Have a Flash website? Let’s optimize it

A flash website is a piece of art for a web designer but is a nightmare for an SEO expert. It has every reason to be called a great technology as it includes a picture and sound effect to a website, but it makes SEO’s heart jumping in his / her throat at a mere mention of it. The reason behind these different approaches is simple to understand. The mighty Gods of the world of web, namely search engines do not index flash pages. The only way left to get a flash website indexed is to feed the pages with some content. But then you lose the battle when it comes to page ranking in the search results. Let’s try some workarounds. Though these workarounds are a clumsy task to perform, they are better than having nothing in your kitty for your site rankings.

Why search engines hate flash?

The reason as to why the search engines dislike flash sites is a simple one to decipher. These flash movies or clips are too complicated for search engine spiders to crawl or understand. The spider sees and read a flash clip as blank sheet so cannot index it as it does not derive a meaning out of it. The flash site comes in a binary format (.swf) and the spiders cannot read inside the flash file. Now if the content of the site is not available for the spiders to crawl then how they can index it. At least, not without any assistance . Till this time all the search engines are united in their approach to flash though there are differences in the relevancy given to weigh these sites. Yes search engines hate flash sites. Though some search engines are divided on the question of indexing portions of flash sites, but all of them are unanimous in their approach to them.

Why flash is a no?

Well it is not only that the search engines dislike flash but also for various other reasons its use is restricted. For example as a banner or other kind of advertisement a flash clip distracts the mind of the visitor hence he skips it, avoid it. So it loses the whole point of its being. It didn’t work for the advertiser. The second reason why it is not always a healthy option is its being fat. Yes the flash file consumes a lot of bandwidth. Though the dial up days are over still 1 MB or more is not established as standard.

The web designers should understand that flash is good for enhancing the effect of story, and not the story telling itself. You should have a main body of text to make your point clear and a flash clip can be added to enhance the effect. By doing so you appeal to the senses of your visitors and keep the web bots also engaged. Now this kind of arrangement is a win win situation for a webmaster. But a complete site made in flash is an unpardonable SEO sin and all dreams of getting high page rank will automatically be dashed.

The other place where also one should not use flash is for the purpose of navigation. The rule applies not only to the main starting page but also to the other ones in the site. Using images or java script for navigation is not permitted in SEO practice. Text links are only SEO approved way for site navigation.

Optimizing flash site

Though it is a clumsy task and not always an easy solution but a flash website can also be optimized.

· Use of metadata ---- this one is very important approach though it is most misunderstood and underestimated. Flash development tools easily allow to use metadata in your flash file to make the language, tools used and the content specified, visible to search engines and visitors. Now with this task done there is no lame excuse left to be given for an empty metadata space.

· Alternative html pages ----- now to make your flash site more visible to spiders one can add only html pages to the site. By doing so you give an alternative to your visitors to skip the flash movie clip and directly read and understand the content. It also enhances the visibility of your website to search engine spiders as they see only html pages. Preparing these pages is an extraneous task but definitely helpful.

· SDK tool ---- this search engine flash site tool is the life line of any flash website. This tool is able to extract text from a flash movie. One of the handiest application of this flash search engine SDK tool is swf2html. As the name suggest it extracts the text information in any flash clip and convert it into html file. The whole job is done automatically but at times one need to have a look at the converted content and if needed the restructuring should be done. Also one should check out for if there is any duplicate content in the extracted paragraphs and sentences. Other important aspect of this tool is to check the font colour every time of the extracted content because if the colour is same as of the background then you can be booked for hidden text black hat practice by the search engine police.

· SF Flash tool ----- this tool is almost similar to sdk tool as it view your website from the eyes of a search engine. Thus help you to learn about the flaws in your site with respect to search engines. Also it is more helpful with Google which does not use SDK.

These above specified tools and means are the ethical ones while it comes to optimize a flash site. There are several other techniques also which are used by webmasters to optimize a flash site but those are not considered favorable by search engines as they are counted as black hat practices like creating invisible layers of text that is visible to spiders. Avoid using that stuff otherwise more than optimizing your site it will bring trouble.

Social Media Hub - A Multipronged Strategy to Get Sales

Getting you part with your money is probably the hardest thing someone can do. You have all the good reasons to hold on to your money. No matter how silly or tempting offers are given to you but you have concerns, questions and reasons not to fork away your hard earned money. Most of the e-marketers lose sight of this perspective of the buyers. And thereby they lose them. Writing good articles, promoting your product from the roof tops, announcing offers and discounts don’t fetch results for the simple fact that buyers go through various stages of transition before actually buying. Now if you crack the code and address this issue you are the winner.

There are different levels of transition between the first glimpse of the product and the actual purchase. Every level has its complexities and demands a strategy to address these issues. When resolved, the customer is pushed to shelve money.

· Awareness - here is the customer’s first encounter with your product

· Evaluation - the customer starts considering the product’s benefit for himself

· Preference - even if the customer doesn’t actually buy the product he starts developing a preference for that over others

· Advocacy - here the customer starts telling about the product to others though he hasn’t bought it

· Purchase - and finally the customer leaves all his inhibition behind to BUY it.

Now, how can you think that by simply making a website to showcase your product, you can push through this whole cycle and sell your product or service? Even the ppc or email marketing also limits themselves only to the first level of this purchase cycle. Now what? What should be the strategy to sail through this cycle to win over your customer? Well the answer is to create a social media hub. Social networking is a thing of past. In today’s world where markets are flooded with options and choice how can just creating awareness about your brand can counter the pull factor of other companies. So you have to take your marketing strategy further to get your work done.

Any company, who has a product up for sale, has a community of interest and these are those people who can take your prospective customer to the other levels of transition. For example there is a customer searching for sports car and he gets a link to an article about a new turbo technology that is located on your social media hub. There the customer comes across a blog written by the engineer who has developed this technology and also a forum post by a mechanic who has used that technology.

Now for various people giving their account about the same thing, this is the essence of social media hub.

In the past only the content developed by the company about its product or service would be available to be found through the search. But now with a social media site the company, its employees’ and all those who are directly or indirectly connected to a specific thing can contribute this site. And with thousands of touch points to draw your prospective customer to your site you can help him passing through the purchase life cycle to eventually opting to buy.

Time has changed and so is buying therefore change the rules and tools of marketing strategy. A social media hub is a place for all customers regardless the phase of their purchase life cycle. This is a place to get information, collaborate and contribute. A social media hub provides services like blogs, wiki, forums, users rating and more. It is a in fact a multi-pronged strategy to get you your desired goal -----the sales.

Have a look at some of the Advanced Social Media Strategies

For hotels that have already dabbled in the starter strategies for Social Media and have seen reasonable success through those strategies, you can take the more aggressive strategies and delve deeper into the social media world. Social Media Optimization Strategies for Lodging Industry we had discussed the advanced social media strategies. We divide the social media landscape into 7 different categories as per the chart below.
Use this link below to check out how to conduct advanced social media optimization across multiple social media channels.
Tracking Your Returns We have experimented with all of the strategies described in this article and have found good increase in the hotel's search engine rankings as well as online revenue. There are 2 different levels at which you can measure the success of your social media optimization strategies:

* Measuring Social Media Buzz

* Measuring Returns -- evaluating website leads and revenue generated

Although both the items above are related, there are different mechanisms for measuring the 2 goals. Keep on reading for more insights.

What to do after setting up the Social media Channels for a hotel?

You own a hotel and you must be knowing the importance of setting up Social Channels...what to do after that?

The distinguishing action to take while in the process of social media optimization is to be actively involved in all important channels. The meaning of 'actively' could range from allocating a full-time resource to the initiative. More and more upscale hotels and brands are doing their best to manage the channels on a weekly basis.

The growing importance of Social media has given rise to a horde of search professionals trying their best to make their companies feel the presence on the social media platforms. Many are already busy setting up social channels in popular platforms. But the relishing the power of Social media is not just limited to being present in these medium. One need to be present in a consistent yet impressible manner. There are many ideas that can actually help you initiate conversations about you, your product, or your business.

The list of NOT-TO-IGNORE facts:

Rely on the user generated Content - Keep on monitoring the reviews being posted about your hotel once a week (many hotels have already hired experts to manage review sites like TripAdvisor on everyday basis). It has become extremely important to respond to any reviews that you think need a response. Management responses can turn a negative review into a positive marketing bullet.

Take Social Media Channels more seriously than ever - In the beginning aim the most popular ones like Facebook, myspace, and twitter. Later you can target all as part of the social media channels. Technically, it is the Twitter going round with excellent business opportunities as it is a micro-blogging channel. Across all these channels, the purpose is for the hotel to be part of a group that share common interests with the hotels and travel related topics. You can choose a community where all love to find destination information and market events. Make people aware of your good initiatives such as green, pet friendly concept etc. and then keep on interacting with the group and offer value. Join groups and friends on the channels who share a common interest with your hotel.

Make the discussions work for you - Discuss things related to your hotel destination, your special offers and facilities offered at your property. Every week you can discuss one attraction or things to do related to the location of your hotel. Talk about things or events happening in your market. If there is a conference or an event in your market, become a part of their social media club and offer specials and packages for the event and conference.You can also discuss any key initiatives at your property to indirectly propagate about it. Last but not the least...Keep your photos/ videos updated on Flickr and Facebook. Do not forget to post the hotel virtual tour videos on platforms like Youtube and Facebook etc.

Social Media Starter Kit

Social Media Starter Kit
26th January, 2011

The SMO strategies would work well for hotels that currently do not have a social media strategy and want to dabble in social media without a significant investment. The main social media objectives for such hotels can include:

1. User Generated Content Channels -- Trip Advisor. If Trip Advisor is not your most effective channel, then determine your most influential channels (where you get a lot of guests from)
2. Facebook Profile.
3. Twitter profile
4. YouTube video channels
5. Flickr photo profile
6. Myspace profile
7. 1-page blog to post your articles and views

Hotel can set up each of these channels on their own without any external help or alternatively, they can use an outside agency or a consultant.

Few items to keep in mind while setting up the social media channels:

Time to ignite your social media marketing intelligence:

1. Channels should be tagged with appropriate keywords

2. Link the channels back to your hotel website and vice-versa

3. Interlink the channels so that the hotel gains from cross-fertilization between the channels. There are apps and plug-ins available that can be used to interlink the channels. The benefit of interlinking is that a "new special offering" post on your blog automatically shows up on Facebook and Twitter. Any pictures posted on Flickr automatically show up on your Facebook account and MySpace page.

New Benefits of Social Media Optimization

Here are the new benefits of SMO:-

OVERTAKE YOUR COMPETITORS

BUILD COMMUNITY FOLLOWING

BOOST LOYALTY
Social Media is a great international market research tool when used strategically. Facebook Fan Pages are email newsletters with smaller pictures. Social media is the ultimate canary in the coal mine. Focus on how to be social, not on how to do social. The goal of social media is to turn customers into a volunteer marketing army. Activate your fans; don’t just collect them like baseball cards.