How to turn your website into a 'flytrap'

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How to turn your website into a \'flytrap\'

By HARVEY SCHACHTER
Globe and Mail Update

The New Internet has arrived.

Surfers don\'t explore sites they land on but use search engines as a springboard to dive into the information they need on a site and quickly move on to the next site the search engine points them to.

And that means companies these days have to view their websites differently, Internet guru Jakob Nielsen warns in his alertbox column.

\"Using search engines as their Web interface, people simply grab query-related nuggets from sites, but don\'t engage with the sites themselves,\" he notes.

The Web has therefore become an agglomerated resource dredging up specific pages related to specific needs, without users caring which sites supply the pages. \"Search engines have essentially become answer engines,\" he says.

That is a major problem for company websites, he notes, because there is very little benefit for companies in giving answers to users who don\'t know or care who provides the service. (E-commerce sites are somewhat of an exception, because they often get a sale from users dipping into their catalogue, and afterwards can follow up.) He says companies should:

Realize that the common statistic for charting website success, \"unique visitors,\" is irrelevant, since many such visitors are sampling a single page rather than engaging your site. Focus instead on loyal visitors.

Offer \"flytrap\" content that provides narrowly focused pages with clear answers to common problems, ensuring those get higher search-engine ranking. Then embellish the answer with \"see also\" links to related content and services, rather than depending on users to navigate themselves.

Go beyond pure information and provide analysis and insight, preferably with a unique perspective and a striking personality that supports your positioning. Some users will appreciate your perspective and want more.

Publish a newsletter with additional tips and useful information, offering a more personal user experience than page viewing.

The search-engine industry is changing, however, and in Entrepreneur magazine, marketing consultant Corey Rudl argues that means the need for some new tactic to ensure search-engine optimization for your site.

In the past, scoring a high ranking with a search engine was about positioning your keywords in \"prime real estate\" positions in your text and site coding. Today, what counts is the number of sites that link to yours. \"But it\'s not just the quantity of links that matter, it\'s also the quality,\" he notes. The links have to be relevant -- the sites should have similar content -- and the linking site should have high traffic.

At the same time, keywords, including in your domain name, can still be important. But the trick is to make sure your keywords are in the \"root\" of your URL (uniform resource locator), not the \"stem\": If your keyword phrase is cellphones you will fare better with [url=\"http://www.cellphones.com\"]http://www.cellphones.com[/url] than with [url=\"http://www.mobilecanada.com/cellphones\"]http://www.mobilecanada.com/cellphones[/url]. Indeed, he says that some search engines will actually penalize a site for using keywords in the stem of a URL.

Relevancy is vital. Some search engines will also penalize a site for irrelevant links or irrelevant keywords.

He notes that an easy way to boost the number of pages that link to your site is to create some pages yourself. But those pages must provide people with useful information. \"Search engines hate \'pointer pages\' that have no content and exist only to add to the number of links pointing to a site,\" he says.

Nuggets

Jiffy Lube International will be adding Vogue magazine to its waiting rooms, and training staff to explain its work better to women. Home Depot will spend $1-billion (U.S.) this year to add softer lighting and brighter signs in stores, also to improve its appeal to women. And Best Buy, aware that women buy 55 per cent of electronic items, will be adding personal-shopping assistants in some stores to translate geek-speak. (Source: Business Week)

A study by business communications agency Doremus found that half of respondents regularly invest in projects they believe in, even when they can\'t make a numeric or return-on-investment case for them. (Source: Management magazine)

Comedian David Granier suggests reducing stress by thinking about the situation causing pain and imagining responding in the most absurd and unacceptable way. Imagine getting on your knees and begging your boss about that unrealistic deadline, or persuading Tony Soprano and the boys to discuss it with him - and winning you a promotion and raise, as well as the extended deadline. When you feel powerless, Mr. Granier says, laughing at your situation can help salvage some of your self esteem and also give you control over what happens internally. (Source: Your Workplace)

Shelly Lazarus, the chairman and chief executive officer of Ogilvy & Mather Worldwide, says the non-business book that most influenced her was Alexander McCall Smith\'s The No. 1 Detective Agency, about an African woman establishing a detective agency in Botswana, which has a lot to suggest about client service and lateral thinking. Barry Sternlicht, chairman and chief executive officer of Starwood Hotels and Resorts Worldwide, chooses The Power of One by Bryce Courtenay, a coming-of-age story about a young English boy in pre-apartheid South Africa, which demonstrates that no matter how large your ambitions you can actually achieve more. (Source: Fast Company)

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