Here is a recent article from the Los Angeles times discussing title tags and the multi million dollar decisions that come from a properly worded title. The article is about the Hollywood film industry, but it could also be written about websites.

It is not possible to overstate the importance of a good title.

A savvy marketer knows that the title is the most important element to a story. Most writers & advertisers will spend 10% creating the content and 90% of their time rewriting and optimizing their page title.

Helpful Movie Titles

  • American Gangster - anything American is cool
  • Disturbia - mashup of disturbing and suburbia
  • Kramer vs. Kramer - relationship film
  • Raiders of the Lost Arc - knockoff of the 30’s 40’s and 50’s adventure films
  • Talladega Nights: The Ballad Of Ricky Bobby - a long title is a rarity, but this reeked of satire and alluded to a satisfying comedy

Harmful Movie Titles

  • Cinderellla Man - historically accurate, but has no relation to boxing
  • Gigli - you need to be able to easily pronounce a title
  • The Shawshank Redemption - solemn, ponderous title gave no indication of redeeming prison film
  • Step Into Liquid - surfing documentary missed its target
  • Tears of the Sun - generic name for a Bruce Willis action flick.

Read the story as only the hollywood reporter los angeles times can write it.

home ownership accelerator logo This is not a post about search engine optimization, I’m taking a slight detour to talk about a revolutionary new financial planning product from the home mortgage industry.

This system combines all your checking, home loan and home equity line accounts into one master “loan sweep account” that automatically transfers all deposited cash against the loan balance each day in order to save mortgage interest. The simple change better leverages cash flow, potentially saving you thousands of dollars in interest over the next decade. Your funds remain available 24/7, just like an existing checking account today.

Instead of paying the loan balance at the end of the month, you pay at the beginning of the month and use the same account to pay daily expenses. The result is a lower daily loan balance with no prepayment penalties. This allows qualified individuals to pay off a 30 year ARM mortgage 10 years early, even with a higher interest rate.

Benefits of this unique mortgage savings account

  • Monthly income lowers your monthly balance
  • Lower loan balance saves you interest
  • Saved mortgage interest becomes extra principal payment
  • Lowers your balance, saving more interest
  • Frees up even more money to reduce principal
  • Cycle repeats itself each month, compounding your interest savings & accelerating the reduction of your debt

Candidates for the Accelerator Mortgage have monthly income that is higher than their expenses and a savings plan. See a mortgage FAQ with myths of the HOA mortgage.

See a video of the Home Ownership Accelerator system.

These MSN live search videos from Great Britain are 100x better than the MSN Live search Microsoft adcenter videos.

These videos showcasing live.com search have real humor and are truly entertaining.

I like the MSN search tagline: Search is changing… are you?


Video: Live Search 1 – Plucky powered skates. British man’s eco-friendly scooter is powered by “his wife’s disappointment.” He goes to the Petrol station when his wife’s disappointment runs out, but is encouraged by the upcoming visit of his mother in law who will “give me enough disappointment to get me to China and back”. Without Microsoft Multi-Map Harry would have to rely on his wife telling him where to go.


Video: Live Search 4 - The hunt for saucy hotel snaps. Oh look. A Mr. G Swanson from Hemel Hempstead has just requested an image of the Hilton Hotel in Paris without any clothes on….


Video: Live Search 2 - Meet Malcolm Dewsbury.


Video: Live Search 5 - Fancy a picnic darling? “Was that tin labeled potato or … poison?” “Having realized they’re just about to die, there’s time for one last cigarette.”

here is a full list of the Microsoft live video ads. Warning: MSN video is drastically slower than YouTube.com

One usability rant about these microsoft search video technology Soapbox: they are cumbersome to use. Just getting the embed clip for these videos took too long and was not intuitive like YouTube. MSN tries way too hard to trick you into visiting their website, including nearly forceing clicks. And spamming the link in embed code? Really microsoft, trying your hand at link stuffing to increase your pagerank?

13th May, 2008

Advanced Search in Gmail

Right around the time I have advanced questions with a particular web service or product, I find a relevant blog post discussing this issue.

This happened with Gmail.com this week, as I was trying to search through the mail archives. I knew Gmail must have slick search features, it was only a question of unlocking this power.

Thankfully the Gmail blog posted details on multiple mail search operators.

  • A link from my co-worker Michael: from:michael http
  • A photo from my mom: from:mom has:attachment
  • That last chat I had with one of the Gmail product managers: keith is:chat
  • All messages from ebay that aren’t outbid notices: ebay -outbid (the hyphen tells Gmail to return all of the messages that don’t contain the word that follows it)
  • The messages in my inbox sent directly to me that I haven’t read yet: to:me is:unread in:inbox
  • limit search to a particular subject (subject:)
  • search label (label:)

If you forget the gmail search options use the show search options link
gmail Search options

More about searching gmail.

stompernet logo Dan Thies’ revolutionary “Adwords Triangulation Method” - and already
MAKING MONEY using it.

There’s still time to send folks to that video here

Make sure users have commercial intent.

Subject: 2x the clicks, 4.7x the sales (in just 3 days)

Have you seen the comments on the new StomperNet “Going Natural
3.0″ video?

“Bloody fab!
I took the info from this one video and doubled
my click through.
increased my conversion rate by 4.7 times!!!
Cant thank you enough!”

-Rich Moses

They only released this thing on Tuesday! 3 Days Ago!

This isn’t just a “teaser” video with the real valuable stuff
for sale. It’s really a totally free video.

In the video they show how they took a brand new website
website and in ONLY 6 months, reached an 8.5x Return on
Investment and $150K a MONTH in sales!

Heck, they made $13K in just the first 30 days using the
“Adwords Triangulation Method” they reveal in the video.

That’s NOT 8.5%. Look closely. That’s 8.5 TIMES ROI.

Imagine how well YOU could be doing after tweaking YOUR
campaigns the way they recommend for the next 6 months.

And you should know that this is NOT stuff that’s been talked
about before, EVER. These are NEW techniques StomperNet
developed with over $1 million of ad spending - there’s nothing
like this anywhere.

Here’s another comment someone left on the video page:

“As a former Google Certified Adwords Professional, I thought I
had seen it all about adwords. What you’ve got here really
makes sense and I’m really excited to learn something new about
adwords
!”
-Mike

For folks that would like a Table of Contents:

* Setting up your Adwords account correctly from SCRATCH
(especially for those of you just starting out)

* Finding the RIGHT keywords that will make money in YOUR
market (this can be the difference between making a huge profit
or actually throwing money away)

* Bidding to place your ad in the MOST PROFITABLE position (and
it’s not just speculation - they SHOW which are the real
winners)

* Writing ads that will get you clicks from PROSPECTS, not
browsers (using 5 simple mindsets that ANYONE can master in
minutes)

*** PLUS they’ve got these ADDITIONAL 2 Videos for you:

They’ve assembled a reel of UNRELEASED clips and subscriber
favorites - All about drastically improving the conversion
rates of your landing pages.

That’s MORE cash in YOUR pocket.

Included with that bonus video is the “Click-Fu” video the
Stomper crew released at the beginning of this year.

They show that if you want to make it easy for your visitors to
buy, you need to break up your pages into little “bites” that
your eyeballs can quickly absorb and comprehend. They show you
just how to do it, and the results of using it on their own
sites.

The results? 2x conversion!

That means sales DOUBLED. More of the visitors they ALREADY
HAD went ahead and BOUGHT something when they used “Click-Fu”
and at the end of the day, that’s why we’re all in business.

Right? To get a good ROI? To make more money?

How much are people loving this video?

“Wow - this is better than my stocks, my bonds, my real estate,
and everything else!

Anytime I can invest one dollar and get back $8.50 - I’m very
interested.

I opted-in to your list today, and look forward to working with
you.

Sincerely, SEO net

Just go check out the video. It’s free. If you like it (as
much as we do) opt-in on that page and you’ll get immediate
access to the “LOST Videos” and the landing page conversion-
doubling tactics.

Don’t miss it! I don’t know how long they’re going to keep it
up for free.

9th May, 2008

Danny SEO

What do you get when you search for Danny the SEO - The logical answer would be Danny Sullivan from SearchEngineLand.com but this wouldn’t make an interesting blog post.

danny SEO Will the real Danny SEO please stand up.

9th May, 2008

Design Dividend Payback

Portfolio of 63 design driven British companies that have beaten the stock market and proven the value of design dividends. This is not the NASDAQ but the FTSE.

British design focused companies growth

Design Stats
This graph shows the increased stock market value of companies that integrate design into their products, and invest in intangibles rather than the bottom line.

This stock market graph does not even include the most famous design oriented company on the planet, Apple, and the design orieited firms performed nearly 300% better.

If you want your company to succeed in a crowded marketplace, use design and quality to differentiate yourself.

Godaddy has a video advertisement on their domain name aftermarket website that features a script from 1992.

While viewing the video ad, remember this is published in 2008.

Some of the Godaddy transcript

For business, the internet is key
Potential is enormous
Transactions happen in real time
The web is alive 24 hours a day 7 days a week
Personal expression has taken off to, thanks to blogging and social networks (ok this did happen in 2004)
Want to stay in touch with family & friends? The internet is perfect for that too.
Think of the internet as a place where people can come together to share news, photos even video clips! (wow even video!)
The internet is doing more than making us money and bring us closer together (really? im all ears)

Yes, this is true. Its amazing that companies don’t turn their servers off at 5pm when they close their offices.

See the Godaddy video that will make you wonder if the Scottsdale Arizona company has 1992 baked into their mission statement.

This is the godaddy video advertising their knowledge of the internets. Bob parsons has hired an attractive female to lure in viewers with subliminal mind tricks, insulting the viewers intelligence with a format similar to infomercials.

Marketing Experts On Demand video webinar series for search engine marketing and PPC campaign optimization.

This webinar covers using A/B and multivariate testing to help make important business decisions.

Let Your Customers Decide: Using Testing to Provide Relevant Content

By online marketers
Sebastian Buerba from Stamps.com
Lily Chiu from Omniture Test & Target

See the video.

Ebay recently moved their affiliate program from Commission Junction to their in house Ebay Partner network.

This is some code that will help you quickly build ebay affiliate links without logging in to their website and using the auction link building tool https://www.ebaypartnernetwork.com/PublisherToolsHome

PHP functions for Ebay.com originally from Tamebay:

function get_country($country_code) {
$US = "711-53200-19255-0";
$IE = "5282-53468-19255-0";
$AT = "5221-53469-19255-0";
$AU = "705-53470-19255-0";
$BE = "1553-53471-19255-0";
$IN = "4686-53472-19255-0";
$CA = "706-53473-19255-0";
$SG = "3423-53474-19255-0";
$HK = "3422-53475-19255-0";
$FR = "709-53476-19255-0";
$DE = "707-53477-19255-0";
$IT = "724-53478-19255-0";
$ES = "1185-53479-19255-0";
$CH = "5222-53480-19255-0";
$UK = "710-53481-19255-0";
$CN = "4080-53484-19255-0";
$NL = "1346-53482-19255-0";

return $$country_code;
}

function aff_link($url,$text,$customid,$country){
$target = get_country($country);
$prefix = "http://rover.ebay.com/rover/1/";

echo "”.stripslashes($text).””;
}


place this PHP code in your website to generate the ebay affiliate link


aff_link("URL","link text","custom ID","country");

where

* URL is the eBay URL to link to
* link text is the anchor text you will use - will also appear as the link title attribute)
* custom ID is like the CJ SID, append a specific ID to any link, for granular affiliate link tracking
* country is the two letter country code relating to the auction program being promoted (US, UK, FR, DE, AU etc.)

You can see more php code to create custom ebay affiliate links at Tamebay.

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