Are people talking about you on the Web? Learn how to find out!

With blogs, news feeds, online discussions Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, FourSquare and millions of other online properties out there who has the time to check each and every single one of them to see who is talking about or your brand?

And, should you even care? Well the short answer is yes you should care. A single negative comment could swell to a crowd of angry people bashing you and your brand and it’s all on the open World Wide Web for all to see. In some cases it might be a simple misunderstanding but unaddressed it will grow and your company and brand will suffer because of it.

So now that you care (hopefully) how can you monitor the World Wide Web? Thanks to our friends at Google they have built a tool for us. It’s called Google Alerts and as Wikipedia put it:

The Google Alerts is a content monitoring service, offered by the search engine company Google, that automatically notifies users when new content from news, web, blogs, video and/or discussion groups matches a set of search terms selected by the user and stored by the Google Alerts service. Notifications can be sent by email, as a web feed or displayed on the users iGoogle page.

Simply head to http://www.google.com/alerts and enter search term you want to be alerted about (your company name for example), the type of web properties you want to be alerted about (news, blogs, update, videos, etc), how often you want to be alerted and finally how many results you want to receive in each alert.

Enter you email address and get ready to be informed!

DecoNetwork interview on Tshirt Magazine online

We were fortunate enough to be interviewed by Tshirt Magazine. Check out the article at: http://t-shirtmagazineonline.com/deconetwork

“…you can just see light bulbs going on for people and they say, ‘this is like you’re reading my mind! I have been wanting to develop something like this but haven’t been able to!!’.”

Adding the Facebook “Like” button to your DecoNetwork store

I explained in a previous post how you can add your DecoNetwork store products to Facebook using the Flash Widget tool. In this post I’m going to highlight a feature we released in V2.05 of DecoNetwork back in May.

Not only can your customers vote or discuss designs or products, V2.05 enables a Facebook “Like” button to appear on a “Sharing” section of your store designs and products page. i.e.:

To enable this feature:

1. Login into your DecoNetwork store
2. Select Manage Store > Store Settings > General Settings
3. Select the Behavior tab and select ‘Yes‘ next to “Show Sharing”

When a customer clicks on “Like” they are prompted to enter their Facebook credentials on a Facebook pop-up page:

After entering their credentials a Facebook ‘Recent Activity’ will appear on the customers Facebook page with a link direct to the product or design they ‘liked’ on your store for all their Facebook friends to see.

Using this tool is just another way to promote your products on the world wide, and getting wider, web.

DecoNetwork V2.05 is now released. All V2.04 websites will automatically be updated to this new version.

Visit http://help.deconetwork.com/tabid/144/afv/topic/aff/7/aft/508/Default.aspx to read more and find out the new improvements and features.

Test your web browser!

You’ve probably heard that your web browsing experience is highly affected by the browser you use.

Certainly on this blog we’ve noted the ups (and downs) of a number of browsers. Different browsers support different capabilities and it’s a very likely that the browser you are using today may not support some of the newer web technologies being used to build modern, dynamic websites.

So how does your browser stack up in terms of supporting modern web capabilities and, more important, web standards?

Run the Acid3 test to see how your browser ranks.

Here at WebStardards.org is a list of what will be tested by the Acid3 test.

I ran the test on the three browsers I run on my Windows Vista notebook and here are the results:

Internet Explorer 8:

Not only is Internet Explorer 8 the worst performing browser it also prompted me to download various add-on’s to improve it. Installing the add-on did not improve the results…

FireFox 3.6.3:

 

I use FireFox the most because I love the free add-ons that are available such as FireBug.

Google Chrome 4.1.249.1064:

Google Chrome is the winner! Maybe I should re-consider my preference…

So what is your browser scores low?

Well, it’s not the end of the world but it could mean you might miss out on some pretty cool features that modern websites deploy.

It is quite important if you are using function-rich websites like DecoNetwork as modern platforms like this use modern web technologies which allow the featured and functions you need.

Using a poorly performer browser might also account for why some websites you visit “just don’t work” and left you cursing the site or site owner. Chances are it did work but your browser just didn’t support it.

So look beyond the browser that came with your computer and consider adopting one of the many free browsers out there which could enhance your web browsing experience.

Links:

• Internet Explorer  (performed the worst)
• FireFox
• Google Chrome (performed the best)

Google’s algorithm change affecting “long tail” keywords

Some SEO pro’s have claimed a ‘dramatic drop’ in Google search results from long or multiple keyword phrases also known as “long tail” keywords. i.e. “gildan printed t-shirt youth sizes”.

Many claim this is due to an apparent algorithm change made by Google but Google are neither confirming or denying any changes.

It’s still unclear if this will have any real affect on your site traffic or if it’s really even happening. The ‘change’ also seems to coincide with some recent UI changes made by Google which provides additional search tools to users. Who knows, maybe these changes might be affecting search behavior of users. This said there are scores of people claiming dramatic drops in long keyword in-bound traffic to their site .

Nonetheless you should keep a close eye on your analytics and monitor the search results of long or multiply keywords. Check recent results to historical results and if you identify a significant drop in long keyword search in-bound traffic review your site and possibly consider breaking up some of the mulitple long-tail keywords.

Reblog: Use Email Marketing? Ignore the Big Picture

The success of a website relies on how affect you are at driving traffic to your site. AdWords help, but cost money, and mass mail-outs to your customers (or potential customers) can turn recipient off your business if not done properly.

Some general no-no’s are overuse of images, inserting scripts such as JaveSciptm Flash or ActiveX and the biggest mistake of all – not testing your email first!

Sounds funny but I’ve received e-mails where the links didn’t work. All that effort for nothing and now I think poorly of the company so why would I use them?

An article in Practical eCommerce by Pamela Hazelton offers some good advice to eMarketers planning an email blast.

You may also want to read over Stupid HTML Email Design Mistakes @ Mailchimp.com.

A general tip is to be as personal and real as possible. Try not to be too ‘salesy’ or you might be detected as spam or end up in the trash can.

Promote your benefits and features in a non-offensive way. No one likes being yelled at in real life…

…OR IN THEIR E-MAIL!

(frankly my personal feeling is bold, italics, red, underlined and UPPERCASE all combined should be left out   .. but that’s just me!)

A final tips is to link to a landing page with a call to action relating to your e-mail. If your e-mail is about product ABC link to the product page ABC so you can track exactly how many recipients clicked on your email and minimize the amount of searching your visitor has to do.

Shipping scam targeting online sellers

A warning to anyone selling online!

A DecoNetwork customer reported that they were nearly conned by a shipping scam targeting online sellers.

Luckily some intuition and a little back-ground checking unveiled the scam before they lost thousands but it’s an important reminder to anyone selling online – be very, very careful.

The scam in a nutshell:

• Usually the seller is from overseas originating from Nigeria, Indonesia or now South Korea.
• They contact you by email claiming they want to order a very large amount of your products. Woo hoo!
• They claim their credit card can only support transactions of around $500 at a time therefore want to buy outside of your normal shopping cart and payment gateway facility. Hmm strange…
• Further more they provide two credit card numbers to split the costs. Um…
• They claim they have a preferred private shipping provider and ask that you contact them to arrange shipping. Ok plausible but why can’t they contact and book their shipping provider?…
• You contact the shipping provider and they supply two shipping methods: Express or standard. Express is excessively high and usually into the thousands of dollars.
• You inform this new prospect and being in a super hurry to receive your wonderful products they request express and are happy to pay thousands for shipping. Now this is getting weird…
• They ask you to immediately debit their cards for the total cost of the goods AND shipping fee and request that you order the shipping direct with their nominated shipping provider.
• You debit the credit cards in chunks (as requested) and all seems OK.
• You book the shipping and pay up front.
• Soon your charges to the customers credit card are reversed and the private shipping provider does not comes to collect the order.
• The shipping fees you pay vanish into thin air and you never hear from the customer or shipping provider again… DOH!

This scam has been confirmed by Australian banks and today alone numerous Australian businesses have contacted the banks to clarify if this dream customer is truly real. This is quite concerning as you can imagine many businesses may not look too deep into it and think they just scored their best order of the week.

Things to look out for:

• Poor English
• Requesting a quick turnaround
• Requests very little information about your products. Just wants to buy, buy, buy and fast, fast, fast!
• Ordering of products they could probably get cheaper in their own country
• The buyer wants to use their private shipping provider
• In this particular string of scams hitting Australia right now the credit card details start with 5485 8400 2216 XXXX.
• Expiry dates of the two credit cards are approximately 6 months apart.

So how to protect yourself?

When selling over the internet to strangers it is safer to stay within the tools and systems you have in place.

Deviating from your standard proven and protected method of doing business not only complicates the sales process but opens you to fraud like this.

Use your standard payment gateway and your shipping provider. In this case stick to the DecoNetwork system as you have full control over the payment and shipping services it uses.

Retain control of the selling process at all times and only use services you know and trust as you have no idea who is on the other end of the transaction.

Finally if the order seems too good to be true it probably is. A simple phone call to your bank to verify their credit card details can save you thousands and hopefully protect others in the future.

If you believe you have been the victim of this scam or have a current order that sounds very similar to this contact your banks fraud department to verify the credit card details.

Adding a DecoNetwork Flash Widget to your Facebook Page

Facebook is a buzz of people and potential buyers so you don’t want to miss out on its potential.

Using the DecoNetwork flash widget you can dynamically display your products in your Facebook fan page allowing your Facebook visitors to browse your products on your Facebook page an ultimately click through to your DecoNetwork site.

This tutorial walks you through the steps to convert the standard DecoNetwork Flask Widget into “Facebook friendly” flash code and embed it on you Facebook Page.

Step 1: Copy your flash code

Log into your DecoNetwork store and select Flash Widget from the Marketing tools menu:

Manage Store > Marketing Tools > Flash Widget.

Essentially we will be throwing away most of the flash code generated on this page but we want to use it to acquire some key pieces that we need.

In the HTML code you will see a value called param followed by a value=”http://…”.

Copy this entire “value” value and it will look something like:

http://www.MyDecoNetworkSite.com/flash/publish/flash.swf?src=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.MyDecoNetworkSite.com%2Fpublish%2Fflashfeed%3Fs%3D0%26t%3D%26sk%3Dmenu_001%26sz%3D1%26bgc%3DFFFFFF%26wid%3D730%26cnt%3D4&bgc=FFFFFF

Make sure you capture the entire value from “ to “.

Copy this code to Notepad for later use.

Step 2: Make a flash banner landing image

Flash objects viewed in Facebook to do not start or load automatically. They need to be clicked by the user therefore you need to make a banner or image that will display initially requesting that the user click to view your products.

1. Create your banner the same size as your flash banner. By default that is 730px wide by 240 pixels high. The image MUST be a .JPG format image. i.e.:
   
2. Upload this to your DecoNetwork website
3. Browse to Manage Store > Appearance > Customize Template CSS
4. Select the “Select File / Image” button.
5. Browse to your Flash landing page in .JPG format and upload it.
6. Select the file. This will create a url reference for you to copy:
   
7. Copy this URL and paste it into Notepad for later use. You will need to add your websites full URL in front such as:http://www.MyDecoNetworkSite.com/uploads/10537673/File/FacebookFlash.jpg

Step 3: Make your Facebook Flash code

Now we have all the elements we need to make our Facebook flash code:

• DecoNetwork flash object
• Facebook flash landing banner in JPG format

Facebook requires your code to be formatted a little different to normal Flash embedded code so we need to make some changes. First of all, here is the raw code you will need to use:

<fb:swf
 swfbgcolor="FFFFFF"
 swfsrc='http://www.MyDecoNetworkSite.com/flash/publish/flash.swf?src=http%3A%2F%www.MyDecoNetworkSite.com%2Fpublish%2Fflashfeed%3Fs%3D0%26t%3D%26sk%3Dmenu_001%26sz%3D1%26bgc%3DFFFFFF%26wid%3D730%26cnt%3D4&bgc=FFFFFF'
 imgsrc='http://www.MyDecoNetworkSite.com/uploads/10537673/File/FacebookFlash.jpg’
 width='730'
 height='240' />
 </fb:swf>

I’ll explain what each of these lines do:

swfbgcolor : This defines the background color of the flash file if it is transparent. By default it is white (FFFFFF) but you can use any hexadecimal / HTML color value.

swfsrc : this refers to the source or location of the flash file object to display. This is where you copy the flash code acquired in Step 1.

imgsrc : This refers to the source or location of the flash banner landing image created in Step 2.

width : This is where you define the width of your flash banner.

height : This is where you define the height of your flash banner.

Make sure you insert your Flash object code from step 1 in swfsrc and your flash banner landing image from step 2 in imgsrc.

This has created the flash code you need for Facebook.

Step 4: Insert your Flash Code in Facebook

First of all I am assuming you already have a Facebook page for your company or business. If not make one here: http://www.facebook.com/pages/create.php

Once created browse to your page and click on “Edit Page” from the left menu:

Scroll down the bottom and select “Browse More” under ‘More Applications’:

In the “Search Apps” field type: Static FBML.

Select Static FBML:

Under the app thumbnail select “Add to my Page”.

Choose the Facebook page you want to add the app to:

Click Close when done.

Browse back to your Facebook Page and the quickest way to do that is type the name of your Facebook Page in the Facebook search field. It will pop up while you are typing and just select it.

Click “Edit Page” again and now you will see the Application listed in your list.

Select “Edit” under the title of the Application.

Enter a title in ‘Box Title’. This will be viewable by your Facebook users so make it useful such as “My Tshirt Products”.

Paste in the Flash code we generated above in the ‘FBML’ field:

Click Save Changes when done.

A yellow “Changes saved” confirmation bar pops up confirming the changes are saved.

We now want to ensure this Flash Banner appears as a tab on your Facebook Page so your Facebook visitors can easily find it.

Browse back to the Facebook Page main website and click on the “+” near your page tabs:

Select the Static FBML application you created, in my case called “My Tshirt Products” and this will add the tab to your main page:

When clicked the flash banner will load:

Don’t forget to track your traffic in Google Analytics to see how many of your Facebook visitors are heading in your direction!

Enjoy!

AdWords: 3 steps to keyword success!