I got some of the best news of the year yesterday: Brian Katz is writing more blog posts! He will be posting every Tuesday (hopefully) starting tomorrow, with my email/social media section being pushed to Friday.
In other news, this weeks roundup brings about new ways to link silo, HTML best practices, new GA intelligence features, and more.
Internet Marketing and SEO
- We start the week with some humor from Linkbuildr: How Google Search fails when looking for Apples. Of course, I’m not sure that’s actually a failure, given that it provided two posts on Apple, two on Apples, and a bunch on local businesses with Apple in the title. Seems like a pretty good set of results for a term that could have so much variation.
- Next up, HuoMah on 3 misunderstood SEO best practices ranging from the value of headings to page building philosophies.
- A third today, because this post is waaaay too good: Michael Gray on how to silo your website (without rel=”nofollow”).
Technology
- Excited about HTML 5? Ajaxian has an HTML 5 boilerplate to help you with HTML5 development. Features include cross-browser compatibility (including IE6!), mobile optimization, graceful degradation, and a baked in ie6 png fix for all you pngheads.
- And whether you’re using HTML 5 or not, SixRevisions has 20 HTML best practices you should be following.
Web Analytics
- The Google Analytics blog has announced a series of new Intelligence options including Adwords Alerts and more options for custom alerts.
- Advanced Web Metrics has declared that integrating web analytics with marketing is the future. I disagree. Integrating web analytics with marketing is quite current. I also would disagree that it’s the simplicity of GA that caused this, and more that its the free-ness, which has lead people, who would otherwise have no experience with it, to experiment and play around. I’d think of it as akin to the benefit that Photoshop got from millions of kids pirating it and practicing with it, and making it a staple of almost every business.
User Experience
- From Forum One: an introduction to card sorting: a technique for organizing and categorizing items. The title says all that needs to be said…
- UXMatters has part 2 of their ongoing series on Perception and Cognition, talking about how poor design can interrupt reading, how short and long term memory aren’t that different, and how brains recall content.
Miscellaneous links of the week:
- You’ve read it before I’m sure, but there has been some kerfuffle about Google and Verison making deals on Net Neutrality. So far I can see Googles perspective, but it still bodes poorly for the movement when its biggest backer is making concessions. HuoMah also makes some good comments on the subject.
- Last week I posted about groupon.com, this week I was sent a story about a man who is trying to live completely off coupons, without any cash. Huh, where’s us Vancouverites coupons for free stuff?
