I’ve never been a big fan of social media sites or forums because it sometimes reminds me of high school all over again.
After a while you get your little band of merry snobby tight cliques running the show there, and if you’re not one of the “in” crowd then you’re gonna get banned, or never voted up, or get posts deleted or accounts banned (yea I know I wrote that twice) etc…
Most of these seo/marketing-related sites are people who are in the Elite echelon of SEO.
The SEOMOZ people, the social media gurus, the people with SEO services trying to be “leaders” in their industry.
People who go to SEO conventions just to hobnob with other Elitists.
People who regurgitate stuff from Matt Cutt’s blog or from Google Webmaster Central, and basically say stuff like,
How the new Google Instant/Caffeine/Mayday/PR update is going to affect SEO, link building etc…
Or regurgitated link bait crap like,
“top 10 link building techniques for 2008,2009, 2010″
In my opinion this is high brow stuff not conducive to realistic “man on the ground with 250 Adsense sites” SEO advice…
Anyhow, Sphinn sucks. I was a member there for about 2 weeks before I got banned for unknown reasons ( their reason was too many unsuccessful login attempts, lol) .
I recently was a sponsor for my buddy Gerald’s Bad-ass Guest blogging contest and they deleted his posts there related to his contest as “trying to game Sphinn”.
Greetings Sphinn
And even more recently, they removed the VOTE button form their site, making it even MORE of a cherry-picking editorialized clique-run snobbish community.
<<<< Here’s a double flip off to Sphinn from Gerald and me.
KEEP your fluff SEO advice and clique-ish voting methods and banning practices.
SERPD might not be any different from Sphinn in regards to what the Elitists are posting, ie. more social media info, Cutts updates, proposed algo changes etc… but at least it’s not run by trigger happy, ban-crazy Sphinn moderators.
And yes, for you link building junkies, it’s a Dofollow social media site.
If you register here and submit stories and URLs, make sure its not crap content, as I can’t promise you, nor should I have to…that you won’t get banned for submitting crap.
{ 17 comments… read them below or add one }
Thanks Daniel for writing about SERPD. We hope to make it a great community…
Some people just get carried away with a little authority, like the Warrior Forum sometimes gets a moderator with a Napoleon complex.
Digg used to be the same way, check out what I wrote about the decline and fall of the Digg Power users clique
I gotta give it to you Warner, Napoleon complex is a good term to describe ‘them’.
Daniel-
Gee, a guy would be inclined to think there was just a hint of bitterness in your post.
FWIW, I was banned at Sphinn, too, after less than a month of membership. And I was pissed! As it turned out, I definitely HAD done something in conflict with the Sphinn rules, albeit inadvertently (I really have to stop pimping my stuff, when half-asleep!), which justifiably got my submission pulled.
I reached out to one of the editors, who kindly got involved, and brought in an admin as well, who determined that my ban was due to a configuration issue, and should never have occurred. I was reinstated, without reservation.
Reaching out is sometimes the most productive approach.
As for Sphinn’s “elitism”, during the week or so that I was unable to get in touch with anyone there, my anger grew, and I found myself in a number of conversations with like-minded individuals. Most of the comments were heatedly against Danny’s removal of voting from the platform, as you can imagine. But at the end of the day, it IS his site to run as he sees fit, and I’m able to understand why he felt it was necessary. I may or may not agree, but since it’s not MY site, that doesn’t really matter, does it? I don’t think that qualifies as elitism, under any reasonable definition.
I like the concept of community voting, and I think there’s a place for SERPD in its present model. I’ve signed up, and will participate, and I honestly hope (and believe) they’ll enjoy some success.
I have to say, though… I think that any success they have will be in spite of posts such as this, not because of them.
Hey, Doc….
Yea long past the bitterness stage there… Just bitter for Gerald though. He was ardent Spinn-er and supporter.
He told me about his Sphinn experiences and even approved this post… so I guess I’m all clique-d up now and one of the cool crowd…
Top o the world Ma!, top o’ the world!
“People who go to SEO conventions just to hobnob with other Elitists.”
Dan – you are a working mans elitist. I just signed up with SERPD. Thanks.
TJ, thank you ( I think?)
Daniel, in a way its a good thing. Dont get me wrong, more traffic to your site is good, but its a matter of bringing more people into “real SEO”.
The more people start using what you describe here, the techniques, the tools, and the networks, the less effective they will be over time, due to many more people using them. I’d rather have people looking down on gray/black hat, rather than realizing its the real SEO, and learning it, spreading it, which in turn makes things a lot harder. The way I see it, the more popular SEO community is like a shield that helps keep those who shoudnt be learning the real stuff away (not to mention snobs who will start rating out the techniques and tools because they are “bad” according to Matt Cutt ways). People who realize what SEO is about, will find the tools, the forums, and this blog. So I say its good Sphinn is run by whitehat snobs, I wouldnt want them creating a coalition to bring down BMR, LV, BLS, UAW, cause it breaks the guidelines of whitehat bs.
Ivan, thanks for stopping by with feedback. If you could head over to this post here to post your results, that’d be helpful to others.
Hey Daniel, havent tried this one yet. Will post my feedback when I will.
In terms of people against grey / black hat, here is exactly what I mean: http://www.highrankings.com/dear-google-290
I respect her, and she is truly passionate about it. I personally dont give two craps, like many others, for “ethnics” when I buy a link, or put out a spam UAW article, but many do, so in a way I think it has to be guarded, and the less attention there’s on it, the better.
Yea, too bad for her (and her clients) that she doesn’t realize that the seo landscape is always subject to change.
It’s when you get mired down in “OLDSEO” that you start to suffer. Get with the times or go home whoever she is…
I read some of the comments there, what a bunch of idiots commenting there, seems like forum mentality is now hitting the blogs
Is it just me, or does the SEO professionals complain more than any other profession – about everything?
Stop complaining TJ, get back to ranking your stuff
lol
Ok Dan. lol
I am referring – not to anyone on this board – but to the SEO pros who complain to Google official message board about how their ranks aren’t correct because of phony backlinks; spun articles; and how backlinks are the worst evil. They complain but offer no solutions. Just why they aren’t #1 on google.
Right , I got that from what you wrote, my apologies to you if/since I wasn’t clear that I was jesting….
HA HA..Sphinn is more arrogant than the Callen, LMFAO
Funny how their own click of peeps are the only ones getting high Sphinns and keeping their posts up…useless waste of time…I don;t care how good the content might be, that is such a turn off that I never go there anymore.
Thanks for SERPD will sign up and add them to my list of IM related social sites.