Here at SeanSEO.com we get our fair share of spam!  Thankfully, we have Askimet. Askimet is a plug-in for WordPress that’s free to use and simply requires you activate it using your API.  If you don’t know how to find your WordPress API, go to your global dashboard and you’ll find it easily.

Askimet doesn’t stop everything and it can occasionally catch non-spam but it works very well at minimizing the amount of blog spam you get.

What’s Wrong With Blog Spam?

A lot of site owners are trying to buy quality backlinks to their sites.  Unfortunately, some of the services they use in order to try to buy those links will resort to very spammy measures.  A lot of spam includes links to pornography sites with non-sensical comments that are filled with obscene links.

Not All Links Are Good Links….

In terms of SEO, you want to be associated with sites that will help you instead of hurt you.  Sites that have good page rank and that are about relevant topics can boost your own site’s rankings.  Some sites allow pingbacks automatically so when you link to them in your site, a link will turn up on that other site.  Some website owners prefer to moderate these links to be sure that the site will add value to their on page and off page SEO.  While moderating takes a bit of effort, it is a good idea to do it otherwise you might not be getting all the attention from search engines that you want.

In your blog, you can decide if you want to moderate comments and pingbacks, allow them openly or block them entirely.  The choice is yours.  While different internet marketers and pro bloggers have varying opinions on the matter it’s important that you do take the time to make a decision because ignoring spam could cause it to spiral out of control and penalize your site’s reptuation.

Have a most outstanding day.

Dana Prince
Internet Marketing Blog
www.SeanSEO.com © 2008

If you want great SEO advice you’ll need to look in more than one spot for information.  Knowledge is power in anything you do, right? On a regular basis, internet marketers need to scour the web for intelligence on search engine marketing.

Here are some great SEO posts or sources of information that contain valuable SEO news:

SEOmoz is a paid service but SEOmoz Blog is free and contains loads of info.

Here’s a great post with 7 SEO strategies

BeanStalk is an SEO company that offers loads of free SEO tips.

SEOChat is a place to read, to chat and to learn about SEO.

One thing that is the constant in search engine optimisation is change so keeping up to date on SEO and getting ideas and news from many sources can help you stay ahead of search engine alogorithm changes and keep you climbling higher in the rankings.

(image courtesy of sxc.hu)

Have a most outstanding day.

Dana Prince
Internet Marketing Blog
www.SeanSEO.com © 2008

Making friends online can do a lot for those aspiring to make money on the internet.  Not only can friends help you learn about internet marketing related stuff  that can help you be more successful and share frustrations but they can also follow you, tell people about you and do some promoting for you as well.

Here are some friend finding and perhaps even more importantly, friend keeping tips:

• Find friends more experienced than you so you can watch and learn
• Find friends less experienced than you so you can pay it forward
• Look for people with common interests as it’ll help your marketing efforts
• Make friends with potential customers
• Reciprocate!

What do I mean by reciprocate?

If you make friends and politely ask people to Digg your great new post or stop by and let you know what they think of your new salesletter or site design, be prepared to return the favour. Stop by and comment on their blog, Stumble their site, tweet their username on Twitter and tell all your followers how fab they are and how much they should be followed! No one likes a selfish internet friend and if you’re guilty of it you’ll eventually get ignored.  Online relationsihps need a bit of nurturing just like your offline ones.

Have a most outstanding day.

Dana Prince
Internet Marketing Blog
www.SeanSEO.com © 2008

There is a lot of free information available online about internet marketing.  But, there may come a time when you’re ready to delve a bit deeper and buy an e-book on marketing.  Which ones are the best? Which ones are duds?

It’s a good idea to do a bit of digging on the author of books you’re considering and see what that author appears to be all about.  A good reputation can be determined and lucky for you, a bad reputation can be even easier to find out so have a look at the author and their reputation closely before spending money on an e-book or marketer mentoring program.

How to know if an e-book is worth buying

Ask others in your niche if they’ve bought the book and see what they say.  Check for reviews on the book. While you’ll find a lot of endorsements with embedded and cloaked affiliate links, you might consider looking for the opinion of someone you know will give a negative opinion if the e-book warrants it.  Finding mentors and gurus in internet marketing can take time but if you spend time researching and learning through the many free information sites that are out there, you’ll pick up a lot of knowledge.

Buying an e-book with a money back guarantee through a trusted payment processor such as ClickBank or PayPal is also a good idea as you know you really have nothing to lose but time reading the book.

There’s also a great internet marketing forum called the Warrior Forum which is probably the largest and oldest internet marketing forum on the net. you’ll find plenty of free and honest information there.

Have a most outstanding day.

Dana Prince
Internet Marketing Blog
www.SeanSEO.com © 2008

Here at www.seanseo.com we like to tell you about tools we think you’ll find useful.  The AddThis tool is fantastic and a wonderful tool for any blog.  Not only can it help you with traffic and social bookmarking but it’s aesthetically pleasing as well.

Social marketing is important but so is blog design and this tool is clean looking and definitely an asset to any blog because it makes it simple for people to help you spread the word about your posts.

What is AddThis?

AddThis gives you a bit of code to add to your site design that allows each post to have a section at the bottom with a list of social bookmarking sites.  When visitors like your post, they can click one of their favourite social bookmarking tools directly below the post to spread the word.  Tools include: FaceBook, MySpace, Delicious, Digg and others. If you look below each of our posts here you can see that you can ad us to your Technorati Favourites, Stumble us, etc.

How Much Does it Cost?

AddThis  doesn’t cost a thing and it’s easy to install on your site. If people use a specific tool on a regular basis and see the button to manually add that on the bottom of your post, they’ll be much more likely to do so. That little logo will remind them that they can do it with just a few clicks and making it as easy as possible for people to tell the world how useful your post is will increase your exposure and your SEO value.

Have a most outstanding day.

Dana Prince
Internet Marketing Blog
www.SeanSEO.com © 2008