Things I Learned While……

Glossary of Internet Terms

May 31, 2011 By Kurt Scholle

Internet Marketing Definitions and Glossary of Internet Terms (Added to Web Asylum Internet Glossary May 2011)

The following Internet terms have been added to my Glossary of Internet Marketing Terms at WebAsylum.com in the past month.

Define: 301 Redirects
A method of alerting website visitors and search engines that a page is no longer a part of a website. The 301 redirect automatically redirects the website visitor or search engine crawler to a new page, usually one with similar information.

Define: Cross Sell
Cross selling can be defined in different ways, depending on the situation. The best example, however, is to try and persuade a prospect to buy something else when they’ve rejected another product or service or if their sought after product or service is unavailable. Other definitions include activities that could be described as upselling.

Define: Dynamic URLs
Page URLs that are generated using a database as opposed to straight HTML or similar language. They’re usually easy to spot because they contain a “?” and often a mishmash of letters and/or numbers and symbols. Dynamic URLs can also be problematic for search because the page is created on the fly, usually based on a series of questions or queries.

Define: Elevator Pitch
A brief (30 seconds or less) description of your business, product or service. So-called because it’s all you could say during a chance meeting in an elevator, it’s useful as a quick introduction in many business scenarios. Your elevator pitch should be rehearsed and include benefits and your USP.

Define: Exact Match
A type of keyword matching where the search query exactly matches the advertising, whereby “deluxe widgets” would only match for that exact term and not “deluxe blue widgets.” Exact match is often specified in pay-per-click advertising but can be used in organic search. See also “phrase match.”

Define: Google Sandbox
When Google puts a website on probation, it is referred to as being in the Google Sandbox and is usually a de-listing of a site for “not playing nice” or incorporating black hat SEO tactics. Sometimes the ranking drops by 30 positions, sometimes more. It’s nearly impossible to contact Google about being in the Sandbox and It is thought that sites are put into the Sandbox for 3 months or as long as the offense remains, whichever is longer.

Define: Lifetime Value of a Customer
The amount of revenue or profit (gross or net) of an individual customer or group of customers. Knowing this metric helps decisions on marketing tactics and other aspects of business. Can be useful to look at individual customers, certain groups of customers or total customers. LVC can be affected by upsells and cross sells.

Define: Phrase Match
Used in Pay-Per-Click advertising, Phrase Match allows for ads to match search queries when the keyword or keyphrase is used verbatim, but allows for leading or trailing words in the queries. (EG :When “down comforters” is the advertising keyword, but would match a query of “satin down comforters” or “down comforters store in Chicago.”)

Define: Pillar Post
A blog post designed to attract inbound links from other sites for the benefit of search engines OR to attract significant attention that results in more brand awareness or to get visitors to click on affiliate links, opt-in to email lists or buy something. Pillar content is significant and special.

Define: Page Authority
Authority rankings for websites and webpages are based on a variety of factors that could be compared to some kind of ‘respect index.’ This ranking changes from website to website and even from page to page on a site. The authority of sites linking to a site or page is part of the complex equations search engines use to determine rank for specific keywords.

Define: Site Authority (aka Domain Authority)
Search engines rate websites and webpages for ‘authority” based on a variety of factors that may include how much traffic the sites gets, how many inbound links it receives and from where, whether the TLD is .com, .org, .net or something else. The authority of sites linking to a site or page is then used in the algorithms that determine rank for specific keywords.

Define: Sitemap
Sitemaps help users and search engines find content on a website. HTML sitemaps are usually links on a site to a directory tree of a websie. Search engines most often use XML sitemaps, which is code behind the page and not visible to to visitors, but search engines sometimes use HTML sitemaps, especially if the site is missing an XML sitemap.

Define: SOHO
Small Office / Home Office

Define: Up Sells
As part of the sales process, when a salesperson or website tries to sell a more expensive product or service or additional product(s) or service(s). Many sales experts think that the best time to sell an additional item is right after a completed sale. See Cross Sell.

Define: USP (Unique Selling Proposition)
Unique Selling Proposition or Unique Selling Point is used in advertising or sales presentations to differentiate the value of one’s goods and services over a competitor’s.

Define: WAHM
Work At Home Moms

Filed Under: Latest, Things I Learned While...... Tagged With: Glossary of Internet Terms, Internet marketing definitions, Internet Marketing Glossary

How Jason Fried Got Good at Making Money

March 9, 2011 By Kurt Scholle

How Jason Fried Got Good at Making Money (and What We Can Learn All Learn From That)

There’s a great article in this month’s Inc. Magazine by Jason Fried, the founder of software company 37signals and a regular contributor to Inc. We use his Basecamp product and I like many of their other offerings, so I’m a big fan. In the article. he talks about how making money to him is about freedom, and he cites 6 specific lessons. I recommend you read the whole article. Heck, I think you should subscribe to the magazine!

Here are some of my biggest takeaways from his article, which include some things I knew, but it’s always good to review.

“I made the discovery that people’s reasons for buying things often don’t match up with the company’s reason for selling them.”

When we develop website strategies, we coach clients to think about the benefits to the customer and how that is not necessarily how our clients perceive the value of their goods and services. That’s one of the benefits of social media, by the way. Social media gives you an opportunity to listen to your market and here what problems people are looking to solve. He goes on to say,

” Understanding what people really want to know – and how that differs from what you want to tell them – is a fundamental tenet of sales. And you can’t get good at making money unless you are good at selling.”

And I agree when he says that’s hardly a unique insight and that most companies miss the mark daily is a lesson and objective to strive for every day.

“Sell only things that you’d want to buy for yourself”

It’s all about passion and I think it’s easier to succeed when you’re passionate about what you do. Your customers will notice too.

“People are happy to pay for things that work well. Never be afraid to put a price on something. Even if there are free options, even if the market is flooded with free. People will pay for things they love.”

Let me tell you something. Sometimes you don’t want cheap customers. My experience is that they can be the most demanding, inflexible and highest maintenance. Sometimes that just kills your ROI.

“So here’s a great way to practice making money: Buy and sell the same thing over and over on Craigslist. Seriously.”

This is an interesting exercise. He talks about selling a commodity, like an iPod. Try and figure out how to sell it for more than you paid for it by changing the item description, headline or photo. See what works, sometimes a product shot with people works better than one without. I saw a study once that seemed to prove that showing a picture of a toy for a small child sold better with a picture of a child playing with the toy than just showing the product.

The important lesson is: test everything!

Filed Under: ROI-Return on Investment, Things I Learned While......

David Ogilvie Inspired Writing Tips for Copy That Sells (+ 1 from me)

October 15, 2010 By Kurt Scholle

Great writing on your website, emails, sales letters, billboards and blogs helps achieve and improve ROI. I found a post by Nathan Hangen on 7 Tips for Writing Copy That Sells based on his studies of famed adman, David Ogilvie. It's a great post and I urge you to read it. His tips:

Go Big or Go Home
Do Your Homework
Never Talk Down to Your Customers
The Headline is 80%
Don't Get Distracted From Making The Sale
Explain Why They Should Buy
Your Copy Is Important. Treat It That Way

I have one suggestion that I'd like to add.

Proof read EVERYTHING you write!

Filed Under: Things I Learned While......, Website Copywriting Tagged With: 7 Tips for Writing Copy that Sells, writing gaffes

Make No Mistake – Business IS Improving

May 20, 2010 By Kurt Scholle

The economy may not be great and may never return to the heady days of yesteryear. Unemployment is too high and not enough is being done to fix it, which is a key to improving business. But make no mistake, signs suggest that business is improving!

I'm no economist, but Brian Westbury and Robert Stein are at First Trust Advisors in suburban Chicago. They write, "Manufacturing is booming right now. Since the low in June 2009, manufacturing is up at a 9.5% annual rate, which is faster growth than even during the tech boom of the late 1990's. We expect rapid gains in production to continue." They note that inventory-to-sales ratios are at rock bottom lows in both the retail and wholesale sectors.

There was an article in USA Today last week talking about a rebound in hotel business. Luxury hotels in the US sold nearly 17% more rooms in the first quarter of 2010 than the same period in 2009. Hotels, in general, were up about 5% for the quarter.

Rates were off 7%, but Jan Freitag at Smith Travel Research, says rates could climb this year. Much of the increases is coming from business travelers, so this is a good sign.

In talks with hotel GMs and sales managers, I'm told that some segments (not all) are booking conferences for 2010 and later this year. Conferences usually have a longer lead time than some travel and meeting plans. I understand the corporate market is still a bit soft overall. But in some areas of the country, near Fortune 500 companies, room nights and rates are up significantly.

I also ran into Mike Skarr, the savvy and very well connected former Executive Director of the Naperville Chamber of Commerce who is now an executive with Choose DuPage, the DuPage Regional Development Alliance. He was very upbeat, saying, "Make no mistake, business is improving."

This is encouraging news for anyone in business! What do you hear?

Filed Under: Hotel/Tourism Marketing, Need To Know, Things I Learned While...... Tagged With: Signs the economy is improving. Business development. Hotel marketing.

Search Engines Love Blogs! (Or do they?)

January 21, 2010 By Kurt Scholle

Things I Learned While Looking Up Something Else

Writing about things he learned while looking up something else was a popular feature for the late syndicated columnist, Sidney J. Harris. (I started reading at an early age) I share the same types of things when I think it will interest you.

An information marketer I follow and like is Russell Brunson. He posted something interesting on his blog about how often blogs come up in search rankings vs. websites. I found his conclusions to be very interesting and SURPRISING. I wish I had thought to test it as he did.

He wrote, "The more general term, with the largest number of searches produced the least number of blogs in the search results."

I wouldn't be surprised that ecommerce sites, using long-tail keywords, might outnumber blogs.

"The searches that I used to find the search results with the
greatest number of blogs in the results are not well searched terms at
all."

Which means that bloggers should research the keywords and phrases that their target audience is using.

I got interested in blogging after attending a Crain's Chicago Business Breakfast three years ago where the panel talked about success at building traffic using blogs. Until then, I had dismissed blogs as pretty useless information about someone's cat, boyfriend, favorite team, etc.

I saw the results and we continue to see them. Since then, blogging as a business has exploded with all types of interests supporting full time bloggers. Sometimes the bloggers earn a living with advertising, but affiliate marketers use blogs to promote the products they sell. Companies use blogs to promote their products and services and provide support and customer service.

Question 1: If websites generally come up in searches more often that blogs, does that mean that blogging, as an industry, is not a significant business? 20-30% of the online pie is still significant!

Question 2: Is the share for blogs growing?

I think there is also value in blogging for the interaction that comes from all forms of social media. There are case studies that support that.

– Kurt Scholle, the Website ROI Guy

Filed Under: Blogging, Case Studies, Marketing, Search Engine Optimization, Things I Learned While......, Weblogs Tagged With: blog traffic, share of Internet searches, website success, website traffic

Online Productivity Tools for the Small Business

January 18, 2010 By Kurt Scholle

The Open Forum has a great post today on online productivity tools for small business: creating ToDo lists, note taking, information & news gathering and document sharing.

I would also like to suggest Basecamp for project management. We (Web Asylum) have benefited significantly from this online offering from 37 Signals. Basecamp allows you to set up projects, assign various staff or customers access, ToDo lists with responsibility, file sharing, messaging and other applications.

It's the best 50 bucks we spend every month!

And probably the best ROI of anything we do.

Another application that I find indispensable is mind mapping software. While not an online app, I use MindApp from Varatek Software, but there are many products to choose from. We use it to express website navigation for sites we're building, to visualize various projects and strategies and even to document various ToDo lists.

Google has some great examples of mind maps.

What's in your toolbox?

– Kurt

Filed Under: My ToDo List, Things I Learned While......, Web/Tech Tagged With: mind maps, online productivity tools for small business, website ROI

What did Google searches reveal last year?

January 12, 2010 By Kurt Scholle

The was an interesting post of the Official Google Blog today concerning some insights they shared with how we used Google Search in 2009. What's interesting: We're searching Google multiple times per day, we're searching for things that have never been asked before on Google and we very often get a map as part of our search results.

Proportion of Google users in the United States making more than one query per day: 7 out of 10

Proportion of Google users in the United States making more than 10 queries per day: 1 out of 7

Fraction of Google queries, duplicates excluded, never seen before: More than 1/3
Fraction of Google queries, duplicates included, never seen before: More than 1/5

Proportion of Google result pages that show a map in search results: 1 in 13

What it means is that people are making more and more searches on a daily basis, which means its all the more important for you to be found in search engines. That people are discovering more stuff that's never been queried before. (My guess is long-tail keywords which suggest an intent to buy in many cases) And that if you want people to come to your location, you should present maps whenever you can and that you make sure your map info in Google Maps and elsewhere is correct.

Filed Under: Search Engine Optimization, Things I Learned While......, Web Metrics

Bing vs. Google, a side-by-side comparison

July 31, 2009 By Kurt Scholle

Want to see how searches on Bing and Google compare side-by-side? Check out Bing-vs-Google.com. Type is a keyword or phrase and compare the results of the 2 SERPs side-by-side.

Something I learned while looking up something else!

– Kurt

Filed Under: Search Engine Optimization, Things I Learned While...... Tagged With: Bing vs. Google side by side