As the power of social media continues to emerge, smart businesses are using this platform to tell customers and prospects about their products and services. But even smarter businesses are using online communication to see what consumers have to say about them. Read the rest of this entry »

It’s official. The email claim that two moons will appear in 2010 is a hoax. NASA has confirmed it — for the seventh year in a row. According to Snopes, the rumors surround an occurrence on August 27, 2003, in which Mars made an extraordinarily close approach to Earth and appeared six times larger and 85 times brighter than it ordinarily does. Recent emails claim that this would be happening tonight, and that Mars would have the appearance of second moon.

Alas, there will be no spectacle. To make up for the disappointment, here is a list of alternative moon-related activities for your Friday evening:

1. Have a Moon Pie
2. Watch old episodes of Moonlighting
3. Check out the Straight No Chaser cover of the Van Morrison song Moon Dance
4. See what Moon Unit Zappa has been up to
5. Read about the late drummer for the Who, Keith Moon
6. Learn about notable incidents of mooning in history
7. Listen to the Glenn Miller classic, Moonlight Serenade
8. Learn how to make your own Moonshine at home

Whether you are a user of the popular social media platform or not, you have probably noticed that more and more businesses are using Facebook pages to stay on the minds of their customers. But are they limited to only reaching Facebook users who connect with them? Not if they take advantage of Facebook tagging. Read the rest of this entry »

Starting this week, Yahoo search results have a new label: “Powered by Bing.”  What?!  Yahoo and Microsoft’s Bing once were two search engines vying for 2nd in market share, behind all-powerful Google.  Their limited alliance –  centered upon Yahoo’s adoption of Bing’s search technology and advertising display — is a major attempt to offset Google’s dominance in search.  Can you say “no more monopoly”?

Key Dates in Bing /Yahoo Search Merger
thanks to coverage by the New York Times

• Spring 2008: Microsoft offers a whopping $47.5 billion to buy Yahoo after merger talks lead nowhere.
• Summer 2008: Microsoft abandons the offer, frustrating Yahoo investors.
• January 2009: Carol Bartz named CEO of Yahoo, as co-founder Jerry Yang is ousted.
• July 2009: The two companies announce a partnership in Internet search and advertising intended to create a stronger market with Google. (<– the current deal)
• August 2010: With few announcements from either party, Yahoo begins displaying Bing-powered search results in the US.
• December 2010: Yahoo plans to display Bing paid advertising, beginning at this time.

Good Timing for Yahoo?
While the alliance is a big win for Microsoft’s Bing– growing since its June 2009 launch– Yahoo is feeling the current momentum:

• In July 2010, Google remained the market leader by a wide margin, holding 65.8% of the U.S. search market compared with 66.2% in June.
• Yahoo picked up those lost points, rising to 17.1% from 16.7% share.
• Bing held its share at 11%.

Yahoo also stands to retain an incredible 88% of paid ad revenue for searches originating in Yahoo during the first 5 years of this merger.  In layman’s terms, Yahoo is “getting a better search engine” for next-to “free,” until it begins forking over a larger share of ad revenue in 2015.  Finally, Yahoo’s Dow Jones stock trading is down 1% for August 2010, vs. a nearly 8% dive in August for Microsoft. Time will tell!

Maybe it’s because you’ve spent so much time together. Perhaps it’s because it knows so many of your secrets. Or it could just be that you remember what you paid for it. Whatever the reason, getting rid of an old computer can be a difficult thing. Once you decide to make the break, just what do you do with that out-dated system? Read the rest of this entry »

Looking for some excitement? Craving adventure? How about getting involved in a little internet piracy on Facebook?

Aye, but ye needn’t be a frettin’, it’s all perfectly legal. All you have to do is “amend yer options.” Read the rest of this entry »

As internet marketing experts, we assist clients with a wide variety of online efforts to boost website performance. But when it comes to analyzing how well your website represents your business, you can benefit from your own expertise. SWOT is an effective business tool that you can use to perform an honest evaluation of your website. Read the rest of this entry »

We were playing with this website we’ve known for a while now: http://web.archive.org/ and thought it would be a ton of fun to share with our readers what Upright’s home page looked like when the company first started in 1996.

Take a tour through our flashback time machine.

1996

2001

2004

2010

Be sure to visit the Web Archive site to see what your site looked like however many years ago.

The online marketing industry is abuzz over radical changes to the way LOCAL SEARCH RESULTS may soon be displayed in Google.

Since around July 1, Google has been testing alternative results page formats, seen when searching for local products and services–such as “dentists” or “Chicago insurance agent”. A full view into these display tests can be found here and here.

As a result of the widespread testing, users are seeing different formats from each other. And it is unknown which test formats will become permanent. However, there are ‘common threads’ among the test displays, which indicate what Google may be moving towards…

Display Changes: Guessing Google’s Intent
*Dentist-related screenshots c/o Linda Buquet of Catalyst eMarketing via Mike Blumenthal’s blog.  See links above for details.

*OLD* STATUS-QUO

*NEW TEST* LOCAL & ORGANIC RESULTS LOOKING MORE SIMILAR

*NEW TEST* LOCAL RESULTS “MIXED IN WITH” ORGANIC RESULTS

*NEW TEST* PROMINENCE OF REVIEWS FOR LOCAL BUSINESSES

We will keep you posted when the new local results format is finalized!

Hi everybody! I’m in Seattle to attend a website usability session with guru Steve Krug all day Friday. Seattle: home of the Mariners, the Space Needle…and Microsoft’s headquarters.

So it’s perfect timing that Bing, Microsoft’s search engine, announces key updates this week. For a full look view into Bing updates, check out this entry from the official Microsoft blog from Seattle Post-Intelligencer. (I’m already such a Seattle local, eh?!)

The Microsoft blog describes the new look and features so well, I won’t compete. So instead, I’ve put together a collection of quotes from Microsoft on the philosophy behind Bing and this week’s updates:

On Bing’s New Look: “You will see a new design aesthetic applied to Bing,” states Bing Corporate VP Brian MacDonald. “We have tried to bring you an experience grounded in clear readable typography that helps you find your way and organize information. With the new design the rich content in Bing really stands out from pages that are clean, light, open and fast. Result pages are not presented in a one-size-fits-all-layout – instead, Bing results pages are richly and visually organized, making the whole search experience feel dynamic and alive.”

On being the decision engine: “Our focus is trying to get to an intent-based dialogue model as opposed to hit or miss model we have today,” Microsoft’s director of Bing Search, Stefan Weitz, said in an interview. “We also went back to the research and figured out what kind of decisions people were trying to make with web search and we built a new experience around this. The number one request we get is ‘help me complete a task more quickly.’”

On Entertainment searches: “76 percent of people use search to help find and navigate their entertainment options online, but only 10 percent say they have a trusted place to go,” states Bing Senior VP Yusuf Mehdi. “So we see a great opportunity to help customers make important entertainment decisions — from deciding what movie to buy or see, which TV shows to watch online or on your TV, what music to listen to, how to find and safely play your favorite casual games – Bing is making a first step today to help make entertainment on the web easy and fun, so you spend less time searching for entertainment and more time doing the stuff you love.”

On Partnering with Yahoo: “Obviously, our long term goal is to grow and build a credible alternative in the search industry. The partnership with Yahoo has to do with the advertising. Today, all the advertisers have to buy Google as their first choice because of all the volume (65% market share) Google has. The next decision they have is whether to spend money on Yahoo (17% share) or Bing (12%) or split between the two, or put money back into Google. Once we do the migration — this fall, hopefully — there will be two options. Everyone will still buy Google, but there will be a clear second choice to buy, with roughly 30% market share. Just being able to be a credible choice, for us, is a huge step forward. And that’s what we’ll accomplish with Yahoo.” – Bing Senior VP Yusuf Mehdi

Are you happy with Bing’s new updates? Let us know in the Comments section below.

Or…you could always wish me safe travels, lots of fun, and lessons learned at my website usability session tomorrow. Til next time!