Five and a half years ago I already have written about the shift towards mobile use of the Internet and growth of social media.
Now, “mobile” is bigger than ever and the trend does not stop as more and more services come online which focus on a great mobile user experience. So it is not really a surprise that Google expresses a clear focus on web optimization for mobile access and mobile devices.
Gary Illyes announced at the Pubcon [1] conference in Las Vegas on Oct. 13, 2016 that Google is switching to mobile-first indexing. This means websites which are not mobile friendly in Google's eyes will be kicked out and moved to the secondary index. Furthermore the secondary index is not updated as frequently as the primary index is. This will be a huge disadvantage for those sites if they rely on search engine traffic from Google.
The following two articles discuss the keynote:
Responsive design or serving an optimized “mobile version” of a site to users on mobile devices has become the industry standard for “mobile friendliness.” However, that's not where Google wants the improvements to stop. Coping with small screens limited input capabilities is not nearly enough. Users want that sites load very quickly in under 2 seconds.
Therefore, Google has launched its Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) (↑) open source project in February 2016. This project tackles low Internet connections speeds as well.
At first, this seems counter-intuitive since mobile high speed LTE Internet connections with speeds of up to 150 Mbit/s become more widely available at affordable rates. In fact in many rural areas mobile connectivity is the only and in many cases best choice you can get. LTE/4G Internet access is nowadays available in 102 countries, … but with limited coverage. On a worldwide scale only 50% of mobile users are covered with at least 3G. [2] The remaining 50% of mobile users are stuck with low speeds: 56 kbit/s for 2G and 220 kbit/s for 2.5G like EDGE. Now the AMP project makes more sense.
It has never been more important to provide users with mobile devices the best user experience possible. Google will hold you accountable.
Adopting AMP does not need to create you a headache, at least, if your website is powered by popular software like WordPress which has 70% market share among content management systems (CMS) and powers more than 20% of all websites on the Internet. Just search for the appropriate plugin.
Joast-de-Valk shares some detailed recommendations on AMP for WordPress (↑).
But AMP is already available for other popular CMS platforms like Joomla and Drupal.
Thanks to the open source nature of the project AMP is already supported by many platforms (↑).
Gary Illyes also gave the impression the site-wide use of the secure HTTPS
protocol for all websites could be something Google has on its wishlist for the future. We will see.
Yours Truly
John W. Furst
[1] Pubcon, is the premier social media and optimization conference, is supported by the industry's leading businesses, speakers, exhibitors, and sponsors involved in social media, Internet marketing, search engines, and digital advertising, and offers an in-depth look at the future of technology presented by the world's top …
[2] Source: Global Internet Report 2015 (↑)
“Google and Facebook are evil.”Invited politicians picked that up immediately. Hereupon the Secretary of State for Media, Thomas Drozda, foolishly proposed the idea of a new tax for digital advertising. Any believed positive effect of this measure is a strong misconception of course. The said extra tax of currently 5% on paid advertising already exists for print media and goes back to 1927 (!). Originally it was supposed to be limited for a period of 5 years. Well, we are in Austria: The tax at some point rose to as high as 20% and even 30% and survived all efforts to abolish it altogether. In June 2000 the corresponding tax law was adapted and changed the last time. The Professional Association Advertising and Market Communication within the Austrian Federal Economic Chamber argues with politicians against this industry specific tax for ages. Obviously without much success so far. Now the time has come to tackle it again, and even more vigorously, because an expansion of this obsolete tax into the digital domain is not useful nor acceptable. To have large international corporations pay higher taxes to individual nations in general is heavily debated not only in the European Union right now. However, it is a much larger issue and cannot be solved on the back of the advertising industry. The problem with tax avoiding practices is of global scope and is not limited to companies like Google, Facebook, and Apple in Silicon Valley. As if any such tax could save individual businesses or industries that do not embrace change. Outdated business models will disappear inevitably. New generations of founders and smart business owners will embrace the digital age and seize the opportunity. Media formats like linear TV, radio, print, and certain types of agencies that serve the advertising industry are under high pressure. They are literally forced to find alternative business models, create new offers, and operate on a more efficient and effective level than ever before. What else should they do? International keynote speakers and successful local business owners shared what works in order to thrive in the digital era. Here is a short list in arbitrary order:
Update 2017-05-03: The book is almost finished. But Phil needs your help to get it off the ground. Please go to his indiegogo campaign (↑) and make a donation and he’ll send you a signed copy the day he picks up the books from the printer.
“Right now Apple’s Newsstand is THE place where people hungry for content are waiting with their wallets out prepared to pay for more information.”
All obsolete tips, broken links, etc. in the legacy editions 1 through 27 have been taken care of and are deleted now. Only evergreen, good tips from reputable sources have survived this procedure.
Update January 22, 2018: Mark has taken down this site in the summer of 2016. Thanks to the folks at Email is Not Dead (↑) for letting me know. They have put together a site with lots of email marketing related content.
Mike Munter presents Move Your Newsletter Content To Your Blog And Reach A Wider Audience (↑) posted at Mike Munter, Marketing Consultant (↑), saying, “Use this tip to get more web traffic and increase sales.”
John’s comment: Personally I am not a fan of pretty, content rich ezines but there are certainly plenty of use cases for them. Saying that, I find it a good idea to put those ezines online for public viewing and indexing by search engines. Thanks also for the descriptive screen shots, Mike.
Nishadha presents Market Your Startup with Emails: 6 Effective Ways with Examples (↑) posted at Creately Blog | Diagramming Articles and How to Draw Diagram Tips (↑), saying, “How a start-up can use email marketing.”
John’s comment: Good examples and guidelines for a brand building type of newsletter. Also with pretty screen shots. Nishada lists and explains six important features of such a newsletter. Miss one and you diminish your ROI.
Zach Bulygo, How to Keep Email Marketing Manageable (↑) posted at KISSmetrics - Tips, Tricks and Resources for Analytics, Marketing and Testing (↑), saying, “It could be argued that email marketing is a better and more effective form of marketing. Unlike TV, print, and internet ads, email marketing is opt-in, so people are willing and want to read your email messages. Unfortunately, many companies get overwhelmed and abandon their email marketing efforts. How can you set up an email marketing initiative that is relatively easy to undertake and maintain? Well, cover the basics first.”
John’s comment: Zach provides three ways for getting the creative juices flowing. And he discusses them in context of recent real world examples and shows why they work.
Technorati tags: email marketing tips, blog carnival
When you ask someone with a successful social media presence how to build your own audience, the answer most often is, “Write a blog post, Tweet it to your following, and share it on Facebook and LinkedIn.” But what if you do not have many followers on Twitter or Facebook Fans?
A few weeks ago, my company decided to start a process to answer the question: “How can a business that does not have many hits on their website, has no followers on Twitter, and no Fans on Facebook, generate sales leads using inbound marketing in only 30 days?”
Image source: Lasso, ©2007 by williac/flickr. - Some rights reserved. - CC-BY 2.0.
Shortly after I turned on the computer this morning, I decided that I will continue to write about Seth Godin and provide you with two great resources about smart marketing.
→ Continue reading: Podcast About Tribes And Speech About Purple Cows (Revisited)
Isn’t it fascinating how social networking platforms are taking over the Internet in a storm?
Ease of use and multimedia capabilities seem to be the main driver behind this development. It makes it fun for non techie people to use the Internet, to play around, and to communicate.
However, it takes effort to change the way your business communicates.
It has become hard to listen to and concentrate on a specific message which is buried in ever intensifying noise.
You as a marketer cannot blame people for being ignorant.
You only can blame yourself for being ignorant.
When was the last time you listened to the response you stimulated? Did you adjust your message, your timing, the channel, …?
(*) Image credit: ©2007 by myklroventine/flickr. - Some rights reserved. - CC-BY 2.0
A business owner who publishes a monthly email newsletter asked me for advice. The business in question is a European based specialist for color trends and consults with designers in the fashion and home design industries. In this particular case, Carol, wanted to know how to increase the open rate for her newsletter editions. Her company publishes the newsletter once a month.
I think my response might be transferable to your business or website as well. That is why I thought I should share it with a wider audience.
→ Continue reading: 5 Tips on How to Increase the Open Rate of Your Email Newsletter
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