Good and bad URLs

This often (and should) fall to content developers: developing a good URL for a site. Here are some quick tips:

• forget the “www.” when you’re marketing your URL
• try to have a URL that is the same as your site name (not complimentary, not a cute pun of, if you can help it not an abbreviation of…)
• Cap the first word of the different words, eg: CheckerspotMagazine.ca - it’s easier for the eye to see the different words than if they were all jumbled together: checkerspotmagazine.ca
• Avoid 2-lining your URL when marketing

To get more tips and see examples of the good, the bad and the ugly, go to GoodURLBadURL.com

Web 2.0 presentation

Learn the difference between know control and no control, web 1.0 and web 2.0, the Streisand Effect and the Digg Effect, and more in this robust powerpoint presentation I and my coworker developed. I’m looking in to adding narration to allow further explanation.

Social Media Marketing and Web 2.0

Comment if you have any questions – I’d be happy to answer them!

Eye-tracking tips

When you’re working on a web redesign, it’s imperative to know certain behavioural trends, such as how a user’s eye moves across the page. I am currently part of the redesign team for The Canadian Wildlife Federation (to be implemented in the new year) and eye tracking was an important part of our site analysis and wireframing. Seth Godin highlights some good eye tracking rules in his blog.

Here are some excerpts from his list relating to content developers:

• Headings draw the eye.
• Large blocks of text are avoided.
• Lists hold reader attention longer.
• One-column formats perform better in eye-fixation than multi-column formats.
• Shorter paragraphs perform better than long ones.
• Show numbers as numerals.
• Text attracts attention before graphics.
• Type size influences viewing behavior.
• Users only look at a sub headline if it interests them.
• Users spend a lot of time looking at buttons and menus (so make them clear!)

Marketing Tools of the Trade – Part 5

Google Reader

You’ll remember we discussed RSS feeds in an earlier instalment of social media tools of the trade. An RSS aggregator, Google reader is a great way to gather, organize and read RSS feeds. Similar in layout to Windows Explorer, Google Reader allows you to subscribe, read, tag, sort, watch trends and even share RSS feeds.

Now, here’s a trick. Share your RSS feeds that include your blog or webpage. Since this aggregator is a Google platform, your links appear to come from Google and anyone who’s spent time optimizing their site knows that Google spiders love Goolge links, placing them higher in rankings.

Marketing Tools of the Trade – Part 3

RSS (Syndicated News Feeds)

Really Simple Syndication (one of the more technical terms if ever I heard one) is another great tool of the trade when it comes to social media marketing – heck, even just staying in the loop.

The idea is that anytime your favourite news site, blogger, tags, etc, are updated, an alert is sent through RSS feeds pinging you to this new information. Sounds painful, but it really it isn’t! Check out this Youtube video, “RSS, In Plain English”

Get it? Good. Here’s an example of an RSS feed. It doesn’t look like much but add it to your RSS reader.

Now, for marketers, the marvel is yet to come. Go to technorati, go to Del.icio.us or Facebook and get the RSS feeds for your tagged campaigns, websites, etc and now anytime someone bookmarks it, blogs about it or generally gets some buzz going, you’ll now be alerted. Instantly.

Pretty cool, huh?