Good SEO Books

[Gas Scooter Guy]

I just today received my (used) copy of Search Engine Positioning by Fredrick Marckini. At first glance it looks pretty good, and the price I paid $26 used on Amazon seemed OK, down from the $45 for a new copy.

It occured to me to ask you folks if there is a SEO Bible that you all refer to on occaison?

Thanks,

Gas Scooter Guy

[sunny]

tell you what...by the time you buy a SEO book, it will already outdated because so much is changing in google algorithm so quickly.

Isn't this forum a SEO book/bible? It's better than that.

If you really do want a SEO book.. go here http://www.seobook.com/ ...I haven't read it. But it's written by a very well known SEO!

I heard from people that it's good. But I don't trust them!

I RECOMMEND READING UP ON FORUMS RATHER THAN READING OUTDATED SEO BOOKS :bond:

[SEO_AM]

GSG, hmmmm.... You bought a book on SEO. That is a good base I guess, however SEO with Google changes so rapidly that something written yesterday will not apply to today, with what is known today changing to be something different tomorrow.

You will likely learn more of the intricacies of SEO on forums such as this. Read the many threads on this forum, ask questions, and visit other forums too, e.g., SEO Chat. We all bounce around to the various forums picking up new knowledge here and there.

[sunny]

muahahaa SEO_AM i win ;) .

[SEO_AM]

You were quicker on the draw. ;)

[sunny]

does that mean i cheated? 8-|

[Gas Scooter Guy]

Jeez Louise guys....I didn't even know sites like this existed up to two months ago. Well this book is a step up from the Idiots Guide to Creating a Web Page that I was using until late last year. It even has a CD. Oh yeah....look out!

Ok Ok Ok, just a portent of things to come...my day job is a Staff Master Black Belt at a large IT Hardware company in San Francisco. I have started collecting my stats in hopes of applying Six Sigma techniqes to improve hit rate. There are some control charts that provide calculated upper and lower level control limits that would help determine if a tweak caused a true jump in traffic (a bonafide statistical aberation!) or was it just background noise. Much more useful than a simple moving moving average chart.

There are some other tests you can do to isolate which of several discrete inputs is causing a specific output.

If I get anywhere with my pontifications I will share them with the group. All of these can be run on an Excel spreadsheet.

Nerdily,

Gas Scooter Guy

[SEO_AM]

I look forward to the results of your statistical testing and posts on the results. You are a welcome addition to the forum. 8-|

[creative666]

Not really an seo book, but buy one on CSS. Minimal HTML, all styles in an external style sheet, position your nav code underneath the content so the spiders read the content first and not the links. For me CSS is one of the best seo weapons that you can use, currently redesiging my own site in CSS.

[mlsiggaes]

Well, having been to Search Engine Strategies and WebmasterWorld PubCon and working at IBM, you'd think i would have seen something published that actually shows you how to do SEO and takes you through while also giving advanced information that is more than someone's sales pitch for thier services.

I found the new book, "Search Engine Optimization for Dummies", actually contained more information, overall, than what gets talked about at SES! Not that I should be surprised, since most anyone who makes money in SEO tends to want to keep their methodolgy somewhat vague (maybe because it is vague.....?)

Well, that's an open question....I mean, the vagueness issue. Really, I found Search Engine Optimization to be surprisingly advanced, and far more useful than anything else that came out recently. There's alot of information on finding link partners and using third party tools that lots of SEO's use, like Optilink and LinkSurvey. There's also information about correctly optimizing for RSS feeds.

Being that SeoGuy likes to share knowledge, as I do, this is the right forum to bring this up.

There seems to be an all too common conflict of interest in the "knowing" of how to do it (ie: the methodolgy and tools to do SEO to deliver results) and what one pitches to clients. We see it everywhere...like schools where you go to learn something and only find the teacher gives "general info". We see in in high end solutions that IT provides to corporate clients that was made deliberately complex with wordy documentation ... so the consulting side of the business would collect. And we see it in SEO, where those that came up with it.....made it more complex so they could charge more money for it. Guess I can't blame them for doing it....only now the poor soul that wants to learn anything....still gets nothing all that useful.

So Search Engine Optimization for Dummies, in my opinion, is the best book for SEO right now.

[Cyber-SEO]

I have never even looked into SEO books i usually grab all my info from all the forums. I will check out that Dummies book and see how it is. Thanks Marshall.

[sunny]

i dunno why but i always hated to read the dummies books lol :confused:

[mlsiggaes]

Me too! But when I saw the SEO for Dummies...I just coulden't resist taking a look. Turned out a much better book, overall, than i thought it would be and ended up buying it.

[sunny]

I am gladthat the dummies book turned out welll for ya :D

but for me, FORUMS ALL THE WAY! 8-|

[creative666]

Optimisation books are not worth the money. By the time that is researched, written and published and I hear about it then I go an buy it Google could IPO, Microsoft could roll out their engine and Google will update and change the value of everything on a web page!!

I would rather save my £20 and go down the pub. :eyes:

[cheeshong]

i think gas scooter guy just want to know those basic first before getting going on further. It's no harm to buy a book. It won't harm. But frankly, this site is awesome! This is my bible.

[mlsiggaes]

Thanks.

Good point. We learn by doing and applying what we read and learn. The fastest way to find out about SEO is going online, reading and posting, and trying out things to see what works.

[creative666]

It's no harm to buy a book

My opinion, is it wont do you any harm but it wont do alot of good. There are thousands of websites dedicated to the optimisation industry (I should know I edit a category on the subject at Dmoz) with more relevant and up to date news than any book could ever give. If you want the basics I could point you to again to many many pages on the subject, how to optimise, what to look out for, what not to do etc...

Save your money in the long run. Just my opinion and not meant to flame ;)

[RideQ]

hey, i beat everyone, i posted a question about this book a long time. SEO-GUY says it makes a good door stop.
:)

[Gas Scooter Guy]

What did he do with the CD that comes with it, Pray Tell?

[RideQ]

Drink Coasters :D

[seobook]

the books go quickly out of date. that is why i try to update mine at least twice a month.

search engine optimization for dummies is a decent book. the one thing i would recommend not listening to from Peter Kent's book is his tips on linking stuff.

he states that directory submission is not worth paying for other than to the top few directories. that is totally untrue from my experiences. other than that his book is one of the better ones on the market.

if you are interested in search engine technology go w mike grehan
http://www.search-engine-book.co.uk/
for adwords go with andrew goodman
http://www.page-zero.com/products_asroi.asp
if you want overall view of seo stuff I would recommend my ebook
of course you knew i would say that so i also made the PPC part of my ebook free so people can "try before they buy"
http://www.seobook.com/archives/000376.shtml

[seo guy]

You should give SEO Guy a free copy to review so I can endorse it ;)

[seobook]

[QUOTE=seo guy]You should give SEO Guy a free copy to review so I can endorse it ;)[/QUOTE]

hi SEO Guy. I would be glad to. can you PM me with the email address I should send it to :)

by the way I did not know you guys had such cool smilies over here.

the problem is, what is better

:useforce: or :fuct:

i would bet an seo forum could use that second one at least once every 10 posts

[seo guy]

hahahahah seoguy@seo-guy.com and if you have more to suggest we are always looking for new smilies

[seobook]

[QUOTE=seo guy]hahahahah seoguy@seo-guy.com and if you have more to suggest we are always looking for new smilies[/QUOTE]

I think I sent my ebook or a link to it. please let me know if you got it ok :)