marți, 16 noiembrie 2010

Damn Cool Pics

Damn Cool Pics


Speedflying in Wengen 2010

Posted: 16 Nov 2010 04:45 AM PST

Speedriding, speedflying and wingsuitflying in the area of Wengen, Switzerland.


Epic Wins - Part 2

Posted: 16 Nov 2010 03:10 AM PST

Another collection of funny and awesome win photographs that can make your day.

Previous part:
Epic Wins.




















































































































How to Sell Vehicles on eBay

Posted: 16 Nov 2010 02:44 AM PST




























































































The World's Oldest Mom

Posted: 16 Nov 2010 02:31 AM PST

You may think they are a grandmother and a granddaughter but they are not. Romanian woman Adriana gave birth to her daughter Eliza at the age of 66. Now the mother is 72 years old and Eliza is only six.










Cute Photos of Vladimir Putin with Animals

Posted: 16 Nov 2010 02:02 AM PST

When former Russian President Vladimir Putin is not swimming in a very cold river, resting in the branches of a tree, hunting or doing any of all the other manly things he usually does, well, he apparently is just the animal lover.

Yep, Putin is not just pictured in macho poses, you can also see him in 'cute' photos with animals.
















































The Brutal Decline of Yahoo! (Infographic)

Posted: 16 Nov 2010 01:53 AM PST

This infographic relies heavily on visuals related to the events on the timeline over the last 16 years. A little text heavy for my tastes, but I had forgotten at least half of this stuff that Yahoo! messed up. It's a little amazing that they're still as big as they are.

More Infographics.

Click to Enlarge.


Source: scores


SEOmoz Daily SEO Blog

SEOmoz Daily SEO Blog


Comparing SEO & Social Media as Marketing Channels

Posted: 15 Nov 2010 04:52 PM PST

Posted by randfish

You may have seen the recent string of posts about SEO vs. Social Media, starting with this effective, but poorly argued controversy-bait, which was excoriated by Elysia Brooker and Hugo Guzman, then followed up with a more nuanced view by Darren Rowse. While I'm not particularly interested (nor do I think there's much value) in re-hashing or arguing these points, I did think the topic warranted attention, as it brings up some excellent points marketers should carefully consider as they invest in their craft.

We Search for What We Want + Need

The search for information and answers has been essential to humans since time immemorial. And there's no sign that our latest iteration, web search, is losing any steam:

Growth in Search Query Volume 2006-2010

Even as we've reached a maturity point with broadband adoption and online population, searches are rising. We're not searching less every month; we're searching more.

Search is an intent driven activity. We don't search casually (much), we search to find answers, information, goods and services to consume. The power of search marketing - whether paid or organic - is simple: Be in front of the consumer at the time of consumption. There's no more effective time to be present and no more effective way of knowing what is desired. All the social graph analysis in the world won't tell you that Sunday evening, I got fed up with my current selection of footwear and, after some searching, spent a few hundred dollars on Zappos. But being front and center when I queried mens puma shoes brought them some nice business.

We're Social to Discover and Share

Social media - whether it's Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, Reddit, StumbleUpon or something else - is about connections, interaction, discovery and distraction. We hardly ever use these portals as a way to find answers, though they certainly may provide plenty to unasked questions.

Social media marketing advocates often make the case that social is how we find out about new products on the web, but, at least so far, the data doesn't back up this assertion:

ATG Study on Where Users Discover Products
-
ATG Study on How Users Discover Products via SearchEngineLand

However, I am strongly inclined to believe the claim that social media is how we find out about new content on the web, particularly when we're not seeking something in particular (as with a search). Blogs, pictures, video, research and the like are surely seeing an increased share of their visits from social, and that branding exposure is definitely valuable.

Some recent GroupM Research helped to shed the light of data on this supposition, noting that:

  • The click-through rate in organic search results for users who have been exposed to a brand's social marketing campaign are 2.4X higher than those that haven't; for paid search, it showed a jump from 4.5% to 11.8% (in both cases, this is for branded queries)
  • Consumers using social media are 1.7x more likely to search with the intention of making a list of brands or products to consider purchasing compared to those who do not use social media

Ben Yoskovitz talked about this value in his recent analysis:

Based on the information in this report, it’s reasonable to argue that social media marketing can increase the quality of leads (and not just the volume). It’s possible to hone in on, and understand intent through search and how social media exposure affects that intent. And as people are exposed (and I would say involved with – since exposure sounds like you’re just broadcasting stuff at people, which isn’t what social media is about) to social media their intent is more focused and driven towards lead conversion

That's the kind of social media marketing value I can get behind. Get exposed to potential customers through social so that when they build their consideration set, search and purchase, you'll have a leg up on the competition.

What Drives Traffic (and Converts) for Whom

It pays to understand the bias of this flare-up's instigator, and I've got plenty of compelling data myself to see his perspective. Last weekend, I started publishing content on a personal blog - no domain authority, no links and little chance of performing well in search. But the results from social media - Twitter, Facebook and Hacker News in particular - are fairly remarkable:

Traffic Data

The search traffic demand, all 78 visits, was generated from the articles that went popular on Twitter & HN. The site itself still doesn't rank for its own name. Yet, social media sent 22,000 visits over 9 days. No wonder bloggers, in particular those that monetize through advertising, sponsorships and other traffic-driven systems, have a proclivity for investing in social traffic. Perhaps it's not so crazy to suggest on Problogger.net, a site about growing blog traffic and improving monetization, that social can be "better" than SEO.

I'd still argue that overall, referring traffic of all kinds sent from social, particularly from the largest network (Facebook), is only a fraction of the visits Google sends out each day (unless you're in the business of appealing to the Facebook audience biases - I was a bit frustrated with how the data was clearly manipulated in the reference piece to fit the story). But, social does eliminate some of the inherent biases that search engines carry and let content that appeals to social users flourish no matter the site's ability to grow its link profile, make content accessible to spiders or effectively target keywords.

Now let's look at an example on the opposite end of the spectrum - conversions for a B2B product.

SEOmoz's PRO membership may not be a good investment unless you're a marketer actively engaged with SEO, but given that both the search and social traffic our site attracts likely fall into this intent group (interested in SEO and likely to be in web marketing), a comparison seems fair.

First, I did some prep work in our Google Analytics account by creating an advanced segment called "social traffic" that contains any referral source with "twitter," "facebook," "stumbleupon," "linkedin," "flickr," and "ycombinator" - these represent the vast majority of our social media sources. Next, I compared this traffic quantitatively with our search referrals over the past two weeks:

  • Social Traffic - 26,599 visits from 30 sources
  • Organic Search Traffic - 102,349 from 20 sources

I then compared the percent of these reaching our landing or purchase pages for PRO membership. Here's organic search:

Organic Search Traffic

And here's social traffic:

Social Traffic

Here's what I see:

  • 4.5% of organic search visitors considered a purchase
  • 1.3% of social traffic considered a purchase
  • While I can't disclose full numbers, I can see that a fair number of search visits converted vs. zero for social.

In fact, looking at the entire year to date traffic to SEOmoz from social sources, it appears not 1 visit has ever converted for us. Social may be a great way to drive traffic, build branding and make a purchase more likely in the future, but from a direct conversion standpoint, it doesn't hold a candle to search. To be fair, I'm not looking at full life cycle or even first-touch attribution, which makes this analysis less comprehensive, though likely still directionally informative.

Takeaways

Given the research and data here and in the posts/content referenced, I think we can say a few things about search and social as marketing channels:

  1. There shouldn't be a VS.: This isn't about pitting web marketers against each other (or perhaps, more accurately, themselves, since our industry survey data suggests many of us are responsible for both). There's obvious value in both channels and to suggest otherwise is ideological nonsense and worse, self-defeating.
  2. Search Converts: $20 Billion+ isn't being wasted on Google's search ads - that sucker send intent-driven, focused, conversion-ready visits like nobody else on the web.
  3. Social Has Value: Those exposed to a social campaign are better customers and prospects; making social not only a branding and traffic channel, but an opportunity for conversion rate optimization.
  4. SEO Is Hard in the Early Stages: Without a strong link profile, even great content may not perform particularly well in search results.
  5. Segmenting Search and Social is Key: Unless you separate, analyze and iterate, you're doomed to miss opportunities and falsely attribute value. I'm particularly worried about those marketers who invest heavily in social to the detriment of SEO because the immediacy of the rewards is so much more tangible and emotionally compelling (He's following me on Twitter! We have 200 Facebook fans!) - make sure appropriate effort goes where it can earn ROI; it's our job.

For another interesting (and more social-media biased) perspective, check out Search vs. Social from Bradford Cross.

I'd love to hear more from you on this topic, too. 


Do you like this post? Yes No

New Photos: Bo Peeks into the Oval Office and More

The White House Your Daily Snapshot for
Tuesday Nov. 16,  2010
 

Tuesday Talk: The National Medals of Science, Technology and Innovation

Today at 1 p.m. EST, join recipients of the National Medal of Science and the National Medal of Technology and Innovation -- including the inventor of the digital camera, a pioneer in organic photochemistry and electrochemistry and a leader in climate change research -- in a live video chat on WhiteHouse.gov and Facebook. Watch live and submit your questions.

Photo of the Day

Check out more behind the scenes photos from October.

Bo, the Obama family dog, peers into the Outer Oval Office from the White House Colonnade, Oct. 26, 2010. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)

In Case You Missed It

Here are some of the top stories from the White House blog.

8 Ways to Follow the White House
A list of the eight official White House Twitter accounts and a few entertaining tweets.

Entrepreneurs: Building Businesses, Creating Jobs, Strengthening Our Economy
SBA Administrator Karen Mills highlights some of the ways the SBA and the Obama Administration are helping entrepreneurs and small businesses thrive.

And the Top SAVER is...
Over 57,000 of you have spoken, and the winner of the 2010 SAVE Award is Trudy Givens of Portage, Wisconsin.

Today's Schedule

The President will award Staff Sergeant Salvatore Giunta, U.S. Army, the Medal of Honor for conspicuous gallantry. Staff Sergeant Giunta will receive the Medal of Honor for his courageous actions during combat operations against an armed enemy in the Korengal Valley, Afghanistan in October 2007.  Staff Sergeant Giunta's wife, Jennifer, and his parents, Steven and Rosemary Giunta, will join the President and the First Lady in the East Room to commemorate his example of selfless service.

All times are Eastern Standard Time.

9:45 AM: The President and the Vice President receive the Presidential Daily Briefing

10:15 AM: The President meets with senior advisors

10:45 AM: The President receives the Economic Daily Briefing

10:45 AM: The Vice President chairs a regular meeting of senior officials to assess progress in Iraq

1:00 PM: Tuesday Talks: The National Medals of Science, Technology and Innovation WhiteHouse.gov/live

2:00 PM: The President awards Staff Sergeant Salvatore Giunta, U.S. Army, the Medal of Honor for conspicuous gallantry; the First Lady also attends WhiteHouse.gov/live

2:00 PM: The Vice President delivers remarks at the "Focus on Recovery" Biennial National Procurement and Grant Fraud Conference WhiteHouse.gov/live  (audio only)

2:45 PM: The President meets with representatives of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus

4:30 PM: The President meets with Secretary of Defense Gates

WhiteHouse.gov/live  Indicates Events that will be livestreamed on WhiteHouse.gov/live.

Get Updates

Sign Up for the Daily Snapshot 

Stay Connected

 

 
 
This email was sent to e0nstar1.blog@gmail.com
Manage Subscriptions for e0nstar1.blog@gmail.com
Sign Up for Updates from the White House

Unsubscribe e0nstar1.blog@gmail.com | Privacy Policy

Please do not reply to this email. Contact the White House

The White House • 1600 Pennsylvania Ave NW • Washington, DC 20500 • 202-456-1111 
 
 
  

 

 

Seth's Blog : Unreasonable

[You're getting this note because you subscribed to Seth Godin's blog.]

Unreasonable

The paradox of an instant, worldwide, connected marketplace for all goods and services:

All that succeeds is the unreasonable.

You can get my attention if your product is unreasonably well designed, if your preparation is unreasonably over the top, if your customer service is unreasonably attentive and generous and honest. You can earn my business or my recommendation if the build quality is unreasonable for the intended use, if the pricing is unreasonably low or if the experience is unreasonably over-the-top irresistible given the competition.

Want to get into a famous college? You'll need to have unreasonably high grades, impossibly positive recommendations and yes, a life that's balanced. That's totally unreasonable.

The market now expects and demands an unreasonable effort and investment on your part. You don't have to like it for it to be true.

In fact, unreasonable is the new reasonable.

  • Email to a friend

More Recent Articles

Don't want to get this email anymore? Click the link below to unsubscribe.


Click here to safely unsubscribe now from "Seth's Blog" or change your subscription, view mailing archives or subscribe

Your requested content delivery powered by FeedBlitz, LLC, 9 Thoreau Way, Sudbury, MA 01776, USA. +1.978.776.9498