Australian SEO & Web Design News

Simplified Magazine Layout Web Style

blackmax — Sun, 06 Dec 2009 01:30:14 +0000

Another contender for the hottest 100 web design: Grow Collective

This site provides an interesting column layout which is carried throughout their site. I’m not sure it works so well throughout the rest of the site, but it makes me want to read everything on the home page.

How a web design goes straight to hell

blackmax — Sun, 06 Dec 2009 01:13:38 +0000

It’s so nice to feel we’re not alone. This cartoon from The Oatmeal has happened to us and if you’re involved in any kind of web development I’d hazard a guess it’s happened to you to. If you’re feeling frazzled by your clients this might make you feel better:

http://theoatmeal.com/comics/design_hell

SEO tactics and link building efforts

blackmax — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 22:33:51 +0000

I’ve just read an article by Axandra, the people who make IBP the do-it-yourself SEO software. This article is a concise and easy way to explain to customers the different approaches needed in SEO depending on the level of competition. It also outlines the importance of links when trying to achieve a top ranking on a competitive term.

It reiterates the importance Google places on incoming links, so let me repeat again, if you want to go after a competitive keyword term then you better have a lot of high quality links. For help on link building visit our link building packages.

Enough talk, go and read the article.

Future of the Web

blackmax — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 21:11:03 +0000

Google’s CEO, Eric Schmidt, discusses how he sees the future of the web. The clip below is a 6 minute excerpt TechCrunch cut as the meat in the sandwich.

Low Quality Backlinks to your Website

blackmax — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 22:44:41 +0000

Google has released a statement about having low quality backlinks to your website. In typical Google fashion it’s not very specific, however I’m reading that having a heap of low quality links to a site that doesn’t hold a lot of weight can effect rankings. Read the article here: http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2009/10/dealing-with-low-quality-backlinks.html

Avoid 15 E-Commerce Website Mistakes

blackmax — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 05:26:23 +0000

The more time you spend shopping online, the more you want to shake web developers and site owners. If each site owner spent some time buying from their top competitors and then tested their own site, then surely they too would be pulling their hair out in frustration at the stupidity of their website.

Well e-shop owners, if you just read and implement this guide from Smashing Magazine there will be no more hair-pulling for us customers…if you need help in implementing these efforts into your e-commerce website contact us.

Now go and read 15 Common Mistakes in E-Commerce Design

Fashion web design gets practical

blackmax — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 20:52:59 +0000

Todays hottest 100 website is home to the French first lady, Carla Bruni-Sarkozy. Ok, so she’s an ex-model so it had to be pretty and she’s French so it had to be stylish, but as an ambassador for her country it also had to be practical and it is. A fashion first – no Flash!

See for yourself www.carlabrunisarkozy.org/en

And your time starts now…

blackmax — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 20:52:38 +0000

How much time do you think visitors spend at your website? I know most site owners like to think visitors will spend in excess of 15 minutes browsing pages in their website whilst sipping on a cup of tea. Jakob Nielsen, usability guru, has an interesting article about the power of 10 and roughly how long each website action should take (or not take)…

Read the article here to make sure you aren’t losing customers in the first second. Not sure if any of these apply to your website? We can audit your website to find out.

SEO for Bing

blackmax — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 21:28:27 +0000

I’ve been ignoring Bing as a search engine, mostly because it’s made by the evil Microsoft. However, it’s now overtaken Yahoo for most of our clients sites as the second largest search engine referrer. That is no threat to Google as the Big G still takes about 90% of the search engine credit, but I’m surprised it’s overtaken Yahoo so rapidly. It could still be the novelty factor, but it could also indicate real competition.

So, not to be left out in the cold, the key factors for number one websites in Bing seem to be:

having an old domain name
having quality inbound links, specifically from pages that have the same keywords in the title
then the usual good amount of quality content (I’ve read Bing likes more than 300 words on a page), clean code and a sitemap

If you’ve done a good job of optimising your site for Google then your rankings shouldn’t be too different for Bing. If you’ve got loads of spammy links holding your website up in Google then these won’t help you in Bing. Bing seems to like better qualified links than Google – it’s about time!

Windows v Mac: The love hate relationship

blackmax — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 22:35:40 +0000

If you feel like killing some time, this is a hilarious article published in the Guardian.

Who knew Microsoft thought Windows was cool enough to have its own launch party for Windows 7?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/sep/28/charlie-brooker-microsoft-mac-windows

Of course the solution is Linux…

p.s. I am not a snootier, insistent advocate. I only mention Linux as a solution for those who aren’t familiar with it.