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Archive for November 2008

CLOUD COMPUTING: The Next Big Thing

by on Nov 13, 2008 (0) Comments

Cloud computing or computing in the cloud is now one of the latest happening trends in the business world and the “next big thing” after Web 2.0. According to a 2008 paper published by IEEE Internet Computing “Cloud Computing is a paradigm in which information is permanently stored in servers on the Internet and cached temporarily on clients that include desktops, entertainment centers, table computers, notebooks, wall computers, handhelds, sensors, monitors, etc.” In other words, we can say that this is about increasing an organization’s or user’s capability by using different applications from some external servers without investing much on its own infrastructure and maintenance of local servers. Rather the organization/user pays for raw computing power. Here the word “cloud” is used as a metaphor for internet.

The basic architecture of this cloud computing is a massive network of interconnected servers where the web applications reside. The user accessing these applications need not be aware of the physical location of the application’s computer. This not only reduces the cost of installing licensed software at the end user’s computer but also saves the cost associated with deploying, maintaining and upgrading of different business technologies.

Paying for Ads When Craigslist Is Free

by on Nov 11, 2008 (0) Comments

Craigslist offers listings for everything from apartments to lawyers to dates. It is free for users to search and in most cases, free for posters to put up their ads.

Patricia Nakache, a general partner at the venture capital firm, Trinity, is backing start-ups that figure people would be willing to pay for higher-quality, screened listings.

Because Craigslist does not much care about making money, it can be hard for a profit-driven business to compete. Just ask newspapers, which have seen their classified ads virtually disappear. But Ms. Nakache argues that “people are willing to pay for a better experience.”

Maximizing ROI On Your SEO Investment

by on Nov 10, 2008 (0) Comments

More and more businesses are realizing the importance their web site plays in their overall marketing strategy. They are also realizing the impact of organic search rankings on branding and sales for their business. And this is creating demand for SEO talent to help them improve their position in web search.

Normally, this is a good thing for the business (and, of course, the SEO). A talented and hard working SEO can bring good gains to a business. For example, if a web site is already producing $500,000 in sales before the SEO gets involved, and their efforts result in those sales increasing to $1,000,000, then there is plenty of room for paying the SEO something for their work.

Unfortunately, it does not always happen quite so simply. It can happen that the business results don’t follow the SEO work, even if the SEO is very competent, and diligently does a good job.

8 DON’Ts and 7 DOs For Holiday eCommerce

by on Nov 10, 2008 (0) Comments

The holiday season is almost upon us. It’s time to start looking over the inventory, keywords, and offers to make sure you’re ready for Cyber Monday. In today’s column we offer several things to do and important don’ts that will help you have a successful holiday season.

Don’t…

Blindly test

Traffic in December is unlike any other month of the year. Conversion rates go up, and cost per conversions go down. If you are running split or multivariate tests throughout the month to see which ads or pages convert the highest, do not blindly trust that the data will carry over into January. It is not uncommon to see the highest converting pages (or ads and keywords) not be the highest performer once the buying excitement of the holidays melts away.

Make major site changes

Every Word is a Keyword for SEO

by on Nov 09, 2008 (1) Comments

You have to look beyond keyword research if you want to be one of those companies that always appears at the top of search results. This implies knowing how to create traditional appeal in non traditional ways.

However, what does that mean specifically? We know that doubling conversion does not necessarily mean you have to double your traffic.

It means that you just have to create more lucrative cross-sections or co-occurrence of keywords (or pages) that appeal to your target audience. This feat is easily accomplished with SEO and within the context of your pages using cross-sections of keywords that will draw an audience based on the content and market focus.

Web 2.0 Gets Big – and Corporate

by on Nov 07, 2008 (0) Comments

As the economy totters, it’s easy to make fun of the concept of “Web 2.0” — the rallying cry of a generation of chipper start-ups spawned over the last few years with an unusual aversion to vowels.

Certainly, most of the venture capitalists I’ve talked to at the Web 2.0 Summit have said they are shying away from companies that are based on the idea of growing an audience now and figuring out how to make money later. However, after listening to the presentations here over the past three days, it is clear that some of the key concepts of the Web 2.0 movement are, in fact, taking root in deep ways.

One of the most significant trends is how the big companies that make very complicated systems are reworking them using the principles of Web 2.0 companies, particularly the notion of programs that talk to other programs. They are breaking up their technologies into discrete modules that can work alongside data and applications from others.

Facebook can be credited with taking the first step to open up large parts of its service to third parties. Last year, it let their applications on its site. Now, through its upcoming Facebook Connect service, it will let other companies build applications that use its list of people and who their friends are to deliver new services.

Intro to DotNetNuke

by on Nov 07, 2008 (0) Comments

DotNetNuke – another powerful content management system to add to the existing list. With so many CMS’s around and each one of them offering you a vast set of features, you feel pampered. A few years back, building your dream website for your organization and managing its content simultaneously, seemed such a daunting task. However after Content Management Systems have come into existence, publishing dynamic content in a consistently structured and customized manner has been astonishingly simplified.

With over 500,000 registered users and 5.0 million downloads in late 2007 (as per official sources), DotNetNuke has become one of today’s largest and effective open source CMS. It has been written in Microsoft’s VB.NET for the ASP.NET (also by Microsoft) framework. With an extensible core and a set of additional customization features that include modules and skins, DotNetNuke can be used to develop, deploy and efficiently manage websites, including extranets and intranets.