Last week the good folks over at 207 had me come on to talk about zombies:

• how to make a zombie costume,
• how to prepare for the (inevitable) zombie apocalypse, and
• how to create zombie-themed websites.

I busted out one of my favorite zombie t’s and waxed philosophical on our undead brethren. We took a look at the CDC’s official blog post on preparing for the zombie apocalypse (for real!) and a great how-to video on creating zombie makeup where the major ingredient is toilet paper.

I also got to show a little love for the project I worked on with Josh Fisher, Zombie Ipsum: the lorem ipsum alternative for zombie websites.

You can watch the video on the WCSH website or check it out below:

Rich Brooks
Zombie Hunter

“What’s in a name? That which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet.”

Last month Google released a desktop version of their voice search technology, allowing people around the world to yell at their computer screen and receive tangible results.

I’m a big fan of the voice search on my iPhone; it’s almost always right, and when it’s not, it’s almost always funny. So, I decided to check it out on the first thing that popped into my head:

Wait,  that’s not what I said! I said flyte new media! No matter how many times I tried it I got the same results.

I can only imagine the frustration for business owners, marketers and entrepreneurs are experiencing when looking for a quality web design and internet marketing company with a homophonistic name.

To that end, I decided to create a “flight new media” post, which would work as a redirect of sorts until Google realizes that when people are searching for “flight new media” they really mean “flyte new media.”

Since Scribe SEO says I’m supposed to have 300 words minimum in this post for maximum SEO, I guess I could continue writing about all things flyte, and you can feel free to stop reading at any point now.

• We have an email newsletter we call flyte log, not flight log.
• You’re currently reading the flyte blog, not the flight blog.
• We talk about a process for building quality websites named the flyte plan, not the flight plan.
• I refer to my co-workers as the flyte crew, not the flight crew.
• We call our educational workshops flyte school, not flight school.
  
• We once ran an ad with the slogan take flyte, not take flight.

OK, I think we’ve got this covered now.

If you have a similarly homophonistically (yes, that’s a word–I just made it up) challenged name, or you’ve had a surprisingly wrong result with Google’s voice search, please let us know.

Rich Brooks
Chief Punster

If you follow the flyte new media news (and who doesn’t, really? I think CNN has a tab for us on their home page), then you may have heard that our search engine marketer, Nicki Hicks, is moving south for warmer climes.

Although she’s going to continue working for flyte, we knew we also wanted to have a search and social media expert in the office here in Maine.

Enter Joan Crocker, the newest addition to the flyte new media crew.

The first thing you need to know about Joan is she doesn’t like to share. That ice cream cone is all hers. Don’t come looking for a bite unless you want to be starting something. Besides that, there are a few things you should know about Joan:

She graduated from Ithaca College in 2003 with a Bachelors Degree in Communications and a concentration in Public Relations and Advertising.  Returning to Maine after school she started her career as a Marketing Coordinator for a small business in Scarborough, Maine.  It was then that Joan was introduced to web marketing, social media and SEO.  Taking on a total overhaul of the company website Joan was able to increase web traffic and sales and had officially caught the social media bug. (Thankfully for flyte, there’s no known cure for said bug.)

Most recently, she worked for a Portland based company as a Social Media Manager. There she helped the company develop web marketing strategies for over 7 brands in retail and direct response.  Through SEO strategies consisting of keyword research, blogging, website content creation and social media Joan increased traffic, brand awareness and sales while improving customer service and overall web sentiment.

At flyte, Joan will be helping our clients increase their online visibility via SEO, social media, blogging and more.

In her downtime Joan enjoys cooking, golfing, skiing, hanging with friends and family, quoting movies, singing with “wild abandon” in the car by herself and making “Grrrrreat Margarita’s.” [Ed. note: not having tasted said "Grrrrreat Margarita's" I cannot vouch for their grrrrreatness. Will get back to you when I know more.]

You can find out even more about Joan on the Interwebs! She’d love to chat. Feel free to follow her on Twitter, friend her on Facebook, and connect with her on LinkedIn.

She’s also taking over the day-to-day maintenance of our Maine SEO Blog, and she’s already got her first post up: Facebook Edgerank: What is it and Why Should You Care?

And don’t worry about Nicki! She’s going to be opening our Florida office and has already started our newest blog: Florida SEO Blog!

Rich Brooks
Surrounded By Greatness

• Consider subscribing to our blog either by using the RSS feed or the email subscription to your right. You can always unsubscribe.
• We’ve got a great resource in The 11 Biggest Mistakes Small Business Bloggers Make. I hand crafted each one of those mistakes, so why not learn from my mistakes rather than your own? Cheaper that way, you know. There is an email registration piece, but again, you can unsubscribe at any time.
• We’ve got an all SEO, all the time blog over at Maine SEO Blog written by our search engine marketer, Nicki Hicks with some contributions by yours truly. You don’t have to be from Maine to enjoy it.
• Since Nicki’s moving to Florida (but still working for flyte), she’s started a new blog, Florida SEO Blog. Please give it some love.

That’s all! Now I just have to get the world’s biggest cup of coffee and head over the Javits Convention Center. Feel free to say hello!

Rich Brooks
You Can Also Find Me On The Twitter

Would you like to take better photos with your iPhone, Droid or other smart phone?

Last night I was on 207, the evening news magazine on southern Maine’s NBC affiliate, WCSH. We talked about some of the great free and inexpensive photography apps that can improve your picture taking, add cool filters, create panoramas or even twist your photos into tiny little worlds.

Some apps, like Camera+, add stabilizers, timers and burst photo options to improve your picture taking.

Others, like Instagram and Hipstamatic, add cool filters that you can try on after you’ve taken your shot.

The picture to the right was taken using the Instagram app on my iPhone. It was already a gray morning in Maine, but the Instagram filter added a slightly ghostly feel to the foggy scene out of our office window.

Pano is an app I like for creating panoramas. What’s nice is that it gives you a sliver of your previous photo so that you can line up your shots better. Here’s one I took of the Portland Waterfront:

Except for the little glitch about a quarter from the right it came out pretty well.

We ran out of time, but I especially like the TinyWorld app that turns your pictures into, well, tiny worlds:

You can watch the video at the 207 website or down below:

Rich Brooks
Unfiltered

Last week we announced a job opening here at flyte for a search engine marketer.

No, we’re not losing Nicki Hicks, who’s been a search engine and social media marketer here for the past few years. As she documented in a recent post over at Maine SEO, she’s moving out of state but not out of flyte.

Here’s how the job posting reads:

We’re an energetic, successful Web design and Internet market firm located in Portland, Maine, looking for an experienced search engine marketing professional.

Our philosophy is that only an integrated, holistic approach to Web marketing will help our clients succeed on the Web, so we’re looking to fold your search engine experience into our Web marketing model which includes email marketing, blogging, social media and other Web-based strategies.

You will run keyword analyses, consult on client content, review analytic reports, provide ongoing support and handle any other tasks that help our clients rank higher at the search engines and drive more qualified leads to their sites.

You have excellent copywriting skills, are organized and detail-oriented. You work well with a team, but you’re a self-starter who doesn’t require a lot of supervision. You’re passionate about helping small businesses succeed online and you’ve got the experience to make it happen.

Flyte believes in ongoing training of our crew and you’d be no exception, but we’re interested in candidates with 1 – 3 years of SEM experience. This is a results-oriented position and we’re looking for someone who has a proven track record.

If you’re up for a challenge, if you want to make an impact, if you have an entrepreneurial mindset, then flyte new media is looking for you.

Please provide your resume and a cover letter with specific SEO projects you’ve worked on in the past, and the outcomes of these projects. The more detail you can provide on past experience, the better.

So, is that you? Are you ready to join the flyte new media crew?

If so, please fill out our application form and submit a cover letter and resumé and we’ll take a look.

No phone calls…please!

Rich Brooks
10% Less Crazy Than Your Last Boss

Photo Credit: Brenda Gottsabend

Online videos are a powerful tool for search engine optimization (SEO).

Search engines like Google or Bing want to deliver the most relevant content to their users, regardless of the form or medium of that content. To that end, they look at the words in the titles of videos on websites like YouTube or Vimeo, as well as the description and the tags.

There’s also some evidence that they look at other factors, such as the number of views, the number of comments, viewer ratings, whether people watched the video to the end, number of incoming links, the number of times shared, etc. Search engines may even be converting the audio to text and using that to better determine if the video content is relevant to a given search.

It’s also been my experience that search engines want to present searchers with a mix of media in the results: web pages, images, video, local results, news, tweets and more. Each one may be another opportunity for you or your business to rank higher and get in front of your best prospects.

So, if you’re looking to leapfrog your competitors in search, you should add video to the mix.

For example, we wanted more visibility for the search term “maine web design.” (If you’re a Maine web designer you can stop reading now. This doesn’t concern you.) So we created a video slideshow called “Maine Web Design – Maine Business Websites” and posted it to YouTube and a dozen other video sharing websites. (I recommend TubeMogul for posting to multiple video sharing sites at once.)

Within a day that slideshow made up half of the top 10 results in Google’s video search for “Maine web design.” That was nice, but there were no video results displayed on the first page and I don’t know how many people click over to video results for that type of search. Still, it showed the potential of video.

Then, about two weeks ago I happened to perform that same search again and, lo and behold, the video was the sixth result on Google in the regular, organic search results. I logged out of Google to confirm my results, and the video was still number six. (When you’re logged in your results are skewed/tailored based on your previous search history.) Although the sixth position isn’t as good as the first slot, many people are more drawn to video than text links, so it has that added benefit.

I’m not sure when the video started appearing in the regular search results, but it is still hanging tough at the time of this post.

Something to note about this video: it’s just a slideshow of screen captures from websites we’ve designed for Maine-based businesses; there’s no audio, just imagery. However, we did feature this video on a previous blog post, which may have helped its visibility and views, which in turn may have improved its ranking. Blogging about it again should give it an additional boost.

What’s the takeaway? If you’re looking to leapfrog your competition for popular keyword phrases, you should experiment with video. Just don’t expect overnight success; be patient, and keep on uploading new videos targeting different keyword phrases you want to rank well for.

Rich Brooks
Ready for My Close Up

Sometimes Google just isn’t the right place to get an answer on the web. Maybe you need an opinion, or the question hasn’t been asked before, or you need the wisdom of crowds.

Because of this, many question and answer sites now populate the web. In a recent segment on 207, Maine’s premiere evening new program, I talked about a few of these answer sites, including Quora, Aardvark and LinkedIn Answers.

All three sites offer unique approaches to getting your questions answered. Quora has a great sense of community, and many well known personalities ask and answer questions there. Aardvark is often a place to get an answer quickly, often in 10 minutes or less.

LinkedIn Answers is a great place to ask business questions of the LinkedIn community or answers questions yourself and establish your expertise there. I’ve often posted business questions such as “what do you charge clients for travel time?” and “how many times will you leave unreturned voicemails before giving up on a sales prospect?” Often, I’ll get dozens of great answers which I then turn into a blog post…giving credit to the best answers, of course.

You can watch the video on the 207 website or down below.

Rich Brooks
I Don’t Have All the Answers…So I Look Them Up

• How to Make Search Engines Work for Your Business (2/10/2011, Portland, ME)
• Expanding Your Mental Health Practice Through Web Marketing (3/11/2011, Portland, ME)
• Blogging Success Summit 2011 (Throughout February, Virtual)

Here’s the skinny on each one:

HOW TO MAKE SEARCH ENGINES WORK FOR YOUR BUSINESS (2/10/2011)

Details:

Open to all persons who have a business website, or are developing their business website. Search engine optimization can increase traffic, deliver more targeted customers, and increase revenue. Search engines have become a core resource for individuals looking for your small business.

You will learn the importance of SEO, as well as how to improve your organic search engine ranking and drive more qualified leads to your Web site. Every business with a website has the potential to be found by more customers online.

Learn how to uncover which keywords drive customers to your site, how to make on page changes to increase your visibility, and key link opportunities to build your authority.

The workshop will led by Nicki Hicks of Portland’s flyte new media.

Date: Thursday, 2/10/2010

Time: 2pm – 5pm

Place: SCORE Maine offices, 100 Middle St., Portland, ME (directions)

For more information or to register please visit SCORE Maine.

EXPANDING YOUR MENTAL HEALTH PRACTICE THOUGH WEB MARKETING (3/11/2011)

Details:

While many mental health practitioners may be uncomfortable marketing their services, most are downright confused and even anxious when it comes to using web marketing to increase their referrals and build their visibility.

However, with over half a billion people on Facebook and millions using Google every day to find help, it’s impossible to ignore web marketing for long.

In this day long workshop you’ll learn:

• How to setup a web site that engages your audience, establishes your expertise, and encourages referrals for your practice
• How to get your web site to rank higher in the search engines
• How to integrate a blog, video and an email newsletter into your web presence
• How to handle HIPAA and other Internet use issues unique to mental health practitioners
• How mental health practitioners can use social media appropriately; how to handle Facebook friendship requests, how to manage your privacy, and how to engage others in the social web
• How to market and sell information products such as e-books, online courses and webinars

Whether you have a robust web site already, or are just getting started, this day long workshop will help you develop and effective strategy for raising your online profile, driving more qualified referrals through your web site, and navigating the treacherous waters of social media.

All participants will receive a certificate for 6 clock hours.

Transdisciplinary Workshops are approved for 6 CE’s in Psychology by the Maine Board of Psychologists.

This workshop is limited to only 100 participants, so please sign up early!

Date: Friday, 3/11/2011

Time: 8am – 3:30pm

Place: Regency Hotel, 20 Milk St., Portland, ME (directions)

Cost: $150 until 2/1, then $170

For more information or to register please visit Transdisciplinary Workshops.

BLOGGING SUCCESS SUMMIT 2011

This virtual conference, featuring 23 blogging experts from around the world–including flyte’s president Rich Brooks–is the perfect event for anyone looking to take their blogging to the next level. Learn how to increase your search engine visibility, drive more quality leads, attract a following and more.

This month long event is only $597…an amazing deal for content this rich. Check out the Blogging Success Summit page for more information and to register.

Rich Brooks
Maine Web Marketing

Mental health professionals, psychologists and social workers are the first to admit that marketing themselves and their practice doesn’t come easy. That’s why we’ve partnered with Transdisciplinary Workshops to put on Expanding Your Mental Health Practice Through Web Marketing.

In this day-long workshop you’ll learn:

• How to setup a web site that engages your audience, establishes your expertise, and encourages referrals for your practice
• How to get your web site to rank higher in the search engines
• How to integrate a blog, video and an email newsletter into your web presence
• How to handle HIPAA and other Internet use issues unique to mental health practitioners
• How mental health practitioners can use social media appropriately; how to handle Facebook friendship requests, how to manage your privacy, and how to engage others in the social web
• How to market and sell information products such as e-books, online courses and webinars.

There are only 100 seats available, so please sign up early!

At flyte we’ve worked with plenty of mental health practitioners over the years, starting with my dad, whose web site I launched in 1997. It’s definitely a challenge to market something like mental health, and the education that social workers and mental health professionals go through rarely include a semester on marketing, much less search engine optimization.

However, to paraphrase one of my dad’s psychologist friends, “if you are able to help people live a healthier, happier life, then it’s your duty to market your services so that they can find that help.”

Date: Friday, March 11
Time: 8am – 3:30pm
Location: Regency Hotel, Portland, ME (directions)
Early Tuition: $150 (by 2/1/2011)
Tuition: $170

Rich Brooks
Web Marketing Presenter