Despite going to great lengths to critique the Internet throughout my Friday post, aptly entitled ‘Is the Internet too noisy?’ I acknowledge my own part in the dispersal of noise, as well as the benefits it can bring. However, elsewhere the baton appears to have been taken on even further; a little too far in fact, which explains this impromptu follow up.
Management Today published an editorial piece this morning on why ‘the Internet ain’t all that great’. The more than slightly wry comparison of the Internet and the traditional media that it is slowly replacing, takes a far more acerbic and negative approach to the online world. It should be said that this isn’t a lone voice, it’s an argument that crops up time and time again; however, it’s one that ought to be tackled.
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In the days before the Internet, information was passed verbally or through writing. You’d read the news in a newspaper or watch it on the television; they were your primary, or in many cases, only source of worldly happenings. You’d discuss things with those around you and others who could be reached by telephone. If you wanted to converse with someone in a distant land – or the other end of the country at least – you’d apply for a pen pal. But the Internet has changed all that.
It is awash with information. News feeds are a veritable deluge of re-written, re-spun stories and regurgitated, most of which is of little or no interest. Almost everything, it seems, can now be done on the Internet; by anybody and at any time too. But as it grows and becomes more ’social’, is it in danger of getting out of control?
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Unless you’ve been living in a cave (on holiday, of course), you’ll be well aware of the downturn in the global economy and the fact that even our politicians are now confirming the UK is entering a period of recession.
Is this the end of online shopping as we know it? Not at all. Web based businesses should see this as an opportunity to forge ahead and gain a competitive advantage. If consumers are looking to cut back, where will they start searching for bargains? Of course, it’s not always about being cheapest but whatever online business you operate, you should be looking to position your site infront of your prospects.
Perhaps now would be a good time to review your site (design, copy) and your online marketing activities (SEO, PPC)? You may need to get creative with your offers and offer more incentives? One thing is certain. Now is not the time to be cutting back on your online marketing budget!
Google have been going through another PageRank update and it seems at first glance that many of the web directories have been affected.
Many low level directories have simply seen their child pages lose all PageRank meaning the only PageRank they have is on their homepage. This means that the appeal of buying links in these directories is now a very unappealing option for those who just buy links to influence the PageRank algorithm.
Effects have been seen all the way up to the likes of the Yahoo directory which have several child pages with no PageRank but most pages are still in tact.
But lets remember that the world is not Google and the directories are still worth being in for relevance, credibility and lead generation.
When visiting a website today and attempting to use it I was met with a message that said “if the page freezes please use IE”.
Being a Firefox user, I hit the back button, went to a competitor, made my purchase and went about my business.
Any company serious about making it online needs to ensure that their website is accessible by the main browsers as, if not, you can potentially be losing a big percentage of your sales!
Don’t become another statistic and, at the very least, ensure that your site performs in both IE and Firefox as, after all, they account for approximately 93% of browser usage.
Many website owners may be looking at their analytics accounts and thinking “I’m sure I am getting more traffic than this?” The chances are, they actually are!
As people are using newer browsers like Firefox, they are utilising more of the useful extensions and privacy options, one of which is an option where you can choose not to run JavaScript.
Now the big problem with this is that if you use a program such as Google Analytics that rely on JavaScript tracking codes to track visitors to your website, visitors with JavaScript disabled will not be tracked.
The way to cross reference this is to regularly check your analytics data against your websites log files and that way you will be able to see just how many visitors are invisible to your analytics account.
Did you know it only takes 8 seconds for your website’s visitors to decide to leave your website?
First impressions really count in business and they can make the difference between your business’ success and failure.
Things that can make visitors hit the dreaded back button are:
- Slow loading speed (caused by big page sizes and bad hosting providers)
- Poor navigation
- Unprofessional design (made in your bedroom type designs)
- Background music (elevator music is not a good idea)
- Flash only sites (some people don’t have the applicable plug ins)
- Site is an obvious ad farm
- Not displaying correctly in all browsers (very common problem with websites)
- Excessive pop up or pop under adverts
- Poor spelling / grammar
- Hard to read text (too small or non standard colours of text or backgrounds)
Are you making any of the above mistakes? If so you know what to do, fix them!
