Rand recently ranked 50 SEO Blogs and I thought a nice comparison would be a whys-and-wherefores of the SEO blogs I read. I’m not going to directly ‘rank’ , I don’t think, instead I will group them in order of importance to me

The majors, or A-list SEO blogs. These are the guys who are the most interesting to read, who are at the top of the field:

  • Matt Cutts’ blog is unquestionably The most important SEO blog right now. While Google holds its pre-eminent engine status, keeping up with its fickle changes is going to remain our most important priority. Matt is helping us to do that, most humanely. If you aren’t reading Matts blog you aren’t being professional
  • Todd Malicoat’s blog, aka Stuntdubl. One of the quintessential blogs - if you’re not reading Stuntdubl and watching what he is up to, you aren’t keeping up to date
  • If I was going to rank blogs, Aaron Wall’s SEOBook would probably have to be #1. I know I wanna be like Aaron when I grow up (and given that I am probably a good bit older than him, that’s dead scary! *laughs*). SEOBook covers everything - I have no idea where Aaron finds the time to do all the stuff he does. Does he need a life? Maybe. (But don’t most of us? ;))
  • Jim’s SEO Thoughts - another quintessential blog. Jim is full of good ideas, and isn’t afraid to share them. And when he’s not sharing like that, he’s often damned funny! Two for the price of one! :)
  • Search Engine Roundtable - Rustybrick’s regular update on the state of the Industry. I must admit that I was missing this feed until a couple of weeks ago when I suddenly realised it wasn’t there. Easy to fix :) (Ha! And in going through my feeds to write this article, I discovered why - I had an out of date feed address! I hate that!)
  • Dan Thies’s “The SEO Coach” Blog hasn’t been updated recently, but this is Dan Thies!!! for heaven’s sake - of course I want to know what thinks about things!
  • SEOMoz the blog by Rand Fishkin and crew - great content, a must read. If you haven’t been reading SEOMoz then you should pick up their best stuff
  • The Link Spiel - this is good stuff about link building. Sadly not very often updated, but - link building? Not really a daily ‘ooh, new stuff!!’ topic so I guess we can’t complain!
  • Michael Gray’s Graywolf’s Wolf-Howl blog is one of my must-reads. Most of his posts are on-topic on his work in Search Marketing. Some are off topic, but with a purpose. Definitely makes it on the must-read list!
  • Martinibuster’s blog is good stuff - but the quantity is low in recent times. Roger really needs to write more!

Then there are a bunch of good blogs, but not quite in that same class

  • McAnerin’s Manic Meanderings Ian’s blog is always full of good stuff. He could write more often :)
  • Search Engine Guide Featured Articles sits in my feedreader - I must admit, I don’t often click through and read these. I guess they seem a little basic a lot of the time. Perhaps its also because the teaser isn’t long enough to get me in.
  • SEO Buzz Box is what I think of as one of ’second tier bloggers’. I mean no disrespect by this, I mean those who are commenting on and analysing what the A-list are up to. Someone has to do it - you could say that this is what I’m doing in this post!
  • SEO Scoop by Dazzlin’ Donna - a good read, but again, more commentary on what is happening than reporting on innovative trials. A good read, I do enjoy keeping up with Donna :)
  • Barry Welford’s BPWrap is a useful read. He’s not an A-list blogger, but its good solid content. Not frequently updated ATM, although it has been in the past.
  • Justilien’s Blog is another of those good quality blogs that is worth reading.
  • Philipp Lenssen’s Google Blogoscoped is a really good blog. He’s had some great ideas and come up with some great link bait. A good read.
  • Tony Hill’s Blog. I only added Tony recently. While not an A-list SEO blogger, he has some interesting ideas and insights that are useful to take into account. He’s also very brief, so his blog isn’t one of those you need to go and make a fresh cuppa for
  • The TLA blog - somewhat promotional, but a useful tool to at least know what those guys are up to! Occasional good technical stuff, and plenty of business info on what the guys at TLA are doing.
  • Heather’s Green Eye Wire is another good second tier blogger, and her recent campaign to help Marcela is nothing short of admirable :)

Anyone who is serious about their search marketing will be keeping up with what the engines are saying themselves:

  • Inside Google Sitemaps - a great way to keep up to date on what’s new in sitemaps. Mind you, anything significant moves through the SEO blogosphere so fast that I sometimes wonder if I need to read the original, but of course its always good to get the info from the horses mouth :)
  • Webmaster Central Blog. This is new, and I assume a replacement for Inside Google Sitemaps. Too new to have any opinion of the content, but I have to ask, couldn’t they just use the old blog? Or at least 301 it?
  • Yahoo! Search blog - Yahoo’s blog. I must admit that Google is so important in the Australian search space that I don’t worry too much about the other players. But they are still on the radar p- I;m naively hoping for real competition for Google one day!
  • Unofficial Google Analytics Blog. OK, so technically Analytics isn’t part of search marketing, but I think it should be - if you can’t read the results of where the traffic comes from, how can you know what needs working on???
  • The Official Google Analytics Blog - I must admit, I have been skimming these two blogs, as Analytics hasn’t really grabbed me yet, although I am giving them my data like a good little girl, err, I mean trialing it to see if it is worthwhile. Skimming has meant that I haven’t quite worked out the difference between the Official and Unofficial blogs. Oops!

OK, that took longer than I expected! My feed list is far too long, but the SEO folder is one I keep up with religiously. Far too much good stuff in there to skip! :) Your order may vary - this is mine!

Care to mention any good stuff you think I am missing? :)