Facebook: 200 Million Members

Facebook says it expects to welcome its 200 millionth member today. It was just January when Facebook announced 150 million members.

Founder Mark Zuckerberg sees Facebook as more than just social networking, he sees it as a force for social action. Writing on the Facebook blog, Zuckerberg said:

Creating channels between people who want to work together towards change has always been one of the ways that social movements push the world forward and make it better. Both U.S. President Barack Obama and French President Nicholas Sarkozy have used Facebook as a way to organize their supporters. From the protests against the Colombian FARC, a 40-year old terrorist organization, to fighting oppressive, fringe groups in India, people use Facebook as a platform to build connections and organize action.

What do you think of Facebook's rapid success? Share your thoughts in the comments below.

The Website Design Centre

If you need any help with website design, online marketing, social media please just ask!

For more information visit our website at:
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leading norfolk online marketing company

Twitter Any Good For SEO?

Twitter is just a fad, right? Nothing to worry about for anyone focusing on their site’s search engine visibility. It isn’t as if a tweet at twitter will rank well in Google or something. Wait a minute! It is a fad? That means that people are using it, right? And eyeballs are what any web marketer is looking for.

Here are a few tips on how to turn Twitter traffic into search engine success.

Twitter is what we call a microblog service. Members are allowed to send out short messages (max 140 characters) to their followers, i.e. to people that are subscribing to their messages (tweets).

On their Twitter home pages they will get a constant stream of such messages from the people they are following.

You may include a URL in the tweet, and many do so to guide their followers to interesting articles etc. However, the links are automatically nofollowed, which means that although Google may spider the tweets themselves, the links do not contribute to strengthening the ranking of the pages they link to.

So, adding a large number of links to your own blog or site in Twitter will in and for itself not lead to better search engine rankings.

Indirectly, however, Twitter links may have a strong effect. Here’s why:

Search engine marketing on Twitter

Quite a few people use Twitter to tell each other about online news and resources. For instance: in the search engine marketing arena itself, many of the best known experts are using Twitter, sending out links to interesting post and commenting on each other’s tweets. There is Danny Sullivan commenting on a blog post by Google’s Matt Cutts. A few moments later Matt responds on Twitter.

This means that Twitter has become a source of fresh news and discussions, and a lot of bloggers and journalist follow these streams in order to get the latest scoops and the best information. This is exactly the kind of information they use when writing their own blog posts and articles, and a link found in those blog posts matter a lot!

Some also use the Twitter search engine to track down the latest news and trends. You want those searchers to be able to find tweets on your articles.

However, if you want the experts to follow your tweets, you have to contribute valuable information. This does not mean that you have to stay online all the time. Four of five carefully selected tweets a week may actually do the trick.

What if you haven’t got the time to follow Twitter? You need your time to write blog posts, right?

You may still establish a presence on Twitter. There are services out there that will turn the RSS feed from your blog into Twitter messages. This means that your blog will automatically send out a tweet every time you add a new post to your blog or site.

How to get followers on Twitter

That doesn’t solve the problem of getting relevant followers, though. How do you get the insiders in your field to follow your tweets?

Twitter has a search engine you can use to search for the names of people you know. Search for brands and site names, as well, as many companies and sites have discovered the usefulness of Twitter. There are also third party Twitter people search engines and directories you can use to find people who share your interests.

Follow the ones that seem to be knowledgeable in your field. Then go through their list of followers and look for people that share the same interests. Follow all that seem interesting.

This will cause Twitter to send an email to those you follow, telling them about your subscription. Many of them will take a look at your Twitter feed and see if there is something interesting there for them. If you have already added a few high quality tweets, they may subscribe to your messages. And presto, you online “radio station” has an audience.

That’s not all: If you provide useful information, they may also explore your profile which includes a link to your site.
Optimize your Twitter profile

When potential followers click on your username to find out more about you, they are taken to your profile page. There are several ways to optimize this page so it holds the kind of information your visitors are after. Click on “Settings” in the top menu and make these easy changes:

• Add your real name so people who know you can find you.
• Add the URL to your blog or web site in the “More Info URL” box. This will place the link on your profile page.
• Add a short, hype free biography in the “One Line Bio” box.
• Make sure the box for protecting your updates is not checked. Otherwise no-one dropping by will see what you are tweeting about.
• Add the URL to your blog or web site in the “More info URL” box. This will place the link on your profile page.
• Upload your photo or company logo in the “Picture” tab. This makes your tweets easily recognizable.

To add even more info, you may want to change the default background image of your Twitter home page with one of your own. Make a jpeg file some 150 to 200 pixels wide and 500 to 600 pixels high. In this area put your logo, your URL and other types of relevant information. The image will not be clickable, but it will help you tell the visitors what your site or product is about.

So what should you tweet about? Well, restrict the number of “Another cup of coffee” messages. A few may make you seem human, but too many and they become irritating noise.

Do provide links to your own articles and blog posts, but also to high quality on topic articles provided by others. If your followers see that you contribute good stuff, they will remain your followers and they will be more likely to visit your site, as well.

Follow us on Twitter

The Website Design Centre

If you need any help with website design, online marketing, social media please just ask!

For more information visit our website at:
www.websitedesigncentre.com

leading norfolk online marketing company

Twitter Goes For Search

A couple of weeks ago Twitter began rolling out some enhancements which consisted of an integrated search box and a Twitter zeitgeist sort of thing called Twitter trends.

These new features have been under beta testing on selected subsets of Twitter users and the Twitter blog just announced that it was definitely coming soon for all users.

Previously the search box or Twitter’s search facility was a subdomain on Twitter. I first saw the search box appeared on my Twitter account located at the upper right navigation tab. And I didn’t quite noticed when it was relocated at the right sidebar just below the “Favorites” link.

Additionally whereas before, the search results are displayed on a new page, the new Twitter search engine now displays them right on your Twitter home page. And if you use a particular search keywords from time to time, Twitter is implementing a new feature that will let you save that search. It will appear on the right sidebar just below the search box. You can then check on this search and it will display the current related Tweets.

The other feature that is being tested is the Twitter trends. This is similar to Google Zeitgeist which is a list of popular words being referenced on the whole Twitter-sphere.

These new features will be rolled out to the public in the coming days.

The Website Design Centre

If you need any help with website design, online marketing, social media please just ask!

For more information visit our website at:
www.websitedesigncentre.com

leading norfolk online marketing company

Basic Forms Of Social Media Explained

If you are looking to getting into social media, at the moment there are basically 6 types of social media. We have briefly described them below:

Social Networks:

these sites allow people to build personal web pages and then connect with
friends to share content and communication. the biggest social networks are
Myspace, facebook and bebo.

Blogs:

perhaps the best known form of social media, blogs are online journals, with
entries appearing with the most recent first.

WIKIS:

these websites allow people to add content to or edit the information on them, acting
as a communal document or database. the best-known wiki is wikipedia4, the
online encyclopaedia which has over 2 million english language articles.

Podcasts:

audio and video files that are available by subscription, through services like apple
itunes.

Forums:

areas for online discussion, often around specific topics and interests. forums came
about before the term “social media” and are a powerful and popular element of online communities.
Content Communities:

communities which organise and share particular kinds of content. the most popular content communities tend to form around photos (flickr), bookmarked links (del.icio.us) and videos (Youtube).

Micro Blogging:

social networking combined with bite-sized blogging, where small amounts of content (‘updates’) are distributed online and through the mobile phone network. twitter is the clear leader in this field.

If we can help in anyway please get in contact.

The Website Design Centre

If you need any help with website design, online marketing, social media please just ask!

For more information visit our website at:
www.websitedesigncentre.com

leading norfolk online marketing company

NEWS: Google Axe 200 Jobs

Google have announced that they are cutting 200 jobs from their sales and marketing teams worldwide. The announcement comes after job losses at both Myspace and Yahoo but is only about 1% of Google total staffing.

The Website Design Centre

If you need any help with website design, online marketing, social media please just ask!

For more information visit our website at:
www.websitedesigncentre.com

leading norfolk online marketing company

Keywords! Are you optimising for the right things?

Doing keyword research is something that alot of small business miss out when optimising thier website for search. But what is the point of optimising your website for search terms that no one is using?

There are a number of ways to find keywords but one FREE way is to use Googles Adword Keyword generator at https://adwords.google.co.uk/select/KeywordToolExternal

Simply type in the keyword or key phrase you want to optimise your page for and the results will show you how many users are searching for those key phrases, what the advertisers competition is like (this will give you an indication whether it is a good search term) and other ideas on more keyword and key phrases.

If you would like advice on other more professional keyword generator tools please just ask...

We would also love to hear how you generate your keywords and what tools you are using!

What is social media?

Social Media is all about user content. Users have the ability to write about blogs & websites, post comments and brands, companies and interact with businesses in ways which have never been seen before. In today’s ever changing technological world, social media websites like Facebook, Twitter & Linked In have given the user a unique platform to be able to discuss their likes and dislikes with the world.

Many brands and businesses use social media to find out what their customers think about their products and services, openly encouraging their users to post articles about their products which other users & potential customers then see, read and finally look for more information about. Social Media is a great way to drive more qualified traffic to your website and helps with search engine optimisation and search engine marketing.

Social Media websites use different types of content for users to be able to share, comment and rate including text (blogs), images (Flickr), audio (Podcasts), video (You Tube)

We found this great little video on you tube by CommonCraft and you can see it by clicking here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MpIOClX1jPE

What is a blog?

A question we get asked alot is, 'what is a blog?' So we thought we would put together this post to help our readers understand what a blog is.

Well first of, a blog is a way a sharing information with users. Back in the 19th century publishers and editors would decide what content they would post from professional journalists but now with the emergence of web 2.0, users can decided what they want to publish through this own Web Logs or Blogs for short. Readers then have the ability to subscribe to RSS feeds or simply re visit the blog to hear more posts. Users are also able to comment of posts which allows for community discussions.

We recently found this video on you tube from Common Craft which explains bloging and how to use it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NN2I1pWXjXI

The APL Team
Website Design, Online Marketing & Public Relations In Norwich, Norfolk

Norfolk's Leading Design & Marketing Agency

Wood Farm, Deopham Road, Attleborough, Norfolk, NR17 1AJ

For more information visit our website at:
www.apondlife.com

FREE Search Engine Optimisation Guide For Norfolk Businesses

We have posted a FREE search engine optimisation guide at: http://www.websitedesigncentre.com/websitesearchcentre to try and help companies in norfolk with search engine optimisation and norwich businesses with SEO.

The APL Team
Website Design, Online Marketing & Public Relations In Norwich, Norfolk

Norfolk's Leading Design & Marketing Agency

Wood Farm, Deopham Road, Attleborough, Norfolk, NR17 1AJ

For more information visit our website at:
www.apondlife.com