I have decided to interview Aaron wall for many reasons, but Aaron seems to be a pretty cool guy which I have had several discussions with him, I would have to say he knows what he wants out of life, and is heading in the right direction.

Tyler Dewitt:So Aaron where did you grow up at?

Aaron Wall:Illinois. I started up near Chicago and kept moving further into the corn.

Tyler Dewitt:What was your first job, and when did you get into seo?

Aaron Wall:Hmm. Paperboy at about the age of 10. I became an SEO 4 years ago, at the age of 23.

Tyler Dewitt:Did you go to college?

Aaon Wall:Nope.

Tyler Dewitt:Do you do any type of programming, or just strictly seo?

Aaon Wall:If I do programming it is not good programming.

Tyler Dewitt:What do you look for in directories, well of course “quality”, but what else?

Aaron Wall:Quality is where everything else comes from (link equity, proof that it is a longterm business, people using it, search engines wanting to trust it, etc.). I recently did a video about this here http://www.seobook.com/archives/002034.shtml

Tyler Dewitt:How do you feel about article submissions, and site wide links?

Aaron Wall:I would rather submit one article to WebProNews than 100 articles to crappy article syndication directories over and over again. Things that are in the active parts of the web will get noticed by the real parts of the web. If a site is well trusted a few crappy article syndication links may not hurt it, but they won’t help it as much as high quality editorial links would.

Tyler Dewitt:What would you say your average sale a day is, or a year on your seobook?

Aaron Wall:Still growing rather quickly, but I would rather not say. Plus some of it is just recycled money. Who cares if I spend x dollars on AdWords and make a small profit or roughly break even on it?

Tyler Dewitt:What made you decide to write the seobook, I mean i have a great idea, but figured it would be better to hear if from you?

Aaron Wall:Client work is feast or famine. And I sucked at business when I got on the web (sold services too cheaply). It just made sense to have fairly automated passive income streams.

Tyler Dewitt:How do you go about creating links for clients, or do you not do much client work anymore?

Aaron Wall:I mostly work on my own sites. But when getting links I tend to get a few of the more trusted obvious links then hit up the social marketing sceen a bit. Plus I am big at just creating things people would want or find cool.

Tyler Dewitt:How long did it take you to get things going in your business?

Aaron Wall:I don’t think it is an on or off thing. In some ways I think I am just now starting to ramp up.

Tyler Dewitt:What do you plan on doing in the next year with your online business?

Aaron Wall:Scaling out. Creating many more passive income streams.

Tyler Dewitt:Do you attend many SES meetings still?

Aaron Wall:I did a lot for the last few years. This year I may actually cut it back though.

Tyler Dewitt:Lol, are you married, or have kids?(don’t worry I’m straight, just a question)

Aaron Wall:Not at the moment.

Tyler Dewitt:What would you say is the most effective way of promoting a store fast, and building links fast?

Aaron Wall:Create legitimate value. Do viral marketing and other types of marketing that spread the value proposition you created.

Tyler Dewitt:Are you just a single person working for your self?

Aaron Wall:In many ways yes, but I have equity stakes in other sites and businesses with partners on some of those.

Tyler Dewitt:What was the big thing about traffic power, I mean I heard you got threaten to get sued, but why did they come after you for?

I am just glad it is over.Tyler Dewitt:I haven’t had much time to research it, but didn’t traffic power get shut down?

Aaron Wall:Not sure.

Tyler Dewitt:What was it like when you first started doing seo, I mean did you have any one tip you off with anything, or just read, and pratice to learn?

Aaron Wall:SearchGuild helped me a bunch. Plus it was easier to spam back then…link filtering was nowhere near as elegant as it is today. But the upside of the current web is that so many people are blogging and active that if you can write things they would find interesting you can litterally build thousands of links from a single good idea. How do you feel about newer directories, typically ones with pr0, which we know these aren’t quality directories at all, but do you think they would help with serps, as long as they don’t contain bad neighborhood links? I think that largely it is a dead business model filled mostly with sites that have no unique brand strategy or value proposition. Search beat out directories because they are more relevant. The fact that bloggers and others commenting on businesses are biased and write lots of information from THEIR perspective (rather than the person submitting their own site) adds value to the information on blogs and other third party review sites. I think a few directories are great for trusted links and co-citation, but beyond the top few the others are only going to have much pull if you are in a non-competitive industry, or already have a highly trusted site and just need a bit more relevant anchor text.

This entry was posted on Thursday, February 15th, 2007 at 7:05 pm and is filed under SEO. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.