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	<title>Vertical Measures &#187; The Basics</title>
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	<description>Intelligent Internet Marketing</description>
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		<title>Are You Paying For Internet Marketing Services You Don’t Really Need?</title>
		<link>http://www.verticalmeasures.com/link-building/are-you-paying-for-internet-marketing-services-you-dont-really-need/</link>
		<comments>http://www.verticalmeasures.com/link-building/are-you-paying-for-internet-marketing-services-you-dont-really-need/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 28 Nov 2011 18:35:32 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Mike Huber</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Content Strategy]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Link Building]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Measurement & Reporting]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Search Engine Optimization]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[The Basics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[internet marketing budget]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[internet marketing strategy]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[panda analysis]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.verticalmeasures.com/?p=11728</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Fixing your web presence is a lot like getting your car tuned up. You really have to make a diagnosis prior to getting your problems fixed. I recently listened to a radio show where the host was talking about how consumers often self-diagnose their car problems. The announcer related a story where a customer brought [...]
Related posts:<ol>
<li><a href='http://www.verticalmeasures.com/business/roi-on-internet-marketing-services/' rel='bookmark' title='ROI On Internet Marketing Services (Infographic)'>ROI On Internet Marketing Services (Infographic)</a></li>
<li><a href='http://www.verticalmeasures.com/boost-your-juice/win-5k-in-free-internet-marketing-services-boost-your-juice-2/' rel='bookmark' title='Win $5K in Free Internet Marketing Services: &#8220;Boost Your Juice 2&#8243;'>Win $5K in Free Internet Marketing Services: &#8220;Boost Your Juice 2&#8243;</a></li>
<li><a href='http://www.verticalmeasures.com/search-optimization/internet-marketing-resources-to-be-thankful-for/' rel='bookmark' title='Internet Marketing Resources to be Thankful For'>Internet Marketing Resources to be Thankful For</a></li>
</ol>]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-11763" src="http://www.verticalmeasures.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/Are-You-Paying-For-Internet-Marketing-Services-You-Don%E2%80%99t-Really-Need.jpg" alt="Are You Paying For Internet Marketing Services You Don’t Really Need?" width="670" height="230" /></p>
<p>Fixing your web presence is a lot like getting your car tuned up. You really have to make a diagnosis prior to getting your problems fixed.</p>
<p>I recently listened to a radio show where the host was talking about how consumers often self-diagnose their car problems. The announcer related a story where a customer brought his car into the shop and told them to &#8220;Give me a tune-up and align the front end because I keep hearing noises when I drive.&#8221;  Based on these instructions, the service shop did the tune-up and front end alignment.<span id="more-11728"></span></p>
<p>The customer paid for the repairs and then got in his car and drove away. But, he came back in just a few minutes, fuming. He asked for the manager and said that he should go for a quick drive with him. The manager agreed and they started to drive away. Once they were on the road, the customer said, &#8220;I asked you to tune-up my car and listen this noise is still here.&#8221; The manager said, &#8220;We did tune-up your car,&#8221; and he then reached over and turned off the air conditioning fan; the noise immediately went away. The service manager said, &#8220;You should have asked us to fix this fan instead of asking for a tune up if you wanted this noise to go away.&#8221;</p>
<p>Then the customer said, that <a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/50/Niagara_falls_panorama.jpg" rel="lightbox[11728]">rumbling noise</a> is still here and I asked you to align my front end. The manager said the noise isn&#8217;t coming from the front end, it sounds like it&#8217;s coming from the back. They drove back to the service station and sure enough, the customer had a badly worn rear tire that was causing the noise and vibration.</p>
<p>The customer paid for the additional repairs as suggested by the manager and drove away a happy camper, although with a much lighter bank account. He paid for repairs that he really didn&#8217;t need.</p>
<p>Many of our clients and potential clients come to us with the same approach. They self-diagnose their problems and come to us asking to <a href="http://www.verticalmeasures.com/services/quality-link-building/">build links</a>, add content or manage their social media without having spent the time to diagnose the real problem. Our recommendation is to <strong><em>always </em></strong>determine the problem before throwing services at a perceived issue.</p>
<p>Many businesses are still trying to figure out the &#8220;why&#8221; of Panda. They think it&#8217;s duplicate content, thin content, stale content, not enough social proof or maybe it&#8217;s not enough links. Unless they take the time, they will just be guessing and like the customer in the illustration above, they will be throwing away good money at problems that may not exist.</p>
<h3>Here are 3 things to consider before deploying any tactics to build web site traffic.</h3>
<h3>1. Make sure you understand the problem.</h3>
<p>Clearly identify the problem. Is your traffic down?  Is it conversions you want improved?  Is it your SERPs you want improved?  Clearly identifying the problem will help you in <a href="http://www.verticalmeasures.com/approach/internet-marketing-strategy/">creating an internet marketing strategy</a> and the tactics needed to solve your problem.</p>
<p>Another thing to consider as you identify the problem; make sure you are solving the <em>right</em> problem. Often times, the problem is really just a symptom and we rush to fix the symptom instead of the actual problem. Careful consideration is the key. Take the time and spend the money to get to the root of the problem. We can do an in-depth analysis of your site and as long as you have analytics, can identify why you were affected by the Panda update and then help you take steps to get re-indexed and back in the game.</p>
<h3>2. Make sure you have enough of a budget to fix the problem.</h3>
<p>I have a background in advertising. Many of the companies I worked with would often &#8220;flight&#8221; their commercials. That is, they would run a heavy schedule followed by being dormant and then another heavy schedule. They realized they didn&#8217;t have a large enough budget to advertise weekly and they also realized if they spread their budget to last the month, it wouldn&#8217;t be significant enough to move the needle. Visualize a large boulder that you need to move and all you have is a steel rod to use for leverage. The longer the rod the better the leverage. Think of your budget like it&#8217;s the rod: more is better.</p>
<p>Often times our customers will come to us with a limited budget and want the moon… oh, and the stars and the sun. We often recommend to prospective clients to save their money and like an advertiser, wait until they have enough of a budget to make a difference.</p>
<p>For example, one of our customers with a limited budget requested that we focus on 20+ keywords. Think about it. With a small budget we would attack all these keywords and not be very successful in moving them up in the rankings. A limited budget might get you from a ranking of 25 all the way up to 19 &#8212;  yet, still no one would find you.</p>
<p>You need to attack a problem with enough leverage to make an impact. Just spending a small amount will not give you the leverage you need to make an impact. Focus on a smaller subset of your problem and make an impact with whatever your size budget.</p>
<h3>3. Think about attacking the problem from a number of angles.</h3>
<p>Internet marketing works best when you take a holistic approach. Like in our advertising example above, many companies focus on campaigns involving a variety of advertising platforms that have detailed schedules with predicted outcomes. That is, attack your problem from a number of angles to give you the very best leverage and have in mind an outcome.</p>
<ul class="feature-list">
<li>
<h4>Site Structure</h4>
<p>First fix anything on-site issues you have. Page load times, canonical issues, landing pages and page architecture should come first. Once you have this handled attack your traffic from a number of angles for the best result.</li>
<li>
<h4>Content</h4>
<p>Add great content. Give your users a reason to come to your site and a reason to come back. Focus on core content (keywords) but also broaden your topics to <a href="http://www.verticalmeasures.com/resources/keyword-research/">capture more long-tail keywords</a>. Make your content so compelling that other sites will want to link to it. You can do this by creating info graphics, white-papers, e-books and video.</li>
<li>
<h4>Link Building</h4>
<p>If you write great content, you&#8217;ll naturally get links but you may want to acquire them quicker. Many of our clients work with us because we deliver quality links. We spend the time researching and accumulating lists of great websites. We often times create great content that is easily accepted by web masters as it improves their site and allows us a link back.</li>
<li>
<h4>Analysis</h4>
<p>The only way to identify your problem is through analysis and the only way to constantly improve is to constantly monitor your results and to tweak your actions along the way. But remember, it&#8217;s not just analysis, it’s creating action steps based on the data. Analysis without action is worthless.</li>
</ul>
<p>Don’t be like our car service customer, diagnosing your own problems. Let the professionals take a look and make their best recommendations. Remember, they’re the ones that have seen and heard it all before. They can quickly determine the problem and through years of experience and lessons-learned, help you to improve your website presence in the most efficient manner possible.
<div class="wp-about-author-containter-top" style="background-color:#dce0ec;">
<div class="wp-about-author-pic"><img alt='' src='http://1.gravatar.com/avatar/72930f22ef19f2dedbe74bec4bef8d52?s=100&amp;d=&amp;r=G' class='avatar avatar-100 photo' height='100' width='100' /></div>
<div class="wp-about-author-text">
<h3><a href='http://www.verticalmeasures.com/author/mike-huber/' title='Mike Huber'>Mike Huber</a></h3>
<p>As the Director of Client Services at Vertical Measures, Mike Huber is in charge of developing efficient processes in order to improve overall productivity and quality of client services including; link building, social media marketing and content development. </p>
<p>Mike has a wealth of experience in marketing and advertising.  Starting out in newspaper advertising, he has seen the transformation of print to digital.  For the past 15 years, he has been involved in online marketing, developing extensive PPC programs and organic SEO tactics, resulting in a significant growth, traffic, and revenue for clients. </p>
<p>Mike is an accomplished public speaker and presents frequently on advertising and online marketing topics.</p>
<p><a href="https://plus.google.com/118264458655980423368/?rel=author">+ Mike Huber</a></p>
<p><a href='http://www.verticalmeasures.com' title='Mike Huber'>Website</a> &#8211; <a href='@mjhuber' title='Mike Huberon Twitter'>Twitter</a> &#8211; <a href='http://www.facebook.com/VerticalMeasures' title='Mike Huber on Facebook'>Facebook</a> &#8211; <a href='http://www.verticalmeasures.com/author/mike-huber/' title='More posts by Mike Huber'>More Posts</a> </p>
</div>
</div>
<p>Related posts:<ol>
<li><a href='http://www.verticalmeasures.com/business/roi-on-internet-marketing-services/' rel='bookmark' title='ROI On Internet Marketing Services (Infographic)'>ROI On Internet Marketing Services (Infographic)</a></li>
<li><a href='http://www.verticalmeasures.com/boost-your-juice/win-5k-in-free-internet-marketing-services-boost-your-juice-2/' rel='bookmark' title='Win $5K in Free Internet Marketing Services: &#8220;Boost Your Juice 2&#8243;'>Win $5K in Free Internet Marketing Services: &#8220;Boost Your Juice 2&#8243;</a></li>
<li><a href='http://www.verticalmeasures.com/search-optimization/internet-marketing-resources-to-be-thankful-for/' rel='bookmark' title='Internet Marketing Resources to be Thankful For'>Internet Marketing Resources to be Thankful For</a></li>
</ol></p>]]></content:encoded>
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		<title>The Basics: Websites that Drive Traffic and Repeat Visits</title>
		<link>http://www.verticalmeasures.com/the-basics/the-basics-websites-that-drive-traffic-and-repeat-visits/</link>
		<comments>http://www.verticalmeasures.com/the-basics/the-basics-websites-that-drive-traffic-and-repeat-visits/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 29 Aug 2011 11:30:13 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Mike Huber</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[The Basics]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.verticalmeasures.com/?p=10710</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[I recently spoke to a group of website owners at Local First Arizona in Bisbee about website design that encourages traffic and repeat visitors. The presentation was in a workshop format that lasted two hours. I was struck by how the issues they face are not new but they warrant repeating, as many of the [...]
Related posts:<ol>
<li><a href='http://www.verticalmeasures.com/search-optimization/higher-rankings-in-google-the-basics/' rel='bookmark' title='Higher Rankings in Google: The Basics'>Higher Rankings in Google: The Basics</a></li>
</ol>]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><img src="http://www.verticalmeasures.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/Websites-That-Drive-Traffic-And-Repeat-Visits.jpg" alt="Websites That Drive Traffic And Repeat Visits" title="Websites That Drive Traffic And Repeat Visits" width="670" height="230" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-10745" /></p>
<p>I recently spoke to a group of website owners at <a href="http://www.localfirstaz.com/" target="_blank">Local First Arizona</a> in Bisbee about website design that encourages traffic and repeat visitors.</p>
<p>The presentation was in a workshop format that lasted two hours. I was struck by how the issues they face are not new but they warrant repeating, as many of the improvements they need to make are the fundamentals of a great website. Here are some things distilled from that <a href="http://www.verticalmeasures.com/content-marketing-workshop/">workshop</a> that will help you increase traffic to your website and repeat visits.<span id="more-10710"></span></p>
<h2>Mindset</h2>
<p>So, you want to have a website with great traffic and return visitors. Then get ready because you need to understand what it takes in terms of focus and resources to create and maintain a high quality website.</p>
<p>Gone are the days of creating a website and then washing your hands and declaring, &#8220;Okay, we&#8217;re done.&#8221;  The best websites are constantly adding great content and updating information. They are not set-it and forget-it entities. You must be able to make a commitment of time and resources in order to have a successful website.  You are now a publisher. Publishers do what? They publish. The very best publish great content on a frequent basis.</p>
<h2>Website Infrastructure</h2>
<p>Unless you have these skills, you will need to engage a web developer and graphic artist to help you create your website. You will need to find a hosting company to host your site (annualized fees). If you want interactivity, you will need to determine a CMS (content management system). There are some very good free CMS systems. Depending on the complexity of your site, you may need to develop a customized CMS system (development fees).</p>
<p><img class="size-large wp-image-10712 alignright" title="Content Development Team" src="http://www.verticalmeasures.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/9_Social-Networking-1024x682.jpg" alt="Content Development Team" width="423" height="282" /><br />
<h2>Content</h2>
<p>Again, unless you have these resources in your company, you will need to:</p>
<ul>
<li>Engage writers and editors, photographers      and videographers.</li>
<li>Create an editorial calendar so you can      track when and what you want to publish.</li>
<li>Research.</li>
<li>&#8216;Listen&#8217; to your visitors and adapt your      content to fit their needs and demands.</li>
</ul>
<p>If you are able to employ your own staff, that is usually the ideal scenario. Your staff knows your business the best and likely has great, untapped ideas. Ask them to contribute to your blog or to write a white paper or free guide about the very tasks they perform each day. It is second nature to them anyway and they will get some good experience and recognition out of it.</p>
<h2>Online Marketing</h2>
<p>And, do not forget that you will need to market your site. It doesn&#8217;t matter how well or compelling your content is if no one ever reads it. Unless you&#8217;re on page one of search engine results, you won&#8217;t have much, if any, traffic. Online marketing takes resources too:  bloggers, community posting, social media personas and frequent postings.</p>
<p>It is a commitment in resources so make sure you&#8217;re ready. Can you do it without all the above?  Sure, but do not expect much from your website.</p>
<h2>Where&#8217;s the Money</h2>
<p>Where can you find the money and the time for this?  Analyze your current media buys. If you&#8217;re doing newspaper and yellow page advertising, then you&#8217;re probably wasting money. Newspaper circulation is down in historic numbers and yellow page readership is almost non-existent with the exception of their online component. Move your marketing dollars around in order to meet your customers where they are congregating&#8230; online.</p>
<h2>Costs and Goal Setting</h2>
<p>There are some things to consider prior to launching your new website or prior to doing a renovation.</p>
<ul>
<li>What information will you put on your      site?</li>
<li>What will be on your core pages? And, how      many new pages will be added to the site?</li>
<li>What information will you include?</li>
<li>What about images?  Do you have images or do you need to      hire a photographer or perhaps, buy from a stock photo service?</li>
<li>Will you need any special      functionality?  Is this an      e-commerce site?</li>
</ul>
<p>Establish a timeline with major milestones down to minor tasks along with who will be responsible for each and the resources and money that will be required.</p>
<p><img class="size-large wp-image-10714 alignright" title="The Bikini Concept" src="http://www.verticalmeasures.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/Bikini-Concept-1024x718.jpg" alt="The Bikini Concept" width="411" height="206" /><br />
<h2>Make Your Site Customer Centric</h2>
<p>Your website should not be about you in terms of the features of your product. It should be about benefits to your customers. Sure, you want them know product specifications but they want to know how your product will save them time, entertain them, solve a problem or save them money. You get it, it&#8217;s the What&#8217;s In It For Me (WIFM) factor.</p>
<p>The best websites teach, educate and entertain. Give your visitors more than they bargained for and they will come back. Teach them about your &#8216;secret sauce&#8217;. Many companies are afraid to share their information for fear that their competitors will steal their ideas. You have a unique selling proposition&#8230;let your visitors know what it is. The competition may use some of your ideas but they will never be &#8216;you&#8217; with your unique personality and unique management style. It&#8217;s the bikini concept. Show them 90% and they&#8217;ll want to see the last 10%.</p>
<h2>Create Great Content</h2>
<p>Your site should deliver relevant focused content to your visitors. This can be in the form of text, images and/or video. Know your audience and deliver information in their preferred format. And, do it on a consistent basis. Search engines love new content. Posting fresh content will help your site move up in the search engine rankings.</p>
<h2>Gathering Content</h2>
<p><strong> </strong>Most businesses have brochures and marketing pieces. Start with these and determine what information you want to include on the site. Look for other internal documents to flesh out your initial <a href="http://www.verticalmeasures.com/content-strategy/how-to-create-and-use-a-content-inventory-2011/">content inventory</a>. Here are some ideas on what to include:</p>
<ul>
<li>History and mission/vision of your company</li>
<li>Any press releases or news articles that have been written about your company</li>
<li>Customer testimonials</li>
<li>Complete contact information</li>
<li>Profiles and bios of your key personnel</li>
<li>Other product information including, prices, photos and graphics</li>
<li>Frequently asked questions (FAQs)</li>
<li>Video that is either product focused or service focused</li>
<li>Information on how to engage your services</li>
<li>Geographic area where you provide services</li>
<li>Features and benefit documentation</li>
</ul>
<h2>Post-It Notes Are Your Friend</h2>
<p>Use post-it notes and write specific content ideas down, one per post-it. This content will start to fall into different natural categories. Take the post-its and arrange them by category. You&#8217;ll start to notice natural breaks where you can add navigation to your site. The more specific you can be here, the better your navigation and organization on the site.</p>
<h2>Wireframe the Site</h2>
<p>Once you&#8217;ve determined the content and the natural categories of information make a temporary site so you can place all the information on a page. Try <a href="http://iplotz.com/" target="_blank">iPlotz</a>.</p>
<h2>Add Interactivity</h2>
<p>Gone are the days of web 1.0 where websites were all about information and transactions. These sites</p>
<p>were one-dimensional and boring. Since 2005, webmasters have been adding interactivity to their site designs. Called Web 2.0, these sites offer the ability to comment, review, and vote and even contribute to the content pages. No longer is it about just retrieving information, it is about contributing your opinion and adding your experiences and information to make a website more informative and more accurate.</p>
<p>The cool thing about interactivity is that you can actually &#8216;listen&#8217; to your customers. Read what they say about you and your products and act on that information. If you get dinged on customer service, then look at your processes and improve them. If your readers are having issues with your products then tell them how to work around issues or about bug fixes or invite them to bring the product back for an exchange or refund.</p>
<div id="attachment_10726" class="wp-caption alignright" style="width: 332px"><a href="http://www.verticalmeasures.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/Bisbee-Image-800x600.jpg" rel="lightbox[10710]"><img class="size-large wp-image-10726 " title="Bisbee Arizona" src="http://www.verticalmeasures.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/Bisbee-Image-800x600.jpg" alt="Bisbee Arizona" width="322" height="241" /></a>
<p class="wp-caption-text">Here is a photo I took on my way out of Bisbee.</p>
</div>
<h2>Research Competitor&#8217;s Websites</h2>
<p>Take at look at the competition.</p>
<ul>
<li>What do their sites look like?</li>
<li>What are they focusing on?</li>
<li>Do you like what they&#8217;re doing?</li>
<li>Is it something you want to emulate?</li>
</ul>
<h2>Keywords</h2>
<ul>
<li>How are your customers going to find you      online?</li>
<li>Most traffic comes from the search      engines.</li>
<li>Do you know what keywords to use and      optimize for?</li>
<li>How will you pare that down into attracting      relevant customers? You have the potential of a global audience.</li>
<li>If you&#8217;re too broad, you&#8217;ll have a high      bounce rate. If you&#8217;re too      specific, you&#8217;ll be missing customers.</li>
<li>Spend some time on this. It is important!</li>
</ul>
<h2>Best Of</h2>
<ul>
<li>Look not only at your competition, look      for the best websites. Determine      what you like.</li>
<li>What kinds of layouts, colors and      functionality do you like?</li>
<li>Consider background texture and color,      general layout structure; whether the site is 2 or 3 column format.</li>
<li>What fonts do you like?</li>
<li>Do you want/like a slider on the home      page. You will want to share this all with your designer and developer.</li>
</ul>
<h2>A Word About Price</h2>
<p>You get what you pay for. If a price seems too good to be true, it probably is. You can get many applications free. If you have a limited budget, you may want to start there. <a href="http://wordpress.org/" target="_blank">WordPress</a> is an excellent foundation for an interactive website. Or, for the more stouthearted, try Django, Drupal, Joomla.</p>
<p>Please do <em>not</em> have your nephew, cousin or friend of a friend build your website. I cannot tell you how many times I have seen this happen and it <em>always</em> results in the need to have the site redone. Spend the money and hire a professional.</p>
<h2>A Word About Flash</h2>
<p>Flash design can really make your site compelling. The trade off is that iPads do not read flash, it takes longer to load your pages and search engines cannot spider flash. Skip flash and have your designer develop your site introduction in HTML5. You can get the same results as with flash and you can see it on an iPad. Not that an iPad is the be-all, end-all, but there are almost 30 million of them out there with more selling every day.</p>
<h2>Mobile</h2>
<p>Make sure you consider what your website will look like on a mobile phone. You cannot just assume your site will look good on a mobile device. On a mobile device, you do not want to be constantly scrolling and enlarging text. The mobile version needs to be easy to navigate and it should have short cuts to transactions with big buttons.</p>
<p>I have covered a lot here&#8230; but you should have been at the two-hour presentation we talked about even more. Hopefully, this information will get you thinking about resources needed and the steps to take to build traffic and encourage repeat visitors.</p>
<p><em><strong>What tips or resources do you have for someone just getting started or who is looking to renovate their current website?</strong></em></p>
<div class="wp-about-author-containter-top" style="background-color:#dce0ec;">
<div class="wp-about-author-pic"><img alt='' src='http://1.gravatar.com/avatar/72930f22ef19f2dedbe74bec4bef8d52?s=100&amp;d=&amp;r=G' class='avatar avatar-100 photo' height='100' width='100' /></div>
<div class="wp-about-author-text">
<h3><a href='http://www.verticalmeasures.com/author/mike-huber/' title='Mike Huber'>Mike Huber</a></h3>
<p>As the Director of Client Services at Vertical Measures, Mike Huber is in charge of developing efficient processes in order to improve overall productivity and quality of client services including; link building, social media marketing and content development. </p>
<p>Mike has a wealth of experience in marketing and advertising.  Starting out in newspaper advertising, he has seen the transformation of print to digital.  For the past 15 years, he has been involved in online marketing, developing extensive PPC programs and organic SEO tactics, resulting in a significant growth, traffic, and revenue for clients. </p>
<p>Mike is an accomplished public speaker and presents frequently on advertising and online marketing topics.</p>
<p><a href="https://plus.google.com/118264458655980423368/?rel=author">+ Mike Huber</a></p>
<p><a href='http://www.verticalmeasures.com' title='Mike Huber'>Website</a> &#8211; <a href='@mjhuber' title='Mike Huberon Twitter'>Twitter</a> &#8211; <a href='http://www.facebook.com/VerticalMeasures' title='Mike Huber on Facebook'>Facebook</a> &#8211; <a href='http://www.verticalmeasures.com/author/mike-huber/' title='More posts by Mike Huber'>More Posts</a> </p>
</div>
</div>
<p>Related posts:<ol>
<li><a href='http://www.verticalmeasures.com/search-optimization/higher-rankings-in-google-the-basics/' rel='bookmark' title='Higher Rankings in Google: The Basics'>Higher Rankings in Google: The Basics</a></li>
</ol></p>]]></content:encoded>
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		<slash:comments>3</slash:comments>
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		<title>Facts, Quotes and Notes from PubCon 2010</title>
		<link>http://www.verticalmeasures.com/the-basics/facts-quotes-and-notes-from-pubcon-2010/</link>
		<comments>http://www.verticalmeasures.com/the-basics/facts-quotes-and-notes-from-pubcon-2010/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 16 Nov 2010 12:30:28 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>James Constable</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[The Basics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Tips]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.verticalmeasures.com/?p=7592</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Last week, three members of the Vertical Measures team attended PubCon, a yearly event where all the latest news on SEO, Social Media and Online Marketing is shared and discussed. Below are some of the more interesting or controversial things that were said by speakers across the various events, and while we may not agree [...]
Related posts:<ol>
<li><a href='http://www.verticalmeasures.com/tips/pubcon-2009-top-50-seo-tips/' rel='bookmark' title='Pubcon 2009 Top 50 SEO Tips So Far'>Pubcon 2009 Top 50 SEO Tips So Far</a></li>
<li><a href='http://www.verticalmeasures.com/search-optimization/pubcon-las-vegas-day-3-session-wrapup/' rel='bookmark' title='Pubcon Las Vegas Day 3: Session Wrapup'>Pubcon Las Vegas Day 3: Session Wrapup</a></li>
<li><a href='http://www.verticalmeasures.com/social-media/pubcon-las-vegas-day-2-social-media-sessions/' rel='bookmark' title='Pubcon Las Vegas Day 2: Social Media Sessions'>Pubcon Las Vegas Day 2: Social Media Sessions</a></li>
</ol>]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><img src="http://www.verticalmeasures.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/PubCon-2010.jpg" alt="PubCon 2010, Las Vegas" title="PubCon-2010" width="670" height="202" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-7599" /></p>
<p>Last week, three members of the Vertical Measures team attended PubCon, a yearly event where all the latest news on SEO, Social Media and Online Marketing is shared and discussed. Below are some of the more interesting or controversial things that were said by speakers across the various events, and while we may not agree with everything, it might get you thinking about your campaign and where you want to take it.</p>
<h2>SEO</h2>
<ul>
<li>Utilize video and images to target universal search and get more page 1 real estate. Submit both image and video sitemaps to search engines.</li>
<li>When your rankings jump onto page one for a couple of days, this is the audition period – ensure you have good CTR and low bounce rates.</li>
<li>End user data, gathered via the Google toolbar or query data, is considered in the ranking algorithm, so ensure good user experience.</li>
<li>A short URL in the SERPs will get twice as many clicks, which a long URL leads to 2.5 times more clicks for the link below.</li>
<li>Don’t chase algorithums, but ask ‘What would I do if it were my search engine’?</li>
<li>Don’t target single word keywords. Aside from the low ROI they are used less frequently due to their ambiguous nature. As more words are included the volume decreases, but conversions increase.</li>
<li>People search in plural keywords, but buy in singular.</li>
<li>Put misspellings of keywords in your meta keywords so they are still included on a page without making your brand seem unprofessional.</li>
<li>The .mobi TLD provides no advantage in ranking for mobile searches, but user detection to serve a different website design is best practice.</li>
<li>Blackhat tactics are like drugs, you might be able to get a quick boost, but in the long term it will only cause problems.</li>
<li>The long tail is bogus &#8211; search is being used more for navigation with brand queries of short length.</li>
<li>Don’t limit yourself to link reclamation for your own site, but competitors’ sites too. Keep an eye on any bankrupt companies in the industry also.</li>
<li>Videos and photos posted to your listings can help give your local listing a boost.</li>
<li>Many have seen it, but <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lFZ0z5Fm-Ng">this is a great video </a>on the power of social media.</li>
</ul>
<h2>Website Design and Conversion Optimization</h2>
<ul>
<li>More people scroll to the bottom of websites than a few years ago (up to 15% from 2%), as scroll wheels have become more common. But 76% of clicks are still above the fold, so put a CTA at the top and bottom of each page.</li>
<li>Flash slide shows show your business cannot prioritize the best service or message to get across for each page. They are also a distraction and take up too much prime real estate.</li>
<li>From left to right across your navigation, take visitors through an Engagement Continuum, who you are and why they should buy from you.</li>
<li>A user can keep 7 things in their short-term memory, design navigation with this in mind and don’t give too many options. Use the 80:20 rule to promote only the top 20% of categories.</li>
<li>Make your message more obvious, don’t hide it in text, or bury it in the page. Everyone has A.D.D. online and no one reads paragraph text.</li>
<li>Keep your numbers specific – e.g ‘2 million users’, not ‘millions of users’ to appear more real and tangible.</li>
<li>Borrow trust from other sources by listing any publications or associations you have with well-known brands. The right hand column is ideal for these trust indicators.</li>
<li>Test your pages using both qualitative and quantities data, using both Analytics and feedback from user experiences.</li>
<li>Never let your IT department write copy, keep an eye on error pages, 404s, thank you pages and search result pages.</li>
<li>Every page can be a landing page, so needs to be designed for conversions. Find the non-converting, high traffic pages and start from there.</li>
<li>You have 50 milliseconds to give a first impression of your site, which is crucial in the buying decision, so your site needs to look professional. Layout will have a greater affect on conversions than content.</li>
<li>Too many homepages have too many options, keep it to one CTA with easy navigation. Too many options mean users make no choice at all.</li>
<li>Page speed is important for users and search engines alike, 49% of rural city visitors are still on dial up connections and page speed is going to become more and more important in future algorithms.</li>
<li>Conversion rates mean nothing without a traffic source.</li>
<li>HIPPO = Highest paid persons opinion. Don’t let the boss pick the design – test it!</li>
<li>Don’t just test, but have a strategic plan and hypothesis based on your target audience and their buying behavior to ensure marketing insight from the results.</li>
<li>Websites are made to sell, not win design awards – ‘slick isn’t sticky’.</li>
<li>Automate your analytics to focus on strategy, not tactics. Ignore any averages, as well as pageviews or bounce rates – you want people to find information quickly!</li>
</ul>
<h2>Social Media</h2>
<ul>
<li>It doesn’t matter if you want to do social media, people are talking about you anyway! Listening to passive conversations about you is the most honest feedback you will ever get</li>
<li>Companies think they are giving up control by encouraging social media participation, but the illusion of control was just ignorance by large brands.</li>
<li>When tweeting you ARE the company, there are no departments.</li>
<li>Use social media to work above Google and keep people away from search. If they know you and trust you, they won’t search for others.</li>
<li>When Google crawls Social Media data, they are listening to your customers, and what they say about you.</li>
<li>Forums are unsexy social media, but still important and have large audiences.</li>
<li>People want to give feedback – make it easy for them.</li>
</ul>
<h2>Future of Search</h2>
<ul>
<li>Mobile search is the largest growing sector of search, and HTML5 is set to replace mobile applications.</li>
<li>PC search and 10 blue links will diminish in importance in the coming years.</li>
<li>If search is the past, prediction and suggestion will be the future.</li>
<li>Don’t optimize pages for algorithms, but optimize the brand itself for search. Give your customers what they want and make your business stand out, to help your site stand out in the rankings.</li>
<li>Microformats are going to become more important to provide information to searchers before they visit your site.</li>
<li>HTML5 will help crawlers better under websites and their layout of content and navigation. Ensure your website is compliant.</li>
</ul>
<div class="wp-about-author-containter-top" style="background-color:#dce0ec;">
<div class="wp-about-author-pic"><img alt='' src='http://0.gravatar.com/avatar/cfa79e82ec13c052bf45321b612378d2?s=100&amp;d=&amp;r=G' class='avatar avatar-100 photo' height='100' width='100' /></div>
<div class="wp-about-author-text">
<h3><a href='http://www.verticalmeasures.com/author/jamesc/' title='James Constable'>James Constable</a></h3>
<p>James is a Campaign Manager at Vertical Measures, looking at client&#8217;s Internet Marketing from a strategic viewpoint to get them the best possible results for their business needs and budget. His blog posts revolve around strategy, analytics and keyword selection.</p>
</div>
</div>
<p>Related posts:<ol>
<li><a href='http://www.verticalmeasures.com/tips/pubcon-2009-top-50-seo-tips/' rel='bookmark' title='Pubcon 2009 Top 50 SEO Tips So Far'>Pubcon 2009 Top 50 SEO Tips So Far</a></li>
<li><a href='http://www.verticalmeasures.com/search-optimization/pubcon-las-vegas-day-3-session-wrapup/' rel='bookmark' title='Pubcon Las Vegas Day 3: Session Wrapup'>Pubcon Las Vegas Day 3: Session Wrapup</a></li>
<li><a href='http://www.verticalmeasures.com/social-media/pubcon-las-vegas-day-2-social-media-sessions/' rel='bookmark' title='Pubcon Las Vegas Day 2: Social Media Sessions'>Pubcon Las Vegas Day 2: Social Media Sessions</a></li>
</ol></p>]]></content:encoded>
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		<slash:comments>3</slash:comments>
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		<title>Ask And Answer Sites: Can They Benefit You?</title>
		<link>http://www.verticalmeasures.com/link-building/ask-and-answer-sites-can-they-benefit-you/</link>
		<comments>http://www.verticalmeasures.com/link-building/ask-and-answer-sites-can-they-benefit-you/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 06 Jan 2009 15:00:01 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Kaila Strong</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Link Building]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[The Basics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[link builder]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Q&A]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[SEO]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.verticalmeasures.com/?p=1005</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Marketing online for big or small websites can become daunting if you don&#8217;t randomize your approaches. A social marketing campaign, varied in its approaches, will give your client better results in achieving search engine domination. Using question and answer sites can prove to be beneficial if using them properly. You might be asking yourself how [...]
Related posts:<ol>
<li><a href='http://www.verticalmeasures.com/content-marketing-2/answer-sites-can-be-a-content-research-gold-mine/' rel='bookmark' title='Answer Sites Can Be a Content Research Gold Mine'>Answer Sites Can Be a Content Research Gold Mine</a></li>
</ol>]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><a href="http://www.verticalmeasures.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2008/12/question-and-answer2.jpg" rel="lightbox[1005]"><img height="150" width="150" src="http://www.verticalmeasures.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2008/12/question-and-answer2-150x150.jpg" alt="" title="question-and-answer2" class="alignleft size-thumbnail wp-image-1008" /></a>Marketing online for big or small websites can become daunting if you don&rsquo;t randomize your approaches. A <a href="../../../../../../../services/social-media-marketing/">social marketing campaign</a>, varied in its approaches, will give your client better results in achieving search engine domination. Using <a href="http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/question_and_answer_sites.php">question and answer sites</a> can prove to be beneficial if using them properly.</p>
<div>You might be asking yourself how on earth these question and answer sites could help in SEO or link building efforts. Q&amp;A sites allow you to establish yourself as an expert in your field. Most sites require you to sign up, make a profile, and earn points to advance in expertise levels. Answering questions provides you with more points than asking questions, and signing in daily can also add to your points. As you become an expert your answers are more likely to be chosen as the top answers, and your status elevates accordingly. In your answers, you are also able to add <a href="../../../../../../../miscellaneous/googles-take-on-nofollow-vs-dofollow-2/">no-follow links</a> back to the resources you used to gain your knowledge. Placing your web address, or a client&rsquo;s web address, in this allotted space has the potential of being seen by many viewers if your answer is chosen as the best.</div>
<div>&nbsp;</div>
<div>The key with Q&amp;A sites is to look at them as resources for potential clients searching for answers. Do you work in the automotive industry? Think about the questions your potential client might ask such as, &ldquo;What is a hella light?&rdquo;, &ldquo;How do I find the best deal on purchasing a car?&rdquo;, or &ldquo;My car makes a funny noise, what should I do?&rdquo;. These are all opportunities for you, as an expert, to help guide them to your website. It is a slow and steady race, but the more varied you are in your approaches the better overall result.</div>
<div>&nbsp;</div>
<div>Try to stick to niche Q&amp;A sites if you want the biggest impact for your effort. Also important, however, is the page rank of each site. You want to be seen not only by each Q&amp;A site&rsquo;s users, but by search engine users as well. If a future client types into a search engine the same question you answered on a high ranking site, then the likelihood of your answer populating on the first few pages of Google is greater. All this from a free site you might log onto for ten minutes every few days to help promote yourself or a client&rsquo;s website.</div>
<div><b>&nbsp;</b></div>
<div><b>Niche Sites, Lower to High Page Rank</b></div>
<div><span style="color: black;"><a href="http://www.asktherabbi.org/">Ask The Rabbi</a>: Page rank 0/10, &lsquo;<i>The website where every question is taken seriously. From beginners to advanced, from the practical to the mystical, our international staff of scholars and educators are standing by to answer your every questions about Judaism&rsquo;. </i></span></div>
<div><a href="http://whatshouldisay.com/">What Should I Say</a> Page rank 2/10, Get the answers to questions about what you should say or do in sticky situations. This site is mostly geared to business and personal relationships.</div>
<div><a href="http://www.gotquestions.org/">Got Questions</a>: Page Rank 5/10, &lsquo;<i>Seeking to glorify the Lord Jesus Christ by providing Biblical, applicable and timely answers to spiritually related questions through an internet presence&rsquo;. </i></div>
<div><a href="http://www.trulia.com/voices/">Trulia</a> <img src='http://www.verticalmeasures.com/wordpress/wp-includes/images/smilies/icon_razz.gif' alt=':P' class='wp-smiley' /> age Rank 5/10, Get answers to all your Real Estate questions.</div>
<div><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><a href="http://www.linkedin.com/">LinkedIn</a>: Page Rank 8/10. &lsquo;<i>Let&rsquo;s you tap the knowledge of your professional network, and to help you get fast and accurate answers to your business questions&rsquo;. </i></span></div>
<div>&nbsp;</div>
<div><b>High Ranking, Good Sites</b></div>
<div><a href="http://www.answerbag.com/">Answerbag</a>: Page Rank 6/10. Standard ask and answer site, topics ranging from celebrity trivia to Russian name origins.</div>
<div><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><a href="http://www.allexperts.com/">All Experts</a>: Page Rank 6/10. Very first large scale Q&amp;A site, standard site. </span></div>
<div><a href="http://askville.amazon.com/Index.do">Askville</a>: Page Rank 6/10. Askville is Amazons version of a Q&amp;A site, this site is all about sharing.</div>
<div><a href="http://www.answers.com/">Answers</a>: Page Rank 7/10. &lsquo;<i>Your free &ldquo;one-stop shop&rdquo; with instant information on over 4 million topics&rsquo;.</i> When most people think about asking or answering questions, they think of this site.</div>
<div><a href="http://answers.yahoo.com/">Yahoo Answers</a>: Page Rank 8/10. <i>&lsquo;With more than 21 million unique users in the U.S. and 90 million worldwide, Yahoo! Answers is the largest knowledge-sharing community on the Web&rsquo;</i>. Yahoo is often seen as the pioneer for Q&amp;A sites.</div>
<div><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><a href="http://qna.live.com/">QNA Live</a>: Page Rank 8/10. MSN&rsquo;s version of Yahoo! Answers, this site provides you with a community of real live people asking and answering questions that appeal to their interests. </span></div>
<div>&nbsp;</div>
<div><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">By using one of the sites listed above you will be able to start your journey to becoming an answering expert as a <a href="http://www.verticalmeasures.com/link-builders/" target="_blank">link builder</a>. At first stick to one site, but once you get the hang of it, perhaps branch out to two or three different sites. Just remember, the more effort you put into it the more benefits you&rsquo;ll receive in return.&nbsp;</span></div>
<div class="wp-about-author-containter-top" style="background-color:#dce0ec;">
<div class="wp-about-author-pic"><img alt='' src='http://0.gravatar.com/avatar/60752b77fcb5e3ac6bf7ec3aafc83193?s=100&amp;d=&amp;r=G' class='avatar avatar-100 photo' height='100' width='100' /></div>
<div class="wp-about-author-text">
<h3><a href='http://www.verticalmeasures.com/author/kailas/' title='Kaila Strong'>Kaila Strong</a></h3>
<p>Kaila is a Sr. Account Manager at Vertical Measures. She works directly with clients to evaluate and analyze their overall Internet Marketing needs, creates sales proposals and recommendations. In addition she regularly reports on client rankings, gives SEO advice to brands in a variety of industries and manages client expectations. </p>
<p>Kaila has a background in social media marketing, link building, SEO and content marketing. She&#8217;s an active blogger on SearchEngineWatch.com, and an avid social media user (@cliquekaila on Twitter). She brings her experience to the table with new clients and enjoys writing about her experiences as well here on the VM blog and throughout the web.</p>
<p><a href='http://www.verticalmeasures.com' title='Kaila Strong'>Website</a> &#8211; <a href='http://www.twitter.com/cliquekaila' title='Kaila Strongon Twitter'>Twitter</a> &#8211; <a href='http://www.verticalmeasures.com/author/kailas/' title='More posts by Kaila Strong'>More Posts</a> </p>
</div>
</div>
<p>Related posts:<ol>
<li><a href='http://www.verticalmeasures.com/content-marketing-2/answer-sites-can-be-a-content-research-gold-mine/' rel='bookmark' title='Answer Sites Can Be a Content Research Gold Mine'>Answer Sites Can Be a Content Research Gold Mine</a></li>
</ol></p>]]></content:encoded>
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		<slash:comments>18</slash:comments>
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		<title>Vertical Measures Website Move, Update &amp; Blog Integration (part 4 of 4)</title>
		<link>http://www.verticalmeasures.com/business/vertical-measures-website-move-update-blog-integration-part-4-of-4/</link>
		<comments>http://www.verticalmeasures.com/business/vertical-measures-website-move-update-blog-integration-part-4-of-4/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 12 Dec 2008 21:24:53 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Vertical Measures</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Business]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Education]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[On-Site SEO]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Success Story]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[The Basics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[mod_rewrite]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[our video]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[verticalmeasures.com]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[website move]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.verticalmeasures.com/?p=929</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Well we can hardly believe it.&#160; WE PULLED IT OFF!&#160; If this is your first time to our blog you may be asking did what?&#160; For the last month we have documented the process of moving our web site to a new hosting company, redesigning and updating it and integrating our blog Link Building Best [...]
Related posts:<ol>
<li><a href='http://www.verticalmeasures.com/business/vertical-measures-website-move-update-blog-integration-part-3-of-4/' rel='bookmark' title='Vertical Measures Website Move, Update &amp; Blog Integration (part 3 of 4)'>Vertical Measures Website Move, Update &#038; Blog Integration (part 3 of 4)</a></li>
<li><a href='http://www.verticalmeasures.com/business/vertical-measures-website-move-update-blog-integration-part2/' rel='bookmark' title='Vertical Measures Website Move, Update &amp; Blog Integration (part 2 of 4)'>Vertical Measures Website Move, Update &#038; Blog Integration (part 2 of 4)</a></li>
<li><a href='http://www.verticalmeasures.com/miscellaneous/verticalmeasurescom-website-move-update-blog-integration/' rel='bookmark' title='VerticalMeasures.com Website Move, Update &amp; Blog Integration'>VerticalMeasures.com Website Move, Update &#038; Blog Integration</a></li>
</ol>]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><img width="263" height="331" border="0" align="right" alt="Vertical Measures New Website" src="http://www.verticalmeasures.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/celebrating.jpg" />Well we can hardly believe it.&nbsp; WE PULLED IT OFF!&nbsp; If this is your first time to our blog you may be asking did what?&nbsp; For the last month we have documented the process of moving our web site to a new hosting company, redesigning and updating it and integrating our blog Link Building Best Practices in to our new web site blog location you are looking at now.&nbsp; It was all done at the same time and you are now looking at the new site that went live effective December 7th 2008.</p>
<p>In our <a target="_blank" href="http://www.verticalmeasures.com/business/vertical-measures-website-move-update-blog-integration-part-3-of-4/">last post</a> we shared some of the planning and specific action items we identified to make it happen.&nbsp; One of our biggest concerns was making sure we don&#8217;t lose any of our excellent search engine position and it seems we achieved that goal as well as transferred our page rank. &nbsp;</p>
<p>I think the best way to wrap up this series is to tell you about what DID go &quot;wrong&quot;.&nbsp;&nbsp; Although we felt like we planned it out carefully and we followed our plan there were things that happened that we just could not have anticipated and maybe sharing this information with you might help your next project as well.</p>
<p><strong>What went wrong</strong></p>
<p>Last Friday night we finished all the &quot;Pre&quot; items and the final step before taking the new site live was to use the excellent built in &quot;export&quot; feature WordPress has.&nbsp; It exports all your posts, post categories and Authors.&nbsp; The plan was to export that data and then import it to the new blog (you are on now) so everything is current.&nbsp; I had already done this once before a few weeks ago just to populate the development version of the blog with some data etc. and I was very impressed with how easy and smooth it went so I wasn&#8217;t expecting what happened next.&nbsp; Before I get in to that though here is where I made my first mistake&#8230;I hopped over to <a target="_blank" href="http://www.godaddy.com">GoDaddy</a> and updated the name servers for the site and blog to begin <a target="_blank" href="http://www.dynadot.com/resource/article/qa.html?aid=16">propagation</a>.&nbsp; Then here is where things got ugly.&nbsp; I exported all the data just fine, then jumped in the admin panel for the new site and started the import.&nbsp; It seemed like it was taking a long time but finally it finished.&nbsp; The first thing I noticed was the post count was twice what it should be (oh oh) so I opened the site and took a look.&nbsp; The entire site was all out of whack!&nbsp; Things were not where they should be at all and the main navigation had extra items. HUH?</p>
<p>The next thing that went wrong was where it got REALLY ugly.&nbsp; The entire site went down!&nbsp; When I tried to view the site all I saw was &quot;A CONNECTION CAN NOT BE MADE TO THE DATABASE&quot; in big black letters.&nbsp; YIKES!&nbsp; This didn&#8217;t make sense because the site was just up and no changes were made that would impact the database connection.&nbsp; I logged in to the database via <a target="_blank" href="http://www.phpmyadmin.net/home_page/index.php">PHP MyAdmin</a> and everything seemed fine. By this time it was 2:30 am and after poking around a while I decided the best thing to do was change the name servers back to the old sites, get some rest and pick it up again in the &quot;morning&quot; when I was fresh.</p>
<p><strong>All hail WordPress the self healing blogging platform!</strong></p>
<p>At 5:30 am (yeah 3 hours later) I woke up and started thinking about the problem, came up with a few ideas and headed in to the office to attack it again.&nbsp; Guess what, the site was up! (at the dev address of course) but still out of whack.&nbsp; After inspecting the main navigation I noticed there were actually just a couple extra items I realized were the PAGES (not posts) from the old blog site.&nbsp; (Well no kidding because pages are stored in the posts table so those were imported as well) Ok, fine I&#8217;ll just log in and delete them because we don&#8217;t need them any more.&nbsp; I logged in and right away noticed the post count was back to normal!&nbsp; NICE! I have no idea how&#8230;so I proceeded to delete the few extra pages.&nbsp; I went back to the site and just like that the world was a happy place again!&nbsp; The site looked perfect and the blog was completely populated.&nbsp; <strong>All hail WordPress the self healing blogging platform!&nbsp;</strong> Since everything looked ok I switched the name servers again to make the new site live and since I had no idea how long propagation was going to take I went back to bed for a while.</p>
<p><strong>Oops, another big problem</strong></p>
<p>I woke up checked my email and had a few from Arnie with the most glaring being all the images on the blog were dead!&nbsp; Obviously I didn&#8217;t know&nbsp; that before I retired for the evening.&nbsp; All the paths to the images were wrong!&nbsp; Normally this might seem like an easy problem to solve right?&nbsp; Just add a copy of all the images to a directory found at the correct path and moving forward all images will be in a new correct location.&nbsp; Nope, that isn&#8217;t going to happen.&nbsp; The problem is that since we had a 301 redirect in place for linkbuildingbestpractices.com to verticalmeasures.com/blog there was no real physical path that could be used.&nbsp; We decided the best thing to do (rather than manually change the path on all the images on the entire blog) was was to use <a target="_blank" href="http://www.modrewrite.com/">mod_rewrite</a> on the .htaccess file to point all the image paths to the correct location. This little beauty did the trick: <strong><span style="color: rgb(51, 153, 102);">RewriteRule [^/]+(/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/.+) $1 [R=301,L]</span> </strong>It 301 redirects all the image paths to the standard directory in WordPress where all images reside.&nbsp; Problem solved!</p>
<p>While we are on the topic of mod_rewrite there was another problem we needed to resolve and mod_rewrite came through once again.&nbsp; On our old site we had a series of website marketing and link building articles and <a target="_blank" href="http://www.verticalmeasures.com/about-us/press-room/">press releases</a> that used an unusual query string path.&nbsp; (They were dynamically generated from a content system developed)&nbsp; We needed to make sure they redirected to the matching page on the new site to pass link juice and authority.&nbsp; Here is an example of the mod_rewrite we used:</p>
<p><strong>Articles: </strong></p>
<p><strong><span style="color: rgb(51, 153, 102);">RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} articles?Outsource-Link-Building-The-Right-Company-Is-Vital.html<br />
RewriteRule articles http://www.verticalmeasures.com/outsource-link-building-the-right-company-is-vital/ [R=301,L</span></strong></p>
<p><strong>Press Releases: </strong></p>
<p><strong><span style="color: rgb(51, 153, 102);">RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} Link-Building-Company-Earns-TOP-SEO-Award.html<br />
RewriteRule press http://www.verticalmeasures.com/link-building-company-earns-top-seo-award/? [R=301,L]</span></strong></p>
<p>Unfortunately we had to write one for each article and press release but it had to be done.&nbsp; Also for extra fun we had to change the case of the new path on each to lower case as well (since PHP&nbsp;is case sensitive)&nbsp; and a &quot;http://UrlLikeThis&quot; is not the same as a &quot;http://urllikethis&quot;.&nbsp; They would be considered different pages and duplicate content!&nbsp; Ouch&#8230;</p>
<p><strong>Our video didn&#8217;t work either</strong></p>
<p>There was one other small problem that required some fast thinking and innovation.&nbsp; If you were familiar with our old site you may recall we had a video built using Camtasia studio explaining the <a href="http://www.verticalmeasures.com/vertical-measures-video/">importance of natural search ranking</a>.&nbsp; The video worked great (on the old site) but for some reason on the new site it would stop about 15 seconds in.&nbsp; Well it was time for an upgrade so we just uploaded the .flv file to the <a target="_blank" href="http://www.youtube.com/user/VMVertical">Vertical Measures YouTube account</a> and it worked perfectly there.&nbsp; Thanks to YouTube we were able to embed it on a new page and the result is a more visually appealing and professional wrapper for the video.&nbsp; If you haven&#8217;t seen it before you should take a few minutes and watch our very informative <a href="http://www.verticalmeasures.com/vertical-measures-video/">higher search rankings video</a>.</p>
<p>So that wraps it up!&nbsp; There were a few other little kinks along the way but we wont bore you with all the details.&nbsp; We hope you found this post and the others informative and a little entertaining.&nbsp; Please be sure to take a moment and tell us what you think about the new site. We would value and appreciate your feedback.&nbsp;</p>
<p><strong>&nbsp;<strong>ArnieK.gooruze.com</strong></strong></p>
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<p>Related posts:<ol>
<li><a href='http://www.verticalmeasures.com/business/vertical-measures-website-move-update-blog-integration-part-3-of-4/' rel='bookmark' title='Vertical Measures Website Move, Update &amp; Blog Integration (part 3 of 4)'>Vertical Measures Website Move, Update &#038; Blog Integration (part 3 of 4)</a></li>
<li><a href='http://www.verticalmeasures.com/business/vertical-measures-website-move-update-blog-integration-part2/' rel='bookmark' title='Vertical Measures Website Move, Update &amp; Blog Integration (part 2 of 4)'>Vertical Measures Website Move, Update &#038; Blog Integration (part 2 of 4)</a></li>
<li><a href='http://www.verticalmeasures.com/miscellaneous/verticalmeasurescom-website-move-update-blog-integration/' rel='bookmark' title='VerticalMeasures.com Website Move, Update &amp; Blog Integration'>VerticalMeasures.com Website Move, Update &#038; Blog Integration</a></li>
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