If Google Sculpting Is Dead Then SEO Must Be On Life Support
Copyright © 2009 Titus Hoskins









I have always thought of SEO as optimizing your content, 
both on-site and off-site, so that it ranks at the top of 
the search engines. Promoting your content or site should 
never be a crime in the eyes of Google or any search 
engine for that matter.

Years ago, before I even knew what SEO was, I wrote an 
article and submitted it to the major online article 
directories. Next morning my article and links were 
on a thousand sites across the web, that may be a bit
of an exaggeration but you get the picture. How can Google 
or anyone fault webmasters for voting on the quality 
of your content by placing it on their sites?

Same thing happens when your visitors bookmark, tweet 
or digg your content and you end up on the homepage 
of Digg with hundreds of sites linking to your content. 
How can Google fault you for that happening?

Democracy happens. SEO happens. 

But not without a lot of promotion and marketing to 
get the wheels rolling. If you want to sit around and 
wait for things to happen, buy a big soft cushion and 
some extra patience at the check-out counter because you're 
going to need it.

Any business has the right to advertise, to aggressively 
market their products. How can Google fault any company 
for doing such a thing? Now outright buying of thousands 
of links to get your site to the top should be wrong but 
presenting quality link bait in the form of articles, videos, 
ebooks, press releases, quality information... and letting 
webmasters decide what content and sites they want to link 
to should be at the heart of all this foolishness.

SEO is knowing how to fine-tune your link bait and your 
site to reach the top spot in organic search.

But is Google cracking down on webmasters who actively
pursue this kind of link building? On webmasters who try
to get those embedded anchor text links on important 
relevant sites? Are they trying to give SEO a bad name?
Like that's even possible!

Over the years, my sites have held some very profitable
keywords on the first page results in organic search, mostly in 
Google. That's mainly because I optimize my content and web
pages to rank well in Google. I have been quietly Google
Sculpting for years, controlling what links I want on their
first page results. 

Actually, ranking well in Google is not rocket science and
any idiot can do it; all it takes is good quality content 
and plenty of good quality backlinks to that content. Anchor 
text (underlined clickable part of an URL) is extremely 
important for ranking high in Google but you have to be 
careful to vary your keywords because many SEO experts 
believe Google has a keyword quota - use the same keyword 
too often and your content will be penalized for keyword 
and/or URL spamming. Makes sense.

Actually, I have been studying and analyzing Google since
it was merely an itch on someone's back. And it seems like I 
have been constantly rubbing that ever changing Algorithm ever 
since. Generally, it has paid off handsomely for me and I have 
been a full-time professional search engine marketer for 3 or 
4 years now.

I am rarely stumped by Google but it does happen occasionally.
And recently my SEO alter ego took a massive beating, some kind 
of filter has taken one of my main keyword phrases off the first 
page of Google and landed it in the 60th place. Ouch!

What is even compounding the problem, this keyword phrase
sometimes bounces back onto the first page and then back off
again. This is not like Google, they are never erratic unless
it's one of their dances or a major update when all hell usually
breaks loose. For the most part, my keywords in Google have
been fairly stable, if they drop, they drop slowly and because
I have stopped promoting them. Years of monitoring your keywords
tells you something very different is happening here in this
case.

It is totally frustrating when Google won't do what you want
them to do! Usually they are so easy to lead and they take
directions so well. However, this recent erratic keyword bouncing
in Google has me so perplexed I am stumbling to find possible
reasons. I am jumping to conclusions way too quickly.

In my case, Google was listing both my main index homepage
and my optimized page for the same keyword phrase. This
appears to be diluting the ranking of both pages. The optimized
page was at around 50 and my homepage came in at the 95 spot.
However, this seems to be more my mistake than Google's, since I
inadvertently placed the same keyword phrase in links on
my homepage going to other interior pages and not necessarily
to my main optimized page which I wanted and which is usually
ranked in Google for this keyword phrase.

Let me explain further, I develop sections/guides on my site
that are keyworded to different markets generally relating
to the theme of my site or domain. For the keyword phrase in
question, I have a well established page that's linked
from hundreds of related sites around the web – this is the
page that should be ranked for this keyword phrase since
it is the most relevant, not my homepage. Likewise, on
my own site I have constructed my pages so that PR flows
to this optimized page. For years, this optimized interior
page held the number one spot in Google.

Could this possibly have something to with regards to
PageRank  Sculpting, which Matt Cutts spoke about in a 
recent blog post? If PR sculpting no longer works on
my site, can this be causing the erratic bouncing
of that particular keyword but if this is true - why
aren't my other keywords turning into bungee cord
wannabes?

Now there could be separate filters at play here and the
above scenario has nothing to do with these bouncing keywords
within Google. It seems to be connected with URL spamming
in some form or manner, even when those links are legitimate
links coming from quality sites. It seems Google's Algorithm has 
become so sophisticated and complex, it probably has developed a
mind of its own and nobody can tell it what to do.

However, it is always rather foolish to draw conclusions regarding
Google on just a few erratic keywords. But something definitely
has changed in how Google is ranking those keywords - could
it be that PageRank Sculpting or even Google Sculpting is 
killing the old tried and true SEO techniques. I am seeing
a lot more Brand Rankings in the SERPs which Aaron Wall talked
about a little while back; I am also seeing much more relevance on
News listings, more relevance on Video listings... can Google
be shaking up the whole ranking order?

Rumor has it that many top Google big-wigs are upset with 
the introduction of Microsoft's Bing into the search arena. 
That orders have gone out to shake up and improve Google's 
Algorithm... to further combat this pesty new competition. 

But does Google have to worry about Bing? The answer is 
a possible yes - if you do a side by side comparison of 
Google and Bing here:
http://www.blackdog.ie/google-bing/search-com.php 


You will see Bing is not half bad - whether it can give 
Google a run for its search dollar money is still up in 
the air but it could definitely eat into Google's share
of the search market. I am seeing Bing turning up in my
own traffic stats with a lot more traffic than I get from
MSN or Windows Live - now it's no where near the amount 
of traffic Google delivers but still it more than what 
was there before Bing launched.

All this shouldn't give Google any sleepless nights but 
Google can't afford to take too many catnaps if it wants 
to keep its dominance in online search.

Could all these background events be playing into Google's 
shakeup of how it lists popular lucrative keywords. I am 
not seeing the same kind of movement in my other less 
profitable keywords. Can Google be hand-picking certain 
lucrative keywords and applying different standards or 
filters to those keywords? Are there "human eyes" filtering 
Google's organic rankings? Extremely hard to believe given 
Google well deserved reputation, but something is definitely 
not routine as usual in the Kingdom of Google?

It now seems to rank high for certain lucrative keywords
in Google, you MUST have TWO highly ranked optimized pages
instead of JUST one? 

Is this a new and more powerful ranking factor which overrules
most other factors? It's my most burning SEO question at the 
moment. What has caused that keyword to drop so far, so fast? 
And why does this keyword phrase seem to be in Everflux, with 
new listings jumping unto the first page every day. The 
rankings/listings are much, much more fluid than they used 
to be; if Google ranks all its keywords in this fluctuating 
manner, SEO may indeed be dead. At least whitehat SEO where 
the webmaster is doing everything according to the rules. 

Again, this is micro-reasoning on my part since all this
could be just some filters holding my keywords back or 
recent activity from competing sites have suddenly increased
and my rankings have naturally dropped when compared to
them. But I have held that keyword for years in Google,
how dare other sites take my spot? For the other sites
to gain so quickly and for mine to fall so fast and so
far has me scratching my head. Something just doesn't
smell right in the land of Google? 

Could something more sinister be going on? Could someone be 
Google Sculpting my links in the opposite direction? Since 
it's so easy to sculpt or convince Google to list your page, 
can it be just as easy for someone to use underhand methods 
to get your page or site ranked lower? Spam your link on 
thousands of nasty sites or simply get you ranked for two 
pages for the same keyword, one of them that's poorly optimized 
such as your homepage so as to pull both of them down lower. This 
is too laughable and too paranoid to entertain, or is it?

Regardless, I have learned long ago, SEO has to be taken with a 
large grain of salt. Besides, this is just one of thousands of 
keywords I am monitoring. Win or lose, I am having the time
of my life, even when Google goes erratic and won't do what 
I want them to do.  After all, when everything is said and done; 
SEO means never having to say you're sorry!




... 

The author is a full-time online marketer who has numerous 
websites. For the latest web marketing tools try: Internet Marketing Tools 
Everyone is Profiting from Google, are you?
Find out how here: Google Cash File
Copyright © 2009 Titus Hoskins. This article may be freely 
distributed if this resource box stays attached.






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