Bruce Clay 1 Day SEO Training will be held on the 28th May 2013 in Sydney.
Training will be from 9-5 and covers all marketers and web-masters should know from an SEO perspective and more. Some technical, but mainly an intro and then through to more advanced concepts such as site structure and link building later in the day. We also have some Penguin updates coming up, so both Panda and Penguin will be covered as part of the 1 day training.
Training includes manuals, access to the SEOToolset as well as teas and lunches on the day. We are at 22 Pitt Street, so convenient for bus, train and ferry.
Bruce Clay has been training since 2000 in the United States and since 2008 in Sydney. This is World Class training and we rate 4.8/5 in our reviews on average.
SEO is the cheapest and most effective way of driving traffic to your website and is a core skill every digital marketer should have. With the proliferation of data, search will only continue to grow. You need to be present and relevant.
Used Giant Mountain Bike for Sale. This bike is sic to the power of rad, as they say and will get you offroad and credible before you can count to $500.
The bike is used, but is hardcore and not for the feint hearted. You can get the full spec here, including Shimano Deore deraileurs and disc brakes as well as Aluminium frame and new saddle. Recently serviced, solid and reliable and lots of fun. The Mountain Bike for sale is here, but only for this weekend, it has to go.
You most likely will want to hit the trails hard with this bike, but you can also ride to the shops for bread and milk. Just watch for any jumps or or obstacles which will jump into your path. This bike to too much fun to ride in a straight line. Good luck bidding, it will go quick and the owner will be sad. Only to a good home.
Speaking at the Social Media Franchising conference today at the Australia Technology Park on the intersection of SEO and Social Media and how each platform supports or in some cases does not support search engine rankings.
The full conference agenda can be found here, thanks to the organisers for including me on the agenda.
Slides will be put up on slideshare after the conference and linked too from here.
Well its the 2013 Sydney Search Marketing Expo or SMX Sydney next week from the 3rd – 4th April 2013. The event is being held at the Hilton Hotel in the heart of the Sydney CBD. If you don’t know how to get there and need directions to SMX, you can find them here. The conference is focussed primary around search, organic and paid, but anyone in online will get value with sessions on data, conversion rate optimisation, persona development as well as social and e commerce. In other words, its all happening at SMX.
While I really enjoy SMX, catching up with old colleagues as well as others in the Industry, Bruce Clay, the greatest SEO company in Australia will be there and has been a sponsor since inception.What makes this year great is that I will be speaking. OK, I did speak last year but only once on a really arbitrary topic.
This information might cause 2 responses. 1) Whose Jeremy Bolt? or 2) I’m cancelling my ticket. Hopefully yours is the the first at least.
My sessions FYI are:
3rd April (Wednesday) at 11:00 on maximising enterprise SEO. If you are in a larger corporate or want t understand more on implementing and getting results in an enterprise environment, then this is for you. We work with many of Australia’s largest websites and leading brands, and have seen a lot in this space and learnt how to get things done to achieve results. I also have a Q&A at 12:00 on the topic.
4th April (Thursday), my favourite topic at 11:15 is Persona’s and Conversion Rate Optimisation. Something most have heard of, know they need to do, but is often easier said than done, and then what to do with them once you have them. Bit like Google Glass. You know they are cool, everyone is talking about them, but really what will I actually use them. But then that’s not the point is it? Attend to learn how to make profits from your personas!
Oh, and there will be some other speakers there as well, forgot to mention that. Some international and some local. Marty Weintraub of Aimclear, I have met Marty on various occasions and he should not be missed, full of energy and excellent ideas when it comes to social media. Rand Fishkin, name rings a bell, can’t remember though. I think he is involved somehow with SEOmoz? Some of the trusted locals like Chris Dimmock of Cogentis (He was there before the beginning of SEO), Dejan Petrovic of Dejan ofcourse, aka “the green machine” and doing some great things online, Monte Huebsch, always has a good story from left field and entertaining, Philip Shaw of Cleverclicks and ofcourse that old legend Mark Vozzo who is now with Salesforce. The full list of speakers can be found here.
Bruce Clay
Bruce Clay, one of the leading and largest providers of SEO and CRO services in Australia will also have a booth at SMX, so if you are there pop in, enter our competitions, for a SEO training place or to win the SEO for Dummies books and just so you know, the Dummies book is not our reference guide, we co wrote it. Also, pop in and ask your questions, we have lovely people on the stand who would be happy to answer your questions and also demonstrate our Toolset.
SEO, SEO, SEO, SEO, SEO, SEO,SEO,SEO, SEO – Sorry density wasn’t high enough for the page for this term!
This weekend I did the fastest ride in Australia, a jet flight over the Hunter Valley. An excellent experience for those of you who fly desks during the week. Mark Precy and his son Mark run Jet Ride and they fly from Cessnock airport in whats called an Albatross but essentially a central European fighter jet, probably which was hip around the 70′s or 80′s and would stand absolutely no chance against a MIG or an F16, but fortunately none of those around, or none that we knew of. Definitely not the best plane for a dog fight but it does just fine for this purpose, buzzing around the Hunter airspace and making the Tiger Moth which took off before us look very very slow. The jet looks good and well maintained and parking is easy at the airport in Cessnock.
The briefing is pretty basic and you sign all sorts of forms to say you might get injured or die and that that is your problem, from the actual flight to just getting into the plane. You get suited in what my kids called a “military suit”, its green and get the helmet and then off you go. There is a mic, so you are always in touch with the pilot and if you get a video, everything is recorded. Not a lot of time wasted but you do not feel rushed. Mark is a really nice guy and gives you confidence in his ability and that of the jet. The only disconcerting thing was putting on a parachute and getting told if you hear the words “get out, get out, get out!”, don’t say “oh Shit ” and start crying in the foetal position or say “but we are 25,000 feet high”, just GTFO and pull the rip cord. Fortunately I landed with parachute still packed. There is also no loo on board and no hostesses serving snacks and drinks. I kind of expected these given the cost of the trip. But hey…
Hunter Valley Jet Flight
You take off and feel the amazing power of the single jet engine and its thrust. Think basically 2 guys sitting on a big engine. Before long you are high, like really high and its effortless. Then Mark says how about talking the wheel (Joystick) which I wanted to respond with, “How about you get optimise a website” , but flying at 700km an hour is actually easier than you think and before long its turns and barrel rolls, literally skimming across the top of the clouds at 20,000 feet odd. Absolutely breathtaking. You also don’t get a choice about the flying bit, as he holds his hands up, so you actually have to take the proverbial wheel, I think secretly he had his knees on it though. Little nerve racking to start but you get into it quickly.
Just as you get comfortable, its rolls, loops, 4 point turns, straight up and so on, and the G force is unbelievable. Unlike anything you have ever felt before. This is real fun and not something you will do a lot. The time flies and the its time to head home and land, all at high speed after what seems like a couple of minutes. Its almost impossible to lift your arm at some stages of the loop with the G’s and then at others you are weightless.
If this is on your bucket list, don’t wait, save up and do it. Its not something that everyone gets to do and I’m thankful at having the opportunity. Thanks to Mark for an excellent experience. BTW this is not a paid review, I received this as a Birthday gift from a special person.
On top of all of this you get to see the Hunter Valley as you haven’t seen it before.
Stats on the jet, it is pressurised, so can fly up to 37,000 feet off and has a top speed of over 700kmph. Check out the Jetride website for more. If you can read Czechoslovakian the cockpit will make a lot more sense.
Final point on the flight, the time you buy starts from the moment you get into the jet and it switches on, so it includes time on the ground, which is around 5 minutes and then landing again. Just saying.
Garmin 610 Forerunner
I could not resist wearing my Garmin 610 during the flight to see how it stacked up. I think it was very confused by the whole exercise, I regret now not wearing my heart rate monitor as well. Key stats from the flight per my Garmin were as follows:
Time 22:30 minutes
Distance 93.7km
Moving speed average 14s per kilometre
Elevation gain was shown as 970m max, but I know we went higher than this, so not sure the Garmin kept up in this department
Temperature 24 degrees, per Connect.Garmin
Below is the mapping of my flight. One point, I have an alert set at 1 km intervals for running which I forgot to turn off so while flying the Garmin was in a constant spasm trying to tell me we had travelled 1km when we had already travelled another km if you know what I mean.
My final unfair prognosis of the Garmin.
The Garmin 610 is no replacement for the instruments in a fighter jet
Remember to turn off the alerts or it wont be much good
Do not trust the elevation readings, there is a good chance you will end up underground
I reckon I have the only Garmin in the world which has clocked speeds of over 650km per hour. I definitely will not be using the virtual racer on this one.
Overall an excellent day for me and my watch. Now back to my desk and running down the road in traffic.
Go search for “online auctions” or “used cars” and you will find eBay missing, who was at one stage one of the biggest spenders of Adwords with Google. Search for “online books” or “buy Books” and Amazon is nowhere and eBay on the first search term is the 12th paid ad, not a big effort. Other than a search for brand, i.e. “eBay” or “eBay cars” where there is an ad and for the second term again a poor generic effort not even using the term cars.
So has eBay and Amazon lost interest in paid search? If so, why?
Well, according to research published in the Harvard Business Review Blog,eBay has done some research in March 2012 in a controlled trial and found that paid ads generated virtually no change in sales when removed. People found eBay anyway. So eBay are now saving tonnes of money not buying paid search ads.
So the main point of the research is that you should always challenge conventional marketing methods and check your data. What works for other may not be working for you. But beware, very often a short term trail can miss longer term declines.
From my point of view, I think this is fine if you are a category leader, with ongoing above and below the line adspend anyway, but I wouldn’t try this as a small business who is relatively unknown, for obvious reasons. Brands in this space that come to mind would be Apple, Google, eBay, Amazon etc. Category leaders in most cases.
I’m still not sure however why they are buying brand terms, i.e. “eBay”. We noticed a number of ads using “eBay” or “Amazon” as a keyword or in the ad, but on brand your organic result typically with sitelinks and all, would be #1 and generally convert the best. So why buy it? Having said that, if you sell through resellers, you might consider buying your product brand, but that’s about it.
B&T has also posted an article on this. A large scale field experiment concluded brand keywords have zero short term benefits. New and infrequent users may be influenced, but loyal users are not. Google has come back firing saying that their research shows that 89% of search clicks are incremental and 50% incremental even when there was a branded organic results and we encourage advertisers to test. If you have no idea what incremental clicks are, searchengineland tries to explain here.
Since I started running, I have learnt the importance of having a strong base or core. Basically building your calves, thighs and butt or glutes are going to help you run faster when you reach that plateau and reduce injury, especially from my experience with the Piriformis muscle and injury to the Iliac Crest which took some months to recover from. The Piriformis issue is more common and results from a pinched nerve and results in a pain in the butt, literally and also what is called wallet syndrome, guys would know this, sitting on your wallet for too long, compresses some nerves. I was initially diagnosed with the first and then diagnosed myself with the Iliac Crest problem after much reading and confused looks from medical practitioners. Turns out, I have 1 week calf, as my distances got higher, over 20kms my hips started to compensate for this issue and eventually it felt as if the muscle had torn of my hip bone, not pleasant. Even after weeks of rest, it would happen after 2,4kms exactly. Took months to get over completely.
To fix this I went to a Chiropractor who shall remain nameless in the Sydney CBD but who I felt was more interested in separating me from my hard earned cash and after a few weeks of treatment had no idea why I had arrived in the first place other than to tell me continuously my spine was out. Maybe I didn’t click!! Anyway, combining this with core strength training seems to have fixed the issue. I think the core training and lots of stretching around this area did it and I have Adam Carter to thank for this who helped a lot. I am still doing this and using the Lebert Equalisers as well. More on this in a minute. I digress.
I also found that switching from Asics Gel Kayano to Mizuno Elixr had a profound effect, not only on speed but in less injury. I have run in Kayanos for years bit it was only after I started running over 10kms that I started having issues. After the Elixr’s the Kayano’s felt like running in high heels. I still wear them around (the Asics), they are super comfortable but I am a firm believer in Mizuno now, even thought they are fugly. Average minutes/ km dropped when I started running in the Elixr’s dropped by 30s and I feel much more in touch wth the surface I am running on and have had no injury. The height drop is from around 22mm to around 16mm in the heel, odd.
I am understanding the barefoot movement and also bought some Adidas Adipure motion shoes. These are ridiculous, like wearing nothing, but I use them only on grass and even then you realise how many muscles in your feet you are not using and are getting lazy from these super padded running shoes we all wear. One word of caution, be careful about running out and going minimalist, your calves and feet muscles need to catch up. Avoid hard surfaces to start or say hello to more injury, especially over 5km.
What I actually wanted to mention today was the Lebert Equalizers, which Adam introduced to me and while initially sceptical I am now a firm believer. Also many of my Bruce Clay colleagues have since also purchased a set and still use them. They are essentially 2 bars as per the image I used from Supply Fitness, which is Adams Shop.
I use these at home, 1-2 times a week and they have helped build core and stretch the hip areas. The program which I use, which I wanted to share as part of this post, sorry, long round about way of getting there is the following, about an hour and should burn depending on your heart rate and effort 400-600 calories for a largish male and leave you stiff with muscles you didn’t know you had the next day. Make sure you warm up first and take this from whence it comes, if you are unhealthy, never exercised before, uncoordinated, prone to bouts of stupidness, clueless, accident prone or generally useless maybe you should consult a health professional first. For the rest with enough common sense, this is the program I have been using which works really well. Repeat the below 3 times and around 12 reps depending on your size and strength. With things like the sideways squat or forward lunges, its 12 per leg.
Lebert Equaliser Program
Squats, holding the LE out front
Pull Ups using both LE, 1 on either site
Forward lunge and sideways turn holding LE out front and then to the side
Push ups using the LE (See video below)
Sideways squats holding the LE out front
Pull ups using 1 LE
Romanian dead lift using the LE
Calf raises using the base of the LE. Hold onto something for balance
Dips, using both LE
Forward tilt, into LE. On your knees lean forward on the LE and work your arms
If you battling with injury or just need to build you core, I think these are pretty good and for the ladies there is Pink as well. Beware of cheap knock offs, the real thing also comes with a DVD to help ypu get started.
The video below gives you some idea of the versatility, video has some wind noise but gives you an idea:
Today I had the fortune of listening to and meeting Grace Mully from the Mully Childrens Family. When I decided to go, I really through this would be a bad way to spend Sunday morning, but what an inspiring women and what a story, thus this blogpost. The Mully Childrens Family is a charity/ foundation started by her father.
The Mully childrens family essentially looks after kids that have no family in Kenya and what started as Mully senior taking in 3 kids off the street into his home and giving up his day job to start looking after these kids (he already had 8 of his own), has grown over time to now encompass 4 properties, looking after 2,200 children who have no parents, no hope and in many cases were living on the streets. Some cases also involve sexual, physical and mental abuse of the children. They offer an education, sport, care and more. Your can read more about what the Mully childrens family does here, and find them on Facebook here. These are people who are making a difference and who are passionate about what they are doing, which is helping others. Not many people who would take the property they had purchased to retire on and put a school for homeless kids on it. Thats what Mully senior did.
I was humbled by the story, looking at my kids, more worried about whether they can in fact have Sushi for lunch and what App to download next versus these kids who have absolutely nothing, every day being a struggle to survive, made me realise how fortunate we are in Australia and how over time we can take things for granted.
So well done Grace, thank you for coming to Australia, thank for your sharing your story, it changed my Sunday and made me realise I blessed I have been in my life and how thankful I ought to be. There is always someone worse off. I will be supporting your organisation over time and would encourage others to do so as well. Safe travels back to Africa.
So you’ve heard the noise, Google Glass is getting closer and you should be able to buy your yours in 2013.
Making technology more human, wearable technology. But hang, on now I have to wear glasses?
Specs from Techradar include: Voice operated (input and output), runs on Android, has camera with flash, GPS so is location aware. You can scroll and click with head actions supposedly, like by tilting your head. Also Wifi and Bluetooth to send pictures with bone induction for sound (It vibrates your skull). It has 3G and 4G connections and designed as a stand alone rather than a Smartphone accessory. They should cost around the price of a Smartphone, but you can pre order a developer version for $1,500. Awesome.
So what the hell do we do with these and what will people do with them eventually? Will I look like a dork wearing these?
Well deliver information directly relevant to your surroundings. OK! Not let people around you know you are videoing them or taking pictures. Cool, might be interesting on a nudist beach or if you were a spy, except the “take video” command might give you away. Be more subtle, pretending you are listening, when you are actually checking Facebook, the constant head tilting might give you away? Watch the Terminator video while visiting Grandma? Check email while you are away from your desk? Uh, Great! Oh, and yes you will look like a dork. With battery and all, its likely they will be heavy and with all the neck tilting required, you might want to find a chiropractor as well.
Seriously, Im not out that often that I need to find a new restaurant or coffee shop everyday. Usually I’m in the same place. My office only moves every 3 years odd and I move house even less than that! Its also not often I jump out of helicopters or planes and if I was paying $1,000 for them I might not want to do any dangerous pursuits with them anyway. How on earth would I get the camera to record during a ballet. Blurt our “take picture” as the ballerina is in the middle of a jump!
So seriously, what could you use them for?
We don’t really know and neither does Google, so they have just had a competition. But some niche ideas would include:
Trying to follow instructions of a video or live interaction. Maybe doing brain surgery or flying a jumbo and getting instruction as you go? Hands free?
If you had facial recognition, never having that awkward moment when you forget someone’s name and cannot introduce your partner
App that allows you to scan a barcode without voice operation to check the price and bring up the best alternative and cheapest while you are negotiating with the salesman?
Navigation, while on foot, or in a car? Easy one!
Record your surroundings, if you were in a dodgy neighbourhood?
I’m thinking they will be banned from use while driving, very quickly. Privacy laws will have to be revised again. Hang on, they have been revised yet. What on earth will I do with my hands? They are usually tick ticking on a tiny keyboard, they are gonna go crazy just sitting in my pockets, while my mouth has all the fun. Hang on, how often is it actually quiet enough to use voice commands? Might annoy the other passengers on the train or bus, with the kids around it would nearly impossible. Obviously not for parents, it would only be a matter of time before junior got hold of them and destroyed them.
Well I guess you could find your friends if they were close. Chances are though, if they were close and in the pub and hadn’t told you, maybe there is a reason, like you are a dork and were not invited. Now the irritating guy keeps on finding us as well! I guess if you are single this might work, and a serious party animal, and all your friends constantly check in and you are all too useless to make any arrangements beforehand, maybe? Can’t beat just sending a text and finding out where they are, or a couple of emails during the week? In fact all of these things can currently be done on a Smartphone which has a better camera, keyboard and phone. But hey, wearable computing is where its at and we had to start somewhere. Like a mini GoPro on your head me thinks!
Apple however has a new iWatch, we think. So throw that Breitling or Seiko out, cos you can get an Apple watch with a smaller screen, and which can do less than you Smartphone can currently do. Seriously?
Actually Google Glass is not for us, it is for the next generation of children who won’t know keyboards, will live life never far from a touch screen and will expect always on connectivity. They will know what to do with it. Until then, all you geeks have fun! Now where is my iPhone?
