So Google has released it’s own web browser (Chrome) - and all us web geeks simultaneously went yeehaa (as opposed to Yahoo!) and argh, another bloody browser to test everything in.  But what I have realised talking to “normal” people is that most don’t give a toss and just don’t get what it all means.  So here it is - browser wars in laymans terms.

Why do websites look different in different browsers? Why do you geeks all promote Firefox? What’s wrong with Internet Explorer? Why should I care?

These are all extremely valid questions for an everyday user, someone who probably spends at least 50 to 60% of their day on the Internet without really having a handle on the method to their usage.  Sure, they are apt at Facebook, have 3 or 4 different email addresses which they check in Outlook, Gmail and some still Hotmail heaven forbid, and in the majority spend the rest of the time surfing the Internet for information whether it be for work or otherwise and probably go to their favourite newspaper website once or twice a day.  These people “use” Google - “we trust Google” - they type their desired URL into Google search instead of the browser and so on.  These same people use Internet Explorer (IE) already pre-installed on their PCs.
So what is in a browser for these people? Let’s ignore the security debate - that is, those that say your data is more at risk from getting pinched by cyber criminals using IE than any other browsers.  It’s one of those debates that should be avoided around most tables in my opinion.  But instead focus on why the geeks prefer Firefox, say, over IE.

It all started way back when there were two browsers competing for market share, Netscape and Internet Explorer.  in the early days each sought to gain more market share by introducing better and better features that website developers could use to make their sites look better - firstly, there was font variation (italics and bold etc), then there were gimmicks - flashing text being my favourite.  The problem was that what one browser did the other did not necessarily do meaning that a site might having flash text if you used Netscape but none in Internet Explorer.  A nightmare for developers who thus promoted one over the other.
Along comes an organisation called W3 (World Wide Web Consortium) who put together web standards - these are standards with which a web browser interprets code and renders a web page.  Here is the most important point - that the primary job of an Internet browser is to take the website code and read it, turning it from text to actually a pretty page.  That’s what an Internet browser does - without a browser a web page would have no medium to be rendered in.  (Try opening a website in word or excel - it looks like mumble jumble).  So, when the Firefox browser rose from the ashes of the failed Netscape browser it immediately adhered to those standards.  However, for Microsoft this was not that easy - the Internet Explorer browser was developed on what we call quirks and just dumping them undermined a lot of its legacy code.  And therein lies the problem, as more browsers were developed they followed the web standards, while IE even through its many incarnations was left languishing with lots of proprietary rendering methodology.  For a web developer this means the use of hacks to make a site render in all browsers in a similar way - whereas a piece of code may work in one browser it can be rendered completely different in another.  We have lots of terms for them - the box hack, an issue with margin and padding in IE, for example.

So, when Google introduces another browser that follows web standards we Geeks are happy because it means that there is one more avenue putting pressure on the developers at Microsoft to make their browser more compatible with internationally accepted coding rules.  Better still Google is big!  The likelihood of everyday users converting to Google Chrome from IE is much higher than the likelihood of those same users choosing Opera of Firefox - after all “we trust Google”!

Unfortunately, it is not that simple and Microsoft don’t appear to be in any hurry to make a complete jump to a pure web standards based browser.  For example, as we know Internet technology is moving at a blinding pace and cool stuff is developed nearly everyday.  Canvas for example is a technology that makes dragging things around your screen very easy - unfortunately IE does not support this and has indicated that they are not going to in the foreseeable future.  The losers here are the general users, less easy to use user-friendly functionality!

But as an everyday user why should I care about all this anyway - isn’t it your problem as web developers to make sure my site looks good regardless of the browser I use?  The answer is yes! But, let’s look at what you do get from a browser - the rendering of a web page - and this is why you should care!.  One of the main ways a browser competes for market share is in the speed of its rendering engine, that is the speed with which it displays the web page.  Firefox is fast - Google Chrome so far appears really fast - it makes your page come up quicker.  This alone is reason enough why you should switch to alternate browsers - so that we can make more richer experiential websites because the browsers support them.

The other area with which browsers are competing for market share is in their “plugins”.  That is, in the functionality you can add to your browser to create shortcuts to everyday things etc.  Firefox leads the way in the number of plugins that can easily be added to your browser such as shortcuts for saving your favourite content, sharing it, uploading your photos and videos and so on and so on.  It is inevitable that Google will follow suit.  One of the main reasons these plugins have proliferated here instead of IE is the openess with which these browsers publish the code saying how they work - they actively encourage developers to develop the plugins themselves by publishing how the browsers work.

But unfortunately even though I have tried to make a case for why the everyday user should choose a browser other than IE it still all sounds like geek-speak.  For the everyday user another browser no matter that it is bought to you by the most famous name on the planet is irrelevant.  Despite the fact that the jump from IE6 to IE7 was extremely relevant in terms of Microsoft moving toward a more web standard browser 35 - 40% of all IE users (75% of overall users) on the websites we monitor still have not upgraded - in fact one very large, very major NZ business (and Xebidy client) said to me recently “we will probably just jump from IE6 to 8 - don’t see the point in IE7″.  In all hope, however, the release of Google Chrome will force other browsers to up their game with regards to adopting newer Web standards and features to stay competitive.  Which at the end of the day will mean we can can make better and better websites with richer user experiences.

So with our new (still under wraps) launch of phase 1 of Travel Generation involving the wiki and the blog I have spent a whole day looking at all the travel blogs (those that I think are relevant to the backpacking market). Here is my pick of the crop in no particular order

http://www.nomad4ever.com/: asia-centric blog but good for anything world travel

http://itinerantlondoner.wordpress.com/: Geoff’s own blog as he travels around the world - nice presentation and true to the spirit of backpacking

http://www.nomadicmatt.com/: This blog got me thinking and is perhaps the root of much of the ideas for the upcoming travelgeneration blog.  I have subscribed to his feed for sometime.

http://nobudgettravel.wordpress.com/: How to travel the world with no money

http://www.gadling.com/: An awesome travel blog and reference site - but I don’t know if it falls into the backpacking category strictly.  Which probably begs the question - what is backpacking anyway?

http://killingbatteries.com/: I love this site; everything is just so honest and raw - for pure content one of my favourites

http://almostfearless.com/: very classy site

http://thetravelersnotebook.com/: one of the professional matador group websites - really fun content professionally produced

http://eurosatemydollars.com/: One of my favourites - lots of really proper useful content (instead of that photo of the day cliche post that fills so many travel blogs)

http://www.myseveralworlds.com/: Carrie Marshall’s beautifully produced blog about her time in Asia

http://sanddollaradventures.wordpress.com/: An almost pro-blogging site by an eternal traveller

http://travel.booklocker.com/: Tim Leffel’s Cheapest Destinations

http://www.lonelyplanet.com/blogs/travel_blog/: Yup!

http://gogreentravelgreen.com/: These guys are interesting - they focus on travel tips for eco-conscious travellers

http://www.travel-wonders.com/: this is a nice site with an eclectic collection of posts

http://travel-junkie.com/: Boris’ personal site is one of my favourites - he might spend a lot of time travelling, but he also has done a great job on this site

http://www.travel-betty.com/: A nice blog for travelling women

http://www.europealacarte.co.uk/blog/: An interesting array of content by an equally interesting array of bloggers - not a big fan of the design

http://frugaltravelguy.blogspot.com/: Some interesting hints on how to get the best deal on everything from flights to airpoints

http://www.wherethehellismatt.com/?fbid=BJ7euW: He is an absolute nutter, dancing round the world - absolutely brilliant

http://www.travelblogs.com: For a list of other travel blogs

What are these about:

Blog Directory

There are a plethora of Internet directories all over the web with which you can register your website.  Of course there are some major ones that it is imperative that you are listed in such as DMOZ, Yahoo and Joe Ant; but what about all the rubbish - do they add anything to your SEO efforts?

I thought I would test the water by submitting this blog to a host of blog directories, include their link (above), see what happens and report back.

So, if any of these generate traffic then I will let you know - who knows.

By the end of this week stage 1 of the stealth Travel Generation project will be launched: a blog-a-zine for backpackers by backpackers.  While we are still keeping the actual URL under wraps the new site will feature articles, blog posts, photos and videos from our pro-travel bloggers as they travel the world, plus the Travel Generation wiki which already has over 25 destinations created and updated by our affiliate sites.

Later this week we will announce our Editor in Chief and also begin introducing some of our writers.  And that is where you come in - we still have space for a few more travel writers.  Check out the information below if this is something for you:

Love sharing your travel experiences with friends?
Have a passion and flair for writing?
Fancy the prospect of getting paid to regularly impart your worldly knowledge in the coolest Travel Forum on the net???

… Then we want to hear from you!

Sendh your personal and travel bio along with some of your travelling photos and any samples of your writing and become the web’s definitive travel oracle!

*Rates start at NZD$50 per post and massive advertising commission opportunities exist.
*”Bands” exist for our blogging team, based on lengths of posts, number of posts, quality of information and market leading news of stories, destinations, photos etc. “Gold” band pro-travel bloggers can earn up to $200 per post plus advertising commission.
*All posts are subject to editorial clearance

All enquiries should be sent to stuff@xebidy.com to marketing@swuzzlebucket.com

I am as guilty as the next person of mass emailing people, or blind cc’ing someone further up the food train to show my worth.  How about those emails you send at 9 o’clock at night to let everyone know you are still working?  I am currently reading Seth Godin’s lateset book, Meatball Sundae, and saw this post on Start-Up thought this was very clever - it’s Seth Godin’s 36 point email checklist.

1. Is it going to just one person? (If yes, jump to #10)
2. Since it’s going to a group, have I thought about who is on my list?
3. Are they blind copied?
4. Did every person on the list really and truly opt in? Not like sort of, but really ask for it?
5. So that means that if I didn’t send it to them, they’d complain about not getting it?
6. See #5. If they wouldn’t complain, take them off!
7. That means, for example, that sending bulk email to a list of bloggers just cause they have blogs is not okay.
8. Aside: the definition of permission marketing: Anticipated, personal and relevant messages delivered to people who actually want to get them. Nowhere does it say anything about you and your needs as a sender. Probably none of my business, but I’m just letting you know how I feel. (And how your prospects feel).
9. Is the email from a real person? If it is, will hitting reply get a note back to that person? (if not, change it please).
10. Have I corresponded with this person before?
11. Really? They’ve written back? (if no, reconsider email).
12. If it is a cold-call email, and I’m sure it’s welcome, and I’m sure it’s not spam, then don’t apologize. If I need to apologize, then yes, it’s spam, and I’ll get the brand-hurt I deserve.
13. Am I angry? (If so, save as draft and come back to the note in one hour).
14. Could I do this note better with a phone call?
15. Am I blind-ccing my boss? If so, what will happen if the recipient finds out?
16. Is there anything in this email I don’t want the attorney general, the media or my boss seeing? (If so, hit delete).
17. Is any portion of the email in all caps? (If so, consider changing it.)
18. Is it in black type at a normal size?
19. Do I have my contact info at the bottom? (If not, consider adding it).
20. Have I included the line, “Please save the planet. Don’t print this email”? (If so, please delete the line and consider a job as a forest ranger or flight attendant).
21. Could this email be shorter?
22. Is there anyone copied on this email who could be left off the list?
23. Have I attached any files that are very big? (If so, google something like ’send big files’ and consider your options.)
24. Have I attached any files that would work better in PDF format?
25. Are there any or other emoticons involved? (If so, reconsider).
26. Am I forwarding someone else’s mail? (If so, will they be happy when they find out?)
27. Am I forwarding something about religion (mine or someone else’s)? (If so, delete).
28. Am I forwarding something about a virus or worldwide charity effort or other potential hoax? (If so, visit snopes and check to see if it’s ‘actually true).
29. Did I hit ‘reply all’? If so, am I glad I did? Does every person on the list need to see it?
30. Am I quoting back the original text in a helpful way? (Sending an email that says, in its entirety, “yes,” is not helpful).
31. If this email is to someone like Seth, did I check to make sure I know the difference between its and it’s? Just wondering.
32. If this is a press release, am I really sure that the recipient is going to be delighted to get it? Or am I taking advantage of the asymmetrical nature of email–free to send, expensive investment of time to read or delete?
33. Are there any little animated creatures in the footer of this email? Adorable kittens? Endangered species of any kind?
34. Is there a long legal disclaimer at the bottom of my email? Why?
35. Does the subject line make it easy to understand what’s to come and likely it will get filed properly?
36. If I had to pay 42 cents to send this email, would I?

My mind is just racing these last few days thinking about link strategies.  One thing I have been giving considerable thought to is how bad are reciprocal links really?

The facts of the matter are:

1. We know that Google does not like link swapping
2. We also know that a link from a high quality content page to your site (with complementary content) is a very good tool in pushing you up the search engines.
3. We know that an outgoing link from your website to another with high quality complementary content also helps your website rankings.
4. Finally, we know that it is your websites complete content that contributes to your overall rankings - that links to your internal pages are very important in pushing up your home page ranking.

BUT: a probing question - what is you have a link within one of your pages to another site with high quality complementary content; and that site from a different page on their site has a link to your site (not the page where you have the link to them) - are these reciprocal links?

Visually the structure is:

Are there really reciprocal links?

Working on link strategies can be an extremely frustrating process because of the difficulty in getting other people to put the link on their website - let alone to do it without having to give a reciprocal link.  I can’t say enough - I believe reciprocal links are increasingly meaningless.  But then I get asked - “well how am I supposed to get links if we are not swapping”.  It is quite simple - think about your link strategy in terms of being of benefit to your website user.

Let’s look at a real-world situation - say an accommodation provider in the centre of New Zealand. Firstly, they get contacted by a tour operators who is in fact one of their main suppliers of business wanting a link (say for example, Stray Travel stays here) - but the link is not reciprocal. Where should this property get it’s links from?

Simple! What other sites might be of use to their customers or vice versa - or in another way to look at is, what are the potential feeder sites to your business? How about other accommodation providers in towns that might be en-route to your property? Say if you are in Taupo you might look for links in places in Rotorua, Wellington or National Park - sites where your visitors are and will be looking to move on from. How about things to do in town - sites your visitors might come across and then also look for somewhere to stay?

When I start working with clients it is amazing what they come up - regional tourism sites, fellow operators and complementary services. Think about creating a path to your site for your users and focus much less on just a mad rush to get lots of links - quality will always beat quantity!

A few days ago I introduced the idea of the Latent Semantic Indexing algorithm as a way for search engines to evaluate the value of a page for its keywords based on the keywords of its sub-pages.  Some readers, however, misconstrued my article as completely deprecating the value of backlinks.  This was not the case, in fact the introduction, I stated that links were important, but that Semantic Indexing was becoming increasingly important.  SO why are links important, and what are they becoming less important?

First and foremost, search engines and Google in particular view links to your website as a tick for your website as the relevancy and authority of the content of your site. The more links the more important your site must be and therefore the higher it ranks in search engines. Combine many links with strong on-site optimisation (the part of optimisation for your site that makes it clear and easy for search to determine what your keywords are) and you are sure to succeed in search engines theoretically.

A second benefit of inbound links is that search engine robots will be driven to your website more often.

So why would I say that search engines are placing less decreasing value on inbound links and increasing value on alternative weightings such as Semantic Indexing algorithms.

Quite simply I believe it is due to the continual gaming of the system by us. Once we realised the importance of links we started creating massive links pages and even sites that were totally dedicated to links (called link farms). These clearly aren’t the useful resource that Google envisaged. Links from pages with many other links were heavily discounted and link farms removed from the index - giving them no value at all. In our obsession to get links we started swapping them - I will link to your website, if you will link to mine (reciprocal linking). This is not really the idea either - a link is a tick for the quality of the content being linked to - most people simply swap links to home pages - which are often not the most relevant resource. The result was that Google started deprecating reciprocal links. The story is never-ending. We created small one page sites (called splash pages) with a bit of content and a link to our site. Google now searches the database for shared IP addresses or URLs owned by the same person. Sites with high Page Rank started selling links - Google now bans sites that pay for or sell links, and so it goes on..

But links are still very important! However, what counts is quality not quantity. You can literally have 10 inbound links that have the same ranking power as 1,000 poor quality links that are derived from link swapping, link buying etc.

The surest way to get backlinks is to build a quality website and work to gain top listings in respected directories such as Yahoo! and DMOZ.

There is a new buzzword in the Internet - “social media”.  We used to refer to the new rich interactions on the Internet as being Web 2.0 or Social Networking, but the term social media is used as a much broader term to encompass not only the social networks like Facebook and Bebo, but also blogging, podcasts, user-generated content such as wikis, social bookmarking, micro blogging such as on Twitter and life streaming such as on Friend Feed.  In this post we examine what social media means for a marketing person - what does their role encompass in this new realm?

If we were to try and write a job description for a social media marketer it might include such terms as brand evangelist, engagement of customers, community building and even viral marketing. Clearly the role might be described as retaining your current customer base and growing it.

This makes sense if you think in terms of bottom line profit - it is much easier to make money by retaining your customer base and adding to it than it is easy to be continually rolling over your customers for new ones. A person engaged in social media marketing aims to keep their current customer happy while adding new customers.

One of the main things about social media marketing is the way in which the company message can be spread to literally hundreds and thousands of people at once. The social media web is built on patterns of friends, followers and even strangers. Bookmarking sites such as Digg, StumbleUpon and Delicious can take a website from backwater to prominence at rocket speed, and micro blogging sites like Twitter allow a company to communicate very quickly, whether it be through responding to a complaint or launching a new product. Customers are able to follow and track the companies message in real time.

Social media is here to stay - case in point the likes of Google looking at buying Digg for US$200 million, the rapid rise of Twitter and the even faster growth of life streaming site Friend Feed. Customers almost automatically go online to interact with their chosen companies. Companies that simply ignore the social media and blogosphere risk large public relations blowups outside of their company and lost bottom line profits as their community of customers move on to companies that talk their social language.

The role of social media in a marketers role is absolutely imperative. Building communities within your customers, reaching out to new customers, building much stronger customer business relationships are keystone foundations of social media and equally should be fundamental goals of any successful business. It is essential that you are part of the sharing of thoughts and complaints of your customers and not simply an naive bystander.

We have said it before, but Google is awesome.  The algorithm for determining search engine positions is very complex and very little is known about the composition of it.  We certainly know that links are important, as are headings; but to what extent weighting is given say for reciprocal versus one-way links, or heading one over heading 2, we simply don’t know.  A huge focus is always given to the Page Rank Index, which determines a pages’ importance relative to other pages based on the number and quality of incoming links.  However, increasingly I feel search engines are basing less emphasis on links and more indexing on semantics.  Microsoft’s recent acquisition of Power Play is proof in point - clearly they believe they way forward in search engine performance is in improving the Semantic Indexing.

When we talk about Semantic Indexing, one of the algorithms that I find interesting is one known as the Latent Semantic Indexing algorithm (LSI). LSI determines a websites importance for it’s keywords and keyword phrases based on the websites use, and composition, of other keywords that commonly appear alongside the chosen keyword and keyword phrases. In this way the Latent Semantic Index also considers the content of your website in evaluating the rank of a single web page by looking for compositions of words that are considered to be commonly associated with the keywords you have optimised your website for.

Optimising your website for Latent Semantic Indexing algorithms necessitates excellent design of your website structure and architecture. At the upmost importance is the proper use of keywords as part of your internal link anchor text that properly support your top-teir keywords.

The best way to optimise your website for Latent Semantic Indexing is to create what are known as thematic silos. This entails creating a top level page for your particular keywords and then creating pages under this page for related complementary keywords in the same theme. Looking at a practical example let’s say we have a hostel in Sydney - a silo focussing on Sydney might look like this:

One of the debated points in the concept of Semantic Indexing is the degree to which theme bleed can occur by providing links to other websites - or even to web pages with your own site but outside the structure of your theme silo. I am not certain about this argument however, as I believe that good outbound links to high quality resources add value to your website both from a usability and from a search engine point of view; and that solid inter-linking throughout your website is important.

One of the important points about optimising your website for Latent Semantic Indexing algorithms using a strict theme silo structure you will find that you are in fact optmising your website for “long-tail keywords” - that is keywords that have lower search volume, but are more specific - such as, “central train station, Sydney city hostel”. The idea of optimising for the Semantic Indexing is that the more long-tail keyword phrases you rank highly for, the better you will do in more competitive terms.