Monday, October 25, 2010

How to Decrease Your Bounce Rate

Bounce rate tells you if your site works.

And it also tells you if you’re wasting money.

Bounce rate is the percentage of people who view a page but don’t click a link. They look at what you’ve got, decide they don’t like it, and click the back button. A good bounce rate is below 35%.
If you paid to bring in a visitor (like via Google Adwords) and they bounce, your ad spend goes down the drain. And if you worked your butt off to get a top 3 ranking for a great keyword, a bounce means that your prospect is probably going to check out your competitors.

Landing page bounce rate is one of the most important metrics to monitor constantly. If yours is too high here are some ways to improve it.

Headline Keyword Matching
Each of your pages’ top keywords has a common theme. You can find this out by looking at your ‘Entrance Keywords’ for a specific page in the Content area of Google Analytics. It will show you the top keywords that brought traffic to a page.

If 80% of your visitors enter looking for information about ‘red army knives’ and you have an unrelated headline like ‘Discover the Difference’, your bounce rate is most likely really high. Most of your visitors won’t be immediately satisfied and they’ll bounce.

Web surfers want what they want and they want it now. (Say that three times fast.)
So give it to them! Put text related to your entrance keywords in big bold letters at the top of your page.

More Images

Pictures are another bounce rate reducer.

It’s easy to know you’re in the right place when you see an image of what you’re looking for. Tons of text may be relevant but it can also be daunting.

Put images of your page theme near the top of your page. If your entrance keywords relate to ‘red army knives’, have a nice big picture of a red army knife into the optimal viewing area to show people they’re in the right place.

Discover Your Optimal Viewing Area

This handy tool from Google shows you the percentage of web users who can see your content without scrolling. Enter your page URL and see the percentages overlaid on your site.

Move your most relevant content to where the most people can see it right away. This means headlines, pictures of relevant things, and a little bit of text within the 99% area of your page.
If your relevant content is outside the viewing area your bounce rate will be high.

Happy testing!


Sunday, October 24, 2010

Handling Computer Viruses

A computer virus is software that is capable of creating a lot of problems to your computer programs and files. It can even affect your hard disk as well. These viruses travel through the Internet from computer to computer. Some of them can even be used to extract information from your computer illegally with the intent to sell. With all your personal information, identity theft becomes easy.
Often times your computer will begin doing weird things and stop running like it usually does when it has acquired a virus. Some signs of this can be your computer is reacting slower, freezing up frequently, runs and then restarts itself many times, some programs are not running at all and the it does not recognize disks or disk drives in the computer. You will also see some strange programs that were not there in the computer before, which you did not install.
You should run an anti-virus program to see if you do have a virus and where it is located. Sometimes your computer shows signs of having a virus, but this may also be due to other hardware failures that your computer is having and it may not have anything to do with computer viruses.
Removing computer viruses is not an easy task. Even experts need the help of removal tools. It is therefore very important to have the latest anti-virus updates on your computer. These programs have been created to stop most of the viruses from getting through, before they enter your computer in the first place. Of course, once you have a virus, you will have to try and get rid of it without losing too much of your data in the process. This also applies to the memory on your hard drive.
Prevention is perhaps the best solution to computer viruses. There are a few things that you can do to make sure that you don’t get viruses in the first place. First, keep your firewall on at all times. This will help keep unwanted programs out. Secondly, keep your system completely up-to-date to be able to handle the latest viruses efficiently. Next, make sure you have a good anti-virus software and that it is not expired. Now make sure to use antispyware software to protect your computer as well. Make sure you have all the information on these products and tools to keep your computer healthy at all times.

Thursday, October 21, 2010

5 Reasons You Should Use LinkedIn Groups for Business Social Networking




LinkedIn currently has over 75 million professionals who are actively participating on the site today. The site includes many features such as allowing users to upload their full resume, updating their status to let the world know what projects they are currently working on and participating in group discussions. Many LinkedIn users take advantage of these features, but there are still some that aren't sure how to make the most out of them.

LinkedIn groups are a great way to interact with other professionals in your field by sharing information and building contacts in other parts of the world. Although joining many groups can make you look more important and connected, it can also be overwhelming to maintain. Aren't sure how to use LinkedIn groups?

Here are 5 tips for getting the most out of groups, provided by the LinkedIn blog.

1. Make a commitment to a few groups that focus on your greatest professional interests. LinkedIn allows business professionals to network and collaborate with others that they may have never spoken to otherwise. If you haven't joined any groups yet, pick a couple that spark your professional interest and jump right into the conversation. According to LinkedIn, many of the most active members find that their participation in the right groups "directly enriches what they do at work."

2. Post news on group discussions. One of the easiest ways to start participating in groups is to post current news and ask an open-ended question. This will start a conversation and you will be able to see what stance your fellow professionals take on the issue. Expressing your opinion on a certain news piece will give you a chance to show others your professional expertise. This will boost your credibility and increase your chances of making useful professional connections. To find material, subscribe to industry-related newsletters, RSS feeds, Facebook feeds, company blog or Twitter.

3. Take advantage of the "Following" tool. Groups make social networking online easy by giving professionals a great way to keep track of which news stories their colleagues think are interesting and what they have on their minds. To keep up with all the current information, subscribe to the digest emails that summarize the activity of a group. Also use the "Following" tool to watch specific discussions that interest you. This will allow you to sit back and observe then jump in the conversation when you feel you have something provocative to contribute.

4. Get your coworkers involved. Why not create your own LinkedIn group and invite some of your trusted coworkers, clients and/or customers to join? You already discuss your professional interests with them which make them the perfect people to collaborate and network with on LinkedIn. Once other professionals see the intelligent discussions you are having, they'll want to join the group too and you'll be able to engage in a broader collaboration than you ever felt possible.

5. Learn more about the professionals on LinkedIn. Make sure to click through the profiles of your fellow group members to spark conversations about what they're currently working on. As your relationship and conversation grows, you can invite them to become a professional connection. The more connections you make, the more chances you have to expand your business and learn from others in your industry.

How Facebook can expand your Business

As a business owner, you are constantly looking for ways to make your business bigger and better. You always want your business to be successful and to continue growing. In order to expand the horizons of your business, you are always looking for the next big thing to take your business to the next level. A great way to do this is to take your business to the internet, but not just the internet, take your business to the social networking website known as Facebook. Facebook is one of the most popular social networking websites on the World Wide Web today with more than two hundred million active users from all over the globe.

How can joining the social networking website “Facebook” better my business?

The Facebook website is a social networking website. This website has taken the internet by storm. There are more than two hundred million active Facebook members who are located all over the globe. Where else can you get that level of exposure for your business? There are no boundaries for your success when it comes to taking your business to Facebook. Here is how Facebook can build your business:
• Build a Facebook profile for your business. On your profile you can use your “About” section to introduce your business and to give viewers a idea of what your business is about.
• Your Facebook profile will allow you to upload extensive amount of pictures. This will allow you to display your business name/logo, a picture of your physical store, and take pictures of your items or products.
• You can create albums, which could be useful for new merchandise. For instance, when you receive new products you can upload photos of all the new goodies and create an album just for your new items.
• If you have sale items or discount items, you can place them in an album all of their own. You can use the caption of the photo to display regular price, and what the price has been reduced to.
• Facebook allows you to update your status. This means you can update your friends and page viewers of new merchandise, sales or discounts, or promotions.
• You can use Facebook as a “refer a friend” method. Tell your existing friends that if they refer a friend to add you to Facebook, that you will reward them with some sort of of discount.
• Your Facebook friends could make purchases through your Facebook profile. For example, tell friends they can send you a message on Facebook with the subject of “order.” Tell them to make the body of the message contain product number, quantity, and color and other product information. Your customers can paypal their total amount due, send checks, or money orders to your business.
• You can also display contact information on your Facebook profile such as physical business address and your business phone number. This will allow potential customers to validate your business


Sunday, October 17, 2010

Using Long Tail Keywords for better Optimization

The objective of a business website is to attract potential buyers and convert them into paying customers.

Keywords can help you fulfill this objective. Use appropriate keywords on your site and you’ll attract visitors who want to buy the types of products you have to offer....The more relevant keywords that you rank well for, the more business you will do.

So, by constantly expanding your keyword lists, you expand the potential market for your business.

If your visitors are searching for chocolate they may also be searching for dark chocolate or organic dark chocolate or even organic mint-flavored dark chocolate.

So try to cover long tail keywords for better positioning in Search Engines...!!