PlanWebs Web Design, Online Media & Marketing

Search Marketing Standard
Yahoo shares a wealth of usability testing data and Web site design experience with Webmasters through its new Developer Center, and Kevin Gold reviews some of the Center’s offerings. “Yahoo has exposed their testing results on issues ranging from ratings and reviews, reputation, navigational structure, ad placement layouts, bead-crumb navigation best practices and wire-framing tools,” he says. “In my past experience, I have spent considerable time searching for this grade of information and have often paid for best practices based on valid testing. Now it’s free.” For example, Yahoo has tested a number of reputation monitoring tools and has posted the results in the Developer Center, including case studies as well as precautions. Gold also suggests tapping the Yahoo User Interface (YUI) blog for more design and usability info.

Search Engine Guide
According to Stoney deGeyter, a “Destination Web site” is one that “truly deserves to be ranked well in the search engines.” It’s likely that every business owner wants to have a site that ranks well, so this post is the fourth in a series that details how to build and market Destination Web sites.

The four factors that go into marketing a Destination Web site are: strong on- and off-page SEO that involves more than just search engine rankings; compelling content that drives conversions; synchronized on- and offline marketing efforts; as well as business management and customer service that extends beyond the sale.

“The difference between a Destination Web site and any other is that all of the strategies above must be used together and you have to be at the top of your game with each one,” deGeyter says. “Too often businesses focus on only one or two of these areas simply looking for a quick boost in traffic or sales. These boosts are often effective, but are also just as often very short-lived.”

Conversation Marketing
Ian Lurie offers a step-by-step guide to creating a “great” 404 not found page, including how to build it (via HTML or a Web page editor), upload it and get your server to point to it–whether via Microsoft’s Internet Information Server (IIS) or the open-source Apache server.

He also lists the three components a quality 404 page must have, including a clear statement that the visitor is in the wrong place, advice to help get them back on track (via either links, a search box, etc.), and an option to contact the Webmaster.

What a 404 error page shouldn’t do is automatically redirect a user to the homepage, a Flash page or tedious registration form, or worse–another Web site! Learn more.

SEO

Meta Robots WordPress plugin - Adds meta tags automatically to posts

Aizatto’s Related Posts - Adds related post information to posts and feeds

Cross-Linker - Set up commonly used words to link to posts or redirects (also useful for affiliate links)

Sitemap Generator - Automatically builds and HTML style sitemap

Google (XML) Sitemaps - Automatically build and ping multiple sitemap services with an XML file

HeadSpace 2 - A monster plugin that lets you rewrite titles, meta data, and host of other features watch the video on the page for the full list of features

SEO Title Tag - Don’t need all the power of Headspace try SEO title tag

SEO Slugs - keeps slugs from becoming too long Continue Reading »

adCenter Community
“Every analytic solution can generate a perfect storm of data that obliterates the horizon in innumerable details.” So says Charles Thrasher, media specialist and project lead for adCenter. And he offers a thorough overview of how to best determine which metrics should be used as key performance indicators (KPIs) for your Web site.

Thrasher borrows from the Jason Burby and Shane Atchinson’s book “Actionable Web Analytics” to suggest some KPIs for a commercial site–metrics that are typically tied to revenue. Think about using stats like overall conversion rate, average order size and the Web site’s effect on offline sales as possible KPIs.

Meanwhile, for sites where commerce isn’t the primary focus, Thrasher borrows from “Web Analytics An Hour a Day” by Avinash Kaushik and suggests using visitor loyalty, recency, length of visit and depth of visit as your primary KPIs.

Graywolf’s SEO Blog
New Web site owners (or even seasoned pros set to launch a new site) should have SEO in mind from the onset, but Michael Gray argues that the trick is to avoid putting the cart before the horse. “Look for a way to differentiate yourself first and use SEO to promote it, not the other way around,” Gray says.

Without quality content (including text, images and possibly video), or a unique value proposition, all the time spent working on keyword density, meta data and link accumulation could actually lead to a smackdown from the engines.

“At the time when some engineer decides to crawl over your suspected SEO site, if you don’t have the content that makes the grade [or your point of difference], you won’t have the links or on-site material to pass the sniff test,” Gray says. And the prized ranking will go out the window–or worse, the site will get banned.

Search Engine Land
Some paid search marketing platforms may allow you to bid on a competitor’s branded keywords, but you should steer clear of their trademarks when it comes to organic optimization. As per an 11th circuit U.S. Court of Appeals ruling, injecting another company’s trademarked terms into your site’s meta tags (be it title, description or any other tag) can cause consumer confusion and thus constitute trademark infringement.

The ruling upheld a district court’s decision that Axiom Worldwide infringed on American Medical Corp.’s trademark when it used the terms “Accu-Spina” and “IDD Therapy” in its meta tags–particularly in its description tag. A Google search that showed the terms highlighted prominently in the company’s description field was offered as evidence.

Axiom doesn’t deny that they used the terms, but as copyright and IP legal expert Eric Goldman notes, the ruling doesn’t take into account the fact that Google (or the other engines) sometimes automatically assembles search result descriptions from third-party resources like DMOZ. The issue also raises the question of whether meta data counts for much more in terms of rankings than the engines have been admitting to. Still, the best way to avoid any kind of confusion (or legal ramifications) is to not use trademarked terms in your meta tags.

Google Webmaster Central
So a hacker or competitor has penetrated your site’s source code and installed malicious scripts or programs. The first step is to get your site offline (temporarily) as fast as possible so that you don’t infect visitors unnecessarily. Speed may be a problem if you’re using a shared hosting service, so try using a 503 status code in the meantime, to keep the engine’s spiders from crawling. The Google Webmaster Tools URL Removal tool can also help with preventing incoming traffic.

The next step is to figure out what the hacker was after. Was it consumer or employee PII? Was it your proprietary shopping cart script? Check your server logs for any modified, uploaded or otherwise suspicious file activities.

Once you’ve assessed the situation, reinstall your OS–preferably from a secure, trusted site or disc. After the fresh reinstallation, use the latest backup you have to restore your site–but make sure that the backup is clean and free of compromised content. Change your passwords, and if your site was offline, take the steps to get it back online and work on getting the engines to start indexing it again.

ISEdb
“Since the ‘purchase’ is the ultimate conversion, it is imperative that you remove as many obstacles from the customer’s research-to-buy cycle as possible,” says Stoney deGeyter. This means having adequate search functionality and clear navigation paths, so that customers can quickly find product and pricing info, get their shopping cart full and check out with no roadblocks.

In terms of content, be sure to include features like side-by-side product comparison guides and customer reviews and ratings. If possible, list product availability–as even if something is out of stock, it’s better for customers to know up front than when they get to the checkout screen.

Meanwhile, don’t be afraid to up- and cross-sell your customers during their research and purchase process. “Provide a list of related products that typically go along with any current items in a shopping cart or product being viewed,” deGeyter says. “If applicable, allow shoppers to purchase additional services such as product engraving, customization, gift wrapping, etc. These features can make a nice up-sell opportunity while giving the visitors that customization offer that they need for special purchases.”

Future Now
If your Web site is struggling and you don’t have the time or cash to hire a search firm, then the Future Now team has some Web site optimization tips you can start implementing as soon as possible.

You’ll need to get a testing platform, like Google Website Optimizer and run a simple split A/B test. Since your site is struggling with low traffic, avoid multivariate testing, as the time it would take to generate enough traffic to gauge the success of multiple combinations of on-page factors could be too prohibitive.

Don’t make any judgments until the test is finished and you have statistically significant results. Basing your choice of one headline or call to action on incomplete data is a surefire way to waste your time and delay success. Meanwhile, supplement your test by driving traffic through PPC buys.