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Guru Kool-Aid: Are You Drinking It? – A SPN Exclusive Article

What is a guru? Literally, a guru is a teacher. The word guru means “heavy” or “deep,” thus a guru is a person “heavy” or “deep” in knowledge. In this sense, a schoolteacher is a guru, a coach or athletic instructor is a guru, a fine-arts, or even a dance teacher is a guru. One’s parents are also gurus. In the religious field, where the word is most commonly used, a guru is a Hindu religious teacher. So a priest or any person learned in Hindu lore may be a guru

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Guru Kool-Aid: Are You Drinking It? – A SPN Exclusive Article

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9 Common Title Tag Mistakes and How to Avoid Them

A website’s title tags are very important for several reasons: 1) The title tag shows up in search results as the blue link, and a good one helps the site get more clicks and visitors from search results. 2) Title tags are a crucial SEO element that can help the website show up higher when people search for the words in it. 3) Title tags show up when web pages are shared on social media sites like Facebook. This is important because social media mentions are now a ranking factor in Google search results. So if you have the time to optimize one thing on your website, title tags are it. Here are some of the top mistakes and missed opportunities I’ve seen in title tags. Avoid these and you’ll be ahead of the game. You’ll rank higher in search results and entice more people to click on your site. 9 Signs of a Bad Title Tag: 1.

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9 Common Title Tag Mistakes and How to Avoid Them

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Google’s New Page Layout Algorithm Penalizes “Above-The-Fold” Advertising – A SPN Exclusive Article

On Wednesday, February 23, 2011, a category 5 hurricane named “Panda” swept through the Gulf of Google devastating businesses large and small alike. The hurricane was reportedly named after one of Google’s engineers. So what was the reason for this catastrophic and “game-changing” update? Well, according to Google: “This update is designed to reduce rankings for low-quality sites – sites which are low-value, copy content from other websites or sites that are just not very useful. At the same time, it will provide better rankings for high-quality sites – sites with original content and information such as research, in-depth reports, thoughtful analysis and so on. It is important for high-quality sites to be rewarded, and that’s exactly what this change does.” (Source: Google Blog ) Mission accomplished. Anyway, in the aftermath of the Panda update, there are 11 important SEO facts I’ve learned based on my own personal experiences, the experiences of my clients, and from listening to top SEO professionals across the Internet. The above passages are from an article I wrote last July titled, Google Panda Update: 11 Important SEO Facts You Should Know . In item #7 of the 11 SEO facts I wrote: 7.

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Google’s New Page Layout Algorithm Penalizes “Above-The-Fold” Advertising – A SPN Exclusive Article

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Best Free Business Cloud Apps You Probably Haven’t Heard Of

The title might sound a bit presumptuous, but the writers at Cloud Nation worked hard to compile a list of cloud applications that most folks who don’t spend time in the cloud aren’t familiar with. All of these cloud hosted applications are free, but some of them do use the freemium mode of app distribution. In other words, the apps’ core features function forever for free, but extra premium features are available with subscription or other pay-as-you go plan. Mail Chimp : Are services like Constant Contact becoming too expensive?

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Best Free Business Cloud Apps You Probably Haven’t Heard Of

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Optimizing Your Business Facebook Page for Maximum Hits and Return Visits – A SPN Exclusive Article

With a user base of more than 750 million, Facebook is a viable social media marketing platform which cannot be ignored. Every business has potential customers on Facebook. So, to increase your brand presence, you need to optimize your business Facebook page and generate traffic for more business. To implement your Facebook business strategy effectively, you need to follow a few regulations. Using Targeted Keywords to Optimize Your Facebook Page Optimizing your page for keywords is the first step to raise your brand visibility. Use keywords which are sure to draw in customers who may not know the brand name but need your product

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Optimizing Your Business Facebook Page for Maximum Hits and Return Visits – A SPN Exclusive Article

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3 Reasons Why Viewers Hate Your Online Videos – A SPN Exclusive Article

Online video marketing – it’s the latest and greatest addition to internet marketing. If you create your online videos the right way, viewers will get excited about your products and services – and, more importantly, they’ll think of you as an expert in your niche. But if you create your online videos the wrong way, they’ll do the exact opposite! Sadly, far too many of the online videos out there fall into the second category. So, why do viewers hate your online videos? And what can you do to make them better? 1. Because the Background is Distracting No one wants to see the clutter on your desk, the drawing your kid made in school (no matter how cute it may be!), or sunlight streaming through the window that’s blinding everyone who’s trying to look at you.

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3 Reasons Why Viewers Hate Your Online Videos – A SPN Exclusive Article

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Google’s First Page… Guaranteed! – A SPN Exclusive Article

A couple of weeks ago, I visited one of the Internet Marketing/Small Business forums that I’m a member of, and noticed a new member had posted a typical newbie question in the SEO forum. The member wanted to know how she could be guaranteed to get her website on the first page of Google. As usual, members came crawling out of the woodwork with advice – including members who didn’t even own a website. Unfortunately, that’s pretty typical on Internet Marketing/Small Business forums… members who don’t own a website instructing other members how to get on the first page of Google… members who don’t own a business dispensing business advice. So be careful where you get your advice from… but I digress. Not surprisingly, not a single member responded with the correct answer. And what is the correct answer? The correct answer is there is NO magic bullet that will assure a first page ranking on Google. Never has been, never will be.

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Google’s First Page… Guaranteed! – A SPN Exclusive Article

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How To Measure The Return On Investment For Social Media In Marketing

“ROI on Social Media? What bloody ROI?” It’s only the first week of January 2012 and already I’m hearing the same refrain as 2011! “How do we calculate the ROI on social media in marketing?” When you begin using social media in your marketing strategy or as a stand alone campaign, it is hard to determine how those numbers of followers and ‘likers’ stack up against delivery of a return on investment. We have clients who ask us this regularly so here’s some clarity for you. Measuring social media ROI is very difficult for a few reasons. The first is that it is very hard to use social media trackers for individual sales and the second is that social media is not a direct sales channel, it’s a relationship marketing tool.

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How To Measure The Return On Investment For Social Media In Marketing

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Holiday Tales: 10 SEO Search-Ranking Myths

SEO myths become larger every year. Some are based partially in reality, and others have spread because it’s often difficult to prove what particular SEO action caused a resulting search engine reaction. For example, you might make a change to something on a page of your site, and a few days later notice that your ranking in Google for a particular keyword phrase has changed. You might naturally assume that your page change is what caused the ranking change. But that’s not necessarily so. There are numerous reasons why your ranking may have changed, and in many cases they actually have nothing to do with anything that you did. Mixing up cause and effect is one of the most common things new SEOs do. If it were affecting only their own work, it wouldn’t be so bad, but unfortunately, the clueless often spread their misinformation to other unsuspecting newbies on forums and blogs, which in turn creates new myths.

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Holiday Tales: 10 SEO Search-Ranking Myths

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WWW Birthday – A SPN Exclusive Article

The 21st birthday of the World Wide Web is on December 25, 2011. This ‘coming of age’ WWW birthday marks the maturity of the first generation that was born with the Web and has always known it as an ordinary tool of life. This immeasurable gift to the world was created by Tim Berners-Lee (Sir Timothy John Berners-Lee) while working for a physics research center in Geneva, Switzerland. CERN, The European Organization for Nuclear Research, approved Berners-Lee’s request to work on a system which would facilitate collaboration among researchers via the Internet. “I invented the Web just because I needed it, really, because it was so frustrating that it didn’t exist,” said Berners-Lee in a 2009 interview with the BBC.

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WWW Birthday – A SPN Exclusive Article

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