It's all about "intellectual curiosity," rather than formal SEO training, according to Erik Dafforn. He points out the SEO firm he works for has hired people with little or no SEO education or industry experience. While you can get a formal SEM education now at many schools, Dafforn wouldn't prescribe a digital marketing curriculum to any potential new hires. He's a "big proponent" of a liberal arts education and has applied plenty of related learnings to SEO prior to installing NCSA Mosaic for the first time several years ago. So, he suggests a curriculum to get started …

Rand Fishkin provides insight on how search engines determine the pages to crawl, the frequency in which they crawl them, and the type of information they look for on the site. Web sites don't rank in search queries unless the engines crawl and index the site. Some of the factors that influence indexing include unique content, domain importance, raw link juice, external link and search, and traffic volume, Fishkin says. Search engines look for frequent updates and new information on sites, link structure and new feeds to determine relevance. He says these factors can determine whether Google …

Why should marketers care about "link spikes," times when backlinks go either up or down "sharply"? While link spikes from news, social media or public relation campaigns occur naturally, "they can, in some cases, serve as a red flag to a major search engine," seeming to hint of linkbait,"which can be a bad thing," Julie Joyce writes. Link spikes "that correspond with nothing of note... basically look a bit dodgy," she adds. She writes that regular spikes that form trends are okay. For example, if your company does a lot of media relations in the beginning of the month …

Katrina Morris looks at Microsoft's Keyword Research tools, which provide traffic and demographic data for selected keyword to identify market trends. Marketers will find tools that provide data on monthly and daily traffic volumes for keywords, historical data and forecasts for monthly query counts, and daily query counts for keywords. Age Group and Gender and Search-User Location are among the tools Morris highlights. She also steps through suggestions on how to use the tools for keyword prioritization, seasonality and targeting.

David Harry believes "real-time" search engines are a misnomer, asserting that some "real time" search engines don't really crawl and index the Web. Harry tests features in OneRiot.com, WhosTalkin.com, CrowdEye.com, Collecta.com, and Google that claim real-time rankings. He believes the ranking mechanisms don't appear to make sense. Some of the more general queries seem to rank the most recent citation. Harry also provides insight into what the Big 3 engines are evaluating when it comes to real-time search.

MichaelC believes writing your own URLs can pay off big, but it's not always an easy process, or it doesn't always scale well when you have a large number of categories and product pages. But it's a lot less scary and complex than first thought, and has several major benefits for companies willing to give it a try, he writes. So, MichaelC steps through what it takes to code the URLs. He covers inbound parameterized links, intra-site links, serving content, ways to handle 404 messages and 301 redirects, and duplicate content.

The domain registration site GoDaddy.com has launched a SEO tool, Search Engine Visibility, that aims to teach Web site owners how to get their site indexed and increase Web site search engine rankings. Search Engine Visibility includes a Top 10 SEO checklist to help identify common mistakes, a list of tips and techniques on how to make Web sites rank higher, and a video tutorial and other educational materials. The package also offers telephone customer support to help users better understand SEO processes.

Double-check misspellings, verify trademark terms, and keep an eye on keyword modifiers and the order you place the terms when setting up a paid search campaign. That's the advice from Lina Nakata, who believes marketers should use "keyword insertion" to dynamically update the ad text with paid keywords that trigger ad. Bold the keyword in the ad copy, Nakata writes. It will draw more people to the ad, which could help to increase click-through rates. High click-through rates can boost the quality score, potentially lowering the cost per click and improving return on investments.

The No. 1 ad position isn't always best. Sidra Condron explains how to stretch ad dollars without sacrificing exposure to the domain, and why clawing your way to the top paid ad spot through AdWords could become a marketer's biggest mistake. Condron believes marketers should devote attention to building click-through rates with relevant keyword ads. This carries more weight with Google and allows ads to show up at a higher position than what the bid alone would have delivered.

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer's assertion that his company is willing to spend up to 10% of its operating income on search during the next five years should give marketers a clue to its plans for Bing, according to Aaron Goldman. Those who have run the math believe that's a total of about $11 billion. Goldman expands on an article in MediaPost, going into detail about what it will take for marketers and agencies to shift budgets from other campaigns to Bing. In other words, he writes, "even if Bing gains 3% in share, it won't see any extra …