Use the Internet to Donate to Japan

Japan?s in trouble. Some 10,000 are dead. Over half a million people have been evacuated and are without shelter, food, water, electricity and warmth, and rising levels in radiation are further crippling the country.

Here?s how you can help:

Facebook is providing for a tremendous platform for relief aid for Japan. Many non-profit organizations have Facebook Pages, such as the�Red Cross;�donate via their�Facebook page, Twitter feed,�Causes campaign or text REDCROSS to 90999 for a $10 donation. Meanwhile Explore.org is donating $1 for every ?Like? of the ?Dog Bless You? Facebook Page. Social gaming platform,�Zynga, has already raised�over $1 million in aid for Japan; purchase virtual goods in Facebook-connected games like�FarmVille,�CityVille and FrontierVille to donate.

Twitter?s also published a post outlining ways to aid in relief efforts, stay up on news and a list of relevant hashtags, discussion boards and more. Here is a list of trending hashtags to connect you with Japan relief efforts:�#HelpJapan #JapanRelief #JapanAid #Tsunami

GlobalGiving.org is also accepting donations; you can also donate by texting JAPAN or TSUNAMI to 20222.

Save the Children is accepting donations on its site through PayPal, Amazon Payments and Google Checkout, as is MercyCorps.

The Salvation Army is accepting donations online as well.

Lastly, with all these relief efforts, be sure to donate only to a well known and trusted organization, such as the ones listed here. Be wary of telemarketers, lone solicitors and organizations you?re not familiar with.

Source: http://blog.grovo.com/2011/03/use-the-internet-to-donate-to-japan/

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How Google is going to fight spam sites in 2011

A few days ago, Google announced that they are going to fight search engine spam stronger than before:

"We're evaluating multiple changes that should help drive spam levels even lower, including one change that primarily affects sites that copy others' content and sites with low levels of original content.

We'll continue to explore ways to reduce spam, including new ways for users to give more explicit feedback about spammy and low-quality sites."

What exactly is Google going to do? Could Google consider your website spam?

1. Google might downrank content farms

Websites with low quality content that has been created to get clicks for AdSense ads might have a hard time in the coming months:

"As pure webspam has decreased over time, attention has shifted instead to content farms, which are sites with shallow or low-quality content. [...]

We hear the feedback from the web loud and clear: people are asking for even stronger action on content farms and sites that consist primarily of spammy or low-quality content."

If your websites mainly exist to display Google AdSense then your site might lose its rankings on Google. Google makes it clear that running AdSense ads won't help the sites to remain in the index:

"One misconception that we've seen in the last few weeks is the idea that Google doesn't take as strong action on spammy content in our index if those sites are serving Google ads. To be crystal clear:

• Google absolutely takes action on sites that violate our quality guidelines regardless of whether they have ads powered by Google;
• Displaying Google ads does not help a site's rankings in Google; and
• Buying Google ads does not increase a site's rankings in Google's search results."

2. Google might enable you to tag other websites as spam

In an online discussion a user asks about the possibility for personal domain blacklists for Google accounts? Users might be given the option to remove sites from their own search results.

Google's Matt Cutts indicates that this might be an option for the near future:

"We've definitely discussed this. Our policy in search quality is not to pre-announce things before they launch. If we offer an experiment along those lines, I'll be among the first to show up here and let people know about it."

3. It will be more difficult to get high rankings with clone sites

Many spammers clone the content of websites to get high rankings for the long tail keywords that are listed on these pages. For example, some people scraped the contents of Google Groups and actually got higher rankings than the original Google Groups pages in Google's search results.

Matt Cuts also comments on that issue:

"I've been tracking how often this happens over the last month. It's gotten much, much better, and one additional algorithmic change coming soon should help even more. I'm not saying that a clone will never be listed above SO, but it definitely happens less often compared to a several weeks ago."

What can you do to make sure that your website won't be downranked?

If you have a regular website with regular content then there's nothing that you have to worry about. As long as your website has good content and good backlinks, Google will give it high rankings in the search results.

You should not try to game Google's algorithm with scraped content and you should not take any optimization shortcuts. Optimizing your website for users and search engines takes some time. If you want to get lasting results, you should use ethical search engine optimization methods.

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Official Google statements about the latest algorithm update

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Welcome to the latest issue of the Search Engine Facts newsletter. Google's Amit Singhal and Matt Cutts commented on Google's latest ranking algorithm update. Their comments reveal why Google released the update which was named "Panda". Also in the news: a new Google patent reveals more information about Google's plans, there's an official online discussion for people who have been hit by the update, is a California IP address good for high rankings and more. Table of contents: Facts of the week Search engine news and articles of the week Success stories Previous articles We hope that you enjoy this newsletter and that it helps you to get more out of your website. Please pass this newsletter on to your friends. Best regards,

Google's Amit Singhal and Matt Cutts commented on Google's latest ranking algorithm update. Their comments reveal why Google released the update which was named "Panda". Why did Google update the ranking algorithm? After Google's Caffeine ranking algorithm update in 2009, Google received a lot of fresh content. The "gibberish" spam content that could be found in Google's results before vanished. Unfortunately, a new kind of low quality content appeared in the results. According to Matt Cutts, "[the new shallow content was like:] what's the bare minimum that I can do that's not spam?" Google does not want to see shallow content in the search results. How does Google recognize a shallow-content site? Amit Singhal said that Google hasn't solved the problem yet. Google came up with a variety of questions to judge the quality of a site: "Would you be comfortable giving this site your credit card? Would you be comfortable giving medicine prescribed by this site to your kids? Do you consider this site to be authoritative? Would it be okay if this was in a magazine? Does this site have excessive ads?" Based on these questions and more, Google tried to form a definition of low quality. Then they tried to put this in an algorithm. "We actually came up with a classifier to say, okay, IRS or Wikipedia or New York Times is over on this side, and the low-quality sites are over on this side. [...] In a hyperspace a bunch of points, some points are red, some points are green, and in others there's some mixture. Your job is to find a plane which says that most things on this side of the place are red, and most of the things on that side of the plane are the opposite of red." Which sites were hit most by the update? So-called content-farms were hit by the update. Google's Matt Cutts names Suite101.com. The rankings of that website have dropped drastically and the keyword traffic is down 94% for that site. In addition to Suite101.com, many other sites have been hit by the algorithm update: "Our classifier that we built this time does a very good job of finding low-quality sites. It was more cautious with mixed-quality sites, because caution is important. [...] When people come to Google, that's exactly what they're asking for ? our editorial judgment. They're expressed via algorithms." Google claims that money does not impact algorithm decisions Some people think that Google changes the algorithm to earn more with Google AdWords ads. According to Amit Singhal, money does not impact their decisions. Google continues to remove spammers from the search results. If you don't want to risk your online business, use search engine optimization methods that are safe to use with Google. Back to table of contents - Visit Axandra.com

A new Google patent reveals more details about Google's algorithm update "The patent basically covers a system for identifying search queries which have low quality content and then asking either publishers or the people searching for that topic to create some better content themselves. The system takes into account the volume of searches when looking at the quality of the content so for bigger keywords the content would need to be better in order for Google to not need to suggest somebody else writes something." Google: are there any advantages to hosting from a California IP address? "I wouldn't worry about sub-country level hosting location, unless there are important latency issues that you need to address for your users. Search engines generally won't look at your site's IP address in that granular of a way. If you want to let us (and users :-)) know about the location of your business, you can do that through a Google Places listing and by including your address and phone numbers on your website." Editor's note: the answer implies that the country level hosting location can be important. Ex-Microsoft employee: 5 things the Kayak deal tells us about Bing "Microsoft announced a partnership with Kayak to provide travel results. [...] Less than 2 years ago, Bing was all about internal innovation and buying companies (Farecast, Powerset, etc) that would help it accelerate product development. Now, with this deal, Microsoft is admitting that it's better for them to outsource innovation to vertical search engines like Kayak, as opposed to trying to build them internally." Think you're affected by the recent algorithm change? In an online discussion forum, Google asks for feedback: "According to our metrics, this update improves overall search quality. However, we are interested in hearing feedback from site owners and the community as we continue to refine our algorithms. If you know of a high quality site that has been negatively affected by this change, please bring it to our attention in this thread. Note that as this is an algorithmic change we are unable to make manual exceptions, but in cases of high quality content we can pass the examples along to the engineers who will look at them as they work on future iterations and improvements to the algorithm." Search engine newslets Will Google penalize sites which only link using the nofollow attribute? Facebook hits record $75 billion valuation on SecondMarket. Patent attack on Google open codec faces 'antitrust probe'. Google to buy UK finance comparison site. Google's 2011 plans are "all about mobile". New Google search results for Twitter accounts. Google tests enhanced suggestions. Back to table of contents - Visit Axandra.com

300,000 readers will read your success story! Let us know how IBP has helped you to improve your website and we might publish your success story with a link to your website in this newsletter. The more detailed your story is, the better. Click here to tell us your story. "I am spending less on AdWords now." "I have used IBP for about 5 months now and have made it to the SERP 1 for a very popular photography related target keyword. Thanks a lot! I am spending less on AdWords now." Pradeep Sanyal, www.pradeepsanyal.com � Back to table of contents - Visit Axandra.com

Google has released a major ranking algorithm update Watch out: Google continues to penalize spammers Paid links: do you still have to worry about them? 5 reasons why your SEO campaign doesn't work (yet) Google launches a new anti-spam algorithm against content farms How Google is going to fight spam sites in 2011 Reciprocal links: don't be fooled by false information View all past issues... Back to table of contents - Visit Axandra.com

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All product names, copyrights and trademarks mentioned in this newsletter are owned by their respective trademark and copyright holders.

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Boost Your Google Places Map Listing

There are several ways to improve your Google Places Listing.

A high ranking on Google Places can help boost your local business and exposure very quickly.� Here are some tips on how to boost your Google Places Map Listing.

1. Fill out all of your listing details.� Add videos, pictures, coupons and store hours.� The more info the better.
2. Make sure you profile photo pops.� Let?s face it most people are visual, experiment with your profile photo and make sure it stands out compared to your competition.� Make sure it makes people want to click your listing.
3. Reviews are great.� Contact people you have done business with and encourage them to write reviews on your business.� The more the better.
4. Pay a little money and sign up for the Universal Business Listing this will get your business listed on 100?s of websites in days.� Save yourself the time and get listed on the UBL.

These are some simple ways to boost your Google Places Map Listings. I strongly recommend spending some time and beefing up your Google Places Listing because your competition probably already has!!!

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Source: http://www.seogodfather.com/blog/boost-your-google-places-map-listing/

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Social Media Strategy: Contests, Giveaways & Sweepstakes

Posted on January 24, 2011 by Brian Honigman

Everyone seems to be scrambling to utilize social media in any way they can. High levels of engagement are what it takes to successfully market your company?s presence within the various social media platforms. However, engagement can?t happen without having fans and followers to engage with. One extremely popular method of encouraging engagement is hosting giveaways. Brands of all sizes have been participating in giveaways and contests to increase their audiences and in most cases do so quite successfully. Primarily brands have stuck with Twitter and Facebook for these promotions, while others have experimented with foursquare, YouTube and other channels ready to feature promotions.

What are the different types of social media giveaways and what conversions are the marketers behind these sweepstakes trying to achieve? Today I?ll try my darnedest to explore both questions.

Types of Giveaways

1. Everyone Gets Free Stuff
The is the most common form of social media giveaway seen on Facebook and Twitter. Many brands host a deal where fans simply like a Facebook Page or follow a specific Twitter account and are given something for free after doing so. Not every company can afford to give every person who begins following their account something in return, but when you?re a big name brand it?s certainly the way to go. Facebook promotion guidelines changed as of December 2010, so it?s against their terms of service now to have a giveaway where the user only has to like the page to be entered. The guidelines now require users to enter more information as official entrance into the contest.

Example: Bruegger?s Facebook Promotion

Bruegger?s Bagels is currently running a promotion of this nature on Facebook, giving all fans that like their page access to a coupon worth 3 free bagels on February 8th. What a great idea to encourage word of mouth about the Bruegger?s brand and not to mention an awesome chance to snag some free bagels! Currently 123,245 people like this page but that is bound to go up with the quick spread of content on Facebook and the option right below the coupon to share this with family and friends.

The conversion for Bruegger?s with this promotion is getting more likes on Facebook. By making the offer extremely easy to complete, announcing the offer throughout their marketing channels (on their website, on Twitter and elsewhere) and giving something of value to the consumer, Bruegger?s is utilizing this form of giveaway very successfully. More likes on Facebook equals higher levels of engagement, which will hopefully bring heightened brand awareness and profit for Bruegger?s.

2. Many Enter, But Not Everyone Wins
Some giveaways are more costly than others, requiring an organization to offer prizes to only a select group of winners. This type of giveaway is also used when running longer promotions. If the Bruegger?s giveaway were running until June instead of February, they might not have had the ability to offer the coupon to everyone for that extended period of time without incurring major costs (possibly outweighing the benefits of gaining larger social networks). Giving away products to a limited amount of contestants over a longer period of time adds an element of surprise that often excites the winning user to discuss their prize and astonishment on their social network.

Example: Troy Polamalu?s Facebook/Twitter Promotion

Troy Polamalu plays the strong safety position for the Pittsburgh Steelers and as a football player, he really has his foot in the door when it comes to social media. With active accounts on both Facebook and Twitter, Polamalu as a brand has begun a Steeler tickets giveaway to help both spread awareness of TwitChange and to gain more followers within his networks.

By requiring users to follow @twitchange, @OOIAL and @tpolamalu and tweet this specific message: I might win #TroyTickets to the AFC Title game because I follow @tpolamalu @ooial and @twitchange Details at http://bit.ly/gF66N7 users must join his network, while also sharing the information with other users within their network. This sends awareness of the giveaway much further than if it merely required users to follow Polamalu?s account on Twitter without tweeting about it. The AFC Championship tickets are not a cheap or easy to come by commodity, which makes the promotion limited to a few recipients and seem more high stakes.

This promotion also features a Facebook component which helps extends the audience it can reach, while making it consistent on all marketing channels. It?s hard to get users to copy and paste specific text for posting because let?s face it, people are lazy. This is one reason why giveaways that have simple instructions tend to have higher conversion rates overall. Because of the high profile prize and the fact that this contest benefits charity, many users have and will go the extra mile to enter the contest. Would people go the extra step for free bagels or free ice cream, maybe?

3. Free Content, Once You Connect
Many companies run a sweepstakes once a quarter or once a year due to the fact that contests lose their edge if they are continually running year-round, not to mention the constant flow of money a never-ending contest requires. Instead of running a giveaway many Facebook pages choose to run fan-exclusive content, which is obviously only available to existing fans of the Facebook Page. Whether it be exclusive industry tips, articles, access to coupons or any other content limited to fans who connect with your channel, it?s another way to encourage engagement and do so with limited or no cost to your company.

Example: LunaMetrics? Fan-only Facebook Content

Here at LunaMetrics we utilize our Facebook page to a variety of audiences within our industry. In an effort to encourage engagement and increase our connections within the industry, we?ve developed a fan-only content tab that is exclusive to fans who like our page. Once a fan likes our page we provide weekly tips and tricks related to Search Engine Optimization and Google Analytics on our fan-only tab. These helpful insights allow us to share our expertise in our industry, while receiving more fans and expanding our network within this particular platform.

What other types of social media contests, giveaways & sweepstakes have you implemented? Have they been a helpful way of encouraging engagement in your social media niches? Share your feedback below.

Related Posts

1. The Evolution of Social Media Analytics
2. 3 Ways Social Media Can Help Or Hurt Your Business
3. Social Media Optimization: How SEO Affects Your Social Strategy
4. So do you have a Facebook strategy?
5. The Top 5 Social Media Developments of 2010

by Brian Honigman | Categories: Industry News, Social Media

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AOL Convinced That Content is the Future

February 8th, 2011 by John

There?s an old adage in the search marketing industry that says ?Content is King?. A bit cliche maybe, but it?s a phrase that runs true for people who adopt search engine optimisation tactics when looking to market their website online.

And though the phrase is trotted out at every given opportunity, it still rings true. AOL, though, are taking the phrase literally, and investing heavily to produce more quality content to attract visitors to their services. AOL want to be seen as making visible changes to their structure ? the company has recently acquired GoViral for $96.7 million, and have recently bought American news website The Huffington Post under a $315 million acquisition agreement.

Arianna Huffington and Tim Armstrong discuss the buyout on PBS News Hour

?It?s amazing to see the work, for example, that we can now do on the local space, the global space, around engagement, the women?s space, and with original reporting. These were our highest priorities for 2011, now we can work on all of them all at once,? says Huffington Post co-founder Arianna Huffington.

Tim Armstrong, AOL CEO, sums it up in one sentence: ?The next phase of the internet is about content.? Well, as far as we?re concerned the internet has always been about quality content, but we see where Tim?s coming from. The investment isn?t just in The Huffington Post. It?s in Arianna?s ability to create more content, and create a Huffington ?media brand? that can grow and grow.

Content, in this case, is news. Content, in GoViral?s case, is video-based. AOL looks to be splashing the cash and invest in creative businesses that can grow, and have the potential to produce original web-based copy and videos for years to come. When it comes to SEO, original content is crucial when expanding your web presence. We can?t help wondering what AOL will invest in next?

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Source: http://www.searchengineoptimization.co.uk/seo-blog/seo-content/aol-convinced-that-content-is-the-future.html

Heidi Klum

5 reasons why your SEO campaign doesn't work (yet)

Many webmasters face the problem that their SEO campaigns don't deliver the expected results. Why are your campaigns underperforming? What can you do to make sure that search engine optimization works for you?

There can be several reasons why your SEO campaign isn't a success yet:

Reason 1: you set the wrong goals

If your website doesn't have many high rankings yet then you cannot expect that Google will display your site on the first result page for keywords such as "mp3" or other very competitive one-word keywords.

You have to start with more targeted keyphrases first. Optimize your pages for many different keywords with lower competition. The more high rankings your website has for keywords with lower competition, the more likely it is that your website will also get high rankings for more competitive keywords that belong to the same topic.

It's like running a marathon. You have to run smaller distances first before you can run the full 26 miles and 385 yards.

Reason 2: you don't take SEO seriously

Search engine optimization isn't set-and-forget. It takes some time to make things happen. Search engine optimization is an investment into your company and it should be treated like that.

If all you do to 'promote' your website is to submit it to search engines then you won't be successful. You have to invest time and effort into the optimization of your site. Tools can help you to save a lot of this time and effort but you still have to work with your site.

Reason 3: you focus on the wrong elements

Some webmasters are obsessed with the length of the title tag. Others submit their website every few days to search engines. Other webmasters insist that a particular part of their website links must use the rel=nofollow attribute.

You don't have to chase the latest search engine optimization trend. These trend topics usually make the difference between position 8 and position 9. If your website isn't listed on the first result page at all, you have to get the basics right.

The most important factors that will get your website on Google's first result page are optimized web pages with good content and good backlinks. The Top 10 Optimizer in IBP will help you with the fine details such as social mentions. However, it will also inform you when you have to focus on the foundation.

Reason 4: you chose the wrong keywords

This is an extremely popular mistake that many webmasters make. If you choose the wrong keywords, you will waste a lot of time and money.

The best keywords for your website are not the keywords with the biggest search volume. The best keywords also aren't the keywords that will boost your ego and it's also not the "obvious" keywords that will work best for SEO.

The best keywords for SEO are the keywords that deliver targeted visitors who will buy. It does not matter if a keyword has thousands of searches. If none of the visitors who find your site through that keyword will buy, then this keyword won't do you any good.

Details about the different keyword types and information on how to find the best keywords for your site can be found in this PDF file.

Reason 5: you get the wrong links

To get high rankings on Google, your website must have good backlinks. Automatic links from link building schemes don't work. Actually, that kind of links can even get you in trouble with Google.

You must get the right kind of backlinks to succeed. Use professional link management tools or backlink analysis tools to get the best possible links to your site.

Search engine optimization can contribute greatly to the success of your website. It's important that you do the right things in the right order and that you focus on the right elements. Download our website promotion tool IBP here and go through the checklist in the main window of IBP.

If you can tick all boxes in the checklist, your website is ready to get top 10 rankings on Google for your most important keywords.

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