Thursday 19 November 2009

Official Google Blog: New site hierarchies display in search results

New site hierarchies display in search results

11/17/2009 08:02:00 AM
Google usually shows a green web address, or URL, at the bottom of each search result to let you know where you're headed. Today we're rolling out an improvement that replaces the URL in some search results with a hierarchy showing the precise location of the page on the website. The new display provides valuable context and new navigation options. The changes are rolling out now and should be available globally in the next few days.

Some web addresses help you understand the structure of the site and how the specific page fits into the site hierarchy. For example, consider a search for the biography of Vint Cerf (Google's Internet Evangelist). The URL for one result, "www.google.com/corporate/execs.html," shows that the page is located in a page about "execs," under "corporate," which is on the "google.com" site. This can provide valuable context when deciding whether to click on the result.

Often, however, URLs are too long, too short, or too obscure to add useful information. For example, consider this result from ProductWiki for the query:

Click below for full details


Official Google Blog: New site hierarchies display in search results

http://1weekseo.blogspot.com

Beginners Guide to Twitter and Tweetdeck


When I first started to use Twitter for my company I was posting discount vouchers constantly, adding random people I didn't know and repeat postings from a Word document I had created, allowing me to copy and paste previous tweets without getting RSI.

Then I downloaded Tweetdeck - I really recommend this free software (it will auto shorten URLs and you can add photos and pitures with a drag & drop). After then I realised, how uninteresting I must be, who wants to be bombarded with repetitious discount codes for a product you don't specifically need at that time.

I learned the basics of Twitter:

  • Names are preceeded with '@'
  • E.g. - senting out a tweet to Thefunkypigeon will not show up on their page, it needs to be @Thefunkypigeon
  • RT = Re-Tweet, repeating some else's post and crediting them by mentioning their name
  • # the hash symbol represents a group, e.g. I am interested in any local tweets, so I have #bristol and #somerset saved on tweetdeck
  • # groups that are being tweeted about (by mentioning this in your post) that are the most popular are called "Trending Topics"

Trending Topic

A regular trending topic is #FF or #FollowFriday where tweeps looking to increase their followers will RT their follower's names in their posts and the circle goes on - here's an example:
Here's some great tweeps for #FF @somerset1 @bristol2 @personalised
This really helps increase your followers, because they join in with the #FollowFriday they WANT to follow and be followed.

Another tip is to follow a tweeter called 'goodbyebuddy' which will notify you daily when anyone chooses to 'unfollow' you, this will help you understand how to make your audience stay with your tweets

I faded out the promo tweets and started to interact directly with local tweeters, and tweeters who have similar business, by re-tweeting their promotional tweets, effectively helping out their reach, and with good success. In the first 2 weeks of using Twitter, I had appeared on local radio and booked an advertisement in an eshot who I would have otherwise never come across before. You can also tweet to advertise #jobs or #vacancies online, real time, for free.

I hope this you have found this useful as I should have researched Twitter before I went barging in full steam ahead. One twitterer said there are 3 golden rules on Twitter which I adapted slightly:

30% Personal tweets and observations

30% links to interesting, pertinant articles and webpages

30% Promoting aspects about your own business / services

That leaves 10% to do what you like - for me it's following celebrities and replying to their tweets, and tweeting about trending topics...

Hope this was good reading, please feel free to leave a comment.
You can follow me on Twitter @SEOukSomerset

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Nina_Greaves

Sunday 1 November 2009

Website Optimisation for www.funkypigeon.com

Following a website re brand a new domain was registered in September 2009 - my aim was to be ranked on Google Page 1, result 1. This was achieved on October 27th 2009, just 10 days after going live.

How did I do it?

This was a full time - 40 hours/week - task.

First of all I used the Admin tool to optimise each of the main landing pages, from the meta title, description and keywords, to writing script for the actual page and matching the keywords accordingly.

Networking online is a huge opportunity and best of all it's free, so I created and maintained accounts on Twitter, Facebook, BeBo, Wordpress, press release and article sites and of course, blogger.com.

Once the site went live after a week of testing, I then launched into my social networking, also promoted the launch offer of a 30% discount code on an online voucher code site and got on board with an affiliate to work with us.

Google Adwords was already running, so I created several ad campaigns, each targeted with specific keywords, and wrote each advert to be enticing to surfers.

The site was verified with Google Webmaster, I changed address in Webmaster from the old to the new, installed Google Analytics and linked to Adwords to be able to report on ecommerce and how the Adwords campaigns were performing in revenue.

301 redirects were used from the old landing pages to the appropriate new landing pages, leaving the old homepage up with the ability to transfer traffic for all visitors with just one click.

Utilising the customer database of over 60,000 accounts, an e-shot was sent out in stages, to the most frequent customers first, and then to single use accounts secondary, informing them of the change of website address, and their account details remained the same. We also included a disocunt code.

Discount codes were different for every online promotion, allowing me to guage the ROI of each campaign, to identify the best performing sites for us.

Directory submission manually by myself went full speed ahead, yes it can be painful and give you a serious dose of RSI but once they're done, they're done. Following the first week of submitting, I decided to spend one afternoon a week in searching and finding directories as an ongoing task.

There was a competition launch which was another slant to the promotion, and free ringtones were created which was a great added bonus to shout about, this went down really well on My Space, You Tube and StumbleUpon.

The Alexa rating collapsed from 2 million to under 700,000 in ten days. Yes, that's right, 10 days! Orders more than doubled on a daily basis and everyone is happy.

Here's the website for you to view: http://www.funkypigeon.com/