Shady Marketing Tactics
American Express Slams SEO, SE Spammers React With More Whining
Tuesday, April 8th, 2008One of the most annoying things about the SEO crowd is how thin-skinned they are. They might come off all rough and tough on their Blogs, but this hard shell masks a quivering level of insecurity that’s clearly rooted in their own precarious and highly temporary status in the search economy.
All it took was […]
Toxic Buzzword of the Week: ORM (Online Reputation Management)
Tuesday, April 8th, 2008I don’t have any real quarrel with the article that John Carcutt wrote for SearchEngineJournal.com this week, because he does us all a service by pointing out that most SEOs are, for a variety of reasons, completely unqualified to handle online reputation management. Not only do they not have the proper skillsets, but as he […]
Ridiculous Statement of the Week: Jill Whelan on SEOs Committing Crimes Against Clients
Thursday, March 27th, 2008SearchEngineLand.com’s Jill Whelan won our “Ridiculous Statement of the Week” award when she wrote the following absurd nugget in a rambling defense of the SEM industry’s complete failure to propose and implement meaningful codes of conduct for SEOers:
“One would think the threat of jail time or a court-ordered breach of contract settlement would be deterrent […]
Amazing Marketing News: SEO Isn’t Quite Dead (Yet)!
Tuesday, March 25th, 2008I made the mistake of opening my e-mail this morning to read an article by Sarah Holoubek entitled “The Return of SEO.” While it wasn’t the worst example of pro-SEO boosterism that I’ve seen, it contained enough misunderstandings about the objective health of the SEO industry to warrant a response.
Ms. Houlebek (quoting the SEMPO 2007 […]
Online Ad Targeting: Doomed and Not to Be Mourned
Friday, March 21st, 2008As reported in the New York Times, New York assemblyman Richard L. Brodsky has introduced a bill to outlaw certain online ad targeting practices, including the sharing of data between 3rd parties, without affirmative consent from the targeted users.
After the Times story ran, Brodsky’s phone began ringing continuously, as panicky online marketers began calling […]