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Did You Know That Share-ability Impacts Who Sees Your Facebook Updates?

Did you know that most likely only 15% of your Facebook Business Page status updates are actually seen on your fans’ walls? Scary isn’t it, to know that the time you spend in keeping your Facebook wall updated may actually have marginal impact. Why? It’s about EdgeRank and share-ability.

Just like Google has an algorithm to rack and stack websites to determine where they appear in the organic or unpaid search results, Facebook has an algorithm to determine when your updates will appear on the walls of subscribers and fans. Not everything you write will be shown, but why such a little amount and how can you get more updates to show?

A great article that explains this topic further and really digs into EdgeRank can be found at SiteProNews.

The bottom line is that the higher your EdgeRank the better your chance that others will actually see what you write and post to your Business Page’s wall. A very simplified explanation of EdgeRank is share-ability. If more people comment, like, link to, and share an update you’ve posted on your wall, the higher the EdgeRank and the more likely this update is to appear on the wall of people who have liked you or subscribe to your news feed.

One way to work to raise EdgeRank is to be specific in a status update and let the reader know what action you really want them to take upon reading your update. Do you want them to share it? Ask them to do that. Do you want them to like your update? Ask them to click like! If you are linking to a download back on your website – ask them to click in and download your paper. Be specific and make the action simple and easy to do.

Improving your EdgeRank is all about action that people take when they read your post. Make sure you are doing your part to help to raise your own EdgeRank by changing your wall post to be more share-able and actionable. EdgeRank will rise when you do so and are successful in engaging reader activity.

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Fair Use Law Demystified

“Fair use is a basic principle of copyright law that says the general public may use certain portions of a copyrighted work without a license from the copyright owner, provided the use is for purposes such as commentary, criticism, search engines, news reporting, research, teaching, library archiving or scholarship.” Read the full article at SiteProNews.

So when are you crossing the line when it comes to using someone else’s content based on the Fair Use Law?

  1. Are you using this for a not for profit site that is mainly educational or research oriented? If yes, then you may be okay. If you are a commercial business using content under the Fair Use Law you are most likely actually infringing on the copyright and not eligible to claim Fair Use.
  2. If you have taken the full piece without attribution and link you are overstepping and ending up in a copyright infringement area. Even for a non-profit to take the full work is pushing the envelope. Better yet is to be safe and quote a section and link back to the full piece on the other website.
  3. The copyright owner may fight any supposed Fair Use so the best bet is to just be careful and not grab what is not yours.

Here is the rule we have our blog writers follow.

  • Never take more than a paragraph of content. Always wrap what  you take in a quote and then attribute or link back to the original work.
  • Never pass off, even mildly reworded as yours something that is not truly yours.

I have been successful before in taking down an entire website through the host for copyright infringement when people have taken my content. Don’t be fooled into thinking that content you find on the Web is simply yours for the taking. Everything is copyrighted whether you see a notice or not. Fair Use may be a slippery slope and it is by far better to create your own content or link to other content than to steal it.

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Footer and Link Use The Google Penalizes For

In the changing world of earning placement on Google.com, Google has been fairly forthright in regards to what it now does not like and will actually penalize a website for doing. What is important to understand is that what Google does not now like was a mainstream SEO and commonly used tactic.

When you see a site that has things like this in the footer:

lemon lawyer Columbus Ohio, lemon lawyer Cleveland Ohio, lemon lawyer Akron Ohio, lemon lawyer Dayton Ohio, lemon lawyer Dublin Ohio, lemon lawyer Wabash Ohio, lemon lawyer Siteville Ohio, lemon lawyer Cincinnati Ohio, lemon lawyer Hamilton Ohio, lemon lawyer Arlington Ohio

AND each one of those phrases is linked to a page on that topic which has very little unique content other than a city location change in the content. You should know that Google has specifically said they DO NOT LIKE content or links formatted or used in this way.

Here is a site to review that is using this type of tactic as an illustration of what not to do.

Google is not penalizing for navigational links in your footer that look like this:

Home | About Us | Web Visibility | Google AdWords Services | Blog Writing

Google understands that you may need to repeat your navigation at the bottom to aid readers to travel your site, but it is the repetitive use of keywords, locations and search phrases that Google is disavowing and penalizing websites for using.

Here are a few sites that I have found that are really bending the rules on Google and may already be receiving a penalty for over optimization:

Make sure to read this great article over at SiteProNews for other great examples of what NOT to do.

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Can You Still Place Organically on Google.com?

This is the million dollar question isn’t it? In today’s search arena can you and should you even work to improve organic placement or should you instead just concentrate on pay per click advertising. Personally, I think that the answer straddles both sides. This is what I recommend for organic placement and good website visibility.

Do Everything Right Consistently

  • That means improve the quality of your content on your website. Write with your reader in mind.
  • Make sure you are blogging under your own domain so you get the spider benefits.
  • Look to add new articles, white papers, and thoughtful insights regularly to your website pages.
  • Syndicate some of your content on article syndication sites.
  • Do a monthly e-newsletter and archive it back on your website.
  • Get going with social media and try to become an active part of a community.

Invest in Pay Per Click Advertising

  • Put money into Google AdWords. Don’t break the bank, but make sure you have a presence and are using it to your advantage.
  • Make sure you are using conversion tracking and have phone calling enabled with your programs.

You’ve just got to cover your bases in this changing world of search engines. You simply can’t go wrong with these approaches, they are simply sure to pay off in the long run in regards to organic placement, link building, and website visibility.