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what every e-newsletter needs

Posted by simon ashwin On Tuesday 18 Dec 07

Electronic newsletters have taken the place of their conventional paper cousins. With the change in delivery mechanism comes the demand for change in format and content, too.

A newsletter sent over the Internet needs links to other sites that the audience may find useful, allowing readers to transition to additional information with a click of the mouse. The audience of an electronic newsletter, published either embedded or attached to an email attachment or microsite link, is already online. Take advantage of that immediacy when marketing new initiatives and promotions.

A newsletter also needs to include keywords. This marketing tool should employ similar search engine optimization techniques as your website. Tags, phrases, and words that have proven to help in search engine ranking should used liberally, especially on the version that you link to your parent site.

And from a legal perspective, a newsletter needs a disclaimer. The Internet is a global audience. An electronic newsletter's distribution cannot be curtailed. If an offer is intended only for a local or regional organization, say so. When linking to other sites or to material that is not original to your company, make sure that is clearly stated as well.

And, finally, a newsletter needs a sell-by date. The concept and allure of a newsletter’s content is that it is topical. Readers expect to find information that is fresh, direct and upcoming.

A newsletter should respond with substance that feeds this expectation and build anticipation for the next...

what is consumer generated content?

Posted by simon ashwin On Tuesday 04 Dec 07

Consumer (or User) Generated Content runs under the notion that the internet is a shared space for all to enjoy and Web 2.0 supports the concept that users have a real sense of ownership over such a vast space. At Whiteduck we believe this creates a very detailed and personal experience, ensuring users feel they have a connection with others using Web 2.0 technologies.

Web 2.0 technology has revolutionized how we perceive and utilize the internet today. Gone are the days where the internet was a read only, one way medium. Today, posting text, graphics and videos is instant, quick and easy. Web 2.0 is not only about linking information; it’s about connecting people with brands.

We consider the key to featuring user generated content on your web site, is giving users a reason to participate. Companies need to focus their web site content on the needs and desires of their target demographic. In order to successfully achieve user participation, it is a must to create the impression of an ‘inner circle’ with users, offering a highly personalized experience.

This subsequently encourages them to submit their own content, creating a sense of user ownership and ensures that members strongly identify with the site because portions of the content are written by members for members to relate and comment on.

What is Social Bookmarking?

Consumer-generated content uses Social Bookmarking to bring a raw human element to a technological concept – the desire to connect with other like-minded...

what is web2.0?

Posted by simon ashwin On Tuesday 27 Nov 07

Web 2.0 is one of those phrases which we’re hearing a lot about currently. Everybody says they’re very excited about it but do they really know what it is?

So what is Web 2.0?
Well, in the simplest terms it’s the phrase being applied to ‘the second coming’ of the internet. Dot-com investors are partying like it’s 1999 and a number of pioneering online services are very much keeping that party exciting, getting everybody talking about the internet once more and its increasing relevance to our lives.

Such as what?
Well, Web 2.0 is a bit of a catch-all which covers a broad range of new online services, user-generated content, communities and social networking tools. The most popular are sites such as Blogger, Flickr, MySpace, YouTube and Wikipedia and the Godfather of Web 2.0 - Google. The phrase also refers to the creation of far greater levels of interactivity, not just between users, or between users and the internet but between complementary online services through mash-ups and web services.

So this is all consumer stuff - photo-sharing and the like?
That’s where a lot of the energy is coming from and the services doing the early running have absolutely been focused on driving and exploiting end-user trends. However, the idea that the web is ‘where it’s at’ is not lost on big business. For example Web 2.0 covers ’software as a service’ (SaaS) - companies are being told they no longer have to buy software but instead...

seven common seo mistakes

Posted by simon ashwin On Friday 16 Nov 07

Starters in Search Engine Optimization, in their zest to increase their site’s SERP (Search Engine Result Pages) ranking, commit some mistakes, which drastically affect their Website’s position on search engines. The following is a list of 7 common mistakes, which you can use as a checklist while optimizing your Web pages.a

1. Ignoring the Title Tag
This is one of the gravest, but most common, mistakes that may spell doom for your site’s SERP ranking. Most of the search engines consider the Title tag very important. Search engines generally display the content that you give in the Title tag. Therefore, have most important keywords in the Title tag. DO NOT leave the Title tag empty or have irrelevant words such as “Home page”, “Welcome to our site”, etc. in the Title tag.

2. Irrelevant Keywords
Some Webmasters use irrelevant, but much sought after, keywords to drive traffic to their site. Getting traffic in such a way will not help your business in anyway. After all, you optimize your Website to boost your business. Say for example, you have a Website where you sell Desktop Computers. To increase the traffic, you use the keyword “Britney Spears” throughout your content, META tags, and Title tag. People who search for “Britney Spears” reach your page. But, when they find that your Website has nothing to do with “Britney Spears”, they will move away from your site quickly. You don’t gain anything from that traffic. In fact, had you optimized your site...

what is rss?

Posted by simon ashwin On Monday 05 Nov 07

You may recognize the universal feed icon or these “chicklets” from your favorite Web sites, blogs and podcasts.

These icons represent content in any format — text, audio or video — to which you can subscribe and read/ watch/ listen using a feed reader.

Why is This a Good Thing?

Technology evolution in online publishing has made it really easy to not only publish regular updates to web-based content, but also keep track of a large number of your favorite Web sites or blogs, without having to remember to check each site manually or clutter your email Inbox. You can now streamline your online experience by subscribing to specific content feeds and aggregating this information in one place to be read when you’re ready.

A) Consumer Bottom Line: Subscribing to feeds makes it possible to review a large amount of online content in a very short time.
B) Publisher Bottom Line: Feeds permit instant distribution of content and the ability to make it “subscribable.”
C) Advertiser Bottom Line: Advertising in feeds overcomes many of the shortcomings that traditional marketing channels encounter including spam filters, delayed distribution, search engine rankings and general “in-box” noise.

Who publishes feeds?

Most of the biggest names on the web offer content feeds including USATODAY.com, BBC News Headlines, ABCNews, CNET, Yahoo!, Amazon.com (including a podcast!), and many more. In addition, hundreds of thousands of bloggers, podcasters and videobloggers publish feeds to keep themselves better connected to their readers/listeners/admirers/critics. Apple, through...

increasing click-thru rates in email marketing

Posted by simon ashwin On Monday 15 Oct 07

A key component of any email marketing strategy involves the creation of an email template that is specifically branded and designed to support the marketing objectives of the campaign. Some possible email marketing objectives include building brand awareness, promotion or a specific call-to-action. However, there has never been a clear answer or in-depth research as to whether a button or link is the better call-to-action.

A recent article Button Vs. Links: Which Is The Call-to-Action Hero? interpreted several different online surveys and queried top online retailers in an attempt to draw conclusions between the use of buttons or links in an email. Although on initial analysis the article surveys and research seems to value links, in the end buttons used as a form of primary call-to-action gained far greater success in click-throughs in email marketing campaigns.

The article further stated that email campaigns that used buttons as the primary call-to-action; coupled with the user of links as secondary call-to-action resulted in higher click-through rates.

In addition, two key things were noted in the design of a button call-to-action, that is make sure the text on the button is HTML, this ensures that when certain email clients automatically block background images the call-to-action text is still readily visible. Secondly, never put more than two button call-to-actions within an email template design as the last thing you want to do is overwhelm and confuse the user away from your primary call-to-action.

link wisely for a better rank

Posted by simon ashwin On Wednesday 12 Sep 07

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) techniques must change and grow in sophistication in proportion to the speed of change and advancement of search engines themselves.

Simon Ashwin, Director of Whiteduck points out that “Search engines are very sophisticated. Search engines like Google have got thousands of rules for determining the validity and integrity of your Website and its content. The algorithms employed are very clever and evolving all of the time.”

Google has a ranking measure that involves the number of sites that a Website links out to, and the number of topic relevant sites that link back to it. However, setting up a suite of linked sites with a virtual hosting service which have different emphasis in terms of content is potentially ineffectual because “Google knows if your sites are all hosted on the same server – at the same IP address [this is the numeric address which identifies the host computer on the internet] – and generally adjusts your site rankings down accordingly.”

If your Website is commercial in nature, then search engine rankings are usually essential to its success. To get positive results from linking to other sites, ensure that they are relevant, and look for sites that have higher ranks themselves. Outbound links should only go to relevant sites with good rankings.

The best link related ranking boost comes from having other popular sites with strong rankings lined inbound.
Relevancy, at the very least, is essential. A good strategy for retailers can be...

what makes a good website?

Posted by simon ashwin On Thursday 30 Aug 07

I was asked by a contact to offer any ideas I had for a tender he was preparing for his organisation for the full redesign and redevelopment of their website.

It really doesn’t matter what industry the website is in; the fundamentals of a good website are consistent and the best website is one with a focus on best practice; best practice planning, best practice design, best practice content.
My submission below is by no means definitive and it was written in the middle of the day in a real rush. I believe however that it offers useful guidelines to any business or organisation assessing what is and is not important in a website redevelopment; on reflection, it is not appropriate for transactional websites and is more akin to marketing/communication-based websites. I have added several notes throughout to explain my rationales.

Please also bear in mind that this is not a website strategy; how a website is built is very different to how it is used.

Contract: the contract with the web development firm

There are several potential contracts you might consider:

Time and materials
Milestones (monthly, on deliverable, other)
Purchase of CMS, design module etc

My view is that you should try and identify a web development firm that will ultimately enter into a fixed-price contract (shares the risk).

Strategy: the strategy behind the website
There needs to be a strategy behind...

booking online make travel cheaper

Posted by simon ashwin On Saturday 11 Aug 07

According to Chris Tolhurst’s recent article in the Australian Financial Review, there are apparently two kinds of on-line travel booking Website which are providing increasingly tough competition to existing popular on-line travel booking sites.

Traditional corporate travel agencies are launching new booking sites, and airlines and other providers are providing on-line booking mechanisms first hand. Mr. Tolhurst’s article indicates that the latter option can be very cheap for consumers because there are no middle-man agent’s fees, and travelers can more directly advantage the cheap late booking rates often made available by airlines.

The article goes on to quote one industry specialist as predicting that these factors, coupled with increased diversification of services on-line, will deliver the main market share to the travel providers (airlines etc.) Another analyst backs the independently established on-line booking services, citing the strength of offering a greater variety of services from different competing suppliers.

Also a factor in the competitive world of on-line travel booking is the ease of use and power of the on-line utilities offered by the various Websites.

Apparently, self-booking is becoming an increasing attractive option for both corporate and leisure booking clients, by virtue of overall cheaper rates thus achievable.

References and Further Reading
1. Tolhurst, Chris. "Travel in Cyberspace Can Be a Turbulent Business." The Australian Financial Review Tuesday 17 April 2007.

email deliverability

Posted by simon ashwin On Friday 03 Aug 07

Email marketing: email deliverability is the term used by eMarketers for describing all the issues involved with getting your email delivered to the intended recipient. Essentially, anything that affects your outgoing email:

1) Reaches the inbox
2) Is actually seen by the recipient, describes the scope of email marketing email deliverability.

Email deliverability: therefore encompasses not only the creative, structural and strategic format of the email itself, but also the technical mechanism(s) in place for ensuring it reaches the destination after you hit the send button.

Basically, and this may sting, no matter how good your creative and copywriting skills are - the dominant factors governing emails actually getting into inboxes are technical. Why? The war on SPAM.

Any bulk mailer is subject to far greater scrutiny, whether you’re selling Viagra, or BMW motorcars. In fact, recent Jupiter Research estimates that anywhere from 10% to 40% of all bulk email sent never even reaches the destination.

So how can this happen?

To put this in context, it’s a bit like creating a really fantastic direct mail campaign. You take your 10,000 Envelopes to the Post Office, pay the Post Office for stamps and then once you leave, the post master looks at your 10,000 Envelopes and decides it’s too many to send out all at once. So the post master sends through 5,000, but sets fire to the other 5,000.

That’s pretty much what technical filters do to your email marketing campaigns. Nobody can...

tiger airways: market entrant online analysis

Posted by simon ashwin On Tuesday 17 Jul 07

Tiger Airways' recent announcement of its intention to establish a new domestic Australian airline resulted in an immediate spike in visits to the low-cost carrier's website by Australian Internet users. The market share of visits to Tiger Airways more than doubled between the weeks ending 3 February 2007 and 17 February 2007 to gain 2.81% of the Commercial Airlines industry.

The intense level of online competition between airline brands Virgin Blue, Qantas and Jetstar raises the question as to whether there is room in Australia for another domestic carrier. Hitwise Airlines industry data indicate that Virgin Blue and Qantas accounted for 28.53% and 27.68% respectively in market share in January 2007. Jetstar, the low-cost carrier brand of Qantas, followed in third position with 15.81% share. The three airlines accounted for 72.02% share in industry visits between them.

In the Singapore market, the collective share of the top 3 players was more diluted, with Singapore Airlines, Jetstar and Tiger Airways accounting for 60% of visits to the online Airlines industry in January 2007. The UK was even more competitive, where easyJet, British Airways and RyanAir accounted for 44.13% share. While there are different geographical and population considerations in the Singapore and UK markets, it does indicate the propensity of consumers to compare beyond the leading brands for their travel needs.

I'll provide a few summary notes here on strategy options (we'll be issuing a more detailed research note):

Search Terms to Inform a Domestic Route Strategy

top ten seo practices

Posted by simon ashwin On Sunday 15 Jul 07

Search Engine Optimization is the sum of many parts.

In order to generate the maximum results from your SEO campaign, it is very important to streamline certain aspects of your online presence.

Here are the top 10 SEO factors according to Whiteduck’s team:

1. Crawlability / Indexability
The notion of “If we build it, they will come...” still holds true for many web design and development agencies around the world. However, considering the fact that search engines have now become the “user interface” of the world wide web, you would be losing out on a lot of visitors and potential clients if you don’t pay attention to these basic requirements.

Clearing out all the technical “speed bumps” that could have a negative impact on the user’s experience or the search engine crawler’s access to your web site content, is crucial.

Using a “progressive enhancement” approach ensures that your website still provides the main content, even if all the “bells and whistles”, like flash or AJAX are turned off.

Starting with a solid foundation is key!

2. Keyword Choice
This is a big one! All too often, keyword research is done with a limited SEO tool-set, or worse, based on half-baked research guidelines. Choosing the right keywords and key phrases to connect with your target audience is the corner stone of any successful SEO project. The failure to do so can be very costly... Proper research requires having a solid understanding of the target...

not all viral markting is good marketing

Posted by simon ashwin On Thursday 03 May 07

Which then begs the obvious question, is all viral marketing good marketing?

• Not if the cost to produce, launch, measure and/or follow up on the campaign is more expensive than the return on the investment.
• Not unless the marketer is prepared to ‘trial’ several campaigns to see what works.
• Not if the marketer expects their first message and all subsequent messages to succeed virally every time.
• Not if the campaign is a thinly disguised ‘hard sell’, or contains too many messages that confuse the recipient.
• And not if the planned campaign does not fully encompass the essence of a good viral – originality, (perhaps a little shock!) and/or humour.

People have to really, really like it, and if they don’t, your campaign will result in poor returns and a potential slur on your brand.

So is viral marketing worth the effort?

Hotmail gained over 12 million subscribers in just 18 months by simply adding Get Your Private, Free Email from Hotmail at www.hotmail.com to the bottom of every message sent using their program. A simple message, which was easy to action, and best of all, it was free – the most successful viral in online history. Definitely worth the effort.

For The Blair Witch Project movie release, hype created by the intense viral marketing through chat rooms and blogs (fictional information about the film was ‘invented’ and posted by the movies’ directors themselves) and mysterious graffiti and billboard marketing, meant that almost everyone in Western culture had an opinion as...

targeted viral marketing

Posted by simon ashwin On Sunday 29 Apr 07

Not everyone will react positively to a clever or intuitive piece of marketing designed to be viral. Therefore targeting the message is key. Savvy marketers look to aim their viral campaigns at a small but powerful segment of the population known as SNP’s (high ‘Social Networking Potential’). SNP’s are typically cutting edge in their personal tastes, responsive to marketing that is targeted to their lifestyle and tastes and highly likely to send on messages that amuse, challenge or impress them.

Crucially, they spend a lot of time on the internet and have a wide and valuable network of friends, peers and acquaintances with whom they mingle online on a regular basis. They regularly use programs like Facebook, MySpace, YouTube, Connectu, Furl, Reddit, Digg, etc. Marketers who target them using email, the internet, mobiles and Web 2.0 applications make it easy for SNP’s to access and then pass on their message.

If the marketing team is unable to get their message directly in front of these SNP ‘movers and shakers’ in the wider community, they should not forget the customers and clients with whom they regularly interact. According to a recent Wharton study, people socially connected to a company’s customers are three to five times more likely to take that company up on an offer than someone targeted through traditional marketing methods.

Malcolm Gladwell, in his bestselling book The Tipping Point, suggests finding ‘that friend’ who can name an acquaintance for every letter of the alphabet. We all know somebody like this, social superstars,...

infections ideas for viral marketing

Posted by simon ashwin On Wednesday 18 Apr 07

As we embrace today’s new media channels and look for more innovative ways to market across them, many organisations are investing in the creation of ‘viral’ campaigns – simple ideas that they hope will promote a brand, a product, or an event in a way that captures people’s imagination and interest, and will impel them to ‘pass the information on’ to others.

For more than a decade now, companies have deployed spectacularly successful online viral and word of mouth campaigns, most notably the Window’s Live Hotmail launch in 1996, the Blair Witch Project launch in 1999, the Burger King ‘Subservient Chicken’ campaign in 2004, and locally, the Carlton Draught ‘Big Ad’.

Two weeks before its launch on Australian television in August 2005, the Carlton Draught ‘Big Ad’ advertisement was released on the internet on its own micro site. Within 24 hours, it had been streamed 162,000 times. By the time it went live on TV, it had been viewed more than one million times by people in 132 different countries. This was, in anyone’s language, an incredible response and huge exposure for Carlton Draught, especially as it was prior to the ‘official’ launch of the advert on traditional channels!

Fundamentals of a successful viral campaign

So, can anyone create a clever, humorous, topical, or insightful piece of marketing, and then launch it to rapturous applause and seemingly hysterical viral distribution at any time? The answer is ‘perhaps’, provided some fundamentals are adhered to.

The following are crucial points for marketers to remember when thinking about...

keywords in website copy

Posted by simon ashwin On Sunday 08 Apr 07

Let’s talk about the keywords on your web page, blog, e-newsletter or any other digital communication tool. How do you optimize them? How do you get the best results? Are there any rules, principles, requirements?

There are 3 simple things you need to take care of in regards to your keywords:

- Keyword density;
- Keyword phrase order;
- Keyword prominence.

Keyword density is how your keywords are spread over your communication. The percentage of your keyword density is easy to calculate.

Here is a simple tool to analyze your keyword density: Keyword Density Analyzer

Also, if you work on your content offline, almost all SEO desktop applications have this tool built-in for you to use.

Different search engines have different algorithms but generally 5% to 15% (of keywords / total words) density is good for any search engine.

Go with 8%-10% option to be safe and efficient. If you see some other page ranking higher than yours for the same keyword with most other factors being equal, you can always adjust this by removing/adding keywords in your copy. Check their keyword density and see if you can make it just a bit higher. However, never forget you are writing for real people so make your texts easy read.

Keyword phrase order is important to make sure it matches the possible search query order. Think about how your potential subscriber would search for the topics or ideas covered in your communication. Place words in your keyword phrase in the same order.

Let’s look at an example. Which of these 2...

introduction to social networking

Posted by simon ashwin On Wednesday 07 Mar 07

The ways that people socialize and connect with one another ?continue to become ever more digital. The elaborate social networks that exist on the web (notably Friendster, MySpace, Facebook) are critical pillars of this digitally socialized society. And new and improved social networks are appearing such as the Microsoft spin-off social network company called Wallop.

Social networks provide a service to anyone looking to connect to people, make new friends or contact old ones, plan events and parties, talk about personal problems (and each other), and experiment with different identities, all without ever having to leave the keyboard.

Although sites may seem broad in scope at first, upon becoming a member the user has the opportunity to seek out special interest groups and individuals who share their interests through use of tags; users are also free to express themselves by posting photos, songs, video clips, blogging, or posting comments on forums or a friends’ (or enemy’s) profile page.

The first blast of social networking came in 2000 with Friendster, although it has since sunk in popularity as other faster and more feature filled refinements of the medium have emerged. MySpace.com, a site originally designed for new and alternative musicians, has become “a place for friends” as their tagline expresses, and the most popular site in terms of members from the US. And everyone is banking on its popularity; not only do everyday Joe’s and Jenny’s sign up for accounts, but so do restaurants, bands, celebrities, brands like Head & Shoulders, and TV and...

demystefying web 2.0

Posted by simon ashwin On Saturday 03 Mar 07

cerpt from ”Social Media” or “How I Learned to Stop Worrying And Love Communication” by Trevor Cook and Lee Hopkins (June 20, 2007)

The traditional means of communicating with audiences — such as employees, customers, investment communities — have relied heavily on print-based documents, email or static internet websites.

Today, these methods are rapidly giving way to a new generation of internet-based tools that allow for far greater levels of two-way interaction, discussion and conversation.

The media no longer owns the audience. Scarcity is no longer the problem. The internet is infinitely scalable. Text, audio and video are available to everyone. The Internet is now the world’s most powerful publishing and broadcasting platform. It is growing exponentially.

The new web tools are cheap (often free), easy to use and fast to produce. Communicating can become seamlessly integrated with your ‘regular’ workload. Everyone can communicate – not just the corporate communications team!

The new immediacy and integration can energise your communications releasing a relationship building power that has been absent from oldstyle corporate communication tools.

Indeed, so fundamental has been the shift from ’static’, ‘brochure-ware’ websites to the new ‘conversational’ internet that many pundits are calling the ‘old’ internet “Web1.0″ and this new web world “Web2.0″, reflecting dramatic improvement based in large part on in far better software coding and functionality.

5 trends to watch in online travel

Posted by simon ashwin On Wednesday 21 Feb 07

A couple of key learning points I picked up at the Amadeus Horizons 2008 conference held in Bangkok on travel distribution.

1. It’s about servicing, not selling online

John Lonergan, general manager-direct channels of Qantas, said that online had become more about servicing than selling for his airline. He said there were hidden costs in the online channel and the biggest single cost of sale on Qantas.com.au was call centre charges.

“It is better for us not to sell online but to service online.”

What’s working in the online channel? Loyalty programmes. Up to 80% of redemptions are booked online, said Lonergan.

“Servicing online is not about reducing costs – it’s about the right content to the right customer at the right time.”

In the end, he said, “Some will book direct, all will fly.”

2. It’s about being personal, and being everywhere

Last year, BA generated 1.5 billion Euros in direct revenues from its website. Up to 38% of passengers in the UK book online, compared with 27% of passengers globally.

Carsten Willert, general manager, E-Commerce, BA, said its Executive Club had become a 100% online programme – a one-stop shop for selling, servicing and loyalty.

Features BA is working on – personalization, dynamic packaging – allowing BA to earn ancillary revenues (there’s that word again) and customers to book non-airline products, enhanced redemption capability.

And ba.com, he said, wants to be everywhere – gadgets, mobile, the works.

3. Low cost may be here in Asia but Asians still want some level of service...

dynamic packaging 2.0

Posted by simon ashwin On Thursday 15 Feb 07

Technology is always evolving. Sometimes this is in the shape of new products and at other times it’s just a step change taking place, which has a marked impact on the way the travel industry conducts business.

New products are things like the online booking systems, the first viewdata-masking selling systems and dynamic packaging. I believe we are about to have another step change. This will come in the form of a true comparative holiday search for travel agents, across all product sources, combined with rich content to provide agents with a vastly improved selling environment - comparable to anything available to consumers online.

In the technology world we like to give these step changes names, and I’ve christened this ‘Dynamic Packaging 2.0′. A true comparative search is an important step forward. This is because consumers don’t care about clever use of technology - all they really want is a good match with their holiday requirements.

Dynamic Packaging 2.0 will offer a search across pre-packaged holidays and those created dynamically in real-time. It will provide agents with a complete comparison and offer add-to-favourites features that make it easier to shortlist and compare from the vast array of holiday options on offer, via a single enquiry. In Dynamic Packaging 2.0, enhanced search will be combined with much richer content in the form of maps, video and audio - all designed to support the sales process and transform the computer on a retail travel counter from an ordering point to an interactive selling environment.

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