A recent blog post and case study by Econsultancy has brought social conversations into the search realm. The post outlines a case study undertaken by Econsultancy on Magners cider whereby it appeared that online conversations mentioning the brand drove the Magners.co.uk website up search engine rankings for both brand and generic key words. Econsultancy had optimised the new Magners web site but there were no back links to it yet as it was sitting at a new domain.

It seemed that social conversations may have played a factor and Econsultancy set up a test site for the theory and you can read about the full results here. These social conversations did not include hyperlinks but instead seemed to rely upon a strong connection between the brand and the keyword “cider” in online conversations, and between the website and social media platforms.
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Our society has turned into a television based culture. People are depend on television for a source of entertainment. It is estimated that 4.5 billion people watch television, attracted by the wide variety of channels and high quality picture to viewers. It can be said that television is branching into social TV to become more interactive for viewers, in order to keep up with the phenomenon of social media and the trend of online television. The Internet is a potential threat to TV lead societies due to the easy accessibility of free information, and Internet sites commandeering more user viewing time than television ever did. Both social mediums; television and the Internet, lack what each other needs in order to become dominate over one another. Cue… Google TV.

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April 2010 has been a busy month in search and social media, so I cherry-picked six news stories which should be of interest to online marketers among which, a report on Facebook advertising; Facebook dropping the fan button; Ning becomes paying; and Google introducing site speed in search ranking. (more…)

Last week Facebook changed the ‘become a fan’ option to simply ‘like’. This alteration was down to the fact that liking something is less of a commitment and so people are more likely to do it over becoming a fan. Apparently users have been clicking the ‘like’ button twice as much as they previously interacted with the ‘become a fan’ option. However my social media clients are yet to see this spike, the number of likes has steadily increased but at the same rate as before so I for one am still waiting for the analytical evidence.

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There has been massive outrage online and especially throughout the Twittersphere over the implications and rushed passing of the Digital Economy Act 2010. To manifest the angry sentiments and give voice to the Tweets Wired Sussex hosted a debate at the Lighthouse yesterday evening.

Chairing proceedings was Anthony Lilley, the chief executive of Magic Lantern and an Ofcom board member. He did very well to play devil’s advocate and ask the panel questions on behalf of the bill in an attempt to maintain some balance to the argument, although it was quite clear from the audience and panel’s vibrations that opposition was the reigning opinion.

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There is so much going on in Search and Social Media that I thought I’d start to cherry pick stories which I find particularly interesting every month to share them with you. These are entirely my choice and I am in no way saying that others are of lesser interest! If there is a story which you think I should have included in this round-up, please let me know. (more…)

Fresh from her BBC documentary series “The Virtual Revolution” Dr Aleks Krotoski came to Wired Sussex’s “Make it in Media” job fair to talk to the students, graduates, and digital media enthusiasts about her trajectory into technology and journalism.

She started by describing her New Orleans origins and Type A parents, and I did appreciate her Lex Luthor reference as she described her megalomaniac tendencies. Being a workaholic was a recurring theme and seemed integral to her achievements. (more…)

Social media flourished in 2009 and this year it’s going to become an even bigger player in the way we browse, consume and share information online. Below are my predictions for the biggest trends regarding social media’s development in 2010. (more…)

Real time search results. Recently we’ve seen both Google and Bing attempt to include Tweets in their SERPs however it was apparent from the out-set that they weren’t quite ready. From a ranking perspective it simply didn’t seem fair that people could get a number one result just because they were the last person to tweet a certain search term. So this year hopefully Google (and the other search engines) can develop a fair and effective way of integrating real time search.

Conversion rate optimisation. One of the most important reasons for a business to improve its online presence through SEO is because it wants more people to find its website and to make more money. However often the conversion rate isn’t as high as it should be.  We’re now into the realms of conversion rate optimisation and this year I think it’s going to be important for more agencies to introduce CRO as part of their standard SEO process. It’s very measurable, normally with a good ROI when done well and therefore should be an added string to any SEO bow.

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Many SEO’s believe that content is king. Quality content will always do well online, people will link to it, disseminate it for you, often it can take on a binary life of its own and raise your brand’s awareness with little more effort expended by the creator. And we’ll happily produce it for free as long as it garners us some positive link equity and other such digital marketing perks.

However for newspapers the game is a bit different. For years now the major broadsheets and tabloids have been giving away their content for free. Why spend £1.20 on the paper when you can surf the website without having to pay? This is the quandary I find myself in most days. I’ve compromised by reading articles on the website in the week and purchasing the weekend editions Saturday and Sunday, so I don’t feel like a fully fledged, ice cold cheapskate.

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