The magic of Search Engine Optimization

Being in “the business”, I am often asked what needs to happen for a website to be first in search results. I’ve even seen it as a mandatory requirement in some RFPs. There are a lot of misconceptions regarding this topic so let me offer my own opinions on it. First there are a few things that need to be understood and accepted:

1. Achieving good ranking in search results is not just predicated on having a quality or well built web site. Good coding practice is very important, absolutely, but it is only part of it and a small part at that.
2. You can affect your own ranking without hiring an SEO “guru”, but it will take time and effort.
3. You’ll need to be able to change your site content often so get a content management system.

So if you’ve decided you’re going to do this yoursel, then here’s what you do:

1. Make sure that whatever you publish to your site adds value for your target audience. If you publish content that is useful and relevant for your audience (aka customers) you can’t really go wrong. They will appreciate it, will probably come back later, they might share it with their own network and if it’s relevant, your content is more likely to contain key words that they would look for in the first place.
2. Get as many other sites you can to link to yours. Every inbound link is an indication of confidence. Exchange links with partners, suppliers, customers. Sign up for online directories, associations etc. and make sure there is a link to your site.
3. Promote your site using social media. If you’re not there already, get a Facebook and LinkedIn account. Everytime you publish something on your site, promote it in your social media accounts with a link back to the info on your site. Always send traffic to your site!
4. Make sure your site has the social media sharing icons so that people can share your content via their own social media accounts.

So that’s a good start. Check out this very clever table of SEO ranking factors. by Third door media.

SearchEngineLand-Periodic-Table-of-SEO

 

The “Holiday season” is upon us.

Once again the Holiday season is upon. It is a deeply religious time that we all celebrate by going shopping. This time honoured tradition is easily accessible to all since no matter where you live there is likely to be at least three malls within 5 kilometres of your house or workplace. It doesn’t really matter which mall you go to since there is a federal law that requires all malls to have the same 67 stores in them. You’ve got your chain clothing store, your chain electronics store, your chain restrooms, your chain shoe store and so on.

This is how the “Season” must be celebrated and we know this to be true because the commercials on TV start reminding us the day after Halloween.

It wasn’t always called the Holiday season and it used to be celebrated very differently. Christians used to call it “Christmas” and celebrated the birth of Christ by going to church. Jewish people called it “Hanukah” and went to synagogue to celebrate the re-dedication, and atheists called it “a great excuse to drink in superfluous amounts” and went to parties.

In the old days Christian people would great each other with an enthusiastic “Merry Christmas”. Jewish people would offer an equally enthusiastic “Happy Hanukah”, and atheists would be greeted with an urgent “Hey watch out for that wall”.

Today however people greet each other with a standard “season’s greetings” or “happy holidays”. These greetings are much safer since these don’t refer to any specific religious beliefs or beverage preference. There is therefore no way that you will upset anyone since, if you really think about it, “season’s greetings” means absolutely nothing special. Spring and Summer are seasons so we could quite appropriately send people off to spring break or summer vacation by saying “season’s greetings” in a loud cheerful voice.

So anyway, off we go to the mall to find that something special that will, in one package, contain all the feelings of love and gratitude we have for our family and friends. We spend all our cash or available credit on this item and wrap it with the nicest paper and ribbons we can find. We visualize the faces of our loved ones when they open their presents and how they will immediately jump for joy, finally realizing how much we really care based on the value of the item we purchased. It will be a life altering event for them.

I remember such a gift that was given to me by one of my kids. It was a hand painted t-shirt and matching shorts. The shirt had a picture of me and my son holding hands… Ah…no… wait; he made that gift himself and that was father’s day. Well, there is the time my other son gave my wife and me a wooden key holder that 20 years later is still hanging on our wall. He built it in shop class at school and…oh wait, he gave it to us in june for no reason except that he was really proud to have made it for us.

I know! There was that time that the kids gave me a set of juggling balls and a huge candle holder…you know, come to think of it that was another father’s day.

Odd isn’t it that the presents I remember the most have very little monetary value and weren’t given to me at Christmas. In fact my fondest memories of Christmas are the hugs and kisses of the people I only get to see once a year. I remember the spirited card games and hilarious party games. I remember and look forward to the family broomball tournament we have every Boxing Day at the lake. And even though I am not a hugely religious person I remember the smiling faces and music at Christmas mass.

Merriam –Webster defines gift as “Something voluntarily transferred from one person to another without compensation”. So technically, I guess hugs and kisses, spending time with others and smiling are in fact gifts.

Maybe shopping isn’ t really what Christmas is about after all.

Listen, we better keep this just between us. If the mall people find out, they’ll be devastated.

Have a very Merry Christmas!

Some things are worth a phone call

I recently made an assumption that resulted in a somewhat humbling turn of events. I forgot that some people still rely on traditional means of communication. Allow me to explain. About a month ago a wonderful event took place that needed to be announced: the birth of my first grandchild.

When my own four children were born, the first thing I did was call family members and friends to give them the great news. I didn’t use my cellular phone because I didn’t have one. I got my first cellular phone sometime in the 90’s. If memory serves, it was a Motorola DynaTac Classic, approximately the size and weight of a small motorcycle. I did have email by the time my youngest daughter was born, but there was no point in going that route since few of my family members had internet access.

So I went home from the hospital and made many, many long distance phone calls. I asked everyone I called to be sure to fill everyone in on the wonderful news. That worked but it took a while and resulted in a super-sized phone bill.

So here we are in 2010. When my wife and I came home from the hospital we called our other children of course and my mother. She is 92 years old living in a retirement home. Even if she could be reached by other means, it just wouldn’t be right. There are some things you want to communicate at least by voice if it can’t be done in person. The birth of a great-grandson is definitely one of those things.

We had spent the night at the hospital so we were pretty tired but I figured I’d at least share the news on Facebook. I created a photo album and uploaded 12 or so of the 567 photos I had taken of our grandson during our 5 hour visit. The reaction was immediate, as you would expect. The last photo was still uploading when I started receiving comments. Messages of congratulations started coming in fast and furious from family and friends around the globe.

Given the immediate reaction and feedback I was receiving, it didn’t really seem necessary to call anyone else.

Imagine my surprise when my sister called a few days ago to tell me she had just heard the news almost 1 full month after the birth. There is an important lesson to be learned here. Social media shouldn’t be ignored as a powerful communications channel, but it still isn’t everyone’s primary source of information. This fact is worth remembering for both personal and business use.

I regularly give seminars on e-business and e-marketing during which I remind people that they mustn’t ignore traditional means of communicating and promoting to potential customers. When you have something important to share, make sure it gets delivered. This event definitely confirms the advice I’ve been giving.

It’s a shame I didn’t follow it. My bad.

Texting while driving worse than driving drunk.

The purpose of my blog is hopefully to inspire but certainly to get people thinking. I hope this post gets a lot of attention.

On the way back from my lunch time run I was listening to an interview with a mother who’s 21 year old daughter died in a traffic accident. She was texting while driving, veered onto the shoulder, over corrected and collided head-on with a truck. The accident happened at 12:33 pm. The time of her last text message on her phone was 12:32. I have a 21-year-old daughter. What do you suppose we talked about the next time I saw her.

I’m not sure where this woman finds the strength, but she is speaking publicly about this in the hope that she will prevent this from happening to other families.

As some of you will know, using handheld mobile devices while driving has been illegal for a year in the province of Ontario. Other provinces have similar bans as do several US states and countries. But it doesn’t matter if it’s illegal does it? It’s common sense!

Since the ban, the Ottawa police service hands out an average of 400 violations per month for using a handheld device while driving.  400!! I see it every day, you probably do as well.

Believe me; I get the convenience of texting. I do it all the time, but never while driving. Is anything really that urgent to be worth the risk? If it is, pull over!

What compelled me to blog about this is what happened a bit later. I was driving down a residential street and came up to a cross walk near a school. I stopped and watched a young girl (maybe 12 or 13) cross the busy street while texting. She seemed to assume that all cars would stop and fortunately they did. She crossed the street looking at her phone the entire time and tripped on the curb getting back onto the sidewalk. Evidently, texting has become  more important than looking where you’re going.

I wonder; will she be able to not text and drive when she gets her driver’s permit?  I really hope so.

Do me a couple of favours. Don’t text and drive and please watch this video from Car and Driver.

A letter to my grandson

My wife and I are brand new bouncing grandparents as of 12:06 AM Monday. Our oldest son and his lovely wife gave life to an 8 lb 12 oz baby boy called Vincent.

I know exactly what you’re thinking: “But Bern that’s impossible, you’re much too young to be a grandfather!”

According to today’s trends you might very well be correct in that assessment. Let’s just say that I got an early start and leave it at that.

Anyway, I’m sure you’ll pardon me for taking advantage of this forum to write a short letter to my beautiful grandson.

Vincent

You can’t imagine how happy I was to meet you. We’ve been thinking about you every day for almost 9 months now. Your grandmother hasn’t stopped talking about you ever since your mom and dad told us you were coming. I never got tired of listening to her, trying to imagine what you would look like and how things would be different when you arrived.

I can’t wait for you to meet everyone. I know you’ll have fun cause you have a very big family. I can’t list them all here, there are just too many and I don’t know all your relatives on your mother’s side but I can tell you they are all very nice and they love you a lot.

I have to tell you that your mom worked really hard to bring you into the world and your dad was right there with her. You’re very lucky to have them as parents. Sometimes, when you’re older, you may not think so but trust me on this one, they love you more than life itself. They will take very good care of you and show you how things work around here. That’s their job and I know they will do it very well.

I need to explain something about grandparents. First, you need to know that you have 4 of them. 2 grandmothers and 2 grandfathers. You will like us  a lot because our job will be to spoil you. That means that we will give you things you don’t really need just because we feel like it. It’s hard to explain but you’ll recognize it when it happens. This will make life difficult for your parents so we’ll try not to do it too often, but we may not be able to help ourselves.

People say that grandparents are supposed to be very wise. Now I don’t know about that, but I would like to share a few pieces of advice that might help you along the way:

• The first is about advice. A lot of people will want to give you some. Some will be good and some… not so much. My advice to you: check with your parents just to make sure. They’ll know.
• Sometimes you will make mistakes. It may not seem like it at the time but mistakes are ok because that’s how you will learn. Don’t be hard on yourself when this happens.
• Never stop dreaming. As you get older, some people will tell you to stop dreaming about being an astronaut or a super hero. They might even tell you that the stuff you’re dreaming about isn’t possible. Don’t believe it. Almost anything is possible if you really want it to be.
• One day you will go to school. When you do, try to learn as much as you can. The world you live in now will be a lot more fun if you learn all about it.
• And finally, be nice to people because everyone is important. Don’t judge anyone by how they look, what language they speak, what their job is or the colour of their skin. Every one started life exactly the same way you did. They all have a mother who worked really hard to bring them into the world. They all have fathers and grandparents too but in some cases they don’t get to see them a lot. I know, that’s very sad but I promise it won’t happen to you.
• Oh and one more thing. Always remember that people don’t stop playing because they got old, they get old because they stopped playing. Sometimes I forget that one myself.

So I’m really glad you’re here because I’m pretty sure you are exactly the little boy who will be able to help me with that.

I love you more than you can imagine.

Thanksgiving, it’s not the same anymore.

This coming weekend is Thanksgiving here in Canada. Since we’re further north we have to have it a month or so in advance of our friends to the south before everything freezes up.

A wonderful time is had with family and friends and/or both. However, in the last few versions of this festive occasion I noticed that it has changed, especially when it comes to the amount and type of food being served.

Used to be that we would have a feast fit for kings, and queens, their entire entourage, their 150 closest friends and most of their dogs. Typically the meal preparation would be shared among my sisters and sisters in law. They would all be assigned a dish to prepare and would take out their best recipe book so that their contribution to the feast would be suitably impressive. (I’m pretty sure one of my former sisters in- law had a recipe for cold fusion but I never actually dared to ask.)

One lucky lady would be tasked with preparing the turkey which was roughly the size of Arnold Schwarzenegger. One year, communications channels became blurry and we ended up with 143 different varieties of mashed potatoes but it turned out OK.; my quick thinking brother in law was able to repair his driveway for next to nothing. There were dumplings, stuffing, meatballs and cheese platters. (Can you say acid reflux?) Oh and everyone had a helping of canned vegetables : 4 peas and two carrots.

I like to keep my blog entries relatively short so I won’t get into the varieties of dessert.

Dinner usually started around 5:30, and by 6:00 pm gravity had become a major challenge for most in attendance. I distinctly remember my two older brothers in law rolling from their dining room chairs to the nearest lounger where my sisters would find them and wake them up later  when it was time to go home.

Of course there was no way we could eat everything so there would have been enough leftovers to feed all the members of the Canadian armed forces serving in Afghanistan.

I am pleased to report however that these days, our Thanksgiving meal is much more sensible. Cheese platters have been replaced with vegetables, healthy dips and salads. The turkey has been cut down to the size of a large cat and most importantly since the introduction of Facebook, communication channels are clear and immediate and there have been no more potato fiascos.

So this year please join me in an expression of gratitude to Mark Zuckerburg.

Have a wonderful Thanksgiving.

The garlic King

Those of you reading this who live in or around Ottawa, Canada, will know who I am referring to here. He is the Garlic king and he can do anything… Not sure what he means by that exactly but that’s his tag line.

You’ve heard his radio spots, you’ve seen him at local events or your might have seen his van with the popemobile style plexiglass bubble. I even saw him in a St Patrick’s day parade waving at everyone from his Garlic-Mobile. And you know what? Everyone was waving back.

The gentleman’s name is Adel Azzi owner of several Lebanese restaurants here in Ottawa.

http://www.thegarlicking.com (be prepared for music)

What’s prompting me to write about him is that I saw him recently at an Ottawa housing residential project near my (Virtuo’s) office. A team of volunteers from Home Depot were setting up a play structure for local kids (good on them by the way) and the Garlic King was there in full royal dress with his Garlic-Mobile blaring away his theme music. A tad loud perhaps but everyone certainly knew he was there and they genuinely seemed to appreciate his royal presence.

I’ve been to his restaurants on a few occasions. My wife and I were happy with the food and will always remember our visit because of the staff. The person taking our order and manning the cash was a hoot. We’d never met the guy but he had us laughing the whole time we were there.

Now I’ve heard varying comments about the Garlic King’s style, not all good. Some think him too flashy or even annoying. Personally I think the man is brilliant at least from the perspective of attracting attention to his business.

Make no mistake, you won’t see me driving around town as the “Internet King” anytime soon; it’s way too far outside my comfort zone. And besides, my business (Virtuo CMS Technologies) isn’t regional. But in terms of attracting attention, his approach might be a bit over the top but it’s clearly working for him.

How could you attract attention to your business?

Inspiration

Once in a while someone comes along that puts things into perspective.

We all have times when we feel sorry for ourselves. There are days when everything seems to be going wrong for some reason. We don’t have enough money, time or stuff. The kids, job or the boss are driving us crazy. Whatever it is, we all have times like this and our reason to be bummed out is, in our own minds, completely justified.

And then there’s this guy.

Army Run 2010 – 2 hours and 14 seconds!

According to my watch anyway, my chip time might be different but no matter, I’m happy with my run.

My pre-ankle injury goal was to finish under 2 hours. I couldn’t run for nearly three weeks so the training schedule I had designed for myself went to hell in a handbasket. Based on my recent times, I expected to finish in approximately 2 hours 15 minutes, so I’m very pleased.

I had forgotten what it’s like to run a longer distance race. The mood is very different than that of a 5 or 10k. I suppose it’s because longer runs appeal to a different type of runner.

The determination and resolve is almost tangible.

Spectators are always fun too. For one thing there seems to be more of them. Many come out to encourage a family member or friend, others because they’ve never seen so many masochists in one place before.  Lots of little kids on the sidewalk with their parents, their hand out in permanent high-five position. It’s encouraging, at least to me, that an amazing number of runners take the time to veer off to the side and slap those little waiting hands. I like to think that for a young child, such a simple gesture as a few high-fives could have an interesting and perhaps long-lasting effect.

Then there are the homemade signs, some are quite elaborate and most created with the intent of providing encouragement to a loved one.

“You can do it Uncle Bob”

“Way to go Mommy, we love you”

But my personal favourite on this day: “Remember, you paid for this!”

I did pay for it and I must say it was worth every penny. I am officially hooked or re-hooked I guess. It wasn’t my first half-marathon but the last one was a few… ok many years ago.

The nicest thing though was the turnout to the event (15,000 registrants or so according to the PA announcer). Part of the fees they paid go to Soldier On and the Military Families Fund.

Compared to the commitment members of the military and their families make, paying for a couple of hours of heavy breathing and a few stiff muscles is the very least we can do.

Got a problem? Stop thinking about it.

When you get bogged down with too many decisions, sometimes the best thing to do is stop thinking about it for a while.

I just got off the phone with a new entrepreneur who is struggling and completely overwhelmed. She attended one of my e-business seminars and asked if I could meet with her to offer advice. She started a business a few months ago and is having a difficult time making certain important decisions. She needs to decide on domain names, a name for her service offerings, business card designs, what to do about the social media tools she is using to promote herself and her business and many other important issues.  Basically she’s at a complete standstill and can’t move forward on anything.

What I find works well for me when I have trouble making an important decision or need an answer to an important question, is to just put the question in your subconscious, and forget about it for a bit.

This summer I was struggling with how to handle a particularly troublesome situation. The usual solutions just didn’t seem appropriate. So rather than lose sleep and spend days worrying about it, I told myself: “I need an innovative solution to this problem and I will receive the answer when I’m ready.” Then I stopped thinking about it.

The very same day, I was early for a meeting and decided to kill time in a downtown book store that I had never noticed before. I was browsing the bookshelves, minding my own business, when someone came up behind me. “Hey Bernie, What the heck are you doing here?”

It was a trusted business acquaintance of mine. Turns out he was also early for a meeting and was killing time. Quite a coincidence.  We chatted about nothing in particular; business stuff, for about 15 minutes and each went off to our meetings. Just as I was entering my meeting, my “troublesome situation” popped to mind and I realized that at some point during our conversation, my friend said something that gave me the answer.

It was perfect; exactly the right way to handle the situation.

Sometimes trying too hard and pressuring yourself only frustrates and stifles the thinking process.

Just put it out there. The answer will come.