What's New In Google Analytics?

Google has recently updated its excellent free web analytics package to provide us with even more useful measures and reporting for our websites. The new set-up and interface is great and is an improvement to what we had previously, which was already very useful. The new interface however is much more intuitive, with easy to understand graphical images and help screens. We recommend Google Analytics to anyone that requires in depth reporting on their website and the new version is very user friendly.

Report Changes
There have been a few changes to the export reporting function that are worth a look. These include the ability to now export reports in PDF Format, which show not only the figures, but the graphical representation of information. Users now have the choice to report in PDF, XML, CSV or TSV formats.

Receive Reports by Email
Users can set-up reports to be emailed to colleagues and clients on daily, weekly, monthly or quarterly manner and in whatever format they want i.e. PDF, XML, CSV or TSV.

To check out an example of the new Analytics reporting, please click on the link below to be taken to a graphical PDF report of Com.Motion's website traffic sources for the month of May 2007 - Com.Motion Traffic Report.

All in all an excellent upgrade that takes your analytical measurements to the next level. At the moment, the new Google Analytics interface is running alongside the previous one so you will be able to continue to use the older version until July 18th 2007.

For more information on Google Analytics, follow this link - Google Analytics Blog

Let Com.Motion help you with your Analytics, follow this link to find out more - Analytics

To EBay Or Not To EBay – That is the Question!

To EBay Or Not To EBay – That is the Question!
It’s funny. Everyone has heard of eBay and has probably used the website to buy or sell something but not many businesses have really considered its true potential for them. Everyday millions of pounds are made by budding e-bayers selling products online to a global audience, however it is amazing to think that most SMEs and big businesses have not considering eBay as a component of their online sales strategy.

Ebay is a relatively new phenomenon, but the company has taken the web world by storm in a short time. Here are some brief stats:

1. eBay was founded in 1995
2. eBay has a global customer base of 181 million
3. eBay has a global presence in 33 markets including the UK and USA
4. eBay UK was Launched in 1999
5. eBay in the UK’s number one ecommerce website
6. eBay UK has 3 million items listed at any given time
7. eBay UK accounts for 10% of all the time UK users spend on the internet

We could go on and on discussing the merits and stats of eBay, but the one that sticks out for me is number 5: eBay in the UK’s number one ecommerce website!

All ecommerce websites endeavour to get customers through online marketing activity like search engine optimisation and paid for marketing without ever considering a mechanism that is already in place to help them – eBay!

There is a misconception within many businesses that eBay is not for them. However, they should consider these startling statistics:

• Profitable since its launch, eBay net revenues totalled $1.329 billion in Q4-05 and $4.552 billion in 2005.
• eBay International achieved net revenues of $604.1 million in Q4-05 and $2.081 billion in 2005.
• In Q4-05, gross merchandise volume (GMV), the total value of all successfully closed items on eBay's trading platforms, was $12.0 billion. In 2005, eBay's GMV totalled $44.3 billion.
• eBay users worldwide trade more than $1,511 worth of goods on the site every second.
• There were 546.4 million new listings added to eBay worldwide in Q4-05. At any given time, there are approximately 78 million listings worldwide, and approximately 6 million listings are added per day. eBay users trade in more than 50,000 categories.
• Based on Q4-05 GMV, the following categories delivered $1 billion or more in worldwide annualized GMV: eBay Motors at 13.0 billion; Consumer Electronics at $4.4 billion; Clothing & Accessories at $3.9 billion; Computers at $3.4 billion; Books / Music / Movies at $2.8 billion; Home & Garden at $2.7 billion; Collectibles at $2.6 billion; Sports at $2.2 billion; Toys at $2.1 billion; Jewellery & Watches at $1.9 billion; Business & Industrial at $1.6 billion; Cameras & Photo at $1.5 billion; and Antiques & Art at $1.2 billion.
• While eBay is well-known for its auction format, users can also buy and sell in fixed-price formats, which accounted for 34% of total GMV during Q4-05.
• At the end of Q4-05, eBay hosted approximately 383,000 stores worldwide, with approximately 212,000 stores hosted on the U.S. site and 171,000 stores hosted on eBay's international sites.
• More than 724,000 professional sellers in the U.S. use eBay as a primary or secondary source of income. In addition, 1.5 million individuals sell on eBay to supplement their incomes. (Source: ACNielsen International Research, July 2005)
• As of December 2005, eBay members worldwide have left more than four billion feedback comments for one another regarding their eBay transactions.
• The most expensive item sold on eBay to date is a private business jet for $4.9 million.

Makes interesting reading and begs the question are online product based businesses missing a trick? In our opinion the answer is yes and it about time businesses cottoned on to this fact and started embracing the eBay concept with open arms.

How do you take advantage of eBay?
Millions of listings on eBay more or less look the same and say the same thing. However, by delving a little deeper, you start to unearth some gems that are excellent benchmarks for you or any business to follow. Listed below are 2 eBay considerations:

1. Selling Manager Pro
Selling Manager Pro is an online selling tool to help you create listings, manage post-sale activities and manage your inventory. If you are a volume seller who wants a robust, web-based eBay tool then this is the one for you. It’s cost - £4.99 per month. It will.

• Automatically list and re-list items for you
• Inform buyers by auto notification
• Let you know when payment has been received
• Tell you what items you have shipped
• Provide Auto feedback upon buyer payment
• Allow the scheduling of items
• Offer Reporting
• Allows you to Design Professional Listings
• Restock alerts

This is a fantastic eBay tool that automates much of the information for you and helps you engage and interact with your eBay clients. Everything is controlled from one area and is generally easy to use once you get the hang of it.

The best things about this facility is that it allows you to create professional and business like listings that when displayed on eBay provide a look and feel that can be similar to your company’s website. For example, our client the Funky Group is currently using this facility to list all products with a branded and professional look and feel that mimics the company’s actual website. This has resulted in well over 4 figure sales with over 300 products sold within the first month of going live!

Our tip for this facility is to brand it as your business and to produce something that uniquely reflects you and allows you to stand out from the crowd and at the same time maintain very professional image. Granted there are eBay fees and costs but these are reduced once you start to receive higher volumes of sales. The more you sell the less you pay!

2. EBay Shops
Creating a successful eBay Shop involves four basic steps: building and customising your shop; managing your listings and sales; promoting your Shop; and tracking your shop traffic and sales.

An eBay shop allows you to

• Set up, brand, and customise your shop to maximise success.
• Save time with powerful tools to manage your listings and sales.
• Drive traffic to your shop and trigger repeat purchases from your customers.
• Optimise your sales strategy with advanced reporting tools.

An excellent benchmark for a company that does this well and takes eBay shopping to a new level is online shoe retailer Schuh http://www.schuh.co.uk. This eBay shop is an excellent example of how to do it right and is worth a visit at http://stores.eBay.co.uk/Schuh-Branded-Shoes-Online.

Why is Schuh such a good example? Well for starters, the eBay shop is branded with the Schuh logo and includes professional graphically designed images. Additionally, the eBay shop is very similar to the official Schuh retail website. eBay acts as a tool to promote the Schuh brand, even increasing sales activity on their own official website.

Each individual pair of shoes has 6 images of it taken from varying angles that help highlight and sell the shoes to potential consumers. The Schuh eBay shop works just like a well designed ecommerce website should- with simple navigation to the product of your choice with the main difference being you can bid on the product first before you buy it.

Consider

• eBay hosts approximately 380,000 stores worldwide (2005), with approximately 212,000 stores hosted on the U.S. site and 171,000 stores hosted on eBay's international sites.
• More than 724,000 professional sellers in the U.S. use eBay as a primary or secondary source of income. In addition, 1.5 million individuals sell on eBay to supplement their incomes. (Source: ACNielsen International Research, July 2005)

Still not convinced? We do agree that eBay has certain pitfalls for business and individuals to consider together with some expensive fees that can be off putting. However, in our opinion it does make sense to consider eBay. Put it this way, your target market may be already using eBay and you could use it to reach these customers that you have never engaged with before – increasing sales and turnover.

Additionally, having an eBay presence can lend itself to search engine optimisation because – eBay listings appear in Google and Yahoo for consumer searches! Consider Schuh – try a Google search for some of their products!

So to summarise - is eBay an opportunity or is it something to be dismissed? We think that it is something that every business that is selling online should consider as part of a range of online marketing activities.

Com.Motion would like to thank EBay, Nielsen//NetRatings and Econsultancy for the statistics in this article.

The Secrets of a Great Website

I have been thinking about the question, what makes a website great? Why are some websites destined for greatness and others heading towards online mediocrity?

Last night I attended an event that brought me some way towards answering my question. I had the pleasure of hearing Jim Buckmaster, the CEO of Craigslist speak. For those of you in the UK who don’t know Craigslist, you will be surprised to hear that it is the seventh largest English language website in the world. Craigslist is one of the survivors of the first dotcom bubble - founded in San Francisco 12 years ago - and currently operates in 50 countries around the world, with 15 million unique users.

Craigslist is basically an online community bulletin board where users can post almost anything they want to for free. There is nothing glitzy about this site as, shock horror, they don’t even have a logo! Most of the company’s £16 million a year in revenues comes from charging companies to post job adverts in 7 American cities. Your everyday Joe gets to use the site for free.

The Craigslist ethos has remained the same from the start – only do what the customer wants. Jim Buckmaster said in his talk that his customers want a simple site. They want local information that is easy to access and they want this for free. They don’t want pop up advertising or fancy designs. Craiglist’s changes and improvements over the past 12 years have been made as a result of customer feedback. They didn’t set out to dominate the world, as they only set up on cities where the customers wanted the service.

So, in summary, the secrets to a great website are:

1. Aim to completely satisfy your customer base.
2. Stick to your company values.
3. Don’t start out promising that you will do one thing and then let your customer down.
4. Take every opportunity that you can to ask for feedback. Listen to what your customer thinks and do what you can to please them.

As an online marketer I always tell my clients that I can increase traffic to their websites, but I can’t guarantee that people will buy. It’s all about the customer at the end of the day and if they don’t like your website or if they don’t trust you as an online business, then they won’t bother. This is especially important in 2007, with web users conversing and interacting in the world of Web 2.0.

About the Author
Kate Little is the Director of Com.Motion, a leading Internet Marketing Company. Visit Com.Motion to discuss how we can help your company increase its online sales through our comprehensive Online Advertising and Search Engine Optimisation programme.

Discover Your Google Links

Google has recently updated Google webmasters central with an excellent tool that allows you to discover who is linking to you. You can now use web master tools to view a greater selection of links to you web pages.

The information provided is more detailed and it can be downloaded to a spreadsheet to allow you to analyse accordingly. The Google webmaster team have split the links into 2 categories to make it easier for you; these are - external and internal. The official Google Blog has clear descriptions to what this means and can be found at this location - Google Blog.

All you have to do is verify ownership of your Google web master account to access this information. Click on this link - Com.Motion's Links page to see a snapshot of our links on Google webmasters central.

Search engine Optimisation Part 2 – Why Linking Does Matter!

Links, or more importantly links that come to your website (inbound links), play a significant part in the overall visibility of your website and they are a factor that you must consider when planning your search engine optimisation strategy.

Linking is important because the World Wide Web is essentially made up of hyperlinks that allow people to move quickly from one source of information to another. When considered from a business perspective, this offers a fantastic opportunity to help deliver your business objectives by linking to the appropriate websites within your market sector.

Main benefits of linking:

• Web browsers are naturally curious and they will follow links. If a website that they visit often suggests a link to consider then they are more likely to follow it, as it is possibly a link that will benefit them and it has come from a trusted source. This backs up the claim that the more quality inbound links your company has, the more potential customers will value and trust the products or services you sell on your website.

• Search engines like inbound links to websites and will potentially give your website a higher ranking and placement because of these links.

• If you are able to attract top websites in a linking exchange initiative, visitors are more likely to pay attention to your website, buy your product or digest what you have to say as they will trust the content more because of the links.

Website Linking Strategy

Link popularity refers to the number and ‘quality’ of links to your website. The top search engines - Google, Yahoo and MSN - consider quality inbound links very important as they assume that if other websites link to yours, you offer valuable content to web browsers and users.

In essence, these inbound links work similarly to client testimonials, as the more links to your website the more support you have from other companies and clients for your business. It should be noted here that search engines such as Google are striving for quality content on websites. Links that appear to add no value to a customers visit will not actively improve your search engine ranking, which is why it is so important to evaluate and think about your linking exchanges.

Like every other aspect of business development or project management, clear focus and planning must be considered when determining your linking strategy. Consider your own website, which should be content rich so that it will appeal to the person that you want to obtain a link from. What information on your website will make up part of your outbound links and how that appeal to other websites and encourage them to want to participate in a linking exchange?

In the first article, we discussed the importance of webpage optimisation and more importantly keyword research. Keyword research is important here as it will highlight a range of potentially content relevant websites that might lend themselves to your marketplace and target audience. Additionally, consider which of these websites are highly ranked by search engines such as Google.

Google does offer a tool bar (http://www.google.com/tools/firefox/toolbar/index.html) for Internet Explorer or Firefox that tells you the popularity or score of the webpage you are on. For example, the homepage score of our website, www.com-motionuk.com, is 4/10 (getting there) and looks like this.








Potentially, websites with a higher rank are valued more highly so it makes sense for you to target higher and better-ranked websites for your linking campaign. However, page rank is purely a guide and should not be the determining factor in your choice of links. If you feel that a website would add value to your visitors or customers experience on line then go for it!

Requesting Links

After you have researched and made a list of companies to approach for links it is important to consider how you will approach them. Will you email or phone?

One of the most efficient ways to request a link is first to find out who the most appropriate person in the company is to contact: i.e. the managing director or the individual who looks after the website. Thereafter, a personal email introducing you, your company and the benefits of linking to each other is key to initiate a response. People receive lots of junk email on a daily basis so doing the research first and sending a relevant personal email will more likely be looked at and responded to.

Sometimes it helps if you have already linked to their website and you can highlight this in your email to the company you are targeting.

Anchor Text

How your inbound links are made up is also important. Creating the correct ‘anchor text’ (the text that the webpage uses to link to your site) is important as this will allow search engines to pick up on popular keyword searches from someone else’s website. If we use one of our clients, Foundationz as an example, we can include anchor text that uses keywords that their customers might type in to find them.

For example, they might use keywords within their anchor text that reflect the products and services they offer as a business i.e. Afro and Black Hair Care Specialists:

Foundationz – Afro & Curly Haircare Specialists

Foundationz – Articles & Advice on Dreadlock, Afro, Curly Haircare Styles

Landing Pages

Your website’s landing pages are also important. As shown in the Foundationz example above, both of these links go to different pages on the Foundationz website (different landing pages). Each one of your web pages is potentially discussing something different and as a result, each should have different inbound and outbound links. Don’t send all your inbound links to your homepage, as your homepage will have its own theme.

Appropriate landing pages are something to consider as all of this linking activity can be measured through analytical tracking or statistics.

Summary

Having a website linking strategy can be a large undertaking and this article briefly highlights the main areas for you to consider. Most SEO firms or experts agree that link building will over time enhance your website listing in the search engines and to achieve dramatic results you need actively monitor and increase your links on an ongoing basis.

Keeping your website content up to date and changing it will add to any users visit and they will value the experience. This organic approach and linking to relevant websites can only enhance your website and attract the correct type of customer over time. As your website ages, you will build up relevant quality links from other websites that add value and keep your customers coming back for more.

Consider

• Who links to your competitors
• Who links to you
• The benefits of link building
• Why someone should link to you
• Is your website content appealing and interesting
• How will you request links
• What landing pages will have inbound links
• What anchor text will the links use

There are some great online websites with lots of free reports listed below for your consideration:

www.linkpopularity.com

www.linkingmatters.com

www.checkyourlinkpopularity.com

Google

To find out in Google who links to you, put this in the search box – link:www.yourwebsite.co.uk

Should you wish to discuss any aspects of this article or if you would like to discuss developing a link strategy in more detail then please contact Com.Motion directly.

The Impact Of Social Media On Business

Social media is taking the web by storm and is creating a buzz in 2007. Social Media allows people to highlight and discuss issues and offer opinions on areas of interest or expertise. The idea of social media is not new, however from a business point of view social media is increasingly important.

Blogs
Blogs are just one example of social media. These online discussion portals offer a fantastic opportunity for businesses to engage with their clients by inviting comment or discussing relevant issues or just highlighting some useful information that might be relevant for their customers and their market place.

Blogs are not a place for the hard sell; these online portals should be used to communicate with customers in a ‘social’ way that encourages interaction. Com.Motion have our own blog were we update our clients and any visitors on what is happening in the Internet marketing world.

Always remember, as a business, you are the expert and facilities like blogs offer a free and fantastic way for you to communicate and engage with clients on the topics of the day. Remember, if you offer something that is of value, the likelyhood is that someone will tell someone else about you who just might be interested in your products or services.

Free Blog - Blogger.com

Other Social Medium Considerations
There are a number of fantastic website to look up and potentially contribute to. The idea is to create a profile on these websites that singles you out as an expert in your chosen field. Start contributing or highlighting useful websites that have value to you and others or give your opinions or thoughts on areas of interest.

Consider these Website Links Below:

• Digg
• Delicious
• Reddit
• Furl

Other social areas of interest to consider are:

• RSS
• Video
• My space
• Online PR

Social Media is definitely here and it is something that should be considered for any online marketing strategy. As a race, we are a social bunch and love to converse and talk to each other – why should that be any different online.

Website Sitemaps - Google, Yahoo & MSN - Sitemaps.org

Google has got together with Yahoo and MSN to come up with a cohesive system that will allow all website owners to create one website map that will work on all 3 search engines.

Website maps are basically XML, TXT or RSS files that contain all the URLs that you would like the search engines to index. Website maps do not impact on your rankings within the search engines but they do tell them what pages you would like them to index.

For example, Com.Motion has a Google website map and the pages that Google has indexed can by found by copying the following into the Google browser and clicking search - site: www.com-motionuk.com

Google, Yahoo and MSN have come up with a unique website that explains all about website map creation and this can be found at the following location www.sitemaps.org .

It explains all you have to know about website map creation and submission and is not to be missed. Further information can be found at Web Pro News (video file) who has interviewed Vanessa Fox from Google on this hot topic.

From the Sitemaps.org website

Sitemaps are an easy way for webmasters to inform search engines about pages on their sites that are available for crawling. In its simplest form, a Sitemap is an XML file that lists URLs for a site along with additional metadata about each URL (when it was last updated, how often it usually changes, and how important it is, relative to other URLs in the site) so that search engines can more intelligently crawl the site.

Web crawlers usually discover pages from links within the site and from other sites. Sitemaps supplement this data to allow crawlers that support Sitemaps to pick up all URLs in the Sitemap and learn about those URLs using the associated metadata. Using the Sitemap protocol does not guarantee that web pages are included in search engines, but provides hints for web crawlers to do a better job of crawling your site.

Search Engine Optimisation Part1

Does the text on your homepage start with “welcome to my website”? This article will explain how text like this can negatively impact upon your search engine rankings, leaving customers with no hope of finding your products or services on the web.

Over the next few newsletters, we will discuss search engine optimisation and the different areas businesses should consider in their online marketing activities.

This month we will discuss one main area of search engine optimisation - web page optimisation. Com.Motion will demonstrate how to optimise individual Web pages on your website so that your products and services are found by potential customers. Com.Motion will use an existing client and one of their products as part of this example:

The Business – The Funky Group
Website Address – www.thefunkygroup.co.uk
Product – Pink GHD Straighteners – found on http://www.thefunkygroup.co.uk/cat-3-subcat-9-product-481

Focusing on one product I can identify the areas that make up the product’s page and highlight how search engines, such as Google, spider or index it.

Web Page Optimisation
Each Web page contains a number of areas that can be managed to help increase online visibility for search engines. These include:

1. Title Tags
2. Description Tags
3. Webpage Body Content
4. H1 Tags
5. Alternative Text Tags

Title Tags
The title tag should be about 60 character long including commas, spaces and full stops and is the most important of all tags for search engines. The title tag can be seen at the top of the screen depending on which web browser you are using. All websites should have unique title tags for each individual Web page, as this is a fantastic opportunity to market your business brand and the specific product or service your company is offering. Therefore, title tags should include your brand, product or service and key search terms and should highlight the page you are trying to promote. For example the Funky Group has labelled their GHD Pink Straighteners page as follows:

If you search using the following terms, you will find this product ‘GHD Pink Straightener’ on page 1 of Google for the business The Funky Group.

• GHD Mk4
• New MK4 Styler
• GHD New Mk4 Pink
• GHD Mk4 Pink
• Pink Mk4 Styler
• Pink Mk4 Straightener

It is imperative to use your chosen keywords near the start of the title tag i.e. GHD Mk4 Pink. There are many other searches that a customer could use to find hair straighteners and these other terms could be incorporated into the title tag and webpage. However, based on research, these terms were considered the appropriate keywords and phrases to use at the time of this product launch in October 2006.

If you have a website that incorporates many Web pages, consider the following for your title tags.

1. Create a unique title tag specific to every single page of your site
2. Use the most important keywords early in the tag – GHD Mk4
3. Use your company name in every tag - towards the end for branding
4. Think about key search terms or phrases (what are people going to search for)
5. Avoid sales pitches and slogans

Description Tag
The description tag is not displayed anywhere on the web page itself and is hidden in the website code; however some search engines index it. A description should be around 150 characters long and should be a simple sentence that includes the specific keywords of the product or service that you are discussing on the specific page. The description tag for the GHD Pink Straighteners is below:

META NAME="DESCRIPTION" CONTENT="Buy GHD New Mk4 Pink Professional Ceramic Hair Styler & Straightener from The Funky Group online shop"

Webpage Body Content
Body content is the actual written content on the web page itself. The Web page body content should discuss the product or service that you are trying to promote within the first two or three sentences. Below are the first three sentences from the GHD Pink Straighteners Web page body content:

“GHD Mk4 Pink Professional Ceramic Hair Styler & Straightener - the Holy Grail of Hair Styling Tools. These are the brand new MK4 GHD Pink Professional Ceramic Hair Styler's, what are you waiting for!

Be the first to own GHD's new MK4 Pink Professional Ceramic Hair Styler in sizzling new hot-pink. The 2006 GHD pink styler comes in an exclusively designed roll-mat with all new packaging. With a funky new sleek design, rounded barrel for improved curling and styling, auto adjust for international voltages, stronger cable and a new sleep mode which turns itself off after 30 minutes!”

Highlighted in bold are the product and search terms that potential purchasers of this product might use in their search on Google, Yahoo, or MSN. Additionally, this page discusses and promotes only one specific product which is key for promotional activity.

Header Tags
Header tags are another important area to include keywords in. Header tags are normally displayed on a web page as a section heading. For the Funky Group, you will find that a header tag reads as the following:

H1GHD New Mk4 Pink Professional Ceramic Hair Styler & Straightener/H1

Alternative Text Tags
When browsing a website, search engine spiders cannot read image files unless they have an alternative text tag - “Alt Tag”

The use of an ALT tag provides a text description for images on a page. This feature works when:

• The mouse hovers over the image
• The visual images don’t download
• A screen reader is used

The Alt tag of the image on the GHD Pink Straighteners webpage is the following, keywords in bold.

ALT="New Mk4 Pink Professional Ceramic Hair Styler & Straightener"NAME="ProductImage"

Alt tags are important for two reasons:

1. Search Engine Optimisation
When “crawling through” a website, search engine spiders only understand what an image is displaying if it has alternative text associated with it. Businesses have the opportunity to include key words in their alternative text descriptions, increasing the chances of their website getting found when a customer types in those keywords into a search engine. To achieve the best results on search engines, alt tags should contain of maximum of 70 – 80 characters.

2. Website Accessibility
Under the Disability Discrimination Act, businesses have a legal responsibility to make their product or services accessible to everyone. This includes any products and services promoted online. Failure to do so is potentially discrimination under the Act.

Search engine optimisation is a huge area and this article demonstrates only one aspect of this wide ranging topic - web page optimisation. However, the next article will dicuss other areas of search engine optimisation and why they are equally important to your online strategy.

To discuss other aspects of web page optimisation, please feel free to contact us.

Google Maps - A free advertising opportunity

You have probably heard of Google Maps and might have even used it to look for a specific business or to find an address. However, have you actually listed your business there?

Google is offering you the chance to advertise the physical location of your business for free. When you register, a map will appear of your home city along with a marker identifying your business location with a comments ‘balloon’ that provides directions, a contact telephone number, fax, web address and email address.

Once online registration is complete, Google sends you a letter by post with a unique code that is used to confirm and verify your physical business location. You log on to Google Maps, input the code and presto, you're listed.

Why consider Google Maps:

• It won't cost you a thing - you can create and display a business listing for free.
• Once your address is fully verified you have full control over your listing. You can add or delete non-address information at will.
• You'll reach qualified prospects - there's a very good chance that lots of people are currently searching on Google Maps for the products and services you offer. Why not make it easy for them to find you?
• You can offer coupons for free - displayed in your listing on Google Maps. Coupons can reward loyal customers and attract new ones. (USA only at the moment)
• You have full control over your listing - With Google Maps; you don't have to worry about publishing deadlines or outdated content. After Google verifies your address, you can edit your listing whenever you like. You'll see your changes reflected in the search results within six weeks.
• You can add all of your business locations from a single account
• You can manage listings for businesses of any size - Whether you have one business location or one on every block, you can manage your listings from a single account. (If you have more than ten locations, you can make updates by sending Google a data file.)

Google Maps Example – Edinburgh Zoo

In terms of organic search engine optimisation, Google has not indicated if being listed on Google Maps will have any impact on the visibility of your website. However, you never know if this might change in the future.

To register follow this link for Google Maps.

Do you have a Google Account?

The Google search engine is the most popular in the United Kingdom and in order to stay on top Google is offering a whole host of add-ons to keep the customers happy.

Google accounts allow you to unlock the world of Google. With just your email address and chosen password, you can access numerous Google services, including some of the following:

• Froogle - a free shopping directory. Something you have to consider if you have an e-commerce website as it is free to list your products.
• Google base - a place where you can post content about your company, product and services. By listing your company here can impact on you visibility on Google web search.
• Google calendar – create appointments and share them online with colleagues.
• Google mail – Fantastic web based email product.
• Google images - searches purely for photos or image files.
• Google video – The world’s first open, online video marketplace.
• Google spreadsheets – store your spreadsheets on the web for others to access and update.
• Google analytics – software that allows you to analyse the performance of your website in detail.
• Google talk – make telephone calls over the Internet to your friends for free.
• Google earth – marketed as “a globe that sits inside your pc. Zoom into a satellite image of anywhere in the world and then fly along to your next destination.
• Picasa – free software that allows you to find, edit and share images

Our favourite is the ability to customise the Google Desktop with content that you’re interested in such as the latest BBC news, RSS feeds or celebrity gossip. This is a great way to keep you up to date on what is happening in the world, as the Google Desktop updates on a daily basis.

The best thing about Google accounts? They are free.

Google launches Google Apps for Your Domain

Google launches Google Apps for Your Domain Business Services

Google Apps for Your Domain lets you offer communication and collaboration tools to your entire organisation — customisable with your branding, colour scheme and content through the administrative control panel, and with no hardware or software to install or maintain.

To get started, you have to sign up at this location - Google Apps for Your Domain. Thereafter, your domain is approved; you'll be able to access the Google Apps for Your Domain control panel to:

• Create user accounts
• Select the services you would like to activate i.e. Google Mail, Google Calendar etc

That's it — there's no complicated hardware or software to worry about. Users can go online to start using these hosted services.

Google Site Maps

What Are Google Site Maps
Google offers a fantastic new tool called Google Site Map or Webmaster Tool that allows you to tell Google what WebPages from your site you would like to include in its index. The idea of the Google Site Map is to make your website more Google Friendly i.e. for their search bots to index your website.

How does Google See your Website?
By creating a Google Site Map, you get an idea of how Google crawls and indexes your site! You can tell Google which pages of your website are the most important and how often they change. Additionally, Google will tell you about any specific problems they have experienced when accessing your website.

Google Site Map are easy to create by using simple text editors such as notepad or by creating one using XML. There are a number of free online tools that will create both TXT or XML site maps for you. Unfortunately, we can't recommend any to you but we found this one really interesting and it is worth checking out - XML Sitemaps.com.

Thereafter, upload your site map to your web server and verify it by adding a simple Google file! That's it, your done!

The added bonus is that Google Website Maps are Free! So get one now!

Why Web Accessibility is so Important

We at Com.Motion Consulting have had many questions on the subject of Website Accessibility, so we thought we would take some time to explain what it is and why it is important.

What is Website Accessibility?
Website Accessibility is providing unhindered access to your organizations website for disabled users online. For example, website owners may and should consider the following disabilities.

• Visual – Users of the web, who are blind, color blind or have poor eyesight
• Motor - Users of the web who have problems using a mouse or keyboard.

Why is it important?
Website accessibility is important is because there are over 10 million disabled people in the UK who by law should have unrestricted access to your website. From an ethical and a business point of view, it makes sense to take steps to address accessibility issues with your website.

Website accessibility can and should be seen as a huge opportunity for organisations to make their websites, products and services available to an audience of potential customers who do not have access at this time. By meeting accessibility standards, organisations are covering themselves legally, disabled users will be able to browse their website and they are potentially capturing new customers as a result.

The Law
Website accessibility is important because it is a legal requirement that organisations should be aware of and should be catering for on their organisations websites. The law requires organisations to make online information accessible to disabled people i.e. "reasonable steps” to make sure that you website is accessible to all.

Web Content Accessibility Guidelines - Consider the these Guidlines
Priority 1 (A) – Your website must satisfy this checkpoint otherwise some groups of people will find it impossible to access the content on a web site and it i.e. A compliant

Priority 2 (AA) - Web Developers should satisfy this checkpoint otherwise one or more groups will find difficult to access information on a website. The British Government is aiming for Level AA on its own sites i.e. AA compliant

Priority 3 (AAA) - If Web developers satisfy these checkpoints the majority of users will be able to access most of the information on a website.

Please click on the link below that provides a report from the Disibility Rights Commission on web accessibility for disabled users.

• The Web - Access & Inclusion for Disabled People

What should and can you do?
There is a wealth if information freely available on website accessibility and as a starting point, check out the W3C Website Accessibility Imitative website (WAI). The WAI has developed a range of literature, strategies and guidelines to assist you with your web accessibility issues.

• WAI - Introduction to Website Accessibility
• WAI - Guidlines & Techniques
• WAI - Quick tips to make Accessible Websites

Additional Information on website accessibility can be found at the following websites.

• Royal National Institute of the Blind
• Section 508.gov (USA)

Website Accessibility Cases
Have a look at this website accessibility cases involving Bruce McGuire and the Sydney Olympics Committee.

• Bruce McGuire’s Case & Sydney Olympics

Website Accessibility is a huge area and cannot be covered in one article. If you have any further question or concerns regarding accessibility, please contact us directly at Com.Motion Consultancy. If we don’t know the answer we will be able to refer you to someone who does.

Links

• Google News


• Seo Hints & Tips


• Com.Motion Consulting