On February 23rd, 2012, Pure Visibility’s own Michael Beasley will be speaking on Michigan State University’s campus, at 6:00 p.m. The presentation will cover how to cut through the complexity of all the possible things you can measure with web analytics, to find the things that are really important and useful to measure, from a business and a user experience perspective.

This talk, which is the first Michigan Usability Professionals’ Association meeting of the year, brings together the areas of user experience and web metrics in much the same way Pure Visibility brings together these two fields within the work of our own Measurement Team.

For more information or to register, please visit the Michigan UPA website.

At Pure Visibility, one of our core competencies is Pay Per Click advertising (PPC). While some may think that navigating the interfaces at Google is where paid search management begins and ends, we know it is only the tip of the iceberg. One of our core values, “Driven to Improve,” plays out constantly in our interactions with our paid search clients.

In the paid search arena, landing page testing is one area where Pure Visibility gains extra leads and conversions for clients. It’s exciting, and we can see the results of quality landing page design, immediately.

I have been managing a very exciting project at PV since I joined the company. One of the sub-projects in that engagement, which I have really enjoyed, is a true team effort. Some of the stakeholders and team members include client representatives and their third-party website designers.

It has been an exciting project from a team building point-of-view, as the client manages both agencies. We all work closely to make sure the results meet our expectations and the client wins.

Good landing page design takes into account what the potential customer is looking for, website usability, and a compelling sell or call-to-action. Before the PPC part of the business can do its magic, the landing page has to be designed.

We design the blueprints (or wireframes) for the web design firm to create. After the page is designed, copy is written, and everything is perfect and approved, the new landing page is moved to a production environment where Pure Visibility’s PPC Pirates (a.k.a. Analysts) can use and test it.

Google has tools that make A/B testing very simple to understand. Using Google Website Optimizer, Pure Visibility’s PPC analysts can set up a test which sends users to the existing, control version of a landing page (A), 50% of the time, and then to a test version (B), the other 50% of the time. If there is a statistically significant improvement in conversion rate between A and B, the interface will let us know and the test will be over.

At that point, we can roll out that winning landing page to a production environment and use it 100% of the time. Since the client has several brands, this landing page design can be scaled and we see gains across all brands. Excellent!

In our last landing page test, the new version of the page was so compelling that it showed a 37% improvement over the older page with a 99.9% level of confidence.

The next time you search the web for something and you soon find yourself on a company’s landing page, stop and think, “How can they do better?” I always do.

I bet you thought that once you graduated school that you were done with having to worry about people evaluating and grading your writing. Well, think again! Google evaluates and classifies the reading level for each of your pages into one of the following three buckets:

• Basic
• Intermediate
• Advanced

The classifications are intended to describe the level of reading comprehension needed to understand the content on the page. For example, scientific research papers would be more likely to end up classified as Advanced, while you would expect a website targeted at kids to be classified as Basic.

Google does this for many reasons, but the main purpose, like most of the things Google does, is to better serve its users. By being able to evaluate reading level, Google can better identify poor quality content and filter out spammy low quality content from their search results.

In addition, they can allow user to search for things based on reading level. For example, lets say you just bought a new iPad and you were looking for a tutorial. You could search for “ipad tutorial” and filter sites that contain basic reading levels to ensure that the tutorials you review are easy to read and understand. Not sure how to do this? Don’t worry, just keep reading.

Filter Your Search Results By Reading Level

Here is a step-by-step guide to filtering your search results by reading level – it is actually quite easy!

Step 1

Enter your search query in the Google search box as usual. Then click the “Show search tools” link in the bottom of the lefthand sidebar. In this example, we will search for iPad tutorials.

Step 2

After clicking “Show search tools” the menu expands. Under the “All Results” menu, click “reading level.”

Step 3

After clicking the “reading level” the search results should refresh and you see a chart that lists the percentage of sites that fall into each reading level. In addition, the reading level is displayed for each individual search result.

Step 4

The last and final step is to click the reading level that you want to filter the results so that only sites that match that reading level are shown. That’s it, you did it!

In the example below I clicked on the Basic reading level. To revert back to normal search settings simply click on the “x” in the upper right hand corner of the reading level box.

Reading Level and SEO

Although the reading level can be very helpful for users, it can also be a valuable resource for optimizing content and improving your SEO. Generally speaking, you want to write content that is consistent with the reading level used on the majority of sites that discuss the particular subject matter in question.

For example, 71% of the sites that write about iPad tutorials have content that is at the Intermediate reading level, while only 8% have content that is at an Advanced reading level. This means that in the eyes of Google, an Intermediate reading level is more “normal” and appropriate for this subject matter.

And as a result, Google may favor this type of content in the results because it believes that it better suits the audience and provides a better user experience for the user – or so the theory goes?

If you think about this logically, it actually makes sense. iPad tutorials shouldn’t be at an advanced reading level. You don’t want tutorials to be like research papers; using long sentence structures, a large vocabulary, and requiring advanced reading levels to comprehend the subject matter.

You want tutorials to be written so that your readers can easily understand the material; short sentence structures and simple vocabulary (basic reading level). However, the iPad itself is a technical device and by nature some of the jargon and vocabulary used to understand it is probably above the basic reading level, which is why the majority of sites are classified as Intermediate.

By doing this research ahead of time you’d know the reading level you want to achieve (Intermediate in this case) and the reading level you most likely wnat to avoid (Advanced in this example). In addition, after you’ve written and published the article you can see how Google classifies it and then make the necessary modifications to get the desired result.

Reviewing reading level for keyword targets is not a game changer, but it can help you write better content and it can be an effective and useful tool in an SEO analyst’s bag of tricks.

We’re developing Instructor Resources for our Internet Marketing Start to Finish book. It has been a fun project.

Yet, because several of our chapters describe data analysis, any exercises for students require… well… data. And since we’re describing how to use web analytics data, creating exercises for using Google Analytics seems like the right first step.

All perfectly logical, except it lands us in a quandary. How do we create exercises for these chapters without knowing whether the students have access to web analytics at all? What might the quality of the analytics installation be, on any access they can beg for through a family or academic network?

In the big sandbox, made available through Creative Commons on Flickr by Ernst Vikne

We came to the conclusion we had to make available a sandbox account where students can view real data. Something where they can play with data, experiment with the interface and learn a few things.

Requirements for a learning Google Analytics (sandbox) account

1. The account should be properly installed (code on every page of the website). One of the first signs of poor installation is a large proportion of self-referrals in the traffic sources, showing that folks are looking like they’re coming from the same website. This can indicate incomplete installation of script-based web analytics services. Web data with configuration issues or gaps in deployment is tricky to impossible to analyze.
2. The account should have over two years of data in it, to shed light on any seasonal trends at work at the monthly level and to provide a long enough timeline to measure year over year change. Because web analytics is recorded from installation forward, it’s not retroactive. So, by the time the course has started, it is years too late to have an interesting data set for students to engage.
3. The account should have goals that have some business value by which to measure success of initiatives and/or success of the site itself.

So, Any Volunteers?

Yet, for businesses that use the Internet heavily for marketing and sales, web analytics data are typically proprietary, so it is hard to envision a scenario where interesting business data is freely available. If you know of such a situation, please leave it in the comments! Otherwise, keep reading for our current, half-baked solution.

Our Current Idea

The Good

The personal blog of one of the authors meets criteria 1 and 2. It has been installed completely on the (very simple) site and has been collecting data since fall 2006.

The Bad

The site and the analytic account is missing several things that would make it a good working dataset – the author is not running paid search to the site or doing a concerted link building program, so the referrals and paid search traffic sources are weak to empty. Worse, it lacks goals throughout its history, to be blunt the site lacks goals beyond experimentation and self-expression. So, it is a poor example for business goals, but a dataset nonetheless.

The Ugly

The thankless and annoying part will be to maintain access for students to the data. Setting up a publicly available login/password seems an invitation to treachery (among other issues, this “open” Google Account would end up having an available email account from which to spam the world).  

So, we’re going to opt for fielding requests from qualified instructors to provide a list of students access for a pre-defined period, opening us up to a lot of silly administration and a fair bit of “tech support” back and forth when student A cannot access her account because she does not yet have a Google Account set up even though she already gave us her email address.

This “access rigmarole” happens all the time with new clients, and doing it for free is not appealing. Yet, this is something that is part of the Google Analytics “setup” process, and is in itself a learning experience, though something I, for one, wish I’d never learned so well!

Let us know if you see a better solution out there or can envision something easier to maintain. Thanks in advance for the input!

Wouldn’t it be nice not to have sticky notes with important passwords scribbled on them lying by your desk or hanging on your monitor in plain sight? Wouldn’t it be convenient to have access to your documents or reports or messages from clients without having to traverse through your infinitely long email folders?

Similarly, wouldn’t it be fantastic to be able to work from your office, your comfy couch at home, or a nearby coffee shop, or better yet, your daughter’s ballet class?

The Good Old Days
Coming from an academic background, I was used to having to carry around passwords in a KeePass folder or remembering to upload the latest version of the MS Project folder if I needed to work from home. Or, uploading all working documents to the intranet before logging out for the day.

In the last few months I have been at Pure Visibility, my routines and processes have changed quite drastically. And, for the better, I must say.

Now: Pure Visibility Project Management

Even though it initially felt like several things to recall every time I did my project management tasks, now it is like second nature and I wonder if I know any other way at all! Messages from team members and clients are safely stored on Basecamp, a convenient tool that helps me sift through my emails and ensures that our team has one place to access message threads, reports, documents, milestones, or you name it, pertaining to client requests.

Do you have really long message threads with attachments that need to be distributed to your team as well as archived? No worries – use MailManagr, and it doesn’t mess up the file formats and the syntax is quite intuitive.

Our wiki, Socialtext, is where we store our internal procedures, policies, operations information, and everything else useful to us in our daily work. Having a wiki keeps everything centrally located and it’s very easy to add, edit, and delete information; and, to train new team members!

Passwords, as we all know, are not only sensitive data but ever-changing to ensure the continued security of systems. The latter making it quite taxing for teams to keep in sync with the IT folks, and may result in major inconveniences at off-site meetings if a system is not available as soon as the password is changed. LastPass to the rescue – not only can you access this without having to carry a jump-drive with KeePass or other local programs, now, we can use the cloud to distribute it on the fly.

Need to log billable time on a daily basis, Harvest, an online time tracking and invoicing system helps us switch from projects/tasks with an easy to use interface and multiple customizable options. Indeed, creating projects and sub-projects along with discipline tasks is a breeze, thus helping us keep this application in sync with our internal Basecamp and Wiki.

Meeting your clients in person at their office or stepping out for a quick coffee to catch up with your team? You know these expenses add up and at the end of the month filling out expense reports to get reimbursed can be cumbersome, and quite frankly, off-putting. Well, it’s not if you have Expensify, this nifty program is available online bundled with a convenient app for smartphones.

Click a photo of the receipt and upload it using your phone, or scan and upload receipts to the website. It’s even conveniently linked up to our company credit cards and assembles our credit charges, too. Our set-up is quite fancy, in that managers can approve team members’ expenses online as well. Better yet, it will send reminders to managers for approvals to ensure we meet our company deadlines. No more excuses to submit or approve expense reports now, is there?

To acquaint myself with our clients, I used the Wiki, Basecamp, project documentation, and reports but another invaluable resource is our CRM, Salesforce.com. It gives me on-the-fly access to ever-changing client details like contact information, titles, and accounts information. And, it is a great way to log information on our prospective clients as well, such as emails, phone calls, and sales details. So, the communication thread is easily available and sorted to help any (new) team member catch up at any time during the sales cycle.

Google Documents is a wonderful collaborative tool that we use not only internally to share documents or spreadsheets by multiple team members; but it has become a lifesaver for client collaboration tasks as well. Whether sharing budget forecasts, time planning, tasks distribution, and even for social purposes like emergency phone numbers to go out for a cup of coffee!

Another neat program I’m familiar with these days is WebEx, which is an online web conferencing solution. Ideally, we’d love to be able to meet in person every time but we all know how difficult that can be, however with Webex’s phone and chat options as well as the ability to share screens among participants, we are a step closer to achieving the face-to-face time.

All I can say is: at the end of the day, I don’t carry a bunch of paper documents; or a special drive with passwords; or slips of paper with my daily time sheet; or wads of receipts to submit my expenses. I just pack up my laptop and I am off to continue work wherever I please.

Well, almost anywhere I please, that is—as I sit precariously on this particular ledge balancing my laptop on one leg and looking for a wireless signal at my daughter’s dance studio! Nevertheless, I enjoy the convenience of the cloud for project management work, as well as the comfort of knowing I didn’t forget something important on my desk, or worse, somewhere else!

Ann Arbor is home to an annual conference, Internet User Experience, which covers web site design, graphics, branding, social media, and more. 2011 was another successful year for the conference and was well attended by a variety of user experience and marketing professionals.

Pure Visibility’s Michael Beasley served as master of ceremonies once again this year, and also presented a 5 minute talk during the Ignite session on “What Every UXer Needs to Know about SEO.”

What Every UXer Needs to Know about SEO

http://igniteshow.com/videos/what-every-uxer-needs-know-about-seo

This multi-disciplinary approach is typical of Pure Visibility, where we bring together experts from different fields to help our clients’ online marketing.

With Google’s bid-per-call feature in AdWords, you can now set separate max bids for clicks and calls. Many businesses benefit from customers calling their office or shop, for example if you own a local pizza joint or flower shop. Some people prefer to book a cruise over the phone, getting advice from the company’s operator.

Some businesses may even be willing to pay more for a phone call than a click. This post will give you an explanation of Google’s call extensions and their features, how to measure your phone calls, and how to bid on calls.

Displaying a phone number within your ads is recommended for most businesses that can effectively turn calls into sales. Here are just a few advantages to adding call extensions to your ads.

• Distinguishes your ad. Anything you can do to help your ad stick out is a positive.
• Makes it easier to contact you. If someone is searching for your phone number they can find it easier if it’s listed within your ad.
• Advanced call metrics. More data! Call metrics within AdWords gives you insight into your calls, including area code and call duration.

What Are Call Extensions and the Related Various Features?

You can add different features to your AdWords ads, which Google calls “ad extensions.” These include adding things like a Google Places listing or sitelinks to your ad.

Again, remember that adding any feature to your ad can help set it apart from others. To access these features, click the “Ad extensions” tab within the AdWords online interface. From there you can add call extensions.

There are several things to take note of when using call extensions. The following list of terms can become confusing if you don’t know what each means:

• Call extensions – Adds any phone number you choose to your ad.
• Google forwarding number – Select “Show a Google forwarding phone number on all eligible ads and devices” when setting up call extensions, to place a dynamic 800 number within your ad that Google uses to report data on your phone calls. If you do not select this option a phone number will only appear on “high end” mobile phones.
• Call metrics – The data which Google reports to you on your calls. Includes duration of call, area code, and other information.
• Click-to-call - This mobile-only feature allows users to call your phone number directly by clicking on your ad.

How to Measure the Effectiveness of Call Extensions

From within the Dimensions tab, pull down the View menu and select “Call details”. This report shows the data collected on each of your calls. The duration of the call and area code can give you great insight. Try downloading this report by clicking on the downward pointing arrow. Open the spreadsheet to analyze the data further.

You can also add phone details from the Column menu in the Campaigns tab. Data like number of phone calls and the average price-per-call can be viewed, down to the adgroup level.

Bid-per-calls

When call extensions were first introduced, all phone calls were charged $1. Google now allows you to bid separately on phone calls and clicks. Say Susie at your office has a very warm personality and does a great job of making sales over the phone.

A phone call may be worth more to you than a visit to your e-commerce site. Simply increase the bid on your phone calls. This can improve the position of your ad while still keeping the price-per-click the same.

As with any new feature within AdWords, it is important to test. So give call extensions a try but pay attention to the results. If sales increase, make sure to take Susie out for a nice cup of coffee!

• Interview customers
• Develop website personas
• Conduct a usability study on your website – watch how users interact
• Do keyword research for your industry – try out Google Insights, a free tool based on real world search history

In the spirit of autumn, Halloween and this weekend’s Thanksgiving holiday, the team at Pure Visibility took some time out to visit our local pumpkin patch at Wasem Farm. Donuts, cider and a few dozen pumpkins later, we had a great fall afternoon. Be sure to check out all of the photos on our Facebook page! From the PV Team to yours, have a wonderful holiday weekend!

Matt Cutts and the rest of the Mountain View Gang have been busy lately. While Google is constantly making changes to their search algorithm, over 500 a year, the last two weeks have seen a series of updates that greatly impact search results. Businesses need to keep tabs on Google’s changes in their ranking system in order to maintain an effective online marketing strategy. Here are some of the most important updates and what they mean for your business.

Freshness Update

Last summer Google completed their Caffeine update. It allowed Big G to index the web faster, giving more recent and relevant results. In early November, a similar update was made, placing even more importance on the “freshness” of content.

Say you’re looking for information on the Michigan Brewer’s Guild Winter Festival. Google will now place more emphasis on content relating to the upcoming festival instead of info from 2010 or 2009. Sports scores, breaking news, and other searches that are time sensitive, will now show up in search results within a matter of minutes.

Relevant, Original Content

Google is continuing to emphasize original content. Several of the recent updates relate to this. Snippets are the brief piece of content that Google displays under the link in the search results page. As Google continues to improve their “understanding of web page structure,” they will place more relevant snippets of actual content within search results. Less emphasis will be placed on headers and titles. This means the content of your latest blog post needs to be relevant, not just the title.

Another update is placing less emphasis on duplicate “boilerplate” anchor text. Say your internal link structure includes a dozen pages pointing to your blog post on “pineapple recipes.” If each link text is easy pineapple recipes, they will still only be counted as one “link vote.” This is to combat sites from gaining “link juice” simply by linking to one section of the site over and over.

Continuing with original content, Google loves the original source. Including tags like “rel=author” helps the friendly Google bot to tell what is firsthand content and what is being rehashed and reshared to generate traffic.

Take this blog post for example. While I am discussing content that has previously been published and linking to it, I am also providing amazing original insight into what it means for your business. When blogging, don’t just cut and paste from an original article. Provide added value and your own opinions or experience. Make it your own complimentary piece instead of a simple summary.

WARNING!

Matty C. does provide the following disclaimer to keep you from ruining your web team’s pre-holiday work schedule:

Before you go wild tuning your anchor text or thinking about your web presence for Icelandic users, please remember that this is only a sampling of the hundreds of changes we make to our search algorithms in a given year…

The takeaway is, and always should be, to create original and appealing content. Content is still King. You can never go wrong by providing valuable and popular content. Google’s latest updates make it even more important to have a dynamic, engaging, and updated web presence. So keep uploading those YouTube videos, writing new blog posts, and sharing everything on your new Google+ Page! Happy SEMing!