Webfusion

If there was to be one resource to use as the bible for web design research the Official Google Webmaster Central Blog should probably be it. Run by web designers for web designers they also have the extensive library of Google knowledge and insight behind them so you should certainly listen to what they say.

Posted just before Christmas, this blog probably passed most people by but is well worth a read and bookmarking. It trumpets the many various tools available under the Google umbrella – without over doing it – in analyzing and understanding your own website. Armed with the information they can provide, you can then ensure any redesign is much more in tune with what you need to do than any office brainstorm. Statistically backed evidence can’t be ignored and as this blog points out, there is plenty of it available free and easy using Google Webmaster tools.

Have you analysed your site recently?

YouTube has a new version of its video-streaming service aimed at pleasing pernickity teachers. YouTube For Schools blocks the vast majority of YouTube videos, showing instead only educational clips so no sneezing kittens or extreme stunts.

YouTube claim that students can learn from more than 400,000 educational videos that fall within the educational remit and include those  from well-known organizations including Stanford, PBS and TED. There are several YouTube specialists also operating in the field like Steve Spangler Science and numberphile and with this latest initiative you can be sure there will soon be many more. Schools are also given the opportunity to customize their YouTube for Schools experience by selecting what videos are viewable within their school network

In a blog post, product manager Brian Truong said, “We’ve been hearing from teachers that they want to use the vast array of educational videos on YouTube in their classrooms, but are concerned that students will be distracted by the latest music video or video of a cute cat.”

With many schools already blocking YouTube access from within their networks, the video giant will be hoping this move will tempt some institutions to re-enable the site for students.

Here’s YouTube’s own promo video

Can YouTube operate on a dual-content level?

We probably all can guess that US adults are shunning traditional media and pushing more and more towards online options but a new report from eMarketer’s suggests that in the past year there has been a massive leap in that move.

The report suggests that the time spent on the internet and mobile phones was up by 7.7% and 30%, respectively, from 2010. That means that US adults now spend more time on mobile devices each day than they do absorbing print media.

Yet, despite industry suggestsions to the contrary, it appears online TV is not over-taking traditional television. In fact the time spent watching traditional TV  has increased in the past year. The research suggests the average adult consumer is spending 4 hours and 34 minutes each day watching TV and video on a traditional television set this year, up 10 minutes from last year.

Confirming that we are the connected generation: The total time spent with internet, mobile phones, tv, radio, print and all media is now an average of 11 hours and 33 minutes each day.

Have your media habits changed heavily in the past year?

Whatever the promise, the reality of the value of Google+ for small business compared to Facebook was highlighted this week by a study from Net Applications. Their latest findings suggest that not only does Facebook dominate the social networking field in terms of numbers but also in terms of return for business. According to their figures, almost two-thirds of web referalls from social networks during the month of November came through Facebook. By comparison, Twitter and new kid on the block Google+ made insignificant contributions.

Showing its growth as a serious competitor LinkedIn showed more than three times as many referrals as Twitter, but importantly Facebook was so dominant it does suggest that changing peoples’ attitudes to move from one social network to another is going to be very difficult.

What are your own findings?

Times are hard, they may begin to get harder as liquidity dries up and people look for more and more value in everything the spend money on. With price margins squeezed as tight as they possibly can go, differentiating from a competitor in the next few months is going to be less price-led more ‘added value’.

The key is your relationship with your customer

You probably already know who your customer is. Millions of dollars are spent globally on this metric and that metric so businesses can find out their ‘customer’. What influences them? What makes them tick? What makes them buy? That’s great, but it is how you use that information and more imporantly how the customer perceives you, that is going to have the biggest impact on where you reach on the ladder of success.

In any relationship people know each other and have an exchange of values. That’s all the way down from lovers to parent and child and it applies equally to business relationships whether you are in a B2B or B2C operation.

Your customer needs to be happy in your relationship just as much as your mate for life. There needs to be trust and understanding from both sides and a commitment. Just as you would woo a potential mate, so you should court your existing customers. Before you give the hard sell, ‘go on a date’. Get your customer interested in your company, get them buying something, however small it is and it is much easier to develop that relationship. There will be upselling paths but think of it more as an upserve path, offering greater value to the customer as you both grow to know and love one another more.

Once you have your customer onboard, then do use the metrics. Find out and try to understand each and every customer and customise that to fit them – it will be much more appreciated. Personalisation with context and suitably timed will not only impress the customer but is also likely to encourage them to recommend you to others too.

How do you deal with your customer relationships?

Everybody in business nowadays thinks they have tobe on social media. It’s true it can have massive benefits for your business, but it can also be massively detrimental to your business if you don’t use it right.

If you treat social media like a spare tyre, as and when you can be bothered, it will do your business and brand much more harm than good. Social media is about being reponsive and responsible, it is about interaction and positive action, you can’t get away with leaving it for weeks, days or even hours. If you launch with a social media arm make sure you give it the resources it deserves and demands to properly serve it.

One step towards that is to set a daily and weekly routine. Social media is most effective of course when you are reactive to changes in the news, or questions from your customers, but in order to reach the stage where that will be effective you first need a solid base, building up followers and serving them on a regular basis.

We don’t claim to have all the answers but the following may form a good basis for those starting out in the social media sphere or those looking to realign what they do:

1. Check your social networks at the start of the day and the end of the day.
Make sure you act upon any questions, queries or complaints too.

2. Run google alerts daily to email you
When you received the emails with mentions of your website, brand and products and check through them- if somebody is talking about you you need to know what they are saying and be able to act quickly and appropiately.

3. Keep a note of your brand advocates
People who talk positively about you are well worth keeping track off. With Twitter you can  favourite any positive posts and also build lists so you can keep a better eye on what they are saying.

4. Add regular content
How often really depends on your project, but weekly is probably the bare minimum. It can be a comment, blog, photo or video, but it needs to be something your followers can interact with. Social media is all about engagement and interaction with your followers.

5. Keep track of your traffic
There are statistic tools built into the likes of Facebook and countless tools you can sign up to track twitter and your website visitors, just make sure you are using something and paying attention to those stats. If a particular day brought in much more traffic, it pays to know why, so you can possibly try to replicate it.

Just 5 quick tips, but important as at the very heart of every successful business nowadays lies social media, and while you need not be a social media guru for success you do need to do these basics correctly.

In online retail terms Black Friday is considered the biggie. This year Black Friday falls on November 25, 2011 but in realtity the day after Thanksgiving marks the climax of the Black Friday shopping season not just a special day. Hundreds of Black Friday sales are already underway and with two weeks still to go until the 25th almost every retailer is looking to make sure they entice customers to spend their money with them.

Even Black Friday, Black Friday sales appear to be a trend! Just keeping on top of the Black Friday offers is something of a challenge. Black Friday Countdown is one of a handful of ‘deal watching’ sites popping up this year, helping consumers find the best offers.

There are facebook pages here , here and elsewhere besides. Plus numerous accounts like this on Twitter.

The truth is many retailers have even taken to calling it Black November because the offers are being waved around for a month before the main event. In fact the earlier you grab these offers the better savings you can possibly make.

Are you promoting Black Friday sales? Have you benefitted from Black Friday sales?

Using a portfolio of domains to promote your website used to be simple. Buy-up, re-direct and watch the traffic come in. Changes in the way Google and other search engines see domains, duplicate content and the like however have made it all a lot more difficult…until now.

Google has launched a new range in its Webmaster Tools system, aimed at preventing cross-domain URL isues. If a problem is spotted by a googlebot it will attempt to notify the webmaster.

Cynics may suggest this is just another way of making sure webmasters are signed up to Google’s Webmaster Central system, but to be fair, other than personal opinions there isn’t much reason for you not to be subscribed anyway.

The big issue that Google dislikes is duplicate content. There are a number of reasons similar content may appear on more than one URL and this blog by Google highlights most and what should be done about it. It’s not all webmaster created issues either site hi-jacking and plagarism are also problematic and the new Google tool changes will help make your aware of them.

Have you used the new tools? Have they helped your business?

We all know that traditional watching of TV is changing and more and more people watch TV and film online. For a while, the prime-time download leader in North America has been Netflix but a new report from Sanvine suggests that no only does Netflix still dominate (with almost 33% of peak downstream traffic) but that people are streaming media via non-PC devices.

As this infographic based on the report findings shows, only 45% of the data volume used by those downloading video is now accessed by laptops and desktops. Perhaps surprisingly the mobile collective of games consoles, smart TVs, set-top boxes, tablets and smartphones are now the preferred streaming tools.

Across the month and not just in peak-hours YouTube is still the leader with 83% of broadband subscribers using the channel but usage is shorter – averaging 3minutes per video compared to the 42 minutes average of NetFlix subscribers.

Sandvine’s report suggests that almost 34 percent of all downstream traffic to mobile devices is media based ahead of Web browsing at 27.5 percent and social networking at 18.3 percent.

The figures suggest brands need to re-consider advertising plans and how they reach out to potential customers. The digital era actually provides greater interaction with the viewer than traditional TV. As people’s perceptions change website creators should also take note. Embedding a video within a website will have a far greater impact nowadays that it would have 6 months ago. While embedding the video you can also ensure the main feature is surrounded by other sales messages from your business and attempts to engage with your audience. It’s all relevant. This is how people are using the internet.

How do you stream your tv and film? Have you changed your preferred channel in the last six months?

Sometimes you come across an article that you know you just have to share.

Here are Webfusion we’ve been talking about new ways in which we can help customers get the most of their hosting space. Thanks to our one-click apps, our shared web hosting customers not only benefit from reliable and trust-worthy web hosting but also a whole range of free web-based applications that are easy to install in directories and get professional, functional websites up and running in minutes. One-click apps offer simple but effective ways of building a website.

The three most popular of our fusion apps are the CMS (content management system) favourites Drupal and Joomla and the blogger’s favourite WordPress. All three are site builder tools that are modular allowing customisation and development of sites over time. All are easy to use and understand and all are being used across the world to run some of the biggest and most popular websites in the world, including the White House official site.

So this article from ComputerWorld jumped out at us as it compared all three of the systems available as free fusion apps and offers positives negatives on them. It’s a great start for anybody not fully aware of the capabilities of the apps or what ones would work best with their own business.

Have a look and let us know what you think.