Aug
23rd

Google Coupons – No Sunday Paper Required

Posted by admin on August 23, 2006 at 12:31 pm

You no longer have to wait for the mail or newspaper to arrive at your doorstep to receive the latest promotional offerings by local businesses in your area. With Google Maps (also known as Google Local), these offerings are closer than you think.

In an August 15th press release, Google announced that it has partnered with the direct marketing powerhouse, ValPak, to offer print-at-home coupons for business listings found on Google Maps, also increasing the reach for ValPak’s current print-at-home coupon sponsors.

So how does it work and what’s in it for Google?

I decided to perform my own test on Google Maps, in search of listings that featured coupons.

Search term: Junk Removal

On the second page of results I located a well respected company, 1-800-Got-Junk? Underneath the general contact and location information is a link for Coupons. I immediately clicked on the link and was taken to a separate page titled, Google Coupons. There it was, a printer friendly page containing 1-800-Got-Junk’s contact information, a map for their Jacksonville location and a coupon for $10 off the next time you book a service.

What’s in it for Google?

Currently, there are no plans for Google to charge for this service. Google hopes to generate enough interest with a company that it encourages them to jump on board with search advertising.

My overall experience and what it means for businesses?

With a quick search and a few clicks of my mouse, I was able to locate a business providing the service I was interested in, along with an incentive to try them out. As the popularity of Google Maps increases and the word spreads, I believe we will see more businesses showing up in the listings with coupons.

Internet savvy business owners and entrepreneurs alike, looking for a dynamic way to reach their audience could benefit from adding their business to the free listings on Google Maps. Did I mention the service is free, and adding a printable coupon to your listing is free?

Sounds like a no-brainer to me – especially coming into the 4th quarter, when consumers are looking for a location to obtain that hard-to-find Christmas gift for Uncle Ned. Maybe adding the coupon will be enough of an incentive to bring them in your door. And hey, it’s free!

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Aug
22nd

Online Resources with a Human Touch

Posted by Anne on August 22, 2006 at 2:55 pm

In today’s world, most companies have a department to handle personnel issues within the business. Referred to as Human Resources or, in its infancy, the personnel department, HR has evolved from an informal paper pushing function of the organization to a more formalized and informational tool/resource for both employer and employees.

To be an effective HR professional in today’s market, it’s imperative to be familiar with both federal and state laws. That means having the right information at your fingertips in a matter of minutes or at times, seconds.

I thought it might be helpful to cite some of my favorite resources that have been helpful to me as an HR professional.

Employment Laws
The Department of Labor does its best in providing information to employers regarding a variety of employment laws. Covering everything from the Fair Labor Standards Act to HIPAA, the DOL website is a most resourceful tool for many human resource professionals.

HR Management
The Society for Human Resource Management is one of the world’s largest associations devoted to human resource management. With a minimal membership fee, the SHRM serves the needs of HR professionals by providing the most essential and comprehensive resources available. They offer “Live Help” online, which connects you directly to a SHRM Information Specialist for direct assistance with human resource-related questions.

Job Banks
With Michigan facing a number of job losses this year, unemployed workers can post resumes at the Michigan Talent Bank. Jobseekers can also search more than 15,000 new job openings monthly and post resumes for more than 40,000 employers to find. Employers can sign up to search more than 600,000 resumes and post job openings. Best of all, it’s free for all users.

Background Checks
For employers who want formal and accurate background checks for new recruits, there are a number of reputable companies out there. From my own experience, ChoicePoint helps HR professionals make smarter decisions in a world challenged by increased risks.

Wellness Programs
Many companies today provide an employee wellness program. At a past workplace, I invited a Weight Watchers representative in once a week to help employees build a healthy lifestyle along with lunchtime yoga sessions. Employees and employers can visit Weight Watchers for workplace wellness program ideas.

Health Plans
To continue on the healthier path, employees can find facilities and doctors participating in their health plans by visiting their providers’ websites. Knowing the type of health plan offered by your employer (PPO, HMO, etc.) makes it easier to find a wealth of information about your health, dental and vision plans.

Common health plan providers include BlueCross BlueShield, PriorityHealth, VSP, and Delta Dental.

If you are part of a company that has an HR professional either on or off site, ask about the online resources available and applicable to you. These tools allow you to gather information in a moment’s notice and make decisions that are right for you. It’s that simple.

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Aug
21st

Google Sub-Links?

Posted by admin on August 21, 2006 at 10:30 am

Snippets, if you will. Google has been testing these additional site link snippets for about a year, in fact, almost exactly a year. In that time, many webmasters have questioned what the requirements are to get these link snippets on their #1 Google listing.

Even when M. Cutts reported on his blog about them, a conspiracy theory ramble started about how to get these nifty elements added.

Is it only for large sites? What about heavily trafficked sites? Both of these theories were proven wrong through other tests.

What about PageRank numbers? Nope, try again.

There was even a theory about using Google Toolbar data, which Matt kinda shot down, but did say they wouldn’t rule out the use of it in the future.

Matt did say in his original blog post that it was purely algorithmic. “The algorithms pick the sites where this could be helpful,” Matt stated. This immediately made me think of the “I’m Feeling Lucky” principle. That being, if Google thinks you are trying to find a specific site, they’ll give you the snippets to navigate into the site immediately without having to go in through the homepage. It makes complete sense for Google to do this, as they’ve always been on a mission of improving their user’s experience.

The SEW Blog provides a few rules, one being:

“…snippet links are displayed for the top result for a ‘brand’ search or ‘domain’ search. (For example, ‘zappos’ and ‘zappos shoes’)”

I’m not completely convinced that this rule is true from the results I received. Some of my own testing with very specific brand and domain searches yielded the result I wanted at the top, but I wasn’t given any link snippets.

I have to believe Google is still working the bugs out of this one, as after a year of positive feedback from the internet community they still haven’t implemented it on every first place search result. We have to simply be patient with Google as always and they’ll give us what we want.

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Aug
18th

Random Rants – Wikipedia Woes & Matt Cutts Videos

Posted by admin on August 18, 2006 at 1:30 pm

Wikipedia Copy Woes

A few weeks ago, I was doing research on the term “Semantic Web” and came across this Wikipedia Definition.

What caught my eye immediately was this block of text that appeared above the entry:

“This article or section seems not to be written in the formal tone expected of an encyclopedia entry.
Please improve the article or discuss proposed changes on the talk page. See Wikipedia’s guide to writing better articles for suggestions.”

What are they trying to say – that it doesn’t sound completely affected and full of academic jargon? Although I do respect how resourceful Wikipedia is, the editors have forgotten an important point in that online copywriting is a far different beast than copywriting for some venerable academic tome.

I’m not saying that Wikipedia entries should turn into subjective essays full of personal opinions, slang, or God forbid, run-on sentences. But couldn’t they at least be a little bit more engaging?

Maybe I’m playing with fire here suggesting that Wikipedia entries need to lighten up a bit. But I completely disagree that they should have to be written in a “formal tone”.

I instead recommend that we listen to the wise words of Nick Usborne when he asks why on earth we continue to focus on “bringing an ‘ATM’ style to the most interactive, vibrant, networked, warm and essentially human communications space imaginable.”

Here’s another interesting link I found on Wikipedia: Wikipedia Articles Needing Style Editing. Who decides which articles get relegated to this sorry category? A bot? I wonder…..

New Video Posts from Matt Cutts

Am I the only person who is less than thrilled that Matt Cutts is now answering juicy SEO questions via video? Well, I have a good reason. I wear a hearing aid, and his videos are definitely not closed captioned.

I find it ironic that a representative of Google, with its mission to “organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful”, would present data in a video-only format.

It’s a usability nightmare for a variety of reasons, from the fact that most professionals can’t disturb their coworkers by playing noisy videos at their desks to the fact that it’s hard to go back and re-read or reference a favorite excerpt to the fact that, oh yeah, I can’t even hear him in the first place. (Was that a run-on sentence?)

Disclaimer: I think Matt Cutts’ blog is a valuable resource, and one that the SEO community is very grateful for. I just wish I could hear what he was saying.

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Aug
17th

Growing Up Google

Posted by Dave on August 17, 2006 at 3:32 pm

Whether made as a conscious decision, or instituted through a forcible takeover, it happens to all of us. At some point we stop being carefree children and start to become responsible, bill paying, 401k investing adults.

After this change occurs, nothing is ever the same. Now, instead of worrying about being home for dinner you worry about insurance rates, mortgages and retirement plans. It’s amazing how things change.

To help prevent the “generification” of its brand name, Google recently sent out a series of legal letters to media organizations, asking them not to use the company name as a verb.

While reading about these letters, I realized that Google is going through that same life change.

No longer the carefree teenager it once was, Google is now a parent with bills and stockholders it needs to look out and provide for. And although Google may not be ready to admit it, from its seemingly unending AdSense network to Google Checkout, Google is no longer just a search engine focused on providing you with the best results. It is a business.

No longer without responsibilities, no longer carefree, no longer the “cool kid”. Welcome to adulthood Google.

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