Compendium Blogware - Indium Corporation - Taking Blogging to the Next Level

I have two clients that are using the Compendium Blogware and they are very happy with it. You should definitely check out this product!

Compendium Blogware - Indium Corporation - Taking Blogging to the Next Level

We're a Favorite Place on Google

So there was a little surprise in my mailbox today - a letter from Google maps telling me that Tork Marketing is now a favorite place on Google. They even sent me a great window decal to post for my clients.

"If you've seen a decal that says "We're a Favorite Place on Google" on a window near you, you may wonder how they got it...Google identifies the most popular local businesses based on how many Google users looked for more information about a business, looked for driving directions to the business, and more." says

5 reasons your press page should lose the PDFs | Blog | Econsultancy

In study after study, 100 percent of journalists - 100 percent - say they use the web to research stories. And something like 80-90 percent of journos writing about businesses visit company websites to dig for information. While there (according to my own approximate calculations), about half are stopped dead in their tracks because companies still insist in making press releases and financial information available only as PDF downloads.

For me, and a plethora of fellow-journalist Facebook friends who thumbed-up a whinge I posted on this topic yesterday, the arguments against PDF press releases are a no-brainer. Like, it's 2010. Web 2.0 has been around for a while (basic HTML even longer). Yet a few befuddled marketers asked what all the fuss is about.

So herewith, five reasons why those PDFs have got to go.

5 reasons your press page should lose the PDFs | Blog | Econsultancy

The Roles of Facebook and Twitter in Social Media Marketing | Brian Solis

If you think that you're ready to take on Twitter and Facebook for your company, please read these tips first. Social media may seem easy but it can be confusing and overwhelming. Make sure you draw out a plan first. Take it one step at a time - don't try to rush and do everything at once. If you're ready to step up to Twitter and Facebook but you want some help, give Tork Marketing a call. We can help you set up your social media marketing plan and show you how to run it in-house.

The Roles of Facebook and Twitter in Social Media Marketing | Brian Solis

Blogger FTP Info

So this change will be affecting our blog and some of our clients but we're looking forward to it. If your company uses the Blogger FTP path and need help when it comes to the switch, please contact Tork Marketing.

Blogger FTP Info

Run On-Page SEO and Design Diagnostics with SEJ Tools | Search Engine Journal

Remember that you can show up on the first page of Google for all of your important keywords, but yet - NEVER convert that into sales. If you can't figure out why, perhaps you need to take a serious, impartial review of your website design. Remember what you do for a living - are you a professional designer? Do you design websites for a living? No, chances are that you run your company and you do it very well. So why not bring in an Internet marketing company with a professional designer and let them do what they do best. Does it really matter if YOU don't like your website - as long as your website visitors are converting into sales?

If it doesn't matter as long as the website is converting, then contact Tork Marketing for a free analysis of your current search engine rankings and the traffic possibilities for your keywords.

Run On-Page SEO and Design Diagnostics with SEJ Tools | Search Engine Journal

Top Five Questions to Ask When Hiring an SEO Company

1. Ask for an example of a problem that a previous client had (as it relates to SEO), how they came up with a solution(s) to try, how they tested the results and what action items came out of the test.
2. Ask how much time they spend online in chatrooms and forums (as they relate to SEO). Ask them their top three SEO websites for keeping up on new trends and posting problems.
3. Ask about their experience with websites that are lead generators and experience with websites that are brand management. Each is very specific and needs different types of SEO. A good SEO company/consultant will know the difference and be able to articulate the different types of SEO for each.
4. Ask what they can do besides SEO. They need to understand the big picture. They need to understand development, CSS, PPC, web analytics and social media. They don't need to be experts in everything but they definitely need to understand the big picture.
5. Ask how often they attend industry conferences or seminars. Ask if they contribute to any industry publications. Ask about their turnover rate. Ask about the training that their employees receive.
5a. Ask them what their strategy would be for your website. This should prove a couple of things. Number one - did they take the time to learn anything about you? Number two - do they sound excited talking about their strategy? Number three - Are they willing to share that information or do they want to be paid for it?

We do sign certain clients on a "pay for performance" model. Normally, we charge a standard rate of "xx" per hour. For certain clients, we will drop those rates by 1/3, then as we get each of your keywords on to the first page of Google, our rate goes up and is retroactive. Then for each of the keywords we get into the top five on Google, our rate goes up again moving forward. This is a strong motivator for my team to perform better than they ever have because every success for the client is a success for them.

The reason I say that we sign certain clients is because of the reasons mentioned here. We have to have complete control. We don't run every single thing we do past you for approval. You have to trust that we have your best interests in mind and at heart. We become a part of your company and a part of your team. We control everything from where your website is hosted to all website development to all paid, natural and social media marketing. That doesn't mean that we have to do it all for you. You may have certain capabilities in-house that would make more sense to use but we direct the project.

We start each of our SEO projects with a task list of "foundation" items - such as unique meta tags (don't forget about poor Yahoo), local directories (Google Local, Yahoo and Bing), xml sitemap and DMOZ listings. But all of our contracts are driven by the bottom line - results. If it's a brand management website, then traffic is the key. If it's a lead generation website, then quality becomes much more important than quantity. So, as mentioned by others, our task list is very fluid and changes on a regular basis - but there is always the goal!

Our first step is to talk to the client on the phone, see what their goals are, get an idea of who they think their competitors are and what they think their top keywords should be. Then, when we meet in person (if possible), we go over our initial research which is just some keyword research with traffic numbers and then a competitive ranking report for their website as compared to their competitors.

As for what makes one better than the rest - it can be personal. If you can narrow it down to two or three companies that all meet your criteria when it comes to proving past successes and strategy for your website. Then it can come down to communication - do you feel comfortable talking to them. Do you feel that they are talking down to you? Do you feel that they are listening to you?

Obama White House goes mobile | Blog | Econsultancy

How best to celebrate the first anniversary of the Obama administration? Why, with an app, of course - and a mobile web site, to boot.

Released today, the "The White House" app is so far only available for the iPhone and iPod touch, but more versions are promised soon.

Obama White House goes mobile | Blog | Econsultancy

Dynamic Drive CSS Library- CSS Popup Image Viewer

I was looking for a fast loading, effective, user friendly image gallery with pop-up images and stumbled upon this website. This was very easy to implement and very user-friendly. If you're interested in a photo gallery like this for your website, contact Tork Marketing.

Dynamic Drive CSS Library- CSS Popup Image Viewer

Happy Valentine's Day

Bing Gets Ready For 2010 Winter Olympics With New Search Features! | SEO Blog PageTraffic

Bing has announced its new search features for the upcoming 2010 Winter Olympics slated to begin this Friday in Vancouver. The two amazing search features Instant Answers and Visual Galleries on Bing will provide you with all the information on these Winter Olympic Games.

On its official search blog, Bing posted that the NBC Universal has collaborated with it to assure the online and on-demand telecast of the digital coverage of the 2010 Winter Olympics. You can now enjoy the exclusive games videos, event recaps, medal counts info, and the direct commentary from the games on Bing, NBCOlympics.com and MSN.

Bing Gets Ready For 2010 Winter Olympics With New Search Features! | SEO Blog PageTraffic

Ten common sense data security tips | Blog | Econsultancy

If you run a website, there's a good chance that you store data that you wouldn't want falling into the wrong hands. At the same time, there's also a good chance that you're increasing the odds of that happening by not following basic security best practices.

Unfortunately, the cost of data breaches is growing every year. A new study released by the PGP Corporation and the Ponemon Institute, the average cost of a data breach incident in 2009 was 6.75 million compared to 6.65 million in 2008. The largest data breach in 2009 cost just under $31m to clean up.

Fortunately, there are a lot of common sense ways to mitigate the risk of a data breach. Here are ten of them:

Ten common sense data security tips | Blog | Econsultancy

I'm through with declaring any tech product or service to be a "killer" of any other tech product or service. But I will say this: If Twitter is found dead anytime in the next couple of years, someone's going to need to hide Google Buzz, which debuted this morning, from the police.

Google's Buzz seems to have most all the features that Twitter is missing, and Google is clearly going to take advantage of all the benefits of being Google to make it popular -- most notably the inboxes of unspecified millions of Gmail users who'll get Buzz as a service-within-the-service. My impression is that Google really, really wants this to be the dominant service in the still-evolving category of "that thing that Twitter does that doesn't have a good name yet."

Tuesday, February 9, 2010

Google's makes mobile search ads more useful

This week Google has brought marketers one step closer to actually tapping into the holy grail of local, mobile advertising with the simple addition of a hot link. Starting Thursday, Google search ads can include click-to-call links.

The look and feel of the ads won't change much, but letting users click on search results gets them one step closer to spending money at those establishments, which is why local businesses are getting excited about mobile advertising.

Google's makes mobile search ads more useful with the introduction of a link | Blog | Econsultancy

Google Social Search goes live — without Facebook results | Blog | Econsultancy

In the battle to conquer real-time search, Google has drawn a line in the sand. The search giant today went live with its Social Search feature, which adds relevant results from users' social graph. But one thing is noticeably absent from those results — Facebook content.

Because so much of Facebook's information is private, Google cannot access it. For a social network trying to plant its flag as the curator of personal content online, that could be a problem.

Google Social Search goes live — without Facebook results | Blog | Econsultancy

SEO or Social Media – Is SEO needed now that Social Media has arrived?

Unfortunately, I am also part of the group that normally uses the web as part of my daily work. However, I work with clients that range from being better than myself when it comes to social media to clients that feel like nobody uses the web for major purchases.

In each case, I can show them the amount of traffic available on search engines and on social media networks.

For my clients, it’s usually split – purchasing agents aren’t looking on social media networks so we target them using seo and engineers/techies are looking on social media networks so we target them using LinkedIn, Facebook, YouTube and Twitter (among others when necessary).

I think the strongest argument can be made for being in both places. If you ignore one in favor of the other, then you ARE going to miss part of your target audience. And we never want that to happen.

I like your definition of SEO – “any activity that helps to promote your business on a SERP”. I also agree with Brian that for the most part, social media is branding and seo is sales. Another way to say it is social media is customer support and seo is purchasing. A successful company that retains clients will have both departments manned by experienced, skilled employees.

I also like Rick’s question about definitions. With traditional search results being replaced by personalized, social, geo-targeted search results; the traditional way of seo is being updated to include these newer outlets. And for engine, even YouTube is considered a search engine with it’s own trends, insights and keyword research tools. But like you, when we use the term seo in our office, we mean the traditional search engine result pages.

We choose to use the phrase Internet Marketing because anytime a prospective client opens a browser, we want them to think of us. We’ve even installed custom toolbars so they can always see us. Wherever our audience is, we will be there with our clients.

SEO or Social Media – Is SEO needed now that Social Media has arrived?

20+ mind-blowing social media statistics revisited | Blog | Econsultancy

I try to put as much information as I can into Econsultancy’s Social Media Statistics, which is part of our Stats Compendium (a truly awesome resource) but I find it’s always interesting to go back and review the old against the new.

So, I’ve collected as much as I can from my previous insane snippets of data and benchmarked it against the here and now, alongside rooting out some new stuff for you to mull over.

If six months ago, it wasn’t a compelling case to consider social media in the marketing mix, then this hopefully might change your mind...

20+ mind-blowing social media statistics revisited | Blog | Econsultancy

How to Copy Fonts from your Computer to CD

So, I ran into an issue recently when I tried to copy fonts from a computer onto a CD - it wouldn't let me. No error message - just flat out did nothing. So I looked it up and the answer was interesting.

Don't go to your fonts using the Control Panel, instead go to C:\Windows and copy the Fonts folder to your desktop. From there, you can right-click on it and choose send to CD drive.

Yay!

Website statistics, web analytics, hit counter - HitsLink

I am definitely going to try this 30-day free trial because they've partnered with Hoovers, a Dunn & Bradstreet Company, to offer detailed information about the companies that are visiting my website. I can't wait to try this on my clients!

Website statistics, web analytics, hit counter - HitsLink