Meta-tags

meta-tags
a series of Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) tags that carry information about the page. This information is not typically displayed by web browsers and is only visible by viewing the source code of a page.
For search engine optimization (SEO), the most important metatags are the meta-description tag, the title tag and to a lesser extent the meta-keywords tag.

Keyword

Keyword
Also called search term. This is the word that your audience types into a search engine’s query box.
The words and phrases typed directly by humans into a search query box often represents their only free-form method of communicating the site visitor’s intent. Determining the intent of audiences based on what the audience types into the search engine’s query box is a part of keyword research.

Example: Customizing Widget for a Tradeshow

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Image by gahlord via Flickr

One of my clients makes awesome wool hats here in Vermont. These hats are made-to-order and very customizable. There are over 650,000 variations possible, not including adding different team names, for just one style of hat. I’m not joking. Very customizable.

The problem with this level of customization, of course, is managing all the different options to get the order submitted correctly. My client was on his way to a trade show and at a trade show, being able to process these kinds of orders quickly and accurately has a big impact on the old bottom line.

So Thoughtfaucet made a Flash widget that allowed visitors to the client’s booth to quickly select their options and print out an order form on-site, including a representation of what the hat will look like. How did it work out?

The widget was enormously successful at the show. We made over 300 art samples in 2 days.

Because Thoughtfaucet focuses on data-driven and forward thinking coding practices we’re looking forward to spreading the custom team hat widget through a variety of media including the client’s ecommerce website.

A take-away here is to look at developing web assets that have value beyond the web itself. Here was something that could have just sat on a website somewhere, but it was a real star performer when put into a live-people environment.

Contest: Why you like doing business in Vermont in 500 Words or Less.

This week I’m running a contest. The winner will get a free ticket to Burlington Social Media Breakfast #4 on February 1. The speakers are Adrian Ho of Minneapolis’ Zeus Jones and Rebecca Thorman from Alice.com, a consumer packaged goods ecommerce site and platform.

I think this BTVSMB is going to be great because these speakers represent solid strategic thinking plus making things people like. I’m psyched. So psyched that I want you to come too.

The contest: Doing Business in Vermont

Here’s how you can win a free ticket to the Feb 1, 2010 Burlington Social Media Breakfast:

  1. Write 500 words or less about what you like best about doing business in Vermont. Feel free to include some pictures/video/media if you want, in addition to the words.
  2. Post your entry someplace where I can read it.
  3. Let me know that you posted (a link to this post is one good way or send me an email or whatever) by 11:59pm January 25th .

Me and my secret panelists will read the entries and select a winner of the free ticket by January 26, 2010. Students can write about why they want to stay in Vermont and do business here after they graduate. The winner will collect their ticket at the event: there is no cash replacement value or anything like that.

Using Social Media to Create Face-to-Face Opportunities

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Image by gahlord via Flickr

Here’s a tactic for organizations scrambling to make sense of social media and figure out the ROI or the relevant policies required to sustain social marketing efforts. This post was inspired by cyskoff’s comment on Jeremiah Owyang’s Matrix: Breakdown of Advocacy Marketing.

You can either go deep with it or fairly shallow depending on the resources you want to invest. Obviously, you can’t calculate a return-on-investment when
Continue reading “Using Social Media to Create Face-to-Face Opportunities”

Scaling social media in ten steps.

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Image by Getty Images via Daylife

In a hurry? The ten steps for scaling social media are in list-format at the bottom of this post.

One of the common laments of companies trying to leverage social media is that it can take a lot of time and resources. If you or your employees are on Twitter and Facebook all day then who’s getting the work done? Common wisdom says that “social media doesn’t scale” or that “engagement doesn’t scale.”

“Doesn’t scale” is true if all of your engagement is one-to-one in real-time and you can’t hire on more people. Absolutely true. But the truth is that many customers will realize that your company is made up of humans and understand that you can’t be one-to-one in real-time all the time. They might not want to realize it if something is going dreadfully wrong. But that’s a special case for another article. This post is about scaling social media in a sane and responsible manner. Continue reading “Scaling social media in ten steps.”