The Vizion Search Engine Optimization Blog 
- PubCon Las Vegas Site Structure for Crawlability Session
I had an enjoyable time speaking today on the Site Structure for Crawlability session.
I was joined by Vanessa Fox from Google, Tim Converse from Yahoo! and Brett Tabke of WebmasterWorld/Pubcon fame.
First let me begin by thanking Brett for the opportunity to speak at Pubcon. This was a first for me to speak at a large event. Vanessa and Tim were most encouraging and I appreciate their kind words of support. From what I heard, I think it went well and it’s my sincere hope that anyone that attended was able to walk away with some actionable information.
There were many people who had requested a copy of my presentation. I’ve been sending emails to these folks for the past hour and a half, so I’ve decided to post the presentation here.
I’m sure that there were many people who I was not able to speak with, so feel free to get in touch with me if you have any questions regarding the presentation or, of course, if our company can help you with your interactive marketing needs. My direct line is 888.484.9466 ext. 201.
I have been holding off on enjoying Las Vegas like most would, but I believe that tonight may be the opportunity for me to get out and enjoy the city.
If you attended the session, thanks so much! I hope that we can stay in touch!
Written by Stefan Weise on Nov, 15th 2006 in The Vizion Search Engine Optimization Blog, Search Engine Optimization | No Comments »
- Party Like It’s 1999?
I was just reading an article on WSJ (subscription required) about the VC funds going towards web-based companies whose business model is selling advertising on their sites.
I can remember back to the “glory days” when I worked for Lycos selling advertising and funded companies were buying everything that they could get their hands on (keyword banner/text advertising, “integrated” programs, and of course the 468×60 banners).
What makes me go “huh?” is that the same thing that caused the bubble burst in early 2000 still exists. Click through rates for banner ads, which started out WAY BACK on HotWired.com so long ago, dropped from the momentus 40% click through rate experienced on the initial days of the banner to around 0.3% on average by the time the bubble burst.
Have click through rates increased that much? Certainly, people are spending more time on the web now, and finding more - and better - ways to use the web. So, as I suspected even shortly after the bubble burst, media planners/marketers should put money where their audience spends their time. But, have click through rates increased much/any? Or, are the mass marketers getting involved and turning Interactive marketing into a medium which is measured in more of a fair fashion with “traditional” channels? Perhaps reach/frequency is good enough? Perhaps it doesn’t have to be about “click through rates” and “cost per acquisition”? Perhaps the fact that the web offers the ability to track these things is good enough?
I have been involved in radio, television, print and web marketing. I have a strong passion for web marketing and believe that it is the most effective and efficient medium available. I believe that you can brand your company on the web, and I believe that you can grow your company through targeted direct response initiatives on the web.
With more people pushing marketing dollars to the web, let’s hope that they’re not as “short sighted” as they were in early 2000 when the budgets went away after the demise of the click through rates of banners. Let’s hope that people understand that the web is another (great) channel for their marketing efforts and that the fact that initiatives can be measured to ANY degree of sophistication is what makes the web a great tool. Let’s hope that this will not be a repeat of 1999/2000 when people bailed out on Interactive marketing because of its measureability. Let’s hope that we are seeing a movement towards a reach/frequency AND direct response measurement of all media. That’s the way it should be and the way that it should have always been.
Every media buy has its own unique set of criteria. Direct response, branding, promotions…you can do it all on the web. If a fair comparison is made across all channels, I believe the web can measure up against any traditional marketing methods. And, for reaching specific audiences, search engine marketing and search engine optimization will always be the most efficient and effective methods.
Written by Mark Jackson on Oct, 18th 2006 in The Vizion Search Engine Optimization Blog, Search Engine Optimization, Search Engine Marketing / PPC | No Comments »
- To Rewrite or Not to Rewrite?
We’ve been having a bit of an internal discussion as to when do you rewrite dynamic URLs and when to just leave them alone here among the team at Vizion. Do we rewrite URLs all the time? Does it depend on the number of variables in the URL string? Does the built in authority and trust of the website factor into the decision at all?
The benefits of rewriting URLs are clear. In my mind, some of the best reasons for using these pretty URLs:
1. They’re easier for people to link to.
2. They promote usability. With a good URL hierarchy, the end user can more easily see where they are in the site.
3. The can hid what’s under the hood of your website, enabling you to change the backend, without having to change the URLs
4. They can encourage the search engines to spider pages, they might not normally mess with.So what’s the downside? The answer is: not much, if it’s a brand new site or a site that’s really not ranking that well. What if you’ve got a finely aged domain, with plenty of great links that most sites would kill for, all initial signs point to the fact that with proper on-page optimization you could rank for anything in the industry you felt like. Would you want to rewrite those one variable URLs now? Or just leave them alone?
If you’re saying to yourself right about now, “Why don’t you rewrite the URLs and 301 redirect from the old to the new?” Good, you’re at least still following along…But if you know about 301 redirects, you probably know that the search engines don’t always have their stuff together when it comes to sorting these redirects out. Here’s just one example (registration reqired) of Google now dealing with a simple non-www redirect to the www version of a website. (A redirect that they recommend) and it just takes a look around the URLs still in Ask.com to see they clearly don’t know which way to go when redirected.
So you see a simple redirect isn’t always so simple and therefore neither is the decision to rewrite URLs on an established site. So to the search engines, is it too much to ask for someone to figure it out once and for all? To the rest of you: Do thoughts of search engine spiders following your redirects (or maybe not) keep you up at night?
Written by Stefan Weise on Jul, 17th 2006 in The Vizion Search Engine Optimization Blog, Web Development | No Comments »
- Underscores or Hyphens for Effective Search Engine Optimization
There has been much debate on this topic, for probably FAR too long…should you use underscores or hyphens within your URLs?
I spent years defending the underscore, because I had seen sites do well on Google, but at the same time I had wondered if it was as “friendly” to other search engines. Recently, I have pushed forward on the use of hyphens and I’ll tell you why.
Our friend Matt Cutt’s (Google Search Engineer) uses hyphens within his blog, located at www.mattcutts.com/blog . Here’s an example: http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/bot-obedience-herding-googlebot/ (that’s a pretty good article to read, by the way).
So, if it’s good enough for Matt Cutts, it’s good enough for me. Seems he would know Google pretty well. End of discussion.
Written by Mark Jackson on Jul, 13th 2006 in The Vizion Search Engine Optimization Blog, Search Engine Optimization | No Comments »
- Radical Shift in Television Ad Buying Coming
Television media buying moves closer to the online media buying model, according to this article posted on AdAge. This is going to cause a radical shake up with the Networks and smaller cable networks as well.
I don’t see people spending more time watching television. I don’t know how the very specialized/vertical channels are going to be able to support themselves without a premium paid to support the cost of production/broadcast of the programs. And, if you read the article mentioned above, the other major issue is caused by how many people will be skipping television commercials, so this will drive them from the “average viewership of commercials for a pod” (again, as mentioned in the article) to the performance-based cost model.
The “pay for performance” model works well for the web because you can place 3-10 ads on a given web page. And, if you’re Yahoo!, you have a lot of pageviews to work with because people are spending more and more time on the web. When television finally does migrate to a “pay for performance” model, it could really disrupt what we all take for granted right now…”free” programming.
Here’s what I think…advertising agencies are going to have to come up with much better creative and marketing strategies. They will have to figure out a way to make consumers WANT to watch television commercials/listen to radio commercials, etc.. It goes back to what we’ve been saying in the Interactive marketing space for some time, you must reach the right people with the right message at the right time in the right medium….relevance is king. Search marketing works very well because it reaches those who are seeking information on a given search. The relevancy of advertising to this audience is unmatched. It’s “perfect” marketing except that it does not have what television does….text ads are not sexy and do not touch upon the senses of sound and site.
The Utopia of marketing opportunities will happen when “television-like” advertising (podcasts?) are targeted very specifically to a given audience when they are in hunt mode (search?) and advertisers only pay when their ads are interacted with. The kinks are still being worked out but it’s happening now.
Written by Mark Jackson on Jul, 9th 2006 in The Vizion Search Engine Optimization Blog, Search Engine Marketing / PPC | No Comments »