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As many industry folks head to the city of sin, Las Vegas to attend the Pubcon event, we thought we would put together a list of must attend sessions for first timers. While something can be learned from each and every session, the sessions of particular interest include:
This panel is an introduction about getting up to speed with the major social marketing sites. This panel of SMO promotion experts will take you from newbie to advanced in short order. Do your homework before you hit this session though. Study the basics of Reddit, Netscape, Delicious, Digg, Facebook, and LinkedIn.
If you are not talking with your customer base your customer base will be talking about you. This session will look at ways to monitor, manage, and influence your reputation within the blogosphere and press.
The 10 little blue link SERP ain't what she used to be. Today's SERP is more complex than ever. This session will examine today's SERP with it's images, media, stock quotes, weather, and other entities. How does this radically change SEO?
Link baiting is a topic that makes some people snicker when they hear it. However, the complexities and subtleties are fascinating. Did you know that there are 12 types of links? Moreover, there are eight types of link bait to get those 12 types of links? That means there are 96 different strategies to get links. This session will look at the eight and the 12.
Moderator:Jake Baillie Speakers: Todd Malicoat, Independent Marketing Consultant, Meta4creations, LLC Andy Hagans, Strategiest, Text-Link-Ads Bill Hartzer, Search Engine Optimization Manager, Marketnet, Inc.
From simple page view measuring to conversion tracking, this session will look at the process to see what your site is really producing and how. This session features two top-notch vendors and two top-notch consultants, which should make for an intriguing mix.
Moderator:Joe Laratro Speakers: Steve O'Brien, Vice President, Internet Solutions Marketing, Unica Corporation John Marshall, CTO, Founder, Market Motive Scott Orth, Director of Internet Marketing Strategies, GTS Services
Site design is critical for quality indexing and rankings. There are pit falls that are not apparent. This session will take a top down approach to designing a modern website.
Moderator:Todd Friesen Speakers: Mark Jackson, President / CEO, VIZION Interactive, Inc. Lyndsay Walker, Web Analytics Coordinator / SEO Specialist, WestJet / Lyndseo Paul Bruemmer, Director Search Marketing, Red Door Interactive Alan K'necht, Founder & President, K'nechtology Inc.
Mix and mingle with the brains behind the search engine. This is your chance to pick the brains of the top Google engineers. A variety of Google engineers will be available to answer questions and chat in this fun and informal setting. Got a nagging question about your site? Want to learn more about a particular Google advertising program? Think you have a brain-teaser that even a Google engineer won’t be able to solve? Come to the Google Reception and hang out with the engineers.
Optimizing for video, universal, and pod casting engines is vastly different than a stock text based engine. From embedded meta data to optical character recognition you have to learn a new set of techniques.
When evaluating and planning your own direction, knowing your sector's finer points is mission critical. It's difficult to look at your competitors without leaving tracks. It can be a challenge, but is extremely important to manage your own reputation. This panel will look at a number of issues surrounding competitive intelligence being probed by the competition and probing the competition yourself.
I was just checking some news about my favorite search engine ASK. As I was reading through the data I was amazed at the diversity of their parent company InterActiveCorp (IACI). The company operates diversified businesses in sectors being transformed by the Internet, online and offline. Barry Diller the CEO has been pretty successful since 1995. I mean it's not a fluke that IAC owns and operates more than 60 global brands such that include:
A leading search engine on the Web, Ask.com combines world-class search technology with one-of-a-kind search tools to help people get what they are looking for faster.
Citysearch is a leading local search service, providing the most up-to-date information to over eight million people a month on businesses, from restaurants and retail, to travel and professional services.
leading entertainment website appealing to a core audience of young males. The site delivers daily comedic content, including videos, pictures, articles and jokes, both created by the CollegeHumor staff and submitted by users
originator of the electronic retailing concept in 1977, HSN is a global multichannel-retailing giant offering thousands of products to enhance all aspects of its customers’ lives.
Match.com has redefined the way people meet and fall in love and is credited with more marriages than any other site. Today, more than 15 million people around the world participate in the Match.com community.
comprehensive comparison-shopping engine. Pronto.com’s proprietary hosted search index contains more than 60 million products from over 60 thousand online merchants.
Offering consumers a better way to buy or sell a home through a comprehensive suite of real estate services, tools and content as they progress through their home buying or selling process.
the world's leading ticketing company, operating in 20 global markets, providing ticket sales, ticket resale services, as well as marketing and distribution.
It's time for a little retro-post. We are quickly coming upon the three year anniversary of Enquiro's discovery of Google's Golden Triangle a.k.a the Golden Triangle of Search. Yes, Google's Golden Triangle was discovered about three years ago by Enquiro during one of our earliest eye tracking research studies back in 2004/2005.
For those not familiar with the Golden Triangle as it pertains to search, the Golden Triangle is a distinct area of intense eye scan activity that is shown in the top left section of a search engine results page.
We have released a couple of eye tracking whitepapers that discuss the Golden Triangle intimately as it pertains to Google, Yahoo and MSN. We believe it’s very important for marketers to understand the nuances of perceived relevance as it can play an important role in the day-to-day decisions being made so we took the data and boiled it down into some real life strategies for the marketer to boost the performance of your campaigns.
Wow three years already, time flies when you're having fun.
Just a reminder that SEMPO is looking to hear from you. That's right you. SEMPO is encouraging you to participate in SEMPO's 4th annual market survey, which is recognized as a leading industry study. This survey is open to everyone.
The purpose of the State of the Market survey is help show where the Search industry is, how it has grown, how it is expected to grow, and trends for the future. This is a great opportunity to share your thoughts on SEO and paid search.
Why should you take the survey?
Taking the survey will actually stimulate you to think about the resources you devote to SEO and paid search - which is a valuable exercise in itself.
First dibs - you will receive the preliminary survey results before they are released to SEMPO's membership.
Support the SEM industry - this survey is highly regarded as a valuable resource for the industry.
Click here to participate and for further information. Click here to complete the survey now.
There's a great post over at TechCrunch on the rankings of social media sites comparing October 2007 with October 2006. You'll notice the huge jump by Facebook which was made available to the general public in May of this year. There are some interesting sites that have experienced explosive growth over the past year.
Here's something that caught my eye. eMarketer projects that online advertising spending will pass C$3.0 billion (US$2.44 billion) by 2011—roughly tripling its value in 2006. We all know that Canada is one of the leading countries in terms of online savvy and Internet usage. Yet as Gord Hotchkiss pointed out a few months back, Come on Canada, It’s Time to Clue into Search! advertisers have been slow to come around to the benefit of SEO, Search and online advertising.
In fact for $695, you can purchase a 21 page report on Canada Online Advertising. Would anyone from emarketer.com care to send me a copy gratis so that I may review the findings?
It's been a while since we posted anything on widget marketing. But then we came across this great article from USA Today.com. The article begins by discussing the success that iLike has had by using widgets. Try this on for size:
In May, iLike had 3 million registered users of its music website. After its widget became available on Facebook, it ballooned to more than 10 million users on Facebook, 15 million overall. And iLike is now growing to the tune of 3 million users per month. I'd say that is a pretty successful use of widgets.
Widgets are simply pieces of embeddable code that can be found on one site, and embedded in another that can be used to promote your own site or blog. They can be things like a slideshow, calculator, or any other mini-application that users can add to their website or blog. Widgets have become popular with users of online communities as a result the business of marketing via widgets is a great way for site owners (including B2B sites) to promote their content and business. Marketers are using widgets to advertise their products and services. Earlier this month, MySpace and Facebook expanded their services for targeted ads, including widgets designed by marketers. When you think about it a widget could be anything. Check out Google Gadgets for some examples. According to reports, "As the popularity of widgets grows, so does their potential as a source of revenue. Ads on social networks are expected to haul in $1.2 billion worldwide this year and $1.9 billion in 2008, says researcher eMarketer."
According to the report from USA Today, Social networks have taken note of widget popularity:
• On Nov. 1, Google (GOOG) created a consortium of social-networking sites, including LinkedIn and Friendster, that could expand their ability to advertise. Google won't try to make money from the OpenSocial network right away but hasn't ruled out the possibility of eventually inserting ads into the applications.
• On Nov. 5, MySpace — the largest social network, with 110 million users — expanded its program for letting marketers tailor their pitches using personal details on users' profile pages. Many of those details were gleaned from widgets used by its members. More than 50 marketers have signed up, including Procter & Gamble and Taco Bell.
• On Nov. 6, Facebook unfurled new advertising initiatives. Marketers will be able to create their own profile pages. They'll also be able to target Facebook members with ads based on the details it collects about community members' likes and dislikes. That information could allow Facebook to sell ads that are potentially more effective and possibly more lucrative to the website. Coca-Cola and Blockbuster were among several dozen marketers who signed on.
It's true that there is no limit what marketers and developers can use widgets to do. If I were you, I'd be jumping on the bandwagon pretty soon.
I don't know about you, but when I think about innovation, I think about Google. Google (GOOG) is the world's leading search engine... maybe not in all markets, but in most, Google is the search engine of choice.
But what is most exciting about Google is their desire to make the world a better place. In just over nine years, Google has made a definite impact on how the world advertises their products and services online. For better or worse Google has redefined advertising models. They have become wealthy with their AdWords and AdSense programs. They have taken products, acquired organizations and their products and released them to the public for free consumption (think of Google services such as Google Analytics, Google Docs and Gmail just to name a few). The common theme here is the innovation and creativity that goes into these product and service releases. Google always has a plan.
So it was no surprise as Google announced that they are going to be investing in alternative energy. According to Reuters,
SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Google Inc said on Tuesday the Web services and online advertising group plans to spend hundreds of millions of dollars to help drive the cost of electricity derived from renewable energy below coal prices.
The project, dubbed Renewable Energy Cheaper Than Coal, is hiring dozens of engineers and targeting investment financing at advanced solar thermal power, wind power, enhanced geothermal systems and other new technologies, Google said.
Google plans to be one of the project's first customers, employing the power to run its massive computer data centers while selling back excess energy to the electricity grid.
The goal of the project is to help drive down the cost of electricity made from renewable energy. According to Google co-founder Larry Page, "We see a plausible path to much lower energy costs and we just want to get people working on that now...". Google just doesn't think like other organizations do. It's not just about making money and improving share price. It's about changing the world and making a difference. Google is the sixth largest company in the US based on market value. You don't earn that distinction in less 10 years by not being innovative.
According to the report from Reuters, Google's investment in this renewable energy push "comes as oil prices near $100 a barrel and coal, which generates 40 percent of the world's electricity, faces regulatory and environmental pressures that may boost prices.
"If they can do it cheaper than coal, then that's the Holy Grail," said Mark Manley, alternative fuels analyst at Natixis Bleichroeder. "If they figure it out, it will take off."
If anyone can accomplish this, Google just may be able to. They have the resources, the creativity and the courage to attempt this feat. Of course there will be no shortage of nay-sayers, as many analysts will report on Google not being able to make a dent in the energy market. The difference between these nay-sayers is that they're writing about it, Google is actually doing something about it. That in itself is pretty impressive.
As Facebook popularity continues to soar, marketers are looking for ways to leverage the social network as a viral promotional tool to market their products. Of course there are going to be success stories and some not so successful stories. Case in point, Molson Breweries recent promotion they ran on Facebook.
The promotion in which they dubbed the The Molson Canadian Nation Campus Challengefocused on the theme of “Be the #1 party school in Canada”. Why was this an unsuccessful promotion for Molson? Well in response to growing criticism from universities and parents, Molson has pulled this controversial photo contest on Facebook. This is a great example of the challenges that companies face in trying to pitch their products on new social media.
According to a story in the Globe and Mail,
Molson's online marketing campaign, in which students were encouraged to post pictures of themselves partying on campus, was “misinterpreted” as promoting irresponsible drinking, said Ferg Devins, a vice-president at Molson Coors Brewing Co.
After a Globe and Mail article ran Friday, the brewer decided to end the contest one week early, he said.
“The whole realm of social media – there's lots to learn,” he said. “It's really a new area. We're probably groundbreaking and leading in a lot of things we've been doing.”
Social networks tend to be frequented by users with like interests and hobbies. As a result these online communities tend to have a lot of trust between members. It may be a matter of time before users of these social communities stop being as trusting due to the participation of advertisers and marketers in the same environment. People are sick of having products pushed at them all of the time. They create these social networks to vent and rant about their experience with marketers and businesses and their satisfaction or (lack-there-of).
They're calling it Cyber Monday. CNN had an interesting article on the fact that online retailers may log record sales today. Comparing the success of "Black Friday" for bricks and mortar retailers, the online retailers are preparing for Cyber Monday where it is expected that 72 million shoppers will go online looking for post-Thanksgiving discounts. According to the CNN report, one-day sales are expected to exceed $700 million.
Would someone care to tell me what people are spending this money on? A number of reports suggest that the economy in the US is not as strong as it should be, yet online shoppers are going to spend a record amount of money. We sure are living in a material world. The CNN report goes on to state:
With plenty of online discounts to bag this year, online sellers are projected to have a record-breaking sales day on Monday.
ComScore Networks estimates that Cyber Monday sales will surpass $700 million to make it the heaviest online spending day on record.
"Online retailers will certainly be paying close attention to what happens on Cyber Monday, which will provide an even clearer indication of what lies ahead for the rest of the season," ComScore Chairman Gian Fulgoni said in a statement.
"While [the $700 million in sales] would make it the heaviest online shopping day on record, we can expect to see even stronger days ahead as the 2007 shopping season progresses into December," he said.
The most sought-after deals today are on video games like the Halo 3 and gaming systems like Nintendo'sWii and Sony's PlayStation 3. Industry experts said price-conscious shoppers this year will also surf the Internet for sales on furniture, home appliances, electronics and clothing.
Is it simply because of the discount or is it just because people like spending money that they just don't have? I would like to know how much of this $700 million the credit card companies will be receiving?
As we mentioned the other day, ComScore released the latest search engine market share numbers based on activity in the US. To no one's surprise Google gained market share while the other big four engines remained constant. So while Google is still the dominant force in the search engine market are they the dominant search product when it comes to search results? The answer? It depends. It truly depends on the type of search that you do, your intent when you perform your search, what type of search that you do (research, purchase intent, vanity search, fun search etc.)
So we polled a few search users to see what their engine of preference was based on the type of search. The goal was to see which search engine results they favored (based on Search Engine). The options were: Google, Yahoo, Windows Live, and ASK. Here's what we found:
Product Search (General)
This involved searching for things such as a digital camera or mobile phone. The top engines in order of favorite where:
Yahoo
ASK
Google
Windows Live
A bit of a surprise here with Google finishing third. Yahoo's shopping results, product reviews and the like seemed to be an attraction to those polled.
Product Search (Specific)
This involved searching for a branded product of interest... a Toyota Tacoma, an Apple iPhone etc. Compare a search in the four engines for the query "Apple iPhone".
ASK
Windows Live
Yahoo
Google
ASK's results included images, latest news, shopping comparisons, and additional search options. Google in contrast presented a Universal Search results page that included news stories. Entertainment Search
This involves searching for information on bands, tour dates, movie releases etc. While the test that we did was not an official research project, we simply asked some friends to perform specific queries in the various search engines and comment on which results they felt were the most relevant. This was an interesting category as ASK was the clear favorite.
ASK
Google
Yahoo
Windows Live
Famous Person Search
This involved searching for an athlete, actor or musician.
ASK
Google
Yahoo
Windows Live
Geographic Search
This involved searching for a destination, specifically a city.
ASK
Google
Yahoo
Windows Live
Try a search for "Seattle" and see which engine you prefer. Of those polled, many did not like the fact that Google was displaying Wikipedia listings so high in the results.
Information Search (General)
This involved searching on a general topic of interest such as a things to do in Seattle, apple pie recipes etc.
Google
Yahoo
ASK
Windows Live
Our "test group" found that for a general information search Google still has the most relevant results.
The study although not anything official provided some interesting insight as to what some people think of the search engine results. Of surprise was the fact that ASK topped a number of the categories. Not surprising for me personally as I love ASK results (depending on the type of query I perform.) It will be interesting to see how users react to the changes made to the results pages in the future. ASK had a great year in 2007, maybe they will be able to lure more users away from Google. Windows Live needs work, although they have began to focus more on their search product.
If we look to where the results were five years ago and to where they are in 2007, all of the engines have improved the relevancy of the results. This can only get better for the user. Our fun little poll is not meant to change your use of your search engine of choice, but it does point out that depending on the type of query you perform, Google may not always be the best search engine to use. Again it gets back to the query that you use, you intent, your past experience an a plethora of other factors that come into play.
As our friends to the south celebrate ThanksGiving and watch football, fans in Canada are getting ready for the football event of the year, the 2007 Grey Cup. The Canadian Football League's version of the SuperBowl is set to take place this Sunday in Toronto. The 95th Annual Grey Cup will be presented to either the Saskatchewan Roughriders or the Winnipeg Blue Bombers. This is very exciting for me as I am a long-time Rider fan. When I was looking for information about this year's Grey Cup, I went to my favorite search engine ASK and found some of the latest news about this year's event.
The game is sold out and unlike many of the SuperBowl's that take place should be an exciting game. Lenny Kravitz is the half-time entertainment which should be great. Unfortunately for Winnipeg fans their starting quarterback broke his arm and is out for the Championship game. It was funny watching a Thanksgiving repeat of David Letterman yesterday where he has Canadian Eugene Levy on as a guest. Levy was hilarious as they were making fun of the Canadian Football League because it only had eight teams and two of them (at the time of this taping) were named "Roughriders (as were both Saskatchewan's and Ottawa's teams at the time). Well make fun of the CFL all you want, the product on the field (with the exception of the officiating at times) is a very entertaining product. More so than the SuperBowl. Here's a look at past Grey Cup Champions:
Year
Winner
Loser
Score
1909
University of Toronto
Toronto Parkdale
26-6
1910
University of Toronto
Hamilton Tigers
16-7
1911
University of Toronto
Toronto Argonauts
14-7
1912
Hamilton Alerts
Toronto Argonauts
11-4
1913
Hamilton Tigers
Toronto Parkdale
44-2
1914
Toronto Argonauts
University of Toronto
14-2
1915
Hamilton Tigers
Toronto Rowing
13-7
1916
No game held (World War I)
1917
No game held (World War I)
1918
No game held (World War I)
1919
No game held (World War I)
1920
University of Toronto
Toronto Argonauts
16-3
1921
Toronto Argonauts
Edmonton Eskimos
23-0
1922
Queen's University
Edmonton Elks
13-1
1923
Queen's University
Regina Roughriders
54-0
1924
Queen's University
Toronto Balmy Beach
11-3
1925
Ottawa Senators
Winnipeg Tigers
24-1
1926
Ottawa Senators
University of Toronto
10-7
1927
Toronto Balmy Beach
Hamilton Tigers
9-6
1928
Hamilton Tigers
Regina Roughriders
30-0
1929
Hamilton Tigers
Regina Roughriders
14-3
1930
Toronto Balmy Beach
Regina Roughriders
11-6
1931
Montréal AAA
Regina Roughriders
22-0
1932
Hamilton Tigers
Regina Roughriders
25-6
1933
Toronto Argonauts
Sarnia Imperials
4-3
1934
Sarnia Imperials
Regina Roughriders
20-12
1935
Winnipeg Winnipegs
Hamilton Tigers
18-12
1936
Sarnia Imperials
Ottawa Rough Riders
26-20
1937
Toronto Argonauts
Winnipeg Blue Bombers
4-3
1938
Toronto Argonauts
Winnipeg Blue Bombers
30-7
1939
Winnipeg Blue Bombers
Ottawa Rough Riders
8-7
1940*
Ottawa Rough Riders
Toronto Balmy Beach
8-2
1940*
Ottawa Rough Riders
Toronto Balmy Beach
12-5
1941
Winnipeg Blue Bombers
Ottawa Rough Riders
18-16
1942
Toronto RCAF
Winnipeg RCAF
8-5
1943
Hamilton Wildcats
Winnipeg RCAF
23-14
1944
Sainte-Hyacinthe and Donnacona Navy
Hamilton Wildcats
7-6
1945
Toronto Argonauts
Winnipeg Blue Bombers
35-0
1946
Toronto Argonauts
Winnipeg Blue Bombers
28-6
1947
Toronto Argonauts
Winnipeg Blue Bombers
10-9
1948
Calgary Stampeders
Ottawa Rough Riders
12-7
1949
Montréal Alouettes
Calgary Stampeders
28-15
1950
Toronto Argonauts
Winnipeg Blue Bombers
13-0
1951
Ottawa Rough Riders
Saskatchewan Roughriders
21-14
1952
Toronto Argonauts
Edmonton Eskimos
21-11
1953
Hamilton Tiger-Cats
Winnipeg Blue Bombers
12-6
1954
Edmonton Eskimos
Montréal Alouettes
26-25
1955
Edmonton Eskimos
Montréal Alouettes
34-19
1956
Edmonton Eskimos
Montréal Alouettes
50-27
1957
Hamilton Tiger-Cats
Winnipeg Blue Bombers
32-7
1958
Winnipeg Blue Bombers
Hamilton Tiger-Cats
35-28
1959
Winnipeg Blue Bombers
Hamilton Tiger-Cats
21-7
1960
Ottawa Rough Riders
Edmonton Eskimos
16-6
1961
Winnipeg Blue Bombers
Hamilton Tiger-Cats
21-14
1962
Winnipeg Blue Bombers
Hamilton Tiger-Cats
28-27
1963
Hamilton Tiger-Cats
British Columbia Lions
21-10
1964
British Columbia Lions
Hamilton Tiger-Cats
34-24
1965
Hamilton Tiger-Cats
Winnipeg Blue Bombers
22-16
1966
Saskatchewan Roughriders
Ottawa Rough Riders
29-14
1967
Hamilton Tiger-Cats
Saskatchewan Roughriders
24-1
1968
Ottawa Rough Riders
Calgary Stampeders
24-21
1969
Ottawa Rough Riders
Saskatchewan Roughriders
29-11
1970
Montréal Alouettes
Calgary Stampeders
23-10
1971
Calgary Stampeders
Toronto Argonauts
14-11
1972
Hamilton Tiger-Cats
Saskatchewan Roughriders
13-10
1973
Ottawa Rough Riders
Edmonton Eskimos
22-18
1974
Montréal Alouettes
Edmonton Eskimos
20-7
1975
Edmonton Eskimos
Montréal Alouettes
9-8
1976
Ottawa Rough Riders
Saskatchewan Roughriders
23-20
1977
Montréal Alouettes
Edmonton Eskimos
41-6
1978
Edmonton Eskimos
Montréal Alouettes
20-13
1979
Edmonton Eskimos
Montréal Alouettes
17-9
1980
Edmonton Eskimos
Hamilton Tiger-Cats
48-10
1981
Edmonton Eskimos
Ottawa Rough Riders
26-23
1982
Edmonton Eskimos
Toronto Argonauts
32-16
1983
Toronto Argonauts
British Columbia Lions
18-17
1984
Winnipeg Blue Bombers
Hamilton Tiger-Cats
47-17
1985
British Columbia Lions
Hamilton Tiger-Cats
37-24
1986
Hamilton Tiger-Cats
Edmonton Eskimos
39-15
1987
Edmonton Eskimos
Toronto Argonauts
38-36
1988
Winnipeg Blue Bombers
British Columbia Lions
22-21
1989
Saskatchewan Roughriders
Hamilton Tiger-Cats
43-40
1990
Winnipeg Blue Bombers
Edmonton Eskimos
50-11
1991
Toronto Argonauts
Calgary Stampeders
36-21
1992
Calgary Stampeders
Winnipeg Blue Bombers
24-10
1993
Edmonton Eskimos
Winnipeg Blue Bombers
33-23
1994
British Columbia Lions
Baltimore CFLers
26-23
1995
Baltimore Stallions
Calgary Stampeders
37-20
1996
Toronto Argonauts
Edmonton Eskimos
43-37
1997
Toronto Argonauts
Saskatchewan Roughriders
47-23
1998
Calgary Stampeders
Hamilton Tiger-Cats
26-24
1999
Hamilton Tiger-Cats
Calgary Stampeders
32-21
2000
British Columbia Lions
Montréal Alouettes
28-26
2001
Calgary Stampeders
Winnipeg Blue Bombers
27-19
2002
Montréal Alouettes
Edmonton Eskimos
25-16
2003
Edmonton Eskimos
Montréal Alouettes
34-22
2004
Toronto Argonauts
British Columbia Lions
27-19
2005
Edmonton Eskimos
Montréal Alouettes
38-35
2006
British Columbia Lions
Montréal Alouettes
25-14
Saskatchewan has only won the Grey Cup twice so it is pretty exciting that they are 11 point favorites to win this year. The great thing is that in the CFL you can never count anybody out. Good luck to the Winnipeg Blue Bombers and the Saskatchewan Roughriders. I will leave you with this little poem entitled "Twas the Night Before Grey Cup" (Thanks Krista...)
Twas the night before Grey Cup, and all through the Dome,
Not a creature was stirring, but the gophers back home.
The players were nestled and snug in their beds,
While visions of Grey Cup Rings danced in their heads.
When out on the field, there arose such a clatter,
Kent sprang from his bed to see what was the matter,
Away to his window, he flew like a flash,
Threw aside the Green Curtains, and Silky White Sash.
And what did he see with his wondering eye?
But a sea of Green Revelers and a furry brown guy.
“That looks like Dominguez, and Flick and Fantuz!”
“Its way after curfew! Do they want us to lose??”
So, out of his room and down to the field,
Coach Austin stormed out with a fury to wield.
As he went through the tunnel, the ground shook with a beat,
From the dancing and prancing of ten thousand feet.
“Hey Coach,” cried a voice, “Whatcha doing down here?”
It was Szarka and Schultz, and they were handing out beer!
Chucky and Chick were grilling up Dogs,
With Burgers being served by O’Day and the Hogs.
Crandall cooked Hot Wings, Joseph grilled steak,
While Cates, Holmes, and Hughes helped Makowsky serve cake.
“This is nuts!” Austin shouted, “It’s one-thirty AM!”
“I expected some revelry, but this is mayhem!”
Eric Tillman tapped Austin, “ You’re not Eagle Keys -”
“But I’m not Berry, or Gotta, or Gregory – so PLEASE!”
“You’re all waddling around here like Wascana geese!”
“And in need of a dance coach like Donald Narcisse.”
“Now, you’ve all had your fun, so back to your rooms.”
But then Austin’s nose picked up the barbecue fumes.
Then Green Is The Color rang out through the air,
As Congi and Boreham played Banjos with flair.
On Davis, on Johnson, on Coach Ritchie Hall,
Even old Alex Smith flashed a smile after all,
On Lloyd, on McCullough, on Hunt and on Perry,
On Kornegay, Frazier, and yes, even Kerry.
The skydome then filled with a soft greenish glow,
And the whole Rider Nation set poised for a show.
An S and a wheat sheaf then formed in the air,
And a smile took the place of Coach Kent Austin’s glare.
Then everyone there, the players, the fans,
They formed a big circle by all holding hands,
Then right in the centre appeared the Grey Cup,
Which Fairholm and Ridway and Elgaard picked up.
They handed it over to Ritchie and Kent,
Who called Kerry and Eddie, and off the Cup went.
It was passed round the field, past heroes to present,
While Gainer dug holes for the Blue Bomber Pheasants.
That music was heard coast to coast people say
And they say Rider Pride grew three sizes that day.
Everyone left there dreaming of Blue Bomber doom.
And they sent all the Banjos to Troy Westwood’s Room.
GO RIDERS GO!
Editor's note: The reference to Troy Westwood and Banjos are result of comments he made a while back. As noted in Wikipedia
He is arguably most known for his tongue-in-cheek insult of the rival Saskatchewan Roughriders' fans by calling them "banjo-pickin' inbreds." He later followed that up with a faux apology saying he didn't think anyone in Saskatchewan was actually capable of playing a banjo. These quotes inspired the Banjo Bowl.
Westwood is also known for his Mullet which he has vowed not to cut until he wins the Grey Cup.
For those of you in the area, Enquiro will be conducting our first Open House here in Kelowna on Saturday, December 1, 2007. The Enquiro Open House is a chance to meet us and get a better idea of what we do with our usability research and our online marketing solutions.
We'll have free food and beverages. In addition we will have a few Q&A sessions and our Human Resources Manager will be there accepting resumes if you want to begin a career with Enquiro. I will also be a part of a panel with Manoj Jasra, and Kyle Grant that will be answering any and all questions on online marketing, SEO, PPC, Web Analytics, Social Media and other online marketing issues. It will be a lot of fun. Here are some of the specifics:
Who: Enquiro Search Solutions Inc. What: Open House Where: 300 – 1628 Dickson Ave. Kelowna B.C. (Landmark IV, 3 rd floor) When: Saturday December 1 st 10:00am – 2:00pm Why: To expose Enquiro's business to our community, educate local business owners and promote employment opportunities .
We will also being doing a draw for a Nintendo Wii, Kelowna Rockets Tickets, and other great prizes. We hope to see you there.
We get a lot of questions on URL structure and how it can affect search engine rankings. So we decided to discuss some of our thoughts on this topic. This is based on our experience with our own sites and with clients that we have worked with. The one single best piece of advice that I like to offer is to make your URLs user-friendly. Make them descriptive of the page and easy to remember (ie. shorter) so that they can engage the user to click through when they are presented on a search results page. Even after the user clicks through a well "optimized" URL may entice the user to bookmark the page and it will help them remember the page (as opposed to remembering a long dynamic string).
SEO Tips for URL Structure
The whole process of SEO is not to exploit search engine rankings, it's to promote the most relevant content (based on a given query) to the audience that seeks this content. One of the most often overlooked issues that can have a definite impact on your online marketing campaign from the organic side of things is URL structure. This is one of the most common things that we see wrong with a number of sites out there. The site owners or designers did not take time to carefully plan out their site's architecture. Instead they seek corrective measures after the fact. Here are a couple of SEO Tips when planning out your URL structure:
Avoid burying your content deep within your site. Use fewer folders, try to keep your important site content less than three or folders deep. If you don't treat your content as important why would you expect the search engines to?
Describe Your Content - to promote the theme of your site, where possible try to ensure that your URLs accurately reflect the page content.
Shorter URLs are better than longer ones for usability as they are more easily remembered.
Avoid use of numbers as opposed to using descriptive keywords. The exception may be incorporating the date into URL. Of course with blogs and archived data, many URLs tend to contain a number sequence reflective of a defined time period.
You can use underscores ("_") or hyphens ("-") but hyphens tend to look better and are preferred by many (some say the search engines even prefer the use of a hyphen over an underscore.
Sub-domains can be effective if you have the supporting content and "theme" to back them up.
Static URLs tend to be shorter and more effective than dynamic URLs. Search engines have been pretty forward in saying that they prefer static URLs.
URL structure is something that may take a lot of planning when launching a new site or contemplating a site re-design. Consider taxonomy and hierarchal structure, classification, and grouping. Shari Thurlow had a great piece on URL structure a while back.
She makes some great points:
The people who least understand issues with URL structure and SEO are the very people who create them: Web developers, programmers, and software developers. This is so true. Further you would think that these same people would be experts on using URL re-writers
It's pointless to optimize a Web page without giving search engines easy access to that page's content. Navigation schemes and URL structures often act as a stop sign to search engine indexing. I couldn't agree more.
In truth, search engines don't wish to crawl Web sites with too many parameters in the URL. Content management systems often generate problematic URLs. When selecting a content management system one of the first things that you may want to consider is if the URLs can be re-written in an effective manner.
Static-looking, shorter URLs are usually the easiest to remember. It doesn't take a brain surgeon to figure that out.
Proper URL structure is one of those items that can have a great impact on your site rankings in the long run. Conversely terrible URL structure can have an immediate negative impact on your search engine visibility. While it's not all about rankings, you still need to generate traffic to your website. Once that traffic arrives, one way that you can keep them there is by having easy-to-identify URLs. Trying to improve repeat visits to your site? You may want to examine your URL structure to see if there is room for improvement.
I have been waiting patiently for news as to when Canadians can expect to see the Apple iPhone in Canada. In fact I have even held off getting a new phone in hope of seeing the iPhone and/or Google gPhone product being released in Canada.
So I was researching for any news as to when we can expect to see the iPhone up here in Canada. I was surprised to see that there wasn't a whole lot of coverage on this. Is this because Canadians don't care about the iPhone, or is there just no information on the release date? Then I came across this:
Apparently Rogers will be selling the iPhone in Canada as of December 7th. Too bad, I refuse to deal with Rogers. Interestingly enough the folks at engadget.com came across the same ad. So if this rumor is true we can expect to pay $500 for the iPhone in Canada. Hmm, might just wait until Android is available on phones up here. Google's Android sure sounds more like my cup of tea anyway. The mobile market in Canada is a little out of sorts right now. As University of Ottawa Internet research chair Michael Geist points out:
a distinct lack of rivals in the Canadian cellphone business has let providers effectively monopolize pricing for accessing mobile Internet services, creating a situation where the companies can charge exceptionally high rates and refuse to offer unlimited data plans.
There's been a lot of discussion that the iPhone in Canada could cost users as much as $300 per month. Why is it that Canadians continue to get ripped off? (Speaking of ripped off, man have I got a story to tell you about Bombardier, but I'll save that for another time...).
comScore just released their October US search Rankings data. No surprise that Google increased market share in the US by 1.5%. Both Yahoo and Windows Live (Microsoft) has slight declines while ASK remained constant.
comScore Core Search Report* October 2007 Total U.S. – Home/Work/University Locations Source: comScore qSearch 2.0
Core Search Entity
Share of Searches (%)
Sep - 07
Oct -07
Point Change Oct-07 vs. Sep-07
Total Core Search
100.0%
100.0%
0.0
Google Sites
57.0%
58.5%
1.5
Yahoo! Sites
23.7%
22.9%
-0.8
Microsoft Sites
10.3%
9.7%
-0.6
Ask Network
4.7%
4.7%
0.0
Time Warner Network
4.3%
4.2%
-0.1
Of particular interest is the fact that ASK.com saw particularly strong growth, gaining nearly 23 percent in search query volume versus September.
comScore Expanded Search Query Report October 2007 Total U.S. – Home/Work/University Locations Source: comScore qSearch 2.0
Expanded Search Entity
Search Queries (MM)
Sep-07
Oct-07
Percent Change Oct-07 vs. Sep-07
Total Expanded Search
13,018
14,457
11.1%
Google Sites
6,593
7,468
13.3%
Google
5,388
6,184
14.8%
YouTube/All Other
1,205
1,284
6.5%
Yahoo! Sites
2,381
2,577
8.2%
Yahoo!
2,346
2,538
8.2%
All Other
35
39
11.4%
Microsoft Sites
999
1,044
4.5%
MSN-Windows Live
966
1,007
4.2%
Microsoft/All Other
33
37
12.1%
Time Warner Network
843
905
7.4%
AOL
397
433
9.1%
Mapquest/All Other
446
472
5.8%
Ask Network
445
493
10.8%
Ask.com
226
277
22.6%
MyWebSearch.com/ All Other
219
216
-1.4%
Fox Interactive Media
492
483
-1.8%
MySpace
483
475
-1.7%
All Other
9
8
-11.1%
eBay
445
472
6.1%
Craigslist.org
197
214
8.6%
Facebook.com
N/A
152
N/A
Amazon Sites
138
146
5.8%
The October report from comScore can be found here.
Earlier today, I was just checking some rankings in Google for Enquiro. I performed the query "jobs in kelowna" to see where our careers page was ranking... while I was logged into my Google account I received a job search function at the top of the organic results.... I tried a search for "jobs in seattle" and received similar results. I did not get these results when I was not logged into my Google account. This was something new to me. I had not seen this before.
Is this a new addition to personalized search results? As I mentioned I had not seen this before and thought that it was a pretty cool feature for users who where searching for job opportunities online.
Well as discussed in September during their Searchification Day, Microsoft finally launched their Webmaster Center tool. The tool, officially known as, Live Search Webmaster Center can be accessed here: http://webmaster.live.com
With Live Search Webmaster Center you can:
Drive More Traffic to Your Site by submitting your content to Live Search to drive more traffic to your website and more customers to your business
Enhance Your Website by using Microsoft products and services such as Virtual Earth Map and custom search engine
Find Technical Support via Microsoft and the Webmaster community
In order to set up Live Search Webmaster Center, you will need to have an MSN account (ie hotmail account).
How To Submit to Live Search Webmaster Center
You can submit a website address to Live Search to include in the Live Search index. Generally, if you follow their guidelines, you don't need to submit your URL to Live Search for MSNBot to find the site. However, if you search for your page URLs and your site does not appear in the Live Search results, you can submit your site to them.
Submitting your site doesn't guarantee that your site will be indexed, but it does help them locate your site so that MSNBot can try to crawl it. MSNBot doesn't automatically crawl sub-pages on your website. If you want MSNBot to index other pages on your website, submit URLs for those pages.
Once your site has been added and your XML sitemap is confirmed, you can view status in 6 different areas:
Site Summary – which includes website status, the last time your site was crawled by MSNbot, the number of pages indexed as well as your top 5 pages.
Profile – this is similar to Google Webmaster Tools where you can identify the address of your XML sitemap and have the verification option of using an XML file or adding at meta tag to your home page.. you can also specify the email address of your Webmaster.
Keywords – allows you to review how this page performs in search results against specific keywords. By entering in a key phrase, you can see your top pages pertaining to that key phrase.
Top Links From – examines your website’s outbound links (from your site). Communicates the 10 links that are performing the best in Live Search having received links from your site.
Top Links to - examines the Top 10 pages on your site that are experiencing the greatest success in terms of external links.
Sitemap – Allows you to provide the web address for your sitemap (sitemap being your XML version not your hmtl version although it appears that you can add that as well).
There is still a few bugs with the product, but I guess something is better than nothing. This product still does not touch Google Webmaster Tools but at least it's a start.
A few weeks ago we posted a piece on how GEO hosting may affect your SEO rankings. Well interestingly enough today as I was going through the Indexing Guideline for Microsoft's search product Live Search, I came across the following:
About hosting your site in a different market
You might host your site in a different location than your target market. Note that if your site is located in a different market, your site may rank much lower in your target market's search results than it does in your local market's search results.
Live Search uses information such as the website's IP address and the country or region code top-level domain to determine a website's market and country or region. You can alter this information to reflect the market that you want to target.
This is interesting as this is the first time that a search engine has admitted that GEO hosting may affect your rankings.
Well it's that time again for the SEO-Space Top 7 Search Stories for the month of November 2007. Last month, Yahoo's Search Assist topped our charts. Here is a look at some of the top search engine related stories from the past month.
There are always lots of rumors and such, but November was filled with talk of Google's mobile project (not the gPhone), various conferences (think adTech and BlogWorld), and of course discussion about Facebook.
#7. adTech New York took place - we posted a story about Yahoo about an interesting panel/SEE Workshop on a number of key SEO issues.
#5. BlogWorld Expo took place in Las Vegas - BlogWorld is the only industry-wide tradeshow, conference, and media event dedicated to promoting the dynamic industry of blogging and new media. In addition to the only industry-wide exhibition, BlogWorld featured the largest blogging conference in the world including more than 50 seminars, panel discussions and keynotes from iconic personalities on the leading-edge of online technology and internet-savvy business.
#4. Yahoo Launches New Social Network Kickstart - Surprisingly this didn't get as much press as it deserved. Yahoo Kickstart is an online social network that connects college students, graduates and alumni professionals on the job market. Sounds similar to the foundation of the product that became Facebook.
We want this blog to be a place for two way communication between Live Search and the webmaster community because we understand that SEO’s and webmasters need this kind of information and the tools we are building to keep their sites performing well.
#2. Facebook announces the launch of Facebook Ads - According to Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook Ads are essentially an ad platform for businesses to connect with users and target advertising to the exact audiences they want.
#1. Google's Big Announcement about Android and the Open Handset Alliance - Many were awaiting word of Google's Phone Project. Well Google did not announce the birth of the gPhone instead they announced the launch of Android a new operating system for mobile phones that Google envisions as being the foundation for many new phones that will create a new experience for users of mobile phones with new applications and capabilities.
That's been this kind of month that it has been for November 2007.
On Friday I had the pleasure of having a discussion (call it an interview if you would like) with the VP of The ILO Institute, Christian Hamilton about the role of social networks in the B2B arena. We discussed the viability of social networks as they pertain to B2B. In addition we discussed emerging B2B social networking sites.
We started off by discussing the fact that the B2B world has been slow to adapt to using social networking as a tool for business development. In fact, according to a Nov. 2006 B2B study by Knowledgestorm Inc. and Universal McCann, 77% of respondents have little or no interaction with social networks. B2B organizations have in fact been slow to adopt to using social networks. The reason for this? Many B2B site owners either do not see social networking playing a role in their business development or do not understand what an online social network is. In the online sense, a social network is an online community that creates an environment that enables a dialog between people to share information and values over the Internet.
So what is the role of social networking in the B2B arena? Well that depends on what your goals are. There are five main benefits for businesses to use social networking.
Social Network Benefits to the B2B World
Social Networks can be:
Used to create Brand Awareness
Used as an online reputation management tool
For Recruiting
Used to learn more about new technologies and competitors
Used as a lead gen tool to intercept potential prospects
There are some businesses and corporations that are currently leveraging social networks and online communities to their advantage. These corporations are using these communities to:
Create brand awareness through the release of things such as widgets
Create buzz about upcoming product releases
Using social networks to drive traffic to their online web properties where they hope to entice users to engage with their sites and their products or solutions
Some businesses are even creating their own social communities to encourage viral discussions about their products, and/or to act like a feedback mechanism about their product/service (for business improvements)
Many corporations are now beginning to use social networks such as Facebook and LinkedIn as tools for recruiting new talent. By creating Facebook Groups some HR departments are using social networks to obtain more insight into potential new hires.
The Future of Social Networking with B2B
Products such as Google’s Open Social may spark interest from the B2B crowd in social networking. OpenSocial is simply a set of programming standards that let developers create applications that can run on a wide range of social networking platforms. But more importantly, OpenSocial has the promise of letting regular people choose which social networks they want to run those applications on.
With an increase in user-generated content on the Web, the user (or consumer) is in control. As a result, traditional push marketing strategies will not work. Consumers want to be associated with friends and family.They want to frequent online "environments" where there is a certain amount of trust and interest shared by the community.
The Internet is a powerful tool for quickly reaching the masses.As a result, Social Networks will become more important for organizations to intercept their target markets.In the future, instead of many social networks there may be one large repository of social networks where users have one login and password to login to their network of choice.Similar to a personalized iGoogle page where users can drag and drop their preferred content of choice to their own page. The individual user will determine which "social network" they participate in.
While we might see some B2B organizations create their own online communities, social networking will become not an option but a necessity to understand the needs and wants of their prospects and clients. Establishing trust with users and generating brand awareness will force B2B companies to become more involved in social networking.
About the ILO Institute
The ILO Institute is a research-driven membership organization focused on helping large companies innovate. Their members come from every industry and include Walt Disney, Whirlpool, Dell Computer, Roche Pharmaceuticals, Kraft Foods, and about 60 others. The ILO Institute conducts research for their members on a wide variety of topics. The I L O Institute delivers member-directed research executed by a dedicated staff of analysts and research professionals, and offers highest-level dialogue on the real-world challenges of planning and executing innovation in large organizations.
For anyone living in Canada looking to purchase a new automobile you know that every time you visit a car dealership you end up bending over.... So for weeks now I have been wanting to write a post about this. You see for years now I have questioned the pricing of Canadian dealerships. I had figured out that (even with the exchange rate) when the Canadian dollar wasn't as strong as it is now, I figured out that the cost of a new automobile in the United States was much less than that of it's Canadian counterpart. So about two years ago I began looking into the option of purchasing a Toyota Tacoma pickup truck in the US.
In fact, right around this time a friend of mine did actually purchase the exact truck that I was considering. Now keeping in mind that at the time, the Canadian dollar was trading at about 30 cents less than it is today. I asked my friend how much he saved on his brand new Toyota Tacoma... his response "...about $8,000". I almost fell over. I knew that we were getting ripped off by the Canadian auto dealerships, just not that bad.
Here's a more recent example. A couple of my uncle's were in need of new ATV's (Quads for those of us here in Canada). In fact there was 4 of them each looking to purchase a new TV. As the story goes, instead of purchasing them in Canada, the four of them went south of the border. How much was their savings you ask? Well after all was said and done, they each purchased an ATV for roughly $6700. The same exact item in Canada would have been closer to $10 - $11, 000. Between the four of them they saved approximately a staggering $13-$14K.
Check this out, a 2008 Toyota Tacoma 4WD in Seattle is listed at $24,243.00. In Kelowna, BC, Canada the same truck is listed at $34,195.00 for a difference of $9,952. OUCH!!! and this is just off of the list price not factoring in the current exchange.
Now I'm not the only one who has done comparisons on Toyota products as Gord Hotchkiss (my boss) had an excellent post about Canadian Car Buyers Calling BS on Higher Prices on his blog. As taken from Gord's post:
Just today, I went to Toyota's Canadian website (toyota.ca) to see what a fully loaded Prius would cost, delivered and ready to drive. The price tag came to just over $41,000. The exact same vehicle, just across the border in Spokane, Washington? $28,000. And remember, that's $41,000 Canadian. If we calculate at current exchange rates, that's $44, 300. Everytime we buy a vehicle, Canadian's are getting screwed, in this case, to the tune of over $16,000.
Now, thanks to the transparency of the web (it took me about 4 minutes to figure out the extent to which Toyota was screwing us) Canadians figured out pretty quickly that we were being had, which lead to a flurry of cross border shopping. Suddenly, vehicles were flying off the lot, headed north for the border. The manufacturer's answer? Certainly not to consider a pricing change. No, they forbid US dealers to sell to Canadians. Of course, in today's world, for every wall you put up, a dozen holes are quickly rammed through it. The auto brokership business is thriving, thank you.
Gord goes on to say:
Now, as a Canadian, that makes me furious. There's no excuse for it. The media have started to pick up on this and there is some pressure on the manufacturers, all of which have remained stonily silent. I suspect that if the reverse were true, and American's were being fleeced out of $16,000 everytime they buy a vehicle, they'd be a little more responsive. I did hear Buzz Hargrove, spokesman for the Canadian Auto Workers Union, say that this wasn't about pricing, it was about keeping jobs in Canada by supporting the Canadian auto industry. What? Like the Canadian auto industry is supporting us by giving us clear, fair and transparent pricing? Buzz, you have your head up your ass. This is about not treating customers like a bunch of stupid sheep. It's about doing the right thing and valuing us. And if you can't do that, you don't deserve your jobs. I want Canada to be able to compete in a fair and open market place, not by slipping a fast one past your neighbours.
By the way, this is not just about cars. We're paying more for pretty much everything. If you're in Canada, pick up a book and see the Canadian price, relative to the American price. We're paying about 40% more. A friend of mine actually had some US cash with him and tried convincing the seller to give him the US price if he paid in US cash. It didn't work.
As Gord mentioned in closing, the customer isn't ignorant. We know when we're being screwed. We've been screwed by the auto dealers for years. It really is time for a number of consumers to get their heads out of their asses. This really is disgusting when you think about it. How long will Canadians stand for it? My money is that they won't. Great post Gord.
By the way, for anyone looking to purchase a Toyota from say Seattle, WA visit this site.
Most of us are familiar with Google Webmaster Tools and the great insight that it can provide Webmasters and Site Owners. Well Yahoo also has a tool albeit not as cool as Webmaster Tools that webmasters can use to help Yahoo crawlers do a better job of crawling their site(s).
Keep in mind that authenticating/authorizing a site using Yahoo Site Explorer has no effect on a site's status in Yahoo's Index or in Yahoo results. By authorizing the site in Yahoo, you are able to:
Start monitoring and managing the feeds you have submitted for that site.
See when the data was last refreshed by Yahoo crawlers.
Resubmit the feed to let Yahoo know that it has been updated.
Find out what subdomains from your site are known to Yahoo!.
Download all 1000 results into a tab-separated value (TSV) file at once (and avoid having to page through the results.)
Learn additional metadata about the URLs from your site in the Yahoo! index, such as language.
Delete URLs that you don't want indexed by Yahoo! Search. This can be useful for managing URLs that may no longer exist on your site but may still be around on the Web.
Of course submitting a Sitemap will help Yahoo crawlers do a better job of crawling the site. However it does not guarantee that the site pages will be included in the Yahoo Search Index as mentioned here:
I cam across a few posts this morning from the OMMA Video conference that took place in Hollywood, California yesterday. In an article by Eric sass at Online media Daily he reports,
"IT'S ANYONE'S game" in video advertising, according to Todd Stevens, the executive producer and co-founder of Expanded Books, speaking during a panel discussion on video production during the OMMA Video conference Wednesday. Stevens' fellow panelists said online ads are poised to disrupt the traditional TV ad business.
Well no kidding. Online ads are poised to disrupt the traditional TV ad buisiness? Uh, I have news for you, they already have. Online video is cheaper than traditional TV ads and has the ability to reach the entire globe. It was only a matter of time that online ads would transition from the Web to people's TV sets. However this may not be a trend that continues as advertisers look for better interception points to engage consumers. Not online with online video clips, but look for mobile advertising to include video that originated online. TV, like radio before it is becoming less popular with the masses. Don't think so? Well the fact that major networks are putting their shows online and that the amount of time spent online has increased dramatically the past ten years, TV viewership will continue to decline.
New technology makes online video an attractive outlet for many advertisers. You don't have to be a professional director to edit and submit a video to YouTube or Metacafe.
So for agencies who are looking to provide the best ads for their clients, you may want to remember that the users are in control. User generated content such as user generated videos are where it's at. Not storyboards for 30 second TV spots.... User generated content tends to be more creative anyway. Even the SuperBowl ads over recent years have been boring. (OK well there are a couple of entertaining ones, but they didn't make me want to go out and purchase their products... so how effective were they?) Online video and online advertising through video will continue to be a more effective way of intercepting target demographics. As placement of online video ads improves, so will the effectiveness of online ads.
For the traditional TV advertisers who do not like change, keep advertising on TV, keep spending your advertising dollars on expensive TV ads, just know that your competition is looking online, saving money on ad budgets and potentially reaching more prospective consumers. Advertisers quite often make the mistake of focusing on ROI when thy should be focusing on the end user, brand awareness and brand engagement.
Great post over at the Yahoo Search Blog where they shared a few helpful tips from the SEO Workshop panel held at adTech New York. Now for a lot of us, these tips are not new, but the fact that Yahoo is reassuring the masses about them makes us happy to know that we are on the right track towards making the Web a better place to visit.
The panel discussion revolved around five interesting areas including:
Spiderability and the ability for a spider to crawl and find your website pages. Including helpful site architecture tips to ensure that the search engine crawlers can find your site content. Think use of link based navigation and sitemaps submission in addition to ensuring that the prime content on your site is not more than 3 or 4 levels deep. It still amazes me the number of sites that bury their content deep within their sites. Sheesh will they ever learn?
Duplicate Content - there is no better way to sum it up than "Try to have one unique URL for one page of content. Doing so should help you steer clear of lowered rankings due to duplicate pages and content." "Nuff said.
Linking Strategies - these never get old. Tip of the day: Use descriptive anchor text when linking internally and externally. Use of contextual and descriptive anchor text can have a huge impact on site rankings. C'mon people think relevancy!!!
Fighting Spam - age old problem. For you black-hats and spammers out there, there are a ton of ways to detect spam. Spamming can get you penalized, so even though the site may be retained in the search engine index, rankings may be negatively impacted.
Blended Search, Social marketing, Behavioral Search, and Local Issues - ah one of my favorite topics. There were three great tips here including:
Adding multimedia content with different formats has been working well, like with videos ranking in video searches. This multiplies ranking opportunities. Makes sense.
Upload your videos to video service sites like YouTube, Yahoo! Video and MetaCafe for expanded results. Done!
Participating in vertical forums where sponsors answer questions can help build a reputation and create a relationship to sell products to your audience.
Thanks to the team at Yahoo for illustrating some of these helpful SEO tips.
Well Search Engine Land just got a great dose of SEO Vitamin C as Vanessa Fox joins their team as Features Editor. Many know Vanessa from her days at Google Webmaster Central (which is a tremendous product), but she left Google earlier this year to try some new things over at Zillow.
Good job Danny and the team over at Search Engine Land in acquiring Vanessa and a number of other recent additions to the team over there. Looking forward their contributions.
Business.com has made available a new whitepaper on B2B search marketing. The paper entitled, "2008 B2B Search Marketing Strategy Guide Advice From the Pros" is based on survey responses from 144 search marketing agencies that currently manage B2B clients. The whitepaper is free and include items such as:
Understand how B2B search marketing differs from B2C
Top 10 tips for improving B2B paid search campaigns
Top 10 tips for B2B SEO
B2B search marketing strategy checklist
In conjunction with the whitepaper, there is a comprehensive B2B search marketing agency directory. Did we mention that this B2B whitepaper was free?
It's no secret about our love for the ASK.com search engine. So we're happy to see reports that Barry Diller, Chairman and CEO of Interactive (IAC) hints that some further acquisitions may be coming for his company. As taken from an interview with AdAge:
Ad Age: The new slimmer, trimmer IAC has a lot of cash. What might you do with it?
Mr. Diller: [Laughs] Well, we're comfortable keeping it. It doesn't cry for spending. But classically, at least for us, cash is to be used to invest in our businesses, to acquire businesses and when we're finished with those, then we repatriate it to our shareholders. That's the purpose of cash. We want to keep good cash balances because we want to be ready for any opportunity. We're essentially opportunistic.
Ad Age: Are there sizes of acquisitions you'd rule out?
Mr. Diller: Never. We'd never rule anything out. ... I don't want to set the world up for surprises. We've tended to surprise people every year with something. So I hope there'll be a few more, but hopefully not shock.
Ad Age: There's still talk that Jeffrey Bewkes could break up Time Warner. Would you ever be interested in AOL?
Mr. Diller: We've talked over the years about our interest in AOL and never been able to get Time Warner to engage with us. I've always said AOL is great opportunity for somebody. When and if Warner doesn't want it, I'll certainly be at the door.
and when asked about ASK.com,
Ad Age: I can't let you go without asking about Ask. Are you happy with how Ask.com is doing?
Mr. Diller: We feel great. We've been able to grow queries second only to Google. We've increased retention, frequency. All the metrics for Ask are very good. Now we have a new five-year arrangement with Google on the sponsored listings that's going to be very, very remunerative to us. Ask is going to be able to continue to innovate. To me, anyone who uses Ask -- well, I can't say anyone, but I think enough people have said other than us that we've got a very good search-differentiated product from Google, Yahoo or Microsoft, which has all sorts of value-added ways to search that people like.
Sounds good to us. ASK is the coolest search engine out there offering a better user experience and a richer search experience. Can't wait to see what they have in store for 2008.
The other day we and about a zillion other blogs posted on the news of the week and possibly the news of the year about Google's move into the mobile space with Android and the Open Handset Alliance. We have been anxious to see what others are saying and have been reading various reports. We really do think that this is huge news. This is innovation happening as we speak ladies and gentleman. While we may not be able to comprehend the effects this will have on the mobile market and mobile marketing right now, expect to see the impact of this innovation to be around for many years. Ahhh technology is a beautiful thing isn't it?
So while there is currently no Google GPhone, there may never be one, or if you ask Google CEO Eric Schmidt there may be thousands of "Google Phones" in the near future. The announcement of the Alliance and the Android mobile software platform suggests that the mobile phone market is about to get more competitive which in this case is great for the user.
Tom Spring from PC World has a great post on "All you need to know about Google's Android" that we thought we would share in its entirety here:
All you need to know about Google's Android
For Android to succeed, Google will have to build a head of steam behind it, and get operators and application builders to accept it.
By Tom Spring, PC World
No Google phone exists yet, but the search giant's announcement of an open platform for mobile-phone apps is a step in the right direction. So when will we see the so-called Android phones from members of the newly founded Open Handset Alliance? We'll dig into those and more of the key questions surrounding Google's phone platform in this FAQ. Be sure to check back for updates as the story evolves.
Will a Google Phone ever be made?
Google's chair and CEO Eric Schmidt won't officially say. But Schmidt does say that if all goes as planned, we'll likely see many "Google phones" from a variety of wireless carriers. He also says that once software developers create a mature Android OS, it would be a prime time for Google to release a gPhone.
What has been announced so far?
The release of the Android platform and the launch of the Open Handset Alliance were the two most substantive news items to come out of Monday's press conference.
So what is this Android?
Android is a Linux-based mobile software platform that Google hopes will be the operating system of mobile phones in the future. It will compete with platforms such as Apple's OS X on the iPhone, the BlackBerry OS, Microsoft's Windows Mobile, and the Palm OS.
Google announced the Android platform along with other members of the Open Handset Alliance, a group of 34 hardware and software companies plus wireless carriers committed to creating open standards for mobile devices.
The Android platform, according to OHA, is free software available under the Apache open-source license. On November 12, a software developer's kit (SDK) will release to developers. This will be the first chance for people to see an early incarnation of the OS.
When will I be able to buy a Google-powered phone?
The first Android phones are expected to be available to consumers in the second half of 2008. The most likely candidates to release Google-powered phones are the wireless carriers that are part of OHA - T-Mobile and O2 in the UK, and Sprint Nextel and T-Mobile in the United States
HTC and Motorola, both members of OHA, will build phones for the Android platform. Forbes is reporting on an HTC-built OHA reference design code-named Dream featuring a touch screen that swivels to reveal a full keyboard. Apparently HTC is considering a commercial version of the phone and could release such a device as soon as the second half of 2008.
Will other carriers outside the OHA offer Android-based phones?
Don't hold your breath for carriers like Verizon and AT&T in the US, and Vodafone and Orange in the UK, to jump on the Android bandwagon. These carriers say they are worried that the open-software standards could expose users to software attacks or security breaches.
Beyond the security issues, wireless carriers have financial considerations, too. A cell phone that allowed customers to use any mobile Web application for free could threaten the revenue of carriers that charge customers for identical applications, such as access to e-mail, games, and GPS features.
How will Android phones differ from today's coolest smart phones?
Google says Android will have a browser capable of handling any type of Web content that a desktop computer's Web browser can handle. That design opens up a treasure trove of possible browser-based services already available to PC users, including contact management, document creation, GPS direction services, and VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) services.
Many of these services could be implemented today but aren't, largely due to the fact that wireless carriers currently offer basic browsers that restrict users to a walled garden of services.
Why is a Google mobile platform any better than an existing mobile OS from Palm or Microsoft?
In theory, software developers will be inspired to create mobile applications for Android, for two reasons. First, an open software architecture will allow software developers more flexibility in creating features.
Second, Android will break the stranglehold that wireless carriers have on bringing new and free applications to customers. Now smaller companies will have more of an incentive to build innovative mobile applications that otherwise might not have reached consumers because the companies lacked the clout to broker deals with wireless carriers.
Will service providers be able to lock down phones?
According to the Android open license agreement, anyone can modify the OS to suit their needs - including locking it down. Conceivably a carrier could place restrictions on applications, such as VoIP services that took advantage of a mobile phone's Wi-Fi capabilities. Being able to receive and initiate calls over VoIP for free on a handset could significantly impact a wireless carrier's monthly revenue.
While Google CEO Schmidt acknowledges that locking is possible, however, he said today that it would be "unlikely" for a carrier to actually do so.
with this "open platform" behind the phone, I'll be able to hack it and customise it anyway, right?
You've seen what has happened with the iPhone. With an open platform driving all Android phones, hackers should whip up something for any locked-down Android device even more easily. We'd bet that any sufficiently popular locked phones won't remain that way for long.
What will I be able to customize on an Android phone?
The Open Handset Alliance platform allows for customisation down to the screen you see when you open or turn on your phone. Imagine being able to customise your opening screen with personalised icons, news feeds, weather details, and voice-mail information. Think of a My Yahoo start page for your cell phone. Again, the amount of customisation will depend on the carrier.
What kinds of applications will we see?
Some companies have expressed an intention to develop location-aware services that, for instance, automatically link users to reviews of nearby restaurants. Other services might include a photo application that matches pictures automatically with people you select from your address book. Other applications could include a more robust offering of online real-time multiplayer games.
At Monday's press conference, when it came to applications, Google director of mobile platforms Andy Rubin promised the world, stressing that mobile programs would be on a par with apps that people know from the PC-based Web.
In late September the Canadian dollar had done something that it had not done in 31 years. It closed at above par with the US dollar. This is due to a number of things in addition to the weak American dollar as record high prices for oil, wheat, uranium nickel, zinc and other commodities have currency speculators rushing to invest in the Canadian Loonie.
CBC.ca has a great review of the history of our dollar. Many analysts agree that the loft Canadian dollar will have to drop at some point, but for right now Canadian consumers are enjoying the ride. Especially since a number of retails have been exposed for having over inflated their prices. Have you checked out US vs, CDN price of purchasing a book or magazine? For years the average CDN price has been anywhere from 15-40% higher than the US price.
Wanting to Subscribe to Wired Magazine
Heck I wanted to subscribe to Wired magazine but the rate for 12 issues in Canada is $40.00. The US rate is 12 issues for $10.00. (or 24 issues for $20). Shipping costs aside, would someone at Wired care to explain why the cost for Canadians is four times that of our friends to the south? Frankly I would like a free one year subscription to Wired just for pointing this out to them. With all of that extra revenue that they are making from my fellow Canadians I'm sure that they could afford it. If I hear back from anyone from Wired, I'll do a follow up post. Don't hold your breath.
Thanks to Barry Schwartz for posting this over at Search Engine Land yesterday. Google Webmaster Central Blog has posted some "advice" on how to make your site crawlable if you use AJAX and other Web 2.0 design features.
The use of Ajax from a design point of view is very cool, but from a search engine point of view is not very cool. If not implemented correctly, Ajax can be difficult for the search engines to index. So while you want to design your site for usability, without a visible presence in the search engines there will be no one to interact with the Ajax.
Google says that are working to better understand Javascript as it pertains to indexing of site content but suggests that it is still best to provide HTML links to your content. In addition, Google continues to emphasize that webmasters should create pages for users and not for the search engines. They make a great point that when designing your Ajax site, think about the needs of your users and those who may not be using a JavaScript-capable browser such as users of mobile devices.
Yesterday (November 6, 2007) Facebook unveiled their new Facebook Ads platform. According to Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook Ads are essentially an ad platform for businesses to connect with users and target advertising to the exact audiences they want. In the past we have discussed the business benefits of Facebook, this new ad platform takes it to a whole new level. They key to this ad platform? The users are in control. They decide if they will endorse or "evangelize" a brand and as a result their friends or family will be exposed the brand. As illustrated in a great post over at Advertising Age entitled Facebook's Big Ad Plan, there are really two parts to Facebook Ads:
The first part involves user-initiated recommendations of a brand: When people visit a business' Facebook page, they can choose to share their engagement with the brand (by becoming a "fan" or writing on the brand's "wall"). What this does is establish trust. If your friends or family recommend a brand, chances are you will add that brand to "one of the rungs on the ladder" for your consideration set.
The second part is the actual paid-advertising. Facebook will permit advertisers to attach an ad message to those user notifications. To do so, marketers make a Facebook ad buy targeting users by any number of traits users volunteer on their profiles, such as age, political leanings or interests and activities.
I think that Zuckerberg is bang on with the notion that a Pull strategy is going to be the way of the future in terms of advertising. So will Facebook Ads work for you? Well that depends on if you are willing to accept the fact that traditional push strategies are a thing of the past. The consumer is in control. This goes against what traditional marketing managers have done in the past. It's always been a push strategy. Push the brand to the potential consumer, push the product to the potentil consumer... it has become so bad that consumers tend to ignore much of the advertising that is presented to them. Thing of television ads. How many of you turn the channel when an ad comes on? How many run to the kitchen to grab a snack? How many people actually tune in and focus on the ad? Even in the online space, our research has shown that certain users still ignore sponsored listings in favor of organic listings. Others simply ignore sposnored ads because they treat them as unwanted advertising.
Today, Facebook Ads launched with three parts: a way for businesses to build pages on Facebook to connect with their audiences; an ad system that facilitates the spread of brand messages virally through Facebook Social Ads™; and an interface to gather insights into people’s activity on Facebook that marketers care about.
Here's what Facebook ads can do for you:
Advanced targeting allowing you to target your audience by age, gender, location, or interests.
Trusted referrals as you can attach friend-to-friend interaction about your business to your ads.
Content integration allowing the most relevant content to come to the surface.
Reach the right audience - Instead of creating an advertisement and hoping that it reaches the right customers, you can create a Facebook Social Ad and target it precisely to the audience you choose.
Top of Mind Awareness - Facebook Social Ads allow your businesses to become part of people's daily conversations.
Simplicity - Creating a Social Ad for Facebook is quick and easy. Simply write a creative, tell Facebook who you want seeing your ad, and decide where you want to drive traffic.
But What About Reputation Management?
Opening up advertising to the social masses can be a dangereous thing. You see it keeps business owner's honest. If your product/service is not what users expect it to be, you can bet that you are going to hear about it from users in social media outlets such as Facebook. We've all heard stories of dissatisfied customers who have gone on to blog about a negative experience with a product or brand. The end result that sales of that product plummet leaving the brand to do damage control. Point being is that if you want consumers to promote your brand or your product, you had better make sure that your product satisfies their needs. While the goal with Facebook ads is to promote your brand in a positive light, the social network can also be used to communicate negative experiences with your brand or product. Is that a risk that many companies want to take?
Let's not forget that in order for this to work, users need to share their purchase behavior with their friends and family. Not everybody is willing to do this. Will Facebook Ads work for you? Well Facebook Ads will work for any advertiser providing you put faith in the social masses to endorse your product and brand.
Sheesh, I must admit, Las Vegas is a great place for a conference. The city has an energy unlike any other that I have ever been to. The fact is that I love Las Vegas. So much so I was even married there last month (I live in British Columbia, Canada). So it is with great sadness that I will not be attending BlogWorld in Las Vegas nor will I be in attendance at PubCon Vegas next month. (I'll be at a Van Halen concert in Vancouver which is an ok trade off I guess... nah I'd rather be at PubCon in Vegas.)
So I've seen a few polls as to why or why not some may or may not be live blogging at BlogWorld. Lisa Barone over at Bruce Clay wrote a post with 5 reasons why she will be live blogging at BlogWorld so I thought that I would come up with my own top 5 list. Here are the top reasons why I won't be attending BlogWorld in Las Vegas.
#5. I believe in attending/studying from afar - not really, it just sounded good. #4. I didn't get invited - C'mon people, share the love, how about an invite to these things months in advance? #3. I didn't receive my Press Pass - what's a guy got to do to get a free press pass anyway? #2. I don't wear pajamas - word on the street is that there is a pajama party happening at the Hard Rock. #1. I heard that Mark Cubin likes to Dance - Mark is one of the keynote speakers at this years event.
Seriously though I do in fact wish that I could be there. This is one conference that sounds like it will be informative and fun.
One of the questions that I am often asked is in regards to geographic hosting and how that affects rankings in the search engines. For example, let's say your website is hosted in Canada, yet you want to target the United States. Does the fact that your site is hosted in a different country affect your rankings?
The answer is yes. At least right now this is how it works with the engines.
The question about server location and how it may impact SEO rankings of sites is an interesting question. We have actually asked the search engines this exact question and unfortunately they have not really provided us with a distinct, concrete answer as to the impact this will have on websites. However, here is what we do know:
At this time, it is always better to be hosted in the country that you wish to rank for (if you want to rank well in the UK, then ideally your site should be hosted in the UK). That's not to say that you won't do well in rankings, it just means that the search engines tend to equate relevance (to some degree) to sites hosted in that specific country.
Let's use the UK as an example. If you are looking to rank in the UK, the fact that you have a UK domain works in your favor (even if the site is hosted in the United States or Canada for example). The reason for this is that the search engines place a higher relevancy on the native country domain (ie. .ca sites may rank better in the Canadian version of the search engine than .coms providing that they are more relevant).
The location of the website host provides the search engine with information about the location of the business and as a result enables it to provide more relevant results based on location of searchers. The idea that a website hosted in London is more likely to be relevant to a person searching for a service in London than a website hosted in New York.
Google has stated that sites that are hosted in a location other than their primary country can run into problems. To what extent we're not exactly sure.
If we look at Google for example, there are ways to tell Google know the location of your site. The easiest way is setting the geographic target via Google Webmaster Tools. You can use this tool to let Google know the location of your site. If your domain is a location-specific TLD (such as .uk), Google will show you the country that your site is associated with but won't let you specify something different. However, if your domain is not country specific (such as a .com or .net), you can indicate the location of the site. Vanessa Fox posted an article on this a while back on Search Engine Land.
There has been a lot of discussion on this throughout the blogosphere and forums. Here's what a few people have said about the impact of GEO hosting and how they relate to search engine rankings:
The fact of the matter is, is that it is best to have your website hosted in the country that you want to rank in. The engines have a relevancy factor they use to accommodate users from countries so that they are served up the most relevant results. Ideally the engines should serve up the most relevant results regardless of where the most relevant site is for that search term.
Wow, it's been a busy day with search engine news with Google announcing news about their mobile phone project: Android and lots of news from IAC pertaining to ASK.com, Yahoo has launched Kickstart, an online social network that connects college students, graduates and alumni professionals on the job market. Yahoo Kickstartis a great place for you to contact with alumni and educational institutions that yo may have been a part of during you life. Check it out and look for my profile.
CNN Money is reporting that earlier today, IAC/InterActiveCorp. (IACI) has extended a deal with Google Inc. GOOG) to provide search advertising on its Internet properties, primarily the Ask.com search engine.
As taken from the report:
IAC Chief Executive Barry Diller said in a briefing Monday that the Google deal is worth in excess of $3.5 billion to IAC. The prior Google deal was slated to expire at the of the year.
The announcement came on a busy day for IAC, which also said it plans to split the company into five parts. Diller said the split has been under consideration since the summer, but disclosed few details of how the spun-off companies would be structured. The split leaves several of IAC's biggest assets, including the HSN home-shopping channel and Ticketmaster, as separate public companies.
In additional news, Barry Dillar has announced plans to split his company IAC into five separate entities with the core group being IAC (formerly Interactive Corp) which will contain ASK.com. The IAC group will contain Bloglines, Citysearch, IAC Advertising Solutions, Evite, Excite, iWon, Match.com and other major websites.
Well the big announcement from Google (GOOG) on their mobile product or "GPhone" has come and gone. Or has it? Earlier today and as I write this Google is announcing the coming of the Open Handset Alliance and Android. According to Google:
We hope Android will be the foundation for many new phones and will create an entirely new mobile experience for users, with new applications and new capabilities we can’t imagine today.
November 12 will see the release an early look at the Android Software Development Kit (SDK) to allow developers to build rich mobile applications.
Basically developers will be able to create their own "GPhone". There will be no single GPhone, there will be thousands of GPhones. Having a phone that you can do anything you want it to do. As a result costs will be lower and innovation will continue to push the envelope to what your mobile phone will do for you. Some features of Android include:
Android was built to be truly open.
Android does not differentiate between the phone's core applications and third-party applications.
With Android, a developer could build an application that enables users to view the location of their friends and be alerted when they are in the vicinity giving them a chance to connect.
Android provides access to a wide range of useful libraries and tools that can be used to build rich applications.
There were over 30 partners for Google on this mobile phone project including:
Motorola
Qualcomm
HTC
T-Mobile
This move by Google will definitely position Google as a leader in mobile advertising. The Search Giant continues to re-write and define advertising as we know it. This is very cool stuff. We have never before experienced such innovation from a single company as we have we Google. Their goal to make it easier to access the world's data is well under way. While many were actually expecting a phone looking similar to that of the iPhone, the Open Handset Alliance has provided the foundation for developers to basically create their own mobile product. Very cool indeed.
Next month, from December 4th to the 7th, search engine marketers, website optimizers, marketing executives, webmasters, affiliate managers, program and channel managers, purchasing agents and the like will be flocking to Las Vegas to attend the annual PubCon conference presented by Webmaster World. Topics this year include: Search, Web 2.0, Net Marketing, SEO/SEM, Affiliates, Domainers, Video, and Multimedia.
Keynotes this year include: Craig Newmark (Craigs List), Richard Rosenblatt (DemandMedia), Matt Cutts (Google). Of particular interest is a session with special Guest Host Guy Kawasaki will moderate the first ever PubCon evening session. This panel will feature an all star cast of search engine standards, including: Tim Mayer, Rahul Lahiri, Dan Boberg, Matt Cutts, and Eytan Seidman. If anything this will be the gem of the entire conference. Guy Kawasaki is an energetic speaker in his own right and the panel is jam packed with top search engine representatives.
Enquiro will be sending a few folks to the show in Vegas so be sure to say hello. I wish I was going but I will not be in attendance this year. (Too bad as I love Las Vegas having just been married their last month.) Not sure what I was thinking as I should have booked this conference a long time ago. This is really a top notch conference.
It's great to see that we're not the only ones who think that SEO fundamentals are still important to your online success. It is amazing to hear the number of clients who come to us and ask us why they are not ranking in Google. They are usually looking for some high level strategic consultation at this point. However, more often than not we do a quick review of their site or a full blown site audit and I would guess that seven out of ten are missing the SEO fundamentals such as optimized meta data, proper keyword density throughout the site and lack of unique content on the site.
Fact: It does not matter how large your company is, from small business to B2B organizations, the need for having SEO fundamentals in place forms the foundation for your online marketing campaign. At least from a natural or organic search perspective.
Lee Odden over at Online Marketing Blog had a great post on Search Engine Optimization Basics where he mentioned things such as:
Keyword research - generate a glossary of keyword phrases that addresses both prospect needs and the content you’re publishing.
Content creation plan
Keyword in alt text of images
HTML site maps listing links to all pages or top level categories on the site are still a good idea.
Anchor text of interlinking site pages should include relevant keywords
Avoid all Flash, all Ajax, iFrames or anything that makes it difficult for a search engine to find and understand site content
Avoid temporary (302) URL redirects. Use permanent redirects (301)
Of course there are many more best practices and SEO basics that every site owner should practice. Even as tactics and strategies change moving from meta data optimization to things such as video optimization, widget marketing and social media marketing, it is always a good idea to ensure that you have the SEO fundamentals in place before proceeding with more detailed strategies.
Again great job by Lee to put together a great list of search engine optimization basics.
I just attended a webcast with Seth Godin where Seth discussed the topic of his upcoming book: Meatball Sundae: Is Your Marketing Out of Sync? The webcast featured a presentation by Seth and was hosted by Kevin Ryan, VP and Global Content Director at Search Engine Strategies and Search Engine Watch.
Meatball Sundae explores 14 trends in an era when organizations are still mistakenly slapping "new marketing onto old" and end up with a lackluster Web presence. These 14 trends include:
Direct Communication - there is a trend towards an increase in direct communication between producers and consumers. More feedback mechanisms are appearing.
Amplifying the Voice of Individuals - power to the people. Everyone has become a critic. This can be a good thing. Viral is all the rage.
The Idea of having an Authentic Story - Seth mentioned the fact that there are scraps of material out there and the need for having an authentic story to tell.
Lack of Attention Span - have we trained people to have shorter attention spans? Seth reminisced about the fact that in the 40's commercials used to be 30 minutes long. Is the 30 second spot still an efficient way to educate potential prospects and consumers about your product and services? Just how successful are those Super Bowl commercials anyway? So long as the ads generate revenue, does it matter?
All About the Long-Tail - we've discussed the long-tail of SEO on numerous occasions. There is a definite trend towards long-tail and providing a choice for people.
Outsourcing - there is a definite trend towards outsourcing. Seth pointed out that "... it can be easier to change the manual than to change the people..."
Google and the Other Search Engines are "atomizing" the World - Seth also touched on the fact that bundling (all of your services) may not and does not always work.
Infinite Channels of Information - a.k.a. creating noise. I like to call this "touch points" or interception points. This creates the elimination of a bottleneck as you should build and create your own channels (and no I'm not talking about Yahoo Pipes)
Consumers Can Talk Directly to other Consumers - power to the people part two.
Shift in Scarcity and Abundance - stuff that used to be abundant is now scarce and vice versa.
Big Idea can reach a large number of people - a big idea is something that changes the world or the big idea's direct environment forever.
Shift of How Many to Who? - This is huge as "who" has become much more important than "How Many". Mass marketing is seeing a transformation.
Identification of who is wealthy and who is not - you cannot always predict who is who.
New Gatekeepers and No Gate Keepers - you'll have to read the book for more on this.
The Q&A session was pretty good and was actually extended (I have to leave the webcast at 2:00 EST so I missed the extended portion.) I did pose a question to Seth to get his thoughts on how Google OpenSocial will affect Facebook. His thoughts were that this is a brilliant move by Google that if done properly may take a lot of wind out of the Facebook sails. However it will not "kill Facebook", in fact if anything it will make Facebook even better.
I'm looking forward to receiving my book in the mail. Seth will be one of the keynotes at SES Chicago next month.
