Google

Uhh . . . i don’t think i meant that.

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I am not an SEO, but an experimental physicist The laws of physics that I study are not fixed but are constantly changing.

They are the physics of Google.

The test of all knowledge is experiment. Experiment is the sole judge of scientific “truth.” But what is the source of knowledge? Where do the laws that are to be tested come from? Experiment, itself, helps to produce these laws, in the sense that it gives us hints. But also needed is imagination to create from these hints the great generalizations—to guess at the wonderful, simple, but very strange patterns be­neath them all, and then to experiment to check again whether we have made the right guess. - Richard Feynman - Lectures on Physics

 

I experiment with links, structure, and content and study their effect on the Search Engine Ranking Placements (SERPs) of websites. The closed system I concern myself with most is that of Google.

There are many like me: scientists of the physics of Google. If you’re reading this, odds are you are one of us. Together we form the environment of the World Wide Web.

“How do I ride a bicycle?”

That’s what I hear when people ask me how to make money on the web or to rank in Google. The best way to learn is to get on the bike and start peddling. You’ll fall at first, but eventually you should get it. I can describe the basics and warn of some pitfalls, but in the end you gotta just try it to learn how.

Does that mean we can’t learn anything from the masters? Absolutely not. While the best way to learn how to play chess is a brief introduction to the rules and then sitting down to play a few matches, there is hardly a novice alive today that wouldn’t benefit immensely from reading a chess book or two. At a higher level that same player will improve by reviewing the chess matches of grandmasters and coaching.

But he still needs to practice to improve. He needs to take what he has learned, experiment, test and refine.

In the same way, we who practice the science of ranking in the SERPs and making money on the web benefit from reading and sharing ideas with others who are successful. But experimentation is still the key to success. The novice who joins SEO Black’s Private Forums will be in over his head. Why review Grandmaster matches if you don’t know how to en passant and barely have 10 games under your belt? But the Google Physicist will reap rewards by studying other’s experiments, exchanging new theories and performing new experiments. We are experimental physicists.

There’s nothing quite like the feeling of “Eureka!” that accompanies a successful experiment. The only way to find it is through experimentation.

No one is going to write a detailed manual for your success. You need to experiment to see what works. Then go back, review those experiments, check it against your results and refine. Then experiment some more.

Don’t Stop. Keep experimenting, keep refining, and keep abreast of new developments in your field: The Physics of Google.

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There’s long been talk in the SEO community about seeking links from .edu sites. Some have argued that the links are better than non .edu links just by virtue of the TLD while others contended that what is important is that .edu sites naturally have trust rank because of all the backlinks they receive.

Up until now, we really didn’t know for certain who is right.

However, a search I did this morning indicates that Google is intrinsically trusting and placing more weight on citations from scholarly articles. After all, why track the information if they are not going to use it to rank results?

Here’s a screenshot from the search:

Additionally, Google is attempting to track by Author.

Q: Will this lead to Google inherently trusting and ranking one author from a site over another?

A: Almost certainly yes.

Why limit ranking to trust by site and/or page? It would certainly be more valuable to be able to determine who authored an article than merely where that article is published. Just as in the print world, while a magazine or newspaper may be popular, various authors have differing degrees of worth, value, popularity, and trust.

Q: So what should I do now?

A: Develop contacts, procedures and applications for the procurement of scholar citations. By hook or by crook, get scholarly citations to your websites and build the trust of your site’s authors.

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The Google Interview has some strange questions on it. Here are my answers:

1. How many golf balls can fit in a school bus?

1 trillion

(then I draw a Dr. Evil Picture)

2. You are shrunk to the height of a nickel and your mass is proportionally reduced so as to maintain your original density. You are then thrown into an empty glass blender. The blades will start moving in 60 seconds. What do you do?

Plead to be taken back out.

3. How much should you charge to wash all the windows in Seattle?

As much as possible.

4. How would you find out if a machine’s stack grows up or down in memory?

Ask someone.

5. Explain a database in three sentences to your eight-year-old nephew.

Hey. Kid. Google it.

6. How many times a day does a clock’s hands overlap?

24

7. You have to get from point A to point B. You don’t know if you can get there. What would you do?

Try.

8. Imagine you have a closet full of shirts. It’s very hard to find a shirt. So what can you do to organize your shirts for easy retrieval?

Tell my wife or a maid to do it.

9. Every man in a village of 100 married couples has cheated on his wife. Every wife in the village instantly knows when a man other than her husband has cheated, but does not know when her own husband has. The village has a law that does not allow for adultery. Any wife who can prove that her husband is unfaithful must kill him that very day. The women of the village would never disobey this law. One day, the queen of the village visits and announces that at least one husband has been unfaithful. What happens?

They kill the queen - she’s the messenger (they always kill the messenger).

10. In a country in which people only want boys, every family continues to have children until they have a boy. if they have a girl, they have another child. if they have a boy, they stop. what is the proportion of boys to girls in the country?

~1:1

11. If the probability of observing a car in 30 minutes on a highway is 0.95, what is the probability of observing a car in 10 minutes (assuming constant default probability)?

About 63% via .95 =(n+n*(1-n))+n(1-(n+n*(1-n)))

(actually, I think it has to do with logs and that’s slightly off).

12. If you look at a clock and the time is 3:15, what is the angle between the hour and the minute hands? (The answer to this is not zero!)

360/12/4 degrees.

13. Four people need to cross a rickety rope bridge to get back to their camp at night. Unfortunately, they only have one flashlight and it only has enough light left for seventeen minutes. The bridge is too dangerous to cross without a flashlight, and it’s only strong enough to support two people at any given time. Each of the campers walks at a different speed. One can cross the bridge in 1 minute, another in 2 minutes, the third in 5 minutes, and the slow poke takes 10 minutes to cross. How do the campers make it across in 17 minutes?

1 goes with 2 = 2 mins
1 returns with the flashlight = 1 min
5 goes with 10 = 10 mins
2 returns = 2 mins
1 + 2 go = 2 mins

but really, how the fuck would they know the flashlight has 17 minutes left on it?

14. You are at a party with a friend and 10 people are present including you and the friend. your friend makes you a wager that for every person you find that has the same birthday as you, you get $1; for every person he finds that does not have the same birthday as you, he gets $2. would you accept the wager?

Maybe . . . but only if i was really shitfaced.

15. How many piano tuners are there in the entire world?

What do you mean, an African or European Swallow?

16. You have eight balls all of the same size. 7 of them weigh the same, and one of them weighs slightly more. How can you find the ball that is heavier by using a balance and only two weighings?

weigh balls 1, 2, 3 (set 1) against 4 against 4 and 5 and 6 (set 2)

- if not equal, take the heavier set and weigh 1 v 2 (or 4 v 5 if set 2 was heavier)

- if not equal the heavier ball is the it

- if equal it is the odd ball is heaviest.

- if set 1 and 2 are equal weight 7 v 8 and the heavier is the heaviest.

17. You have five pirates, ranked from 5 to 1 in descending order. The top pirate has the right to propose how 100 gold coins should be divided among them. But the others get to vote on his plan, and if fewer than half agree with him, he gets killed. How should he allocate the gold in order to maximize his share but live to enjoy it? (Hint: One pirate ends up with 98 percent of the gold.)

Wrong shitbag. You tell a pirate he’s gonna get 1 gold piece out of 100 and he’s gonna vote to kill you. You can reason with him all you want, but he’s gonna vote to fucking kill you. It’s not game theory, it’s human emotions and common sense.

20/20/20/20/20 or something close to it.

Hint: They’re fucking Pirates, not Game theory doctorates. If anyone get’s fucked they’re gonna vote to kill the others.

I’d vote to kill you if you if you gave me only 1 piece.

ARRRRRRGGGGG!

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Let’s say you’re gonna buy a company. Wouldn’t one of the ways you choose to buy a company be based on what it’s gonna earn next year? They have a stat for that; it’s called Forward P/E. It’s the Market Cap of a Stock divided by How much the company is expected to profit next year.

A higher number means a more expensive company when comparing Apple’s to Apples. (Everyone still with me?)

GOOG and YHOO are arguably in the same business. What’s not arguable who is in a better position in the Industry. One is an 800 lb Gorilla, the other is Yahoo.

So even after this whole YHOO - MSFT debacle, for some reason the market thinks that YHOO should trade at Forward P/E (1 yr): of 43.52 while GOOG trades at a Forward P/E (1 yr) of 24.04.

Apples to Apples (or Pears to Pears so some dipshits don’t think I’m talking about AAPL stock), Investors value YHOO 79% higher than GOOG.

So . . . for the Universe to get back into balance, YHOO has to go to $13.61 / share, GOOG has to go to $1065 / share, or some combination of the two (like YHOO to $17.50 and GOOG to $833). Either that Jerry has to whip out that super secret sauce he’s been saving up to suddenly get Yahoo’s profits to start skyrocketing.

de’Nile ain’t Just a River in Egypt!

. . . it flows through wall street too. Some investors are still hoping or praying that MSFT is gonna up their offer and close the deal. They just can’t accept that this deal is deader than . . . umm . . . some really, really dead thing.

The other big reason the stock’s being propped up? Jerry Yang is putting his money where his balls are and is buying up $500 million of YHOO with his own wad.

It’s a Ballsy Move. Only time will tell if it’s a Brainy one too.

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The full cnbc interview.

Excerpts on Youtube:

“I don’t think we’ve quite figured out the perfect solution of how to make money, and we’re working on that. That’s our highest priority this year.”

“We believe the best products are coming out this year. And they’re new products. They’re not announced. ”

On where to look for new business:

“Over the next three or four years, there’ll be more than another billion or so mobile phones added. Eventually our numbers indicate that there’ll be five or so billion mobile phones in a world of six billion or so.”

and

“the Internet is growing faster outside the United States than in the United States. Also advertising online growth rates are higher outside the United States than they are in the United States. You’ve got–and of course you have a weak dollar strategy–because the US has a very weak dollar–so that also helps. For all of those reasons, revenue outside of the United States should grow dramatically over the next while”

Why should customers spend more money on search?

“Because we earn it. Because you can measure it.“

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Fake Steve Jobs For the Win:

You’ve got these weirdly smart and semi-nasty super-spoiled children who really believe they’re superior beings who shouldn’t have to work too hard and who really don’t take criticism well (because they’ve never received any in their sheltered little lives, and it just totally knocks them on their ass) and on top of all that they are almost entirely incapable of focusing on anything for more than a few minutes at a time. You’ve got an entire corporate culture built on ADHD and entitlement. Nice work, frigtard.

 

And you know what? There is something really evil about taking thousands of the world’s smartest young people and using them to sell online text ads more efficiently. Really. Think of all the really interesting and important things that this pool of brainpower could be addressing.

 

FSJ is one of the best bloggers on the planet.

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GOOG has fallen from a high of $747 a share to less than $450 intra day yesterday. The latest 10% or so drop comes as comScore reports that clicks on Google ads in the United States were flat in January when compared with a year earlier.

But why? WHY are Clicks flat from a year ago? Is it the oncoming recession? A sign that this “Internet thing” is just another bubble? Is comScore one of the Four Horsemen of the apocalypse?

To find out what really happened, let’s take a short stroll down memory lane: all the way back to the middle of October 2007.

To set the scene, picture ten men clad in dark blue business suits in a smoke filled executive boardroom deciding how to squeeze the last nickel out of customers for shareholder value. Then slap yourself in forehead: this is Google after all.

To reset the scene, imagine something like the 10-year reunion of your University’s Computer Science Fraternity set in an office best described as Geek Paradise. Towards the middle of the room, two people are engaging in a “policy meeting”. It looks something like this:

Googleoid says to GoogleDork, “You know, [snort-laugh], most Adsense clicks are an accident because of the clickable area of the Adsense Ads.”

GoogleDork Replies (in his best Yoda Voice) “Foolish you are in the way of the Click. Knows where he clicks, does user. Accidents, they are not.”

Googleoid whips out his Gangsta Rap impression “Shit Holmes, Don’t make me put the smackdown on your ass, [Snort-Laugh], dem clicks is played out. And you’d know dat if youz let me do some regulate’in”

“Clickable area size matters not. Look at me. Judge me by my size, do you? Hmm? Hmm?” taunts GoogleDork.

“Yo Homey, don’t be fronten. [pushes up glasses on nose] The shit ain’t broken, so maybe we shouldn’t be fuckin wit it – know what I’m sayin?” asks Googleoid.

“Fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to . . .”

Googleoid Interrupts “Pleeeeeeze Neeegro! I’ll bet you that 6 digit ICQ number you got that reducing the clickable area drops the CTR by more than 30% of the quotient of area reduced over net total area.”

GoogleDork Breaks from his Yoda Voice and says “Put up that complete 1984 1st edition Legoland Kings Castle set and you got yourself a bet.”

They drop their foam swords, shake hands on the bet and walk over to GooglePlebe’s desk (seen here):

They tell Googleplebe to reduce the clickable area on Adsense text ads and he makes it so. Before, a user could click anywhere on the ad and be brought to the destination. After the changes, users have to click on something that looks like a hyperlink.

The Aftermath

“The CTR on text ads declined about 60% in the last 2 months with Googles changes, Image ads on the other hand stayed the same.” –January 4th, 2008 Marcus of Plentyoffish.com

4 months later, that little back and forth in the Google Rec Room shaved about $85 Billion (with a B) in market capitalization.

But it wasn’t as stupid an idea as it might seem. You see, Adsense works in a Quasi-market place environment. The market will bid up the cost per click once the adjustment for accidental clicks is readjusted. Right now, marketers should be getting a better value per click as a higher percentage of the clicks are “real” or intentional. That will lead to higher bids per click and ultimately should be close to a break even for GOOGs bottom line.

Is the Sky Really Falling?

The problem is that in the interim, GOOG gives almost not Guidance to the stock market. Mutual Fund types are really too thick to grasp exactly what’s going on, so they think that this “slowing” in the growth has to do with the potential recession effecting GOOG.

Meanwhile, the real story is that Online Advertising Spending will continue to grow at about 30% per year for at least the next 3 years and GOOG is poised to take a disproportionate amount of that growth even if nothing else they do is even marginally successful.

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According to the WSJ and Bloomberg, Yahoo thinks it’s going to reject Microsoft’s Takeover offer.

It begs several questions. Not the least of which is how the hell are they gonna do that?

When someone offers a 60% premium over your current stock price in cash, you’ve got to come up with a pretty darn good reason not accept it or your shareholders are going to revolt.

Some have speculated that Yahoo might make a deal with Google to outsource search or advertising or something: But a deal like that would certainly be the death nail in Yahoo’s coffin.

Remember how well that deal worked for AOL years ago? AOL had 30% of the search market when they outsourced to Google. Now they have about 5%.

The same thing would surely happen to Yahoo if they got in bed with Google Yes they would get more money per search over the next 3-5 years, but after that they would have no bargaining leverage with GOOG and would have to renew on far less favorable terms.

What other options does Yahoo have to reject the Offer? Find a white knight to put up a bid with more favorable terms? Almost no one has the cash to start a bidding war – and who would even want to?

Yahoo is screwed. All they can do is try to bargain a better price. Filo and Yang are just flailing to add one last bit of shareholder value before they’re both out on their asses as an all cash takeover from MSFT would leaves neither with an equity stake in the new “MicoHooey!”

The other question is whether Microsoft anticipated a rejection (either by Yahoo or regulators) and tendered this bid just to fuck with Yahoo. How desparate will Yahoo get to try to stave off Microsoft? Will they have a fire sale? Merge with a worse suitor? Or even sign a dark Pact with the Prince of Searchness?

One thing is certain: 2007 2008 is the End of Yahoo as we know it.

For a predator like MSFT, that’s probably what they were looking for all along.

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The war on Paid links is in full gear. Buying and selling links without the nofollow tag is now officially a black hat SEO practice that is against Google’s Webmaster Guidelines.

Google has and will continue to penalize sites that flagrantly buy and sell links. If you are buying or selling links: do it covertly & do it under the radar.

However, in many instances there may be a better option that trying to buy a link from a site: buy the site outright. While this won’t work for a large newspaper site, those links have long been void of link juice anyway. In fact, anyone who is openly selling may already have their link juice passing privileges revoked.

So who does that leave? Generally, the sites you can still buy links from that can pass link juice (help you site rank in the SERPs) will be small to medium sites with a single owner or decision maker. In those instances, where you’ve already gone through the bother of finding out who owns the site and getting in contact with them, why offer to buy a link for a few thousand a year? Wouldn’t you be better served by just making an offer on the entire site?

If you bought the site you’d get any revenue it was producing, any potential appreciation from the domain name, and total editorial control (you could link to some or all of your other sites). Sites aren’t as cheap as they were a few years ago, but you’d be surprised how many people will jump at $10 or $15k. Hell, even monsters like Adult Friend Finder are only selling for only 3X EBITDA.

So if you are going to ask someone to buy a link, perhaps the first question you ask them shouldn’t be “Would you sell me a link on this page for X/year?” but rather “Can I buy your site ____ from you for $XYZ?”.

If you buy the entire site then you’re no longer violating Google’s Webmaster Guidelines by changing where it links. It’s not like we actually give a shit, but . . . ya know . . .

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