A couple days ago Yahoo announced they are rolling out some changes to their crawling, indexing and ranking algorithms.  The update was expected to be completed fairly quickly.Did you notice any changes?

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Google is trying out a new method of distributing original material on the Web.
 
In September, Seth MacFarlane, creator of the TV show “Family Guy” will reveal a carefully guarded new project called “Seth MacFarlane’s Cavalcade of Cartoon Comedy.”

Unlike “Family Guy,” which is broadcast on Fox, this animation series will appear exclusively online.

Here is where Google comes in.  Google will syndicate the program using its AdSense advertising program, to thousands of Websites that are predetermined to be perfect for the target audience (young men).

Instead of placing the usual static ad on the Web page, Google will place a “Cavalcade” video clip.

Ads will be incorporated into the clips in varying ways. For example there may be “preroll” ads, which require viewers to sit through a TV-style commercial before getting to the video. Some advertisers may opt for a banner to be placed at the bottom of the video clip or a simple “brought to you by” note at the beginning.

Seth MacFarlane (who will receive a percentage of the ad revenue) has created a host of new characters to star in the series - which will run as 2 minute episodes.  There will be 50 episodes.

In an interview, MacFarlane described the installments as “animated versions of the one-frame cartoons you might see in The New Yorker, only edgier.”

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A recently compiled report from UK Based eConsultancy in conjunction with Clash-Media shows some interesting number.  Below are just a few highlights:

• Most companies view online lead generation as a growth area (94%), significantly up from 82% last year. This figure rises to 97% for both European (non-UK) and North American respondents.

• Company respondents (82%) and agency respondents (85%) are expecting online lead generation to be more important to their own or their clients’ organisations over the next 12 months

How Companies Generate Consumer Leads:

• Press (i.e. newspapers and magazines) is still the most commonly offline method to generate consumer leads (65% of organizations). Up from 61% in 2007.

• Natural search (79% of respondents)

• Email marketing (in-house lists) (75%)

• Paid search (71%)

Lead Generation Budgets and Measurement of Effectiveness

• A greater proportion of online lead generation budget is being spent on online (on average 53%) than offline (44%).

• Compared to 2007, PPC is getting a bigger proportion of online lead generation budgets even though natural search is perceived to be better value for money.

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Summer time slow down?

A lot of people think summer is slow and not the time to focus on their websites. 

So many people are out of town, some businesses slow down.  Not to mention we all have concerns about the economy right now.

I want to propose a different perspective.

1. People are sticking closer to home because of high gas prices.  You’ve all heard the term “Staycation” thrown around by the media.  If you watch the Daily Show with Jon Stewart you heard John Hodgeman (the PC guy from the commercials) create his own new word for the “stick closer to home because gas is way too expensive” phenomenon: “Holistays”. 

No matter what you call it, people are sticking closer to home.  People are shopping online even more. 

It’s a great time to offer a shipping special.  With the cost of shipping going up, again due to the cost of a gas, a shipping special is much appreciated right now.

You can tap into this situation by playing it up.  Just as The Daily Show created a segment that was funny and garnered a lot of attention; you can find a way to make the current situation work in your favor.

2. If things are a little slow, it is actually the perfect time to devote some of your time to your website. 

It is suggested that you review your website and refresh it at least once a year.  Just a  handful of  suggestions for you: 

• Now is a good time to check the links and pages within your site and make sure everything is in working order.  Get rid of those pesky 404 errors from broken links. 
• You could also come up with a summer special. 
• Jazz up the site. 
• Add some testimonials. 
• Look at your web stats and see if you can increase conversions.

3. Now is when you absolutely must start focusing on your upcoming holiday campaigns. 

No one wants to think about the fall and then winter and the holiday season, while enjoying the sun and probably some time off.  However as we all know,  time passes quickly and I hate to be the one to say it,  but holiday season will be upon us before we even know it. 

• Start planning your campaigns
• Write your ad copy
• Design your graphics

4.  Top rankings don’t happen over night.  It takes time for the engines to rank your site for your top keywords. 

It is not too soon to start your optimization in anticipation of the upcoming holiday season.

On the flip side; if summer is your busy time, you don’t want to ignore optimization now.  When the busy time settles down a bit, you want optimization in place to help bring in traffic to boost what would normally be a slower time for you in the fall.

No matter which way you look at it, and no matter when your busy time is, the truth is putting off optimization is never a good idea.  If you don’t need free targeted traffic from the search engines, then this won’t apply to you.

I don’t really know of any website that isn’t looking to increase traffic and get more sales though.

So take a look at getting your site optimized and prepare for the upcoming change in seasons.   You aren’t going to be happy if the holiday season approaches and you aren’t positioned to benefit from it.

For those reasons and more now is actually the perfect time to focus on your website’s growth and improvement.

For anyone that is ready to take action, we are here to help you.  To get the ball rolling and help you determine where you need to focus, simply call me at 562-592-5347 or email me at jennifer@ecombuffet.com and request a free consultation.

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There used to be a lot of hype about online press releases.  Recently it has died down a little bit.  We are still finding that it works well for clients.  But there are some very definite riles to follow.

When done properly press releases are a great way to generate publicity, drive traffic and boost search engine rankings.

The key to a successful press release is to have a clearly defined purpose.

Why are press releases important?

1. More consumers than ever are reading press releases online and consumers may be interested in a topic that the media may not be.  So, there are releases where the target audience is the consumer and then there are releases were the target audience is the media.  The releases targeted at the media are usually bigger news and more likely to be something that the media will run with and create an article out of.

2. Keep in mind there are journalists that have columns about websites; they cover what’s new, what’s hot, what’s popular on Blogs and sites.  So, something that may not have been newsworthy to the “regular” media may be considered newsworthy to these new crop of journalists.

You should start by defining your target audience.  Is this a story for the public, something that is potentially good for the mass media or something for the web reporters out there?

No matter who you target, your press releases really needs to be creative to catch the interest of the chosen audience. 

Press releases need to be stand out among a sea of thousands of other press releases that are being released every day.  So, you’ll need to create an interesting hook.  How do you do that? 

Ask yourself these questions:

• Who will care about what I’m saying and why will they care?  In other words what is the focus of the release, what is the part that will excited, anger, interest people?
• Is it something that is unique in your industry?
• What are the benefits of the product/service/news you are announcing? 
• Is there anything controversial about this?  If so, playing it up is a great way to get attention.

Next you’ll want to define your keywords for the release:

Doing keyword research will help you use keywords within the release that you know people are looking for. 

Next you will make sure that you write a compelling title.  Ideally it will include one of your keywords and it will pique the curiosity of people scanning headlines.

Since the launch of Google’s Universal Search and Blended Search from Yahoo, images are fast becoming another way to make your content stand out, so make sure you use an image with your press release.

It never hurts to have an SEO Firm take a look at your release. Have them go over your press release for any recommendations for better optimization.  A fresh set of eyes, especially ones that are specifically trained in optimizing content can go a long way in helping your press release be found in the search engines.

So, there you go – a quick lesson in press releases.

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My husband and I, and all of EcomBuffet have been supporting OperationJumpStart (operationjumpstart.org) for over 6 years.  OJS is a great mentoring organization that helps disadvantaged youth.   OJS is currently looking for new mentors and I am happy to share this opportunity with you.  If you are in the Long Beach area - or anywhere in LA or OC, and are looking to give back to the community OJS is the perfect way.  Network with other mentors, support your community and most importantly make a difference in the life of local kids.

For more details visit http://www.ecombuffet.com/Mentor2008.pdf

I don’t usually post anything other than SEO and marketing news, however it was worth making an exception.  Please check out the link above and contact OJS if you are looking to give back (and also get more than you can imagine - I’ve been a mentor myself - it’s a great experience)

- Jenn Horowitz, Director of Marketing

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“User 927″ is a new 90-minute play based on the search log of a real-life person.  The person’s identity is still unknown.  It has been said that the play continues the trend of integrating technology into the arts.

Personally I think it is brilliant and fascinating!

“It’s the world’s first play based on a search log,” director Michael Alltop said.

“User 927,” (being done in Philadelphia) is a blend of fact and fiction in the tale of a disappearance from a small Midwestern town.

The story’s central clue is the real life (bizarre) search log of an AOL subscriber — identified only as User 927 — that was released to the public two years ago.

It is a bizarre string of search terms, indeed: Dying Elmo. Mange. Human mold. White camellia.

Alltop said he was astonished when AOL intentionally released 19 million search requests made over three months by more than 650,000 subscribers.   The logs were released to help academic researchers, but they were quickly  posted on a public site and circulated after a Blogger discovered them.

AOL substituted numeric IDs for the subscribers’ real user names, there were enough clues for The New York Times and The Washington Post to track down two of the users and identify them by name.

The identity of User 927 is still unknown though.

Director Alltop was fascinated enough by that subscriber’s strange queries to commission a 90-minute play around the search log.

30-year-old writer Katharine Clark Gray (a friend of Alltop) created a story of a mother and her teenage daughter who move from Brooklyn, New York, to fictional Osterville, Indiana, in search of a simpler life.

Mom declares a techno-free summer (no internet!) Daughter Deena (14) sneaks off to the library and uses a computer there. With two friends she made online, Deena begins exploring an actual Web site that has copies of the AOL search logs (one of many created in the aftermath of the release).

Audience members see the queries on screens overhead as Deena and her friends dive into the logs, glimpsing the lives of some users.

The trio’s interest in User 927 was due to previous visitors to the site giving that log high ratings.

Their searches in the library become important later when someone from Osterville disappears.  Alltop doesn’t reveal who.

Fictional investigators in the play try to find the missing person by tracing User 927’s identity.

“This search log, to me, is a character,” Alltop said. “It’s like a guided tour through a polluted mind.”

Steve Jones, a communications professor at the University of Illinois in Chicago, sees validity in exploring whether you are what you seek.

He questions whether one’s personality can really be gleaned from one’s searches, noting that when retail sites like Amazon.com Inc. recommend products based on past queries, they are not always on the mark.

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Social Media, Social Networking, Leveraging Web 2.0 – it’s known by many names and it’s all the rage!

Let me start by saying I am a fan of social media, I personally choose to participate in social media.  However when you read about social media, you often only hear one side of things – the message is clear – Participate or miss out!  And while I do believe that is true, I think it’s not always that simple. 

There is so much to read, so many different opinions.   It can be overwhelming.  First you have to decide which sites to participate in and then you have to create your account and learn how to participate.  It’s often confusing. 

I am not saying this is an excuse not to participate.  In fact I am writing this article to provide some helpful tips so you can participate.  .

I think attention to the details is really important, so I want to cover all the small items that people aren’t really talking much about.

Facebook: 
I started on Facebook as a way to connect with old friends.  I had all kinds of games and the crazy apps (applications) that Facebook offers.  When I started networking for business I realized that all my business connections were going to have access to all of this personal information – photos, wall posts, they’d know which Sex and the City character I was most like (if you’ve spent any time on Facebook you’ve likely seen this app on people’s profile). 

I understand that using social media to open up and connect with people is one of the benefits.  Allowing prospective clients to get to know you helps build trust and relationships. 

But do I really want people to see every little silly app I mess around with?  Do I want them to see the crazy pics from high school that have been posted? 

Ultimately I decided to clean off some of the silliness that wasn’t really important to me and I left the rest.  I figured if I’m opening the door and letting people peek in, there is no point in censoring anything.  So I jumped in and started adding “Friends” that were business connections. 

Of course if you are only using Facebook for business, then you don’t have to think about these issues.  If you do plan to use it for both – just spend a few minutes thinking about what you do and don’t want to share. 

Twitter:
Make sure you think about what name is best for you.  I chose EcomBuffet (my company name) but have now realized that people are searching for me by my full name and not finding me.  I would have been better off choosing my name.  Not a major issue, but something to consider if you haven’t picked your name on Twitter yet.

There are varying opinions about how often you can Twitter (or tweet) and not annoy people.  Some people say once per hour, others say once a day.  There is no hard rule about this.  You do want to consider it carefully though.  If you tweet too often, people may get annoyed and stop following you all together, or just remove their cell phone updates.  That means when you have important updates, people aren’t going to get them at all or as quickly as they could have.  You want to find a balance.  For me, I have been tweeting about once a day.  On some days when I have more to share, I may tweet a few times day.  Every time you tweet, ask yourself if it is really information people will want to know.  If you are sure every tweet is useful and serves a purpose then you can tweet a little more often.  If it’s fluff and all self-promotional, then you should probably do it less (or not all some may say). 

Social bookmarking buttons
There are so many buttons you can add to your articles for people to bookmark or vote for your content.  Digg, StumbleUpon, RSS Feeds, TwitThis etc – My concern is that we are adding so many different options and people become so accustomed to seeing them that they ignore them.  And with so many buttons people may get confused  and just ignore them.  I don’t know what the solution is for this yet.  I previously wasn’t using any of these buttons.  I realize I am missing out because of that, so I am now going to selectively use them.  I don’t have a perfect plan in mind, I am just going to play with using some of the more popular ones and see what happens. 

MySpace versus Facebook
There is a lot of confusion about the MySpace versus Facebook issue.  The general consensus is that MySpace has been trashed and isn’t worth the time.  That isn’t entirely true.  There are still people making money off MySpace.  The key to remember is that MySpace is a younger crowd with a lower income and Facebook has a higher income and is older.  The best thing you can do is study both – see what others in your industry are doing, see how you see yourself fitting in and most importantly, come up with a plan.  So many people just jump in and set up a profile and then don’t know what to do next.  Just being there doesn’t mean the money is going to pour in. You need to engage people, you need to come up with something that people will want to see, hear or read. 

Is it too late to join now?
The answer is no!  Studies show that most of the social media sites are growing in popularity and traffic and participation is increasing month over month.  Just remember, the rules change as these sites evolve, so be sure you are current on what is and isn’t acceptable participation. 

Check it out; see how you think you can fit into the space.  But remember its not all about how you will benefit.  If you don’t have something to offer (information, resources, insights, news etc) then people aren’t going to be interested.

How does all of this really help me make money?
Consumers are much more educated and demand much more than they used to.  We are all hit with so many sales messages daily; we start to tune them out.  What used to work doesn’t work (or at least not as well).  In order for your business to succeed and grow, you need to adapt. 

People are looking for more information and companies they can trust.  Selling has become more about creating trust and building relationships. 

Social media helps you connect and establish trust.  Any one social media activity may not lead directly to a sale in any given moment, but it helps you establish a presence online; and in your prospects mind.   If you get yourself out there and share information, you will increase your following and have a base of people that trust you that you can market to.

That covers it for now.  Keep the questions coming in!

About The Author: Jennifer Horowitz is the Director of Marketing for www.EcomBuffet.com. Over the past 10 years Jennifer’s expertise in marketing and Search Engine Optimization (SEO) has helped clients increase revenue. Jennifer has written a downloadable book on SEO and has been published in many SEO and marketing publications.  Jennifer is the editor of the popular Spotlight on Success: SEO and Marketing newsletter.  Follow Jennifer and stay current on SEO, marketing, social media and more.  http://twitter.com/EcomBuffet

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SEO is the foundation of your marketing campaign – at least it should be.  Aside from any other marketing that you participate in, you should also make sure your site is ranked in the top of the engines so you can tap into the millions (actually over 400 million) searches performed daily.

So, how do you pick an SEO Firm?  It is a very important decision.

I was talking to a man recently who told me the problem was he didn’t even know what questions to ask, let alone how to evaluate the answers. 

Here is some guidance on what to ask and what to expect in response.

Do you have any initial or set up fees? How much and what are they for? Are there ongoing fees and how much are they?
They should be able to outline all fees and tell you exactly what is included.  Different firms price things differently.  If they require full payment up front, that may concern me.  Most firms will require some payment up front, and that is to be expected.  You need to look at what they are proposing, make sure it is clear to you and make sure you are OK with it.

Is monthly maintenance necessary?
Any SEO Firm that knows what they are talking about should tell you that maintenance and monitoring of rankings is required to ensure you don’t start losing rankings. If they tell you that you will lose rankings as soon as you leave them, they are lying—or more accurately they are just guessing. They don’t really know for sure. However experience shows us that rankings do tend to maintain until the next major algorithm shift and then if no one is maintaining them for you, they may begin to drop.  SEO is not the kind of thing you do once and then you are done.  To maintain and hopefully even increase your rankings, you need to have someone continually working on your behalf.  Alternatively, you could learn to handle some of the maintenance items yourself.  But the key is to realize that someone needs to monitor your rankings and work on your site in order to hold on to your top rankings and grow them.  Don’t forget the engines themselves reported that approximately 25% of searches each month are never before seen phrases.  So, at the very least you’ll want to monitor what new phrases are popping up and make sure you are getting exposure for them.

How long is my term of service?
Typically you should hear anywhere from 3—12 months. Anything less than 3 months isn’t long enough to see any matured results. Six months seems to be the industry standard middle ground. With six months you aren’t locked in too long, but it does allow time for the campaign to mature.

Do you offer a Guarantee?
Contrary to popular belief, guarantees aren’t all bad. You just have to make sure you aren’t being promised something that no one can actually deliver.

• Top rankings in less than 30 days? Not likely.
• Guaranteed amount of site visitors or conversions?  With regular SEO and no other services no SEO Firm can guarantee the precise number of visitors or the conversion rates.
• If you are told you will get rankings on a precise keyword within a precise amount of time, that just isn’t possible unless they are doing PPC or have magic fairy dust.

The kind of guarantee that is safe is the kind where the company states they don’t control the engines and can’t predict exact timeframes but they will not stop working until they have delivered what they promised (ex: 20 rankings within the top 20 for 6 months—so they may have to work 8 or 9 months of real time to deliver the full 6 months of “guaranteed” time.)  This offers you protection but it’s also honest and lets you know that the Firm does not control the engines.

Do I own the work you do for me? Where does it reside?
The answers should be: yes you own the work (once it is paid for in full) and it resides on your server.  If they are hosting content on another server or another domain, you want to think twice before getting involved. 

Do you provide regular reports and how often are they provided?
You should be provided reports once a month to show the results and your site’s rankings.

When will I start seeing results?
That is a question that varies from site to site. Your site’s history and competitiveness of the industry are big factors and the SEO firm should try to answer honestly considering what they know about your site. Any blanket statement is just a guess. They could also tell you their average time for other clients and that is a good indicator of what you could expect.

What engines do you submit to?
This could change as things in the industry change.  Basically you’ll want to look at the list of engines they give you and make sure you have heard of them all.  Most Firms focus on the Big 3 (Google, Yahoo! and MSN) and then about 6 or so other engines.

What about past results? Do you provide references and testimonials?
The answer should be YES! They should be happy to show off past results. 

What techniques do you use to optimize my site?
An ethical SEO Firm will focus on content and on-page optimization as the foundation. They should also look at whether you are in need of links and may include linking as part of their strategy.  More people tend to get links on their own, but they don’t focus on the on-page portion, so maybe all you need is the on-page work.  The SEO Firm should evaluate that and let you know what your specific needs are. 

They shouldn’t hide any text or code on your site, and they should be willing to explain every step of their process and not want to hide any information from you.

If they tell you they have a special relationship with Google, or proprietary techniques that should be a warning sign to you.

Do I have access to anyone on your staff, so I receive personalized service and can ask questions at anytime?
The answer should be yes. SEO can be confusing and you need a Firm that will work FOR you and WITH you.

Any SEO Firm that is worth working with should be happy to spend time going over each of these questions with you.  Selecting an SEO Firm can feel intimidating but if you use these questions as a guide and follow your instincts, you should be fine.

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Think of the search engines like a child with a short attention span.  If they have to crawl through tons of messy code before they get to the body content on your page, there is a chance they will “lose interest” and not continue spidering the page.Since you want the engines to be able to spider all of your content pages, you should minimize the amount of extraneous code that is on your page. You worked hard to create your content and get your site optimized, so the last thing you want to do is take a chance that the engines won’t want to spider your pages.One way to clean up the code is to take java script that is on-page and put it in an external .js file.

Java script on your page usually takes up anywhere from 3 – 8+ lines of code.  That is all just creates extra code that the spiders have to crawl through before they get to your body text.  You are better off calling your java script in from a .js file.  This takes what used to be many lines of code on your page and reduces it to one line where you just call the script in.

To create an External JavaScript file:

Copy your script and paste it into Notepad. Remove the beginning and end script commands. They are:
<script language=”JavaScript”> and </script>

Next, do a SAVE AS command and save the file as “text only” with an extension of .js

Example: java.js

Upload the file to a folder on your server that you name Java. (Or whatever name you wish.)

To call your Java file into your web page, enter into the same place where the script originally was:<script src=”Java/java.js” mce_src=”Java/java.js”> </script>

Lastly, if you wish to hide the text from JavaScript impaired browsers to avoid error codes, surround the JavaScript with <!– and –> in your java.js file.This will make for cleaner code, and the functionality will still be the same.  You could also move your script to the bottom of the page – but remember if the page doesn’t fully load then your script may not load, so it could impact the functionality of your page. 

Whatever solution you choose to implement – make sure you test it to ensure it works.  Once the engines pick up your pages and the traffic to your site increases, you want to be sure the site is fully functional and in tip top shape. 

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