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For whatever reason, I was doing the following search on Google: “can women take Tylenol while pregnant”

Now, Google has gotten pretty darn good at returning relevant top 3 search results. So good, that I’ve taken it for granted.

But I encourage you all to reconstruct the search that I did above, and to look at the NUMBER ONE FREAKIN’ RESULT.

Assuming that this will be fixed within a few days of being identified, I present the following:

Cached page
Original Link

Thoughts?

Sometimes you don’t need to write an article because someone else has done it perfectly. And sometimes you read the perfect article that you just have to share with everyone else.

Fortunately, I’ve discovered that article in 21 SEO Tips For 2007 (pdf)

Even the vast majority of linkbait written these days is 99% fluff and if you’re lucky you’ll find one new piece of advice or useful bit of information.

But GaryTheScubaGuy has written a truly insightful, “every word counts,” 33 page article detailing what works and what doesn’t work for SEO and web promotion in 2007.

Check it out. It’s a must read gem.
http://www.halfagain.com/Top_21_SEO_Tips_For_2007_Final.pdf

Misinformation is a bitch – it usually happens when people who are pushing their own views either bend the truth or (more likely) omit certain facts when presenting their ideas.

Case in point – the whole brouhaha around sponsored themes. Of course, many sponsored themes are being distributed with the sole purpose of building backlinks / making money out of selling sponsored or hidden links. However, brushing all sponsored themes with the same tag and calling them evil is lazy at best and wrongful discrimination at worst.

Case in point – a question asked today by a Performancing member.

On the September 07 Theme Sponsorship post, Performancing member Wilson Chua asks:

Hi guys,

I am a bit concerned, as i use a lot of sponsored themes, but Matt Cutts, in his whitehat-SEO-tips-for-bloggers.ppt, in slide 25 mentions:

“Dont use sponsored theme- can lose all your trust in different search engines”

I hope there is an error here somewhere…..

This has nothing to do directly with Performancing.com’s sponsored themes, and yet people sometimes doubt us because whenever ‘white-hat’ SEOs talk about sponsored themes, they forget to (or neglect to) mention that it’s not sponsored themes that are bad, but the ‘source’ that can be bad.

It’s a bit like saying that you shouldn’t drink milk because it contains growth hormones, fat, cholestrol, etc and is dangerous for your health (please, I’m not starting a debate on milk here 🙂 ). It’s presenting one side of the story, or in this case, just the possible negative effects without mentioning the positive effects OR giving any weight to the fact that there is a good chance those negative consequences will NOT happen to you.

But fear-mongering works exactly this way – take something that people don’t understand fully (search engine penalties), take another common fear that people understand and are genuinely worried about on a large scale (being banned from search engines) and put them together while conveniently omitting the fact that it doesn’t apply to all cases (or all sponsored themes).

Here’s the answer I gave to Wilson:

If your sponsored theme is packed with two dozen hidden links and a dozen links to completely unrelated and SPAMMY sites, then you are in trouble, yes.

If your sponsored theme links to 3 sites in the footer, all of which are involved in the development of the theme, then you’re not going to suffer.

As always, it pays to dig deeper into the ‘why’ of a sweeping statement like “don’t use sponsored themes because you can lose your trust in different search engines”. Ask how. Ask why.

Hands down, you’ll get the answer that I gave above.

Free themes often link out to WordPress.org, to accessibility standards sites and to the designer’s own site. Now why wouldn’t those themes be penalised? Because those themes are not using bad SEO techniques like hidden links or stuffing dozens of unrelated links to spammy sites in the footer.

There is no difference in the linking-out policies of free themes and sponsored themes from trusted sources.

Hope that clears things up.

Please, if you are using WordPress themes and are interested in using one of the WordPress themes that Performancing.com hosts, get ALL the necessary facts and then use your OWN judgement before you buy into misinformation and fear-mongering.

In Deb’s recent article, she implores us to Never Underestimate the Power of a List. Her main point is that informative, thoughtful and well-done lists can draw a lot of attention to your blog.

I want to take her idea regarding “lists” a little further and suggest an experiment that everyone who is serious about becoming an authority blogger should try. Hard work? Sure. But hard work is necessary if you wanna play with the big boys. And to play with the big boys, you’ve gotta move away from fast-twitch blogging and towards long-term value blogging.

So here’s the suggestion:

Create a resource in your niche that you can feel proud about placing as an external link in Wikipedia.

That’s it. That’s all I’m asking you to do. Create something in your niche that is original, valuable, and which *deserves* to be linked from a Wikipedia resource in your niche. If possible, try to develop the resource so that it will still be relevant 5 years from now.

That’s your project for this week. Cut back on fast-twitch blogging. Stop reposting news that’s on about fifty other blogs. Spend two hours each day to develop a unique resource and within a week you might just have something great.

If the experiment works, then create a “Resource” section on your blog and plan to create at least one killer Wikipedia-worthy resource per month.

Ryan’s Note: This is an important post, loaded with important, deep-level questions. We all need to take gut checks from time to time. And I for one have found myself asking the same questions and dealing with the same issues.

The question should be an obvious one. If I am to continue with my blog, it would need to be significantly reworked with a proportionate investment of my time and effort.

I pondered if this should be a question for the forum but I couldn’t think of an appropriate place. It also appeals to my sense of humour that my first post on my Performancing blog is one that questions whether I should be bothering at all.

I have been a casual reader of Performancing for well over a year now, largely via the main feed. I’m not a pro-blogger (actual or aspiring) but I have found many interesting tips here that have, at various times, improved my blog (to my eyes at least).

My problem is that my free time is becoming more and more of a rare commodity between working, being a father and husband and studying part-time. Researching subjects and writing used to be fun but it is now less so. Sometimes it even seems like a chore.

It started off as fun. I never aspired for greatness or huge traffic, which is a good thing because I’ve got neither. In just over a year I have a blog that only has 150+ posts, traffic that struggles to maintain double-digit visitors, no community (so few comments I wonder if having comments turned on makes a negative impression) and, according to feedburner, I have between 5 and 10 subscribers (although sometimes that spikes up to 30 for a day or two for no reason I can see).

The more news feeds I subscribe to, the less inspired I feel. There are so many good writers out there with better leads and information that can analyse and report on issues that interest me much better than I can. It’s depressing for a (very) small time blogger like myself.

I know there are many things wrong with my blog: standard Blogger template, too broad a focus, no linkbait, no time to market it or do the comment thing on other people’s blogs. I’m sure there is much, much more that could be dissected and analysed.

I thought about submitting for a reboot but I don’t think there’s enough to work with to make it worth anyone’s time. Therefore, I’m not looking for a reboot here. I’m just looking for honest opinions. Is there anything in my writing that would indicate that reworking and relaunching my blog would be worthwhile? Is there some sort of spark, something buried deep or am I just wasting my time? Should I just write it off as a fun experiment and let it go?

There are no ads so I’m not trying to drive traffic or increase revenue with this. I just need an opinion from people who do this sort of thing for a living.

Pixelated Dreams – http://www.pixelated-dreams.info/ – the current first page is an accurate reflection of the malaise that has struck me in recent weeks. There’s probably better stuff buried a bit further in but I no longer feel like I’m in a position to judge.

The Sitemeter stats are publically accessible so feel free to poke around through the sitemeter link at the bottom as well if you so desire.

All comments are welcome, positive or negative. If anyone does stop by to take a look and share a thought or two, your time is greatly appreciated.

Shane

So I’m just like the rest of you. I treat PageRank updates like a sporting event. I also monitor things like the Dirt 100 which uses an algorithm to rank the top 100 Celebrity blogs (aside from a few major anamolies, it does a good job).

The one thing that kept sticking out to me is how PopCrunch was sitting below other sites with far less traffic. Perhaps the most glaring issue was the low Technorati score that PopCrunch was assigned.

So I went over to the EatonWeb Celebrity category rankings to see if PopCrunch was getting a bad score there as well. Indeed it was.

At EatonWeb, I have database access, so I logged into see what was depressing the score. Turns out that the Technorati API was returning a big fat 0 for both total links and total blogs. Ouch. I knew that this was wrong.

Then I went over to Technorati and saw that the PopCrunch Authority score was something ridiculously low like 88. Crazy. Didn’t make sense.

So then I started contacting Technorati support. The same guy probably got all five of my requests;-)

I never got a response. But within 24 hours, PopCrunch was showing a more appropriate Authority score of 617 and had found its way into the Top 5K. Further, the total links and total blogs number started returning some accurate figures.

I have no idea what was wrong. But the take home lesson is this: BlogJuice, EatonWeb, SEOMoz Page Strength and a whole slew of ranking tools (probably even GOOG itself) use Technorati data to evaluate the strength and authority of websites. And the temptation is to assume that a massive company like Technorati gets everything right.

Well that’s wrong. Today I found out that Technorati wasn’t tracking or storing data properly for at least one blog. I wonder how many others are out there with the same problem. You’ll only know if you look;-)

Update: This theme is going to be the new theme on College Startup for at least 12 months. So the winning bidder not only gets a 12 month link on Performancing Themes but also on an established, authoritative blog like College Startup. Quite a perk in my opinion.

Since launching in June, we’ve had winning sponsorship bids on three great WordPress themes. Sponsorships are a win-win situation. They help Performancing continue to commission high quality themes and they help the sponsor get recognition for her production-level work in making the theme possible.

We’re excited to announce the September 2007 theme that’s now open for for sponsorship bids. Designed by Thord Hedengren, Estranged is a two-column theme that features large, standout headers, and easy-to read body and link text. The color scheme involves subtle shades of grey and red, with a bit of orange, and these add to that simple yet eye-catching look. The proportions of the columns and the headers are just right, making ample use of the rule of thirds popular among those in the visual arts. Contrast is just right–having adequate readability, but not at the cost of being too much of a glare. The theme also makes adequate use of white space, so the blog doesn’t look cramped.

Estranged is suitable for both personal and professional bloggers who prefer a clean looking theme with enough space for the essentials. The right sidebar is wide enough to accommodate square ad space (text links or images) up to 250 pixels in width. This is great for bloggers who would rather not stuff in too much information, but would rather present essential information in blocks. This is due to the fact that there is only one sidebar, and that the footer does not support lists or longer content than the copyright statement.

Estranged is set for release as this September’s Performancing theme for WordPress.

Bids can start in the comment section.

Cousin to the Dark Laptop Theme we are pleased to launch the Blue Laptop Theme for those of your looking for a softer, gentler version of the Dark Laptop Theme.

If you look closely, Blue Laptop is a deep, rich theme with about six different shades of blue spread throughout. Because of its emphasis on blue, the theme is instantly welcoming and naturally attractive. The unique design makes this destined to be a classic WP theme that people are still using three years down the road.

Personally, I think that both the Dark Laptop and Blue Laptop themes are among the most professional and original looking free WordPress themes available. They give you exactly what you need to stand out from the crowd of bland, squared-off newsy themes that are so pervasive.

Designed by GeekWithLaptop and produced by RideLust Cars, Blue Laptop is the perfect theme for any topic in entertainment, technology, literature, or even professionals in fields such as counseling or law.

Download the Blue Laptop Theme or Click here for a live preview

View the official support forum for the Dark Laptop theme