Operation Technology Internet Marketing BlogOperation Technology Internet Marketing Blog

Hashtags now clickable on Facebook

Brad — Wed, 12 Jun 2013 18:50:37 +0000

Facebook has just made an announcement that #hashtags will now be clickable throughout Facebook. Services like Instagram, Twitter, Tumblr, or Pinterest already had hashtags to follow conversations and as of today, Facebook will allow you to add context to a post or indicate that it is part of a larger discussion. When you click on a hashtag in Facebook, you'll see a feed of what other people and Pages are saying about that event or topic. It's about time..even though copied from other social media sites, it's a welcome addition. Note that Facebook says it’s only “beginning to roll out” the feature, so everyone might not see it right away (immediately available to about 20 percent of Facebook users). Note also that the Facebook says it’s going to be introducing more features like this in the future (trendling hashtags?). Here is the Facebook hashtag announcement. Now you can: • Search for a specific hashtag from your search bar. For example, #Education. • Clickable hashtags that originate on other services, such as Instagram. • Compose posts directly from the hashtag feed and search results.

Who Should Not Use Four Square | Social Media Gone Wrong

Brad — Tue, 09 Apr 2013 12:40:11 +0000

Ever wonder who should not use Social Media or Foursquare?

Top SEO Strategy and Advice for Beginners

Brad — Wed, 20 Mar 2013 01:23:09 +0000

Are you just starting to learn about search engine optimization and what it could do for your website? Well, our Chicago SEO consultants are here to help you understand the basics. Sure, you may need an SEO company for advanced SEO techniques down the road but getting off on the right foot doesn’t need to be difficult. Here are some basic strategies to help you get started with understanding how to apply basic SEO to your website or blog.

8. Implement on-page SEO:

Every page title you create needs to use targeted keywords
The URL of the page must include the target long tail keyword phrases
Every page title tag should be unique
The H1 tag (only 1 per page) should contain your target keyword
Every page or post should contain a single and unique META description tag
The META description tag should be shorter than 156 characters
The page title should be up to 65 characters
Analyze your competition with free SEO tools
Research keywords with the Google Keyword Tool
Write a great article for your blog that will attract links and visitors

7. Putting the cart before the horse:

SEO Comes Before Web Design. Web designers largely ignore two parts of what an SEO provides, much to the disaffection of their clients: Keyword Research and Traffic Acquisition. As noted previously, keyword phrase research should be the starting point of any new website created. You need to know what your prospective customers are looking for and what words the site should be optimized for or they won’t find you. Second, and what most web designers fail to recognize is how the site is going to garner traffic. How and why should the site you are building get traffic and make sales? The answer may ultimately be content marketing via a website blog or or integrating a concrete social media strategy, but making these decisions before the website is created can be a huge benefit to any website’s return on investment. In summary, the web designer and SEO consultant (or yourself if knowledgeable enough) should work together. It beneficial to optimize at the start of a project.

6. Local Search Engine Optimization:

It can be tempting to shoot for the stars and set your goals on keywords like “web designer” or “SEO company.” But before you go after these blockbuster keywords with that's highly competitive, it makes more sense to target easier local SEO keywords like “SEO company in Illinois” or “Web Design Company Illinois,” depending on where your business is located. Look for local business websites that you can list your company website and explain the benefits of your products and/or services. The Better Business Bureau or local Chamber of Commerce may a good place to start. Local websites that list your business profile can help you rank for local search opportunities and drive some targeted traffic to your website.

5. Google and Bing SEO Can be a Slow Process:

No matter how fast you implement SEO on your website, the process can be slow going in order to get ranked for certain keyword phrases. Nobody ranks #1 in the SERP’s (search engine results pages) overnight unless the keyword phrase is useless and / or not competitive at all. You have to build authority / trust over time for the rewards to show in a top 10 ranking for a fairly competitive keyword phrase. And if we’re talking about the top keywords, it very well might take you or your SEO company over a year. No website is exempt from building trust and worthiness of top rankings.

4. SEO Copywriting for Success:

SEO Copywriting is the technique of writing the viewable text on a web page in such a way that it reads well for the user while also targeting specific search terms on the page. Its purpose is to rank highly in the search engines for the targeted search terms. Although link-building gets a lot of attention, remember that the only dependable information Google has about your site is the content you write on it. Lastly, remember to write for human readers first, THEN optimize for the search engines.

3. Focus on Link/Anchor Text Diversity:

Recently, Search Engine Watch noted what many top SEOs already knew: it’s not just how many links you receive, it’s from how many different websites and the diversity of anchor text within your links. Google loves to see link diversity in your backlink profile, so give them what they want to see and try to score links from as many different sites as possible.

2. Read the Top Online SEO knowledge base Websites:

One of the simplest SEO tips on our list is to stay up to date and read about SEO from the experts in our field. Although the top SEO experts tend to stay away from the forums, there are still plenty of knowledgeable people who are more than happy to help you succeed in your SEO efforts. There is a goldmine of free SEO tips and tricks available from websites like Search Engine Watch, Search Engine Land and SEO.moz. If you’re paying attention, you’ll be able to recognize the experts from the novices. Once you do, pay extra attention to each of their posts, as they’ve been through it many times.

1. It’s a Long Process. Don’t Give Up:

The learning curve for beginners getting into SEO can be tough the first few months. There is a ton of information to absorb, new terminology to grapple with and lots of outdated information (ex: are Meta keywords still relevant?), to sift through. The good new is that every person knowledgeable in SEO was a beginner at some point and reached expert status by keeping up with SEO trends and focusing on improving their SEO implementation. In summary, don’t let your beautiful website go to waste because you gave up on the SEO game or did not follow some of the basic SEO rules. Too much work, too much time, too much money seems to be the common reason but the payoff down the road is well worth your time in growing your website.

By Brad Fogel

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Should you use Instagram to start engaging new customers?

Brad — Sat, 16 Feb 2013 17:59:18 +0000

You may have noticed how much marketers are using images in their social media marketing the last few years and with it the use of Instagram by businesses has really taken off. With a huge amount of users, Instagram has become a great opportunity for brands and businesses to get distribute quick messages and showcase their photos to their target demographic. Using Instagram, small business owners can instantly put a face to their business and watch their customer relationships and sales flourish as a result.

Why Instagram for business?

Instagram initially started out as a easy way to post pictures to your fans and probably did not have a lot of marketing value. However, during the past few years Instagram has become an effective outlet for marketers to expand their audience with visuals and short messages. 5 examples of ways businesses are utilizing Instagram to promote their business include:

To showcase products from their ecommerce catalog.
Ability to add context to photos.
In order to show how products are created with visual representation.
To quickly promote new products and sale items.
Share photos on various social networks for added marketing virality.

Backing this up is an infographic which shows how people are using Instagram today. This will help marketers to convince their stakeholders that Instagram is the next place to start engaging new customers.

Will you or do you utilize Instagram for your business? Let us know in the comments.

By Brad Fogel

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Making the Business Case for Pinterest

Brad — Sun, 03 Feb 2013 19:44:25 +0000

Social marketers tend to default to Facebook and Twitter for their viral marketing strategies, however, the statistics surrounding Pinterest are remarkable in showing just how popular the social network has become in a short amount of time and utilizing Pinterest must not be forgotten moving forward.

6 Stat that make the Business Case for utilizing Pinterest are as follows:

1) Pinterest buyers spend more money, more often, and on more items than any of the other top 5 social media sites. (Source: comScore) 2) According to comScore and Business Insider, Pinterest is the third most popular social network in the US and had more than 28m unique users a month. (Source: Business Insider) 3) Survey Finds Consumers Using Pinterest To Engage With Retailers More Than Facebook, Twitter. (Source: Shop.org, comScore and The Partnering Group) 3) Pinterest pins which include prices receive 36% more likes than those which do not. (Source: Shopify) 4) 47% of U.S. online consumers have made a purchase based on recommendations from Pinterest. (Source: BlogHer) 5) 81% of U.S. online consumers trust information and advice from Pinterest. Source: (BlogHer) 6) Pinterest generated more referral traffic for businesses than Google+, YouTube, and LinkedIn combined. (Source: Shareaholic) Though Pinterest may no longer the hot new thing that it was for much of 2012, it still has too much potential to be ignored. These 12 statistics highlight how Pinterest is a bullseye for gaining user traffic and driving additional sales to your business. Therefore, it naturally makes sense for businesses to utilize Pinterest as another means for creating business accounts to help companies spur their visual marketing efforts further.

Please leave a comment below or remember to share if you like this article. Looking for a social media marketing company to assist with your internet marketing goals? Give us a call or contact us to see what we can do for you.

By Brad Fogel

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6 Web Design Trends To Expect in 2013

Brad — Wed, 30 Jan 2013 00:08:36 +0000

I’m going to share with you 6 predictions I expect to happen for web design trends during 2013. There have been many new design trends over the past few years and our web design company tries to stay up with numerous trend in order to enhance the overall look of our clients websites. In the past, trends for website development companies were more focused on the integration of the rich media but now, the latest web design trends seem to be more about usability and appearance. The following are my expectations for design trends that will take place in 2013 as well as some web design trends to avoid during 2013. Prediction 1: Sites Designed With Typography In Mind Web design companies have a ton of fonts available to choose from over the years. Moving forward, though, choosing the typography will no longer be a minor decision as we move into 2013 as it will become more imporant to the overall design because now instead of trying to choose attractive pictures, designers will try to enhance the beauty of the site via typography. In summary, our prediction is that we expect design companies to give more attention to typography and will be included in the foundation and implementation of any new website. Prediction 2: The Use of Responsive Design Desktop and mobile devices vary in screen size and other proportions. My prediction is that more attention will be made earlier in a website design project to make sure that the responsiveness of the site is based on the design and not the vast variety of devices out there. The idea of forgetting about the size of devices will help drive better responsive design. Responsive web design will eliminate all these problems because of its ability to respond to the size of the device being used. With responsive web design, web designers do not need to create a separate layout for mobile devices and for desktops. A single design will work seamless on all devices. This trend will make things more convenient for designers. Prediction 3: The Use of Large Visual Imagery For Designs More and more websites are using large images on their home page to make a visual bang that drawers the user into the design and I don’t see it slowing down any time soon. It’s an excellent way to capture your visitor’s attention and it can look great when done properly. When blended into your layout, this design technique can give your website a major edge in marketing. Companies know this (ex: Apple, Blackberry, Gateway, Logitech), so I predict this trend will continue through most of 2013. Prediction 4: Content Remains King..But With More Focus on High Quality. Without content there is no website, so content will remain a high priority which is also due in part to responsive web design. Additionally, more focus will be made on creating high-quality content for websites. Designing, writing, publishing and social sharing will help content keep its crown, while responsive design will be responsible for the delivery of that content. Prediction 5: More Use of Vertical Scrolling Another prediction for 2013 web design trends involves mobile devices and the usage of vertical scrolling. Although horizontal scrolling can be difficult on some mobile devices, vertical scrolling is more appealing because it works whether the page is viewed in portrait or in landscape. Remember to verify that your menu is coded to scroll down with the page, so that the user does not have to scroll all the way up to the top of the page to navigate through your website. That being said, there is no reason to add them everything at once. You can progressively update your website to include these newer design features. Implementing a few new design features keeps your visitors engaged and coming back. Prediction 6: Say Adios to Flash Not much of a surprise here. It’s highly evident that Flash is on its last leg moving into the early goings of 2013. It’s bad for the SEO of a site, many mobile devices don’t support it (Apple? Unless you have an app like SkyFire), and it is a pain to update and takes up a lot of computer resources. Additionally, there are many other technologies out there that can do what Flash does now (ex:. JavaScript, HTML5/CSS3, etc.). Since Flash is already on a downward spiral, I predict that we could see the end of Flash in 2013 as fewer developers are going to use it. Please leave a comment below or remember to share if you like this article.

By Brad Fogel

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8 SEO Related Blog Post Steps Missed That Will Kill Your Traffic

Brad — Thu, 24 Jan 2013 03:38:53 +0000

Time and again I see bloggers forget to not take on page SEO into account before publishing to their blog. As people get started with blogging, they think it’s as simple as clicking, “Add New Post,” typing a few paragraphs, and clicking, “Publish.” The problem is in the hope that page views, social shares and comments will ultimately bring large amounts of visitors to come flooding in. Then, after waiting and watching their web analytics (if you have that set up?), nothing happens. They then make a few more attempts using the same process to only to quit blogging because it’s dead as a ghost town on their blog. The blogger most likely does not realize that in order to get any kind of sizeable traffic, they must adhere to a few publishing steps that could lead to some traffic gains to their blog posts.

Here are some of the most popular SEO blog post steps that publishers tend to forget.

1. Fine-Tuning the Headline Here’s is a basic formula for creating headlines for list posts: [#][keyword][interesting-catch phrase] For title tag SEO, your goal is to place the keyword as near to the front of the headline as possible:

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2. Keyword Research and Relevancy Before I write out my content, I figure out if it’s something that people are asking about or if the subject is trending. And if it is, I want to know if the internet is already saturated with that type of content and are those keywords relevant to my article. Keywords are at the heart of any successful blog / SEO campaign. Once you have selected a great batch of keywords and key phrases, make sure to use them properly. Don’t stuff your content too full of keywords, because that will get you in trouble with the major search engines.

To figure this out, I do two things:

Google’s Keyword Tool – I look up the words I believe people would search for to find the post I plan on writing.
Google – I Google those keywords to see the actual competition.

By now, I can look at a series of search results and determine how well I’ll be able to rank for a keyword. I want this post to rank for “8 Blog Post Steps Missed” (click to see how it’s doing). 3. Catchy / Funny Images We all know that images grab your attention, break up the content, and supplement your ideas. But they also add great SEO benefits, as long as you follow these steps:

Save your images as [keyword-phrase.jpg] prior to uploading them to your site.
Add alt text as [keyword phrase].
Add anchor text if used as a link [keyword phrase].

These rules apply to your featured image and the images within your posts but do not overdo it with repetitive spammy keywords if you have many images.

4. Subheadings Similar to images, subheadings break up the content and make blog posts easier to read while also providing big SEO benefits. When a search engine crawler hits a web page, it reads the headline/title tag first

. Then it reads the H2, H3, and H4 tags. When you add subheadings to your content, proper HTML is:

Subhead Level 1

Subhead Level 2

Subhead Level 3

In summary, the title tag is one of the best things you can do from an SEO perspective for your blog post. You do not need to bold and use italics on all your headings. 5. Interlinking Between Post Pages Another important step that most people forget is interlinking between posts. Personally, I even forget sometimes to link between my blog posts. What it does is create “stickiness” to the site for users meaning that it will lead them to stay around and view additional posts/pages that may be relevant to the original post they arrived from. Remember to read through the post you are working on and try to find two-three opportunities to naturally link back to relevant posts on your blog to keep the reader around longer. 6. External Linking Also, look for opportunities to link to other bloggers in your related niche area. Linking to other sites is also a good way to build relationships with other bloggers. 7. Meta Data Google may not look at meta keywords anymore, but the meta description is definitely relevant as this is what shows in the search results. The meta description often shows up as the little description (hence meta description term) beneath the hyperlink in the search results. In writing your meta description, you need to keep three things in mind:

Google cuts off the description after 155-160 characters so it’s good practice to use 155 characters or less so Google will display the entire description.
Include your relevant keyword phrases because Google will bold them in search results.
Create an actual sentence from the post because people will most likely look for that sentence once they arrive.

Another tip is to summarize the post with the relevant long tail keyword phrases (instead of “Hotels”, you would use “Hotels in Boston Massachusetts”) in the last sentence of the introduction and use that as the meta description. 8. Include a Call to Action The final step is the call-to-action. A calls to action is crucial when it comes to trying to create viral content or generate sales for your product. Visitors want to be told what to do – they don’t want to be left in the dark. If your site leaves them scratching their heads, they won’t understand the point. As an example on spreading this blog post, here are a few calls to actions for reference:

Comment – Encourage readers to comment by ending the post with a thought-provoking question or simply ask them to let you know what they think.
Share – “If you liked this article, tweet it!”
Implement – I believe the best result of any blog post is for a reader to take your advice and implement it.

Now the user will have a choice. They can comment, share, or implement. The user performing all three would be the triple crown. Well, I hope you liked this post. And following my own advice, please let me know what you think and PLEASE SHARE. Looking for more tips on SEO or an SEO audit checklist to review on your new website? Read some of our other featured SEO articles By Brad Fogel

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What If Fonts Were Dogs

Brad — Mon, 21 Jan 2013 17:11:56 +0000

What If Fonts Were Dogs? [caption id="attachment_613" align="aligncenter" width="357"] What If Fonts Were Dogs - Operation Technology web design with fonts[/caption]

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Top SEO Tips For 2013 After Google Penguin and Panda Updates

Brad — Sun, 20 Jan 2013 20:36:10 +0000

SEO during the past few years has evolved at a rapid pace, especially from the Google as a result of their Panda and Penguin updates. The biggest effect of the prior noted Google updates has been to blow up spam websites that were ruining user search results. Every SEO company became well aware fast to the effects of these algorithm updates as clients would inquire what happened to their keyword rankings. This would now alter their SEO strategy moving forward to ranking in SERP's and make search engine optimization only more difficult in the coming years. In summary, we need to alter some of our tactics and strategy to better prepare for better search results moving forward. With that said, our focus on search needs to be squarely on terms that are “Unique” with the following tasks at hand in 2013 as a priority: 1. Unique Link resource: Also called “link diversity”, this method is effective and can help you build your authority for your website. The idea here is to get links from many different resources and websites but with high page rank value. You can find this from the website AHREFS.com where it called as “AHREFS Rank”. 2. Unique anchor text: As we now know, Google Penguin has devalued or completely bombed websites out of the search results that build links with same anchor text across many websites including directories. The old method to pasting the same anchor text for SEO purposes on every website looked unnatural from a link building point of view. Many websites using the same anchor text got caught by the updated Google algorithm so going into 2013 you need to diversify the anchor text for each link pointing back to your website and spread within your website the pointing links also. Don't point all your backlinks to your home page. If you have a site link about web design, point the backlink with related keyword anchor text back to the pertaining web page. 3. Write Unique Content: Writing unique content for your website and blog is one of the most important things you can do and keeps your website fresh. This includes your meta tags and internal links. Understanding that search engine are currently crawling to rank new and content that is unique. If you do not have a blog, we highly suggest you implement one to complement your website with fresh content. This will help your site to post more pages and in turn drive more traffic and rank higher for relevant in the search results. 4. Identify Unique Traffic source: Most of us are dependent on the Google search traffic but is very competitive for common search terms and keywords. Do not put all your all eggs in one basket. Optimize your website and the marketing efforts to get traffic from different sources including BING, social media and local search. Local directories including Google Business Local, local shopping directories can bring in targeted search traffic for your products and services. In summary, using some of these tactics in 2013 can be a challenge but well worth it in the end. If you have any suggestions or comments then please post below. Happy SEO hunting in 2013.

Operation Technology Internet Marketing BlogOperation Technology Internet Marketing Blog

Hashtags now clickable on Facebook

Who Should Not Use Four Square | Social Media Gone Wrong

Top SEO Strategy and Advice for Beginners

8. Implement on-page SEO:

7. Putting the cart before the horse:

6. Local Search Engine Optimization:

5. Google and Bing SEO Can be a Slow Process:

4. SEO Copywriting for Success:

3. Focus on Link/Anchor Text Diversity:

2. Read the Top Online SEO knowledge base Websites:

1. It’s a Long Process. Don’t Give Up:

Should you use Instagram to start engaging new customers?

Why Instagram for business?

Making the Business Case for Pinterest

6 Stat that make the Business Case for utilizing Pinterest are as follows:

6 Web Design Trends To Expect in 2013

8 SEO Related Blog Post Steps Missed That Will Kill Your Traffic

Here are some of the most popular SEO blog post steps that publishers tend to forget.

. Then it reads the H2, H3, and H4 tags. When you add subheadings to your content, proper HTML is:

Subhead Level 1

Subhead Level 2

Subhead Level 3

What If Fonts Were Dogs

Top SEO Tips For 2013 After Google Penguin and Panda Updates

Our office web design meeting is going well.