Our communities have been discussing the story, along with a few stories about links, AdSense, HTTPS, and more this week.
One of our stories about links is actually quite different from the usual “how do I get them” discussion – on WebmasterWorld, users are wondering about the UI/UX aspect of links.
The standard practice is to make them blue and underline them, but if you've been surfing the web lately you might have noticed that not everyone does that anymore. Here's the rest of our new and exciting discussions for the week:
Color Us Surprised: Links Are Still Incredibly Important!
As Google grew and became more sophisticated, there were some webmasters who wondered if links would fall by the wayside. Would new ways of identifying a website's importance and relevance to a search query develop? If they have, they haven't impacted links very much.
Eric Ward recently reported for Search Engine Land that links are actually more important than most people think. Some of us are less surprised to learn this than others – you can get some great links for reading over on Threadwatch!
Blue, underlined text (or magenta/red underlined text if you've clicked it already) has been the hallmark of a link since the dawn of the 'Net. But, as ergophobe of WebmasterWorld writes,
“…for many years now, the vogue has been to make links practically impossible to find. I actually run some sites that I did not design where I basically cannot see the links…”
This thread is all about the UI/UX concerns of links. Web users have been trained how to recognize links for years. When we change how our links look, are we making it more difficult for users to parse our websites?
Keyplyr writes that compromise is possible:
“Usability vs aesthetics has always been a conflict, but IMO I found the compromise best suited for my design and my users.”
Graeme_p emphatically disagrees:
“The internet diversifying is a bad thing. Different approaches for different audiences is a bad thing. Usability depends on convention.”
What do you think?
What is the Value of Attending an Industry Conference or Trade Show?
Attending regular industry conferences and trade shows involves some sacrifices – money and time, specifically. And are they worth those sacrifices? Kim on Cre8asite writes that,
“For me, taking risks and working hard to get to a conference where I would be educated and network was how I was able to teach myself.”
EGOL agrees that they have value:
“…especially if you are in the early to middle stages of your learning…A lot of people balk at spending [the kind of money it takes], but this type of education can be self-funding if you are serious about getting educated and applying what you learn.”
For other members, the value of conferences diminishes as your own experience decreases. But at that point, isn't it worth giving back to the community with what you've learned? Smaller niche-specific conferences are almost always valuable for the networking, Cre8asiteforums users agree. What's your stance?
AdSense – What's Good Traffic Mean?
Plenty of people who run AdSense are obsessed with getting as much traffic as possible. But there's good traffic and there's bad traffic, and your goal should be to maximize the former. So what makes traffic good?
Threadwatch has some highlights from a recent WebmasterWorld thread all about it. You probably want
“…traffic that purposefully visits your site, sticks around for more than two pages without bouncing, visits multiple times, comes from an authoritative or relevant link, and is relevant to your niche and location.”
Beyond that, there may be certain age groups that work best for you, too. The definition of good traffic is a little different for everyone – get some ideas from this thread!
HTTPS – One More Reason to Change
Chedders on SEO Chat pointed this out –
“…Chrome as of version 50…no longer supports any requests for user location unless it's via HTTPS.”
So if you've got a website that takes a user's location to display relevant ads or content, that function could be totally broken for Chrome browsers as of April, 2016!
How Do I Get Someone's AdSense Suspended
A user from WebmasterWorld has fallen victim to a very stubborn and malicious content scraper. A significant amount of their content has been stolen and re-purposed to make a quick buck with AdSense.
Now Mr_Jefe wonders how to get the scraper's AdSense account suspended. Or, failing that, how to end the scraper's attacks. Everyone deals with content scrapers eventually – but this one is so prolific that it makes for a very interesting read.
Did you know that Verizon also owns AOL? For many of us who have been around to watch the old search engines come and go, putting AOL and Yahoo in the same bucket says a lot about Yahoo's potential future.
The sale to Verizon doesn't include Yahoo's most valuable components, though – Yahoo Japan, the company's cash, or its lucrative stocks in Alibaba. Users on Cre8asiteforums wonder what Verizon's plans are – and what about Yahoo's current deals with Bing and Google?
The post Links and Usability, Verizon Buys Yahoo, And More: Weekly Forum Update appeared first on Internet Marketing Ninjas Blog.
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