Yesterday’s webinar worked really well, and judging by the volume of email that we’ve already received, attendees found it to be both useful and entertaining. We aim to please.
We’re hoping to post a video of the critique, and will announce it here once it’s online.
Thank-you to everyone who attended, and a special thanks to my co-host, Sharon Housley of NotePage, Inc.
Microsoft have just begun beta-testing what amounts to a localised version of Twitter, yet for now, they appear to be focused on users staying informed about what’s happening with the places and people you care about.
“Send and receive alerts with Microsoft Vine. Organize people into groups so it’s easy to send information to them all at once — the sports team you coach, people who live nearby, family far away, special friends, and the people you might want to reach in an emergency. Each person can define how they want to receive their alerts — through e-mail, a text message or on their computer — so your message is sent to the right people in the right way, quickly. You can send those from your computer or mobile phone to people who have affiliated with you.”
Could this actually be a practical and useful version of Twitter?
Watch this space. We’ll hear it through the grapevine.
Fact 1: Small changes to your website can have a major impact on your downloads and sales.
Fact 2: You are effectively blind to the strengths and weaknesses of your own site.
Dave Collins and Sharon Housley’s Website Critique Webinar is taking place in less than 31 hours!
Subjects to be covered include the initial impression created by a website, structure, navigation, communication, SEO setup and more.
The webinar is only 40 minutes long, and various levels of inspiration and entertainment are guaranteed.
Where: Your web browser.
When: 5:00 PM UK time (12:00 Eastern, 11:00 Central).
Why: Free information to increase your sales.
I hope you can join me.
We just finished redesigning our SoftwarePromotions website. It was a complete redesign, and involved a massive investment in time, cash and stress. But I think it paid off.
We began our redesign process by first of all identifying what we felt were the most important pages on our website. The pages that we considered vital to our business.
The next step was taking a look at existing log data, to see which pages visitors were going to, where they were spending time, and where they were leaving too quickly.
Then we started to think through our navigation system.
I’ve spoken to a number of people about how they designed their websites, and the results surprised me.
For most companies, the process begins with a designer submitting a few draft proposals. Someone chooses the look they like the most, makes a few suggestions, and after a few months of back and forth, the job is done.
Some companies simply go for a new look to an existing structure. Some opt for a complete new look, based on the whims of their designers. A few list some ideas for the design team before they start the work.
Yet no-one I have ever spoken to begins the process by looking at existing data, nor prioritises their important pages before the design begins.
If you imagine buying a home with the intention of spending a lot of money on improving it, you’re almost certain to compare it with your existing home and other people’s designs.
Yet if you’d lived in the home for a number of years, you’ll have some useful experience, and will know exactly what you want to change. You’ll know that the kitchen didn’t have enough storage place, that the main room was a little too large and that one of the bedrooms was dark in the morning. So you would apply your knowledge to create your ideal home.
If your house is a website that is responsible for your income, you have to make accurate and informed decisions.
Web Log Analysis is a vital component of running an online business, and should be factored into website design, new content, publicity, marketing, expansion and even deciding where to focus your efforts.
If you don’t yet have a Web Analytics system in place today, I strongly recommend that you make time today or this week to select, implement and start working with a solution. If you do have a Web Analytics system in place, but aren’t using it, then I recommend you reassess your priorities as a matter of urgency.
Perhaps you already know the story of the woodcutter who was so busy sawing wood that he didn’t have time to sharpen his saw. If not, you get the idea.
Make the time. You are sitting on a great source of vital information.
Click Forensics are reporting a fall in click fraud rate for Q1 2009:
“The overall industry average click fraud rate was 13.8 percent for Q1 2009. That’s down from 17.1 percent reported for Q4 2008 and from the 16.3 percent rate reported for Q1 2008.”
This in itself is good news, at least potentially. Why only potentially? Because the figures only report detected click fraud. Anything that hasn’t yet been identified as fraudulent obviously can’t be reported.
Anyway, I digress.
Click Forensics are in the business of click fraud, which puts them in the unusual situation of not only working to identify and eliminate click fraud, but also profiting from it.
So when they present their data, they need to be careful. After all, the guy who installs intruder alarm systems isn’t going to get rich by telling everyone that there’s no crime in their area. But credit to them, Click Forensics have reported the data accurately and fairly, so what I’m going to say next in no way reflects on them.
Let’s revisit those figures:
Q1 2008 – 16.3% click fraud.
Q1 2009 – 13.8% click fraud.
If we compare the two, we could say that Q1 2009 saw a 2.5% drop in click fraud: 16.3 – 13.8.
Alternatively, we could say that Q1 2009 saw a drop of 18%: 16.3 / 13.8.
Both of them are accurate, and both of them are true. Yet one of the figures is more than seven times larger than the other.
Click Forensics have been meticulously precise, and simply reported the figures as they are.
If a company that made money from identifying click fraud was less accurate, do you think they’d report a drop of 2.5% or 18%?
We all know that figures and statistics can be moulded around whatever ideas we choose to promote. But while dramatic figures make good headlines, they might not always be in a company’s best interests. Especially if the customer doesn’t get what they think they paid for.
Honesty and clarity are usually more effective than spin.
On Thursday the one-billionth download from Apple’s App Store occurred, marking an impressive milestone for the store.
Only in existence for 10 months, the App Store already boasts more than 30,000 applications with new content pouring in every day.
With consumer’s voracious appetite for mobile apps growing by the day, developers are racing to come up with the next big App Store hit. A seemingly already overcrowded marketplace, however, has made many developers wonder if it is too late to cash in on the boom.
Mobile analytics firm Flurry thinks the answer is “no.”
According to Flurry, “… there still remains a significant opportunity to make solid money with iPhone applications, especially for games. However, like traditional video game, movie and music industries, the iPhone App market is a “hit-driven industry” meaning that total market revenue is concentrated among a few big winners. That said, there appears to be more of a middle class in the App Store; that is, more companies bringing in respectable revenues.”
Flurry’s research suggests that offering a free version of one’s app is the key component in achieving APP Store success, “Among your strongest marketing plays in the App Store is to offer a free trial of your game or application. Not only is the App Store designed for this, but also it’s the best way to reduce consumer risk in trying your application, with the goal of eventually getting that user to purchase the full version …. Simply put, free trial has leveled the playing field for independent developers who previously struggled to get consumers to even give them a try. Additionally, it rewards more established companies who innovate and leverage capabilities of the iPhone hardware to wow consumers…”
With the one-billionth download Apple announced the App Store’s top 20 all-time paid apps.
In a humorous, but somewhat sad commentary on our society, the top 20 includes:
15 games
2 music-related apps
1 app that turns your screen into a virtual koi pond
1 app that turns your screen into a virtual foaming glass of beer
and last but certainly not least…
1 digital fart machine
Mashable have (yet another) interesting article on Twitter: Inside the Minds of Twitter Users by Ann Handley from MarketingProfs.
The article explains the results of a fascinating survey of 432 “highly involved Twitter users“. And how is a highly involved Twitter addict defined? Someone who spends an average of 2 and three quarter hours per day on Twitter.
An average of two hours and 45 minutes a day. Average. 165 minutes.
That’s around a third of their working day on Twitter. Assuming they work.
I’m starting to get the feeling that Twitter is a virus. It infects people (not computers) with a range of mind-altering symptoms.
When initially exposed to the Twitter Virus, people are disinterested. “What’s the point?” and “What do I do now?” are the first reactions while their immune systems are still working, and at this point, around 50% of the people exposed to the virus become infected. The severity of the infection and symptoms vary from person to person, and may range from a person posting and reading too many mundane comments to a person spending 165 minutes a day in the Twittersphere.
Back to the survey. The closing paragraph:
“Twitter may be used as just another lead-generation tool. Or it may be about connecting with new friends. But above all, people on Twitter are truly motivated by learning new things and getting information real-time, as it’s developing.”
I’ve had enough of this. I’ve been asking the question so long that my throat’s getting sore. So this time I’m going to throw in a reward.
Background: At the time of writing this I have just under 4,000 people following my Twitter account (hello), and have posted 400 updates. That’s ten people for every post.
My updates are mainly about Google AdWords, online marketing with a little SEO and some updates on my need for caffeine. But it’s 99% work related.
We get some traffic from Twitter, but if you’re a Twaddict, you’ll already know what that means. You click on the link just to get a feel for who they are, but you don’t really explore the site. It’s usually a one-click thing.
My question: How do I use Twitter for my business? I’m not interested in abstract ideas and theories, so please don’t bother with things like “generating leads”, “finding people with similar interests” or “finding people interested in your services”. I need real, concrete ideas that I can actually use. And I need evidence that your ideas could actually work.
The person whose answer impresses me the most will get a $100 Amazon Gift Voucher, and will inspire me beyond words. Please add your comments below, and please remember to leave your email address so that I can tell you you’ve won! The email address will not be published, and you can trust me. I’ll select a winner on Monday the 27th.
So how can I use Twitter for my business?
You probably already noticed that there’s a lot of anti-Google sentiment out there. If someone awoke from a ten year coma today, they might be puzzled. They might assume that Google manufactured cigarettes or perhaps chopped-down rainforests as a sport.
I’m as critical as anyone else when it comes to the things that Google could and should do better, especially when it comes to the AdWords system. But overall, I have to admit to being a Google fan. I use their services countless times a day, and without them, my life would be significantly different, and probably significantly more difficult too.
I’m not, however, a Google cheerleader. And as little patience as I have for the Google Conspiracy Theorists, I am sometimes a little concerned by how much data Google have on all of us. Google Analytics tracks us when we trawl the web, as does the Google Toolbar, websites displaying adsense ads, ISP relationships, site search on partner sites, search data, Gmail and more. It’s a little unnerving at times, and Google are now about to ask for more.
“It’s no secret that from time to time many of us have searched on Google for our name or someone else’s. When searching for yourself to see what others would find, results can be varied and aren’t always what you want people to see — whether it’s someone else with your name, or the finishing time from that 5K you ran back in 2002. We want to make that better and give you more of a voice.
To give you greater control over what people find when they search for your name, we’ve begun to show Google profile results at the bottom of U.S. name-query search pages.
…
Don’t have a Google profile? Just search for [me] and follow the instructions at the top of the page to create one. In just a few minutes, you can create a public profile that represents you and that appears when people search for your name on Google.”
This is potentially quite ingenious, but if you think Google are offering the chance to remove unwanted information, think again.
Google Profile is essentially nothing more than a means of giving Google more information. And today’s web users are increasingly aware that their details are a commodity.
Google’s typical users aren’t as stupid as Google sometimes seems to think they are. Or are they?
Google Labs have launched two new experimental products that actually have the potential to change the way we search for news and pictures.
Google News Timeline “allows users to view news, scanned newspapers and magazines, blog posts, sports scores, and more on a zoomable, graphical timeline”, while Similar Images “helps you narrow your search by finding images that are visually similar to an existing result”.
This comes at the same time that Google have announced strong results for Q1.
On Monday, Adobe premiered a new version of its streaming Flash content that will be compatible with internet-enabled televisions, Blu-ray players and set-top boxes.
The development means that people with Internet-connected TV’s will be able to watch high-definition videos, play Flash-based games and access other Web content which had previously only been available via computers.
In a press release, Adobe stated that, “The Adobe Flash Platform for the Digital Home now enables the delivery of HD Web videos to digital home devices via the Flash Video (FLV) file format. Consumers will be able to enjoy rich, interactive viewing experiences and amazing new ways to engage with HD content on televisions. Flash technology-based applications will allow users to quickly switch between television programming and Web content outside the Web browser.”
Atlantic Records, Broadcom, Comcast, Disney Interactive Media Group, Intel, Netflix, The New York Times Company and several other prominent cable TV and media content providers have already thrown their support behind the new technology.
David Wadhwani, general manager and vice president, Platform Business Unit at Adobe, said that the company believes this advancement will “dramatically change the way we view content on televisions.”
This new technology is not only significant for television watchers, but for advertisers as well, who will now be able to stream ads to both televisions and web browsers.
Google AdWords