Razworks Web Designer Sarasota and 3D animation

One of the easiest ways to grow a business is also one of the most overlooked. Many of us want the latest marketing strategies or traffic tricks to grow our business. But the truth is the easiest way to grow your business, without spending a penny, is hiding right under your nose. The answer is in the people who visit your web site…

Knowing your site visitors better than they know themselves is the easiest way to grow your business. The more you understand your site visitors the less marketing and strategies you need. Why…because every single thing your site says, does or offers will hit the sweet spot. You will say exactly what your site visitors want to hear in order to turn them into paying customers.

You see it is far easier to get prospects to buy from you and customers to keep buying, if you focus on providing them with exactly what they want to hear and to have. Anything that you put on your web site that does not speak to your site visitors’ fears, frustrations and desires is needless noise that is harming your conversion process.

Let me give you an example of what I mean…

You own a stall selling water in the desert (sounds strange but stick with me). You have a small sign on your stall that says “Quench Your Thirst With My Beautiful, Fresh, Cold Water – Only $1.” Along comes a passer by who is sweating buckets and clearly desperate for a glass of water. For a dollar he can have a glass from you. If he has the money – he’ll buy. Period.

Now let’s say the same guy comes along but instead of seeing the previous sign, your sign says “Sit Through My One Hour resentation On How I Built A Water Pump And Get A Glass Of Water At The End For Just 50 Cents – Half Off The Normal Price.” What do you think will happen? He may sit and wait, he may not. But now you have put up an obstacle that is stopping him from buying what he desperately wanted. And this, unfortunately, is what most web sites do. They try to be clever by putting in too much information or putting in obstacles that stop their site visitors from buying.

The bottom line: If you give your site visitors EXACTLY what they want at the right price – they will buy. Why wouldn’t they?

The good news is all the research has been done for you. Go to Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk and search for products similar to yours. Then read through the reviews of the products and start writing down the good and bad points in the reviews. Look for the commonalities. What are the majority of people saying they do, and do not, like about a product? Spend a little while doing this and very soon you’ll realize what potential buyers in your niche really want. Your job is then to explain to them on your site the positives/benefits that they get from buying your products or service (make sure this is true. If it isn’t – create or source a better product/service).

If your product or service is not on Amazon, then search the internet for “(product/service) forum.” A forum is like an online notice board where people can chat about the topic. So, if you sell something like car insurance, you would search for “car insurance forum.” Read what people do, and don’t, like and ensure your site hits all the positives!

Or, and it is beyond me why most companies don’t do this, ask your previous customers! Send them an email linking to a survey (use a survey like https://www.surveymonkey.com/ where they can fill in a short questionnaire about their desires and frustrations in the niche in return for a free gift of some kind (a discount on your products/services for example).

In my seven years online the most common mistake I have seen in failing sites is the owners believing they know what the customer really wants – when clearly they don’t. An example of this was a guy who was trying to sell luxury holidays as an affiliate. His site focused on nothing but the cheap price of the holidays in comparison to other luxury holiday web sites. The problem was if someone is looking to book a luxury holiday they’re not that bothered about price. They’re more bothered about the golden sand, clear blue sea, five star hotel etc etc. See the difference? You can think you know your customers wants and desires but until you have done some research you may just be guessing – and guessing wrong. And this can have a detrimental effect on your web site sales.

Stop thinking you know what your site visitors want and instead make sure you really know – then give it to them.

---

Jason Taylor is the owner of www.rapidprofitbooster.com where you can access a complimentary video seminar on how to earn more from your web site without increasing your traffic.

Post from: SiteProNews: Webmaster News & Resources

Using Amazon to Read Your Site Visitors’ Minds

The term brand reputation management has been around for some time now and, over the past year or so, more websites have explored the possibilities of getting away from the hackneyed SEO tag and have embraced the need for brand restoration and management as forms of modern business communications are far broader and personal than reacting to negative posts on Google.

A recent article on Mashable spoke with five companies, with each taking a different path to co-ordinating a company’s message on various media classes. Some media types work much better with personalised communications, such as Twitter, with personal customer interactions, suggestions, industry retweets, adventures, film and documentaries, while Facebook seems to lend itself towards more behind-the-scenes content, such as newsletters, Instagram posts, video links, magazine features, Google maps of store locations, product launches, books, customer photos, exclusive discounts for Facebook fans, news updates, etc.

So when we talk about brand reputation management it surely isn’t all about mere brand restoration from an unscrupulous business rival or dissatisfied customer. It goes much further than traditional SEO and the manipulation of search engine listings; this involves looking at all the major media channels and deciding what approach should be taken and how to achieve it.

In the Mashabale articles, they cited women’s apparel fashion designer Tory Burch as perhaps the best spokesperson on how to achieve this mix, when she opined that “social networks are not best used as a conduit to the brand’s marketing messages, but rather a place for “of the moment” and “off-the-cuff” comments that are “compelling”. Add to this the blog, YouTube promotional videos, Pinterest and Tumblr and you perhaps get to the point where the brand consultant brings scope and understanding of how these media types work to the table.

Social communications require a voice that lends itself to feeling a connection with the brand: they want the company to be approachable. But keeping the voice consistent and broadcast in tones relevant across a disparate range of media channels is challenging. But, in my view, that is the role of the brand consultant, not just knocking back comments that are negative.

Other considerations can be found in the approach and manner in which the brand voice is being dealt with. One of the worst cases of bad press is denial. Remember the affects on the company following the BP oil spill? This is a classic example of the press highlighting the inadequacy of management at addressing the issue. Later, they included an entire section on their website through admission of responsibility and steps they were taking to tackle the problem.

Social media does not take kindly to dishonest communication and denial of responsibility where a company is at fault. Instead they should admit their mistakes and speak directly with customers to reassure them that the problem is being rectified with good intent.

---

Article by John Sylvester. Brand Reputation Management is comprised of a professional team of writers, journalists and reputation management specialists with years of internet marketing experience.

Post from: SiteProNews: Webmaster News & Resources

Brand reputation management and the media channels

We’re better connected than we’ve ever been, but we’re not always connected. ApplicationCache lets users interact with their data even when they’re offline, but with great power come great gotchas. For instance, files always come from the ApplicationCache, even when the user is online. Oh, and in certain circumstances, a browser won’t know that that the online content has changed — causing the user to keep getting old content. And, oh yes, depending on how you cache your resources, non-cached resources may not load even when the user is online. Lanyrd’s Jake Archibald illuminates the hazards of ApplicationCache and shares strategies, techniques, and code workarounds to maximize the pleasure and minimize the pain for user and developer alike. All this, plus a demo. Dig in.

Browsers can do terrible things to type. If text is styled as bold or italic and the typeface family does not include a bold or italic font, browsers will compensate by trying to create bold and italic styles themselves. The results are an awkward mimicry of real type design, and can be especially atrocious with web fonts. Adobe’s Alan Stearns shares quick tips and techniques to ensure that your @font-face rules match the weight and styles of the fonts, and that you have a @font-face rule for every style your content uses. If you’re taking the time to choose a beautiful web font for your site, you owe it to yourself and your users to make certain you’re actually using the web font — and only the web font — to display your site’s content in all its glory.

For a while it’s been known that Google was about to consolidate its privacy policies into one large, all-encompassing policy. On 1st March 2012 these changes went into effect.

In a nutshell, what do the changes mean? Basically it means that Google will now share the data it stores for you between all their services. They won’t be sharing anything new with outside parties; just among Google’s many services. Google has been adamant these changes are only being made to make their products better than ever and display even more relevant content and advertising to each personal user.

Alma Whitten, Google’s Director of Privacy, wrote in a blog post recently:

“As you use our products one thing will be clear: it’s the same Google experience that you’re used to, with the same controls, and because we’re making these changes, over time we’ll be able to improve our products in ways that help our users get the most from the web.”

Alma outlined out 3 important points to keep in mind regarding these changes.

• Google’s Privacy Policy is now much easier to understand.

• Google’s Privacy Policy will enable them to build a better, more intuitive user experience across Google for signed-in users.

• Google’s privacy controls aren’t changing.

Pablo Chavez, Google’s Director of Public Policy also discussed in a January post five things that aren’t changing.

• Google will still keep your private information private — they’re not changing the visibility of any information you have stored with Google.

• Google will still allow you to do searches, watch videos on YouTube, get driving directions on Google Maps, and perform other tasks without signing into a Google Account.

• Google is still offering you choice and control through privacy tools like Google Dashboard and Ads Preferences Manager that help you understand and manage your data.

• Google still won’t sell your personal information to advertisers.

• Google is still offering data liberation if you’d prefer to close your Google Account and take your data elsewhere.

It must be said that Google did a fantastic job on trying to usher this in quietly. They hammered home that these changes are being made to simplify things. For most people this is good enough to satisfy them. The average person on the street might not know (or care) but there is no question that many people are concerned. The changes have drawn the attention of many privacy watchdogs. The Japanese and EU governments have also expressed concerns. A member the FairSearch Coalition (which is made up of Google competitors), sent a letter to the National Association of Attorneys General expressing concerns with the changes.

Privacy issues around Google’s past are only fueling the fire of controversy and adding strength to claims this is a huge deal. Stuff-ups like the recent story around Safari and the launch of Google Buzz a couple years ago have tended to stick in people’s heads.

But despite the warnings will the changes really affect you? Is it really as big an issue as some media are suggesting?

What you need to know is that Google is not collecting more information, just using it in a different way.

There is a huge misconception that Google will suddenly have access to information it didn’t have before. That is incorrect. In reality Google has always collected your data for all of its services. They’ve been using that data to personalize your experience already, and isn’t it a great service?

All that changes now is that data collected from your activity across their services, say between YouTube and Google Search, will be used to provide a further personalized experience across all of their products.

You Will be Tracked. No Matter What You Do

Up to today many tech experts have suggested you should clear your Google Web History to increase your privacy. But it’s become clear now that this is not going to stop Google from collecting your personal data. You can clear and stop the tracking of your activity, but you’ll only prevent Google using that collected data with your Google account, it won’t stop Google from tracking your web activity. Your searches will still be followed and stored on their servers, even if you’re not signed in. The information can still be used to build a profile about you and will allow Google to sell ads that are specifically tailored to you.

Is It Really a Big Deal?

Some privacy experts are outraged while others exclaim, “Who Cares?” Both are right.

Many think that this isn’t a big deal. Google is collecting the same information that it always has and it’s just being used now to improve the user’s experience. Who cares if the data is used for advertisements? You will always see ads, but now the advertisements will be closer to your interests. Google needs to make money from advertisements, so from my point of view they might as well be accurate.

On the other hand, privacy experts and lawmakers are up in arms about the policy. It is a gray area. The United States has very few laws about the collection, use, and distribution of user data.

The US Government has proposed a consumers ‘privacy bill of rights’ that will protect people, allowing them to decide what information is collected about them, and how this information is used. But as it stands no current laws can stop Google’s unified
privacy policy.

Can I Do Anything?

Well you can just stop using Google services… Good luck, in today’s world this would be almost impossible!

You can however, follow some simple tips to minimize how much data is collected about you, such as performing searches on Google without signing in.

---

Article by Karl Rooney, managing director of Online Expression.

Post from: SiteProNews: Webmaster News & Resources

Google’s Policy Changes – What Do They Mean for You?

Compiled By: OnlineUniversities.com

Post from: SiteProNews: Webmaster News & Resources

Ivy League Facebook-Off

How can you even begin to keep up with Facebook? As soon as you get used to their last changes, they spring something new on you. The latest is Facebook Timeline – it’s been forced on us without our consent! All fan pages now use the Timeline format. Well, stop your crying because this is a good thing and here’s why.

Timeline offers a lot more than the old format did. You can engage more easily with your customers and brand your business better. They’ve listened to our feedback and created something that’s all-around better.

The Cover

First, you’ll notice that at the top of your profile is a huge picture. This is your ‘cover.’ It’s the most powerful branding opportunity you have on Facebook. Don’t believe me? Look at Coca-Cola’s Timeline. Check out the New York Times’ profile. They’ve used their cover in a cool, creative way, and that’s what you can do too.

New and Improved Tabs

Remember those boring tabs on the left-hand side of the page? Actually, you might not because what’s to remember? Timeline offers ‘views.’ These are basically the same except that they are thumbnails instead of text. I smell another branding opportunity!

Control Your Posts

On the old profile format, whenever somebody posted on your wall, it appeared at the top. Whenever somebody came to your wall, they’d see whatever random thing somebody posted last. If you wrote a really cool post that you wanted people to see, it would get buried under all the new stuff. This is why I always advised people to backlink to their info, not their wall.

Timeline lets you control which posts are seen first. One way is the Starred Post feature. You ‘star’ a post and it stays on top. Another feature is the Weekly Pinned Post. You choose the week’s greatest hit and keep it there for all to see.

Multimedia Wall Posts

Did you ever try embedding a video on your wall with the old profile? You needed to basically be an amateur coder to do it. You had to use iFrame and it could be messy if you weren’t a pro at stuff like that. Timeline makes it as easy as copying and pasting to put multimedia on your wall. This includes videos, music, slideshows, testimonials, custom apps and just about anything else you want to slap up there.

PM Me ASAP

I mentioned better engagement with your fans. Well, Timeline lets your fans send you a private message. If they want to communicate through your page, they don’t have to post publicly or send a message to the admin’s profile. This may seem like a tiny change and it is really, but it has important consequences. You’re put in much more direct contact with your fans and if you use this to your advantage and communicate with them well, it can really help with your branding as the nice guy/gal.

Timeline is good, trust me. Once we all get used to it, we’ll realize that this is a change for the better for Internet marketers and business owners.

---

Toby Russell, Internet Marketer, Publisher & Property Investor offers tried and tested methods to help you succeed on line. “Top Internet Marketer Reveals His Secrets” – FREE MP3 Download plus my popular FREE step-by-step 94 page Special Report. Available at => http://www.startinternetmarketingonline.com

Post from: SiteProNews: Webmaster News & Resources

Facebook Timeline – Don’t Complain, It’s Good For Business

There is an epic battle being fought on the Internet between the mighty forces of the left-brain ‘analytarians’ (those who worship at the feet of the almighty Google analytics) and the upstart underdog right-brain creatives. Lines have been drawn in all out trench warfare leaving the under-manned creatives scrambling for evidence to back their claims of superior marketing influence and impact.

Woe is the plight of the poor creative who dares to challenge the influence of the Great & Powerful Google and its vast cadre of graduate math majors armed to the teeth with a dizzying array of numbers and statistics, all presented in pretty, colorful charts and graphs. Which side are you on: the left-brainers with their B52 size statistical bombs filled with numbers that can be interpreted in any way that suits their purpose like your morning astrological advice, or the lowly right-brainers only equipped with research papers from neurobiologists, psychologists, and various other social scientist types who actually study human behavior? This is war, and it’s a dirty business to be sure.

To The Victor Go The Spoils

Business is often described in terms of war strategy and to be sure the spoils do go to the winner, but like war, the winner is not always on the side of right, and by right I mean correct. But first a cautionary note: if you are looking for “The Seven Immutable Bulleted Points Guaranteed To Help You Find Your Marketing G-Spot,” you can forget it, that’s a secret I’m not prepared to divulge; however what I am prepared to do is tell you a story about a monkey, a monkey that will tell you more about the influence and impact of experiential Web video marketing than any reading of the analytic tea-leaves.

Jacob Braude, in an expert blog post on the ‘Fast Company’ website entitled “Mirror Neurons And Their Role In Marketing” writes about researchers who “implanted electrodes in the brain of a monkey in order to map which neurons controlled the monkey’s movements.” And like many important discoveries, serendipity followed, another argument for following the creative forces, but that’s a discussion for another time.

Ice Cream, You Scream, We All Scream For Ice Cream

Numbers are merely data, not information, they can only tell you part of the story, so to quote the famous Paul Harvey, “here’s the rest of the story.” One of the researchers decided to get an ice cream and when the monkey spotted the researcher eating his ice cream the electrodes lit-up like the giant Times Square Ball on New Years Eve. Eureka!

What the researchers discovered was something called “simulation,” a process where “mirror neurons… mirror in your brain an experience you see, hear, or read.” In other words, the monkey vicariously experienced eating an ice cream just by watching the researcher enjoying his ice cream – Holy Baskin Robbins – this is important stuff, at least if you want to learn what makes an effective marketing or advertising presentation. The conclusion: “your unconscious uses physical experiences to make sense of abstract ideas – even when you are only looking at the experience.” So here’s the secret marketing g-spot, I swore not to divulge: if your marketing initiatives, including Web videos, display ads, text content, etc. don’t provide a shared brain experience with your audience, you are not going to win the marketing battle no matter what the high priests of algorithmic scriptures divine to be gospel.

The Battle Continues

One of the major battlegrounds in marketing today is “engagement” how do you get your audience to connect with your company? It’s the basis for all the buzz (you say buzz, I say bunkum) surrounding social media. Every month a new tech-based social media solution emerges spawned by a group of math geeks and touted by the media as the next killer app destined to change the world. Few business people take the time to investigate fundamental science research into human nature but instead rely on rip and read journalism taken from the latest company press releases.

There’s a reason why people like to watch sports and porn (not you of course), it’s because the viewer is participating in the activity just by watching. Martin Lindstrom, author and marketing expert writes in a ‘Fast Company’ blog “Are You A Victim of Phantom Vibration Syndrome?” about his study on smoking: “Using fMRI we learned that something called Mirror Neurons are activated the moment a smoker sees another smoker lighting up. Mirror Neurons give credence to the old saying ‘Monkey See, Monkey Do.’ It’s a built-in mechanism connected to the empathy emotion, and it partly explains the popularity of sports and pornography. Both activities take us beyond observation, because in our brains we’re actually participating.”

Excite The Brain

Your marketing should excite the brain; if your Web video gets those mirror neurons popping then it’s done its job. It really doesn’t matter if they watch or read everything, what matters is that you made an impact, that they felt something, and whether they act right away or some time down the road is not the point. What matters is did they get it, did the video make an impression, did it engage their senses, because that is the goal.

Marketing Is Contextual Storytelling

Your marketing has to spin a yarn, create a fable, a legend. Apple Computer tells a fabulous story, much better than its competitors, and that’s why its customers are so loyal and why it’s the biggest market cap company on Wall Street. Facts are only tools designed to help you tell a story, and as the experts often repeat ‘a good story is a fact wrapped in an emotion.’ A good story provides context, it paints a picture that your audience can relate to and participate in. It’s what separates the marketing winners from the losers. It’s an approach that takes courage, patience and consistency; characteristics that are in short supply, leaving the field wide-open for those who dare to be creative.

The vast majority of business people will pick the number crunchers every time; it’s seemingly safe and has the appearance of logic backed by arithmetic, even if those numbers are misleading, and in truth tell a vastly different story than what appears on the surface. Only the forces of creativity can develop a marketing story that produces the kind of shared experience needed to motivate people to act.

Business Has Lost Its Mojo

The financial and personal pressure downloaded onto today’s entrepreneur combined with an exhausting continuous flow of misleading and contrary advice creates a business climate of fear and timidity. If success on the Web is based on anything, it’s the ability to be bold and creative in telling a story that makes your audience feel. It’s time to get your mojo back.

---

Jerry Bader is Senior Partner at MRPwebmedia, a website design and marketing firm that specializes in Web-video Marketing Campaigns and Video Websites. Visit http://www.mrpwebmedia.com, http://www.136words.com, and http://www.sonicpersonality.com. Contact at info@mrpwebmedia.com or telephone (905) 764-1246.

Post from: SiteProNews: Webmaster News & Resources

The Web’s Epic Marketing Battle: Analytics versus Creativity

Today I browsed through the 3,500 or so SEO questions people asked at Google and chose the most common ones to answer. I figured that, if so many people were seeking out answers for these SEO questions at Google, many of you may also be wondering the same things.

Unsurprisingly, many questions were along the line of “How do I get my site found in Google?” (Answer: Read everything the High Rankings website!) And sadly, there were tons of questions about Meta keywords, as if they had anything to do with SEO. But there were lots of specific questions that you may also have wondered about recently, from very basic things that we in the biz assume everyone already knows to what’s happening right now with Google’s latest algorithm changes. (I’m starting out with the more tricky technical ones. If those go over your head, please scroll down to the “On-page SEO Question” section.)

Let’s dig right in…

Technical Google Questions

Q. Can I recover from Google’s “Penguin Update”?

A. For those who don’t know, Penguin is the name of Google’s latest algorithm change that came out toward the end of April 2012. At this point, it’s too early to have had any Penguin recoveries. However, as with any Google update, of course you can recover from it as soon as you understand what it was that your site had (or didn’t have) that caused it to be nuked from the search results. From what I’ve seen so far, Penguin is simply an extension of Panda. Reading what I wrote in “Why SEO in All the Right Places No Longer Works” is a good place to start your recovery.

Q. How do we know about unnatural links to our website?

A. You can use backlink checker tools to find some of them. Or ask the jerk spammer company who purchased them for you.

Q. How do I find the number of pages of my site that Google has indexed?

A. The quickest and easiest way is via a “site:command” at Google. Go to the Google search box and type: site:example.com and hit the search button. You’ll then see at the top of the page: “About xx,xxx results.” That’s the approximate number of URLs from your site that they have indexed. You’ll be able to scroll through the first 1,000 results, but that’s about it. Please note that site:command isn’t 100% accurate and you may find vastly different results from one day to the next.

If you want to see how many pages Google has indexed that actually bring traffic to your website, SEOmoz had a post from 2010 that shows how to find that number in your Google Analytics. I’ve taken that a step further and created a custom report that does something similar.

Q. How often does Google update its search results? (Or another variation: How long does Google take to index pages?)

A. In the early days of Google, it could take up to a month for pages to get indexed. And the search results would shift once a month or so during what was called the “Google Dance.” Today, due to much more processing power and many different data centers, most existing sites see new pages getting indexed almost immediately. This in turn causes the search results to also change constantly. Even brand-new sites will often be indexed within a few days if they ping Google and/or have a few tweets that announce it.

Q. Can you have two domains for the same site?

A. You can have as many domains for the same site as you’d like. However, you typically want only one of those domains to be indexed by the search engines. Use 301-redirects to point to your main domain from your extra domains for best results.

Q. Can a web crawler find unlinked pages?

A. They do seem to manage to find them these days, so be sure to exclude them via your robots.txt page and/or through a robots=noindex tag.

Q. Does the canonical link need to go on every page of the website?

A. The canonical link element (aka rel=canonical) doesn’t necessarily need to be on any page of your site. But if there is a chance of pages having URLs that get appended one way or another with stuff that doesn’t change the content, it’s not a bad idea to use rel=canonical to ensure that Google indexes only the correct (main) URL. It will also pass all the link popularity to the main URL as well. All pages where the URLs may get appended should use rel=canonical.

Q. Will deleting duplicate content from my website get me ranked again?

A. If the duplicate content on your site was what caused you to somehow lose rankings, then yes. Just remember that it’s doubtful that your site was penalized for having duplicate content. What may have happened, however, is that you split the link popularity of your content between multiple URLs, which can definitely affect rankings. In which case, using rel=canonical as mentioned previously can help.

Q. How are search rankings affected by a domain name change?

A. If you 301-redirect the old domain to the new, tell Google about the new website address within your Google Webmaster Tools (GWMT) account, set up a new GWMT account for the new domain, and change as many of the old links to point to the new domain, your rankings and traffic shouldn’t be affected.

Q. If forum signature links can be seen only by members, does Google count them?

A. If the forum has set the Google spider to be a “guest” and not a “member” (which is the norm), then no, they can’t see the signatures and therefore can’t/won’t count them. That’s how we purposely have it set at the High Rankings Forum, but every forum has its own unique settings.

Q. What is the best for SEO: PHP or HTML?

A. By the time it gets to the browser, PHP is in HTML form, therefore they’re both the same as far as search engines and SEO are concerned.

Q. Why are tables bad for SEO?

A. They’re not. They’re perfectly fine for search engines and SEO, and always have been. See SEO Myth #3.

On-Page SEO Questions

Q. What are key phrases?

A. Key phrases are simply the words people type into a search engine to find relevant websites. They’re also known as keyword phrases, and sometimes just plain old keywords.

Q. What is a web copy?

A. Web copy is simply what you write on your website.

Q. What is the purpose of writing keywords in an article?

A. Because keywords are what people type into search engines to find relevant websites (or pages from websites), using them as part of the web copy in your articles and other pages helps them to be seen by Google as relevant for those key phrases. Without keywords within your content, the search engines have a hard time figuring out what your pages should show up for in the search results.

Q. How many words should I use in an article? (There were many variations of this, such as How many words should I use in my Meta description tag, or in a Title tag, etc.)

A. As many as you need to use to say what you need to say. Period. There is no magic number of words for those things, nor has there ever been despite what you may have read elsewhere. Great SEOs do not get hung up on numbers.

Q. Can you see the title tag?

A. You most certainly can. It’s typically what is shown at the top of your browser window (or tab) and also the clickable link to your page when it shows up in the search results.

Q. How important are title pages in SEO?

A. I believe they’re still the single most important on-page SEO element.

Q. Why is Google making up their own title tags?

A. Because they suck? (Oops, did I say that out loud?) I’m not a fan of them changing title tags in the search results, but changing them they are. From what I’ve seen, the changes are query-specific, meaning that on some keyword searches they’ll change the title and others they won’t. They seem to be more apt to change them if the titles are fairly long and if the exact search query isn’t contained within it. Sometimes they’ll change them to whatever is in your headline, if that’s more inline with the search query.

Why they do it is anyone’s guess, but my thought is that they believe that shorter titles (such as just a 3-word phrase) look better in the search results and show more relevancy. I don’t happen to agree and wish they wouldn’t do this, or would invent a tag that we could use to tell them not to mess with our title tags. The good news is that even though they may change some long titles, they still seem to index the entire contents of your real title tag.

Q. 10 ways why and why not to dissect frogs.

A. No idea, but that was an actual search query for my site!

And on that note…

If you have any SEO questions not addressed here, see if they’ve been posted at the High Rankings Forum or have been addressed in a past HRA post. If not, please send it in via my question form.

---

Jill Whalen is the CEO of High Rankings, an SEO Consulting company in the Boston, MA area since 1995. Follow her on Twitter @JillWhalen. If you learned from this article, be sure to invite your colleagues to sign up for the High Rankings Advisor SEO Newsletter so they can receive similar articles in the future!

Post from: SiteProNews: Webmaster News & Resources

Your Most Common SEO Questions Answered

You have a brand new IP address, maybe even several brand new IPs. Maybe you changed your email service provider, or maybe you just added a new IP address into your delivery stream. Whatever the reason for your brand-spanking new IPs, you are chomping at the bit send off your newsletter or product info to your subscriber list of a million plus names (or whatever). But hold the phone (or the email in this case). An ISP that is making a decision on whether your email should go to the inbox, the junk folder or blocked all together does not care that you need to send to your entire list NOW. Their primary concern and responsibility is to their subscribers and keeping spam from reaching them and/or overloading their own servers. With millions of emails coming into their severs every hour, they make this decision based on a multitude of factors. If they see an IP address with no previous sending history, that is sending a large volume of email, they have to assume it is the work of a spammer. Hey, if you look like a spammer, you probably are a spammer. So what is a legitimate mailer to do? Answer: Walk before you run.

Just like a toddler taking their first steps, a brand new IP address needs to first crawl, and then learn to walk before it can run. You need to prove to the ISPs that you are not a spammer. You need to show that you have legitimate email that is wanted, relevant and consistent. With a new IP address you want to start slowly with minimal volume and send to subscribers that will put your best foot forward – that is subscribers that respond to your emails through opens and clicks and are the least likely to report you as spam. Little by little you will increase your volume and add in subscribers that have interacted with your messages in the less recent past, until finally you are mailing to your entire list again. Each ISP has its own parameters for what volume it will accept and how soon, but below are some guidelines to help assure you will establish a good sending reputation and reach your desired volume as quickly as possible:

1. Pave the road: Establish whitelists and feedback loops before you start e-mailing. Update authentication records such as spf/SenderID and DKIM/DomainKeys.

2. Create a segment of active e-mail addresses from your current mailing list. These should be your best customers or responders. These should not be brand new addresses and not very old addresses unless they have had recent and consistent interaction of at least 2-3 clicks on campaigns in the last 30-60 days. These should be your most active and engaged subscribers.

3. Send messages that are relationship building in nature. The idea is to be non-intrusive or offensive. Offer incentives to clients to confirm their address with you or if they fill out a survey so that you can serve them better in the future, etc. Marketing messages are OK, but if they are used, they should be very relevant to the subscribers receiving them.

4. Monitor your delivery metrics. Ideally you want 95% or more inbox delivery. You should monitor:

a. Complaint Rates
b. Spam Trap Hits at Microsoft domains via SNDS
c. Hard and soft bounce rates
d. Inbox Delivery Reports (like Green Arrow Monitor)
e. Your IP Reputation f. Blacklists that your IP or URLs may be on

5. Ramp up volume slowly:

Week One: No more than 5,000-10,000 subscribers to each major ISP per day for a week. The idea here is to show a consistent volume of good, clean, wanted email. If you are a new sender and don’t have the volume for this each day, it is better to mail a small amount every day or two vs. just once a week.

Week Two: Assuming there were no major deliverability issues during the first week of sending, additional recipients (using the selection criteria from week 1) can be mailed to daily – doubling the volume after every 2-3 successful sending days of mailing. If the increase in size results in poor delivery , a second segment should be sent 48 hours later with refined selection criteria (e.g., signup in the last 60 days, that have opened within the last 14 days, clicks) until delivery rates to target ISPs reach a minimum 80% inbox delivery.

Week 3+: (Proceed to this step when delivery rates are good to target ISPs with 50K/day segment size)

If additional recipients are available using the selection criteria from week 1, these can continue to be added on an ongoing basis as available.

Two messages should be created at this point; one to the existing “week 1 and week 2″ segments, and one to a 10k-15K segment with expanded selection criteria (i.e. opens and clicks in the last 30-60 days. The “week 1 and week 2″ segment should be launched approx. 10-15 minutes prior to the smaller segment to ‘prime’ the IP; a complaint rate comparison between the segments will be used to guide segmentation strategy moving forward. A deliverability Inbox monitor tool like Green Arrow Monitor should be used with the smaller segment.

If successful delivery is achieved, the 10k-15k segment can be rolled into the “week 1″ segment for future campaigns, and an additional 10k-15k recipients based on the expanded selection criteria can be added daily, as long as Green Arrow Monitor continues to indicate delivery rates are not adversely affected.

If inbox delivery rates slip below 75% for several consecutive messages, list segments should be reverted to their state 3-4 days prior (or beyond, if necessary) until delivery rate improves.

This strategy should be repeated until regular segments reach 100k with at least 90% inbox.

Week 4+: (Proceed to this step when delivery rates are good to target ISPs with 100K/day segment size)

Our goal at this point is to achieve sustainable delivery to a growing list, without having to limit campaigns to more “static” lists. Signup processes should be refined such that the first several messages to new recipients generate complaint rates less than 4x the ongoing account average.

Data gathered during the course of the first two weeks’ mailings should be used to identify high-performing messages/offers from a recipient response standpoint (opens, clicks, lack of complaints – still not primarily focused on revenue), and these should be evaluated for inclusion in a “welcome” stream – a series of messages (approximately 3-7, sent daily or every other day) designed to elicit maximum positive response from new recipients and identify active recipients.

Regular account cleaning processes should be established. Depending on recipient response, subscribers who don’t open or click within an acceptable period should be identified via a search within the system and suppressed from messages or re-permissioned. Messages/offers in the “welcome” stream should be reevaluated vs. other offers to ensure optimal ongoing relevance.

If you want to reintroduce older recipients from before the signup process was improved, this may be done a small segment at a time – say no more than 10% of normal daily volume – and added to the welcome stream. Reintroducing recipients who signed up over 6 months prior and have no activity during the last 60 – 90 days is not recommended.

6. Keep putting your best foot forward

Once the warm-up period is over, you still need to maintain your good reputation. You can expand the criteria for selecting subscribers but maintain an active list. Only mail to subscribers that have opened or clicked on at least one message in the last 3-6 months, preferably more recently than that. Quality over quantity results in higher inbox delivery and higher conversion rates. Emailing to a large list of older, non-active subscribers to “see what sticks” may seem like a good approach, but your IP reputation will suffer and more email will end up in the junk mail folder or blocked, which means even your best customers may not ever see your email, resulting in fewer conversions.

This transition can take some time. How long depends on the size of your list and the results of delivery along the way. Remember, keep a close eye on the results of each mailing, paying particular attention to the major ISPs like AOL, yahoo, Hotmail and Gmail. Some ISPs like Yahoo may throttle your email and temporarily block your messages, so some adjustments in sending rates may be needed as volumes increase. If done properly, you should be able to get good inbox delivery as you increase volume. If you start to see any negative results, adjust your volume and/or segmentation accordingly as described above.

The IP ramp-up process takes planning and patience, but, if done properly it will be well worth the effort when you see a high inbox delivery rate and higher conversions. An experienced deliverability consultant can help you fine tune this process and provide specific recommendations based on your needs.

---

Article by Stacey Hammel. GreenArrow by DRH Internet is enterprise level and high volume email sending software capable of sending up to 1 million messages per hour from a single server. GreenArrow is state-of-the-art email delivery software, monitoring and consulting designed to maximize the deliverability of transactional and marketing emails. Visit them today at http://www.drh.net

Post from: SiteProNews: Webmaster News & Resources

Your New IPs Need to Learn to Walk Before They Run