Apuntes para aplicar en Facebook:

Optimizacin del Facebook: 1. Debe ser persuasiva a. Creacin de tu pgina de fans b. Creacin de pgina de portada i. Mensaje de portada ii. Aplicaciones 1. Tabs personalizados a. Imgenes de los tabs b. Con llamados a la accin especficos c. Foto de perfil i. Logo ii. Head Shot d. Creacin de los fan page. i. Indispensable que alguien se haga fan para acceder ii. Crear contenidos que se propaguen viralmente e. Creacin de campaas publicitarias con segmentacin adecuada. El recurso que ms desperdiciado es el tiempo: Crea blueprints o plantillas para conocer que hacer. Tus diagramas de flujo de accin: 1. Se pueden replicar pues son procesos 2. Se adaptan a cualquier situacin sin comprometer su resultado

Crea, modifica y optimiza la pgina de Facebook Usa Iframes emplea las tecnologas actuales Genera trfico viral (indirecto) y segmentado (directo)

Crear reveal tab

Top leads generation tactics:

Website optimization, SEO and email are critical these were top three tactics for 2010 and 2011 The role of content Must achieve an optimal mix for YOUR audience

TACTIC #1: Craft all messaging around your central value proposition.
. For every action you desire a visitor to make (a click in the case of PPC), there must be an immediate promise of value that outweighs the cost of that action. . Like the Central Value Proposition, the Derivative Proposition of a specific action can be measured by its: . . . . Appeal How much is this offer desired? Exclusivity Is this offer (or a better one) available elsewhere? Credibility How believable are your claims? Clarity How easy is it for the customer to understand?

TACTIC #2: Never underestimate the power of a value-based headline.

There are two primary principles to remember when crafting a headline:
PRINCIPLE #1: All marketing messages must be centered primarily on the interests of the customer. Therefore, when it comes to crafting headlines, emphasize what the visitor gets rather than what they must do. The highest performing headlines focus on what the potential registration will get (i.e. value-centric). The lowest performing headlines focus on what the potential registration has to do. (i.e. action-centric) PRINCIPLE #2: The goal of a headline is similar to the goal of the opening scene of a movie to arrest the visitors attention and get them into the first paragraph. Therefore, utilize a point-first structure (i.e. place the value at the front of the headline).

TACTIC #3: Use testing as a means of developing your customer theory.

A. The goal of a test is not to get a lift, but rather to get a learning B. To achieve the maximum amount of learning, your tests should be designed around two key elements: a. A research question: Which? after this then ask Why? b. A theory question: What?

Value Proposition Question: If I am your ideal customer, why should I buy from you rather than your competitors?
Content marketing is the art of understanding exactly what your customers need to know, and delivering it to them in a relevant and compelling way to grow your business. 1) Customers must trust Alugen first and 2) Alugen must show the human element (not the technology) in order to sell products and services. Online informational tools are at the center of its marketing strategy. Print and events are integrated, but the plan and creative are pulled from online. With every type of demand generation activity (events, SEO/ SEM, public relations, advertising, direct marketing) there is a specific tool and landing page to tell the customer story as it relates to Alugen marketing objectives. These include microsites, video case studies/libraries, eZines (digital magazines), white papers, online communities.

HOW TO DEVELOP A STRATEGY

1. Become an Effective Change Agent Within Your Organization Develop a content marketing mindset Make the commitment Think and act like a publisherContent marketing requires you to view yourself more like a publisher delivering valuable editorial products than as a marketer selling products and services. Learn how to create the kind of high-quality content that emanates from great publishers and great corporations. 2. Use the B.E.S.T. Formula as Your Content Marketing Roadmap Behavioral Everything you communicate with your customers has a purpose: What do you want them to do? How do we want the customer to feel? What effect must we achieve with them? What action do we want them to take? How will we measure their behavior? How will we put them on the path to purchase? Essential Deliver information that your best prospects and customers really need to succeed at work or in life. What do our buyers really need to know? What will provide the most benefit personally or professionally?

 How can we present the content for maximum positive impact? What are the mandatory elements of the campaign? What media types must we include? StrategicYour content marketing efforts must be an integral part of your overall business strategy. Link your content strategy to your bottom line results. Does this content marketing effort help us achieve our strategic goals? Does it integrate with our other strategic initiatives? TargetedYou must target your content precisely so that it is truly relevant to your buyers. Use the B.E.S.T. approach for all of your online, print, and in-person communications. Have we precisely identified the prospects we want to target? Do we really understand what motivates them? Do we understand their professional roles? Do we understand how they view the product or service we offer? 3. Determine Goals, Buyer Needs, and Desired Outcomes Follow these four steps in detail to create your content marketing plan: Determine which organizational goals will be affected by the content program. Before you launch your content program, list your key organizational goals. Goals must be two things: specific and customer-focused. For example: To generate an average of 10% revenue growth with our top 20% of customers in Latin America. How will your content marketing program affect these goals? Results should be measureable and drive behavior change. Determine the informational needs of the buyer. Businesses create specific content so that customers react in very specific ways. Without a clear understanding of the customers information needs, any reaction that is close to the end goal is pure dumb luck. You probably already have a pretty good understanding of your core buyers. In order to create an effective content program, you need to take it a step further. The goal is to create a buyer persona (a vision of who your target customer really is), and a true understanding of what information they need (not just what you think they need), which in turn will enable you to meet your objectives. Determine what you want your customer to do and why this helps the business. To summarize, before you initiate and create the content for your content marketing plan, make sure: The content plan specifically drives yourorganization s goals The action(s) you want the customer to take are in some way measurable The content is based on your research about the buyers informational needs. If you have each of these components, you can create very specific goals for your content program. Some of these goals will be easy to link to your overall goals (e.g., achieving a business transaction). Others will just be pieces of the overall pie that keep you going in the right direction (e.g., getting a prospect to sign up for a trial offer or an eNewsletter to begin creating a relationship). Today, most organizations call these instances a conversion. Whatever you call them, make them specific and measurable in some way. Even print programs can measure conversions through group A/B benchmarking studies, or specific calls to action that drive customers to web landing pages. Determine the product and content mix. Your content marketing program should be well integrated with your website, microsites, ancillary content initiatives, and other collateral. Make sure all touch points speak to each another.

PUT THE PLAN IN MOTION

How to Develop and Execute Content The real challenge comes at this stage, where you need to actually begin planning and developing content.

1. Get outside helpespecially with the content. According to Junta42/BtoB Magazine research (2008), the majority of B2B marketers outsource their content projects. Anything can be outsourced: project management, content creation, design, web development, audience development, distribution, marketing, and more. Of all these, the most important is content. Lets face it: Marketers are so busy focusing on their products and driving demand that its difficult to step back and think about customersinformational needs like journalists do. Also, great writing is an art form, and takes talent. If you have that talent in-house, great. If not, find an expert from the outside using a free service like Junta42 Match. All companies, no matter what the size, may not always be able to outsource the complete project, but can always afford to outsource portions of the project. 2. Develop an editorial plan and schedule. Like a publisher, create a content schedule that works from present to about a year out. That doesn t mean you cant change things as you go depending on strategic objectives, product launches, or new customer information. What it means is that good content takes time. Whether you are creating content for a magazine, eBook, or video series, you need to plan ahead to get it done right. Good content doesnt happen overnight. Most often, it takes research and revision to meet the needs of your customers. Therefore, two sets of plans are needed. First, create an ongoing editorial calendar with key milestones for content deliverables. Second, develop a production schedule for the project team to follow for each individual project. 3. Define the process and assign a project manager to own it. Superior execution is the core of a successful content program. One person in your organization should be responsible and own the content initiative. Consider this person the publisher for your content efforts. Ultimately, this person is responsible for executing the goals you set out to accomplish. When content programs fail, its usually not due to a lack of quality content, but because of poor execution. Thats why a project manager may be your most important content asset, even though this person most likely wont be creating any of the content. The project manager must ensure excellence in every content marketing tactic, including: Content/editorial Design/art/photography Web development/integration Content-specific marketing Monitoring customer conversations Project budgeting Contract negotiation with freelancers Print/web production and maintenance List/audience development and maintenance Research and measurement Responsibility for accomplishing the goals of the project. Sometimes, just a little upfront work can make all the difference. Such is true with content marketing. With a little planning, a few processes, and ownership within the organization, any size business can make an important impact in the lives of its customers. 4. Identify sources of content. The traditional route of creating content by completing a sound and reasonable content plan is always important. Whats often forgotten, though, is that you can take advantage of content happening in and around your organization. For example, do your executives and employees speak and give presentations on a regular basis? If so, get the rights to record them through video or audio. Thats a piece of important content.

Do your engineers or process improvement personnel create industry documentation to substantiate designs or quality improvement measures? If so, rework it to create a piece of valuable content for your customers and prospects. The list could go on forever depending on your organization. The goal is to look at what is happening in your company to uncover gems of content that can be reworked by your editorial staff and produced as original and valuable content.

HOW WILL YOU KNOW IF ITS WORKING?

Set Up the Plan for Measurement Content marketing can always be measured, if you have a clear understanding of your strategic communication objectives. Just keep it simple and answer the question, How will we know that the content plan is working? This should lead you directly back to your organizational goals. One effective way to judge the effectiveness of a content plan is to analyze Return on Objective (ROO). ROO measurements come in all shapes and sizes, and usually include multiple items to give you the complete answer to your question. The important aspect to remember is that its not measurement for the sake of measurement. The tools and tactics below are used to directly answer what the projects objective is. If you keep that in mind, youll get your ROO. The information will also help you continually refine your content projects. Here are a few measurement initiatives to get you started: Tracking sales lift of those who receive the content program versus those who do not. Tracking conversions for online content products or print subscriptions and measuring new or increased sales. Online readership studies to determine the impact of the content project, as well as the acquisition of customer informational needs and trends. Measuring engagement (time spent) through online research or by using analytic measures on eNewsletter or web portal products. Pre-/post-awareness study to measure the impact of the program. If possible, separate out a control group that does not receive your content initiative. Without that, its challenging to tell if the project made the impact, or if it was something else in your marketing arsenal. There are also a number of new online measurement tools that can give you some insight into how your content is performing, both with search engines and with customers themselves. Some examples include Alexa.com, Compete.com, Quantcast.com, and Trafficestimate.com (for traffic comparison) and Technorati.com, Icerocket.com, and Feedburner.com (for blog impact). Finally, here are some additional tactics to consider when integrating measurement into your content marketing: Distinct 800 number on print and online initiatives Using individual URLs among different content projects Specific landing pages based on customer segment Every print or web page should have some type of call-to-action Use print and online versioning tools to send more precise content to customers and prospects based on their individual needs, and measure the impact difference. Ultimately, we are only scratching the surface here when it comes to content marketing measurement. The key comes down to this: You have to plan for measurement. It is almost impossible to measure the content vehicle after youve already begun. An organization that invests in content without investing in the measuring of that content doesn t truly believe in the content initiative.

FINAL THOUGHTS: CONTENT WITHOUT PROMOTION IS NOTHING

Motorola is a great example of how content promotion is integral to the entire sales process. Every one of its demand generation activities links to a specific informational tool that leads customers through the sales process. Lee Odden, one of the leading marketing bloggers in the country, posted this about the content versus promotion debate: If you create great content and no one knows about it to link to it, youre spinning your wheels. A combination of content as well as social networking, link networking, public relations, and gaining editorial visibility as well as viral and individual link solicitations will all work together synergistically. Building a community of consumers of your content as well as relationships with the media in your industry is the distribution network necessary to gain the most link value out of creating great content. All too often, companies engage in a content project, dont see positive results, and halt the initiative, thinking that the content didnt meet customer needs. The majority of time, the problem was not necessarily in the content, but in the marketing of the content. It doesnt have to be that way. There are so many affordable and easy-to-use technologies available today that enable you to both reduce costs and increase precision. Very importantly, effective and efficient distribution powers the very best content marketing strategies. After all, theres not much point in creating great content if you cant deliver it. Now you can do both.

To make a page noteworthy is not only the creative ways the brands interact with their fans, but also their incorporation of clear calls-to-action and targeted links for potential customers to connect. They launched their unique campaigns so fans and followers could learn more about their company and brand, and in addition, created ways for them to become leads and potential customers. 1. Es necesario crear una pgina a la que se acceder a travs de una fan gate donde los fans podrn participar en algn juego interactivo relacionado con el cuidado ambiental o algo as. 2. Darles alguna opcin de diseo 3. Opcin de suscribirse a newsletter de Alugen 4. Introduce a progressive coupon on the Alugen Facebook Page. The coupon began at a low value of $0.75 off and increased as people 'liked' the page and signed up for the coupon, ultimately reaching a buy-one-get-one-free deal. Most importantly, also ask to new fans to subscribe to Alugens newsletter. 5. Crea ofertas por tiempo limitado y ofrece garanta de satisfaccin, para que tus posibles compradores sientan confianza y se convenzan a s mismos de que necesitan poseer eso que t vendes. Its not always about what you do; its how you do it. If your fans and followers are engaging with your campaign, thats great, but make sure you give them a reason to be there that will help move the needle for your company as well. Set goals (do you want to increase reach, generate leads, etc.?), use calls-to-action, and make sure your campaign is engineered to achieve those goals. Use your social media campaigns as a tool to build interest in your business and ultimately generate new leads and future customers.

Fijarse un objetivo claro y preciso, y proponerse una meta a cumplir. Elegir una estrategia y aplicarla hasta lograrlo. Si eres bueno escribiendo y disfrutas de esta actividad, entonces puedes ganar dinero escribiendo artculos para distintos blogs.

Creacin de un producto digital. Puedes enfocarte en un tema que te apasione mucho, o en un tema de inters general, o en realizar vdeo tutoriales, audio libros, e--books en pdf, etctera; y posteriormente promocionarlos y venderlos por Internet. Elige un nicho que te apasione, o que te genere mucha satisfaccin. Define tu prototipo de prospecto y disea cuidadosamente tu comunicacin con ellos. Elige las palabras que vas a usar, define cmo les hablars, cmo te sumergirs en su problema para poder entenderlo y ayudarlo real y genuinamente. Consigue los elementos necesarios para generar tu producto: una cmara de vdeo con buena definicin, un buen micrfono, el software necesario para editar tus audios, vdeos y fotos. La idea es que puedas crear todo tipo de contenido desde tu casa, con tu propia computadora, as el proceso ser lo ms rpido posible y hasta puedes ponerlo a la venta en el mismo da que lo terminas. One of the tenets of inbound marketing is not to annoy. Many of the elements mentioned (autoplaying multimedia, flash, annoying animations) can be avoided simply by keeping simplicity and purpose at the center of design decisions. Simplicity in that simpler is generally better, and translates better across multiple browsers, channels and devices; and purpose meaning keeping in mind what a site visitor is trying to accomplish (getting information or support, or better yet, to contact you or buy, not see how skilled your flash developer is).

Things People Hate About Your Website 1) Pop-Up Ads 2) Automatically Playing Multimedia Content When a Page Loads 3) Disorienting Animations Nix the animations, and let visitors focus on what they can do on that page with clearly written headlines and explanatory copy. 4) Generic Stock PhotographyShow pictures of customers, real people that work at your company, your product, and your location. Or if you're particularly design savvy, create visuals yourself that directly relate to what you do. Images are helpful if they clarify something for a visitor -- generic stock photography doesn't help visitors, so by extension, it doesn't help you. 5) Including a 'Contact Us' Form in Lieu of Contact Information A 'Contact Us' form may seem like an easy way to generate an opt-in email list, but it's really the least valuable form of lead generation for you and your site visitors. It's terribly generic, and doesn't indicate the contact actually wants to receive ongoing communications from you -- it's more likely they have a one-time problem or request that needs to be addressed. So let's say they do in fact have a one-time request. There's nothing wrong with having a "Contact Us" module on your site; but it should never be the only means of communication between you and your customers. If your visitor or customer needs help, they want it now. They don't want to fill out a form and wait to see when, if ever, they get a response. Let people get in touch with you via email, the phone, and social media, and make that information available on your website. 6) Unintelligible 'About Us' Page

Does your 'About Us' page explain what you do in business babble, or using the words and phrases common to the general population? Let's play a translation game using HubSpot's 'About Us' page copy. Would you know what we did if our 'About Us' page said this (thankfully, it doesn't)?

HubSpot assists organizations across multiple countries reduce churn by backfilling the sales pipeline with highly qualified traffic that generates leads that convert into customers with high lifetime value. We achieve this through leading-edge software that integrates all marketing channels for a synergistic view of the data that determines and prioritizes the high-value marketing activities.
What? Let's translate that into the way people actually speak!

HubSpot all-in-one marketing software helps more than 6,000 companies in 45 countries attract leads and convert them into customers. A pioneer in inbound marketing, HubSpot aims to help its customers make marketing that people can actually love. Got it, we make

marketing software that helps you get leads and customers. Do a business babble check on your 'About Us' page to make sure you're speaking in a language non-experts can understand. I recommend running it by a few friends and family members that don't work in your industry for the best results. 7) SEO-Driven Copy Remember back in the early 2000s when you went to a website and saw paragraphs and paragraphs of copy? Aside from being visually overwhelming, if you read that copy you'd find nothing more than a bunch of keyword-dense copy meant for crawlers, not humans. Unfortunately, some websites are still writing for bots, even though Google's algorithm is far more sophisticated at determining a page's relevancy than it was 10 years ago. In fact, now Google will ding you for these types of activities! There's a difference between search engine

optimized content and over-optimized content. Don't write for crawlers; write for humans.

8) Not Including Social Sharing Buttons on Your Content If you're writing for humans, you probably have some really interesting content on your site. Content that people want to share on social media, perhaps. That's why it's a huge disappointment to scroll up and down looking for a "Tweet This!" button, only to realize there aren't any social sharing buttons on your website! These buttons make social sharing easy for your readers -- they don't have to copy and paste your URL, shorten it, and compose a tweet. And easy social sharing options means your content gets more visibility, which means more site traffic, better search engine rankings, and more lead generation opportunities. 9) You Don't Have a Blog Perhaps I'm biased, but visiting a website without a blog is a turn off. Visitors want to learn about you, and in today's world where consumers are performing in-depth company research on their own before ever contacting a sales person, an 'About Us' page isn't enough to tell the full story. Think of it like this -- the 'About Us' page is like your personality at a job interview, and your blog is your personality after a few drinks. After reading through a

10) Titles and Content are Incongruous

sample of blog posts over a long span of time, visitors have a much better understanding of who you are (awesome), who works at your company, what you believe, and how you've grown over time.

If you're an avid content creator, you know how important a well-crafted title is. Great titles are what cause people to click through in their RSS, emails, and search engines to read what you have written. But if they're met with content that's unrelated to the title you provided, you'll disappoint visitors -- and they'll abandon your site. While it's important to capture peoples' attention in titles, make sure it isn't misleading and your content can actually live up to what you promised you'd deliver. 11) Your Call-to-Action Copy Doesn't Align With the Offer Along the same lines, your call-to-action should align with what visitors receive when they redeem your offer. There's nothing more frustrating than being promised a 50% off coupon in the call-to-action copy, only to redeem it and find there's a caveat that says you must first spend $1,000 on select items. In-store purchases only. This is not only insulting to your visitors, but it will also kill your reputation and the conversion rates of your calls-to-action and landing pages. 12) Your Internal Linking Isn't User-Friendly When done correctly, internal links are helpful for readers and website alike. They point readers to other relevant information, and help you improve the organic ranking for important pages on your own website. But some websites seem to have trouble executing internal linking correctly, pointing users to irrelevant pages, linking strange phrases within the copy, and overdoing it to the point of making content unreadable.

Include internal links only to relevant pages on your website that will enhance a reader's experience, and include that link on the anchor text that makes the most sense. Recognize

that sometimes, the link that makes the most sense isn't keyword-optimized anchor text, either, like in this example from yesterday morning's blog post. I thought about a way to rephrase the last sentence so the anchor text could be keyword optimized, but in the end, the "reference this ebook" text, while technically against SEO best practices, was the most user-friendly option.

(Tip: Be sure to have all links open into a new tab in your browser, not the same window. Visitors may not be done reading the content on this page, and you don't want to navigate them away while they're still reading!)
13) Sliders That Take Forever, and Ever, to Load

Sliders are a great way to showcase multiple images in a space-efficient manner (just check

out our current homepage, for example). But there's a right way and a wrong way to use them. If your slider loads images quickly and doesn't require a new page to load every time a user clicks, congratulations! Your slider is not annoying. But the web is filled with sliders that, every time you click the arrow for the next image, load an entirely new web page. That can take visitors from a 0 second load time to 1, 2, 5, or more seconds as the entire webpage reloads!

(Tip: If you're using a slider in a list post, accompany the visual elements with written copy above or below the slider. Many readers are scanners, and won't invest the time to click through every image in the slider.)
14) Using Flash

Many designers use Flash on clients' websites, and it's enough to make a search marketer cringe along with the site visitors. The problem with Flash is not in its limitations; I've seen some stunning websites created with Flash! But search engines can't read it, so your site

won't get indexed. And another problem? Visitors are often looking for a very specific piece of information when visiting your site -- if they have to wait for a 10-second visual

introduction to unfold on the screen before they can find your hours of operation, you're going to have an angry customer (or would-be customer, depending on their level of patience). 15) The Worst Offender: I Don't Know What to Do. This is the worst offender in my opinion -- when someone lands on your site, do they know what to do? Alright, maybe they don't like your stock photos, or perhaps they see a 'Contact Us' form that grinds their gears. But visitors may be able to look past those things if they can immediately see what your website does, what the value of that is, and what they should do next: 1) Include clear headline copy, jargonless page copy that explains the value of what you do, 2) and one clear primary call-to-action per page that shows visitors how to take the next steps: a. whether that's subscribing to your blog, b. getting a free trial, c. watching a video, d. or any other action you hope visitors will perform on your site. 1) Skittles launched a "Win the Rainbow" contest, asking its fans "what they would do for a Skittles vending machine," which garnered entries that racked up hundreds of thousands of views on YouTube. 2) The Zappos Fan Page has a great call to action that tells visitors exactly what they should be doing the first time they come to the site. They also have a "Fan of the Week" section where they ask fans to send in pictures of themselves posing with a Zappos box in the photo. 3) McDonald's Fan Page includes a number of short and quick mental games that are not only addicting but also allow fans to share their scores with their friends, thereby promoting viral sharing. 4) Harley Davidson's page includes a number of informational resources that educate their fans on interesting topics ranging from how to ride to the history of Harley Davidson. 5) The iTunes Fan Page brings much of the functionality of the iTunes Store right to their Facebook page. Search for artists or check out the most popular hits of the week, right from Facebook! 6) The Jones Soda page has a number of engaging opportunities for fans. From the fan page, you can order personalized Jones Soda, get the iPhone App, or take the weekly poll. VitaminWater is using its Fan Page as its main online presence. Learn about upcoming product releases, such as their newest flavor SturD, right from Facebook.

7) Doritos uses their Fan Page to share all of their recent commercials, including many of the ones submitted by fans. The quality and hilarity of many of the video shorts is sure to keep fans coming back. 8) Best Buy's Fan Page lets you shop and read reviews from products right on Facebook. Not sure which flat-screen TV you want to buy? Get feedback from their over 2.5 million fans so you don't make a bad decision. 9) Kaplan's Facebook Fan Page makes studying for the SAT fun. Join the SAT Quizbank Daily Challenge to compete against other fans answering realistic SAT questions. 10)Redbull's page is another great example of an incredible CTA. Upon first visiting, you only have one option - to "Like" their page. After that you can watch a number of their extreme sport videos from all over the world. 11)Dell was one of the first big companies to embrace social media. They continue to build their customer engagement by allowing fans to ask for advice, get reviews, or get personalized recommendations right from their fan page. 12)Starbucks recognizes that one of the best recommendations is going to be one from a friend. That's why it has made the main offer on their Facebook Fan Page the ability to give a Starbucks gift card. 13)REI's page is another great example of CTA usage and customer education. They're being very clear about what they have to offer and what they want you to do. 14)Burt's Bees gets cute with their Fan Page by playing on the emotions of their fans. We like you...don't you like us? Well then click the "Like" button! =) 15)A picture is worth 1,000 words, and on the Victoria's Secret Fan Page, you get access to their iPad and iPhone apps. Now you can "get sexy, anywhere, anytime." 16)Another example of fan engagement, on the Sony Fan Page you can vote to help decide how their game, LittleBigPlanet 2, is designed. 17)The call-to-action at the top of the page pretty much says it all. "Like the NFL to receive breaking news updates, exclusive offers, and the best content and information from around the league." 18)Coca Cola has a wide variety of resources on their Fan Page. They do a great job of promoting their presence on a wide variety of social networks such as Twitter, MySpace, YouTube, and Flickr.

Even if youre on social media, operating without a website is just silly. A website is an essential piece of your online marketing strategy. Having a website alone isnt the key to great results. Instead, its the ability turn your website into an inbound marketing machine. A website needs to not just exist, it needs to perform. It needs to attract visitors, educate them and convince them to buy. Today, the web is social and interactive. We now need to consider integrating search, social media, content, blogging, and more with our websites.

Todays buyer wishes to consume information when they want and how they want and often-times without the involvement of a sales person. And more importantly, they want to be educated and not sold to.

Get Found Online

A great website isnt so great if no one visits it.
Off-page search engine optimization (SEO) is the most important factor to increasing your ranking results. Off-Page SEO is about building inbound links, essentially getting other quality websites to link back to you. Search engines call this authority or link juice. The more inbound links you have, the more important your site must be, thus the higher youll rank. Create high-quality, educational or entertaining content. If people like your content, they will naturally want to link to it. Submit your website to online directories (check out this list here). This is an easy way to start.
Free Link-Building Directories to Jumpstart Your Search Engine Ranking
Posted by Rebecca Churt Thu, Feb 11, 2010 @ 01:30 PM Links are the top metric by which search engines determine who you are and what you are about, and ultimately how you are ranked in search results. In other words, links are your website's life line. A great way to jumpstart your link-building efforts to get that online vote of trust is to submit your business to directories, which is a great way to get your small business website on the map. Wondering how to get more inbound links to your website, and where to start? Heres a list of top link-building directories, which are all FREE resources to help you get started. Local Directories: Loopt.com Localeze.com Biglocal.com Openlist.com

Outside.in BOTW.org/top/Regional/United_States Superpages.com

Search Engine Local Business Listings: Yahoo.com, Google.com and Bing.com Local Getlisted.org (to double check if youve been listed) Blog Directories: DoFollowBlogs.com PlaceBlogger.com Bloglines.com Blogsearch.Google.com Technorati.com Blogged.com BlogCatalog.com Blogmarks.net MyBlogLog.com Zimbio.com Review and Rating Directories: Yelp.com Rateitall.com InsiderPages.com Directories not only help you get more inbound links but also bring in more qualified traffic and generate leads. As you add your business to directories, be sure to use very specific categories including location, industry-specific niches and anything else that makes you unique. Whether you are locally focused or have branches throughout the country, you should be listed where people are looking for you. Inbound links pointing to your site from other trusted sources on the Web are like people raising their hand to Google and saying, "You should pay attention to this one!" Photo Credit: Jurek Durczak

Write guest posts for other blogs. This is a win-win for both parties. People
will want extra (quality) content from others and in exchange, its a great way to build inbound links.

Researching link building opportunities with other websites, but always

check the authority of the websites that you are trying to get links from. There are many tools online that allow you to check domain or page authority, including HubSpot's link grader tool.

And dont borrow, beg, barter, bribe or buy links.

An Introduction to Link Building: Understanding the Anatomy of a Link

Posted by Andrew Pitre Wed, Sep 28, 2011 @ 09:09 AM

A Quick Note About Content Creation At the end of the day, link building is about content creation. If you don't have content worth sharing, you won't get link love. Even with the best link building campaign in place, the lion's share of your links should come from people freely linking to your content. Use a blog on your website to write about your industry. The content you create will get found and will get linked to.

Understanding the Anatomy of a Link

There are three things you need to think about: 1) Anchor Text: This this the textual representation of your hyperlink. For example the anchor text for this link is "this link," and the hyperlink is "http://www.hubspot.com." Anchor text is important because most major search engines use it to determine what keywords are relevant to a page. For example, if you want to rank for the term "Orange Widgets," then you should try to get as many links as you can with "Orange Widgets" as the anchor text. 2) Authority of the Linking Domain: Inbound links are important to SEO because they are a signal to search engines that you Web site or Web pages are important. Simple put, the more inbound links you have, the more authority you get. Furthermore, the more authority you have, the better your chances are of ranking for a given keyword. Your goal should be to get links from high authority domains. When researching link building opportunities, always check the authority of the websites that you are trying to get links from. There are many tools online that allow you to check domain or page authority, including HubSpot's link grader tool. 3) The Page on Your Website that is Getting the Links: As I mentioned at the beginning of this post, most of the inbound links your site will receive in it's lifetime will come naturally from people linking to your remarkable content. Those links will help improve the authority of your domain as a whole, but are often very general and do not contain keyword-rich anchor text, or point to meaningful pages. The goal of targeted link building is to improve your rank for a keyword phrase or to improve the rank of a particular page on your site.

Think carefully about what pages you want linked to. For example, if you currently have a page on your site that is ranking number 22 on Google for the term "Orange Widgets." Your goal should be to generate more links to that page, hopefully containing relevant anchor text. As links to that specific page grow, it should climb up in position in search engines.

On-page Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

While off-page SEO is hugely important, we cant forget about on-page SEO. This consists of placing your most important keywords within the content elements of your actual pages. These on-page elements include Headlines, Sub-headlines, Body Content, Image Tags, and Links. Often times on-page SEO is referred to as keyword density.
Get Found Online: On-page SEO

For on-page SEO done right: Pick a primary keyword for each page and focus on optimizing that page for that word. Place your primary keywords in your headline and sub-headline. These areas of content have greater weight to search engines. Include the keywords in the body content but don't use them out of context. Make sure they are relevant with the rest of your content. Include keywords in the file name of images (e.g. mykeyword.jpg) or use them in the ALT tag. Include the keywords in the page URL and keep the URL clean. And lastly, write for humans first, search engines second. Always prepare your content for your audience and then look to optimize it for search. Content written in the other order wont read naturally and your visitors will recognize it.
Example of a clean URL containing primary keywords:

6 Ways to Instantly Improve On-Page SEO

1. Choose a great headline. There are two things that make a headline great; 1. One is that it is attention-grabbing and entices viewers to visit your page. 2. The other is that it contains the keyword or phrase you want to optimize the page for. a. This will help search engines rank your page as more relevant for certain search queries and will therefore make them more likely to display your page in the search results for those queries. b. Using other formatting such as sub-headlines and bolded text can also help search engines figure out whats important on your page.

Here, the headline is optimized for the keyword internet marketing. The sub-headline includes marketing on the web, and the bolded text uses the phrase internet marketing strategy. This structured keyword placement shows search engines that this page is highly relevant for search terms like internet marketing. 2. Keep the URL clean. Weve all seen those messy URLs with endless strings of numbers, letters, and symbols. As long as you have the option, avoid those at all costs. Search engines look at your websites URL as part of their attempts to understand your content and index your page. Choose a simple, organized URL that uses keywords to indicate the topic of your page and help your page rank higher for it. 3. Provide information about your images. Images are an excellent way to make your website more appealing to your visitors, and if you use them correctly, you can also make your website more appealing to search engines. There are two things you can do to provide information about images and photos to search engines. One is to give the image a relevant file name, such as howto-use-facebook-ebook.jpg, instead of pic12345.jpg. The other is to use alt tags, which are snippets of code that allow you to tag each image with a short piece of text. The file name and alt tag information for an image is stored in the HTML of the web page, so search engine bots pick up on it. Make sure to include keywords!

4. Choose keyword-rich title tags and meta descriptions. A title tag is just a fancy term for the name of your page. Its what shows up on the tab of your browser when you have the page open and also what is displayed as the headline (or blue link) when your page is listed in the search results. The cap is 75 characters, so choose carefully! The meta description of your page is the short description that shows up beneath the title tag and URL in your listings on search results pages. These are limited to 150 characters, so again, make sure you include some keywords to help improve your rank.

5. Use header tags. These are another great tool for indicating to search engines which keywords and phrases are most important, since they allow you to create headlines of different sizes. So, for example, search engines know that text within an h1 tag is slightly more important than text in an h2 tag, and far more important than text in an h6 tag.

6. Do some internal linking. When creating content for your page, you can link to some of your other pages as well! This will not only help your visitors find more of your content, but you can also use the anchor text (the text you link on) to provide search engines with clues about the keywords for that page.

For example, here, the search engines will see that the link with the anchor text launching a blog must be relevant to keywords about blogging, and the link for improved lead generation must be relevant to keywords about lead generation.

Title Tag & Meta Tags

While this may be the least sexiest component of SEO, it is a definite musthave. A Meta Tag is a line of code that is contained in the background of a web page. Search engines look at meta tags to learn more about what the page is about. Meta tags dont quite have the level of SEO importance as they used to but are still very important. Back in the day, websites abused meta tags to increase their rankings by including far too many keywords. Now search engines are smarter and give more weight to inbound links and page content for ranking instead. However, they still play an important role to an SEO strategy. Make sure to use these on all of your pages. If youre not a web guru, most website editors and content management systems enable you to easily edit meta tags without coding knowledge. If you dont have an editor, you can simply open a web page file (ending in .htm, .html, .asp or .php) in Notepad or a plain text editor and the meta tags will be found near the top of the document. Here is example of what meta tags look like in an HTML document: Title: The title of the page seen at the top of a web browser, also the main headline displayed in search engine results. <title>HubSpot Inbound
Marketing Software</title>

Description: A concise description of the page. <meta name="Description"

content="Stop pushing. Start attracting. Stop interrupting. Start engaging. HubSpot's Inbound Marketing Software...">

Keywords: Words that identify what the page is about. Keep to less than 7
keywords per page. Keywords in meta tags are not visible in the search engine results like Title and Description. <meta name="keywords"
content="inbound marketing, marketing software">

3 Meta Description Mistakes You Might Be Making

Posted by Eric Vreeland Fri, Jan 14, 2011 @ 09:00 AM

If youve ever been to one of my Website Optimization Webinars youll be pretty familiar with the advice we give companies on how to get their website to rank better on the search engine results pages. Create content thats valuable to your target readership and youll attract inbound links. These links will increase your SEO credit and hopefully youll see your website crack the first page on the search engine results pages for your most relevant keywords. However, thats only the first step towards getting found, and if you stop there then its likely that youre selling yourself short. Getting on the first page of the Search Engine Results Page (SERP) is a great first step, but as research has shown your placement on the page also has an incredible effect on the amount of traffic you drive to your site. It has been measured that over a third of the traffic goes to the first search result and that traffic continues to decrease significantly as your place on the results page decreases. Although boosting your ranking on the SERP is one way to increase traffic the meta description has also has an impact on driving traffic to your website.

The Often Misunderstood Meta Description

The meta description is not something that is visible on your web page. The short summary of the web page, which is usually included at the top of the pages source code in a <meta description> tag is not used by the search engines for any SEO purposes. What the meta description is used for is to provide the searcher with a short description of the page (<150 characters to be exact) beneath each result. In fact, if a meta description is not included in the source code then the search engine will usually display part of the contents from the page in its place. Since the meta description is not as well understood as other page elements there are some very common mistakes people make when creating their websites.

1. Missing Meta - The most obvious mistake is to forget to include one entirely. As I mentioned earlier, if the meta description is omitted the search engine will simply take a part of the content from the web page. Of course the piece of content that search engine uses usually isnt a thoughtful succinct summary of your website and most likely will not give the searcher a good idea of whether your result is what they are looking for or not. The search engines will also abruptly cut off any text longer than 150 characters, which can look sloppy and read awkwardly.

2. Keyword Stuffing - A lot of webmasters that dont understand the purpose of the meta description see it as another opportunity to boost their SEO by jamming a bunch of keywords in there. Since the meta description has no effect on SEO this will actually have a negative impact on the traffic your website will get. Think about it for a second. Which result are you more likely to click on? Website Grader Free SEO tool from HubSpot that provides an Internet Marketing Report for your website. Or Website Grader, SEO, Inbound Marketing, SEM, Internet Marketing, search engine optimization, search engine marketing. The first is easily read and provides a simple description of what the viewer can expect to find on the page. The second just looks like what it is, a mish-mash of internet marketing keywords. 3. Not Including Any Keywords - Although keyword stuffing should be avoided, carefully thinking about how to incorporate your keywords into your meta description should not be overlooked. When someone searches for a keyword or keyword phrase in a search engine if those keywords are present in your meta description they will be bolded. This draws more attention to your result and increases the likelihood that someone will click on your result. It makes sense that the result that includes the keyword phrase in the meta description is more likely to be what the searcher is looking for than one that does not. I hope that these tips helped you to better understand the meta description and how it can be a very useful tool in increasing traffic to your website. If I missed anything be sure to stop by the website optimization webinar and let me know.

XML Sitemaps
The general incentive behind an XML sitemap is to help search engine crawlers (or spiders) sift through your pages more efficiently. An XML sitemap is simply an .xml file containing a listing of all your pages and when they were updated. Its a lot like a subway map. It shows the structure of your website and where are your pages reside. Creating a sitemap is easy. You can find sitemap generators online that will create the .xml file for you. Once you get the .xml file, simply upload it to the root directory of your website (e.g. www. website.com/sitemap.xml).
Get Found Online: XML Sitemaps

If your website is updated regularly, make it a good practice to update your xml file at least once a month so search engines have the freshest data. Adding an XML sitemap is a component that is commonly overlooked, while it may not be the deciding factor in improving your Search Engine Optimization, it will certainly help.

Tips for a great website design:

Proper use of colors: Use the right colors for your audience and to draw
attention to select elements. Dont try to make everything jump out. The result will be just the opposite nothing will stand out. Avoid a chaotic mix of colors on your website and instead pick two to four colors for your template and marketing materials.

Animations, gadgets and media: Avoid anything unnecessary. Using Flash

animations because they look cool is the wrong strategy. In most cases its best not to use animated background or background music. Only use media and animations to help support content and information.

Layout: Create a clear navigation structure (refer to Navigation on page 21)

and organize page elements in a grid fashion (as opposed to randomly scattered). Also, dont be afraid of white space and avoid clutter!

Typography: Make sure your website is legible. Use fonts, font sizes and font
colors that are easy to read. For easier page scanning, use bullet lists, section headers, and short paragraphs. If your site is English language-based, make sure information flows from left to right and top to bottom. While design is important, dont forget that offering great content is what your visitors are ultimately after. A well-designed website might convince visitors to take a closer look but they won't look twice if the content isn't useful and well organized. After all, you never get a second chance to make a first impression.

Maintain Consistency
Its best to keep elements on your site fairly consistent from page-to-page. Elements include colors, sizes, layout and placement of those elements. Your site needs to have a good flow from page to page. This means colors are primarily the same as well as fonts and layout structure. Navigation should remain in the same location of your layout throughout your website. For layout structure, typically three page layouts exist for most websites: one for the homepage, one for content pages and one for form pages. For example, your homepage will have a different layout than a landing page for a PPC campaign. Keep the elements in these layouts constant. This will help keep your visitors from feeling lost.

What REALLY Matters in a Website Redesign

Posted by Andrew Remis

Do you run for the hills when it's time to bust out the wireframes and discuss redesigning your website? It's okay, not everyone was born to be a designer. Creating a new website can potentially be a long and arduous process - but it doesn't have to be! So many businesses get stuck on 'form OVER function' when trying to design or redesign a website. What's "under the hood" is just as important - if not more - when you main goal is turning your site visitors into customers. With that said, it's still important to have a site that makes a good first impression. For example, when we helped create Website Redesign LITE, stripping down the design process to the fundamentals was a key part of the plan. There are three fundamental aspects people should consider before engaging in a new web design process. The homework looks something like this: 1. Decide on a navigation style and layout. Making it easy for people to navigate through your site is extremely important and one of the first steps is to decide whether you want your main navigation on the top (horizontal), side (vertical) or both. Both remember, follow the general rule of 'less is more.' For a majority of businesses, it's a best practice to have your home page, interior pages, and blog consisting of different layouts so visitors can easily distinguish between them. The popular cloud software company, Salesforce.com, did an excellent job creating separate looks for their home page, Cloud Blog, and interior content pages. 2. Identify elements that your target audience can quickly grasp. In his New York Times best seller 'Blink,' Malcolm Gladwell states "When you meet someone for the first time, or walk into a house you are thinking of buying, or read the first few sentences of a book, your mind takes about two seconds to jump to a series of conclusions." This is also true when people visit your website. These fleeting two seconds just might be the difference between acquiring a new customer who generates revenue for you, or simply a lost prospect who falls into the seductive arms of one of your competitors. Well-placed 'calls to action' buttons, such as this van from a Birmingham-area dry cleaner, clearly tell your visitors where to focus their attention. Also, having a prominent header image that viewers can easily connect with your business will create a lasting first impression.

3. Pick your color scheme. Generally businesses have specific colors for their brand already established. Sooner or later you'll need to come to a consensus and choose a primary and secondary color for your site. Quite often, these are simply highlights from the colors of your logo. There are plenty of free tools on the web to help you pick out color schemes. Adobe's Kuler, Aviary's Toucan, and Color Explorer are just some to name a few. Write down the hexcodes of the colors you want featured and pass them along to your designer to play with. Conclusion R esearching these three elements before diving into design meetings will put you in a much better position to minimize your turnaround time for your launch. Avoid wasting time on distracting flashy imagery or minute details that won't increase in lead generation. The following was a guest post by Sam Coren. Coren is a Project Manager at PullnotPush, a Boston inbound marketing agency. She uses her arsenal of design skills combined with web marketing to deliver copywriting, analytics analysis, landing page creation, and social media outreach to help clients get results. You can find her on Twitter @S_Coren and also find her musings on the Pull Marketing Blog.

Using the Right Images

Images can be a powerful element to any website but you need to use them wisely. Marketing Experiments performed a test comparing the use of stock photography verses real imagery on a website and each of their effects on lead generation. What they found was that photos of real people out-performed the stock photos by 95%. Why? Because stock images tend to be irrelevant: Resist the temptation to use photos of fake smiling business people! Expert Advice: Creating Divine Website Redesigns As a result, take care to place meaningful images on your site. Every image is transmitting a subconscious message to your audience and sometimes the result is different from what might expect

Expert Advice: Creating Divine Website Redesigns

Posted by Carol Ortenberg Thu, Sep 09, 2010 @ 04:00 PM

Now that weve looked at the steps you should take before starting a website redesign as well as some SEO tips to keep in mind, were going to move on to what many consider the sexiest part of a redesign: the actual look and design of the website. Its very easy to get swept up in the excitement and wind up overdoing it or building something that looks great but isnt very functional. Here are some tips from HubSpot Partners to keep you on the right path.

Dont Turn Anyone Off or Away

So youve done your SEO homework, built up a repository of great content and established yourself as a thought leader all the hallmarks of a great inbound marketing strategy. But what happens when someone comes to your new site and has no clue how to navigate it or find what they need? We shop where we feel comfortable. We use services that we feel confident in. These feelings are conveyed by the combination of words and design. A site may be able to attract initial traffic to the site with SEO and social media but they may not stick around if they find the site visually confusing, boring or unappealing. Make sure that your site is as inviting, clear and trust inspiring as your content.

Make Sure You Show Who YOU Are

We recognize that your content will help differentiate you from your competition. But sometimes we forget that design can do this as well. What it does mean, is that you want to make sure that your companys essence comes through in the design as well. It's always important to associate brand with content, otherwise there's no "stickiness" between who you are, what you do and the content you publishthere's an emotional, human component of every sale. The more you can appeal to the emotions of your target audience in design, the more likely they are to convert. A well placed graphic or video that does that can really help.

Show the Design Whos the Boss

..Effective calls to action and clear goals trump design. Dont let the design step over your ultimate [goal] which is getting leads. It can be easy to spend a lot of time thinking about the design and the effects, while not spending time through who your buyer personas are and accurately understandingwhat the stages in the [the] sales process are in order to speak to each persona at each stage.

Make Your Own Divine Redesign

Now that weve walked through the questions you need to ask yourself, SEO tips and finally design tricks, youre ready to get started on your own website redesign. Make it effective, make it visually appealing, make it yours! Photo Credit: valakirka

Navigation
Perhaps one of the biggest factors to keep visitors on your website is having a good, solid navigation system that supports all search preferences. In fact, more than three-quarters of survey respondents from a recent HubSpot study say that the most important element in website design is ease in finding information. If people cant find what they are looking for, they will give up and leave. Important factors in a sites navigation include: Keep the structure of your primary navigation simple (and near the top of your page). Include navigation in the footer of your site. Use breadcrumbs on every page (except for the homepage) so people are aware of their navigation trail. Include a Search box near the top of your site so visitors can search by keywords. Dont offer too many navigation options on a page. Dont dig too deep in most cases its best to keep your navigation to no more than three levels deep. Include links within your page copy and make it clear where those links go to. This is also great for SEO! Avoid use of complicated JavaScript and especially Flash for your navigation. Many mobile phones cant see Flash (yet), thus they wont be able to navigate your website. Same applies to web browsers that dont have an updated version of Flash installed. The overall rule with a proper navigation structure is simple: dont require visitors to have to think about where they need to go and how to get there. Make it easy for them.
10 Common Website Mistakes and How to Fix Them
Posted by Haris Krijestorac

Fri, Jun 25, 2010 @ 07:00 AM

Comments

4 in Share .

While hosting the past few Website Optimization Webinars, I've noticed that many businesses could benefit from similar easy fixes to their websites. All of these mistakes are easy to identify for free using Website Grader. In this post, I'll show you the common mistakes I've seen, and help you in fixing the ones that apply to you. Where possible, I will demonstrate these opportunities through Phantom EFX, a guest from a recent webinar.

10 Common But Easily Fixable Website Mistakes

1. Page Title Longer than 70 Characters

A page title is the text shown at the top of your browser window.

It is also the title of a page as shown in Google search results.

Page titles tell visitors what a page is about. Search engines and browsers may cut off your page title if it is too long. In most cases, it is good to keep your page title below 70 characters long. From a Search Engine Optimization (SEO) perspective, it is good to keep your page titles concise. If your page title is too long, it will dilute the importance of each term in the title. This might prevent you from ranking well on any of the words in your page title. Website Fix #1: Come up with a concise but keyword-rich description of your page that is under 70 characters long. Make that your page title.

2. Meta Description Longer than 150 Characters

Meta descriptions are important for drawing in visitors from search. The meta description is the text under a page title in search results. Like page titles, meta descriptions will get cut off and replaced by "..." if they are too long.

Website Fix #2: Come up with a meta description of your page that adds detail to your page title, but remains under 150 characters long.

3. Page Title not Targeting Realistic Keywords

A key factor in search engine ranking is how closely the title of a page matches the user's search terms. Phantom EFX's home page title (pictured below) illustrates the two common mistakes in targeting realistic keywords.

First, their page title is written too much like an advertisement. Users are not likely to search for the "#1" casino game publisher. Avoid unnecessary descriptive words like this, because users don't actually search for them. Additionally, their company name should not be the start of their page title. The first few words in a page title are the most influential in search engine results. Your want people that don't know about your brand to be able to find you, so using more genreal industry keywords is important. Website Fix #3: Think about (or look at using analytics) the words that users might searching to find you. Adjust your page title to remain readable, but match these words more closely.

4. Page Keywords Are All the Same

Each page on your website is a new opportunity to get found online. You don't want to waste all these opportunities by reusing the same page titles or internal page keywords. Website Fix #4: Diversify your keywords. Think what each page has to offer uniquely, and target keywords based on that.

5. Domain Name Set to Expire Soon

Search engines favor websites that are not set to expire for a long time. Having your domain name registered for the next few years shows committment, and means your website is less likely to be spammy. Website Fix #5: Renew your ownership of your domain for $10-$20 per year for a good SEO boost.

6. Images Have No ALT Text

Search engines do not "read" images. They scan primarily for text. Fortunately with the ALT tag, you can associate text with an image. ALT text does not have as much influence on the page keywords as actual text on the page, but is still worth having. Website Fix #6: Assign ALT text to a pictures whenever possible by adding something like the following to your HTML.

7. No CSS
Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) are not only a good way to ensure that your website has consistent design, they also help your SEO. Many websites still have layout-related information in their HTML. Since HTML is the language that search engines understand best, make sure your HTML is as concise as possisble. This ensures that search engines extract the most relevant keywords and other information from your pages. Website Fix #7: Put your layout-related code into CSS, and take it out of your HTML.

8. Conversion Form Too Lengthy

Conversion forms are crucial for converting traffic into leads. However, more traffic will be willing to become a lead if your form is done right. Take a look at the Phantom EFX conversion form below.

Do they really need the address information for a person in addition to their email addresses? As a site visitor, I don't understand this. Would they actually send me snail mail? I'll bet they're better off communicating with leads via email for now, and requesting a home address only when they need to deliver something to them. Website Fix #8: Limit the content of your forms to only the information you need.

9. Too little (or Too Much) Text

Search engines read text better than anything else. So, it's important to have text on your web page. Knowing this, some people cram as much text as possible into a page. As a result, search engines then struggle to extract the relevant text.

Website Fix #9: Make sure your page is readable and contains the keywords you are targeting. However, don't add unimportant text just to have more of it.

10. Not Using Analytics

Even after you've created interesting content on your website, optimized, and converted traffic into leads, your work is not done! If you want your website to be all it can be, you should analyze your results, and refine your SEO strategy accordingly. Website Fix #10: Install and start using an analytics program. To learn how to use analytics more effectively, take a look at HubSpot's Web Analytics Marketing Hub.

Flash and Animation

Flash animation can grab someones attention, yes, but it can also distract people from staying on your site. Not only are mobile applications lacking the capability to view flash animation but many people simply don't want to be bothered with unexpected noises and animations. Keep the animation to a minimum and only use when necessary. If youre in love with Flash or require animations, consider moving to HTML5 instead, if applicable. Its a great browser-compliant alternative to Flash.
How Not to Redesign Your Website (A Marketing Lesson From NYTimes.com)
Posted by Rick Burnes Mon, May 11, 2009 @ 07:10 AM
Comments

4 in Share . Imagine this: Your business has two successful sites with lots of inbound links from quality sites. Both are content-rich, with long-tail search traffic and Google juice.

One day you realize that for business reasons, you can no longer maintain two separate sites. They have to be combined.

So what do you do? Shutdown the smaller site, and send all the traffic to a single generic landing page on the new site? That's exactly what NYTimes.com did recently when it closed IHT.com and replaced it with a global edition of NYTimes.com. If you go to an old article on IHT.com (http://www.iht.com/articles/2002/05/07/t1_24.php), you'll end up on a landing page like the one on the right. Trouble is, that's exactly the wrong thing to do. From a user's perspective it's a terrible experience. Today, if you click on an old IHT link from a blog post or Wikipedia page, you won't end up on the page you're looking for, you'll end up on the generic landing page. That's a waste of time. From a business perspective, the NYT is throwing away money -- at least $100,000 every month the links are broken. According to Compete.com, IHT.com was getting over 1.5 million visitors/month before it shut down. If a third of those visitors were from search and direct old links, 500,000 visitors a month are hitting the dead end in the image above, instead of the page they were looking for. To buy that traffic from Google at $.20/click, you'd have to pay $100,000 a month. Add that $100,000 to the value of the SEO authority IHT.com accrues from its 3.9 million inbound links, and you have a sense of the money The Times is leaving on the table. So what's the right way to shut down a site you own? Create 301 redirects. If you're moving or shutting down existing pages, make sure you create redirects from your old pages to your new pages. A redirect is a simple rule that forwards all visitors to an old URL (including search engines) to its replacement. The result is that the SEO authority of the old url is transferred to the new url. 301 redirects would have saved The Times the money it's currently loosing with its dead-end landing pages. The New York Times has a top-notch web team, and this example is probably some sort of management snafu. The landing pages explain that The Times is "in the process of moving IHT articles dating back to 1991 over to NYTimes.com." Hopefully that means the old links will be fixed in the future. Still, it's an expensive mistake that would have been easy to avoid, and one you probably can't afford to make if you're a smaller business.

Accessibility
Make sure that anyone visiting your website can view it no matter what browser or application they are using. In order to gain significant traffic, your site needs to be compatible with multiple browsers and devices. With growth in mobile

phones and tablet devices, people are surfing the internet more than ever before. Make sure to get some of those views by allowing everyone to view your site, no matter what kind of system they run or which browser they use.

How to Create Custom Facebook Pages

http://www.labnol.org/internet/create-custom-facebook-pages/17957/ This video tutorial describes how you can create custom apps for your Facebook Fan pages in minutes. Your Pages can have maps, tweets, slideshows, music and more inside Tabs. Facebook has made some significant changes [PDF] to the layout of Facebook Pages in recent months. The custom landing tabs are gone and all Facebook Pages are now rendered using the new Timeline view. Page owners can add cover photos and they can also highlight important stories by pinning them to the top. Facebook Pages, by default, include apps for Events, Photos, Videos and Notes. However, if you would like to include custom information on your Facebook Page maybe a Google Map of your business you need to create an app for that. Let me share a few good examples. The official Facebook Page for Nokia has a Welcome Tab that highlights some of their recent phones. The Nike page has a Locations Tab that highlights the location of Nokia stores in the country. Apples App Store page has a Featured Tab where they have put a list of their topselling apps and games. The Al Jazeera Page on Facebook has a Watch Live Tab where you can watch news right inside Facebook. Have you ever wondered how do big brands create such interesting Facebook pages? They may have big marketing budgets but do you really need to hire skilled designers or programmers to build such fan pages? Well the answer is obviously no. You can create beautiful custom apps for your Facebook Page without writing a single line of code and all you need are few minutes.

Building Custom Tabs (Apps) for Facebook Pages

Facebook Apps for Pages, in simple English, are like regular web pages that are embedded inside Facebook using the IFRAME tag. Thus, any object that can be embedded in a HTML web page like audio MP3s, Google Maps, YouTube videos, presentations, Google Calender, jQuery Carousels, photo slideshows, etc. can be easily added to your Facebook Pages. Before we get into the actual process of creating custom tabs (or apps) for Facebook Pages, we need a find a place to host the HTML, CSS, Images, JavaScript and other files associated with our web pages. I prefer using Google Sites to host pages because they are free, you get a WYSIWYG editor to create pages and Google Sites can be integrated with Google Analytics so you more easily track visits to your Facebook pages. The other big reason is that Google Sites can serve pages over secure (https) and regular (http) connections. This is an extremely important point because a majority of Facebook users may have turned on secure browsing in their security settings. If your Facebook app serves content from a regular (http) URL, all these users will see is a warning message and you definitely dont want this to happen. Google Sites is thus a recommended option.

How to Create a Facebook App for your Page

Enough theory, lets get our hands dirty and create a custom app for our Facebook Page. If you get stuck, follow this video tutorial. Step 1: Open Google Sites and create a new site. Choose Blank Slate for the theme and, under Site Settings, set the width as 100% so your content occupies the entire width of the Facebook Canvas. Also disable the Header and Sidebar since we dont want this stuff to appear on our Facebook Page. Step 2: Compose a new page in Google Sites and add some content to this page using the built-in WYSIWYG editor. If you are an experienced coder / designer, switch to the HTML view and add

HTML code directly to your page. You may insert images, maps, videos, spreadsheets, gadgets, tables and everything else just like a regular HTML page. Step 3: Open the Facebook Developers page at developers.facebook.com and, if this is your first Facebook App, click Go to App to add the Developer app to your Facebook Profile. Next click on the button that says Create a new App and give your app a name (you can skip the other fields).

Step 4: Expand the Page Tab option under Basic Settings and set the URLs for Page Tab and Secure Page Tab the same as your URL of your Google Sites page. The Page Tab URL should point to the http version of the Google Sites page while the Secure Page Tab URL should use the https version. Step 5: You should also upload a 11174 pixels thumbnail image with your Page Tab as it will show up in the header of your Facebook Page. Use bigger fonts inside the image for better readability. Save the changes and your Facebook App is now ready. Step 6: Now we need to add this custom Page Tab to our Facebook Page. Thats easy. Copy the App ID of your Facebook App that you just created and replace XZY in the following URL with that App ID. Open the modified URL in your browser and you should see an option to add the app to your Facebook Pages.
https://www.facebook.com/dialog/pagetab?next=http://facebook.com&app_id=XYZ

Thats it. You can add more apps /tabs to your Facebook Page using the same technique and it is also possible to alter the order of these tabs in the header. If you ever need to update the content of a Facebook tab, just update the corresponding Google Sites page and your Facebook tab will update automatically because internally, you are just serving the same Google Sites Page to your Facebook Fans.

Heres a video tutorial that will walk you through all the steps in greater detail.