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We've been saying this for years... Even "local" businesses need a web strategy.. Does yours?

In these stats lies a big - but fleeting - opportunity: serving local businesses by helping them use online well. By this, I don't mean doing what local newspapers have been doing: trying to sell them display or directory ads, just as they did in papers but in a new medium. Instead, I mean redefining what it means to help them succeed online. This might mean helping them place ads smartly on Google with good SEO (see Fred Wilson's tweet out of our New Business Models for News Summit at CUNY). It might mean finding was to help local businesses interact more meaningfully with their own communities.

Now, a new breed of companies is trying to tackle all of those options and determine what ad works for a specific audience. They are creating hundreds of versions of clients' online ads, changing elements like color, type font, message, and image to see what combination draws clicks on a particular site or from a specific audience.

Free landing page templates - but most importantly a quick overview on what a landing page is and why you need to use them.

A landing page is a special page created for the express purpose of "converting" website visitors - to get those visitors to take some action such as filling out a lead form or subscribing to a newsletter. If, for instance, you were running an ad campaign to generate leads online, you would point the ad to your landing page, rather than to your home page where the visitor might get lost or frustrated.

Google will begin showing ads on Wednesday to people based on their previous online activities in a form of advertising known as behavioral targeting, which has been embraced by most of its competitors but has drawn criticism from privacy advocates and some members of Congress.

Great insight on changes coming to Google's algorithm. This has the potential to have huge impacts on your SEO and overall Web Strategy

Google's about to make search engine optimization (SEO) into marketing, for good. How? They've been slowly adding user behavior to their ranking algorithm. Bet on far bigger changes after January 1st.

Great tool for bigger Search Engine Marketing campaigns

Clickable's immediate activation and intuitive user experience make it easy to manage pay-per-click marketing across all major ad networks. Powerful recommendations and reporting make you more efficient, effective and confident with your search advertising - even at first login.

More than 80% of marketing executives say email, search marketing, and display ads are their company's top performing advertising channels, and many plan to increase spending on them in 2009, according to a survey from Datran Media.

Learn what bounce rates are, how they affect you, and what you can do to improve your user's experience.

Bounce rates can be an important measurement for your website and web pages. They can help determine whether a certain ad campaign is successful, whether you're targeting the right keywords, or whether changes you make are improving your site. Knowing the bounce rate of your site and individual pages can give clues about what is and isn't working for your site.

But one problem nags at me. Local merchants like "Joe The Plumber" usually don't have a web presence and many don't really even want one. But if you are going to buy cpc advertising, then you'll need a place for the clicks to go. The local ad agencies and local oriented web services are happy to create a web presence for local merchants, but they are often poorly designed and there's no standardization of them.

f you've ever been involved with planning website improvements, you know how hard it can be to decide what action to take. You've heard great potential lies in social media, adding product reviews to your site and search engine optimization (SEO) but which is the best to pursue? Luckily, estimating and measuring performance improvements is easy when you look at the numbers. Today, Big Picture Web brings you a special website planning worksheet that's sure to empower you to correctly select the big ticket items on your next web project.

You've refined your keywords, optimized your bids, and written AdWords text ads that pull in tons of targeted clicks, but after looking at your Google Analytics reports, you realize that your landing page has a bounce rate of 91%. Which means that 91% of the users coming to your site are quickly glancing around and leaving, deciding immediately that this site isn't for them. One of the easiest, low-tech ways to make users stick around and look at your products or services is to catch their attention with an engaging headline.Recent research suggests that users decide to stay or leave your site in 8 seconds or less -- in that short amount of time, headlines are the one piece of copy that users will actually read. Here are five tips for writing headlines that will draw in user attention.

Great tips and tricks regarding lesser known Google Analytics features!

Last year I did a large post over-viewing most useful Google Analytics tips and today I am presenting them as well as adding a number of more important hacks to compile one mega-post on Google Analytics tips and tricks:

Today at Searchology, Google has launched a search results enhancement called "rich snippets" that uses meta data from web pages (from microformats such as hCard, hCalendar, and RDF) to display additional details (both content and meaning) about pages in the results. This initial launch supports reviews (with sites such as Yelp) and people (with sites such as LinkedIn). They will be adding more sites and categories over time.

Testing your ad copy and your landing pages can significantly improve your paid search efforts. Of course, building a solid keyword base, creating an optimized account structure, and executing a well-planned bid management strategy are also crucial. However, testing allows you to understand how to optimize and improve your communication with your target audience. Conducting thorough tests on your landing pages can deepen your audience interaction and increase your conversion rate.

If you pay close attention to the source and the type of traffic you get in your blog, you should be able to find if the majority is from direct referral or organic traffics from search engines. Organic traffics from search engines convert good to CPC, but visitors who visit your site on regular bas

Online Marketing - Advertisment Campaigns