Marketing 754: Friend or Foe?

December 18th, 2008

Marketing 754: Friend or Foe

OSU MKTG 754 Student

Guest Blog Post

 Hands down, Marketing & Logistics 754 is the most difficult class that I have ever taken.  I have struggled thru the past eight weeks hopelessly lost.  The material is difficult to grasp and the presentation of it is hard to follow.  And don’t even get me started on web analytics!

web_analytics_2Dan_hour_a_day2.jpg

But rather than focusing on the negatives, I would prefer to share what I have enjoyed about the class.  First, there are the blogging assignments.  I had never blogged before this course. 

Another aspect of the class that I have enjoyed is the optimizing of a website’s landing page.  The instructions were clear and well organized; this is what it currently has and this is how you make it better.  Rewriting titles, content, and Metatags was actually fun.   Metatags remind me of the Matrix with all of that funky code!

I know this may sound crazy but writing Metatag codes is kind of like sculpting or painting.  You start with a blank canvas and then create a beautiful piece of artwork out of nothing! 

As we also learned in class, there are other ways to optimize a landing page as well.  Including footers and anchortext links are great ways to improve a site.  So while I didn’t have enough computer savvy to actually build a site myself, it was rewarding thinking of ways to beef up the Bizwatch landing page.  

So even though I have faced many obstacles in this course, I can also say that the few achievements I have accomplished have helped to inspire me to stay strong and push threw these last few weeks of the quarter!

Posted in Blogging, Ohio State University Fisher College of Business. No Comments »

 

OSU Search Marketing & Analytics (Principles of Electronic Marketing) Student Blog Posts on Bizresearch.com

March 31st, 2008

by Laura Thieme

Hello everyone! The Ohio State Search Marketing & Analytics (Principles of Electronic Marketing) 754 course began last week. 34 students remain as of right now - although over 40 registered. I had 32 students on the first day of class last week, and it was such a joy to begin teaching again. The most enjoyable project thus far is reading the blog posts of the students about anyone of five topics they chose to write about last week. I included a couple of touchy subjects, including voting in this year’s election, climate change and global warming, as well as more benign subjects of your favorite pet, your favorite hobby and what you plan to do upon graduation.

Here are some blog post tips for the students as well as anyone reading this blog post:

1) Write relevant, catchy (when possible) blog titles - search engines read these, some blog software creates keyword embedded URLs from your page titles (this one does not, but www.laurathieme.com does - see the blog post itself, or category pages, etc.)

2) Write blog posts somewhat like an opinonated essay, but offer paragraphs, transitional sentences, and useful information to the reader

3) Link out to relevant websites, deep links to specific pages, categories or topics on other sites - don’t be afraid to lose your reader - if your topic is well-written and useful - you typically won’t lose your reader

4) Link to pictures, embed pics, when possible - use a Flickr (www.flickr.com) account when possible - we have one - www.flickr.com/photos/bizresearch

5) Don’t oversize your pictures - 300 pics is big - perhaps a smaller photo using the Flickr index image if possible - I’ve started doing this recently

6) If you’re writing for a corporate blog, not your own, limit the personally identifiable information that might make someone just a little squeamish - and uncomfortable - or think immediately - TMI - don’t expect that ONE to be published by an administrator

7) If you think I’m talking about you mentioning your dog, your opinions, you’re wrong - it’s the reference to something else, trust me

8) Keep them short - don’t ramble - although I’ve done this upon occasion - but when I write for other journals and search engine websites, I have a word limit and I’m always edited. So, keep that in mind when writing for an outside corporate blog.

9) Add valuable information - cross-reference - I can’t say this enough - and yes, I’ve already said this once…. :-)

10) Typos, typos - are a reflection upon you that someone can easily judge - it means you’re not paying attention and thus, I might not want you working for me in marketing if you can’t spell…….

I’ll continue to publish OSU Search Marketing & Web Analytics 754 (Principles of Electronic Marketing) blog posts throughout the quarter on various topics. This week they have to write about a pleasant or not so pleasant product or service experience. There is an amazing power as a blogger - utilize it!

Posted in Blogging, Ohio State University Fisher College of Business. No Comments »

 

The Keys to Successful SEO - Part 5 of a 5 Part Series

March 25th, 2008

The Keys to Successful SEO - Part 5 of a 5 Part Series on Why SEO Doesn’t & Won’t Work
by Laura Thieme

It’s nearly 4 a.m. on a Tuesday morning. I can’t sleep. Monroe, my tuxedo cat, woke me up, and quite frankly I’m not sure I mind - I was dreaming about ghosts in the basement and watering the vegetable garden - see what happens when you watch “Medium” at 10 p.m. at night. I’m going to have to boycott that show.

Misha who is purring in my ear now, is petitioning for a “midnight” snack. I’m not sure what I’m more afraid of, not being able to return to sleep before it’s “time to get up” or waking the dog. Once I get up, then the cats have to be fed, the dog wants to be let outside, and then it’s all over. No chance of getting back to sleep, but do I care? My mind is active on many fronts - and I suspect it has a lot to do with my class at OSU starting today. But the mind also wandered into web analytics, which is a large part of what I’m teaching my class on at Ohio State. In fact, I’ve redone several parts of the syllabus to put more emphasis on web analytics.

We’re starting the class this year with five sessions on web analytics, instead of ending the class with web analytics. The focus won’t be on visibility first, it’s going to be on web analytics first, because it’s all about continuously proving value to your client (internal or external) on your web marketing budget. Today, I was on a prospective client call. It was our second call into the “relationship”. The company said something that I really liked hearing. They said, “some companies won’t even work with us if we don’t use web analytics”. Isn’t that great???? I loved it!!! I don’t use exclamation marks very often either :-)

I had asked the company in my first call if they had any form of web analytics? Did they have Google Adwords? Did they have Google Analytics? They had neither. And before you SEO and analytics experts scoff, these people understand the value of investing in meaningful data - they just need a little education on the process. In fact, they are moving forward on making a few minor changes to their website and installing Google Analytics before we proceed, regardless of whether “we” get the deal. So why do I care so much about web analytics, and why am I willing to write about it at 4:10 a.m. in the morning?

If you don’t have a robust web analytics package installed, you’re not able to intelligently answer “what’s wrong and what’s right with my website?” Granted, with web analytics, you will indeed have to make some inferences regarding what’s wrong, what’s right. And in fact, you won’t really know the specific experience analysis (see Avinash Kaushik’s book on Web Analytics, An Hour a Day, Chapter 1), unless you survey your customers. You can only make observations based on the web analytics data.

However, it’s the time that goes into the web analytics process that can be daunting - mindless at times - and like looking for meaning in your life while walking on the beach and looking out at the ocean (not that you or I have ever experienced the latter). What can make web analytics painful, and at times useless? It’s the tool, baby! Well, that and a little methodology or lack thereof.

So, how do you get a good web analytics tool? And how can it help you with your SEO efforts, which is what this series is all about? Do I need a part 6 of this 5-part series? Let’s start with Google Analytics because that’s what at a minimum, most of us should have this application installed (javascript code on your website) if we’re doing SEO and paid search (which is what you should all be doing). And why do you need web analytics again? Because you’re going to learn which keyword phrase(s) send you the lead, make your phone “ring, ring”, and your cash machine ka-ching, ka-ching! (Sorry, it’s 4 a.m.) Start with Google Analytics because it’s relatively painless, and it’s free - go figure!

With Google Analytics you can get alot of info about what’s working and what’s not with your online advertising campaign, or your website in general. It’s not perfect, the data may not reconcile, and quite frankly, if it’s not installed correctly, it could be relatively useless. But in general, Google Analytics makes my life as an SEO expert, and a search marketing guru, much easier to show the client value in which keyword converts to a lead or an online sale.

Now having said this, it’s knowing where in Google Analytics you need to go to figure the answer out to “what’s working, what’s not”. I am guilty of long posts, so I’m going to start another page in the event you want to “read on about web analytics!”.

Posted in Ohio State University Fisher College of Business, Search Optimization (SEO), Web Analytics. 1 Comment »