On Tuesday I spent the day at Search Engine Strategies Toronto 2009, helping Max Haroon in the Society of Internet Professionals booth, I was was really surprised with the lack of foot traffic coming into the Expo Hall, I mean it was quiet.
During the times while the crowd were in the learning sessions I chatted to some of the other vendors. The common answer I heard was “there was 5 times the traffic last year”.
As I was working in a booth I could attend a seminar for free, so I chose ‘Extreme Makeover: Live Site Clinic’, last session of the day and it could have potential clients looking for SEO help. I walked into a 300 seater room to see 20-30 people attending, that’s a lot of empty seats and it’s not as though the content was bad, it was very good. The panel ruffled a few feathers with their comments, but they were honest.

What everyone is missing is, this is the time to win in the search engines, whilst everyone else is cutting their Internet marketing budgets and slowing down, your SEO company should be picking up and gaining that hard earned ground in the search results, this will pay off 10 fold when the economy picks up and you are at the top for your key words!

A potential new client emailed us saying that his new website just launched and the web company currently doing his online marketing had been bought out by another business who are ONLY interested in doing web design and he would like to know more about our services.
I almost fell off my chair, what company would ignore Internet marketing? Surely they go hand-in-hand. I mean, who has a website build today that doesn’t want it to be found in the search engines? Or am I missing something?

It gets better…
We had a good look at the potential client’s website, it was build using a custom CMS system, on the surface it looked okay. The web company had a great video showing off how wonderful it all was, drag and drop capability, ease of use etc. Looking at the code we can all pick holes, but the big shock came when we checked with Google.
If you type site:www.yourwebsitename.com in a search box Google will show you the pages it has indexed of the site.
The results showed 325 pages, but this was only a 40-page website!
When we looked closer there were only 3 pages that were actual pages from the website, the other 322 where CMS template problems. We got the client on the phone and showed him, he went silent with shock. We offered some solutions, which he asked to be emailed to him and he would take to the current provider.
Next thing his site is down with an ‘Internal Server Error’. Not a good sign!

Lately I have been reading about social media being used in extreme ways. Scammers are using these channels in corrupt ways, spammers are infesting every corner, intelligent agencies can’t find agents without Internet trails, court law papers are served over Facebook and now companies are using social media channels for analyzing future employees. Interestingly enough some people have not got jobs because of it. Slowly but surely it seems that the freedom the Internet provided us, is coming back and biting us.

The Internet gave us the means to express ourselves, a connection to resources and the ability to communicate and network with people. Naturally with any good, comes the bad.

Companies use social media in the hopes of enhancing their public appearance and to positively promote themselves. They hope this will bring positive attention towards their brand/product and “buzz” around them. Unfortunately, we have all seen companies that aren’t ethical or transparent and have been slammed down by social media because of it.

But now businesses are using social media channels to analyze future employees. Viewing people’s profiles on Twitter, Facebook, MySpace and LinkedIn is not unheard of. They look for personality, what you are writing about, whether you swear a lot or not and in general how you come across in your ‘natural’ state.

So don’t use the Internet if you are not willing to be examined under a microscope! It’s sad to think that we no longer have that freedom. Everyone needs to understand that by using the internet, you are exposing yourself beyond your understanding. For companies, customers will look over every fine detail of your business. One wrong doing and you are done for. For people, your personal information, photos and anything of the sort is exposed as well, ready and available for anyone to get a hold of.

Keep this exposure in mind while using the Internet. Act as if the world is starring!

I’ve noticed quite a few Facebook related articles circulating around the web, most of them concerning scams and spammers. Who would have thought our beloved Facebook would come down to this?

Spammers:
So they are everywhere and annoy all of us equally. With Facebook’s rule and strick regulations who would have thought that people would still find a way to irritate a social media networks people. Who and what are they doing? For starters, groups on Facebook are created for all sorts of reasons. From silly to serious, Facebook is inundated with groups, especially those pertaining to schools or universities since Facebook was originally intended for college and university students ex: Class of ‘09. Now that it has gone public, more and more school groups are being created with slightly different purposes. Most school/university groups have been created to give prospect students information about the school such as registration dates, tours etc. Here’s the twist, spammers are creating Facebook groups with the exact same name as the school or date of graduation. Some are even going as far as writing ex: OFFICIAL group of ’09. Some spammers don’t create the groups, but pretend to be students and invade different groups. It is becoming clear that viral marketing campaigns are to blame for these spammers or posers.

It’s frightful to think that potential students and graduates are part of groups or have members in them that aren’t actually there for the purpose that was initially intended. Schools and universities have to take action to take control of the Admin and to make sure that no one is tampering with such groups. It is important to bring awareness to this situation.

For more information read this article

Scammers:
Ok so maybe spammers have an easier job on Facebook compared to this next example. Apparently scammers have been hacking into people’s personal Facebook accounts. They look through all your personal information, photos, friends etc and really get to know you and what you are about. Then when they see the chance, they strike up a conversation with your friends on Facebook chat and ask for money. Either saying you are stranded somewhere and need help or your stuff has been stolen, these scammers try and get money out of your friends. How terrifying is this?? I dug a bit deeper and found that is actually a regular occurrence amongst Facebook users!! The horror. Innocent people using social media sites that are being scammed thinking they are doing good. It annoys me to think that people like this are out there, invading social sites and giving them bad names.

I hope Facebook takes further action on both matters, and instead of them worrying about breastfeeding mothers posting pictures of bare breasts, they should worry about bigger matters such as these. 

Are you running email campaigns? What about sending out newsletters, blogging, and managing PPC campaigns? If you are doing all these things, that is most excellent! If you have synched up all of these opportunities and are utilizing them to cross promote each other, that is even more most excellent!

It is very important to synch up these campaigns because it will make your activities more effective and simple to manage. It is not difficult to set up cross promotion activities. Here are a few simple tips to get you started.

• Add a new PPC campaign that directs people to your blog.
  PPC campaigns are a great way to generate traffic to your website. It is not surprising, then, that PPC campaigns can also send traffic in droves to your blog for free ideas and information.
• Use your blog as a teaser for your newsletter once a month.
  Write a short blog entry about a pertinent subject and then mention that newsletter recipients will receive a more detailed article in your upcoming newsletter.
• Add a newsletter sign up button to your blog.
  If people are actively and consistently reading your blog posts, chances are they will want to sign up for your newsletter as well.
• Always mention your blog in your newsletter.
  Tell your customers that they do not have to wait a full month to read more great stuff, written by theirs truly and direct them to your blog.
• Link to your blog within newsletter articles.
  Try to refer back to your blog as well as your website within your articles. Soon your newsletter recipients will realise that your blog is a valuable source of information.

Properly synching up and utilising your email, newsletter, PPC management and other online campaigns as cross promotion tools will help generate interest and drive traffic to your website. It will also simplify your efforts. Of course, this will only work if you actually taking part in all of these marketing efforts, so if you have yet to set up that blog, newsletter, or email campaign, get going already!

Here is a great (but long, 30 minutes) video from TED Ideas worth spreading with Barry Schwartz discussing his book, The Paradox of Choice. Funny and entertaining, Barry talks about how providing consumers with too much  choice can affect your business.  Watch the video and think in terms of website design.  You’ll be simplyfying your own website in no time.

When I think “viral marketing”, one of the first campaigns that come to mind is the Dove Campaign for Real Beauty I am sure that I am not the only one!

There have been several elements to the Dove Campaigns, pretty much all of interactive and successful. Click on the link below to see just one Dove promotion, a YouTube video that was posted in 2006. Since that time, this video has been viewed 8,056,122 times, commented on 3,262 times, and been rated 7469 times. Talk about consumer interaction!

Dove Evolution

Another viral element is their pay beauty forward campaign, which invites their website viewers to send a flower with a message (the sender picks both the colour of the flower and the message from a drop down menu). So far over 10,000 flowers have been sent. There was also the Dove Sleepover for Self Esteem, a great concept inviting women and children to host a sleepover that includes much discussion about self esteem and “real beauty”.

Now I happen to live in downtown Toronto and I doubt that I will ever forget the “Fat vs. Fab” billboard over the DVP that featured a woman in her undies. People were invited to text in their votes on whether they thought she was “Fat” or “Fab”. They rant the same ad in UK with the options being “Overweight” or “Outrageous” and I think it was “Fat” or “Fit” in the US. I remember being slightly uncomfortable with this one and very disappointed when the results came in with 51% of them voting “fat”. Still, that was one of the first campaigns that I had seen successfully incorporate texting

So after mentioning all of these well thought out interactive campaigns, what will Dove come up with next? Something that focuses on how well Dove products work, perhaps? With the exception of maybe a couple of television commercials, Dove has so far skipped the whole “believe in our product” sort of advertising and jumped straight into the “believe in yourself” messaging, weaving their products with the warm happy feelings that one feels when she is confident and beautiful.

Love or hate the Dove approach, this whole concept of creating a movement that is bigger than your product is a perfectly suited for viral marketing and the rest of the online world. We have seen other successful examples of this and, as more companies catch on to the implications and potential of online marketing, I am sure we will see many more successful viral campaigns spread throughout the web like a wildfire.

A Fitch Media Study (free login to get to the content) expects online ad revenue to keep its head above water with single digit growth in 2009. Fitch also speculates that some cities will be without a daily print newspaper in 2010. Video and social media marketing will likely continue to grow while CPM will see a downturn.

As far as SEO is concerned, Google is expected to get more aggressive with universal search, providing searchers with more images, video, audio and user generated content.  How do you optimize for universal search?

From day 1, Google has pushed to provide users with relevant results and pounded into our brains that fresh, quality content will help you rank well in the SERPS.  Moving forward, Google will expect your website to provide the same info in a variety of ways people consume information.

Think of the latest hot novel that is out. I prefer an audio book to reading these days. I know, shame on me but it does save time. Others would prefer to wait for the movie while many still enjoy reading the book.  All are different ways that consumers enjoy the experience of the content.

Now, what can you do do adapt your website for the future of search? Start with video, add it to your website and then syndicate it with TubeMogul (free). You can answer questions related to current news items, deliver short training sessions or just try to build a relationship with your audience.

On one side you have a company that creates a products or provides a service that they present to the community. On the other side you have the consumers that a company is hoping will interact with their product or service. Where these two intersect is where a companies brand is created. This brand is a mix of what you are offering and those that are consuming or engaging with your product or service.

The consumers that are loyal to your brand and engage in a profound way would be located on the outer edge of the brand, connecting with the product on the arc of satisfaction.

The consumers that take your product and make it their own, are on the outer edge of your brand, connecting more with the consumers on the arc of experience. This means that your product is being used in ways in which your consumers are living their lives, and the relevance it has to them.

It’s important for marketers to understand that both their consumers and their brand are behaving in a transformative manner, which is mostly facilitated by social media. Consumers behaviour is constantly changing, and companies need to be aware of these changes and be able to respond or adapt in the appropriate manner before competitors do.

Site Map Pro is a an example of tool that was developed to build site maps for your website. However, once out on the market, SEO (search engine optimization) companies began using that tool as a means to check title tags for websites. This is a good example of how a product was created for one intention and over time was changed by its consumer.

Examples like this are happening everyday and it is a companies responsibility to realize what their customers are seeking, and fulfill those needs to their best ability.

I was just speaking to a client about setting up Google analytics on his website. We tried to set it up for him 3 years ago but as a one man show, he didn’t have the resources to follow through on the results so he decided to put it aside for the time being. I think we can all relate to that.

His analytics has been up for one day and already he is marveling at the information that Google can track and that he can use to negotiate with his “referrers”.  Once we set up a couple of goals , he was able to compare each advertising vehicle in terms of return on investment (ROI).

The days of impressions and click throughs are long gone now,  you must be able to track ROI or suffer the consequences. In PPC, you may be bidding on keywords that aren’t producing sales and in SEO, you may be going after keyword phrases terms that simply don’t pay for themselves.

As the economy gets tougher over the next few months, you will need to take the guesswork out of your marketing program. Google analytics is an easy and inexpensive (free) way to start.