Sunday, January 30, 2011

How do I get my site on Google?

If you want your web site to be highly ranked Google and other major search engines create quality content to add to your web site—create content that the users you want to view your web site will value and connect with.

Does SEO (Search Engine Optimization) have value?
Google doesn't think so.

Why does Google dislike SEOs?
Nobody likes spam. SEOs have a reputation for perpetuating spam; using practices like submitting sites to thousands of search engine directories, creating satellite sites that use optimized keywords to point to a main site, writing and spinning bogus "Boondoggle" articles and blogs to use anchor text full of key words to rank their main site higher.

What does Google like? SEM (Search Engine Marketing)
Google gets profit from Paid advertisement; Google wants businesses to use their paid services. For businesses who want to be ranked higher the answer is simple, bid higher than your competition. The most successful businesses are probably the businesses who are willing and can afford to pay more for specific keywords. These top businesses will be rewarded with their higher bid prices by being listed higher on Google's search results.

The good news for the underdogs is that if you do not have the resources to play bidding games and risk money on paid advertising you have an alternative—to achieve sustainable high ranking results on Google you simply have to create quality content. Create content that users want to link to. Create new content with new information that is useful to the visitors of your site. Put value in the content of your web site so that you can make a connection with the visitors.

If you need help running a PPC (pay per click) advertising campaign or creating quality content for your web site to rank higher in organic search engine results you may benefit greatly by retaining the services of persons skilled in search engine optimization and web site development. Just make sure that if you hire a SEOer or SEMer to put value in your content and make a connection with your users.

Saturday, January 29, 2011

Affordable Web Design

What is affordable Web Site Design?

The cheapest web site solution will mostly likely let you down, will be a waste of your money, will not bring you any value. My collegiate team was transported in busses by the company who offered the lowest bid; the result was that no one ever slept in one of those busses and many of my team mates found religion on one of our many harrowing road trips. Cheap might get you to your destination but it can be risky.

Will affordable web site design bring you greater prosperity?

Of course this is based on your individual needs and your relationship with your web site designer or web developer. Less experienced designers might charge half of what an established web design firm would bid on the same project, and you might get great work for your money, or you might get less superior work and end up having to pay an established firm to redesign a site you already spent money on.

If you can find a web designer that you trust, who values your opinion of their work and their desire to serve you more than the financial benefits of retaining you as a client you will probably receive greater value for your purchase no matter what price you paid.

Most Web Site Designers are willing to help you out by offering a deal that works for both of you. This could mean a web site with less frills, by only being able to promise a specified number of hours for your web site project, or that your web site will take longer to produce than it would for a client paying the full price. Talk with your web designer and see what they might be able to do to help you by finding a solution that is mutually beneficial.

Tuesday, October 26, 2010

Non-Profit Tip: Google Website Clinic Form

Google Non-Profit Website Clinic Form!


This is a great resource to have Google professionals review your site and give you tips on how to make your web site a better tool for your non-profit organization.

"Submit your site to be considered for review, analysis, and advice from Google's Search Quality team! Please note that if you submit your site, you agree that Google may use your site as an public example in our follow-up site clinic posts on the Webmaster Central Blog and in other public forums. You acknowledge that Google may publicly identify problems with your website."

https://spreadsheets1.google.com/viewform?formkey=dFhvVTZ6dE5CNlFGUVhFWHQ3YTUwc1E6MQ

Thursday, October 21, 2010

Kiva.org Empowering 3rd world Entrepreneurs with Micro Loans!



Kiva.org is a site that connects people by allowing every day Joe's to lend micro loans ($25 & up) to help alleviate poverty. The loans go to Entrepreneurs all over the world who work every day to make their world a better place.

This week Kiva touts a 98.5% repayment rate on loans, over $2 milllion in loans, about 5,000 new lenders funding almost 6,000 new entrepreneurs, and 1 loan every 9 seconds!

I think of this site as a real life version of Sim City, I get to put money to develop businesses and see the money returned to me to lend out again to make our world a better place.

Check it out for yourself and maybe play around with micro-loans see how our small contributions can change the world.

See the change:

Monday, October 4, 2010

Pepsi Refresh Project

Interesting experiment in Social Giving, the Pepsi Refresh project gives away 1.3 million per month to user voted and submitted ideas to better: Health, Arts & Culture, Food & Shelter, The Planet, Neighborhoods, and Education.

Connecting with social media platforms like Facebook, the Pepsi Refresh project allows users to spread donation requests throughout their own social networks to push ideas they believe will help to make a better world.

I hope this works and other companies follow suit!

check it out at: http://www.refresheverything.com

Thursday, September 30, 2010

"the community is the end goal."

reposted from: http://philanthropy.com/blogPost/Social-Networks-Shouldnt-Be/27055/

Social Networks Shouldn't Be Used Solely as Fund-Raising Tools

By Derek Lieu
For as long as nonprofit groups have used social-media tools, they have faced the perplexing problem of Internet money math: How do all of those supporters and friends add up to real dollars in the door?

But Zachary Sniderman, an assistant features editor for Mashable.com, suggests that money shouldn't necessarily be the object of nonprofit groups' social-media efforts. Social good, after all, is also about the process of bringing people together.

Take the Livestrong campaign. The group behind the ubiquitous golden wristband, the Lance Armstrong Foundation, recently started a Facebook campaign that encouraged fans to share their personal cancer stories on the social-networking Web site. The foundation wasn't trying to raise money through this effort. It was trying to bring people together behind its cause.

In this case, Mr. Sniderman writes, "the community is the end goal." The campaign did raise money, but as Brooke McMillan, the Lance Armstrong Foundation's online manager, said in the Mashable post, the social good came from "the actions of the people in the community."

Participation in online communities, Mr. Sniderman writes, "can help make [donors] feel like they are part of the organization and part of the solution."

That connection is crucial for advocacy groups, which depend on mobilizing members to rally in support of their causes. "Having a million people is more important than having $1-million," says Ben Rattray, chief executive of the social-change Web site Change.org.

Do you agree with this assessment? Is social media truly changing the way nonprofits connect with supporters—or are these tools merely new ways to accomplish the same goal?

Sunday, September 26, 2010

Why are friends important to intervene for your goals?



"In fact, the availability of these data, I think, heralds a kind of new era of what I and others would like to call "computational social science." It's sort of like when Galileo invented -- or, didn't invent -- came to use a telescope and could see the heavens in a new way, or Leeuwenhoek became aware of the microscope -- or actually invented -- and could see biology in a new way. But now we have access to these kinds of data that allow us to understand social processes and social phenomena in an entirely new way that was never before possible. And with this science, we can understand how exactly the whole comes to be greater than the sum of its parts. And actually, we can use these insights to improve society and improve human well-being."