Shake off that New Year's hangover, Homestar! 2010 is gonna be great!

Happy New Year! Sure, 2009 was kind of a downer but 2010 is the start (sort of) of a new decade so things are bound to pick up, right? Right! It’s the Year of the Tiger (in about five weeks) so it’s time to start thinking like a Tiger: 2010… it’s gonna be gr-r-r-reat!

Okay, that just broke my New Year’s Resolution on not making any more terrible jokes.

Well, without further ado, let’s take a look at some of the good news on the horizon for 2010! Let’s get going:

• Are you part of a start up? Wpromote probably can’t be considered a start up any longer, however, we certainly started as one! I guess most businesses did, right? Maybe that’s why we were so happy to hear that Q4 was a great one for start ups. Due, in part, to Amazon’s acquisition of Zappos, M&A in Q4 for 2009 was up by a factor of seven from the previous year. That’s some serious merging and acquiring! [ReadWriteWeb]
• Remember when eCommerce was something that people used to say? That was back when it was “eThis” and “eThat” all over the ePlace. Nowadays, it feels like commerce is just commerce, however, one report specifically noted that eCommerce was up about 12% in Q4 of 2009 compared to 2008. So, if you want to help the eConomy, head over to the nearest eTailer and spend some eDollars to keep this train eRollin’! [AdAge]
• So, it sounds like we had a pretty decent Q4 but what about the future? Well, one area that is on the rise is the burgeoning display advertising market which promises a big rebound in 2010. We all know, of course, that search advertising is where it’s at, however, with all the new developments and technologies associated with display advertising, it’s becoming more and more prudent to integrate marketing efforts across the two media. So, get to integrating, everyone! [Washington Post]

The biggest story of the day, of course, is the launch of the new Google Nexus One superphone. It’s so amazing, allegedly, that Google gave it its own URL. This isn’t really search engine news but it is pretty crazy. I mean, Google is now competing on Apple’s sacred turf and one could logically have their email (Gmail), phone service (Google Voice), search engine (Google), marketing (Google AdWords), news (Google News), blogs (Google Reader, many of which will be powered by Google-owned Blogger), videos (YouTube) and God knows what else all on a single device brought to you by–who else–Google! Are you scared yet? If you are, don’t be. It’s much, much too late for that…

Thanks for stopping by. Read up on and keep up with the online world; keep reading Tues News! Catch ya later!

PS: For a New Year’s treat, go to Google.com and hit “I’m feeling lucky” without entering anything into the search box!

Save this Post!

Z Gallerie, one of the leaders in high-quality, reasonably priced products for your home, has been a PPC client with Wpromote since August. Over the past five months, Z Gallerie has seen impressive results from their online marketing efforts, resulting in a dominant online presence. Founded in 1979, this unique lifestyle retailer has been providing its customers with superior merchandise for over three decades. From elegant furniture to decorative accessories from around the world, Z Gallerie not only offers carefully selected merchandise, but it prides itself on providing outstanding customer service and a truly exciting shopping experience. Although it has grown substantially from a small poster shop in Sherman Oaks to a thriving business with 54 retail locations nationwide, Z Gallerie strives to maintain the quintessence of a family business that makes customer satisfaction its top priority. Next time you are looking for a stylish sofa for your living room or beautiful artwork to compliment your master bedroom, be sure and visit zgallerie.com.

Z Gallerie sought out Wpromote’s online advertising services in order to boost online sales for its growing product line. Through an expertly managed paid search campaign, which includes banner ads and search ads, Wpromote has helped Z Gallerie achieve an increase in revenue totaling over $68,000 in December. Delivering over 73,000 clicks to the Z Gallerie website from Google alone, Wpromote’s effective marketing strategy utilizes day-to-day management and Google Analytics in order to find out which keywords drive the most effective traffic to the site. Over a three-month period prior to contracting Wpromote’s services, Z Gallerie had an ROI of only 351%. Compared to an ROI of 656% over three months when using Wpromote, Z Gallerie’s ROI improved by over 300%! By increasing sales and simultaneously lowering the cost per acquisition, between 2008 and 2009 Wpromote has helped Z Gallerie increase its ROI by 69%, lower its CPA by 193%, and cut costs by more than 38%. With the start of the New Year, Wpromote will continue its efforts to bring in more online sales at the lowest cost possible.

Save this Post!

2009 was a lot of things, but one thing is wasn’t? Boring. As we’ve said before, A LOT happened this year, and the bloggers here at Wpromote worked hard to keep up. We hope we succeeded in providing you a valuable and entertaining mix of content.

As we approach the beginning of a new decade, let’s take a look at six posts from The Wpromoter that highlight some of the most important online news from 2009.

• The Google Witchhunt

Calling it a ‘witchhunt’ is probably extreme, but let’s face it - everyone had a reason to sue Google this year. Whether Google is at fault is not for us to decide - we’ll let the courts handle that. Get an overview of some of Google’s battles from Michael Block, Wpromote’s VP of Client Services and resident PPC expert, in “Tues News: 6/30 (Google vs. Everyone Edition).”

• The Quest for Better ROI

A recession year in terms of spending on advertising, everyone was looking for ways to increase ROI. The beauty of online marketing tends to be accountability, but another huge benefit is the ability to make nominal tweaks and notice relatively instant results. Check out this roundup from Wpromote’s President and CEO, Mike Mothner, called “8 Things You Aren’t Doing That Will Boost Your SEM Results.”

• The Twitter Phenomenon

Twitter made it cool to ‘do you’ in 2009. If you’re still unsure what all the fuss is about or simply want a better understanding of the microblogging service that took the world by storm, check out my post, “Tweeting to Transparency: 4 Reasons to Be Who You Are in 2009.”

• The Viral Marketing Explosion

It’s effective, powerful, and ‘cool.’ It has that ‘everybody’s doing it and so should we’ cache to it. But viral marketing is not a paint-by-the-numbers tactic, and poorly executed viral campaigns can cause a brand more harm than good. Get some tips from Jesse Bouman, Wpromote’s Viral Marketing and Social Media Manager, in his informative post, “3 Common Viral Marketing Mistakes and How to Avoid Them.”

• The Broadband vs. Broadcast Battle

Another big development this year was the growing popularity of online video and the effect it had on consumer viewing habits and the broadcasting industry as a whole. Get an overview of the way online video is changing the TV game in my post, “Hulu Desktop App Challenges Cable Networks.”

We hope you enjoyed this recap. Here’s to more great content, and lots of success in 2010! Happy New Year!

Save this Post!

It’s two days until Christmas; despite a brisk breeze and a couple cold weather days over the past few weeks, it still feels like spring in Los Angeles.

Many of you have likely left for the holiday, but some of you, like us, are at the office wrapping up loose ends. For those who haven’t left the grid, we have a best of 2009 list with five cultural shockers, the news of which went viral instantly and spread like wildfire through our online conscious via blogs and social networks like Facebook and Twitter.

Here they are, our picks for the top five viral ‘OMG’ moments in 2009 that the Internet couldn’t stop talking about, in no particular order:

1 - Iran protests

When the results of Iran’s 2009 presidential elections were revealed in June, citizens erupted into mass protests over alleged conspiracy and flocked to Twitter to share their experience on the ground in Tehran.

From shootings to arrests, the American public got up-to-the-minute status reports from Iran, and the citizens use of Twitter to spread the news further solidified the value in microblogging networks in times of emergency, while stirring support and interest people who may have otherwise ignored the situation.

2 - MJ froze the Internet

An idol and inspiration to many, Michael Jackson touched the lives of fans around the world. When he passed suddenly in June, the outpouring of grief, memories, and questions froze Internet traffic across websites and browsers.

Sites like TMZ and that of celebrity blogger Perez Hilton were crushed under the weight of people searching for confirmation the King of Pop was in fact deceased, while MJ’s wiki entry was frozen by site owners due to the massive number of queries received simultaneously abd Google returned error messages to countless users suggesting they were robots automating searches.

3 - Hudson River plane crash

When US Airways flight 1549 crashed into the Hudson River in New York this January, it wasn’t CNN who broke the news, but rather, an ordinary man with a camera and a Twitter account. That man’s name was Janis Krums, and the photo of the crash he posted to Twitter to accompany the following tweet since been viewed more than 43,00 times:

“There’s a plane in the Hudson,” Krums wrote. “I’m on the ferry going to pick up the people. Crazy.”

If media were skeptical of Twitter before January, the value inherent in the microblogging site’s immediacy could no longer be overlooked. News of The Hudson River plane crash spreading via Twitter was more proof that a real shift from big media to citizen journalism was taking place.

4 - Euna Lee and Laura Ling

When Current TV journalists Euna Lee and Laura Ling were arrested by the North Korean military in March 2009 and later sentenced to 12 years in a hard labor camp for border trespassing, blogs and social media networks answered Lee and Ling’s silent call for support.

Eventually, you couldn’t visit a popular news blog or log on to Twitter or Facebook without being reminded of the journalists’ plight.

Thankfully, the two women were released after a trip to North Korea by former US president Bill Clinton. We’d like to think their release was inevitable; still, the way Internet users came together to drum up support for Lee and Ling speaks highly of the power of social media to effect positive change.

5 - Kanye and Taylor Swift

The other four events on this list may be grave, but the ‘OMG’ factor is strong when it comes to the relatively one-sided showdown between hip-hop artist Kanye West and pop-country songstress Taylor Swift at the 2009 MTV Video Music Awards.

Whether you cared about Kanye, Taylor, or MTV, it didn’t matter; on the morning of September 14th, websites, blogs, and social networks were spitting Kanye disses like battle raps, and it was hard not to wonder what happened to incite the virtual hate-fest.

Inspiring 300,000 tweets in just one hour, the amount of press Kanye received for his VMA stunt was hard to believe; the Kanye interruption parodies that followed proved no matter whether you like him or his music, the man knows how to cause a scene.

Does traditional media have a shot at competing with citizen journalism? What were your most memorable viral/OMG moments of 2009? Post your thoughts below!

Save this Post!

Can you believe it that 2009 is almost over? How did you do on your new year’s resolutions? Not too good? No worries, 2010 is just around the corner! To cap off the Wpromoter’s weekly Viral Video Friday segment for 2009, we have selected the Top 5 Viral Videos of the year.

1) Susan Boyle on Britain’s Got Talent

Why We Chose It: This clip of the 47 year old, frumpy, unemployed Susan Boyle absolutely stunned the world. It became an overnight, internet sensation right after the show aired and since then the video has been viewed over 120 million times! Susan Boyle reiterates the old adage, never judge a book by it’s cover.

Susan Boyle Stuns Crowd with Epic Singing - Watch more Funny Videos

2) David After the Dentist

Why We Chose It: Josh Tauber, the Director of Viral Marketing and SMO at Wpromote sent me this video one afternoon and I distinctly remember the view count at 504. Since that afternoon, the world has enjoyed seven year old David’s conversation with his father shortly after leaving the dentist over 38 million times.

3) Jk Wedding Dance

Why We Chose It: This home video of a unique wedding entrance single handedly revived Chris Brown’s record sales. The wedding party of Jill and Kevin boogied down the aisle to “Forever” and captivated the world to a tune of 34 million views.

4) Evian Roller Babies

Why We Chose It: Everyone loves babies. Everyone needs water. Why not combine them? Evian created Roller Babies which shows babies on roller skates performing a variety of stunts, including flips and jumps. This adorable (possibly creepy) video attracted viewers to a tune of 27 million views.

5) Paranormal Activity

Why We Chose It: Paranormal Activity’s trailer only received about one third of the views New Moon’s trailer had but it still makes the list because of it’s tremendous viral success. Viral marketing catapulted this $15,000 movie into a $100 million success and the highest return on investment in movie history.

Save this Post!

Now that you've got the ornaments hung, it's time to look under the tree!

Happy Holidays, everyone! The Tues News is back to tell you that there are already a few gifts under the tree that aren’t from Santa Claus. No, they’re from Google! Google has released several new products and services to help you have a slightly happier holiday. Well, they probably didn’t release this stuff as much to help you out as to make more money for themselves but, hey, ’tis the season, right? Why not enjoy these new items while we’ve got them. Let’s get going:

• Are you handy with a computer? If the answer is “yes” you still might not have a good use for Google’s text-to-speech API. Luckily, there are brilliant minds all over the place in this day and age and you don’t need to be one to envision the possible applications for an open text-to-speech platform. Currently, you can only generate small text-to-speech mp3s but the potential for this product is pretty impressive! [ViralPatel.net via Dzone]

• What do you use to shorten URLs? Bit.ly? Is.gd? TinyURL? If you answered TinyURL, then I have a phone call for you; it’s 2008 and they want their URL-shortener back! Ha! Okay, that’s a terrible joke. Even still, the URL shortening game just got a big, scary competitor in Google, which is using goo.gl to give URL shortening a distinctly Google look. What’s “.gl” all about? Well, it’s actual the top level domain for the pseudo-nation of Greenland. Man, those Google guys must have really had to search hard to find that one! Of course, you can’t really use it for anything non-Google related yet. [BusinessInsider via del.icio.us]

• That’s not all! Google is also rolling out some tricks in the search engine. For example, let’s say you wanted to get me a Christmas present but you weren’t sure whether to get me a wool coat or a light sweater. Well, now, when you search for “weather El Segundo, California” you will not even have to finish your search to get your results! If you check out the screen shot below, you can see that with today’s temperature comfortably at 64°F at Wpromote HQ, you’d probably go with the light sweater. If you were wondering, by the way, if that was a veiled attempt at bragging about Southern California weather in December, you’d be wrong. It wasn’t veiled at all! [Official Google Blog]

So, there is something in common with most of the gifts from Santa Sergey and Larry Claus: they don’t really “go under the tree,” per se. Not to mention that one requires hack, one isn’t really available yet and one only saves you about 1.5 seconds. Before you get mad, though, remember that these are all free and, as always, it’s the thought that counts. Thanks for stopping by. Read up on and keep up with the online world; keep reading Tues News! Catch ya later!

PS: I’m not sure if this is an upcoming gift from Google, but go to Google.com and click “I’m Feeling Lucky” without typing anything in the search box. There appears to be a countdown going on. Is it just to New Year’s or is it to the moment that Google takes over the entire world? Both are probable but we’ll have to wait to find out for sure.

Save this Post!

SEO Advice

Although one of the most BASIC and easy-to-implement SEO tactics is simply making DIFFERENT/UNIQUE page titles and meta descriptions for all your website pages, many people still don’t bother to do this.

Those who do will rank higher against pages similar in weight in terms of inbound links and appropriate anchor text but without unique meta data.

META DATA: what’s important

Meta tags that matter include the all-important ‘Meta Description‘ and  ‘Meta Robots‘ tags. There is the ‘Google Webmaster Tools Verification’ tag and others that have specific functions, but for search the Meta Description and Robots tag are the most important in terms of  on-page optimization.

There is another tag, however, that people spend a lot of time with called the ‘Meta Keywords’ tag - and it just isn’t that important.

The Meta ‘Keyword’ Tag and why you don’t need it

The Meta ‘Keyword’ tag is falsely important to many site owners. I constantly get calls from people with SEO questions who say thing’s like, “We’ve already taken care of all the meta keywords and what not.” But they don’t understand they are wasting valuable time. Here are two reasons why:

• When you use the meta ‘keyword’ tag, competitors can see easily which keywords you are targeting and use that information in a competitive manner - e.g. buying PPC advertisements or inbound links targeting those terms specifically knowing that you do, too

• Google has announced they do not use the Meta Keywords in any part of their search ranking algorithm. And if you don’t believe me read this post FROM Google entitled, “Google Does Not Use Meta Google does not use the keywords meta tag in web ranking“

Now, on to what you DO NEED…

Writing a good ‘Meta Description’

The Meta ‘Description’ tag is important because it helps users decide whether to visit your page by providing them with a brief, compelling description of what they will find if they do. I strongly recommend having unique meta descriptions on all pages across your site. As an SEO, I fully understand you may not be able to do this every time, in which case just leave the field blank.

NOTE: DO NOT PUT DUPLICATE META DESCRIPTIONS ON ALL YOUR PAGES BY DEFAULT

Although many content management systems (CMS’s) offer this option, it is better to allow Google to create their own snippet for you than leave a duplicate description. REASON: Google will note duplicate meta descriptions in your webmaster tools accountand assign you a lower ranking under the assumption your content is either not unique or being automatically generated.

Again, the goal is to give Google UNIQUE info about EACH specific page.

In terms of LENGTH, keep meta descriptions under 165 characters and put important keywords near the beginning of the text. It is also important to include a ‘call to action’ in the meta description if possible to increase your click-thru-rates.

For example, here is the meta description I used for this article:

<meta name=”description” content=”Always Write Great UNIQUE Meta Descriptions & Page Titles To Beat Your Competitors Who Aren’t. Basic SEO Advice That Is Often Not  Done Properly Or Overlooked…”/>

It has 163 characters total, has the keywords ‘Meta Descriptions‘ and ‘Page Titles‘ in the forefront and also mentions ‘SEO Advice,’ another focus of this post. The ‘Call To Action’ is ‘Always Write Great UNIQUE Meta Descriptions.’

Writing effective page titles

Page titles are often called ‘Meta Titles,’ a term I find can be confusing to new SEOs and Non-SEOS or ‘muggles’ (jk), due to the amount of useless and useful ‘Meta Data’ used. I would suggest sticking with the term ‘Page Titles’ (and the other term ‘Meta Descriptions’ again, as the two most important pieces of information accompanying any web page).

When creating page titles, you want to target the keyword that the page is specifically about. Put the keyword near the front, if not first, in the title where possible, and be sure you use it in a meaningful way that is relevant to the page.

For example, this post that you are reading was originally  titled:

<title>SEO Advice:Write Unique Effective Meta Descriptions & Page Titles</title>

Points to note:

• Number of characters (incl. spaces): 65 -Don’t go over 65 or it may not show up or get truncated. To be safe, maybe even keep the keywords away from 55+ characters
• Main Keyword: SEO Advice
• Subcontext Keywords: Meta Descriptions, Page Titles
• A verb where possible (i.e. ‘Write’) can be leveraged in the meta description as a call to action and may be less important here

Following my own advice, I decide that ‘Write Unique’ while important, could be moved to the end in case it gets truncated.

Here is the new version:

<title>SEO Advice:Effective Meta Descriptions & Page Titles Uniquely Written</title>

Points to note:

• Now it is 69 Characters in Length, however ‘Meta Descriptions’, ‘Page Titles’ are not in danger of being truncated in the Search result (snippet)
• Depending on your indexing needs, you can play with the methods you use.
• I still felt this was a bit long and since ‘Effective’ is NOT a keyword I decided to use a shorter synonym for it

Here is the final version I decided to use for this page:

<title>SEO Advice:Strong Meta Descriptions, Page Titles Uniquely Written</title>

Notice how I kept it to 65 Characters to be safe and still got the point across without being ’spammy.’

I hope you enjoyed this post. Stay tuned for more SEO advice.

‘Til next time,

@KRONiS - Wpromote Inc.  SEO Director

Save this Post!

This gloomy SoCal Friday brings you a Facebook obsessed couple, my future son, high tech stuff from Google and SI, and worst video trend of 2009.

At My Wedding Twitterring and Facebooking at the Altar
Why are the good ones always taken?

I’m Yours (Ukulele)
In 10 years, this is going to be my kid. By the way…I already own a ukulele.

Google Goggles
You’ve heard of Beer Goggles but have you heard of Google Goggles?

Sports Illustrated - Tablet Demo 1.5
Not your typical bathroom reading material.

This Year In Auto-Tune 2009
I hope when we’re done with the year 2009 that also means we’ll be done with auto-tune.

EMBED-This Year in Auto-Tune 2009 - Watch more free videos

Save this Post!

Following similar launches for Chicago, New York, and Denver, Huffington Post launched its Los Angeles local site on Friday. With a parent site pulling in over 8 million unique hits per day over according to Compete.com, nearly 1 million more than local news site LATimes.com, and the addition of celebrities like Drew Barrymore, Larry David, and LA mayor Antonio Villagaroisa to their list of bloggers, HuffPoLA may be a force to reckon with for LATimes and other hyperlocal news sites vying for ad dollars.

While other news and culture-focused sites like LA Weekly and LAist have yet to hit the 7-figure mark in terms of traffic and may not be seen as a threat to the bigger fish, as the hyperlocal news space becomes bloated with competition, the question may be less about how many visit a site regularly and more about how well those visits can be monetized.

The rise of hyperlocal news and the monetization challenge

The move towards city-centric news that doesn’t rely on traditional reporters has been ongoing for some time. Local online news sites are cropping up left and right and major online portals are trying to capitalize on the hyperlocal market while print publications continue to close their doors.

However, despite what seems to be a growing trend, hyperlocal sites are not without their challenges. While hyperlocal sites provide advertisers with clear geographic and broad demographic targeting, thus making it easy to tailor one’s strategy and messaging to needs specific to cities, states, and towns, the audience for hyperlocal sites is naturally limited, giving advertisers more precision but less reach.

Still, the hyperlocal ad market is relatively untapped; according to an article in The New York Times, the Kelsey Group, a research firm that studies local media and advertising, has found many small businesses have yet to place an ad online and expects the local ad market to bring in $32 billion dollars by 2013.

Personally, I find hyperlocal news sites practical. I consult LAist.com regularly for updates on what’s going on in my neighborhood and the city at large and I view Everyblock.com’s feed from my iGoogle homepage to stay abreast of crimes and other news happening close to home. Visiting these sites feels like a valuable use of time; the content is relevant, and there is nothing distracting me from finding the news I want to read. Whether sites like these stick around depends on a variety of factors - how well ads perform and whether hyperlocal sites can sustain themselves once they can no longer rely on print and TV outlets for news - and I hope they will. I’m also looking forward to some HuffPo LA blogs from Drew Barrymore and Larry David!

What do you think of the hyperlocal trend? Are sites like LAist.com more likely to thrive or are bigger fish like HuffPo likely to have more success integrating local pages into their existing sites? Post your thoughts below!

Save this Post!

First week back from the Thanksgiving holiday can always be tough but we have some breast cancer awareness, Legos, animals, and a pop star parody for you today.

Pink Glove Dance
We’re a few weeks late posting this video but we’re going to do it anyways because you can never be late raising awareness for breast cancer.

Lego Matrix Trinity Help
What would you do with 440 hours and few Legos?

Surprised Kitty
You’d be surprised how many people watched a woman play with her cat.

The Drench Clever Hamsters Jazz Band - Official Ad
Don’t hamsters make you thirsty?

Lady Gaga: Bad Romance Parody
Maybe you didn’t like us posting Lady Gaga’s Bad Romance video…will a parody make you feel better?

Save this Post!