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Something new for 2012

01-03-12

I’m not normally one for making New Year’s resolutions, partly because I think folk rarely achieve them and partly because if something is important it shouldn’t need to be influenced by a new set of numbers on your calendar.

Having said that, I’ve decided to be a bit more transparent in 2012 and publish some general goals:

  1. Blog regularly and grow a subscriber list of over 1000 users
    In actual fact, I plan to start a new blog and leave this one for more personal/opinion led posts. More info on the new blog coming soon but it will be strictly SEO/affiliate oriented.
  2. Increase my Twitter follower count to 4000+
  3. Push my passive income above £3000/mo
    Some time ago I wrote a post about how I wanted to pay my mortgage with my affiliate earnings. Well, I’m pleased to report that I’m currently earning around £1000/mo so it is mission accomplished in that sense (although I’ve learnt there’s no such thing as 100% ‘passive’). The one thing I didn’t do was document the process which I regret now. I plan to change that for the next £2k/mo.
  4. Build and launch a web app
    This one goes hand in hand with point 3 but I have several ideas for web apps that could make good money. I want to have one live in at least a minimum viable product format by January 2013
  5. Lose weight and increase fitness levels
    Now, I’m no fatty by any stretch of the imagination but I’ve developed a bit of a beer belly over the last 12 months. I want to lose a stone (down from 12 to 11) and be regularly running 5-8k (couple of times a week). The bigger pitcure goal is to run a marathon in 2013, but it’s also about getting motivated physically and mentally.

So that’s it, not a huge list but one I think I can certainly make a dent in.

The Google SSL saga, in cartoon format.

11-02-11

(Click for the full size version.)

This is basically what Google is saying to site owners.

SEO Sunday: Oct 16 2011

10-16-11

I know, I know - 3 weeks in and I already missed a couple of posts. In my defence, I’ve been pretty damn busy on a Sunday night but hey ho. As always, this entry is from a series of weekly posts highlighting a handful of interesting links I bookmarked each week(s). For the full archives visit the SEO Sunday category page.

SEO Sunday: Sep 25 2011

09-25-11

This post is from a series of weekly posts highlighting a handful of interesting links I bookmarked in the past 7 days. For the full archives (only two weeks so far) visit the SEO Sunday category page.

  • Engeeno
    What happens when two ex-Google spam-team engineers (@pedrodias and @ArielL) leave and create their own startup? We don’t know yet, but I’m on the list and you should probably be too.
  • 62 steps to the definitive link building campaign
    Great post on wordtracker from Mark Nunney covering everything you need to know for link building. Well, maybe not everything, but it’s a big chunk of knowledge anyhow.
  • Google News Ranking Factors 2011
    I’m too lazy to find out who’s directly behind this site - but if you have a strategy that involves targeting screen space in Google News (which you should) then this is probably one for the bookmarks.
  • Step by Step Guide to Spying on the Competition with KeywordSpy
    So this one isn’t strictly SEO - but if data on a competitor sites PPC strategy isn’t something you’d sit up and take notice of then you aren’t doing your job justice. We’ve all heard of KeywordSpy but SEER has gone the extra mile and even provided a downloadable Excel file to make sense of all the raw data.
  • Basic SEO for Facebook Pages
    I haven’t delved too much into social media profile optimisation as my focus is heavily on enterprise SEO and technical issues but this is a great starting point for anyone looking at giving it a go.
  • How to Game Klout
    Who knew Klout was so easily gamed? and more importantly, who knew that with a high Klout score you could get all sorts of perks in Vegas? time to knuckle down and then book some flights methinks….
  • Google -50 Penalty Research
    Some good discussion on WebmasterWorld of a -50 penalty dissection. Certainly worth a read if you ever have potential leads contacting you over similar issues.

SEO Sunday: Sep 18 2011

09-18-11

This post is from a series of weekly posts highlighting a handful of interesting links I bookmarked in the past 7 days. For the full archives (only two weeks so far) visit the SEO Sunday category page.

  • Tracking the KPIs of Social Media
    You rarely see a poor post by @randfish over on SEOmoz and this one is no different. If you’re from the agency world then you’ve no doubt had a conversation with a client who is scared of dabbling in social because “there’s no way to track it”. Rand covers some great advice on how to get a bit more insight into the impact of being friendly.
  • Using Google Docs To Generate Hot Content Strategies [Tool]
    Very nice tool from ex-HP SEO @DBSEO that takes a little bit of pain out of the process of content strategy research. This triggered a few extra ideas in my head too, which is always nice.
  • Google+ Developer Platform
    Awesome! it’s finally here - the Google+ developer API! oh… no, hold up… let me step back a second here. It turns out it’s pretty much a one-way API right now, so essentially just a data export tool. Looks like all of those spam bots will have to be put back on hold for the time being.
  • A Guide to Long Tail Link Building
    Yet another great post by the famous @rishil this time tackling how to create sub-sets of your head terms and create those all important long-tail anchor text variations. A seemingly simple guide but one I’m sure many SEOs don’t action often enough.
  • Quora: Kevin Lacker’s Answers about Web Search
    I think it was Rand Fishkin that tweeted this out originally but I’m too lazy to go and check. Anyway - this guy “wrote search algorithms at Google” so he knows his shit. There’s some really interesting answers that any hardcore SEO will enjoy reading.
  • Introducing Twitter Web Analytics
    About freakin’ time. Twitter finally launch an official analytics tool. Well, I say launch but it’s still closed to a selected beta group for now. Hopefully it will roll-out more widely pretty soon.
  • Blekko Web Grep
    Blekko certainly get the kudos for empowering the modern SEO with decent tools. This one does exactly what it says on the tin - allows you to essentially grep the web using strings or patterns. This could be awesome for certain niche research tasks.