By Bob Speyer – Web Success Team

I believe one of the most important pages on a website is the About Us page. It is often misunderstood and at best undervalued. Going against the grain, I propose this page is more about the reader and less about the company or person.

Here’s my reasoning: Marketers have long agreed that people both read and react (positively and negatively) to the proposition “What’s in it for me!” In real estate it’s location, location, location. In online marketing it’s benefits. People want to know the advantages of a product or service before making a decision. In their quest to find reasons to buy or learn more, website viewers will go to the About Us page to gain a better insight on who is selling to them or, more to the point, whom they are buying from.

This is key, because viewers do not just want a resume of location, employees, company history, and growth patterns. What they really want is to find out the personality of the company, what makes them tick and if they are sincere and credible. It’s their first impression of you, how you want to be portrayed and if your values match up.

A Culture of Caring About Your Customers

From the corporate side, Starbucks is a great example of an effective About Us page. It is not too wordy or detailed as in how may locations they have. Rather it is about the customer and their experience. They humanize their page stressing each customer is as important as the next one. It’s about making a connection; serving the community and conducting business responsibly. They have other links to other social media outlets on the page if you want to go deeper into their mission statement, their history and their company workings. But the message is clear.

They are about people and making their lives a little bit better each day. In reading their Facebook page or Twitter, you are instantly engaged, thinking, “I can relate to that!”

For small companies or entrepreneurs, your online brand should be personalized. Using an inviting picture of smiling head shots or an engaging video of a talking head will connect with your viewer. The content should be informative and portray you or your company as well rounded and committed to giving back to your customers and your community. Sprinkling in some personal glimpses of your life or interesting anecdotes will help make you the reader feel they know you or get to know you. Putting yourself out there is never risky, it is what makes us human and real to others.

It’s About Us — Your Viewer and You

In conclusion, if you can get a reader to make that positive connection with your organization, they will be more receptive to processing your information and ultimately interacting or contacting you. You will achieve more web success if you can follow these simple guidelines.

The Web Success Team specializes in developing and marketing direct response websites that take full advantage of the latest developments on the Internet. The Team has an arsenal of effective web strategies, online marketing tools and proven customized social media techniques to promote your products and services. And we’ll show you ways to increase the amount of qualified traffic to your site.

For more tips, tools and articles of interest, become a fan of the WebSuccessTeam Facebook page and learn more about online marketing, SEO and social media. Visit us at http://www.facebook.com/WebSuccessTeam. Contact the Team today for a complimentary consultation to your web success!

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By Bob Speyer and Kristin Tomlinson, Web Success Team

Internet marketing gossip is exploding  — and the line between fact and fiction is blurring. If gossiping is a crime, then every blogger and Internet savvy professional needs to be incarcerated for this misdemeanor. What was once an indulgence is becoming a dependency as more and more individuals are turning to various social media outlets to extract their daily dose of breaking news and scandal. Today, people are simply taking a quick glance at their updates on Facebook and Twitter to squeeze out the latest juice. Social media marketing is the driving force behind this Internet sensation, and businesses everywhere are taking notice of its impact on consumers and using it to their advantage. They’re spending less on print ads and relying more on word of mouth through online marketing to establish their web success.

He Said… or Did He?

It’s no secret that a small whisper can turn into a loud buzz through emails, blogs and tweets. Like Michael Jackson’s tragic death or the shocking fabrication of the demise of actor Johnny Depp, gossip is an unstoppable force and it’s making a special guest appearance on every text, tweet, and chat room. Whether imported or formed domestically, hoaxes and factual stories alike are making the evening news. As Mark Twain once said, “The reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated.” This was a giant wake up call for marketers who underestimated the power of the digital word to deliver their message. Companies are quickly fanning this fire by to turning their words into actions by using Internet medias to promote their brands, goods and services.

What Happens in Vegas, Goes on the Web

If you want to save a marriage before it’s even begun, do yourself a favor and delete last week’s bachelor party pictures from your camera. Today nothing is safe from the prying eyes of the Internet. When pictures and comments get posted on Facebook, they will go viral on other sites like Flickr, Twitter and YouTube. Even Google is jumping on the bandwagon by indexing Facebook Updates. You can bet your dirty laundry that friend and competitor will read it. With so many social media sites itching to be the first ones to deliver the breaking revelation of the day, nothing ever is kept hush or in the dark anymore. So it is a good practice to discriminate what you post — from a corporate or personal standpoint.

Rumor Control

With Internet gossip running rampant, things can spiral out of control. You may not be able to stop it but you are not helpless either. Managing your reputation is important, especially when your business relies heavily on online marketing to deliver your message. Good communication has always been effective and holds true in this digital era. Be honest, transparent and consistent. Address your detractors online and promote your brand.

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By Bob Speyer and Kristin Tomlinson – Web Success Team

SEO certification is one of the hottest topics among online marketers. It is one of the most controversial and misunderstood because there is no consensus on a uniform certification. Universities offer courses and certification, private industries have their own certification and even Google has entered the fray. What is certain is the growing demand to optimize a website for optimum search performance.

SEO certification is coming of age as an important component of an online marketer’s arsenal and being certified is key to being viewed as an expert in Search Engine Marketing and Search Engine Optimization. Not only does a certification draw in future employers, but it also catches the eye of potential clients. The ability to brand your website with the “SEO Certification” logo instantly opens the door to countless opportunities including recognition from your competition, positive feedback from potential customers, and an increase in job opportunities.

Using Clay to Construct an SEO Model

Bruce Clay is an internationally recognized SEO expert and trainer. He is one of the best and brightest when it comes to all things SEO. He believes that the “mission of SEO is to make a site’s content worthy of higher search engine ranking by being more relevant and competent than the competition.” Clay emphasizes that in order to achieve web success, you need to follow Google Best Practices Guidelines and keep up to date on the ever-changing world of search by getting a SEO certification.

Many companies are now offering certification, including the 2010 Online Marketing Summit. Hosted in San Diego from February 22-25, 2010, OMS is the only marketing conference that is purely education-focused. Attendees will learn to execute some of the best practices in Online Marketing as well as discover new tools and actionable tactics. Before the conference, the Online Marketing Institute is offering a special Online Marketing Training workshop where attendees will gain credit toward certification. Classes at OMI are also offered both online for convenience.

Google offers certification from their Analytics Conversion University courses by taking the Google Analytics Individual Qualification test. The lessons are offered free from Google, but the GAIQ test has a nominal $50 fee. After completion of their advanced Training Course, an individual will be able to maximize the use of the Google tools and apply them to any website. And importantly, you will receive a Google certification that you can place on your website.

Taking a Spot at the Top

SEO Certification will give you the ability to implement the best practices to improve websites, blogs and other online content that has the potential to target countless markets. With a certification, you will be able to effectively optimize websites, improve their page rank, increase overall consumer visits, and improve conversion rates. A SEO certification badge on your website will also add to your portfolio as an expert in online marketing. Wouldn’t it be nice if the SEO certification were consolidated into one universal exam? Legitimate SEO and SEM marketers could then be recognized as professionals.

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By Bob Speyer, Web Success Team

Is Your Brand Being “Heard”?

There’s a new marketing tool in town you should know about. It’s in Beta testing but it is not only free but produces mountains of great marketing information to help you improve your website. It’s called “Heardable.com,” and quite simple it is the easiest and most efficient way to measure how your online brand is perceived, performs and stacks up against your competition.

Just enter your URL in the free tool and you get a Heardable Score in return. The six measurable sub-scores that will help you determine you brand’s success against your competition are:

1) Portable: Is your site optimized for mobile search? The better positioned you brand is to take advantage of mobile, the higher your ranking and site’s effectiveness. Portability is determined by detecting auto redirects for the four top mobile device platforms; iPhone, Android, Blackberry and Windows Mobile.

2) Shareable: Sharing is a reciprocal exchange, giving and getting. Heardable scans for RSS feeds with the more feeds the more you are likely to share content and thus more engaged in social activity. The more you share, the more you will be picked up and shared as well. Social media is all about engagement.

3) Measurable: Does your website have analytics that track, monitor and optimize site activity, including on-page performance, ecommerce and online advertising? A low score would indicate you need to set up more tracking indicators for your marketing efforts.

4) Actionable: Does your website interact with your visitors and connect with them using visitor focused words? A higher ranking is achieved if your website speaks in personal tones to customers, using ‘you’ or ‘your’ as ways to connect with them. A low ranking focuses more on brand information and corporate policy.

5) Sociable: Word of mouth marketing is becoming a major player in brand image and how consumers react through the power of the purse. Make sure you have a brand blog set up with at least a few employees making regular contributions. Set up social accounts on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Digg and YouTube immediately and participate on a daily basis.

6) Searchable: Ranking in this category depends on search engine visibility, number of inbound links, and local search determinants. Keywords, original content and linkage to your site will improve your site’s performance and searchability.

Facing Down the Competition

Business is all about competing and the goal is gaining market share and customers. Heardable can give you a powerful tool to find the answers about improving your business and achieve web success. It provides you with real time data that you can use to make better marketing decisions, and turn them into an action-based plan backed by indisputable metrics. Your boss wants proof, well show them the stats!

Brand Comparisons

Heardable’s extensive research of category brand leaders mirrors a Heardable Score. This means you can now get the statistical intelligence to help you dramatically improve your site’s performance and take the lead of your chosen category of business. Heardable Category Overviews factor in over one million URLs covering seven critical areas of analysis.

Learn from the Best Brands

The Heardable 100 is a sort of gold standard of online branding. They share with you the best of the best and what makes them tick. Heardable takes the features and functions that these 100 online brand leaders have in common. There are plenty of take-a-way lessons in this batch to give your site that needed marketing boost.

Make Your Website Heard!

In today’s competitive environment, online branding is critical to building your business online. Getting qualified visitors is a marketing imperative. Tools like Heardable are critical in understanding your site’s performance and visibility. The Web Success Team can analyze and optimize your website, increase your Heardable Score to make it ‘Heard’ throughout the Internet. Contact us today for an complimentary analysis of your website and the effectiveness of your online marketing efforts.

Images: from Heardable, Inc.

The Web Success Team specializes in developing and marketing direct response websites that take full advantage of the latest developments on the Internet. The Team has an arsenal of effective web strategies, online marketing tools and proven customized social media techniques to promote your products and services. And we’ll show you ways to increase the amount of qualified traffic to your site.

For more tips, tools and articles of interest, become a fan of the WebSuccessTeam Facebook page and learn more about online marketing, SEO and social media. Visit us at http://www.facebook.com/WebSuccessTeam. Contact the Team today for a complimentary consultation to your web success!

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by Bob Speyer, Web Success Team

The human mind is a remarkable thing, but it can also be fooled. Everyday, whether we want to or not, we are bombarded by advertisements and marketing in magazines, on TV, radio, billboards, etc. Almost everywhere we look, we see ads and brands telling us what we need, adding to our own views and preferences even creating a placebo effect.

Perception Is in the Eye of the Beholder

Stan Reents, PharmD writes in his article “Don’t Underestimate the Power of Suggestion” about how placebos affect the human mind in various studies. One example was a taste test study on different types of vodka. The subjects were asked what their favorite vodka was before the test. However, the results showed that many rated their favorites poorly. Why did they insist that one brand of vodka was their favorite when their taste buds said differently? The answer can be said in two words: brand loyalty.

Brand loyalty is when a consumer buys and continues to buy a specific brand, because he or she believes the product’s features are better. This can be done either consciously or unconsciously. This explains why some people in the above study preferred certain brands of vodka over others despite their liking to them. Those brands favored must have had the right images, features and prices to create a higher perceived level of quality.

Establishing Your Own Online Identity

Creating an online brand will give consumers an image of your company and add interest to your products and/or services. The job of an online marketer is to try to break the habits of the consumers that buy your competitor’s products by offering something fresh, new and better. If you suggest that your product is better, it puts the possibility out there.

Now I’m not advocating lying to potential consumers or offering products and services that are of poor quality. The idea is to sell the best quality that you can offer and to market a specific image in order to attract potential clients.

You want to distinguish your brand from your competitors but in an interesting, positive, and memorable way in order to leave consumers wondering if they should give your products and/or services a chance. Once you have a clear and strong brand image, your products and/or services become something more, a brand. They stop being items and start being something better, different and not something that can be imitated.

Momentum Marketing

Having established a branding, you now need to deliver your message online and keep the momentum going. Obviously your website is “brand central” but you still need to actively promote your brand through direct response marketing and the various social media network marketing channels like Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin and YouTube. Also you need to support your brand by blogging and article marketing where you can write and post informative content that positions you as an expert in your field. Set a realistic budget for marketing and promotions. If done correctly, it will be well worth the return on investment and move you closer to web success.

The Web Success Team specializes in developing and marketing direct response websites that take full advantage of the latest developments on the Internet. The Team has an arsenal of effective web strategies, online marketing tools and proven customized social media techniques to promote your products and services. And we’ll show you ways to increase the amount of qualified traffic to your site.

For more tips, tools and articles of interest, become a fan of the WebSuccessTeam Facebook page and learn more about online marketing, SEO and social media. Visit us at http://www.facebook.com/WebSuccessTeam. Contact the Team today for a complimentary consultation to your web success!

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By Kristin Tomlinson-Web Success Team

With the Winter Olympics and Super Bowl just around the corner and with the World Cup taking center stage this summer, sponsors are taking a new and different approach to advertising their brands. They are scrambling to invest more in social media campaigns and less on expensive TV and print advertisements. Aside from the obvious cost savings, the big question is why social media? The answer is two-fold. Social media is personal and it builds relationships. Advertisers are fast recognizing that to build brand loyalty they need to connect with their consumers in new ways through online direct response marketing. What better way than through sports marketing where fans identify with athletes and their national teams.

Social media is playing a critical part in presenting brands and athletes in a manner that interacts with fans on a worldwide basis. It creates anticipation and excitement for fans that can communicate directly with their favorite athlete and connect with them on a more personal level. Social media is enabling brands to create lasting relationships with people around the globe that isn’t possible with television and print media.

The Crossover to the New Media

NBC, who has exclusive broadcast rights to air the Vancouver Olympics, is making a big play with online marketing as a major part of their promotions to achieve web success. It has partnered with the social media firm The Swarm Collective to produce Olympic Pulse, a place where visitors can look up tweets from athletes, Olympic blogs and top trending stories. The Super Bowl promotions have also been very active in social media on Twitter, Facebook and blogging. Athletes and teams are scrambling to hype the event and gain more followers.

In order to prep for the World Cup in the coming months, the corporate partners of FIFA, football’s world governing body, are moving away from the use of traditional TV and billboard campaigns. Instead they are trying out social networking sites to promote their brands, to sell their pitch and build their business online. Calum MacDougall, director of global marketing partnerships at Sony Ericsson, says 2010 will be the first “social networking World Cup.”

Changing the Way the Game Is Played

What makes social media so attractive to powerhouse companies is the realization that more and more people are resorting to popular social destinations like YouTube, Facebook and Twitter to get their daily dose of their favorite brands and athletes. In addition to this, these sites come with major audiences and give brands a huge boost and a way to reach millions of consumers. As an added bonus, these sites give brands the viral, online hype that they’ve been searching for in their audiences and their markets. In addition to this, it’s cheaper than spending millions on TV, billboard and print campaigns, and they can get real-time results in relation to how many people are engaging in these sites and taking advantage of their promotional offers.

The consumer has changed and companies have finally recognized that they need to be where the consumers are most responsive. Is social media the advertising vehicle of the future, replacing more traditional media? Probably not, but it may run an effective second.

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By Kristin Tomlinson-Web Success Team

The catastrophic earthquake in Haiti showed no mercy on the tiny capital of Port-au-Prince and has affected us all with information and images about the devastation to life and property. Many nations have sent their first wave of emergency responders and people throughout the world are sending donations, goods and services. The Web Success Team is also taking action to aid in the relief efforts. As a participating sponsor, we are helping with online promotion and branding for “Taste of the Tropics,” a Super Bowl event geared to raising funds for the earthquake victims of Haiti.

Star Studded Fundraiser at Super Bowl Week

Entertainment & Sports Plus (ESP) along with Sports Entertainment Team (SET) have partnered with the American Red Cross and the Yéle Haiti Foundation to help the victims affected by the January 12^th earthquake. “Taste of The Tropics” is a Latin-inspired culinary tasting event hosted by actress and comedian Kym Whitley with all proceeds to benefit the earthquake victims. It will take place in Miami during Super Bowl Week. There will be special guest appearances by: Michael Boley (NFL player, NY Giants), DeShaun Foster (former Carolina Panthers and San Francisco 49ers player), Vivica Fox (Actress), and Willie Gault (former NFL Player). In addition to enjoying the cuisine, guests are asked to bring emergency and medical supplies to aid in the relief efforts.

Hope for Haiti

Taste of the Tropics will be held at the Epic Hotel on February 6, 2010 from 3:00 PM – 7:00 PM in Miami, Florida. Please visit www.tasteofthegamemiami.com for ticket information. Lives have been shattered, and a country has been devastated. This was a natural disaster of unprecedented proportions. By offering your support you will be giving hope for Haiti. If you’re unable to attend the event, please go to www.redcross.org or www.yele.org to see how you can help.

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I recently came across an article in Advertising Age about re-branding Time Warner Cable.

In my very recent past Time Warner Cable was one of my accounts on the creative services side. Being tightly controlled by the large Madison Avenue Advertising Agency. Creativity was very limited.

In this day and age with all the social media avenues Time Warner Cable can find a viable avenue to re-brand the company and its services.

We are a client of Time Warner Cable and find that the company is “stuck” in the last century, as you can see by the comments on the Ad Age post.

They are competing with the Dish, Netflix and many other more “modern” avenues like watching TV online. Customers are their lifeblood and they need to do a better job taking care of them.

I would STRONGLY recommend that Time Warner get a Facebook page and a Twitter page and USE them for customer complaints and suggestions. That would be a start. Then follow what other strong customer oriented brands are doing. Starbucks, JetBlue and others are using Social Media to better communicate their services, offer discounts or specials, field and resolve complaints, and to gain valuable customer feedback. They gain loyalty and repeat business.

Here is one of many “Time Warner Sucks” pages  that I found on Facebook. It has over 1,000 members.

A Lesson for Your Business

Throw a rock in a pond and watch it ripple. The bigger the stone, the bigger the consequences. But what does this mean for your business? Do not underestimate the value of social media. It is a unique way to reach out to current and new customers. Business is about building relationships and trust. Keeping open new and popular channels of communication will help grow your business online. And it is a good way to defuse negative press before it gains momentum.

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Note from Web Success Team: Here is part II of the article published on January 7th. When we run into an article that has practical application value, we want to make it available to our clients and our readers. This Guide takes the mystique out of PPC and offers excellent short-cut strategies to maximize your PPC budget and its effectiveness in driving more qualified traffic to your website.  — Bob Speyer, Web Success Team

Creating Killer PPC Ads

1. Include your keywords in your ads (on every line if possible) for higher QS and lower cost per click.
2. Use your headline to grab attention, the first line to mention the top benefits of your products and the third line for a clear call to action. You can use the URL line for including keywords and calls to action as well.
   
3. Use Digg.com to come out with killer headlines. Look for the headlines with the most diggs.
   
4. Tie your ad copy to current events.
   
5. Always split-test ads. Have two ads that look almost the same except for one element. Find a winner and then write a new ad to beat it. Keep doing this again and again to constantly improve your click-though rate (CTR) and conversion rate (CR). Start by testing the big stuff (offers, guarantees, marketing message) and move down to the small details. Changing one single word can double or triple your CTR, so test everything. This is a nice tool that allows you to calculate if you have enough data to make a good decision.
6. Avoid Dynamic Keyword Insertion (DKI). This is a feature that includes your keywords in your ads. I used to love it but then I realized that it made some of my ads look really bad if the keywords people searched for weren’t relevant to the ads. Stick to one keyword and one ad per ad group and you’ll do great.
7. Use numbers and special characters in your ad ($, #, ®, ©, ¼, &, etc.) They’re a great way to get people’s attention.
8. Call your readers. For example, “hey you, skinny man” or “hey you, bankruptcy victim”.
9. Use negative ads. For example, “Is Bob’s New Book a Scam? Don’t Buy Bob’s Book Before You Read This”
10. Try news-style ads. For example, “62 Year-Old Woman Happy with Husband’s Performance”
11. Try tease ads. For example, “The One Secret to Reduce Taxes by 87%. Get It Here for FREE”
12. Ask questions: “Are You Sick of Spider Veins?”
13. When you write ads for the Content Network, you don’t need to include your keywords. Your goal here is to grab people’s attention, so get controversial, use weird characters and get their attention in any way you can.

The Perfect Landing Page

1. Use landing pages; don’t just send people to your home page. The goal of a landing page is to capture leads. After that, you’ll need to do a good job to monetize those leads.
2. Avoid big headers and navigation menus. If you need a navigation menu, you can have it in the footer.
3. Have an attention-grabbing headline.
4. Use bullet points to get your point across.
5. Have 1 clear call to action. Make it clear what you want people to do.
6. This post will give you copywriting tips.
7. This post will help you understand how the subconscious mind works.

How to Optimize Your PPC Campaign

1. The best way to ensure you pay as little as possible for your clicks is by using negative keywords effectively. Read this post on PPC negative keywords.
2. Eliminate keywords with no impressions after 7 days.
3. Eliminate keywords with no clicks after 14 days.
4. Eliminate keywords with low conversion rates after 30 days.
5. Eliminate keywords with low CTR or write better ads to increase the CTR.
6. Eliminate keywords that don’t appear on the first page or increase their bids so they make the first page.
7. Use the Opportunities feature to get ideas on how to improve your campaign.
   
8. Put keywords with a lot of traffic in their own ad groups and write special ads for each of them.
9. Use Google Website Optimizer to test elements on your landing pages (headlines, calls to action, graphics, bullets, guarantees, etc.) This is the best way to increase your conversion rate.
10. Pick your winning ads and write new ads to beat the winners.
11. After 45 days, once your campaign has built a good record of high CTR and QS, lower your bids by $0.03 every couple of days and keep an eye on your traffic to make sure it doesn’t drop. Most of the time, once a campaign has a good record, you can lower your bids without losing any traffic.
12. Look for the “Campaign Limited by Budget” message. If your budget is limiting your campaign, set it extremely high. If you absolutely need to have a budget, lower your bids so you get more traffic for the same amount. Keep lowering your bids until the”Campaign Limited by Budget” message disappears.
13. Look for new traffic segments. For example, if you’re a chiropractor and a lot of people see you for their back pain, create a landing page addressing that issue and create a new ad group with back pain-related keywords and ads.
14. Compete with yourself. If your campaign is doing great, create a new website (in a new domain) and get almost twice as many leads/sales.
15. Buy several domains. Some domain names get 2-4 times as many clicks as others. Keyword-rich domains always win. Domains are only $9/year, so buy a bunch of them and see which one has the highest CTR.
16. Don’t limit your campaign to Google. Yahoo!, Bing and Ask.com also have PPC programs. They’ll send you a lot less traffic, but the conversion rates are usually higher.

How To Ensure an Excellent Quality Score
QS is extremely important. If you have a high QS, your ads could get twice as many clicks as your competitor’s while you pay only half of what he’s paying. In fact, having a poor QS is the reason why most people lose money with PPC, so pay attention and follow these guidelines:

1. Have links to a contact us page and a privacy policy page on your landing page.
2. Include your keywords in your ads as much as you can. This is where having one ad per keyword makes a lot of sense.
3. Include your keywords in your landing pages, but don’t overdo it.
4. SEO factors on your landing page are very important. Have a relevant page title, H1 tag, meta description and meta keywords.
5. There must be a connection between your ad and your landing page. If your ad promises a downloadable report and your landing page tries to sell a widget, you’ll be in trouble. You can offer whatever you want, just be upfront about it in your ad.
6. Avoid “trouble” words like “offer”, “guarantee”, “buy now”, etc. Put these words in images and call the images 1.jpg, 2.gif, etc. Don’t put the trouble words in the images alt tags either.
7. For all those images that don’t contain any of the “forbidden” words, use descriptive alt tags.
8. If you’re going after very different markets (such as “beach vacations in Costa Rica” and “ski holidays in Colorado”), have individual landing pages for each of your markets so you can keep your QS high.

I hope you guys enjoy this post. It took me a long time to put it together but it was a lot of fun. – Zeke Camusio.

Source: Zeke Camusio http://www.TheOutsourcingCompany.com/blog

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