| LED Digest 2533: Conversions, Usability & SEO |
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================================================== The LED Digest Moderated Discussion List "Effective Online Advertising, Since 1997" Data > Information > Knowledge > Wisdom www.GetWebContent.com/LED : the LED's Key Sponsor The Web's Most Experienced SEO Content Providers. www.SEOToolSet.com/training/ : the LED's Premier Sponsor Bruce Clay's Search Engine Optimization Training & Certification ================================================== List Moderator: Published by: Adam Audette LED Digest adam, led-digest.com http://www.led-digest.com .............................................. November 12, 2007 Issue no. 2533 .............................................. .....IN THIS DIGEST..... ==== CONTINUING ================= --== What Came First? Usability & SEO ==-- ~ Terry Bailey "...neither is more important, or better, both are equally important." ~ Richard Stubbings "What matters is what is better for each site. It may differ." --== Stop Supporting IE 6? ==-- ~ Jon Langley "...the @media command that goes into the stylesheet." ~ R. Neilson "IE7 is so drastic a change that many of my older programs don't support it..." --== Are there Secrets in SEO? ==-- ~ Thomas Schmitz "Yes, there are SEO secrets. Don't let anyone fool you or tell you otherwise." ~ Dirk Johnson "I am not speaking to the SEO community here." ======== CONTINUING =============================== From: Terry Bailey Subject: Usability SEO [In response to the debate about usability and SEO...] Adam, What I'm saying is that neither is more important, or better, both are equally important. As a professional I have been developing websites since about 1996, and have taught workshops in all 50 states and 6 provinces of Canada. I have heard this and other impassioned arguments far too long. The reality is that web development and optimization is an on-going project no matter what the purpose of your website is. If you are selling on an e-commerce site or trying to win political votes, or simply trying to disseminate information, your effort is a waste unless you give both SEO and Usability equal time. FACT: A site that has no visitors, ie., cannot be found will not sell your product, get votes or supply information. FACT: A site that drives visitors away because of unuseablity will not sell your product, get votes or supply information. It is the responsibility of the webmaster or optimization consultant to emphasize the necessity of BOTH! It is a constant battle to keep a site both useable and findable, though if you are willing to spend enough money to put the site at the top of PPC, you can focus more exclusively on your site's Usability, but this is an artificial solution because the moment you stop paying for visitors, your site will dry up if you have not made efforts at SEO. I am always looking for better ways to position my sites and make them for user friendly, BOTH ARE ESSENTIAL FOR SUCCESS. Hope this clarifies Terry Bailey Grandriversupply.com -------- new post - same topic -------- From: Richard Stubbings Subject: Usability SEO All the arguments are pointless. What matters is what is better for each site. It may differ. Metrics should be taken on conversion rates overall conversion numbers and average order amount. The goal, presumably is to maximise profits. Thus a high number of visitors who do not convert, or who convert with a low order amount, are not necessarily as good as a lower number of visitors who all convert with a high average order amount. Many sites concentrate on SEO to maximise the number of visitors only to loose them once they hit the site. A site that leaks visitors is like a leaky bucket. Fix the holes first, maximise your conversion statistics, THEN pour in as many visitors as you can. Always remembering to keep tracking your conversion statistics to ensure you retain good statistics. Do changes one at a time. Check the results. If sales drop then remove the change. Let your customers and visitors tell you what works, not an expert who may have a bias to his great new idea. Richard Stubbings Kulture Shock www.kultureshock.co.uk ========= Begin Sponsor Message ========= 2007 Is Aging Fast, So Is Your Content! Remember when search bots visited every four or five months? Now their noses are in your tent constantly. Weekly. Maybe even daily. What's a webmaster to do? Give 'em what they want! Fresh copy. Great copy. Relevant copy. http://www.GetWebContent.com/LED copy. ========== End Sponsor Message ========== -------- new post - new topic -------- From: Jon Langley Subject: Browsers > ... there is an option to design a style sheet that is to be > used only for printing... The code to activate the print > stylesheet looks like this: > link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" media="print" - Bruce Snipes, LED Digest 2532 - http://www.led-digest.com/content/view/1947/190/ That isn't the only way. You can also embed screen / print CSS within the same Stylesheet. Benefits of this are you can apply 1 set of styles that are used for both, 1 set of styles for just print and 1 set of styles for just screen. This means that if certain styles are identical, you don't have to put them in both stylesheets. Refer to http://www.w3schools.com/css/css_mediatypes.asp This shows the @media command that goes into the stylesheet. If your site is all CSS, then you can do almost anything that you could with the browser. ie, In a browser, "some" people prefer to have 100% width. When you have some content that forces a page wider than normal, then you can use the @media print to redefine the image size(s) to a smaller size and force the page width to a smaller size to ensure that ALL the information required to be printed can be printed. Whilst also removing content that is not required on a print page. Like adverts, footers etc. I have a similar idea on a site where you can view a product. If you click print, you then get a "brochure" type page. Remember then, you can show/hide any content that is relevant to one and not the other. eg. If you sell a product that has optional extras, then on the screen, you can dispaly the optional extras, knowing that the user can browse the site to the relevant pages to get more information like price. But if they print, they cannot, so display the prices. You can reformat the Links as well. on paper, links are worthless, so put them to normal font rather than visited active etc. Jon Langley Jons All Sorts http://www.jons-all-sorts.co.uk -------- new post - same topic --------- From: R. Neilson Subject: Browsers I agree you can't force us to use IE7 if we haven't upgraded. The main reason I haven't and many others is that IE7 is so drastic a change that many of my older programs don't support it and I really don't have the money or desire to be forced to upgrade all my computer software to use the new browser. I believe this is the case for the majority of internet users. Plus if you change what your servers support and look at statistics of users you may find that the majority of users with IE7 may just drop off the charts because they can't use your site. R. Neilson H. L. Supply Co. www.hansons.net -------- new post - new topic -------- From: Thomas Schmitz Subject: SEO Secrets When I say that consultants need to protect themselves during the introductory period before negotiating an SEO contract I mean that I will spend 20 or 30 minutes speaking with you to see if there is the potential of a good relationship. During this period I will answer your questions in general terms but I am not going to go into detail because it is the the detail and/or the competent execution of the detail that I sell. This is not about keeping things from you. It is about what can be realistically accomplished during a half-hour chat before I have ever studied your situation. It is about respecting my own "business time." It is about the self-control while conducting business. After that initial conversation a consultant is within their right to charge further time spent. If I spent three hours speaking with everyone that telephones or emails me I would not have time to get my paying responsibilities accomplished. As for "telling you my secrets," once you are paying for my services I will happily open-up and tell you exactly what I am doing 99% of the time. You are paying for my knowledge and for me to apply that knowledge to your specific situation. I too agree that the client should know what you are doing and why. How detailed you want me to get is up to you. You are paying the bill. Anyone who knows me knows that during my "teaching time" I do not hold-back. http://www.veoh.com/videos/v64962383EgcrJ3... If you are wondering about the other 1%? Yes, there are SEO secrets. Don't let anyone fool you or tell you otherwise. Yes, knowledge is traded in the back rooms and bars during conferences, knowledge that never makes it to the stage or conference room floor or to the "Give It Up" session. Don't fret. You can be a perfectly respectable and effective SEO without knowing these secrets. Most of the secrets are for fun anyway and they serve no practical application. Others, though, can give you an edge in just the right situation. Some are black hat; some are pure as the driven snow. (I don't do black hat for clients.) If you are my client I will tell you that I have something special planned. I will tell you the general idea. But no, I am not going to reveal specifics or methodology. My chosen ethic is to honor and respect for the person who took me into their confidence. Sounds dramatic, doesn't it? Well, it's not. Each year I can count the number of times I use "SEO secrets" on the behalf of clients on one hand. No, not hat hand. The other hand. Yeah, that hand. Now put it away until you clean your fingernails. Thomas Schmitz http://www.marketingpiranha.com/blog/ -------- new post - same topic -------- From: Dirk Johnson Subject: SEO Secrets Just to reply to Jeremy Weiss and Nathan Holley's posts in the last issue... Jeremy, You've found a level of detail in your proposals that works for your business. That's great. I'd just point out that, if it were me buying SEO services, I'd demand to see the details. But that might be because I have seen too much bad outcome from the SEO industry. Most business owners have not. They take what is presented to them in an SEO proposal on faith. Most don't even know what to ask. A lot of SEO consultant's websites have "pricing packages". These are often quite general in nature. A lot of them look the same. They propose a little bit of this, some of that, and a dollop of links. Jeremy, you are right, nobody wants to confuse or turn off a prospect with nitty-gritty details. Especially a prospect that doesn't know what they are reading. Yet, the actual substance behind two similar sounding SEO packages might vary considerably. One might represent a very thorough set of underlying SEO tasks, while another might be nothing more than some title tag tweaks and some slam-bam links. They both sound the same on the front end, and they both are priced similarly. The SEO consultant that is selling the "shell game" will make a lot more profit on that job, and produce pitiful results. But, to cover their tracks, that same consultant can usually point to a few well-ranking domains they have worked as "examples" or references. Jeremy, I don't expect that my rantings here will change the SEO consultants approach to selling their services. That is their decision. I am not speaking to the SEO community here. They can do whatever they want, and they will. My goal here is to reach a few business owners and get them to stop taking this industry at face value, and stop accepting that "celebrity" status in SEO circles is any indicator of skill, understanding, professionalism, or expected results. It's not. Its merely an indicator of self-promotional skill. Some of the most confused and/or overpriced people in this industry are also some of the most well-known, as far as I am concerned. You have to demand details from these people, in order to protect yourself. Self-education is the best defense. For SEO agencies that prefer to evade inquires for proposal specifics, the educated business owner will simply go elsewhere for their SEO services, while hoping that their less-educated competitors buy into some overpriced, under-performing SEO scheme. Jeremy, to be clear, none of this is directed at you, as I do not know your situation. These are just general observations of what I see taking place out here. You've found an approach that works for your business and your clients. Nathan, I don't understand why you are taking me to task for my comments. You have provided a detailed explanation of a very thorough SEO package. The kind of SEO agency that I'd hire. It implies a lot of work for the money. I would point out that all of the on-page tweaks that you mentioned, as well as the link building, would certainly manifest itself publicly. Anyone can review the indexed pages of well-ranking site to observe the keyword focus, the tag coding, and content development strategy. Similarly, any links that would influence a search engine are indexed and readily available for open review, to anyone willing to dig deep enough. No secrets. Nathan, in your post, you also go well beyond what is typically included in an SEO package (the basics, as you referred to them, and I agree), and you venture in general online marketing strategy on behalf of your clients. Here is an area where I will readily agree that there are "secrets". Or, at the least, they are strategic advantages that competitors would have a much more difficult time de-constructing or copying. My hat is off to you. If that is what you do, then your clients have found a very good advisor. BTW - I am not unaware of these issues, nor am I ignorant as to how to deploy them, as you seem to have claimed. I've been there, done most of it. They are vital to a complete online marketing effort. But you are combining SEO basics with a lot more. Most "SEO work" does not include the higher-level online marketing strategy and development that you provide. Maybe it should. I'd tend to agree that a site owner needs an overall online marketing advisor, and that person should also arrange for the SEO basics as a subset of an overall marketing strategy. Then every aspect is well-coordinated. But that is another discussion. Apples and oranges. Again, SEO consultants who do a good job and can stand behind their work have no reason to beat up the messenger here. You can justify your production, and the cost of doing it. Those of you who are in that category should be glad that someone link me is calling for business owners to demand that same level of transparency from the rest of the industry. Best regards, Dirk Johnson DomainDrivers LLC www.domaindrivers.com (c) Copyright 1995-2007 Orange Wheel, LLC. All Rights Reserved. ----------------------------------------------------------------- "Take rest; a field that has rested gives a bountiful crop." - Ovid |
