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Peppergal
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Web Positioning Software - 10/9/2002 20:36:20
Does anyone know anything about this software? Is it worthwhile? A client of mine is very interested in it.
http://www.webposition.com/
From what I have read about this kind of software, I have the impresson that it' s a waste of money. But maybe I' m wrong. Any comments?
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Reflect
Posts: 4767
From: USA
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RE: Web Positioning Software - 10/10/2002 7:15:30
Hi,
I have not used this in years. From the way back memory, I do not know if this still applies, you should not use the rank checking tool. A lot of SEs frowned on this usage. Also stay away from the doorway page option.
Brian
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Eli
Posts: 2658
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RE: Web Positioning Software - 10/10/2002 10:10:09
I' ve used the " gold" version - all I can say is that you need to watchnout for spam. I never ever got spam before using this product - now my inbox is full of it every day
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Thomas Brunt
Posts: 6106
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RE: Web Positioning Software - 10/10/2002 13:30:39
Hi Peppergal,
I moved this one into the Business / SEO forum because I think it' s a better fit. It' s been years since I' ve worked with WebPositon Gold, but I did find some of its features to be useful. I' ve read good things and bad things about it. I would love to read some more real world experiences here if there are any to be had.
t
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BLADE
Posts: 73
Joined: 3/1/2002
From: Belgrade, YU
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RE: Web Positioning Software - 10/10/2002 14:20:51
I think it' s the waist of money.
The software is simply too expensive and it' s not worth the money you pay for it.
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petewelch
Posts: 6
From: hilton head island, sc - USA
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RE: Web Positioning Software - 10/10/2002 14:42:54
I have used Web Position for years and would not be without it. I found it hard to learn at first, but as in all things it' s easy now. I use just the inexpensive version, as it can do everything I want. If you need the more expensive version then you have enough clients you can afford it, and it allows you to customize the reports so you can give them to your clients. The software will warn you if you try to do something the search engines might not like. They even suggest you not use the doorway pages. I have no reason to believe it has anything to do with receiving spam - everybody I know gets all kinds of spam anyway.
Pete
Old age is a terrible price to pay for wisdom.
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Liam5150
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RE: Web Positioning Software - 10/10/2002 14:52:58
Web Positioning.....What a pain in the @&$.
I used to do this professionally for about 15 clients as part of their Web site development. One of the things that I found was, the Search Engine/Directories company' s liked to change the rules and they way they allowed submissions....Like they changed their underwear...Constantly.
The one program that I used, and still use today is Topp Dogg. http://www.topdog.com
They really kept up with all of the changes that this industry likes to do with out notice.
It isn' t perfect, but if you do the research, and find out which of the search engines/directories allow auto submission, it can cut your posting time down quite a bit.
Doing this kind of work, even for 1 single client, can easily become a full time job in itself. You have to do month to month checking and re-posting, over a long term, to gain any acceptable results that you might be seeking.
(No, I' m not bitter!)
But, with this tool and a little persistence, and time, it can produce satisfactory results.
And, (just a little helpful hint) DON' T, I stress, if you do this for a client, DON' T, guarantee that you can get #1 ranking across the board (As some companies say they can.) We don' t control where things come up on Search Engines/Directories.
Those companies that run them do, based on their own set of rules, algorithms, positioning of the stars...You get the point, so don' t box yourself in with any promises.
Well, that' s just my 0.25 cents worth (Inflation ya know)
Hope what ever you choose works well.
Good Luck.
Liam5150
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JohnP
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RE: Web Positioning Software - 10/10/2002 15:34:24
I saw the comment in the newsletter re WebPosition. I have used WebPosition Gold for going on three years. I like it very much. The company constantly updates their SE profiles and the program checks on line for updates every time you load it. (Yes, that can be a pain, but IMHO it' s essential in a field that changes as rapidly as SE criteria.)
It' s not the sole answer and it DOES take some time to get the portal or doorway pages right for each of the many SE' s out there; however, my experience is that after say 90 days sites that I have used WebPosition Gold on do extremely much better than those that I have not used it on. Of course, you do have to keep updating and that' s a pain, but it can also be an income generator. WebPosition Gold has some really nice automated reporting capabilities and it' s designed so that you can customize all the reports so they look like your work and never mention WebPosition.
Someone mentioned SPAM. WebPosition does mail a periodic newsletter but I used a " coded" e-mail address (as I always do so I can track down spammers when necessary) and I have receive no, I repeat NO, spam addressed to that address. My guess would be that the person complaining about SPAM uses " mailto:" links or formmail scripts which make his/her e-mail address available to every two-bit address harvester out there. I would suggest using a service side routine (I swear by PHP) that will let you put the recipient' s actual e-mail address in code that is NEVER served to the public. THAT WILL reduce your SPAM and prevent your clients from bitching that you are generating more SPAM than legitimate contacts.
I am hard to please by nature but I think that WebPosition Gold deserves high marks.
That' s my two cents worth. I get a lot out of the content that comes my way from OutFront and want to publicly thank all responsible.
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MarcoSantarelli
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RE: Web Positioning Software - 10/10/2002 16:23:06
I have used WPG for years. It is only a good tool for reporting. It is not good tool for SEO (optimization) on its own. A level of expertise is required to understand what you are doing and how to get the results you need.
It would be far more effective and time efficient to hire a professional SEO firm such as Submit360 (www.Submit360.com) and have them take you through the entire process and get results that to have to figure it out through trial and error.
I have been doing SEO since 1995 and it is not the same game today as it was then.
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LarryMcJ
Posts: 80
From: Chesapeake VA USA
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RE: Web Positioning Software - 10/10/2002 16:35:17
As with anything in life...there will be people who love/hate it. I have used WebPosition Gold for years just keeping a few of our own sites updated...and now I use the Pro version for the development business and I wouldn' t be without it. I admit, that even for a geek it is a really steep learning curve and you have to make a commitment to " use" it...not dabble with it. It' s not a program that you can play with a couple hours a week and get any kind of ROI.
The folks that write the software have been great to work with and I can' t think of any program in the price range that does what it does.
Just use the evaluation period to determine its value to you...that' s what is important in the long run. Not that it works for me, or doesn' t work for someone else :-)
Larry
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ElTel
Posts: 25
From: UK
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RE: Web Positioning Software - 10/10/2002 17:31:14
I' ve been using WPG for 2 years now and find it superb for a number of things. The reporting facility saves hours of work; the traffic stats are a bonus; the page critic is good for analysing each page before submitting (but heed must be taken of the comments on doorway pages - they' re now considered spam).
Liam mentions TopDog, but I' m sure I read a couple of days ago that this is about to disappear - following on from the two other submission casualties earlier this year - Submit Wolf and Site Promoter.
If you look to the specialist forums on SEO, such as http://www.webmasterworld.com it seems that the pros use WPG mainly for reporting.
And one more thing on WPG - they are great at support - something I find non-existent with many purchases.
It' s worth the money as it gets you looking at right things for basic SEO work.
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Liam5150
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RE: Web Positioning Software - 10/10/2002 18:12:17
I would also like to add to ElTel' s list, another Search Engine newsletter source.
It is moderated by a gentleman named Detlev who is considered one of the best in this field.
The Group is called Adventive: http://www.adventive.com
They have newsletters for just about anything, but the Search Engine Discussions are on the I-Search newsletter.
Again, hope this helps.
Cheers,
Liam
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pageoneresults
Posts: 1001
From: Orange, CA USA
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RE: Web Positioning Software - 10/10/2002 21:50:14
Once upon a time...
I was probably one of the first 100 users of WPG way back when. In the beginning, during that time span, it was the talk of the industry.
Many things have changed since then which make certain program characteristics obsolete. For one, machine generated pages are spam. They have also been referred to as gateway pages, doorways and/or bridge pages. They still work with some of the SE' s but they continue to drop from the indexes quicker than people can generate them.
Auto submissions in the year 2002 are useless! There aren' t that many free resources left that generate any viable traffic. Google is the last one and it probably won' t be long before they switch to a paid model only. So, the auto submission feature of the program is obsolete.
The only real benefit of the program is its reporting features. Unfortunately that benefit has become a risk for some. Depending on how you use the reporter could result in any number of issues. One, your access to the Google search engine could be blocked. This occurs when you' ve abused the reporting feature of WPG and Google has snagged your IP in the process.
Two, you could end up penalizing your own site if certain footprints are left while checking positions. I won' t get into all the details, but if you are going to use the reporting features, deselect Google from the searches. Google can be responsible for up to 90% of your traffic and the last thing you want to do is disturb that relationship!
The Page Critic, and the Scheduler are obsolete. There are some good tips to be found in the page critic advice but you can probably learn more of those here or at other search engine forums. The Scheduler is useless. At one point in time, it was the in thing. You would go in and set up a schedule of submissions. You don' t do this type of SE promotion any more. There are many companies waiting to take your money who are armed with a copy of WPG and think that its the answer to SEO. Well, I' m sorry to burst your bubble, but that just isn' t so.
My advice is to make sure that you understand the program fully before utilizing it. That advice applies to any programs that are out there which are designed to make SEO an easier job for you.
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Susan Goodson
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RE: Web Positioning Software - 10/11/2002 8:33:59
Hi
I am not going to plug WebPosition Gold here, or try to argue with or refute those who said they do not like the software, because I think most of you will agree either you like it or you don' t. To me everyone has a right to state his or her experiences and opinions of the software. And everyone has different experiences with every piece of software on the market regardless of whether it is SEO software or Operating System software, or word processing software. Experiences with the software will vary from user to user depending on their level of SEO experience, HTML experience, computer experience, and even personal issues that may be going on in their lives that might limit their time to use and patience for the software.
However, what I would like to do is to clear up a great deal of misinformation that has been posted here, so that those of you who have not used the software for " years" will be aware that much has changed.
First regarding the Page Generator it was mentioned that the machine-generated pages are spam. There was a time when the pages were generated with canned phrases, headers, footers etc and they were indeed being detected by AltaVista who was dropping the pages. However this was over 2 years ago. Since then we have made numerous changes. The Page Generator now generates pages entirely based on what the user enters. It contains no canned text, or code. It now even has a full template feature so that you can create pages based on your current web pages' format. You can create your own template with your own designs, logos, graphics and text completely start to finish and it will work just like any standard HTML editor software that will allow you to use templates and input text.
The next thing that concerned me was the statement that someone received tons of spam after using the software. We do follow up with our customers and trial users, both for sales purposes and to keep in touch so that they know we are here for them in case then need us, they are not in this alone. We don' t want to be one of those companies that sell you the software and then bail out on you so you are stuck with a piece of software and you have to go it alone. We also send out a monthly newsletter to our subscribers. However, I can promise you that when we do send out any offer emails they are strictly sent as offers to help and incentives for purchasing and we only do this for our WebPosition Gold software and its Knowledge Base updates. We do not try to sell you other pieces of software, nor do we send email ads for other companies. That being said there are some people who will go and download the software and subscribe to the newsletter using someone else name or email. Unfortunately we cannot keep people from doing that. However, I can promise you (I know because I am one of the people here whose job is to do this) when you send an email to us each email is handled and seen by a real person. All email unsubscribe requests are handled personally. I cannot tell you how many changes we have made to make it easier to unsubscribe. We added links right within the newsletter so that with one click - you are unsubscribed. When someone first subscribes to the newsletter we immediately send him or her the current issue of the newsletter along with a confirmation email so that they can choose immediately to unsubscribe. Now, if you are receiving email from other companies and that is the spam you are referring to I can guarantee you they are not getting your information from us. Our database is 100% ours we do not share, sell or lease it to anyone for any purpose. The software itself only passes your email address on to the engines that require it for submission purposes, so that your submissions can be accepted. Now we cannot guarantee the engines keep your email private, and in fact I am certain they do not. However, that would occur regardless of whether you are submitting via our software or manually at the engine itself.
Regarding the software being updated and staying current with the engines' changes. We have gone out of our way to make sure that the software always has the most current information available. It checks for updates everytime you open it and run a mission. We run searches 24/7 to analyze the latest search engine rules and trends, and we have people whose sole job is to monitor and search for any changes in each engine' s rules, preferences, and format.
I believe the final thing (and thank goodness because I am getting extremely long winded here  was the Reporter, in which it was stated could cause you trouble with the search engines. In reality this is only one search engine and that is the Google search engine. This also occurred a while back - perhaps a year ago or more. We have made numerous changes to the software to make it much more polite and smart when performing searches. For example there is now a feature that will insert random time delays so that the searches are not so resource intensive on Google. We also no longer pass the domain name over to Google when performing searches. And, the Scheduler has been vastly improved to allow for more flexibility in scheduling your missions to run.
I hope that clears some things up, of course there are many more additional features in the software that what I have mentioned, but I was trying to keep this as short as possible (believe it or not  ).
If any of you have any questions feel free to email me directly at susan@firstplacesoftware.com I' d be happy to do anything I can to help or clear up any questions you may have.
Thanks!
< Message edited by Susan Goodson -- 10/10/2002 9:15:39 AM >
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erinatkins
Posts: 3072
From: Mechanicsville VA USA
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RE: Web Positioning Software - 10/11/2002 8:50:40
I have used Web position along with hand submitting sites to the search engines.
I have NEVER had any problems with Spam.
I Do Not use the page generator. I do like doorway/gateway pages. I know many people who like them but I do not use them.
The scheduler is a great feature.
I like the reports the Web Position Generate. My clients also like them.
I think Web Position if used properly can be an asset.
I think it is worth the $.
Erin
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Andy from Spain
Posts: 920
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RE: Web Positioning Software - 10/11/2002 9:25:28
Hi Susan
It was good of you to relpy here - can you categorically deny that there is now no problem whatsoever using Weposition in regards to a Google banning /listing? It' s a program we have used in the past, found it to be useful but have stopped in fear of upsetting Google.
Cheers
Andy
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Susan Goodson
Posts: 4
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RE: Web Positioning Software - 10/11/2002 10:48:31
I cannot promise that you will not ever have trouble with Google. That will depend on how wisely you use the tool. If you go out and run hundreds of searches daily on their engine, or disable the safety precautions and run numerous searches no matter how many warnings we give you or how we warn against it you can get yourself blocked or worse. However, I can tell you that we have not had any reports of anyone being blocked from searching Google in over a year.
I can also tell you that what was happening was that Google would block you from searching their engine. They would not globally ban sites or pages for doing searches using WebPosition Gold or any automated tool, because if they did that would make it too easy for anyone to get anyone banned that they wanted. They also were also very courteous and good about reenabling searching once the person emailed them and asked them.
Google states plain and simple that they do not like automated queries to be run on their service. They say accessing their service with a browser is fine, but all other tools that automate searching are not. We updated WebPosition a year or more ago to emulate a browser as closely as possible to avoid unfair discrimination toward WebPosition users. There is no other tool on the market that does a better job of emulating a browser than WebPosition.
You may hear of a Web site being banned by Google, but normally it takes some form of spamming on the person' s Web site for that to happen, not simply running WebPosition' s Reporter. That' s because WebPosition Gold 1.60 as well as WebPosition Gold 2 do NOT pass the user' s URL to Google when running keyword reports or verifying URLs. In the case of URL verification, it does a query on a keyword phrase and then scans the results for the user' s domain name offline.
Therefore, Google' s server cannot look at rank checking queries from your IP address and say they belong to a particular Web site, which is on another IP, and ban it. Although they can certainly launch scare tactics to make you believe that if you check your rankings your Web site will be banned, that has not been the case as we' ve observed it. If it were, we' d be hearing a flood of complaints from our customers about being banned and that is just not happening.
Earlier versions of WebPosition Gold 1.x, mainly at the end of 2000 and first month or so of 2001 did pass the domain on URL searches but this has long since been changed. Most people saying that using WebPosition will get your IP blocked are basing their belief on those incidences. The browser emulation problems that led to a small number of people being banned have long since been corrected. Even at that time, less than 1% of WebPosition customers were even affected. However, the rumors continue to circulate anytime someone is dropped from a search engine (which happens all the time whether you use WebPosition or not) that WebPosition must be responsible. WebPosition' s Page Critic will actually tell you how to avoid accidentally spamming a search engine, which is by far the easiest way to get banned by a search engine.
As a side note, FirstPlace Software has made numerous communication attempts to Google' s management in response to their complaint at the end of 2000. For a period of six months, those attempts were ignored and put off. After extraordinary efforts, we did eventually receive a single response from a Google VP. We sent a detailed proposal of how we might work together to encourage the reduction of queries on their service, discourage abuse, promote their Web marketing services such as AdWords, and address other issues they might have if they could clearly spell them out. Some of these things required cooperation on their end to accomplish. Unfortunately, our proposal was not responded to by their VP. So considering the six-month history of calls, faxes, and letters being ignored, we deemed that the matter was in reality not that important to them and thereby dropped the matter. Since we updated the product long ago, we' ve had no substantiated reports of WebPosition customers being blocked or banned simply for running rank checks or for submitting, so it' s been a non-issue.
If you do use an automated tool of any kind, you should try to be sensitive to the needs of a search engine and not abuse their service. More specifically:
a) Avoid excessive numbers of queries if you choose to monitor your rankings on Google. Most people do not have time to improve their rankings on 100' s of keywords. Therefore, don' t rank check on 100' s of keywords if you don' t have the time to do anything about all those rankings anyway.
b) If you choose to run queries, run your queries at night and during off-peak periods, which is something Google has suggested in the past. This is when many of their servers are presumably standing idle, waiting to handle the increased volume during peak periods. Our scheduler makes this easy to do. The scheduler' s ease of use and flexibility has been improved in WebPosition Gold 2 to further this goal.
c) Do not run your queries more often than is really necessary. Since Google normally doesn' t update their entire index more than once a month, you should not have a strong reason to check your rankings more often than that.
d) I have heard that some people who are concerned about Google' s statements choose to monitor their Google positions via the Yahoo Web Pages option in the Reporter. Although these rankings can vary a bit from Google.com, normally because the index is not always as up to date, it can be a reasonable alternative for some people.
e) Avoid spamming on your Web site (same color text as background, excessive keyword use, etc.) since this is by far the quickest and easiest way to get yourself red-flagged whether you use WebPosition or not. WebPosition' s Page Critic gives extensive advice in this regard and is updated monthly so you can achieve top rankings through " search engine friendly" web pages.
f) We admit that we do have some concerns that Google' s Toolbar program that some people use could be used to set cookies or other things to help identify people conducting certain activities. We have seen a forum posting earlier this year that indicated that Google may have used the tool to track down the author of a product that reported PageRank outside of the official toolbar program and demand he stop publishing such a tool. Therefore, although WebPosition does not record cookies or things that could easily associate your domain name to queries you do, we cannot vouch for what information the Google toolbar could communicate to Google' s server. If you want to error on the side of caution, consider using the toolbar on a separate machine and IP from all your other SEO work, whether using WPG or otherwise, or not using it at all. (If you never downloaded their toolbar and installed it in your browser, then you don' t need to be concerned about this).
In the case of WebPosition Gold 2, you can use the " Be courteous to the search engines" feature on the Options tab of the Reporter so you do not query their service so quickly. This gives you an added level of safety you will not find elsewhere if you don' t mind the missions taking longer to run. The submitter has a similar feature to randomly submit at various intervals to more precisely emulate manual submissions in your browser so that you' re not discriminated against simply for using WebPosition rather than your browser to submit.
We recognize that online businesses have a fundamental need to measure their search engine rankings and automate submissions to save time and increase accuracy. This can be particularly true if you are paying a search engine to be included in their index. You can' t invest time or money into a marketing effort without having a tool to measure your results. Part of that measurement comes from measuring traffic, but another part comes from measuring your rankings and whether they improve or decline over time. Whether you choose to use a tool like WebPosition to assist you in that, another tool, your browser, or not at all is ultimately up to you as the marketing manager. Ensuring your Web site is visible on the search engines is an effective, and for some businesses, essential marketing method. The desire to be found on the search engines is not one that is likely to ever change.
In conclusion, we are not receiving reports to my knowledge of customer' s IP' s or Web sites being blocked or banned. I also want to say Google has an outstanding service that should truly be applauded. The accuracy of their search results has been some of the best in the business! Therefore, we by no means wish to promote the abuse of Google or any other service.
We do hope Google realizes that the same people that financially support Google by buying advertising via AdWords and other services also have a need to measure their rankings. If they don' t do that with the tool we offer, they will simply use some other tool, so this is not simply a " WebPosition" issue. With that in mind, at least in the case of FirstPlace Software, it is our desire to promote the responsible use of our product, to discourage search engine spamming, and to work together with search engines and the Web marketing community whenever possible. Most search engines realize this, but in the case of Google, they have a different viewpoint.
I hope this helps clarify things a bit. I apologize for being long-winded, but I wanted to give you as much information as I could so you' re better informed and can make intelligent decisions on promoting your Web site. Let me know if you have any other questions or concerns.
_____________________________
Susan Goodson
FirstPlace Software, Inc.
http://www.webposition.com
Answers to commonly asked questions:
http://www.webposition.com/answers2.htm
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pageoneresults
Posts: 1001
From: Orange, CA USA
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RE: Web Positioning Software - 10/11/2002 12:36:39
Susan, thank you for your well thought out responses.
Couple of things immediately come to mind. One, can you explain to us the benefits of using the Auto Submitter in WPG? What engines still accept free submissions that are of any value?
Two, why does the webposition.com site have a PR3 for its home page and PR2 for internal pages? With as many users that you have, and with as many sites as you have linking to you, surely your Google PR should be somewhere around 6 or 7. Also, Google is not counting backwards links for your site. Is there a possible penalty in place? If so, why would there be a penalty?
There are some flaws with your statements above. I don' t have the time to dig up all the threads I' ve read at various forums where WPG has been a possible cause of their problems. I do remember quite clearly a statement from GoogleGuy indicating that rank checking programs are against their TOS, no matter what program it is. I' ve seen users post comments about how they used WPG and then GoogleGuy comes along and states that was a possible reason for their troubles and that he would reinstate their PR if they stopped querying Google.
About the Page Generator, I experimented with it last night. Those pages are in my mind not worth the effort. You are better off building your own page following the core algo strategies that most professional SEO' s use.
About the Page Critic, I ran a few top ranking pages through the critic. I was a little suprised at the advice it gave me in regards to making changes. Right now, those pages hold top 5 positions in various SE' s. If I were to make the changes that the Page Critic suggests, I' d probably lose those positions.
Here are my suggestions...
Remove Google from the program. If you want to make amends with the largest SE out there, then you need to honor their TOS. You' ve not done that by keeping Google in the list of search engines that can be queried.
Post a very large and bold statement telling your users not to query Google with the program. Also let them know that they should not post reports on the web showing Google results. You know how many web sites I' ve seen that do this? Too many, and some of them have been assessed with some sort of Google penalty.
Remove the URL verification feature from the reporting software. That is sure to cause issues with certain users.
Don' t get me wrong, WPG was a great program in its time. I think its time is coming to an end. You were able to capitalize on the market at a time when WPG represented value. I' m not too sure that is the case in today' s SEO market place. You won' t find many top SEO' s using it the way you describe above. The main thing we might use it for is the Reporting Feature which in my mind is the only thing left of any value. And, even then, you are taking a risk if you don' t understand what to do, and what not to do. Good luck!
< Message edited by pageoneresults -- 10/10/2002 12:40:09 PM >
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Andy from Spain
Posts: 920
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RE: Web Positioning Software - 10/11/2002 13:04:09
Hi Pageone
I think you' re being a tad harsh - Susan came on here to give her thoughts on a subject that was asked about and I found her reply very useful, it would have been easier to ignore the thread.
I have to admit that it' s strange the page rank wasn' t higher for webposition but I assume if it was being penalised, it would have none, I' m sure you' re aware anyway, getting above 6 is extremely difficult.
I know it' s not the case here, but it' s very easy to jump on a bandwagon and pass on third hand information - that' s why I was glad that Susan had the chance to give her point of view - I' ve read some less than complimentary things about SEO software but I think it' s the users, like Erin above, who can give their personal experiences that are are going to be very useful. Is there anyone else that has used this or a similar product that can comment?
Cheers
Andy
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abbeyvet
Posts: 5095
From: Kilkenny Ireland
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RE: Web Positioning Software - 10/11/2002 13:22:39
I too am delighted to see Susan giving such a long and detailed, and extremely helpful, reply. It certainly clears up several misconceptions for me.
But I think you are being a little harsh on Pageone Andy. Yes, user reports are very, very useful but at the end of the day Susan is paid to defend her product and is hardly likely to spend too much time pointing out its deficiencies or problem areas, so it is fair enough to reply to some of the points she makes and query them from a position of some considerable knowledge of search engines and thier ways, which I think we can agree is where P1 is commenting from.
I used WPG in the old days when there were a considerable number of free SEs worth submitting to. I don' t use it now, mainly because I now outsource all but the most straightforward SE work so that is no reflection on its value. Thus I am not really qulaified to comment on its usefullness in the current, utterly changed, situation. But I do find hearing both sides of the issue thoroughly aired most useful.
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pageoneresults
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RE: Web Positioning Software - 10/11/2002 13:23:10
Too much overlap in the Reporting Feature...
Alta Vista
Primary Results: Alta Vista
Sponsored Links: Overture
PFP: Alta Vista
Directory: LookSmart
AllTheWeb (Fast)/Lycos
Primary Results: Fast
Sponsored Links: Overture
PFP: Fast
Tweaked By: ODP
HotBot
Primary Results: Inktomi
Sponsored Links: Overture
PFP: Inktomi
Directory: ODP
Tweaked By: DirectHit
7Search
About.com Sprinks
Ah-Ha
AOL Web Sites
Primary Results: Google
Sponsored Links: Google AdWords
Directory: ODP
AskJeeves (Teoma)
Primary Results: Teoma
Sponsored Links: Overture
PFP: Teoma/AskJeeves
Tweaked By: DirectHit/ODP
Xuppa (Formerly Bay9)
FindWhat
Google
Primary Results: Google
Sponsored Links: Google AdWords
Directory: ODP
Tweaked By: ODP
iWon
Primary Results: Google
Sponsored Links: Overture
PFP: Inktomi
Directory: LookSmart
Kanoodle
LookSmart
Primary Results: LookSmart
Sponsored Links: LookSmart
PFP: LookSmart/Inktomi
Directory: LookSmart
Tweaked By: Zeal
MSN
Primary Results: LookSmart/Inktomi
Sponsored Links: Overture
PFP: Inktomi/LookSmart
Directory: LookSmart
Tweaked By: Zeal
Netscape
Primary Results: Google
Sponsored Links: Google
PFP: Google
Directory: ODP
Open Directory
Primary Results: ODP
Overture (Formerly Goto)
Primary Results: Overture
Sponsored Links: Overture
PFP: Overture
Yahoo Web Sites
Yahoo Web Pages
Primary Results: Yahoo!
Sponsored Links: Overture
PFP: Yahoo!
Directory: Yahoo!
Tweaked By: Google
When you look at the above search engine relationships, you can see that there is a lot of overlap in the results. There are a few primary providers and the rest of them utilize the results from those primaries.
Why would I want to query all those SE' s that use Google' s results? Why would I want to query all those SE' s that use Overture' s results? If I' m not paying for an Overture PPC campaign, I could care less what my positions are in Overture as it is not used as a search engine, it is a provider of paid advertising to the major SE' s.
It sure looks good on a report to a client when you show them top ten positions across the major SE' s. Unfortunately many of them have no clue that a majority of those results are due to Google and Overture.
The above information can be seen in tabular format here...
[url=" http://www.webmasterworld.com/forum5/1234.htm" ]Brett Tabke' s Search Engine Relationship Chart[/url]
That chart was last updated in July 2002. Some things may have changed like Yahoo!' s recent renewal with Google for its web page results. If you haven' t been out to Yahoo! in the past couple of days, you might want to make it a point to visit. Big changes have occurred and it probably affects everyone posting here at this board if they rely on Yahoo! for traffic.
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RE: Web Positioning Software - 10/11/2002 13:40:27
> I have to admit that it' s strange the page rank wasn' t higher for webposition but I assume if it was being penalised, it would have none, I' m sure you' re aware anyway, getting above 6 is extremely difficult.
Not necessarily so. There are different types of penalities that Google has imposed throughout its tenure. There is of course your PR0 which means one of two things; the site has no inbound links or it has been penalized by Google. From my research I can tell you that once you get hit with PR0, the chances of recovery are slim to none.
There are also -2, -3 and -4 penalities out there. That is where Google deducts a certain level of rank from your PageRank. These are manually imposed penalties and if you get one of these it usually means Google does not like what you are doing. There was a recent issue with this and the selling of PageRank by a certain organization.
In regards to WPG, I don' t dislike the program, I' ve used it myself over the years. Once you become familiar with how the SE' s work, the benefits of the program become less and less. Susan is of course here to defend those benefits which I respect.
The problem you run into are the users who don' t take the time to read the help files and learn how they should use the program. I' ve watched over the years as many programs that were designed to automate the process of SEO fall by the wayside. I have a list of them as long as my arm but will not post them here out of respect for their developers.
If you just purchased the program and read the help files, you' d be that much further ahead. Using some of the features of the program does have its drawbacks and that applies mainly to the unsuspecting newbie who has stumbled upon a site that promotes the use of the program and how it can help you to achieve top positions in the search engines.
If you cannot afford an SEO to promote your site, then you may opt for a program like WPG to assist you in the promotion. Just be very careful in how you use it and the claims that you may make publicly about your SEO skills. When it comes to competitive industries online, I can assure you that being equipped with a copy of WPG is not going to be of any real benefit in your efforts to achieve top positions. There is much more to it than generating a few optimized pages and submitting to the few free search engines that are left out there.
There is another thread in this forum discussing how its a pay to play landscape. Programs such as WPG have no benefit in the PTP scheme of things. There is no need to check your positions on Overture if you are paying to be in the top 3 spots and are managing your campaign correctly. The Overture interface or whatever third party bid management tool you are using clearly shows where you are positioned up to the minute.
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RE: Web Positioning Software - 10/11/2002 13:49:11
> For example there is now a feature that will insert random time delays so that the searches are not so resource intensive on Google. We also no longer pass the domain name over to Google when performing searches. And, the Scheduler has been vastly improved to allow for more flexibility in scheduling your missions to run.
Susan, with statements like the above, you are sure to keep WPG on Google' s hit list. I' m sure you are very familiar with their TOS. But yet, you' ve found a way to fly under the radar in regards to querying their database. I' m sure this is one of the reasons for the negative PR issue that the webposition.com site is faced with.
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RE: Web Positioning Software - 10/11/2002 14:03:58
Hi
I don' t think I was being harsh at all, Katherine, I enjoy reading Pageone' s comments and have learnt a great deal from him and SE forums - obviously Susan would be here to " defend" the company' s software as would Pageone with his business and knowledge.
Personally, I feel if you can' t afford or feel uneasy with SEO to promote your site, you have to do it yourself but if there is a way of streamlining the way of doing it, and I' m referring to getting information about keywords/rankings here, then I' d be happy to pay for reports (rather than submissions), that why I asked the Google question earlier.
Cheers
Andy
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pageoneresults
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RE: Web Positioning Software - 10/11/2002 14:20:39
I' m not one to fall for the harshness. I don' t think anyone is being harsh in this topic, just forthright in their observations. We all know that Susan is here to defend WPG which is great. We all know that I am here to offer my observations from being in the trenches daily.
I stopped producing ranking reports for clients over 18 months ago. Why, because there is too much overlap in the results as stated above. Now I just inform my clients to pay close attention to their web based statistics. If the traffic is there and an ROI is being achieved, then the campaign is producing the results that were expected.
With a majority of web site traffic coming from Google, Yahoo!, Overture and MSN, you can do those searches manually and provide your client with an Excel spreadsheet. There are also little applications floating around out there that will make this task easier. You can also get a Google API key and perform up to 1,000 queries per day for personal use.
Ranking is not everything. I have sites in the #1 positions for targeted keyword phrases and some of those do not generate any real ROI. We' ve had much greater success with PPC and CPC than with anything else. Just think, a top bid position in Overture is displayed on most of the major SE' s. Top positions in Google are displayed on the major SE properties like AOL and Yahoo just to mention a few.
If you are serious about SEO, you' ll do these things...
1. Learn what works and what doesn' t work.
2. Learn what the core algo strategies are for top rankings. This applies to most of the SE' s.
3. Learn what keywords and keyword phrases to target. Google has a tool for this and so does Overture. You can also use a program like Wordtracker.
4. Set aside a respectable monthly budget for an Overture campaign or any of the other PPC providers. Of course Overture is the dominating force, especially when you can be in the #1 position in Yahoo! for your targeted keyword phrases.
5. If you don' t have the time to do the above, then hire a professional SEO to do it for you. Make sure you fully understand what they are doing and that they are not using any strategies which may cause long term detriment for your web sites.
And, if you cannot do any of the above and want to take shortcuts, you can purchase any number of various programs that are out there which are designed to minimize the amount of time you spend promoting your site. Make sure you read all of the help files before embarking on your journey!
< Message edited by pageoneresults -- 10/10/2002 2:22:37 PM >
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RE: Web Positioning Software - 10/12/2002 7:49:50
quote:
Learn what the core algo strategies are for top rankings
Hi P1R,
Out of curiosity what are some good resources that you are willing to share on this?
Brian
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RE: Web Positioning Software - 10/12/2002 12:13:41
Actually I did not come on here with the intention of defending every little aspect of WPG nor did I want to push or sell it. As I stated from the start some people like it, some don' t and I am not going to try to change anyone' s opinion. I just wanted to clear up some of the misinformation and outdated information that was posted. And further to that, out of those that do like WPG, I' m the first to admit that they do not necessarily like or use every module of it. Some have certain modules that they feel are of no use to them and have other modules that are indispensable to them. Everyone has a right to his or her opinion and no one' s opinion is necessarily right nor is it necessarily wrong. The bottom line is: that it is what is works best for YOU as an individual user that is right for you. So if you are looking for me to come on here and say " YOU MUST USE EVERY PART OF WPG AND LOVE THEM ALL BECAUSE THEY ARE PERFECT FOR EVERY ONE ALL THE TIME" that is not going to happen. Yet I do feel that is what some of you are looking for, especially pageone. That would be like me saying you must all eat prunes, carrots and broccoli for every meal for the rest of your life and eat nothing else because they are very healthy and I like them. What if prunes make you sick? What if you are allergic to broccoli? What if you just hate the taste of carrots?
That being said I am happy to do my best to address your specific questions.
Okay there were a lot of questions and statements made there and I will try to do my best to address each of them if I miss some feel free to point them out:
1) One, can you explain to us the benefits of using the Auto Submitter in WPG? What engines still accept free submissions that are of any value?
>The benefit is that it is a quick, easy, automated way to submit your pages to the engines. Almost all of the engines have paid and free ways to get listed in their engines. The free ways are either directly through their engine or free via a partner engine that they pull results from. Specifically the following WPG supported engines still accept free submissions either directly or indirectly:
AhHa
Alltheweb/Lycos which supplies results to:
-Lycos
-Regional versions of Lycos
-Alltheweb
Google which supplies results to:
-AOL and all regional versions of AOL
-Anzwers
-Google
-ICQ Search
-Web DE
-Yahoo
Hotbot which supplies results to:
-Inktomi
-Iwon
-MSN and all regional versions of MSN
-Overture
-Goo
Jayde
Regional Engines supported in the submitter are:
Goo
Fireball
Liberio
Club Internet
NoMade
BigLobe
Regional Googles
Regional Lycos
Rambler
Voila
WebWombat
And we are continually adding more engines.
2) Two, why does the webposition.com site have a PR3 for its home page and PR2 for internal pages? With as many users that you have, and with as many sites as you have linking to you, surely your Google PR should be somewhere around 6 or 7. Also, Google is not counting backwards links for your site. Is there a possible penalty in place? If so, why would there be a penalty?
>I honestly don' t know. We no longer do any site promotion for our company or software. As we have dealer and partner programs we allow our dealers and partners to promote their sites. One possibility is that because our dealers have mirror sites and they link to our site there may be a penalty for so many mirror pages linking to us. Another is that because we have so many partner sites linking to us it may look like some kind of link farm so Google may also penalize affiliate or partner sites to help even things out as far a link popularity. But straight out, for a certain answer to this you would have to contact Google directly. However, would it be possible there is a penalty? Absolutely, there could be one! Google has the right to penalize any page or site they wish.
3) There are some flaws with your statements above. I don' t have the time to dig up all the threads I' ve read at various forums where WPG has been a possible cause of their problems. I do remember quite clearly a statement from GoogleGuy indicating that rank checking programs are against their TOS, no matter what program it is. I' ve seen users post comments about how they used WPG and then GoogleGuy comes along and states that was a possible reason for their troubles and that he would reinstate their PR if they stopped querying Google.
>I never said it was not against their TOS in fact I stated in my post above:
" Google states plain and simple that they do not like automated queries to be run on their service. They say accessing their service with a browser is fine, but all other tools that automate searching are not."
Also regarding Google guy, of course he is going to say it is WPG' s fault. But then you have to stop and think what about all those people who don' t use WPG and never used WPG who got blocked and/or banned?
Regarding the posts and thread you refer to, I think I may know at least one of the threads you are referring to which is:
http://www.webmasterworld.com/forum3/4235-6-15.htm#msg84
Googleguy and I both posted to it and it is an excellent reference for those who want to know more about both sides of the issue (including those whose pages and site get completely dropped and Google admits to it not being on purpose but rather do to a mechanical glitch).
4) About the Page Generator, I experimented with it last night. Those pages are in my mind not worth the effort. You are better off building your own page following the core algo strategies that most professional SEO' s use.
>Hey that is fine! I understand completely, when I was strictly doing SEO I didn' t use all the modules either. I never said (and our company never said), you must use all tools in the software and love them all. Most users don' t, they use the parts of the software that are useful to them and work for them. But to say hey I don' t like the Page Generator therefore NO ONE should like it, is an overgeneralization. I have tons of customers who call in and love the Generator, because they are new to HTML and new to SEO and the Page Generator helps them create pages and they learn about the different areas of the pages and about HTML code as they go.
5) About the Page Critic, I ran a few top ranking pages through the critic. I was a little suprised at the advice it gave me in regards to making changes. Right now, those pages hold top 5 positions in various SE' s. If I were to make the changes that the Page Critic suggests, I' d probably lose those positions.
>The recommendations and suggestions given by the Page Critic are based upon statistical AVERAGES of top ranking pages. Used effectively, these suggestions and tips can do wonders for a page' s position. But, the suggestions made by the software are far from being the only solution. There are an infinite number of combinations that can produce a page that ranks well. Any number of variations in the tags, body text, etc. could produce that special high-ranking page. We' ve had customers report that top ranking pages still had lots of suggested improvements by the Critic. In fact, this is the norm, and is GOOD for you. It means that generally when you implement the suggestions, you' ll rank HIGHER than those already in the top 10. In other words, just because a page is number one in an engine for a given term that does not mean that it is perfectly matching the search engine' s algorithm. It just means of all that pages in the engine' s index, with the search term in them, that page came the closet to what the search engine' s algorithm was looking for. That means there can still be a lot of room for improvement. But we have always stated and I believe this is also in our FAQ' s and help files that if your page already ranks in the top 10, or top 5, and you' re satisfied with that listing, then you may want to leave the page alone since positioning is not an exact science yet. Tinkering with it could move you to the number one slot, but occasionally you could drop in rank too.
6) Remove Google from the program. If you want to make amends with the largest SE out there, then you need to honor their TOS. You' ve not done that by keeping Google in the list of search engines that can be queried.
>As I stated above:
We recognize that online businesses have a fundamental need to measure their search engine rankings and automate submissions to save time and increase accuracy. This can be particularly true if you are paying a search engine to be included in their index. You can' t invest time or money into a marketing effort without having a tool to measure your results. Part of that measurement comes from measuring traffic, but another part comes from measuring your rankings and whether they improve or decline over time. Whether you choose to use a tool like WebPosition to assist you in that, another tool, your browser, or not at all is ultimately up to you as the marketing manager. Ensuring your Web site is visible on the search engines is an effective, and for some businesses, essential marketing method. The desire to be found on the search engines is not one that is likely to ever change...We do hope Google realizes that the same people that financially support Google by buying advertising via AdWords and other services also have a need to measure their rankings. If they don' t do that with the tool we offer, they will simply use some other tool, so this is not simply a " WebPosition" issue. With that in mind, at least in the case of FirstPlace Software, it is our desire to promote the responsible use of our product, to discourage search engine spamming, and to work together with search engines and the Web marketing community whenever possible. Most search engines realize this, but in the case of Google, they have a different viewpoint.
7) Post a very large and bold statement telling your users not to query Google with the program. Also let them know that they should not post reports on the web showing Google results. You know how many web sites I' ve seen that do this? Too many, and some of them have been assessed with some sort of Google penalty.
>We state this in the software as follows:
Google has stated a policy that they do not like any type of automated program to query their service. In rare cases, they have been known to ban IP' s or sites caught conducting automated queries. However, they went on to say that if you run automated searches on Google, that you do so during non-peak hours (late at night, US Pacific Standard Time). Therefore, in respect to Google' s wishes, we suggest that when using the Reporter, that you take advantage of the Scheduler program to schedule your Reporter missions to run during off peak hours whenever possible. You should also consider spreading our your missions during the month rather than running a large group of missions or queries during a short time period.
We also have safety features in the software to help make it easier. We do not have plans to remove Google, and I personally don' t feel we should have to. The only people that were blocked from searching were those that abused the software. Should we ban all hammers because sometimes people miss the nail and smash their thumbs with them? To do so would start a dangerous trend. Our software was built so that SEO professionals and laymen both could utilize it. You are looking at this from the aspect of " if I feel this way" then you should do it. But we have hundreds of thousands of customers and each one has the right to monitor their positions and each one has different opinions on this. Also, there is a tendency towards some SEO consultants to want the software to die because they feel it takes customers away from them. However, there will always be a market for professional SEOs because some folks don' t have the time, patience or knowledge to do their own positioning and some of the biggest most profitable and successful SEO companies out there use our software and have helped build their fortunes on it. So again it is not the tool that is the problem but what each user chooses to do with it. A hammer is a wonderful thing in the hands of a responsible carpenter but look out if you hand it to someone who is careless.
8) Remove the URL verification feature from the reporting software. That is sure to cause issues with certain users.
>URL verification is nothing more than a unique text search. It does not pass the domain nor the URL to the engines. It is no different than any keyword phrase search on the engine.
9) Don' t get me wrong, WPG was a great program in its time. I think its time is coming to an end. You were able to capitalize on the market at a time when WPG represented value. I' m not too sure that is the case in today' s SEO market place. You won' t find many top SEO' s using it the way you describe above.
Actually I know of easily 50 or so, SEO companies off the top of my head that use the software in some form. And in fact two of them are the single biggest SEO companies out there today, that do positioning for Fortune 500 companies.
10) The main thing we might use it for is the Reporting Feature which in my mind is the only thing left of any value. And, even then, you are taking a risk if you don' t understand what to do, and what not to do. Good luck!
Again you are making a generalization here. I do not agree. Every customer has his or her likes and dislikes. To say you think a module is useless, therefore it is useless for everyone is rather short sighted. I speak to, email and post to hundreds of customers every day and I can tell you for a fact that each one has their own favorite modules of the software and some have modules that they don' t use at all. It is up to each individual user as to what is and is not useful to them. We provide all the tools in the software so that our users have the best possible software we can give them, with the most options we can give them and they can pick what works for them and what does not.
< Message edited by Susan Goodson -- 10/11/2002 12:17:26 PM >
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http://www.webposition.com
Answers to commonly asked questions:
http://www.webposition.com/answers2.htm
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Reflect
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RE: Web Positioning Software - 10/12/2002 12:45:30
Hi Susan,
I just wanted to take a moment and thank you for hitting up this thread/forum. Your insight' s are eye opening and are very much appreciated.
Thank you again,
Brian
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