5 for Friday – G+ On Your Phone, Teens On Facebook, & Tips For Powerful Images
June 27th, 2014 by
1) CNBC: This 17-Year-Old Website Devastated By Google’s Panda Update – Search Engine Roundtable
Once upon a time, there was a woman named Linda Stadley. Her recipes brought so much joy to her and those around her that she generously decided to share them with the Internet. So she created www.whatscookingamerica.net, and for 17 years her recipes reigned supreme. She lived happily ever after until Google unleashed its mighty Panda 4.0 paw and ended her domination of the search engine results page faster than you can say Jack Robinson. Users everywhere weep for her loss of traffic.
…that website though. The writer of this article says it all with his closing statement, “I feel bad but the site does need a facelift.” Well, yeah. This article speaks to the very nature of Google updates: even though they may not make everyone happy, the goal is to help all users find the best information first. Let’s be real here. This site lacks a lot of the features that make a website useful to users looking for recipes (like reviews, for example); therefore, more useful websites will get better rankings because they give people more of what they’re trying to find. Google would probably reply with something along the lines of “sorry we’re not sorry.”
2) Google My Business iPhone App Now Available – Blumenthals
Do you want Google all up in your business? You’re in luck. Google just released the My Business iOS app (as discussed by Mary Silva). The noteworthy features (for both the iOS and Android app) include the ability to edit your business listings and view local insights. Missing from this app is Google Analytics and Adwords Express. You can also access all the features of your Google Plus account. JUST WHAT WE’VE ALWAYS WANTED, said no one ever. The thought behind this was probably something along the lines of, “hey wait a minute, no one seems to be posting to their Google Plus account, maybe they would if they could do that on their phones?” We will see Google, we will see.
3) Wait A Minute. Facebook Is Still A Big Hit Among Teens? – Marketing Land
Facebook hasn’t been poisoned by moms and businesses? What?! As it turns out, Facebook is still popular with teenagers. Forrester Research released a report revealing that 75% of Facebook users ages 12 to 17 use Facebook once a month, with 28% of this age group claiming to use Facebook “all the time.” Of course, numbers don’t always give the whole story. Yeah, these kids are logging on, but are they actually using Facebook? Who’s to say these kids using Facebook everyday are not just scrolling through the newsfeed absentmindedly? Well, this may be the case, because a niche study reveals Facebook lost to Instagram for the most engaging platform.
There’s a lot to consider here. For one, how will this trend change in the future? Have teens just been classically conditioned to check their Facebooks like a hopeless romantic checks Craigslist missed connections? Do more engaging platforms have more of an advantage in retaining and attracting new users? Time will tell.
4) Net Neutrality Protesters Arrested At Google HQ – Techcrunch
Well, this is a fun one. A group of activists in favor of net neutrality were arrested for protesting outside Google Headquarters. What were they doing there, you ask? The group calls for Google to “stand with us in support of an Internet that is free from censorship, discrimination, and access fees.” The group asked Google, among other demands, to change their homepage for a day to include a link to the FCC petition. You may be thinking, ‘but Google isn’t exactly the bad guy here trying to end net neutrality for all, why are they protesting there anyway?’ And you would be thinking correctly. According to this article, Google declined to comment on the arrests. I can’t blame them, as it seems these protesters might have a classic case of misdirected rage.
5) The 8 Types of Images That Increase the Psychological Impact of Your Content – Copyblogger
Quality images matter because they increase user experience. Yes, we know this. The advice in this article seems rather obvious, but there’s something to take away here. Specifically, what makes an image useful? This article proposes eight different types of images that provide users with the information they need. The top eight being: stock photos, screenshots, charts and graphs, personal photos, still frames from popular movies and TV shows, infographics, custom art, and comics. I would like to point out that most of these (except stock photos) could and maybe should fall under #7 “custom images.” I feel this article missed out on the opportunity to highlight the way that custom images serve more of a functional purpose for marketing than non-custom images. An infographic, comic, or screenshot that is custom and directly relevant to your business would obviously be more useful to users than one that is not.
