Google has launched a new feature in Google Search Console that allows web site owners to request a Recrawl of their own web site. I suspect that this is in response to web site owners, such as myself, complaining over the past few weeks about Google’s slowdown in indexing. Google announced this feature on Twitter. [Read more…]
18 Speakers to See at Engage 2018 Portland
Whenever there’s a great search engine marketing or search marketing industry conference, I personally take the time to review all of the speakers. Just recently, I hand picked the speakers to see at Pubcon Austin. Especially when it’s a great conference, such as SEMPDX’s Engage conference, which is being held on Thursday, March 8, 2018 in Portland, Oregon. I spoke at last year’s Engage conference, and the year before that–and it’s a great one-day conference to attend. [Read more…]
Grammarly Chrome Extension Exposes All Your Documents
A bug in Grammarly’s Google Chrome web browser extension was exposing all of your documents to virtually anyone or any website that wants to view them. If you’ve used Grammarly’s Chrome extension, all of the documents (including websites, documents, MS Word documents, including Microsoft Office documents) have been exposed to the public.
If any of the documents that you’ve used Grammarly on to check spelling or plagiarism are of a sensitive nature, then you probably should be concerned about this security breech.
Update: this has been fixed and user login details are no longer exposed. However, if you have any documents that are of a sensitive nature in your Grammarly account then you may want to remove them. Also, in any case like this, I urge you to go change your login details (change your password) at Grammarly.
Splitting a Website Into Two Websites: Part Two
As you might recall, I decided to split my website into two separate websites. I moved content (mainly my services pages) over to Hartzer.com, leaving my 1000+ blog posts here on this blog. I’ll continue to blog and write news articles here on BillHartzer.com. The goal is to make BillHartzer.com more of a blog and news site–while moving my SEO Consulting business over to Hartzer.com and Hartzer Consulting. [Read more…]
Google Responds to Jesus Censorship Claim
Google has officially responded to the claim by some that they are censoring the answer to a question on their Google Home devices. Earlier today, I wrote about how Google Home may be censoring their answer to “Who is Jesus Christ?“. [Read more…]
Splitting a Website into Two Websites: Part 1
If you’re reading this post and you’ve been reading my posts for a while now, then you probably have noticed that I’ve made some changes to the site recently. Actually, I’m making some major changes, and I’d like you to follow along with me as I split this website, BillHartzer.com, into two separate websites. This website, my primary blog and personal brand, is going to remain as it has, and always have been: a blog and “news site” dedicated on Search, Marketing, Tech, and Domain Names. I’ve moved my primary consulting business over to Hartzer.com, and a new business, Hartzer Consulting. [Read more…]
Official OnCrawl Brand Ambassador
I am proud to officially announce that I have been chosen to as the OnCrawl Brand Ambassador for the United States. If you’re not aware of OnCrawl, OnCrawl is an SEO crawler and log file analyzer that helps you improve your SEO performance. I use OnCrawl as a critical part of the SEO audit services, Mini SEO Audits, and Technical SEO Audits I do for clients on a regular basis. [Read more…]
How to Stop Retargeting by Advertisers
Are you sick and tired of being retargeted? Have you gone to a merchant’s website, maybe a hotel website or even some other ecommerce business and now their ads are following you all over the internet? Even on Facebook? For days on end? Literally, it can be very frustrating, especially if you are already a customer. Retargeting is great for business (I tell clients to implement retargeting during an SEO audit), but it honestly can be really annoying in some cases. [Read more…]
New gTLD Domains Win The SEO Hero Contest
The results are in for the SEO Hero contest by Wix, and the New gTLD domain names have a great, strong showing in the results. Wix ran a good old fashioned SEO contest, where the winner would receive $50,000. Essentially, on a certain date, after four months’ time, whoever ranks #1 for the phrase SEO Hero will win $50,000. [Read more…]
A Wealth Management Book for Those Who Make Money Online
It’s hard for me to calculate how many people currently make money online in one way or another. I estimate that we’re most likely talking about millions upon millions if you add up all of the freelancers, online entrepreneurs, search engine marketers, SEOs, internet marketers, bitcoin investors, domain investors, bloggers, soforth. [Read more…]
How to Tell If Someone Really Is a Digital Marketing Expert
How to Tell If Someone is a Engine Optimization Expert
How to Tell If Someone is a Social Media Marketing Expert
I’m mad, and at the same time I can’t exactly make up my mind about the title of this post. If you know me, I’m almost never mad and frustrated like I am right now as I write this post. What’s gotten me steamed is the fact that there are so many self-proclaimed “experts” out there who are NOT experts. And it’s shame that it’s these very folks who are giving the whole digital marketing industry a bad rap. [Read more…]
An Update from Bill Hartzer, June 2016 Edition
This is an example of the newsletter that I send out on a regular basis. Here’s the latest edition, for June 2016. If you’d like to subscribe, you can do so at the end of this post.
I truly has been a few months since I have sent out my newsletter, and I have a lot to share this time. It’s certainly getting hot here in Texas, and we’ve had a lot of Spring storms and rain. It’s been heating up in the marketing world, as well. [Read more…]
Bill Hartzer – February 2016 Update
It’s been been a while since I send out my newsletter. If you are one my newsletter subscribers, this is the type of content that you’ll receive in my monthly newsletter. [Read more…]
State of Texas Passes Legislation Requiring Certain Businesses to Link to Them
Wait, what?!? Yes, you read that headline right. In the latest legislative session, the State of Texas approved legislation that requires certain businesses to link to them with specific anchor text. I’ve heard of websites suing other websites for linking to them, but this, in fact, is just about the opposite of that. [Read more…]
Tweet Containing Swear Word Appears on Yahoo! Homepage
I’ve always considered the Yahoo! home page a place with family-friendly content. But lately it’s becoming more family un-friendly. So much so that I’m reconsidering my usage of Yahoo! as a home page for my web browser. Especially because my school age kids use my laptop from time to time to browse the web. How is it that a Tweet from Twitter, along with a pretty nasty swear word gets listed as a news story on the site’s home page? [Read more…]
19 Speakers to See at Pubcon Austin 2015
Every so often, when I attend and speak at conferences, I put together a list of speakers to see or speakers that I want to meet at that conference. So, since the Pubcon Austin conference is on April 20, 2015, being held, of course, in Austin, Texas, and since I’m speaking and moderating, I thought I would post my personal list. [Read more…]
When Sending a Sales Letter, Grammar Counts!
Whenever sending a sales letter to someone, even an unsolicited sales letter (aka spam), then you will have a lot more success if your grammar is correct. [Read more…]
Using Square To Boost Domain Authority
Well, this is interesting. Or embarrassing. Apparently, somehow Square is associating me, of all people, with boosting Domain Authority. I mean, according to Square, who sent me a marketing piece in the mail, I run a company called To Boost Domain Authority. Does this indicate that you can use Square to Boost Domain Authority? Take a look at what Square just sent me: [Read more…]
Trademark Filing Changed Based on Bad Keyword Advice
An interesting trademark filing has been done by a company owner who originally got bad advice. Specifically, this website owner claims that they got bad keyword advice from Trademark.com and LegalZoom.com. They had originally advised the company owner to insert keywords into the name of the trademark such as Best Flavored Funnel Cakes in the World rather than the company name, which is Carnival Food Year Round. [Read more…]
Sometimes Even an SEO Expert Needs Help
After actively doing SEO since the mid 1990s, and not just talking and speaking about SEO but actually doing it, I consider myself to be an SEO Expert. But, I have to admit that there are times when even this search engine optimization expert needs some advice. Back when SEO was “easy” (was it ever really easy?), one could use more of a formulaic approach to SEO and be fairly successful with any website that you were optimizing. But, as the search engines have become smarter, and those programming the algorithms have cracked down on spam more and more, there are times where you’re at a loss as to why a website is not ranking as well as it should. It’s in these times when only a truly professional SEO expert can “suck it up” and admit that you need help. [Read more…]