Google claimed that this update, which was part of their privacy policy overhaul, would affect less than 10% of queries. While this many be the average, many website are seeing 20-30% of their search engine keywords fall into the (not provided) category, and some website are seeing almost 50%.

So how do you deal with no longer having this data available?

1) Assess the percentage of organic keyword traffic that falls under (not provided): If you’re lucky, only 5-10% of your traffic falls in this category. If that’s the case then consider yourself lucky, you don’t have much to worry about. If, however, you notice 25-50% in lost keyword data, then you’ll want to find ways to analyze this unaccounted for traffic.

2) Analyze the other 50-75% of your keyword traffic that is accounted for: This is the best place to start because, more than likely, the non-logged in user searches will correlate with the logged in user searches. There’s nothing to say Google users search differently, therefore if a given keyword accounts for 10% of your keyword traffic from non-logged in users it’ll likely account for about 10% of the keyword traffic from (not provided).

3) View Your Landing Pages by Keywords: Drill down to specific urls and use keywords as your secondary dimension. Here you can get a sense, for each landing page, what keywords are driving people to that particular page. Again, just as I mentioned in #2 above, there’s no data to prove that the keywords we can see will vary from the one’s we can’t see in the (not provided) area.

4) Judge the performance of (Not Provided) Keywords: This step is to reassure you that the tendencies of logged in users doesn’t sway much from non-logged in users. Take a look at average page views, average time on site, etc. to see if there are any glaring discrepancies.

5) Run an Adwords campaign: You can always find out more information about your organic optimization by running an Adwords campaign. Google Adwords will not limit the information you can see based on whether or not a user is logged in; you get it all. If you have the resources, it wouldn’t be a bad idea to analyze the paid traffic to your website by keyword, and then compare that to your organic traffic by keyword.

Many users don’t even know whether they’re logged in or not when they search. This only lends to the theory that search behavior does not change based on whether someone is logged into Google or not. I don’t foresee Google changing its (not provided) policy anytime soon, but it would be nice to be able to see a breakdown of the (not provided) traffic in the future. This idea, brought up by SEO blogger Blind Five Year Old, would list all the data for each keyword in (not provided), but simply replace each keyword with “keyword 1″, “keyword 2″, etc. I like the idea, but who knows if Google will ever implement anything like this. For now, you simply have to be more savvy about how you analyze your website data.

If you have any questions about Google Analytics or SEO, please leave Turbo a message here, or call us directly at 877-673-7096 x2.

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About a year ago, I published an article that discussed the best times to post on Facebook. In that article I only focused on Facebook, and I concluded that it really depends on your business when the best time to post messages is. Well, in this article I’ll introduce some new evidence that illustrates that there in fact ideal times to post not only Facebook messages, but content in general.

A study by iMedia Connection of BuzzFeed, a social media website who’s platform allows for real time sharing of social content, recently released data that clearly shows predictable, daily traffic patterns. The following graph outlines hourly web traffic to different posts on BuzzFeed. Here is what the pattern showed:

As you can see, traffic bottoms out in the early morning, which makes sense because most people are either sleeping or getting ready for work at 5am. From there traffic steadily rises until about noon, which coincides with lunch. Traffic still rises, but at a much slower rate. Traffic then picks back up later in the afternoon, rising until 4pm, and then begins to fall, until it plateaus around 8pm. Traffic then stays steady until about 11pm, which is about the time most people are sleeping or getting ready for bed.

Obviously this is data is from just one website, but Buzzfeed gets over 300 million visitors a month, which is a very significant sample size. iMedia also noted that this study examined 1,700 days of traffic, and 86% of the days followed the above pattern.

So what does this data mean for you? Well, for starters I would examine your daily traffic in Google Analytics to get a sense of when people are viewing your articles. Next realize that just because 4pm is the hour people are most active doesn’t mean that’s when you should publish your articles. Give yourself an hour or two so the article or post has time to build some buzz and get shared.

Take time to analyze your web traffic and identify trends. This will help you better understand your audience, keep them interested in your products or services, and eventually turn them into paying customers. If you have any questions about the best time to post content online then contact Turbo Social Media or call us directly at 877-673-7096 x2.

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If you’re like most people, you receive a lot of junk mail. Whether it’s the penny saver booklet, retail ‘going out of business’ ads, or credit card companies offering you a new card, almost every day you’re likely to get some piece of mail that’ll likely be immediately thrown away. Therefore, the initial challenge for a business owner is creating a postcard that stands out. Before I even touch on the design and presentation I want to touch on another key point…

Specifically target your campaign: One of the main reasons you immediately throw out this junk mail is because it’s not targeted to you. Either you’ve never done business with this company or you’ve done business but have no desire to pay any more (cable companies). The first key rule when planning a direct mail campaign is to make sure that everyone you’re targeting has done business with you or has at least opted in to your newsletter, email list or inquired about your services. If you buy a list with addresses, even if you can narrow by target market demographics, you’re still “throwing darts” and hoping something sticks.

Determine your offer: You’ll want to consider something a little bit more generous than a 5% off coupon. That kind of offer doesn’t really motivate people. Of course, this will depend entirely on your business and what you’re selling, so take some time coming up with a generous offer. I won’t even start to throw out examples, but if you’re a local business, consider something significant, a discount similar to something that you would offer on a Groupon-type deal.

Present it well: Too often I get flimsy pieces of glossy paper in the mail that scream, “throw me away.” The best part is that when you receive these marketing pieces they’re easy to fold and discard with the rest of the junk mail. Now, if you take the time to design an eye-catching postcard that’s not too small and is printed on much stiffer paper, then you’re putting yourself in a much better position to not get thrown away. Consider using a company like Vista Print to upload your design, print and mail your postcards. They offer proofs, have good customer service and affordable pricing.

Once you’ve mapped out your direct mail campaign and executed it you’ll want to make sure you’re able to track its effectiveness. Make sure you’ve written down all your costs for the campaign, including any design costs, printing costs, shipping costs and any miscellaneous costs. That’ll be your break even number for determining profit or ROI for this campaign.

If you have any questions about planning and executing a direct mail or postcard campaign then leave Turbo a message here, or call 877-673-7096 x2.

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Facebook Timeline:  Timeline is Facebook’s new format, and as of March 2012, all Facebook Fan pages were automatically upgraded to the Timeline format.  Timeline is a completely new way of organizing your posts in chronological fashion, and you can go back to the inception of your company and insert relevant business information and milestones.  Timeline is like a detailed, digital scrapbook of your business’ life.  Timeline even allows you to communicate privately with users now, instead of publicly on your wall.

Picture viewer:  The way you view pictures on Facebook has undergone some major changes.  Now, when you click on a picture, it pulls up the picture viewer feature.  This allows you to flip through albums, make comments, and check off what you like without leaving the page you are on.  This is big for business selling a product, as it gives users to see a much clearer view of what you offer.

Privacy policy:  It seems like Facebook is constantly under attack because of its privacy policies. It comes as no surprise that the social media giant has incorporated serious changes that affect your personal privacy.  The privacy policy is now much easier to access and understand, and users have more options upon initial registration.  Furthermore, the amount of data social plug-ins are now able to collect from user accounts is more limited.

Facebook is constantly trying to upgrade and improve its platform, because in order to grow they need more users. If the changes in 2012, and beyond, do in fact continue to attract more Facebook users, then the value of Facebook for your business only grows. If you’re a business owner that’s new to Facebook I encourage you to explore some of our previous articles about Facebook.

To learn more about how to use Facebook for your business, or to schedule a 30 minute consultation, leave Turbo a message here, or call us directly at 877-673-7096 x2.

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If you’re unfamiliar with Instagram’s story then I’ll quickly break it down for you. They’re a free photo sharing mobile app that was launched in October of 2010, allowing users to take a photo, apply a digital filter to it, and then share it on many different social networking services. The app was initally supported by iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch, but as of this month, the company has added support for an Android application.

On April 9, Facebook announced the intended acquisition of the company, and its 13 employees, for $1 billion in cash and stock, with the intention of keeping it independently managed. This move by Facebook raises several questions…

Has the game changed for Internet start ups? The model in the past decade or so has been to develop a web-based software, but Instagram is an entirely mobile application. Ben Lerer, manager of the venture capital firm Lerer Ventures and one of the early investors in OMGPop, a multi-media mobile game developer, sheds some light on this emerging trend among start ups. He claims that he prefers to back companies that are building services for mobile first and the Web second, because “businesses that are thinking that way are planning for the future.”

While Instagram does have a website, it is built almost entirely to attract people to download the app. Therefore, in a world where more an more people are using smartphones, Internet start-ups are changing the way they think about their business model.

So how do Instagram’s many users feel about the deal with Facebook? Many have voiced their opposition to the deal, claiming that they fear Facebook will destroy the app they’ve come to love. Others have stated that they avoid Facebook altogether and use Instagram to share photos with a select few.

For right now it looks like any loyal customers Instagram loses because of the Facebook connection will be more than replaced by new users who are signing up because of the aforementioned social networking giant.

Some tech experts feel that Instagram is just a fad, with little to no value, and this eventual purchase by Facebook is the sign of another tech bubble. I don’t see it that way. The mobile market is ripe for more products and software that can save people time and money, not just provide entertainment. Time will tell who takes advantage of this opportunity.

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If you go to your Fan page now you’ll notice that it looks different. Your page probably looks much more boring and plain, especially when compared to other Fan pages that were converted and have the new cover art (more on that later)

What about the welcome page? If you spent a lot of money on your custom welcome page I have good news and bad. The good news is that it’s not going anywhere (unless you have any FBML page, in which case you’ll want to convert that to an iFrame). The bad news is that you cannot set the welcome page (or Fan Gate as it’s commonly referred to as), or any other tab for that matter, to the default page visitors see who don’t already “like” the page. All visitors, new and old, will see your Timeline first. We’ll see if this changes in the future…

The cover photo is huge! The first thing people notice about the Timeline format is the eye-popping photo. You know have a 851×315 area to create an image or design for your business. Think of this as a clean slate, but with a few restrictions: no calls to action, to pricing information and no contact information. This essentially relegates your cover photo to a branding piece rather than a promotional or advertising piece.

So what else is new? You now have the ability to pin posts. What “pin” means is that you can place any message, denoted by a small orange flag, as the top post for a week at a time. This is similar to the ability you have in WordPress to make a blog article “sticky,” or keep it at the top (as opposed to dropping due to chronologically progression).

Pinning is a cool feature, and another notable tool is the ability to highlight certain posts. This allows your posts to take up the entire width of the page. Consider highlighting all your best photos and posts before launching Timeline.

Another cool new feature is that you now have the ability to send private messages via Timeline. This is currently an optional feature that is turned “on” to start. If you’re concerned about handling the influx of private messages then you can always turn it “off.” Allowing private messages does allow people to voice criticisms discreetly, which is nice; however, there’s always the advantage of addressing a concern or problem in front of an audience. That can be powerful.

You’ll also notice two boxes near the top of the page that show all your friends that “like” that page, as well as recent activity (comments) from other Fans about your business. This is designed to be engaging, but there appears to be some “randomness” to what shows up in this section.

What about the admin panel? This now shows up at the top of your Fan page, if you’re a logged in admin. You’ll find notifications, Insights, settings and private messages in this section.

This is just a brief run-through of the new Timeline for Fan pages. Keep an eye out for a follow up article (or series) that goes into a little more depth. If you have any questions about the Timeline format, or you need to upgrade your Fan page, then leave Turbo a message here, or call us directly at 877-673-7096 x2.

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Google is not collecting any more information than it has in the past, they’re still gathering information from emails, chats, pictures and videos you access. However, all this information can now be accessed by all of Google’s networks, including Gmail, YouTube and web searches. This information is gathered under one user profile, yours!

So how can you prevent Google from gathering your information?

1) Turn of your web history and YouTube history. Depending on your browser you can clear history and ‘pause‘ existing history gathering. In YouTube you simply click ‘video manager’ in the top right corner and then click on ‘history.’ Then you’ll want to clear and pause viewing history, as well as clear search history.

2) Sign out of Google before searching. This is a more simple and self-explanatory solution. If you’re not signed in, Google will not collect your search data and will not provide customized search results.

3) Become familiar with all of Google’s products. As you might already know, anything with a “G” in front of it, such Gmail and Gchat, is likely owned by Google. YouTube, Picasa, Blogger, Orkut and several others are also Google-owned.

4) Use another search engine. When all else fails, just use Bing or Yahoo. While Google remains the clear-cut search market share leader, if you’re concerned enough about privacy try using another search engine.

I recommend you check out the Google Dashboard to see all of Google’s products and its privacy policy in writing. If you have any questions about Google and its new privacy policy then leave us a message.

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5) Slow or Unresponsive Third-Party Content

Following up on the live chat notion mentioned in #4 of our previous article, make sure that it is working correctly. This goes without saying, but when your site is using third-party software and widgets you run the risk of slowing down the page load rate. A slow performing application that is using Ajax, for example, prevents visitors from accessing content immediately, resulting in a higher bounce rate.

6) Slow Loading Time

This might be the most annoying issue any site could have. You may get over the poor layout, color scheme and navigation, but if the site is loading fast enough why would you stay on the site? In addition to hurting your SEO rankings, a slow loading site will no doubt lead to a higher bounce rate. This problem can easily be fixed though, simply be updating your hosting or getting rid of unwanted application or files that are clogging up bandwidth. If you’re using  CSM such as WordPress or Joomla make sure that your hosting account is capable of supporting your site.

7) Ads

If your site is popular enough to warrant showing others’ ads, congratulations. However, you need to be cognizant of how these ads are displayed. Too many advertisements can be a big turn off for your readers, and an ad that is too close to your navigation bar or another link may lead to accidental clicks. Also, keep the advertisements visible, but focus the majority of the “above the fold” content on your website information.

No Phone Number or Contact Form

This is a personal pet peeve of mine, and not quite as detrimental as the other points listed above, but relevant nonetheless. Most savvy Internet users know that if they don’t see a phone number or address on the home page they can usually find it on the ‘contact’ page. However, you shouldn’t have to even make people click to find that out. It should be listed right up at the top of the website in the header. As far as contact forms go, again, it’s not crucial as the other items mentioned, but having a contact form or opt-in box may have small effect on your bounce rate, but it’ll surely increase your conversion rate.

While this is a thorough list of tips for lowering your bounce rate, there could be other reasons your site’s bounce rate is so high. One such reason that comes to mind is the social bookmarking site StumbleUpon. This site allows you to submit a categorized blog article, and when “Stumblers” go to the social bookmarking sites they can rapidly view sites that might interest them based on their preferences. The keyword here is rapidly. The site encourage users to quickly jump from site-to-site, so I recommend keeping an eye on all your top traffic sources, and if you see StumbleUpon as a leading referrer analyze the bounce rate from StumbleUpon. More than likely it’s high.

What’s your website pet peeve? We’d love to hear from you.                                                                                                                                

To learn more about bounce rates leave Turbo a message here or give us a call at 877-673-7096 x2.

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1) Colors

Colors, or more specifically, color contrast, can either draw a visitor’s eyes to certain parts of your website or force them to shield their eyes. The use of color is important on many sites, as it can graphically enhance basic text, as well as the overall look and feel. However, if a visitor cannot read the text on the page why would they stay on the site? While we’ve moved well beyond the “black text on white background” early Internet model, many websites still utilize low contrast colors. Reemember, make your website as readable as possible, and that starts with color contrast.

2) Layout 

It’s obvious that if you’re building a website it needs to have a consistent and organized layout. In the past web developers simply had to account for varying desktop and laptop screen sizes and different browsers when building a website. As mobile device Internet usage has become more common, developers have created mobile versions of the site so that they layout fits appropriately onto the screen. One alternative to creating two separate site is having a responsive layout.

A responsive layout design uses techniques, such as CSS media queries, to rearrange and scale content based on screen resolution. Also, consider high-resolution images and stylesheets if you’re hoping to make the site clear and navigable on mobile and tablet devices.

3) Navigation

If you haven’t placed links in easy-to-find areas then people will leave your site. This typically means in a navigation bar at the top of the site or on the sides. You can get create and have boxes within the page that link to various pages, but having a consistent navigation set up on the top or the side of the site is highly recommended. Make sure that whatever area you choose you stay consistent and keep the navigation in that spot for every page of the site. A couple other tips, replicate the navigation in the footer and make it very clear and obvious to the visitor how they can return to the home page.

4) Distractions

There are various distractions which can increase your bounce rate. One obvious annoying distraction is pop-ups. I don’t get why anyone would ever put a pop up on their site. The visitor is already on your site, why annoy them? This includes “fly-ins” as well. I also advise that you don’t have audio (this means music) or video that starts playing without being prompted. Finally, if you’re using a live chat software don’t set it up to automatically pop up every time someone comes to the site.

Stay tuned for #s 5-8 in Part II of this two part series. To learn more about bounce rates and improving your website’s bounce rate leave Turbo a message here or give us a call at 877-673-7096 x2.

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Google’s CEO Larry Page has expressed his concern over the “patent wars” in a recent blog post: “The U.S. Department of Justice had to intervene in the results of one recent patent auction to ‘protect competition and innovation in the open source software community’ and it is currently looking into the results of the Nortel auction,” Page writes. “Our acquisition of Motorola will increase competition by strengthening Google’s patent portfolio, which will enable us to better protect Android from anti-competitive threats from Microsoft, Apple and other companies.”

Page also referenced Motorola as “betting big” on the Android phone in 2008 when it was committed to using the Android operating system on all its phones. Clearly this shows some savvy for a mobile manufacturer that’s dominance in the mobile industry has dwindled over the past decade.

While there certainly was a defensive element to this deal, from a legal standpoint, Google obviously has a lot to gain from it as well. There’s the potential to make considerable money off of these patents through licensing deals.

According to Google, smart phone usage has increased by 7% over the past year in the U.S. This number will continue to grow, especially as the cost of smart phones decrease, and Google will be waiting for these news users, strategizing on how to keep iPhones and BlackBerrys out of their hands.

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