In the past I have never worked with flash sites, not because I couldn’t (I’m sure my technical knowledge would be adequate), but rather because I never had the opportunity to optimise a flash site. I have had a vague idea of what I would do if the opportunity ever came up, but never really researched much further in to it.

Lately I started to research and didn’t get that much closer to solving the flash problem, but I did learn something very important;  SEO ‘experts’ know nothing about optimising flash but like to pretend that they do. Whilst they often write about it, I think the vast majority are in the same boat as me; some basic knowledge but no practical experience of optimising flash. To be honest, I have never seen a SEO topic so widely written about by so many misinformed people.

I can admit I don’t know all that much about making a flash website search engine friendly. I know what I shouldn’t do, and I know some possibilities of what I could do – but there is still no way you would see me write a tutorial about it. 99% of articles and blog posts are people writing “If you do x and then you do y, the flash site will be search friendly… I have never tried it, but it will work.”In all my research I did not see one example of any of the practices that these SEO consultants wrote about.

Now to the challenge: I want to see a completely search friendly purely flash site. It doesn’t have to be optimised by you, but it needs to be actually search friendly, it needs to be aesthetically pleasing and it needs to be optimised in light of Google’s most recent flash indexing announcements. Can somebody find me this site?

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When will local come to Australia; Despite the prominence of small business in Australia we have still failed to capitalise on local and small business marketing on the internet. With the exception of hospitality (which has had a long history of user generated reviews) Australia is still not embracing websites that combine official business information with user generated content, reviews and comments.

How long until this expands to other forms of small business – could we have a system where tradesmen are reviewed? Or many people just want to find a good hairdresser or beauty salon? It is after all just a matter of time before there is a web 2.0 incarnation that will satisfy our needs of information, yet where is it?
Some of the bigger directories like HotFrog may have gotten it right with better quality listings than traditional business directories, yet they are still not that open to user generated content. Same for AussieWeb – it is nothing more than a huge business directory with contact information. These sites, in essence are providing nothing that the yellow pages hasn’t provided for decades.

True Local is perhaps the best example of a site that is on its way - at least it has tried to start a reviewing system, the problem is 99% of businesses do not have any reviews. It is a chicken and the egg problem; if small business embraced local search better consumers would start using it, and if consumers started using it small business would embrace it… In the end we have to ask, is it us that is the problem or is it small business? One of the reasons that local SEO has undoubtedly not taken off is that we are all too lazy to offer the infrustructure to support it, that is, online spaces that small businesses can use for promotion, reputation management and as a public relations tool.

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There is a misconception that a good site and/or idea will sell itself; which has led to many entrepreneurs putting their cash in to online ventures without adequate knowledge, research or skills to make it a success. What many entrepreneurs who have had business success offline do not realise is that the online market is just as demanding (if not more) than your average brick and mortar business. There are just as many failures, probably far more online than there are offline especially with the increase in Web 2.0 start-ups.

The number one problem is that these investors/entrepreneurs think the internet is the same as traditional offline business, yet for some reason they treat it so differently. These entrepreneurs have (mostly) been in industries where if they have a good idea they follow a series of logical processes as well as overcome many barriers to get the business underway: they do their market research, they do their balance sheets, they consult accountants and business advisors, they go to a lawyer, they write a business plan, they have financial forecasts, they have financial goals, they need permits, leases, contracts ect. They are used to going through the hoops to get a good idea off the ground and a 5 or 10 year wait is nothing in the end. The most important thing, and the thing that they remember is that eventually their idea/s have worked and they have made money from them.

Having this success offline has recently increased with web 2.0 start-ups, such as online websites and businesses. What most entrepreneurs think is that offline business skills can be transferred to online enterprises; they think the internet is the same as any other business. This isn’t where the problem lies, however. The problem is that despite thinking that the internet is the same, they treat it so differently. Rarely do these entrepreneurs do any kind of market research, business plans or financial forecasts for a web site. They spend their lives going through these barriers and seeing success so much that they think it is their ideas that will sell themselves. What they don’t realise is that it was often all the other work that originally made their businesses successful, not just their ideas. Most ideas change a lot in the time from when it is in somebody’s head to when the idea is actually executed in a business sense. Inversely, the internet translates ideas too easily and directly from somebody’s head in to reality without consideration of all the external (normal) business issues that are usually considered with any other business. For most it is a matter of going to a web developer and fronting the funds, and the sad thing is that so many people do just that with faith that their idea will take off, even without consideration for marketing or promotion of the idea.

They think the internet is like any other business (which it is in certain ways), yet they will trust their intuition in putting down $30,000 for a large web development project just because they think they no longer have to go through the same barriers to get their ideas out there.

The internet is different from other industries, but each industry in itself is different anyway. I wouldn’t start a shoe store if I had success starting a mining company without a LOT of research and advice. Same with the internet, just because you may have had success with a shoe store offline doesn’t mean you will have the same success with a shoe store online; they are two very different industries, and entrepreneurs will think the online like the offline; with faith that their ideas will just work. But they will not treat the online like the offline, which is the number one problem with entrepreneurial investors.

An idea is just that, an idea, and if you can execute it without breaking the bank you may have a chance at success. If the idea has a solid business plan to go with it you may even have a greater chance at success. But if you think you can invest in just an idea, you are nearly always destined for failure.

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To be a good link builder, you have to constantly think like a link builder. Since being heavily involved in SEO I can no longer casually browse the internet without thinking SEO; I will use the SEO for Firefox Extension at home (as well as work), I will critique the search friendliness of every site I visit, and above all I will use any opportunity I have to keep a link diary. Despite trying to separate work and play, since starting a link diary this is the only thing I can’t stop out of work time.

One of the most valuable link building ‘tools’ I use is my link diary; a spreadsheet where I can quickly add sites and pages where I may be able to get a link from in the future. It needn’t be anything fancy but it is a way to quickly add a site to come back to at a later date that may be worth looking at for link building. I have found the best way to satisfy the inner SEO in me is to quickly write down the site in a text file or spreadsheet, and then come back to these sites at a later date and take a better look. This way you never pass up good linking opportunities, but are not interrupted every time you see a site that may benefit you.

I do it for a range of sites; a niche directory that I wouldn’t have found otherwise, sometimes it is a links page, but most often it is those kinds of sites which you would never try to get a link from – the more obscure sites where you (and your competitors) would never actually think of – these are the ones you really have to look out for. You wouldn’t believe how many quality sites I have casually came across which I would have overlooked if I wasn’t thinking of my links diary at the back of my head. It is so simple to do, doesn’t interrupt you, and means you never pass up a good opportunity for links.

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