June 2006
Monthly Archive
Webmaster Interview - Andy McDonald from Swift Media UK
MattE 30 Jun 2006 | : Web, Webmaster Interviews
Here I present another webmater interview. A while back we had Stephanie from BlahBalhBox showing how age is no barrier to having a dream and chasing it. This time we hear from Andy MacDonald a 19 year old from Plymouth, England who is a never give up sort of guy who takes life by the shoulders and is giving it a good shake! That’s him on the right, done by artist Zalo at Caricature King
Post script: It’s just a shame he never paid for the next caricature of he and his “Mrs” he had done…
Over to you Andy…
Google visitors non-converters?
MattE 29 Jun 2006 | : Marketing, Web
Here is an interesting article Two New Studies Show Google Clicks Don’t Convert as Well
It talks about lower conversion rates of visitors coming from Google than other search engines.
The author tries to counter this by saying that the lower Google number is because people buy lots more keywords on Google than on other main search engines.
Trust me - I have a website
MattE 28 Jun 2006 | : Marketing, Web
I have just finished doing a free website review for a private detective business’s website.
One of the things that really struck me was the inadvertent overlooking of the element of trust. Every website needs to establish trust - it is no different to any other sales process - rapport and trust.
In the case of this business, people are often emotionally charged, and you need to know that the business you retain to undertake an investigation is going to be trustworthy. Not that they are going to take your money and run, but more a case of you have to have trust in them to understand your needs, trust them to be competent and reliable, trust them to be discreet.
How is trust developed? There are several ways:
Search Engine optimisation advice
A reader has sent me this interesting article. It was sent in by Andy McDonald of Swift Media UK - contact details at the end. All the points he raises are pertinent for any webmaster wanting to improve his search engine rankings.
So you have a website but where is it on Google, Yahoo! Or MSN? Have you fallen foul of a penalty or have you overlooked one of the many common search engine optimisation pitfalls when designing your site? Understanding what works for the search engines and what doesn’t when it comes to the content on your website can have a crucial impact on the relevance and/or page rank of your pages from a SEO perspective.
Here we highlight common mistakes that could affect your rankings on Google and other search engines, and possible alternatives when all else fails.
A bit of humour today
MattE 21 Jun 2006 | : Communications, Media
All work no play is a bit dull. I received this in the email - I thought it had an air of sophistication about it!!
2 billion GSM mobile phone users
This weekend, the mobile phone industry will celebrate an historic milestone as it connects the second billionth GSM mobile phone user in the world, the GSM Association (GSMA) announced today (13 June, 2006).
The GSMA said that new users are signing up at the rate of 1,000 per minute (just under 18 per second) to services that include both second generation GSM, as well as third generation 3GSM services - for which there are already more than 72 million users in the world.
Never mind the virus on your computer - your phone could be next
MattE 17 Jun 2006 | : Communications, SMS
Experts are warning that mobile phone viruses are the next wave of concern - and many are based on criminal intents.
An article in the Australian newspaper The Age, quotes Mikko Hypponen, director of anti-virus research at Finnish-based F-Secure Corp, who says mobile phones are fertile territory for cyber criminals to harvest millions from the unsuspecting. Criminals can take control of phones using botnets, without the knowledge of owners, and use their stored numbers to send SMS spam.
The article goes on to say:
Botnets are networks of PCs or phones that have been hijacked without the knowledge of their owners.
Take control and give it a go - thoughts against why it cannot be done
MattE 09 Jun 2006 | : Marketing, Web
On one of the many forums I participate in, there was a post from a guy bemoaning the fact that if he earned too much from Adsense it would affect his pension, so he was taking his ads off to keep under the limit.
A while back I wrote a post on responsibility. Taking the future in your hands and having a go. It was about young people, but this guy is not young. He has been around. He should know the deal that life is about taking control and not surrendering to anything.
To stop short when you have at your disposal the best tool ever created - the internet - to recreate your life, to build an empire if you wish, just because of some pension is beyond me.
View Bids on Overture
Thinking of advertising on Overture? Now you can get an idea if it is for you because you can View Bids
and see what people are paying at maximum.
I guess that the amounts would be fairly similar for adwords.
Webmaster Interview - Kent Johnson from Discount Leather Mart
MattE 07 Jun 2006 | : Webmaster Interviews
Welcome to the latest in our series of webmaster interviews. Today we are hearing from Kent Johnson from Discount Leather Mart - http://www.discount-leather.net
As you will read, Kent started out in ecommerce in a way that will be familiar to many online merchants - there was little choice owing to employment changes. Kent also highlights some interesting pitfalls of the dropship model…and how this is leading to his business
The internet provides access to global audiences and markets. Where are you located and is your market influenced by your location?
