Roland Tanglao's Weblog

I am sure Nstein and Brandimensions have fine, expensive public image monitoring products but for most small to medium businesses you are better off doing the following:

1. Buy FeedDemon (Windows), NetNewsWire (Mac) - these programs cost less than $US 30!)
2. Subscribe to PubSub, Technorati and Google RSS feeds about your keywords of interest (company name, competitors name, etc) in FeedDemon/NetNewsWire (here's my HowTo specific to PubSub but generally applicable to Technorati, Google, etc.)
3. Check FeedDemon and NetNewsWire once a day for people talking about you, your competitor and your domain
4. Reply and/or blog as appropriate once a day

FROM Do you know what they're saying about you? - globeandmail.com : Globe TQ:

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Initially involving the analysis of customer information contained on corporate databases, BI has spread to the Web. Using public image monitoring (PIM) or search-driven BI to stay abreast of consumer-generated media, two Canadian companiesNstein Technologies Inc. of Montreal, and Brandimensions Inc. of Torontoare gaining attention in the business world.

Putting a stamp of validation on Nstein, IBM recently started selling Nstein-based PIM applications that track content on blogs and websites. And Brandimensions counts major corporations such as Daimler-Chrysler, CBS and ABC among its clients. "The volume of information out there requires powerful analytics to find trends, patterns and relationships," says Mario Girard, Nstein president. "Our technology uses concept extraction to determine if content is positive, negative, or neutral." PIM can also track "the velocity of a story" in terms of how many web links are connected to it and how fast the story is spreading, says Bradley Silver, Brandimension's chief executive.

Nstein's PIM tools can gather data in 15 different languages and automatically contextualize the data. Brandimensions gathers data in English and Spanish and funnels information to more than 400 analysts who add context based on colloquialisms. For instance, the context of comparing a car to an animal can change. Calling a Ferrari a fox likely indicates a positive comment, while calling it a dog is probably negative. Using PIM reports, companies can monitor their image, react to what is being written, and take action to counter misinformation. "The Web is so important to sales and brand protection that it has to be monitored all the time," Silver says. "If a crisis emerges, you want an early warning system in place so your advocates can engage in the conversation."

But advocates of the brand are not necessarily paid employees of the company. They can be bloggers who like a certain brand or it could be web users who spend time discussing the product or service on review forums. However, there is a fear that companies are doing more than merely correcting misinformation that's out in cyberspace. There are those that engage in stealth marketing by paying marketers to pose as consumers to influence on-line discussions. In one of the better-known cases, a great deal of pre-release buzz for the independent movie The Blair Witch Project was created on-line using stealth marketing techniques.

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As I've publicly blogged before, Paul Lima's keyword and link farm strategy is wrong and blogging takes no more time than email. Do you have time to respond to email? Then you have time to blog. The benefits to your search engine rank and public profile (blogging is the best form of conversational internet marketing we have today) greatly exceed the few hours a week it will take to blog.

FROM Confessions of a search-engine optimizer: globeandmail.com : Globe TQ:

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To optimize my site, I first determined the keywords people might use when searching for a writer with my expertise. Then I wove those keywords into my website copy. I also associated keywords with images on my site. If you go to my website and place your cursor over my picture, you will see a yellow flag containing some of my keywords.

Those words can be read by web crawlersautomated programs that access websites and follow the links they contain. The web crawlers then index website addresses and associated content in search engine databases. Web crawlers cannot read images. So, if you have an image-based homepage, you have feed textlike the keywords associated with my pictureto the web crawlers. Otherwise your graphics-only homepage will not show up in search results.

I also included my keywords in meta tagsa keyword list, site description and page title. Other than the page title, meta tag information is not seen by regular site visitors. Many SEO experts say using meta tags are a waste of time, because web crawlers tend to ignore them. But, writing meta tags helps you think about your keywords and how you want to describe your site. As well, when a visitor bookmarks your site, a title meta tag makes the site easier for people to find it in their favourites list.

However, all this keyword work won't necessarily get your site listed in search engines. While you can submit your website information to search engines, it can take several months (or longer) for your site to be included in search results. What you should do is make it easy for web crawlers to find your site.

Since web crawlers swing from site to site looking for links, you need to have other websites linked to your site. What you want is quantity and quality. To acquire links to my site, I entered reciprocal arrangements with several writers and other associates. They provide links to my site and I provide links back. As well, I sold several articles and chapters of my e-books to content sites that now link to my own website.

Many SEO experts recommend that you maintain a weblog, also called a blog, or an on-line journal. Bloggers frequently read other people's blogs, and if they find something interesting, they often will comment on it and link to it. This creates links that web crawlers will find. But if you think you can boost your search-engine rank by simply littering thousands of blogs with links to your site, think again. Web crawlers are able to detect this type of "blog spam" and can issue the search engine equivalent of a death sentencethe removal of a site from the search engine database.

While blogs can help with SEO, I don't maintain one because of the time it requires. However, as an alternative, I am looking at generating Really Simple Syndication (RSS) feeds from my site. RSS is a way of notifying site visitors and search engines of new content on your blog or site. Like blogs, RSS can drive traffic to your website and boost your search engine rank.

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