How Google Autocomplete Affects Your Business
Have you ever paid any serious attention to Google’s Autocomplete function? That’s the built in algorithm that suggests additional keywords as you begin to type a search into the box. Picture this: you begin to type in the name of a company that you want product or service information on, and the Autocomplete function adds the words ‘scam’ or ‘complaint’ to your search terms. Of course, if you are a potential client doing shopping research online, you are going to
The Mobile Coupon Mania
With location-based mobile apps like Foursquare, smartphone users can "check-in" to establishments or events they visit and share this information with friends. It's a bit of a social game, with badges and achievements (such as mayorships) providing incentives to use the app and show off your places of interest. Businesses can also use foursquare to provide special offers and rewards to their clientele, such as free stuff for those that visit the most often. It turns out that perhaps unsurprisingly
Conflict-Free Tech Minerals
You’ve probably heard of the expressions ‘blood diamond’ or ‘conflict diamond’ used to refer to those stones that come from war-torn areas of Africa and fund warlords and their exploits. A new expression related to this is emerging in the tech world: ‘conflict minerals.’ Certain minerals like tin, tungsten and gold are in high demand in the tech industry, as they are vital in the construction of everything from motherboards to iPhones. Just like diamonds, these minerals can often come
The Smartest Use of Your Time and Money in Digital Marketing
When it comes to marketing your business online, there exists a bewildering amount of services, sites, strategies and software that can help get you results. From lead-generation services to coupon distribution to social media marketing, never before has there been so much available for a small business owner looking to give their company an efficient marketing boost. The following graph nicely illustrates all the options that are commonly used to this end, sorted by the relative ratios of time
Google vs Bing Translate
In a bilingual setting like Montreal, it is crucial to have all business documentation and web content available in both English and French (it’s also required by law to have the French versions). Tools like Google and Bing Translate might be tempting to use in order to alleviate some of the work involved in translating content. We decided to test each service with a small paragraph of text to see where they are at in their effectiveness: Here’s the text: Un contenu
Technologies that will disappear within 5 to 10 years
A child born today might very well never use any of the following technologies. In many of these cases, one can see how tablets and smartphones, as they conglomerate functions that were once reserved for dedicated devices, are dramatically whittling down the variety of devices that people once used to perform all the tasks that they needed to get done. 1. Wired Home Internet This one might be obvious. Wired internet might still give some slight performance and stability benefits over wireless
Feeling Lucky? Hungry? Playful? Google Can Help
If you’ve ever pressed the "I'm feeling lucky" button on Google you know that it ignores the search result pages entirely and sends you directly to the first page related to your particular query. It’s also a fun way to discover some hidden games and other funny tricks when you're bored online. Recently for some users, the functionality of the "I'm Feeling Lucky" button has been expanded with new options: I’m Feeling Doodly: random doodle I’m Feeling Playful: random interactive doodle I’m Feeling Artistic:
Google’s Upcoming Algorithm Change is Causing Concern
Google is adding a new ranking factor into its search algorithm that is causing some concern, especially amongst those involved in the online intellectual property and copyright debate. The search engine’s algorithm will soon take into account the number of ‘valid’ (as determined by Google) copyright removal notices when determining a site’s ranking. For an SEO company or anyone involved in SEO services, this is definitely a development to watch. In essence, if a site has been the target of several
Why You Need a Professional Writer to Blog for You
We’ve all heard it before: content is the key to online marketing these days. It’s all about convincing those Google algorithms that you are some kind of an authority on a product or service by generating content around a particular topic. SEO is really focusing hard on this now, and the best illustration of this strategy is the blog. Now, if you want to rank highly on search engines, you’ve got to generate quality content. On top of that, you’ve
Top Web Design Mistakes that Kill your Conversion Rate
In a recent interview on Search Engine Journal, online marketing expert Ben Hunt shared his thoughts on how web design should work to increase conversion rates. A long-time advocate of combining SEO with Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO), Hunt focused on how web designers can often miss the mark when it comes to creating websites that result in compelling visitors to act on a consistent basis. Some of his most important points include: Designing the