For a long time now I have wondered what sets apart great search marketing articles (namely, YOUmoz posts) from not so great ones.  Unfortunately, there is no short answer to this question.  Extensive discourse both online and off makes search marketing a tough subject to get a definite answer on.  Fortunately, the YOUmoz thumbs/comment system provides a great place for us to start, and by limiting ourselves to tangible factors, we can draw safe conclusions from its data.  I will follow up with another post examining this information from a content-based viewpoint, but for today our discussion points will be strictly visual.

A couple disclaimers before I start :

1. YOUmoz is indeed a small subset of the search community and, due to its nature, a rather inexperienced one compared to the "A-List" bloggers commonly seen around the SEO blogosphere and sites like Sphinn.  Speaking of...
2. I realize that some will be under the opinion that Sphinn would be a better source for this data, but I think YOUmoz is the perfect size for this and there is not as much probability that commercial forces are attempting to game it, skewing our data.
3. The YOUmoz system and YOUmoz-to-main-blog-promotions are not (from what I've seen) a straightforward matter of the number of thumbs or comments, but more likely, a combination of thumbs, comments, public reception, staff reception, and finally - staff decision.  This is an acceptable bias in our data, however, if we assume they have our bests interests at heart, and I think I've done a decent job of remembering this in our data analysis below.

The Outline

First, please allow me to prefix my post to say - I do not, in any way, intend to demean the content or value of a post by simply pointing out the visuals.  My end goal is to prove that appealing visual elements increase your chances of a positive reception and/or YOUmoz promotion to the main blog.

Our objective therefore is to determine how and to what extent visual elements affect the reception and opinion of a YOUmoz post.  The thumbs are a great system for this, as are the comments (strictly speaking, the number of comments).  For the sake of simplicity, I limit my scope to 

1. The Thumb Spread (Thumbs Up - Thumbs Down = Thumb Spread)
2. The Number of Comments (An indicator of Interest or Controversy surrounding the post)

Again, emphasizing the idea of safe data and simplicity, our visual elements are :

1. Whether the post contains pictures or illustrations. (Y/N?)
2. Whether the post is or contains a numbered format of instructions or points. (Y/N?)

Although I would love to include more advanced elements of design and usability, the nature of YOUmoz doesn't give us a lot of versatility in how we present content, but it does give us these basic elements which we can easily measure and rank.  I chose these two elements because they can be included in a post without much effort and, in my opinion, are the two most visually impacting tactics that can be used to enhance the aesthetics of a chunk of text.  I am by no means saying that all numbered format posts are better than others, but I think it is a tangible element we can use, that seems to be consistent in promoted entries.  I also hope my data proves this point.  I think you would generally agree with me here, but I'm open to hearing opinions of course.  If there's one thing I can't stand in the SEO community, it's when people make sweeping generalizations or declare rash opinions as fact without supporting data, so let's leave our opinions here are look at some data.

The Data

Please note that I chose to segregate the data based on whether it was promoted or not.  According to the assumptions we made in our outline, a promotion is the 'goal' (I use that term loosely) of writing a YOUmoz entry.  Promotion is a result on the community/staff reception so I think this is a good metric of success.

There are a total of 8 variables included in our data:

There are a lot of conclusions that we can draw from this graph.  Let me be the first to say that I think the nature of this graph is flawed due to the nature of YOUmoz entry promotions - promotion to the main blog carries a tendency to higher exposure, controversy, and discussion.  Here is some data to give you an idea of the nature of YOUmoz promotions:

• Of the current 921 YOUmoz posts - only 78 we're promoted (8.4%).  It appears that SEOmoz did not do promotions before January of 2007 so this data includes 2007, 2008 and 2009.
• SEOmoz averages 2.75 YOUmoz entry post promotions a month. (January 2007-May 2009)
• The Non-Promoted data above represents 78 randomly picked YOUmoz entries from January 2007-May 2009
• The Promoted data above does not include guest bloggers, the Distilled team, etc

Also keep in mind that I did not track the Thumb Spread above 50, or comments above 100, so the graph cuts off there.  I think this is necessary for illustrational purposes.  I will start off with my conclusions, and I'd love to hear yours in the comments!

There appears to be vague 'thresholds' in the data; this could be for 2 reasons :

1. Our objective and my hypothesis that the visual aspects of a YOUmoz entry is confirmed - A numbered format and pictures or illustrations has a higher rate of promotion and a higher Thumb Spread than those without.
2. The thumb spread is a direct result of the blog promotion.  Since we didn't have any data from before the promotion, we cannot know.

Our Zone 1 seems to carry mostly YOUmoz entries with no pictures and no numbered format, or a numbered format, but with no pictures.  There are a few with only pictures but no numbered format, but there are almost none with both.  There are also very few in the zone who have been promoted.  I think what this data represents is a combination of:

• Promotions naturally see more exposure and thus would not be in this zone, although the negative Thumb Spread and lack of comments seems to show that there was little interest to begin with.
• Though we take it with a grain of salt, there is a reasonable impression that there is a conspicuous absence of posts with both pictures and a numbered format, as well as an abundance of posts without pictures or numbers.
• The posts with the visually appealing elements that are still in this zone were likely of poor content or of little interest.

Right away we notice:

• There is a high ratio of Promoted Youmoz entries to Non-Promoted.  This is where we can assume the nature of promotion comes in.
• There are a high number of posts with both pictures and a number format, and posts with only pictures.  This might indicate that the content was mildly interesting, but the added elements might have propelled it from Zone 1 to Zone 2.  
• Also note that there are still posts with negative Thumb Spread that have pictures and numbered formats.  It is possible that this operates contrary to our hypothesis, but since there is a high number of comments, it's more likely that these were either highly controversial or intended to be humorous but poorly received.
• It is apparent that those posts with both elements, or at least pictures, ranked consistently higher even amongst only the posts which were promoted.

This zone appears to be the best of the best, the entries enthusiastically accepted and discussed amongst the community.

• There is about three times as many posts in this zone which contained images or illustrations, and twice as many which contained both images and numbered formats.
• There are posts in this zone which did not contain either.  It is likely that these posts were highly appealing in content.
• Content appears to matter about the same in this zone (judging by the percentage ratios), but those with visually appealing elements appear more often.

The Conclusion: Pictures or illustrations and numbered formats do not make or break a post, but they have a consistently higher reception rate than those without.  This is particularly evident in Zone 2, where posts with visually appealing elements appear 66.6% more often than those without, and Zone 3, 70.6% more often.  By including visually appealing elements, you greatly increase your chances of a positive reception and YOUmoz promotion.

Further Questions: 

1. What innovative elements can sensibly be used within YOUmoz entries or in general search marketing articles which would increase public reception?
2. At what point do visual elements detract from the overall presentation of the content, thus decreasing positive reception?
3. What other visual elements or reception metrics can we use to refine our data?

Stay tuned for the follow-up - An Analysis of Great YOUmoz Post Content.  I look forward to hearing your comments and thoughts.  In the meantime, you can follow me on twitter: twitter.com/calamier