Sure, the holidays aren’t the time for ranting.. but heck..it’s me so… why not

I was just enjoying a few drinks at the SR Xmas party… and saw this article

‘Latent Semantic Indexing (LSI) And SEO’

Those ‘in the know’ understand my penchant to the technical aspects of search engineering.. for those who don’t, suffice it to say, I have a reasonable handle on it and have given far too many hours to the alter of Patent Gobble-D-Gook

The problem here is not far from my Kim-possible rants… I have to wonder if the writer is seeking self glorification since much of the information and presentation is skewed.. I wrote about LSA (I) and did so after many hours following it’s trail

Let’s have a look-see (grab yer Rum and Egg Nog)

Indexing has always been considered a highly targeted science. Enter a search query into Google search and the pages that are displayed are generally optimized towards that exact word or term. However, in their continual battle to server the most relevant but most natural pages with genuinely useful information Google has injected latent semantic indexing (LSI) into its algorithms.

Pardon? Is that actually English?? Beyond how confusing this is.. Latent Semantic ANALYSIS has been around form quite some time and Latent Semantic INDEXING (a-la Applied Semantics) with Google since 2003…

The extremely rigid form of “keyword indexing”

Whhaaatt? Somebody puullleeeeaazzee explain WTF KW indexing is? It wasn’t in my training manual



We then have some babble about it being in some way part of fighting web spam (Black Hat) which is simply Bunk…

The introduction of LSI has seen some dramatic changes in the search engine result pages already. Sites that had previously performed well because of an impressive link profile based on a single keyword have found their pages slip in the rankings. Other pages with a more diverse portfolio of inbound links are taking the lead with search terms for which they had not previously performed.

Hmmmm.. to begin with no one knows FOR CERTAIN that LSI found it’s way into the CORE index… it was acquired (Applied Semantics) for use with AdSense/AdWords.. NOT the search index.
This automatically makes the balance of the statement incredible and sounding an awful lot like Google’s Big Daddy update earlier this year

Website content copywriting for Google’s benefit is not merely made up of keyword density and keyword placement as it once was and link-building techniques will need to change to incorporate LSI algorithms but it can be done.

Man.. I have to wonder if this was written in 2004 or something now?? KW density has been dead a loooonnnnggg time now

A link profile should no longer consist of thousands of links with the same anchor text (that of your primary keyword). There’s no reason to panic if you already have this kind of profile. Instead you should look at relevant and similar terms and improve your link profile by gaining links using these as your anchor text.

Come on.. it is or it isn’t. You can’t get ‘sort of’ pregnant, right ladies? It is either BAD or GOOD…. While I don’t believe the statement to be false, it simply does not clarify things much

It is widely acknowledged that Google is the search engine at the forefront of latent semantic indexing.

Uhhh yeah.. Cause Applied Semantics created the term LSI and Google purchased them. Now that is not to say that Yahoo or MSN don’t use aspects of LATENT SEMANTIC ANALYSIS (which is what LSI really is.. and is based from ) since that is open territory… ( man I hate this KW indexing’ term  yeesh)



In the end it is a skewed and cursory view of LSI that does little in the way of allowing folks to understand the implications of it…. For some better LSA/I stuff see;

ME; http://www.thebusinessdevelopers.com/ar … _link.html

JonJon ; http://www.johnon.com/103/latent-semant … g-lsi.html

Visio; http://www.1stsearchenginerankings.com/ … echnology/

Merry Xmas!!!

LOL -- rant on, my man!

He he... I like to think of it not as a 'rant at the author' but more of a 'gift to the SR family' .. I can sleep much esier this evening as well... lol..

Well.. grab another drink and see what else I can hammer on er.. uh.. help out with I mean... he he (see how Uve corrupted me.. I was a genteeel soul when I arrived at SR) weeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

a good Christmas read...

Ummm, Dave? Does this mean you weren't the author?!

Couldn't resist. I am shocked that so many of you 60+ hours of work per weekers weren't using this perfectly good excuse to take off for a whoooooole week, but instead, are hanging out at the SR Pub tossing back a few, while keeping up with the reading! (My excuse is this IS my fun! So... )

The extremely rigid form of “keyword indexing”

Whhaaatt? Somebody puullleeeeaazzee explain WTF KW indexing is? It wasn’t in my training manual

I found over 44,700 hits when I googled the term, and discovered it is mostly used as a way of indexing publications online, so people can do searches within an informational based/data based site, much like an index in the back of a book. He explains his own unique definition in the paragraph that follows that sentence, but I think he means “keyword” verses keywords or phrases.

Seriously, do you think anyone, who has been using Google for over a month, will understand this? …believe this? …accept his expertise? Honestly, this didn’t even make a flicker on my Article Geiger Counter, and you know me – I do quake at some articles. I read some, rolled my eyes, and moved on!

Actually Lynn, I'm thoroughly convinced that ranting IS Dave's idea of fun   

Steven.... you're 'almost' right.

Steven_A_S wrote:

Actually Lynn, I'm thoroughly convinced that ranting IS Dave's idea of fun   

Good point!

MrStitch wrote:

Steven.... you're 'almost' right.

Almost? Come on.. let's stop playing 'semantics' here ......  blah ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha

Seriously, do you think anyone, who has been using Google for over a month, will understand this? …believe this? …accept his expertise?

U bet, that's what keeps me on SEO boards, trying my best to get more SIgnal and less Static out there. If every potential client came to me with a reasonable SEO understanding - I wouldn't spend so much time dispelling silly myths and strategies... or worse - fixing God awful messes (considering one such project at the moment)