Out of the Fog Marketing

Can female entrepreneurs save the economy?

2010-12-14T09:07:00.000-05:00

From The Economist...
Can female entrepreneurs save the economy?

Cielo MedSolutions Awarded $1.3M Grant

2010-11-15T14:10:00.003-05:00

Congratulations to our client Cielo MedSolutions on their Phase II STTR award from the National Cancer Institute. Cielo provides healthcare and web applications to support primary care physicians.

Be Sure to Update Google Places

2010-11-08T14:02:00.003-05:00

If you run a business that's at least somewhat dependent on local customers or clients, be sure to periodically update your Google Places (formerly Google Local Business Center) listing. You would be surprised at how many companies forget to update their listing after an office relocates or employee leaves.

Google Places has a new tagging feature that lets highlights special offers, video, coupons and more. It's free for the first 30 days and then $25 per listing monthly. More info on Google Places tags.

Wonderful stories of career rejuvenation

2010-10-28T13:49:00.001-04:00

With all the doom, gloom and complaining about the unemployment rate, here's what makes our country wonderful...Michigan self starters.

Read Fortune's Tales of Career Rejuvenation.

Chris Slocumb Receives Professional Achievement Award from Villanova University

2010-10-26T13:29:00.002-04:00

Clarity Quest Marketing's President Receives Professional Achievement Award

Social Media Release on PR Leap

Ann Arbor Ranks #12 in Most Innovative Cities List

2010-10-25T10:03:00.002-04:00

Our agency's home city, Ann Arbor, Michigan, ranked as the 12th most innovative city in North America in a recent story by Business Insider. Read the full story.

Clean Rippling Water

2010-10-15T10:38:00.003-04:00

This isn't my usual post on marketing but one that's even more important. Today is Blog Action Day and this year's theme is water.

As a paddler and now a coastal dweller, I am refreshed every day by the sight and smell of water. It's great to know there are still some rivers here on the East Coast where wetland wildlife flourishes. Each morning my daughter and I pass part of the Mystic River on our way to her school and make a game out of guessing whether it's high or low tide. Cormorants are sunning themselves on rocks and an occasional white heron graces our view.

With that in mind, it's hard to imagine that about 4,500 children die each year from contaminated drinking water and lack of basic sanitation facilities. When my daughter was 1.5 she came down with a severe case of rotovirus and had to be hospitalized due to severe dehydration. The doctor told me that this disease kills millions of third world children each year because they can't get simple IV fluids. And the disease is often contracted through unsafe water. I was horrified.

Please join me in signing a petition to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon urging him to continue the UN's life-saving work in bringing clean drinking water and sanitation to developing nations.

Change.org|Start Petition

How Internet Marketing Can Grow Your Medical Practice

2010-10-05T20:34:00.003-04:00

Numerous medical practices hire business consultants for practice management, billing and now for technology management/health records. However, they often depend on internal staff or an office manager to take care of all the marketing efforts. Usually marketing efforts get relegated to the bottom of an ever-growing "to do" list. That's where a seasoned healthcare marketing agency can help.
Marketing agencies that concentrate in medical practices know your needs and the lingo. These companies can increase patient volumes through direct mail, e-mail campaigns, marketing automation, advertising, PR and internet marketing. One marketing tactic which practices often neglect is internet marketing. Many practices neglect to even possess a basic website! In today's world with the baby boomers' ready access to computers, it's essential to have a website that at a minimum provides an overview of your practice, provider biographies, directions to your office and contact information. The next step is to optimize your website using key phrases prospective or current patients would enter into a search engine, such as Google, to locate your practice. A qualified search marketing company can perform a keyword analysis proving how much volume and competition exists for each keyphrase. The SEO firm will then incorporate the top phrases into your site in a way that will lay the foundation for improved search results rankings. As a follow-on step, the agency should also be able to assist you with sponsored search and online banner ad campaigns in order to drive even more volume to your website. And be sure not to forget listings on the online local marketing channels - Bing's local listing directory and Google Places.

Join Blog Action Day October 15th

2010-09-29T10:04:00.003-04:00

This year's theme for Change.org's Blog Action Day is one dear to my heart as a paddler...WATER. Join me in blogging about water and water resources for the world on October 15th.

Change.org|Start Petition

What's Up with the Google logo?

2010-09-08T12:28:00.001-04:00

Notice the weird changes to the Google logo the last two days? Read PC Magazine's take on what it all means. All will be revealed at the press conference coming up today.

A New Site Comes Clean

2010-08-25T20:57:00.004-04:00

BBF Technologies of Wilsonville, Oregon wanted a website that visually displays the wide variety of semiconductor processing and industrial equipment they design and manufacture. We created a graphic-intensive site loaded with shots of their custom products. Ranking in Google search results was also important so we incorporated the results of keyword analysis using the latest in search engine optimization techniques.

So if you have a clean room to outfit, check out www.bbftechnologies.com.

Need an image?

2010-08-09T11:01:00.004-04:00

Blog posts and articles are far more effective and eye-catching if you use an image. Need a free image? Check out Creative Commons' Google Image Search Assistant. It will return free images that can be used and modified without licensing.

You'll have to sift through some junk, but the search often results in thousands of images so there's sure to be one to meet your needs.

Six Things Marketing Agencies Do To Completely Annoy Clients

2010-07-15T11:22:00.004-04:00

The marketing agency you hire should not need to be reminded that they are working for YOU and owe you their best effort to achieve your goals. Why, then, do they sometimes act like they are working against you? What goes through your head when you face one of the situations listed below? Eternal patience, resignation or homicidal thoughts? Depending on how bad things are, the latter two reactions are understandable (but don’t act on the last one!).

Scenario #1 – You hire them, and they develop a design or copy that is . . . BORING! You sit there and stare at it and want to cry. Even if you manage to catch the attention of the terminally nerdy, they will quickly figure that there’s nothing interesting there. Where’s the WOW factor? Did it die on the way to the homepage? Can they actually make it through the technical specs they spew out day-in and day-out to actually create something that might interest ANYBODY? You should get outstanding, knock-your-socks-off web design, enthralling video, eye-catching special effects (see #6 below), edgy logos, and outstanding, grabby taglines that stick like peanut butter to your pancakes instead of gravy on a wall.

Scenario #2 – You spend more time holding their hand than you do taking care of your customers. Sigh . . . . How did you get so lucky? Hey, we all start somewhere. Fact of life, can’t get around it, and shouldn’t be a problem so long as there is someone experienced to run the show. However, if your “project manager” still has acne, and has your phone on speed dial, using it every hour or so to “check in” and ask questions, call the person in charge and ask if you can have a (well)-seasoned project manager that can answer his or her own questions.

Scenario #3 - They don't track metrics. Say what? If your marketing agency is not tracking your hits, visits, sales, then you better get used to the idea that the flushing sound you hear is not the commode – it’s your marketing dollars leaving the planet. Bluntly, there is no excuse for not tracking marketing campaigns with the number inexpensive analytics tools available today. Custom web landing pages and dedicated phone lines also make it possible to track almost any campaign - offline or online. And most importantly, if your website isn’t generating the traffic you expect, or the web bots aren’t reporting back to the mother ship and kicking you up to page one on the search pages, SOMETHING IS WRONG! Get on them and get them to track the stats. Otherwise, make them a statistical casualty and find a marketing agency that will give you metrics.

Scenario #4 – Campaign overkill. The phrase “target market” isn’t in the lingo for nothing. Your marketing firm should think both strategically and tactically. Adjustment in your marketing campaign(s) should be made based on quality feedback. The shotgun approach – multiple campaigns in every conceivable venue and format – will eat through your marketing dollars like a herd of cats through buttermilk. One or two approaches ought to work. Don’t pay for their experiments.

Scenario #5 – Campaign life support when the patient is dead. The campaign is sitting there like a quivering bowl of Jell-o and getting about the same sales results. It’s a dead horse and the bones have been scattered. If they can’t show you how it is magically going to come to life and produce visits and paying customers, tell them to give it last rites and move on with something more effective.

Scenario #6 – You get all “flash” and no “action.” They give all the "bells and whistles" without any substance. Pretty Flash animations mean nothing if the content doesn't compel your prospects to act. Glitz without "call to action" is meaningless. No one going to spend more than 2.3 seconds on your website because there is nothing there to grab them. If your Flash animation is entertaining your visitors, but they don’t go beyond the insipid marketing message on the homepage, you get a gold star for effort and nothing else.

Is your marketing agency guilty of any of the above? If so and you're fed up - we'd love to chat. You can have it all, if you can find the right marketing agency that knows how to blend sparkle with results.

Twitter vs Facebook in the Fortune 500

2010-07-14T10:04:00.002-04:00

While Facebook may still be the biggest largest social networking site in the business world, Twitter seems to be the favorite among the Fortune 100 companies, with 65% owning a corporate Twitter account.
Check out some beautiful and interesting social media infographics at Mashable.

Adwords (ACE) Campaigns Experiments beta signup

2010-06-15T23:37:00.001-04:00

If you use Adwords for English-based campaigns in the US, you might want to get on the waiting list for this beta tool test:

http://adwords.blogspot.com/2010/06/adwords-campaign-experiments-beta-split.html

It lets you run split tests in your campaigns, assign varying percentages of traffic to the experiment, and you can actually test different bid amounts.

Our favorite directories for link building

2010-06-11T00:05:00.005-04:00

More and more people are turning to article posts in order to build back links to their website. Here are our favorite article directories:
1. Ezinearticles - They are the strictest and only allow backlinks in the author signature area, but articles posted on this site get great pickup. You can also track stats.
2. Article Alley - Allows 2 backlinks in the actual article body.
3. Go Articles - Promotional links are OK in the Author Bio area.
4. Article Snatch - Allows up to 3 backlinks in the author area.

Also be sure to check for directories in your product or service niche. We have an attorney client that gets great pickup off posts to goinglegal.com. Also consider turning your written posts into videos. It's easier than you think. We'll cover video articles in a future post.

If Facebook were a country...

2010-05-21T14:41:00.004-04:00

If Facebook were a country, it would have the 4th largest population in the world. Your business is probably ignoring social media, but would you completely ignore an entire country as a target market?

Don't overlook the importance of being negative

2010-05-04T12:16:00.004-04:00

I'm usually a pretty positive person, but there is one instance when it pays to think negative and that is pay-per-click campaigns. Pay-per-click or sponsored search systems let you specify negative keywords at the adgroup or campaign level.

Just add negative keywords or phases to your ad group or campaign means and ads won't show for search queries containing that phrase. By filtering out unwanted impressions, negative keywords can help you reach the most appropriate prospects, reduce your cost-per-click (CPC), and increase your ROI.

An Example

If you are advertising on the phrase "computer networking" you probably don't want your ads to appear for "computer networking classes" or "computer networking jobs" unless you: a) offer a class, or b) are hiring. Thus you could place "classes" and "jobs" in your negative keyword list and solve the problem.

Why Aren't more B2Bs selling online?

2010-04-23T16:21:00.002-04:00

In a recent study, Enquiro and Business.com found that 58 percent of B2B customer prefer to make repeat purchases online. Yet only a small percentage of B2B companies provide e-commerce on their websites.

Graphic courtesy of Enviro.com

Could your business sell repeat product or services purchases online?

Video raises site click-through rates up to 200%.

2010-04-05T23:10:00.001-04:00

Some food for thought from the folks at Forrester Research:

You're 53x more likely to appear on page one of Google's search results when you have video on your website.

Video raises click-through rates up to 200%.

Choosing the best web domain name

2010-03-31T12:26:00.002-04:00

Many startups ask us how to choose the best domain name for both SEO and branding. There are so many secured domains, finding a domain can often be daunting. Check out a blog post by the folks at Noble Samurai on choosing domain names.

We agree that one hyphen is OK and it's better to have a hyphen in your URL.com that one without a hyphen at a .net.

Marketing isn't a campaign, it's a commitment

2010-03-10T15:29:00.001-05:00

Love this quote from Rich Scheferen's excellent blog series on building credibility....

“MARKETING ISN’T A CAMPAIGN…
IT’S A COMMITMENT!!!”

It’s a commitment to a relationship.

A relationship that’ll leave your prospects and clients better off than before.

And, it’s your job to continually convince them that you’ve got the chops to do it.

What have you done recently to convince your prospects and build trust? Check out these customer testimonial videos we created with our longtime client Vision Computer Solutions for whom we recently launched a new website.

Apple Overrated, Cisco Underappreciated

2010-03-08T13:09:00.004-05:00

Check out IT Database's latest report Business Press Technology Coverage for a fascinating look at how business publications cover the technology industry. Tech gets far less coverage than its finance counterparts even though it's a huge part of our country's economic engine.

Particularly vexing is Gartner predicted $3.3 trillion in IT spending in 2010, yet enterprise IT is barely covered in the mainstream media.

In the study IT Database also asked tech PR pros which companies they thought were overrated or underappreciated by the business press. Look at the results and see that hip and hype really matter when it comes to PR coverage:

Overrated	Underappreciated
Apple (32%)	Cisco (18%)
Google (28%)	Microsoft (12%)
Twitter (12%)	VMWare (12%)

Technology Companies Diving More into Social Media

2010-03-02T15:48:00.002-05:00

A new MarketingSherpa Social Media Marketing Benchmark Report found that more than 55% of marketers surveyed in the hardware and software industries plan an increase in their 2010 social media marketing budget. This trend implies that B2B marketers recognize that IT buyers are using social media to make informed purchasing decisions.

The best Superbowl ad was cheap

2010-02-09T15:56:00.003-05:00

The best Superbowl ad last Sunday was Google's. Hands down.

It's so simple anyone with a computer and free movie editing software could have made it - as witnessed by the Tiger Woods spoof of the video that was up by Monday.

The real power of that Google ad was the message, the music and the emotional connection it made with the viewers. Contract that with all the inane ads of people slapping each other in the head. Simple sophistication and emotional connection sells.

3 Myths about SEO Companies

2010-02-04T13:33:00.002-05:00

Great post by Aaron Muller discussing myths related to search engine optimization companies.

You can almost think of Search Engine Optimization (SEO) as a somewhat secretive industry. You see a lot of people claiming to be SEO experts, and some charge a lot of money for their SEO services. Some people guarantee results and some don’t. At the same time, almost nobody will tell you the exact methods he or she uses to improve your web site’s rankings, so you are left wondering: am I paying too much? Am I being too cheap? Am I hiring the right person? What should I look for when hiring a SEO company? Is it worth the investment?

If you think about it, there is a reason that the SEO industry is somewhat secretive. For one thing, search engines like Google do not like people tampering with their search results. If you are a dentist in Chicago and you realize that thousands of people type “Chicago dentist” into Google every week, imagine how much more business you would get if your web site comes up first in the search results! When I say search results, I mean the organic search results, not the paid advertisements, since 70% to 80% of people click on the natural search results instead of the paid advertisements.

This brings me to the second reason why search engine optimization companies are somewhat secretive. They take away Google’s revenues from paid advertisements! The more people hire SEO companies to improve their rankings on the natural search results, the less likely they are to use paid advertising with the search engines such as Google AdWords and pay-per-click (PPC) advertisements.

For these reasons, search engines such as Google do not like search engine optimization companies, and the SEO experts have to be somewhat hush hush with their methods. As a result, there are a lot of myths and misconceptions when it comes to hiring SEO companies. However, this does not mean you need to be at a lost. You are likely to get better investment of your dollars with some SEO companies than others. With a little education and understanding of SEO companies, you will be better equipped to choose the right SEO company for you.

Here are the top 3 myths when it comes to search engine optimization…

1. The majority of the SEO work takes place on your web site. The logic behind this myth is that if you design a really search engine friendly web site, your web site would be ranked high by search engines such as Google. Yes, it may be true that having the right keywords and meta tags on your web site help your ranking, but if it were that easy, don’t you think everybody would be doing the same thing? The truth is – only a small percentage of the SEO work is done on your web site. The majority of the SEO work to improve your ranking should be done on other people’s web sites! Search engines tend to care a lot more about what other web sites think about yours rather than what you have on your own web site. This is the reason that a good web designer is not necessarily a good SEO expert, and vice versa. Web designers tend to focus almost all of their energy working on your web site. Good SEO experts, on the other hand, tend to focus their energy on other web sites in order to help improve your web site’s rankings.

2. Good SEO can be done cheaply. There is a saying that people tend to get what they pay for, and this saying applies to hiring SEO companies. However, you should not base your decision on price alone. What you should understand is why some SEO companies charge you so little (such as $49.95 per month). Some keywords are more competitive than others. For instance, let’s say you run a hair salon in Los Angeles called “BJ Hair Design”. Which keywords do you want to optimize? Do you want to optimize “BJ Hair Design”, or do you want to optimize “hair salon Los Angeles”? I can charge you very little to improve the ranking of the keyword “BJ Hair Design”, but potential customers searching for hair salons on the Internet don’t know your company name (which is why they are searching in the first place), so no one is going to type in “BJ Hair Design”. Chances are they will type in “hair salon Los Angeles”, and this is when you want your web site to come up first. It is much harder to get a high ranking on competitive keywords such as “hair salon Los Angeles”, which means it will cost you a little more to get high rankings on highly desirable keywords. So before you go with the cheapest SEO company, think about this… Which keywords are they helping you optimize?

3. SEO stops when your ranking is high. Another myth is that SEO is a one-time investment. If you have a very high ranking on Google, there are probably 9 other companies trying to compete with you. If everyone else is advancing but you, your ranking will eventually drop. That is why you should think of SEO as an ongoing investment for your business. By continuing to invest in your web site’s ranking, you will ensure a steady stream of new customers that will visit your web site and call you up.

Running ads before online video loses 16% of audience

2010-02-02T12:05:00.003-05:00

TubeMogul just released the results of an interesting study showing almost 16% of viewers will abandon watching a video if there is an ad before the video starts playing. Read the full report.

This is interesting data since many online advertisers may be paying on a cost per impression model when the viewer did not even watch the ad.

Know your target demographics?

2010-01-21T17:07:00.002-05:00

Microsoft Adcenter Lab's Demographic Prediction tool is pretty interesting. I have no idea how accurate it is, but it's informative to compare one site or one term to another. This tool predicts a user's age, gender, and other demographic information, based on their online behavior, such as what queries they search online and what web sites they visit.

I was amazed to find 25% of visitors to our site are between 18 and 24, until I remember all the job opening requests we get from recent college graduates.

Should you advertise on content networks?

2010-01-06T14:12:00.004-05:00

In an attempt to find a revenue generation model, LinkedIn and other social media sites now allow direct pay-per-click advertising on their sites. So when should you advertise on these sites and other content networks. Here's my advice....
1. You've maxed out search network PPC and have budget to spare. When folks search for terms in the traditional search network, you know they are looking for something particular to the keywords you have in your ad campaigns. On LinkedIn they might just be looking for their buddy's phone number and many times don't even see the ad. That being said it is another channel and your cost-per-click (CPC) should be much lower than a search network CPC.
2. You can advertise on a niche site. If you sell a medical device for headache relief and can advertise on a migraine discussion forum site, then content network advertising makes a whole lot of sense.

See who's linking to your site on Twitter

2009-12-11T13:28:00.005-05:00

If you would like to see who is Tweeting with a backlink to your site, check out Backtweets.com. The advanced option tab lets you set a date range and setup email alerts.

If you would like to see how your company can take advantage of Twitter and other social media sites, check out our social media programs for healthcare and technology companies or give us a call for a free consultation.

Google expands personalized search results

2009-12-08T15:44:00.005-05:00

Google has extended its personalized search results to worldwide users - not just those signed into their Google account. So now when you search with Google, it will provide results that are aimed at higher relevancy to you as an individual user, as opposed to relevancy for the average person.

For example, since I always search for [recipes] and often click on results from epicurious.com, Google might rank epicurious.com higher on the results page the next time I look for recipes.

The feature has been available to Google users who have accounts, are signed in, and have their web history enabled (on Google) for a while. Now it appears to just be the standard way of delivering search results to everybody.

You'll know when Google customizes results because a 'View customizations' link will appear on the top right of the search results page. Clicking the link will let you see how Google has customized your results and also let you turn off this type of customization.

What Does This Mean for Organic SEO?

Our agency has never promised search placement results (such as we'll get you the #1 ranking for a particular keyphrase) because we believe it's unethical. Now for certain search phrases it's impossible to make that promise. One user's search results could look significantly different than another user right across the hall. What we do promise with our internet marketing services is to increase lead generation and conversion, which in the end is the only metric that should matter.

Personalized search, in addition to Google's recent announcement it will include real-time results from social media sites, will play to the strengths of companies with truly integrated web marketing strategies. Long tail keywords will become even more important and companies may have to rely more on Adwords for lead generation.

What about Privacy?

If you're worried about privacy, Google lets you turn personalized search off altogether. For signed-in users, all you have to do is remove web history from your Google account. For signed out users, click "web history" in the top right corner of a search results page, then click "disable customizations." You can also just clear your browser's cookies.

The best affordable inkjet printer I've owned

2009-12-08T14:35:00.003-05:00

While I normally don't do product reviews on this blog, this one warranted it. For 10 years, I've owned HP printers...everything from low end throw away units to more expensive office printers. I've always been unsatisfied with the overall quality of both the hardware and software, but I could never find a suitable alternative. Well now I've found one.
Over the weekend, my latest HP all-in-one printer, scanner, fax died. I did some research and found Canon has a great product. As an amateur photograph, I've always been happy with Canon's cameras and photographic software. So I purchased the Canon PIXMA MX330 Inkjet All-In-One Printer which is on sale at Amazon and Staples for less than $70. It's normally $149. For the price it's amazing...great speed, well made, easy to open, and it's easy to change ink. It even has a mini LCD color screen. Most importantly their software does not crash my Microsoft Office applications like HP did.
I hear it's not the best printer for very high resolution photographic prints, but as a general office or home office printer, it's a very good buy.

Evaluating a Social Media Agency

2009-12-03T14:30:00.000-05:00

We are getting many inquiries in the past month from prospects looking for social media and interactive marketing campaigns. Paul Dunay's blog Buzz Marketing for Technology had a great entry on how to choose a social media agency given this marketing area just hasn't been around that long. Here's Paul's advice...

Now that we are beginning to feel the relief of the economic uncertainty that has been hanging around us for the past few months, I am beginning to hear a lot about the invention of some new roles inside organizations looking to get “social media”.

Typically this means hire someone who knows our “space” really well and someone who is an expert in social media.

Well it’s the latter part that is the hard part. Consider that in Malcolm Gladwell’s latest book Outliers: The Story of Success he goes into a discussion about Violinists and how long it takes them to become a master at their craft. So without spoiling the book for you – the bottom line was – it takes 10,000 hours to become a Master Violinist. This got me thinking about how it could apply to Social Media and how long it would take to become a Social Media Expert.

So if you practice Social Media on the job for a few hours a day, let’s say 3 hours a day learning more about social media and 2 hours a day practicing social media times 5 days a week that means you could become a social media master in 7.6 years. Throw in the weekends and that drops to 5.5 years! But wait, social media hasn’t been around that long!

So since you can’t hire an expert, what qualities would make for a good social media marketer? Here are 4 macro competences to look for:

1) Story telling – in social media you need to tell good stories, stories that people will be attracted to, identify with and want to share. Story telling is key!

2) Packaging – they need to be able to package the stories up and be able to make them shareable this means the content can be found in a variety of media forms not just one.

3) Reach – they need to know how to reach people with their content, the more forms the better. So that means they need to be fluent in many social media sites.

4) Measure – and finally the hardest part for most people is the measurement of the effectiveness of the media and the efficiency of the story being spread in those media.

Pros and Cons of Content Management Systems

2009-12-02T00:11:00.005-05:00

I'm reposting a blog post from Josh Freedman of Seattle's Web1Marketing that outlines wonderful criteria to evaluate if your company needs a content management system (CMS) for its website(s).

Clients often if they need a Content Management System (CMS) to help manage website changes. In theory, these systems allow organizations to effectively manage their own site changes. This post will delve into the pros and cons of using a CMS.

As their name implies, Content Management Systems are software packages that make website maintenance more systematic and (in theory) easier. Typical features include:

Security — Password protected logins and different levels of control over site design and content.
Multiple users with multiple roles — Different users can have different capabilities so that, for instance, many people can create new content, but only certain editors and administrators can make those changes part of the live website.
Templates — Standardization of web sites and site sections, and removing the need for special formatting of each new piece of content. Also enables some things to be changed site-wide very easily.
Simplified content creation and editing — Most common CMSs allow users to create and edit content without knowledge of HTML and CSS.
Task automation — Automatic creation of menus, navigation tools, sitemaps, RSS feeds, etc.
Expanded functionality — Many CMS systems support “plug-ins” that provide additional functionality like blogs, email list management, usage statistics, etc.
Lower cost — Simplified content creation and editing saves time and reduces the reliance on technical services and outside vendors.

The above list is by no means complete, but they summarize the basic capabilities and point out the most popular benefits. There are hundreds of different CMSs that offer a variety of additional capabilities that may be valuable for particular situations.

The most common alternative to a CMS-based strategy is to built websites using standard HTML and CSS (and perhaps limited use of ASP or PHP). Much of the initial design and development work is the same for sites that do and do not use CMSs. You will either have to know or pay for HTML expertise to make changes, but there are tens of thousands of people and firms that can help, which cannot be said of event the most popular CMS.

So what are the downsides of CMS use? Well, there are many potential challenges:

Software cost — There are many open-source (hence “free”) CMS tools, but there are many that cost hundreds to thousands of dollars.
Installation and configuration cost — Any CMS must be setup and configured for a particular site design, group of users, initial information organization, and any additional features of the CMS or integration of other tools. This process requires significant technical expertise and experience with that particular CMS. The required level of expertise is typically much greater (and more expensive) than HTML and CSS authoring. Typical installation and configuration costs run from the thousands to tens of thousands of dollars.
Database dependence — Virtually all CMSs rely on database software. This adds technical dependencies that static websites do not share and may require the skills of database experts for advanced configuration issues.
Lack of portability — Unlike static websites, CMS-based sites typically require a variety of technical steps to be relocated from one server to another, and the underlying server software usually needs to be the same. Moving a static site is usually as simple as copying files form one location to another.
Maintenance — While a CMS may make creation of content easier, systematic changes to a site require expertise with the particular CMS and specific implementation, and they can be expensive.
User training — Content authors, editors, and anyone else who will be using the CMS must be trained on its use, which includes how NOT to create new problems in configuration.
Upgrading — A CMS is a piece of software that must be upgraded periodically to insure that any security patches or bug fixes are implemented in a timely manner.
Vendor dependence — The cost of making systematic changes is usually lower if you work with the people that installed the CMS because of system and installation-specific knowledge. This makes it much harder to cost-effectively to change vendors.
Security — Any software that allows multiple users introduces the risk of abuse by a user or someone who gains access through other means. The risk rises as more users are granted access. Integration with other systems (e.g. lead management) can introduce security risks for those systems.
Breadth of failure — In a site that relies on “static” HTML and CSS, problems are typically isolated to a particular page and are not catastrophic. Problems in any software-dependent system can bring down an entire site. Such instances are rare, particularly with high quality CMSs and skilled vendors, but the risk is not zero.
Feature additions — If you need a capability that your CMS doesn’t offer, it may require custom programming that requires integration with the existing system. This can be simple or it can get very complex, and any integration may complicate subsequent upgrades to the CMS.

With all of these challenges, it should be pretty clear that for very small sites and those that are changed infrequently, CMSs can be a very poor investment. For larger sites or those that require frequent updates from multipe authors, a CMS might be a good solution.

What's the Most Popular Word of 2009?

2009-11-30T22:55:00.003-05:00

Believe it or not, "Twitter" beat out h1n1, Obama and Michael Jackson as the most popular word in the English language in 2009. While it's not completely fleshed out, online social interaction is here is stay. Read the full story.

If your company doesn't already have a social media strategy, now is the time to get one. In the very least you should do a land grab for vanity name URLs on Facebook and claim your company profile on LinkedIn and corporate/product fan pages on Facebook. And start to play with Twitter. There are tools such as Ping.fm that link all these social sites and your blog together, so in 5 minutes per day, you can provide a status update on each site with just one login.

Create color themes with Adobe Kuler

2009-11-24T23:09:00.002-05:00

Check out Adobe's web-based application, Kuler, to view a gallery of created color themes or create your own from a particular base color or even a photograph. The tool is especially useful in presentation and website development.

Google ranking changes in 2010...think fast

2009-11-13T14:30:00.005-05:00

Interview with Matt Cutts more than hints to the fact that the speed at which your site loads may start to enter into the search ranking factors. You can test the speed of your site and get access to many free tools at the this Google site speed page. We especially like the Page Speed Firefox app.

Monitor your branded traffic

2009-11-13T00:28:00.001-05:00

Check out this nteresting post by Andy Edmonds on using Google Analytics to monitor your brand. I tried it on a couple of accounts and found some pretty interesting results. You can set it up in 5 minutes per account.

Want free publicity?

2009-11-09T14:00:00.004-05:00

Free media coverage is one of the best deals going. If you want to see your company's name in print, scan the daily emails from Help a Reporter Out (HARO). It will only take you 5-10 minutes each day to scan dozens of inquiries from reporters looking for information on stories they are writing. Our efforts in responding to HARO posts recently landed us a nice mention in Oregon Business Magazine.
Here's some advice when pitching editors through HARO:

Make sure your response is relevant to the editor's inquiry. For example, don't send information on electric vehicle sales if the writer is doing a story on low-cost auto repair.
Think before you write. The information you provide should be descriptive yet to the point. Don't send paragraphs of information on a first reply. The writer will contact you if he needs more info.
Be patient. We get action on only about 10% of the responses we provide. However, the ROI is still there.

Responding to editor and freelance writer inquiries can be a great addition to your public relations strategy. Combined with press releases, media outreach can get your company great press which often garners new leads and establishes your management team as experts.

Clarity Quest Opens Third Technology Marketing Office

2009-10-28T07:35:00.001-04:00

We are proud to announce the opening of our third technology marketing agency office. This time our new office is in Roseburg, Oregon -centered between the tech hubs of Silicon Valley and Portland. Our headquarters will remain in Ann Arbor, Michigan.

Read the press release.

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Using WordPress for static website builds

2009-10-26T14:47:00.014-04:00

We just completed a website for Cobb School in Oregon using the WordPress platform and a custom theme. The site is for an elementary school that needed a easy to learn content management system for multiple authors. As a nonprofit, they could not afford a custom content management system.

Designing a basic site using WordPress is fairly straightforward. There are hosting companies, such as A2 Hosting that offer 1-click WordPress installs. In working with WordPress we found a number of advantages and disadvantages:

Advantages

For the most part, WordPress is easy to learn and use for folks that do not know coding. The one exception is tables, which do demand a bit of HTML coding knowledge.
WordPress keeps a revision history of each page which is great for novices and their webmaster alike!
The image editing options are excellent. Being able to downgrade an image size within the application saves much time.
Novice editors really liked the "preview before upload" capability.

Disadvantages

In the theme we used, some aspects of the theme rendered differently in Internet Explorer compared to Firefox and Safari. For example, we could create true orphan pages by selecting a "private" publishing option. Privately-published pages show up on Firefox, but do not on Internet Explorer This was not a shocker and our developer was able to create workarounds in most cases. In our case, we hid orphan pages under a section that's not frequently visited.
You can upload images directly from your computer when editing a page, but you have to upload documents such as PDF files directly into the Media Library.
In the theme we selected, the homepage is considered a theme element and therefore, does not keep a revision history. Also, the homepage does not allow for visual editing. It must be edited in HTML.
The theme we selected did not have a true "blog posting" section, so we had change a real estate listing section into a blog section.

So lesson learned, choose your theme carefully. We actually purchased a pretty high-quality theme on ThemeForest, but it was still not perfect. Your webmaster or marketing agency may have to tweak the theme for it to meet your requirements. But overall, WordPress is a budget-friendly content management system that's easy to use.

Google and Bing to add Tweets to Search Results

2009-10-22T17:07:00.004-04:00

Microsoft today announced that it will add live updates from micro-blogging service Twitter to its Bing search engine results. Google also announced plans for live Twitter updates integration in its search engine. At the Web 2.0 Summit in San Francisco, Microsoft announced it has access to the public Twitter feed and released the Bing Twitter search bet a for U.S. residents. Google promised to roll out Twitter integration in its search engine "in the coming months". In addition, Microsoft has inked a deal with Facebook and Google is said to be in talks with them.

Yusuf Mehdi, senior vice president of Microsoft's online services group, said, "We are going to get access to all of the public Twitter information in real time." Bing will also get the Facebook status feed at a later date. Sheryl Sandberg, chief operating officer, Facebook, said, "We are giving Bing a feed of data made open to everyone. No money exchanged hands. We are not trying to make money on data."

Bing Twitter search sees the text of a Twitter update and any shortened links tagged with it. Domain names are displayed after the shortened links mentioned in the Twitter update. However, Bing Twitter search only shows Tweets that happened in the past week.

This is the first attempt of the search engine giants to show real-time information in search results. Stay tuned to see how both Google and Microsoft will roll this search functionality out of beta. If you do not have a social media strategy, it's time to get cranking.

Custom Top Level Domains- Part 2

2009-10-20T22:48:00.004-04:00

Last week we reported that ICANN(Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) will be allowing customized top level domains starting sometime in 2010. ICANN is instituting the change to allow more visibility and intuitiveness to domain names. After all, what does a “.com” mean to most people? A .nike would be much more intuitive.
ICANN is reviewing its application process and will soon announce when in 2010 the customized top-level domains will be available. However, it's not going to be as easy as buying a .com or .org domain name. The ICANN application process will require the following

Business plan - including how you will maintain the domain over a 5-year period
Policy overview
Extensive documentation of community support (if the domain is for a community site)
A competent and stable technology provider for registry services and hosting

So this is not going to be a minor or cheap undertaking for most companies. There is going to have to be a large budget and commitment to the project.

Walk this Way this Blog Action Day

2009-10-15T14:00:00.000-04:00

I'm participating in Blog Action Day today, so I won't be talking marketing or SEO. Today's topic is climate change.
When I lived in Ann Arbor, Michigan, I used my car only once a week for grocery shopping and maybe 2-3 times per month for outdoor adventures or out-of-town client meetings. By virtue of the town's great pedestrian and bike-friendly paths and a thriving downtown, my husband and I both walked to work for 3 years and I walked my daughter to preschool every day. That's everyday - even in Michigan winters.

Now alas I find myself in Oregon suburbia and I'm in the car all the time it seems. The "downtown" of the town in which we live has amazing historic homes but we don't feel it's a safe environment for our young daughter which is a complete shame. I encourage everyone in a similar situation to get involved with Main Street revitalization efforts. Imagine how we could affect the climate if everyone could walk to work at least 3 or 4 times a week.

Own .YOU

2009-10-12T17:47:00.005-04:00

If you're looking for a more direct and personal way to interact with consumers, instead of
sending them to your company's Facebook page or Twitter profile, what could be
better than an entire section of the Internet devoted solely to your brand?

That is exactly what you'll be able to get in early 2010 when you'll be able to grab a .brand instead of .com. Your company name can replace the .com! Imagine our emails coming .[your brand here]. Or your emails coming from you.[yourlastname]! Will Nike launch branded communities on a .nike domain? Can your company create an engaging microsite on .[your product name]? Whether you are a brand owner, technology company or healthcare organization you need to know how this upcoming domain registration change will affect your brand.

We will let our blog readers know exactly when these domains will be available and how to grab them. Stay tuned.

Buy a Cookbook, Warm a Child

2009-10-07T11:59:00.002-04:00

Our client SVS Vision is selling cookbooks at their 50 optical centers or by calling 800-SVS-4600. All proceeds go to the Coats for Kids Foundation. Eat well and keep a deserving child warm this winter!

Advertising to Change More in the Next 5 Years than in the Last 50

2009-10-01T16:40:00.003-04:00

An IBM study is predicting the end of advertising as we know it. It floors me that IBM has an Institute for Business Value that probably used a six-figure budget to tell us things we already knew. 18-24-year old use iTunes? Duh. The traditional ad agency is a dying breed? Of course. We've been predicting that traditional advertising agencies have been declining for years. That's why boutique ad agencies and tech-savvy marketing firms are thriving.

I will give them that the scenarios make the report more interesting especially for folks outside of ad agencies. It's worth a quick read even if just for the pretty graphs.

Now add your own videos to Animoto

2009-09-24T14:30:00.000-04:00

We've been using Animoto for a few months now and love it. Examples of the videos we've created with Animoto can be found on our testimonials and marketing portfolio pages. We're even more excited that Animoto now gives you the ability to upload your own videos and to mix them in with your still shots. They have upgraded their music selection library as well.

Free trials are available, however, the business package lets you customize the videos and delete the Animoto logos.

US entrepreneurs now get loans through Kiva

2009-09-21T23:12:00.003-04:00

I was really excited to find out this evening that Kiva.org is now offering microloans to small businesses in the U.S. Our 24th microloan is to Roberto - a mechanic in Fremont, California who wants to expand his shop. What a better way to stimulate the US economy, than to provide small business owners with necessary capital.
With just a $25 loan, you can make a difference. And these entrepreneurs are worthy of it. Not a single entrepreneur has defaulted on one of our loans to date. And many pay them back before their allotted time.

Improve Your Online Searchability with DAO

2009-09-15T16:14:00.003-04:00

Digital Asset Optimization (DAO) is the part of a change companies are implementing to meet online consumer search needs. DAO is different from Search Engine Optimization (SEO), which concentrates on the text files of a website, focusing on keywords within that text. DAO identifies content in all its forms and uses filters to identify what is material is most promotable. The Internet is no longer a text-only environment, and search engines are adapting to meet the standards of the new content available through the Internet.

If you are a part of a company that tries to promote products/services online, then you know that having a strong online presence is an essential part of your business, and this presence is only valuable if your company can be found on the internet. Digital Asset Optimization ensures that search engines pick up all of the content that a company has available on the web: videos, animation, podcasts, message boards, maps, images, and other non-text based files. To prepare for all of this new information, almost every search engine now offers media-specific searching for users. If you offer more than just written information to your online consumers, your will benefit tremendously from implementing DAO strategies.

According to digitalassetoptimization.net, a site that promotes the benefits of and ways to use DAO, by implementing Digital Asset Optimization strategies, you can gain an increased presence with:

Multimedia indexing
Increased page rank
Increased traffic
A more targeted audience
Increased back links to your site

DAO is similar to SEO in that everything from your file names to metatags are an important when implementing DAO. It is important to include text and descriptions for your images and videos so that they can search well on the Internet. For example, instead of naming your video, “Online Marketing,” change it to more specific search terms such as “How Marketing Firms Help Online Marketers Grow Their Business.” By being as specific as possible, individuals searching for you will have a better chance of finding your video online.

It is also a good idea to upload your videos to a service like YouTube, which is visited much more frequently than your individual site.

When in comes using Digital Asset Optimization to improve the searchability of your website there are several important things to remember. DAO relies on concise, targeted words and tags. Although having an attractive, creative website is still important, if your consumers can't find you on the web, your attractive website is not going to help sell your products/services. To get the most from your website using DAO, install an analytics service such as Google Analytics. These services provide you with a clear picture of how individuals see your site and alerts you to any problems. Digital Asset Optimization is all about how search engines index your content and return your web page in search results. Clarity Quest Marketing offers competitive pricing on Google Analytics reporting, customization and analysis, to help companies increase the productivity of their DAO efforts.

Still not sure if your ready for DAO? Contact the marketing experts at Clarity Quest Marketing to hear more about the opportunities available using DAO and how it can help increase your online presence.

Take a ride on the Wonder Wheel

2009-09-15T00:17:00.003-04:00

Although it's been out awhile, I just started playing with Google's Wonder Wheel. If you perform a Google search, you will see a "show options" link at the top. If you click on this link, you will get a bunch of different Google tools including the Wonder Wheel.

I've found the Wonder Wheel really useful in trying to come up with keywords and key phrases for websites. It's a much different tact than the Google Keyword Tool which just starts spitting out phrases and data at you. The Wonder Wheel makes you think visually about the relationship between words and phrases. I thought I had exhausted volume-getting terms for a particular niche, just to find a couple more using the Wonder Wheel. It's just another tool to add to your keyword analysis arsenal.

Do you have a particular tool you use often for building keyword lists?

What the font?

2009-09-09T17:45:00.005-04:00

Check out the great NY Times article about the debate over IKEA changing their font in their 2010 catalog. Design does matter. A logo designed for $200 more times than not looks cheap. Creating a professional, polished and modern identity for your company is well worth the time, money and effort.

Take the first step by completing our brand personality quiz. It only takes 5 minutes and is fun to boot. When you're ready to brand or re-brand your company, our graphic and identity experts are waiting.

Here are a couple of our recent logo designs:

Ranking on Google News

2009-09-08T12:07:00.004-04:00

Getting a top ranking on Google News for your original articles can mean many leads for your business. Check out this informative video from Google's Maile Ohye on how Google ranks news stories.

Does Malcolm Gladwell's Outliers Apply to Business?

2009-08-25T23:49:00.002-04:00

I just finished reading Malcolm Gladwell's new book Outliers: The Story of Success. While it details how a person's environment, cultural background and lucky breaks have contributed to success, I could not help wondering how things such as the year in which you start year your business and the location of your company affect the chances for success.

We happened to start our second office in Ann Arbor, Michigan just as the auto industry was really tanking. This meant we had less competition in terms of other agencies which were left standing. We didn't specialize in auto, therefore, we didn't take a big hit. We did, however, focus on small to midsized technology companies which are plentiful in the southeast Michigan area, especially in college towns. I'd like to think some of our success was due to hard work and creative talent. But I have to wonder...how much was our success due to the factors discussed in Outliers?

What are your thoughts on lucky breaks vs. hard work?

Social media passes web-based email usage

2009-08-24T18:01:00.004-04:00

According to a report by Nielsen Online, social networking site use has surged 73% and exceeded web-based email usage for the first time ever! Last year alone the time spent on social media sites increased by 73%.

What Google Caffeine Might Mean for your business

2009-08-12T14:14:00.002-04:00

One of the largest behind-the-scenes updates to Google's search technology in three years is in the works. On August 10th, Google quietly began soliciting feedback for "Caffeine," a new system for Web searching that is being tested.

Google makes almost constant changes to its search algorithms and infrastructure, but it hasn't made an update of this magnitude since 2006, said Matt Cutts, a principal engineer at Google who is considered one of the driving forces behind the company's approach to search.

Preview Caffeine to see how it might affect your company's search result rankings. So far we have not seen a huge difference in rankings for Clarity Quest's site or our clients' sites. In all cases tested so far, the changes were actually positive for us. I credit this to the fact we build links the correct way through public relations, social media and rich content.

Feel free to post your comments to let us know what you are seeing.

Who wants to be an Entrepreneur?

2009-08-12T13:07:00.001-04:00

In an article titled, “Who wants to be an Entrepreneur?” AP writer, David N. Goodman, reported that “the Kansas City, Mo.-based Kauffman Foundation has launched a $9.25 million initiative to find 800 Detroit-area people this year with the ideas, talent and drive to start businesses that could help the nation's struggling auto capital develop a new economic base.”

On August 18th there will be the final session for the Detroit FastTrac to the Future program. Individuals are encouraged to come and present their businesses ideas with hopes of gaining the collateral to develop their own businesses in this trying economic climate.

With Michigan having the nation’s highest unemployment rate, at 15.2 percent, this program hopes to “create thousands of jobs, spur growth of small businesses, help auto suppliers diversify and make sure minority businesses fully participate in the new green economy.”

By year's end, the Detroit FastTrac program seeks to pick 800 people to help, with the hope that 400 will end up starting businesses with the overall goal to create 1,200 new companies over the next three years.

We at Clarity Quest are excited about this business venture for Michigan residents and hope that we will be able to help publicize these new businesses using our marketing services.

For a link to the full article, please click the link below.
http://www.wwj.com/pages/4976532.php

Animoto Lessons Learned

2009-08-06T12:19:00.002-04:00

Animoto is an easy tool for creating quality videos that can be used for both personal and professional purposes. All you have to do is upload pictures to the Animoto website, select background music to play with your video slide show from the numerous choices on the Animoto website, or upload music directly from your own computer, and add some text to direct your audience through the video and you’re done.

Animoto Tips for Better Video
While Animoto takes a lot of the leg work out of creating professional looking videos, a few tips to maximizing the use of this tool can make your slide shows look even better. At Clarity Quest, we use Animoto to create videos not only for our IT and health care clients, but also to advertise the benefits of using Clarity Quest as a technology marketing firm. We have seen the benefit to creating these Animoto videos, and have been so impressed with the results that we have posted several on our website.

Here are some tips Clarity Quest has found that help to create better videos with Animoto as well as some tips from the creators of Animoto:

1. When uploading photos to Animoto, always pick photos that have a landscape orientation as portrait photos can sometimes format oddly during the video render process.

2. Animoto will automatically determine the duration of each picture in the video slideshow but if there’re pictures that you really want to emphasize in the video, select the images in the video editor and use the spotlight button.

3. When adding text to your video, always make sure that their pictures on either side of the text slide else your text will lack any moving video in the background.

4. Your choice of music determines the transition speed. If you select a slow classical song, your music video will have slow transitions whereas if you select rock, the transitions will happen fast.

5. Animoto consumes around 15-20 images for their 30 second shorts. If you upload more images, they are likely to be discarded in the final video so pick the best shots before starting the render process. For full-length videos, you an upload up to 300 shots but the number of pictures used would really depend on the choice of your music - slow music means less pictures.

6. While most people use Animoto for creating fast slide shows, you can adjust the video speed to 1/2x for a more traditional slide show.

7. If you want to brand your Animoto slide shows, make sure that the last image in the slide show is not a photograph but an image of your logo.

8. To prevent images from getting cut off in your slide shows, try putting a 50 to 100 pixel border around the image to prevent loosing the edges of your pictures and create a more professional-looking image.

9. If you have a full-length video (business) account you are able to turn off the “created by Animoto” and music credits text that appears at the end of the slide show. Right before you go to render your video there will be options to turn off this text with the simple click of a button.

Design Trends for PPC Landing Pages

2009-07-31T11:44:00.002-04:00

A recent article from Website Magazine addresses the design trends for pay-per-click landing pages. The piece, entitled “Five PPC Landing Page Design Trends,” stresses the importance of having landing pages that can convert impressions if you are paying for clicks.

According the the article, it is best to start with competitive terms while focusing your keywords to determine what PPC landing page design works for you. By comparing multiple landing pages, applying different techniques and testing your own landing pages, you will find the most successful ways convert your consumers to buyers and maybe even know how to influence the quality score of individual listings.

Here are the top five design trends that have been seen on PPC landing pages:

1. Limited path for users
2. Prominent images
3. Strong call to action
4. Data collection
5. Content teasing or registration

For access to the full Website Magazine article, please click here http://www.websitemagazine.com/content/blogs/posts/archive/2009/06/18/five-ppc-landing-page-design-trends.aspx

What About Bing?

2009-07-29T17:07:00.002-04:00

Having spent over 80 million dollars in advertising, it’s not surprising that everyone is starting ask about Bing.com and whether or not it could really replace Google as the premier search engine for all things internet.

Bing is Microsoft’s latest web search engine, or “decision engine” as it is being advertised. It was unveiled on May 28, 2009 by Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer at the All Things Digital Conference in San Diego, California, replacing Microsoft’s Live Search.
By marketing Bing as a “decision engine,” Microsoft affirms that its search functions produce more relevant results and organizes the results in a way that makes more sense. Bing provides tabs for different searches similar to Google including “images,” “videos,” “news” and “shopping” but, Microsoft has also crafted some intuitive search features to narrow Bing search results by related topics. As an example, searching for “Microsoft” on Bing will provide the user with the typical links to Microsoft’s website, the Wikipedia entry, etc.; but in addition Bing will give the user "smart" tabs that sort through links for subjects particular to Microsoft such as its products, online services, investor relations, jobs at Microsoft and the like. In some ways, these “smart” tabs represent a successful spin-off of Google’s “I’m Feeling Lucky” button, which nearly no one uses.

For those online marketers that want to know how to receive high SEO rankings, or maybe we should be calling them DEO rankings (decision engine optimization) with Bing, they should know that Bing puts emphasis on elements of web pages that Google does not, and vice versa.

As an example, compare a Bing search with a Google search for “technology marketing firm”Only 1 result (our Clarity Quest homepage) is in both of the sites’ Top 5 results.

Here are some tips important SEO tips from bizzia.com, a business news and commentary website, to ranking well with Bing:

1. Importance of Domain Age
Bing appears to put a lot of stock into how long ago a domain was registered. For marketers, this means that you may look to purchase older domains if you want to get on good position in Bing.

2. Bring on the Text
On most search engines the amount of text on the page usually isn’t usually a huge factor. However, Bing seems to really like pages with at least 300 words of text.

3. Linking Out
With Google especially, some marketers are scared to link out to other websites because they don’t want their Page Rank to be lowered. On Bing, linking out actually appears to be smiled upon.

4. The Blogging Blues
Google seems to appreciate the blogosphere more than Bing. This is especially true when recent news events occur and bloggers battle with major websites for space on the search engine results page.
5. Bing Loves Titles
It is important for marketers that are wanting to make it to the top of Bing to have a title tag and header that correlates to the subject at hand.
Although Bing does offer s some new features for users to explore, Microsoft dos not anticipate Bing replacing Google. Instead, Microsoft hopes that the changes being made are just a start to future improvements on their search engine, but even now it is definitely a useful tool for online marketers to explore and use to their advantage.

So what should you do if you want to rank well on both engine ranking pages? Well Google is still the dominant player, however, we have closed a good deal of business off Yahoo! search rankings, and I suspect we will off Bing as well. The lesson is to make sure you have backlinks from a variety of sites including article banks, public relations wires, print publication, e-publications, blogs and videos. You truly do have to be everywhere to rank well on all the engines.

Twitter Takes a Step Toward Commercial Accounts

2009-07-27T14:32:00.000-04:00

New York Times reporter, Claire Cain Miller, published a story on the New York Times Bits Blog stating that on Thursday night Twitter revealed Twitter 101, a downloadable tutorial for companies to learn how to use Twitter for their business. Twitter 101 also includes case studies of well-know companies that are currently using Twitter such as JetBlue and Dell as well as small businesses like Teuser Wines and CoffeeGroundz.

The inception of Twitter 101 is taking Twitter a step closer to offering commercial products for businesses to use on Twitter with the goal being to introduce these paid services later this year. Services would include allowing businesses to verify their accounts and analyze the traffic to their Twitter profiles.

However, Twitter still holds to the belief that the biggest advantage for companies using Twitter is “being able to build relationships and listen to and responding to comments about your company. It is also a way to ask questions and float ideas in real time,” the company says.

Link to full blog post from the New York Times
http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/07/24/twitter-takes-a-step-toward-commercial-accounts/index.html

Got visuals? Use Flickr to promote them

2009-07-23T13:27:00.005-04:00

Flickr is fast-becoming a popular online marketing tool, especially for companies hoping to make a bigger impact using social media marketing. It allows companies to be creative and take advantage of marketing opportunities that are often overlooked in favor of costly online marketing tools. For those that are willing to take advantage of it, Flickr will create marketing opportunities where few exist.

Flickr is a web site community owned by Yahoo! But beyond just being another social networking site, Flickr offers its users free photo sharing and a host of related services. According to Nielsen/NetRatings, Flickr is the fastest-growing photo sharing site on the web, and the 7th most trafficked social media site overall, giving it some marketing clout for companies looking to expand in this shaky economy.

Given that Flickr is a photo sharing site, the companies that have found it to be most effectively have a visual element to their business, or a product and/or service to sell. Nikon has served as the benchmark for a company marketing with Flickr by using it as an extension of their Nikon School and their Nikon Digital Learning Center website. Their Nikon’s Digital Learning Center on Flickr is an “online resource (that) provides Flickr members with tutorials, practical photography tips and advice from Nikon photo professionals to assist them in taking photos.” By using Flickr Nikon has been able to generate 8,527 members, 23,440 photos, and 669 discussions, all for free using Flickr.

There are other large and small companies alike using Flickr to creatively market their business ranging from companies as dissimilar as 7-11 using Flickr to market their Simpson’s Kwik-E-Mart campaign pictures to Purina dog food catering to dog lovers. There is even a Facebook Flickr application so that companies can link their social media sites together. A number of opportunities exist for brands to engage in Flickr but they seem to break into three basic categories:

1. Spreading content
Unique visual content like 7-11’s Kwik-E-Mart photos that have received over 800,000 views after being distributed around the web from using Flickr.

2. Hosting online competitions
Flickr allows companies to create image-based competitions without the cost of creating their own infrastructure for the project.

3. Creating a community while providing customer support
Flickr can serve as a venue for fans to give insight to products and provide feedback while connecting with other company fans. This can be effective for technology marketing such as software vendors who want to show solutions or promote new products using screenshots.

When used effectively, Flickr has definitely shown that it has marketing potential for companies. Flickr can show any company, large or small, how to visually engage their customers using free social media, while creating an online community to disseminate their company message over the web.

Starbucks goes upscale

2009-07-21T14:53:00.002-04:00

Starbucks is remodeling 3 stores in Seattle attempting to rebrand itself to upscale clientele by offering not only coffee, but live music and alcohol. Read about it in Ad Age. About time...my local coffee shop in Oregon, My Coffee, already has wine tasting nights and live music on Friday. I think it's the first good move Starbucks has made in a long time. Now they just have to get themselves out of lower-end retail chains. It always amazed me they didn't use a different brand name in those lower-end locations.

Your thoughts?

Google Voice Opens Lines

2009-07-16T11:31:00.002-04:00

After it's acquisition of Grand Central, Google closed the service down to new accounts. Only existing Grand Central users had access to the service. Now Google is starting to open new accounts again.

Here's what it offers:

A personal phone number that rings all of your existing phones when people call
All of your voicemail in one inbox with unlimited online storage and free voicemail transcripts sent to your phone and email
Low-priced international calling to over 200 countries and free SMS
Other powerful features like the first phone spam filter to protect you from unwanted callers, the ability to ListenIn^TM on your voicemail messages while they are being left, conference calling and more

Learn more about Google Voice.

SEO Fast Start available for free download

2009-06-29T21:21:00.002-04:00

You can pay a firm like ours to do internet marketing or you can learn it on your own. Either way, we're here to help. If you are into learning some of the basics yourself, download Dan Thies' SEO Fast Start 2009. Dan always gives rock solid info especially in the areas of keyword analysis and link building.
Download the free report.

Tips for Effective Social Media Marketing

2009-06-17T11:54:00.004-04:00

“Social Media Marketing” has become a trendy catchphrase in today’s business world. Social media sites have made it relatively simple to set up free accounts on their sites and allow companies to virtually syndicate their message to thousands of potential customers. However, there are a lot of individuals ineffectively using social media marketing. It is not enough to create a Facebook or Twitter account and assume you are going to attract numerous new contacts for your business. There are steps that need to be taken to successfully contend in online networking communities. Consider the following to productively use social media marketing:

1. Focus on several relevant social media sites
It is important to consider your business and your potential customers when choosing which online communities to participate in. Many social media sites on the web are geared towards younger generations or are focused around acquaintances maintaining contact with one another. The target markets for these sites are not companies trying to marketing their business online. It is more practical to pick several sites that are specific to your business industry and/or sites that are well-suited for creating company profiles.

If you are a B2B company, I recommend getting a profile (fan page) for your company on Facebook, creating a company profile on the LinkedIn company beta site and setting up your employees with LinkedIn profiles.

2. Participate in the online conversation
One of the best ways to get your name out online is to participate in discussions on social media sites. Posting comments on industry-specific blogs showcases your knowledge of that industry. Sharing information will also help to introduce you to people interested in your business, but remember it is not appropriate to go onto other individuals sites to merely promote your company. If people are interested in what you are saying they will gravitate to your sites to find more information.

3. Consistently update your accounts
Having accounts on every social media site is not effective, especially if you aren’t consistently updating them. Visiting and updating your accounts will help increase traffic to your pages and using web services that update your social media accounts for you such as Ping.fm make doing so easier. Ping.fm allows you to manage your social media accounts by letting you post information that is “pinged” out to all of your accounts, rather than having to update your individual accounts with the same information. Web services such as Ping.fm help to keep all of your accounts updated at once and leave time to be spent on other aspects of your business.

4. Display unique quality content
It is not beneficial for your business to merely post content that is uninteresting or useless to your followers. The information you post needs to be relevant as well as entertaining for the reader. Using Twitter to tell readers that you are going to a business meeting is not relevant to your consumers. Posting unique and customer-focused content will keep people coming back to your to see your new updates. For instance, Sprinkles Cupcakes, a bakery in Beverly Hills, uses their Twitter page to increase customer visits to their store. On Cinco de Mayo, Sprinkles “tweeted” that the first person to come into their store and say “Hola” as opposed to “Hello” would receive a free cupcake. This is a brilliant way to use a site like Twitter for business because it engages consumers and entices them to act.

5. Do not abandon conventional marketing techniques
Although social media marketing can be great way to market your business when used correctly, it is not a replacement for traditional marketing practices. Because social media marketing is a relatively new phenomenon, there are still many unknowns associated with it. As a result, there is still a lot to be said for communications tactics such as newsletters, phone calls, and trade shows. Maintaining a diversified marketing plan that offers a wide variety of techniques will help you to attract more customers for your business.

You can still claim a Facebook domain name

2009-06-15T11:29:00.003-04:00

I've had two clients call me this morning confused about Facebook recently allowing individuals and companies to claim custom domain names. Now instead of a long string such as www.facebook.com./234fsd0 you can actually get www.facebook.com/chris.slocumb. Unfortunately you do not have to be the owner of a personal name, trademarked name, or domain in order to claim the custom URL.

Even though the name land grab began this past Sunday, you can still claim a custom URL by logging into your Facebook account and directing your browser to http://www.facebook.com/username/.

How to Rank Well for Local Search

2009-06-04T11:11:00.001-04:00

Read the excellent local search opinion report from David Mihm and other local SEO experts.

SEO, PPC and email are most effective

2009-06-03T14:22:00.004-04:00

Validating what we have been seeing for awhile with our clients, senior marketing executives view search engine optimization, pay-per-click (PPC) and e-mail tactics as the three most effective tools, according to a new study by Forbes Media.

Among the pool of senior marketing executives, the tools seen as most effective for generating conversions were SEO (48%), email and e-newsletter marketing (46%) and pay-per-click/search marketing (32%).

Respondents to Forbes’ survey rated ad networks and video ads as least effective.

The study, “Ad Effectiveness Survey,” received 112 responses from senior marketing executives.

Using Mindmaps for Marketing

2009-05-28T19:35:00.001-04:00

Check out our real-time presentation audio blog using my latest toy -the Livescribe 2GB Pulse Smartpen
Click the link below and select "full screen" and the right arrow at the bottom to place the graphic in landscape mode.

Using Mindmaps for Marketing
brought to you by Livescribe

Social networking 1930's style

2009-05-27T15:04:00.001-04:00

Coin operated tweeting? Read about it.

Wow Visitors AND Search Engines with Your Web Copy - Part 4

2009-05-26T10:58:00.004-04:00

Welcome to the last installment of my Wow with Web Copy series. In past blog posts I've discussed setting website goals, finding the most effective key phrases and setting up a web content template. Today I'll address writing the actual on-page copy for a site.

Step 4. Write keyphrase-rich headers & body copy with anchor text links. Now that you know the primary and secondary phrases you are targeting on your page, you need to figure out how you can link to other pages within your site. Since your homepage is probably going to have the most authority in Google’s eyes (link juice to pass on), you’ll especially want to ensure you have keyphrase-rich links off your homepage.

As an example, consider the copy on the Clarity Quest homepage in the graphic below. We link to several sub-pages within the Clarity Quest site. We also use keyphrase-rich copy "Marketing Agency...Technology Companies" in the H1 header.

We've also put a small flash area at the top of the page and it's here where we inserted our snazzy copy which is not keyphrase-rich, but eye-catching and attention-grabbing.

There is a Google penalty if you try to stuff too many links into a page, especially if you put a whole bunch in the footer. The key is to provide just enough links so you are guiding the user to particular areas of your site and not putting in links just for their own sake. If you write for a site visitor, Google rarely penalizes you.

I hope this four-part series has been helpful for those who write copy for websites. As always, I welcome any feedback.

Wow Visitors AND Search Engines with Your Web Copy - Part 3

2009-05-19T13:45:00.003-04:00

Part 3. Create a master web copy template.
In my ongoing series on crafting the perfect copy for your website, this week I'll discuss creating a master copy template. I recommend you setup a master copy document in a word processing application. I create a new page for each web page and insert a table with the following headers at the top of each page.

Page Name
Call to Action for this Page
URL
Title Tag
Meta description
Keyphrases to use

Here’s how to complete each field in the table. I will use the Clarity Quest outsource marketing landing page as the example.

a) Call to Action for this Page – Earlier you determined the overall goals for this site, now it’s time to figure out what you want the visitor to do as a result of visiting this page. In the case of the Clarity Quest outsource marketing page, I want the visitor to either request a proposal or further investigate our other marketing service offerings.

Clarity Quest’s Outsource Marketing Page
Call to Action for this Page: Go to request proposal form, check out our clients or additional services.

b) URL – Use your primary keyword phrase in the URL. In this case “outsource marketing” is the primary phrase for the page. If you do not already own a domain name, it will help your search rankings if you can obtain a domain containing the keyphrases such as www.outsourcemarketing.com. However, since we already owned a domain, we just used the keyphrase at the end of the URL separated by underscores. There’s debate in the search engine community on whether dashes are better separators than underscores. The consensus seems to be dashes are better, although we have not seen a detrimental effect using underscores.

Clarity Quest’s Outsource Marketing Page
URL: http://www.clarityqst.com/services_outsource_marketing.aspx

c) Title Tag - Although visitors don’t often know where to find the title tag, it’s one of the most important pieces of information in the eyes of the search robots. It’s located at the very top left of your browser window and it’s the first line you will see in a search engine results page listing.
a. Use the title of your site or your company brand at the beginning or end of every title tag. If you are working with a nationally-known brand such as IBM or Apple, put the company name first for brand awareness. For all other companies, I recommend the putting the brand at the end of the title tag.
b. Limit the length of the tag to 65-70 characters (including spaces) or less. The search engines limit the number of characters they display on the results page listings.
c. Use keyphrases in the tag. Incorporate your primary and secondary keyphrase in the title tag without keyword stuffing.
d. Use different keyphrases or variations in every page’s title tags. This is one rule we see violated all the time. If you use the same tag on different pages you’ll force the search engines to decide which page is more relevant. For example, on the Clarity Quest site we use “technology marketing agency” on one page and “high-tech marketing firm” on another. This way I've fulled used each page of real estate to my advantage.
e. Use a divider symbol to separate your brand name from the rest of the title tag. We like to use the “|” (pipe) symbol but the forward arrow “>” or hyphen “-“ also work effectively.
f. Use the title tag keyphrases in your headlines. Re-using the keyphrases in your H1 and H2 header tags makes search engine robots happy because it is confirmation you didn’t falsely keyword stuff the title tag. More importantly, it makes visitors more comfortable when they land on your page and it actually has something to do with their search term.

Clarity Quest’s Outsource Marketing Page
Title Tag: Outsource Marketing Department, Virtual Marketing |Clarity Quest

d) Meta description - The meta description tag is most often seen as the descriptive text in a search engine ranking page listing.

If you do not provide a meta description tag, the search engines will scrape the content off your page that most closely matches the search terms. However, if you provide the meta description you can target your keyphrases within the descriptive text.
This tag is not so important for the search rankings, but it makes a big difference in click-through rates. Here’s where you can write the eye-catching, ad-like copy that is compelling and gets attention. Remember there are 9 or so other listings on the search engine result page and you want your site to stand out.
The tag should describe your page clearly and accurately. Google allows the fewest number of characters at 160, so use this as your limit.
There is controversy in the internet marketing world on whether or not you should always provide a meta description. Here’s a general rule. If you are targeting 1-3 high-volume, highly-targeted keyphrases on the page, then write one. If your page is a blog or product model catalog with many possible long keyphrases, then let the search engines scrape the best descriptive text off the page. As with many aspects of web copy, it’s always best to test for the best conversion rates.

Clarity Quest’s Outsource Marketing Page
Meta description: Clarity Quest provides outsource marketing services serving as the virtual marketing department for technology companies across North America.

e) Keywords to use - I like list primary and secondary keywords to use on the page just so I have them staring me in the face when I go to write the body copy for the page.

Clarity Quest’s Outsource Marketing Page
Keywords to use: outsource marketing, outsource marketing services, outsourcing marketing

Once you have your template, you'll be ready for our next blog post covering Step 4: Writing Headers and Body Copy with Anchor Text Links. Stay tuned.

Wow Visitors AND Search Engines with Your Web Copy - Part Two

2009-05-12T15:16:00.005-04:00

Last week we spoke about the importance of determining overall site goals before writing copy. This week we tackle finding the right keywords to use in your site pages.

Step 2. Compile a keyphrase list. We highly recommend a comprehensive keyphrase analysis which looks at monthly search volumes for each keyphrase related to your offering in addition to how difficult it will be to rank for these terms. Many internet firms including Clarity Quest offer a keyword analysis service.

However, if you cannot afford this step or you sell into a very niche field, you can create a keyphrase list yourself. Come up with a list of 25-50 seed phrases you think prospects would type into a search engine in order to find your products or services. Try to think like your buyers, not your product development team. Note the phrases your competitors are using on the headlines and title tags (first line in the browser) of their sites. You can also enter competitor website URLs into Google’s Keyword Tool and it will extract keywords used in that site.

Once you have a seed list, plug it into Google’s Keyword Tool and make sure the “include synonyms” box is checked. If you have different product platforms or vastly different services, it makes sense to break your seed list into sub-segments. If you select “exact match” under “Match Type” at the far right, Google’s Keyword Tool will return an estimate of average search volume during the previous month for the keyphrase. Note: these numbers are not exact, in fact, they are inflated. But give you a way to compare keyphrases to each other.

If your search terms have significant volume you can run them through Google Trends. You can also try Google’s search-based keyword tool. Based on your URLs, the Search-based Keyword Tool displays a list of relevant user queries that have occurred on Google.com (and on other Google search properties, such as google.co.uk) with some frequency over the past year.

In addition to keywords with a lot of volume be sure to include product names, brands and model numbers that you sell. These won’t have high volume in many cases, but they will be extremely relevant to a searcher.

To analyze the competition, look at the top 5 Google results for the keyphrase. A quick and dirty way to do this is to check the number and quality of backlinks the top sites have. To do this go to Yahoo! and type linkdomain:url.com -site:url.com in the search bar. For example, to see the number and listing of back links for "technologymarketing.com", type in:
linkdomain:technologymarketing.com -site:technologymarketing.com.

Once you have possible keyphrases narrow your list down to 1-2x the number of pages on your site based on count, relevance and competition.
For example, if you are writing copy for a 20-page site, you will be able to optimize for approximately 20-40 keyphrases. Separate your list into your primary keyphrases (top 5 heavy hitters) and secondary keyphrases. Using your sitemap for reference, create a table in which you pick at least a primary (and possibly a secondary) entry webpage for each keyphrase.

What's next? Part 3 of Wow Your Visitors and Search Engines with Your Web Copy will focus on creating a master web copy template.

Whose covering your topics?

2009-05-07T15:19:00.004-04:00

If you are looking to pitch journalists or publications for public relations efforts and need to know who has been covering your areas of interest, check out the Google News Timeline. Enter a search term into this Google Labs web application and the tool will display news, press releases and other data sources related to your phrase. If you click on the "Add more queries" option, you can select to view results from blogs or specific newspapers or magazines.

It's also a great way to check out what your competitors have been releasing in the news realm.

Wow Visitors AND Search Engines with Your Web Copy

2009-05-05T12:55:00.003-04:00

Writing website copy which appeals to both your website's visitors and search engine robots is part art, part science.

Over the next few weeks we we detail a step-by-step process for creating effective copy on your technology business website. This is not a guide on writing award-winning taglines and catchy phrases. It is, however, a step-by-step formula for writing copy that compels visitors to act while helping you get ranked highly in search engine result pages.

Step 1. Determine your overall goals for the site. Many B2B companies do not conduct online transactions, however, there should still be clear visitor goals for the site. Are you trying to educate customers or trying to get them to call your business development team? Are you attempting to increase the perceived value of your company or products? It’s crucial at this stage to determine if catchy copy or search engine rankings are more important to your overall goals, because at times during the copy writing process you might have to choose one over the other.

At this stage also determine which pages on the site you would like to be the top landing (entry) pages. Having clear positioning goals for the site will result in more effective copy.

Stay tuned for Step 2...Compiling the best keyphrase list.

Execs behind the digital marketing curve

2009-04-28T13:02:00.002-04:00

Only 13 percent of firms believe they have the in-house talent to implement effective digital marketing, according to a recent Heidrick & Struggles International report.

Marketing automation for technology companies

2009-04-20T09:30:00.003-04:00

Business development and sales teams at small-to-midsized technology companies are stretched thinner than ever, if they even exist at all. Marketing automation systems (also known as demand generation systems) can keep prospects warm by reaching out to them in all phases of the sales cycle. Web-hosted systems automate email campaigns and lead followup; some even allow creation of direct postal mail campaigns to support the email campaign. Systems also provide the ability to add landing pages to your website and include analytics data on clickthroughs, web site visits, repeat visits and more. Systems include a contact management feature or integrate with popular CRM applications such as Salesforce.

Higher end systems such as Eloqua or eTrigue start around $2,500 per month. Simpler systems, such as Infusionsoft are $199-$299 per month. Higher end systems work most effectively if you company has an in-house marketing department or can afford an outsource marketing services or a tech-savvy copywriter. Lower-end systems work well for small businesses with limited time, although, it will take up to 1 week to familiarize yourself with the application and upload your content. For small to midsized companies, I'm actually quite impressed with Infusionsoft's capabilities and features for the price. David Raab, an expert in direct marketing tools, wrote a detailed review of Infusionsoft if you want all the details.

Before jumping in with one of these systems, make sure you have content for at least 3 email campaigns and the related web landing pages. Otherwise, you will be paying the monthly fee before you have the content necessary to use the system effectively. You should also think through the process of buying through the eyes of your prospects. For example, if a prospect downloads a whitepaper on electronic medical records, should you send information on your upcoming EMR webinar or your latest case study?. It helps to sequentially map out how your customers go through the decision process and test your theories by actually asking them.

Your campaigns should contain valuable content such as technical whitepapers, case studies, new product announcements, webinar invitations and breaking news in your industry.

Microblogging for B2B Technology Companies

2009-04-15T12:32:00.003-04:00

Gartner added micro-blogging to its list of technologies that will transform business over the next two to five years, predicting that by 2011, business micro-blogging will be a standard feature of 80% of social software platforms. However, standard micro-blogging platforms, such as Twitter, don't make sense for technology and healthcare companies selling into niche markets.

Media Brains has launched "Business Chatter" which targets their niche directories such as electronic engineering, plastics, and manufacturing. You get one free post a month. However, for unlimited posts you have to pay $995 for a 12-month profile listing. So far, I don't see conversations happening on this platform, just blatant self-promotion. I think these platforms will have a tough time competing with niche discussion forms.

What do you think? Please post a comment if you know if any micro-blogging platforms that are effective for niche B2B marketing.

Lowly Rectangle Ads Outperform Skyscrapers, Leaderboards

2009-04-14T14:20:00.004-04:00

Internet marketing firm Lotame found that 300 x 250 "medium rectangle" online ads averaged 13 seconds of "viewing" exposure per user served vs. only 5.4 seconds for leaderboards and 1.9 seconds for skyscrapers. This result is liable to shake up advertising rates since leaderboards and skyscrapers command premium prices over rectangle ads. The study, however, did not look at clickthroughs and conversions which are the most important metrics.

Read the full article.

PRWeb vs. Marketwire

2009-04-07T13:05:00.000-04:00

In our popular Press Release Wire Service whitepaper, we recommended a PRWeb.com package with BusinessWire. PRWeb recently discontinued this package.

Over the past few weeks, I've gone back to using Marketwire with great success. Media pickup, online news service and search engine rankings were much better than PRWeb. I also noticed many small to midsized high-tech companies were using this wire service.

Media coverage is far superior to PRWeb and pickup from MSNBC and Marketwatch also show up on Google page 1 for key phrases in your release title. Their editors are also very good at catching even subtle typos.

The only drawback to Marketwire is you have to call their customer support if you need to make a change after posting. With PRWeb, it's a simple matter of making the change online and then resubmitting. However, that's the difference between a wire service and a distribution service. I've found Marketwire's customer support staff to be fast, efficient and helpful.

Cost savings hint: If your business only serves a local market, try Marketwire's state distribution service. Rates start at $145 and for less than $250 you can get a release with anchor text links of your key phrases. The excellent part from a search ranking perspective is sites such as MSNBC and Marketwatch usually picks up the cheaper one state releases.

Everything you need to do to rank well on Google

2009-04-06T12:51:00.003-04:00

Chris Garrett wrote a fantastic post that outlines all the ways you can increase the Google authority (and thus the ranking) of your website. I especially like the visual Mindmap at the bottom of the post.

Our Portfolio Piece created on Animoto

2009-03-30T16:18:00.002-04:00

The easiest way to make business videos...ever

2009-03-30T12:53:00.003-04:00

In our continued theme of "you too can make a video in under 1 hour", check out Animoto Business. Upload photos or graphics, choose a song from their library or yours and then Animoto creates a professionally-designed video that you can embed in your site, use on your blog, or share on popular social media sites. View sample videos on Animoto's case study page.

Once complete, you can share the video via web link or instantly upload to popular social media sites such as YouTube and Facebook. There's even a feature that allows you to download and burn DVD-quality videos. My favorite feature is a custom "call to action" button that can be embedded at the end of the video. You can encourage viewers to "visit your website" or "request a quote".

Business package pricing starts at a very reasonable $99 for 3 months, or $249 for 1 year.

Is your marketing leaky?

2009-03-25T09:11:00.007-04:00

Drip marketing comes from a marketing tenant that prospects need to see or read your message multiple times before doing business with you. In technology companies, 90% of salespeople give up on a lead after 3 contacts, yet 80% of deals are closed after the 7th(!) contact. Sales often moves on to greener pastures to follow hot leads, because they are easier to close.

Staying in constant communication with clients and prospects is a requirement to closing more business. Drip marketing is a direct marketing strategy that involves sending out customized communication pieces over a period of time to subsets of leads. The pieces can include whitepapers, letters, webinar invitations or event announcements.

Content is King
Before you launch a drip marketing campaign, it’s imperative to build a library of value-added, fresh & interesting content. One of our clients calls them “SOVs” or “something of value” – I love that term. These can include whitepapers, product reviews, industry trends, webinars, newsletters, or forums just as examples. Currently video is becoming one of the hottest SOVs. Google & Tech Target released a report last year showing 72% of IT buyers watch video as part of their decision-making process.

Get a Content Generation SYSTEM
Don’t have time to develop all the content yourself? Get others to write it for you! Partners and affiliates will often write blog posts or short articles in exchange for a back link to their website and co-promotion. Or outsource your writing – Clarity Quest has a staff of technical writers that ghost write on topics as varied as software development systems and medical devices. The key is to have a system that churns out content on a consistent basis – even when your internal teams do not have the time or energy.

OK, I have content. What’s Next?
After you have a library of content, you’ll need a reputable email service provider (ESP) and the ability to add content to your website in the very least. We currently switched to iContact as our ESP because their ability to deliver email past spam filters is very good.

However, to take full advantage of drip marketing, we recommend marketing automation/demand generation systems which will be covered in an April blog post and our April e-newsletter. If you not already on our e-news mailing list, sign up today on our blog page.

Get Custom Title Tags on your Blog

2009-03-18T11:18:00.004-04:00

If you use Blogger, you can optimize the search engine rankings of your blog posts by implementing a small Javascript application developed by Agawebs that uses the title of your post as the title tag of the post page.

Google up to 72% of US internet searches

2009-03-16T15:27:00.003-04:00

Online research company Hitwise reports Google accounted for 72.11% of all U.S. online searches conducted in February, an 8% increase over the same period last year.

Michigan-Based Optical Company Sees Benefits of Internet Marketing

2009-03-12T09:45:00.000-04:00

In December 2008, we launched a new website for optical company SVS Vision. As a result of our on-page internet marketing strategies, SVS now ranks on Google and Yahoo! page 1 for "optical centers" behind just JCPenney , Sears and D.O.C (now owned by PearleVision). As importantly, the SVS website is getting organic traffic from more than 1,100 key phrases such as prescription safety eyewear thanks to an extensive keyword analysis and implementation on the new site.

Thanks to Cathy Walker, SVS Vision's VP of Marketing for the following quote:

"Clarity Quest replaced our outdated website with one that is wonderful! Response has been greater than anticipated. We are hearing from our customers more than ever before and they are telling us that the look, feel and ease of use have helped them in making buying decisions. Everyone on the Clarity Quest team is a true pro and we look forward to a long-term relationship with them."

Internet Marketing Goes Local

2009-03-11T14:31:00.003-04:00

A study by comScore Networks and TMP Directional Marketing, found that local search grew 24 percent in 2007, while general Web search grew only 14 percent. Piper Jaffray notes that 30 percent of all queries conducted today contain a city, state, or ZIP code. According to Yahoo! Research, 88 percent of sales revenue generated from online advertising is derived from consumers who have conducted their research online, then made their purchase in a brick and mortar store.

So what does this mean for your business? Your internet marketing and corporate blogging strategy should include ways to include city names, counties and zipcodes in your site and blog copy.

Compedium Blogware goes as far as recommending you have a separate blog for each location you serve based on key phrases.

At Clarity Quest, we use this strategy as well. Although we serve clients throughout the U.S. and the world, we concentrate our search efforts on "Michigan marketing" based on the location of our headquarters. Next up: More location-based blog posts and individual web pages for our Seattle and upcoming Oregon offices.

Become a star on your website

2009-03-10T17:48:00.005-04:00

Visitors will stay on your web 50-70% longer if you incorporate video. Video is extremely effective for technology companies. Riverbed Technologies does a nice job of recording and post its "Chalk Talk" series. Below is my quick attempt at an under 2 minute video which took under 20 minutes to script and produce. Stay tuned for some more sophisticated videos from us both here on the Out of the Fog Blog and on in our Clarity Quest marketing resources library.

Please forgive the thumbnail Google came up with below. I was not asleep when I recorded the video!

Video changes everything

2009-03-04T15:15:00.003-05:00

Cisco's marketing chief Marilyn Mersereau was recently quoted in B2B Marketing..

"Video changes everything on the Web. People stay longer on our sites when video is involved. Also, instead of publishing a spec sheet about our products, our program managers publish a video of themselves talking about their product. People have short attention spans today. "

I could not agree more - it's nice to see a tech giant validate what we have been espousing for over a year.

If you try and get frustrated with video or audio quality, check out our Web Video Best Practices guide for tips on making your own videos.

Twitter Search as a Competitive Weapon

2009-03-03T21:01:00.004-05:00

Want to easily spy on competition, find partners, seek out resellers? Type a phrase into TwitterSearch and see whose tweeting on your topics.

Spy on your competition

2009-02-28T11:30:00.000-05:00

Ever wonder the keywords your competitors are targeted? Or how much they are paying for a click on a term Google Adwords? How about approximately how much they are spending each day on sponsored search.

Find the answers at KeywordSpy. Type in a keyword or phrase and the tool gives the top paid and organic competitors. Enter a domain, and it will give you the domain's approximate search budgets along with targeted key phrases.

It's invaluable information when scoping out competitors.

Product naming on your iPhone

2009-02-25T11:22:00.003-05:00

If your an iPhone user and often find yourself brainstorming product or company names, check out Nomina. Available on the iTunes store for $14.99, Nomina checks domain availability and searches the U.S. Patent & Trademark office for pending or registered trademarks with the same wording. It also will conduct a common law search using The Library of Congress, Google, Thomas Guide and more.

We can't wait to try it in our next branding brainstorm.

Web Video Best Practices

2009-02-24T21:22:00.002-05:00

Online video can truly differentiate your products and services by personalizing you and your company. Read our best web video best practices.

Best Time to Issue a Press Release

2009-02-19T11:15:00.004-05:00

Many of the lower cost press release distribution services are now allowing you to specify a distribution time. I'm often asked "what time of day should I issue a release"?

Unless you are trying to stem a crisis requiring an immediate release, I have found 7:30am-8:00am in your "target timezone" to be the most effective. Note your "target timezone" may be different than the location of your business. For example, if your technology business is in Dallas but you want to reach out to the San Francisco tech media, a 7:30am PST release would be advisable.

I would be interested what others have found to be most effective in terms of timing.

Clearingout the prairie

2009-02-17T16:30:00.001-05:00

Good USA Today article on which technology companies will survive the recession.

HootSuite Manages Twitter Accounts

2009-02-13T21:31:00.003-05:00

HootSuite, formerly BrightKit, is an multi-faceted Twitter management tool. I especially like the fact I can manage multiple Twitter accounts from one dashboard. It's great for agencies managing client accounts because you can add multiple editors and pre-schedule tweets. It's our latest awesome free marketing tool.

Clarity Quest Profiled on Kiva B2B

2009-02-04T21:12:00.002-05:00

We've given 17 loans to 3rd world entrepreneurs through Kiva.org. Kiva B2B recently profiled Clarity Quest. For more information on how you can give loans to businesses in developing countries, visit Kiva.