| LED Digest 2578: Social Media and Trust |
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The LED Digest Moderated Discussion List "Effective Online Advertising, Since 1997" Data > Information > Knowledge > Wisdom http://www.WillMaster.com/Master : the LED's Key Sponsor Master Series Software - Get Connected with Your WebSite http://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 .............................................. January 29, 2008 Issue no. 2578 .............................................. .....IN THIS DIGEST..... ====== NEW ====================== --== Are Content Management Systems Worth It? ==-- ~ Brett Atkin "Have you found it to be huge savings in up-front development? Has it been overkill?" --== Flexible and Affordable Shopping Carts ==-- ~ Ron Carmickle "I am working on setting up an online store selling automotive related parts." ==== CONTINUING ================= --== 2008 Marketing Predictions ==-- ~ Dirk Johnson "...99% of this is not rocket science..." --== Bounce Rates as Ranking Factors ==-- ~ Avinash Kaushik "At its most pristine Bounce Rates measure something extremely simple..." --== Shilling Social Bookmarks ==-- ~ Steve Pronger "There's no shortcut to success on social media sites." --== StoresOnline.com Seminars ==-- ~ Al Toman "I've visited the web site that which you referenced and it does nothing but emit bad karma." ========= NEW ===================================== From: Brett Atkin Subject: Content Management Systems (CMS) Use I've been following Linkedin Answers closely lately (in the web development area) and I see a lot of questions concerning CMS's. Questions like which one to use, should I use one and can I do this... Most of the response indicate you should use one and it can do what they are asking - answers by people not promoting their own services. I answered one of the questions this way... -------------------- "I know the latest thing is using a CMS, but it sure feels like pushing a round peg through a square hole sometimes. Without knowing more about what you want the site to do, it is difficult to say an "off-the-rack" CMS will provide the solution you need. If you end up having to pay a developer to do a lot of customization to make the thing work the way you want, you might be better off with a custom solution that fits your exact needs. A custom solution in PHP, ASP or ASP.net could easily give you what you want with the ability to make updates on your own. It might even cost less in the grand scheme of things." -------------------- So, what experience do any of you have implementing and using a CMS system (Joomla, EE, DotNetNuke, Drupal, etc...)? Have you found it to be huge savings in up-front development? Has it been overkill? Did the clients require a lot of "coaching" on how to use it? From the SEO side of things, have you found the system's you've used to be SEO friendly? Thanks Brett Atkin http://www.BrettAtkin.com ========= Begin Sponsor Message ========= One Way Links to your Site, by the Hundreds? Yes! Get Traffic and Link Popularity to Your Site from Legitimate, General Interest Web Directories. DomainDrivers Makes It Hassle-Free. Details Here: http://www.domaindrivers.com/directory-submissions.html ========== End Sponsor Message ========== -------- new post - new topic -------- From: Ron Carmickle Subject: Shopping Carts on a Budget Hi LED'ers I've been watching this site for a long time now and have recieved a wonderful amount of information from the contributors. I've never posted anything before, but I've run into a bit of a problem and I was hoping I could get some input. I am working on setting up an online store selling automotive related parts. The problem I am having is finding a shopping cart that not only can I easily operate on the front end but also is able to handle the number of parts that I plan on carrying as well as abilities to change pricing and all the other headaches associated with large inventories. Most of the shopping carts I have been looking at are php and mysql formated. They seem to be most suited for what I'm doing. I'm not a web-developer so my ability is limited but I'm also not an idiot either. Any suggestions as to your experiences with shopping carts would be greatly appreciated. I know a lot of developers like oscommerce or zencart, but both of these are beyond my abilities and I don't have the finances to have someone build the site for me. So with that info in mind??? Ron Carmickle oregonhotrod.com ======== CONTINUING =============================== From: Dirk Johnson Subject: Predictions > ... but the same rationale for skepticism > you give for the SEO industry could easily > be applied to the real estate industry, the > medical profession, finance or any other > discipline that involves expertise and > consulting. - Lee Odden, LED 2577 - http://www.led-digest.com/content/view/1992/190/ Hi Lee, All of the professions that you cite have substantial standards and licensing requirements, for very good reason. The fundamentals of their professions require considerable education. This certainly does not prevent bad actors, but it goes a long way toward maintaining professional standards for most practitioners. The SEO industry has no such safeguards. Similarly, the educational demands to be a qualified entry level SEO practitioner are quite limited. But that's not my point at all. I would not want to see SEO consultants adding the letters "SEO" after their name, as if they were medical doctors. In fact, such acronym chasing would only worsen the current situation. That is, it would provide more unwarranted smoke screen for some of the bad actors in this industry who woefully under-deliver on service due to their own bad management practices. Attaching capital letters to the end of their name would not change that. Again, 99% of this is not rocket science, by any means. I can explain basic SEO concepts, while showing actual examples of sites that follow them successfully to a real estate agent during a 30 minute phone call. In fact, I have been doing exactly that for the last few weeks, to a lot of people. At the end of the conversation, they are not only grateful, but stunned that it is all so straightforward. Many are also quite upset that they'd previously spent thousands of dollars for "SEO services" and got very little tangible to show for it. The old "burn me once" cliche certainly applies to the SEO industry these days. That, combined with an overall belt-tightening economy will do a lot to weed out the overpriced, under-delivering players in SEO circles. The current market actually helps the SEO consultant that has consistently delivered great service at great prices, be it advanced or mundane. They'll peel off clients and prospective clients that previously bought into the "higher priced = better service" mentality that drove a lot of this industry in the past. A lot of the "don't try this at home" posturing that pervades the top of this industry, as means to prop up rates for mundane work product, is starting to ring hollow. Practitioners who genuinely deliver complex services to clients that need it will probably do well, but most of the top firms that charge top rates in this business do not fit that profile. They are structured to deliver mundane SEO work to a large base of clients. It's not sustainable. That work will seek out a less expensive solution. It already is. I fully believe that by educating the business owner about the actual SEO services that they need, the market itself can sort all of this out, which it is doing now, finally. Best regards, Dirk Johnson DomainDrivers LLC www.domaindrivers.com -------- new post - new topic -------- [Note to LEDers - I asked Avinash Kaushik of Google to comment on this thread. -Adam] From: Avinash Kaushik Subject: Bounce rates + return visitors > With a bit of clever tracking, which I've > never thought to do, you could measure > return rates of the bouncing visitors, and > reduce them to bouncers who don't return in > say 30 days. That would be a better metric > imho. - Barry Mills, LED 2577 Adam, At its most pristine Bounce Rates measure something extremely simple: Visitors who come to your site and only see one page. There is a scenario where this is ok - for example for my blog, people will come to read my latest post and then they'll leave and that is ok. For 99% of the sites out there (except blogs) visitors coming to your site and leaving instantly is deeply sub optimal. There is nothing you can convince anyone of in one page view (and course not get a conversion!). So bounce rates bear looking into and if yours are high then it is good to understand why. Barry has a couple good points. I am a bit concerned that he is overlaying his own experience (of how he surfs) with visitors to all sites. If there is one thing I have realized it is that no one surfs like me. :) But if the purpose of netstep.co.uk is to get people to come to their site, bookmark it and then promptly leave then bounce rate is not a good metric. Having looked at their site I doubt that is the case because I learn nothing about what they do from their home page. I will probably click Our Services or See what we can do for your company or other links. Barry does provide a excellent way to check if bounced visitors are really "bookmarkers and they'll come later" or people who were just bounced - measure repeat visits by those. I could recommend using the persistent cookie value, and hence Unique Visitor, to do that computation. Here is a post that might be interesting to some folks. http://www.kaushik.net/avinash/2007/08/standard-metrics-revisited... -Avinash. Book - Web Analytics: An Hour a Day: www.snipurl.com/wahour Blog - Occam's Razor: www.kaushik.net/avinash ========= Begin Sponsor Message ========= WebSite's Secret Members Area You pay one fee and have unlimited access for 6 months to a collection of Will Bontrager's handy web tools. (Since this is a new service, the fee is still low.) The latest addition - Spam Resistant PHP Form: The form, the form handling script, and instructions are included in the download file. http://www.willmaster.com/SecretArea ========== End Sponsor Message ========== -------- new post - new topic -------- From: Steve Pronger Subject: Shilling > I put together a quick site I call SICoop. > (The Slightly Inappropriate Co-op for > Shilling Social Media Sites.) You can find > it at electroniclearningkits.com/sicoop/ - Paul Weaver, LED 2577 Although this idea isn't new you need to be very cautious about how you execute it and participate in it. Most social media sites track your participation. The sites you submit and vote on, comments you make, groups you join and friends you make, are clearly visible to the entire community. So, if you were to submit your "Shilling Social Media Sites" page to social media sites, what would that say about you as a member of that community? Once you're marked as a spammer the damage is done and there's no turning back. Take the second URL I saw listed on SICoop - http://bigfast.net. What is that? Seems to be nothing more than a copyright notice. Trust me, NO genuine social media user is going to submit that to StumbleUpon, Propeller or any other social site. Submit it to Digg and you'll likely get banned. Or worse, your domain will be banned and no one else will be able to submit any of your content. There's no shortcut to success on social media sites. You have to gain an understanding of how they work and become a trusted member of the community. These guys aren't stupid. They can spot spammers and attempts to manipulate them a mile off. If you vote up a page which exists for no other reason than to game their system then you're just asking for trouble. A StumbleUpon "I like it" click is very powerful. It truly is a personal recommendation, unlike a link in the eyes of search engine. When a SU user checks out your recommendation, and they like it, they'll check out other stuff you've voted for. If they like what they see they'll check out your profile (with links to your site) and become your "fan". They'll start to trust you. But submit a site for "shilling social media sites" or a copyright notice, that trust will evaporate. They'll start clicking the thumbs-down button and before you know it you'll be shown the door. It's ok to network with other members of a community such as LED. But I'm not going to risk my reputation on SU by voting on a page just because you're a LEDer, and I wouldn't expect you to do the same for me. However if you post a good article on your blog - whether it be about web hosting, SEO, marketing or any aspect of doing business online (which is why we're all here after all) and I'll gladly vote for it. The concept of LED users helping each other is fine, but we have to be smart about how we go about it. I recently joined a membership site called Social Power Linking. Part of that is a "buzz" group where they are doing what we are discussing here. I haven't actually participated in it yet (not sure if I really want to), but there are very strict rules on how it operates. It's not just a matter of posting your URL for anyone to see. The guys who run it have been doing this for years, successfully, and really understand social marketing. Steve Pronger http://www.stevepronger.com -------- new post - new topic -------- From: Al Toman Subject: StoresOnline > I spent about $3,000 and got a tin of > cookies. but they do sell dreams well - Carrie MacKenzie > The family spent around $6,000 with > StoresOnline. At no time did they say > anything negative about StoresOnline. - Lee Roberts If one reads Mr. Lee Robert's tale closely and reads the (you know who) website closely, then one will recognize the "negative" about (you know who). It appears that "they" wouldn't know enough to speak negatively. I've actually done a quick SEO analysis on two web sites that are using (you know who). One is doing exceptionally well (SEO-wise) and if you read the comment of the owner of that particular web site, you'll note that it is THE OWNER, not (you know who) that led to the web site's success. He simply states that, "it takes a lot of work". The other website is a complete disaster both SEO-wise and Design-wise. Again, reading the owner comment explains THAT story. As a web designer and developer it used to be extremely frustrating to read about these incidents. However, as of late, I've gotten over it and find it humorous. This explains why 95% of business fail within the first 5 years or less. Let's try to improve on this reality. Here is a survey: Why would ANY business person spend $3,000 or $6,000 for a (small to mid-size) online store? Do business people "do their homework" BEFORE "taking the test" or after? Online stores can be had "OPEN SOURCE". If you, a business person, are "unsure", then, rather, spend $300 or $600 and have a PROFESSIONAL web designer/developer guide you through the "open source" or "other" process. You have now reduced your expenses by 90% and have a MUCH BETTER online store. WHAT DO YOU DO with ALL that EXTRA MONEY that you now have burning a hole in your pocket? You spend the extra $2700 or $5400 on PROMOTING and MARKETING your newly formed online store web site by hiring a PROFESSIONAL internet marketer! !!! WARNING !!! STAY AWAY FROM SEO (Snake Elixir Oil). Who IS a professional? Someone who is NOT a relative. Someone who is NOT you. Someone who does NOT "sell dreams well" through the side of their mouthes. Someone WHO is knowledgeable enough to tell you straight on AND whose statements you can research and confirm. There are a TON of professional web designers and developers (cough, cough) right here on the LED Digest and there are a TON of professional marketers on the Internet right here on the LED Digest. My advice, Mr. T. Scott, would be rather to hire a LED Digester! Mr. T., I've visited the web site that which you referenced and it does nothing but emit BAD KARMA. It's time to decide if your online store will be a winner or a loser. Make that decision with good karma and turn that 95 to 5 ratio around. Kind Regards, Al Toman studio9 web design Web Design Your Business(tm) (c) Copyright 1995-2008 Orange Wheel, LLC. All Rights Reserved. ----------------------------------------------------------------- "I would especially like to re-court the Muse of poetry, who ran off with the mailman four years ago, and drops me only a scribbled postcard from time to time." - John Updike |
