Windows Live Writer 2011

Posted on Jun 12, 2011 in Blogging | 0 comments

Google’s +1 Button

Posted on Jun 8, 2011 in Social Media | 0 comments

Google’s +1 button is now available for websites. The new button will influence the position of your web pages in Google’s search results. What exactly does this button do and how can you use it with your web pages?

What is Google’s +1 button?

The +1 button is Google’s answer to Facebook’s “Like” button. It is a button that you can add to your website.

When one of your website visitors clicks the +1 button, your website URL appears on the +1 tab on the user’s Google profile. Google wants website visitors to click on the +1 button when they find something interesting or recommendable.

What does Google do with the +1 clicks?

For people who are logged in to Google, their search result snippets might be annotated with the number of +1′s that the listed page has received.

If someone who is connected to you through your Google account (Gmail chat list, contacts, etc.) clicked the +1 button, then the name of the person might be listed next to the search result snippet.

Google also announced that the +1 button will influence the search rankings of a page. The number of +1 clicks and the person who clicks on your +1 buttons might influence the position of your pages.

As it is very likely that spammers will try to use the +1 button, Google will perform tests before the +1 button has a major influence on the search results.

According to Google, the number of +1 clicks can also influence the position of an AdWords ad for the page with the +1 button.

How can you add the Google +1 button to your web pages?

It is very easy to add the Google +1 button to your web pages. The button is available in different sizes and different formats.

You can view examples and instructions here: How to add the Google +1 button to your web pages

What is Google’s +1 button not?

The Google +1 button is not the same as the Google Buzz button. However, many sites have already replaced their old Google Buzz button with the new +1 button.

It is likely that Google Buzz functionality will also be added to +1. Google also announced analytics for the +1 button to show webmasters info on geography, demographics, content, and search impact.

Although Google’s +1 button does not have a major impact on the position of your web pages in Google’s search results yet, it does not hurt to add the button to your pages.

Google uses many different signals to specify the position of a web page in the search results. If you want to find out if your web pages have all the elements that are necessary to get high rankings on Google, analyze your web pages with IBP’s Top 10 Optimizer.

Social Media Marketing

Posted on May 18, 2011 in Facebook, Linkedin, Social Media, Twitter, You Tube | 0 comments

Social Media Marketing

Why you need a word junkie.

Posted on Mar 27, 2011 in Copy Writing, SEO | 0 comments

Why you need a word junkie.

Words manipulate, motivate, provoke, inform, intrigue and breathe life into your marketing objectives.

Not so long ago there was a misguided belief that words would be consigned to the bottom shelf in the marketing tool shed – shoved out by an insatiable appetite for graphic content. How wrong. The internet has changed all that. The power of words is more important than ever in marketing and branding. The talent of the skilled copywriter is back in demand.  If you want marketing with impact you should chose your copywriter carefully. You need a word junkie.

The secrets of copywriting for Search engine optimisation (SEO)

Take page ranking in search engines. Google loves words, but only the right kind of words. The words you use on your website are like carefully placed search engine tit-bits. Optimised copywriting balances every word and sentence to seduce robots into loving your content. But it’s not a trick, and you can’t just rattle it off.  Sometimes it takes days to get it right.

Google consumes your words verifying the content and context with an algorithm of increasing organic complexity. It’s an interrogation that’s based on your words not your pictures. Search engines love well written informative copy that’s carefully crafted. If you haven’t already sussed it, copywriting for search engine optimisation is a calculating and exacting discipline. You should invest in the best copywriters you can afford.

New sex technique is a cure for baldness.

Bet you want to read about it? It proves a simple point. Words get attention. Marketing copywriting is the art of button pressing and selective mental massage. Painting pictures in the mind to motivate and provoke. Great copywriting connects people with your product or service in enduring and dynamic ways. Your goal is to be first in the mind. Think great copy. You’re already thinking W.

Great copy motivates people to take action, tipping them towards a decision or impression. Your words should set you apart from everybody else. Great copywriting makes you memorable. ‘Advancement through technology’ may not be a winner, but ‘Vorsprung durch Technik’ is probably the best slogan in the world.

The copywriter’s goal should always be clear enduring communication. But just like a pallet with four colours and a blank canvass, the tools don’t make the artist.  Great copywriting is a dark art. A witches brew of creativity, psychology, manipulation and carefully crafted words.

In a cluttered world of mediocre lifeless text you need great copy that sells, motivates and energises your marketing. We can start doing that for you in just two words. Contact Us.

• Web & marketing copywriting
• Brand names and slogans

Google New Algorithim for Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)

Posted on Mar 22, 2011 in Internet Marketing, SEO, Web Traffic | 0 comments

On 24th Feb 2011, Google announced a major change in its search algorithm.

The Official Google Blog reports:

Here are three ways to make sure your website doesn’t suffer:

1. Content. Google has made it clear that you need plenty of unique content to rank highly in the search engines. If you are tempted to shortcut this process by duplicating reports or displaying automated news feeds this will put your website at risk of falling down the rankings. Also you need to resist the temptation to post shared content or just lifting content from other websites. You need to update your website frequently to keep your ranking.

2. Content Delivery. The ability to deliver content in a variety of ways has become very important recently. Consider video, social networking, audio or any other delivery method to get your marketing message out there. Facebook’s new page update is scoring highly in the new algorithm for unique content. Make sure you content is high quality and that you are presenting information that your visitors will view as valuable.

3. Engage and Interact with your prospects and clients. Try and use your website to interact with your visitors which will also help grow your mailing list. People by people as the old saying goes so get into frequent contact with your visitors so they get to know you better. The you interact the more they are likely to trust you and want to do business with you.

And for the technically minded make sure you pay attention to your title tags, headers and anchor text. If you don’t know how get in touch with your local SEO advisor – McKenzie-Thorpe.

Add Featured Image for your Post or Page in WordPress

Posted on Mar 17, 2011 in WordPress | 0 comments

A short video explaining how to add a featured image for your post or page in WordPress is available here.

This is another video in the tutorials contained in the Introduction to WordPress section here.

Twitter

Posted on Feb 14, 2011 in Twitter, WordPress | 0 comments

Twitter Tools is a plugin that creates a complete integration between your WordPress blog and your Twitter account. Get it here

WordPress – An Introduction to Using WordPress

Posted on Feb 14, 2011 in Blogging, WordPress | 0 comments

A series of video introductions to WordPress to help new users become confident in using this very popular blogging software.

• Introduction to WordPress
• Browsing and Configuring the Dashboard
• Managing Comments
• Managing Users, User Levels, and your Profile
• Managing, Adding and Configuring Pages
• Using the Media Library
• Managing and adding Links and Lind Categories
• Configuring your Settings
• Changing your Design
• Writing a Post

News Roundup

Posted on Feb 13, 2011 in E-Commerce, News Roundup, Software | 0 comments

E-books

According to the latest sales figures for Amazon.com, sales of e-books have overtaken paperbacks. Amazon US says it has sold 143 digital books for every 100 hardbacks in the last three months.

he pace of change is also accelerating. Amazon said that in the most recent four weeks, the rate reached 180 ebooks for every 100 hardbacks sold. Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon, said sales of the Kindle and ebooks had reached a “tipping point”, with five authors including Steig Larsson, the writer of Girl with a Dragon Tattoo, and Stephenie Meyer, who penned the Twilight series, each selling more than 500,000 digital books. Earlier this month, Hachette said that James Patterson had sold 1.1m ebooks to date.

Apple App Store

There have been 10 billion apps dowloaded from the Apple App Store since it launched in 2008. The downloads have been to the iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch, which is an impressive achievement, since it took the iTunes store nearly seven years to sell 10 billion music tracks.

Libre Office

If you don’t want to spend a fortune on Microsoft Office then maybe this fully featured FREE alternative will serve the same purpose.

Libre Office

Three of the programmes in the suite are obvious – Writer, Calc and Draw. The others – Impress, Math and Base are not so obvious. Impress is a presentation creator (like PowerPoint), Math is an equation editor and Base is a database compiler. There is also a built in PDF creator and the programmes will let you open and edit the majority of documents created in Microsoft Office, or any other office suite software.

More information can be found here www.libreoffice.org

Facebook Ads Get Half the Clicks of Network Banners

Posted on Feb 9, 2011 in Social Networking | 0 comments

Facebook apparently has some distance to cover before it achieves the utopian vision of social advertising. A new Webtrends report suggests the site’s paid promotions performed only half as well as network-driven banner ads in 2010. And it found Facebook.com ads delivered a lower average click-through rate last year compared to 2009, even though prices went up.

Webtrends’ research examined 11,000-plus Facebook ads to create a set of marketing benchmarks. According to the Portland, OR-based company, Facebook’s average click-through rate was 0.051 percent in 2010, down from 0.063 percent the year before. So for two straight years, the platform has come in below the industry standard of 0.1 percent for banner click-throughs. Cost per click was $0.27 (2009) and $0.49 (2010) for those years, according to Webtrends.

The researcher also studied demographics of viewers clicking ads vs. those who did not. It found that older consumers are more likely to click, as are people who didn’t attend college. Regardless of education level, people clicked more if an ad had a friend’s name appear at the bottom of the ad. Geography wasn’t much of a deciding factor with clicks unless the Facebook users resided in Hawaii, Wyoming, or North Dakota. Hawaiians clicked less often than any other state’s residents, while North Dakotans and Wyomingites brought in click-through rates that were double and triple the average.

In addition, Webtrends found that click-throughs for an ad decline by around 50 percent after it has run for two days. Once click-throughs drop below a certain threshold, Facebook stops serving the ad. But when marketers use the “friend-of-fan” targeting option, the report says, the ads “last two to three times as long” on the platform.

While click-throughs have long been an important online metric, marketers are naturally more interested in creating sales and brand engagement. And the promise for social advertising on Facebook’s platform revolves around friends affecting other friends’ purchase and interest behaviors.

Facebook last week launched “Sponsored Stories” ads, which let marketers utilize messages from their “likes” community for paid promotions on the site. The ads contain word-for-word Facebook user posts and his or her profile picture, while appearing in the right-hand column with other paid promotions on the website.

This article was written by Christopher Heine who is a staff writer for ClickZ News. His beats include social media, sports/entertainment marketing, retail, CPGs, and e-mail. Chris has been covering digital marketing since graduating from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln in 1999. You can follow him on Twitter at @ChrisClickZ.