It’s 2012, and that means it’s time to allocate your budget for the year. How much do you plan to spend on marketing? Getting your business’ name out into the public eye is no small feat. And the public’s eyes are online. Make sure you are, too. But don’t be a guppy fish about it, do it right:

1. Make your site even more user friendly. Let people know what you’re all about, and don’t leave them with any questions other than “Why haven’t I done this already?”
   Ex. If it takes me even 1 whole minute for me to get from your site that you sell insurance, you may have a problem.
2. Update your local listing. Since local results are combined with regular listings, consistency is crucial. Make sure that your address, phone numbers, and website are listed identically across the web.
   Ex.  It’s either your office line or your toll-free number. You have to pick just one.
3. Let people find you through social media. If you don’t have accounts set up with all of the major social networking platforms, your company is behind the times.
   Ex. How can your passive-aggressive customers let you know what they’d like to see changed if you don’t have an account for them to complain on?
4. Refine your SEO key terms. It’s okay to sacrifice mega-volume for quality leads. Often better than okay. An accurate key term with responsible link building will get the right people looking at your site.
   Ex. Be clear but not general. (*Salute.) If you’re looking for potential customers, your key words should reflect that. Someone searching “shoes” wants a desktop background; someone searching “leather upper charcoal saddle shoes” is probably looking to buy.

It is clear that Google Chrome’s marketshare had been slowly creeping up on Firefox for a few months now, but can it actually surpass the top browsing giant to gain the number one spot?

In the past, there have been many complaints about Internet Explorer. Many web designers have found that their site will load perfectly on all browsers, except when it comes to Explorer. They have to make specific changes to their site just so it can be compatible with Internet Explorer, which can become quite tedious.

However, regardless of these nuances, Explorer still currently holds approximately 15% more market share than Google Chrome. Internet Explorer’s lack of presence in smartphones and tablets is one significant reason that the Microsoft browser is continually losing ground. The majority of mobile traffic (approximately 62%) has actually gone to Safari, which is the default browser for the iPhone and iPad.

Which internet browser do you prefer and why? Stay posted for updates on the browser wars–we’ll be watching the results closely!

Microsoft SkyDrive

Cloud computing is continuing to improve and it is important to now understand how cloud computing works.  To put it simply you can put these documents on the cloud, instead of it taking up space on your computer.

Microsoft Skydrive’s update now lets you share individual files instead of complete folders.  This makes it simpler to share what information you want with the right people.  You no longer need to create multiple folders to make sure everyone gets the right information and nothing more.

If you want to share a document from Microsoft Office, the person that opens it can view it either using a Microsoft app of the program that is on the internet, or by using the Microsoft program that is on your computer.

You can also let those you share your document to edit it or to make it read only, so you have full control of your documents.

With so many people using social media it makes sense that you would want to share documents using either Facebook, or LinkedIn.  SkyDrive now lets you do this making it easier to share with all of your friends.
Microsoft SkyDrive has made a lot of progress in this latest update.  What do you think is better, SkyDrive or Dropbox?  What do you use and why?

There are many types of CAPTCHAs that appear on websites.  One of the more common types of CAPTCHAs that you will see is reCAPTCHA.  Many different companies use reCAPTCHA including Twitter, Facebook, Microsoft, and many others. ReCAPTCHA is a free service that any website can use and something you will want to consider while doing your company’s web design.  Having reCAPTCHA will reduce the amount of spam that gets to the website.

Another benefit of reCAPTCHA is that by filling out the letters, users help digitize books by giving words to humans that optical character recognition software can’t read.

Words that the OCR software can’t read are put into a reCAPTCHA along with a word that the OCR software was able to read.  If the user inputs the right word for what is known, then it assumes that the other word is also correct.

This is done with multiple users so that the unknown word can be verified with a number of the same responses.

So the next time you enter a reCAPTCHA, think of the good that you are doing at the same time and it will be a lot less frustrating having to enter it in.

Now it seems that they are having a hard time. According to a Nikkei report, an English language news program which focuses on the Japanese economy, Nintendo earnings is set to be a loss of approximately $1.3 Billion from the past 6 months.

One of the biggest products out for Nintendo right now is the Wii.  The Wii has been out for a while and have been struggling in sales recently.  This has to deal  in part with the fact that the graphics on the Wii are not as good as those on the Playstation 3 and Xbox 360.

Nintendo is planning to come out with a new system called the Wii U which will have better graphics.  It is yet to be seen if it will be as good as the competition.  Sony and Microsoft’s systems have been out a while and it is predicted that they will come out with a new system with better graphics in two to three years.

Nintendo has also come out with the Nintendo 3DS but it is not doing as well as previous mobile platforms that Nintendo has come out with.  Adding to the struggles of Nintendo, the Yen is now strong and causing currency exchange loss against the dollar and euro.

With this new service, customers will only need to remember one user name and password as opposed to the multiple that you would need to create for different vendors.

Checking out online will also become quicker and easier.  The option will be given to log into PayPal which you would proceed to do.  Then you will be asked if it is okay to share your information with the site to make the purchase.

PayPal Access is looking to greatly reduce the bounce rate on the check out page because a lot of revenue is lost in that step.  If the consumer does not have to fill out their information repeatedly then they are more likely to finish with the purchasing process.  Also, when returning to buy other items, customers won’t leave because they can’t remember their username and/or password.

If you are a business you will want to look into allowing customers to log in via PayPal.  Web design is important both in appearance and functionality, so be sure that the option to use PayPal fits with the rest of your site.  PayPal Access will help increase your sales as well as providing your customers with a more pleasurable experience.

Conference Intro

The conference started off with Andy Samberg from SNL doing an impersonation of Mark Zuckerberg. It started out funny, but then got somewhat embarrassing and uncomfortable when the actual Mark Zuckerberg showed up and tested out his comedic skills. Let’s just say he’s meant to develop software, not entertain crowds. I don’t know if this was the best segue into the keynote speech, but then again, Zuckerberg’s t-shirt and tennis shoes weren’t very impressive either.

However, Einstein’s brilliance was not necessarily manifest in his appearance either, so at least we should thank Zuckerberg for combing his hair. Zuckerberg then began his f8 Conference keynote speech, and introduced this year’s newest feature: that of “Timeline,” the newest revision of the Facebook profile.

Timeline Introduced

This profile is much more visual, and is a way for people to record their whole lives in one place. With this new update, there is no longer some kind of “black hole” when you get to the bottom of your Facebook wall. You will no longer have to look through the virtual archives or your life by clicking the “more publications” button at the bottom of the screen over and over again. Instead, there is a sidebar for easy access to years, and the entire wall becomes a conglomeration of pictures, app activity, and latest stories.

Of course, the first glimpse is the most intimidating to a seasoned Facebook user (not such as myself). In the past, people have complained about the new layout of everything from the Facebook home page to the ways you can organize your friends. This being said, from the looks of the new profile, users will have to get accustomed to logging into what looks like a virtual scrapbook instead of a quick news-feed type infrastructure.

Story of Your Life?

There is much more to be said, but who can summarize someone’s whole keynote presentation in a blog post? It’s as difficult as summarizing a person’s life by means of a virtual profile. Although Mark Zuckerberg believes Timeline is “the story of your life,” I think it is impossible to capture every aspect of an individual’s life experience simply by putting it online. But I could be wrong—who knows what we’ll hear at the next f8 Conference?

In the past if you wanted to have any animation, video, or dynamic images on your site your options were pretty much limited to using Flash. This sometimes caused problems because it required users to download Flash and keep it updated. It caused problems for search engines because until recently when Google began to index flash files search engines couldn’t read them at all. Entire web sites were built in Flash and were unable to be read by search engines.

With HTML5 there are several new features that have the web design community excited. There are several new tags, including <video> <audio> and <canvas>. Each of these allow things, such as video embedding, that previously required plug-ins to be programmed directly in HTML. HTML5 also integrates SVG content, making animation with vector graphics possible.

The <canvas> tag lets programmers use JavaScript to create graphics among other things. This means there is less reliance on alt tags when search engines try to understand images. Search Engines will actually be able to read the code for the graphic. Right now it is a painstaking process to draw with HTML and Javascript, but Adobe has announced the development of a new program that will allow users to draw and animate in HTML5 with ease.

The Google Chrome team has been hard at work to create projects to test the capabilities of HTML5. My favorite projects are some interactive music videos that have been created with OK Go and Danger Mouse and Daniele Luppi’s Rome. You’ll have to watch both of them in Google Chrome to get full support. As these videos demonstrate, HTML5 has huge implications for the future of the web. And unlike Flash HTML is free making interactive website design affordable for more people.

What It Is

For those who are wondering how cloud computing works, the process is a fairly simple one. Rather than having to pay for updated versions of products and services and access them through traditional upgraded gadgets, people will have access to the cloud instead. The cloud is an upgraded version of the world wide web through which people can remotely get access to programs and processing power, effectively providing them with quality web hosting.

Put simply, the cloud will work with people though their technology while providing premier services that were previously only given to those that constantly upgraded. Therefore, it is possible for someone who has an older laptop to connect to cloud and have the same processing power for tasks as someone who has a brand new one.

Uses for the Cloud

Data processing and storage are also important to how cloud computing works. People that are looking to get their data securely stored can do so without having to physically have any kind of storage capacity. Indeed, the tasks could be executed by any type of tech, as long as it is being used to someone registered on the cloud itself.

Innovation

Convenience and innovation are critical to how cloud computing works. By going through the servers and using the Internet as a proprietary source for all things needed, people can have access to the most innovative way of using technology yet. Whether or not it will become an internet human rights necessity remains to be seen.

Creating a sitemap

There are many ways to go about creating a sitemap for your website.

• Sitemap Generator
• Sitemap plugin
• By hand

The most universal of those methods is to use a sitemap generator. You go to a site that hosts the service and paste your site’s URL into their program and it will output an XML or various other kinds of web oriented files that you can upload to Google Webmaster tools and a sitemap page on your site to help crawlers know what to look for on your site.
If you have a WordPress site you can simply install a plugin that will dynamically update your sitemap every time you make any change to your site; this way you will always be able to take full advantage of crawler indexation.

Other Sitemap Strategies

A tactic that SEO’ers have begun to implement is the practice of using multiple sitemaps within your sites file structure. The purpose being to increase the chance that any given search engine will actually thoroughly index all of your pages. If you have a page indexed the higher the likely hood that you will get traffic to subpages on your site.
What you do is divide up your sitemap into multiple documents based upon how deep each section of your site is going. I.E. have a high level map and a map for all of your categories with all of their subpages.
There has been a recent case study showing an average of a 200% increase in traffic to sub pages due (at least in part) to implementing multiple sitemaps. Again, the rule here is to make it as easy as possible for the crawlers to index as many pages as possible.