I'm going back to my own jWAG website tracking today to look at the top 10 Daily Golden Nuggets of all time, that are still relevant today. I see that some of the Nuggets with the highest reader count are out of date because Facebook and Google have changed things, and a few others are very similar so I'll have to do some consolidating.
Popular Screen Resolutions
1. The most popular screen resolutions change constantly as new mobile devices and laptops are introduced. I publish an updated version of screen resol... VIEW FULL GOLD NUGGET
This is the #FridayFlopFix of the Daily Golden Nugget. I'm on the hunt for a retail jewelry store with a bad website, or at least with something that's broken so I can suggest a way to fix their flop.
My search this week led me to Mukilteo, WA, specifically the Google search for "jewelers in Mukilteo, WA" and these results:
Those of us who try to make an honest living using the internet are often overshadowed by those who use the internet as a tool for destruction.
Cyber security is a real threat, and it comes in various shapes, sizes, and disguises. Even though we might spend lots of money maintaining our anti-virus and firewall software, there are still Trojan types of attacks that can catch you completely off guard.
I was able to identify and document a Trojan cyber attack last wee... VIEW FULL GOLD NUGGET
Once a week, usually on Friday, I write a website review for a randomly chosen retail jewelry store. This week the review is being moved to Wednesday.
For this week's review, I'm searching for "jewelers in Sedona, AZ" using Google Chrome in incognito mode. The results I saw during last week's review were formatted for a smartphone. This week the results are formatted for a desktop browser again. Oddities like that are usual... VIEW FULL GOLD NUGGET
During my Throwback Thursday Nugget last week, I dug up the old story of bad neighborhoods and how they could negatively impact your website.
The negative impacts I mentioned included slower website response time, potential for server downtime, and lower Google ranking if too many of your website neighbors involve porn, gambling, or E.D. drug websites.
Originally just known as unsolicited and unwanted email junk, now spam exists in new multiple forms. Sometimes it's in the guise of blog posts that are unreadable, or useless blog comments, full websites loaded with junk content and video memes out to lure you into some scam service or pop-up nightmare.
In recent years, the idea of spam has included attempts at social engagements that I've directly experienced on Twitter, Facebook, Meetup, and Instagram. I'm sure every social network has spam and fake ... VIEW FULL GOLD NUGGET
It never ceases to amaze me that jewelers are either paying for, or directly engaging in link building schemes that are bad for them. With all the talk of Google Penguin since April 2012, I'm surprised that some businesses still don't understand the difference between good and bad link building.
Perhaps one of the most heated website design debates I've read recently was about the use of CAPTCHA on website forms. You know what CAPTCHA is, right? It's that annoying string of characters or words you have to retype before you can submit a website form.
CAPTCHAs are used to prove that a real person is submitting the form on your website rather than a computer program. Spammers use automated programs to send solicitations through your website forms. The reason behind this Nugget in the first place is a recent flurry of s... VIEW FULL GOLD NUGGET
This is the Friday website review edition of the Daily Golden Nugget. Every Friday I choose a random city and search for a potential jeweler to use as my review candidate.
This week I'm looking in Maplewood, NJ for a local jeweler. I used the search query "jewelers in maplewood nj" and found the results below. There's a lot of detail in the SERP screen shot, so click it to view larger:
In this edition of Google+ Monday Golden Nugget, I need to explain some Google+ commenting etiquette. In fact, the type of etiquette you should be practicing on Google+ is the same type of good etiquette you should be employing on other social networks and when leaving comments on blogs.
Simply said, you should never spam someone's social share. "Spamming" isn't just for emails; it also applies to an unwanted solicitation as a comment on a social post, or on a blog post. This is referred to as "comm... VIEW FULL GOLD NUGGET
Each social network has their own notification settings where you control how you should be notified when someone shares content.
On the smartphone, you have the ability to set the social networks to "push" a notification directly to your screen. These pop-up notifications will appear in front of whatever application you are running at the time.
You also have the ability to trigger an email notification to be sent whenever someone mentions your name, or sends a m... VIEW FULL GOLD NUGGET
We're continuing our topic of Black Hat SEO techniques that will cause your website to be banned or seriously penalized by search engines. Today's topic is about "Link Farms" and bad link building.
Link building is the process of posting a link to your website on another website. This can be as simple as putting a link in your next Twitter status update, or posting a link to your Facebook wall. On Google+ you can build a link to your website with a Public post. Building links slowly in this way is considered to be the correct, organic way.
Any time you pay someone to put a link on their website pointing back to yours it is considered paid link building. All the search engines hate the paid practice of link building and consider the process within the SEO boundaries of Black Hat.
What's the difference between email you send to your friends and family and the email you send out in bulk to your customers?
Constant Contact is one of the popular, easy to use email newsletter management systems. They provide colorful email templates that you can manipulate and turn into beautiful masterpieces of email creativity.
Perhaps you sit and marvel at the beauty of those email newsletters before sending, only to have your excitement crushed by those built in statistics that show how few people open the email (called open rates).
There are many reasons for low open rates, including spam filters, firewalls, poor subject lines, and customers who don't view images in email. You can only track when an email is opened if the person views images. Have you ever see that "Having trouble viewing this email? Click ... VIEW FULL GOLD NUGGET
In yesterday's Daily Golden Nugget we told you about Citysearch.com and presented a case study of Roslyn Jewelry in NYC who has bad reviews dating back to 2002 and obviously spammy reviews in the past two years.
Citysearch requires a monthly PPC advertising commitment of at least $299 before they allow you to rebut your reviews. Instead of paying, Roslyn took the frugal approach by creating 4 bogus user accounts each with 1 review. These reviews were posted on the same date, which is a red flag for bogus reviews.
As we said a few days ago, online reviews are forms of user generated content that will help or hurt your business. On the other hand, if done correctly they are also forms of direct marketing.
If you find yourself in the same unfortunate Citysearch position as Roslyn, and you want to take the frugal appro... VIEW FULL GOLD NUGGET
From our recent research study we've found that online review sites account for a lot of your business visibility.
Citysearch.com might show a 5 star user rating for your business and no one notices you because the 5 stars are almost expected now. But there can be a particularly devastating effect to your business if your ratings are low, and you would feel it.
Several members of our team are currently working with a large supplier that has a disastrous online reputation. Every review site has dozens of complaints about them, but until we got involved they simply didn't know how to fix the problem. Let's use our experience and give you some ideas that will help in your own reputation management.
Sometimes those online reviews can illustrate a long standing probl... VIEW FULL GOLD NUGGET
Ask someone for their cell phone number and they immediately think you will send them spam text messages.
Ask someone for their email address and they immediately think you will waste their time and send spam emails.
The internet gets clogged with spam emails every day. We directly track and block about 75% of email traffic every day because it's all spam.
Google has a dedicated department to fight "Web Spam" and all things that cause any type of digital interaction that will annoy people. This team helps to control the built in filters that block troublesome websites.
One of the things they watch out for are websites that plainly show email addresses. Freely posting your email address as bob@jewelrystore.com will invite spam. Malicious email com... VIEW FULL GOLD NUGGET
Years ago, Google used to wait a few months at a time before unleashing new search engine code into the world (wide web).
As it stands right now, they have teams of different programmers working on different segments of the search engine at all times. Some teams work on web spam filtering, some on measuring links, some on basic page formatting. Each team works almost independently of any other team.
As these teams release new features, they are automatically added to a daily routine of mini updates for website ranking. Most of the time you won't notice a big change in how your web page is ranking with the new features; in fact, you are more likely to hear about some change on a blog post than noticing it yourself.
However, there will be day when you sit down with your morning coffee and discover that your website ... VIEW FULL GOLD NUGGET
The term "web spam" has been mentioned in many official blogs recently. Actually, the term seems to be mentioned every few months when someone complains about it, reawakens the topic.
In reality, "web spam" refers to a web page that is made up entirely of clusters of similar words that looks like gibberish.
Here's EXAMPLE 1 of web spam:
"We sell engagement ring the best selection of engagement rings is in our jewelry showcase you will find the best bridal engagement rings at our store women should look here for a variety of wedding engagement ring selections available nowhere else but our jewelry showcase in our engagement ring store where we have the best jewelry and diamond rings you could ever expect from an online jewelry store."
All of the search engines have implemented filtering to prevent you from eve... VIEW FULL GOLD NUGGET
"...articles are easy to follow and seem to have information one can use right away." -Ann, Gallery 4, Hamden CT
"...serious kudos to you. We love your straight talk, pertinent information and plain language. I don't know how many industries have something of jWAG's caliber available, but I learn from the emails every day. Really, really nice work, and very appreciated." -Cheryl Herrick, Global Pathways Jewelry
