Discussion: Link lists and resource indexes....

Hi Gerald;

Sorry, an over generalization agreeed, [I did say "most"] no insult was intended I was referring to a link farm in it's purest form, a 'flat' collection of links designed specifically for search engines to spider.

SEO IS important and a full time job, I must admit, I've been designing websites for over 12 years now and while I have the SEO basics down, a complete SEO solution and keeping up to date on the constantly changing strategies is a FULL TIME job and something I don't have the time to do with any efficiency.. with the preponderance of people who say they can do it [every freelancer I have ever encountered promises SEO results, so in my opinion they ae either probably lying, sadly misinformed or overconfident of their abilities.] a person who actually can deliver results is worth thier weight in gold. Whenever a client asks me about what we will do the standard answer is "we do the basics, you need more results, contact an SEO firm".

Google is becomeing more 'fuzzy' these days and less of a useful resource. I'm finding more and more that when I search for information, the top 2 or three results willl be for ebay! oh well. 

anyway,... border crossing, it isdifficult, there is the extra time if a package has to be opened and inspected, that can take weeks and can happen leaving the US and entering Canada! ouch! then duty and taxes... if you have to order items from three different places... that's the main reason I try to shop online from Canadian stores....  even if the cost is say 10% more, it's still worth it in the long run. 

 I looked up your article... http://www.cbc.ca/canada/montreal/story/2008/02/14/qc-olf-0214.html
it's been a few years since I was in Quebec [even though I am frequently in Ottawa and Quebec is literally "across the bridge"] and I don't recall if when I was in Montreal if they have a chinatown [is it even PC to say that anymore?] but I'd be curious to see signage around there, trilinual? Definately not in Toronto, even in one of the suburbs, Markham which has a high oriental population, signage is frequently in chinese or korean only, even the banks!
I think Quebec is just trying to preserve their heritage, which is fine, grand - go for it. but $1500 fines is a little excessive for a poster you Toronto beer rep sent you. again - hohum, oh well..
To my best recollection the language laws are nationwide, but not enforced. The only place where you will always see 100% binlingual matter is anything from the government. Quebec's provincial bylaws may differ or expand on that, I don't know.

Link library... I was thinking I should probably just start one as a personal project. build content as time allows, it's not the sort of thing that could be launched without tons of content... still requires some noodling..

-regards
-sean

Saying all companies that provide SEO services are tied to link farms is an over generalization. My wife is a copywriter and her company helps businesses improve their web presence as part of comprehensive marketing strategy. A link farm it isn't. Google is the worlds largest link farm, beit as it may, to be seen in all of the 'thick fog' of the internet, SEO is important so individuals have the ability to actually find what they are looking for when they enter a key word in the search bar.  Enough about that.

The biggest thing that can be done to assist modelers easier access to the kits, accesssories and supplies they want is to throw out North American Free (Fee) Trade Agreement, notice I crossed out 'Free'! Nothing crosses the border without some sort of price being paid!! It restricts customers in Canada access to many products at an affordable price.

Canadians aren't without their own governmental issues...I heard a report on CBC's 'As It Happens' about a bar owner who was being fined because the decor in his Irish Pub wasn't bilingual. Their decor of beer signs, cans and collectables apparently don't include French on them...Hello! Neither do they in any other part of the world! Irish beer generally doesn't have anything but English print on it, so why should the signs and promotional items?  I think if you walk into a pub, especially an Irish one you know what the menu is likely to include and what types of beer are being served. When in doubt stay out or a s k someone!

I ship products to Canada, it does require more effort on my part, but I do it as a service for my customers. I try to ship them via a mode of least cost to the receiver, I've only had one issue with customs, seems they wanted to charge the customer $70CDN for a $30USD purchase. I had to fax a copy of the invoice direct to customs because they wouldn't accept the one in the packing sleeve. I think the inspector had a case of rectal cranial inversion. Once the paperwork was received, they withdrew the charge. 

Would a link library be used, yes...of course there are those who will still just post a question on a forum asking for a link even if they have access to the site to look it up for themselves. So it goes.

Hi Gerald;

All valid points... specifically time required, even with some of the automation tools I am capable of writing, a well maintained list would take... well 'maintenance'

I think the key here would be the quality of the entry full meta information, relations and extended data[contact, location etc, when I look for online shops/aftermarket etc. I generally prefer to deal with someone in Canada, makes shipping much easier for us - and WAY faster]
Of course tabulating all that quality data will take the bulk of the time. thinks like validating your links is very easy to do by script nightly or even during a clickthrough. 

Link farms = crap, they are mostly just set up by SEO firms looking to have lots of "links" for google to associate with...  IMO it sort of even borders on criminal....

I think it would be fantastic to have a place where I can find all my resources quickly rather than spending a couple of hours trying to decipher google results and endless posting in forums hoping for a hit... that's how I feel, everything in one nice organized pile, I'm just wondering if everyone else out there is looking for the same thing.

Truly, is it a valuable resouce that will be used?

-sean 

You have to understand that the lists compiled on the net are mostly done by nonprofessionals that do it as a side hobby to modeling. Very few are web designers, have the software nor are willing to pay the costs of having a site created (professionally) and maintained (professionally) in addition to paying the hosting costs.

There are several core modeling websites that have survived and thrived, mostly because their owners have built upon their popularity and success, dumped a great deal of time and capital into them and/or have landed sponsors/advertisers. 

Some informative websites die on the vine, due to lack of interest.  Initially their creators showed great interest but it soon wained. Never updated or checked regularly for issues such as hacking...the list goes on.

The key to having a viable list it to keep it current which can be a full time job given the number of resources one would want to collect for users to use as reference resources. Many reference sites are here today, gone tomorrow (causing a nonworking link) because they failed to renew their sites hosting or domain. Tracking this for the 'average Joe' isn't feasible as a part time gig. You'd never be 'current'.  

There are a lot of link farms out there, many are good, but many others bring you only problems. What company selling plastic model supplies wants to be on the same list as some fetish porn site? Not this one!!!  

I think the real challenge is educating the owners of websites who spend the resources to build and host a good reference site would be teaching them the proper SEO techiques and procedures. If you can't find them, what good does it do for them to have exhausted the time and money. Location location location. 

One the other side of the coin, teaching modelers how to set about researching a project whether it be reference materials or a resource to acquire materials is probably easier to achieve.

Years ago Kalmbach published a book...anyone remember "The Scale Modeling Buyer's Guide"?  It's second edition was published in 1991. Thumbing through it brings back what once was,  is no longer today. Not to mention the ones that came along afterwards and have vanished since.

If you feel this is your calling and you are up for the challenges, go for it!