Posts tagged Heads
SEO Tutorial: Getting into the Heads of your Ideal Clients – Business 2 Community
Apr 12th
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SEO Tutorial: Getting into the Heads of your Ideal Clients
Business 2 Community Use basic SEO (focusing on this phrase) to increase the likelihood of Google (or Bing/Yahoo picking it up), including things like Page Titles, Picture Names and Alt Tags, Headers and Internal Linking (see the SEO Boot Camp or SEO for WordPress for more … |
View full post on SEO – Google News
Why Chat Heads Will Be Facebook’s SMS-Killer
Apr 9th
Perhaps the most intriguing announcement to come out of the Facebook Home unveil last Thursday was the social network’s overhaul of messaging, called Chat Heads. While not a phrase you’ll want to be caught saying in public very often, the service’s title is self-explanatory: The faces of the friends you’re communicating with through both text messages and Facebook messaging appear in little movable bubbles that follow you to any app on your smartphone.
On the surface, it sounds like little more than a blatant attempt to boost use of Facebook Message – the service’s email, texting and instant messaging feature – but Chat Heads is actually of one of Home’s most appealing and important features. Not only does it build-in an already viable alternative to the many messaging apps currently on the market, but it also manages to do for Facebook and Android what iMessage does for Apple and iOS.
Chat Heads Offer Alternative To SMS
In other words, Chat Heads give Facebook a subtle way to nudge users away from SMS and towards its own platform – without seeming like the same evil overlord that changed all its members’ default email address last summer.
This move finally establishes Facebook Message as a serious player in the field of SMS-killers, and the most disruptive one to date. Its success, or failure, will likely reverberate throughout the mobile world.
(See also Facebook Home: A Facebook Phone & A New Facebook Mobile Experience.)
Granted, Chat Heads’ effectiveness is entirely contingent on the adoption rate of Facebook Home. After all, only those who indulge in obsessive Facebook use will really be gung-ho about jumping in the deep end with Home when it debuts on the Google Play store on April 12.
But if Home takes off, Chat Heads will undoubtedly prove to be one of the social network’s most valuable assets. CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s intentions are to increase the visibility and longterm use of Facebook Message – eclipsing all other services. Chat Heads could help him succeed.
Messaging Anywhere, Anytime… For Real This Time
Chat Heads’ strength lies in its ease of use. While many messaging services like to promote themselves as “seamless,” allowing for anytime, anywhere messaging, Chat Heads can actually back up that claim. There’s no app to launch or multi-tasking menu bar to flip through. You can place the chat bubble anywhere on your display, or just flick it away when you need the screen real estate for something else.
Taking a page from Apple’s iMessage book, the only thing that differentiates a message in Chat Heads from a SMS message is the color of the text bubble (green for text message, blue for Facebook Message). This functionality also plays into one of Facebook Home’s core strengths – the ubiquitousness of the social network while using the skin.
(See also Is Apple’s iMessage Killing Texting After All?)
Obviously, having Home on your Android phone means you want to use Facebook as much as possible. But by bundling SMS and Facebook Message into Chat Heads, the social network is playing on your constant exposure to wean you off SMS and and onto Facebook Message.
Since Chat Heads works works with SMS as well as Facebook Message, there’s really no reason why Home user won’t slide into the habit of replacing texts with Chat Heads.
SMS Is King, But Facebook Message Is More Flexible
When Facebook rolled up its Chat and Message service into one platform back in 2010, some users were outraged. It stripped away the email-style “get-to-this-when-you-can” feel of Message in favor of Chat’s quick back-and-forth, instant messaging style of communication.
But in making this switch, which most users eventually accepted, Facebook created a middle ground to build a substantial SMS competitor. After two years of growth, Facebook Message is now a platform to be reckoned with, and therein lays Chat Heads’ true power.
By not having to define itself as a texting alternative, an email-killer or an AOL IM revival service, Facebook Message exists as all three simultaneously, depending on whom you happen to be talking to. You don’t really have to think about whether you need to use an outside app to send an email (a communication means that Facebook Home has completely buried in its interface), or which method may be best for a particular purpose. You can simply use Chat Heads to talk to anyone you know, and interact with them on whatever level you deem necessary.
Like other alternative messaging services, Facebook Message is free, imposes no character limits and offers easy multimedia sharing. Add its visual attractiveness, ability to handle multiple conversations and flexibility as an email-text-IM hybrid and its easy to see how powerful Chat Heads could be.
Android-Only Is Its Only Weakness
The most obvious hurdle facing Chat Heads as a true SMS alternative is the fact that iPhone owners won’t be using it anytime soon. That means iMessage will still reign supreme for iDevices, and will keep its own share of the messaging service market intact. Of course, Zuckerberg would love to have an Apple version of Facebook Home, but that ball is in Cupertino’s court. At last week’s Facebook Home launch, Zuckerberg said that putting Home on iOS would require Apple’s cooperation in ways that working with Android did not – although Facebook was in contact with Google over the project. Apple hasn’t commented, but history has not been kind to moves that could wrest ecosystem control away from the Apple.
That is a bummer. As an iPhone user, I’d love the opportunity to try Facebook Home, if only to check out Chat Heads. In a broader sense, an Apple version of Facebook Home would be a devastating blow to SMS as well as iMessage – all the more reason why Apple likely will never allow it. But even on Android alone, Facebook Home and Chat Heads could soon be the biggest, baddest new player in the messaging wars.
Lead image by Fredric Paul.
View full post on ReadWrite
Heads Up: The IDF Is Live-Blogging Its Attack On Hamas
Nov 14th
We’ve never seen anything quite like this. The verified social media accounts of the Israeli Defense Forces are providing live updates on a concerted military effort against Hamas. Using the hashtag #PillarOfDefense, the verified Twitter account @IDFSpokesperson is posting ominous messages, headline-style updates, and YouTube videos of strikes.
It’s brilliant in its way. By controlling the messaging so tightly, the IDF ensures that the media coverage of the operation is framed the way Israel wants it. Why dig deeper when the information is so carefully presented right there? That’s a rhetorical question, of course. The PR move here is as devastating as the operation.
We recommend that no Hamas operatives, whether low level or senior leaders, show their faces above ground in the days ahead.
— IDF (@IDFSpokesperson) November 14, 2012
The stream of tweets began with background information on the operation, explaining that Operation Pillar of Defense is in retaliation against Hamas rocket attacks.
This IDF operation against terrorist orgs in #Gaza comes after a month of frequent rocket attacks against #Israel. idfblog.com/facts-figures/…
— IDF (@IDFSpokesperson) November 14, 2012
Since the beginning of 2012, Palestinian terrorists in the #Gaza Strip have fired 768 rockets into #Israel.
— IDF (@IDFSpokesperson) November 14, 2012
After providing the background info, the account announced that “the IDF has embarked on Operation Pillar of Defense,” insisting that “all options are on the table,” including a ground operation “if necessary.”
The next tweet shared this intense, 10-second aerial video of a pinpoint strike on a vehicle reportedly carrying Ahmed Jabari, head of what the IDF calls the “Hamas Military Wing.”
Immediately following that post, the IDF followed up with a blog post profiling Jabari. Jabari was in charge of the well-known operation that captured Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit in 2006 outside of the Gaza Strip. Jabari personally escorted Shalit to the Rafah Crossing with Egypt when Shalit was released in a prisoner exchange.
The IDF then offered this statement in an image engineered to go viral:
Ahmed Jabari: Eliminated. twitter.com/IDFSpokesperso…
— IDF (@IDFSpokesperson) November 14, 2012
The IDF is also posting maps and other images to an official Flickr account.
And in response to the operation, retaliatory strikes have already begun.
Bomb squad at scene of strike in Beersheba, Israel – @benhartman twitter.com/Benhartman/sta…
— Inside Breaking News (@breaking) November 14, 2012
Reminder of Hamas’ strategy: Fire rockets & mortars from Palestinian schools & hope they land on Israeli schools. youtu.be/zmXXUOs27lI
— IDF (@IDFSpokesperson) November 14, 2012
This carefully planned social media campaign around a military operation is an amazing kind of PR that we at ReadWrite don’t know of a precedent for. If you do, please share it with us, and we’ll be glad to update with more info.
UPDATE 12:51 Pacific: My friend Eugene has pointed me to the Twitter feed of the Kenya Defense Forces (@kdfinfo), which has posted ongoing updates about military campaigns. It’s surely an interesting stream of information, but it’s far from the cross-media PR war machine the IDF is running right now.
The Other Side Of The Story
The Twitter account @AlqassamBrigade representing Hamas-affiliated brigades in Palestine took to Twitter to respond to the IDF campaign. It continues to report on the operation as well as retaliatory Hamas attacks.
@idfspokesperson Our blessed hands will reach your leaders and soldiers wherever they are (You Opened Hell Gates on Yourselves)
— Alqassam Brigades (@AlqassamBrigade) November 14, 2012
As he is beloved for doing, Andy Carvin is curating all sides of the story by retweeting reports from the ground on both the Israeli and Palestinian side.
11 month old son of BBC colleague killed in #Gaza. Sister-in-law killed, brother critically injured. Civilians always casualties of conflict
— Jon Williams(@WilliamsJon) November 14, 2012
#Israel Defense minister Ehud Barak: “We are still at the beginning of the event, not at the end. We expect some complicated tests ahead.”
— Lauren E. Bohn (@LaurenBohn) November 14, 2012
I have just recorded the noise of drones. Hope you find it clear. It’s dark because electricity is off. #Gaza keek.com/!FDMCaab
— Rana(@RanaGaza) November 14, 2012
some parts of #Gaza have no electricity now
— Majed Abusalama (@MajedAbusalama) November 14, 2012
This operation has driven Egypt to call for an emergency meeting of the UN security council. Ahram Online is reporting that Egypt’s newly appointed ambassador to Israel, Atef Mohamed Salem, has been recalled by President Mohamed Morsi.
Egypt president orders UN representative to call for emergency security council meeting over Israel Gaza strikes, spokesman says – @reuters
— Breaking News (@BreakingNews) November 14, 2012
It’s a strange new world.
We’ve reached out to Twitter for comment on how this whole thing looks from their perspective, and we’ll update the post if we hear back.
View full post on ReadWrite
Heads Up: The IDF Is Live-Blogging Its Attack On Hamas [Video]
Nov 14th
We’ve never seen anything quite like this. The verified social media accounts of the Israeli Defense Forces are providing live updates on a concerted military effort against Hamas. Using the hashtag #PillarOfDefense, the verified Twitter account @IDFSpokesperson is posting ominous messages, headline-style updates, and YouTube videos of strikes.
We recommend that no Hamas operatives, whether low level or senior leaders, show their faces above ground in the days ahead.
— IDF (@IDFSpokesperson) November 14, 2012
The stream of tweets began with background information on the operation, explaining that Operation Pillar of Defense is in retaliation against Hamas rocket attacks.
This IDF operation against terrorist orgs in #Gaza comes after a month of frequent rocket attacks against #Israel. idfblog.com/facts-figures/…
— IDF (@IDFSpokesperson) November 14, 2012
Since the beginning of 2012, Palestinian terrorists in the #Gaza Strip have fired 768 rockets into #Israel.
— IDF (@IDFSpokesperson) November 14, 2012
After providing the background info, the account announced that “the IDF has embarked on Operation Pillar of Defense,” insisting that “all options are on the table,” including a ground operation “if necessary.”
The next tweet shared this intense, 10-second aerial video of a pinpoint strike on a vehicle reportedly carrying Ahmed Jabari, head of what the IDF calls the “Hamas Military Wing.”
Immediately following that post, the IDF followed up with a blog post profiling Jabari. Jabari was in charge of the well-known operation that captured Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit in 2006 outside of the Gaza Strip. Jabari personally escorted Shalit to the Rafah Crossing with Egypt when Shalit was released in a prisoner exchange.
The IDF closed with this statement in an image engineered to go viral:
Ahmed Jabari: Eliminated. twitter.com/IDFSpokesperso…
— IDF (@IDFSpokesperson) November 14, 2012
This carefully planned social media campaign around a military operation is an amazing kind of PR that we at ReadWrite don’t know of a precedent for. If you do, please share it with us, and we’ll be glad to update with more info.
Meanwhile, this operation has driven Egypt to call for an emergency meeting of the UN security council. Ahram Online is reporting that newly appointed Egypt’s newly appointed ambassador to Israel, Atef Mohamed Salem, has been recalled by President Mohamed Morsi.
Egypt president orders UN representative to call for emergency security council meeting over Israel Gaza strikes, spokesman says – @reuters
— Breaking News (@BreakingNews) November 14, 2012
It’s a strange new world.
View full post on ReadWrite
Get Inside Their Heads – A Strategic Framework For Super-Effective SEO! – SEOmoz (blog)
Mar 20th
 SEOmoz (blog) |
Get Inside Their Heads – A Strategic Framework For Super-Effective SEO!
SEOmoz (blog) You spend hundreds, or even thousands of dollars on SEO. Your page finally ranks on top at Google – but your traffic isn't that much higher. Worse, when you analyze your visitors' behavior using a stats package like Google Analytics, you discover that … |
View full post on SEO – Google News
As Yahoo Layoff Rumors Swirl, Labs Chief Heads to Google
Mar 6th
Yahoo’s woes continue after it confirmed it will lose the head of its labs unit, Prabhakar Raghavan, to Google. Raghaven’s research interests focused on search technologies, with particular interests in text, web mining, and algorithm design.
View full post on Search Engine Watch – Latest
The Hats Swap Heads: Microsoft Uses EU Leverage to Pin Google on Patents
Feb 22nd
Microsoft confirmed to ReadWriteWeb this morning that the formal competition law complaint it filed this morning with the European Commission is against both Motorola Mobility (MMI) and Google, its would-be parent company. The office of the EC’s Competition office confirmed to ReadWriteWeb this morning it has received Microsoft’s complaint and will review it in due course, but will not yet release a copy to the public due to court rules.
Today’s move marks perhaps the final step in Microsoft’s spectacular transformation from the de facto force of evil in all matters of intellectual property, to the champion of the oppressed and the standard bearer of the people. Wearing the black hat now is Google, which just two years ago considered a bold solution to the video patents problem: open sourcing the technology and dare others to sue.
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If Google completes its acquisition of MMI (only a few roadblocks remain), the newly combined company will be the holder of essential patents pertaining to the H.264 video standard. In an early morning blog post today, Microsoft VP and General Counsel Dave Heiner noted that MMI presently charges a 2.25% fee for rights to some 2,300 essential H.264 patents, for roughly $22.50 shaved off the sale price of a $1,000 laptop. By contrast, the MPEG LA group (whose name Heiner omitted, though we all know to what he refers), which collectively licenses rights to other essential patents also surrounding H.264, charges a somewhat different fee.
“Microsoft’s patent royalty to this group on that $1,000 laptop? Two cents,” Heiner writes. “That’s right. Just 2 cents for use of more than 2,300 patents. (Windows qualifies for a nice volume discount, but no firm has to pay more than 20 cents per unit.) Motorola is demanding that Microsoft pay more than 1,000 times that for use of just 50 patents.”
Heiner added that Microsoft ends up paying a kind of penalty whenever a PC manufacturer implements Windows in a premium model – hike the hard drive capacity, and Microsoft pays more. “Windows implements more than 60 standards, and a PC supports about 200. If every firm priced its standard essential patents like Motorola, the cost of the patents would be greater than all the other costs combined in making PCs, tablets, smartphones and other devices,” he argues.
Neither Google nor MMI have issued a response.
The timing of Microsoft’s move is interesting. If its motivation were to block approval of the Google + MMI acquisition, it could have acted well before the EC Commissioner for Competition, Joaquin Almunia, issued his approval of the deal last week. Instead, Microsoft’s strategy may be to see the deal go through and then sink MMI. When Google offered $40 per share for MMI last August, that 75% premium on its public share price at the time reflected the perceived value of MMI’s patent portfolio – the principal reason, investors believe, Google wants the company.
MMI shares are trading unchanged as of this morning. In his approval of the deal last week, Comm. Almunia indicated he believed Google would have no reason to raise MMI’s royalty rates after the deal goes through. That’s not exactly a statement of skepticism, although Almunia did warn that his office would continually ensure that the combined Google’s conduct would be “fully compliant with EU competition law and with the FRAND commitments given to standard setting organizations.” If Almunia’s stance changes even slightly in the wake of Microsoft’s complaint, the needle on MMI’s public share price could start ticking negative.
And perhaps that’s the idea. If the new Motorola is compelled to charge significantly lower fees for its portfolio, Google may end up propping up a deadweight property at the same time Microsoft is going for broke.
View full post on ReadWriteWeb
Avid Studio Heads to the iPad for Mobile Moviemakers – ReelSEO Online Video News
Feb 3rd
 ReelSEO Online Video News |
Avid Studio Heads to the iPad for Mobile Moviemakers
ReelSEO Online Video News The following is an index of our more popular video search engine optimization (Video SEO, VSEO,… Many of us here at ReelSEO are still settling back into our routines following the awesome SMX West… Google has been giving users "instant previews" … |
View full post on SEO – Google News
Synergize makes heads move in SEO and online marketing – Bizcommunity.com
Nov 11th
 Search Engine Land |
Synergize makes heads move in SEO and online marketing
Bizcommunity.com Synergize is a Cape Town- and Johannesburg-based SEO and online marketing agency that has come to the rescue of such companies that have found themselves slipping down in the rankings of Google; building up their organic rankings and using online … SEO Marketing for Online Retailers Active Web Group, Inc. Offers Businesses Free SEO Analysis How Celebrity & Authority Change Link Building In SEO |
View full post on SEO – Google News
Ads Across Platforms Get Inside People’s Heads
Sep 28th
Google and Nielsen measured the impact of advertising across multiple screens, and the findings were stark. Advertisers will be happy to learn that advertising across devices appears to significantly increase brand retention by eyeballs… I mean, people.
The study tested a 15-second car ad on different subject groups. Some saw no ads, others saw them on various combinations of TV, PCs, smartphones and tablets. Those who saw the ad on TV alone recalled the brand of car correctly 50% of the time. The people who saw it across all devices got it right 74% of the time.
Sponsor
The study also found that multi-screen advertising increased “engagement,” meaning that subjects remembered more details about the product. Twenty-two percent of the TV group remembered that the car was a 4-door sedan, versus 39% of the multi-screen group.
These results come on the heels of multiple Google analyses of tablet use, one showing that users flock to their tablets in the evenings, and another breaking down the kinds of activities tablets are used for. News flash: it’s mostly for consumption. So the moral of today’s story is, if you want to get inside people’s heads, it’s measurably worth the money to reach them across devices all day long.
Google’s Smooth Moves
To that end, Google has also announced AdWords for video today. This makes it easy to place ads on YouTube videos.
Google has also recently launched new incentives for advertisers who optimize for mobile devices. Google, of course, is almost entirely in the advertising business, so its partnership with Nielsen on this study conveniently defines a problem to which Google is the solution.
How do you feel about advertisements in general? Do they make for a better Web?
View full post on ReadWriteWeb
