SOPA is short for the Stop Online Piracy Act, a bill introduced this past fall to give intellectual property owners a better handle on the trafficking of pirated content. Those in favor of the bill feel enactment will allow copyright owners to finally gain control over the seemingly lawless nature that has run rampant with the proliferation of torrent sites and lax sharing regulations. Supporters are confident proposed regulations will bolster would-be sales of otherwise easy-to-find, illegally spread free content.

Opponents, on the other hand, are concerned that the proposed regulations compromise the informative open nature of the internet. They are worried that that any concession to somewhat blurry regulations will create a “whistle-blowing” atmosphere that will cause publishers to second-guess information that is shared for fear of retribution. They claim that withholding any information for fear of penalization promotes internet censorship which in turn violates the First Amendment.

First legislation is set to hit the Senate floor later this month. Regardless of your stance, there is no denying that this topic will surely affect your Search experience in the coming days. If you follow some of the bigger industry titans on Twitter such as Danny Sullivan or Matt Cutts, then you’ve surely noticed their respective stances based on their profile pictures alone. Content giants Wikipedia, Reddit, and many others are taking it one step further – “going black” on Wednesday, January 18, 2012 to protest the anti-piracy bill.

All of this controversy has led to some pretty interesting SEO questions. Namely, if some of the highest naturally ranking sites are willingly taking their content down for a short period of time, how will this affect the overall indexing process? SearchEngineLand got ahead of this question early this morning and offered a very interesting and to-the-point response.  By labeling your domain temporarily with a 503 HTTP status code, you are instructing the crawlers to temporarily overlook your content. According to Google, enacting this measure will tell the spiders that the content that you currently have on your domain is not the “real” content and should not be considered. Simply undo this when the time is right, and your content will be re-indexed shortly without any real side effects.

Whether or not you plan on enacting your point of view on SOPA, the very topic has taught a very interesting lesson that can be applied in other areas of SEO. And that’s something both sides can agree on.

Edit: According to a just-released statement from the House Committee on the Judiciary, the authors of the bill are regrouping to modify the bill. From the horse’s mouth, “Due to the Republican and Democratic retreats taking place over the next two weeks, markup of the Stop Online Piracy Act is expected to resume in February”.

According to the official Google blog, all hands are firmly on deck to take its Social Search initiative to the next level. In doing so, Google has radically infused the private data from your Google+ page (photos, status updates, contacts, etc.) into the SERP. Searching for your friend’s recent shared wedding pictures? There’s a good chance they’ll be there for you. Remember a great quote from a friend’s recent G+ status update? Enter it in Search, and presto, it’s there. Danny Sullivan from SearchEngineLand is calling the SERP change Google’s most “radical transformation ever”. While this stance might be somewhat exaggerated, the change will affect some natural Search results – but to what degree?

To back up a minute, we should note that this platform change is only really applicable to those who have Google+ accounts AND are signed in. And of course, the returned social content will be for your eyes only. If you do not have an account or have opted to remained signed out while performing searches, you will probably not notice anything significantly different about your returned results. With, of course, one exception. Whether or not you are signed in, it’s apparent Google is now obtrusively pushing users to adopt its social offering. Take the search term “entertainment”. Notice anything funny? It’s doesn’t take much to easily spot a Google+ promotional panel to the right of the search results and just above the pay-per-click ads. You will be tempted to follow the likes of Britney Spears, Snoop Dogg, and others through their Google+ profiles for the price of quick subscription. Sound familiar (cough, cough, Twitter)?  This is some valuable real estate with a pretty blatant motive.  The development, as marginal as it may seem, does compromise the search results in a fairly biased fashion. However, I remain skeptical about its impact on companies’ SEO strategy.

Why is this?

After a thorough test drive, it appears that the “Search Plus Your World” changes will mainly affect searches that are already socially-influenced.  Search specifically for a recent update or photos you know your best friend has posted from their trip to Bali, and you will undoubtedly see the appropriate social-centric Google+ result appear in the SERP. Now, search for a more generic term that is clearly geared towards a potential purchasing decision independent of your social motives (“cheap car insurance”, “iphone cases”, “laptop batteries”). While signed-in, you will see results remain nearly identical those of a user who is unaffected by the “Search Plus” update. Consider longer-tail terms and there is even more uniformity.

What about those terms that aren’t so cut and dry? The term “Pittsburgh Steelers” can be either a social-centric term (I have friends who post about their favorite football team, after all.) or one that is conducive to business decisions (buying tickets, merchandise, memorabilia). The update seems to have compromised this issue by including a unobtrusive portioned-off space at the top of the SERP indicating how many times this result appeared for me “personally”. It will tell me how many friends have posted anything Steelers-related rather than provide the actual results. If you blink, you actually might miss this new addition. All other results have remained unchanged as if I were signed-out.

Long story short, SEO’s have no reasons to throw their arms in panic. These changes, as distracting and agenda-oriented as they may be, will not get in the way of  a consumer that is looking to make a buying decision. Instead, this move is two-fold: 1) to invigorate interest in Google’s waning social platform 2) to make Google the one-stop shop for users’ social network needs.

Upon arrival, the New Yorkers were treated to some of the swankiest accommodations the Phoenix-Scottsdale area had to offer. The quick-talking Yanks learned early on that “Southwestern Hospitality” is the new Southern Hospitality when they were immediately welcomed into the newly renovated state-of-the-art Scottsdale headquarters. The foundation was laid for what would be an unforgettable weekend, as bi-coastal collaborators finally got the chance to meet (and party) face-to-face.  On Friday, some of the iAcquire faithful pre-gamed over a friendly round of golf, while others explored the beautiful surroundings before prepping for the soiree of the year.

The real fun kicked off on Friday night, when the entire iAcquire family (along with wives, husbands, girlfriends, boyfriends, and significant others) reconvened at the extravagant El Chorro Lodge. The beer flowed like wine, and spirits were as high as the Arizona mid-day sun. Bocce ball, a gift exchange, and the traditional iAcquire push-up contest were just some of the activities that took place as the company literally shut down the bar in the wee hours of the night. Check out the iAcquire Facebook page for a peek of some of the action.

The holiday party exemplifies the “work hard, play hard” mantra that iAcquire exudes. 2011 was a fantastic year because of the hard-working, smart people our company prides itself on. And the truth is, we are just getting started. We are always looking for like-minded brilliant people who are ready to get their hands dirty. Check out our careers page to see if you would make a great addition to the growing iAcquire family.

John Lincoln of SEO Inc. argues that rumors of the quick demise of Google Plus may have actually been greatly exaggerated. Whether or not Google is aggressively leveraging its own assets to prevent yet another expensive addition to its product scrap yard, Google+ profiles are beginning to make leaps and bounds in organic search. If you have a personal Google+ profile and you’ve recently Googled yourself, you will see that your profile has not only gained ground on page 1, but more than likely jumped above the fold. Try it. Unless your name is Justin Bieber or Tim Tebow, the G+ page will be one of the first few results (if not the first) you will see for your name (you’ll first need an account). Well, according to Lincoln’s findings, this trend is also happening for Google+ business pages.

Lincoln’s research, which was published last week by SearchEngineLand, examines Toyota. If you perform a search on the auto maker’s most general branded term (“Toyota”) while signed out of Google, you will see that the company’s Google+ business page appears 2^nd in the SERP – ahead of its Wikipedia entry, local dealerships, and surprise, surprise, its Facebook/Twitter pages. Within this “posting” you will see Toyota has opted to include content that is very promotional to its brand – terms that contain very worthwhile SEO value. By actively maintaining its Google+ business page, Toyota has seized control over a highly-visible search asset. This speaks volumes for the brand’s reputation management and ability to gain natural rank for the terms it opts to include in this particular social channel.

The obvious moral of the story: take the time to update all social assets to reflect terms or campaigns you would like to promote in the SERP. High-ranking social content could be an easy boon to your key business terms!

Anyhow, back to occupying my office. I manage a very successful Internet marketing startup company based in Phoenix. We’re just over two years old. We have 55 team members. We are pioneering new technology, new techniques, new products and new services. The work is exciting, challenging, creative, and rewarding.

We are actively seeking more team members. It’s been strangely challenging to get qualified people to apply for the 6 new positions I opened up a few weeks ago. Imagine that, in the middle of everyone complaining about a lack of jobs, we are having a tough time hiring entry level positions with excellent growth potential! We post on Craigslist, Monster, Facebook, Linkedin, etc. We see surprisingly few applications coming in from recent college grads…another thing I just don’t get.

We want recent college grads that are ready to bring energy and passion to work every day. We’ll train you on the technical stuff, if you can arrive with solid fundamentals you damn well should have developed in those four years you were racking up your (protest worthy?) college debt. What solid fundamentals? Clear, concise, persuasive writing skills, well developed critical thinking skills, and discipline to come to work and become a professional. Liberal arts type majors in history, English, philosophy, journalism, etc… all those majors that ‘didn’t prepare you for a business career’- come on in if you have the above mentioned capabilities ready to go. If you don’t, then what were you doing for four years? Are you at least great at throwing a ping pong ball into a red solo cup?

I hear that the Occupy Wall Street movement is coming to Phoenix. Occupy Phoenix. Hmmm. Last night at my company we held an open house to provide information on our company, our industry, and the job positions we have open. We promoted it for two weeks. I wanted 30-40 people coming in to attend. We had an underwhelming ten people sign up. Six actually bothered to show up. They all got interviews and a shot to work with us. I wonder if the folks preparing their protest signs may have been better off attending my open house last night. We had free food and drinks too. Bonus!

You don’t have to go into high finance or management consulting to have a great career, or even a chance to get wealthy one day. There’s this thing called the Internet- it’s brought on one of the most monumental changes to business, work opportunity, and the economy. Advertisers and marketers are shifting their budgets to Internet marketing by the billions. Search engine marketing makes up about half of all online advertising. Think this might just be an interesting place to gain experience?

Debt laden recent college graduates of Phoenix, you have a choice. You can Occupy Phoenix, OR you can come and Occupy My Office :  Monday – Friday 8 AM to 5 PM.  At my office you’ll get a salary and a chance to make a chunk of change in bonuses if you are smart and motivated. You’ll get healthcare, benefits, and a 401k program to get started on saving for the long term. But far and away what you’ll get most importantly is experience. The experience and insight you will gain will be highly sought after, and those college debt concerns will evaporate.

We’re iAcquire, a youthful and energetic company that is kicking ass, disrupting paradigms, and having a lot of fun doing it as we forge the future of the $40 billion search engine marketing industry.  Three weeks from now we are breaking down the walls in our office building so we can expand our space by 80%. That includes a break room with a ping pong table.  You can keep practicing your beer pong skills.  Whatever path you choose for yourself, I recommend this: stop finding walls, and start finding ways. Perhaps a few of you will even consider joining us as we knock down our walls and continue marching into the future. Proactively. Positively.

What do you think? Help me understand, share your thoughts, be constructive, give feedback.

occupymyoffice@iacquire.com

Sincerely,

Tom Rusling
General Manager
iAcquire.com

Post Script: Oh yeah, and for you Wall Street area folks, I’ve got four unfilled sales positions and two Account Manager openings in our New York City office just sitting there, waiting for the right highly motivated, articulate, critical thinking skilled people to show up and show us what they’ve got.

The iAcquire IT Operations Engineer will fill a critical role in the operations of iAcquire. The candidate will provide IT systems support for all departments in Phoenix (40 employees) and NYC (15 employees). The candidate will also manage 3^rd party support services for the NYC office.

Essential job functions

• Manage all desktop systems and office servers (Windows Vista, Windows 7, Ubuntu Linux)
• Provide end-user tech support for sales, account services, accounting teams
• Maintain system backups – server and client side
• Manage vendor relationships
• Research and suggest products and solutions as assigned
• Support smart-phone connectivity to enterprise mail systems on Blackberry, iPhone, Android devices for all users
• Plan, enact, and test disaster recovery policies and procedures

Skills and Abilities

• Excellent skills in network and system administration of Windows and Linux systems, including hardware and applications
• Windows/Linux Desktop Management (Windows Vista, 7, Ubuntu Linux) – local and remote
• Good written and oral communication skills and ability to transfer knowledge to other technical professionals
• VOIP Phone system management
• Networking (Cisco, switches, firewalls)
• Network security

Experience Required

• 3-5 years of recent professional experience in an IT role
• Good time management skills with flexibility for special projects
• Experience working in a start-up environment – versatile, agile, and creative.
• Experience working with web-based technology platforms for file sharing, development, and project planning.

Created by pioneers in the link building and SEO industries, iAcquire is forging a new frontier in enterprise level natural off page services. Our team of highly trained US based professionals drive surefire results by creating a custom set of relationships with website owners on behalf of our clients. Our people, our process, and our technology come together to yield predictably exceptional results at the enterprise level. Based out of Scottsdale Arizona, the company was founded in 2009, and recently opened its New York office.

Location:

Scottsdale, AZ

Job Description:

iAcquire is growing rapidly. The team is comprised of top-tier natural search strategists and we are seeking energetic & motivated Account Executives, to sell our market leading off page optimization solutions. A successful employee at iAcquire is an entrepreneurial go-getter and effective leader who looks to win as an individual while thriving in a team environment. Account Executives are responsible for developing relationships with new clients while delivering on quarterly revenue goals.

Requirements

• 1-3 years proven sales experience exceeding quota in a competitive, online advertising environment.
• Both inside and outside sales experience is preferred.
• Record of success in developing new business and effectively managing the sales cycle, from generating leads to closing deals quickly.
• Proven track record of penetrating and expanding large corporate accounts.
• Proven track record of exceeding quotas and goals.
• Exceptional written, oral and presentation skills.
• BA/BS degree at a minimum. Recent Grads preferred!
• Relentless desire to be successful.

Please apply by sending your resume to join@iacquire.com

NOTE: This is an Entry Level position, seasoned candidates may apply to Mid and Sr. level positions when posted.

Location:

New York City, NY

Job Description:

iAcquire is growing rapidly. The team is comprised of top-tier natural search strategists and we are seeking energetic & motivated Account Executives, to sell our market leading off page optimization solutions. A successful employee at iAcquire is an entrepreneurial go-getter and effective leader who looks to win as an individual while thriving in a team environment. Account Executives are responsible for developing relationships with new clients while delivering on quarterly revenue goals.

Requirements

• 1-3 years proven sales experience exceeding quota in a competitive, online advertising environment.
• Both inside and outside sales experience is preferred.
• Record of success in developing new business and effectively managing the sales cycle, from generating leads to closing deals quickly.
• Proven track record of penetrating and expanding large corporate accounts.
• Proven track record of exceeding quotas and goals.
• Exceptional written, oral and presentation skills.
• BA/BS degree at a minimum. Recent Grads preferred!
• Relentless desire to be successful.

Please apply by sending your resume to join@iacquire.com

NOTE: This is an Entry Level position, seasoned candidates may apply to Mid and Sr. level positions when posted.

We are happy to report that all runners finished strong, as iAcquire proved to wield its athletic mettle like no other company at the event. Celebratory refreshments were in order, as all participants later basqued in their collective glory at a local watering hole following the race. Kudos to all finishers from New York and Arizona for making this a spectacular event:

Valerie Albolote, JP Barnych, Jay Swansson, Meredith Matthews, Sam Harbison,
Jordan Garner, Andrew Agnello, JD Metz, Neal Sussman

This past February, Google implemented a major modification in its search ranking method. The “Panda Update” (also known as the “Farmer Update”) significantly affected a broad range of companies that depend on impactful keywords for their ecommerce revenue. According to Search Engine Land, It is estimated that 12-15% of all search results were affected during the initial launch of the algorithm tweak. Industry analysts assert that Google rolled out this adjustment to improve search quality across the board by attempting to eliminate prevailing content farms and affiliate spam sites designed to take advantage of Google’s vulnerabilities. The Panda Update would turn out to be Google’s latest weapon in its ongoing battle against low quality sites occupying extremely valuable SERP real estate. While it is clear the intentions were there to fix a lingering problem, the implementation did not come without some controversial hiccups that affected countless companies’ ecommerce initiatives.

High-quality sites both big and small began disappearing from the organic keyword ranks they had owned for years. The expected “Google Dance” (the temporary rank variance advertisers typically suffer immediately following algorithm updates) appeared to last longer than usual. On top of this, domains that users grew acclimated to for particular search terms began losing ground to competitors that had otherwise never posed threats. For many advertisers, relevancy as they once knew it seemed to be compromised, which seemingly caused fluctuations without any rhyme or reason.

The Aftermath

While some companies were able to gradually recover traffic for their core organic terms, others to this day grapple with an unfortunate and unexpected fall from grace. Since the first rollout of the Panda algorithm change, Google has indicated that future versions of the update would emerge every month or so. And as such, addendums did indeed occur this past May and June. Although it is difficult to forecast the complexity of each modification, Google has vaguely cited that the overarching Panda cornerstones would coincide with their mantra of “high-quality content created by wonderful websites around the world [being] rewarded”. What this exactly means is not easy to interpret, as recent updates have rocked the figurative SEO boat harder than ever before. One thing is for sure – the old method of trying to organically improve rank has additional variables that need to be carefully recognized. Experts in the industry have collectively settled on a few points to consider in the post-Panda SEO world:

Content remains king.

• Google crawlers will be more precise about gauging the type of content that is on-page and how it relates to the searched subject matter.
• Having low-quality pages that stray from content will affect overall domain rank – the “weakest link” methodology.

Always keep the end user in mind.

• Adam Audette of Search Engine Watch suggests the urgency of continually creating quality, unique content to keep the end user engaged. Always be vigilant about on-page usefulness with respect to the searched material.
• Proper website design and interface layout are more important than ever, as user engagement and time spent on-page are now determining rank factors.
• Crawlers will be gauging content from a more “human” perspective. User experience is now going have a much larger impact than ever before.
• Content lacking “useful information” that is blatantly designed solely for SEO purposes will be more likely to be devalued.

Get social.

• Engaging media that encourages user dialogue, feedback, comments, etc. will be seen as most relevant in the eyes of Google. Bridging a site’s content with respective Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn collateral are not the “end all be all” but are necessary first steps.
• Diversity of traffic is now a determining factor – the number of users entering a site domestically and worldwide will be gauged.

Remember to always check under the hood.

• According to Rand Fishkin of SEOMoz, optimization around usage metrics is now key – time spent on-page, bounce rates, click-through-rates from the SERP are now factors that are heavily weighed by Panda.
• Fishkin also encourages keeping a close eye on analytics data to ensure that all ducks are properly aligned – if direct traffic, branded traffic, and search traffic do not increase, rank will be affected for targeted pages.

iAcquire’s Stance on Panda

The Panda updates do nothing but complement the Enterprise Content Marketing solutions that iAcquire has been advocating for months. These updates are focused on eliminating obtrusive spam sites – an initiative Google set in place to make Search more useful for browsers and advertisers alike. While leaps and bounds have been made to enact these improvements, there is still a long way to go as for matching rank with relevancy. Rather than having to patiently wait for these changes to fully mature, advertisers that partner with iAcquire equip themselves with the ability to get where they belong in Search.

Before Google determined that more thorough on-page content characteristics would be the key to doing so, iAcquire anticipated the value of partnering with hundreds of established unique content partners across dozens of industry channels. Our outreach team not only performed the legwork to determine which content providers were worth partnering with, but also consulted with advertisers to architect customized strategies that constantly cultivate new and fresh off-page content to mutually benefit partners and clients.

We actively work with our roster of advertisers to steer them in the right direction to not only comply with Google’s constantly changing guidelines, but to also champion them. Our principles are focused on helping advertisers achieve their maximum search potential, a principle that aligns beautifully with many of the newer gold standards that the Panda

Updates are setting. We help to channel unique content like full-page articles, infographics, embedded video, and miscellaneous tools and widgets that help harvest natural links, social interest, search engine ranks, and ultimately traffic. We then encourage advertisers to build upon these tools to preserve newfound rank improvements that can be supported by Google’s rules and regulations.

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