Web Marketing Strategy Update

Have you read any of the new Google patent releases yet? I suggest you do, or at least learn more about them. Not that you’ll find anything concerning underwear — I just made that up! But what you will find is a plethora of strategies Google is either already using, planning to implement, or considering for possible use in its search algorithm.

If you’re not one who keeps up with what Google’s doing, or didn’t read the last patent release, it will probably come as something of a surprise to discover how wide reaching Google’s ideas on ranking factors are.

As well as information on things that many SEO’ers already believed to be part of the algorithm, or have been expecting to see implemented, the Google patent also contains quite a few new strategies that on first reading have given rise to some considerable concern in the SEO world.

But before you start pulling your hair out and thinking Google has everything sewn up and all resistance is futile, bear in mind that as it’s a patent, it’s very likely that Google is also to some degree simply, “covering all the bases.” Knowing the SEO community would pounce on it for clues as soon as it was released, it’s also conceivable that there are some red herrings in there too. What’s left is to decide what’s probable and what isn’t.

To shed some light on that, your best bet is to read some of the discussions and analysis of the new Google patent that can be found on Google using this and similar searches.

If you’re in the mood for a long read you could also take a look at patents 20050071741 and 20070094254, both of which list the illustrious Google mouthpiece, Matt Cutts, as one of the inventors. You might also want to visit this hyperlinked list of Google patents or search for more Google patents at Google Patent Search.

Squidoo is the brain child of popular and latterly philanthropic marketer Seth Godin, who’s also the author of a small pile of marketing books containing some pretty revolutionary thinking.

The idea is that anyone can set up a “Lens” on any topic they choose, sharing information for the purposes of building reputation, drawing traffic to other websites, making money or just for fun.

Simply a web page with a hip new name, besides giving you space to write on your subject of choice, a lens has modules to optionally add stuff like RSS feeds, items from Amazon, polls, photos from Flickr, etc.

A lot of time has now passed, but if I remember correctly, the basic premise in setting up Squidoo was that search engines would never be able to deliver what people want, and that the people themselves would make a better job of it by voting with their feet as it were, from amongst Lenses created by others knowledgeable on a subject.

Here’s the Oct 2005 post on Seth’s blog with the free ebook download introducing Squidoo and explaining the concept of “everyone’s an expert.”

Personally I think it’s a flawed idea, because the member group will always be far too small to cover everything, people using Squidoo to position themselves as experts will not point you to competing experts in their field unless it involves financial reward, and many of the true experts will never join Squidoo anyway.

Although Squidoo comes across as egalitarian, virtuous (you can donate part or all revenues from your Lens to charity) and bordering on cuddly toy fluffy in its language, I can only see Lenses as a promotion tool. Perhaps I’m just not a “giving” enough person.

Anyway, I’m drifting. The point is Google loves Squidoo, and carefully planned Lenses bring you PR, backlinks and traffic. Between that and promoting products or affiliate programs directly on your Lens, Squidoo is a money-maker.

But now there’s another, newer place called Hubpages. It’s very similar to Squidoo. In fact, you’d probably be correct in saying it’s a copy.

But it’s got me wondering if Seth’s Squidoo story is going to be like that of Friendster creator Jonathan Abrams: First to market but almost eclipsed by newer rivals who copied the idea but did it better (”better” is of course, subjective. Perhaps I should have said, “more successfully”).

Is Hubpages better? Well, I guess that’s for you to decide. But since it’s faster and easier to use from a purely promotional perspective, and also seems to be getting some Google love, it has my vote. For now at least.