This is another subject I have been meaning to discuss that I haven’t seen debated a huge amount openly even though everyone in the industry is aware of it.

Simply checking the UK agencies ranking for ‘SEO’ (as an example) it’s very easy to spot that some of them are using their own clients as a link network to rank for that very term. I am not going to call anyone out or make examples of anyone, they know who they are.

Presumably by doing it they think its fine, so perhaps I can give examples.

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A good slide deck for a live presentation makes a lousy handout. Conversely, slides built to be referenced as a leave-behind are wrong for use as a presentation. If people can read your slides and get all the information they need, there is no need for you to waste their time talking for an hour.

But if you give a good webinar presentation that is useful and beneficial for the audience, they are naturally going to want a way to reference your information after the webinar. A good leave-behind can help you reach more people as it gets forwarded to colleagues by attendees or referenced by registrants who couldn’t make the live session.

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You can’t just walk into the middle of any conversation and know what is going on — especially if it’s a conversation between people you don’t know from an unfamiliar culture. The best thing to do is to observe. But for some people, the hardest thing about social media is shutting up long enough to learn. As in so many situations in life, you need to listen before you speak.

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There are a lot of businesses that are staying away from social media, using the excuse that it’s not the right fit. That can be true, and I’ll often tell clients that they’re not ready for the space yet.

Yet there are also a lot that are saying it’s “opposite to our plans”. Meaning that they’re going to continue with their traditional marketing, PR, advertising or whatever. The one-way dialogue where they can exert the most control. Even though there are plenty of neon signs flashing that the message and medium has changed.

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Email and I have a love/hate relationship, leaning mostly towards hate.

One of the things I’ve never been able to organize effectively is access to my  domain email from any device, especially mobile devices.

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Question: Does it matter for my site’s SEO in Google or other search engines if I use www in the domain name? For example, do I need to use http://www.example.com or can i use http://example.com ?

Answer: It doesn’t matter at all to your SEO in Google, Bing or Yahoo whether you use www in your domain name or not. Read the rest of this entry »

If you rely on local customers to come to your store or service facility, then it is most important that these customers can find you on Google.

If they do their checking before they leave home using their desktop PC, then they may well use Google Local Search. It may be a problem for you to rank well in such a search as a recent Cre8asite Forums discussion points out. As the topic author pointed out, there are Completely And Utterly Farcical Google Local Verification Procedures. The problem is that Google does not support this local search facility with a customer service function. They rely on computer algorithms to identify the location of particular businesses. If that algorithm handles your website incorrectly, then it may be very difficult for you to get that corrected.

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For several years now, I have been talking to anyone and everyone about how the Internet is the great equalizer for small and medium businesses. It can help the little guy play with the big boys. It can help create a David vs. Goliath scenario where the SMB can take the industry giant out with skill and precision. There are so many things that any SMB can do with regard to the Internet that it is mind boggling.

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I’m from an old-school marketing background. I got my marketing degree back in the early 90’s and it helped educate my views on how to market a message or product, and continues to help me shape strategies today.

But there’s one thing that stands out clearly from these early days – the numbers game is utter bullsh*t.

My educator and many of my fellow students subscribed to the theory that numbers are the linchpin of any marketing campaign. The more eyeballs your message reaches, the more potential for interest.

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Stacy Karacostas here from http://www.success-stream.com with another quick audio marketing tip. In case you don’t like listening to audio, below are the transcripts for today’s podcast, “An Easy Way to Make Your Small Business Marketing Materials Way More Effective… And Make Sure They Get Read!”

I’ve often noticed that when I talk to my clients about their products or services, they say the most amazing, engaging and interesting things. But when I read their marketing materials it usually sounds more like the teacher from the old Charlie Brown cartoons “wha wha, waa waa, waa whaaaa”.

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