Google to Reward Fast Websites

Google will soon be unveiling a new search architecture called Google Caffeine, which promises to be faster, and bring users social media updates in real time.

From an SEO perspective, it will reportedly inject a new ranking factor into the algorithm — website speed. As a result, Google will be pushing faster sites higher in the search results, whereas slower sites will find it harder to rank.

On that front, here’s an insightful article you might want to check out: Website Performance: What To Know and What You Can Do.

An Omnivorous Google is Coming

Google’s Vice-President for Search Products and User Experience, Marissa Mayer, recently shared her insights into the future of Internet search engines.

Mayer says the ideal will be to get access to your friends’ updates in search. There may be increased privacy concerns and complaints from publishers, but Mayer and Google likely won’t be deterred.

Look out! An omniscient, omnivorous Google is coming, and it knows what you want — even if you don’t.

Read: Marissa Mayer: An omnivorous Google is coming

Google Discusses Comment Spam

Comment spammers should stop their shenanigans, suggests Google.

Comment spammers abuse comment fields of innocent websites, like blogs and forums, to get inbound links in an attempt to improve their website’s organic search ranking.

In line with its objective to provide Internet users the most relevant and valuable results, Google has algorithmic ways of discovering those alterations and tackling them.

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Email Customer Service on Websites

Websites should be focused on customers’ multichannel experiences, reported Forrester Research. Why, then, is email customer service trapped in a silo?

“Email customer service habitually drives customers further — sometime irreparably — from their online objectives,” stated Forrester’s Diane Clarkson.

In a recent Forrester evaluation of retail websites, websites commonly missed opportunities to use email customer service to encourage web interactions or provide seamless transitions to other channels.

“eBusiness professionals must re-address how their customer service email strategies can keep consumers satisfied,” noted Clarkson, “by re-engaging them with online content, facilitating online purchases, and providing seamless cross-channel customer service.”

The Evolution of Click Fraud

Anchor Intelligence identified a click fraud ring being run out of China, which involved 200,000 different IP addresses and racked up more than $3 million worth of fraudulent clicks across 2,000 advertisers in a two-week period.

Click fraud occurs when someone sets up a website, signs up with an ad network, and then clicks on the ads to generate ad revenues with false clicks. DormRing1 operated the same way, except it easily involved more than 1,000 people who set up more than 10,000 Websites to spread out the fraud.

Read the full Tech Cruch article: Massive Chinese Operation DormRing1 Uncovered.

Why White Papers Generate Leads

White papers offer an effective way to generate new leads for business, especially for service providers.

A professionally written white paper can demonstrate your know-how in a way that provides value to your prospects. It puts forth your point of view, addresses issues your prospects face, and serves solutions.

A white paper that contains useful, practical information builds trust and rapport with prospects, and can help grow your client base.

Is there a common pain in your industry you could address with a white paper? If so, you could be sitting on a productive lead generation and relationship building tool.

Generating Traffic Through PR

You want to grow your business. Raising its profile in the community or industry can be an effective way to get more visitors to your website. But, if you launch a public relations campaign prematurely you could be doing more harm to your business than good.

Before you start pitching to media outlets and bloggers, there are a few things you need to consider.

Read: Using PR to Drive Traffic to Your Website

The Benefits of Blogging

Benefits of blogging

Adding a blog to your website is a simple and affordable way to enhance your online marketing efforts. By following a few guidelines, you can create a blog that helps strengthen your connection with both current and potential clients, while improving your search engine rankings.

Add personality to your brand. A regularly updated blog introduces your website visitors to the real people behind your business. Since blogs are often written in a casual, conversational style, you can let your personality shine through. Don’t be afraid to express your professional opinion on new developments in your industry, offer useful tips, or share something entertaining in your blog posts.

Demonstrate your knowledge. Blogging can also help you establish yourself as a source for information on current developments in your industry. If your blog content is relevant and well researched, your visitors will view you as an authority and keep coming back for more. They might even share links to your blog with their social networks, increasing your visibility among potential clients.

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Using PR to Drive Traffic to Your Website

Using PR to drive traffic to your site

You want to grow your business, and raising its profile in the community seems like the perfect strategy to get more visitors to your website. But, be warned, if you launch a public relations campaign prematurely you could be doing more harm to your business than good.

Before you start pitching to media outlets and bloggers, there are a few things you need to consider:

First Impressions Matter

Studies show you have just a few seconds to make a positive first impression on the Web. Your website must have engaging web copy a friendly, pleasing design. Anything less and you’ll lose potential visitors. Installing a user tracking system like Google Analytics will help you determine your visitors’ behavior. Heed the results. Pay attention to how long people are staying on your website. If your current visitors aren’t engaging with your website, why would media outlets and bloggers bother to stick around?

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Are Bing Users Click-Happy?

It seems people who search on Bing could be more commercial than Google searchers.

According to a study by search-advertising network Chitika, visitors who arrive at sites from organic search results on Bing are 55% more likely to click on an ad than if they arrived from Google.

Chitika looked at the click-through rates from 32 million ad impressions across its network of more than 50,000 websites in a week this past July. Visitors from Bing clicked on an ad 1.5% of the time on average, versus a 0.97% click-through rate for Google visitors, and a 1.24% click-through rate for Yahoo.

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