CloudBurst Consulting

Gord Hotchkiss put up an excellent article profiling Google, and particularly Search Marketing, in the midst of the econolypse.  It’s true that while most advertising is being curtailed (and most business and consumer spend have slumped in general), people are still searching online and clicking on paid and organic listings at Google.  While the rest of the economy suffers, Google sees what can only be referred to as tremendous growth in these times.

“Despite one of the worst economic years in recent memory, Google showed 23% growth in revenues…The economy didn’t just slow down. It screeched to a halt.”

And a safe prediction:

“So, when we hit bottom and start climbing out of this economic black hole, search will have consolidated its position as the most accountable of marketing channels. It will form the basis of a new marketing model: consumer-driven, immediate, measurable, effective, interactive.”

As searching continues to increase, now is the time to maximize exposure in that channel.

Most of us have received unsolicited emails from online companies indicating they can get you on the first page of Google for a little amount of money no matter what the competitive pulse of your particular industry.

Only because Valentine’s Day is a few days away, I thought this would be appropriate to showcase that some online marketing companies are still a bit unscrupulous in their advertising and placement guarantees.  

I wouldn’t recommend taking advantage of this promotion until you review the following comments:

1.    No company can guarantee a “small initial investment” of $750 to get on “the first page of Google.”  But wait, here’s the catch …

2.    For the keyword phrase “Valentine gifts” there are actually 40,200,000 search results on Google – note that the advertisement indicates “Google – Singapore!”  If you had a U.S. company that was promoting gifts for Valentine’s Day, why would you want to be positioned on Google Singapore?

More than ever, creating good online visibility doesn’t happen overnight unless, of course, you have an unlimited budget and then we still wouldn’t put all the funds in one particular campaign.

Send traditional gifts such as flowers, cards and candy for Valentine’s Day but save your online marketing budget for a more realistic promotion! 

A possible new update to the way Google displays search results might break all of your website tracking software and statistics – are you prepared?

There’s been a backlash in the last couple of weeks against a possible update to the way Google displays search results and  Google has admitted to testing AJAX-formatted search results.

What is AJAX?  It’s a method of displaying web pages dynamically.  You’ve probably run across it all over the web.  An example of AJAX is in Gmail – when you click an email from the inbox, the message is brought up without reloading the entire page.

So, if they’re already using it all over the web, what’s the big deal?

It could completely remove anyone’s ability to track what keywords lead users to their website.  If you don’t know how users are finding your website, how can you know if what you’re doing is working, or what you’re missing?

While things are never as bad as they might seem, it’s important that you know the capabilities of your current website tracking software.  Do you already have Google Analytics installed?  Are you using an outdated website statistics program?  Have you registered your website with Google’s Webmaster Tools?  Can your current website statistics be upgraded to handle the upcoming changes?

Knowing what changes are coming and how to react is key with any major update the search engines put out.  It’s particularly crucial when an update like this comes along so that you don’t find yourself losing all info about how people find your website.

Is User-generated-content (UGC) taking over the Internet?  Thanks to the Web, when people want to complain, read or listen to others, they congregate online.  Remember when just a short time ago if you wanted to voice your opinion you had to attend a meeting or send a letter to the editor or place a phone call … no doubt, people are still doing that but the question is “why?”  All you have to do now is turn your computer on and join a blog.

Just recently, eMarketer estimates the number of UGC creators will grown from 83 million last year to 115 million in 2013!  If you think that’s amazing, they are estimating that from 116 million content consumers in 2008 will reach 155 in 2013.  Take a look at their recent prediction:

UGC_Consumers_2008_2013

Admittedly, it is a bit scary for companies to embrace user generated content, but let’s not forget that consumers are tired of having advertising pushed to them and so their attention is being pulled away from traditional avenues such as magazines, newspapers, etc. and on to the Internet where they can share the good, bad and ugly regarding a product or service.  It’s time for all companies to start paying attention to what your consumers and clients are saying about you and join in the conversation for the good of your business! 

Happy Websites, Sharing PageRank

PageRank: the name of Google’s system of assessing every web page a score, from 0-10, indicating that page’s importance.  Any score is good, and only sites like Wikipedia and CNN are unable to attain a 9/10 or 10/10.  So unlike with most other scales, a 5/10 or a 6/10 is very good.

A particular web page’s PageRank score has a lot to do with how many other websites link to it, and what the PageRank of those websites are.  The more high-quality websites that link back to yours, the higher your PageRank can be.

Do you know what your website’s PageRank is?  The Google Toolbar is a tool you can add to your website browser that displays the PageRank of every web page visited.

If you noticed your PageRank dropped this week for no apparent reason, don’t worry, Google is aware of the issue and it seems to be a side effect of some changes to their database.  According to one Google representative, things should be back to normal soon.

If you didn’t like what your PageRank was in the first place, there are proven methods to help increase a website’s PageRank.

[Image Credit: Felipe Micaroni Lalli]

One of the most fascinating and anticipated conventions of the year is the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas.  Interestingly enough, the Associated Press commented that “absolutely every device in our lives is becoming a computer connected to the Internet.”

Manufacturers are looking to embed computer chips with Internet connections into more and more unusual devices – take Sony, for example, who is introducing an Internet-connected alarm clock to wake you up with your favorite music videos and traffic forecasts!  A Taiwanese company, Asustek, developed a touch-screen computer that hangs on the wall.  And according to Jonney Shih, the chairman of Asustek, “everything in your house, even your bedroom mirror, will be a computer display.”  Hum … I wonder if it will be possible to use SEO tactics on a mirror?

The CEO of Netflix predicts “that the Web, a browser like Firefox, Chrome or IE, will be right on the television in the next couple of years.” 

Personally, I’m turning in my driver’s license when Intel starts selling their Smart Cars to the general public – I’m not sure I want to be on the highway when people are that connected!

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PGeAywC_wkM[/youtube]

The Lynx is Browsing

Google, Yahoo, MSN and all the rest send out little bits of automated software that scours the web, visiting any and all links they find to discover new web pages and keep their repositories of websites current.  These agents – more commonly referred to as crawlers, spiders or robots – don’t see websites the way a human eye does.  They can’t “see” and interpret images and video.  So what do they see?

Back in the days when the Internet was still text-only there was one browser that was most commonly used, called Lynx.  This browser is actually still around.  And you can use it to visit your website and see a reasonable facsimile of what a search engine sees when it visits your website.  In order to do this you’ll have to find and download a copy of Lynx for your computer.  You can get it for Windows or Mac and other systems.  If you’re not in the mood to download and install something, there is also an online tool that attempts to accomplish the same thing at Seebot.org.

Once you’ve got Lynx installed and running, you’ll have to press the letter ‘g’ on your keyboard for the address bar to appear (at the bottom), then type in your website’s URL and hit ‘enter.’  You navigate pages in Lynx with the arrow keys on your keyboard (no mouse support).  You’re probably seeing either a bunch of text or hardly anything at all depending on how graphical your website is.

If you don’t see everything or there is unformatted text all clumped together, then you’ve got some work to do.  If your website isn’t appearing as neatly-formatted paragraphs of copy with proper headlines, as in a newspaper, with links in horizontal or vertical lists, it’s probably going to be difficult for a search engine to decipher what it’s looking at either.

MarketingVox reports today that Twitter® has over 3 million active accounts. Increasing attention from marketers has meant that agencies face updating tweets on behalf of their clients, but trying to juggle multiple accounts and schedule tweets at different times is a real challenge to say the least.

BrightKit comes to the rescue with what is described as “the ultimate Twitter® toolbox”. I’m giving it a try (a trial account is free while the service is still in beta) and although pricing plans are yet to be announced, they promise it’ll be cheep.

What’s on your schedule starting on January 19th for the next six months? If you aren’t busy, would you be interested in working with Seth Godin, best-selling author and probably the most respected marketing mind in the online world?

If selected, you could spend the next 6 months with Seth and his team as an apprentice. So how can you take advantage of this opportunity? Well, for starters you have to convince him that you’re worthy of it and be willing to drop everything you’re doing.

So if you’re interested in learning from the best, keep in mind that the deadline for applications is December 14th – find out all the details here. Oh yes, one more thing, if you are selected, give me a call when you get back … I’d like to pick your brain 🙂

Many websites go into great detail about their business, its history, its services, its managers etc… We often encounter websites that go into great depth about who they are and we always point this out and recommend that the copy be re-focused.  The goal is to re-write the website’s copy to emphasize what its benefits are to its prospective users or customers.  That’s not far enough though.  Where possible, website copy needs to provide an actual benefit.  The site itself should serve some purpose.

Having useful info on your website can be as simple as providing tips or facts and figures, or even showing instructional How-To videos.  This can do more than establish a business as an authority.  It gives users more reasons to re-visit the website, spend more time on it each visit and share it with others.

This is a fundamental mistake a lot of companies make when transitioning to the web: they think of the Internet as just another piece of media on which to make a ‘buy.’  The internet represents an entire paradigm shift, though, from that of a ‘push’ mentality to that of a ‘pull’ mindset.  Your website’s #1 job is to engage your audience and give them something meaningful, not as another avenue for broadcasting bland corporate messages.

This is something that many businesses will struggle with for years to come, but those that embrace this fundamental change in their business communication now can be leaders in their field.

How does your website help its visitors?  Does it merely function as some digital version of a megaphone or does it provide something of substance?  We can optimize copy to target certain keywords all day and your website can rank as #1 for every keyword phrase you like, but if people don’t like it or have a reason to keep coming back or share it with others, is it worth it?  Will it be a successful tool in converting new business?

If it’s all about the bottom line, then it’s got to be all about the user.

[Photo credit: Russ Morris]