Engagement Statistics show Pictures are of Highest Importance!

Taking a page from Facebook engagement studies we see that if a post has a Picture in it there will be seven times the interest than a post with simply Text. Videos rank in between as having 4 times more engagement than text only.

And this number is growing according to Google! The increasing number of smartphones being sold, especially when compared to dwindling PC sales, is having a pronounced effect and shift in consumer behaviour. That the smartphone can be used to search the web and access web content while on the move is not lost on consumers, especially when there is a specific call to action instore to check out a mobile website or QR Code to obtain more information or a promotion.

Your Site Needs to Speak the Language of Your Audience!

Ask WHO is your audience and HOW do they speak?

Our site as an example, is in my voice. If you’ve ever met me, you might recognize the style. My audience are potential clients - small & medium sized business owners and people who just want to know more about “this web stuff”. Unfortunately, writing for a website is often an afterthought – it’s easy to get caught up in the design, but remember that it's the words that search engines are interested in and what will keep your customers coming initially and coming back. Therefore, if writing is not your strength, hiring a good web writer can make all the difference.

The Canadian Tire QR Code and Mobile Website Experience

These black & white squares or QR "Quick Response" code seem to be popping up everywhere, and just when you go to use them what happens? Unfortunately more often than not what happens is something that gets in the way of what these little guys were designed for - getting information easily and quickly to smartphone users!

LG Life's Good QR Code Campaign

In an attempt to provide timely up to date information for customers interested in purchasing big ticket items such as refrigerators, LG has taken the bull by the horns and placed QR Codes in strategic locations in their appliances with the intention of having the potential customer scan the code and be provided with the information required to make the purchase right there and then.

The latest search results display algorithm from Google has been showing videos as part of search results for a while now, but what's happened recently is that Google's Alerts have started to show images next to the content description. From personal experience these images have been part of the content, usually found at or near the top, and been labeled as to image content in both the image file name as well as the alt tag.

Local Ontario men's retailer, Stars Men's Shop recently revealed its QR Code campaign offering its customers a $25 value coupon for scanning the QR Code in their store window ... but is this enough of an incentive to make you scan. It would be for me if that was all I had to do, but as usual, it isn't as simple as it seems. 

or Why & Did Google's Penguin Bite my Website!

Links or linking in the digital space refers to having an actual link to or from your website to other websites or web content … Why is this important? Two reasons: links to your site can bring you additional visitors, and secondly that Search Engines seriously take into account the number and quality of links pointing to your site, internal links within your site and the links within the site that point to outside content, as factors in determining how your site will rank in their search rankings.

In a recent attempt to cater to the smartphone user and its employable demographic, Tim Horton's has developed an in-store QR Code campaign in hopes of recruiting staff for its locations. 4AV4N3KJQRWS

The Penguin update hit thousands of Websites Hard!

The past few weeks have been painful for thousands of website owners following the Google Penguin Update - being a change to Google's ranking algorithm as to how your website is shown in search results - businesses have folded and lives have been changed irrevocably, all because of the immense power Google's algorithm wields.