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I recently caught wind of the ability to grow perfect white (or clear) diamonds in a lab. They have been able to create colored diamonds in labs for some time now, but the white diamond idea intrigued me so I started doing some research. I searched on “white man-made diamonds”, “cultured white diamonds”, “synthetic white diamonds”, “lab grown diamonds” etc. and the site that consistently showed up (at least on the PPC side) was DiamondNexusLabs.com.

I spent some time on the site and the more I read, the more it sounded like this company had accomplished creating the perfect white diamond. And the best part was they were incredibly inexpensive! Paying hundreds of dollars in comparison to thousands of dollars made me think I could upgrade my wife’s wedding ring for our anniversary without breaking the bank. I was ecstatic! I did a quick search on the company name to double check its legitimacy and a scan of the first page of results only gave me more confidence. It even looked like they were doing some SEO because their Facebook and Twitter pages were on the first page. Good for them!

Because I was in a consumer mindset (and it was very late at night), I felt like I had done enough research on the industry and the company and I started to seriously consider purchasing. Luckily, something inside of me forced me to sleep on it. The next morning a thought occurred to me: If this company was doing SEO or having someone do it for them, they may have been doing some reputation management on their company name. I checked on it, this time doing a more thorough search on the company name, and lo and behold, every SERP but page 1 made it very apparent that reputation management was being performed for this company. I found hundreds of comments about the company being deceptive, fraudulent, and even illegal in their claims. According to most, the company was simply a reseller of CZ diamonds that can be found for $10-20 regularly. Now, if you want to sell CZ diamonds for exhorbitant prices to uneducated shoppers, that’s one thing, but when your site appears to claim that you’re selling something very different than what you actually are, that’s a big problem in my book.

In addition, every time I found a negative comment about the company, the very next post was someone who was extremely pleased with their purchase and took the diamond to jewelers who couldn’t tell the difference between it and a real diamond. Odd? I thought so.

What really hurt me most about this experience was that with the exception of the last practice, the marketing that had been done seemed to be fairly white hat. Someone was using good for evil. I know this isn’t the first time this has happened in the SEO industry, but it was definitely the closest I have been to it.

This experience brings up a very difficult question that SEO companies have to face. Even though you may perform transparent white hat techniques for clients, the business model of the client may be “black” or even “grey”. Do you still perform the work? Do you make a company successful in Google who doesn’t deserve it?

Hopefully it’s obvious where I stand.

Yahoo's search and infrastructure expert Doug Cutting is leaving the company to join Cloudera. He will be leaving Yahoo! at the end of August, 2009. Cutting created the Hadoop technology for Yahoo's search index.

Although, people are assuming that the recent Yahoo-Microsoft deal, in which Microsoft would take over Yahoo's search engine can be the reason behind Cutting's move, he told the New York Times that is not the case.

“This has been in the works for awhile and is unrelated,” Doug Cutting said. “I am definitely not leaving in any sort of protest, and the thing I like least about this move is that it might be perceived that way.”

Well, Cutting will be doing the same sort of work at Cloudera that he has been doing at Yahoo. In his personal blog, Cutting informed that he will continue working with Yahoo! developers.

Twitter is an extremely popular social media site, and many companies are exploring ways to use it for marketing purposes. With all the attention it’s getting, it seems as though anyone who is anyone is posting updates on Twitter. I must not be anyone. I’m a copywriter. Twitter never seemed to apply to me. If you need a copywriter to write a 150 character tweet, you are doing something horribly wrong. But that doesn’t mean I’m not interested in the marketing possibilities.

MarketingExperiments recently released a report on Twitter usage and trends that detailed a number of ways companies are (or should be) using the platform to reach their customers. Some of their findings create an interesting picture about the type of marketing tool Twitter really is. How is it really being used by businesses compared to individuals? Does personal tweeting prepare you to tweet for your company? Is it really worthwhile?

The MarketingExperiments report cited a few studies about Twitter that present a detailed profile of the network and its users. According to the report in the Harvard Business Review, 10% of Twitter users are responsible for 90% of all tweets. By comparison, in most social networks the top 10% of contributors account for only 30% of the content.

A comparison was drawn to Wikipedia, a platform that doesn’t technically have anything to do with social networking. But it was interesting to note that 15% of Wikipedia editors account for 90% of the edits. These similar statistics could imply that Twitter is becoming more of a one-to-many announcement service, like Wikipedia, than a two-way communication network, as it was intended.

The report offered some other interesting details about Twitter usage. According to The Business Insider, 51% of users don’t even tweet once a month, while 19% will use it once a day or more. And according to Nielson Online, more than 60% of U.S. Twitter users sign up for an account but don’t come back to it the following month.

What does this mean to the average Twitter user? It seems to imply that many casual users just don’t “get it” and that most of the users who stick with it are more tech-savvy and prone to early adoption of new technologies. If your target audience includes this particular type of consumer, you should definitely consider taking advantage of Twitter.

Twitter gives companies the opportunity to monitor, join, or start conversations about their products, services, or the company itself. However, according to some MarketingSherpa research, nearly two-thirds of marketers aren’t monitoring or responding to comments (both positive and negative) about their company. Remember, just because you aren’t initiating the Twitter conversation, that doesn’t mean no one is talking about you.

When consumers tweet about your company, it’s an open invitation for you to listen in on their personal conversations. Monitoring the kinds of tweets going on about your company can provide valuable and usable data on consumer trends and disposition. In a business environment where knowledge is power, this is the kind of information a company can’t afford to miss. And participating in the conversation is a great way to reach out to those consumers.

Once you’ve identified your target users and started building a following, Twitter can become a channel to communicate with your “preferred customers” by offering special deals or insights into the company. Twitter has also become an excellent source for live event coverage, and if you present or attend such events, this is a great way to build followers.

So there are a lot of benefits to using Twitter, but the platform seems to have trouble attracting longtime, consistent users. What does this say about Twitter as an effective marketing tool? Is it really worth the time and effort to get involved?

The only way to answer that question is to stop and really consider whether or not tweeting will increase your revenue (through special offers and sales notices), build brand or equity (by creating relationships and sharing good experiences), and reduce your costs (by allowing customers to address any problems before having to call the company directly). If you can clearly delineate how your company can use Twitter in these areas, then this is certainly a marketing avenue you should consider.

Recently, Google has signed a deal to acquire On2 Technologies, Inc., a leading provider of video compression technology. Both companies entered into an all-stock deal valued at approximately $106.5  million. As per the terms of the agreement, each outstanding share of On2 common stock will be converted into $0.60 worth Google class A common stock in a stock-for-stock transaction.

“Today video is an essential part of the web experience, and we believe high-quality video compression technology should be a part of the web platform,” said Sundar Pichai, Vice President, Product Management, Google. “We are committed to innovation in video quality on the web, and we believe that On2’s team and technology will help us further that goal.”

“We’re thrilled that On2 is joining one of the world’s most innovative companies,” said Matt Frost, interim CEO, On2 Technologies. “After intensive review of On2 products, Google confirmed our long-held beliefs as to the quality of our video technologies. This transaction is a testament to the hard work of every On2 employee and the strongest possible endorsement of our products and people. On2 will continue to improve, support and sell our products throughout the transition. We believe that Google shares our ambitions and know that our products and expertise, combined with Google’s globally recognized brand, ingenuity and resources, will create an incredible team.”

However, the all-stock deal is yet to be approved by On2 Technologies’ stockholders and reviewed by regulatory authorities, including the SEC. The deal is expected to close in the fourth quarter of 2009.

Are you being kept in the dark by your current SEO firm? Do you wish the communication lines were a little more open? It’s too bad that some SEO companies view communication and sharing as a conflict of interest rather than an opportunity for reinforced, attack-at-all-sides teamwork. Amazingly, some SEOs believe clients would only stick around long enough to find out their methods and then bolt! In sharp contrast, SEO.com has found that as we share valuable information and resources with our clients, it builds the relationship and they achieve greater success.

I love the work I do at SEO.com. It is a privilege to work at one of the best, if not the best, SEO firms out there. We have consistently helped our clients rank on page 1 of Google (which holds about 70% of the search engine market share) for multiple targeted keywords. Each day I marvel at the methods we employ to help our customers achieve their desired conversion goals. I quickly gained great trust and admiration for SEO.com for many reasons, but especially for how transparent and open we are with our clients in regards to the methods and tools we use to help them.

At first, I was taken-back by it and wondered why any successful company would consider sharing valuable company tools, intellectual property, methods and training with a client who could choose to go out on their own and mimic the same techniques. But I quickly realized that there was no genuine risk and it is one of the reasons why we are so effective.

There are no big secrets in Search Engine Optimization. The work is very transparent, and most anyone can do it. Quality optimization only takes a lot of time, knowledge, dedication and skill, and that’s where an SEO firm comes in. We work for hours a day doing the tasks that anyone with SEO knowledge could do-because we have the time, and the training, to do it. We spend multiple hours every day doing keyword research, looking at our clients’ competitors, link-building and offering site optimization recommendations.

Every now and then we all need to be brave and do something different. We have to break the molds and stereotypes to step out of the norm and stop following the crowd if we want to be special and set apart. I’m proud to work for a company that does this. Many SEO firms simply do the basics for their clients. SEO.com is great at the basics too, but we also do things no other firm will-transparency with clients being only one example.

For example, a current client of SEO.com has seen phenomenal results in the year they have employed our services. During their first six months online they had no sales and only a handful of page visits. As a result of this failure, two of their four investors backed out, and the remaining two investors began desperately searching for a new firm. During their first month working with SEO.com they had 15 sales. By the third week of the second month they had between 5 – 6 sales a day. By the third month they began asking questions about what we were doing and how we were doing it. They even asked if we could show them our SEO methods, so we could work together as a team. We gladly shared the information with them. By the sixth month they were experiencing between 400 and 500 visits to their site every day and a dramatic increase in sales. At the end of their initial six-month contract they decided to double the amount of work we were doing for them and renew the agreement. Today they average between 1200 to 1300 visits and 30 to 40 sales each day!

In SEO, stepping out of the norm is usually rewarded with highly-desired results. Clients like to be kept in the loop. They like to know what is going on-especially with their money. Communication is the key. Our success and growth as a company are the result of a number of different variables, but the level of transparency and openness SEO.com offers its clients certainly deserves due credit.

“A generalist is someone who knows less and less about more and more until he knows nothing about everything, while a specialist is someone who knows more and more about less and less until he knows everything about nothing.”

In some fields, neurosurgery for example, nothing short of a specialist will do. There’s a reason we have a Surgeon General and not “surgeon generalists” in the United States—nobody would trust a surgeon who claims, “I’m better than average at cutting into and sewing up pretty much any body part. I even do animals.” Paging Doctor Frankenstein.

In other areas, like SEO, the tables are completely turned. The role of an SEO specialist doesn’t feel very specialized some days when I feel like anybody could perform the same SEO tasks I do, because let’s be frank—SEO isn’t brain surgery. Then I remember I’m compensated not for my depth of concentrated training, but for my breadth of skill. I’m trained to nimbly jump from one tactic to the next, seamlessly creating videos for one client one minute, doing conversion optimization for another client the next, and blogging at the end of the day. I’ve wondered whether they should change my job title to SEO generalist.

True SEO specialists definitely exist. They do only on-site and off-site optimization. They do keyword research. They build links. They generally have very boring jobs—the kind that robots will be doing soon. I get the impression that these “specialists” desperately want to convince the world that the search industry is a specialist niche, when it isn’t. Until we understand this, we’ll see the same topics being rehashed again and again in SEO blog posts and presentations while conferences like SMX Advanced will be “buzzing” with revelatory changes in myopic areas like PageRank sculpting.

I suspect that the SEO pool isn’t deep enough for a bunch of specialists. It’s not deep enough to make ultra-specialization practical or profitable (or I’m not seeing how brain surgeon-level SEO expertise translates into markedly improved rankings).

Even while SEO spending is on the rise, SEO-only companies may find it increasingly difficult to make a buck, particularly when every hosting, web design, or marketing company outside the search realm is finding it profitable and easy to expand into the SEO market – GoDaddy.com being the recent scary reminder.

So how do SEO companies take a generalist rather than a specialist approach to SEO? You have to be willing to do more for your clients.

We’re an SEO company, yes, but when an indirect opportunity comes along for our clients to get a traffic or rank boost, we draw on our acquired set of skills that includes advertising, public relations, web design, social media, etc., as if we were a full-service web marketing firm. For instance, my boss just spent time on the phone finding geo-targeted newspapers willing to publish one client’s press release and drive traffic to his site—something you would be hard-pressed to find at an SEO-only company.

This kind of Swiss Army knife approach keeps us creative enough to cater to specific client needs. It’s our version of an above-the-rim milkshake with the cherry on top. As a result, we get happier clients and higher rankings because we build better links and drive more targeted traffic.

My opinion is obviously that generalists are better equipped to accomplish the objectives associated with SEO than their specialist counterparts are, as surprising as that may be. Generalists of the SEO.com breed have enough specialization to get and maintain top search placement for competitive keywords, so what does that say about SEO-only specialists?

Search engine optimizers don’t need the education of a brain surgeon to be the best–just an expanded multi-functional skill set, which ultimately proves to be far more impactful and exciting for the client, the company, and employees like me.

There used to be an old saying that if you throw enough mud at the wall some of it will stick and that used to be the way people threw in keywords. Splatter enough keywords across a Home Page and some of them are sure to attract the big boys. Times and the competition have moved on since then and now it’s not enough just to work out the most relevant and most Googled keywords; now it’s how those keywords are incorporated into key phrases.

A well-optimised website will have a combination of carefully chosen keywords that combine to make popularly searched key phrases.

If people search for a steel bin or search for steel bins they will probably enter in the search box the two single key words ’steel bin’ rather than type “steel bin” with quotation marks at the beginning and end to establish the phrase – steel bin. But, there will be a few people who will know that quotation marks will find them a steel bin that is more accurately targeted.

“steel bin” in quotation marks attracts via Google about 35,000 websites and steel bin without quotation marks attracts about 300,000 websites. Therefore, by incorporating the two words < steel bins >, into a complete sentence, without quotation marks, then steel bins is recognised by search engines as a genuine phrase.

Of course, people searching for items on the Internet often misspell or mistype. It can work to your advantage to allow for common misspellings of products or services. If you enter steal bin as two separate words into Google it produces about 2.6 million websites. But if you enter “steal bins” in quotation marks, Google returns a mere 286 results on Monday, April 27. In other words, if you incorporate steal bins as a phrase within your body copy, without it appearing to be a misspelling, the result can be very effective. i.e. ‘Steel bins supplied by the Steel Bins Company at these low prices are a veritable steal. Bins provided by the Steel Bins Company are produced in a combination of brushed steel bins, matt steel bins and mirrored steel bins’.

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Keywords or Key Phrases?