For the last 4 weeks, I've been toiling away in my non-existant free time on a Beginner's Guide to SEO. My goal was to have a comprehensive document that I could reference to the many newcomers I engage through email, forums and in person.
The final product is something I'm already proud of, though I hope to get even more feedback and improve it over time. I've already gotten great advice from my staff (thanks, Kat & Si), some folks at Cre8asite and my good friend, Bill Slawski. This isn't a project I could accomplish single-handedly and my appreciation goes out to the contributors.
With a bit of luck, this can be a document that others in the industry can use as a pointer for newbies as well. It's offered in multiple versions - a giant, single page version; a 9-page walkthrough and a printable MS Word version. As always, I'm soliciting your help to make the guide better than it is. There's a thread I've started at Cre8asite with that goal in mind.
Tomorrow, I start on a new long-term project for SEOmoz - stay tuned.
Nice one Rand. Pointed the first link to this resource.
I wonder where you find time to do things like this?
Natasha - Unfortunately right now there's no way to be alerted when there are replies to your comments. Maybe in the future when (if?) we have threaded comments we could add that feature.
-Matt (seomoz programmer guy)
Any document which starts with a quote from Strunk is off to a good start :)
Nice work, Rand! I really appreciate your efforts for compiling such a handy, comprehensive list of SEO tips. Keep it up...
Rand, great job indeed and very impressive by its volume and depth, but you might want to fix one thing - there is at least one link I've come across pointing at a thread on SC where you have deleted the actual post (I think it is where you talk about links)- I know you've deleted a bunch of your posts when the SC exodus happened but if you have that stuff reposted/saved someplace else please link to there.
Great introduction document - keep up the good work!
Re:"With a bit of luck, this can be a document that others in the industry can use as a pointer for newbies as well."
Funny you should write that, last week a newbie asked me for some good seo articles. The two that I pointed to: Your "Search Engine Ranking Factors" article and my all time favorite, "The Keyword Density of Non-Sense". Now I'll add this. I wish this had been around when I first started learnig seo... hmm, then again maybe not. I think there's alot to be said for learning based in trial, error and testing.
BTW: He loved your article.
Natasha "That Girl From Marketing" Robinson
Also, is there a way to be alerted when others comment to a post that you commented on?
Excellent resource as usual.
A nice link worthy resource. Good job.
If the first 2 documents are any indication, I'll be definitely looking forward to the next one :)
Marc
I will have my assistant work with it. That will be "live" testing. I'll let you know how it goes.
Hooray! I'm glad it's done. :-)
I'd just like to say rand that I absolutely LOVE the format you put the guide in (the multi-page one in particular) and will be using something similar for a guide on a different topic.
Well done and keep it up!