OUR FREAKY FRIDAY: WEIRD OF THE DAY

FreakyFriday: Weird of the Day

A Twitter Feed for all Your Google Searches

by: iCopywriter Senior Editor, Heather Price-Wright

In this age of tech giants like Google and Facebook gobbling up our personal information like it was literal cookies, one app is encouraging that, rather than fight it, we actively participate in the over-sharing of our entire lives.

According to msnbc.com’s Technolog blog, the app, called OverShareMe, can be added to users’ Google Chrome browser as an extension. It then tracks users’ every Google search and broadcasts those search terms to Twitter, via the handle @PlzOverShareMe.

Luckily (or unluckily, depending on how much privacy you actually want to maintain), your searches aren’t announced via your own personal Twitter feed. Instead, when you install the Chrome extension, you choose a personal hashtag, which appears with your search terms on the app’s feed. For example, if we chose the tag #iCopywriter and searched for, say, “Why do people have two nostrils?” (I myself have, embarrassingly enough, Googled that exact phrase), the app’s Twitter handle would read:

@PlzOverShareMe: #iCopywriter Why do people have two nostrils?

One of the most interesting aspects of following the app’s Twitter feed is watching people refine their search terms or jump from search to search, and trying to imagine their thought processes while doing so. In the last few hours, for example, a user with the hashtag #prettyprettyprincess searched for “dr pepper 10 manhattan” and then, presumably because the results weren’t specific enough, “dr pepper 10 manhattan where to buy.” It seems this app, meant to be a cheeky addendum to Google, might actually give the search giant an extremely useful look into people’s search behavior and how they refine and change search terms to find exactly what they want.

The overall point of the app isn’t clear to us; is it a social experiment? A commentary on the culture of data mining and sharing the minutest, most banal details of our daily lives in which we exist? What is it trying to say about searches, about sharing, about privacy in modern life?

We were going to think about those big questions, but we got sidetracked Googling, and then tweeting that we were Googling, “What should I eat for lunch?”

Have you checked out iCopywriter.com lately?

Small Businesses May Not Be Using Best Practices When it Comes to Social Media - The Numbers Don’t Lie

by iCopywriter

So, you own a small business. And unless your business is housed under a rock, you’ve almost certainly heard the buzz about social media, and the ways in which it can help you do everything from reaching consumers on a personal level to getting news out in a timely manner. Maybe you even use social media - more and more small businesses are getting on the bandwagon.

Unfortunately, according to a new infographic from Intuit, even those small businesses that are using social media to connect with customers may be doing so wrong.

The main issues seem to be that such businesses, while their ideas about social media are in the right place, aren’t spending enough time, money or personnel resources on launching and maintaining strong social networking campaigns. And that, according to the infographic, may be translating to a less effective overall strategy.

Need some stats on small businesses and social media? We broke down the infographic for you here:

·      26 percent employ someone - whether full time, part time or on a consulting basis - to handle their social media marketing

·      42 percent spend no money on their social networking campaigns

·      17 percent spend $100 or less

·      40 percent don’t always respond to friends’ and fans’ comments on the site(s) they use

·      16 percent don’t respond to comments at all

The top reason given for not responding to comments? Not having the time. So it seems that the majority of businesses that don’t have someone handling their social media campaign would do well to outsource to a consultant or marketing company with the time and know-how to interact with customers on all social media platforms.

Can you imagine spending just $100 on a print, TV or other, more “traditional” ad campaign? Not in a million years. But think about it - social media is a much more effective method of reaching individual consumers and interacting with them on an incredibly close, real-time basis - something other marketing methods have never managed to truly accomplish - yet most businesses are spending only a tiny fraction of their overall budgets on these campaigns.

The lessons here are simple: Social media is here to stay, and is a great way for businesses to reach their customers with an entirely new kind of immediacy. But businesses simply can’t go it alone. For a truly effective social media marketing push, it makes sense to spend a few extra dollars and find a company that will help you perfect your social networking presence. The extra resources are almost sure to pay for themselves, and more, when it comes to reaching out to the people who matter most - the customers.

Have you checked out iCopywriter.com lately?

Breaking Down The Panda Update - Why You Shouldn't Fret, & How iCopywriter Can Help

by: iCopywriter

You’ve probably heard by now. Google’s latest Panda Update took place on Tuesday, February 27.

Not to worry, our professional writing and editing team is hard at work helping clients make the necessary changes to stay fresh. The Panda 3.3 launch refreshes all data in Google’s Panda results ranking algorithm that was released in February of last year. With the latest updates to this system, it’s important for online businesses to bring their content up to date, which is exactly what we are doing for our clients.  

What Does this Mean?

Danny DeMichele, Managing Partner at Incubate.com - and an iCopywriter client - breaks it down for us: 

         While it’s not completely clear the specifics of the update (yet), it is going to be based around     
         how they evaluate links. My suspicion is that it’s going to be a filter that will take the   
         emphasis off the use of keyword-rich hyperlinks, and more around the context of the article
         the link resides in. This makes unique and creative content that much more crucial.

How Does iCopywriter Fit in Here?

Sites without fresh content are left behind the curve. It's true...many sites have suffered as a result of Panda, while others, those that are constantly adding fresh, relevant content, are doing better than ever in terms of Google’s search engine rankings. 

Our team provides clients with high-quality content to ensure search engine prominence during Panda data refreshes. Clients who have been regularly updating their sites with the content iCopywriter creates have been able to maintain or even raise their search engine rankings throughout these data refreshes. 

The bad (?) news: Panda updates are here to stay. The good (!) news: Websites still have an opportunity to turn things around by regularly uploading relevant content [insert shameless self promotion]. We can help.

Have you checked out iCopywriter.com lately?

Clear Your Google Browsing History Before the New Privacy Policy Takes Effect

by: iCopywriter

In just three days, Google’s new privacy policy will take effect. Basically, what that means is that information gleaned from any part of a person’s Google use, or the use of the company’s many apps and services (from YouTube to gMail and gCal to the basic search engine) will be compiled to create a spookily cohesive Google user profile. This profile will be used to generate search suggestions (like knowing whether you mean lacrosse, the sport played with nets on the ends of sticks, or LaCrosse, the Buick car) as well as generate Google’s increasingly eerie targeted ads.

Unsurprisingly, a lot of people are less than pleased with these changes, which are seen by many consumer and privacy protection groups as vastly breaching Google users’ rights to privacy, especially as there’s no choice to opt out. And if you think about it, as Tech Daily News notes, your searches will tell Google a lot about you.

Ever searched for information about a medication you or a loved one is taking? Now, Google will be able to add that fact to its vast cache of data on your private life. Ever entered your age, gender, date of birth, country of origin or ethnicity on a website? That, too, can be collected and used to target ads to you. Where you live, where you travel, what you like to see and do and eat and wear, not to mention even more sensitive information, like facts about your (ear muffs, kiddos) sex life - all fair game under this new umbrella privacy policy. It’s enough to make a person feel positively icky.

So if you, like us, are clamoring to clear your Google browsing history, here’s how, according to Tech Daily News:

1.     Sign into your Google account.

2.     Under your name in the upper right corner, you’ll find a dropdown menu. Click “account settings,” which will take you to your accounts overview page.

3.     Scroll down to the section called “Services.”  You should have the option to “View, enable, or disable web history.” Go to the “Web History” section and click the link at the top of the page that says, “Remove all Web History.” At this point, your web history will remain turned off until you manually turn it back on.

By performing these steps, you’ll stop Google from linking information from your searches and the sites you’ve visited with more personal information from your Google accounts. While it’s not a perfect fix for what many see as an overreach on Google’s part, it’s a great first step in protecting your online privacy.

Have you checked out iCopywriter.com lately?

Tumblr May Block Self-Harm and “Thinspiration” Promotion

by: iCopywriter

How much say should a social network have in what its users are allowed to post, discuss and promote? It’s a question social giants like Facebook and Twitter have been grappling with for a while now, and spans issues from massive social upheaval in places like Egypt to violent words or images used in politically-oriented Facebook groups.

Relative newcomer Tumblr is tackling this issue head-on with a new policy it plans to implement in the coming weeks. The policy deals with Tumblr blogs that promote any kind of self-harm, from eating disorders to suicide attempts. Tumblr released a statement on its staff blog yesterday calling this sort of promotional material “just wrong,” and asking users what they think of the proposed policy, which would ban people from posting any text or images that urge users to “cut or mutilate themselves; embrace anorexia, bulimia, or other eating disorders; or commit suicide.”

Tumblr also plans to respond to certain search terms and keywords, especially those related to so-called “thinspiration” (material, usually images, that people use to help them become or stay anorexic or bulimic), with language encouraging users to seek the help of a resource agency for issues such as eating disorders or depression.

The reaction to these policy proposals from Tumblr users has been mixed. Understandably, many wonder who will decide what constitutes “promoting” certain behaviors, as opposed to just discussing them in an open way, and what criteria will be used. Others worry that the move could stifle the discussion of important and relevant issues like suicide and eating disorders in a space that’s meant to be safe and conducive to sharing. However, many people see this as a brave move on Tumblr’s part, and an opportunity for the social network to do some genuine good in the lives of its most troubled users.

What do you think? Is Tumblr overstepping its boundaries here? Or does it have the right and/or responsibility to block such content from its site? We'd love to hear from you!

Have you checked out iCopywriter.com lately?

Are You Pinterested?

by: iCopywriter Senior Editor, Heather Price-Wright

In a recent piece for the WashingtonPost, columnist Petula Dvorak conjures up a sensation with which many people are no doubt becoming familiar:

She describes attempting to log onto new social media darling Pinterest simply for research purposes, only to become lost in what she describes as “the site’s churning cycle of interest, hope, inspiration, jealousy, desperation, despair and depression.”

She’s not the only one - and don’t worry, neither are you. According to her column, Pinterest saw a staggering 11 million unique visitors last month alone. And its path to such viral success has been positively meteoric: Dvorak writes that Pinterest may have hit 10 million users faster than any other social media site.

However, in her column, Dvorak also referred to the site, which is basically a virtual pin board for photos and inspiration for everything from recipes to home projects to dream vacations, as “digital crack for women.” Digital crack? Hmmm…

Some online commenters and fellow columnists, including the Washington Post’s own Katie Rogers, wondered at that descriptor, and so did we. All 11 million visitors in January couldn’t possibly be women looking for wedding dress ideas, or “compiling a virtual hope chest,” could they?

So we ask: Are you using Pinterest? And if so, what for? Is it, as Dvorak claims, a space where mostly women share ideas for mostly very stereotypically feminine interests, like crafting and nuptial planning? Or is it more diverse than that? What are you pinterested in?

Have you checked out iCopywriter.com lately?

Why Your Search Engine Marketing Push Needs More than Adwords

by: iCopywriter

Last week, seomoz.org’s Daily SEO blog contributor Rand Fishkin ran some fairly intensive tests and found that Google AdWords may leave something to be desired when it comes to keyword research.

Without going into the nitty-gritty details of Fishkin’s extensive foray into the intricacies of AdWords, the findings were a bit startling:  

AdWords tends to miss high-volume key phrases related to a particular word or phrase. 

For example, in Fishkin’s test, AdWords came up with “how to increase blog traffic” and “increase traffic to blog,” but not “how to get traffic to your blog” or “how to increase traffic to your blog” from the suggested phrase “blog traffic.” Even more startling is the fact that the latter two phrases are designated as highly competitive on AdWords.

Is your head starting to spin? If so, you’re probably not alone. While AdWords is a fine tool, it’s incredibly difficult to deploy effectively unless you know its ins and outs, and are familiar with tricks like the one Fishkin uncovered. But if you’re using AdWords, it’s probably because you own or operate a business, and in that case, you have better things to do.

Findings like these about Google AdWords point out the necessity of hiring a competent SEO research and content writing team to deploy your search engine marketing strategy. After all, you don’t have time to fiddle with AdWords all day, or to wait around to pounce on sought-after keywords or phrases. Your time is better spent making sure those customers who do find your business get the goods and/or services they’re looking for.

Instead, you need a team of SEO experts to do the tinkering, the figuring and the pouncing for you. And on top of that, you need the best content team out there (hey, we know someone...) to use the findings culled by your SEO experts in the way it was meant to be used: to write content.

So don’t waste your or your company’s precious time and resources trying to figure out AdWords or create your own content based on dense, confusing analytics. Remember: SEO experts and content writers are worth our weight in gold when it comes to creating a search engine marketing and content strategy that actually converts.

If you’re not already working with a great firm, let us know...we work with some fantastic teams (like the one at LSF Interactive) and would love to share them with you. We promise, that AdWords headache will go away faster than you can spell S-E-O.

Have you checked out iCopywriter.com lately?

Demand Media Posts 4th Quarter Losses - Could Panda Be the Culprit???

by: iCopywriter Senior Editor, Heather Price-Wright

One company’s notable losses in the most recent fiscal quarter seem to indicate just how much Google’s Panda algorithm update is changing the content-creation and SEO landscape.

According to a Los Angeles Times report, Demand Media Inc., owner of sites like eHow, Cracked.com and Livestrong, posted losses of $6.4 million in the fourth quarter. That comes just over a year after a whopping $1 billion initial public offering and much positive Wall Street buzz. The company lost a total of $18.5 million in fiscal year 2011. Ouch.

Industry insiders speculate that Demand Media, whose business model is sometimes pejoratively referred to as “content farming,” suffered a great deal when Google’s newest algorithm update took effect. The Panda update emphasizes content quality and freshness, rather than simple keyword use - you've heard us say it before: the days of keyword "stuffing" are O.V.E.R.

As Search Engine Land’s Greg Sterling put it in the Los Angeles Times article, “Google felt that these content farms diluted the quality of its search results. So they tried to address that.”

And it seems to be working, if the Demand Media losses are any indication. While it might not be great news for that particular company, or those like it, the news reveals that Google is taking seriously its efforts to reward better, more relevant and more recent content in its search results. And as far as we’re concerned, that’s a good thing, both for Google users and for businesses hoping to improve their search rankings.

As the Panda algorithm and its effects on the Internet landscape are proving, content really is king these days. Many people believed that so-called content farms, while they were prolific, were producing just plain bad content - whether stale, irrelevant to the actual search or just plain poorly written. But that won’t cut it anymore.

Instead, it looks like businesses looking for better Google rankings in the new, Panda-ified space will need to opt for content creation that focuses on high-quality writing, relevance to top search terms and freshness. Lucky for you, you have us!

Have you checked out iCopywriter.com lately?

Mobile Searches Aid in Romance on V-Day

by: iCopywriter

This one goes out to all you lovers out there.

According to data released by Google today, 62 percent of searches for popular chain restaurants performed on Valentine’s Day were from a mobile device.

That means two things: For one, it sounds like a lot of you were doing some serious procrastination, and maybe even checking with your restaurant of choice on your way to the restaurant. To that we say, tsk tsk, and no wonder you had to wait an hour and 45 minutes for a table.

But that’s very, very good news for businesses that have put their dollars toward developing their mobile sites and advertising. Consumers are moving more and more toward performing many of their basic Web searches on their smart phones, tablets or other mobile devices. According to Google, searches for the chain restaurants grew, between February 7 and February 14, 2012:

·      359% on mobile devices

·      142% on desktop computers, and

·      135% on tablets

That’s a big leap for mobile devices, especially compared to the more modest growth for the other two categories. Restaurants who invested in strong mobile landing pages and unique mobile content likely saw the bulk of that boost in traffic.

Conversely, there’s a lesson to be learned here for businesses that haven’t jumped on the mobile bandwagon: There’s not much of a choice, at this point. Consumers are going to try and find your business on the go, and if they can’t access your site and learn about what you have to offer via their smart phones, then you’re going to lose their business.

Moreover, it won’t work to simply move the site you already have to a mobile platform. We’ve all tried to navigate sites built for a desktop via our phones. The text is too small, the menus are impossible to find and capabilities like searching are basically unusable. Users will leave a mobile site that doesn’t work well just as quickly (if not faster) as they’ll leave a buggy, slow-loading traditional website.

Instead, these Valentine’s Day stats reveal that businesses who haven’t already made the effort are going to need to develop highly usable, unique mobile landing pages for their companies, whether they sell pasta or packing tape, fine wine or furniture. These days, you simply can’t afford not to have a mobile site, complete with unique, high-qualityon-page content and a user-friendly design.

Have you checked out iCopywriter.com lately?

LinkLove’s 2012 Conferences are Coming Up!

by: iCopywriter

Are you nuts about link building? An SEO gear head, as it were?

If so, consider attending - or sending a company delegate to - one of this year’s Distilled LinkLove 2012 conferences. You can choose to attend the March 29 event in London or the April 2 event in Boston; either way, you’re sure to learn tons of new, highly implementable tools and tactics of link building.

A few topics sure to be covered this year:

·      Performing effective outreach

·      Link building and social media

·      Advanced link profile analysis

·      Creating high-quality content to be linked

·      And many more

In addition, the conference will feature speakers from the top of the link-building field. Distilled prides itself on choosing engaging, expert speakers, and working closely with those speakers to ensure their presentations are both advanced and highly relevant to their audiences. Speakers are each given 45 minutes all to themselves, so you can be sure to gain a deep understanding of the material being covered.

The information presented at this year’s LinkLove conferences is sure to be relevant and actionable for you or your clients. Distilled has gotten a great deal of feedback from previous attendees attesting to the worth of the material covered at previous conferences; several have implemented strategies learned at these conferences that have revolutionized their businesses.

So if you love links, now’s the time to book your conference registration — and your trip to Boston or London. Bon voyage!

Have you checked out iCopywriter.com lately?

Tweet Leads to Deportation for Two British Travelers

by: iCopywriter Senior Editor, Heather Price-Wright

Here’s a lesson from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security: Watch what you tweet.

British 20-somethings Leigh Van Bryan and Emily Banting were looking forward to their trip to Los Angeles. But when they arrived at Los Angeles International Airport, they were greeted not by palm trees and movie star sightings, but by Homeland Security officials, who detained the two in separate holding cells for 12 hours, according to the Daily Mail. Van Bryan was apparently held with Mexican drug dealers, and described the experiences as “really scary.”

Their offense? Two tweets.

Three weeks before the trip, Van Bryan tweeted “3 weeks today, we’re totally in LA pissing people off on Hollywood Blvd and diggin’ Marilyn Monroe up!” Later, he tweeted, “free this week for a quick gossip/prep before I go destroy America? x.”

Van Bryan claims the “diggin’ up Marilyn Monroe” phrase comes from an episode of “Family Guy,” and that “destroy” is slang for partying hard and getting drunk (a little like “wrecked” might be used on this side of the pond).

Homeland Security didn’t seem to think those explanations were adequate; they flagged the tweets and, after holding, questioning and searching the two (they even looked for spades and shovels, ostensibly to be used for disinterring Marilyn Monroe) put them back on a plane home. Van Bryan says one agent told him, “You really f***ed up with that tweet, boy.”

The incident raised the hackles of privacy and free speech advocates, who wondered whether Homeland Security should have the right to undertake such extreme actions on the basis of nothing but statements made on social media.

On the other hand, some claim that Twitter and similar sites are public, and that people should understand that statements they make on such sites might be subject to scrutiny, especially if they could be perceived as threatening or violent.

It’s a tough debate, and one that is sure to rage on as social media becomes a larger and larger part of public life.

What do you think? Does the government have the right to watch what we post and take action, or are tweets, status updates, check-ins and the like protected as free speech? Did Homeland Security overreact, or do its job to keep the country safe?

Have you checked out iCopywriter.com lately?