VO-BB - 20 YEARS OLD!

[DougVox]

Anyone who participates in V123's new Blog Post Contest should know that they'd be sabotaging their own SEO, while giving away tons of free Google juice to the P2P platform.

See, the site is hoping that you'll write a 1,500 word blog post following some very specific, VERY SEO-focused rules (which will benefit them FAR more than they'll benefit you), with the "winner" getting a free V123 membership.

Since there's a "prize," they're promoting it as a "contest," but really, it's little more than what they're hoping will be a massive (and free!) SEO campaign for their site.

It's a brilliant marketing move by the P2P. They get you (if you participate) to write a long blog post, using very specific keyword density as mandated by their rules, along with a very specific link – also mandated by their rules – back to their site.

They claim that you'll get great exposure by participating/winning, but actually, the opposite is true. THEY'LL get great exposure, and loads of valuable SEO benefit. YOU'LL get...well...shafted.

For example, if 100 people participate, Google's algorithms mean that each person will get 1/100th of a drop of Google juice, (virtually meaningless) while the site will get hundreds of drops of that same juice. That's because of how specifically their rules require that you write the post, using keywords and summaries to boost their content.

Among other factors, near the top of the things Google looks for when calculating search rankings is, "...based on ‘a relevance of the group of blog documents to the search query and the quality of the group of blog documents." In other words, a bunch of keyword-rich blog posts (and based on the "contest's" rules, V123 is looking to optimize search results for the phrase "videogame voice actors") will go a loooong way toward boosting the site's search results.

And remember that for every boost the site gets for better Google search results, the worse your chances become of booking work there. See, they claim to have something like 200,000+ voice talent on the site, so when a client searches for voice talent and ends up clicking through to V123, you're one of a whopping 200,000 talent they'll have to choose from.

Now, all of those clients might very well use the P2P the next time they're in the market for voice talent, significantly reducing your chances of booking the gig. (When considered against a situation in which you're marketing directly to those people you might have sent to the P2P.)

So here's the question: Why participate in this contest?

Yes, I realize that the 'winner' gets a year's membership and might get a bit of free press, and that may or may not have some value, but where's the ROI for everyone else who participates?

It seems to me that the P2P (who you PAY to list your demo) gets all of the benefit here. First, you pay them to be on their site, and now they want you to do a bunch of free SEO marketing and publicity for them, which ends up benefiting them – and by extension, other talent – much more than it benefits you. What am I missing here?
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Doug Turkel (tur-KELL)
Voiceover UNnouncer®
UNnouncer.com

[Bruce]

Thank you, Doug!


B
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VO-BB Member #31 Enlisted June, 2005

I'm not a Zoo, but over the years I've played one on radio/TV. .

[todd ellis]

well reasoned, my friend.
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"i know philip banks": todd ellis
who's/on/1st?

[Bish]

[Eddie Eagle]

They should be giving everyone that has a paid subscription a free year or more from the cluster they created in Dec.

It's a broken wheel.

[Foog]

Why am I not surprised that a site that profits off of the race to the bottom is going to try and scam people out of free labour as well? And the truth is that if you're fool enough to still have a membership with them (and yes, that sadly includes me), then there's a good chance you are fool enough to give them what boils down to your labour (writing a post promoting them) for free.

This never really not-relevant comic comes to mind: https://theoatmeal.com/comics/exposure
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Andrew Fogarasi

[craigsvoicetalent]

Rolf is a politician through and through with absolutely no background in the VO world. He has genetically had the word "sorry" removed from his vocabulary and as Peter said - thinks we are all bloody stupid. I was at VO Atlanta and his blatant disregard to most of the VO world concerns were never answered. He keeps saying things like "less is more", "we don't want to scare the buyers away" etc. etc.
His actions concern me and therefore I am one of those who did not renew.
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Reading, talking and listening.

British Voice Over

[Lance Blair]

What Craig said. He's only running V123 because he's one of Torrenegra's "Digital Democracy" buddies.

No experience in VO, media, production, radio...NADA.

Thank you Doug for the warning to others.
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Skype: globalvoiceover
and now, http://lanceblairvo.com the blog is there now too!