"Twelve Paid Directories"
"Eleven Bloggers Bloggin'"
"Ten Lord's a Link-Baiting"
"Nine Laides SEOing"
"Eight Web Stats You're Milking"
"Seven Steps to Great SEO"
"Six Blog Promotion Tactics"
"Five Golden Steps to Marketing Planning"
"Four Calling With Phones to Complement SEO"
"Three Search Engines"
"Two Something Somethings"

Today: And a number one Google placement!

Oh wow we wish it were true. To wake Christmas morn and realise Father Christmas, Baby Jesus, whoever, have finally pulled a string in your favor. Maybe, just maybe, Google wised up to your great web site and started ranking you. Albeit, number one rankings never happen overnight, when they do happen, it's a mini-miracle.

It's so nice to have all your hard work finally pay off. All you unique content is being linked to and Google loves your stuff over the copied fodder the competition has. Even those links coming in are from relevant web sites. And get this, although the PR from those web sites aren't PR 6-7, they are on topic and send some good traffic. So much for Joe Competition who buys 2-3 PR 7 links and dominates the field. Oh yes, what a beautiful Christmas morn it is!

Apply all the 12 days we've suggested here, or at least get started in researching some more, and you're on your way to ranking success. Of course, ranking is only worthy if you a) it's a good market with good traffic, and b) you can capture and convert that traffic into sales. Otherwise why bother....

Some of it may sound like a dream, but in the ideal world your white-hat-by-the-book SEO should pay off. In the long run Google alludes to the fact smart webmasters who follow the rules will reap the rewards. Well get the Google: you're placing big fat pieces of coal in stockings this year.

All indications at the time of this writing was a 'data push' happened 4 days before Christmas that helped some and destroyed others. The moves were significant for those noticeably affected. I've noted some industry winners and losers and have drawn some observations.

• Google is rewarding stagnant content. For the most part, authority sites are reigning supreme in the SERPs (that's good). There are, however, some very stagnant web sites and 'clown' web sites that have no business in the top 10. I've noted some forums that have zero activity ranking over very active forums. So Google either lied or had a hic up somewhere.
• Google is rewarding irrelevant high PR links. Many SEO's will clearly tell you the whole linking boondoggle continues. If you can get a PR 6 or higher link from any type of web site, go get it. Why? Google will reward it. A completely irrelevant PR 7 link (one way) will bump you up the SERPs immensely. Google is very very clear (as evidenced in their engines) that web sites with irrelevant but high PR links will reigns supreme in the index. They say it will change, but it hasn't yet. I have a few examples (of all the places I've checked its' been the case, but by no means have I completed exhaustive research.)
• Google is rewarding paid links. Another one, very clear, Google wants you to put 'rel=nofollow' for all your links you buy. Why? They don't like this manipulation. But Rand from SEOmoz.org (link here) is ABSOLUTELY correct in his observations: Google just doesn't have the right stuff to determine which links are bought and which are not. You can walk to a bum on the street who has a web site, offer him a meal, and get a link. This is buying links and Google will never know.
• Nothing is going on; normal Google flux. This I find hard to believe, but hey, who am I to speculate. Just read this post from Matt Cutts discussing terminology behind 'data refreshes' and 'algo changes'. Also note my question a few places down asking whether, "data refreshes routinely boot web sites down 400+ places."Matt was nice enough to respond to me later saying, "I see where you’re coming from, Barry. My guess is that the variance of these particular data refreshes would go down over time, much in the same way that everflux eventually faded into the background to where people hardly notice it these days." *hmmm*, that doesn't really help....

(As an aside, the same places I've looked for the high PR observations I've also noted a number of one way links bought from known places (i.e. Yahoo, Business.com, Joeant, etc.))

What are we, the hard working webmaster and SEO supposed to make of all these things? Right now it's very discouraging. Despite remaining obedient SEOs some are getting creamed and eaten alive by those who continue the 'no-no' game of ripped off content, crappy (but high PR!) links, and other black hatter techniques. The only problem with the whole situation: if you change to their tactics, tomorrow Google will unveil the new algo that will see your competition and your newly (poorly) optimized web site bomb. Great news hey?!

Seems as though last year's 2006 version held up less some buying links issues.... All in all, the playing field in the game we call SEO remains stuck in the usuals, which is good. That means relevant content and relevant and quality links still reign supreme. So if and when you tame the Google beast, sit back and reap the rewards. Stay tuned for a Year in Review in a week's time. Till then,

Merry Christmas! -Distinct SEO.com