Do you need a helping hand with your Google page rank or are you experiencing reoccurring problems with the search engine results page? If you said yes, you might be interested is some of the things I dug up while peeking around Google the other day. Unfortunately this topic has been rehashed thousands of times so I will try and provide relevant up to date links to help alleviate any problems your having with Google page rank.

   This great tidbit came from Webmaster Central's Google Product Forums asking about SPAM and it boils down to properly building a Google friendly webpage or blog posting. Black hat has been temporarily knocked back a step with the Panda and Penguin updates and it might be time to think about putting the white hat on for a while.

To properly apply White Hat SEO we need to first set down some ground rules. What follows are important steps that will help improve your standing with Google :

Google Wants a Great Title Tag

   We will cover the title first. You need to create an original descriptive title for each of your webpages.  Creating a descriptive title is critically important to your website audience as it gives a quick overview into your blog posting or webpage content and explains to Google why your page is relevant to their query. It lays down the foundation that is used to decide which result a reader selects. Do yourself a favour and stop for a second the next time you’re ready to blog post. That high quality title could really make a difference and an honest title will build a great reputation as well as help with your Google page rank.

The title should follow these simple rules :

• It should entice the reader to take a peek.
• Your main key phrase should be in the title and it should always describe your post, business or webpage.
• Every letter of each word in the title should be capitalized except for articles, prepositions or conjunctions.
• No unnecessary punctuation.
• Make the title less that 8 words.
• Don't use your company name in the title.
• Do not include words and phrases such as "Welcome to," and "Homepage of" or "Website" in your titles.
• And finally, create unique title tags for each page.

Fix Your Meta Description Tags

   Next we are off to the Meta Description Tags. These are used to describe the body of your page, blog posting or gallery of images. For Google to remain happy and your page rank piece of mind, the Description Meta Tags should follow these simple guidelines :

• Include your key phrases in your Description Meta Tags.
• Do not capitalize all of your descriptor key words.
• Meta Descriptions should be kept under 25 words.
• Don't repeat the entire site title in the description.
• Do not include: street/mailing and e-mail addresses, telephone numbers, hours of operation, prices, or other URLs.

Googles View on Proper Body Copy SEO

   Next is the body of your page, blog post or article.  Google loves to grab at the real meat of the page so it requires that you focus your undivided attention when it comes to keywords and proper SEO techniques. To keep Google ranking happily the following train of thought should keep you on track :

• You must use your keywords in the body of the page itself.
• Never use hidden text or hidden links
• Do not attempt to trick the crawlers with sneaky re-directs or cloaking
• Don't load pages with irrelevant keywords.
• Don't create multiple pages, subdomains, or domains with the exact same content.
• Don't create pages with malicious behavior, such as phishing or installing viruses, Trojans, or other bad ware.
• Avoid dumping large amounts of text on varying topics onto a page without paragraph, subheading, or layout separation.
• Don't rely on dropdown navigation menu's alone. Search engines can't follow these.

Obvious SEO Everyone Should Know

  Finally the obvious SEO points to skim over. These ones you should know because everyone repeats the same thing over and over ad-nauseum. Keeping you Google rank healthy just requires you to keep applying these common sense points of reference:

• Use easy-to-read text that is well written and easy to follow
• If your site participates in an affiliate program, make sure that your site adds value.
• Provide unique and relevant content that gives users a reason to visit your site.
• And finally, make your site easy to navigate.

Hover over the final product and take her for a spin.

1.  Create a blank Jimdo page

   Open up a blank page on your Jimdo website and make it hidden using the eyeball icon. This way you can experiment without prying eyes. If make a mistake or are stuck the css code is included in a text file at the end of this tutorial.

With your new Jimdo Page, create the following:

• A horizontal line element.
• Two 50px Spacing elements.
• and finally add another horizontal line element.

   You should now have 4 elements in place looking something like this:

2.  Creating and placing our HTML Jimdo snippet

   We now have a boxed in area on our Jimdo page to hold the animation we are going to display.

   The next step is to place the html5 snippet code in place. Snippets allow you to put in special markup code such as Javascript and or HTML Tags and Elements.

There is two ways to insert this code.

   The first way is to create a text element using Jimdo's element menu bar on the left side of the page. The bar will display when you hover over any existing element on the page. After creating a new text element you would then select the 'Edit HTML Source' button located on the top html menu. This now allows you to place the code behind the text editor. This is a little complicated but there is an easier way.

   Hover over the first 50px element we created

From the Jimdo element menu bar on the left side of the page, do the following:

• Select Add New Element
• From the Drop down list select Widget/HTML

A Jimdo widget now opens up ready for your code.

Copy and paste the snipped code below into the widget you just created or manually enter in the text.

Now hit the save button when complete.

3. Understanding what the HTML code represents.

   Between elements, attributes, tags, divs and classes, it can get confusing at times. What the html code represents can be a chore to understand but hopefully what follows might clear things up for you.

Let's begin first by quickly talking about tags, elements and attributes.

• Tags can be thought of as a piece of land.
• Elements can be thought of as everything between the tags < >. In our code snippet the element is div. Think of an element as the house on the land.
• The location of the house can be thought of as an attribute. In our code snippet the attributes are class and id. The values assigned are ball-background, ball and shadow.
• Again, just think of the div tags we created as a piece of empty land (div) that has a house (attribute) . The house has an address to receive mail (class id) and values attached.

   Now if you look at our code snippet you will see that we have created 3 Div tags or 3 houses so to speak. Notice they have an opening tag <> and a closing tag </> reference. This creates a division or a section and allows the grouping of elements for easy reference. Every tag inside the div will be thought of as a child of that div.

Each Tag or house has been assigned their first attributes

• the first div tag has an id attribute named ball-background
• the second and third div tags are class attributes named ball and shadow
• Notice that the div tags are not displaying anything. This is due to the fact that they are sitting empty, for now.
• If you hover between the 2 50px space elements you created you will see a thin element presented for editing. Clicking on it will display the code snippet element you just entered.

Now is a good time to explain the id and class definitions:

id attributes can be thought of as:

• Postal addresses so we can find the tag or element inside the tag.
• You can put multiple id's on a webpage but they must have a unique name that no other id or class has.
• The name of the id should describe the element or tag it represents.
• Always use lowercase letters.
• If more than one word is used in the name, use a dash('-') or an underscore ('_') instead of spacing the words apart.
• The element the id represents can be referenced by using the pound symbol '#'
• You can place the id in a link or address query for navigational purposes.
• An id is more specific than a class, hence its attributes are stronger.

class attributes can be thought of as:

• Postal addresses so we can find the element or house itself.
• You can put multiple classes on one webpage but they cannot share an id name.
• The name of the class should describe the element it represents.
• Use lowercase letters but for me personally, I like to capitalize the first letter of the first word in a class.
• If more than one word is used in the name, use a dash('-') or an underscore ('_') instead of spacing the words apart.
• You can have multiple, same named classes on a webpage.
• A class is more specific than the element it is in, hence its attributes are stronger but a class is weaker than an id.
• You can make attribute changes to all elements in the same class by using referencing the class name assigned to it.
• The attributes the class represents are referenced using the period symbol '.'

   Hopefully now you should be able to see that class and id's are user-defined address markers so to speak. This allows you to change things about a tag or  element and, in the case of id, reference its location directly using links.

Remember :

• The Div tags we just created can be thought of as empty houses waiting for movers to bring in furniture. The address of the houses are represented by the class or id assigned value or attribute.
• Using the above rules for class and id allows us to create only one ball-background div tag due to the assigned 'id' attribute.
• But we are able to create many ball and shadow div tags because they have been assigned the 'class' attribute.

   If your still confused, have a little patience, it will come to you. It is going to get a little more complicated now because we are going to start filling up those div tags with some interesting attributes.

4.  Creating our first Jimdo CSS3 Internal Style Sheet

   Now the Jimdo fun begins. We are going to start creating our styles to fill in the div tags we have set down in our Jimdo HTML. You will see how the id and div tags interact and how you can place margins, size an image and create transitions.

   To create our CSS3 Style Sheet rule we are first going to modify the head element of our Jimdo page and create an internal style sheet. Don't worry, you won't break anything.

   In edit mode, open the Jimdo drop down menu on the top right of the page. Click the setting icon and then select the Edit Head icon from the website category.

   Scroll down to the end of the existing code, select the last line of code and then make sure you are at the very end by using the arrow keys if necessary.

Hit enter 3 times to create some space for yourself to work.

  Now copy / paste or manually type in the above code into the free space you created in the head of the page.

  Look at the code and observe the opening <style> and closing <style> tags. This creates an address or space to place information just like the empty div tags we place in step 2. This created style element is then assigned an inline attribute of 'text/css'. This tells the browser that every element inside this style tag can be thought of as a style and that this whole block is a now a stylesheet.

  Before we save the information we should get into the habit of leaving comments about the changes we make. To give you more practice grab the code snippet below and place it in the head section twice, once above and below the code you entered or pasted.  '/*' and '*/' tells your browser that everything inside is a remark and should be ignored.

/*

--   remarks  --

 */

   Enter in the a description of the code, your name and date into the top remark. In the bottom remark just announce the end of the code change. Your comment should be now understood in future by anyone following behind you.

Top example:

/*

-- ball background code - Tim - 12/27/2013 --

*/

Bottom :

/*

-- end of code change --

*/

5.  Understanding the CSS3 Code for our Jimdo Image

  Your first hand-made Jimdo style sheet must have an opening tag and closing tag and must have a type assigned to it.

<style type="text/css">

..

..</style>

   We next need the parser to ignore the information on the sheet otherwise we could get validation errors so we need to place the opening and closing CDATA tags

/*<![CDATA[*/

..

../*]]>*/

Now it's time to create our style sheet rule. Remember with CSS everything has a beginning and an end.

   First we need declare the style effects of the ball-background div element which is sitting empty. To assign these effects we use the div tag followed by the pound sign # and then the name of the id itself. Make sure that you leave omit spaces and remember that the pound sign denotes the id attribute. This first part of the style sheet rule is called the selector.

   Take note that after the selector there is a space and then a open-curly-brace and a closing-curly-brace. The content inside these braces will hold the assigned values of the div. This second part of the style sheet rule is called the declaration.

selector {declaration}

div#ball-background {

....

...}

Declarations:

A declaration has two parts: property and value or method, separated by a colon. Each selector can have more than one declaration.  Remember to end each declaration with a semi-colon. 

We are first going to set the maximum width and height of the div in pixels.

• width: 400px;
• height: 400px;

   Next we need need to set the top , right, bottom and left margins in that order. This creates a transprarent border inside the div.  The div's new dimension will now expand to 470px wide by 485 high.

• margin: 30px 45px 55px 25px;

   Now we need an image for the div. I have uploaded the image used here to my google+ account and the address is provided below.

• background:url(https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-v6_CQngbCEs/Ur2tR7mF2RI/AAAAAAAAB2k/T1aFI6w7v10/s375-no/jimdo-logo.gif);

  Moving along, we now need to size the image. The image loaded is smaller than the 400 x 400 px of the div. We do not want to repeat it over again to fill the area in. Just so you know, we could of used a very small image to create a pattern to fill the div.

• background-repeat:no-repeat;

   We find out unfortunatly that the image we are loading is smaller than the 400x400 pixels, so we need to stretch the image to fill in the div area. The image is currently 300px x 300px so the aspect ratio will remain the same. The only thing lost is a little resolution by the stretching.

• background-size:100% 100%;

   Finally we are going to create a transition event in the next step. We need to set a time limit of 3 seconds between changes in the div's state. We are using all other defaults such as easing to save your eyeballs from reading too much.

• transition-duration: 3s;

   Save the file and look over the information to check that it has been validated. If Jimdo catches invalid markup it will remove it.

   You need to now reload the page for the new information to take effect. Once the page is refreshed you should see the image displayed where you inserted the div tags.

6.  Applying our First Jimdo CSS3 Transition

Now we are going to bring our div id to life in our Jimdo Tutorial.

   In edit mode, again open the Jimdo drop down menu on the top right of the page. Click the setting icon and then select the Edit Head icon from the website category. Scroll down and find the code you just placed.

   Starting at the div#ball-background scripts closing curly brace, create some space using the enter key so you have some room to work. You should always leave one space between each element declaration you make.

A cut-out example of your head section

div#ball-background{

.....existing code.............

}

<-- place hover code here --->

/*]]>*/
</style

   Copy-paste or type in the hover script located below into the space you just created for yourself in the head section.

7  Understanding the Hover Transition Code:

  We need to first declare a hover selector on the id div. This will allow us to trigger an event. Take note that hover must come after link and visited if present.

div#ball-background:hover {

....

...}

   The hover trigger is now in place and now we need to apply the declarations to execute the event. Before we continue, notice the pound sign '#' in the selector and remember that it refers to an 'id'.

Lets now look at the first transform property declarations.

-webkit-transform: scale(1.4) rotate(180deg);

• The words before the colon ':' refer to the browser being used
• But the '-' at the beginning tells us that the browser's different versions have not finalized the default code for this event.
• The scale value creates a 2D scale transformation. In this example we will increase the size of the div's background image by 40%.
• The rotate value will rotate the div's background by 180 degrees.

   Because the transform property is in development on some browsers, we unfortunately must make seperate calls using vendor prefixes to each browser to allow the event to happen. If you do not have a browser that supports the event, have not updated your browser or do not make calls to the browsers developing the event, nothing will happen on your screen. Hope that makes sense.

  Google Chrome and Opera browsers currently use Webkit so we know those browsers will run the -webkit-transform event we have listed above.

  -moz-transform tells us that Firefox supports the event and this will work on their browsers.

  -o-transform tells us that Opera supports the event and this will work on their browsers.

  -ms-transform tells us that Windows Explorer supports the event and this will work on their browsers.

  Transform is the final prefix and should always be last because it is the default setting. Any browser not covered with the other prefixes and or has finalized development will run this transition.

  If you have the above browsers and this event does not trigger may I suggest you update your browser.

  Save the Head file again and look over the information to check that it has been validated. If Jimdo catches invalid markup it will remove it.

  You need to now reload the page again for the new information to take effect. Once the page is refreshed you should see the image and when you hover over the image the event will trigger. The event will last 3 seconds to reach its end state and if you move your mouse off the image it will slowly return to its original state.

8.  Creating our Jimdo Tutorial Orb and Shadow

Now we are going to create an Orb for our Jimdo Tutorial and it's Shadow

   In edit mode, again open the Jimdo drop down menu on the top right of the page. Click the setting icon and then select the Edit Head icon from the website category. Scroll down again and find the hover code you just placed.

   Starting at the closing curly brace again of the div#ball-background:hover script you just installed, create some space again using the enter key so you have some more room to work.

A cut-out example is provided again of your head section

div#ball-background:hover {

.....existing code.............

}

<-- place div.ball {} and div.ball + div.shadow  code here --->

/*]]>*/
</style

   Copy-paste or type in the div.ball {} and div.ball + div.shadow script located below into the space you just created for yourself in the head section.

9. Understanding the CSS3 Code for our Ball and Shadow

   In your Jimdo head section you should notice first that we have some of the same properties as the ball-background div but with different values.

  You also should of noticed that instead of a '# pound sign we have a period connecting the terms in the selector. This tells us that we are dealing with a class div. Make sense yet?

Now the fun part.

   div.ball + div.shadow creates an adjacent sibling relationship. This is important because we want the shadow to follow the ball. The rule will apply to all shadows that are created right after a ball element and both the shadow and the ball must have the same parent, which in our case is the ball-background div element. Might be a little confusing but just remember they now can operate in sync. 

The Declarations of the ball and shadow

We are first going to set the maximum width and height of the divs in pixels.

• The first ball div is square in size and 200px by 200px
• The shadow div is a rectangle and 200px by 40px in size.

   The first ball div is created using the ball-background div as a parent. This div sits inside the ball-background div and expands outwards 200px from the top left and 200 px down. With me so far?

   The second div or the shadow div has the ball background div as its parent. It also sits inside the ball-background div but due to the first ball taking up space it must sit below it. The shadow is 200px in length and only 40px in height.

   The Border radius declaration creates rounded corners with the fact that the larger the number the greater the rounding. 50% gives you a circle or ellipse shape depending upon the dimensions given.

   The transition-duration declaration again means the same thing as the ball-background div.

   The background: radial-gradient declaration values are

(center, shape size, start-color, and  last-color);

• The first value positions the center of the gradient. Center is default
• We see that the next value determines the shape. Circular is default
• And final aspect is the color value and color stops.

For the circle simplistically speaking :

• The center of the gradient lies at 40% of the box’s width horizontally and 40% of the height vertically, the color starts as a Cyan in the center, moves to light blue at the half way mark and ends in a dark blue near the edge.

For the shadow simplistically speaking :

• The center of the gradient is in the middle and starts as black, moves to grey just past the halfway mark and finally goes transparent at the outer edge.

   That was unfortunatly a mouthful  of information and hopefully I didn't confuse the issue. Save the head again and look over the information to see that it has been validated. If Jimdo finds invalid markup it will remove it.

   You need to now reload the page again for the new information to take effect. Once the page is refreshed you should see the orb and shadow displayed where you inserted the div tags. Next stop is the animation.

10. Applying CSS3 Transitions to our Orb and Shadow

   Now we are going to make the Orb and it's Shadow roll around using again the magic of CSS3 and Jimdo. We are almost done so breath a sigh of relief and prepare to copy the last part of code.

   A cut-out example is again provided of your head section. We last left off with div.ball + div.shadow element. Again for the last time open the Jimdo drop down menu on the top right of the page. Click the setting icon again and then select the Edit Head icon from the website category. Scroll down again and find the hover code you just placed.

div.ball + div.shadow {

.....existing code.............

}

<-- place div.ball:hover {} and the div.ball:hover + div.shadow {}    code here --->

/*]]>*/
</style

   Copy-paste or type in the div.ball:hover {} and div.ball:hover + div.shadow {} script located below into the space you just created for yourself in the head section.

11.  Understanding the Ball and Shadow's Translate Method

    You should of spotted the transform property and rotate method and also noticed the seperate calls using prefixes to each browser from the CSS3 code snippets we installed before. If you need a refresher course just scroll up and review, I can wait, after-all, it can be hard to remember.

Lets now look at the the Translate method.

   The translate method allows you to move your Jimdo created orb by a specified distance along the X and Y axes. It is a faster way to animate and can be made interactive with a little bit of research.

In our animation we have :

   translate(300px)  This allows us to move the ball and shadow 300px when the hover event triggers, simple as that.

   Save the Head file for the last time and look over the information again to check that it has been validated. If Jimdo catches invalid markup it will remove it.

   You need to now, for the last time, reload the page for the new information to take effect. Once the page refreshes you should see the orb again and when you hover over the orb, the event will trigger and it should begin moving. The event will take 3 seconds to take place again and if you move your mouse off the orb it will slowly turn around and return to its original state.

Conclusion to the Jimdo Spin Tutorial

   I hope you have enjoyed the tutorial and if you want to reseach this deeper we have a wealth of information on CSS3 Transitions and animation located in our resource bubbles. Have fun with your Jimdo website build and keep on being creative.

Expand your Jimdo Knowledge with our CSS3 Animation Tutorials.

Using Google Plus To Appear In The Top Results Every Time | Whiteboard Friday

4 Tips for Promoting Infographics and Other Visual Content Online

Sharing of online content by users on the Google+ social network is set to surpass sharing by Facebook users by February 2016 according to a new US study from search and social analytics specialist, Searchmetrics. The forecast comes in the run up to the 2nd anniversary of the introduction of Google+ which was first announced at the end of June 2011.

Encouraging people to share URLs for web content they find online with their friends on Google+, and collating data about how actively these links are shared and by whom, is very likely  a vital part of Google’s strategy for delivering fast relevant search results according to Marcus Tober, founder and CTO of Searchmetrics.  And his company’s analysis indicates that Google+ is enjoying rapid success in this area.

“Google wants as many people as possible to share things – web pages, blog posts, videos etc - they find useful and relevant with people they are connected to on Google+. It can roll up this information into the mass of data that helps it understand which content people consider valuable and useful and give it insights about how to position it in search results. This social data will also help Google build more personalized search results that tie in with a person’s social network connections and activities – something for which many people think Facebook has a head start,” explains Tober.

http://www.realwire.com/releases/Social-sharing-on-Google-to-overtake-Facebook-by-2016-predicts-new-study

[Infographic] Google’s 200 Ranking Factors

   There’s no doubt that Google’s algorithm is more complex — and volatile — than ever. The days where SEO was all about meta tags and backlinks is long gone. Google now uses at least 200 ranking factors in their algorithm, including social signals, user-interaction signals, and trust.

If you’d like a bird’s eye view of these factors, then this infographic by Entrepreneur.com and Backlinko may give you some much needed perspective. The piece covers all of the known 200 ranking signals that Google uses to rank sites and pages. However, it’s important to note that many of these aren’t proven or official ranking signals.

http://www.searchenginejournal.com/infographic-googles-200-ranking-factors/

Author: thegoldenpipewrench+

But for some.......

The Pearl Harbor of algorithm updates

   Worst of all for many website owners was the fact that Hummingbird was launched as a kind of sneak attack, with Google dropping the bomb without warning which had the effect of taking many website owners by surprise.

Newswire.net reported that:

   “In the past, Google’s Panda and Penguin updates have struck fear in the hearts of SEOs as they watched their clients’ rankings plummet. While Panda and Penguin affected 1% or 2% and still caused panic, this new update is reported to affect the majority of search results and no one noticed until the announcement was made a month later.

   The last Google update that replaced this much of the search engine was in 2010 with the ‘Caffeine’ update. Caffeine introduced the ‘live search’ and keyword suggestion tools, and many people seem to have forgotten the huge emphasis that it placed on social signals. This new update is possibly even more dramatic since it appears Google now understands the intentions of the words carried in these social signals.”

   What it boils down to is that Google is only going to give high ranking to websites that provide a complete multi-media experience to visitors. This means the age of “Set it and forget it” websites is at an end and that using trickery to garner a high position is no longer going to be possible.

   It also means that what was traditionally considered to be SEO-friendly will become as obsolete as many of the search engines that used to rule cyberspace. (AltaVista, the titan of the search engine world back in 1999 went dark for good in 2010 after seeing its share of the market reduced to two tenths of one percent.)

So if you don’t want to wind up relegated to the bone heap online, you need to create a corporate culture that is designed to feed a world wide web that is hungry for content, before Google’s next cute critter decides to take a bite out of your web presence.

http://www.bizjournals.com/jacksonville/blog/socialmadness/2013/10/googles-humdinger-named-hummingbird.html?page=all

Author: thegoldenpipewrench+

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/aug/11/nsa-internet-surveillance-email

related

   A Texas-based encrypted email service recently revealed to be used by Edward Snowden - Lavabit - announced yesterday it was shutting itself down in order to avoid complying with what it perceives as unjust secret US court orders to provide government access to its users' content. "After significant soul searching, I have decided to suspend operations," the company's founder, Ladar Levinson, wrote in a statement to users posted on the front page of its website. He said the US directive forced on his company "a difficult decision: to become complicit in crimes against the American people or walk away from nearly ten years of hard work by shutting down Lavabit." He chose the latter.

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/aug/09/lavabit-shutdown-snowden-silicon-valley

Author: thegoldenpipewrench+

   Great article on how Facebook likes are used to scam and twist both Facebook users and viewers. It does makes you wonder just how many likes are real when you visit a Facebook page. Be careful, if you’re thinking of buying likes to boost your own desirability it could be a futile endeavour. Money and a fool are soon parted so they say.

I hope you have fun at the casino, the odds are not stated.

Cnet - How to spot and avoid scams

   Facebook "likes" mean money. Individuals and businesses of all types -- legitimate and otherwise -- use various techniques to persuade you to click that ubiquitous thumbs-up button. Begging for Facebook "likes" has become epidemic. "If I get a million likes I'll be cured of my terminal disease and I'll be able to implement my sure-fire plan for world peace!" "If you don't like this picture you hate your mother, America, and apple pie." Yeah, right. Scammers prey on Facebook users' propensity to respond emotionally by clicking "Like" when an image or plea tugs at their heart strings or piques their ire. Scam sites offer to sell you likes clicked by real-live humans. The buyers intend to convert the clicks into traffic for their Facebook page, which translates to increased ad revenue. Several such sites I visited appear to be owned by the same anonymous party and are registered in Panama.

http://howto.cnet.com/8301-11310_39-57594894-285/how-to-spot-and-avoid-facebook-like-scams/

Our Little Facebook Like Building Experiment.

Please note : We are currently in a live early beta-build on this website. Many resource bubbles are already populated and provide a wealth of information you might find intersting. Please be patient as this is an ongoing process.

Author: thegoldenpipewrench+

Author: thegoldenpipewrench+

Author: thegoldenpipewrench+

 Page Rank: Google+ Profiling Author Rank  

 related

An in-depth montage of information on how to use Google+ effectively.

Guides-to-Google-for-Business-and-Personal-Use

A Great Video on how news releases play an important role with website development.

If you’re tired of exhausting your marketing dollars on expensive campaigns that don’t bring customers or positive ROI results, watch this webinar, “How to Improve your ROI with Online News Releases.” Mihaela Vorvorneau, SNCR fellow and assistant professor at Clemson University, and one of the researchers behind “Exploring the ROI of Online Press Releases” will discuss ways you can use your news to successfully build your online presence, drive traffic to your website and improve search engine rankings. - See more at: http://service.prweb.com/learning/article/how-to-improve-your-roi-with-online-news-releases/#sthash.uDg6z0Ue.dpuf

http://service.prweb.com/learning/article/how-to-improve-your-roi-with-online-news-releases/

with pdf of presentation

related video

How to Repair your Online Reputation

Author: thegoldenpipewrench+

A great slideshow I came across on HTML5 and search engine optimization..enjoy

related

Since the advent of the first web search engines, designers and developers have struggled with issues of how to increase their placement on a search engine results page.

With the major search engines (Google, Bing, etc.) unwilling to reveal their ranking algorithms — protecting them from “black hat” search engine optimizers attempting to game the system — “white hat” search engine experts must play a constant guessing game to determine which tactics will be most effective.

The continuing development of technologies, from HTML and XML to JavaScript and Flash, has made the pursuit of prime search engine real estate a massive industry in its own right.

The introduction of HTML5 has simplified many tasks, but adds another layer of complexity in this area.

http://www.webdesignerdepot.com/2012/10/html5-and-seo/

Author: thegoldenpipewrench+

Author: thegoldenpipewrench+

XSS attacks have become one of the most prevalent and dangerous security issue affecting web applications today. According to the Microsoft Security Intelligence Report Volume 13, there has been a significant increase in reported XSS cases over the past two years, to the point where XSS vulnerabilities have started to displace other types of reported vulnerabilities by percentage. An analysis of the vulnerabilities reported in the first half of 2012 revealed that 37% of all verified vulnerabilities involved XSS techniques that the Internet Explorer XSS Filter can mitigate.  

XSS vulnerabilities occur whenever an application takes data that originated from a user and sends it to a web browser without first properly validating or encoding it. XSS attacks can be used to hijack user sessions, deface websites, conduct port scans on victims’ internal networks, conduct phishing attacks and/or take over users’ web browsers.

http://blogs.technet.com/b/security/archive/2012/11/29/microsoft-s-free-security-tools-a-deeper-look-at-xss-attacks-and-microsoft-s-free-anti-cross-site-scripting-library.aspx?Redirected=true

If you want to know how to defend, sometimes the best place to start is to know your enemy. At AusCERT 2013, WatchGuard director of security strategy Corey Nachreiner walked information security professionals through a couple of common tools and techniques that many hackers use on a very basic level.

Nachreiner walks through Rapid7's Metasploit tool, showing how even "script kiddies" can easily use it thanks to its relatively user-friendly graphical user interface.

https://www.owasp.org/index.php/Top_10_2013-A3-Cross-Site_Scripting_%28XSS%29

Author: thegoldenpipewrench+

   You can write thousands of posts, but unless Google recognizes you as the author, it’s easy for someone else to steal your words. It’s like leaving a finished manuscript on a table at a writer’s conference. Someone is going to pick up your words and sell them as their own.

Authorship allows you to register your words. If someone copies and pastes your words to their own site and tries to take credit for them, Google will know. The thief will be penalized.

   Depending on who you ask, Google is either a gift from God to the masses or the technical spawn of Satan. I’m going to let you make your own call on that.

In the world of the internet, Google is calling the shots. Follow the rules or disappear from search results. Your choice. When you set up your Authorship profile, your Google+ picture will show up in the search results. Having a photo increases the probability of someone clicking on your article.

   Many things have authorship. PowerPoint, for example, even has authorship. Even images like vector art can show authorship. For PowerPoint, Google infers from text, not meta data.

Google Books does not show authorship yet!

   Be smart and be thoughtful about authorship and how you implement it. Suggestions:

• Only the first author will show in the rich snippet.
• Be sure you get the snippet you want (watch for “by” in text followed by a name). Even editors or commenters can get picked up as the author – so, watch for that type of text.
• Author will only appear once on a page of search results. Example for site search of SearchEngineLand.com for “Danny Sullivan”, and Danny’s face only shows once in the results.

   What does authorship mean for traditional PR and SEO?

• Traditional, offline methods for choosing a reporter to work with may not generate the best SEO. Make sure you work with people who have authorship to get that benefit in the SERPs.
• Does the site allow for authorship?
• Does the author have a Google+ profile? What sites are listed in their “Contributor to” section and other links under About.
• To check: search “site:URL” followed by author name. Ex: site: “nyt.com david pogue”
• Weigh the SEO value – does the author have ‘cred’ with Google?
• Weight the readership value. Realize the value in readers finding your content that contributes to SEO.
• Recognize the level of authority of the publication.

Here is Janet’s complete presentation

http://searchengineland.com/smx-advanced-authorship-the-deep-dive-revelations-162894

Author: thegoldenpipewrench+

   Below is a framework to ensure that content is driving your search and social efforts. This process builds upon search and social content synergies — not only does content drive your search and social activities, but your search and social research helps inform you to build your content plan.

The User

   Understanding the user is paramount to leveraging content as your search and social catalyst. Optimizing for your target audience and for consumers is just as important as optimizing your keywords — a fact sometimes overlooked by search marketers.

Keywords – You & The Competition

   Once you understand the users you are targeting, you can begin to look at a combination of keywords and social trends. Look at your baseline rankings and compare them against those of your competitors in the SERPs. What does their content look like? What content strategies are working for them? Use this to start brainstorming your own content, around which your search and social strategies will be built.

Social Trends & Topics

   The relationship between search and social referrals is growing — understanding the correlation between social sharing and search rankings is essential as marketers use content marketing insights to further integrate social media and SEO strategies.

   Monitor social media for topics relevant to your search keywords. Analyze the content being shared to reinforce what’s working while phasing out what isn’t.

Taking the correlation between search and social into account has proven to work. TinyPrints saw a 47% increase in rankings by integrating its organic search and Twitter strategies based on a clear understanding of this correlation.

http://searchengineland.com/the-content-catalyst-how-content-drives-search-social-synergy-161022

Author: thegoldenpipewrench+

    Social media and video sites are growing rapidly, because of the continuous increase in the useful life of online media irreversibly leads to a dramatic decline in the use of traditional media such as TV, print and radio. A recent infographic from voucher codes Pro shows the development over the last 3 years.Then, the average user spent last year every day 3 hours and 7 minutes in the social media, on video pages or other online activities - in 2011 it was 2 hours and 56 minutes, and in 2010, already two hours and 34 minutes.

    In favor of Internet users here are especially high up: Socia Media & Social Networking sites, e-mails, online videos, search engines, online games, blogs, online radio, online newspapers and online magazines.

   Although consumption of TV content is reversed, the average user is still sitting about 5 hours of TV. For more shows this development once again how important it is to strengthen the commitment in the Digital Space and especially in the social media.

http://www.ethority.de/weblog/2013/06/18/nutzungsdauer_social_media_video-seiten_vs_tv_print_radio/

The impact of social media and video on web usage (infographic)

Author: thegoldenpipewrench+

   Think of a brand as a personality. People have personalities, and we come to expect certain responses from them as we get to know them. Brands are the same way, which is why clear branding guidelines are central to any content strategy. Branding guidelines tell you who the brand is, what it’s about, how they reinforce those attributes, and what they’re prepared to do for their customers.

   If content is a conversation, we need to know who we are before we start talking. When you develop content, which is a shared asset in an organization, you need to know who you are, what you represent, and what personality promise you’re making to your customers. Everyone in the organization needs to know it too, so they can create content that centers on those brand values.

   Today we focus in on Margot Bloomstein.

She has some great insights into branding strategies that I think you might enjoy.

   Online experiences can be fast, efficient, easy, orderly—and sometimes, that's a recipe for disaster. We click confirm too soon, confuse important details, or miss a key feature in a product description. Efficient isn't always effective. Not all experiences need to be fast to be functional. In fact, some of the most memorable and profitable engagements are slow and messy... and that’s just right.

   Entropy drives discovery, but it requires careful planning in the form of content strategy. Content strategy can identify and support these outliers of user experience. Let’s look at REI, Target, Patagonia, Disney, and others for content strategy that you can apply to aid learning, retention, and user satisfaction. Help your audience soak up the journey or just engage with more certainty; content strategy can help you control the pace.

Jeff Eaton and Margot Bloomstein discuss the book writing process; the overlap of design thinking and content strategy; and the importance of asking "why."

http://www.lullabot.com/blog/podcasts/insert-content-here-episode-15-margot-bloomstein-design-thinking-for-content?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+lullabot%2Fplanet-feed+%28Lullabot.com+Drupal+News%29

Author: thegoldenpipewrench+

   When Matthias Henze needed to let off some steam in the early days of his start-up, he would pop outside the farmhouse he shared with his two co-founders, Fridtjof Detzner and Christian Springub, and chop some wood. The three (pictured from left to right) were holed up in the countryside in Germany’s north, a place “in the middle of nowhere”, where they spent every waking minute together between Sunday night and Friday evening.

   Fast forward to 2011 and their website-hosting service, Jimdo, had built more than 4m websites and expanded to nearly 70 staff (its mission is "pages to the people": everyone should be able to create websites without any technical knowledge). But the success came at a price: office life had become a lot more stuffy. In search of lost fun, a handful of staffers came up with a list of 15 points that defined the firm’s culture—which today marks it out not only from more established German businesses, which are typically formal and hierarchical places, but from hyper-competitive American online start-ups.

http://www.economist.com/blogs/schumpeter/2013/06/management

Author: thegoldenpipewrench+