The main change seems to be that user data will be shared across Google platforms and products. Processing over one billion search requests every day, Google collect a lot of data about its users and now data from search, YouTube, Gmail, Docs and other services will integrated, making it all the more insightful and helpful both to Google and its users, through personalisation.

We’ve been talking about personalisation of search for some time, as already search results are influenced by search history when users are logged in. This is set to continue, with data collected from all of Google services allowing search results to be personalised to an even greater extent. This is why we’ve been talking about attracting visitors at an earlier stage in the buying cycle with informative and useful content, on the basis that visiting once makes a return visit much more likely thanks to personalised search.

So what’s the new privacy policy like? It has some nice illustrations, and some reassurances that data will not be sold. If you’re cynical about the change, take comfort in the fact that user behaviour will play a big part in the story of Google. Google+ as a social network might be gaining momentum, but just look at Google Wave and Buzz – if products and services aren’t used, they will be dropped. It’s impossible to deny that for many users this update gives Google the ability to suggest even more relevant search results.

A cynic’s concerns lie with the way that the algorithm is now likely to prioritise online activity and content on Google networks over any other activity or content online. For example YouTube could impact search rankings in a way that other video hosting sites are unlikely to. It’s impossible to predict what the final outcome of this or the next Google update will be, and that’s why we stay on top of developments in search to better understand the market for our clients.

Post from Apple Pie & Custard blog by SiteVisibility - An SEO Agency

Google’s New Privacy Policy

Related posts:

1. Google Personalised Search knows where you live…
2. Google’s YouTube In-Video Advertising
3. 26 Biggest Winners from Google Instant

We know that someone you were wondering about getting the Internet Marketing Podcast onto to your Android phones, and this is the way to do it. If you go to Stitcher’s website, you’ll be able to download the app (for free!) for your Android phone, your iPad, and your iPod.

If you’re curious, you can have a look here for the podcast page, or you can cut to the chase and download it here.

As always, we love to get feedback so let us know what you think! So email Kelvin or leave us a comment on Stitcher or iTunes.

Post from Apple Pie & Custard blog by SiteVisibility - An SEO Agency

Internet Marketing Podcast is now on Stitcher!

Related posts:

1. The 12 Internet Marketing Tools of Christmas – Internet Marketing Podcast Episode #56
2. Twitter Conversations & Animoto – Internet Marketing Podcast #47
3. Your Internet Marketing Strategy – Podcast Episode #11

Many in the Search community are debating what this means for search, as asking Siri a simple question will differ from accessing the web and doing a search. We’ve rounded up some articles about the anticipated impact that Siri will have, in particular on local search.

What do you think? We’d love to hear from you. We’ve got a debate here in our LinkedIn Group.

Here are a few that we found interesting.

Siri, Are You Taking Over Mobile Search?

3 Simple Steps To Get Siri & Her Friends To Talk Up Your Local Business

Siri, What Can You Teach Search Marketers?

How Apple’s Siri Could Destroy Local SEO

The End of SEO as We Know It

Post from Apple Pie & Custard blog by SiteVisibility - An SEO Agency

How Will Siri Change Search?

Related posts:

1. 5 Ways the iPhone 4 is going to change the way Internet Marketing- Podcast Episode #75
2. Why do big brands need Google’s hand holding in the latest Vince update/change?
3. All Change at Google – Podcast Episode #147

Ever since they treated us to a fragrance profiling session, we’ve known that Penhaligon’s are a unique brand with a rich history and an expert knowledge of their field. It seems that they’re also charitable sports, as not only are the team cultivating crumb catchers this month to help raise sponsorship money and awareness, but they are also opening up a pop-up barbershop at their flagship store in Covent Garden, offering free moustache trims for Movember participants, or “mo bros”.

It’s been over 140 years since the first Penhaligon’s barbershop opened on Jermyn Street, and for Movember this year they are resurrecting their gentleman’s shaving service. Mo Bros will be able to book an appointment at the barbershop during Movember, and can have a complimentary moustache trim to keep them looking refined and gentlemanly.

Penhaligon’s have generously agreed to donate 20% from all sales of shaving products during November to Movember.

Post from Apple Pie & Custard blog by SiteVisibility - An SEO Agency

Movember UK: Penhaligon’s Pop-Up Barbershop

Related posts:

1. Movember Fund Raising DJ Marathon
2. Remember, Remember, it’s nearly Movember
3. Movember – Great Cause & Great Marketing – Podcast Episode #96

Moving house can be a stressful time, not to mention a massive upheaval, so it’s unsurprising that valuable items can often end up being abandoned, left in skips or taken to the tip. Recycling or donating to charity is not always at the top of the agenda during a house move, but a wealth of forgotten and neglected valuable items often turn up. Bishop’s Move want to use these items to help support the disability charity, offering a ‘De-Clutter Service’ to each of their customers. Customers will receive a Scope donation bag, which they can fill with unwanted items including:

• Clothes
• Shoes and boots
• Bags, handbags and belts
• Books, CDs and DVDs
• Mobile phones
• Small electrical items
• Jewellery and bric-a-brac

They will collect the bag when they help the customer to move house, and donate the items to Scope, who can distribute it to their stores nationwide. It will help Scope to raise some much-needed funds, and assist them in making a difference to people’s lives. The money will be used to help Scope provide schools, skills development centres and independent living to disabled people.

Bishop’s Move carry out 12,000 removals a year, so we are expecting some fantastic results from this brilliant partnership. Look out for news of an exciting launch event coming soon or find out more about Bishop’s Move and check out their Facebook page for useful information on de-cluttering your home.

The partnership is being supported by the whole team here, who work closely with Bishop’s Move on their social media and marketing. Our aim is to maximise awareness of the “de-clutter service”, by co-ordinating the activities of the SiteVisibility network, as well as the Scope and Bishop’s Move teams, to ensure the campaign gets the most coverage possible.

Post from Apple Pie & Custard blog by SiteVisibility - An SEO Agency

Bishop’s Move Support Scope with De-Clutter Service

Related posts:

1. Bishop’s Move
2. A Quality (Search Marketing) Service Never Goes Out of Fashion.
3. Twestival for Twits or a Service Worth Celebrating?

Howdy! My name’s Dominick and today is my first day as a Digital Marketing Manager at SiteVisibility. It feels a bit surreal to be writing this from SiteVisiblity’s lovely office in Brighton, when I’ve spent some time following the blog posts and listening to the podcasts during my own leisure time, but to be now part of the talented team at SiteVisibility and get the chance to work with some fantastic clients is a great opportunity and one that I shall relish.

Now for some quick background information, in case you’re wondering who is this guy that’s hijacked SiteVisibility’s blog this week. For the last 3 years I’ve actually been doing my best to avoid England’s cold climate and work in some slightly more tropical countries in Asia. Most recently I returned from Taiwan about 4 months ago, where I was working for a multinational software company handling their English Paid Search and affiliate programs as well as consulting on their international SEO strategies.

When I wasn’t tied to a desk, I enjoyed surfing in typhoon conditions, and attempting to improve my Chinese which so far extends to just the basic conversations. I loved everything about Taiwan, except the food (I’m sorry if any Taiwanese person is reading this, but stinky tofu is something I can never get used to).

Prior to living in Taiwan, I lived in Thailand for two and a half years, and worked for a UK SEO Company based in Bangkok. Conversely I loved Thai food and still do, love speaking the language (I would rate myself as semi-fluent) but found the chaos and humidity of Bangkok a bit too much at times.

I returned to the Sunny UK to rekindle my love of all things British, and to return after a few years of being a nomad, and finally set down some roots. Brighton, striked me as a great place to do this, and now here I am. I’m very much looking forward to getting involved in the projects, events and conferences SiteVisibility is involved with and hopefully you’ll be reading more posts offering some valuable insight into the world of Search Marketing from me in the future on the blog.

Post from Apple Pie & Custard blog by SiteVisibility - An SEO Agency

SiteVisibility Have A New Team Member! He’d like to introduce himself…..

Related posts:

1. Rachel Lovejoy Joins the SiteVisibility Team
2. I would like to introduce you to SiteVisibility’s newly appointed Sales Coordinator … ME!
3. SiteVisibility All Star Aerial Assualt Team

It can happen to anyone on their birthday right? Terrified of taking the leap from a 160ft-high crane which was set up in Potters field Park, a beautiful little area in the East of London, I started browsing the You Tube channel using keywords such as “bungee funny” or “bungee comedy”. Too frightened to take a look at any of the extreme bungee footage, all I needed was a little bit of comedy. One of the top search results was a short sketch which appeared on the Flemish Comedy Television Show “In De Gloria” many years ago. The sketch shows a father amazed – or rather distressed – by his family’s originality when they organize a bungee jump for his birthday. Although being terrified of heights, the man eventually takes the jump. However, his fears take control of him, making the bungee an embarrassing event for himself as well as his family. “Alles vol. Alles is vol” [It’s completely filled up]; those are the only words the poor man is able to shout out while jumping.

This was literally all that went through my head on that Sunday morning train to London. And believe me, it was definitely one of the better scenarios that had crossed my mind during the previous days. Once arrived on the site, I was welcomed by the Extreme Element team and asked to give a short interview before the big bungee jump. Still thinking about that sketch, it didn’t really sink in that I was going to be flying through the sky in the next 30 minutes. All I could think of was that it should all be fine, as long as I don’t end up like that man on that comedy show.

Once weighed and weighed again, I got into the harness and the ankle straps were attached. From there on it all went really fast. Before I realized what was going to happen, I was in the cage at the top of the crane and instructed to jump on “One, Two, and Bungee!” I’m not even sure if I waited to jump until we got to “Bungee”. I got up there, had a quick look around – trying to take in most of the view of London – and wanted to make sure that I jumped before I got the chance to change my mind.

And guess what? I had a lot more fun during the jump than I had looking at my online search results the night before. I was absolutely speechless, and extremely happy that I was able to put my fear aside to accept this challenge. The amount of adrenaline running through my body after the jump was phenomenal. I could have easily ran a 4-day marathon straight after. Once descended back to Earth, everyone at Extreme Element did a really good job making sure that everything was fine and that I got the chance to tell everyone how fantastic my London Bungee jumping was.

I would highly recommend this event to anyone who has ever thought about doing a jump. And there is definitely no need to fear, all it takes is the right keywords to prepare yourself and to make your experience even better than you ever imagined.

Post from Apple Pie & Custard blog by SiteVisibility - An SEO Agency

Exclusive Central London Bungee Jump – Extreme Element

Related posts:

1. Google ‘Jump to’ Links Getting Confused by AJAX?
2. How to never make a marketing mistake as big as the London 2012 Logo
3. Want to follow 44 of the speakers from A4U London?

Brighton Digital Festival is an open, Fringe-style festival in which dozens of exhibitions, workshops, performances, meet-ups, conferences and other events are hosted. International artists will showcase their work while innovative experts share knowledge on technological developments and concepts. There are far too many events involved in the Digital Festival to list them all here, so check out their website for a full programme. The festival has been organised by a group of organisations and individuals including technology companies, arts organisations and those with a passion for digital. The aim of the festival is to bring together Brighton’s digital industries and art communities.

WP Brighton takes place at the Friends Meeting House on the 23rd of September, and aims to “bring together business and digital professionals to show how great web strategy, design and development can meet specific business objectives.” Attendees can expect highly qualified speakers from the world of digital media, giving advice, tips, tricks and best practises.

The Brighton Digital Marketing Festival is a marketing festival featuring many different events, including workshops and presentations by representatives of the BBC as well as local digital agencies such as Pure360, Nixon McInnes and White Hat Media. The events take place at many different locations around the city, including The Fabrica Art Gallery and the Dome.

Digital Open Studios are part of the Digital Marketing Festival, taking place between eh 12th and the 16th of September. Organised by Wired Sussex, the open studios give attendees the chance for insight into Brighton’s digital agencies, viewing their offices and meeting the teams. It’s a chance to learn, share and innovate with some of Brighton’s brightest digital professionals, including the SiteVisibility team!

Brighton SEO is Kelvin Newman’s own digital marketing event, as part of the Digital Festival. After the success of the last Brighton SEO in April at the Sallis Bennis Theatre, with inspiring and informative talks from some of the industry’s top speakers, this September sees BrightonSEO move to the Corn Exchange. Tickets were all free, so it’s no surprise that all 600 of them were claimed within 30 minutes of being made available. Attendees are travelling from far away locations, including Manchester and Scotland to attend the event, and claim a free pint at the after-party.

Brighton’s digital media and arts community is friendly and lively, so if you’re interested in getting involved or listening in, why not force your way into one of these events and see where it takes you?

Post from Apple Pie & Custard blog by SiteVisibility - An SEO Agency

Digital Events Aplenty This Month in Brighton

Related posts:

1. Brighton Digital Open Studios Week
2. Why is Brighton the Search Engine Marketing Capital of Britain?
3. 7th Annual Winner of the SiteVisibility Trophy for “Best Digital Media Student” at University of Brighton Announced

BBC

The Guardian

Reuters

Marketing Week

Marketing Magazine

Post from Apple Pie & Custard blog by SiteVisibility - An SEO Agency

Web Domain Suffixes

Related posts:

1. Choosing the best Domain Name for SEO and other Questions – Podcast Episode #150
2. ABC’s of SEO: I is for International
3. Click Here for 50,000 Free Dofollow Links from a PR9 Domain

The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) are the UK’s independent watchdog committed to maintaining high standards in advertising. They are self regulated and funded by the advertising industry who are required to contribute 0.1% of their media spend to regulating the advertising industry. The ASA’s authority is recognised by the Government, the courts, other regulators such as the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) and Office of Communications (Ofcom) as the established means of consumer protection from misleading advertising.

The Committee of Advertising Practice (CAP) are the body responsible for writing the CAP Code which is governed by the ASA. Their purpose is to ensure the industry remained honest, truthful and within legal guidelines. Basically, to ensure that what you see is what you get.

Unbelievably, until March the 1st the digital remit only covered paid for advertising such as E-mail marketing , banner and pop-up advertisements, PPC, commercial classified advertisements and paid-for listings on price comparison sites so out side of these paid for adverts online marketing was entirely unregulated and advertisers could get away with saying what they liked. The new rules will effect all businesses no matter what the size or nature.

What are the benefits?

Firstly, the new rules should go at least someway to ensuring what we see online is truthful and reducing the amount of outright dishonesty in marketing messages. It will also be effective in making online marketing a more equal playing field as currently ethical marketers could be losing out to competitors who sound amazing and lure in unsuspecting clients with far cheaper prices which are not anywhere near the truth! The good that about the guidelines is that if you are aware of a competitor doing this you can report them and they will have to be open and truthful about their prices and services.

Why has this only just come in to place?

The extended CAP code has come into play this year for a number of reasons. Firstly and probably most significantly as 2010 was the 1st time online advertising spending in the UK exceeded TV yet this was largely untracked. Unsurprisingly, the Internet is now the second most complained about medium after TV. In the last 2 years, Over 3500 complaints regarding websites that fell outside of remit. For these reasons, even the Conservative Party pledged to ‘Tackle currently unregulated marketing on corporate websites targeted at children’ and ‘to shut this regulatory loophole and clamp down on irresponsible online marketing targeted at children’.

The ASA gave advertisiers a 6month grace period from September to get to grips with what the new rules mean to them and have been offering online site audits to marketers who are unsure.

To fund the new remit, the industry has agreed to apply the standard 0.1% levy on paid-for advertisements appearing on internet search engines through media and search agencies. This has been spent on an advertising campaign including TV ads and posters around stations and on billboards.

The Official line from CAP….

“Advertisements and other marketing communications by or from companies, organisations or sole traders on their own websites, or in other non-paid-for space online under their control, that are directly connected with the supply or transfer of goods, services, opportunities and gifts, or which consist of direct solicitations of donations as part of their own fund-raising activities.”

So what does all this actually mean and how will it affect me?

There are now a number of things that you will need to be careful of when considering your marketing activity:

1. Watch out for claims you can’t back up

In theory everyone should have been doing this anyway! But you must now substantiate not just everything you say or write on your site, social media platform or blog, but also everything everyone else does too.

3.18 … Quoted prices must include non-optional taxes, duties, etc.

3.7 … must hold evidence for any claims that consumers are likely to believe are objective

3.17 … price statements must not mislead by omission and relate to product listed

3.9 … not stating significant limitations or qualifications

2. Social media and User generate content

For the first time, Social media platforms fall under the remit as “ Non Paid for Space under Advertisers control” something that will undoubtedly effect they way we think about our social media strategies.The biggest challenges for marketers regarding social is with regards to User generated content (UGC) and distance marketing rules.

The first big consideration is using content from your Facebook page, Twitter account , blog or forum for your marketing materials. Previously, you could quite rightfully take positive comments or Tweets and use them for self promotion. This, along with using photos that have been posted by users on Facebook, even if you are tagged in them is no longer allowed.

Another major factor is ensuring everything you Tweet or post can be substantiated at the time you post it. This includes ReTweeting or even liking something a fan has written about you that at the time you engage with that comment is no longer true.

Top Shop for example recently go into trouble for ReTweeting a comment someone made about how great they were and how they had just bought a skirt in the sale. By the time Top Shop ReTweeted the skirt was no longer in the sale so the comment was unsubstantiated.

The CAP code refers to this as, “Inaccurate or misleading copy that contains a claim written by the advertiser themselves or by the customer and then reused by the advertiser” .

3. Distance Selling Marketing

The inclusion of Distance selling marketing communications in the online remit essentially means all promotions, Tweets and comments about a product must include:

9.2.1 the main characteristics of the product

9.2.2 the price, including any VAT or other taxes payable (see “Prices” in Section 3: Misleading Advertising, and payment arrangements

9.2.3 the amount of any delivery charge

9.2.4 the estimated delivery or performance time (see rule 4.9.3) and arrangements

9.2.5 a statement that, unless inapplicable (see rule 9.6), consumers have the right to cancel orders for products. Marketers of services must explain how the right to cancel may be affected if the consumer agrees to services beginning less than 7 working days after the contract was concluded.

This is virtually impossible to do in 140 characters and so could essentially change the way we use Twitter and Facebook for promotions. However it is still very unclear how strictly this will be enforced.

4. Forums and reviews

Moderating out negative comments and only showing positive ones was one of the specific examples given by the ASA of situations to which the code applies. Leaving aside all the usual reasons why this is a damaging practice, doing so now guarantees that your review system will be eligible for scrutiny from the ASA.

Fake Reviews where marketers actively plant comments acting as ‘consumers’ is another widely used tactic that is now be a banned by both the ASA code and under European Law.

5. Blogging and commenting

If you are undertaking blogger outreach as part of a campaign, then you should ensure that any commercial benefit received by the blogger is clearly out in the open. This should be the case anyway, and brands that have not historically followed this common sense approach have seen it backfire on them. Another example of this would be if a blogger, with the approval of your company is fundraising on their blog and you have editorial control over the content – particularly, if the blogger has been paid (monetarily or another benefit such as tickets to an event, link exchange, etc).

It would be advisable to ensure everything has an audit trail is out in the open so blog readers are informed upfront.

The same thing goes for using a pen name…. although this is not entirely made clear by the ASA, if you are using a pen name to write content for a client or to comment then that would potentially be regarded as failing to disclose information or falsely impersonating someone.

So What you CAN still do within the CAP code?

-press releases and other public relations material

-editorial content

-corporate reports

-investor relations material

Natural listings on a search engine or price comparison site, will not be included

“heritage” advertising (e.g. old Guinness advert videos) as long as they’re placed within appropriate context.

Poppin’ a cap in your ASA : Are the new codes enforceable?

This is the big questions and the answer is currently very unclear and like every set of new regulations, advertisers and agencies will have to wait for the first companies to be rapped on the knuckles. Underpinning the ability of CAP to maintain and improve high standards in marketing communications is an effective range of sanctions. If a marketing communication is in breach of the Advertising Codes, the marketer responsible is told by the ASA (or the CAP Compliance team) to amend or withdraw it. The vast majority of marketers willingly undertake to do so. If they do not, sanctions are applied, although the possibility of imposing sanctions is often sufficient to secure compliance with the CAP Code.

Firstly and most significantly, the ASA will not be actively policing the remit. To get in trouble, someone will have to report you and the ASA will then have to investigate.

The enforcement process is fairly simple;

- Informal warning at first asked to withdraw Ad.

- If you fail to remove it, the ASA will report you to the office of fair trade.

However, if you still refuse to comply the penalties are tough;

-They have a black list page on the site where any non comlying companies will be featured. This is an enhanced name and shame policy – providing details of an advertiser and the non-compliant marketing communication on a special part of the ASA website.

- Removal of paid-for search advertising – ads that link to the page hosting the non-compliant marketing communication may be removed with the agreement of the search engines.

-You may get to feature in ASA paid-for search advertisements – the ASA could place advertisements online highlighting an advertiser’s continued non-compliance which will clearly have a knock on effect for an advertisers reputation.

As a result of such strict and potentially damaging consequences the ASA have seen 97% compliance rate in previous offline broadcasting and would expect to see something similar online.

How can I be sure I am staying with the remit?

CAP Services will be providing training and advice to help website owners and agencies get to grips with the new rules. However this costs a hefty 8k so it would definitely be worth getting to grips with the rules yourself.

I would recommend signing up for CAP newsletters or watching the online webcasts which will keep advertisers up to date with the progression of the remit and give them a better idea of how the rules will be enforced.

-Understand what is and isn’t acceptable to the ASA

-Keep up-to-date with the latest developments and guidance in ad regulation

- Help avoid reputation and commercial damage that can come with an upheld ASA adjudication.

See below for Jo and Graeme’s full presentation on the new ASA regulations from Brighton SEO. Our Creative Director Kelvin Newman is delivering a presentation at SMX Advanced in London next week about ASA regulations and their impact on digital marketing.

Post from Apple Pie & Custard blog by SiteVisibility - An SEO Agency

Staying on the Right Side of the ASA

Related posts:

1. Brighton SEO – Staying on the right side of the ASA @jo_morley @mrgraeme #Brightonseo
2. Why Facebook Ads are a Better Opportunity Now than Adwords in 2000
3. Why Search Marketers Should Be Running Your Facebook Social Ad Campaign

I thought a few of the readers might enjoy the video so here I am in my favourite Cowboy shirt!

Post from Apple Pie & Custard blog by SiteVisibility - An SEO Agency

Why Conventional SEO is Dead?

No related posts.

You can read the full details on our jobs page, but here’s a few more details about the type of people we’re looking for.

1. SMM – Integrated Search specialist – from a marketing background, you will be experienced in conceiving, planning, managing and delivering multi-disciplinary and possibly multi-lingual internet marketing campaigns including SEO, Social Media and Paid Search.
2. SMM – Financial Services specialist – per the Integrated Search specialist with additional experience of delivering FSA compliant campaigns.
3. SMM – Online PR Specialist – from a PR Industry background, you will have hands-on experience in planning and executing off and online PR tactics
4. SMM – Senior SEO Consultant – you will have at least 2 years experience in delivering SEO campaigns with a particular interest in analytics, website analysis, usability and conversion optimisation.
5. SEO Placement – my client is keen to take on a SEO Placement with a view to climbing the career ladder in Search

Post from Apple Pie & Custard blog by SiteVisibility - An SEO Agency

We’re Recruiting…. Again

Related posts:

1. SiteVisibility are Recruiting an Octopus
2. We’re Recruiting – Search Marketing Manager
3. Recruiting? AKA A Very Easy But Effective Form of Link Building.

How To Use Podcasts To Build Links

Podcasting doesn’t get the love it deserves, if implemented correctly it can be one of the most effective social media tools at building relationships. We show you how and why it works.

This is just one example of our daily training videos where we explain exactly how to carry out advanced internet marketing tactics yourself, we’ve covered topics like reputation management, keyword research, linkbuilding, improving your PPC quality score, tracking via Google Analytics amongst 100+ topics covered so far.

You can sign up here and get a weeks worth of content for absolutely zilch, no obligation, no hard sell, just quality content for nothing -  I hope you find it of use, it’s designed especially for people like you!

Post from Apple Pie & Custard blog by SiteVisibility - An SEO Agency

How To Use Podcasts To Build Links

Related posts:

1. Easy steps to build links and traffic from images on your website or blog
2. Build More Links with Better Backlink Analysis – Podcast Episode #141
3. How To Use Link Requests To Sell Your Product As Well As Build Links

Webcam chat at Ustream

Post from Apple Pie & Custard blog by SiteVisibility - An SEO Agency

Watch the Internet Marketing Podcast Live from #mwl2010

Related posts:

1. Watch The First Ever Live Episode of the Internet Marketing Podcast
2. Video Highlights from The Online Marketing Show
3. Special 50th Edition of the Internet Marketing Podcast – Podcast Episode #50

Image Credit

Our podcast, which we broadcast weekly to a world-wide audience of over 15,000 marketers, will be streaming live across the net for the two day event and we’d like to know if you’d like to get involved?

We’ve already scheduled in interviews with some of the events keynote speakers but we’d also like to reach out to a whole range of other attendees and answer any specific SEO and internet marketing queries that they might want answering on the day.

So, if you’ve already got a ticket then pop over to stand A118 and ask for Kelvin!

If you haven’t got a ticket to the show, don’t worry, all you need to do is visit this page and enter “SiteVisibility”  as your entry code and you’ll be able to get a ticket for absolutely nothing.

And even if you’re not going to the event you’ll be able to watch our stream using a player we’ll embed right here on our site

Looking forward to seeing you there!

Post from Apple Pie & Custard blog by SiteVisibility - An SEO Agency

Watch The First Ever Live Episode of the Internet Marketing Podcast

Related posts:

1. Watch the Internet Marketing Podcast Live from #mwl2010
2. How Do You Learn Internet Marketing? Podcast Episode #94
3. Internet Marketing Podcast is now on Stitcher!

I have a couple of very exciting pieces of news to announce about the forthcoming #brightonseo free half day conference.

First of all we have an evening venue confirmed. We’ll be returning to BrightonSEO’s sprititual home of upstairs The Quadrant, where Tim Aldis of FreshEgg has very kindly offered to put some money behind the bar, along with refreshments during the afternoon courtesy of SiteVisibility.

This is of course after the daytime element which we will be holding from 1.30PM at Community Base.

But onto the bigger second piece of news the speaker line-up.

We’ve been lucky enough to have a deluge of speaker applications from some of the UK SEO industries leading lights. Sorry to the people I couldn’t squeeze in this time. It’s surprised me just how many people wanted to get involved.

We’ll be sticking to the popular conference format of three fifteen minute talks per session followed by fifteen minute q&a; so we can squeeze in as much high quality SEO-ness as is humanly possible with out some kind of time travel device.

Over to the agenda

BrightonSEO 23rd July Agenda

Social Media Shenanigans

Kevin Gibbons – Director of Search, SEOptimise

20 WordPress Plugins to Supercharge Your Blog

Cedric Wooding – Digital Producer at Jollywise Media

A Practical Guide to Managing a Facebook Advertising Campaign

Annabel Hodges – Head of Search & Analytics at Zone Content

When is an SEO Campaign not an SEO Campaign

The New Age Of Statistical and Data Driven SEO

Mark Cook – Director of Search Marketing, Further

Making Accurate Traffic Predictions

Rob Green – Senior Natural Search Analyst at iCrossing

Data Analysis for SEO

Nikki Rae – Head of Analytics & Insight at Fresh Egg

Custom Variables in Google Analytics

Giving Link Building the Creativity it Deserves

Sam Crocker - Lead SEO at Distilled

Using Competitions in SEO

Gary Preston – Strategy Director at Propellernet

Interesting & Inventive Link Development Ideas

Simon Dance - SEO Manager (UK) at Cheapflights

Linkbuilding & CRM

Eye Openers

Rishi Lakhani – Search Marketing Consultant

Actually Making SEO Happen

Zachary Colbert - Social Media Manager at Whitehat Media

Lev Manovich’s theory of Linking & Association

Nichola Stott – Owner at theMediaFlow

Challenging the Conventional Wisdom of Anchor Text

Moderated by Kelvin Newman, Creative Director SiteVisibility & Internet Marketing Podcast

Sound good for precisely zero pounds and pence? Leave us a comment below and let us know who is coming from where!

Post from Apple Pie & Custard blog by SiteVisibility - An SEO Agency

#BrightonSEO Speakers Announced – Free Conference July 23rd

Related posts:

1. The Next #BrightonSEO will be Friday July 23rd
2. Google offer free training courses for all experience levels until 23rd July
3. Next #BrightonSEO Meet-Up Friday 19th of FEB – Beers and Mini Conference

As part of the campaign setup we were invited to experience the brand first hand in their Covent Garden branch, to get a real feel for the brand and their way of portraying themselves.

We had all read their marketing material and were keen to immerse ourselves in the brand first hand. So after an early start for us all we arrived in London at the shop and we were met by Emily marketing  manager at Penhaligon’s and our guide for our time at the boutique perfume store.

First impressions of the store were the amazing smells on the way in, fragrances that really do encapsulate ‘liquid emotion’. We sat down to listen to Emily brief us on the fascinating Penhaligon’s history beginning in the Edwardian era with the founder William Penhaligon. The same scent recipies that he made all those years ago are still available as part of the range today!

It was interesting to learn of the heritage of this brand and how London has always been part of that history. Also the way Penhaligon’s sees their master perfumers as the brand ambassadors not any celebrity representation.

Another eye opener was some of the strange ingredients that go into perfumes, such as Ambergris Lumps of oxidized fatty compounds, whose precursors were secreted and expelled by whales, with a large price tag to match if ever you stumble across any washed upon the beach.

Next came our scent profiling a totally free service offered by Penhaligon’s to help customers be expertly matched to a scent that will suit them. We were asked a series of random questions in order to gauge the type of people we were, the service usually takes 45 minutes but in our case because there was a number of us Emily only had ten minutes to match each of us to a scent and she did well.

I was matched to invigorating cologne called Quercus which smells great.

Alex was matched up with Malabah, a semi-oriental fragrance, after being asked Whiskey or Wine? (Wine) and to describe her favourite dress (Black silk maxi dress with large brightly coloured orchids). It was an excellent experience and she genuinely wouldn’t hesitate to recommend the experience to a friend. You don’t just get a perfume, you get an experience and leave with a fragrance which is an extension of your personality.

Post from Apple Pie & Custard blog by SiteVisibility - An SEO Agency

SEO Smells Sweet with SiteVisibility and Penhaligons

Related posts:

1. Movember UK: Penhaligon’s Pop-Up Barbershop
2. Luxury Brands Going Digital
3. SiteVisibility ranks for the 3rd time in the Deloitte Technology Fast 50 and in EMEA 500

After the success of the last BrightonSEO, I’ve been itching to arrange the next one and I can now reveal that the next BrightonSEO will be taking place on Friday July 23rd.

Image Credit

Much like last time it will be a half day conference and evening social beers, but this time split across two venues with the day-time element being held at Community Base’s SouthWing and during the evening we’ll decamp to the pub (I’m just firming up a few details over which pub over the next couple of days)

Again it’s going to be a free event with interactive talks from members of the SEO community, I’ve already started arranging the speakers, although I can’t guarantee we’ll be featured in the Guardian again, it’s already it’s shaping up to be a great line up, but we still have slots available.

If you think you can talk for 15 minutes on a topic which will interest an passionate and advanced SEO audience drop me an email at kelvin.newman@sitevisibility.com, especially if you’ve never spoken at conferences like SMX & SES we want open the floor beyond the usual suspects.

So that’s the low down for the moment, the UK’s most friendly SEO event is back on July 23rd, You’ll get an afternoon of high quality talks on SEO and related topics and an evening in one of sunny Brighton’s finest drinking establishments.

So get it in your diary!

(There will be more update’s here as more details are confirmed, so worth signing up to the feed or keeping a close eye on the #brightonseo twitter results.)

Post from Apple Pie & Custard blog by SiteVisibility - An SEO Agency

The Next #BrightonSEO will be Friday July 23rd

Related posts:

1. #BrightonSEO Speakers Announced – Free Conference July 23rd
2. Next #BrightonSEO Meet-Up Friday 19th of FEB – Beers and Mini Conference
3. BrightonSEO- Podcast Episode #132

image credit

Generally the reaction from most of the digital community has been pretty negative and many aren’t convinced that it’ll work.

I won’t rake over old ground, but a variety of people have put across arguments like

• People can get the content elsewhere for free, why would they pay to get it from you?
• Behind a pay wall you’ll get no Google traffic and then you’ve got no visitors paying or not
• Once you’ve made something available for free it’s very hard to then charge for it
• The concept of the newspaper is broken and user-generated journalism or solo-journo’s are the future.

And, I’ll be honest, I think everyone who puts forward these viewpoints is probably right.

Why though, if I think The Times paywall is a bad idea, have we very recently added a premium content channel for our popular Internet Marketing Podcast, where people are paying to get a daily training video?

We Wanted to Offer More

We’re very lucky that as an organisation which gains indirect leads and referrals as a result of the podcast, we can fund recording, but there’s limits to how much time we can dedicate to the podcast just as a marketing tool.

There was so much more knowledge we wanted to share, introducing a premium content area allows us to do that.

I like to think this is where intelligent paywalls differ from the mad ones; everything that was available for free still is. In fact we recently up-ed the frequency of the free podcasts from a monthly to a weekly schedule.

The paid content is extra and we hope even more valuable. A daily training video and access to best practice documents was more than we previously offered.

The Listeners Wanted It

A while back we surveyed a significant chunk of our community and asked them whether there was any additional content they would be willing to pay for.

The top three responses were How To Screencasts, Ebooks & Training Materials. Not surprisingly this is just the kind of content we’ve included.

I’m not sure whether the media companies introducing pay walls have asked their readers what existing or additional content they’d be willing to pay for, but if they haven’t then they just aren’t equipped for the world of the web.

We Think We Can Do A Better Job Than the Competition

Yes, it might sound a little cocky, but we’ve seen a lot of ‘Get Rich Quick’ types offering paid for training on internet marketing who have never promoted anything other than a blog about making money online. We know we can do a better job.

We know there’s a significant chunk of of business owners or employees within companies who want to promote themselves better online but just don’t believe a lot of the the ‘Make Money Online’ hype merchants.

We’ve worked with some of the biggest brands in the UK and have produced over 70 episodes of the podcast so we hope we’ve got the track record.

The problem for people like the Times is that very few newspapers have successfully implemented a paywall – they’re flying blind.

I think what we’re doing is quite different, and I hope some are convinced that paywall doesn’t always equal internet busines FAIL.

Post from Apple Pie & Custard blog by SiteVisibility - An SEO Agency

Why We Introduced a Paywall On the Internet Marketing Podcast

Related posts:

1. Announcing the New Premium Content Membership Site From The Internet Marketing Podcast
2. The 12 Internet Marketing Tools of Christmas – Internet Marketing Podcast Episode #56
3. Internet Marketing Podcast is now on Stitcher!

We’ve worked hard to produce one of the world’s most popular marketing podcasts, and we know there’s an appetite among our listeners to learn more about internet marketing in a structured way, that’s not part of a pyramid-y ‘make money quick’ spam-fest.

So we thought we’d introduce a membership site where subscribers can gain access to a library of great content and join a community of like-minded individuals.

The site, which can be found at http://premium.internetmarketingpodcast.org , is rapidilly filling up with in-depth content in a variety of formats.

One of the most requested types of content that was suggested in our last listener survey was how-to content. We wanted to show people exactly how we do internet marketing so we started recording screencasts which will show you exactly how we go about promoting a site.

We’re launching with a series of screencasts to get you up to speed on how to promote yourself on Google Local and everyone’s favourite hype magnet – Twitter.

We’ve also been busy producing training videos on a variety of topics and are also planning to carry out live video Q&A sessions for members. We’ll be able to take questions and offer advice to solve members problems/ issues and offer the kind of advice that will help solve their unique problems.

These are the types of video we’ll be sending through to subscribers every day.

We’ve also produced a number of best practice documents in PDF format that will help you deal with the most common internet marketing dillemas. We’ve launched with two guides that solve two of the most common SEO predicaments; how to migrate to a new website without ruining your optimisation efforts and how to navigate your way through the myriad of option when targeting a new country overseas.

These are just a few of the pieces of training material we’ve produced, with more content being added every day covering all areas of internet marketing in more depth and detail than we could have ever managed in a 20 minute audio podcast.

I know that when it comes to signing up to membership sites it can be a bit difficult to know if you’re going to get good value, so we’re launching with an amazingly discounted offer for people who sign up in the first month. Want to know what that offer is? You’ll have to have a look around the site.

P.S As it’s still very early days for the site, if you can think of any ways we can improve it please drop me a line on kelvin.newman@sitevisibility.com

Post from Apple Pie & Custard blog by SiteVisibility - An SEO Agency

Announcing the New Premium Content Membership Site From The Internet Marketing Podcast

Related posts:

1. Announcing the Affiliate Service for the Premium Podcast – Podcast Episode #79
2. Exciting Announcement From Internet Marketing Podcast – Podcast Episode #71
3. Get a Free Week’s Worth Of Content From The Premium Podcast – Podcast Episode #81

Post from Apple Pie & Custard blog by SiteVisibility - An SEO Agency

Big Podcast News Tomorrow

Related posts:

1. News and Tools, Part One – Podcast Episode #110
2. News and Tools Part Two – Podcast Episode #111
3. How To Get Your Content Indexed on Google News

Here’s the list of the UK’s biggest search agencies ranked by income.

1. Bigmouthmedia
2. iCrossing
3. Greenlight
4. Forward3d
5. Latitude
6. Jellyfish
7. Unique Digital
8. Stickyeyes
9. Tamar
10. Steak
11. Propellernet
12. Golley Slater Group
13. Epiphany Solutions
14. Agenda21
15. Equi-Media
16. I Spy Marketing
17. Summit Media
18. VCCP Search
19. Harvest Digital
20. SiteVisibility
21. Positive Digital
22. Guava
23. SiteLynx
24. DBD Media
25. Further Search Marketing
26. Coast Digital
27. Leapfrogg
28. Lakestar Media
29. Euston Digital
30. Artemis8
31. Tug
32. SEOptimise
33. Strange
34. Vivid Lime
35. Web Marketing Group
36. iVantage

Suffice to say you should go out and by a hard copy yourself or otherwise NMA might get angry with me for sharing the list!

Post from Apple Pie & Custard blog by SiteVisibility - An SEO Agency

Biggest UK Search Agencies – The 2010 NMA List

Related posts:

1. Sitevisibility gain #17 place in the NMA’s Top UK Search Agencies list
2. The Biggest Threat to the UK Search Marketing Industry….
3. A Reading List on How To Blog for Beginners

I graduated from Cardiff University with a degree in Language and Communication and have specialised in areas such as linguistics and computer-mediated communication, hence the desire to work within digital marketing.

My previous roles have included everything from being part of a leading promotions team for the now huge Beachbreaklive student music festival, to a somewhat more challenging role of controlling the Social Media and marketing strategy for a Jungle and Reggae record label. Trust me, it may be wicked, but Jungle is definitely not always massive! I started the job borderline facebook illiterate (well for a student with too much time on my hands anyway) and emerged with plenty of new found skills and a love for social media and an understanding of the undeniable power of social media has in marketing , particularly within the music industry.

I then went on to work on a series of high profile events for companies such as the Guardian and The Observer and learnt a lot about how they manage their marketing campaigns.

In my free time I mainly like to do anything that involves the beach and preferably the sun, having said that, as a Cornish girl I am finding this somewhat limited in Brighton – although, to be fair the nightlife here is beyond Cornwalls wildest dreams!

I’m now looking forward to getting stuck in and integrating everything I’ve previously learnt and hopefully assisting in producing and maintaining a streamlined and exemplary model of organisation to keep things flowing in the busy offices here at SiteVisibility!

Post from Apple Pie & Custard blog by SiteVisibility - An SEO Agency

Say Hello to Jo Morley – Our New Production Assistant

Related posts:

1. Digital Events Aplenty This Month in Brighton
2. Theory into Practice: Women in the Media
3. Social Media Lessons I Learnt While on my Honeymoon in Hawaii

It’s great for finding out what’s going on in a particular industry or sector, and submitting your site for inclusion is also a good way to gain traffic and awareness for your site. By producing useful and interesting news content and packaging it in the right way, you can see your blog posts or news stories appear in the search results alongside those from top newspaper websites and news agencies on the Google News pages.

News is ranked on a variety of factors, including post frequency, freshness, location and relevance. Stories are not displayed based on a political preference or ideology, providing readers with stories from a wide range of publishers on every subject.

Requirements

There are some criteria which Google expect a site to adhere to in order to be included, this includes the content being original and not solely promoting the publisher’s business and activities. It’s also important for the site to be produced and maintained by an organisation with multiple writers, and Google will ask you for links to this information when you submit a site.

Each article needs a unique static URL, which should contain a unique three-digit number (such as http://www.sitevisibility.co.uk/blog/2010/04/12/googlenews123/). Four digit numbers which appear as years (e.g. 2006) cannot be crawled by Google News.

Homepages should contain links to individual articles, and not the articles themselves, at least not in their entirety. The stories on the homepage should link to each individual story on its own page. Text links of less than 22 characters such as “full story” or “read more” are recommended.

Articles which are too long can be excluded, and this can also result from having excessive reader comments or an html layout which contains extra material at the bottom of the page. Google are looking for paragraphs consisting of several punctuated sentences. Articles consisting of a few isolated sentences are unlikely to be indexed.

Google News displays images alongside stories, and prefers .jpg images to .png. Embedded videos can also be displayed, and are much more likely to be if they are hosted on YouTube, which coincidentally is owned by Google.

Once your website and its contents are up to scratch, then you can submit the site to Google News for inclusion.

Post from Apple Pie & Custard blog by SiteVisibility - An SEO Agency

How To Get Your Content Indexed on Google News

Related posts:

1. Getting Content Indexed By Google Quickly
2. Use the News for Cheap Pay Per Click Traffic
3. How to time your Sphinn Submissions Perfectly to Hit Front Page

He’s worked on a number of really interesting projects over the year, but he’s normally pretty professional when it comes to revealing specifics. Not the case last week. He had a few too many rum and cokes when we met up, and revealed a bit too much about his work infiltrating Twitter to find out about their advertising platform.

He was being paid by a number of stock brokering types who were planning on shorting companies like Google around the time of the announcement, who wanted the inside line on what they could expect from the announcement scheduled at Chirp on 14th of April.

The headlines are: there’ll be two different advertising options. First the widely reported PPC advertising for Twitter search, nothing hugely inventive here but neither was Adwords when it first launched.

Secondly, and far more interesting to my friend’s clients, was sponsored tweets not unlike ad.ly. With this, advertisers specify a budget per tweet, and a number of twitter followers they hope to reach. Then any twitter user can choose to share the advert with their network.

Each advert will be prefaced by the letter AD (a bit like RT) and include the twitter user name of the advertiser. The revenue is then split between twitter and the users, much like Adsense.

Twitter are hoping this process will act as great user-generated quality control system, with only high quality sponsored tweets making their way into the system.

They’ve also got their fingers crossed that this will lead to a few high profile power users like Conan O’Brien ‘going pro’ and using twitter as their main creative outlet.

But enough of me jabbering on to the screenshots.

Not Surprisingly if you click them they get bigger

Post from Apple Pie & Custard blog by SiteVisibility - An SEO Agency

Leaked Screenshots of Twitter’s Much-Hyped Advertising Platform

Related posts:

1. Top Free Twitter Tools for 2011
2. Twitter driving non-Twitter traffic!
3. Analysing the Twitter Profiles of The Top UK SEO Companies