Rank Theory #14

The hopes and dreams of an entire industry, carried on the shoulders of one single SEO newsletter.

Nov 26, 2021

But the tigers come at night
With their voices soft as thunder
As they tear your hope apart

— Les Misérables

Happy Friday, my friends.

Up here in north-central Vermont we’re expecting 2-9 inches of snow today, so… I’ll be hiding out inside all weekend most likely. Buying things.

It’s black fridaaaaay what are you buying?

For me, it’s mostly hosting, and mostly re-upping all of my accounts with as much discounts as I can. This mostly only works for WPX, which not everybody loves, but which I love a lot.

They are a great managed WP host, and their support is really robust and responsive (opposite of like, Bluehost).

I’ve got an affiliate link if you’re looking for things to click on and here it is. I highly recommend them.

In stuff I’ve never used before but am checking out for the first time, I’m picking up a lifetime Schema Pro account for just under $200. No affiliate link, but click here to check that out if interested.

I also picked up many many Deposit Photo credits at AppSumo, for my various website posting. Highly recommended. No aff link, just click here to check it.

What about you? Share the good deals for shit in the comments.

In This Newsletter:

I try and convince you to buy my expired domain SEO course using classic marketing techniques couched in humor, sarcasm, and downplaying a serious marketing push with fake “wink wink we’re on the same team it’s us against them” style positioning.
My reaction to the November 2021 core algorithm update
How I actually monitor these stupid goddamned updates
Next week’s (or whatever) newsletter

The Expired Domain SEO Course is Expiring (for new sign-ups)

Do you get it?

Wordplay!

So, I did a pre-sale for this course starting last Friday, and it ends tomorrow at midnight. I’m closing it down to new sign-ups while I actually build the course and deliver it one painful video at a time to those intrepid explorers, those brave and fearless people that signed up first.

To recap:

I’m doing an expired domain SEO course where I cover:

how and where to find good domains to acquire
what makes a good expired SEO domain
how to use these domains to grow your traffic
a bunch of other foundational stuff
some cool and weird advanced shit

The course doesn’t exist yet, I’m releasing it as I go. If you sign up to receive the course this way, it’s $199, lifetime, and you get all future updates and stuff (if any).

I’m closing entry to this course on Sunday, and releasing it again once the course is all put together, where it will cost $299.

So, if you’re on the fence, that’s my best and most long-winded pitch to have you give me the monies now, or more later. Whatever you’re comfortable with. Here’s a button:

Or if you have Koumpounophobia, here’s a nice, safe hyperlink for you to click:

Get the course for $199 before it’s no longer available.

#fomo #marketing

The Great Google Update of November 2021

Here are some quotes that sum up mine and most people’s experience with the 2021 November Core Algo Update. Take from this what will you will: life is a mirror.

“In his blue gardens men and girls came and went like moths among the whisperings and the champagne and the stars.”

― F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby.

When you’ve done something right, people won’t be sure you’ve done anything at all

— God, Futurama

Film is an illusion. Fame is ephemeral. Faith and family are what endure.

—Emilio Estevez

And that’s all I have to say on the matter.

How to peel back the layers of reality and look at the guts of the artificial machine that drives core algorithm updates

OR: How to keep an eye on the ongoing impact of core algo updates.

Couple things here.

The first way: constantly check the same five SERPs everyday, but especially during updates.

If you’re not obsessively checking the SERPs of your most important keyword, and measuring your own self worth/living and dying by how your site is performing in said SERPs, are you even an SEO?

If your site is not there yet, you should still be checking constantly. Making note of things like:

Are newspapers ranking?
Do info KWs dominate?
Is that one site doing super toxic SEO still ranking first and second?
Are the any sites left on the internet that aren’t fucking newspapers?

Look at how the intent of the keyword changes. Sometimes it’ll be info heavy, sometimes buying-related, and sometimes a weird mix where Google doesn’t know what to do with itself.

Look at the sites that pop up during an update, the weird mutants that live on page 14 where the sunlight never reaches, who’ve grown strange appendages and multiple, wide milky eyes on the foreheads to better see flashes of movement in the extreme dark down there.

What are they doing in the #2 spot?! What did Google’s algo see in them to temporarily promote, only to have them disappear two hours later, their soft, exposed retinas burned forever by a glimpse of the light of success.

Second: I like to make note of newspapers vs. magazine sponsored posts once the dust of an update has settled.

Look at things like: are they super fresh, just published? That’s something that might matter.

Do they have 10,000 referring domains?

Zero?

This is all good advice.

Finally, look at the sites that used to rank in the top 3, got dropped as-if-by-a-record-label-because-they-were, in fact, no-longer-hot… only to re-emerge three years later in a duet with Justin Bieber about how Miami is like, a city filled with beautiful women and also beaches, and you can dance on the beach and maybe buy some Iced cream on that beach.

Is that DR 75 pure-spam-backlinks-but-has-2400-pages-of-content site back on page one?!

It *IS* back on page one. I bet they’re making $2,000/day in affiliate revenue.

I guess actions have no consequences, might as well fire up the ole GSA machine for 10,000 automatic backlinks, life has no meaning and nice guys truly do finish last in the SERPs. Time be a straight up SHITHEAD with this link building campaign, I’ma hack your ugly site and link to all of mine with exact anchor text and draw a penis on your logo while I’m there.

Anyway.

What were we talking about?

How to monitor Google core updates.

My advice:

be super obsessive and observant about your niche and your keywords.
hit a nice vaporizer every night—like the Pax 3 maybe—and a strrrrrong Indica.

That’s how you SEO in 2021, bitch.

Well, that’s all the advice I have for you this week.

I’m gonna go listen to the new It’s Always Sunny podcast and play Breath of the Wild on Switch.

Stay tuned to next week’s newsletter where I share my purchases and sales of 2021—it’s been a wild year (I don’t want them to live on forever online, so they will ONLY be sent via, so make sure to subscriiiiiiiibe).

…if you haven’t.

Have a good weekend, and one more reminder to sign up for my course before I close that shit (and if you’ve already signed up: what an OG, you are the best).

Peace, love, and pumpkin pie.

Sean