Small Business Mavericks

APRIL 28, 2012

Back in the good old days, before the Internet came into existence, every business had a bricks and mortar presence somewhere. Marketing was hard work, and it didn’t always come cheap either. It has taken a long time, but those same bricks and mortar businesses are now turning to the Internet to market their goods and services. They look at social media like Facebook and Twitter and think wow – I can promote my business as much as I want, it’s as easy as pressing a few keys.

Social Media 126

Social Media Marketing Publishing Engagement 126

Small Business Mavericks

APRIL 30, 2012

Social media is everywhere and it can often be a little daunting when for a small business owner about to engage in a social media marketing campaign. All to often a business will focus on one or two social media platforms, particularly Facebook and Twitter since they receive the most mentions. There are hundreds of reliable social media platforms available to small businesses and whilst you can’t cover them all, you do need to consider a balanced approach.

Platform 110

Platform Social Media Forums MySpace 110

Small Business Mavericks

MAY 2, 2012

Much is being written about the difference between ‘freshness’ and ‘relevance’ in Google’s search results. Much of this discussion stems from Google’s own ‘freshness’ update in recent weeks. There are a couple of points that are well worth noting now when it comes to search results. These include: What you see is not what you get.

Google 105

Google Issues Examples Publishing 105

Small Business Mavericks

MAY 4, 2012

Google has been reworking search algorithms for years, however, they have been coming thick and fast recently, and Google I’m sure has taken great pleasure in applying names to them. Earlier in the year we had the Panda update that hit poor quality sites and recently we had the Penguin update that is said to hit spammy websites. The problem with the Penguin update is that it came hot on the heels of a fresh Panda update, so webmaster who suffered a drop in traffic are unsure if it is due t

Guidelines 101

Guidelines Issues Analytics Google 101

Small Business Mavericks

MAY 1, 2012

It’s hard for some business owners to rationale the effect of website design on SEO, yet is is an integral part of a successful online business. If you need a pointer, look at everything that comes out of Google – everything hinges on relevance and user experience. User experience starts with your websites design and that design is now impacting on search results.

SEO 93

SEO Compete Policies Google 93

Small Business Mavericks

APRIL 29, 2012

If you include unique images in your web pages, then you may want to consider including an image sitemap on your site. I emphasis the word “unique” – if you are using images from other websites then an image sitemap may not help. Unique images are a hidden resource for those websites that put in the extra effort to create them. Images appear in search results, and often draw clicks from users in preference to text links.

How To 101

How To Embedding Google Resources 101

Small Business Mavericks

MAY 3, 2012

WebProNews has published an infographic (created by TastyPlacement) that clearly demonstrated the effect that social media marketing has on a websites Google search results placement. The data range is quite narrow, especially when compared to some of the big businesses on the web, and test sites used were from one narrow niche. I am sure you would get a wide range of results depending on the competition in any particular niche, however, the data for this test case was sufficient to draw some co

SEO 105

SEO Comparison Small Business Google 105