Homepages spruced up to reflect hot topics

1 comment Friday, May 28, 2010

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If Carol Bartz’s remarks about “pretty search” (made during the Yahoo Investor Day event) left you scratching your head, her company’s acted quickly to clear up the confusion.  Today, Yahoo updated its image and video search homepages so that trending terms are represented with rows of pictures.

Five pages of images representing trending topics have been made available in each case, and it’s possible to either click through the pages one by one or let them scroll automatically.  Then, by hovering over an individual image, a user can see what site it came from.  Current top sources include the Washington Post, Yahoo News, the New York Daily News, YouTube, Yahoo Video, and Metacafe.

It seems like this approach is bound to get Yahoo a lot of additional clicks and attention.  After all, it’s one thing to know that tensions between North South Korea are running high, but a picture of three warships – or of Megan Fox or Michael Jordan, depending on one’s interests – is more likely to draw an individual in.

Early results have been quite positive, too.  A post on the Yahoo Search Blog explained this morning, “Already, we’ve seen double-digit percentage increases in engagement for both image and video search since launching these new homepages, with a 60% increase in time spent on the image search homepage.”

And more “pretty” updates should be on the way.  The post continued, “This is just the start of a set of changes we’ll be making to help you find the information you’re looking for.”

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Email Deliverability Tips

Posted by Tom Kulzer (AWeber CEO)

Ensuring requested opt-in email is delivered to subscriber inboxes is an increasingly difficult battle in the age of spam filtering. Open and click thru response rates can be dramatically affected by as much as 20-30% due to incorrect spam filter classification.

Permission

Confirming that the people who ask for your information have actually requested to be on your list is the number one step in the battle for deliverability. You should be using a process called confirmed opt-in or verified opt-in to send a unique link to the attempted subscriber when they request information. Before adding the person to your list they must click that unique link verifying that they are indeed the same person that owns the email address and requested to subscribe.

Subscriber Addresses

When requesting website visitors to opt-in ask for their “real” or “primary” email address instead of a free email address like Yahoo or Hotmail. Free emails tend to be throw away accounts and typically have a shorter lifetime than a primary ISP address.

List Maintenance

Always promptly remove undeliverable addresses that bounce when sending email to them. An address that bounces with a permanent error 2-3 times in a 30 day period should be removed from the list. ISP’s track what percentage of your newsletters bounce and will block them if you attempt to continually deliver messages to closed subscriber mailboxes.

Message Format

Usage of HTML messages to allow for text formatting, multiple columns, images, and brand recognition is growing in popularity and is widely supported by most email client software. Most spam is also HTML formatted and thus differentiating between requested email and spam HTML messages can be difficult. A 2004 study by AWeber .com shows that plain text messages are undeliverable 1.15% of the time and HTML only messages were undeliverable 2.3%. If sending HTML it is important to always send a plain text alternative message, also called text/HTML multi-part mime format.

Content

Many ISP’s filter based on the content that appears within the message text.

Website URL:

Research potential newsletter advertisers before allowing them to place ads in your newsletter issues. If they have used their website URL to send spam, just having their URL appear in your newsletter could cause the entire message to be filtered.

Words/phrases:

Choose your language carefully when crafting messages. Avoid hot button topics often found in spam such as medication, mortgages, making money, and pornography. If you do need to use words that might be filtered, don’t attempt to obfuscate words with extra characters or odd spelling, you’ll just make your messages appear more spam like.

Images:

Avoid creating messages that are entirely images. Use images sparingly, if at all. Commonly used open rate tracking technology uses images to calculate opens. You may choose to disable open rate tracking to avoid being filtered based on image content.

Attachments:

With viruses running rampant and spreading thru the usage of malicious email attachments many users are wary of attached documents. It’s often better to link to files via a website URL to reduce recipient fear of attachments and reduce the overall message size.

CAN-SPAM Compliance

The January 2004 Federal CAN-SPAM law introduced a number of rules regarding the delivery of email. It’s important you have your legal counsel review your practices and ensure you are in compliance. The two most important rules include having a valid postal mail address listed in all commercial messages and a working unsubscribe link that is promptly honored to remove the subscriber from future messages.

Reputation

Reputation services are often used by large ISP’s as a way to vet email senders regarding their email practices and policies. Businesses listed with these services are then given less stringent filtering or no filtering at all. Several reputation services are:

• http://www.isipp.com/iadb.php
• http://www.bondedsender.com
• http://www.habeas.com

Relationships & Whitelisting

Contact with major ISP’s and email providers is essential in letting them know about your requested subscriber email. Many large providers such as AOL and Yahoo have specific whitelisting programs and postmaster website areas to ensure your email is delivered as long as you meet their policies and procedures in handling your opt-in list.

Email deliverability is about ensuring requested opt-in email is delivered to the intended recipient. While no single tip will enable you to get 100% of your email delivered each one utilized as a group can go a long way to reaching that goal.

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The first thing you want to do when considering a website link exchange with another site is to make your site the best it can be. Although this may sound irrelevant, it is likely website operators will only be willing to help you if they truly admire your site and find it appropriate. This should be the standard in all cases at least. If a website operator is going to commit to allowing your link to be placed on their website and vice versa, they will want your reputation and website to be top notch. So, before you even ask for the trade off, make sure your links are working and everything looks great with your own site.

After polishing your site, you will need to make a list of the potential websites you can trade with. If you are a member of another website, then certainly add it to your list. Any site that you regularly visit or contribute in some way to is a great place to begin. Consider sites that you frequently use for message boards or chat rooms as well. If the site is familiar with you in any way, they will be more likely to partner with you on this task. Make sure you are realistic in your list as well. An enormous site will not likely be interested in helping a smaller site promote itself.

When creating your list, also be aware of websites you are in competition with. Many people who automatically be drawn to websites that offer similar services as their own. This is a mistake however. The best thing to do is target sites that offer services or products that are somewhat connected to what you offer, however are not the same. For instance, if you operate a website that sells flowers, consider targeting another website that sells vases, but not a site that also sells flowers. If you can find a correlation that works for both you and the other site, you will reap the most benefits.

Once you have a strong list of potential sites to work with on the exchange, develop a little proposal to send to each webmaster or owner. This should be short and concise explanation of what you want to do, which is exchange links on your sites. You can outline a few potential benefits for the other site as well as yourself. Explain why you think your site would mesh well with theirs. Even if it seems elementary, they may not realize the benefits unless you spell them out in the proposal. Make sure you include contact information for yourself and ask them to respond by a specific date. You can reasonably state, “a response within ten days would be greatly appreciated”. Most webmasters or owners will likely have gotten around to reading the proposal in that amount of time.

Once you have a few sites on board, you can sit back and see the benefits roll in. With users seeing your link on their website as well, you will get much more traffic than usual. You will be able to reach an audience that you might not have gotten to otherwise. Using the method of exchanging links with other websites is an inexpensive way to boost your website’s traffic. You may need to research and connect in order to make the agreement work with other sites, but the effort is well worth the cost. Once you have developed these relationships between yourself and other sites, you will be able to work on other issues together as well. This type of networking is great for your business overall.

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Writing articles to market a product or service is an
excellent way to build business. The articles should
be very informative, providing the reader with
information that is relevant to a specific topic. The
article usually includes a link to a webpage for more
information. The webpage, of course, is designed to
sell a product or service that relates to the topic of
the article.

These articles are commonly submitted to article
banks, websites, and ezine publishers. This is one
of the most effective ways to market a service or
product on the Internet, and it can become even more
effective when it is combined with the use of an
autoresponder.

Begin by setting each of your articles up in your
autoresponder. It is important that each article have
its very own autoresponder address, so you will
need an autoresponder service that will allow you to
do this. Next, make a master list of your articles, with
the autoresponder address for each article listed
beside the title. You can even add descriptions of the
articles on your master list if you want to.

Advertising your articles one at a time can take a
great deal of time…but advertising one autoresponder
address – the one for the master list – won’t take
very much time at all. Simply put it in your newsletter
and on your website. You can even allow other
ezine publishers to use this is a free resource for
their subscribers!
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Sounds like a wild idea, right? Can you really get unlimited targeted traffic in 15 minutes? Not only can you do so, but I am going to tell you how. If you like to get unlimited, targeted traffic in any niche to your website listen up, for I am about to tell you the way to do it.

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You may think I am pulling your leg, but the fact is that after you are done reading this blog and put to action what I state here, your traffic ticker will explode. And the best part is the way to do it is by using a system I created. That’s right. The secret is to using my system.

http://www.bobbybeaulieu.com/recommends/googletrafficpump/

You may then ask what system I am talking about. I am talking about a powerful and effective technique that is built around a five-step process. It is a system that when set up, will pump traffic to your website so fast that it will make your head spin. All you will need to do is perform all the actions required, and take a look at your hit counter. Then go do something fun for 15 minutes. Then come back and take another look at your hit counter. You will faint when you see how many hits you got within just 15 minutes.

If you think I am joking here this. I have a friend who owns a website. Before using my amazingly powerful program, his website was getting about 1000 hits a month. After he put my five-step program into action, he saw his hit counter go from 1000 hits a month to a 1000 hits in an hour. If he can see this kind of results, so can you.

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Blogging
is taking off like a wildfire. People are blogging about  just about anything you can think of. From
the daily routine of their cat, to technology reviews, to politics.

Until
the blogosphere sorts itself out and matures a bit more, it may be difficult to
tell exactly how this new frontier of instant publishing can help you and your
business grow. But don’t worry – you’ll start getting a flood of new ideas in
the coming months.

For
now, the most important thing you can do is develop the right mindset about
business blogging. What you think about something, and how you strategize
appyling it in your business very often has more to do with succes than the
technology, tool, or resource itself.

With
that in mind, here is the most important thing you can do. Keep your eye on
people.

DO NOT
get stuck on the “technology.” That’s what drove all the pie-in-the-sky dot.com
dreamers into the financial abyss. It’s people and personal communication that
matter most, and should always be a the center of all your thoughts,
strategies, and actions.

Blogging is just a tool. But
it’s a tool that can and should become a major support arm of your business.
Why?

Because it exponentially
multiplies the world’s oldest, most favored, and trusted form of information
sharing — word of mouth.

Just ask
yourself, whom do you trust the most to give you advice, recommendations, and
information about opportunities, purchases, or choices? Someone you know and
trust, right? Someone who you feel is just like you.

That type of
trust comes from personal communication, social interaction, and the joining
together of like-minded individuals. Blogging simply magnifies and expands that
sense of community and more personalized communication, and then expands the
reach across the entire world!

Link trust; with
respect, positioning, and word-of-mouth and you have the makings of a powerful
marketing arm that can initiate an ever-growing stream of highly targeted
prospects.

Remember, it’s
the relationships that matter most. Keep your eye on that fact, and you’ll
always have the right mindset for business blogging that’s a benefit for you
and your readers.

I often get questions from my associates and like minded individuals in search of reliable information. There are a few resources that I like to use on a regular basis and describe each of them in this post.

If you want to stay on top of all aspects of online marketing, a good way to do so is via targeted media. The online marketing industry, specifically Internet marketing and Search Engine optimization have a variety of resources that can give you timely information. Some of my favorite are:

Media

Webmaster Radio

Webmaster Radio is an Internet-based radio station that has really good programming that covers Pay Per Click maketing, to affiliate programs, to search engine optimization. Shows are hosted by experts in each niche like Danny Sullivan who covers search news to other ‘big names’ across the industry. A great feature is that you can listen throughout your day or simply download the podcasts for later listening on your ipod or listening device.

WebProNews

Wow… they have a lot of information and some great column writers that you are going to want to learn more about. WebProNews provides timely information on virtually every event. They have reporters writing constantly and have other scoring SEO blogs and other news sources, compiling the information in one place for easy access. They also have great articles by third-party writers and a very active readership that is proactive in their commenting. Definitely near the top of my go-to list when I’m looking for news and current feedback.

Search Engine Watch

When it comes to search, Search Engine Watch has been around since the beginning. SEW provides everything from search related articles to updated news stories related to what’s going on in search. Be sure to visit and bookmark this site.

Blogs

As with many industries – blogs are a great way to keep informed on the latest goings-on in the SEO realm. The trick, however, is figuring out which blogs are worth reading and which authors are truly knowledgeable. Over the years I’ve read many blogs and to be honest – I still do. Below are some of the key blogs I reference on a regular basis.

The Marketing Blog

If you’re reading this post than obviously you’ve found The Marketing Blog. Although I have experience with everything from Advertising to Trade Shows, my passion is Internet marketing. Here you’ll find all you need to know about Internet marketing, SEO, PPC, and much more.

Matt Cutts Blog

If you haven’t heard of Matt, you will. He’s one of the most outspoken Google associates – attending SEO conferences and speaking about the Google Algorithm. Officially, Matt Cutts is the head of Google’s Webspam team. His blog covers Google, technology, and some personal posts. Even though he doesn’t give away the farm, Matt does reveal some great insights into Google search.

SEOmoz Blog

SEO expert Rand Fishkin provide research, news and SEO tips on a regular basis. From op-eds to SEO whitepapers the SEOmoz Blog provides useful information and even has a great feature called Whiteboard Friday’s where you can get some great SEO advice.

Forums

Forums are a great place to tap into industry experts and get questions answered quickly and easily. I was a little fearful of using forums in the past but have found them to be one of my most valuable assets for Internet marketing and SEO. The other great thing about forums is that once you build up expertise in a certain area, you can share what you know with those just starting out.

The Internet Marketing Forum

This forum is my latest project and is set to be released from Beta in the next 30 days. The beauty of this forum is that it was created by my marketing team in search of answers to their most difficult questions and from readers like you with questions and the need for expert advice. Registration costs nothing and gives you access to some of the best Marketing, Internet marketing, SEO, and PPC experts around. If you’re not already an inaugural member, sign up today.

SEO Chat Forums

The SEO chat forums are really the most popular of SEO forums out there. Each covers a broad set of topics from Google to Social Media.

DigitalPoint Forums

DigitalPoint has been around for a while and again covers many of the same topics as found in the Internet marketing forum and SEO Chat Forums. Some users well known but overall the forum serves as a good place to ask questions and get them answered.

Newsletters & Other Resources

In addition to the above mentioned resources, other resources that are helpful in the area of SEO include:

Google Webmaster Tools And Guidelines

If you’re not already familiar with Google Webmaster Tools and Guidelines, than I suggest you check it out. Not only are the webmaster tools essential for uploading your sitemap to Google and getting noticed, but the guidelines are helpful for knowing best practices.

High Rankings Newsletter

Not being a fan of newsletter in general, I rarely read them. However, I have found this newsletter to be helpful when trying to stay on top of changes in SEO and more importantly, accessing real case studies associated with Internet marketing. In short, it provides great advice and helps you stay on top of search marketing.

Conclusion
There are literally thousands of resources online for marketing, Internet marketing, and SEO. The resources I mention above are just a few that I use to stay on top of my game. The key is to always be on the lookout for new and valuable resources that you can learn from. Internet marketing is continually evolving – so should you.

For more free marketing advice, visit the marketing experts at http://www.MarketingScoop.com.