Ignoring The Basics In The Rush To Embrace Web 2.0

With the immense hype surrounding web 2.0 are many companies ignoring the basic principles of creating websites?

More often than not, the web agency or web designer is at fault by trying to create something which is impressive to look at and, in an effort to embrace the web 2.0 ethos, has features that probably only 1% of site visitors will use. This can often result in having a badly designed website that is difficult to navigate and probably results in your customers moving on to the next website.

Lots of websites which use customisable features fall into this category where over 90% of the users will never use these ‘great’ features available to them. The development time for the extra features are often relected in higher costs for the client - resulting in very little ROI, if any. 

Web usability guru Jakob Nielsen held a presentation on this, highlighting some of the facts about our headlong rush towards Web 2.0. He warned that the desire to make webpages more dynamic often meant users were badly served.

E-Gain like many other web agencies use good practices include making a site easy to use, integrate good search tools where necessary, use jargon free text, usability testing and consideration to the design even before the first line of code is written.

Always ask yourself if you really need those extra features built into your website, and will the majority of your website visitors use or benefit from it?

Add comment June 24th, 2008

Websites Continue to Take a Larger Share of the Retail Pie

With the credit crunch biting hard, economic slowdown and falling retail sales it is encouraging to read today that online retail continues to grow, with this years online retail spend expecting to grow by 32% compared to offline retail sales which expect to see a minimal growth of 1.2% according to the European and UK internet consultancy group Verdict Research.

Online retail is currently worth around £20bn, an estimated 7% of overall retail spend and by 2012 Verdict forecast that this figure will rise to 14% or around £45bn.

With shoppers increasingly turning to the internet as an effective means of seeking out bargains and low-priced products, will an online retail presence become the difference between commercial success or failure? And will online apathy lead to a retail sales disaster?

1 comment June 19th, 2008

People who have shaped search marketing…Your views?

This year has been a bumper year for search, particularly SEO. In particular as we have mentioned a number of times before some of the people who have shaped the search marketing industry, so further to this E-Gain are asking for your feedback as to who has shaped search as we know it whether the UK search engine marketing industry or the US search marketing industry - we’re not fussy in that respect.

So feel free to give us some feedback. Whether you think its the usual suspects ie Danny Sullivan, Ralph Wilson or even Matt Cutts, or perhaps some of the new kids on the block (so to speak) such as Rand Fishkin, Jon Myers, Vanessa Fox or Andrew Girdwood. Or perhaps one from left field, maybe Lisa Dietliefsen or Kevin Lee. The floor is yours…

2 comments June 1st, 2008

Hitting your head against a brick wall - Is your site optimised

I have read a number of very good articles recently, not least Michael Gray aka GreyWolfs post “Does you site have a squeezy top”. I’m pleased someone as high profile as Michael has tackled this issue, as I think all too often conversion and usability are lost in the quest for keyword density, internal linkage and other on-page factors.

As Michael mentions in his post, most websites are built around a core function, whether that be completing a purchase, downloading a thought leadership piece or merely signing up for further information. It is therefore unfortunate that many website conversion funnels therefore suffer, in order to appease egos, wild theories or a desperate quest for user information with little regard of target audience or the product in question.

I recently watched a presentation by Omniture regarding conversion funneling and multivariate testing, two key areas when it comes to maximising any online advertising whether search or display. This can take many forms, however the main ones tend to be

• Landing Page Optimisation
• Creative Optimisation
• Flow and Form Optimisation - one of the more important here I think)
• Segment Optimisation
• Optimise with the general public in mind

However moving on from this, when optimising your conversion funnel, you really need to do your homework.

• Make your conversion mechanism fit for purpose- I was involved recently in a campaign, where we had little control over the landing area for the campaign. The product centered round a very niche offering, and something whilst fairly close to a mainstream service, did not directly relate to it, and indeed, the type of people who would buy this product/service differed significantly. Added to this the product was not one you would directly type into Google. It is therefore essential that any conversion mechanism whether primary site or microsite is fit for purpose, and provides your customers with the details they need in order to make a decision and complete the sale. As you may have guessed, this initial was not the case, something that came back to bite them quite significantly (we did raise this with them), however it did highlight the requirement to provide potential customers with information, such as coverage, usage, and cost, as well as comparisons with similar products
• Don’t ask for too much information - THe amount of sites you go to where you have to sign up, and are subsequently asked for everything bar your National Insurance/Social Security number (and sometimes even that) - just to get something like a whitepaper is astounding, and fortunately one of the easiest to fix. At one of my first jobs at Tiny.com (sorry), this was something we addressed quite well, turning what was originally a lengthy sales process, to something that was much more streamlined and had the customers requirements at heart, rather than the marketing department. As a result, sales increased by over 300%.

  My rule of thumb for this however is, the more valuable/desirable the product/service/information - the more likely you are to be able to ask for more information. Using the information above, the desire is to complete that computer sale as quickly as possible, however something like a Key bit of research may carry considerably more business value, and as a result you may get away with a greater volume of customer information requirements. Ask for too much - and you will scare people away, ask for too little, and you may not be able to close the deal. Getting the balance right takes time and effort.

• Profile and Monitor - Like everything else - getting your site optimised from a conversion perspective takes time, effort and sometimes money. However I would suggest in many cases, this is money well spent, and will provide you with a streamlined, effective solution, that will return that cost over and over and over again.

  Get the tools in place, whether they be

  • Analytics - Such as Google Analytics, Clicktracks, WebTrends etc
  • Behavioural Analysis - such as BunnyFoot or other eye tracking software
  • User/Focus Groups - Speak to people  - at the end of the day surely its better getting it straight from the horses mouth.

I would suggest you take some time to read Michael’s article, and spend sometime researching the area round conversion. Myself and John Hill here at E-Gain have spent a lot of time over the last couple of years (and yes our website is not testament to this - Cobblers shoes and all that) and much of this changes, as behaviour and technologies improve. However at the end of the day, you are aiming at the majority of the time at people, and its worth remembering that.

Add comment May 28th, 2008

Google/Doubleclick deal approved

After months of deliberation, the European Commission have finally approved Google’s $3.1 Billion acquisition of Search firm Doubleclick. The investigation, which started a mere five months ago has confirmed that the “transaction would be unlikely to have harmful effects on consumers, either in ad serving or in intermediation in other advertising markets”.

This news on the back the Google that Google expects to be in a “very significant position” in the online display advertising market by 2008/09, has seen Googles stock value rise significantly.

The decision by the European commision has been seen as the final major obstacle to purchase following the US Federal Trade Commission’s decision to approve the purchase back in December 2007.

Add comment March 11th, 2008

Fine tuning your landing pages - Turbo boost your Online Marketing

Over the last couple of weeks we have spent a fair number of hours finetuning a number of Pay-per-click (PPC) campaigns run here at E-Gain. Very few (if any) campaigns are spot on at the first attempt, and most campaigns will take hours of ‘tweaking’ in order to become efficient conversion vehicles. Therefore it is essential, you don’t look at Campaign Setup as a one off for a campaign, and then just leave it. To make PPC work it takes time, effort and testing, and above all patience. However it is worth it, we have had some startling results, with some ROI campaigns seeing 100%+ increases in ROI, due to ongoing ‘optimisation’ just off the landing pages, so what do you need to consider…

Test, Learn, Refine

As we mentioned above, no campaign is perfect - there is always room for improvement. Therefore a good campaign should involve a healthy dose of testing, always followed up by evaluation and learnings from the testing, and then refinement of the campaign as a result. Once this has been done, test - learn - and refine your campaign again.

There are plenty of tools out there that will help you do this, not least Google’s very good Website Optimiser product which allows you to test a number of on-page mechanisms such as strapline, imagery and content, in such a way that you can see exactly what is working, what isn’t and subsequently develop a strategy that will work for your clients. After all - every project and every client is different.

Web Analytics are your friend - Track Everything

As we mentioned above, Test - Learn -Refine is a fundamental part of all campaigns, however Web Analytics are a fundamental part of that process. On all E-Gain Search Marketing campaigns, we implement three forms of analytics in order to:

• Get an overview of where our visitors are coming from
• Find out what phrases our visitors use to find us
• Find out what our visitors do when they land on the site
• Determine what proportion of visitors leave the site on entry (bounce rate)
• Determine how many of these visitors convert and above all what mechanisms do they use to convert - brochure downloads/orders/bookings/newsletter signups etc
• Determine the ‘trends’ of visitors visiting the website
• Determine how they interact with the site as a whole

There are a number of tools out there that allow you to do this, from base level Google Analytics (which is a very very good starting point), to Omniture (would suggest for Enterprise level sites), to more niche analytics such as SpeedTrap (behavioural analysis) to more sophisticated eye-tracking tools. As mentioned previously, we use three tools on our sites to identify the above behaviour, and allow us to tailor our strategies accordingly.

Know your audience

This to me is critical with landing pages. There is no point having a one page conversion mechanism for a client if the product or service they offer is not an ‘everyday product’. I can use an example of a company I recently spoke to whose niche product similar to health insurance was not converting. However a first look at the conversion mechanism (a one page ‘funnel’ into signup), highlighted the consumers requirement for further information, particularly from online referrals such as Paid Search and Behavioural activity.

It is therefore imperative you know your audience. The above scenario does not fit for all. In some instances, you will need to make the conversion metric far more streamlined - for example I would suggest Apple could/and probably do (haven’t analysed it for the purposes of this post), a far more ’streamlined’ conversion funnel given both the strength of their brand and the type of product they offer

Above all, test - learn - refine, and make sure you track everything.

Engage with your audience - Your calls to action

Your calls to action are your mechanism for your customer to communicate with you, whether it be

• Contact Form
• Product Purchase
• Brochure Download
• Whitepaper request
• Newsletter signup
• Competition Entry
• Blog Subscriber
• Price Alert Request

These mechanisms need to be obvious and above all prominent. Incorrect implementation of your calls to action can significantly impact on your ROI, and ultimately on your bottom line.

Secondly, don’t put all your eggs in one basket. I am constantly amazed by the amount of websites that only have one call to action, even if its a contact form. Above are 8 possible data capture mechanisms, and I could have gone on. Not all customers convert at the first attempt (according to a recent presentation at Search Engine Strategies 2008 in London - a research study by ComScore suggested that most users converted roughly 3 visits after their initial entry to a site - and this entry to conversion mechanism in many cases could be longer than 30 days+).

Say your are selling widgets. Your primary call to action is going to be based around the purchase of your widgets, however by providing

• Newsletter signup - Collect potential customer information and then email these ‘consumers’ with information regarding deals, news and other information
• Competition entry - As with the above - these people have allowed you access to your data (I would add at this point, permission of the ‘customer’ is essential to send email marketing to), so use this data to send them relevant news and information. Above all - understand your customer and make sure these timings are right - don’t overuse this as this is likely to make the whole process counter productive
• Brochure Download - this I would suggest is two fold - one you know your client is further down the ‘conversion matrix’ and thus is in decision making/buying mode rather than browsing, so they require a different type of approach. A simple follow up a couple of days later could work wonders here.
• A widget blog - you can get people to subscribe to your blog and raise further brand awareness of your widget

Above all make sure people can find these conversion mechanims. Don’t hide them away at the bottom of the page (you will be amazed how many people do), and make them obvious without making them offputting - as there is a fine balance.

Therefore make sure your landing pages have relevant and obvious calls to action - as soon as your customers get to the site, and make sure they have the relevant ’support material’ to make that decision.

First impressions are key - Dress to impress

Much like people I guess - landing pages need to create a favourable first impress. In most cases - that first impression can be the difference between you getting the sale, and you losing the sale. Your website is your shop/your sales channel - so it needs to be treated as such. A users mind is made up within the first 4 seconds of them visiting your site (obviously this is going to vary by sector/product), however it is not a long period of time in which to engage and communicate with your customer so those very first important impressions are crucial.

Therefore make sure your pages engage from the off.

• Use colours intelligently in order to raise awareness of key calls to action.
• Use fonts, font size and font weight carefully in order to attract awareness and prominence to your key messages on your page
• Use imagery in moderation in order to convey your message more effectivelly
• I personally would advise not using any highly interactive elements as the primary part of your landing page strategy such as Flash. IF the user does not have this installed - your are very likely to have lost that sale in a very short period of time.
• Make sure your site is up - website downtime is a Very bad turnoff.

Getting your landing page strategy takes time - but in the end it can pay off handsomely. Above all make sure your landing page strategy doesn’t end with the landing page - follow this process through to the rest of your site. A well thought out conversion funnel can pay dividends (John, Paul and myself used to work for a major PC manufacturer and were responsible for the redevelopment of the conversion funnel - from entry to conversion - a redevelopment which saw a 300% increase in conversions due to streamlining of the conversion funnel)

Add comment March 10th, 2008

SEO is evil - Vanessa Fox bites back

Just read a fantastic response from ex Google guru, Vanessa Fox regarding another recent ‘SEO is evil’ post from well-known expert Alex Bosworth. In her post ‘SEO is the worst thing ever invented‘, Vanessa responded to a number of misguided points raised by Alex, and I wholeheartedly have to agree with a number of her responses, not least

• MODERN SEO is not just about rankings. As Mike Grehan has often eluded to, SEO as we know it has evolved significantly, and a GOOD SEO’s job is not just about rankings, its about maximising ROI. People ask why do they need SEO. Well here are some thoughts for starters
• Many web designers develop for look alone not for ROI - there is a difference. A good SEO will test - learn - refine - test again, learn again refine and so on - until he gets it right. And then continue testing.
• Most web developers do not consider correct robots management. During the recent SES conference in London, one of the key points made during the keynote speech was regarding Privacy. How would you like content that isn’t supposed to be indexed, indexed. I would suggest you wouldn’t yet this is something I would suggest the vast majority of traditional web development agencies and designers don’t consider.
• Most web developers do not consider the role of correct domain/server setup and infrastructure - for example how many of your web developers are going to consider regionalisation of domains, geo-location of servers etc. Very few I would suggest - most will just whack your website on their shared hosting and have done.
• Most web developers do not consider duplicate content
• SEO is not just about rankings - modern SEO as Vanessa says in her article Traffic vs Engagement vs Bounce Rate. ROI therefore is a fundamental part of any SEO campaign. After all who wants to rank no.1 for ‘Concrete Lifejackets’ if no one is ever going to search for that, never mind clickthrough, never mind purchase.
• Good SEO incorporates good optimisation with good usability. You look at any big/good UK SEO agency, and most will consider usability or conversion metrics as part of their service offering
• Another aspect Vanessa tackled was a comment made by Alex, namely “Do you think that javascript widget you made for navigating your archives is really awesome, intuitive and innovative? Google disagrees, it thinks it’s a big black hole of nothing.” I would advise before you post something like that Alex - you do some research. This isn’t merely a whim of the search engines, it is based around mere usability. That is something I would suggest Jakob Neillson will pick you up on, never mind Google.

I would highly recommend a read, particularly people new to SEO. SEO is not evil, much as advertising isn’t evil. Surely embracing and understanding the role of modern SEO will help people understand the value and contribution a good Search Marketing Specialist can provide to any web project.

Vanessa Fox Nude - SEO is the worst thing ever invented

Add comment March 6th, 2008

Microsoft will buy Yahoo

This is a point I have been discussing with others in the industry recently, and something we have covered in the recent post ‘Can Microhoo compete with Google‘. Much discussion has taken place on various prominent blogs throughout the search industry as to the potential impacts of such a deal, and other potential suitors.

However according to a couple of people I have spoken to, within Yahoo, there seems to be a general consensus, that it isn’t a case of IF Microsoft buy Yahoo, it is more a case of WHEN.
Only time will tell whether this is the case, however it is sure to raise a lot of questions for Paid Search Consultants such as ourselves, namely

• Which platform will be developed further, or will both. My personal thoughts would be that the stronger Panama platform would in all likelihood be further enhanced using some Microsoft integration
• Will the two brands operate seperately - I would again suggest yes, as both brands are very well established within their core markets, and thus a ‘re-brand’ would achieve very little
• What does this mean moving forward - This could be where the real winnings are made. I think it was Brian Eisenberg at SES London who said that Microsoft and Yahoo had to a certain degree conceeded to Google on search (apologies if it wasn’t you Brian) , and I would to a degree have to agree with this sentiment, however the future battlefields via the behavioural and social media battlefields will continue.

Wait and watch…

Add comment March 4th, 2008

Open letter to American Express - Why you do need SEO

My attention recently got drawn to an article by Cuban Council on the American Express website ‘Youropenbook.com’, which stated the following

“Finally, don’t waste money on so-called Search Engine Optimization (S.E.O.) specialists. Search engines are very quick to penalize sites that try to trick their filtering techniques, and once your site has been put on Google’s blacklist, it will take forever to get off.”

What made such ‘experts’ in online come to such a conclusion I would love to know - its a bit like me pointing the finger at American Express for the US credit crunch. It seems a very significant statement to make with very little evidence to back it up, and something I would suggest should be properly researched before putting pen to paper. Whilst I would agree ‘Textbook SEO’ (As Mike Grehan has often referred to it) is a dinosaur of the past, however the role of search marketing specialist even a Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) specialist/Digital Asset Optimisation (DAO - Chris Copeland) is still a fundamental aspect of your marketing mix - and something that should be embraced.
In the article, a number of points are raised in order to raise awareness of your services online - none of which in their simplest form I can disagree with

• Get a memorable domain - Great advice - but why not get one that potentially may help with your online visibility as well
• Outsource web hosting - This is where the role of a search marketeer could help you. What happens if you so happen to outsource your hosting to a shared host hosting a number of prominent link farms. Potentially this may cause a number of issues with your online visibility.
• Design for your audience - no argument here - the most fundamental part of web design imo.

However the final part advises readers to ‘Optimise for your search engines’ - Yes Optimise for your search engines - just don’t use search engine optimisation specialists according to Cuban Council. No offence but this is like saying - invest your money but don’t use a broker. Chances are it may work - but its far more likely to be a successful project if you get someone that knows what they are doing - just make sure you are getting someone that does know what they are doing. These days there are so many good agencies out there - that there is no need to use a standalone web design agency many who arguably do not understand search engine optimisation nor how it works.However I would like to draw points to five points on the American Express website alone where an Online Marketing expert could have provided far more value -

1. Localisation
   http://www.google.co.uk/search?num=100&hl=en&rls=GGGL%2CGGGL%3A2006-24%2CGGGL%3Aen&q=american+express&btnG=Search&meta=cr%3DcountryUK%7CcountryGBTry running the above query - that is a search for American Express on a UK only search. Feasibily I would say this is something a potential customer may do - i.e. I don’t want contact details for your Singapore office, I want a UK contact. Because of the current setup of the American Express website the site does not show - as it does for a global search.A well structured global search engine optimisation strategy would have picked this issue up, and implemented a localised search campaign aimed at correctly targeting applicable demographics.
2. Basic Optimisation - A simple browse of the UK subdirectory shows the ‘lack of SEO on the current site’. Whilst to a certain degree brand would go a long way here - the fact is - finer segmentation and optimisation of data makes it more difficult to a potential customer like me to convert meaning that I have to undertake a four to five clickstream to get to the top level of information I require - something I would suggest could be significantly reduced by a more targeted optimisation technique.
3. Use of Subdomains - Whilst I understand technically why subdomains may have been used - this has resulted in considerable segmentation in their display in the Search engine results pages. Take a look at the example we provide above and you will notice results for https://home.amer…, http://www.american… and http://www3.america . These results have been treated as seperate domains and thus diluted much of the effects a more unified site may have provided. Not just optimisation related but from an administration perspective it must be a nightmare.
4. Visibility - Away from core brand terms American Express does not appear for many high traffic relevant terms such as ‘credit card’. With research suggesting users are becoming more search savvy, and therefore conducting more searches and browsing less SERPs. This means that making your website more visibile whether in terms of search engine positioning, or actual visibility in its original guise - making it stand out is more crucial now than ever. Mining the long tail here could throw up some golden nuggets.
5. Competitors - Lets face it all the competitors are doing it

Now I know American Express did not directly write this article, however as the huge brand they are they wield a massive amount of influence, and such comments are a little irresponsible in my opinion. Whilst as others in the industry have said previously, SEO in its 1990’s guise is dead - however there exists an important service offered by online marketing specialists that enhances the design and development of sites , both from a technical and marketing perspective

1 comment February 24th, 2008

Can Microsoft/Yahoo/Microhoo compete with Google

I recently attended the SES London 2008 conference down in the Business Design Centre down in London (for day 2 anyhow), where well established SEO ‘celebs’/speakers such as Mike Grehan, DaveN (Dave Naylor - Bronco ), Paul Doleman (iCrossing) and Jon Myers (Mediavest) presented various topics relating to search and online marketing over the course of three (very intensive days). As mentioned previously, I was lucky enough to attend the second day, which was started with a Keynote speech from Nick Carr, followed by a Q&A session with a panel consisting of

• Kevin Ryan - Moderator
• Mike Grehan - CEO SearchVisible
• Paul Doleman - CTO iCrossing
• Erica Schmidt - Head of Search Isobar
• Steve Kauffman - Digitas
• Bryan Eisenberg - Future Now

The main topic of debate was the recent proposed takeover by Microsoft of Yahoo, something which has been a hive of discussion in the recent times, not just directly in terms of Microsoft buying Yahoo but for anyone else potentially buying Yahoo. One of the questions however asked was - would this allow Microhoo to compete more effectively with Google, something I am going to attempt to answer below.

In my opinion no - not unless something radical (and yes a merger between Yahoo and Microsoft is quite radical - but I mean MORE RADICAL) was to happen. To me there are a number of factors that would need to be overcome before any such ‘merger’ would bair fruit including (but not limited to):

• Mindset - one is pioneers of the Internet, one is pioneers of Software - both which have changed Significantly since the days when both these organisations were ruling the roost. Their approach to business is also considerably different, Yahoo is reasonably innovative, and arguably Microsoft is not, however both have been very slow to react to changing markets, requirements and social climate
• Character - Sort of similar to the above - however there is a signficant difference in culture between Yahoo and Microsoft which would need to be overcome before anything else. Google is successful as the sum of a collective - something I feel would be a huge obstacle to something as major as a merger/takeover between the two above - and possibly something that would suggest a merger with another organisation such as Fox Interactive would provide a better yield on investment than any Microsoft deal
• Moving forward - Both Yahoo and Microsoft do not seem to have the same ‘innovation’ and drive that Google have within both Search and the Online Advertising space. Both seem to be happy to ‘consolidate’ to a certain extent and leave Google to it, which potentially could be a dangerous thing to do with competitors such as Baidu, Naver et al on the horizon.
• Technology - Both the Yahoo and MSN Paid Search services are VASTLY inferior to the Google Interface, and personally this is something that would require significant investment in, not only from an administration perspective but also from a marketing/managability perspective if it is to compete with Google more effectively.
• Support - Both services are somewhat limited in their service and support in my previous experience - something Google seem to do better - I only had to listen to Andew Girdwood from BigmouthMedia talk about their discussions with Google whilst developing the Hilton Hotels Online Marketing campaign in order to see this, and something both Yahoo and MSN need to work on. This and their support for smaller organisations - after all small organisations don’t always stay as small organisations…
• US focus - Whilst this is small - I can’t help thinking that if Yahoo and MSN were to spread their vision out of the US remit and include more of Western Europe etc into early beta testing, launches etc, they could make some early significant wins, not only with agencies but with advertisers only. Using Yahoo Ambasador as an example -this is something - that whilst some UK advertisers do have - is something that is only available to US and Canadian organisations - and not us minnions across the pond - and this US focus I would suggest reflects itself in the Usage stats for the North American market vs that of the UK etc - something I would love to hear further feedback on

One thing that did however stand out at the conference, was Yahoo and Microsofts reluctance (for use of a better word) to get out there. Google’s attendance at the conference was highly evident - big stands as well as the usual Google University sessions whilst we were there. However Microsoft and Yahoo were both conspicious in their absence.

So can Microsoft or Yahoo compete with Google? Compete I would say Yes, be market leaders No. I don’t for one minute think that Google will dominate the market for ever - others will rise and fall as they do with other markets and as they have done once before within SearchSpace. However do I think it will be Microhoo - No !!

1 comment February 23rd, 2008