I spent some time on the phone today with William Stinson from InfoSearch Media (link condom applied). They had cold called an old client (and friend) of mine who referred them to us. I spent a good 20 minutes chatting with William to attempt to understand their business model and their services. I took a few notes from our phone conversation - here's what InfoSearch Media had to say:
- Google currently uses LSI as a big part of their ranking algorithm (which is a load of bull)
- The perfect length for an article to rank well is between 200-250 words; any shorter and the search engines don't have enough material, any longer and they start to get confused (no, seriously, that's almost verbatim what he said)
- Text content is the primary metric on which search engines base their rankings - links, while important, are a smaller part of the equation
- InfoSearch Media was named "best content writer" by TopSEOs.com - apparently, they're also an "official sponsor" - can you say "conflict of interest"? Luckily, the press release didn't reveal that information.
William had evidence to back this up, too. He showed off a few clients:
- This page ranks #3 for "kobe beef steaks delivered" thanks to the great article that Infosearch wrote for Allen Brothers.
- This one ranks #1 for "organic dark roast coffee," once again due to the brilliant article writing. William told me that if they had opted for the full package of 400 article, they could probably rank for "coffee." (more on that gem later)
- This page ranks #1 for "buy hard drives" - they can rank well for these competitive terms because Infosearch wrote so many great articles for them, not because they're NewEgg... right? (BTW - the "article" they wrote that's helping the page rank is at the bottom of all the products - it's "not for users.")
I literally felt like I was on a phone call to crazyland. I tried asking William to explain the logic behind why Google would want to rank a site higher simply because they had more articles on a subject than another and we came back to LSI. Then, I received the following from them through email (after our call had ended):
Hi Rand-
Here is the info I was referring to about LSI and Google:
How Does Google Use Latent Semantic Indexing (LSI)? Latent Semantic Indexing (LSI) helps Google and others maintain relevancy by distinguishing in search results between polynyms, words with multiple meanings ...
www.wilsonweb.com/seo/google-lsi.htmAlso, my manger sent me this email after we spoke about Google:
“I just came back from the WebMaster World Conference in LV. I spoke with a man who recently worked for Google. He explained to me that Google is restructuring their algorithm to align more closely with LSI. Many people have been noticing a wide shuffle in search relevancy scores recently. Some of those well in the know attribute this to latent semantic indexing, which Google has been using for a while, but recently increased its weighting.”
When I told William I was speaking at WMW Vegas next week, he told me that his manager "was quoting a blog he read."
Contentlogic (the Infosearch service I was being pitched) says on their homepage that article content (like the type they offer) is the best way to achieve high search engine rankings. They excerpt a quote from Mary O'Brien (formerly of Overture), when the actual article Mary wrote is a near-perfect argument against the kind of "write-for-engines-not-users" philosophy that's embodied in their services.
It's not that their services are bad - they COULD be valuable to the right company in the right place. The writing is good quality and the subject matter isn't awful, it's just that they go about promoting it in such a horribly manipulative, shyster-like style that it's hard to take anything they say seriously. It makes me sick - no wonder there's articles like this about SEO. With these guys as role models, we're going to be thought of as bottom feeders for a long time to come.
p.s. Obviously (as with all things in the blogosphere and on SEOmoz), the above represents my opinions. If you're curious about whether I've got the right to say these types of things without fear of legal retribution, check out this guide to defamation as it relates to blogging.
I would add the observation that you can find other ways to contract writing services without getting them from large companies with large overhead to pay for.
As an SEO firm, we use people we have under contract to generate scores of articles every single day. It's a fundamental part of the process.
The game is links and content, and you need them both in depth. And you need the articles to be FOR USERs, because good links come from people who actually look at your site, and need to value it.
Back to my original point, we believe in generating content in volume, but we also need it to be cost effective, and like to have the resources nearby, so we can maintain a tight leash on the topics being written about.
We also use an approach where we do not provide our writers with a list of keywords to write about. We give them topics to write about, and then let them write.
We want the stuff written to be GOOD (and again, for users). If you generate a lot of this stuff the links will follow.
Take seomoz for example - This site generates tons of content that humans actually want to read. Any more questions about why the site attracts so many links?
Rand,
I am the VP of Sales and Business Development for InfoSearch Media. I recently had the pleasure - and admittedly, the horror - of being introduced to this thread. Although it’s never fun to be taken to task this way, I am grateful that it happened - I am truly interested in what others think and say about my company.
I have only recently joined the company, and since I took the reins, I have worked aggressively as prompted by our senior management to eradicate any “black hat” selling originating inside our organization (whether through ignorance or intent, we have certainly encountered issues with this in the past). To William Stinson’s credit, however, he is in general a conscientious sales citizen. If William said something that didn’t exactly stack-up (let’s all remember that SEO is somewhat muddy) then ISHM - and essentially, that means me - will take that squarely on the chin.
Dr. Garcia’s comment (in the paper you cited) was poignant and insightful: “…talk about something, explain nothing…their trail, combine scientific terms with marketing lingo.” Although I can see how this approach might be tempting to a sales person (I was a starving sales rep once), I am not interested in running an organization driven by this mentality - eventually this approach catches up with everyone (when I say everyone – I mean the whole industry). In my past, I’ve had the good fortune to work with several world-class brands where I learned, through first-hand experience, that you don’t need to cheat to win!
In reading (and re-reading and reading again) the posts associated with your comments about InfoSearch Media, I will defend us this way: We believe that content (and especially the content we write) has an integral place in SEO. We believe that content combined with link building and overall good SEO “practices,” is critical to the search experience! And after all – if you don’t have good, functional content on your site – what will you do with all that traffic - regardless of how it arrives?
In sum - Rand, I appreciate the intent of your blog. This enforces that everyday, I should be monitoring what our people say; I should be working to improve the reputation of our industry; and most importantly, I need to remain hyper-vigilant about how our product/service performs for our customers.
To that end, I welcome you and all your readers to contact me at ISHM for further comment. I can be reached at 800.388.1680.
Edan P
For sure. I remember that drink as well, but i also recall that you were going to pop me an email back in... august? :) We had a campaign to run. I think it was about posting "Permanent Midnight" to GooTube.
In the end I must agree with linked kingdom.
While it is very close to the "chicken or the egg" question, in the end you must have quality content to give others a reason to link TO it.
The issue of HOW William was selling it, he was selling something beneficial.
Man, Rand. If you got this upset everytime some noob seo salesperson gets you on the phone, then I'm going to farm out a call center full of Indian seo wannabes just to barrage you with calls. That's pretty funny I must admit--you obviously spent too much time on the phone with him. I've actually talked with this guy William before. He tried selling me content. It didn't occur to him that I used to run a sales team at that very company and chose to leave because I couldn't stomach the lack of product delivery and client relations.
The fundamental premise that content is important is a sound one indeed. Granted, you're a link guy Rand and that's fine. But you're a content guy too by definition: I can outrank every last one with one post on SEOmoz or one Wikipedia article (even if the content of each says nothing but the phrase in question) because the domains are well linked-to and search engines love the links. Either the post or Wiki article is worth the links, or some other content on the site is worth the links, thereby (according to the transitive property of link juice) getting your post/article to rank. There is content involved (I'm sure no one is going to argue that).
It's a shame what happened to that company. There was some real promise and the beginnings of something important: the desire to create meaningful content for people and create valuable advertising real estate. There was alot of talent involved.
Check out the Threadwatch comment Stuntdubl made once upon a time. Buying links is okay...attracting them is genius The point is that the company did want to create meaningful content in the past. Unfortunately, the company got top-heavy with execs that weren't in touch with the clients or the industry. All of the promise fell by the wayside in exchange for inflated salaries, cosmetically acceptable quarterly reports and press releases that touted the "TopSEOs.com award" (which was an award I actually greased in exchange for some content way back when! lol). The shysterness that you mention is what drove away all the talent (ahem, yes me included).
I've read Mary's article several times. She's a smart lady, and the piece just says to create first-rate content. You've gotten into the "quality" debate which is subjective (I agree with you btw).
Indeed. It's a sad thing indeed. The company (trafficlogic) did send some really good traffic at one point (before its site got burned for some other misbehavior). The content they added to many sites also did honestly help some companies to do a hell of a job. But at this point the costs outweigh the product, and it's a testament to the fact that the company has lost touch with the pace of the industry.
I now leverage some of their best ex-copywriters to build hundreds to thousands of pages of good content each month as well. It makes sense. But the shysterness needs to go, and with it will go the company (guess where?).
Legally, Abhilash
Abhilash - Great to see you on the blog, mate! I remember that drink we had in San Jose; must do that again :)
Thanks for your deep insight into the matter and for clearing up the TopSEOs.com award system - my next piece should be on their massive sleeziness.
As a former member of Abhilash's team at InfoSearch I can say that his comments are quoted for truth. While the place has become a smile and dial factory dedicated to the execs bottom line, the value of content still holds true. Their was a lot more education and training given to the sales floor back in the good old days that created some knowledge in our heads before we got on the phone with a potential client. This allowed for less reliance on a script and more conversations with people on the phone about what was being offered and what was/wasn't already working for them. P.S. - William is a good guy. I suspect that when confronted by a personality, uh, as strong as Rand's anyone would get a little flustered.
All with you on this one Rand. My conversation - and I stress it in the SINGULAR - with infosearch media about 8 months ago resulted in great skepticism.
To the self-deluding:
Matt Cutts to seos: it's the content, stupid!
note from Rand - rather than copy the entire post in the comments (and thus create duplicate content), I've just linked to the article from Michael Martinez that you had originally cut and pasted here.
>>>Tell them who you are, be UPFRONT about it! Don't lay traps and run back to sanctity of your blog
So, it isn't their fault for giving misinformation to Rand - likely the same misinformation given to people who, based on their "reputation" took their hard earned money and spent it with this company based on that misinformation... it's Rand's fault for not saying upfront "oh, by the way, I'm a top SEO with a well read blog - you may want to know that before you spoon feed me what you do the more ignorant webmasters". I don't even understand that train of thought. Everyone wants to make SEO ethics about blackhat vs. whitehat - but that isn't where ethics really counts. What counts is that you're truthful and upfront with clients. And not just the clients with the big mouths and larger media profiles. ;-)
Rae - the hilarious part - William told me he knew who I was and followed my work. There was no confusion on anyone's part.
I just wonder if it's possible to write LOL more in one's comments. Perhaps the inclusion of this mysteriously and unfortunately overused acronym is actually the mark of quality content! aha! Rand, both you and I had it wrong. All we had to do was write "lol" a bunch of times, LOL. Hopefully your future content will be more inclusive of modern language, LOL.
Hahaha...wait, I mean LOL!!!1111!! OMG
I would tend to disagree with the thought that "it's ALL about links". Links are important, however so are a number of other factors and content is a big one. You can not do anything by focusing on just one factor, but need instead a comprehensive approach which is what I focus on and have been quite successful.
I appreciate rands follow up saying William was not being sleezy. Good content is important, truly, however there are other factors that are just as important in the total SEO approach.
Just my $.02
Hmmm... well, if you dance in public naked while totally sober, you really can't whine when pictures of your naked ass wiggling to Beyonce show up on the internet now can you? ;-)
Your eloquence is divine; masterfully said.
First Time Post on seomoz:
I can tell you first hand from a company who was scammed by InfoSearch Media (formally Traffic Logic), STAY AWAY! One of my employees meet these guys at SES NY ’05 came over to me with this “wonderful deal”, and I gave the go ahead to invest $3k PREPAID at a CPC of around $.50 for education related clicks coming form organic listings on Google and Yahoo. I mean we were paying a few dollars a click on some listings, and converting profitably so $.50 CPC was a no brainier. They were a premium sponsor at SES and Webmasterworld, so I though they were legit, but I was wrong. After running the program for about 3 months, we got approx 100 clicks and not one conversion.
After having yelling matches with my account manger refusing to send back our funds, I started calling the CEO of the company with no reply. I waited till WebmasterWorld in New Orleans (June of ’05) and confronted them at their booth, planning on making a scene if I did not get back these funds. The VP of Client Services stressed he will make it work, and to give them another chance, with $1,500.00 refunded to us right away. We optimized the keywords we were using, and we got our first lead a few days after WebmasterWorld! That was it! We received all the clicks we contracted with one conversion, which was probably the VP of InfoSearch filling out my client’s application…
I took a look at their fake spam sites. They're just using the same site template for their fake marketing site that they spam from. When people start complaining about spam from one, or they get shut down, they just create a new one and spam from that one.
Their fake sites are all shut down now, but you can see a few of them on the internet archive site below:
https://web.archive.org/web/20070203060745/https://ecyberscreen.com/
https://web.archive.org/web/20061115183541/emarketscreen.com/
This can't be legal.
Last year Infosearch contacted me and the sales pitch seemed straightforward, certainly not intense. I was given some suggestions I could do to help optimize our site. I had no web design skills when I did our site (BuyActivatedCharcoal.com) but a couple search terms already had first page positions and our traffic was increasing every month. I checked several of their success stories. They seemed legit. I thought they might be a good fit.We have a very niche market (activated charcoal). We were given 20 suggested search phrases. I was suspicious when I had to drop some and edit a couple others. When the scripts came back I should have right then asked for a full refund. One key phrase that included "capsules" kept referring to "tablets". I responded and told them the writer had not researched our product. They had to rewrite over half of the pages. They tell you that if you alter the text they provide they cannot vouch for any failure in traffic.I had to correct spelling and punctuation on the third edit. On the fourth edit I looked over the "Final Content" (see bottom of page for "Read More Information On...") for the errors I submitted. They had all been fixed and I was about to confirm this latest Content when a little voice said, "Just check the headings". I started back up the page only to find two errors! I went no farther - one was inserted on this last correction! The other had to do with "adsorb" instead of "absorb", which I mentioned to the script writer on my first edit - clearly the writer never bothered to follow up my edit notation.What was supposed to make us money and save me time had not only doubled my time in editing, but also my frustration.I won't go on, but someone finally conceded they had failed to deliver, and for a paltry $1300 I could buy the pages instead of rent them. I was assured I would have ongoing contact and support with the project managers. That was 10 months ago and when I recently emailed and phoned they were not available (?) They have a web analytics page that supposedly tracks all entry and exit pages as well as other info. Strange that my website tracking tools do not agree with their statistics as far as total visitors. In any case they counted 27 as the highest number of visitors in one day. But NOT ONE CONVERSION in 10 months! So much for making us money.No wonder they do not respond when I call.Infosearch must be working for some but it didn’t for us. I continue to focus on content and our page rank has gone from 1 to 2 and our traffic/sales increase monthly.
My advice would be, if the prospective customer realizes early that the writers do not understand their product then drop them right there. Save your time, money and energy.
As for further optimizing our site, I have shied away from reciprocating links that do not relate to our site, but reading this blog maybe I need to rethink this.
As a former client of Infosearch Media, I was never too crazy about their methods, but I was only the middle man between them and my boss and he wanted them, so we went with them. We signed up to them again a year later, that being around four months ago, and now, they're no longer a company. They shut down as of last month, but who knows where the pages we just paid 2,400 dollars for, or the trackers, or any of that went. Their numbers are disabled, e-mails left unresponded. It's just.. Dead. I spoke to the "executive assistant" who informed me they were closing down and were bought by a large company, but no mention as to how to come in contact with them or what would happen as a current active client...
Oh well..?
Rand lays the smack down!
My first run-in with Infosearch Media was from a friend who used to work there later in 2006. When i saw this post, i called him and asked him about it. He told me some things that were pretty interesting.
Apparently some new management took over the company in 2005. the new CEO was originally the President of Ask Jeeves! The company is publicly traded (https://finance.yahoo.com/q?s=ishm.ob). I didnt even know there were any publicly traded SEO companies.
My friend told me that they use spam as their main form of generating leads. I find this to be very interesting that a public company would be doing this since i always think of public companies as having to "play by the rules" more since they are in the public spotlight.
Than it got even more interesting. Apparently, Infosearch has created false companies with false domains to spam from. They set them up in China to try and avoid the hosting and legal problems in the US, however, since they still spam into California, I believe this is still in violation of Federal spam laws.
My friend told me that they made him call company owners and tell them they were writing a story about them, only to hook them and try and sell them content for their website. He said the name of the domain was www.ecyberscreeen.com (which has since been taken down).
You can read more about this here:
https://marcelo.sampasite.com/brave-tech-world/A-real-press-contact-or-the-most.htm
One of the main laws having to do with Spam is that you it is illegal to send email under a false identity. Im surprised that a public company is engaged in these practices. Although, after reading Randfish's post, and after talking to my friend about his experience there, it sounds like there are a lot of shady things going on at that company.
Oh God, I used to work for InfoSearch (as a copywriter), and admittedly, my knowledge of SEO started with them. My knowledge has grown somewhat in the interim though, I'm pleased to report.
As a former member of Abhilash's team at InfoSearch I can say that his comments are quoted for truth. While the place has become a smile and dial factory dedicated to the execs bottom line, the value of content still holds true. There was a lot more education and training given to the sales floor back in the good old days that created some knowledge in our heads before we got on the phone with a potential client. This allowed for less reliance on a script and more conversations with people on the phone about what was being offered and what was/wasn't already working for them. P.S. - William is a good guy. I suspect that when confronted by a personality, uh, as strong as Rand's anyone would get a little flustered.
This phone call must really have pissed you off.
A great rant from rand. (I had to say that ... )
What really gets me is that the examples given are all 3 and 4 word search terms. Content alone probably can rank you on a lot of obscure 3 and 4 word search terms, but that isn't going to drive a lot of traffic. Also, the kobe steak artilce site looked like a MFA spam site only it was missing AdSense. What a joke.
I just looked at the examples for rankings. They seemed to be perfectly fine to me. It seems to me that this article was a little childish. Speaking to one person in a company, cannot determine or give right to judge their services. We should educate people, and not write childish articles, that make us feel like the bigger man. These are just my thoughts.
Sincerely,
Tapeworm
Come on, already!!!
I read the Blog here all the time and after seeing how Rand has handled this I am very disappointed! The purpose of a forum such as this is to share ideas/ knowledge and to educate those who might not have it right. I am so "glad" to see that Rand is so knowledgeable about the Google algorithm that he can sit back in his "Ivory SEO Tower" and judge everyone else in a deceptive way! The type of deception he displays here does not help the next person who might get "less than accurate" information about SEO/SEM. To make this industry better and eliminate those wrongdoers while enlightening the possibly undereducated/misinformed we must correct those who we find fault in immediately so that it does not spread outside the "Link Condom" (lol!) to the rest of the content universe!
Rand, you could have handled this much better. According to what you wrote, William did have some things right, maybe not the way you would like to hear it though.
Rand, your lack of CONTENT and GOOD INTENTION in the conversation is hardly worth linking to. lol!
Next time try to take the high road and do the right thing - make us all look good! This childish reaction does no good, especially for this industry. Rand, you have a lot of good to offer this industry and it is a shame to see you waste it with such petty stabs at others.
P.S. Links are only as good as the CONTENT they link to! LSI - well now that is a whole other story, or should I say question. Is it a huge stretch to say that there could be forms of LSI in BETA, Colossus perhaps?
Peace out! Some names have been changed here to protect the innocent. lol!
linked_kingdom - It's awfully hard for me to understand your perspective. I believe you're suggesting that my analysis of ContentLogic's services is misleading, but you don't give any specifics.
You've also accused me of having ulterior motives or bad intentions in posting this piece - why? What could this motivation be? How would it benefit me? SEOmoz certainly doesn't offer directly competing services, and our clientele is very different demographically from the folks who might buy ContentLogic.
This statement "links are only as good as the content they link to" is the complete opposite of what I believe. IMO, "content is only as good as the links it can attract" - which, by no coincidence, is also how the search engines rank pages.
Companies like this are nothing short of our industry's Achilles heel. Every time I hear another story about some TP-esque scam artist my blood boils. There are so many talented folks in search marketing that are passionate about what they do and honestly make their clients' successes their own - yet the actions of these fraudulent few tarnish us all.
At some point market forces will hopefully edge out the remaining crooks, there simply won't be a place for them to hide as quality resources like SEOmoz continue to broadcast good knowledge. This just goes to show the market has a ways to go before maturity.
Am I getting a different data center or is the first "#1" ranking (for "kobe beef steaks delivered") now #2?
And I'm sure it's an immensely popular keyword, despite what Yahoo! and Google estimate for traffic...
(1) My perspective is simple. Make the SEO world a better place by sharing your highly evolved knowledge with those who you spend time with and dispel the notions you find to be not true with them. Tell them who you are, be UPFRONT about it! Don't lay traps and run back to sanctity of your blog and the cronies who back you up. lol! The company is not important, your interaction with the companies front line is. You had the opportunity to offer something possibly better and you did not.
(2) Motivation! - Schmotivation! Who knows/cares!
(3) Yin Yang. High quality content and links to that content favor the user - which, by no coincidence, is also the guideline webmasters are suppose to adhere to for search engines and their rankings.
What came first the content or the link? (Chicken vs. Egg. lol!) Only this one is easily answered: There had to something to link to!
Attracting links is genius, although you must start with something to link to and that, my friend, is why CONTENT is the creator!
Links without quality content is a chain of fools...
linked_kingdom - You've accused me of: not sharing my knowledge, hiding my true identity, and creating a low quality post.
I would respond simply by saying that I try to share as much as I can. My identity is a secret to noone, and certainly least of all on this blog or in my interactions with ContentLogic/InfoSearch. If you didn't like the post - sorry! Hopefully our future content will be more to your liking.
Rand, Excellent link bait!
Sheesh... Want a legal suit againts SEOmoz.org? ;)
I suspect much of the problem is that you may have been talking to a salesman. So many times, a company's salesperson (regardless of the industry) really doesn't have a clue what he or she is talking about. They are simply regurgitating a script they've learned, and often, they mangle that badly. Often, however, the person they are selling to knows less than the salesperson, so it really doesn't matter. The sale get s made, and often the customer is happy, regardless of the bad information he initially got from Mr. Sales Guy.
I have no experience with that company, so I'm just taking guesses here, but just to give them some benefit of the doubt - they may actually know more than that guy represents. Or...maybe not. :)
Oookay. Typos and misunderstandings aside, this one was a red flag, wasn't it? Or did we miss the conference? Oh, man! :)
Sharp eyes, Jane. :)
He's clearly a time traveller, Jane. You mean you don't have those in New Zealand?
Aw, man. I'm being outed as not knowing about time travel again. Rebecca picks on me. :P
Personally, I always thought time travel was a great business asset. ;)
Did you get all up in his face like when those other sleazeballs called? That was hilarious!
I think you might be missing a few links in this sentence, referring to the articles in question: "It makes me sick - no wonder there's articles like this and this about SEO."
Also, I concur that he must be a time traveler from teh future.
I don't mean to suggest that William was sleazy - he was just towing the company line and could hardly be blamed. He kept repeating things like "well, I've been told," or "my information says." It's not his fault, but I do hope he does a bit more digging into what real SEO is about so he can properly sell the service.
Like I said - the article writing can be useful, you just have to know where and how to use it (and stop conning website owners into buying a service that doesn't help them).
After reading this post Rand, I agree. What you dealt with wasn't a bad salesperson, but rather a misinformed salesperson. Some of the better salespersons I know are very ignorant of their product. They sell to the human emotion, not on a set of facts. They'll know what the product does and why you NEED it, but not necessarily how it does it. That can be a good and bad thing.
I think the blame lies in the "manager", the man behind the curtain. He seems to be the source of misinformation in this case. The sales guy did add his "I don't know I just work here" type of disclaimers to some his statements. Gotta give him credit for that. But, to be a great salesperson you must first truly understand and know the product you are selling. SEOs we have a mixed bag. We're (for the most part) half tech and half marketing, with a constant dynamic shift in the industry that could easily change tomorrow (and just as easily remain the same).
Rand do we look like a bunch of idiots, all this information you can get from any SEO book or any SEO Search Engine Optimization site. Search Engine Optimization for Dummies is only 24.99. Your shit is 40.00 per month what a Rip off
Why is it that spammers always have bad grammar, spelling and punctuation? And, BTW, you're banned. Leaving 6 comments in a few minutes all with the same content is a good way to make that happen :)
Well yes, seoguy101. Yes you do.