Elinor Mills, author for CNET News.com discusses the effect of SEO on Newspapers and the websites those newspapers maintain. It may not be a new concept to us but those folks working with the print medium have not had to worry about SEO, until now.
Headlines are a primary focus for print marketers. “Good” headlines can catch the reader’s attention and pull them into the article. However, “good” happens to be in the eye of the beholder. Clever and witty headlines may catch reader’s attention but search engines are not so easily persuaded.
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University of Wisconsin Executive Education - Integrated Customer Communications — Madison, WI
Optimize your online efforts
After more than a decade of online marketing, companies are still struggling to find the best ways to use the web to promote themselves and build relationships with their customers. Our proven, practical tips will help you to get higher search engine rankings, make your e-mails filter-friendly — yet compliant! — and deliver relevant customer-focused website content.
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Web content guru Gerry McGovern, author of “Killer Content” - one of the best books on writing copy for the web - says that one of the biggest mistakes companies make in regards to their website content is thinking that customers care one little bit about the company. “Customers care about themselves (their loved ones and their community),” he said in an interview with founder and president of Netconcepts, Stephan Spencer. He went on to add that organizations need to be customer-centric, talk about benefits, and speak the language of the customer.
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So many designers of e-mail campaigns make the fatal mistake of designing the e-mail to be viewed in its entirety. E-mail doesn’t work like that. E-mail is scrolled through and in very small windows.
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Emergency Medical Products Inc. sells emergency medical supplies and equipment to fire fighters and EMS professionals. In other words, each sale isn’t just money in their virtual cash register; it’s as if somebody’s life depends on it!
This online catalog site is powered by our GravityMarket ecommerce platform which means it is search engine friendly out of the gates, with an intuitive feature rich website for customers and a powerful administrative interface for our client. Among other things, the site supports “EZ Ordering” by SKU or item number. They are also embracing the concept that “markets are conversations,” having just started a blog.
[ database | client admin cms | SEO ]
Visit the site: Emergency Medical Products
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MarketingProfs virtual seminar series — online
For many of you, your email campaign lost the race even before it got out of the gate. Spam filters and email firewalls silently and unceremoniously junk your emails. Research has shown that fully one-third of permission-based emails don’t get delivered.
Even if your message gets past the filters, it doesn’t mean your email will be opened. Your recipients are brutal when it comes to slashing through the commercial messages clogging their inboxes. A split second decision will decide your email’s fate, based squarely on your From line and Subject line, and to a smaller extent, what’s visible in the Preview pane. After navigating these deliverability and openability hazards, you still have to get the recipient to comprehend and act on your message. A pretty tall order nowadays.
This virtual seminar is going to get “hands on” with reviews of actual email campaigns submitted by seminar attendees. Not all will be chosen, so give yourself the best chance of having your campaign critiqued: submit your entry early. Stephan is one of the most popularly and highly acclaimed MarketingProfs seminar leaders.
If you’ve ever wondered what you were doing wrong with your email marketing, or wondered what you could be doing better, then this is the seminar for you.
You will learn:
- How to write messages that are opened and read
- How to create subject lines that are the best they can be
- Best practices for your call-to-action and value proposition
- How to balance text and images
- When to use Text or HTML
- Whether your email is compliant with CAN-SPAM legislation
- Whether your messages will get past spam filters
The 90-minute seminar will include an extended Q&A.
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The other day when I was on whitepages.co.nz I kept getting this tasteless banner ad:

Not only did I find the ad irritating and gross, I thought less of the White Pages brand after I saw it. It is an animated GIF banner, where the piece of poo actually flies across the ad from left to right and then hits the spinning fan, making the whole banner go brown. Nice.
Whoever at the White Pages approved that banner ad for publication should be fired.
I have also seen plenty of ads placed in email campaigns that hurt the brand. Here’s an ad in an internet.com newsletter that cheapened the JupiterMedia brand while simultaneously flagging the email for spam filters (the Alt tag associated with this banner ad was “Work From Home” — a terrible thing to say in an email campaign if you want your campaign delivered):

It always amazes me how email ads get approved when it’s so obvious that they are going to cause the campaign’s deliverability to tank. Like this one:
Some people think email marketing is horribly expensive. If only they knew about VerticalResponse. We give you the power to create, send, and track your email campaign, right from your web browser — for less than 1c an email! NO set-up fees, NO contracts, NO hidden charges. And it’s easy, too! See for yourself by creating your own test mailing — FREE. Get started today!
Some big no-no phrases in the above email ad, including: “no hidden charges” and “see for yourself”.
In short, your website and your email campaigns are a reflection of your brand. The advertising you accept for display on your site and in your emails is also a reflection of your brand. So think carefully before you take on an advertiser or accept a creative that isn’t “on message.”
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Gdata, short for Google Data APIs, promises to be Google’s new standard protocol for transmitting all sorts of data back and forth to Google and its various services. As Google states on Google Code: “All sorts of services can provide GData feeds, from public services like blog feeds or news syndication feeds to personalized data like email or calendar events or task-list items.” Imagine for instance, starting with a base feed, then adding query parameters like restricting to a particular category and date range and ending up with a customized feed that specifically fits your criteria. Gdata builds on the RSS 2.0 and ATOM 1.0 protocols.
Imagine your desktop machine — armed with your personal profile — communicating with Google (and even with the Web in general) about your email, search history, RSS subscriptions, calendar, bookmarks, blog posts, and the news… and all through the GData protocol. As Reto Meier states, “Google already has a ridiculous amount of my information. Now with an API that promises access to this information to use the way I want to, there’s one less reason to think about storing it anywhere else.” Kinda scary but also exciting at the same time. Google Operating System here we come!
Will we all be speaking GData in years to come? Will the GData protocol become as ubiqitous as the HTTP protocol? Only time will tell, but I certainly think GData is one to watch!
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Professional Association of Innkeepers International 2006 annual convention — Phoenix, AZ
Every email marketer’s biggest challenge is getting their emails delivered, opened and read. Don’t worry, advanced tools and tactics like whitelisting services, domain verification, and spam scorers can help save the day!
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Professional Association of Innkeepers International 2006 annual convention — Phoenix, AZ
Don’t want to get caught in spam filters, alienate your recipients, or burn your list? Then come to this session and learn the fundamentals of successful email marketing.
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