9 Web Designs that Represent Sydney

Sydney is the greatest city in the world and rather than right a blog about why it’s the greatest city, I thought I would create a list of 9 Sydney web designs that represent  the city of Sydney that …

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The Many Digital Media Job Titles

Having worked in the Digital Arena for the last ten years, I have a pretty thorough knowledge of the different professions in the industry. However, I seem to be coming across more and more job …

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E-Web Marketing Equals Great Value on Getprice

Getprice, the largest comparison shopping website in Australia, have selected E-Web Marketing as the online digital agency of choice to feature in their new merchant newsletter’s case study section.
E-Web’s comparison shopping strategy, based on a combination of flash ads and optimised product listings, boosted Bing Lee’s online sales from this online marketing channel by 26% [...]

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Web Designer & Client Etiquette Guidelines

Like any relationship, a business relationship between a web designer and client need a certain amount of etiquette to survive. Each party needs to be polite, reasonable and tolerant to make the project a success. …

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Building Back Links With Article Marketing

Article marketing is a time-tested method of promoting your business and getting back links that help improve your index rankings on SERPS. There are many article directories you can submit your marketing articles to, but only a few have high Google PR and international authority and reputation. Since article marketing is considered an effective and [...]

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Current State of the Internet

JESS3 designed and animated this infographic for there lecture at Stevenson University for AIGA Baltimore in Feb 2010.

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Central Coast Web Design

The title of this post isn’t really very descriptive but I just wanted to give and overview of Central Coast web design and the quality of work that is being output by the web design …

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Vodafone mobile phones: Best Network Best Offers

Vodafone mobile phones: Best Network Best Offers Article by Kevin Rixon There are various network providers are present in the UK now but Vodafone still retains its top position in the mobile phone market due to its authenticity and reliability factors for which users are always looking for. Vodafone has a great network coverage area [...]

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Was Your Domain Used for Porn? How to Avoid a Costly Mistake

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The Cure for Creative Block

Creative Block is something most of us have experienced. Whether you’re a writer, designer or artist, most creative people have hit the wall and not been able to go any further. In this article, I’ll refer to …

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AdSense Reports on Device Platform Traffic

A post on the Inside AdSense blog has announced a reporting update that allows website owners to track the type of devices visitors use to access your website. Visitors are grouped according to their use of desktop/laptop, mobile smartphone, and other mobile devices.
The reporting enhancement enables site owners to develop website content that supports high traffic user platforms. For [...]

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Designing websites for young people

At my house we have a computer which is usually taken over by my 6 and 9 year old children. And don't think they are using Microsoft paint to tirelessly waste away their youth, no! These kids, and all their school friends, are spending time on hugely rich web experiences from interactive games through to social networking sites all geared towards their age group

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Re-designed Modern Technology in the 70?s

What would you do if you could travel back in time? Perhaps grab all the modern technology I could find, take it to the late 70′s, superficially re-design it all to blend in, start a consumer electronics company to unleash it upon the world, then sit back as I rake in billions, trillions, or even [...]

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Account Director - Search Marketing Agency

First Rate, a search marketing agency, is looking for an Account Director to join its marketing and business development division.

Objectives

? Grow agency revenue from existing clients by working the client base
? Grow agency revenue from new businesses by pitching search marketing to potential new clients.

Reponsabilities

? Work with existing clients to maintain and increase media budget
? Identify opportunities within the agency client base
? Propose and present new digital and search marketing ideas to clients
? Identify opportunities and pursue them
? Expand your knowledge of SEM, SEO, and Performance Marketing

Requirements
? 4+ years experience as an account director
? 2+ years experience in search marketing
? Active professionnal network
? Great interperso
nal skills

Salary
$85,000 to $110,000 + super (based on experience)

For more information or To apply: http://lnkd.in/atUBxt

HTML5 Audio Element

The [fairly] new HTML5 spec has brought many favours to web developers – two of the most high profile additions to the HTML spec are the Audio and Video elements. They both have caught my attention because of the simplicity they have brought to introducing rich media to any website. For this post I will focus on the new Audio element.

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What is A/B Testing?

You should only have two problems in your life as a website owner- driving visitors to your site and making them buy/enquire more. I’ve covered a lot of research in my previous posts about different elements that can be tweaked to improve your conversion rate. Applying these changes to your website as “best practice” is [...]

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Professional SEO ? Google Instant

Is your business ready for Google Instant? Have you been advised to target long tail keywords by an SEO company? Well it is time to update your SEO Strategy to cater for Google Instant with more emphasis now placed on head terms. SEO firms should be advising to target mid to high traffic terms. For

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Is 'Click to Call' an answer to shopping cart abandonment?

If you don't already know what Click to Call is, it's actually quite a simple concept. You put a Click to Call button on your website, the user enters their phone number, then your lines are connected and wallah! You are now speaking directly to a potential customer or client. Likewise with Live Chat, the user clicks a link to be taken to an instant messaging dialogue with a company representative. Direct contact to achieve direct results.

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3 Tips to Effectively Set Your SEM Budget

Setting up a SEM budget might seems like the easiest part, when considering advertising your business or products in search engines, however making the wrong decision with your budget allocation can have a bad impact on your campaign ROI.

A budget too high will result in some money being 'wasted' on not relevant terms or non converting terms . On the other hand, a budget too low is likely not to capture relevant traffic and will represent a high opportunity cost.

Based on experience and best practices, we have outlined some tips, which we hope will help you set your budget and maximise your campaign return on investment.

1) Your budget should reflect the search demand

This basic marketing principle is often overlooked when setting up SEM budget, which often result in inflated budget. For some reasons advertisers often think that they can spend without limits, but search traffic is a limited dem
and environement.

Having a budget much higher than the search volume is often the cause of poor performance. By forcing to spend more, the advertisier is likely to pay more for a click or select keywords which do not bring qualified traffic and therefore lower its ROI.

Before choosing a budget, make sure you do a quick research with the Google Adwords keyword tool to see the actual search volume. While useful, remember that the data is only an estimate and is likely to be different from the reality.

2) Take seasonality into account.

Seasonaliy is an important factor to consider when setting up your SEM budget. Search demand is not flat and depending in your industry is might vary based on the time of the year or special events.

If you are an online retailer, the Christmas season will generat
e a much higher demand than usual, so your SEM budget needs to reflec
t this.
If you are an accountant, the end of financial year will see an increase in search demand, which should be reflected in your budget.

Again the Google Adwords keyword tool can help you to identify seasonal trends.

3) Review your budget on regular basis

Setting up a budget for 12 months based on estimate is a risky exercise. 99% of the time, the estimate will be wrong so you budget is likely not to be fully aligned with the search demand.
Reviewing your budget every 2 to 3 months and adjusting it based on the demand, will make sure that you search engine marketing spend is in line with the search demand.

Commuting from Sydney to Copenhagen

Commuting from Sydney to Copenhagen… Crazy you say! Well yes it is crazy. We’ve been given the opportunity to relocate to Copenhagen, Denmark for a promotion my wife recently received. The thing is, I’ll need to commute between countries …

search engine optimization search engine optimization company seo seo company google seo

Was Your Domain Used for Porn? How to Avoid a Costly Mistake

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Google Caffeine: Towards a Fresher Google Index

Back in December 2009, we wrote a post on the issues that Google faced with real-time search. At this time the integraton of real-time search and especially Twitter updates in Google's search engine result pages showed some weaknesses.

Since then, things have changed and Google has reviewed its way of indexing documents and build a completely new search index called Google Caffeine. On July 8th, Google has officially announced and explained the Google Caffeine.

What is new with Caffeine

The orginal Google search index was built some time ago, when the Internet was much smaller and very different. In the last couple of years and even months, the content on the internet has increased dramatically and the need for instantaneous
and fresh information has put a lot of pressure on the Google search index resulting in large delays to display the latest information.

The 'old' Google search index was build around layers. Each layer was updated at different rates (some layers were updated more frequently than others for example for Google News), but the main layer or main index required to crawl a very large amount of web pages to be fully updated. This process could take up to 30 days to integrate newly created pages in its index.

Although Google does not give a lot of information on what it is radiacally different, Caffeine appears to have higher crawling capabilities. The crawling process has also been reviewed. Rather than crawling the entire web at once, Caffeine crawls smaller portions and update the index on constant basis, which would improve the freshness of information.

At this stage, it is still early days to see the difference and measure the real effect of the changes.

Update:
After having published a few posts since the Google Caffeine release, I have noticed that most of my posts were indexed in the next 30 mins after the post has been published. Not sure if it is because we use Blogger, but it seems to be working quite well so far!

Become a Web Designer in Sydney

Web Design has been a very popular profession to take up the last 10 years in Sydney. After the internet boom people caught on to the fact that the internet was here to stay and …

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How Does a Freelance Web Designer Find Work?

Finding work is a obviously a big part of being a freelance web designer. It’s something you always need to be aware of and have techniques in place to make sure you have a steady …

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3 Tips to Effectively Set Your SEM Budget

Setting up a SEM budget might seems like the easiest part, when considering advertising your business or products in search engines, however making the wrong decision with your budget allocation can have a bad impact on your campaign ROI.

A budget too high will result in some money being 'wasted' on not relevant terms or non converting terms . On the other hand, a budget too low is likely not to capture relevant traffic and will represent a high opportunity cost.

Based on experience and best practices, we have outlined some tips, which we hope will help you set your budget and maximise your campaign return on investment.

1) Your budget should reflect the search demand

This basic marketing principle is often overlooked when setting up SEM budget, which often result in inflated budget. For some reasons advertisers often think that they can spend without limits, but search traffic is a limited dem
and environement.

Having a budget much higher than the search volume is often the cause of poor performance. By forcing to spend more, the advertisier is likely to pay more for a click or select keywords which do not bring qualified traffic and therefore lower its ROI.

Before choosing a budget, make sure you do a quick research with the Google Adwords keyword tool to see the actual search volume. While useful, remember that the data is only an estimate and is likely to be different from the reality.

2) Take seasonality into account.

Seasonaliy is an important factor to consider when setting up your SEM budget. Search demand is not flat and depending in your industry is might vary based on the time of the year or special events.

If you are an online retailer, the Christmas season will generat
e a much higher demand than usual, so your SEM budget needs to reflec
t this.
If you are an accountant, the end of financial year will see an increase in search demand, which should be reflected in your budget.

Again the Google Adwords keyword tool can help you to identify seasonal trends.

3) Review your budget on regular basis

Setting up a budget for 12 months based on estimate is a risky exercise. 99% of the time, the estimate will be wrong so you budget is likely not to be fully aligned with the search demand.
Reviewing your budget every 2 to 3 months and adjusting it based on the demand, will make sure that you search engine marketing spend is in line with the search demand.

Google Slaps 11.8% of Sites on the Web

"During this week, Google announced a significant algorithm-update which aims to increase quality in Google?s search results. . . . → Read More: Google Slaps 11.8% of Sites on the Web

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Two Tips to Keep in Mind While Buying a Used Cell Phone for Sale

Two Tips to Keep in Mind While Buying a Used Cell Phone for Sale Article by jennifer dsouza With the mobile phone becoming a household item, more and more people have a requirement for it. The cell phone has become a one stop device for a person’s mobile information and entertainment requirements. However, not everyone [...]

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Why Should My Business Hire A Freelance Writer

I hear that question all the time; and invariably the answer is always the same; to maximize your marketing efforts while saving money at the same time! In my travels as a writer covering popular events for some of my customers, I always run into a business owner or two who will scoff at the [...]

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Commuting from Sydney to Copenhagen

Commuting from Sydney to Copenhagen… Crazy you say! Well yes it is crazy. We’ve been given the opportunity to relocate to Copenhagen, Denmark for a promotion my wife recently received. The thing is, I’ll need to commute between countries …

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Web Design Denmark ? Danish Web Design Style

As I am soon to be based and working as a freelance web designer in Copenhagen, Denmark I have recently been doing a lot of research on Danish web design to bring myself up to …

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Firefox Supports Colour Correction

Did you know that Firefox supports colour correction? Colour correction was introduced into Firefox 3, but was disabled by default. In Firefox 3.5 some issues were resolved and it is now enabled by default.

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When to use HTML 5?

HTML 5 is still in development, but developers are keen to implement it now. However, due to the lack of cross browser compatibility for html 5, and the large percentage of people who don't use HTML5 compliant browsers, clients can be wary about developing a site in HTML5 and alienating alot of users/customers.

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SEO/SEM Strategy: Capitalise on Traffic Generated by Events

Every year on the 3rd Thursday of November at 12:01 am, the Beaujolais Nouveau, the first French wine of the vintage, is released world wide.
Interestingly, the release of the Beaujolais Nouveau is not only a major event for wine enthusiasts, but has also a dramatic impact on search traffic.

The Impact of Events on Search Traffic

As you can see, every year at the same period, the traffic for the term "beaujolais" increases dramatically compared to the usual level. The popularity of the event is mirrored online generating searches. Obviously the Beaujolais Nouveau is not the only case and many other popular events do generate similar spikes in traffic. For example the Melbourne Cup has a similar effect on the term 'betting' (see below). Every year in November, the volume of search for this term increases dramatially as punters look for tips to place their bets.

A Great Opportunity

In most cases, the traffic generated by an event does not last long ( a few days or weeks before and after the event), however it remains a major opportunity for industry players. As a french wine online retailer or for a wine related website, the traffic generated by the Beaujolais Nouveau can bring a lot of new visitors and generate sales. Likewise, the Melbourne Cup offer a tremendous opportunity for any business in the gambling/horse racing industry.
The main advantage of events generated traffic, is the fact that is occur each year at the same time. There is no surprise effect and there is all year to be ready.

Capturing Event Generated Traffic

Being able to plan in advance for the event,
offers plenty of opportunity for SEO. Some content can be created a few month before and some links can be built to give the 'event page(s)' maximum opportunities to rank high on D-Day. For yearly event, the optimisation can be improved every year.

SEM (Google Adwords, Yahoo Search Marketing) can also be an opportunity for the late mover. A specific campaign targeting a small range of keywords can be created and put live on the day. SEM will give you the opportunity to have full control of the message and wont require as much work as SEO.
The main drawback is the cost. Obviously your competitors will also be aware of the event and try to do the same, so the cost per clicks will be high. Monitoring the spend on daily (even twice daily) is definately required.

Obviously a good mix of both channels appears to be the best way to leverage the event generated traffic.

WordPress Page Titles Hacked

Recently I have been having a few problems with by WordPress blog. Somehow it, or one of the plugins got hacked and all my page titles where changed to stuff like “Buy Nasonex Online” and …

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The Many Digital Media Job Titles

Having worked in the Digital Arena for the last ten years, I have a pretty thorough knowledge of the different professions in the industry. However, I seem to be coming across more and more job …

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Value of orders received over the Internet up 52%: ABS

Australian business Internet income increased by 52% in the twelve months to 2008-09, according to ABS

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Google PageRank Update - June 2011 - Finally!

Even if the PageRank score is slowly loosing its aura amongst SEO professionals and webmasters, it is always great to see that some of your work is paying off!

Over the last 2 years, Google got into a good rythm of updating the PageRank every 3 months, but had suddently stopped in April 2010, which was the last time I recorded a page rank update. Some people recorded an update on January 2011, but I did not really see it in Australia.

How to Design an A/B Test

In last week’s post, I talked about what A/B tests are. This week, I am taking it one step further and breaking down the steps required to design and set up an A/B test.
1. Pick a tool
There are a number of tools available to help you with A/B testing:

Google Website Optimizer
Visual Website Optimizer
Optimizely

I have used [...]

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The Professional SEO Pyramid

Many SEO’s argue about which sections of SEO are the most important, this is one of the best images to depict SEO I have seen, the graph made by Rand Fiskin the CEO of one of the worlds most reputable SEO companies SEO MOZ, He states the following sections are the most crucial for SEO

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Benefits of Social Media in Search Engine Optimization

Benefits of Social Media in Search Engine Optimization Article by Wildnet is an expert author to write articles. Social media is a blanket term to describe websites and web tools which allow for user communication and interaction. Some examples of social media sites are MySpace, LinkedIn, Facebook, YouTube, Digg and Twitter. These websites allow their [...]

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Web Designer & Client Etiquette Guidelines

Like any relationship, a business relationship between a web designer and client need a certain amount of etiquette to survive. Each party needs to be polite, reasonable and tolerant to make the project a success. …

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Nokia 6500 Slide Mobile Phones Excellence

Nokia 6500 Slide Mobile Phones Excellence Article by UK Online Phone Shop Mobile phones with third generation (3G) capabilities are the latest entrants in the telecommunications domain. Tech-savvy mobile phone users are more than happy with the innovative features that are a part of these sophisticated phones. High speed Internet access, video calling and user-friendly [...]

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Commuting from Sydney to Copenhagen

Commuting from Sydney to Copenhagen… Crazy you say! Well yes it is crazy. We’ve been given the opportunity to relocate to Copenhagen, Denmark for a promotion my wife recently received. The thing is, I’ll need to commute between countries …

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Multithreading made easy with .NET 4.0 Parallel Extensions

With the growing popularity of multi-core processors, there is an increasing expectation that applications are able to utilize this power.

Up until recently, the task of writing a robust multithreaded application was daunting to say the least. But with the addition of Parallel Extensions in .NET 4.0, it's as simple as changing a couple of lines of code.

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Stop Wasting Money On Failing Marketing Programs and Scams

If you have been involved in online promotion or marketing for any length of time, then I am sure you have seen one of those countless ads or emails that boast how they just made thousands of dollars without using Google, or by working from home in their spare time, or by the selling of [...]

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What is HTML 5? What does it mean for Web Design?

What is HTML 5 and what does it mean to web design? Have a look at this infographic for more information on what features it adds, and the browser support, as per usual internet explorer is lagging way behind.

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Do I have a Benzene Exposure Lawsuit

Benzene is a highly toxic chemical that is used in the production and manufacturing of a wide variety of products such as: types of rubbers, adhesives, lubricants, dyes, detergents, drugs, explosives, napalm, and pesticides. Exposure can happen by breathing vapors or fumes, contact with the skin and by ingesting it. Although benzene is commonly absorbed [...]

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Affiliate Manager Job

An exciting opportunity has come up to work for TPN, an Australian performance marketing network.

As a senior affiliate manager, you will be responsible to manage a wide range of online advertising campaign for TPN's advertisers including CPC and CPA campaigns. You will also work on the acquisition program for a 400,000 members in-house list including recommendations on landing pages, creatives, A/B Testing and developing strong relationships with overseas performance networks.

Ideal canditates will have a marketing or technical degree with a good understanding of the different online marketing techniques. Excellent attention to details, good communication and time management skills are also required.

Salary: $60,000 to $70,000 + Super

To apply, please send you resume to support@tpn.com.au. If you need more information, click her e

Central Coast SEO ? The Big Click Way

This is a shameless plug, but I would like to tell you about an important service Big Click Studios (My Business) offers on the Central Coast. SEO or Search Engine Optimisation… SEO is a major …

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Google?s New Sitelinks 12 Pack

You may remember my post last week about Google experimenting with the search results for brand keywords such as “apple” and “ebay”. Search industry experts had noticed for the past few months, and more prominently in the last few weeks, that the search results for brand keywords had begun to merge.
 
The search engine announced yesterday that this change is [...]

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Account Director - Search Marketing Agency

First Rate, a search marketing agency, is looking for an Account Director to join its marketing and business development division.

Objectives

? Grow agency revenue from existing clients by working the client base
? Grow agency revenue from new businesses by pitching search marketing to potential new clients.

Reponsabilities

? Work with existing clients to maintain and increase media budget
? Identify opportunities within the agency client base
? Propose and present new digital and search marketing ideas to clients
? Identify opportunities and pursue them
? Expand your knowledge of SEM, SEO, and Performance Marketing

Requirements
? 4+ years experience as an account director
? 2+ years experience in search marketing
? Active professionnal network
? Great interperso
nal skills

Salary
$85,000 to $110,000 + super (based on experience)

For more information or To apply: http://lnkd.in/atUBxt

What is A/B Testing?

You should only have two problems in your life as a website owner- driving visitors to your site and making them buy/enquire more. I’ve covered a lot of research in my previous posts about different elements that can be tweaked to improve your conversion rate. Applying these changes to your website as “best practice” is [...]

web seo search engine optimisation search engine optimisation company search engine optimization search engine optimization company

Affiliate Manager Job

An exciting opportunity has come up to work for TPN, an Australian performance marketing network.

As a senior affiliate manager, you will be responsible to manage a wide range of online advertising campaign for TPN's advertisers including CPC and CPA campaigns. You will also work on the acquisition program for a 400,000 members in-house list including recommendations on landing pages, creatives, A/B Testing and developing strong relationships with overseas performance networks.

Ideal canditates will have a marketing or technical degree with a good understanding of the different online marketing techniques. Excellent attention to details, good communication and time management skills are also required.

Salary: $60,000 to $70,000 + Super

To apply, please send you resume to support@tpn.com.au. If you need more information, click her e

Web & SEO Sales Professional ( BDM)

Freedom SEO is a fresh and fast growing SEO & Search Engine marketing firm based in Melbourne, which has a wealth of experienced team members, from all over the IT industry. Due to rapid growth and expansion plans, we are looking for an enthusiastic, ethical and professional web sales expert to join our team.

This is a high profile role within our organisation, that enjoys an enviable reputation for excellence. This role is ideally suited to the ambitious BDM who strives for success. The successful applicant will have a proven track record in B2B sales. SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) experience will be highly regarded.

Key Objectives & Responsibilities:

? Create new leads through research and networking.
? Present sales proposals to potential clients.
? Ensure the highest level of customer service.
? Achieve sales targets, and encourage the growth of the business.
? Build, maint
ain and enhance relationships with new and existing customers.

Key Attributes:

? Experience in SEO, PPC, social media and other online marketing products.
? Good Phone manners and strong experience in cold calling businesses.
? A strong sales and customer service history in selling to SMEs.
? A proactive outlook.
? Account Management experience.
? Experience in managing a pipeline of high-end small to medium businesses from qualifying, prospecting and to contract signature.
? Experience in preparation of quotes, proposals, and presentations as required.
? Computer and internet savvy skills and should be familiar with MS Office applications.

Remuneration will include $50K base + achievable and uncapped commissions. As the company is in the growth phase, there is great opportunity for career progression!

To apply for this role submit or email your cv and cover letter to gordon.chong@freedomseo.com.a
u

Understanding Location & Language Targeting Options in Google Adwords

Recently I had the opportunity to work on a global paid search campaign targeting multiple languages and locations. Although languagelocation targeting in Google Adwords appears to be pretty simple, some aspects can be slighty more complex.

Location Targeting Options

The main criteria that Google uses to determine a user location, is the actual Google domain they use. For example someone search in Google.de, Google will assume that the user is more likely to want to see German ads rather an English ads.
However, Google also look additional parameters including search personalisation settings, user IP addresses and the actual search term. Based on the combination of all these, Google might decide to refine the ads it displays. ( Please note that mobile devices use different location targeting parameters)

What is often misunderstood with location targeting, is that locally targeted ads wont always display to users physically located in a specific region.
For example someone in Australia searches on Google France for a plumber (plombier in French), the Australian user will be able to see the ads targeted to France, but not the Australian Ads
Another example, the same person in Australia, searches in Google France for the term 'Accommodation New York', the user is likely to see ads targeted at France, but also ads regionally targeted to New York, once again the Australia
n user is not likely to see Australian ads.

When setting u
p a location targeted campaign, it is important to remember these details to be sure to understand the audience of your ads.

Language Targeting Options

Targeting becomes more and more interesting (and complex), when you bring languages into the equation. Google offers the option to target up to 40 languages, which is great. To target ads at specific languages, Google looks at the language of the Google interface.
If you are not sure, which language is your interface set to, you can see your interface language settings in the URL when you make a search. Look for the following parameter in the URL "&hl=en" - in this case it is set to English.

Although it does not really apply to English speaking countries, this element need to be understood when looking at different languages as you might miss out on a large share of audience.
For example, you are an Australian retailer and want to sell your prod
uct in Spain, you target your campaign at Spain as a country. If you only target your ads at Spain in English, your ads wont be displayed to all users searching in Google Spain with their browser set as Spanish! This is more than likely to reduce the reach of your campaign.

Moreover if you want to use multi-language ads, it will be really important to set your campaigns properly to ensure optimum results.

Best Pratices for Language and Location Targeting

Lets say your products are commonly searched in English and Spanish and you want to serve ads in Spanish to Spanish speakers and English ads to English speakers.

First, you will need to set 2 campaigns targeting Spain as the location. The campaign using Spanish ads will have to target Spanish only and the campaign using English ads will have to target English only.
When someone searching in Google Spain with his interface set to Spanish
, the Spanish ads will be displayed. If the interface is set to Engli
sh, the user will see ads in English.
Now, it is also really important to look at the keywords as they will play a big role. If someone searches in English in Google Spain with a Spanish set as the language, the ads will only be displayed if the actual English keyword is integrated in the Spanish campaign targeting Spanish, so your Spainish campaign will need to include both English and Spanish keywords to reach any possible combination of language/locations.

To summarise, for multi-language campaigns, it is strongly advised to target each country and language combination with a specific campaign, but do not forget your keywords. This will help to target global users with the correct language and therefore have a much stronger impact in terms of CTR. Obvioulsy local landing pages in the right language will also be required to achieve better results

Coming soon to a computer near you

A good Coming Soon page can be done at hardly any expense and can in fact be a very powerful way to build momentum for when your brilliant new website does go live.

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Does Ethical SEO Exist?

It seems as if the term ?SEO? is now only equated with back linking, which is certainly contributing to the current unethical situation. . . . → Read More: Does Ethical SEO Exist?

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AdSense Reports on Device Platform Traffic

A post on the Inside AdSense blog has announced a reporting update that allows website owners to track the type of devices visitors use to access your website. Visitors are grouped according to their use of desktop/laptop, mobile smartphone, and other mobile devices.
The reporting enhancement enables site owners to develop website content that supports high traffic user platforms. For [...]

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The benefit of doing SEO?

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Not getting interviews? Here?re some tips on working with a recruiter

The first thing to understand is that recruiters are usually working very quickly. We have to deal with hundreds of people and CVs every week. This means there isn?t really a lot of time to pick apart your CV in great detail. You need to make a strong impression, fast.

Even if you?re dealing direct with an employer this holds true. A hiring manager is trying to do their day job while taking time out to read 10+ CVs. Studies show you?ve got less than 30 seconds to get your message across or the person reading your CV is gone and onto the next one.

So what can you do?

When applying for jobs

1. Ask yourself, can you honestly do this job? It?s important to think before applying ? if you apply for too many jobs you?re not quite ready for, chances are people will notice and not take you seriously for the jobs you can do.

2. If you can do the job, why? Don?t send a generic cover letter, send a cover letter that passionately explains why you are right for the role. Point out where you have relevant experience that the ad says you must have. So many people miss out on jobs because they have not shown evidence of why and where they have gained the relevant experience.

3. Your CV must show relevant experience that is asked for in the ad / job description. Check your CV to make sure it says you?re an obvious choice for the role. Highlight your relevant experience, make i t prominent (ideally first page!).

4. Put at least 3 key achievements in your CV for each job. Doing the job is one thing, measurable results are something else entirely! Stand out from the crowd with what you?ve achieved.

To attract headhunting calls

1. You have to market yourself ? it?s no longer about who you know, it?s about who knows you!

2. There?s a variety of great online resources (like Linkedin) that help you do this. Make sure you have an online profile(s) that?s easy to find and keep it up to date.

3. Even if you?re not actively looking for a job, it?s always worth understanding what the market is doing and building relationships you can leverage at a later date. As they say, you create your own luck!

You can find me in the following locations:

Email: shai@xpand.com.au

Phone: 03 8637 7316

Twitter: http://twitter.com/shairoitman

LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/shairoitman

Multithreading made easy with .NET 4.0 Parallel Extensions

With the growing popularity of multi-core processors, there is an increasing expectation that applications are able to utilize this power.

Up until recently, the task of writing a robust multithreaded application was daunting to say the least. But with the addition of Parallel Extensions in .NET 4.0, it's as simple as changing a couple of lines of code.

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All you need to know about Unlocking GSM Mobile Phones

All you need to know about Unlocking GSM Mobile Phones Article by Daniel Stouffer If you have just learned that your GSM mobile phone is locked, you might be wondering what on earth that means and possibly asking yourself how you can “unlock” it. The short answer is that some wireless providers do lock their [...]

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How Does a Freelance Web Designer Find Work?

Finding work is a obviously a big part of being a freelance web designer. It’s something you always need to be aware of and have techniques in place to make sure you have a steady …

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Small Business SEO Web Design Company

Small Business SEO Web Design Company Article by Rajeev R In order to be successful in the extremely competitive arena of online business, it is vital for businesses to have search engine friendly websites. For organizing your website content and updating it in order to be listed in the initial pages of the search results, [...]

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SSL ASP.NET MVC 3 - Force SSL

Implementing SSL in an asp.net MVC application is snack with .net 4. Use cases for implementation off sll in web development exist in:

· Shopping Cart Checkouts

· Account login areas

Any real area encrypted data would be necessary.

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Commuting from Sydney to Copenhagen

Commuting from Sydney to Copenhagen… Crazy you say! Well yes it is crazy. We’ve been given the opportunity to relocate to Copenhagen, Denmark for a promotion my wife recently received. The thing is, I’ll need to commute between countries …

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Yahoo's Organic Search Results Powered by Microsoft Bing in Australia

Back in August 2010, Yahoo and Microsoft announced a search alliance to use the Microsoft technology to power Yahoo's organic search results.
On January 15th, Yahoo and Microsoft announced that the search transition between Yahoo7 and Microsoft Bing has been successfully completed in Australia as well as in 2 other markets.

According to Yahoo:

The Yahoo! and Microsoft Search Alliance team has reached yet another important milestone today. As planned, we are moving fo rward with the global transition of certain Yahoo! Search back-end functions to Microsoft?s search platform, and have just completed this process for organic search in Australia, Brazil and Mexico. This news is another step forward for the Yahoo! and Microsoft Search Alliance as we continue our efforts for a quality transition with our worldwide advertisers and partners.

Although the transition should be seemless, Yahoo has advised to double check your rankings and set up a Bing Webmaster Tool account to optimise the indexing capabilities.
The Search Alliance will have a large impact on the US and Canadian markets, but is likely to have little impact in Australia, which is largely dominated by Google.

Regarding paid search, Yahoo has announced that the transition will occur in the second half of 2011.

Building Back Links With Article Marketing

Article marketing is a time-tested method of promoting your business and getting back links that help improve your index rankings on SERPS. There are many article directories you can submit your marketing articles to, but only a few have high Google PR and international authority and reputation. Since article marketing is considered an effective and [...]

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Domain Trust ? A Key SEO Ranking Factor

Domain Trust is a important ranking factor for SEO, If you have an aged domain or a domain which has been in the press & been linked to by authority websites Google will more then often trust these domains more so then new domains with no authority what so ever. View the following image below

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Coming soon to a computer near you

A good Coming Soon page can be done at hardly any expense and can in fact be a very powerful way to build momentum for when your brilliant new website does go live.

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How to customise AddThis Sharing icons

As websites rely more and more on social networks to promote their presence, it's nice to be able to customise the default icons you usually get with "Add this" and "Share this".

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Web Design Denmark ? Danish Web Design Style

As I am soon to be based and working as a freelance web designer in Copenhagen, Denmark I have recently been doing a lot of research on Danish web design to bring myself up to …

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WordPress Page Titles Hacked

Recently I have been having a few problems with by WordPress blog. Somehow it, or one of the plugins got hacked and all my page titles where changed to stuff like “Buy Nasonex Online” and …

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Put IE6 out of its misery ? A list of Anti IE6 Websites.

Internet Explorer 6 … The name sends shivers down web designers spines. The question is why do we keep pandering to the needs of an out of date browser that is almost 10 years old! …

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How Much Does SEO Cost?

One of the big mysteries of web development is Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) and an even bigger mystery is how much does it cost. It has become fairly common knowledge for anybody who owns a …

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How Much Does SEO Cost?

One of the big mysteries of web development is Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) and an even bigger mystery is how much does it cost. It has become fairly common knowledge for anybody who owns a …

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Fun Friday: Win These DomainTools Binoculars!

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The Client Roles in SEO Success

The success (or failure) of a SEO project is very often entirely attributed to the SEO consultant or agency, however the client itself has a critical role to play in the outcome of a SEO project.

SEO Results: A Shared Responsability between the Agency and the Client

Over the years, I have heard of projects stalling or not delivering the expected results partly because the client did not communicate correctly with the agency, did not play its expected role in the implementation or simply because it did not expect to have anything to do with the project.

Do not get me wrong, I strongly believe that the SEO agency or consultant is the main warrant of a SEO project's success. The consultant has an expertise and that is why is being hired. The consultant needs to have skills, experience as he is the one, who do the researches, analysis and recommendations.
The consultant should also be a specialist in c
ommunicating effectively with the client whatever the client's personality. The consultant should be able to deal with client's request while pointing out the main priorities and tasks of the project to deliver the appropriate results.

What I am trying to say, it that clients have an important role to play in the project outcome as they plays central roles at various dimensions of the project. In most case, they need to be pro-active and distribute resources effectively to ensure maximum results.

Coordinating SEO Implementation

One of the most important role of the client is the implementation of the SEO recommendations. In many projects, the SEO consultant is hired to provide analysis and recommendations on how to improve a client's website ra
nkings, but does not actually do the implementation. Most of the time
, the implementation done by the client IT team or a third party provider.
The SEO Consultant plays a role in assisting the client with the implementation, however the client do need to allocate appropriate resources to make the correct implementation possible in a timely manner.

Project Briefing & Information Circulation

Often overlooked, but crucial is the initial client briefing. Although the consultant will do in-depth research on the project, nothing replace in-house knowledge. The client is the best to know its industry and business and should try to circulate this information as best as it can to the consultant. Very often approximate briefs jeopardise the SEO project effectiveness.

On the same topic, it is likely that the SEO consultant will have questions, which will need answers. Late and approximative replies, often leads to project delays and confusion. Being available is therefore high
ly important to ensure that the SEO Consultant can work properly.

Coordinating Resources and Interactions

When the project involve different party such as 3rd party vendor or different departments within the client's company, it is crucial to insure appropriate communication, resources allocations and coordination. For many political and organisational reasons, SEO Consultants are often not in a position to contact other departments or 3rd party vendor directly. As a result the client should make sure that flow of communication is correct and that each party cooperate and can interact effectivelly.

As a summary, I hope this post will make sense to clients and SEO consutants. For the client to better understand how to work with a SEO Agency. For SEO consultants to remind that the client has an important role to play too and he/she should therefore be involved in the project. At the end of the day each party will benefit from an effective cooperation.

Our Guarantee: We Care

E-Web Marketing is excited to introduce our HSF Guarantee, which goes into effect as of today. We hope that this will be a great step forward in the realisation of our Company Vision, which is to bring HSF (Happiness, Success and Fun) to everyone we encounter.
So what exactly is our HSF Guarantee? It is this following commitment to you, whether [...]

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Mobile Phones: Experience Hi-tech Mobility

Mobile Phones: Experience Hi-tech Mobility Article by Looking for some attention in the crowd? Make your presence felt by getting yourself a cool new mobile phone. Looking for some attention in the crowd? Make your presence felt by getting yourself a cool new mobile phone. Grab the hottest mobile phone deal along with the latest [...]

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Sydney Web Design ? The Big Click Way

I have spoken about my business, Big Click in some of my other posts. However, I wanted to give it another plug, mainly to businesses in Sydney and surrounding suburbs. Big Click Studios is located …

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Sydney Web Design ? The Big Click Way

I have spoken about my business, Big Click in some of my other posts. However, I wanted to give it another plug, mainly to businesses in Sydney and surrounding suburbs. Big Click Studios is located …

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Create a Work Space to Increase your Productivity

Having a work space that you enjoy working in will have a direct impact on your work output and quality. We  know productivity can be affected in many ways. In my opinion, one of the biggest influences on our work …

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Google Hotel Finder

Eight months after making one of their most strategic purchases in the travel industry, Google have revealed a service that has them strategically placed to put all travel-related websites and hotel finders out of business.
In October 2010, Google purchased ITA, the company that held over 65% of all flight and travel information that agencies used to [...]

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SEO Professional Sydney James Norquay

Welcome to SEO Professional Sydney. This is a blog run by James Norquay a well known SEO professional from Sydney Australia. James has over 6 years experience in SEO for numerous global companies in Australia. James has worked for two of the largest global agencies in Sydney on a senior level. He also has experience

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5 Useful SEO Tools

When choosing a SEO tool, it is important to know exactly what you really need. If you look around in Google, you will find a vast amount of tools performing a lot of functions, but very often you wont need half of them.

After reviewing and using some SEO packages (all in one), I realised that ,in most cases, I did not use all the functionalities, or some functionalities were quite weak so the investment was not always worth it. Instead of using one SEO package, I found more useful and often cheaper to use different t
ools.

The tools listed below are some of the ones, I use most.Obvioulsy it is a personal opinion and not an exahustive list.

OpenSite Explorer by SEOMOZ

OpenSite Explorer has recently been released by SEOMOZ. It is essentially a backlink analysis tool. OpenSite Explorer can be used for free, but it offers a lot more functionalities when you have a membership with SEOMOZ.

OpenSite Explorer is similar to Yahoo Site Explorer, but with a lot more features. You can analyse the backlinks of your site or any competitors websites and obtain information about the domains linking to them and the anchor text they use.
In my opinion, it is one of the best tool for link building research.

Advanced Web Ranking by Caphyon

Advanced Web Ranking is es
sentially a ranking monitoring software. It does the painful job of m
easuring the results of your SEO activities. I have personally reviewed a few and this one have provided the most accurate results. Advanced Web Ranking allows to measure the progress of rankings over time and see the evolution over a period of time.
Advanced Web Ranking is not free (unfortunately). The standard version comes at $99, but I have found the Professional edition ($199) the best.

FireBug for Firefox

Firebug is one of the most popular web development plugin for Firefox. While it is more a web development tool, I have found it very useful to inspect the HTML code of a page without having to go through the page source every time. The inspect function let you view the code directly on the webpage. You can therefore find any on-page optimisation weaknesses ( missing Heading tags).

Web Bug by Aman

Web Bug is a free software, which allows to view the server response for a web page. Obvioulsy this a kind of geeky tool with very limited use, but I do use it frequently when I perform website audits. Web Bug will be quite useful to highlight redirects and server response issues, which might affect the optimisation of a site.

SEO Quake for Firefox
SEO Quake is a nice Firefox extension, which summarise some SEO parameters ( PageRank, age of the site, etc...) while browsing on a site. While the data is limited, the toolbar is quite useful to quickly scan and evaluate the value of a website. Another useful plugin providing pretty much the fuctionality is SEO for Firefox, so feel free to compare and choose the one you prefer.

As I said earlier, this
is a personal and non exhaustive list. I would be really interested to know the tools you really like and use on regular basis