Author: Nancy McCord

Nancy McCord is the President and resident blogger for McCord Web Services LLC. She has been providing global web services since 2001. She is a web designer, search engine marketing professional, and search engine and blog expert. She lives in Maryland just south of the Washington DC metro area.
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Google AdWords Introduces New Ad Text Rotating Options

Boy, this past week has been a busy one for Google; with a new search algorithm released and some nice new improvements for Google AdWords rolled out too. One that I find particularly helpful is the option to select to show ads that generate conversions more frequently.

Previously, the only option you had to show ad text for your ad groups was to rotate the ads (good for A/B testing) and optimize the ads. Optimize is where Google serves the ad with the highest click through more frequently and eventually only shows this one high CTR ad. Unfortunately the ad that sometimes converts the best is not always the ad that has the highest click through rate. Now Google allows you to select to show the ads that convert the best preferentially.

So, how do you set this up? Go to your campaign settings tab in your Google AdWords account. Go nearly to the bottom of the settings page and click open “Ad delivery: Ad rotation, frequency capping”. Then select from the radio buttons there: “

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Google Update Their Algorithm to Benefit Information Rich Sites

Google just did a massive update on their search algorithm which impacted what sites get pushed to the topic of organic results this past week. The bottom line is that the change will benefit information rich sites but hurt those without original content.

This is what Google said exactly: “This update is designed to reduce rankings for low-quality sites—sites which are low-value add for users, copy content from other websites or sites that are just not very useful. At the same time, it will provide better rankings for high-quality sites—sites with original content and information such as research, in-depth reports, thoughtful analysis and so on.”

For our own site and those of our customers, this is very good news. When you build content that is more than just focused on your own business and services you enrich your own readers’ experience and now improve your own chances of placing higher organically on Google.

Of particular note is the comment “with original content and information such as research, in-depth reports, thoughtful analysis and so on.” This is good news for clients that we have worked with to create in-depth articles and mini white papers which we have then in turn additionally used as link bait articles and have archived back on their website as HTML pages and PDF files.

This is also be good news for blogging clients where blogs are informative and information dense content but only if the blog resides on the same website server as the website files and is found in a directory in the root of the parent website.

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New Twitter Background Design How-To

Twitter has moved to a very slim line background profile. If you haven’t visited your Twitter profile in a while and you had done a custom background, you may find that what you had before is cut off and nearly invisible with the new Twitter background space available.

Here are is a detailed explanation of what space you now have for Twitter.

We used to take a 1,920 pixel wide by 1,000 pixel tall canvas and show the company phone and website address in a block starting 25 pixels from the left to 200 pixels from the left. This space has now shrunk to 5 pixels from the left to a maximum of 110 pixels from the left.

The top drop down has also changed. Before we started our content block 70 pixels down from the top. Now we start the content block at 0 pixels or 57 pixels depending on what type of graphic you will be using. You may have to tweak a few things on your background based on the visual elements you are using, but this gives you a starting point.

The big issue is that background space has shrunk from 200 pixels to 120. This means that your previous Twitter background will look bad with the new interface design. In fact your company information that previously used to show may be cut off. There just isn’t much real estate for personalization at this point, but you can still use what is there to tie in with your website brand colors and Facebook Business page profile.

If you use HootSuite or TweetDeck to update your Twitter account, now’s the time to look at what your profile at www.Twitter.com looks like so you can make sure to make any necessary changes to keep looking good!

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How To Clean Up Your Twitter Followers Fast

You shouldn’t take action to clean up your Twitter following base until you have about 500 or so followers. Twitter operates in a reciprocal sphere. Initially to get people to follow you, you need to follow them. It just works that way in the real world.

However as your account grows and you get more serious about using Twitter and not just dabbling with it, you want to cut out people from your list that are sapping your SocialRank. That means chopping out followers who are not following you back. Don’t cut out people who have merit or who are high profile, but cut the people out who initially followed you to build their fan base and then chopped you. Additionally you want to cut out people who are just spamming your fan base with their repetitive tweets or get rich quick schemes.

To make this easy, I have found a free tool that allows me to cull through my fan base and with one click drop non- followers. I use www.JustUnfollow.com to clean up my list. (They are not paying me – I just like the online application.)

First login to your Twitter account then visit JustUnfollow.com and allow it to connect with your Twitter account. You will be able to unfollow people right from that screen. As your account and following base grows it is important to keep a differential between the number of people you follow and the people who follow you. Just Unfollow makes it easy to do.