Greg Boser - WebGuerrilla Interviewed
One of the really great things about Greg is he says it like it is. He doesn’t worry about offending anyone, he just speaks the truth as he sees it, and I for one, really appreciate this quality.
I could write a short Bio on Greg, but he’s done it much better at his site webguerrilla. The short of it: he’s the co-host of SEO Rockstars with Todd “Oilman” Friesen, he’s been around SEO for much longer than most, and has experience will all kings of SEO. He’s a true authority, and if you ever get a chance to hear him speak, present, or participate in a panel Q&A - jump. It’ll be informative and entertaining.
Q. How long have you been working with SEO / SEM ?
I began seriously playing with SEO in 1996. By 1997, I was squeaking out a meager living and by 1998, I was able to convince my wife I had a real job.
Q. What’s been your favorite technique that you can no longer use due to algorithmic changes at Google?
Wow. That’s a tough question. There has been so many over the course of 10 years. It was pretty cool back in the day when keyword meta tags actually meant something. If you want something a little more modern I’d probably say Google reducing their dependence on PageRank, and changing the way they handled internal links are right up there. Being able to take an extremely large site and have it shoot to the top by simply adding the proper keywords in the footer navigation and buying a couple well-placed text links was pretty cool. (and profitable).
Q. Has Google (or any other engine) ever made an algorithm change which made you very happy?
Sure. Every time they make a change and a client’s rankings improve. And for us, that happens far more often than the opposite. Being a good SEO isn’t just about figuring out what works today, it’s being able to predict where things are going to end up down the road. If you understand that, you can end up having the best of both worlds in terms of maximizing current algorithmic conditions and preparing for future changes.
Q. If you could get Google, Yahoo!, MSN, and Ask to each answer just one question about their algorithms, what would it be?
Google — What percentage of total daily searches are done by logged in users? (They’ll never answer that)
Yahoo — What causes all the inconsistencies in your 301 handling? Just when it looks like you’ve got it figured out, everything flips out.
MSN — Why don’t you just buy Yahoo?
Q. Why analytics are important to you?
Conversion data. All the other stuff is great, but at the end of the day, I want to know what search phrases were responsible for conversions.
a. how often do you look at them
We look at various bits an pieces on a daily basis.
b. how do you suggest your clients use them,
Prioritize what core data is most important to them, and then build custom filters or dashboards that restrict the data to include only what they need to see. Otherwise, they end up getting lost in a sea of fancy looking reports that don’t end up helping much.
Q. What do none of the analytics tools do that you would want them to for you?
I don’t think anyone does a real good job of identifying and tracking rogue traffic. Bandwidth consuming bots can be a real problem. We ended up developing our own internal apps to track and notify us of bad bot behavior because we just couldn’t find any stock analytic product that really addressed our issues.