Yes, doing well on search engines is all about your content. You need to have high quality text and multimedia that people want to see. You also need to keep serving it up fresh so that people will want to come back. Offering both will also keep Google happy. But there are a few other things Google likes also, from keywords to links, metatags and social signals (what's that?). This handy … [Read more...]
Teaching courses on WordPress and social media
August 19, 2011 by 2 Comments
If you live near Staunton or anywhere in the central Shenandoah Valley of Virginia, we'd like to invite you to sign up for one -- or both! -- of the courses we'll be teaching this fall at Blue Ridge Community College in Weyers Cave. First, starting on the evening of Wednesday, September 21 and continuing for three more Wednesdays after that, Erik will help you build your own web site in … [Read more...]
Five ways employee turnover is killing your business
November 22, 2010 by Leave a Comment
One in an occasional series on best business practices. In a culture where management is king, unions are vilified, and the almighty dollar is more important than humans and human relationships, it's not surprising that a good number of businesses give no thought to the impact of high employee turnover. But businesses ignore this issue at their peril. High employee turnover is, in … [Read more...]
Cut all your ads
November 8, 2010 by 1 Comment
Want to cut out the fat in your business? Yank all your ads. Today, Web 2.0 has changed the marketing landscape. This means that free marketing -- blogging, direct email and social media -- can actually be more effective than most ads. I remember when I had a retail baby store. Ad rep after ad rep came by to tell me why their newspaper, magazine or directory was the place I had to be. And … [Read more...]
Will work for food
October 27, 2010 by 4 Comments
A recession feels statistical, anecdotal, and removed from reality when it's just an ongoing news story in the daily paper and on TV. It's much more real when someone you know is unemployed, underemployed, or looking for work in the wake of downsizing rumors at their firm. And when everyone you know in turn knows a few folks in that boat, the recession hits home pretty clearly. The upside is … [Read more...]
The unelected mayor
August 17, 2010 by Leave a Comment
The niche-popular city-hopping site Foursquare typifies how social media marketing and advertising are now almost wholly out of the control of a given venue and fully into the control of the consumer. Foursquare aficionados (some say narcissists) relentlessly "check in" to whichever venue they are currently supporting in an effort to share with the rest of the information-consuming public both … [Read more...]
The company you keep
August 11, 2010 by Leave a Comment
One in an occasional series on best business practices. When beginning a new business, few entrepreneurs include an organizational "culture" in their plan. Often they think that the product or service itself stands for the culture of the business. Or that a mere values statement about the product or service (high quality, reliable, putting people first) translates into a culture of the … [Read more...]
Perils of the two-way street
August 5, 2010 by Leave a Comment
Back in the beginning of this century (he, he, he, I just had to use that phrase), working at washingtonpost.com as their online discussion moderator, I experienced the early days of two-way Website communications. Previously, Arapnet, listserves and the rudimentary message board technology depicted in the social media classic "The Well," were the only conversational forms of online … [Read more...]
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