Category: Miscellany

Personal Websites – Why every SEO should have one
30 Oct
Posted in Miscellany 4 comments

Personal Websites – Why every SEO should have one

I think that every SEO should develop their own website. I don’t care if it’s an SEO blog, a travel blog, a site about your cat, or a tribute to Metallica.

My argument is:

In order to be a decent SEO and to be able to stay current as SEO becomes more and more technical, you need to have a place to test out ideas that you otherwise may not be able to do on client sites (for ethical or practical reasons, such as making changes yourself/quickly).

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My Top 5 Personal Productivity Tips and Tools
24 Oct
Posted in Miscellany 2 comments

My Top 5 Personal Productivity Tips and Tools

Productivity. We all hear about it constantly and know that we should take steps to make our lives more productive in the time set aside to do so, so that we can enjoy the time where we do not need to be productive. Or, so that we can actually have free time.

I used to to be a productivity loser, but over the past few months have become much more of a productivity ninja. One important thing to note is that everyone is going to need to find what works for them, but here are some of the shortcuts and tools that I use to keep my inbox under control, my writing and drafts synchronized, and my priorities straight.

Google inbox shortcuts

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On Being Afraid of Failure
17 Oct
Posted in Miscellany 45 comments

On Being Afraid of Failure

Can I take a minute to write a personal post on here? This blog is usually all about SEO tactics, but today I’ve been doing some thinking and reflecting.

I come from a family that is really smart and well educated. I mean really smart and really well educated. My father has his PhD in institutional analysis. My mother is working on her second Masters degree, this one as a mathematics specialist. My older brother is in a fully funded MD/PhD program at Baylor College of Medicine, and my younger brother is a genius who will one day be an ambassador or something to a foreign country, helping to keep our country safe.

And I have a Bachelors degree from James Madison University in Virginia (a good state school). I work for the best SEO consultancy in the world, hang out with some awesomely smart people, and am trying to make waves in New York City.

And guess what?

I’m petrified of failure.

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Getting Things Done is about Quality, not Quantity
11 Sep
Posted in Miscellany 3 comments

Getting Things Done is about Quality, not Quantity

I’ve been reading a number of books and blogs recently about business. I recently got sent a copy of Tony Hsieh’s “Delivering Happiness”, thanks to Zappos Service. I’ve also been reading Michael Hyatt’s blog Intentional Leadership, where he shares a lot of tips about productivity and leadership. Both have impacted me in big ways. Let […]

How to Learn SEO and Find Your First SEO Job
19 Aug
Posted in Miscellany 15 comments

How to Learn SEO and Find Your First SEO Job

*Post updated January 2012, originally published August 2011* “I’m an SEO beginner and I want my first job.” Is this you? Are you looking to find your first SEO job, but don’t know where to start? The SEO and online marketing industries are growing rapidly, with an incredible increase in the amount of jobs posted […]

SEO Cannot Be Done Alone
17 May
Posted in Miscellany 3 comments

SEO Cannot Be Done Alone

Is SEO a team sport? SEOs are often known individually in the industry, not necessarily for who they work for (though it is great when the company pushes the SEO into the spotlight, and the SEO gives love back to the company). At the beginning of my SEO career, I assumed that everyone had skills […]

My New Job at Distilled
05 May
Posted in Miscellany 7 comments

My New Job at Distilled

*Note – this post contains no SEO tips or tricks or ideas. It’s strictly informational and I am extremely excited about it* It seems that I mention Distilled quite a bit on my blog. I accuse them of stealing my page titles, I recapped their London conference, and today I must mention them again. Why? […]

What Blogs Should I Read to Learn SEO?
02 May
Posted in Miscellany 13 comments

What Blogs Should I Read to Learn SEO?

I’ve been asked a few times what blogs I have been reading to increase my knowledge of SEO. I’ve decided to put together a list here of blogs that I subscribe to via RSS. The Lucky 13 Blogs I Read via RSS SEOmoz: If you don’t know that SEOmoz has an incredible blog with the […]

Open Letter to Spammers
11 Apr
Posted in Miscellany 3 comments

Open Letter to Spammers

I would love to just write this: Dear Spammers, Go away. Sincerely, John I cannot however, because I have mixed feelings about spammers. Background Today this site was hit with some massive spam by someone labeling themselves Betus Promotion Code. This is betting/gambling website that I guess is trying to achieve rankings through comment spam, […]

Help Me Reclaim My Page Title from Distilled!
05 Apr
Posted in Miscellany 9 comments

Help Me Reclaim My Page Title from Distilled!

On Monday, my post entitled “How Distilled Stole My Page Title” went around the Twittersphere. It was interesting to see the feedback and there were a lot of comments from a lot of people I respect. Read the comments here. Now I run into an issue. I’ve never confronted something like this before, and I […]

Submit a Sitemap – A Beginners Guide
06 Mar
Posted in Miscellany 4 comments

Submit a Sitemap – A Beginners Guide

Sitemap (n): A file placed on your web server, in XML format, to alert search engines to a website’s existing pages. Submitted manually to search engines using Webmaster Tools. I just made up that definition, but it is also deceptive. I’ve been in web development for about 5 years, and I still hate sitemaps. At […]

Why Brand SEO Is Good For Humanity
27 Feb
Posted in Miscellany 6 comments

Why Brand SEO Is Good For Humanity

Do you ever long for the days of 1950’s or 1960’s America, where most Americans lived in small towns, walked to the corner store for groceries, knew their neighbors across the white picket fence, and used word-of-mouth as their gauge for knowing where to eat and who to do business with? I think we’re heading […]