Nothing new in Jakob Nielsen's new article, it is pretty much same what SEO and Analytics community has been advocating for years. Unique visitors are not an effective way to measure traffic, you will most likely wish getting most of the traffic from loyal users and search engines.
However, in his latest article, Reduce Bounce Rates: Fight for the Second Click usability guru Jakob Nielsen definitely undermines the value of social networks. He believes traffic from Digg is of "low value” as diggers are notoriously fickle and leave the site immediately, once they've satisfied their idle curiosity.
I think it is not the case, diggers are witty, they don't waste their time. You must have interesting and relevant content on your website to engage your visitors with website.
Do you believe in Jakob Nielsen? Post your comments here.
Showing posts with label seo. Show all posts
Showing posts with label seo. Show all posts
Tuesday, 1 July 2008
Tuesday, 24 June 2008
The decline of traditional marketing Vs the growth of online marketing
I joined Adido after studying marketing at Southampton Solent University and throughout my three years there we not once taught about online marketing techniques. Given the growth in online spending in the last few years it now seems strange why we didn’t even cover some of the basics of online marketing.
Given the current financial climate, I’m glad I know about online marketing now but wonder why more companies don’t make more use of effective online marketing strategies which can help businesses outperform the competition and stay ahead of the game?
The growth of the internet within our homes, work and education has brought many very distinctive benefits to marketing. Online marketing lowers costs of distribution to a vast amount of people, and can bring you an immediate global audience if you want it (although most SMEs still need to have a local presence).
Traditional marketing is normally the most expensive way of advertising and in the current financial climate businesses are trying to cut back on costs. However I’ve learnt that Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) and Pay Per Click (PPC) are both online marketing methods which can be controlled in-house where the out-goings and results can easily be monitored.
I’m not the only one who thinks that traditional advertising is on its way out, Wikipedia also agrees that online marketing is cost effective;
“Internet marketing is relatively inexpensive when compared to the ratio of cost against the reach of the target audience. Companies can reach a wide audience for a small fraction of traditional advertising budgets. (Wikipedia, 2008)”
So can the traditional marketing methods be repaired and make a come back?
Well…I’m not too sure about this question, working alongside SEO and PPC professionals has made me realise that these methods are easier, more cost effective, save time, have a better response rate and can reach a vast audience with a click of a button. However, I’ve also learnt that most people need some help from an SEO/PPC professional to get the best results (like us!)!
I’m not saying that the traditional marketing methods do not work anymore as they do for specific products and brands, however for most SMEs I would definitely recommend using online marketing techniques first to get the most from smaller budgets.
Given the current financial climate, I’m glad I know about online marketing now but wonder why more companies don’t make more use of effective online marketing strategies which can help businesses outperform the competition and stay ahead of the game?
The growth of the internet within our homes, work and education has brought many very distinctive benefits to marketing. Online marketing lowers costs of distribution to a vast amount of people, and can bring you an immediate global audience if you want it (although most SMEs still need to have a local presence).
Traditional marketing is normally the most expensive way of advertising and in the current financial climate businesses are trying to cut back on costs. However I’ve learnt that Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) and Pay Per Click (PPC) are both online marketing methods which can be controlled in-house where the out-goings and results can easily be monitored.
I’m not the only one who thinks that traditional advertising is on its way out, Wikipedia also agrees that online marketing is cost effective;
“Internet marketing is relatively inexpensive when compared to the ratio of cost against the reach of the target audience. Companies can reach a wide audience for a small fraction of traditional advertising budgets. (Wikipedia, 2008)”
So can the traditional marketing methods be repaired and make a come back?
Well…I’m not too sure about this question, working alongside SEO and PPC professionals has made me realise that these methods are easier, more cost effective, save time, have a better response rate and can reach a vast audience with a click of a button. However, I’ve also learnt that most people need some help from an SEO/PPC professional to get the best results (like us!)!
I’m not saying that the traditional marketing methods do not work anymore as they do for specific products and brands, however for most SMEs I would definitely recommend using online marketing techniques first to get the most from smaller budgets.
Friday, 28 March 2008
Where will SEO be in five years?
One of the best questions to come from my talk in Southampton today was related to the future of SEO. Following on from my point that most people click on the left hand side of the search engine results pages (SERPs) or 'natural listings' or 'free listings', as opposed to the Pay Per Click listings. The gentleman in the audience wondered where SEO will be in five years time? If everyone cottons on the facts that SEO is a good thing and results in great things for their business (more sales, more brand awareness, beating the competition etc) then how will businesses be able to optimise their website and get it to the top of the search results?
This is something that I've seen a lot of in the last few months and was going to write about anyway. Already the competitive phrases all pull up very similar looking results, as most companies start to target the same phrases and use the same techniques (e.g. improving title tags, writing great META descriptions).
An example is shown below for 'chocolate fountains'
As you can see here, nearly every website has the phrase 'chocolate fountains' mentioned twice. This results in the pages looking very similar as the key phrases is highlighted in bold. As all of the websites are highlighted, there is little differentiation between the listings. As a result the user is going to find it difficult to make a decision between clicking on the first listing or the fifth.
It is a not very well known fact that 42% of searchers hit the first result regardless of what is returned. However, if all of the results look the same, will this still be the case? Will people trust Google to still give them the best result, or will they see a page of bold text and results all looking the same and not bother?
I would assume that Google are watching this activity very carefully to analyse the effect of optimisation on rankings, perhaps even to the point where they don't use the bold matching on some occasions.
Maybe in five years time, we might not be even worried about Google rankings and all searches maybe carried out in some other way or with some other company (Facebook? MySpace? Someone else?).
In the mean time though, companies serious about the Internet and getting the best results should look to maximise their returns through effective search engine optimisation. We're happy to talk to any company who wants to do this :)
If you have any views about where SEO is heading or where you think it will be in five years, please share your views with us below.
This is something that I've seen a lot of in the last few months and was going to write about anyway. Already the competitive phrases all pull up very similar looking results, as most companies start to target the same phrases and use the same techniques (e.g. improving title tags, writing great META descriptions).
An example is shown below for 'chocolate fountains'
As you can see here, nearly every website has the phrase 'chocolate fountains' mentioned twice. This results in the pages looking very similar as the key phrases is highlighted in bold. As all of the websites are highlighted, there is little differentiation between the listings. As a result the user is going to find it difficult to make a decision between clicking on the first listing or the fifth.
It is a not very well known fact that 42% of searchers hit the first result regardless of what is returned. However, if all of the results look the same, will this still be the case? Will people trust Google to still give them the best result, or will they see a page of bold text and results all looking the same and not bother?
I would assume that Google are watching this activity very carefully to analyse the effect of optimisation on rankings, perhaps even to the point where they don't use the bold matching on some occasions.
Maybe in five years time, we might not be even worried about Google rankings and all searches maybe carried out in some other way or with some other company (Facebook? MySpace? Someone else?).
In the mean time though, companies serious about the Internet and getting the best results should look to maximise their returns through effective search engine optimisation. We're happy to talk to any company who wants to do this :)
If you have any views about where SEO is heading or where you think it will be in five years, please share your views with us below.
Monday, 11 February 2008
Easiest SEO Competition: Google T-Shirts for South Asian Webmasters, Bloggers
10 Free Google T- shirts, Hoddies and Hooded Fleeces for Indian and Paksitani bloggers, webmasters and internet users.
Adido Solutions has announced to day to launch the easiest SEO competition ever for webmasters and bloggers specifically for South Asian SEOs, webmasters and bloggers from India and Pakistan.
How it works?
SO SIMPLE.
Anyone from india and Pakistan can win a Google T-shirt, Hoodie or Hooded Fleece by giving a link with a short description on his/her website or blog to www.primera-bournemouth.co.uk and www.primera-bournemouth.co.uk/ManTemplate.aspx?manID=7 in a format given below:
Example:
Primera Sport are excusive dealers of Assos Clothing, the same famous Assos brand in bike accessories and cycling clothes. Based in Bournemouth, UK - Primera Sport also deals in Specialized and Cnnondale bike.
This is just an example, however you can write your own paragragh and with Assos and Assos clothing anchor text. Once you have done it, send us an email at adido.press@gmail.com with a link to page of your website.
The competition ends on 31 March 2008. 10 lucky winners will be selected randomly, results will be published in this blog, so bookmark the blog as well. Will will contact the winners through email and send them the Free t-shirts via post.
In any case, Adido Solution's decision will be final.
Adido Solutions has announced to day to launch the easiest SEO competition ever for webmasters and bloggers specifically for South Asian SEOs, webmasters and bloggers from India and Pakistan.
How it works?
SO SIMPLE.
Anyone from india and Pakistan can win a Google T-shirt, Hoodie or Hooded Fleece by giving a link with a short description on his/her website or blog to www.primera-bournemouth.co.uk and www.primera-bournemouth.co.uk/ManTemplate.aspx?manID=7 in a format given below:
Example:
Primera Sport are excusive dealers of Assos Clothing, the same famous Assos brand in bike accessories and cycling clothes. Based in Bournemouth, UK - Primera Sport also deals in Specialized and Cnnondale bike.
This is just an example, however you can write your own paragragh and with Assos and Assos clothing anchor text. Once you have done it, send us an email at adido.press@gmail.com with a link to page of your website.
The competition ends on 31 March 2008. 10 lucky winners will be selected randomly, results will be published in this blog, so bookmark the blog as well. Will will contact the winners through email and send them the Free t-shirts via post.
In any case, Adido Solution's decision will be final.
Wednesday, 23 January 2008
Do you see what I see?
While trying to put together some screenshots for a potential client, proving our SEO capabillities, we stumbled upon a (very) rare occurance in Google. There has been much made about the great Google Datacentres in the sky, and in the old days, they used to be watched like hawks to see if any new pagerank updates were on their way. However, since the Jagger (or Big Daddy) update a year or so ago, I thought that most Google Datacenters showed the same results. I was wrong...
It still seems that the results you get from Google depend on where you are in the country. While I was sat in my Southampton office and seeing the great SEO positions we've got, in Surrey something strange was afoot. Not only were we not on top of the listings, sometimes we weren't even on the ten pages! It was like Google was being geographically biased!
After some research on datacentre issues, it turned out that our problem was indeed down to Google being different. How did we know? Are you ready to get techy?
If you go to Start > Control Panel > Accessories > Command Prompt (or for the dextrous of you Windows Key & R) you'll see the Command Prompt (surprise, surprise). If you type in;
ping www.google.co.uk
you'll get a number which looks like this;
216.239.59.99
This is the IP address of the Google.co.uk domain. If you try this somewhere else in the country, or perhaps at a different time of the day, the number could be very different. If the numbers are different, it means that you're going to a different data centre, and so could get a completely different set of results. In theory, they should all have the same results. But a word of warning, they may not, so if you're SEO rankings appear to have vanished, then this could be one of the reasons why...
Update: Hmmm, the plot thickens. I've just watched the whole video by Matt Cutts (top Google Geek blogger) and he said that even if the IP addresses are different, they can still show different results! Arrrghhhhhh!!!
It still seems that the results you get from Google depend on where you are in the country. While I was sat in my Southampton office and seeing the great SEO positions we've got, in Surrey something strange was afoot. Not only were we not on top of the listings, sometimes we weren't even on the ten pages! It was like Google was being geographically biased!
After some research on datacentre issues, it turned out that our problem was indeed down to Google being different. How did we know? Are you ready to get techy?
If you go to Start > Control Panel > Accessories > Command Prompt (or for the dextrous of you Windows Key & R) you'll see the Command Prompt (surprise, surprise). If you type in;
ping www.google.co.uk
you'll get a number which looks like this;
216.239.59.99
This is the IP address of the Google.co.uk domain. If you try this somewhere else in the country, or perhaps at a different time of the day, the number could be very different. If the numbers are different, it means that you're going to a different data centre, and so could get a completely different set of results. In theory, they should all have the same results. But a word of warning, they may not, so if you're SEO rankings appear to have vanished, then this could be one of the reasons why...Update: Hmmm, the plot thickens. I've just watched the whole video by Matt Cutts (top Google Geek blogger) and he said that even if the IP addresses are different, they can still show different results! Arrrghhhhhh!!!
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