Google Hosted Blogger Blogs

Google is now allowing blogger blogs to resolve to your own website address. According to Google Operating System...

"....If you wanted to enjoy all the features of the new Blogger, but also have your own domain, now you can. Follow these instructions: buy a domain, create a CNAME record for your domain and select "switch to custom domains" in your blog's settings.Google will continue to host your posts and pictures, so you don't need to buy a hosting service. The old .blogspot.com address will redirect to your new domain. This way, you'll keep your visitors and the beloved search engine rankings."

It might be something I'd consider doing one of these days - have to set up a new site first. Right now I'm so busy blogging at Webmetricsguru.com, Artnewyorkcity.com, Smartmobs.com and BigGreenBlog.com that I don't have much time to build something new.

In fact, I need to clean up this blog, get rid of a lot of junk in the right navigation - just make it look better. Wish there were more free templates to choose from on Blogger - don't find the default collection has enough choices.

test of writetomyblog

Tags: test

Testing FeedBurners new metrics tracking

I hope to post more often to this blog - it's the only one that I actually control the template of the blog and can test out new code/tracking services. I'm testing FeedBurner's new metrics right now.

Figured out how Avinash Kaushik's blog is rising so fast in Technorati Rank - here's a test

I just figured out why Avinash Kaushik's blog, Occam's Razor, is rising so quickly in Technorati Rank!!!!!!!! It's so simple....I don't know why I did not see it before - if I was not the "detective type"...I'd never put it together.

Yep - here's part of the Secret of Avanish success - every time I post about Occam's Razor and reference a blog post - my post appears as a COMMENT in Occam's Razor - even though I did not actually leave a comment!

That's SMART . OK Here's the test. I just read Avinash's post on Hiring a Senior Web Analyst? Here’s a Suggested Job Requisition / Description and I'm using my personal Blog - ... does he approve the comment (maybe) or does it show up by itself.

Either way - every time anyone writes about one of Avinash's post ....the way he's got Occam's Razor set up .... it will show up as a comment.

I have to hand it to Avinash Kaushik ..... that was a very SMART plugin you installed.

My first post in 9 months - Stuff Happening at WebMetricsGuru.com - ArtNewYorkCity.com and SmartMobs.com

This is my personal blog - but I hope someday soon to make it the repository of all my posting activity, because it really should be - I own it and I can control the blog template - I don't control the templates of Webmetricsguru.com, ArtNewYorkCity.com or SmartMobs.

And if any of these blogs goes "belly up" and don't want to lose all my subscribers and have to start all over again, like what happened to Andy Beal.

So I'm going to post more often here, even if it means making a special effort to do so - and to give information that maybe...I haven't put anywhere else - I hope you'll subscribe to Now-Seo if your reading this.

What's going on:
Just got back from the EMetrics Summit this week (I count Monday as the start of a new week - otherwise, it was last week as I got back Wednesday night). I wrote a lot of stuff on that - here's the link to that content on the Emetrics Summit at WebMetricsGuru.com. I also wrote a lot about blog ranking algos and how they differ, depending on how you count them. There was also a lot of interesting stuff going on in the Entertainment Industry and I wrote about it here - record companies spamming .. that's right...spamming .

In the Art world, I did did a 3 part post on Peter Saul, a well known American artist who has been painting for 55 years! I covered the show in 3 posts, part 1, part 2 and part 3, my thoughts on all of it.

I have also been painting a lot myself, driven by circumstances out of my control, things that let me to have to paint again - I had no choice - and now what comes out is not my rehash of Cezanne, or Manet, or anyone else - it's 100% Marshall Sponder. Many of my paintings were first published at WebMetricsGuru, along with other artists I saw, earlier this year. When I began ArtNewYorkCity.com on the Syntagma Blog.

And you can read my stuff on Smartmobs.com

AxROI - New Conversion Tracking Tool -

I posted information about AxROI at WebMetricsGuru

Matt Cutts: Gadgets, Google, and SEO � Confirming a penalty

Matt Cutts: Gadgets, Google, and SEO � Confirming a penalty: "I'd like to address those two points. I can confirm that Google has removed traffic-power.com and domains promoted by Traffic Power from our index because of search engine optimization techniques that violated our webmaster guidelines at http://www.google.com/webmasters/guidelines.html. If you are a client or former client of Traffic Power and your site is not in Google, please see my previous advice on requesting reinclusion into Google's index to learn what steps to take if you would like to be reincluded in Google's index.

Note: I'm turning off comments for this post. There are other places that are more appropriate places for discussing this issue. "

I'm glad that Google announced, via Matt Cutts, that it banned Traffic Power. At least now people know - they don't have to wonder about it.

Seth's Blog: Hearing, part II

Seth's Blog: Hearing, part II: "Hearing, part II
So, of course, the Eata Pita parable below is part of a bigger story.
How many organizations don't hear?
I don't mean the counterpeople and the customer service reps. I mean, how many organizations are organized to actually allow customers and prospects to share their insights and feedback?
Second, how many of those organizations have management that bother to listen to the feedback? Or employees that are empowered to do something with it?
And finally, once an organization listens, does it actually do something about what it comes across?
Insert [political party, relgious order, non-profit, for profit, teacher, school board, insurance company] here. Do they Hear, Listen and then Act?"

The funny part is that I passed Eat A Pita the other day on my way to work when I went to GCT - I imagine I could have bumped into Seth trying to order something there. The place looks seedy....I'd not order anything from there - it's no surprise the workers don't listen - they're apathetic.

Agree with the rest of this post though - most businesses are not set up for feedback or taking action on it.

WebMetricsGuru: Top Search Engine Search Numbers - just posted

WebMetricsGuru: Top Search Engine Search Numbers - just posted: "Search Engine Traffic share for US searches were just posted yesterday by Nielson//NetRatings. According to ClickZ
'The number of U.S. searches grew 55 percent in December 2005 over December 2004, according to data released by Nielsen//NetRatings. '

Top Three U.S. Search Share Rankings by Percentage Points, December 2004 and 2005
Search EngineDecember 2004 Search Share (%)December 2005 Search Share (%)Change (Percentage Points)
Google43.148.85.7
Yahoo!21.721.4-0.3
MSN14.010.9-3.1
Source: Nielsen//NetRatings, February 2006

Most of the sites who i do both Web Analytics and SEO/SEM for show a much greater increase in Search Traffic from Google than the numbers above suggest. In fact, one of my house plans clients had a 300%+ increase in thier Google Search Referral Traffic from Dec 04 to Dec 05.
The data above is actually not the whole story - "

I posted this information in my new blog...www.webmetricsguru.com - where you can read the rest of my post (the formatting also looks better on my other site).

Loyalty Programs for Search (by Jeremy Zawodny)

Loyalty Programs for Search (by Jeremy Zawodny): "You might not think that web search is a commodity service, but I've seen public and private data that suggests we're headed that way. It was only a matter of time, right?"

Loyality as measured for return visitors via Search would be something interesting to compile for clients.

Greg Boser Says Big Companies Should Spam Search Engines (by Jeremy Zawodny)

Greg Boser Says Big Companies Should Spam Search Engines (by Jeremy Zawodny): "It's not the first time I've heard this logic, but Greg's done a better job than most by putting it in simple terms:
We'll be allowed to take cuts because search engines want our sites to show up. They want them to show up because their users expect to see them. And those users don't give a shit about what's contained in the source code. All they care about is whether or not they land on a page that matches their search.
Until that fact changes, there will be virtually no risk associated with aggressive SEO for big brands. And as long as the risks are low, managers of big brands would be foolish not to explore potential strategies that will ultimately improve the visibility of their brands simply because a search engine has said they disapprove.
Is he right? Are the big brands (IBM, BMW, Apple, Toyota, Playboy, etc.) so important to search engines (or their users), that they should 'optimize' first and worry about being discovered later?
Put another way, what if every one of the Fortune 500 decided to follow BMW's lead and spam Google? Who win?
Sure, it's an extreme case. But most fun thought experiments are. :-)"

Since I work for IBM and I met Greg Bozer a couple of times at WebMasterWorld Conferences (shady fellow) I found this post of interest to me.

SRC, LLC. WebEx Enterprise Site

SRC, LLC. WebEx Enterprise Site: " Date & Time Event Panelists Info
January 2006

I found some very interesting presentions on Demographics Analysis at the SRC Website - I'm going to attempt to attend as many of these meetings as I can. I believe Web Analytics and Search Engine Marketing/Optimization can be merged with Demographics Analysis data; in fact, Hitwise has attempted to do this on the high end - but at 18,000 - 46,000 per year for licensing, it's out of reach of most marketers that don't have a big agency to buy those packages.

I'll report back on how these packages can be used for Web Analytics here, so come back and visit often. Feburary should be an interesting month - based on what's being presented (below),

January 31, 2006
10:00 am- 11:00 am PST Introduction to Alteryx

Enroll

February 2006

February 7, 2006
10:00 am- 11:00 am PST HealthCare Demographics
Mandy Tehrani
Enroll

February 8, 2006
1:00 pm- 1:30 pm PST Updates and Custom Reporting In DemographicsNow!
T.J. Heyns
Enroll

February 15, 2006
8:00 am- 9:00 am PST Identify your Target market with Dnow
Nino Pozgaj
Enroll

February 20, 2006
1:00 pm- 1:30 pm PST Real Estate Research with DemographicsNow.com
Tony Thompson
Enroll

February 22, 2006
8:15 am- 9:15 am PST Learn more about adding aerial photos to your account
Nino Pozgaj
Enroll

February 22, 2006
1:00 pm- 1:30 pm PST Learn to Create Custom Maps with DemographicsNow.com
T.J. Heyns
Enroll

February 27, 2006
1:00 pm- 1:30 pm PST Power Up Your DemographicsNow.com with Add-ons
Tony Thompson
Enroll "

Know More Media: I Sneeze For Seth

Know More Media: I Sneeze For Seth: "Permission Marketing
You have to give something first to people before you ask for something from them. You have to date first, allow each other to get to know each other. Does your business know how many people you have permission to talk to? You REALLY need to know and track that number."

Here's some detailed notes from Seth Godin's recent conference in NYC; I'd love to go to one.

"With all the clutter, the only lasting way to stand out among the noise is to be remarkable. Remarkable means to have other remark about what you are doing."

SiliconBeat: Kosmix raises cash for a new search engine -- to compete with Google

SiliconBeat: Kosmix raises cash for a new search engine -- to compete with Google: "They are making an audaciously risky bet that they can crack the code on a vexing problem in search: finding the meaning, or at least the topic of a Web page. 'This is an unsolved problem on the Web,' says Harinarayan, from his office perched on the seventh floor of a Mountain View high-rise. His window commands a sweeping view of the valley, stretching out over toward the Googleplex, just three miles away. "

I'm interested in taking a look at Kosmix when it goes live. I have written about finding the true meaning of a page using Pertinence Summerizer; I also routinely use AdWords Keyword Planning tool which pulls out the likely keywords for a site (and a page as well). I'm curious to see what Rajaraman and Harinarayan have come up with.