Majestic SEO is one of Raven’s most robust data partners, providing powerful SEO insights and metrics across many sections of the Raven platform. And like Raven, they share our commitment to not scrape or use scraped data from Google.

At a glance

Data partner: Majestic SEO

Category: SEO

What it does: Discovers how all of the websites on the Internet connect with each other.

Where you’ll find it: Competitor Manager, Research Central, Link Manager, Site Finder, Backlink Explorer

Get to know Majestic SEO

If you need to research a keyword, domain or entire Internet marketing campaign, Majestic SEO has the data to help you. One of the largest public indexes of the entire web, Majestic SEO had 42,000,000,000+ websites in its fresh index at last count. That’s 42 billion. With a B.

Get started with Majestic SEO

You can find and work with Majestic SEO data within multiple Raven tools. Here’s a quick primer on each.

Competitor Manager

The Competitor Manager is a great way to quickly see a ton of data about your website as compared to any competitors you’ve added. Majestic SEO provides the number of pages and number of external backlinks metrics. We pair that data with Raven’s own composite quality score and data from SEOmoz.

Research Central

Find potential link partners, discover new keywords to target, even compare several domains at once in Research Central , Raven’s one-click research hub. This tool is powered by lots of Majestic SEO data, with just about every tab giving you insightful data from backlinks to referring domains to IP neighborhoods.

Link Manager

Link Manager – Raven’s central clearinghouse for storing, categorizing and monitoring all your links – also provides you with crucial and up-to-date data for each link. Opening any link that you’ve entered into Link Manager will lead you to a display of metrics that include Citation Flow and Trust Flow from Majestic SEO.

These scores between 0 and 100 provide an indication of how sites compare within the context of the internet. Citation Flow focuses on the number citations to a URL, while Trust Flow focuses on the number of clicks from trusted sites to a URL. These metrics update every time you open the link record.

Site Finder

Site Finder is one of the best resources around for finding quality sites on any given topic. It takes the top 10 domains from Bing for the keyword you’ve entered and then provides you a giant list of sites that link to those top URLs. Using Majestic SEO data and other sources, you’ll be able to determine how valuable a link from that each site would be.

From here, you can easily add a link to the Link Manager to begin the relationship- and link-building process.

Backlink Explorer

With Backlink Explorer, you can automatically see the backlinks to any website, then easily add these links to the Link Manager – knocking hours off your research process. Try entering your competitor’s domain for an instant view of websites that are linking to them. Now you’ve got a brand-new list of top link prospects.

Good to know

Virtually all of these tools are reportable, so you have all of Majestic SEO’s data at your fingertips to report to a boss or a client: website research, link building and relationship research and competitive analysis, anytime you need it.

There are only a few usage limits with Majestic SEO data, in Site Finder and Backlink Explorer. Agency accounts get unlimited usage of this data, so feel free to run as many queries as you like. Pro accounts come with 20 Site Finder queries and 40 Backlink Explorer queries per month. Need more? Additional Site Finder queries are $2 each, and additional Backlink Explorer queries are $1 each.

Previously in our Raven partner spotlight: Scribe content analysis

The post Raven partner spotlight: Majestic SEO appeared first on Raven Internet Marketing Tools.

What does Raven cost?

Raven offers two base monthly plans: Pro and Agency. Pro accounts cost $99 a month. Agency accounts cost $249 a month. There’s no contract. Customers pay month-to-month and can change plans at any time. Raven doesn’t prorate bills or offer refunds for partial months.

Power users may accrue extra charges for heavy use of certain features, which are explained in detail on the pricing page of our marketing website. Also, some services offered through Raven are pay-as-you-go, such as ordering original content from Textbroker or registering hundreds of social networks with one click via KnowEm.

At any time, an account owner can check on usage — and set limits on extras — so there are no bill surprises.

Does Raven offer a cheaper plan?

No. Raven started as software strictly for SEOs, with a few core tools. For a while, we did offer a cheaper plan for the individual, newbie or sideline SEO practitioner who was managing only one or two websites. We discontinued that plan in 2012.

Why? As the Internet marketing industry evolved beyond SEO, so did Raven. We now offer more than 30 tools that help professional online marketers manage and report on SEO, social media, PPC, analytics, email and content campaigns.

We want every in-house or agency customer to be able to access to every tool, every data integration and every reporting option in Raven to excel on each campaign, without paying an exorbitant amount of money. By limiting ourselves to two plans, this is possible. And we don’t have to raise our prices as we add tools.

If you see an article or review online that mentions a Raven Tools Solo plan, that information is out of date. We’re working with those writers and reviewers to update their information.

Does Raven offer coupon, promotion or discount codes?

No. This is another reason that we’re able to keep our base monthly prices low. If you see an article or review online that includes a Raven coupon, promotion or discount code, that information is out of date.

Does Raven offer a free trial?

Yes. We offer a free, 30-day trial — no credit card required. After 30 days, we’ll ask if you if you want to keep using Raven when you log in. Pick the account level you want and enter your credit card information, and we’ll start billing you from that day forward.

May I pay by check, Paypal or wire transfer?

No. Raven accepts only credit cards. Again, this keeps the cost of our base monthly plans low.

Does Raven offer any discounts for prepayment?

Yes. If you prepay for one year of Raven at either account level you will receive one month free (and that’s in addition to your free, 30-day trial). Basically, you’re getting 13 months of Raven for the price of 11. If you’re interested in this option, please email support@raventools.com for more details.

Does Raven offer discounts for bulk purchases?

No. Instead, Raven gives its customers a generous allotment of users (a.k.a. seat licenses) — 4 for Pro accounts and an unlimited number for Agency accounts. Plus, each account can add an unlimited number of read-only users for free. This meets the needs of almost everyone who inquires about bulk purchases.

Does Raven offer discounts to nonprofits?

No. However, we do contribute to a variety of nonprofits in multiple ways. Most recently Raven has supported Shepherd Center, which coordinated the physical rehabilitation of a Raven developer who was badly injured during an SUV-vs-bicycle accident. (His story is a must-read.)

Does Raven offer discounts to industry conferences?

Yes. Raven attends, sponsors and presents at leading industry events ranging from Pubcon to Explore to BlueGlass conferences. We often receive conference discount codes and share those via the Raven blog or any of our social presences: Twitter, Facebook, Google+, LinkedIn and Pinterest. From time to time, we run contests for free tickets to events. Keep up with Raven’s blog and social media accounts to stay in the loop about these opportunities.

Does Raven have an affiliate program?

Yes. Raven has an affiliate program via ShareASale. Learn more at raventools.com/affiliates.

Is Raven worth it?

Hell, yes! If you’re a professional Internet marketer, Raven is a steal.

Take data alone. With more than 20 data partners and integrations — from Majestic SEO to Google Analytics to Facebook to MailChimp to Scribe to… well, there are more than 20 — Raven can allow you to consolidate your list of tool subscriptions and save lots of money. Then measure the cost savings of efficiency and collaboration, and Raven starts looking pretty inexpensive. Top it off with quick, professional PDF reports on demand or on a regular schedule, and Raven just might pay for itself.

Oh, and did I mention Raven’s Site Auditor, which is worth the price of admission alone?

Don’t take our word for it. Check out a few of our case studies and find out what other Internet marketers have to say about the benefits of choosing Raven.

Have a pricing or billing question we didn’t address here? Email support@raventools.com and we’ll be happy to help.

The post FAQ: Does Raven offer coupon codes or discounts? appeared first on Raven Internet Marketing Tools.

Odds are, if the data is helpful for Internet marketers, we have it from one of our 20+ partners within Raven. A lot of this data is sprinkled throughout the Raven platform in ways both obvious and more subtle.

In order to help you get to know all the different data that Raven contains, I’ll be walking through each of our partners and where you can find their data. First up is Scribe, so let’s get started.

At a glance

Data partner: Scribe

Category: Content

What it does: Analyzes content for structure, keyword prominence and context within your site.

Where you’ll find it: Content > Content Manager

What else it connects to: You can add keywords to Raven’s Keyword Manager right from the suggestions.

Get to know Scribe

Even if you haven’t heard of Scribe, you probably know of Copyblogger if you have anything to do with creating content for the web – it’s one of the best resources around for all things content.

Copyblogger has four great software offerings: Studiopress for design, Synthesis for hosting, Premise for landing pages, and Scribe for optimizing content.

Optimizing content is right up Raven’s alley, so in 2012, we integrated Scribe’s awesome data into our Content Manager.

Get started with Scribe

Per month, Raven offers 20 Scribe analyses for Pro accounts and 50 Scribe analyses for Agency accounts.

Start by navigating to Content > Content Manager and choosing “Add content”.

From there, you’ll add your content into the fields given: title, the content itself, meta description, tags to help you organize the content on your blog or site, and the keywords you’re focusing on for that piece.

You must have the title, content, and meta description boxes filled out to run a Scribe analysis. Once all three green checkmarks are visible, you can select “analyze”.

Once the content has been analyzed, you’ll see Scribe data on the right hand side, including tips on enhancing the content’s structure, keyword suggestions from Scribe and tips on how to improve their prominence. You can also add tags and keywords to the Keyword Manager right from the suggestions.

Also on the page you’ll notice two metrics: Scribe Site Score (say that five times fast!) and Scribe Document Score.

The Scribe Site Score is a score from 0 to 100 that compares the keywords used within the document to those used on your website.

The higher the Scribe Document Score (which also goes from 0 to 100), the better the structure of the document.

Make changes and re-analyze your content until you get as many green checkmarks as you can. Once you’re finished, you can easily publish your content to any WordPress blog you have set up by moving it to Blog Manager, or just store that optimized content within the Content Manager.

Good to know

If you go beyond your allotted Scribe analyses, additional analysis are only $0.27 each.

Also, if you already have a Scribe account, you can easily connect it to your Raven account via API key. This allows you to use the allowances from your own Scribe account instead of from your Raven usage allowance.

The post Raven partner spotlight: Scribe appeared first on Raven Internet Marketing Tools.

“You can have whatever you want in life if you help people get what they want.”

I can’t remember who said that. But I’m sure he or she was quite successful in life.

At our core, Raven Tools is about helping you get what you want — results, new business, happy clients, more money, etc.

To date, Raven’s strengths have been managing campaigns, metrics and reporting. We’ll continue improving in each of these areas.

But these days, the theme commonly heard around Raven is “close the loop,” meaning fill out all the things that will help our customers be more successful.

For 2013, that means adding two big elements to Raven’s roadmap:

• Auditing/proposal development
• Goals, benchmarks and baselines

We believe these new elements combine with our existing management, metrics and reporting to make Raven an invaluable resource for any online marketer.

Let’s take a look at each area of the roadmap in more detail.

Auditing and proposal development

Everybody needs new work. It could be new business for an agency, or new projects for an in-house team. If you’re not moving forward, someone is catching up.

Audit and proposal tools will help you identify opportunities and prepare proposals you can present to your client or boss.

The first addition is Site Auditor, which Raven will release this month. It crawls sites to identify errors for visibility, links, pages, etc. and includes an easy-to-read report you can share with cients.

Raven is scoping out similar functions for social media. For example, we plan to add the ability for you to compare social media accounts side by side to see fans, followers, top shared URLs and more.

Goals, benchmarks and baselines

Everyone who uses Raven is chasing results of some kind, whether it’s sales, fans, authority, etc.

Those results take on a whole new meaning when you are able to compare them to a goal, benchmark or baseline. Here’s how we view each:

• A goal is something you are trying to achieve, usually within a set time period. For example, you may want to increase organic traffic 50% by Dec. 31.
• A benchmark is a comparison versus a similar period. For example, a comparison of organic traffic versus last week, last month or last year.
• A baseline is a comparison versus a specific date. For example, what is the organic traffic compared to the date you started working on SEO.

Ideally, we would like to have all three for every metric in Raven. Realistically, we’ll have to start with a handful of metrics. Let us know in the comments below the most important metrics for you to set goals, benchmarks and baselines.

Campaign management

This is Raven’s current strength. We were once an agency, like many of our clients. We started the company by building tools for our own work and then made a business from them.

Campaign management will always be a strength. The next evolution of Raven is not just building tools to do work better but tools that work better together. For example, Competitor Manager should work with social media campaigns as well as SEO campaigns. Raven has started this process already. An example is our CRM, which integrates fully with Link Manager and Social Stream.

We want to do the same with data. Having multiple sources of data is a strength. Combinging data in unique ways so you don’t have to build spreadsheets is a differentiator. There are tons of ways Raven could combine data points. Again, let us know in the comments what you would most like to see.

Anybody who manages a team will be happy to hear we’re planning management views for many tools. Managers should be able to see who on their team is peforming well — or not so well. Similarly, managers should be able to see who on the team did what work, e.g. posting to a client Twitter account.

Metrics

It doesn’t matter unless you can measure it. That statement is especially true of online marketing.

Raven was one of the first SEO platforms to integrate Google Analytics. Likewise, we have tons of data about authority, links, content, social media, etc.

Our new SEO performance reports, which focus on organic traffic, debuted this month. The Link Referral report gave link builders an entirely new way to dice referral traffic.

Social media performance reports are in the works.

Here are some questions we want to answer:

• How can we combine that data so that you and other users don’t have to?
• What data are we not using from our many sources?
• How do we let users select data points or filter data?
• Should we add other data sources?

Reporting

No single function in Raven pays for itself like reporting. We’ve heard time and time again from customers that Raven’s reporting saves hours  (sometimes days) of work.

Raven recently added reports to Research Central and an improved Links module in Report Wizard. The new Site Auditor will have a killer summary report you can share.

Reporting can always be better.

Raven’s product team is working on a new approach that will make reports better looking and more functional.

Great reports balance comprehensive data, user flexibility and design. That’s what we’re working toward.

What did we miss?

The Raven community is great about sharing product ideas. As always, we want your feedback to improve the roadmap.

What else can Raven do to make your job easier? Let us know. The comments are yours.

Photo Credit: Atli Harðarson via Compfight cc

The post Building the Raven Tools roadmap appeared first on Raven Internet Marketing Tools.

You’ve got clients to tend to, links to build, tweets to tweet. You may think you don’t have time for Raven’s new free training classes, Raven University.

The funny thing is, that’s pretty much why we created Raven Tools in the first place: to save you time.

And whether you’ve been a customer for a few years or a few days, we’re betting there are a few corners of Raven you haven’t fully explored.

So let’s find out how well you know your Raven Tools account. Take our quiz and see how you do.

So how did you do? If you uncovered some new Raven tidbits here, just imagine how much you could learn at Raven University – why not sign up now and join us?

Each class will last about 45 minutes total, with 30 minutes of instruction and 15 minutes for Q&A time.

Take all seven classes on topics including SEO research, SEO management, social media management, content and more – or just choose the ones you need.

Let us know your quiz results in the comments and tell us what else you’d like to learn more about in Raven. See you at Raven U!

The post Quiz: Do you need Raven University? appeared first on Raven Internet Marketing Tools.

Here at Raven, we’ve already crossed one 2013 goal off our to-do list when we launched new SEO reports, an upgraded Research Central and revamped social tools Jan. 2.

Here’s what else we’re up to in January, including a Las Vegas trip, new Raven University training classes and a brand-new feature we can’t wait to show you.

New Media Expo Jan. 7-8 in Las Vegas

Ravens will start the new year right by appearing at New Media Expo, the world’s largest conference and trade show for bloggers, podcaster and web TV and video series creators.

With more than 140 sessions presented by more than 175 industry leaders, NMX has plenty to offer – including a presentation by our own Alison Groves.

At 10:15 a.m. on Tuesday, Jan. 8, Alison will discuss “Link Building: The Best Marketing Strategy You’ve Never Heard Of.” This session will focus on tools and strategies for relationship building and link building to bring your site more traffic and attention.

Meanwhile, we’ll be showing off Raven with demos in the expo hall and giving out some of our always-popular Raven T-shirts.

Raven University

In January we’ll also be opening up registration for Raven University, our new free training that’s open to everyone on your team.

This first-of-its-kind training will help you save time, make money and impress clients using Raven. We’ll offer 30-minute sessions (followed by Q&A) on topics including:

• SEO Research
• SEO Management
• Social Media Management
• Content
• Metrics
• Reporting
• Admin

All courses will take place online in February 2013, but class registration will open soon. Be the first to know by signing up here.

Website Auditor

And finally, a tool we’ve wanted to add to Raven for quite some time will debut in January: an automated site crawler named Website Auditor.

Website Auditor can automatically crawl any website and report on problems related to visibility, META data, pages, internal and external links, images and semantic data. It will even create a sitemap.xml file for you.

Read more about it here, and stay tuned for a release date soon.

Photo courtesy vonSchanuzer on Flickr

The post Where’s Raven? January 2013 appeared first on Raven Internet Marketing Tools.

This means Raven has hit another milestone: its 11th prime number of employees. (Previous prime number milestones were 2, 3, 5, 7, 11, 13, 17, 19, 23 and 29.)

Here is a data visualization of 31:

And here is more information about Raven employees 30 and 31, who answer (at least) 10 questions from the Vanity Fair Proust questionnaire.

Matthew Townsend

Matthew Townsend has joined Raven Internet Marketing Tools as a Product Development Coordinator. Matthew has more than 16 years of experience in product development, e-commerce and social media. He previously served as Director of Operations and Implementation for Moontoast LLC.

1. Which words or phrases do you most overuse?
   Awesome.
2. What or who is the greatest love of your life?
   My wife and two daughters.
3. When and where were you happiest?
   Dinner with my wife at Tra Vigne.
4. What do you regard as the lowest depth of misery?
   Cork rot on a bottle of 1994 Harlan Estates Cabernet.
5. Where would you like to live?
   Edinburgh, Scotland.
6. What is your favorite occupation?
   I would love to spend one summer as a carny.
7. Who are your favorite writers?
   James Madison, John Jay and Alexander Hamilton.
8. Who is your favorite hero of fiction?
   Jax Teller from Sons of Anarchy.
9. Who are your heroes in real life?
   There are no heroes.
10. What is it that you most dislike?
    Tardiness.

Contact Matthew

Email: matthew@raventools.com
Twitter: @RavenMTownsend

Andrew Norcross

Andrew Norcross has joined Raven Internet Marketing Tools as a Senior WordPress Developer. Andrew has more than five years of experience in WordPress and owns a development agency. He previously served as Senior WordPress Developer for BlueGlass Interactive Inc.

If you know anything about Norcross (his preferred moniker), you know he’s a chatty typist. Not surprisingly, he answered 30 questions instead of the 10 I asked for.

1. What is your idea of perfect happiness?
   Endless coffee and the time to code whatever I want.
2. What is your greatest fear?
   A life without the internet. Seriously, I’m kinda worthless without it.
3. Which historical figure do you most identify with?
   Johnny Cash.
4. Which living person do you most admire?
   Burt Reynolds.
5. What is the trait you most deplore in yourself?
   My occasional lack of empathy for others.
6. What is the trait you most deplore in others?
   Those who complain about something but are unwilling to take action to change it.
7. What is it that you most dislike?
   Since “the human race” is probably a red flag, I’d say decaf.
8. What is your greatest extravagance?
   My Cadillac CTS.
9. What do you most value in your friends?
   Loyalty and trust.
10. What is your favorite journey?
    The lineup with Steve Perry as the lead singer.
11. What is your most treasured possession?
    Some of my coffee mugs. I’m not a collector of things.
12. What do you consider the most overrated virtue?
    Workaholic(ism)? I’ve done it myself, but it’s not a virtue.
13. On what occasion do you lie?
    When it’s with my kids and they won’t understand the truth. Or I want them to just stop.

    

14. What do you dislike most about your appearance?
    My inability to grow a beard.
15. Which words or phrases do you most overuse?
    It varies, but usually meme related.
16. What or who is the greatest love of your life?
    My wife.
17. When and where were you happiest?
    Probably my wedding, or the birth of my son. Cheesy, yes.
18. Which talent would you most like to have?
    The ability to play the stand up bass.
19. What is your current state of mind?
    Content. Somewhat Zen-like, but not quite.
20. If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be?
    Be able to grow a beard. not that I’d have one, but I want the ability.
21. What do you consider your greatest achievement?
    Starting my own business from nothing.
22. Where would you like to live?
    I love Florida. I’d be perfectly content staying here.
23. What is your favorite occupation?
    What I do now. I left a career in banking / finance for it. I WANT TO CODE ALL THE THINGS.
24. What is your most marked characteristic?
    In a literal sense, the tattoos on my body. Other than that, my sarcasm.
25. Who are your favorite writers?
    Vonnegut.
26. Who is your favorite hero of fiction?
    Super Mario. Dude just grinds, ya know?
27. Who are your heroes in real life?
    Burt Reynolds and my dad.
28. If you were to die and come back as a person or thing, what do you think it would be?
    Honestly, I don’t wanna come back. One life is enough. And if I don’t come back with any memories, there’s no point.
29. How would you like to die?
    In a blaze of glory. Or asleep.
30. What is your motto?
    Never Say Die (from the Goonies, of course).

Contact Andrew

Email: norcross@raventools.com
Twitter: @RavenNorcross

The post Raven hires a product coordinator and marketing developer appeared first on Raven Internet Marketing Tools.

Everybody using and building SEO software will have to choose what’s most important – because no one provider can have it all.

Following our announcement on Friday, Ahrefs announced that it will also end the use of scraped rankings in January. I commend them for making what I know is a difficult decision.

Raven Tools and Ahrefs will not be the last software providers to make this decision. Other well-known SEO software companies have reached out to me for counsel and to commend Raven for making what they deem a brave choice.

I see three camps forming:

• Those with authorized data, like Raven and Ahrefs.
• Those who provide scraped data.
• And those trying to straddle the line and say they have both authorized data and scraped data.

I can understand why companies choose to offer scraped data. But the undeniable current demand for rankings carries some undeniable future risk for those companies. As Raven’s CEO, I’ve lived through more rankings nightmares than I care to explain.

The companies still trying to operate in the middle are going to get hit on both sides. I don’t understand that business model.

This means customers will have to vet their software providers more carefully; evaluate the accuracy and reliability of data closely; and possibly rethink their investments. Eventually, no provider will have both authorized and scraped data.

If Google would sell this rankings data, I would bring back the SERP Tracker tomorrow. I don’t expect that to happen. So, Raven and our talented team moves on to what’s next.

We’ve been listening as the industry reacts to Raven’s decision, and we’ve posted much of the feedback on our website. Here are a few pieces that I recommend for their overall focus on where the industry is headed.

• Majestic SEO: “The Importance of Trusted Data”
  Majestic SEO is a valuable data partner in Raven. The perspective here – on who to trust with the data you use to run your business – is an important one.
• Webpresence: “Google Clips Wings of Raven Tools”
  Despite its title, this post is thoughtful about Google’s potential rationale and impact on SEO.
• Scott Offord: “What is the Future of SERP Tracking?”
  I appreciate that Scott pulled in perspective from both sides of the debate.

You can see more headlines at raventools.com/scraped-data.

I appreciate all the feedback we’ve gotten. Knowing what I know today, I would still make the same decision. I believe Raven will be a better company in the long-term – and a better value for all of our customers.

Still, I wanted to further address two big questions we’ve heard more often than the rest.

Why is Raven abandoning SEO?

We’re not.

We’re exiting the scraped rankings business. It is a calculated risk that we have considered from almost every angle.

Raven will not be of value to anyone whose business depends exclusively on scraped rankings. It’s understandable if those customers need to seek an alternative. We recommend Authority Labs and Advanced Web Rankings.

We also accept the challenge to create new metrics for SEO campaigns. It’s not enough to authorize Google Analytics in Raven. When we exit the scraped rankings business on Jan. 2, we will face a measurement void in our product.

Two immediate projects are already in the works:

• Accessing more Webmaster Tools data through Raven
• A new SEO Report module focused on organic traffic

The rest of Raven’s SEO tools remain and will continue to be an integral part of our value proposition, including:

• The powerful and soon-to-be-improved Research Central
• CRM, for managing link outreach and relationships
• Keyword Manager
• Keyword competition and volume data from AdWords
• Link Manager
• Link Monitor
• Backlink Explorer

We’re also putting final touches on a Website Auditor for on-site SEO. It will be released in January.

Why did Raven choose AdWords data over SERPs?

It was not a choice of AdWords versus SERPs.

Raven had to decide between keeping scraped data or dropping it from our platform. Our decision factored in the short-term risks, the long-term risk and commitment to our vision.

Short-term risks

The short-term risks of keeping scraped data were minimal. We would have to add significant costs to get scraped AdWords keyword data for research, but the SERP Tracker would still function with scraped rankings. And many of our customers would remain happy.

Long-term risks

The long-term risks of keeping scraped data could be devastating. For reasons unknown, Google is strictly enforcing the AdWords API ToS. And we don’t know what might be next.

What if Google sends cease and desist letters to every company selling or reselling scraped rankings? Where would we — or any SEO, for that matter — get the data then?

What if Google goes after companies who are scraping AdWords data and selling it as authentic? Google charges customers like Raven for access to its AdWords API. Third-parties scraping AdWords data and reselling it, in effect, cost Google money by taking away potential business. Will they go nuclear when they find out?

What if Google added “no scraped data” to the Google Analytics API ToS? Given the recent AdWords enforcement, this scenario is plausible. And scraping for analytics data isn’t feasible.

These scenarios were speculative.

But if we chose scraped data in the short-term, we might have to give it all up — Google rankings, Google AdWords and Google Analytics — in the long-term, anyway.

Long-term vision

The final consideration was our long-term vision.

From 2008 to 2010, Raven was almost exclusively an SEO tool. So much so that our domain was raven-seo-tools.com.

In 2010, after we changed our name to Raven Internet Marketing Tools and domain to raventools.com, we began to diversify our offerings because we predicted a change in the industry – a consolidation of Internet marketing practices coming together under one roof.

This meant adding social media tools, PPC tools, better data partners and more. We continued to build SEO tools, like Research Central, a better Link Manager and the new CRM. We switched our social media data provider to uberVU and added content analysis from Scribe by Copyblogger. Here’s a timeline of Raven’s product evolution. And we built a reporting engine on top of all of it.

Continuing with scraped data was not possible and would put much of that in jeopardy.

In the end, I made the difficult decision with the full support of co-founders Jon Henshaw and Scott Holdren.

Patrick E. Keeble
Co-founder, President and CEO

The post Raven’s CEO on Ahrefs and choosing to end use of scraped data appeared first on Raven Internet Marketing Tools.

It’s the most difficult decisions that define a business. Abandoning your comfort zone for the sake of growth and stability. Going with your gut even though you know it will cost you money in the short term.

This month, I’ve had to make the most difficult business decision about Raven since we created the software.

It means letting go of a tool we’ve offered for seven years.
It means removing data that our customers rely on us to provide.

Above all, it means preparing for a future that my Raven co-founders and I strongly believe is coming to this industry.

Raven has decided to remove unauthorized Google data from our platform. As of 5 p.m. PST (GMT-8) on Jan. 2, 2013, we will no longer offer Google rankings and are eliminating our SERP Tracker tool in its entirety. Also, we will remove all data provided to us by SEMRush. You have until then to include any of that data in your reports.

According to the Google AdWords API team, these actions by this deadline will bring our software into compliance with the AdWords API Terms of Service; as a result, Raven will continue to offer AdWords tools with data directly from the AdWords API well into the future.

Raven’s co-founders — myself, Jon Henshaw and Scott Holdren — know this change will create hardships for some of our customers. We wish we had more time to make this transition, but that was not in our control. Raven worked hard to make sure you could run reports for all of your data through the end of the year.

We have gathered step-by-step instructions, FAQs and additional information you’ll need to know about this transition into one place. That’s also where you’ll find a public forum for reactions, comments and conversation.

Why we’ve made this decision

Raven integrates more than 15 sources of data for a variety of online marketing methods, from SEO and PPC to social and content.

For many years, Raven has operated with data we received directly from Google and data about Google scraped by third parties. It’s a common model for software companies in the Internet marketing industry. It’s partly stable, partly risky—but more or less comfortable.

That’s not an option going forward. Software companies and their customers will have to choose if they want authorized Google data or scraped Google data.

After much reflection, built on years of experience, Raven has come to the conclusion that the future of scraped Google data is one of diminishing returns. As a private, profitable company planning a long-term future, it was time for us to choose stability over risk for ourselves and our customers.

We want to be a platform for SEO, social media, PPC, content and related analytics. And we want to be a platform with the most reliable, accurate data that we can provide so that our customers can report to their clients with confidence. That’s why I made this choice.

Google AdWords prompted immediate action

On Nov. 2, 2012, Raven submitted its application for Google AdWords’ annual audit. If you pass the audit, you can continue to access the AdWords API. If you fail, you lose access. It’s an audit we’ve passed two years running, and we didn’t anticipate any problems.

On Nov. 5, the AdWords team emailed to tell us Raven had failed the audit and our access to the AdWords API would be revoked in 7 days. We replied immediately to ask for details and more time to make any necessary changes.

On Nov. 8, the AdWords team replied and said we had 7 additional days before our access was revoked to present a plan about how we would comply with the AdWords Terms of Service. They were specific:

“In order to be in compliance with the AdWords API Terms and Conditions please cease offering any product or product feature that collects scraped data or uses scraped data acquired from another source (this includes the functionality offered under website and keyword research in your tool).”

We received that email on a Friday evening.

It was clear what it would take to pass the audit. We had to choose: authorized AdWords data or scraped Google data of any kind. Over that weekend, my partners and I started to think through options.

On Monday, Nov. 12, we emailed the AdWords team to say we wanted to remove Google scraped data. We asked for four months—until March—to execute a plan of action, and we asked to keep our AdWords API access during that time. We didn’t know when we would hear back or if they would approve our plan.

On Tuesday, Nov. 13, working under the assumption they would revoke access within days, we turned off Raven’s AdWords research, management and reporting tools and contacted our customers.

Then, for the next two weeks, we explored scenarios while waiting to hear about our plan. Could we keep scraped Google data and live without AdWords API access? Possibly. If we removed scraped Google data from the SERP Tracker, would that tool in its current form have any value? Probably not. Could we allow customers to import Google rankings to the SERP Tracker and still be in compliance with the terms of service? No.

On Monday, Nov. 26—right after the U.S. Thanksgiving holiday weekend—the AdWords team replied. They approved our plan, stipulating only a timing change. We couldn’t have four months to be in compliance, but we could have 30 days. After another email exchange, the AdWords team granted us an extension to Jan. 3, 2013, to execute our plan and pass the AdWords API access audit.

On Wednesday, Nov. 28, we turned our AdWords research, management and reporting tools back on in Raven.

We appreciate the additional time that the AdWords team allowed us so that we could communicate with our customers. That way, our customers could compile reports through the end of the year, and they could do it with all of their data.

Why scraped data isn’t worth it

In the case of scraped Google ranking data, we were paying a lot of money to get these things in return:

• Unreliable results. It’s impossible to be 100% accurate with scraped Google rankings because geography, personalization, server timing and types of results influence SERPs for each searcher.
• Inflated expectations. Most customers expected 100% accuracy regardless of geography, personalization, server timing and types of results. Any variance from what they saw when they (or their clients) performed a search caused confusion. Adding rank editing did not alleviate the problem as much as we hoped. What’s more, recently we’ve had more requests than ever for daily, universal and local results.
• High risk. Using scraped Google data violates Google’s terms of service. It doesn’t matter whether we provided scraped data for rankings, research or really boring Friday night entertainment.
• An unpredictable future. This metric, though deemed essential by some SEOs, would only continue to diminish in relevance as campaign performance metrics replaced it in importance.

As an experienced businessman, I’d rather provide tools and data that prove ROI, conversions and goals, not simple rankings.

What we predict about the industry

Raven wasn’t singled out during this AdWords audit. We know that two of our third-party data providers have lost AdWords API access at some point in the past two years. Google seems to be universally enforcing its terms of service regarding scraped Google data, which it has every right to do as a business.

If this enforcement continues—and I believe it will—then every software company will have to make the same choice as Raven: either you comply with Google’s requests or you don’t. Every SEO tool provider will have to choose between a very risky future (unauthorized, scraped data) or a less risky future (authorized API data).

Regardless, it will be impossible for any software company to provide scraped Google ranking data and authorized AdWords API data.

And what happens when Google realizes that it’s not just its editorial content that’s being scraped, its money-making advertising data is being scraped, then sold as authorized data, too?

Raven’s plans

We love what we do. We want to provide the kinds of efficient, essential tools for Internet marketers that prompt them to write, “If you’re thinking about getting Raven, do it. It’s one of the best decisions that I have ever made. It has been part of our business tripling in the past year alone.”

The convergence of content, SEO, social, advertising, email and other marketing methods into single agency offerings is already happening and will accelerate. What’s more, traditional marketers—ad agencies, public relations firms and the like—are in the game now. We’re building our platform with that future in mind.

One more reminder: You can find step-by-step instructions, FAQs and additional information about this transition right here. There’s also a public forum for reactions, comments and conversation.

— Patrick E. Keeble, Co-Founder, President and CEO

The post A message from our CEO: Raven to drop rankings, other scraped data on Jan. 2 appeared first on Raven Internet Marketing Tools.

Raven Tools will exhibit Dec. 5-6 at SMX Social Media Marketing, a two-day, tactic-rich conference that covers the ins and outs of social marketing – from ROI to customer service, from Twitter to Pinterest.

During Expo Hall hours (12 p.m.-7 p.m. on Dec. 5; 10 a.m. -2 p.m. on Dec. 6) attendees can come by our booth to take our social media management, monitoring and reporting tools for a spin, or just pick up one of our always-a-hit “I’m a Social Tool” T-shirts.

And while sessions are going on, I’ll be doing some live blogging. SMX Social Media offered some great insights last year, and I predict 2012 won’t disappoint. Some sessions I have my eye on include:

• Customer Acquisition Through Social Media with Drew Conrad (@drewconrad), Mariana Rodriguez (@marodcar) and Peter Vogel (@pvogel) (Check out our interview with Drew Conrad of ZAGG for a preview of this session)
• Twitter Talks: How To Win Friends & Not Be Unfollowed By People (Or Worse) with Del Harvey (@delbius), Director of Trust & Safety at Twitter
• SEO For Social Media Managers with Raven favorite Mathew Guiver (@mathewguiver) Sarah Lokitis (@Lokitis), Dave Rohrer (@daver) and Travis Wright (@teedubya)
• Measuring Success: From Reach To ROI with Mark Cooper (@offerpop) Nan Dawkins (@NDawkins_SC) and Jon Morris (@JonBMorris)

See the full agenda for the two-day conference to check out even more enticing sessions.

Want to go?

Both one-day and all-access passes are still available for SMX Social Media Marketing. And did we mention we have a discount code? Save 10% off your total ticket price by using the code smx12raven!

The post Raven to exhibit at SMX Social Media Marketing 2012 appeared first on Raven Internet Marketing Tools.