An interview with Matt Cutts shows that web sites that load up fast will probably be a factor in web site rankings. You can view the interview at Search Engine Land.

Michael

There is a new update to Google’s algorithm that will display the latest most up to date news on the search engine results pages (SERPS). For the sake of giving people what they want in searches Google will be placing social media at the top of the lists which means blogs, tweets, news, etc.

For example if their is a natural disaster recently and you Google for info on it you will more than likely get blogs, latest news, peoples opinions, etc on it. Even though the top ratings may be short lived it is important for your site.

So what can you do?

Keep your blog up to date and keep current events that relate to your website in mind, use Google trends to give you ideas on what people are currently searching for. I also recommend using Google trends to help with your keyword research as well. Add a ‘add to social network’ button to your site to help promote your site in the eyes of social media, display an RSS feed on your website that automatically updates itself with the latest news specific to your field, etc.

Google is already using this from evidence of an earthquake that struck in California just before new years. People did a search for the earthquake on Google and Google promptly returned the latest news, tweets, and blog comments on the event.

Michael

I just found out about this today. If you wanted the simplicity of using PayPal on your website, but was concerned about the image it would give your website using a 3rd party merchant account or if you disliked having your e-customers being routed to a PayPal page then you will want to look into this one!

It seems that PayPal has just started something called PayPal Website Pro that does the processing of the credit/debit card in the background so that your customer never leaves your site and your web developer can set it up so that it doesn’t look like that you use PayPal.

This version of PayPal is not free however and has a monthly fee. I’m willing to bet that compared to a regular merchant account that its fees are very competitive.

One thing that comes to mind is when the customer receives the receipt does it show it was processed by PayPal? Since the transaction is done and over with does it really matter? I will enter PayPal live chat to find out now.

. . . . . . . . .

Oops, they are unavailable. If anyone has used this and knows the answer please let us know. I know a lot of customers do not choose PayPal because they feel it devalues the site, but are hesitant of the cost of their own merchant account. This may be the answer that they are looking for.

Hello Everyone,

I noticed a lot more people following me on the Webs That Rock twitter account so thank you! If you see this post go ahead and follow me on twitter since most of my posts are sent to twitter as well. It comes in handy when you want to check updates through your phone.

When designing a new site I have to take into consideration what type of people would be visiting the site. Also, what type of browsers would they be using? This is important from an SEO standpoint as well for the conversion rate and how the web site appears to the customer marketing wise. According to Fogg, B.J., Stanford Guidelines for Web Credibility in November of 2003 75% of web users admit making judgments about the credibility of an organization based on the design of its web site. Are your users tech savvy and using Firefox or are they of an older generation using an outdated Internet Explorer?

When trying to get an average of browsers used for specific genres I had a tough time finding it on the internet so I complied some data on my own for 2008 and next month I will bring you the results for 2009. Here is the information below.

2008
Totals of top 3:
Internet Explorer 74.66%
Firefox: 21.83%
Safari: 3.55%

Medical Sites Top 3:
Internet Explorer: 93.63%
Safari: 4.6%
Opera: 1.24%
Internet Explorer 7 was 63.89%
Internet Explorer 6 was 35.54% (maybe in 2009 it will finally die)
Internet Explorer 8 was 0.19%

Commercial-Retail Web Sites Top 3
Internet Explorer: 65.65%
Firefox: 31.61%
Safari: 4.47%
Internet Explorer 7 was 71.67%
Internet Explorer 6 was 20.87%
Internet Explorer 8 was 7.32%

Entertainment-Games Web Sites Top 3
Internet Explorer: 83.16%
Firefox: 13.07%
Safari: 3.14%
Internet Explorer 7 was 50.64%
Internet Explorer 6 was 48.74%
Internet Explorer 5.5 was 0.28% (What people are still using this in 2008???)

Vacation-Lodging Sites Top 3
Internet Explorer: 73.44%
Firefox: 20.15%
Safari: 4.13%
Internet Explorer 7 was 62.71%
Internet Explorer 6 was 36.84%
Internet Explorer 8 was 0.18%

Commercial-Business to Business Web sites Top 3
Internet Explorer: 70.32%
Firefox: 23.4%
Safari: 2.4%
Internet Explorer 7 was 74.5%
Internet Explorer 6 was 25.39%
Internet Explorer 8 was 0.31%

Just watched the movie Couple Retreats and in the small scrolling text afterwords it showed it was filmed on location at St. Regis Bora Bora Retreat. If you check Google Trends at http://www.google.com/trends?q=st.+regis+bora+bora+resort&ctab=0&geo=us&geor=all&date=all&sort=0 you will find their was a spike of searches for it when the movie came out. This is just a reminder that Google Trends is another tool that you can use to help with your search engine marketing.

Hello,

This month I will be in business for 7 years!

Michael

I just visited a site that boasts to be a search engine optimization company and looked at the source code. They had a meta keywords tag there that if they knew anything about SEO they should have known that it is totally useless!

I guess Jill Whalens is right when she said that there are only a handful of SEO companies that really know what they are doing.

I just read about a new tool at the Microsoft adCenter Labs. By typing in a search query it will give an educated guess on the people who search for that particular phrase according to their browser habits. The gender and age is displayed.

So, I typed in ‘toy trucks’ and guessed it would be male ages 8 to 12. What came back surprised me and prompted me to delete the shortcut from my bookmarks.

Toy Trucks
Male: 49%
Female: 51%
Age: 35 to 49

I guess the educated guess was really using the SWAG method. (Scientific Wild Ass Guess)

I finally upgraded to Firefox 3 and after doing so my back and forward browser buttons disappeared. Now it is working fine thanks to Google and Trouble Fixers.

I ended up having to restart Firefox in safe mode in order to resolve this so if anybody else has the same problem just follow the above link to solve it.

I just received an email today about Google sharing an API for the development of 3D websites. At first I thought it would pop out of the screen from wearing 3-d glasses, but it turned out to be different and still have the WOW factor.

To view the application you can visit Google labs to give it a try or view the demo. Will this become web 3.0? One thing for sure the gaming community will love it!

Click this link below to view the demo!

3D Website