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+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+ ********************* OPTIMIZING VISIBLE RESULTS IN SEARCH MARKETING ********************* Catch and cache past installments of SearchWrite SearchNews in the http://www.searchwrite.com/Pages/searchnews.htm ********************** GET THE "SEO TIP OF THE DAY" EVERY WEEKDAY ON TWITTER. ****************************************************************** +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+ OPTIMIZING VISIBLE RESULTS IN SEARCH MARKETING ********************* Catch and cache past installments of SearchWrite SearchNews in the http://www.searchwrite.com/Pages/searchnews.htm ********************** GET THE "SEO TIP OF THE DAY" EVERY WEEKDAY ON TWITTER.
++++++++++++++++++++++++ John Wanamaker famously said, "Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is I don't know which half." He would have loved search marketing, because it is one of very few kinds of media that provides visibility into the wasted half. Because search (paid and organic) is such an accountable medium, it's also one of the most efficient. And because of quality-based bidding models, search is possibly the only medium that actually becomes progressively more efficient: as campaigns improve their quality score, minimum bids go down and ad rank goes up. In a recent poll, over 400 business marketers were asked: What three internet marketing tactics will you emphasize most in the next 6 months? Here are the results of the poll: * Search engine optimization (36%, 149 Votes) Even if businesses stop or cut-back on advertising on TV and radio or in print, this is the time for them to maximize their Internet exposure. And realize the ROI on their SEO and PPC!
Speaking of accountability, Google wants qualified Web authors to get more credit for their work. Some have fathomed that reputation score will soon be a factor in quality score. A few days ago, Google added a link to a Sitemap XML file in their robots.txt. This Sitemap is hosted at gstatic.com (I wonder why?) and contains links to long lists of public Google user profile URLs. A typical URL contains – optionally – an avatar image or photo, name, location, bio, links* and more. If you’re logged in, you can find your own profile at google.com/s2/profiles/me. There might be as many as 132,000+** individual profiles on Gstatic right now, but that’s just based on a rough calculation, and Dan Goodwin at iCrossing says many more profiles would fit. Dan suspects that it may be possible that “Google is looking to compete with Facebook and possibly Linkedin for searches on individuals names, locations and employment”. (Note that Google has the data stored already without indexing it, of course, though crawling from a public source perhaps offers different possibilities of inclusion for them... and other search engines out there.) The original profiles created at Yahoo for anyone who has used Direct Submit Express or another Yahoo service has been expanded this week to form the basis of a new Profiler system in it own right.
Need a fast SEO overview? You'll feel as if you have x-ray vision with one of these diagnostic tools. QuarkBase.com provides on-site information on meta description and tags, popular pages (per Digg, Delicious, Twitturly, StumbleUpon, nd Reddit), Alexa traffic details,Technorati reactions, and hosting details. <http://www.quarkbase.com/> Website Grader aggregates on-site data and also lets you compare your site with a chosen competitor. The analysis lists: Page metadata, Heading summary, Image summary, Interior page analysis (a deeper look at a couple of your sub-pages); Readability level, Domain info, Google PageRank, Google indexed pages, Last Google crawl date, Traffic rank (Alexa), Inbound links (plus Dmoz and Yahoo directory mentions), Blog analysis (recent blog articles and Technorati rank), Social media analysis (Delicious bookmarks and Digg score), Top keyword Google rank, and Analysis summary. <http://www.websitegrader.com/> CubeStat.com offers data (in a handy list style) and takes an unreliable stab at a Website's worth. . Featuring Alexa, Quantcast and Compete rank; Backlinks; Google indexed pages; Dmoz mentions; WhoIs data. <http://www.cubestat.com/> Statbrain.com furnishes the following website related information (at the domain level, no subfolders or subdomains). Meta description and keywords; Alexa traffic; Backlinks (based on Google and Yahoo); Server location. <http://www.statbrain.com/> Popuri.us aggregates data from Google PageRank; Alexa Rank (often broken);; Compete Rank;; Quantcast Rank] Google BackLinks; Yahoo BackLinks;; Live Search BackLinks;[ Technorati Links; del.icio.us Bookmarks; Bloglines subscribers. <http://popuri.us/> Test Everything centralizes a bevy of links in one place for your convenience: Enter the URL you want to explore; choose the category; pput ticks for the tools you want to check; push “Test website”;
Have you ever wanted to use Facebook as a desktop application? Now you can with a new and innovative application called VisualSage, a unique way to browse and use Facebook by providing access to many of Facebook’s functions, including pokes, profiles, photos, and chat, all right from your Windows desktop. You can also use VisualSage’s built-in search feature to perform advanced friend searches and then organize your friends into groups via drag-and-drop. In addition to simply providing an alternative interface to Facebook, VisualSage can create interactive representations of your Facebook “social graph,” which is your network of friends on the Facebook service. <http://visual-sage.com/default.aspx>
So which is better, dashes or underscores in a domain name, URL path or text link? An official statement from Google says the following: Consider using punctuation in your URLs. The URL http://www.example.com/green-dress.html is much more useful to us than http://www.example.com/greendress.html. We recommend that you use hyphens (-) instead of underscores (_) in your URLs. And. when you’re thinking about using dashes or underscores in your permalinks, use dashes. Let’s take a quick look at the blogging/CMS platforms and how they handle this. Dashes or Underscores? Blogger: dashes <http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?answer=76329&hl=en> ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ The Commoncraft Show is a husband and wife enterprise. Lee and Sachi LeFever, who produce a series of short explanatory videos on all kinds of subjects, but mainly Web technology. Their goal is to fight complexity with simple tools and plain language. Their most recent release is Web Search Strategies in Plain English. In less than 3 minutes, this funny yet eloquent little animated video explains how to search the Web in a way that school kids and perhaps even my old mother will understand. <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CWHPf00Jkqg>
* View a variety of search sites on a single page plus the auto-completion phrases each site recommends: * How many words or characters does Google count in a link? Answer: 55 characters, about 8-10 words. Max! * "Mearch" Kedrix, a Meta-Search engine with easy Nav tabs for the Big Four. <http://www.kedrix.com/> * Blog links don't count for SEO if the links are No-Follow. Here are links to Do-Follow blog lists: http://tinyurl.com/6rzmok , <http://www.dofollowblogs.com/> , <http://www.blogsthatfollow.com/>, and <http://www.rajaietalks.com/do-follow-blogs> . * Read The Blogger's Guide to SEO by the Walls, Aaron & Giovanna. <http://www.seobook.com/blog>.
Marketing Sherpa has posted research that reveals how technical searches can run silent and run deep. Tech searchers look beyond the first page of results in an average technical search on Google, Yahoo! etc. While 39% of searchers rely on the first page of results only, 47% go beyond the first page, and 37% scour more than two pages deep to find the information they seek.
Conversions are all about "closing the deal", the final stage in the sales process needed to get customers or prospects to sign on the dotted line. Typically, the objections that stand in the way of conversion are affordability, no perceived need, no hurry, or no trust. Sales people are trained on how to spot and deal with this issues. But how does your Website handle rejection? 1. Never Make It Difficult For People To Pay You Once someone has said "yes" to an idea, you need to get them to sign on the dotted line as quickly as possible. Leave too much time, and people may reflect, have second thoughts, get distracted, or otherwise lose momentum. Think about bricks 'n mortar stores. It's always immediately obvious where, and how, to make payment. If the store is smart, they don't make you wait to pay. 2. Be Relevant Learn the lesson of Amazon. What do you your visitors really want from you? If you're not what the visitor wants, then all the SEO, testing and tweaks in the world won't help. Monitor what people do on your site after they arrive. Do you know how many visitors click the back button after arriving? If too many visitors click the back button, you've clearly got a relevancy problem. 3. Measure & Iterate Good analytics are important. What's even more important is acting on the data. Look at your Website as a constant work in progress. It should be always "under construction". Watch what your visitors do, and what they don't do. Make changes, measure the results, then make further changes in response to those results. Repeat. 4. Reassure People The Web is often nebulous. Unlike a physical store, or face-to-face dealings, it can be hard for the visitor to gauge credibility. Therefore, you need to go the extra mile to reassue people your site is legitimate. You need to include as many credibility markers as possible. Examples of credibility markers include your contact details, testimonials, money-back guarantees where appropriate, a physical address and phone number, credit-card security measures, and privacy and data collecting policies. Tell people what to do when/if the process goes wrong. TO GET THE "SEO TIP OF THE DAY" EVERY WEEKDAY ON TWITTER. ***************************************** Catch past installments of SearchWrite SearchNews in the |
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