Being Proactive

Google's guidelines on hiring an SEO clearly stipulate "Be wary of SEO firms that send you email out of the blue."

In most industries the 'cold calling' approach is acceptable however in SEO the general consensus is that it is not.

I found myself with time on my hands at the beginning of the week and wondered what I could do to generate business. I was unsure whether to spend a day cold calling or if this would be an ineffective use of time.

I was chatting to Darren Moloney, another Google Optimisation Consultant, over at http://www.allthingsweb.co.uk/, who suggested a couple of ways I could be proactive.

His first suggestion was to attend conferences as a guest speaker. He also suggested approaching small business owners in person. We also discussed offline and online networking opportunities. Whilst these are all great ideas, the calling in person is something I have more experience with and will definitely be giving it a try out.

So be warned, I may be knocking at your door in the not to distant future...

Gmail Open To All

Sign up to the GMail service no longer requires an invitation. Now anyone can register and take advantage of their free communication tools.

Don't forget, when you are logged into your Google account that your search results will be personalised. You need to bear this in mind when looking at how yours, or your competitors sites are performing.

To turn off personalised results sign out from Google and clear your Google Toolbar history.

Googles New Backlink Checking Tool

In the past it was possible to check the number of inbound links to a site by using Googles link:operator. However, for some time, this tool has only been showing a sample of inbound links and many web masters have since been using Yahoo's link: operater for a true represention.

Google has listened to its users and extended the functionality of its link: operator. If you go to Googles Webmaster Central there is a much more comprehensive set of tools that allow the data to be classified, filtered and downloaded.

If you don't already have one, you'll need to greate a Google Account.

Google Personalises Search Results

Google recently announced they are increasing user personalisation. If you are logged in to your Google account then the results returned for your searches will be personalised based on your search history, and possibly your geo location.

In the past Google gave the option to turn off personalised results. This option is no longer present, and when searching you have no way of knowing whether your results have been personalised or not. Unless, of course, you notice that the search results are becoming more and more targeted.

Whilst this may be useful in finding information, it makes it harder to judge how any site is doing for particular searches. If you are looking at where you competitors are positioned, for instance, you will see a misrepresentation of results.

You will see what Google has deemed are the most relevant results for you personally, and not necessarily what your audience is seeing at that point in time.

You can turn off personalised results by clearing your search history and ensuring that you are logged out of your Google account. I would imagine that applies to all Google applications including GMail, Blogger, Analytics, Webmaster Tools and Sitemaps, to name but a few.