But have no fear, Gaveltek 2.0 will be here in the coming months. In the meantime, our blog will be updated with more tutorials and SEO / WEB related shenanigans.

Thanks for your patience everyone! Our Designers (me) and our programmers (I am one of those  also) are trying to has out the bones and features. We dont want to recreate any of the usual type sites such as SEOmoz or those our friends the boring twins over at Distilled.
Our mission has always been to service the Legal Industry, the boys over at distilled could have a Bore-off regarding that breed of SEO, I digress. We are diversifying by bringing Azimuth Six, Champion of small business SEO up to speed to work in conjunction with the Gaveltek
brand we have created. So stay tuned, and any feedback would be good! info@gaveltek.com

Try Knocking on this door and see what you get

Why did we take down the old site and loose our rankings, etc… Because this is a year of change for us, and honestly its a great experiment to hone our skills all the while learning some new SEO skills.
We dont mind that the site is down, not one bit. As a matter of fact we might redirect it to our sister company, Azimuthsix.com for a while and see how much juice is passed. None the less we should have the new rollout in a few weeks, backed by our pals at Joomla, of course.

Any questions drop us a line info@gaveltek.com or use the contact us form on the blog

SEO or PPC which dominates

SEO VS PPC. How can you decide whats best for your company? BOTH!

This topic intrigues me. I have spent years researching this and really wanted to unload all my data to those who areequally passionate. However, with the amount of people chiming in with really great value adds, its a moot point Please review the Quora post. I will give you the abridged version with some basic percentages. But before that, let me point out that PPC never converts as well as Organic SEO. That is not to say it cant be equally as effective when used in tandem, however, empirical evidence cannot be argued. I doubt anyone here with research backed data would argue that Organic does not dominate the market space in conversion and CT’s. On with 1 tiny slice:

25% of our e-commerce sites saw a 13% gain of conversions and a 42% gain of traffic via organic avenues (showing that PPC does affect rankings, perhaps this is a clear signal that google seems to place value on brands that choose to advertise, and might also consider them to be honest) It is to also be mentioned that upon termination of the PPC campaigns there was a slight (as compared to w / PPC ) dip in the rankings, but it recovered in only 3 days (average) ( links and such were continually built throughout these campaigns, some quality some not)

These signs point to a few things I find interesting:
1. brand recognition and acceptance through paid advertising channels provided through the major search engines ( really only in the case of google)
2. CTR increase when compounded with PPC
3. Organic Traffic Increase (perhaps happy coincidence)
4. Brand Trust (key?)

I can continue to drill down into more of my data (collected and sorted over quite a long period) however, you see the point. There is a happy marriage and a nice merit to be seen by using both. I myself am a proponent of organic SEO, however I always suggest a very aggressive targeted marketing campaign for the first 6 months of any new engagement. I always ask my clients for a set aside budget to fund this venture. This marketing strategy is multi-faceted and includes some very non-traditional (for the web and SEO) avenues of advertising. If you are interested in discussing those with me I am happy to share. But as its unrelated to the topic….

in short *deep breath* these two can co-exist nicely. With just that right amount of this and that you can have quite a decent conversion rate. Remember SEO encompasses all avenues of online marketing, where as PPC only deals with paid ads, and Organic SEO deals with, well, naturally searched results and rankings.

Google kills another useful tool, and focuses on Google +puss, er Plus

I woke up to this email:
“Dear App Inventor User,

The App Inventor Team”

OH Google! You never cease to amaze us! You have removed more functionality  (see: wonder wheel, etc…) that we all love to use. Your charm is starting to wear thin. I personally have shifted the bulk of my searches (personal anyway) into Blekko and Bing (because its just so nice to use, although the results do need some serious work). And for anyone interested in this, I have it on GOOD authority from the source that Intel has all but shut down the department responsible for GoogleTV, that is as dead as Rasputin my friends. Well enough with the rumor mill, thought we could do with some updating about the search engine we are all forced to play with, at least for now. For those interested in continuing to use that fun tool, MIT posted this about App Inventor

Any other interesting news? Contact us 

Beat the Freshness out of Google

Fresh is the word

As if small business owners havent had a hard enough time adapting to Navneet Panda’s little gem, we are now forced to contend with Googles latest internet bombshell entitled “fresh”. Why would they call something fresh? Well the premise is that sites who lack fresh content and a regularly updated inventory will pay the piper in the ranks. What does this mean to you? Am I over simplifying the issue? The jury is still out on both, but if my spidey sense is right, small businesses with static offerings and stagnant content strategy are going to lose their proverbial rears.

How can I save myself?
First off, the answer is as it always has been, put a up a blog, employ social media. While I would love to post some links to multiple awesome blog software there is really only one:

1. http://www.wordpress.org/download

for those who would like to not host their own site, the options are a little more plump:
1. http://www.posterous.com

2. http://www.blogger.com

3. http://www.wordpress.com

4. http://www.tumblr.com

Those are some really great and easy to implement solutions to this content crisis. However, simply having a blog does not mean you are completely safe. You actually have to write and post interesting and engaging topics, while staying relevant to your core cause, product, or service. Sounds easy? Don’t get ahead of yourself! Make a schedule and stick to it. As youll probably notice this is my first update in a while, I am not making any excuses but lets say that a certain Volvo ran me off the road in my Mini Cooper and caused me to be hospitalized. Then there is China… there is always China.

There is really no need for alarm, the algorithm is just tightening up what we have always known… having great relevant content that others like to read and will readily pump through their social networks equals a win for you and your business. The trick there (as I have already mentioned) is keeping it up do date (as I have not, but will begin to again).

We will have more examples as the algorithm goes through its motions, as of yet we haven’t seen any real dip for any of our clients. If you have, let me know, ill take a look at your site and see whats what. The more data we have the more answers we (as in all SEO’s) can provide to you ( as in clients or looky-loos).

Get in touch via a form, or shoot an email directly

The Google +1 Button

By now you have seen or heard about the release of the Google +1 button, which operates much like Facebook’s like button as a feature to let those in your network know about recommendations you have found on the web.  Like Facebook’s like button, +1 helps friends in your network discover things like websites, an interesting search result, or even an ad that you have suggested.  When used on your own webpage, the +1 button allows users to recommend your content with the intention that the friends of that user will see their friend’s recommendation and visit your site.  You must be signed into Google to access the feature and for your friends to see what you have recommended.

+1 SEO Value

According to Google, the +1 button is “one of many signals Google may use to determine a page’s relevance and ranking” as content that is recommended by your network is often thought to be more relevant than content from strangers.  Like the Facebook like button, website owners can likely see an increase in traffic as users recommending their content may be driven by others who have visited your site and shared (through the +1 button) the content to like-minded friends with similar interests.

Who can see the +1 annotations?

Everybody can see the annotations, and signed-in users can also see the personalized annotations from the following four sources:

• People in their Gmail (or Google Talk) chat list.
• People in their My Contacts group in Google Contacts.
• People they’re following in Google Reader and Google Buzz.

+1 is not yet available on mobile devices as Google is likely first testing the popularity of the feature as they have not always been successful in the social media avenue (think Google Buzz).  Time will tell if +1 lives up to Google’s hopes and is implemented on cell phones.

How to get +1 button on your site

Google provides fairly simple instructions on how to implement the button to your website here:

http://www.google.com/intl/en/webmasters/+1/button/index.html

It is a section of code that you implement into your back end or that your webmaster can do for you.

Google recommends placing the button near titles of pages, close to links, and both at the beginning and end of an article or story.  An additional item of interest for SEO is that Google has said that they may crawl or recrawl your page in response to a +1 impression or click.  Facebook like and Twitter’s retweet have significantly impacted search, we will pay close attention to see if Google’s +1 does the same.

Tweetdeck releases new version in response to the August 1st planned foursquare update

Most of you have noticed this message:
“Your foursquare client is out of date! If you don’t upgrade before August 1st it will stop working.”
or this image:

Do the upgrade, but still seeing the message regarding foursquares API update on your Tweetdeck?

The impending doom of shutting down one pillar of social media is upon us. But how can we avoid? My inside sources tell me that our friends at twitter errr… tweetdeck will ensure that when the metal meets the bone, tweetdeck shall prevail over the foursquare v2 API update. We will keep you updated as to the status of our beloved foursquare posting ability via the amazing power of Tweetdeck. But have no fear our friends at Twitter err…. Tweetdeck have already realeased the basic upgrade to the software to handle the API upgrade. Get your upgraded tweetdeck

Google's Panda 2.2

By now most SEOs and webmasters have all seen or felt the effects of Google’s initial Panda algorithm that greatly targeted minimizing the rankings of what they thought to be poor-quality sites.  A Google spokesperson writes: “we’re continuing to iterate on our Panda algorithm as part of our commitment to returning high-quality sites to Google users. This most recent update is one of the roughly 500 changes we make to our ranking algorithms each year.”

Although Google has not officially announced that the algorithm changes are live there is buzz around the net that the changes have taken place.  For white-hat SEO operations such as Gaveltek, our clients have continued to see positive gains as we have always stressed that our content be original and high-quality.

Matt Cutts of Google said that a new iteration of the Panda update would take place.  This was mentioned some weeks ago and was verified by Matt that the updates had been approved.  The new update, dubbed Panda 2.2 by the search industry, is expected to address the issues Google has with poor content.  For more ethical SEO firms and website owners who favor quality over duplication and unoriginality, the changes come as welcome as the search results often produce scraped content that ranks higher than the original.

For sites that have high quality content as determined by Google, the Panda 2.2 update should have a very small impact on their rankings, if any.  For sites that have been impacted negatively the issues of their content should be addressed.  Web owners should not, however, forget that content is just one of the many signals that Google uses to rank you.  Consider making other changes in other areas that may help you to improve your rankings if you have been negatively affected by these changes.

Google's wonder wheel

Using the Google Wonder Wheel

As you can see, you type in search terms as you normally would in the search box.  Then, on the left navigation side bar, select “more search tools” then select “Wonder wheel.” Your original query will show up in the center (pantheon in this example), surrounded by related queries.  If you click on one of those, you see related topics to your original search or can find something moderately related.  Every time you click a new topic, the search results also change to reflect that topic.   You can also jump back to any point in your path as well.

The tool acts as kind of a mind mapper which goal is to filter out the most relevant results of searches in a well-organized and fun manner.  In our pantheon example, we can see such related searches such as the colosseum and partheon, as well as other related searches that can take us in a different direction such as the pantheon books topic.  Let’s look at the cycle when we click the colosseum, one of my favorite pieces of historical architecture in Rome:

Google Wonder Wheel 2nd Tier

The feature works nicely, detailing great links to common searches in the wonder wheel and other searches in the search results.

Let’s try another more generic search, “internet marketing.” Have a look below:

No Ads With Wonder Wheel!

The same, except using the traditional search method:

Traditional search has ads!

Notice that the Wonder Wheel results contain no ads for the same search query! For SEOs and businesses that put their marketing efforts into organic search we are finally finding a place where we aren’t inundated with poor and misleading paid ad campaigns.  All we are left with in the SERP (on the right) are results that are related to our search and some results in the Wonder Wheel that help us consider other topics in a fun and easy to use way.

What is great about this feature is the ease of use and the inherent ability for this feature to provide brain-storming like abilities for the user.  As far as SEO goes, using this tool to dissect and navigate useful information is great because it allows us to research like a timeline and get relevant search results without all the extra clutter.

Let’s go back to the pantheon search and see where it takes us.  Pantheon –> Colosseum –> Colosseum facts –> Gladiators facts –> Gladiators history –> American gladiators’ history –> etc.

This was awesome!  What started with a bit of Roman architecture has brought us to one of the most entertaining shows of the 90’s hosted by Hulk Hogan.  So not only have we found exciting ways to dig deeper into our searches but we have also have a tool that helps searchers who may not have an idea of exactly what they are searching for find relevant results.  For example typing in gladiators and navigating to a section about the colosseum would prove useful for someone who had an idea but wanted to understand other facets to it.  The tool helps to sort out the results and locate words related to the main phrase you started with which can lead you to the phrase and results you really want.

Ways to Utilize Wonder Wheel

As Internet marketers we are always trying to uncover searches that are relevant to our client’s niches.  To utilize the power of the Wonder Wheel start by typing in one of your main keywords into the search box.  Use the Wonder Wheel to locate more phrases related to your search, and use these phrases in your content to get more traffic.  The same can go for keyword research, Google will tell you the keywords that are relevant and you can come up with creative ways to utilize them based on their relevancy.

The idea for every SEO and Social Media Guru is to leverage the power of your social network in a fashion that is advantageous to the end user. This is a very risky venture as (if implementation goes poorly, or is way over the top) you can quickly find yourself on the receiving end of bad press, and at worse a loss in your social networks effectiveness. Recently there has been a lot of litmus testing in this area as to what is too much and what is too little to ask for before the end user turns away. The answer seems to be that most users (better than 60%) are willing to “give up the goods” so to speak and jump on board your brand etc.

How to leverage that data:
so you’ve managed to build yourself a little social empire, you have a great Klout.com score, and your Facebook likes and comments are off the chart. So what do you do with all that power? USE IT! Take it by the neck and teach it whose boss. Continue to tweet about relevant topics, use info-graphics (albeit sparingly) and try to convert those participants into possible conversions for the services your company provides.

The does and don’ts of the Facebook world:
first of all (Thanks Mat Clayton of Gingerhost.com) there are plenty of good pieces of code out there (xfbml, etc…) written by people who spend a great deal of time thinking about exactly how much is too much.  Recently at the Distilled / SEOmoz conference in Boston Team Gaveltek got to spend much of the time sleeping, until Mat Clayton got up and started discussing HTML5, CSS3, AJAX, etc… what we took away was that the placement and the tracking of that data (via Facebooks built in tools with their built in code) wasn’t doing the trick. Mat managed to nail down some pretty simple techniques that work wonders regarding conversions. Here is an example of some of Mat’s Facebook Code:

<div id=”fb-root”></div>

<script>

(function() {

window.fbAsyncInit = function() {

FB.Event.subscribe(‘edge.create’, function(response) {

_gaq.push(['page', 'like', response]);

});

FB.Event.subscribe(‘edge.remove’, function(response) {

_gaq.push(['page', 'unlike', response]);

});

};

var e = document.createElement(‘script’); e.async = true;

e.src = document.location.protocol +

‘//connect.facebook.net/en_US/all.js#xfbml=1′;

document.getElementById(‘fb-root’).appendChild(e);

}());

</script>

This code is a clean and mean version of the Facebook “like” function. There are plenty more to choose from but this one struck me as interesting in its vast difference from what Facebook themselves offer. By implementing this style of code into your site (tying into the power of your social network) you offer your user more opportunities to intermingle with other people and spread the word.  The important piece of this whole blog is MAKE THE USER EXPERIENCE FUN, EASY, and INCORPORATE THEIR SOCIAL NETWORK. Power in numbers most definitely is in full effect in this case.

How do I make a great user experience?

Quite simply, DON’T OVER DO IT! Don’t put 40 like buttons, 80 different social outlet buttons. Pick the relevant outlets and use them. Put the majority of your social media icons at the top of your page or on the right hand side. I won’t spend much more time on this, we have all seen sites that use good social media, pay attention and as well all know “imitation is the most sincere form of flattery.”

For more information or to ask questions:

www.gaveltek.com

info@gaveltek.com

561-899-0507