The law works by rating cookies into four categories:

1. Strictly necessary for a website to function
2. Allowing a site to measure ‘performance’
3. Added functionality (saving passwords, forms)
4. Targeting cookies – tracking a user’s behaviour on the website

The laws will affect this by requiring each European Union business that has a website to inform users of what cookies will be used and what data will be taken from them. This has potentially serious implications for businesses and particularly those in the web analytics and advertising fields, as it means potentially a large stream of revenue will disappear, and there is also the addition of development costs for the compulsory addition of an opt-in cookie system for each website. A corporation that breaches these laws could be fined more than €500,000 by the European Union.

The response to the introduction of these laws by the European business community has been overwhelmingly negative, although privacy advocates have welcomed it. The controversy within this law is centred on the interpretation of the ‘strictly necessary’ clause; as for many businesses, such as Google with their Google Analytics monitoring software, it is strictly necessary. Many companies are also making the argument that in the modern day performance and information tracking is strictly necessary to remain competitive and have a functional online presence.

In a recent survey of United Kingdom based online retailers conducted by Ecomplished, it was revealed that more than 2/3 of businesses had conducted internal cookie audits, and that 47% of British business owners were going to take no action as a result of these laws because they believed their cookies were non intrusive and therefore exempt from the laws. It also revealed that a large amount of companies were planning to use compulsory pop up windows, which is thought to add frustration to the retail experience.

In terms of financial impact, whilst it is difficult to predict, the research firm QuBit estimates losses of these laws to total over £10 billion in the United Kingdom alone, sourced mainly from losses from a decrease in predicted sales and development costs, as well as the loss of jobs as retailers move their websites overseas where they will not be faced with the excess costs of that the laws will create.

Mobile Internet access and mobile phone users are growing exponentially and on a global scale. This has created an enormous and thriving app economy that Internet retailers are only now beginning to tap into. The Internet itself has opened up entirely new and exciting markets, offering products that were once considered niche and are now considered mainstream, as evidenced by the massive popularity of craft marketplaces Etsy and Pinterest. These sites use clever social media integration and social buying to create an engaging, fun and interesting experience for the consumer. Amazon was one of the first companies to succeed at online-only retail, and continues to set the benchmark of online marketing.

Online retailers are beginning to take note of the importance of offering a mobile website. The positive results have been proven repeatedly. For example, for a typical group of people that click on a mobile advertisement, over 39% will visit the website, and 49% will end up making a purchase. With the mobile ad market reaching over $2.5 billion in 2011 alone, it’s understandable why it’s worth the time to expand the capabilities of your online store.

Despite their enormous benefits, there are also ways in which mobile apps can be flawed. They can be very expensive to develop and maintain, and there can be significant issues with platform segmentation. Platform segmentation involves developing separate software for each major operating system, such as iOS, Android, Windows Phone 7 and Blackberry OS. Different types of phones also have different capabilities and limitations, so the ideal app needs to cater to as large of a market as possible. It’s also difficult to enforce users to keep their app updated. Most people don’t update the software on their phones regularly, potentially creating security and stability problems.

Fortunately, new technologies have risen to adapt to these issues. HTML5 represents the next natural progression in the world of web development. This technology allows programmers to create universal websites that offer similar or better functionality than apps, can be used on any device, and are far more cost effective and simple to develop. HTML5 also builds upon current web standards, meaning that it’s features can usually be applied to current websites with relative ease. There are thousands of e-commerce platforms on offer that can easily be adapted for any form of online retail store, be it clothing, electronics, services, software and any number of industries looking to expand their customer base.

Having a strong culture of learning and using the latest and most powerful technology, Websalad has been constantly keeping up with the information and practices related to the rapid expansion of HTML5. The team has been working to extensively increase current capabilities to utilize the technology, and can offer it across all aspects of current digital development offerings.

There have been several great boosts to the online retail world in the past decade. The explosion of social media has contributed enormously to the success of many businesses. For example, when Facebook implemented ‘Facebook Connect’, they allowed users to create an account on external websites with the click of a button then connect and share information with their entire network of friends and family. This gave online retailers a marketing opportunity beyond anything they could achieve on their own. These days it’s rare to find a site without social media sharing buttons for each product. Social media enables potential customers to talk about brands and products, find advice, and share what they’re interested in on networks such as Facebook, Twitter and Google+.

Social media campaigns offer a new and exciting way for online retailers to both attract potential customers and support current ones.  Popular social media channels such as Twitter and Facebook offer an enormous consumer base that can, with the right strategy, be accessed – for free. Most online retailers now offer news, promotions and post-sales customer support through social media.

The new frontier of online retail is changing the way people access the internet, particularly through mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets. In the United States, the amount of people that accessed online stores from mobile devices increased by 87% from 2010 to 2011. Greater growth is expected in future. Large retailers have responded to this trend by offering mobile friendly websites, some allowing Amazon to adapt their site for easier navigation within these new environments.

Among the many recent and notable innovations in online retail, free shipping, once rarely offered, has become a popular offering. Retailers who accept the cost of shipping and offer further incentives are rewarded with increased customer confidence and increased customer conversion rates.

Complaints about Facebook’s privacy controls have never been lacking, and even seeded Facebook alternatives such as Diaspora and AnyBeat. Google+’s successful launch and it’s intuitive approach to privacy on a post-by-post basis just exasperated the situation for Facebook.

As well as these privacy changes, Facebook is discontinuing it’s location-based service Places. In it’s place will be a much deeper location integration that moves away from the Foursquare ‘Check In’ in favour of including location in status updates and photos with location tags. Rather than only in a standalone service, location is now a core part of every Facebook action (although it can still be turned off).

The move is clever as it will expand Facebook’s potential to provide more relevant, location-based advertising across the site. The site’s location-based deals offering will also become more integrated with the changes. If someone checks into a location offering a check-in deal, the offer will show just below the newsfeed story.

All these changes just show how deeply ingrained social media is becoming in our daily lives. This is a unique opportunity for brands to engage in the online social media community and utilise the targeted nature of location-aware marketing.

The premise of any LinkedIn campaign can be summed up in three words: influence, reputation and reach. Being actively engaged within online business networks opens up a plethora of marketing opportunities for your business. LinkedIn has a range of features to faciliate this engagement. Here are five easy ways to grow your LinkedIn influence, reputation and reach.

Increase Your Connections

Your personal network is the foundation for any promotion you do on LinkedIn. Make an active effort to grow your connections both through real-life networking and searches for people in your field or the field to which you want to promote. As you grow your network, ask for and offer profile recommendations. Keep in mind that if you give more, you’ll also get more. Profile recommendations are a great way to grow your professional reputation, and add an authoritive voice behind any events or products you hope to promote.

Participate in Discussions

LinkedIn is packed with virtual business communities, and it is in your interest to be as actively involved in these as possible. Search for groups in the areas you want to promote to and join in with that groups’ discussions Also make good use of LinkedIn’s Q&A feature, answering as many relevant questions as you can. Doing so will grow your reach and reputation on the network, and will lead people to your products and/or services.

Optimise Your Profile

Your profile is essentially your online persona, your avatar. Any time you spend fine-tuning your LinkedIn profile is time well spent. What should you tweak?

1. Add links to your website, blog and other social profiles. Try make names for those links as descriptive and catchy as possible to help with search and click-through rates. For instance, say you were a business consultant with a website on your LinkedIn profile. Instead of calling your link “My website” try “Experienced Consulting Services” or something along those lines.
2. Post regularly. Like Facebook and Twitter, frequent engagement is essential to grow your LinkedIn presence. Post interesting links, content or ideas to your profile and link in your Facebook or Twitter accounts so your posts on those networks automatically come across to LinkedIn too.
3. Include an image and description. An incomplete profile is like shoes without socks, and is never a good look. It’s worthwhile taking the time to add an image to your business or personal profile, and filling out a brief description.

Utilise LinkedIn Events

It’s hidden in a dropdown menu, but LinkedIn has a very clever events feature that allows you to see all the upcoming events within your network. Events are effective ways to engage potential clients, if you’re running or attending an event be sure to add it into LinkedIn.

Research Potential Business Opportunities

By engaging in groups, Q&A and LinkedIn events you will be able to learn a lot about potential customers and business opportunities. You can gauge demand for certain services, and look into the people or companies you should target your idea towards. Planning is a key part of any marketing effort, and the power of LinkedIn search and groups will help you even in the planning stages.

There is a wealth of potential within LinkedIn that can be accessed by a well constructed social media campaign. If you’re looking to promote a product to business customers, Websalad’s range of B2B marketing services are for you.

It’s important to remember that a B2B social media strategy is remarkably different to a B2C one. Unlike the B2C environment, B2B sales often occur over a longer timeframe. Looking in the vicinity of months as oppose to hours, B2B social media strategies shouldn’t fuel the immediate purchase hype of a B2C campaign. Rather they should be focused on fostering new partnerships. An effective B2B social media campaign becomes a public front on which to set the scaffold for forming new long term business relationships, and then maintaining those relationships through the sales cycle. Our B2B internet marketing services are a great way to start this process.

Reach Further Online

The key advantage of online networking over its offline counterpart is simply in its reach. The internet has allowed many businesses to extend out of their home ground, playing in markets interstate and overseas. By providing business with a public platform to demonstrate their expertise, B2B social media campaigns have the potential to tap into new markets and forge new customer relationships.

Social networks recognise this, and have acted accordingly. Only last year LinkedIn launched its business pages, a free way for business to establish their presence on the network. Location-aware network Foursquare has now followed suit, announcing their new business pages on their blog on August 2. These business pages open up the new possibility of starting B2B relationships on a location-basis, and can then extend those relationships onto other networks.

Google+ = Potential+

Google+ is also making waves on the B2B social media scene, recognising the need for business pages from the outset (they have asked business to hold off creating personal profiles as pages are on the way). We expect Google+ business pages to build on the success of Facebook Pages and LinkedIn business profiles allowing for a powerful marriage between search and social media.

There’s huge potential for B2B marketing within social media, and an effective strategy can unlock some stellar new business partnerships. We can help you reach a larger client base with our B2B social media strategies. You can contact us for more information and a free consultation.

Image credit: tungphoto / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

The social web can be a little overwhelming

There’s a lot out there! At times business owners can find this a little bit intimidating as they stare at the search box without any clear objectives in mind…

If you’ve ever wanted to check up on your brand’s reputation, here are a couple of quick tips to give you some insight into some of the activity out there:

1. When you search for your brand name, head straight to the ‘discussions’ section in Google. This little area of search is a goldmine, because Google is effectively feeding you every social conversation seeded around your brand name. Do a quick scan of the search results, and explore some of the discussion boards and blogs mentioning your business.
2. If you see something negative out there, don’t bite back. Think about the cause of the negative reaction, and how to address the user politely and formally as a representative of your business.
3. Thank users spreading the good word – A sincere ‘thank you’ makes your business appear passionate about quality customer service. If you come across a discussion thread or blog mentioning your brand in a positive light, sign-up and join the conversation!

If you would like a bit of an insight as to how your competitors are being received by the greater web, search their brand name and see what comes up.

For more insight into online reputation, you can visit our ORM primer here.

Troubles with your reputation? Don’t panic!

No business is perfect; there is always the possibility of word-of-mouth on the web not portraying your products or services favourably.
Is this happening to your business? Talk to us, our search marketing team at Websalad are extremely knowledgeable when it comes to building a positive brand reputation online.

Click here for more information on online reputation management.

Not just limited to one device

Google’s Android OS is being built-in to a new breed of smart phones that are hitting the shelves, with manufacturers such as Motorola and HTC being the first to adopt the new technology.

If sales take off, smart phone users will have a much more convenient, interactive mobile search experience in the palms of their hands.
The web browser used on the Android OS plugs the holes in Apple’s innovation – offering mobile browsing support for Adobe Flash. The end result makes browsing much more practical for hand-held web users on the go, who could not previously view and flash videos or flash applications when encountered via the Apple iPhone.

A personalised local search experience

Of course, Google are going to make use of their own Maps technology with the Android OS and deploy an in-built 3G GPS system for phones that support Android.
With the operating system to become available across a multitude of new smart phone models from various manufacturers, Google Maps will continue to strengthen its position as the global standard for a localised search engine.

Pretty cool, huh? The competition is heating up! Expect the importance of local search to grow over time as the smart phone market continues to expand.

How does a search engine view my site?

It’s all subjective to the build of your site, the key to achieving greater search engine visibility is implementing a well-balanced design encompassing good usability and strong, visible keyword theme that tells search engines what it is your website it about.

It would be impossible to list all of the ranking factors involved in determining your website’s organic rank! What we can say, however, is that when you’re developing a website for your business, an SEO audit of your site architecture can save you a lot of time and effort in future when you want to rework the contents of your website to increase your respective organic rank in search engines.

The art of information architecture

In SEO, search engines will scan through the build of your website, identify a keyword theme made prominent via certain semantic elements and then relate that theme to the content on your website accordingly.

Time and time again, we witness sites that have been built with amazing designs that have failed to acknowledge the behaviour of search engines. For a site to rank well organically, the search engine must identify a clear navigation path that can better the identification of your target business areas.

It’s a lot harder than it sounds!

Good usability is hard enough to achieve already on its own, so if cosmetic changes are made to your website to accommodate more content to fuel your SEO campaign without considering the consequences, the results can be disastrous!

The bottom line is that you don’t want any SEO changes implemented within your website to have any hindrance on user activity, impede on valuable conversion goals or hurt brand name credibility.

You need someone with both the technical and marketing backing to help you achieve the balance between SEO and usability that you require.

Seek some online marketing expertise

At Websalad, we’ve got years of experience in online marketing and search engine optimisation under our belts. If you want to improve your online presence, talk to us, we’ll make sure that your online campaign is heading in the right direction.

Despite the hype, the Australian-conceived idea had teething problems since day one. Users seemed to find the interface very confusing, and the fact that the software was buggy didn’t help things a great deal either.

The idea was great – but in an online world already choc-full of existing ‘collaboration’ and ‘social sharing’ platforms, the future of Google Wave seemed pretty bleak.
At least they gave it a shot, right?

As far as Google is concerned, it will be interesting to see how much further the company goes with Google Buzz – the beta social media platform absolutely riddled with privacy issues, particularly with another Google social media platform, known as Google Me, in the works.

Will they get it right this time? Time will tell!