I Didn’t Know That I Was a Top SEO Expert?
I received an email from Evan Carmichael who informed me that a post I wrote on my blog earlier this year made his top 46 SEO posts for the entire year of 2008. One thing is for sure, I am pulling in $10,000 dollar months with AdSense, so with confidence I can tell you that I am a Google AdSense Master. But I really don’t think I am a SEO guru.
Part of the reason why I don’t give myself much SEO credit is because I believe that SEO is very over rated. My best SEO tip is to customize your blog so that it produces proper HTML, TITLES and META TAGS the way search engines like them. Secondly, you should write content in a very natural form, but with careful precision, you should include keyword phrases that you want to rank for.
The post that made Evan’s top 46 list was a blog post titled, The Day After John Chow Lost To Google. Ironically, I don’t feel like that post was really about SEO. The story told in this post expresses my opinion about how I feel John Chow took advantage of his readers by leading them to believe that he himself was an SEO expert and how he lead hundreds of people down a path that could have left them for dead with their Google rankings.
At any rate, I am glad to have made this list, and I am also very glad that I shared my views in that post. I am not surprised to see that my post drew attention in the public eye; however, I am surprised to see that the post made a top SEO list.
Anyway, a special thank you goes out to Evan for including my post on his top 46 SEO Posts of 2008. So what do you think, do you think that a lot of people tend to over-complicate SEO? I don’t think SEO is really all that complicated. I don’t work at Google, and I sure don’t know of any magic formula to score excellent rankings. I do know that if you write natural and also carefully include keywords a certain way that you’ll gain rank and do so fairly easily. Thus, that is why I make so much money with Google AdSense.
Expert Bloggers
Being 30 years old, at times it seems like I am one of the older adult bloggers online. Blogging seems to attract a crowd of real young entrepreneurs who have the hopes of making money online. In the blogosphere, there is a wide range of ages of people who blog....Learn How To Hire a SEO Expert, Find Cool Mac Software, Claim Credit For User Generated Content, and Design & Promote Your Website
As you may know, I am one of the writers on SeoHosting.com. This has been an amazing, super fun, and rewarding job for me. When excellent material lands on my desk, it seems like I have to flip a coin and decide which blog to publish the article on. Over...Are You A Natural Blogger or a Prefabricated Blogger?
Many people have blogs for a multitude of reasons. Some people enjoy blogging about their family and kids so that other family members out of state can easily view pictures, videos and read about the things going on with immediate family. Other folks really enjoy writing and want to show...Is Alexa Ranking Important To You?
You know, I am going to be straight forward and put my cards on the table here. I’ve been having a hell of a time trying to figure out Alexa and their ranking system. Really and honesty, I have. Alexa makes absolutely ZERO sense to me. Recently, back in April,...Increase Google Rankings, Backlinks And Advertise For Free
I have just launched a new promotion that will help you increase your Google rankings. This will help you with increasing backlinks, gaining more traffic and allow you to advertise for FREE on my site. It’s called, “Category Sponsors” and it is completely free! My site design is very straight forward...
Garry
It doesn’t matter if you are a Google Adsense Master of a SEO Guru, the fact that you are cashing out 10K a month from Adsense alone proves that you know what others don’t and that deserves a certain degree of recognition. Well, it doesn’t come as a surprise to me. Congrats and all the best in 2009.
Yan
Blogging Tips
29 Dec 08 at 1:17 am
Hey Garry. Congratulations. That was a great article, although I agree with you that it was not really an “SEO article” in the traditional sense.
I think there are a couple of important points here.
1. There are lots of different kinds of SEO. There is the sexy I want to rank #1 for ‘Credit Cards’ kind. This is the kind of brute force high profile SEO people normally think of when they think of “SEO Experts”.
2. Then there is the more common sense “SEO as a tool” kind of SEO that you do. Very practical. You get a lot of bang for a modest amount of SEO effort and turn that into dollars. In that space, you really are an expert.
The lesson is that you only need to know enough SEO to accomplish your goals, and Google will take care of the rest if you follow their TOS.
Second lesson is that a post like Evan’s is not only useful, but it is excellent link bait. He is going to get a ton of backlinks from that content — and he deserves them.
Thanks,
Mark
Mark Mason
29 Dec 08 at 6:39 am
Hey Garry,
You definitely are a SEO expert. Your tips are fabulous. I always wondered since when have you been blogging and did u have to struggle too or you always knew the right procedure to succeed?
Regards
Laksh
http://makemoneyonline-withme.blogspot.com/
Make money online with a 17 year old kid
29 Dec 08 at 7:47 am
I did also like that post of you. But I can’t also figure out the seo thing behind that post.
Hussein
29 Dec 08 at 10:09 am
You’re the man Garry – period. That was a great article – I can remember how well it flowed, and very deserving of it’s reward.
I find this site all the time on keyword searches – always in the top 5 or so. Also I just did a keyword search on a specific affiliate income long tail on my little piddling site – and I rank 4th on Google Page 1! That’s a first for me – thanks Garry!
Kent F
29 Dec 08 at 12:47 pm
Thank you Yan.
Garry Conn
29 Dec 08 at 2:39 pm
I agree. I think Evan invested a lot of time into his article and deserves the recognition and traffic. Also his article is very interesting. It is something that I felt you guys would enjoy reading. And indeed, I wrote a post about it linking to it, just as most of the other people on that list will do.
It is pretty cool to observe the cycle of that article and there is a lot that can be learned from just observing the process. Great points Mark.
Garry Conn
29 Dec 08 at 2:42 pm
When I started GarryConn.com it was very difficult. Because I was new, no one above me would even give me the time of day, let alone a backlink or a mention on a blog post. No one would help me.
That in itself motivated me because I hate rejection. I hate to lose and I hate rejection. If I come in second place for something, I am pissed because I have to be number one.
With that said, the tables have turned in many ways. I now receive daily emails with people requesting to have me add backlinks on my blog. I now have requests for me to write a post about someone’s product or blog. I now am in a position to accept money for advertisements and such.
When I first started, I didn’t know how difficult it would be. A lot of people when they make this discovery, they close up shop. I couldn’t do that because if I did, I would feel like a failure.
You might say, “Wow, these are awesome qualities that Garry Conn has.” However, I’ll admit too, because of how competitive I am in nature, I often battle the problem of beating a dead horse. Sometimes I am blinded so badly that I don’t know when it is truly time to give up.
All games comes to an end, and there is a point on a game if you are losing, when it is impossible to win. But, I never see the loss. I always play to win even if the odds to do so are impossible. Sometimes with this drive, it allows me to make the impossible possible, other times it doesn’t. One thing is for sure, I never quit and I will die trying.
Garry Conn
29 Dec 08 at 2:49 pm
I think Mark summed it up pretty well in the above comment.
Garry Conn
29 Dec 08 at 2:50 pm
See right there should give you lots of motivation. I remember the first time I ranked well for a search term in Google. I did backflips, I showed my wife and told all my friends. “Hey!! Look at this… I a f&%%king #1 in Google!!! Holy S%&t!” Congrats to your rankings and go back and study that post to figure out what you did and duplicate it over and over with other keywords that you want to rank for.
Garry Conn
29 Dec 08 at 2:52 pm
Congrats. With that income, you are definitely an expert in something.
And yes, I agree that many people do over-compensate SEO. In most cases, for example, basic optimization does work. However, advanced SEO techniques – such as strategic placement and density of keywords – do have merit.
Shirley
29 Dec 08 at 3:21 pm
“When I first started, I didn’t know how difficult it would be. A lot of people when they make this discovery, they close up shop. I couldn’t do that because if I did, I would feel like a failure.”
Oh, I SO relate to that statement you made! I am also very competitive by nature – and I married a very competitive person, which just adds to my problem. In fact, before we married, we didn’t speak for 3 days because I beat him at golf (it’s amazing we even GOT married….haha!)
Anyway – I think what you said is very important. When we first look towards any form of internet marketing, it is “sold” to us as being easy.
It’s not.
You have to want it so badly and be willing to fail A LOT before you see any success. Being able to have your web pages found organically is one of the biggest challenges. Even basic on-page SEO is something that we all struggle with when new – and it is such an important skill to have.
CONGRATS on the recognition your post received – it is so well-deserved!
Happy New Year!
Jennifer
~PotPieGirl
PotPieGirl
29 Dec 08 at 8:25 pm
If you know how to make thousands of dollars from Adsense and many others don’t, you’re definitely an Adsense guru, and even if you’re not, you know what you’re doing. All the best for 2009.
Ganesh - Online Bull
29 Dec 08 at 9:18 pm
Congrats my man! Do yourself a favor though, whenever faced with the options, always go with “Expert” or even “Coach”, my personal favorite lol…
“Master” is too egotistical, and “Guru” is just short for *full of crap*.
Dennis Edell
29 Dec 08 at 9:23 pm
I agree, master sounds very egoistical. Expert is nice.
Ganesh - Online Bull
29 Dec 08 at 9:29 pm
I agree with you Dennis, expert is better… awesome Adsense earnings, how many websites is that on or..?
With the seo element, on this post alone your are using a lot of seo factors..
Timon Weller
29 Dec 08 at 11:08 pm
Your website was perhaps the first one I got drawn to right from the dawn of my own web history, and the main subject, however not the only subject I was interested in, was SEO. I learned heaps from your highly valued advice (various), and yes you are very popular out there. You also make the reading jazzy by adding in matters from your own personal life whose make the reading extra interesting.
Saying all off this, I have progressed in my own web work, since the hard beginning when I started only to digest all the tech info from you. But I still read what your write, and what your long time visitors write. I am sure I have thanked you before…
Happy New Calendar Year 2009 to you Mate and, the same to all yours!
convert
30 Dec 08 at 10:36 pm
Congrats! I think a lot of people get way to worked up worrying about SEO and such and forget to worry about the important things. While you not consdier yourself to be much of an SEO expert, I have been wishing for a bit more free time so that I could get some more things going and contact you for some tips/information/advice
Nick
31 Dec 08 at 6:53 pm
Congratulations! Wish the same could happen to me
Nette
15 Jan 09 at 3:15 am
Who said that it couldn’t?
Garry Conn
15 Jan 09 at 5:00 am