Friday, February 25, 2011

List of some forums and reviews sites.

http://www.babyandbump.com
http://strollersandprams.com
http://forumbaby-gaga.com
http://www.justparents.co.uk/forums.html
http://www.babybable.com
http://www.parentingforums.org/forum.php
http://www.mahalo.com/strollers
http://www.basupplies.net/forum/default.asp
http://www.justusparents.com
http://www.car-seat.org
http://www.healthboards.com
http://www.youbemom.com/forum
http://www.huaren.us
http://raisingchildren.net.au/forum
http://www.justmoms.com http://www.garednweb.com
http://www.parenting.com
http://www.constantchatter.com
http://celebritybabyscoop.com
http://family.go.com
http://inventorspotforum.com
http://inventors.about.com
http://forums.creative.com/creativelabs/
http://www.intelproplaw.com/ip-forum/index.php
http://www.babyuniversity.com
http://www.city-data.com/forum
http://www.cafemom.com
http://www.inventionforum.com

Optimize a flash website

A flash website is a piece of art for a web designer but is a nightmare for an SEO expert. It has every reason to be called a great technology as it includes a picture and sound effect to a website, but it makes SEO’s heart jumping in his / her throat at a mere mention of it. The reason behind these different approaches is simple to understand. The mighty Gods of the world of web, namely search engines do not index flash pages. The only way left to get a flash website indexed is to feed the pages with some content. But then you lose the battle when it comes to page ranking in the search results. Let’s try some workarounds. Though these workarounds are a clumsy task to perform, they are better than having nothing in your kitty for your site rankings.

Why search engines hate flash?

The reason as to why the search engines dislike flash sites is a simple one to decipher. These flash movies or clips are too complicated for search engine spiders to crawl or understand. The spider sees and read a flash clip as blank sheet so cannot index it as it does not derive a meaning out of it. The flash site comes in a binary format (.swf) and the spiders cannot read inside the flash file. Now if the content of the site is not available for the spiders to crawl then how they can index it. At least, not without any assistance . Till this time all the search engines are united in their approach to flash though there are differences in the relevancy given to weigh these sites. Yes search engines hate flash sites. Though some search engines are divided on the question of indexing portions of flash sites, but all of them are unanimous in their approach to them.

Why flash is a no?

Well it is not only that the search engines dislike flash but also for various other reasons its use is restricted. For example as a banner or other kind of advertisement a flash clip distracts the mind of the visitor hence he skips it, avoid it. So it loses the whole point of its being. It didn’t work for the advertiser. The second reason why it is not always a healthy option is its being fat. Yes the flash file consumes a lot of bandwidth. Though the dial up days are over still 1 MB or more is not established as standard.

The web designers should understand that flash is good for enhancing the effect of story, and not the story telling itself. You should have a main body of text to make your point clear and a flash clip can be added to enhance the effect. By doing so you appeal to the senses of your visitors and keep the web bots also engaged. Now this kind of arrangement is a win win situation for a webmaster. But a complete site made in flash is an unpardonable SEO sin and all dreams of getting high page rank will automatically be dashed.

The other place where also one should not use flash is for the purpose of navigation. The rule applies not only to the main starting page but also to the other ones in the site. Using images or java script for navigation is not permitted in SEO practice. Text links are only SEO approved way for site navigation.

Optimizing flash site

Though it is a clumsy task and not always an easy solution but a flash website can also be optimized.

· Use of metadata ---- this one is very important approach though it is most misunderstood and underestimated. Flash development tools easily allow to use metadata in your flash file to make the language, tools used and the content specified, visible to search engines and visitors. Now with this task done there is no lame excuse left to be given for an empty metadata space.

· Alternative html pages ----- now to make your flash site more visible to spiders one can add only html pages to the site. By doing so you give an alternative to your visitors to skip the flash movie clip and directly read and understand the content. It also enhances the visibility of your website to search engine spiders as they see only html pages. Preparing these pages is an extraneous task but definitely helpful.

· SDK tool ---- this search engine flash site tool is the life line of any flash website. This tool is able to extract text from a flash movie. One of the handiest application of this flash search engine SDK tool is swf2html. As the name suggest it extracts the text information in any flash clip and convert it into html file. The whole job is done automatically but at times one need to have a look at the converted content and if needed the restructuring should be done. Also one should check out for if there is any duplicate content in the extracted paragraphs and sentences. Other important aspect of this tool is to check the font colour every time of the extracted content because if the colour is same as of the background then you can be booked for hidden text black hat practice by the search engine police.

· SF Flash tool ----- this tool is almost similar to sdk tool as it view your website from the eyes of a search engine. Thus help you to learn about the flaws in your site with respect to search engines. Also it is more helpful with Google which does not use SDK.

These above specified tools and means are the ethical ones while it comes to optimize a flash site. There are several other techniques also which are used by webmasters to optimize a flash site but those are not considered favorable by search engines as they are counted as black hat practices like creating invisible layers of text that is visible to spiders. Avoid using that stuff otherwise more than optimizing your site it will bring trouble.

Article Source : http://internetmoguls-news.blogspot.com/search?updated-max=2011-02-14T22%3A45%3A00-08%3A00&max-results=7

New Age Online Marketing Strategies for Hotel Industry

A lot has been said and written about how technology changed our lives and preferences. The web and internet has changed the methods of business also. Now things are changing so fast that it becomes at times troublesome to keep your pace matched up. But if you are in hotel business then it is worthwhile to keep an eye on ever changing trends in hospitality industry. In this cut throat competition, it is imperative to know where your potential customer is and how he can be indulged. For this you need a marvelous mix of marketing strategy. According to a recent study on the trends in hospitality industry done by Merrill Lynch of all the bookings in 2010 a whopping 45% share is to come through internet bookings.

According to a research, the share of internet booking for hotels is on rise since 2006. In the year 2006 an estimated 30% of bookings made were online. This percentage rose to 33% in the year 2007 and in the year 2008, 40% of total hotel workings were done online. This gives a fair idea that more and more people are now using online services when it comes to book a hotel. First because of its cost effective nature and second tourists do a lot of online research while choosing a hotel at their preferred holiday destination. So it is important for all the hoteliers to understand the psyche of your customer and follow the trend.

Internet is clearly exercising a growing influence on consumer’s decision making. And this presents a whole new range of opportunities and possibilities, where selling of your product and services is concerned. Understanding the target market and its internet or digital activities is crucial for developing an effective online marketing plan. The total number of internet users worldwide in the year 2008 was 1.57 billion which equals to the 23.5% of the total world population, according to the Internet World Statistic web directory. Thus internet is an efficient way for all the companies to gain customers across the world through the medium of online marketing. It specially gives the hotel business an edge as the customers are tourists coming from distant places. The number of customers using internet to book their stay at chosen hotels is also going to shoot up this year according to the expectations of the industry.

Apart from that there are other facts also which hoteliers should keep in mind while promoting their business online.

· Search engines continue to play a crucial role, as people like exploring new opportunities and ideas. The number of people who get travel information by searching on various engines is 85% as against the 69% people who access the travel site by typing in web address. The inference is simple that instead of going directly to known site visitors like to have a fair idea of what is happening and what is new? So as a travel website owner you cannot afford to stop wooing search engines.

· The other new trend in the offing is the ability of a video to capture the imagination of your visitor. In new Google algorithm a due share has been given to the video section. Websites linked to a video are able to enjoy a better rank in search results. So while working on your website, always pay attention to get some good videos to do the magic for visitors as well as search engines.

· Also thrust emphasis on customer engagement through the inclusion of blogs and social media. As these are also indexed by search engines and impact the search results favorably.

· There is a growing popularity and utilization of mobile and on the go marketing. In the era of blackberries and 3G services net surfing is not as static as it was before. So always keep this in your mind while planning online marketing strategy that your customer will be one on the go. If your site is not compatible for mobile apps then you can probably miss out a large number of potential clients.

Outsourcing the marketing

This is the newest and one of the fastest growing trends in hotel industry. With the technology changing at a breath taking fast pace that it is becoming difficult for the businessmen to keep running their business and looking after the marketing. If we talk about only online marketing then also there are n number of options, and when you face such a wide variety of choice it becomes all the more difficult to chose. According to a survey done on the hotel industry by Quill Advertising 54% of hoteliers say that marketing outsourcing, whether partial or complete, is on their future planning agenda. So it is a known fact that now with the change in needs and interest of the customers, the planning and strategy of business and advertising is also changing. So you also brace up for a better tomorrow by planning your strategy right.

Article source : http://internetmoguls-news.blogspot.com/2011/02/new-age-online-marketing-strategies-for.html

Internetmoguls: Is Twitter on the way to be the second largest Sea...

Internetmoguls: Is Twitter on the way to be the second largest Sea...: "Twitter Does 19 Billion Searches per month, it is almost like making the Yahoo & Bing run for their jobs!"

Most popular categories of Online Advertising

Online advertising has a great potential and the sphere is going to balloon to $50 billion. According to the Morgan Stanley’s latest presentation, people spend 28% of their time on internet but there is only 13% of relevant advertising. According to the presentation made in Web 2.0 summit held in San Francisco, online advertising is yet to see its golden days with an eye pooping growth of $50 billion. Now it is simple to understand where should, the merchants head for showcasing their products.

Many business sectors have already pulled up their socks to beat the competition. Hospitality industry leads other with many popular hotels opting for companies offering Hotel Internet Marketing strategies. It is a known fact that people spend a great deal of time surfing internet, and it is quite understandable that web is the place to be in the eyes of your customer. Now, when you chose to advertise online, you have four options by which you can buy space for your advertisement. Usually when asked about different form of internet advertising, people think of popup ads, banner ads, floaters etc but all these actually fall under four categories. And these categories are cost per click, cost per impression, cost per action and cost per lead.

Cost per click ---- CPC online advertising model invites users to show interest in a product or a service. Clicking on these ads specifies that visitor wants to get information about the specified product. When purchasing a cost per click ad, the advertiser agrees to pay every time a visitor clicks the advertisement. Now the cost of these ads is determined by either flat rate or bid based purchasing. In the flat rate agreement the advertiser and space seller agree for a predetermined rate per click. But in the bid based model prices are sold in a private auction with bid being placed by competing buyers. If your ad is full of high worth keywords then the cost of bidding will also go up. It is most popular and chosen form of online advertising. But it has its own share of woes. Cost per click programs have become the breeding ground of fraud. Space selling websites in connivance with people by luring them with good percentage keep the click ratio up and make profits while the advertiser pay for fake visitors.

Cost per impression ---- this type of advertisement campaign is based on the assumption that a higher a traffic to advertisements generates a high volume of sales. The cost of each impression is fixed as low as fraction of a cent. However depending on the value of traffic the cost sometimes can even go up.

Cost per action ---- in this type of advertisement campaign the buyer of the space pays only when the visitor performs a specified action say filling up a registration form or subscribing free newsletters. This kind of ad program is based on the assumption that by educating the visitor about a specified product he/she can be turned into a buyer. Cost per action ads are generally a first step towards a more strategic and expensive marketing campaign. These are often started to make a data base of prospective clients who by signing up for permission advertising give the advertiser a green pasture. This type of ad campaign is started with the aim of getting visitors attention towards the product only.

Cost per lead ----- these types of advertisements are best for the space buyer as he has to pay the money only if a lead is generated. Such ads are often used to promote high end services for example investment or real estate purchases. Leads are qualified on a range of factors including age, financial standing, and medical history etc. advertisers hoping to initiate contact with customers such as health insurance companies frequently use CPL ad campaigns.

Article Source : http://internetmoguls-news.blogspot.com/2011/02/most-popular-categories-of-online.html