PPC-Advice.com

It’s that time of year again.  Time to look back at the last twelve months and reflect on what was a roller coaster year on PPC-Advice.com.  There were good times and there were bad, there were times a few articles were stumbled and dug, and some articles that just plain sucked.  Before we ring in the new year, and possibly a new site (OMG teaser…) let’s go over a few of my favorite posts, a few of your favorite posts, and a few odd-ball articles you may want to revisit.

My favorite posts

Every blogger has their favorite posts that may not be the most trafficked on their site, but involved a little extra effort, fulfilled a bit of a dream in their subconscious, or gave them a bit of extra pride.  The following three posts are my personal favorites this year:

• Dispelling the myths of SEO
  Perhaps the be all end all of SEO posts I’ve ever written.  I’m proud of this one because it’s the culmination of several days of work researching current best practices and debunking a lot of bad advice.  Hopefully the fundamentals are deep-rooted so that it doesn’t become obsolete too quickly.
• Book review: Web analytics 2.0 by Avinash Kaushik
  This truly inspired post came about after reading Avinash’s second book in a record 10 days.  Despite being thoroughly satisfied with it the first time around, I keep going back to it as a reference guide on more than a few occasions.  A must read for any marketer or analyst.
• Interview with Craig Danuloff of ClickEquations
  The guys at ClickEquations are some smart dudes.  On first glance of their product, I was mesmerized to learn more and ask a ton of questions.  Alex Cohen and Craig Danuloff stepped up and answered each one of them in rapid succession, even the ones that were impossibly theoretical.

Your favorite posts (by the numbers)

I can’t ignore the obvious.  Visitors to my site vote on their favorite posts simply by coming back, reading, sharing, stumbling, sphinning, digging, etc.  Some of your favorite posts this year included:

• Tracking paid versus organic keywords in Omniture SiteCatalyst.
  This one was somewhat surprising to me because Omniture has a fairly decent knowledge base set up, and they also have a few very sharp customer service reps that often go above and beyond.  In this case however, a guy named Jim reached out to me, along with a handful of other people, to ask for help.
• Interview with Avinash Kaushik, Google Analytics Guru.
  Avinash is probably one of my favorite guests.  His pace is frantic, his knowledge and wit unmatched in web analytics.  He’s no stranger to my blog, and you shouldn’t be a stranger of his.
• Thinking of implementing Omniture? Things to know before signing a contract.
  I’ll admit it, this was back in my early “angry at Omniture” days.  But I guess the popularity of this subject really struck a chord with other people out there.  To be fair, due diligence in contract negotiations of a web analytics platform is extremely important with any vendor, but until later this year, I had not experienced the sales cycle with the others — that might make a great post for early 2010.
• Google’s search based keyword tool: Finding diamonds in the long tail.
  Ever wonder whether you’re missing keywords when optimizing your site for SEO or adding keywords to a PPC campaign?  Google can help send you more traffic, for free or for cold hard cash.  Which you decide to go with is up to you.
• Pay-per-click scams to avoid like the plague.
  If you’ve ever sat down with an SEO or PPC agency, you’ll be familiar with the whole dog and pony show.  For those of you that haven’t, be sure to read up before setting a meeting date so you can call BS when you hear it.

Totally underrated posts

Finally, there are posts that are relatively decent, I think, but didn’t get a lot of attention for whatever reason.  Bad timing (or maybe bad writing) could be a factor, but I think there is probably a bit of gold in the following posts.

• Turning online ads into Amish Furniture
  I think sometimes a lot of us take traffic for granted.  If a website is converting and creating leads, or even bringing in cash, your job isn’t done!  For lead generation efforts, that means you have to follow-up with prospects.  For e-commerce sites, it means delving into non-converting pages to fix them or up-selling on promotions that work well.
• True conversion and return on investment BS (ROIBS!)
  Maybe this was just my utter failure to coin an abbreviation of my own, or maybe I was totally off my rocker that day.  Who knows, it could be a bit of both?  Perhaps the message was a bit premature in that it addresses multi-touch campaign attribution and true ROI calculation.  Recent conferences seem to indicate the audiences are ready, so maybe it will get legs again in 2010.

So long 2009…

Wow, and another year is almost in the books.  This is my one year anniversary of being hit by a car while crossing the street and I truly do have a lot to be thankful for:

• I feel that I pushed myself beyond my comfort zone by reaching out to several vendors and thought leaders in our industry to deliver knowledge exchange, and for that I thank everyone out there for being patient with a non-PR person:
  • Avinash Kaushik
  • Tim Ash
  • Eli Goodman
  • Bryan Eisenberg
  • Ray Comstock
  • Marc Poirier
  • Matt Cutts
  • Sally Falkow
  • Greg Jarboe
  • Craig Danuloff
  • Alex Cohen, and countless others.
• I thank my friends in digital media for pushing me into Twitter and becoming increasingly active in social media.  I’ve made a lot more friends and a ton of connections in that space.  Thank you for shoving me when you did, I admit it, I was late to that party.
• I wanted to thank the people at Search Engine Strategies and Incisive Media for inviting me back time and time again.  To someone just getting their feet wet, it only takes one show to convert them for life.  To a seasoned veteran in this space, the shows can be very similar, but it’s the 15-20% that changes between shows that is crucial in keeping up with trends in our industry.  For that and the great connections I’ve made at SES, I’m truly thankful.

After living to tell the tale of the first decade of online marketing, the next should be just as exhilarating.