October-December have been VERY busy months! We’ve fought off attacks by hackers, had a link network go down on us, and some of our clients had errors with your websites that required some complicated fixes.
Thankfully, each issue has been addressed and dealt with, and things have become EVEN better for our internet marketing efforts as a result…
I’d like to start with the first and most obvious concern this month:
So…a particularly nasty beast showed up at our doorstep last month. Hackers compromised several websites on our FTP server using the “Zero-Day compatibility” hack in WordPress. Our sites were hacked through a open-source script called Timthumb.PHP, a very common script used in WordPress.
Most of these errors haven’t even been detected yet by most webmasters. But once we figured what was going on, we went in and deleted malicious code from about 30 different files per website. Steps have also been taken to make our servers MUCH more secure, so that nothing like this will ever happen again. That said though, please always notify me IMMEDIATELY if you notice any strange activity going on with your site.
LavaLink’s clients who have hired us for SEO probably heard about our link network becoming de-indexed. This means that some of the links that we built to your blogs lost their value and became useless.
The entire link network has been re-built from the ground up and I spent this week re-building links to each of the websites and blogs that we’ve created together. They will be indexed over the next 45 days. You have probably experienced a slight drop in search rankings this month, but I promise that it is temporary and things will be better than they were before. Just hold on till then…
Also, to ensure that the integrity of the network is not compromised again, unfortunately, backlink reports will no longer be available. If you have questions about where I’m building links for you though, feel free to ask and I can point out some sites that Google is indexing for you.
I sent each client an update on Google’s algorithm change this month and why fresh content is more important than EVER (see these links if you need a refresher: http://www.marketingpilgrim.
I’ve also created Google Reader accounts for all of our clients and plan to pursue a strategy to capitalize on this change over the next month by updating your blogs with more recent newsworthy content. If you’d ever like to log in to your Reader account, simply go to google.com/reader/ whilst logged in to Google, and search for keywords that you’re interested in.
December has been an equally busy month. We’re nearing the completion and launch of two new WordPress websites: the WordPress Design Institute – wordpressdesigninstitute.org, which represents the culmination of your own Lavalink’s very first information product, and we’re trembling with excitement!
We’re also trembling with excitement about the other project we’ve been hard at work on: a redesign of Alchemy Fine Events & Invitations – alchemyfineevents.com, which we’re putting the finishing touches on and plan to launch within the next couple of weeks.
Finally, we’re excited to report dramatic increases in ranking, positioning and traffic for our search engine optimization and search engine marketing clients. Our client West Coast Flooring, has moved up from position #9 to #2 in the organic listings for San Diego Flooring in just the past 2 months, and is ranking for numerous other keywords. Traffic is up %35 over this time last year.
I’ve sent a few clients early Christmas gifts.
I’ll be out of town for the holidays. In fact, I’ll be way, way, out of town!
I’ll be flying out to Mexico City in 2 days, and then from there to Buenos Aires, Argentina.
It’ll be nice to enjoy a second summer and pursue the work/life balance without having to worry about making rent each month (I found a great apartment in the Palermo district for 1/2 what I was paying in San Diego). And we’re always working hard to improve each of our businesses to make them more efficient and profitable!
Let me know if you’d like me to send you a postcard from Buenos Aires!
Warm Regards,
Danny Flood
VP, Strategy & Client Services
