Hey, where did everyone go?

Actually I do do too but I can't agree about the influx into the SEO forum (and I don't think it has anything to do with ownership) . I don't see new ideas coming in. I see old ones that no longer work well. Seems like we lost quite a bit of people who knew what they were talking about or they post a whole lot less.

Perhaps it is time for new blood. I'm not here as much, as I am spending way too much
time on my shtuff. That ought to make some people happy!

It got to where I thought I was just putting out fires, sometimes with gasoline. But
the same old same old stuff just keeps rearing its ugly head. The fires had
gotten out of control, and the majority of those will just have to go on with their
badselves and fail.

Thing is, the adsense/ppc part used to be filled with its fair share of good, old
fashioned debate threads, with honest info and opinions. I do miss that. But like
I said, I learned waaaaaaay too much on this forum to not start making my sites
better, and making money. More of it. I suspect others are doing the same, or
perhaps they gave up.

Thing is, how much "new" in SEO can there be? Google tweaks are really just
a reiteration of past stuff, tweaked because someone heard a guy tell another
guy how this might fool them.

The same old SEO that involved basic hard work, is still required. There seems
to be a flood of WP wannabes looking to make quick buck. And the things they
ask about are just inane. Nobody wants to learn. Nobody wants hard work.

It's like a guy who buys a white coat, a scalpel, reads about humans bones,
then walks into an OR and wants to teach surgeons. Good thing SEO
is not life or death.

Paul

Hi Mike,

Unfortunately that Forum is where all the non-traditional CPA opt-in affiliate marketing, paid to click, fake traffic exchange, and other no traditional marketing and business concepts have been discussed, and for the most part, they have been banned from SEM programs, or perhaps never tried because they knew their niche is not welcomed at any of the major search engine platforms. Heck, many of them cannot even do SEO, because search engines don't want those business models to be found on their SERPs.

It seems nearly every time someone starts a thread over there, on an SEM topic, we are deluged by an army of posters telling people not to do SEM, to instead try some weird unheard of program that their 13 year old neighbor just created, or something as crazy as that. The AdWords platform seems to be particularly hated by that group. I am guessing it is because the forum, until recently, has been the place for people who have been banned by Search Engines.

What are people to do that have traditional businesses and do conventional SEM? Are we to politely ask those folks that built that forum to leave and go somewhere else? To get the hell out, like we have been told to do in this forum? I don't want to go there and fight with them, just because someone decided to rename the forums and didn't have a place for us conventional marketers. It seems they tossed us into a catchall forum for people who aren't welcomed anywhere else on the Warrior Forum.

We, that have conventional businesses, do not have anything in common with the bulk of the folks in that forum. I don't want to fight with them, or judge them, are even talk to them. I'm not saying they are wrong, just different.

To use an analogy It like putting a US Navy Seal Veterans discussion group into a forum that is made up of primarily of Code Pink supporters. You know there is going to be a fight, and it ain't going to be pretty.

Forcing people that do SEM for conventional business to discuss topics in a forum that is made up of people that have been banned or just aren't welcomed by the Search Engines, is just an odd thing to get your head around. Was the idea to start major flame wars, or to just purge conventional business owners that market on the web from the WF? It is beginning to feel like that is the goal on the new owners.

Another thing to consider is that SEO is actually a subtopic of SEM, Search Engine Marketing includes keyword search based PPC advertising, SEO, and web page promotional activities designed to improve authority which helps to improve ranking in SERPs. In fact, I have found AdWords to be he most important tool in any serious SEO campaign, it's just foolish to wage a major campaign without AdWords data, IMO. I can see the logic of mixing those topics, but pushing SEM into the forum that was created for topics that were not welcomed by people who discuss SEM is just madness, IMHO.

So again I ask, where have Warriors, who are owners of conventional businesses gone to discuss SEM topics, other than SEO? Apparently it isn't WF (except for threads in random places), so if any knows, please share.