Natural Search Blog

Welcome to Natural Search Blog

Natural Search Blog provides articles on search engine optimization including keyword reasearch, on-page factors, link-building, social media optimization, local search optimization, image search optimization, and mobile SEO.

In addition to natural search optimization topics, we also cover internet marketing, ecommerce, web design, usability, and technology.

Recent Entries

AMA Hot Topic Series: Search Marketing in San Fran

The San Francicso leg of the American Marketing Association’s Hot Topic Series on Search Marketing this past Friday was really great! The crowd was intimate, which allowed all of us speakers to mingle and have some quality discussions with folx, and the seminar/conference/workshop was excellently organized.

Read on for more details about the AMA Hot Topic Series day’s sessions.

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Posted by of Silvery on 04/25/2007

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Filed under: Conferences, Google, HTML Optimization, Keyword Research, Link Building, Marketing, Search Engine Optimization, Seminars, SEO, Social Media Optimization , , , , ,

Images & Search Session at SES NYC, 2007

As promised, here’s the copy of my preso from the Images & Search panel discussion at the Search Engine Strategies Conference in New York, April 2007.

Also, here’s the Image Sharing Sites Comparison Chart that I created while researching out the potential for improving sites’ traffic through integration with social sharing services.

I see that one blogger, Morpheus Media, posted a good bulleted summary of the Images & Search session.

My new company, Netconcepts, does SEO consulting and web development. As I mentioned, the area which I was hired to work upon is some software service that Netconcepts provides which I describe as a near turnkey SEO solution for dynamically generated websites. One area where I do research is in using image sharing sites like Flickr to improve rankings for sites such as online product catalogs which have lots of photographs. Contact me if you’re interested in these services, or if you have any questions about optimizing for image search or through photo sharing services.

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Posted by of Silvery on 04/16/2007

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Filed under: Content Optimization, Search Engine Optimization, SEO, Social Media Optimization , , ,

I joined the Dark Side, or This In-House SEO went to the Out-House!

So, as many of you noticed in my online profiles or heard about at the recent SES Conference, shortly ago I resigned from my post as Head of the Technology & Advanced Development Department for Idearc’s Superpages.com (Idearc was spun off from Verizon in November of 2006).

Yes, I’ve moved over to the “Dark Side” and become an external agency Search Engine Optimization consultant! 😉

Read on for more juicy details!

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Posted by of Silvery on 04/16/2007

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Filed under: General, SEO

SES Keynote with Steve Berkowitz had Surprise Appearance by Ms. Dewey

At the SES Conference in New York this week, Danny Sullivan’s keynote conversation with Windows Live Chief Steve Berkowitz featured a surprise appearance by Ms. Dewey – the beautiful avatar of the Windows Live promotional search interface.

Danny Sullivan, Steve Berkowitz & Ms. Dewey at SES NYC 2007

Ms. Dewey flounced onto stage in the middle of the interview, throwing out a number of cute bon mots and clever retorts to things that Danny and Berkowitz said.

As soon as I heard her voice and she went on stage, I started clapping, along with one or two others in the audience. I’m guessing that not everyone has actually been aware of who Ms. Dewey is, since most search marketers obsess more about Google and Yahoo!, in that order. So, it was sort of tragic that the audience didn’t really know who she was, or what was up when she invaded the stage.

When she heard my clapping along with the other few folx who recognized her, Ms. Dewey turned towards me and gave me a really enthusiastic “thank you!” Having the pretty geek poster-girl give me such a heart-felt thank-you really woke me up, I can tell you. The Ms. Dewey character is played by the gorgeous actress, Janina Gavankar.

I previously blogged about the Ms. Dewey Live Search interface as a cool, interactive avatar for the search service, and pointing out a bunch of the funnier responses that she has pre-programmed for various keyword searches — check them out for an idea of what she’s all about. This link-bait promotion was wonderfully built in order to promote Microsoft’s Live Search service, and to persuade users to submit searches through it.

When I saw Ms. Dewey come out, I grabbed the opportunity to snap a few pics, including the one above. Click on it to view some more in the same series.

Although she wasn’t widely known when she came on stage, I think the audience caught on that it was some sort of promotional stunt within just a few minutes, so by the time she exited, the audience was fairly captivated by her, and everyone applauded.

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Posted by of Silvery on 04/11/2007

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Filed under: MSN Search , , , , , , , , ,

New Research Could Improve Google Image Search

New research recently published out of University of California – San Diego could allow Google’s Image Search to easily begin using elements from “true image search” — that is, the ability for software to detect and identify elements appearing within the image itself rather than just relying upon external text metadata to associate keywords with the images. Read on for more details.

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Posted by of Silvery on 04/05/2007

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Filed under: Google, Image Optimization, Research and Development, Searching , , , ,

Coming Soon to NYC: The Googleheim Museum

[Source: SEO-AP] Due to budget cuts of the NEA and gross mismanagement by the Guggenheim Foundation board of directors, one of America’s top museums has been in danger of closing down in bankruptcy and selling off priceless artworks in order to repay debtors. However, Google [NYSE: GOOG] company has apparently made a unique sponsorship offer to the Solomon R. Guggenheim, and the deal is apparently set to initiate on June 1.

Secret image of Googleheim - Google internal documents
Source: Google internal documents outed earlier today on Natural Search Blog.

Information related to the deal was discovered by this reporter while browsing through 3D images of buildings created with Google Sketchup (while researching an article on Sketchup’s University Contest). Apparently, Google personnel had generated a new façade of the building in the application in order to use the images in a proposal to bail out the museum. Due to a temporary glitch, links to the confidential building diagrams showing a new exterior could be found for a short while in the application’s online data warehouse. These images showed a new logo reading “Googleheimâ€?, apparently a cross between the well-known Google brand name and the Guggenheim name.

The proposed exterior showed the newly Google-ized logo broadly splashed across the museum, replacing the much smaller signature letters of the current museum name. Other information regarding the deal was leaked by a few unnamed sources within the company, and the deal was subsequently confirmed to by Google spokesperson, Erin Fors.

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Posted by of Silvery on 04/01/2007

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Filed under: brand names, Google , , , , , ,

MSN Live Shuts Down Info for SEO

I was quite disappointed to see that MSN Live announced yesterday that they were shutting off advanced syntax queries such as: link:, linkdomain:, and inurl:. Eytan Seidman, MSN Live’s Lead Program Manager stated that they could tell there was a large amount of automated datamining going on, so they’d unplugged the features completely.

MSN Live Bans Advanced Queries

 Now, I’m completely familiar with how impolite dataminers can impact service for real users — that’s something we police for as well here at Superpages.com. But, I’m unhappy because Seidman’s announcement sounds more like it’s not just impolite datamining they’re after — it’s all automated usage of those specialized queries.

Microsoft is quite lite on features supporting the web community and optimizers, so I’m unhappy that they’re halting the very data that supports those folx. While I don’t use those queries much in my work (because their data hasn’t been all that useful to me, and because such a relatively small fragment of our users come through MSN), it seems like a backwards move for them to revoke the functionality.

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Posted by of Silvery on 03/29/2007

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Filed under: MSN Search , , , , , ,

Podcasts of Neil Patel, Eric Ward, and Vanessa Fox

I’ve been interviewing speakers of the AMA’s Hot Topic: Search Engine Marketing events taking place April 20th in San Francisco, May 25th in NYC, and June 22 in Chicago (all three of which I will be chairing). I had fascinating and insightful conversations with link builder extraordinaire Eric Ward, Googler Vanessa Fox, and social media marketing guru Neil Patel. There’s some real gold in those interviews.

Download/Listen:

More podcasts to come from other speakers, so be sure to subscribe to the RSS feed so you don’t miss them. Also be sure to register for the conference at one of the three cities, it’ll be great!

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Posted by of stephan on 03/28/2007

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Filed under: Google, Link Building, SEO, Site Structure, Social Media Optimization , , , , , , ,

In-House SEO vs. Out-House SEO

Not long ago I posted a list of some Top In-House SEOs I identified, and I touched on the subject of in-house development vs. outsourcing of natural search optimization work. As an “in-houser” myself (as one of my many roles, I perform SEO for Superpages.com’s sites), I thought I’d develop this out further and give my thoughts on the relative pros and cons of in-housing versus outsourcing, followed up by a list of the merits of doing either.

I should mention that my reference to “Out-House SEO” is firmly tongue-in-cheek. WebMama used that term in commenting on my previous post, and I couldn’t resist using it myself. (Coincidentally, I see that she’s just yesterday posted an article on the merits of outsourcing SEM work, “Does Hiring a Search Marketing Firm Cost or Save You Money?“)

Out-House vs. In-House

Read on for my commentary and lists of the relative advantages of each approach.

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Posted by of Silvery on 03/28/2007

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Filed under: General, Marketing , , , , , , ,

New Columnist for Search Engine Land

Locals OnlyI just became a new contributor for Search Engine Land with the publication of my first article today:
“Google Builds Local Map Content in 3D“. As you may recall, Danny Sullivan launched SearchEngineLand.com back in December of last year after stepping down as editor-in-chief for SearchEngineWatch.com which he’d originally founded. I’m contributing work under the Locals Only column that was earlier launched with their correspondent, Greg Sterling. As you may know, Greg Sterling was a former member of the Kelsey Group, and is widely respected as a top authority/commentator/analyst on marketing/business in the local search space.

I was really surprised and flattered to’ve been invited to contribute – I’ve long been a fan and devoted reader of the folx who worked upon SearchEngineWatch.com and now SearchEngineLand.com. I’ve also been a longtime reader of articles by Sterling, along with many others in my company, Idearc Media. I think I’m in really august company, and I know it’s going to challenge me to try to put forward work that’s worthy of appearing under their masthead along with others in the same space.

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Posted by of Silvery on 03/26/2007

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Filed under: General, Local Search, Reference Material , ,

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