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Findable. Scannable. Readable. Concise. Layered. We know much these days about how to make Web content usable-thanks to experts such as Robert Horn, Jakob Nielsen, Ginny Redish, and Gerry McGovern. What we don't understand as well, however, is how to make content win users over to take the actions we want them to take or have the perceptions we want them to have. We don't understand how to make Web content both usable and persuasive. I, by no means, intend to imply that we should sacrifice the usability of content to make it more persuasive. Truly winning content must be both.

Taking lessons from two marketing disciplines, online retailers and their web designers can build a well structured Internet store organized into themes or categories that will make it easy for shoppers and search engines alike to find important information and product pages. In this Ecommerce Know-How, I will briefly define search engine optimization (SEO) and information architecture (IA), describe one of the many places where these marketing specialties intersect, and explain how easy and natural thematic structure and linking really is. I've also included a video. I should point out that this technique is very intuitive, and many site owners or designers are probably using it to some extent naturally. We are simply putting a name to these natural tendencies.

Online, pictures are worth more than words, they're worth dollars. But how many dollars depends on how effectively product images *speak* to customers. We're talkin' details. Just like textual product descriptions describe a product in detail, enlarged images and alternate views better describe your products. And many products cannot be fully described with words.

When it comes to building links and generating coverage of your web site and products online, there's a skill that often gets overlooked. Relationship building gets a lot of lip service these days, but I sometimes wonder how many small businesses really, truly understand how much work goes into it. Relationships go beyond reading a single blog post or scanning a Facebook page...it means investing time in someone.

It is greatly ironic that algorithms, the quintessential example of all that is not human, would be so fundamental to social media. Last week I wrote a post about how Google gathers user data. This week I continue by exposing how popular social media websites use algorithms to utilize user data. Although humans power social media, it is algorithms that provide the frameworks that make user input useful. As proven by the countless social sites online, finding the correct mix of participation and rules can be extremely difficult. Below are some of the algorithms that when combined with the right people have proven successful.

Yesterday we looked at examples of image zoom and alternate views, which can help customers experience the product better than one small view. A good photographer plus AJAX or Flash technology like Scene 7 or Magic Zoom can achieve this. But online retailers can go a step further and use photos that show products in use, or "in context." This can reduce a shopper's fears, uncertainties and doubts about a purchase like "how does this look on a person?" or "how large is this in real life?." Images can also "sell" by triggering an emotion, showing the quality or versatility of an item or illustrating a products features and benefits.

"For a website, gaining RSS subscribers requires hard work as visitors prefer to subscribe websites with fresh/quality content & expect this to be continious. On the other hand, RSS subscribers are very valuable loyal readers which follow the website regularly. So, for a website, it is very important to analyze "how visitors become RSS readers" like: * from which websites do they reach to yours * which page of yours is the one that gains you most subscribers, etc. Google Analytics, besides all the simplicity it offers, has a very functional event tracking method for analyzing custom events which we will be using to track new RSS subscriptions and see how to analyzing them deeper."

How SEOed is Your Site?" It has a series of multiple choice questions to help you gauge your degree of SEOedness.

A test that checks how many customer & how many company related words appear.

how to build your brand

How your website is a communication tool

Don't forget to market your content online.

Fill in the form information and click the Generate URL button below. If you're new to tagging links or this is your first time using this tool, read How do I tag my links? If your Google Analytics account has been linked to an active AdWords account, there's no need to tag your AdWords links - auto-tagging will do it for you automatically.

A great post from Matt over at 37signals about how to get publicity. I've had a few people write me asking how they can get their blog "out there" -- I'd think all of these tips apply equally well to individual bloggers as they do to companies like 37.

SEO is nice for popularity, but conversion is even better. So, before you go out and start snatching up more keywords than you can shake ...

Over at The Email Wars, there is an interesting post about personalized links in ecommerce emails. Instead of linking to the relevant email topic, many times an ecommerce marketing email will simply send me to a homepage, or a broad category page.

When it comes to selling online, getting someone to take action right now is often the key to success. Many ...

Traditional Web Marketing needs to evolve, and this post intends to kick start the next generation.

What should be the role of marketing in the semantic web? Should there be any? According to the W3C, the semantic web is about common data formats that make it easy to integrate and combine data from diverse sources. It's about mapping ideas expressed in human language to data in a way that facilitates automatic processing, where software can programmatically comprehend how different pieces of data are related. It's a web behind the web of animated banner ads and branded UI designs.