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NAPFA’s (Not So Secret) Link Farm: Social Media Consultant Mike Byrnes Highlights A SEO Black-Hat Tactic |
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Thursday, May 17, 2012 16:57
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Tags: NAPFA | Search Engines Social media consultant Mike Byrnes covers a "beat the system" tactic NAPFA members are engaging in to get better search engine rankings. If you're a private wealth advisor, please join Advisors4Advisors (A4A) to get its full benefits. Register now, and we will donate $20 of our $60 membership fee to Bubbles The Clown’s financial literacy program, and you can post an icon on your website saying you support Bubbles' 501(c)3 charitable organization. Plus, get other membership benefits, including: - Analysis daily of issues affecting advisors
- Aggregation of news from dozens of sites targeting wealth managers
- Reviews by advisors of practice management applications
- 30 independent experts blogging on advisor business issues
- 24/7 access to webinars with 50 hours of CFP® CE and 100 hours of IMCA CE
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NAPFA members have engaged in a practice where they link to one another's sites. Link popularity is an imporant component in search engine rankings. The more sites link to you, the better your site will do in search engine algorithms.
Byrnes blows the whistle on an advisor who has been promoting this "black-hat" SEO tactic, and he mentions that it was suggested as something other NAPFA members should participate in at the group's recent conference.
In questioning the judgment of the advisor who encouraged attendees to join NAPFA's link-exchange program, Byrnes says he "did not seem concerned that the NAPFA members run a risk of Google labeling the exchange as a 'link farm.'”
To be clear, advisors could indeed be penalized by Google and other search engines for participating in the link scheme. It's against Google's terms of use to engage in a link scheme to boost your site's ranking.
I'm seeing more misinformation than ever circulated in the advisor practice management world. Advisors are being hoodwinked left and right by sales people, and it is more difficult than ever for advisors to filter out the noise and focus on reliable sources of information.
The participation by NAPFA members -- who pride themselves on their integrity and fiduciary status -- in a link scheme is not a serious ethical lapse, but it is unbecoming.
NAPFA members participating in the link scheme are not intentionally showing a wreckless disegard for following the rules set by Google and other search egines. They're just naive about the rules and don't realize what they're doing is frowned upon by ethical search engine optimization vendors.
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Many Advisors In Their 50s And 60s Are At A Technological Disadvantage, Creating Opportunity For Advisors In Their 20s, 30s, And 40s |
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Thursday, May 03, 2012 20:26
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Tags: business planning | business strategy | marketing | prospecting | technology Advisors in their 20s, 30s and 40s have an opportunity that does not come along even once in a generation. You are competing against advisors in their 50s, 60s, and 70s with little understanding of social media and technology but large AUM.
Today’s 45-year old graduated from college around 1990, when the computer revolution was well under way. He’s computer savvy. In contrast, today’s 55-year-old graduated from college around 1980, before PCs became a household appliance. If you're a private wealth advisor, please join Advisors4Advisors (A4A) to get its full benefits. Register now, and we will donate $20 of our $60 membership fee to Bubbles The Clown’s financial literacy program, and you can post an icon on your website saying you support Bubbles' 501(c)3 charitable organization. Plus, get other membership benefits, including: - Analysis daily of issues affecting advisors
- Aggregation of news from dozens of sites targeting wealth managers
- Reviews by advisors of practice management applications
- 30 independent experts blogging on advisor business issues
- 24/7 access to webinars with 50 hours of CFP® CE and 100 hours of IMCA CE
Register Now | |
While generalizing means you can, at best, be generally correct, it is fair to say that advisors in their 50s and older generally have weaker technology skills than the next generation. These older advisors have been practicing for 20 or 30 years and have amassed AUM.
However, they often have paid little attention to social media marketing or how to use technology run their practice more efficiently. And, even when they try to change their ways and adopt new technology systems, they often fail because they are unable to change old habits. I see that all the time.
Young advisors in their 30s and 40s have a natural advantage because we live in a time that history is likely to record as a turning point in technological advancement, the period just after the internet was born. In this time of convulsive change, older advisors don’t know how you can appeal to a large part of their customer base by using social media and just being honest.
Also, younger advisors have an easier time adopting new systems because they are unburdened by legacy databases. An advisor who started his or her business in the 1980s or 1990s may still be using Advent Axys for portfolio management or Act! as a CRM, or other desktop programs, for example, and may have a lot of custom fields in his or her database. Converting that data can be a nightmare. So older, successful advisors leave old systems in place.
While older advisors in the past have always been able to direct their staff on key practice management issues, many of the older advisors have neither the time or interest in learning about social media marketing. They may assign social marketing to a young person on staff but it’s unlikely any serious effort will be made to utilize content marketing or spending time learning about newer technology.
In contrast, a younger advisor is more likely to be using modern systems built for the Web, with a standardized SQL database, and platforms with an application program interface for integration. It’s easier for that younger advisor to connect his or her IT stack to other systems and understand how to use social networking.
Point is, the accelerating pace of innovation has placed younger advisors at an advantage. If this applies to you -- whether you are a younger or older advisors -- do something about it.
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Cyber Crime Is Increasing Across Industries |
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Wednesday, March 28, 2012 15:41
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Tags: fraud | security
Economic cyber crime may not be the topic of popular crime shows but it has the #2 spot on financial services firms’ radar. Misappropriation is the first concern with 78% of firms falling victim. If you're a private wealth advisor, please join Advisors4Advisors (A4A) to get its full benefits. Register now, and we will donate $20 of our $60 membership fee to Bubbles The Clown’s financial literacy program, and you can post an icon on your website saying you support Bubbles' 501(c)3 charitable organization. Plus, get other membership benefits, including: - Analysis daily of issues affecting advisors
- Aggregation of news from dozens of sites targeting wealth managers
- Reviews by advisors of practice management applications
- 30 independent experts blogging on advisor business issues
- 24/7 access to webinars with 50 hours of CFP® CE and 100 hours of IMCA CE
Register Now | |
Cyber crime has affected 38% of firms. This number compares to 16% of firms across industries, showing a direct connection between financial firms and cyber crime. Since money is involved, this should be no surprise, although higher reporting of such crimes naturally comes from industries like finance which are more regulated and monitor activity more closely.
The survey was global and had almost 4000 respondents from just under 80 countries. Across industries, cyber crime is #4 on the list of economic crimes. Its top ranking damaging effect is sullied reputation of a firm. Despite this, over 60% of respondent organizations do not monitor social media involvement, do not review cyber threats, and do not have a crisis plan in place.
In the financial firm arena, most crimes emanate from outside the organization and are more easily detected. A cyber crime is defined as a crime in which the internet plays a predominant part.
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Alleging Forgery, Facebook Unearths Emails In Bid To Dismiss Suit Claiming 50% Ownership Stake |
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Monday, March 26, 2012 17:51
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Facebook Inc. filed a motion to dismiss the case brought against it by wood-pellet salesman Paul Ceglia, who has sued Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg for 50% of his stake in the social network, the Wall Street Journal. If you're a private wealth advisor, please join Advisors4Advisors (A4A) to get its full benefits. Register now, and we will donate $20 of our $60 membership fee to Bubbles The Clown’s financial literacy program, and you can post an icon on your website saying you support Bubbles' 501(c)3 charitable organization. Plus, get other membership benefits, including: - Analysis daily of issues affecting advisors
- Aggregation of news from dozens of sites targeting wealth managers
- Reviews by advisors of practice management applications
- 30 independent experts blogging on advisor business issues
- 24/7 access to webinars with 50 hours of CFP® CE and 100 hours of IMCA CE
Register Now | |
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Home-Based Advisors With A Google Places Listing: "Hide" Your Address In Your Listing Or Risk Delisting From Google Maps |
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Monday, March 26, 2012 16:42
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Tags: marketing | Search Engines Home-based advisors who do not receive customers at home need to “hide” their address in their Google Places listing or risk being delisted in Google Maps and penalized in search rankings.
Advisors who have a Google Places listing, work from home, and do not receive customers there must change their Google Places listing. If you're a private wealth advisor, please join Advisors4Advisors (A4A) to get its full benefits. Register now, and we will donate $20 of our $60 membership fee to Bubbles The Clown’s financial literacy program, and you can post an icon on your website saying you support Bubbles' 501(c)3 charitable organization. Plus, get other membership benefits, including: - Analysis daily of issues affecting advisors
- Aggregation of news from dozens of sites targeting wealth managers
- Reviews by advisors of practice management applications
- 30 independent experts blogging on advisor business issues
- 24/7 access to webinars with 50 hours of CFP® CE and 100 hours of IMCA CE
Register Now | |
Businesses with Google Places listing for years are suddenly delisted by the popular search engine because Google tweaked its policy without letting you know. That’s why the policy change is being criticized by some search engine optimization (SEO) consultants.
If your Google Places listing suddenly disappeared, this could be the reason why.
Andrew Shotland, an SEO consultant, appears to have been the first to report on a Google policy change that, as it stands today, penalizes business listings in Google local search rankings without forewarning.
Shotland posted on an incident in which he received a phone call from Google. He was on another line when the call can in, he reports:
"The caller-ID said 'Google, Inc.' I was intrigued.
The voice on the other line asked if I 'serviced clients at this address.' I was busy servicing a client with the other hand (on the phone – get your mind out of the gutter) so I said that my clients were all over the world, which they are, including within a 5-mile radius of my location.
Then I asked the voice who she was and why she was calling. She said she was with Google Maps and they were just doing some quality checks. I had to go – see client servicing action above – and hung up.
Next thing you know I no longer have a listing in Google Maps."
When he realized his site had been delisted, Shotland used a Places Troubleshooter to try get restore the listing and he pinged Google Help to explain the problem. He received the following response from Google Help:
"If your business travels to its customers and doesn’t have a consistent customer-facing location, you should apply a service area or service areas to your listing. You should also check the box to hide your business address if customers cannot make face-to-face interaction with your business at the address listed. To learn more about service areas, check out this article:
http://www.google.com/support/places/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=177103
Once your listing adheres to the quality guidelines, you can respond to this email, and we’ll evaluate for reinclusion on Google Maps.
Thank you for your understanding.”
In case you've never received a call from Google, you should be aware that the company does occasionally need to call businesses to verify business listings. If someone from Google calls and asks if you receive clients at your home-office, be truthful. If you don’t receive clients in your home-office, be sure to change your Places listing to hide your address. According to SEO experts, Google no longer penalizes companies for hiding their address.
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