Lean Development At Fruitbowl

Lean software development is a set of practices and principles designed to increase value and efficiency of the development process. The seven principles of lean software development are:

• Eliminate waste
• Amplify learning
• Decide as late as possible
• Deliver as fast as possible
• Empower the team
• Build integrity in
• See the whole

We aim to be as efficient as possible at Fruitbowl and the Lean principles help use do that. The key for us is to “deliver as fast as possible” thereby testing assumptions and discovering fallacies early in the development process. We want to get products to market and in the hands of users fast, delivering only the most essentially functionality. The key benefits of this are:

• Users can be getting value from the essentials whilst we work on the extras.
• We can test the fundamentals of the product early on before too much time has been invested in to it.
• New features and changes can be prioritised based on what users tell us is important to them.

Prototyping & Rapid Development

You can ask users what they think of an idea, but you will never really know whether or how they will use a product until you let them use it. To do this without investing too much time and effort in a potentially bad idea we build a “Minimum Viable Product“. An MVP is a glorified prototype and presents the primary core value to users; it lets customers test and feedback on your value proposition.

The initial prototype for Virally was built in about a week and in our first customers hands shortly after that. We then spent another week or so bringing the prototype up to a more polished, but still basic standard, also adding in payment processing for new accounts.

Virally already presents considerable value to customers, and we’ve only spent 3 man weeks on it. Is it finished? No. Is it perfect? No. But it is now in a position to be used by real clients, with real users, in the real world. Future development and design decisions will be directly influenced and directed by the their usage and feedback.

Lean Is Efficient

This makes for incredibly efficient development going forward. All the time we invest into Virally from this point on will have a much greater level of insight, and be based on facts, rather than guess work. The alternative, that you so often see in software development, is pouring time and money into developing the “perfect” “finished” product, only to launch and find all the assumptions you made to build it were wrong.

Read the full post here: Virally: Our First Lean Development

1. What kind of results do you think we can expect to see? And when will we see them?

Any good agent will rightly tell you that it’s extremely difficult to judge, and that with SEO campaigns, it often takes months to notice the improvements. They’ll be able to make a prediction of course, but should definitely stay away from any exaggerated guarantees. They shouldn’t promise great rankings as nobody can. If the company advertises #1 rankings, or a free service, you should decline their services as this could just be a cover-up for a lack of experience and poor reputation.

2. Do you offer conversion reports?

Ask to see an example of their client reports. If they offer a report that is heavily laden with graphs and diagrams with little explanation, it could be a sign that they are regurgitating Google Analytics reports. Many rogue agencies do not want to take responsibility for results-orientated metrics and will only provide SERP (search engine ranking position) reports – something which will produce no actual outcomes for you and your business.

3. Do they identify their team by name on the website?

In short, who’s the pretty face behind the magic? Does their website identify the team by name? If a company doesn’t make it clear who’s part of their agency, then be wary. If the team do not publicly represent themselves, you should think twice about hiring them. You should be able to find a page with an introduction to the agency, a little bit of information about the team and perhaps with links to various social media sites. A team with nothing to hide is the team you should place your trust in.

Many companies claim to be SEO experts, but unfortunately, most aren’t. As a client, it’s always best to play the idiot and remember that a good SEO will try and educate you, but a bad one will just try to deceive you. Any good SEO company will be happy to answer these questions and in good detail. And if they aren’t, then go nowhere near them, else you might have two men in leather jackets turn up at the office, motorbike running, looking for the ‘Rogue Traders’ you’ve just hired!

Read the full post here: 3 Questions You Should Be Asking An SEO Agency

Targeting keywords based on market research

Data may tell you what specific thing your customer wants, but that doesn’t necessarily mean they will use that phrase in a search engine. You should never prejudge your customers. Study analytics to see which keywords bring customers to your site, as market research can sometimes give misleading results. You shouldn’t reflect how you perceive your company, but how your target audience does.  You must balance between branded terms and longtail (we’ll expand on this in our next point) variations of keywords that people use when they’re unsure of what they’re looking for.

Failing to respect the competition

You’ll get lost in the crowd if you choose your keywords based on their popularity alone. You should instead choose keywords with less competition to build a stronger client base. For those of you that have read our blog on Longtail, well done, you’ll be familiar with this technique. For those of you that haven’t, have a nosey here.

From our blog, you should know not to prioritise single-word keywords over phrases. Even novice internet-users know that single-word searches return some muddling results, therefore using Longtail keywords mean smaller competition and still plenty of room for popularity and profit!

Not doing your research

The internet is a highly dynamic world, so your SEO strategy can be easily outdated. You must keep a constant check on how people search for information – keeping up with the trends is the best way of getting noticed. People use search engines to find answers, therefore your success relies on whether or not you understand the questions being asked. In short, does your website solve your customer’s problem? The only way you can answer that question is by keeping your research up-to-date and thorough.

The bit left over

Whatever we might tell you about the burning importance of keywords, don’t forget one crucial thing, maybe the most important little nugget we’re giving away here today! Folks, keywords might be important, but you should never focus too much on them. They might help you get more traffic, but people come back to your site for its content. Don’t get so caught up in analytics and keyword research that you don’t publish content as regularly.

So there you have it, three a half little tips on how to avoid keyword pitfalls. It’s simply really.

Read the full post here: 3 And A Bit Keyword Pitfalls To Avoid

No, it isn’t a type of newt or lizard, or any of those little critters for that matter! Longtail describes how niche marketing works on the internet. For example, shops that sell products like DVDs and CDs can only afford to carry the most popular releases. More people would buy said popular products, so the company is able to afford their overhead expenses.  However, by taking geographic location out of the equation, the internet changes everything.

Definitely not a newt

So now that we’ve established that Longtail isn’t a type of reptile, why should you use it? Hang in there, we’re getting to it! The idea is that if you create content and optimise the keywords that aren’t as popular as other terms, you will encounter less competition for the terms and so will ultimately get more page views. As you can see on the graph to the right, the bottom right, the more specific, has fewer results, compared to the ‘generic’ end of the diplodocus. With fewer results to choose from, it increases the likelihood of a potential client finding your site! So instead of focusing entirely on optimising your page for one or two really popular trends, go for Longtail results, meaning a smaller competition and still plenty of room for popularity and profit.

Turquoise peep-toes

In short, Longtail keywords are those phrases that don’t have as large a search volume as the more popular terms out there. For example, I want to buy a pair of shoes. I want some turquoise-coloured shoes.  So, I go ahead and type into my Google search bar, ‘turquoise shoes’.  Bingo!  42,200,000 results. Oh dear, that’s a lot of shoes to look through. So I get more specific. I want these shoes to be heels and I’d like them to be peep-toes, too. This brings my options down to 2,050,000 web pages to choose from. Let’s narrow down that search again, shall we.  I’ve decided that I’d like these shoes to be suede and have an exact heel-height of four inches. We’re now down to 71,500 results. Not bad.  Instead of typing in the single phrase, ‘turquoise shoes’ and getting specific, I’ve significantly narrowed down my selection. Typing ‘suede turquoise peep-toes 4 inch heels’ is by far more effective than my original, ‘turquoise shoes’.  Get it now? Of course you do! And as you can see from the below graph, the longtail keywords actually makes up 70% of the overall searches performed, compared to just 30% for the “popular” search terms!

So, if your business depends on potential customers/clients finding you through a Google search, the Longtail technique is for you. So rather than focus all your efforts on making your webpage the most popular, concentrate on making lots of pages that serve niche markets.

Out with the old…

So, you’ve identified your Longtail phrases, now what? Well, you need to make sure that your site is optimised for them. You can do this by updating old content, or creating new – or both of course!

Creating is of course always good because it means you’ll have more content on your website, meaning more pages are available to be found in a search. Remember, you’re optimising Longtail keywords now, so get specific! So, instead of using the phrase, ‘long-tailed lizard’, you need to include the keywords, ‘Asian’ and ‘grass’, giving you the ‘Asian Long-tailed grass lizard’. Much more specific and a lot more effective!

You might be able to say no to us, but how could you ignore this little guy? Listen to the Asian long-tailed grass lizard. Get long-winded, go Longtail!

Read the full post here: Is it a plane? Is it a bird? No, it’s Longtail!

To use the words of Sir Francis Bacon, “Knowledge is power”. Nowhere is this truer than within your business. Knowledge about what you might ask? Well in this instance, we want to talk about what you know about your customers and how they use your website. Do you know how they find your webpage? Which pages do they look at first and last? How long do they spend on your website? Perhaps you already know this because you’ve been trained in analytics – you lucky thing, you! But has everybody in your company also been trained? Not even the basics? Ah, we thought not.

Back to dear old Francis; knowledge is indeed a powerful thing. Knowing where your customers come from to your webpage means that you can cater to their needs. For example, let’s say that your Twitter page is a hit; 60% of visits to your website this week were accessed through your Twitter feed. Well done you! This means that whatever you’re doing is working and you should keep up the good work! However, what if that number were only 12%? You’d want to change that wouldn’t you; improve the page, attract more followers, encourage them to visit the website etc, etc. The problem is, only you know that. And the chances are that a different member of your team is in charge of your Twitter page. This knowledge should be available to all.

It’s all Greek to me

“But I already do that,” we hear you cry. “I send out the data every week/fortnight/month to all of my staff.” That may be, but are your team really listening? It’s probably a fair assumption to say that they aren’t. Not because they can’t be bothered, but the more likely explanation is that they don’t understand how analytics can be applied to their area of work. If you aren’t trained in analytics, it can be extremely confusing. Like trying to read road signs in a foreign language. And haven’t we all done that before!

“I gael busnes gwell, yn dod y ffordd hon!”

“Pardon”, you ask. And we respond, “Exactly.”  If you aren’t a  Welsh speaker, the last sentence meant very little to you. You weren’t motivated to do anything about it and probably just skimmed over it and moved down to this paragraph. This is what your team does with analytics reports. However, if you were to spend a little while in a classroom, learning the language of the people of Cymru, then you’d be able to translate that sentence for us. The same technique applies to your office: organise for your team to go on a course teaching analytics and they’ll be able to understand those emails you send!

Share and share alike

If everybody has basic knowledge of analytics, then by publishing one batch of data, each individual can see where they’re going right or wrong. They can see where improvements can be made. You shouldn’t have to be part of the marketing team to understand that knowing where the traffic to the website is and isn’t coming from can help with future business. If you can’t get the budget to send your team on a course, or have someone external come in, then organise it yourself. And it’s not just for the marketing managers. Analytics is something that the company as a whole should know about; it should be internalised to make sure you’re using this technique to its full potential. Share your wealth of knowledge; go on. Save a team member from a world of incomprehension today! Shed the light on what can be a bewildering topic to the untrained worker!

Read the full post here: Internalising Analytics Across The Entire Company

What’s in a ‘Tweet’?

If we take the definition of the word ‘tweet’ without its modern internet influence, we can see that it can be described as the vocalisation of a baby bird. This is because even though animals cannot talk in a language recognisable to human beings, they still communicate. We should take a tip or two from those little warblers. (No, seriously)! In business, communication is key, as with all other aspects of life. We communicate constantly; every minute of every hour of every day. We humans just cannot give it a rest! However, how can you transfer your superior skills of prattling and turn it into something useful?

It’s A Fine Art

It’s simple! It’s all in the Art of Conversation.  Twitter in its simplest form can be defined as a “word-of-mouth marketing technique through the online medium”. It’s a dialogue between people. Twitter has been proven to be a powerful tool in customer retention and relationship-building. So, back to this art of natter malarkey.  We here at Fruitbowl Media will be bringing you the simple steps to having a charismatic conversation over the next few blog posts.

Shiny Things

In four easy steps, we’ll tell you everything you need to know about how to create and manage a successful business Twitter account. Twitter is a real-time opportunity to listen to the conversation of the over 200 million users. We’ll show you how to effectively use it as resource to find new customers and most importantly, keep the faithful ones interested. Look out for our shiny tips to help build up your Twitter success. Oh those lovely sparkly little tips! Magpies know exactly what to do with shiny things: collect them up and put them to good use.

Magpie-Friendly Twitter Tips

We’ll be bringing you the 4 Steps of setting up and managing a business Twitter account. In the first step we’ll be outlining how to create your business’ Twitter ‘persona’, then we’ll look at how to use Twitter to increase your clientèle. Then comes Step 3 where we will share our knowledge  about really engaging with your customers and most importantly being a resource to your followers, not a billboard for your product/service. In the fourth and final step, we’ll cover the most important element of creating and managing a business Twitter account: listening. That’s right, there’s more than one participant in a great conversation. And didn’t we say that’s what Twitter is all about, what having a successful Twitter account is all about? Remember the Art of Conversation? You’ll be a master of the word-of-mouth marketing technique!

And if Fruitbowl Media’s 4 Steps to Twitter aren’t enough for you, we’ll be bringing you our in-depth and comprehensive Guides; expanding on our steps, keeping you up-to-date and informed about the best social media platform for your company! Watch. This. Space. Tweeple!

Read the full post here: Magpies And Twitter

However, you can’t get access to these juicy insights if you haven’t set it up quickly! So here’s 3 quick tips to ensure it’s implemented properly.

Install the code everywhere!

Make sure that your web developers have installed tracking code on every page on your site. The easiest and quickest way to implement this is to add to a generic file shared by every page on your site (like the header or footer). If you have a WordPress or one of the other many open source content management system (CMS) then there are loads of tools/plugins for Google Analytics out there, which anyone with access can install and set up in a few minutes.

Goals are your friend

Your website was created to achieve one or more goals. That might be to download a PDF guide, download a podcast, visit a particular page, or complete a contact form. One of the core features of Google Analytics is measuring how many people complete these goals – and for those who don’t, why not?

You need to clearly define each goal (try a pen and paper mind-mapping session) and then input these goals into Google Analytics. You can have 25 for each website profile – which is usually plenty.

Multiple profiles make life that little bit easier

Google Analytics allows you to create multiple profiles for the some domains, which enables you to generate and view reports quickly for the information that matters to you, when you need it. Using this feature is useful if you want to track certain campaigns or segments of your visitors by applying filters to that profile.

For example, you could create a profile that only shows by default users from specific areas (i.e. London), or maybe a profile to track a certain micro-site for a campaign you have set up. Each profile can also be assigned to multiple individuals, allowing you to give access to only certain data for those who need it, and not giving away all your data to those who don’t. One more tip though: always create at least one profile that tracks everything – just in case anything goes wrong!

Read the full post here: Setting up Google Analytics – 3 Quick Tips

Does your business need a mobile website?

Before we answer that, let’s first looks at some of the pros of going mobile:

• Mobile internet is a great way to attract more visitors and potential clients.
• With a mobile-friendly site, it’s easier to reach out to a wider market.
• Mobile websites can cater to the needs of any business type.
• Customers will see you as a company who’s interested in providing quality, up-to-date service.
• It shows that your business is willing to innovate in order to provide easy access to your customers.

These days, mobile phones are no longer just for making calls and sending text messages. Users can access the whole world of the web whilst taking the train to work, whilst having refuel in the coffee shop. As more and more people are using mobile internet, it’s imperative for businesses to tap into the potential market.

And what about the dangers of not embracing mobile?

• Consumers will see you as an old-fashioned business, not willing to try and make purchasing your product/service easy.
• The lack of convenience will put customers off and they may be encouraged to shop elsewhere.
• Consumers are becoming increasingly demanding and expect businesses to have a mobile website. They have little patience for one that doesn’t.

So, back to our first question – does your business need a mobile website?

The answer, quite simply, is YES! The way in which your current and potential clients and customers access the internet is changing, therefore you need to adapt with them. Your customers will thank you for the transition you’ve made from desktop to mobile and will reward you with an increase in sales generated, engagement and loyalty.

Nickels and dimes

Worrying that this will be a costly endeavour for your company? Fret not! Mobile websites cost little to setup and even less to maintain over time. Remember, being mobile means that your site is accessible 24 hours a day, 7 days a week! Having a mobile website will increase your overall market and you won’t lose valuable mobile device users. Like we mentioned earlier, smart phone adoption (as well as countless other devices) is up. You need to be too. Up your game, go mobile.

Read the full post here: Death of the desktop, Embrace Mobile

Take a guess at where I am. A yoga class, you say. You’d be correct! But this isn’t your average set-up. I’m not practising the ancient relaxation ritual at a retreat, a spa, or even the local gym. I’m sitting at my desk; my desk in a busy office.

Office Yoga Anyone?

Yes, Office Yoga. It’s the ultimate respite for some of us who are at the workplace 9-5 most of the week. Wearing the right clothes (no pencil skirts, please), depending on your desk set-up and the understanding of your colleagues, you can enjoy a full yoga session in the mid-afternoon if it’s all getting a bit too much. I feel the most important point to stress is the indulgence of your workmates. After all, some moves to give the impression that you’ve decided to change career spec and become a contortionist. Doing yoga at your desk is really very simple. Using both desk and chair as support, one can perform a variety of exercises like ‘Chair Cat’, ‘Wrist Rotation’ and ‘Sun Greeting’. How very relaxing!

Well, we here at Fruitworks are going to go one better. We’re not content with the limited space behind our desks. We’ll be rearranging the office space; pushing desks against the walls and taking out our yoga mats (or towels for those not as committed to the practise outside of the office) and having a proper yoga session! That’s right, the team will be busy relaxing and finding out who can do the best‘Downward-facing Dog’ as we partake in the ‘Yoga Challenge’.

Competitive Streak

Ah, I didn’t mention the competition element? Probably not the best thing to bring into the calm and peace of the yoga classroom, but we’re bringing it nonetheless! So, it’s Fruitworks versus Service Desk Institute (SDI) in a head-to-head (or should that be Asana-to-Asana?!) The first team to complete a yoga session wins and gets to decide on an appropriate forfeit for the other office. No pressure then folks. May the best office win! So, I’ll bring this blog post to an end whilst I bring my palms together, lightly bowing my head and say to everyone, ‘Namaste!’

Read the full post here: The Yoga Challenge!

Over the next few months I’ll be working closely with Chris to produce lots and lots of lovely content; including blogs, guides, a newsletter and (hopefully) before long, podcasts. I am very much looking forward to researching and writing all about things that are completely off my radar, though not for long as I am eager to learn about all aspects of writing for the company.  I expect I shall learn a great deal and before long I’ll be fully versed in all things Fruitbowl Media.  I am most excited about writing articles for our newsletter as it’s the type of writing I have done least of – and the biggest challenges are always the best!

So, a little bit about me.  I am a first year BA English Language and Linguistics student at the University of Kent. My professors will tell you that Linguistics is a dynamic field of study, a controversial field; exploring the finer points of our many-faceted language. I spend most of my time, however, engrossed in textbooks exploring the finer points of grammatical tense versus grammatical aspect. (Lost yet? I know I am.) So why do I do this? Because I love language of course! It’s something we use every day, and if you’re particularly skilled in the art of language, then you’ll be able learn about the power of persuasion and breaking down communication barriers – something I believe is key to a successful business.

Although I can spot a grammatical error at fifty feet and tell you exactly what an allophone is, I’m afraid that, as of yet, I haven’t put those skills to use in factual/journalistic writing. Before coming to Canterbury, I was involved in an award-winning drama group. I’ve been across the world and written a multi-lingual play exploring global heritage – something which requires excellent communication skills, but not so much excellent article-writing skills. Consequently, my writing has been limited to plays and short stories, but I feel that this is a transferrable skill, so a little less sounding like I’ve swallowed a thesaurus, a little less theatrical and rather more to-the-point and I’m sure I’ll get there. Hang in there, Fruitbowl Media!

Read the full post here: New produce for the pot

Why? Well, because no one is perfect, and occasionally after 10,000 lines of code, a programmer can make a typo. Or a junior designer working on one of his first sites can leave an extra character where it shouldn’t be. Either way, a quick 10 minute check over can catch any silly mistakes that could otherwise cost us a lot of headache, and a lot of unhappy customers!

We’ve decided to share some of the lists we use, so here is the simplest one we have.

Our website launch checklist for small websites (or brochure websites).

Print one out for each website, and get someone else to check it. It should take no more than 15 minutes for an average (<25 pages) website.

Download The PDF Here

Read the full post here: Website Launch Checklist

The comparison of White Hat vs Black Hat originates from old Western films where the good guys would wear white hats and the bad guys black. And how does this apply to the world of SEO?

White Hat SEO agencies (like us here at Fruitbowl Media) are the good guys, improving your website’s ranking in the search engines by using every option available, but without breaking the rules. Black Hat SEO on the other hand uses techniques which break the rules.

And the rules are set by Google. And Google is kind. Here’s 5 early warning signs that you may be dealing with a black hat SEO agency.

1. Over Emphasizing Meta Keywords

Meta keywords appear in the head section of a web page and are not displayed to the end user. They should be a short list (normally 10-15) of keywords and phrases that describe the main themes of the webpage.

Back in the days of Altavista or Lycos this kind of made a difference. But anyone with a bit of sense soon figured they could stuff all their targetted keywords into this meta tag, and boom! They ranked number 1.

No decent search engines care about these anymore – in fact there’s some research over at SEOmoz to suggest you should delete the tag altogether as all it does is show your competitors the keywords your going for.

if your SEO agency stuffs your meta keywords, run a mile!

2. Non-human Readable Meta Descriptions

As before, the search engines of old paid attention to the meta description and looked for relevant keywords. Now, its no.1 purpose is to explain to the user, in easy to understand and clean english, what the page is about.

Google will highlight the search term if it appears in the description in bold, but it doesn’t affect the actual listing position.

If an agency changes your meta descriptions to just be a list of keywords and phrases that makes no sense, you’ve got yourself a black hat.

3. Hidden Content

There are many ways to hide content on your website but one of the simplest methods is to colour the text the same as the background, therefore it’s hidden from the user but search engines can still read it.

There are other techniques such as using hidden input tags in forms or hiding text behind images but using any of these methods will result in your website ending up in Google’s sandbox.

And spending a term in the sandbox can cost you thousands of pounds in lost sales.

4. Link Farms or Spammy Content Networks

Any SEO worth their salt can tell you that incoming links are the backbone of any good SEO campaign. As far as to say some agencies consider link building an entirely separate service to SEO (we don’t, thats just dumb).

Again, older search engines could be fooled by getting links from “spammy” websites. Without going into detail, just know that these websites would stand out a mile to a user, filled with hundreds of links to other websites.

If your SEO agency tells you they have a “network of websites to build an instant incoming link profile” run a mile. Not only do these links add no value (and are therefore a rip off) but in a “post Google’s Panda world” having links from link farms will actually flag  your website onto an inspection list (which is bad) and could end up in a trip to the sandbox.

And as we’ve said, the sandbox is bad.

5. Doorway Pages

A doorway page is a web page that has been specifically created and optimised for a high-traffic keyword. But the user never gets to see this page, because as soon as they land on it they’re automatically redirected to another web page, which usually has nothing to do with the original keyword. Search engine’s algorithms are continually improving and web pages such as this are removed very swiftly.

Followed by a trip to the sandbox.

Summary

These are 5 of the tamest Black Hat SEO techniques. There are much more aggressive techniques, but we don’t really want to blog about them because we don’t want to be seen promoting or educating about them.

This post isn’t meant to be an education into Black Hat, but a few pointers to watch out for. You should always aim to go with an ethical agency, following Google’s rules. Its the best way to ensure you’ll never get penalized in future updates!

Read the full post here: 5 Black Hat SEO Warning Signs

Read the full post here: Anatomy Of An Agency [INFOGRAPHIC]

5. Kenneth Cole

Fashion designer Kenneth Cole PR team sparked outrage by using the protests in Egypt in an light hearted way to push its brand out. Stating that the protests and “uproar” was due to the Spring Collection from Kenneth Cole being released. Classy guys…

Kenneth Cole Tweet Makes light of Egypts Protests

4. Habitat

Habitat UK may have recently shut down, but from seeing its Social Media Strategy its no wonder! It seems Habitat UK must have sat down at a big table and discussed what people do on twitter. They came up people search hashtags. They where correct. Where they where wrong was adding random hashtags that have nothing to do with them or the tweets causing outrage on the community for the first know spam campaign.

Habitat UK Spam Twitter

3. Vodafone

VodafoneUK twitter team are normally known to actually be quick helpful (unlike the rest of its customer service but that’s another story!, but when one of its employees took it upon himself to update the Twitter account, without possibly thinking at all, thinks went quite sour for poor old Vodafone…

VodafoneUK - Homophobic Remarks!

2. Microsoft

Microsoft makes it into our number one spot. One of the worlds largest companies recently failed massively recently not just once but twice within a short period.

On the 12th March, Microsoft decided that the Japan earthquake was a great way to increase its twitter following. Offering a $1 for every retweet up-to the value of $100k, they annoyed alot of people. Realising they had gone mucked up, they quickly offered an apology on Twitter and donated the $100k straight away regardless of retweets. Sure if Mr Gates was about, he would have slapped the idiot who came up with this idea right round the back of the head!

Bad PR for Mircrosoft

1. Microsoft (AGAIN!)

Of course following the Japan Quake incident you think that the MS departments would be briefed on how to handle delicate situations, but nope! When Amy Winehouse passed away Mircrosoft brought it upon themselves to try to promote its Zune store. Offering Amy Winehouse downloads for her album “Back to black”

Microsoft Tweet about Amy Winehouse

Read the full post here: 5 examples of why your social network accounts need to have restricted access

This means knowing which techniques are useful and will actually improve a websites ranking and which techniques are just myths and may even hinder me in ranking well. Hence the reason for this blog post as I wanted to create a list of what I think are the top 5 myths when it comes to SEO and to hear your feedback on those myths, whether what I think is true or not.

Myth 1 – You must have lots of Keywords

I can hear you saying it now… “keywords aren’t important! What is he on about?” let me explain. In the beginning search engines relied heavily on keywords and the density of those keywords when ranking websites. This lead to ‘optimisers’ stuffing their web pages full of keywords in order to improve their ranking.

Whilst this may have worked in the beginning it doesn’t now, search engines have changed their algorithms and you may even get penalised for keyword stuffing. I’m not saying keywords aren’t important, far from it, but keywords need to be implemented into your content in a natural way.

Myth 2 – You need to be Technically Minded

Many people think the technical side of your website is key in making your site climb up the rankings in search rankings and that you need to be technically minded or a programmer to have a chance in improving your websites ranking but this is not the case, SEO is not a technical skill.

Sure is does help to make sure you have a sitemap.xml uploaded and a robots.txt file in place but it’s much more important that you’re not doing something Google doesn’t like. Google will rank you lower if you have something on your website which is slowing your website down, having lots of broken links or implementing black hat SEO (something I will talk about in a future blog).

Myth 3 – PageRank is Everything

This is one myth I fell for until recently. I was led to believe that PageRank was Google’s be all and end all measurement of how well your website ranked in their eyes, meaning the higher the PageRank the higher you ranked.

This is not strictly the case. Whilst having a high PageRank is a good thing it doesn’t necessarily mean your website will always rank higher. Pagerank is just one factor of many used by Google to establish the Reputation (or trustworthiness) of a website. But this is only half of the battle.

Myth 4 – Commenting on Blogs

When it comes to SEO, links are very important and people believe by commenting on blogs and forums and leaving links to their website at the bottom of their comment it will help improve their rankings. This is not true for 2 reasons:

1. Most bloggers add the ‘nofollow’ tag to all comments
2. Search engines know people ‘comment spam’ and therefore pay increasingly less attention to them

Myth 5 – Submitting your Website

In the past when a website was new you had to submit that site to the search engines, this informed them that your website existed. It is argued by some that you no longer need to submit your website as search engines will eventually find your website.

I’m still a little dubious about this myth, what if your website contains no inbound or outbound links, how would a search engine find it? What I do know is you do not need to pay a company huge amounts of money to submit your website to a search engine. If you see a company focussing on this service, steer well clear!

There are many more SEO myths than just the 5 I’ve listed above and probably some more that I’m not even aware of. If you know of any others or if you think one of the above myths has some truth to it then please let me know in the comments below, I’m always happy to hear what others have to say (even if I might not agree with you!)

Read the full post here: Top 5 SEO Myths

High Street Stores and Supermarkets spend tens, if not hundreds millions of pounds every year ensuring that their stores are kept ‘fresh’, expanding product range, investing in more shops, ensuring their branding is uniformed across all their outlets, and on staff training. Yet when it comes to their online shops, many stores are still lacking the attention to detail they spend on their high street stores. Yet consumers spent over £10 billion online in January and February and Office for National Statistics published last month showed internet sales in the UK running at £527m per week. Below are the top 5 reasons as to why consumers are leaving online stores and how to prevent them.

1. Spelling Mistakes

The number one reason why consumers abandon a online transaction is simply incorrect spelling and grammer.

Charles Duncombe states that one spelling mistake is enough to cut your online sales in half. If you take that into consideration when thinking that UK online sales is currently worth £527m per week, you may want to double check your sites! It may also lead to concerns about a website’s credibility to a consumer.

Your IT department/ Web Developers/ Web Designer should never double as your copy writers. Why? Simply because they know how to build and design your online store. They do not know all your products and they are not your product development team! You wouldn’t let your decorators try to sell your products to customers would you…

2. Load Times

The number one complaint from consumers in retail stores is long waiting times. The average broadband connection is the UK is now 6.8mbps. Yet online retailers are still failing to make their pages load fast enough.

Strangeloop – a company specializing in site loading times, published a report which showed that if a page takes longer than 3 seconds to load then 57% of customers will leave that site, and 80% will not return. A one second delay in page load time will account for a 7% loss in conversions (sales).

Try to reduce external assers calls. Introduce image sprites to reduce the number of http requests, ensure that all images are optimized for the web and try to use as much HTML5 and CSS3 to reduce the amount of images, and plugins for your site.

3. Bad Design

So your site loads quick, and you have hired a copy writer to ensure that all your information is correct. However is site design working? Is your site in-line with your corporate identity or even in style? Have you done user testing? Can your users get around the site with ease? Are their clear, defined steps to take when purchasing?

Sit down and think about what you are selling. Figure out who your target audience is online (not always same as in store!) and map out how they interact with the website. Discuss with your designer the layout using wireframes, and CTA (call to actions). Make sure your designer understands good website design and practice and one last thing… if your job title is anything other than “graphic designer / lead graphic designer” then you my friend are not a graphic designer.

4. Lack of Information

You look at the products on your site – they have an image, price, name, description, customer reviews. Great stuff. Try to find your links to your contact information, delivery charges and refunds procedure in 10 seconds! Go…

Nope? Oh dear! I recommend buying this book. Its an evenings read and on Web Computing degrees the first book on the reading list! Customers are worried about three things when shopping online. Returns – You are not a shop they can pop into – let them know how to return things. Contact information – They need to get hold of you. Maybe the product has been lost in transit, its turned up and broke, they want to ask more questions. Engage with them! Delivery Charges – Why online shops still charge for this I have no idea! You choose to sell it this way, so why make customers pay for your choice. However if you must do it – ensure they are given it in plain English! Its data so use of tables is allowed!

Make the changes, and get your mates to find them in 10 seconds! Go… Worked? Great!

5. Payment Methods

And of course I don’t just mean payment types but how easy is your transactions to process by customers? Have your forms got inline checks for mistakes? If an error occurs have you got a page which helps customers (we all that wonder when you hit submit, and an “Page not found” pops up if we have been scammed or if its been paid for!). Does your form re-populate with previously entered details? If not, why not?

Now…there are plenty of ways to take payment for products but you are online. Here are the four main ways to pay online:

• PayPal
• Credit Card
• Debit Card
• Google Checkout

Have you got all of these? If not, why not? Giving your customers as much options to pay ensures they are not put off if they are afraid of using one of the other methods.

Read the full post here: Top 5 reasons why potential customers leave your e-commerce store

In a previous job I had used Google Analytics to produce a number SEO reports for clients so I thought I was fairly up-to-speed with how Google Analytics worked and how I should be using it. However over the last few weeks I’ve been working through the Google Analytics IQ lessons to help prepare me for the exam and I now realise I had actually just been a member of the group HITS… How Idiots Track Success (I didn’t come up with that acronym)!

Many of the reports I had created in the past for clients involved looking at how many hits (or visits) that website had received and what the current bounce rate was for the various pages so nothing too in-depth. But one of the biggest things I learnt from completing the Google Analytics lessons is that I needed to move beyond just tracking hits to websites and to look at the bigger picture… goals!

Every website is created for a reason whether it’s just for having an online presence for your business or for selling products online. One thing every website should have though is a goal, something that they want their website to achieve and this is where understanding Google Analytics and knowing the ins-and-outs of the 130+ reports can really help you achieve that goal.

Lets say for example you have an online shop and your main goal is to sell products. Whilst it’s still important to know how many people visited your website, I believe it’s much more important to understand why you may not be achieving your goals. Think of it this way, you’ve spent hundreds of pounds on marketing for your website and getting your website to appear on the first page of Google and you’re receiving hundred’s of hits but you’re only making a few sales! What’s going on? What if I was to say your customers were adding products to their shopping basket, proceeding through to the checkout but then suddenly leaving your website completely? This might suggest customers are finding the checkout process too confusing. Maybe customers are leaving the checkout, going to the delivery page and then leaving the site, which may indicate some customers are finding your delivery costs too high.

I believe information like this is much more valuable to you than just knowing the number of hits your website has received. Any member of the HITS group can easily tell you the number of hits your website has had but you need to move beyond this basic type of reporting and delve a little deeper to find the really important stuff to help achieve your goals.

So don’t be an idiot, get to know Google Analytics, take the Google Analytics exam and don’t become a member of the HITS group! Alternatively contact us and we can do it all for you!

Read the full post here: Google Analytics: Don’t Be An Idiot!

For a start, getting me “1000 new followers a week!” is not only useless, it’s dangerous. And in case you’re already thinking “You get what you pay for, I don’t use those types of offshore agencies…” this wasn’t from those wonderfully designed, “Engrish” type websites either – these were respectable agencies based around London.

Getting annoyed by this research was enough to finally get the Fruitbowl Media blog setup, and here’s my inaugural blog post: 5 reasons your company’s Twitter follower count is meaningless

1. I can buy 20,000 followers for $40

If you don’t believe me, do a Google search and take your pick. I’m serious. And spotting these people is easy because everyone uses the same process/technique: the followback effect.

Let me explain: If you follow someone on Twitter, they will probably follow you back (they might even have software that does this automatically without even caring who you are).

Used properly, using the followback effect can actually be a semi-effective way to discover your Twitter community.

And properly means organically, gradually and by a real human. And by semi-effective I mean it isn’t the whole story to building a Twitter following, but it can be one of the strategies.

But these guys just stick you username/password into some automatic software, run a few searches on some generic keywords, and then hit the ‘Go’ button. Your account then starts following people, and if they don’t follow you back within X days, you unfollow them. Rinse, repeat.

If you want those kinds of followers, don’t get them from your £175 /hr agency, buy them from a guy in India for $40. He promises only the top very bestest targeted followers for you sir…

2. Amassing lots of followers with spammy techniques can get you banned

So what’s wrong with this “bulk wholesale Twitter followers” shindig and why is the follow-back effect so dangerous?

Simply put, it can get you banned from Twitter. It’s done automatically, by software that attempts to game/exploit Twitter. Even with plenty of random number generators making the timings seemingly random eventually you’ll be flagged as a spammer by Twitter users.

Get enough spam flags, and your suspended.

3. Your followers don’t even know you

Think about what happened to get those 20,000 (for example) followers. You just ran upto someone in the street and said “FOLLOW ME!” and then ran off again. If they started chasing you, great. If not, you’ll just keep shouting in more peoples faces.

Would you do that at a conference?

Or instead, would you begin a conversation, ask the person about themselves, their interests, their job role, see where you might be able to help them out, leverage connections, share a best practice report etc.

It’s the same principle as those business card collectors you get at tradeshows. No one calls those guys back. No one even knows who they are.

To your followers, your just noise in their timeline (if they even watch their timeline).

4. How much time can you commit each day to talking to your twitter followers?

So you built up 5,000 followers without using the guys I recommended in India. Cool. But you don’t have any in-house community manager, and your only paying your agency for 2 hours per month?

So how are you actually communicating with those followers?

If you just want an audience for your broadcasts, who may or may not see the links you shout about, great you got it. But if you’ve been to any marketing conference, read a recent marketing book or followed a marketing blog in the last 3 years, you’ve probably heard this buzzword already: engagement.

Engagement is a lovely word I hear dropped into any conversation by anyone who wants to prove they get Twitter and Facebook.

But seriously, it’s just talking. conversation. Discussion. It’s been around for a while you know.

When was the last time you had a conversation with 5,000 people in under 2 hours? I’ve been to 3 hour networking evenings and only managed to really talk to 20 people out of the 40 who were in the room.

If you don’t have the resources to do anything with your audience, you can’t afford to pay your agency for more hours, or you don’t have a community engagement rockstar, then your not getting the benefit from your 5,000 followers.

You might even annoy a few of them by not having enough time to respond to @mentions…

5. Twitter is a game

Twitter was a bit of a silent pioneer of gamification. They pushed everyone’s follower count as a status symbol pretty early. Just how everyone wanted to have the highest score at snake on their friends Nokia 3210, everyone on Twitter wants to have a higher follower count than their peers.

And just like that snake highscore, it’s about bragging rights. And everyone is playing the same game. Everyone is getting a high follower count for status, to look like they have more customers, more fans, more supporters.

But because we know all of the many dubious ways to gain a high follower count, we aren’t falling for it anymore. Neither are your customers. We know a follower count is as reliable as the UK Train Times.

Don’t waste money building 3,000 followers for the sake of saying you have 3,000 followers.

As the saying goes, “a good friend helps you move house, a best friend helps you move a body”.

Read the full post here: 5 reasons your company’s Twitter follower count is meaningless