311–320 of 382 posts
So a 10% conversion rate? Seems normal.
10% of the entering traffic, acts normal. The other 90% is garbage. So if your initial organic conversion rate is X%, this article suggests your Google Ad, or Facebook ad conversion rate will be 10% * X%. That said, its not an extensive study or anything scientific.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why is it that if someone steals my wallet in the street I have to describe them to the police?
Your analogy is incorrect. If the police simply refused to respond until you'd done the full investigation yourself and handed in the proof, and then the only thing they'd do was acknowledge "yup, that guy stole your wallet, we won't assume he legitimately possesses that wallet anymore but we also won't do anything to get it back or prosecute him", then you'd have an analogy.
Also, have you tried reporting a minor crime in a major city recently? Me: "My (nice road racing) bike was stolen. Here's the video tape from the security camera showing the crime and the thief's face." Cops: "That's nice for you. Come back in a week and see if your bike is in our shed if you like. Cheerio".
Earlier quoted context omitted.
You are the most motivated party.
I would like to see this change. If Google's approach is encouraging or enabling fraud, I'd like to see to it they're the ones who are motivated to change their approach. Making them legally responsible for the actions of their algorithms, preferably with penalties steep enough that even they can't ignore the resulting fines, might not be a bad start.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
What exactly is "dumb" amounts of money? If by dumb, you mean enough for authors to get by, then you are probably in the minority. People love talking about how much they hate ads, and how, no, they're not cheap, they would totally pay for content. Let's be honest - internet users are cheap. They want stuff for free. And if site A starts charging, they will jump ship to site B, until eventually it's a race to the bot…
I guess I'm cheap then. I have no interest in paying any amount of money to read most of the things I read online. It seems to me that it's not so much that people are demanding this content for free as it is that people don't think it's worth paying for. It's not that I particularly wanted to see an article about the usefulness of advertising as it is that it's something to read on the bus. I would probably just loo…
So.. to me, the opposite holds true. If lets say I was interested in reviews on some technical product I wanted to buy - I would definitely prefer to have a lengthy article that goes over all the details rather than a comment thread which might detail one tiny slice of their experience with the product. So maybe if enough people comment, I can waste some time reading them all and cobble together a larger slice in my head, but again, its tedious, its just easier to go to a single source that has already done it.
Maybe what we really need is better curation than the current voting model.
I've got a long history here, stretching all the way back to 2007. At that time 80% of my traffic was organic, and most importantly, was spread equally between MSN, Yahoo, Google, AOL, etc. I paid for ad's through HotScripts, and this was a solid source of leads. This mixture, along with a fast, secure, easy to use site and great word of mouth lead to an annual growth rate of around 30%, ending up in 2011 with a mont…
The spammy links thing fascinates me. I don't know much about search algos or SEO but on our small, industrial business site we couldn't understand why, after many hours and thousands of dollars spent on the procedures that Google recommends, our organic ranking in SERPs for a very niche product (of which we are one of only three providers in our region) was appalling - often page three. It wasn't till we realised we…
A bit off-topic, but how did you create those videos? It seems like a useful tool to test/optimize design, find UI bugs, etc. EDIT: They used FullStory ( https://fullstory.com ). I missed that when I read it the first time.
There are quite a few of these screen-capture tools around (Inspectlet, Mouseflow, Hotjar), most of them for UX optimization. If you're looking for a more developer-focused product, you can also check out LogRocket ( https://logrocket.com ).
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Just checked your site. It's well put together but the language is far too technical for AdWords. Engineers don't usually make the kind of business decisions to buy these things at larger companies, it's VP level people. Find your kinds of customers and tailor a landing page with stuff that they want, instead of having the site explain everything like a users manual. Ex: Calls centers do not care at all about the oth…
Thank you for the suggestions! The intentionally deep technical content of the site may be motivated by reasoning backward to your thought process: Usually it's the technical guys, tasked with researching and finding a product that fits the requirements, who find the site and forward the link to their managers. The managers have no idea what any of it means, but "it looks like good stuff", so "contact them and find o…
Once management and IT know about the problem there's usually already a shortlist of software to check out and management makes the final decision.
Indeed it is probably self selection of our markets to a large extent :) but it worked for us. In my current and last company new tools and hardware have been exclusively pushed from below. If management doesn't know there's a problem they won't change anything, and most managers hate being told about problems without solutions in hand
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Thank you for the suggestions! The intentionally deep technical content of the site may be motivated by reasoning backward to your thought process: Usually it's the technical guys, tasked with researching and finding a product that fits the requirements, who find the site and forward the link to their managers. The managers have no idea what any of it means, but "it looks like good stuff", so "contact them and find o…
LOL I have a site that is totally and exclusively devoted to Study Skills. My quality score for the keyword "study skills?" 1/10 Now, I understand what's happening. I haven't loaded up the tags and stuff. I'm appealing to the people who might be looking for something like this. It's very different from selling umbrellas, but we are forced to fit the same mold. I think the general conclusion is sound: Having such a do…
You need to have the most appealing intros or people will simply hit X on the tab and move on to someone that does. In short, make absolutely sure it's abundantly clear to a five year old that they've reached the right place within ten seconds or people will go somewhere else.
Also, everyone will be 1/10 qs for study skills. The keyword is far too broad for more than 1% of your ads to be targeted properly. Unless you have thousands of negative keywords I wouldn't go near that one. Google wants ads to be relevant so users will continue to click them. You will be punished severely every time your ad shows up and it's not what the user was looking for
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Thank you for the suggestions! The intentionally deep technical content of the site may be motivated by reasoning backward to your thought process: Usually it's the technical guys, tasked with researching and finding a product that fits the requirements, who find the site and forward the link to their managers. The managers have no idea what any of it means, but "it looks like good stuff", so "contact them and find o…
AFAIK Technical information is usually downloaded in PDF white papers.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I second that opinion. The site has a good technical explanation, but it doesn't have a "value proposition" - why should I, as a manager, buy your product? (I guess it makes calls cheaper? Is it needed for what?)
The nature of the organic audience is such that if they found their way to the site in the first place, they are very likely highly specialised in IP telephony and know the answers to these questions. They are typically looking for more details, not a gentle layman's introduction. When they contact me, 90%+ of the time they have highly specific questions, and there is no need to convey what the product is or what it…