The Moz Blog

Tool of the Week - Musings on SOA/Micro-Services

Frank Costello: [while eating crab] Do you know John Lennon? Billy Costigan: Yeah, sure, he was the president before Lincoln. Frank Costello: Lennon said, "I'm an artist. You give me a fucking tuba, I'll get you something out of it." Billy Costigan: [sarcastically] Well I tell you Mr. Costello, I'd like to squeeze some fucking money out of it. ...

SMX Whiteboard Interviews-Shut The #&@$ Up!! with Brent Csutoras

During SMX Advanced last week, we had the chance to invite several awesome search industry personalities to our booth and interview them. We'll be bringing these interviews to you over the next couple of weeks. For the first installment of the SMX Advanced Whiteboard Interviews, Rand talks with Social Media Rockstar, Brent Csutoras...

Sexism Runs Rampant on Reddit (and maybe the rest of the social web)

I am conflicted. I'm in an abusive relationship with reddit. And I keep going back, thinking I can somehow change things. I keep visiting, keep commenting, keep frantically checking my comments every hour or so to see if anyone's replied. I think if I say the magic word, somehow, things will get better. I'm addicted to it, yet I don't enjoy...

Answers to Your Questions

At the beginning of last week, I asked for your questions and recieved more than a hundred! As promised, here's a first round of answers to those queries, and, not surprisingly, I think there's some terrific material in here for everyone who reads SEOmoz or works in the SEO or startup community. The SEO...

SMX Advanced Recap (The R. Kelley Version)

It's hard having a conference in your own backyard. Everything feels so much more stressful--you have to drive back and forth from the conference to your place and back out for dinner and networking events, you have underlying priorities that are hard to miss (I missed the kickoff networking event at the Sculpture Park due to an open water swim clinic), you have spouses or family members you have ...

SMX Advanced - A View On Tone & Content

I always find it difficult to begin conference recaps. To me, they always sound trite. They're the high school English class equivalent of the forced short stories that begin, "We packed up the car to go to the beach..." Thus, my complaining about beginning conference recaps is how I've chosen to start this one. Luckily, there is plenty to talk about from SMX Advanced, and...

Whiteboard Friday - Link Building Tactics from White to Black

This week we're joined in Whiteboard Studios by Eric Enge of Stone Temple Consulting. Eric knows a thing or two about link building campaigns, so he and Rand discuss the many tactics one can employ when building bulk links, everything from shiny white hat to shady black hat, and everything in between. ...

The World Series Spidering Problem

The issue I want to talk about is geo-delivery i.e. delivering different content to different visitors depending on their geographic location. When you don't know more information about the visitor (from sign-up information, cookie, etc.), the only way of doing this is through determining their location from their IP address. Whenever you start talking about selectively delivering content based on IP address, the topic of cloaking inevitably comes up.

New UK Law Criminalizes Stealth Marketing Techniques

Our European colleagues have been buzzing about a new law prohibiting certain stealth marketing tactics. Distilled, IPA, The BBC, BigMouthMedia, The Times Online and Marketing Week have speculated on the potential fallout of the new regulation. Many have predicted the demise of common, but controversial covert marketing techniques, including paid links, fake reviews, flogs, and comment seeding. What exactly does the law prohibit? Is it the death of stealth marketing? What does it mean for stealth marketers in other countries who may do some business in the UK?

Social Media Gamblers: Learn to Play the Odds

Creating viral content for social media is always a gamble. Seemingly great pieces can unexpectedly flop while poorly written blog posts and strange images can go viral without any effort from the creator. In most ways, the success of viral marketing is out of the hands of the marketers. Yet, smart marketers, just like smart gamblers, know there are certain things they can do to help their chances...

Get Free Links on Search Engine Watch!

Before you read any further... there are NO free links on Search Engine Watch. I just made that up to get your attention. Well... kinda. Ok, so maybe there ARE free links... but only if you're a douchebag SEO wannabe. I'm only using SEW as an example, because (1.) it's the first example I could find, and (2.) I'm hoping th...

The Lessons of "Halfway Over Greenland"

I was very impressed by two aspects of the post: its literacy and its honesty.Especially during the hopefully closing business era we've all recently lived through, stupidity and dishonesty have ruled the day. Even a year ago, I still dispaired that everyone I did business with represented a barely hidden value system based on Milton Friedman-type winner-take-all (at whatever cost) e...