The website project started a few months ago, and after alot of hard work from Ray Oldroyd and everyone at UNISON, we worked together to create an excellent new site which we hope members and staff will enjoy being a part of.

Check out the screenshots and once again, thanks to everyone at UNISON for their hard work!

It’s a question that we’ve all been wondering the answer to since Google rolled out the service late last year. In the alreay dubious world of search marketing, the addition of personalised search was seen by many as a potential “kiss of death” to search marketers.

Whilst it’s not as bad as all that, conducting any sort of testing on whether your search rankings are affected by personalised search is both time consuming and difficult at best.

Well, the fantastic Dr. Pete at SEOMoz has done some of the hard work for us. His post looking at whether Google are getting a little too personal is a brilliantly informative read which proves thought provoking and reaffirms that testing is the only sure fire way of making any decisions about personalised search.

Have you come across any other testing methods for checking the impact of Google’s personalised search? If so, let us know in the comments!

As a search marketer and general digi marketing geek I’ve often wondered the best way to use Facebook for my clients. Of course we know about the “Pay Per Click” style advertising Facebook allows but what about those people who can’t afford that; the people who want a more cost effective Facebook advertising solution?

Well, whilst it’s not a golden egg, the recent announcement by Google that Facebook Pages are now included in real time search results is very welcome.

Google currently is seemingly only showing status updates regarding trending or news related items (it is real time search after all), but the potential here is big: you’re a switched on company and you’re on top of what’s happening in your industry. Given the magnitude of any particular even in your sector, you could find your Facebook page displaying in Google’s top ten for a search term you considered a throw away comment on your social network.

Of course, some creative thinking would need employing to sell this as a service to clients; you have to, after all, make sure that anything like this draws quality and relevant traffic.

It’s a big enough development in online marketing to warrant heated debate amongst search marketers, I’m sure – whilst I’m not sure that we can use this as a service alone I do believe that it has some weight if considered as part of an overall digital strategy; after all, Google is all about providing quality and relevant content to searchers and as real time search grows over the year(s?), having your finger on your clients industry pulse will become more and more important.

How have you employed Facebook Pages in your online marketing strategy?

Over on the mojoPortal blog Joe mentions that a couple of Artisteer designs are actually included as skins in the new release.

For anyone unfamiliar with Artisteer it’s a fantastic licensed product which allows you to build a web design using a drag and drop interface; adding advanced elements and navigations with ease.

Artisteer then allows you to export your design in a variety of instantly compatible formats for some of the most popular web platforms out there, including WordPress, Joomla and now mojoPortal.

It’s a double edged sword for mojoPortal; skins are now easier to create (even though most designers I suspect will stick with the Photoshop slice and dice method for flexibility) and the inclusion of mojoPortal as a supported platform adds credibility to this fantastic system whilst showing it’s growth.

Have you tried mojoPortal with Artisteer? Let us know how you got on!

Whilst I’ve had a play around with the desktop version and to be honest, couldn’t see much point in it considering we’re on Twitter and Facebook (just another social network to update?!), I didn’t find it revolutionary or at all useful; especially considering I’m not an ardent Gmail user.

Anyhoo, I can see why people would like to use Google Buzz and one day (if and when it opens up to non Gmail users and fixes some bugs) I might even revisit my own personal Google Buzz profile and crack on. For now I’ll keep it at arms length, especially given the privacy concerns (which Google have apparently now fixed).

That said; there are some very interesting features within the Buzz setup. The most promising aspect for me is the location feature – the ability to find what’s “buzzing” in your area and see what people you may have never come across before are saying about things around you opens up networking opportunities that may have been previously unheard of.

And, for those who do enjoy Buzz I’d imagine that mobile solutions are a huge selling point; keeping your Buzz profile up to date on the go is integral to a healthy social experience.

So, does Google Buzz have an iPhone App? Sadly no, not yet. However, the Google Buzz iPhone Web Interface does a great job of simulating a real life iPhone App – as do all Google’s iPhone targeted web interfaces. If you get a coffee break and fancy looking into it more I’d strongly suggest a read through Digital Trends Hands On Review With Google Buzz which looks in depth at the mobile interface and provides some great insights.

What do you think of Google Buzz – hit or miss?

Obviously this piqued my interest, given that a lot of companies outsource such tasks to us at The Design Loft.

The article isn’t actually a search marketer bashing as I may have expected, it’s actually an interesting piece on how getting a basic grasp of SEO can greatly benefit your online business.

It also looks at how employing search marketers such as us to manage your SEO can be a daunting task; asking how can search marketers know how you want to promote your business any beter than you do.

Whilst I don’t agree with everything the article says, it does make some valid points around avoiding search marketing companies who promise quick ranking boosts and various grey hat methods – methods that, whilst not strictly “wrong”, do leave something to be desired and are likely to be flagged as bad practice at some point in the near future by the big search players; Google et al.

It is true that most of our clients do actually have a basic understanding of SEO, and it helps us to get along better with them. We can talk more openly about techniques used and the clients who do have some search experience are full of enthusiasm for the new strategies we propose.

As a business owner, the bottom line really is that gaining a basic understanding of SEO will allow you to make informed decisions about which search marketing company to choose, what realistic expectations are and how to effectively track the search marketing company’s progress on your websites.

As a search marketer, it’s reassuring to know that the processes we undertake here as standard; getting to know our clients, their businesses, their goals and past experience among other things is a vital part of providing a complete and quality SEO service to you as a client.

If you’re a designer looking to outsource SEO, or a company looking to find a search marketing company to work with, I’d greatly advise spending a little time getting to know the basics so that the (not so) “ninja art” of SEO becomes a welcome addition to your marketing arsenal.

Have you had any bad experiences outsourcing your SEO?

Open up iChat and then follow these instructions from the Facebook Site Tour:

• Go to iChat Preferences
• Click “Accounts” and then hit +
• Select “Jabber” from the list and then enter:Username: yourusername@chat.facebook.com
  Password: <your Facebook password>
• Click the arrow next to “Server Options” and enter:Server: chat.facebook.com
  Port: 5522 5222
  (Uncheck the box labeled “USE SSL”)

Voila! Facebook is now set up to work with iChat!

It’s a good read as a SEM and provides a bit of an insight into the company’s plans for it’s search product going forward; Yahoo! of course did pioneer this a decade ago…

The thing that really got me wondering is this quote from Greg Sterling of SearchEngineLand:

“I think the market wants a competitive Yahoo, it doesn’t want to see just two players dominate this space. It wants more diversity and innovation and that comes from competition. I give them a fighting chance.”

As a search marketer, of course we want to see Yahoo! bounce back and drive innovation in search the way that Google is constantly doing. But, my question is this:

As standard web users – do people really care whether or not they have a pick list of search providers, as long as they get relevant results from their queries?

Anyhoo, Facebook have just announced Jabber (XMPP) integration for their live chat service; welcome news for anyone wanting to use Facebook chat with iChat and many other standard chat clients.

I can now drop Adium (great as it is) and use my Mac’s native chat client. And anyway, I don’t use my Windows Live Messenger account anymore, does anyone?

Facebook have also made this technology available to developers wanting to integrate Facebook chat into their websites.

This is great news and I’m betting Joe Audette considers this for mojoPortal going forward. Ahem… hint hint :0)

This makes the best chat service on the net even more accessible, even if at times Facebook’s chat is a tad unreliable.

Happy chatting!

First of all, here’s what Google say about it:

Go beyond status messages
Share updates, photos, videos, and more.
Start conversations about the things you find interesting.

And if you check out the video on the Google Buzz website, it does what it says on the tin. You’ll see from the video that there are a few things that you already recognise:

• The facility to share your thoughts with people you follow (more on following later)
• The ability to “Like” or “Un-Like” what people share (Facebook anyone?)
• The facility to use @replies to target people in you status updates (sounding familiar?)
• The functionality to share links, photos and videos with people you’re connected with

All that sounds familiar right? Facebook and then Twitter have revolutionised the way we interact online; they’re defining the way teenagers communicate and even my Mum likes everything I post on Facebook.

Facebook and Twitter are also fantastic for quickly sharing content with friends, family and actually just random strangers if you like; they provide a great way to promote your services or (shameless plug) your band for example.

I’ve previously blogged about my use of HootSuite to (kinda) effortlessly manage these two fantastic social networks from a business and a  personal perspective; the thought of having to update another network, such as Google Buzz, fills me with thoughts of slight depression and cash flow which will rapidly dwindle as my time is spent updating the multitude of social networking sites that I use, just to keep my head above water in the rapidly changing world of online marketing.

Add to this the fact that Google Buzz actually only works with a Gmail Account (something I’ve never used) and it’s actually putting me off trying the service out. Sure I might sign up to have a peek but really, I can’t see myself using this like I do Twitter or Facebook, or even the lesser LinkedIn.

Can you see yourself using this new social networking tool from Google or is it just Google trying to capitalise on the seemingly ever expanding reach of social networks?