Thu, 31 Jan 2008 14:51:26 by Kerry Dye
As our Managing Director, Matt Hopkins said the other day "Local search is the
Next Big Thing". The curious thing is that whilst everyone agrees it seems to be a slow burn and not a quick one.
Back in July it was reported that the
majority of searches have local intent and then in August that local search is growing faster than traditional search.
Read More.
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Thu, 31 Jan 2008 08:28:33 by Matt Hopkins
Mobile search is the "next big thing" and all search engines are
investing heavily in their technology to deliver search services in
better ways to a mobile/local user.
Yesterday, Google announced the release of an improved mobile search interface for the UK market.
One
of its main features is the ability to remember your location for
certain types of se...Read More.
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Thu, 31 Jan 2008 05:47:26 by Jayson Munday
When looking at your website, there are several tips you should keep in mind to not only help with you end user satisfaction, but also to keep the search engines happy. These points can generally be done by yourself, without the need for a major shake up of your site, but the benefits from them could really help you out with rankings and conversions.
Look at the con...Read More.
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Thu, 31 Jan 2008 05:37:42 by Cameron Winslow
Too often in the today's world of information technology where everything happens instantly and is spread through various forms of online communication, companies have the challenging task of managing their online brand reputation.
There are constantly issues with various clients brands from a disgruntled customer that decides to post a blog to articles put out by their c...Read More.
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Wed, 30 Jan 2008 14:38:03 by Pete Handley
I am constantly working with various different content management systems (CMS). I totted up this morning and over 75% of the websites that I work on use some form of system to manage content on their website, either for adding content to specific pages/areas of the site, or for managing the content of the entire site. These also include shopping carts in my mind - although not a content managemen...Read More.
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Tue, 29 Jan 2008 09:09:23 by Kerry Dye
Local searchers
might not be the same volume of website traffic as ranking for big terms, but
the users searching locally are using more specific search terms and tend to
convert better as a result.
As Matt mentioned the other day, there is a
lot of experimentation going on in the search engines for increasing relevance
for local searchers. And local on...Read More.
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Thu, 24 Jan 2008 07:20:08 by Jayson Munday
We've interviewed and analysed more than 35 of the top Australian web
hosting companies and have compiled a list of the top 10 that we judge
as being the most "search engine friendly".
The web hosting company you use can have an impact on the effectiveness of your search engine optimisation
campaign. Its important to assess the web host you select on its
se...Read More.
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Thu, 24 Jan 2008 05:12:22 by Cameron Winslow
There is a great 8 minute video that provides various professional opinions from US Marketers on the viability of Online Marketing for 2008 and Beyond: http://www.imediaconnection.com/content/18094.asp
In summary, they all agree that online marketing is a viable medium that is definitely here to not only stay but have continued, sustained growth in the future. Fortu...Read More.
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Wed, 23 Jan 2008 15:05:00 by Matt Hopkins
Who you link to can have a negative effect on your search engine rankings.
You can't control who links to you, but you should be in control of the sites that you are linking out to. If your web site links to sites that are known to spam the search engines or those in "bad neighbourhoods", then this can have an adverse effect on your rankings.
W...Read More.
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Tue, 22 Jan 2008 05:46:06 by Cameron Winslow
One of the big buzz words in the US with over 240 million subscribers, is the marketing concept of Mobile marketing. Here in Australia, it hasn't yet caught on to the extent of our North American counterparts. But like most marketing initiatives, it will become more integrated when planning your next years budgets. Australia is in the fortunate position to learn from mistake...Read More.
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Fri, 18 Jan 2008 17:48:19 by Kerry Dye
I recently came across a case of a website
design being stolen, where the duplicate site was being used to host affiliate
links.
I am presuming, because the site was a top
10 result in Google for a high traffic keyphrase, that the expectation of the
copier was that the site would rank for the same phrase and thus gain traffic
intended for the original site.&n...Read More.
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Fri, 18 Jan 2008 12:09:48 by Joe Bursell
I quite like "retro"; I've got a boxfresh pair of black Air Jordan V's, Tetris is still my favourite game and Frank Lloyd Wright's architecture remains brilliant 60plus years on. What these things have in common is that they are still functional and enjoyable, they were created in the past yet people like me still enjoy them today. Clearly this doesn't apply across the board. As the worl...Read More.
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Fri, 18 Jan 2008 10:52:25 by Matt Hopkins
Recently, Advertising Age released their Search Marketing Fact Pack for 2007. This is a great document to download and keep by your computer for casual reference as it is jam-packed with little factoids.
One of the sections provides the top industry categories that are getting the most traffic from search. At first, I was pretty surprised by the results and so conducted a stra...Read More.
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Fri, 18 Jan 2008 02:18:55 by Cameron Winslow
There is a fantastic 68 page study called "The Never Ending Frieding Project" that should be required reading for every Corporate, SME, B2B, B2C Marketing Manager globally. This project was commissioned by Isobar and MySpace and has some very powerful findings such as incorporating Social Media Marketing into your Integrated Marketing Strategies can provide increases in your a...Read More.
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Wed, 16 Jan 2008 09:52:14 by Matt Hopkins
That old adage - jack of all trades, master of none - is true with many things and none more so than with search engine marketing.
Its not an issue of capability. Many web designers have fantastic skills that would also make them great search marketers or optimisers. The same is true of many copywriters, web developers, etc.
The issue is with consistency of app...Read More.
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Tue, 15 Jan 2008 14:30:28 by Kerry Dye
I've previously written about the major update introducing Live Search and about the results we have seen so far.
Because I have been looking closely at the resources provided recently,
I thought I would blog on the ways that you can find out more
information about SEO for MSN and Live Search.
Microsoft has tried hard to make themselves
more accessible for Webmasters. They...Read More.
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Mon, 14 Jan 2008 17:33:56 by Kerry Dye
This blog is a bit of an update on what has occurred with our Live
Search results since I wrote a blog back last Autumn on the Live Search Recent Changes:
Pete also wrote this one on Live Search Webmaster
Center
- it is working now for me, although the information is light on detail. (Find some reviews of Live Search Webmaster Center here).
Regarding th...Read More.
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Mon, 14 Jan 2008 08:28:50 by Matt Hopkins
Kaizen is a Japanese term that effectively means continuous, incremental improvement. This is a large part of our company ethos and features heavily in how we manage both SEO and PPC campaigns.
The Kaizen philosophy was brought to light during the 1980's when the success of Japanese manufacturing was leading the world in terms of quality. It is part of a larger qualityimprovem...Read More.
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Mon, 14 Jan 2008 07:11:37 by Cameron Winslow
Too often new businesses or corporate divisions are more concerned with focus groups, Branding design of logos, and the general "feel" they want to project to the consumer without looking at practical aspects of getting their message to that same target market.
There have been many times that companies have gone through all the steps to determine their Brand name and t...Read More.
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Fri, 11 Jan 2008 12:47:41 by James Daniels
Google Checkout has been around for a good year now but I'm still rarely seeing online retailers use it. It's highly recommended that all online retailers using Google Adwords should sign up to Google Checkout. The main reason is that the Google Checkout graphic is the only colourful graphic on any Google SERP and reports suggest that CTR can increase by as much as 20%-30% by having this logo...Read More.
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Fri, 11 Jan 2008 12:08:05 by Kerry Dye
I came across the SEO Checklist blog when looking for an SEO checker to examine the outbound links from a site. I was very interested in the article Does Linking to Spam Sites Hurt Your Rankings?
Due to the recent parasitic spam-attacks that we discovered last year on our clients' sites, (see the press releases) the answer to this question is not no, as Mariella Moon concludes, ...Read More.
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Thu, 10 Jan 2008 13:05:09 by Pete Handley
Well, this is one we have all been waiting for here in the Vertical Leap UK office.
Plenty of people are aware of the Wikipedia, whether you are an Internet Marketer like the staff here at VL, or whether if you are a normal searcher. Wikipedia is widely used as an information resource, I even used it when I was doing some initial research for my dissertation when I was at uni -...Read More.
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Thu, 10 Jan 2008 12:54:45 by Kerry Dye
A recent report by Group M demonstrates that they have read their
crystal ball and determined that given current growth patterns in spending on
TV advertising and internet, there will be more spent online by 2009.
There is a good breakdown of the data by
eMarketer and a really nice
analysis of why this should happen in the UK particularly. The TV market in
th...Read More.
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Thu, 10 Jan 2008 07:48:25 by Matt Hopkins
If you or your clients have a global or international market, then it can be difficult to understand how your SEO is performing in those countries due to the localisation of search results in Google.
Over the past few years, Google has worked to "regionalise" most of its search results. This means that with each search request, it takes into account which Google domai...Read More.
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Thu, 10 Jan 2008 05:49:44 by Cameron Winslow
For a kickoff to your company's 2008 online media marketing strategies and New Year Resolutions, consider how your company is represented in the various social media mediums that are available.
How are you positioned to attract new customers this year and increase conversions?
What are your customers and competitors saying in discussion boards and foru...Read More.
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Wed, 9 Jan 2008 14:01:08 by Matthew Hopkins
To make it easier for our clients and partners to contact us, we've just acquired a new toll free telephone number -- 1 800 390 8520.
Matthew Hopkins
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Wed, 9 Jan 2008 09:32:43 by Matt Hopkins
It seems that Google is really experimenting with their local business ads to better understand the Local Search user and how they utilise search.
In the past few weeks, I've seen full addresses appear for businesses in the sponsored listings (PPC) section of the SERPs (as you can see in this example):
I've also seen Google playing with the placement of their Local...Read More.
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Mon, 7 Jan 2008 16:53:03 by Joe Bursell
I've noticed more and more postings about how best to avoid seeing affiliate search results appearing when you're looking for something.
Initially I couldn't see why it was a topic worth blogging about, but then I realized that I'm one of those uptight anally-retentive searchers that usually stuff their search terms with operators. Not a day goes by that I don't use at least three or fou...Read More.
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Mon, 7 Jan 2008 10:31:19 by Joe Bursell
Update:
In December last year I blogged about a bug I found in Google's local search. The issue was that a search for "brighton hotels" was bringing back results for Brighton in Massachusetts USA, rather than UK focused results.
In interest of fairness I thought I'd go back and re-check the search, and it looks to have been fixed:
"brighton hotel...Read More.
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Fri, 4 Jan 2008 13:13:42 by James Daniels
In Google's quest to take over the marketing world, their next venture is called Google Print Ads. The Times newspaper has reported that the service would employ a method similar to an auction. Customers/Businesses would be able to choose a newspaper online through Google and place a bid for advertising space. The bids that are made through Google Print Ads would be on a day-to-day and p...Read More.
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Fri, 4 Jan 2008 12:49:55 by Pete Handley
Many companies are now regularly writing a blog, and Joe talked yesterday about the SEO Benefits of a Company Blog. Once you have that blog, you have to decide what you want to write that blog about. Are you ever stuck for ideas on what to write?
At times it seems that there are a never ending amount of topics to choose from, sometimes there can be lots going on in your industry, whilst ...Read More.
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Fri, 4 Jan 2008 06:24:00 by Jayson Munday
I read an intersting article by David Morgan regarding "Knol", Google's new Wikipedia like website. He gives an interesting insight into why the site is being launched.
http://blogs.mediapost.com/spin/?p=1200
Jayson Munday
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Fri, 4 Jan 2008 05:46:44 by Cameron Winslow
There was an interesting article on search behaviour from a study released in the last United States Summer. Here are a few statistical examples given in an article with the link to the article provided below:
three out of four (72 percent) Americans report experiencing a degree of "search engine fatigue" (i.e., they're regularly becoming frustrated during ...Read More.
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Thu, 3 Jan 2008 16:35:04 by Bill Greer
Just where will the savvy marketer be allocating budget this year? Could 2008 present an opportunity to take advantage of an increasing trend for your audience to make the internet their first port of call when looking for the goods and services you sell without the need to increase your overall budget?
January is always a long, cold month, but from a business point of vie...Read More.
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Thu, 3 Jan 2008 13:27:43 by Kerry Dye
The latest version of the Google Toolbar has introduced advanced handling for 404 errors. This involves realising that the page is not going to load, and giving you alternate content in that situation. For a "File not Found" that includes giving you links to alternative places you might want to go:
Other activities include showing you the...Read More.
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Thu, 3 Jan 2008 11:11:55 by Joe Bursell
Here are some questions that website owners often puzzle over when the notion of a company blog is suggested:
1. Why would I go to the trouble of writing yet more content for my already populated website?
2. Why should I create a website and then still have the hassle of finding new and interesting things to publish to it?
3. Why, after I've invested time and money in building my...Read More.
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Thu, 3 Jan 2008 07:18:23 by Matt Hopkins
There are a lot of unscrupulous companies out there offering phony or weak SEO services and ultimately ripping off their clients. For those of us who are trying to contribute to making this industry professional and ethical, it is a source of great frustration.
I came across this posting on Search Engine Watch today - highlighting the arrest of the CEO of one of the more infa...Read More.
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Thu, 3 Jan 2008 05:22:35 by Jayson Munday
Well, once again the new year is here and it is time again for companies to look at their marketing strategies and analyse their marketing approach. This year will see a lot of advancements in a lot of fields - especially in the online world, but one thing I can pretty much gaurantee you is that SEO will still take time to see results.
Unlike other forms of marketing and a...Read More.
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Wed, 2 Jan 2008 08:01:18 by Matt Hopkins
There's been lots of discussion about universal search (aka "blended" search) results in Google over the past several months but I rarely see a true example of its use. I guess that I perform a lot of B2B type of searches and the blended search concept is currently moretargeted at the consumer. But last week, I was searching for information on the new Will Smith movie - I Am L...Read More.
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Wed, 2 Jan 2008 05:29:17 by Cameron Winslow
Online Marketing is not only essential for businesses to win new business, but has also been embraced as crucial in winning elections both here in Australia and abroad.
The United States Presidential candidates have all incorporated various online marketing strategies with varying degrees of success. Just as we saw in Australia the Kevin 07 campaign do a fairly good job of...Read More.
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