variation

** What matters most are broad trends over time using a variety of data sources. **

I favor a "poll of polls" approach.

Here how I do reporting for a sophisticated client:

• monthly reports on just ten keywords
• data from three sources: SEOMOZ, Raven Tools, and a panel of 5 geographically dispersed people in the US doing depersonalized manual searches using the same devices, IP addresses and browsers each time
• attach equal weight to each of the three data sources

All this smooths things out and you can more readily see the trends.

Like so much else in SEO, client education is the key. When I explained to the client what I was doing and why -- it really helped gain trust and move the relationship to a new level.

i agree. Outsourcing to anyone who doesn't have a deep and strategic command of the brand is a mistake....unless you're just chasing phony metrics.

Let me zoom up to the 30,000 feet level to offer a much broader perspective than a techie/geeky approach that draws on general principles. The reason is simple: your situation is very particular.

As i'm sure you are aware, NLP is hugely controversial. Many consider it a discredited and crackpot theory roughly on a par with the flat earth society. I'm not saying that's true....only that those doing a quick Google search might reach that conclusion.

The Wikipedia article on NLP has a bone of contention for years. It is currently edit-protected and includes the sentence:

"NLP is unsupported by current scientific evidence, and uses incorrect and misleading terms and concepts."

In a former life, I was the editor of a fitness publication. We published an article that drew on some NLP concepts. It provoked a furious response -- up to, and including, suggestions from otherwise rational people that all those responsible for publishing the article should be fired and blacklisted!

Again, I'm not saying I agree or regret publishing the article.

But given all the above, I can see no arguments in favour of including NLP in your domain name and many against.

I am also not suggesting you hide who you are, what you do, or what you believe.

Only that there is a time and place for everything.

Happy New Year!

It's now been almost six weeks since the last update.

I realize we got an extra bonus...

...and I realize that even robots celebrate Christmas.

All that said....

...and having exhausted my limited repertoire of diplomatic politeness...

WTF!

When is the next update????

Just asking. Nicely. (Kinda)

Thanks.

-Daniel

Right. And some of the backlinks you earn from the initial no-follow links can be very valuable. Reporters often begin research with Wikipedia.

Yuck. Very slick. And very wrong, wrong, wrong.

This sort of thing makes me want to puke. But I guess it's the cranky old journalist in me coming out. Your mileage may vary.

But here's how i see it: a rotten-to-the-core pay for play scheme.

The site goes on and on about its high ethical standards -- never an encouraging sign. The fact that the payoffs are disclosed doesn't cure the conflict. It just publicizes them.

The site says the opinions expressed are honestly held. But it also gives advertisers pre-publication censorship rights  in the name of correcting  factual errors ( which is conveniently left undefined. )

I'd stay away. As far as I can see, no law or regulation is being violated. But there is still too much risk of blowback: a real reporter writing a real story about the really dubious tactic of making payoffs for content.

P.S. The site says this about no follow:

Search Friendly Links

Each sponsored link in SocialSpark automatically carries the NoFollow attribute so as not to affect search engine rankings. This is designed to protect Publishers and advertisers from search engine penalties based on paid linking. Publishers and Advertisers participating in the marketplace agree not to circumvent this practice and manually remove the “nofollow” attribute.

My advice: don't  do it.

Sure, the sites might have good feedback now. They probably used dubious tactics that work for a while. Then the tactics stop working. At best, their clients' rankings drop. At worst, penalties are imposed.

It's a bit like asking people about whether they are satisfied with someone who paved their driveway for $99. At first, they will say they are delighted. But try asking 6 months later, after the driveway has cracked.

If you are determined to follow through, at least ask the providers for six references:

• who have been clients for a year
• who you can call yourself

It's extremely unlikely that a single press release will be a significant driver of traffic to web pages. I send out weekly press releases and get anywhere from 100 to 300 page views from 1,000 to 1,500 backlinks. This suggests that many aggregation sites have written rules that say something like : "publish to the site any press release from PR Web that contains the word _______ in the _________."

PR Web has a very high domain authority and established relationships with Yahoo News and other sites. To me, that's the real value -- along with carefully chosen anchor text in a well written press release. In the last few weeks, I've had online pick ups from The Wall Street Journal, The Times of India, and several other first tier outlets. But most are from marginal sites.

Still, the weekly press releases are paying off. I can see the results on SERPs. But this is a long term strategy that depends on spending several hours each week crafting the press release and distribution list. Expecting a single press release to cause a anything other than a small bump  in page views of a landing page is almost certainly hoping for way  too much....especially if it's little beyond a routine product launch.

Here's the real problem. Almost all  press releases suck.  They contain nothing remotely newsworthy and will just annoy the recipients, in the unlikely event human eyes ever see it. So make sure your press release doesn't suck.  Or don't send it.

Also, pick up the phone and talk  to a human a PR Web and ask if there are bulk discounts available.

As for the low end services, I don't think much of them. Distribution is often little beyond spamming the info@ inbox. At the other other end of spectrum is Marketwire, which often distributes directly to opted-in reporters. (PR Web offers something similar at additional cost.)

I've also gotten huge traffic from Reddit, Stumbleupon and guest blog posts. The guest blog posts delivered lower volume but higher quality traffic.

So tactics other than a press release may be a better use of your time and money, especially if you have to hire a copywriter on top of paying the PR Web fee.

Do you regularly update content?

You may have benefitted form Google's most recent algo update.

Several of my sites when up and the tops links were shuffled around.

Try to get the cartoon published on other sites.

Make it an explicit requirement that any such publication also include a link back to your site -- and preferably to a page on which users can take a further action (e.g.. subscribe to a newsletter).

If can make the link one of the keywords you are trying to rank for, so much the better.

So if the cartoon were about the crazy world of office furniture:

• the cartoon would appear on the other site
• It would include something like: Courtesy of Mac's Furniture Warehouse. Check out their blog about office furniture for the inside story about how this cartoon was created
• this leads to your blog, which includes the cartoon and the details about how it was created
• your blog page might also include an email capture field at the bottom (or perhaps a discount offer)

This is quite a bit of work. You will have to contact the sites individually with a well-crafted and polite invitation.

But it sounds like the effort may well pay off in this case.

Why is this even a discussion? It should go without saying that you always want to put your best face forward.

Why risk your reputation with a "good enough" post that gets you the link but could engender a neutral or negative reaction?

The way I was brought up, when someone was nice enough to invite you into their house...you were on your best behaviour.

Thanks. Rami:

Your solution and offer are fascinating. And no worries about the shameless plug pitfall.

The issue for me is clients who may not quite fit into the category of being victims of the scraping/complete sleaze bag racket.

Rather. they are industry leaders who are often victimized by leading content farms (and you know who I mean!) Some poor schmuck gets 15 bucks spending 15 minutes lifting our content without attribution or links by paraphrases it..

Ironically, said content farms claim to have turned over a new leaf, hired reputable journalists as so-called "editors-in-chief" and now want to "partner" with our leading SMEs.

As they used to say in 19th century  Russian novels "What is to be done?"

Love it!

I agree you have to be very careful.

I am only suggesting this approach might be considered in certain circumstances.

Public shaming is an intermediate step somewhere between sending a friendly note, a C&D letter, and suing, provided:

• the other company's identity is known
• the other company cares about its reputation

I am not a lawyer. Nor do I play one on the Internet.

The other company might claim "tortious interference" in its business. (That was the claim against CBS in the tobacco case.) But it's a stretch. A truthful story in a mainstream media outlet poses little risk, IMHO.  Any competent attorney could make the case that the purpose of the story was to inform the public. As for libel, you have to prove "actual malice" or "regardless disregard for the truth" an almost impossible standard to meet of proving your were lying and knew you were lying.

But who wants to go to court? One company I worked for had copyright infringement issues. Enthusiastic fans were using the name and logo without consent. A friendly email was usually all it took for them to either cease and desist or become official affiliates.

But these were basically good people who infringed out of ignorance.

It's different if you're dealing with dirtbags.

Thanks. Very helpful.