SEO Moves Blog - Search Engine Optimisation » Online Marketing

A look at SEO in 2011

John — Thu, 02 Dec 2010 01:40:06 +0000

What does it mean to rank #1 on the major search engines in 2010 and beyond? Is it as important as being the “big dog” a few years ago? Or, as some believe, is it not quite as important as in the past?

Not too long ago, Wired magazine ran an article by Chris Anderson and Michael Wolff entitled “The Web is Dead, Long Live the Internet.” In the introduction to that article the authors write, “Two decades after its birth, the World Wide Web is in decline, as simpler, sleeker services – think apps – are less about the searching and more about the getting.”

If this is true, finding your way to the top of the search engines won’t be quite so crucial, in terms of business success. The authors note that people may spend their entire day on the Internet and never really search the Web. Specific apps for email, social sites, news and business resources make it unnecessary to type and search.

Anderson and Wolff urge the skeptics among us not to toss this off as “a trivial distinction.” They call the new model “semi-closed platforms” that use the Internet as a transportation device. But there is no basic need for a browser to display pages. The bottom line is it’s “a world Google can’t crawl.”

Conversions: Getting Them to Yes

John — Wed, 03 Nov 2010 04:37:21 +0000

When it comes to the idea of “conversions” and “converting” in online business we’re not talking about changing a PDF document to Word or a JPET image to GIF. With the technology available today there are online sites that will perform this service for you. But that’s not the conversion you should be interested in at this point.

We’re interested in is converting Web site visitors to leads that may mean a true increase in business. People have invested money in the pursuit of increased traffic to their Web sites but sometimes don’t go one step further and generate leads. This is the major step you need to take to have an effective Web site and to measure site effectiveness.

So many creative people step into the online world expecting great things from their Web site, their product or their service. But there is really only one way to measure success in this field and that’s through conversion. If you can move a solid percentage of your visitors into leads (then into customers) you are on the right track. Keys to this process are quality content, good design and the right call to action. Then it’s time to test and measure user data with such tools as heat maps.

A Social Media Checklist

John — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 09:41:15 +0000

If you were hoping that social media sites like Twitter and Facebook would blow over as a fad, then I’m sorry to disappoint you, but it isn’t happening any time soon. You can do amazing things with your brand, your traffic, and your sales by taking advantage of social media sites and making it easier on your site’s visitors to use social bookmarking tools like Digg.

You can even track social media success by using sites like SocialMention.com (see screen shot) to see how much buzz there is in the world of social media about your brand.

Sometimes you may want to have an all-out assertive social media campaign built around a new product launch or other big event, and other times you should keep on with a perpetual social media campaign to keep the drumbeat of your brand going in people’s minds. Social media is important enough that any webmaster should devote regular time and attention to it, just like any other aspect of business. Good use of social media (meaning no spam, ever) can make the difference between a site that has mediocre traffic and sales levels and a site that makes regular, solid progress in those areas. Don’t let your website be left out of the social media revolution.

Sell Online Using Google Docs and Google Checkout

John — Wed, 20 Jan 2010 08:10:14 +0000

Google has made it so you can set up an online store in just a few minutes. They have integrated Google Checkout with Google Docs (spreadsheets in particular) to allow creation of an online store. Google Checkout gives your customers a way to pay for goods or services, and you manage the inventory in a Google spreadsheet. You don’t have to do any tricky coding because there is a wizard that takes you through all the steps.

The first thing to do is sign up for Google Checkout. This is what you’ll use to process orders at your online store. Google Checkout (according to Google, anyway) can help attract leads, have higher conversion rates and protect yourself against fraudulent transactions. The first screen shot shows an example of some of the data you’ll enter to set up your Google Checkout account.

Next, list your products in a spreadsheet in Google Docs. This is where you manage your inventory. They have a template spreadsheet to use: just replace the example inventory with your own real inventory. Setting up the spreadsheet is covered in a step-by-step guide that takes you through all the steps.

Once you’ve done this, you will have a store gadget that you can embed anywhere you want: your blog, Google Sites, or your regular website. This process, too, has a step-by-step guide to help you. The second screen shot shows an example of what the embedded store gadget looks like.