http://www.paulgsmith.com/wordpress Internet Marketing, Usability, and Web Analytics Fri, 05 Sep 2008 01:48:15 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en I just read a great post by Bruce Eckel about Collective Stupidity: Why does a company full of smart people make stupid decisions? How do we keep it from happening?If you accept that the inevitable growth that comes with success leads most organizations away from effective use of small teams, ... http://www.paulgsmith.com/wordpress/index.php/2008/09/04/collective-stupidity-keeping-smart-people-from-making-stupid-decisions/ Is it more productive to get up and busy at the crack of dawn or is it better to be a late riser? This is an intersting article from a site all about tips for transforming your life. This is some interesting fuel for thought that applies to those of ... http://www.paulgsmith.com/wordpress/index.php/2008/08/17/morning-larks-vs-night-owls-which-is-more-productive/ LOL, this is way too funny. Seems there is a Smart Car epidemic striking in NYC, and the locals are left voicing their concerns that "there goes the neighborhood." Seems that some of the local residents have considered moving out in response to the gentrification of their neighborhood. This is way ... http://www.paulgsmith.com/wordpress/index.php/2008/08/16/smart-car-epidemic-strikes-nyc/ Given that many designers and marketing professionals often get usability wrong, what should we do to help make us more likely to succeed? Steve Krug, in his classic book "Don't Make Me Think" quickly identifies five important things you can do to make sure your visitors see and understand as ... http://www.paulgsmith.com/wordpress/index.php/2008/08/14/what-can-you-do-about-usability/ Addressing the on-page and off-page factors is really the best way to ensure your pages are relevant for the appropriate keywords. And the best way to do this is to take time and create a traffic improvement plan that includes a continuous series of systematic changes, testing, and evaluation. However, if ... http://www.paulgsmith.com/wordpress/index.php/2008/08/10/ppc-marketing-for-quick-results/ Web usability is all about making sure that your website works for your visitors. Making sure your website provides it's visitors with the information, functionality and user experience they want and expect sounds like good common sense but so often we web developers fail to do this.  One obvious reason ... http://www.paulgsmith.com/wordpress/index.php/2008/08/01/web-usability-and-why-we-get-it-wrong/ And once you have decided to focus your attention on these search engines, the single most important factor to consider is relevancy. Search engines still make their most of their money from advertisers (and their ads). To make money they need to show their ads to as many people as ... http://www.paulgsmith.com/wordpress/index.php/2008/07/22/relevancy-the-most-important-search-optimization-factor/ We all know that Google has a solid lock on the Internet search market, at least from an end-user point of view. But not everyone knows the other major players. At this time it looks like Yahoo!, Windows Live, and Ask also need to be considered, especially in any search ... http://www.paulgsmith.com/wordpress/index.php/2008/06/14/search-engines-the-major-players/ OK, I have been on Flickr for a long time. But I have only lately rediscovered the fun. I am beginning to post my images there, and I have learned how to publish directly from my phone. Soon I may figure out how to add my photostream to my blog. http://www.paulgsmith.com/wordpress/index.php/2008/06/01/rediscovering-flickr/ How did I miss this one for so long? I always loved Led Zeppelin. I always loved Jimmy Page's acoustic pieces, like White Summer/Black Mountain side. I never realized that he was so heavily influenced by Davy Graham. Finally purchased The Guitar Player and Folk Blues and Beyond. Two outstanding ... http://www.paulgsmith.com/wordpress/index.php/2007/12/16/just-discovered-the-music-of-davy-graham/