Many searchers have seen and used Google’s newest search features - Search Options and The Wonder Wheel.  The Wonder Wheel is hidden in the “Search Options” link that now shows up at the top of every search:

Click on the show options and you will be offered several choices to refine or restrict your search results.  My two favorites are the time based results (so I can find NEW content when I search) and the Wonder Wheel:

If you click on the Wonder Wheel, you will find a tool that recommends related searches.  Notice you can click several levels deep and as you click the results change in the right column. Also notice how you can move backwards and forward through the wonder wheel. It really is quite… wonderful.

Check out this video from Google Search Engineer Adam Stepinski talks about everything you can do with Google’s Wonder Wheel, a tool in the Search Options Panel:

Also, you may want to look at the new search engine from Microsoft, Bing, which adds suggested related searches directly into the left column:

Clearly, the search engines are making it easier and easier for consumers to refine their searches. Although, Bing is showing a lot different recommendations than Google.

In the long run, this is another part of the trend that is diluting the power of the traditional top placement in organic search (by encourage consumers to refine their search)

Wordpress Blogs Whitepaper

Blizzard Internet Marketing, Inc., a search engine marketing company out of Glenwood Springs, Colorado, has released a new whitepaper: SEO for Wordpress Blogs - A Non-Techie’s Guide. The whitepaper instructs readers on the finer points of using Wordpress to futher the success of their weblogs in Organic Search Results.

Blogs, by their very nature, are search engine friendly and provide natural advantages in optimizing for the Search Engines.  More and more, SEOs agree that among blogging platforms, WordPress provides superior flexibility and more advanced options that enable administrators to customize their designs with specific components. By following simple tips and using recommended plug-ins, even those with limited technical skills can have an easy-to-use content management system that ranks well in the Search Engines.

SEO for Wordpress Blogs is authored by Carrie Hill and Mary Bowling.  The 15 page whitepaper is available for download at http://www.blizzardinternet.com/whitepapers/ (more…)

Blogging can be very habit forming, but could lead to having great website success. By having a blog, you are providing your visitors a new medium to connect with your business or industry. With the evolution of website technologies and the social networking trends of the infamous Web 2.0 generation, having a blog is essential.

Many non-techie business owners get the mindset that a blog is where teeny boppers write an entry online discussing their current love relationships. If you are one of these people, it’s time to think differently. A blog is where you will keep your visitors informed and up to date on what is going on with your business or in your industry. It is also another great way to get visitors to return to your website.

There are many free blogging solutions online today to get you started. But for the best results, you should attach a blog to your current website. Wordpress is a well supported and widely used blogging platform. Wordpress along with a select few of quality plugins can be the best tool you can use to improve your website’s search engine rankings and entice visitors to come back for more.

Your blog’s design should match the look and feel of your current website. Consistency is the key to remember for your site’s visitors. Although the page layout of a blog varies differently than the regular web pages on your site, it should still resemble the same brand you want your visitors to trust and recognize. Make sure that your blog is customized and coded correctly for best performance in different browsers and screen resolutions.

When it comes to writing blog posts, think of a blog as an online magazine. Write posts that are of high quality that people would like to read. By only writing a few words every other week, you are not using your blog to its full potential and your visitors won’t stand for it. Write frequent and full featured posts that are interesting and that will keep your audience on the edge of their seats.

With the growing number of RSS feed readers online, more people are subscribing to blog feeds to stay up to date. Encourage your visitors to subscribe to your RSS feed so they will be enticed to return. For those of you that do not know, an RSS feed is a teaser for your blog that lists the last number of posts. This is a great way to secure and track returning visitors to your blog.

A blog is designed to allow your site’s visitors to read and comment on your posts. Encourage your readers to post comments and be sure to reply to those comments. The more you can get your visitors to engage on your website, the more likely they are to return. Not interacting with your readers is where many blog owners go wrong. Be sure to moderate and reply to comments often.

The unique advantage that blog posts have over regular web pages is the awesome ability to get indexed in Google within a matter of minutes. When a post is published, you can set Wordpress to “Ping” or inform Google that you have added something new to your blog. Google will then take the necessary actions to get your post listed in their index. In a search engine marketing advantage, if your post is optimized for a non competitive search term, you may have the possibility of securing a top 10 ranking in a matter of hours.

By having a blog that is frequently updated with great information, you are opening up new horizons for better online marketing. In a search engine standpoint, the more content you can produce, the more likely you are to gain more search engine traffic from long tail search terms. A long tail is a non-competitive, yet very popular search phrase.

If your posts are really good, you should consider utilizing the social media scene. Social media sites such as Digg can have the potential to produce thousands upon thousands of site visitors. Some sites that have reached Digg’s homepage have actually shut down due to the overwhelming amount of traffic. Encourage your readers to submit posts to Digg and to share it with their friends.

So why should you have a blog? Let’s review. By having a blog you are expanding your website into different marketing mediums by utilizing social media websites and RSS feeds, gaining search engine traffic potential, keeping your visitors informed and up to date, creating a new way to interact with your visitors and taking a gigantic leap ahead of your competitors. Not to mention the ability to become a leading expert in your industry just by blogging about what you know. With these great reasons, why don’t you have a blog?

image courtesy anniemole

Here are my notes on a variety of tips related to blogs and blogging from the recent Search Engine Strategies Conference in New York City:

• Use a blog as a way to establish yourself as an expert on a topic.
• Blogs are useful as a natural ranking tool. They attract links to boost the power of your site.
• Blog posts tend to rank well rather quickly. But unless they gain good links, they will fade after 2-3 weeks.
• Link out from a blog and spread the link love.
• You can email photos into Flick’r directly from a camera phone.  Then, you can publish them from Flick’r directly into a blog.
• Comment on other people’s blogs as a way to gain exposure for your blog. If you’re one of the early commenters, you’ll get the most attention, since most people don’t read all the comments on a post.

Online reviews are inevitable - especially in the hospitality industry. Whether you like it or not, your guests are going to review their stay - either at a review site like “Tripadvisor.com” or on their own blog. The key to harnessing the power of the online review is to bring that unique, fresh and FREE content onto your own website.

Content, and lots of it, more than any other factor, is going to help you rank well in the search engines. Well optimized content is going to help even more. But, realistically speaking, WRITING content is something you’re hoping little fairies, brownies or elves do at night while you’re getting your zzz’s. Unfortunately, the brownies, fairies, and elves are busy hiding your car keys and removing all of your matching socks from your drawer - they don’t have time to write content and the job falls on your shoulders to get it done.

Honestly, as an agency we CAN write content for your website - but truthfully - you’re better off doing it yourself. Yes, an agency can provide a quality product, don’t misunderstand my intention. But have they BEEN to the property, do they really “know” how cool your pool is? Probably not - so the best content comes from those who have experienced it.

Okay - this is where we get to consumer generated content (CGC) and reviews. If you provide your guests a place to leave a review of their stay with you, ON YOUR WEBSITE, you’re looking at thousands of words of content added every week or month. Content you didn’t have to write, content you don’t have to PAY for - great stuff, eh?

I know you’re concerned about the negative reviews - with good reason. But instead of dreading this inevitable occurrence, embrace it. Use a negative review on your website as a way to show shoppers and future guests how much you CARE about each and every experience given on your property or properties. Offer the negative reviewer a discount for coming back and trying again - give your email address so they can contact you directly to resolve the problem. The more public you are with this information and resolution, the more you CARE about your guests, the more consumers are going to trust you to give them a really great time, or make it right if things so wrong.

It’s a scary step, and implementing a review platform on your site can cost a bit - but the results can show a positive ROI in a short amount of time. A recent article in the newsletter about a case-study featured at HotelMarketing.com outlined how trusted reviews featured on your site DOUBLE your revenue. So mix your on-site reviews with a feed of your reviews from Tripadvisor.com. Lend credibility to what is read ON your site with a set of unbiased reviews from an independent site.

For the most part, people who consider consumer reviews are a picky bunch. They tend to discount a set of all 5-star reviews and they also tend to discount ONE bad review in a set of pretty good reviews. Keep this in mind when showing reviews on your site, don’t JUST show the great stuff, lend credibility with a little good and a little not so good. That being said, don’t let a set of comments turn into a public dirty laundry session. If things stay amicable and constructive, leave it online. Name-calling and rudeness are never okay, no matter what the venue is.

Keyboards image from GothCandy

Roes are red
Violets are blue
Google’s creative
on Valentines too…

 
I realized I was an “Internet junkie” when I found myself logging onto Google’s homepage this morning just to see the new Valentine’s Day logo! For those of you who use the Internet on a regular basis, you’ve probably noticed how Google changes its logo for major holidays and big events. I find this oddly amusing, and thought I’d share some fun facts I learned.
 The Google holiday logos, also known as “Google Doodles” are created by Dennis Hwang. Hwang “designed his first logo for Google in honor of Bastille Day (a national French holiday), July 14, 2000, and has been designing the specialty logos ever since.”  To view some of his previous work, check out the Google logo museum. I’ll be looking forward to the St. Patty’s Day logo!

I searched for the answer to this question at Google.  How often should I blog?, blog frequency, blogging schedule and similar queries returned amazingly relevant results from bloggers ranging from writers to affiliates to realtors to lifehackers. Here’s a very unscientific summary of their advice.

The best overall suggestion I found was if you don’t have anything to say, don’t say anything. Quite a few bloggers talked about nuisance blog posts clogging the web and the bad noise drowning out the good.  Frequency of blog posts should be dictated by the quality of what you have to say.  If you’ve created a blog for the right reason(s), then you are passionate about your topic and should have plenty of useful information to share.

Many bloggers also agree that blogging frequency is dictated by the type of blog you have. News blogs, of course, would be at the most frequent end of the scale. Thoughtful and thought-provoking essays are somewhere near the other end.

Most of our bloggers think that no matter what your posting schedule is, you should be consistent with it, so that your readers get into the habit of visiting regularly.

You’ve probably guessed by now that there is no one answer on posting frequency that applies to every blog or every blogger. For most of us, the right answer is from once a day to once a week, with most of our advisors recommending posting 2 to 3 times per week.