Your Team Builder

Google's New Patent? ...seriously?

2009-09-06T15:03:00.000-04:00

In 2004, Google filed for a patent on their distinctive home page. The patent was awarded on September 1, 2009.

The home page is described in the patent as a "Graphical User Interface for a Display Screen of a Communications Terminal."

I don't want to belittle what Google has brought to the world, but I can't imagine Google was really the first to put... Logo... then Search Box, centered on the page.

Bing Knows... Don't Ask How

2009-09-03T15:32:00.001-04:00

Bing is Microsoft's attempt to overtake Google. The way they plan to accomplish this lofty goal, is to use semantics to determine what a searcher is really trying to find. The Bing engine combines its' knowledge of typical user behavior, natural language search, and quickly determines user intent, and delivers results based on what it thinks you meant, not necessarily what you typed.

Just when we thought Microsoft couldn't possibly be any more creepy and big brother-ish, they create a search engine that claims to know "what you really want," in addition to "what you said you want."

Get More Hits With Images

2009-09-01T10:00:00.001-04:00

Search engines aren't just cataloging the text and code of your website, they are crawling the images also. Bing's Todd Schwartz suggests how to make sure your images are crawled effectively, and you get the most clicks possible.

- Name image files appropriately – For improved relevance, make sure that the file name describes the image appropriately.

- Alternative image text (alt text) matters – For increased optimization, make sure photos are properly described with alternative text tags, and ensure that test within any images is also

- Watch frame breaking – Sites that attempt to break frames make it more difficult for the image to display correctly within search. Make sure you’re testing your site against the search engines.

Allow Competition and Make More Money with Adsense

2009-08-31T08:57:00.000-04:00

In keeping with it's open source philosophy, Google has announced that it will allow Google approved ad networks to embed in Google content advertising. If you are an Adsense user, this means you now how have the option to permit competitive content ads to be placed in your Google Ads locations. More competition means more revenue.

Starbucks picks a fight with Mom & Pop

2009-08-13T08:10:00.005-04:00

Starbucks' New Branding Strategy -- Hide Its Name, Pretend to Be 'Authentic' Local Coffee Shop

As market share gives way to the almighty McD's, Starbucks goes after an easier competitor, Mom & Pops. Starbucks is dressing up its new locations to appear as a locally owned shop, using different business names to reflect the locale, and entirely hiding Starbucks from the store.

It's a clever strategy. If you happen to be a locally owned business, and are offended by Starbucks' covert competition, remember, you have the upper hand. Starbucks is imitating you, not the other way around. Just do what you do, better than anyone else, and the competition will take care of itself. I love America!

Network Marketing Research With Twitter Advanced Search

2009-08-06T13:00:00.000-04:00

Most Twitter users have no idea Advanced Twitter Search exists, but it's the very feature that makes Twitter so revolutionary, Real Time Search. It's what has Google and bing running in circles to catch up.

You can use it to market your products and business opportunity to people who not only need it right now, but they're even saying they need it right now!

Let's say you're providing information on how to generate more leads and more team members in your MLM or network marketing business like I do at SmarterNetMarketing. To find people looking for that info, I might type in "how do I get more leads?" and find out who is tweeting that exact phrase at this very moment. The result is intensely powerful marketing data, that is here for the first time in history, and it's all completely free. Check it out at http://search.twitter.com/advanced