The Story of SEOmoz | SEOmoz. SEOmoz Story Introduction Duration: 1' 15'' Full English Text Transcription Rand Fishkin: This is the first time that I am giving this specific presentation. This is a story that I told many times in bars, restaurants, enotecas, but never on stage in a formal presentation - you are going to be the first to see it, and hopefully it will be valuable. What I want to do is tell the story about how we started SEOmoz, how it went from being nearly a disaster to a surprising success this year, in fact the last few months have been incredibly exciting for us. Some of the things we learned along the way, both from an entrepreneurship perspective - starting a company, scaling a startup - as well as in marketing capacity. I know there are a few of you here that are very interested in search, in SEO, in web marketing...
I put the presentation up on SlideShare, so if you like it you can download and share it. The Origins of the SEOmoz Company Duration: 5' 20" We were struggling. Duration: 4' 39" 11 takeaways from Econsultancy’s Digital Cream event. Yesterday I attended Econsultancy’s Digital Cream event, which we host annually, and which brings together around 300 client-side e-commerce brains together for a day of intense knowledge sharing. The event format is based on roundtables, which are a core part of our staple diet. We’ve been running roundtables since I joined Econsultancy back in 2003, and they inform much of the best practice insight that underpins our research.
They are incredibly helpful. Digital Cream is essentially roundtables on steroids… there are more than 20 of them, in one day. I have a few takeaways from the event that I’d like to share. Before we begin I should probably mention a couple of similar events, which are are free to attend for client-side folks. The difference between user experience and customer experience I sat in on a customer experience roundtable, moderated by Dr Mike Baxter, author of some of Econsultancy’s best customer experience guides (such as this gem).
Goals are key Think about Ryanair. Social Media Managing Info. The Future of Social Search. The Future of Search Series is supported by SES New York Conference & Expo, the search and social marketing conference helping brands, agencies, and professionals connect, share and learn what’s next for the interactive industry. A "social search" is one that ties a searcher's social graph to his search queries. With social search, each searcher sees unique results that are shaped by the interests of his social network friends. Google, not the company to often fudge with the appearance or function of its search results, turned on its version of social search more than a year ago. It has since gone on to more prominently feature social search results and blend them in with regular results. One should not make light of these changes; they point to the company's recognition that the average web user, who now spends more time on Facebook, may be not-so-quietly demanding a new form of search.
In fact, Facebook is more than a social network for many these days. Can social media really overtake search? 2011 has been heralded as ‘the year of social media’. But can it really offer companies as solid a marketing investment as search? It is, of course, far too late to suggest that social media is going to be ‘the next big thing’. Social media is very big and very much ‘the thing’ already. But without doubt, the ante has been upped of late, and even the men in suits are taking note. Investment bank JPMorgan recently announced the launch of a new fund to invest in online and digital media companies. According to reports, it plans to raise up to $750 million through the initiative. This follows Facebook’s recent valuation at $65 billion, while ‘deal of the day’ site Groupon managed to raise $950 million in the financial markets. But in a tough economic climate, where marketing departments are under more pressure than ever to deliver a return on investment for their online activities, can the money men’s hype around social media’s ‘value’ really translate into measurable marketing returns?
Leeds Digital Festival 2011. Understand your online social capital. Build Your Social Media Embassies. I came across a great analogy over at Zen Habits, and it's got me rethinking how I view social media: If my personal website is my digital home, then my social networking profiles on Facebook and Twitter, etc. are my embassies. Embassies exist to maintain relationships with "distant lands". Although the post is really about gaining focus and managing your digital life, I think the idea of social media profiles as embassies in distant lands is fantastic, and I'm going to run with it.
My apologies to the author (Tyler Tervooren), who probably didn't intend anything I'm about to say. Here are 6 ways to build up your social media embassies without an international incident… 1. Declare Independence Before you can really have an embassy, you need to be a sovereign nation. The impact of social media is growing, no doubt, but that doesn't mean you should surrender your entire presence to someone else's site. 2. Your embassy is, first and foremost, your face to the world. 3. 4. 5. 6. Facebook floats chat-to-ad test - m.NYPOST.com.
Facebook is testing a new program capable of serving up ads as fast as members can post a status update. The social networking giant’s initiative, currently being tested on 1 percent of its users, delivers promotions based on real-time conversations. For instance, if someone posts, “Thinking of pizza for dinner,” a company such as Domino’s could ship a Web ad to that person in an instant. The advertising test, which was reported in Ad Age, opens a brave new world of real-time advertising, as well as raising the usual privacy concerns when a Web company mines personal data for commercial advantage.
“It’s an opportunity for advertisers to get in the conversation, and to have that timing advantage is potentially huge,” said Paul Verna, a senior analyst with eMarketer. “But in order for it to happen, Facebook has to pay close attention to not overstepping that balance or risk freaking people out, invading privacy and going over that line.” Dales Tourist Information - Explore & Discover the Dales. The Dales on ITV1 The Dales on ITV1 was a smash hit as it explored the intricacies of Dales life.
The Dales gave viewers a taste of some of Yorkshire's most treasured attractions. The 2nd Series will be airing in early 2012. Skipton As the gateway to the magnificent Yorkshire Dales, people travel the length and breadth of the country to visit this charming market town. Ripon This unspoilt cathedral city is a North Yorkshire gem, balancing a rich cultural heritage with exciting contemporary living. Grassington With its bustling cobbled market square, fringed by shops offering local foods, arts and crafts and clothing, Grassington is an attracitve, busy town, set against the backdrop of the Yorkshire Dales .
Middleham Nestled between two rivers, the magnificent castle of Middleham has the largest castle keep in the North of England and a royal heritage that once earned it the title of the 'Windsor of the North'. Reeth Richmond Settle Leyburn Masham Easby Abbey (EH) Bolton Abbey Bolton Castle Caves/Caverns. Improving social media monitoring… As Social Media Monitoring travels through the technology hype cycle it’s clear that many early adopters are experiencing disappointing results. Having heard the stories of start-up businesses like Threadless or GiffGaff harnessing social insight to create real, tangible value (see my post on GiffGaff – a case study of customers in control), many large organizations are often disappointed at the results they are getting from SMM. If you find yourself in the “trough of disillusionment, below are some of the common pitfalls along with some suggestions to improve results and drive value from your investment.
A common complaint about SMM is accuracy. Many SMM tools do not have access to the full Twitter fire hose and so only get a fraction of the full Twitter feed. Most tools also struggle to automate the classification of content (e.g. “positive, negative, neutral, mixed”) – accuracy rates can be as low as 20-30%. Finally, make sure you turn insight into action. Bit.ly | Basic | a simple URL shortener. SMWF for iPhone, iPod touch and iPad on the iTunes App Store. Leeds Digital Festival to crowdsource 2011 identity.
The Rules of Social Media Engagement Brian Solis. InShare1,645 A study published in 2010 surfaced a startling statistic, “75 percent of employers say their business has no formal policy instructing employees on the appropriate use of social networking sites on the job.” The report, “Employer Perspectives on Social Networking,” compiled data from 34,000 businesses in 35 countries. Does your organization have a formal policy regarding employee use of social media? Perhaps better asked, does your organization offer training, guidelines, and insights to help employees excel in new media on behalf of your business? In the same study, 63% of employers that employed social networking policies reported that those policies improved productivity. More than a third also stated that social media policies helped protect intellectual property.
Social Media represents the democratization of information and the equalization of influence. Training Day The careful selection of capable officials combined with coaching is only the start. When writing Engage! Google launches rival to Facebook Like. Google has launched a new social button, similar to Facebook’s “like”, for users to recommend its search results to their friends. The new button, dubbed “+1”, will appear next to search results and advertisements on Google.
A +1 click can be shared with users’ friends on their Google Account and any links recommended by friends will appear higher in search results. The data from clicks will also be added anonymously to public data, which Google will use - among other signals - to calculate pages’ relevance and ranking on search results. In a blog post, Google says advertisers will not have to adjust their Adwords strategy because the way it calculates its quality score will not change.
The +1 button will launch across English searches on Google.com but it will roll out across more languages in the future. Google says it will also expand the use of +1 for websites to integrate the button on their own pages as well as in search results. Mixtent | Where do you stand in your industry? How Google’s Panda / Farmer Algorithm Could Affect Email Marketing. Google’s Panda / Farmer algorithm modification did more to shake up the established world of SERPs than any other update since the Big G was a junior-sized ankle biter cowering in the shadow of AltaVista. That may be no news to any SEO specialist, but its possibly unforeseen impact on email marketing could change that medium as profoundly as the publishing platforms have been hit. Most of the primary article publishers got slammed hard All of the primary blogging and article publishing platforms have been tagged with the discriminatory and derogatory title of “content farm” whether they deserve it or not.
Ezine Articles and Suite 101 lost over half of their visibility, with Wisegeek getting devastated at a 93% drop. The percentage of loss as calculated by Sistrix placed some prominent sites such as Associated Content, Business.com, and Articles Base at over 90% of traffic which simply evaporated overnight. Manual teams feed data to the engineers & spam reports are weighted at 4x. Bienvenue sur Facebook | Facebook. Last.fm: Deeper recommendation features, and now a pause button! - TNW Apps.
It’s no easy task being in the shoes of Last.fm right now. The service has been around as a relatively free source for curated music for quite some time, and recently shifted to a paywall format for its mobile radio product.While the move has caused some to wonder exactly what Last.fm is up to, a recent interview that I had with the VP of Product for the service cleared up a lot of questions. I’m spending some time this week with the updated Android and iOS players for Last.fm, and that’s going to formulate much of what I talk about in the interview piece this weekend. For now, you have your chance to use the updated apps, as well. The obvious change is that Last.fm now has a pause feature and it’s even included on the mobile apps. It might seem like a small thing, but it’s part of a much larger picture, based on what I’ve been told.
The algorithm under which Last.fm’s recommendations work is truly amazing, in my experience. Claire Hunter-Smith at Social Media World Forum. 15 signs it's time to quit Facebook. Samfurness. Twitter Automation Should you do it? ‘Regionalism’ row sparked by public land sale. THE Government is facing accusations of launching a “fire sale” of development agency Yorkshire Forward’s land and buildings after confirming £10m worth of property is being put up for sale – while giving London a “free gift” worth millions of pounds.
Shadow Business Minister Gordon Marsden accused the Government of treating Yorkshire and the other English regions “outrageously” after it was confirmed 15 sites owned by Yorkshire Forward can now be sold off in preparation for the agency’s closure next year. The sites are understood to be valued at just under £10m and include a plot at the Advanced Manufacturing Park in Waverley, Island Wharf and the former ABP site adjacent to it on Hull’s Humber Quays, the old National Tyres site in Bradford, the former Bristol Street Motors in Leeds, Colburn Business Park in North Yorkshire and land at Rockingham, by Junction 36 of the M1, Last night, it emerged Ministers have approved the first round of sales. A Critical Analysis Of The Literal Web Crowd: The Tools You Need To Survive In A Humorous World.
We’ve been whining about the “literal web” problem for years now. Someone says something funny, albeit in an ironic or sarcastic way. A percentage of the masses think the joke is great. Another percentage get it but don’t think it’s funny. The rest take the statements absolutely literally and go nuts. Hilarity ensues. If you come across a statement or a conversation that seems odd at first, like really dumb things are being talked about like they’re brilliant ideas, your first reaction will be to write something like “I can’t believe you would actually think that,…” with the “…” usually containing a derogatory term like douche, douchebag, asshole, etc. Now if you do that and check back on your comment later you may see subsequent commenters saying something like “woosh.” Sarcasm, irony and other lovely verbal gymnastical tools and trick are what make our language beautiful.
It’s important that more people come to understand, and even appreciate, these situations when they come up. Ok. Google Social Search Update - Web Analytics World Blog. Stars: Spotlight on Brian Solis. Gowalla founder Josh Williams talks to Jemima Kiss | Technology. Now for the more social side of social media… « samfurness. How is Facebook advertising performing against search? Newsnight - Will social media tech bubble lead to a dot com crash? Google launches Plus One to rival Facebook's Like button | Media.