Amazon snaps up Digital Photography Review

CNET is reporting that Digital Photography Review has been bought by Amazon. This will make the owner a very rich fellow! Anyway, DPReview.com is a great site gathering information on different cameras for which you might be in the market. Just about every time I have had the need to purchase a camera, I have headed there to check them out. You pretty much can't go wrong with Nikon or Canon, my usual choice, but if you still want to read up on them, this is the place to go.

Amazon snaps up Digital Photography Review | CNET News.com

Different Kinds Of Marketing ...

This was forwarded to me, so I'm passing it along. Kinda funny...

I wonder how you could fit this analogy to MLM... :D

What is Marketing...

You see a gorgeous girl at a party.
You go up to her and say, "I am very rich. Marry me!"
That's Direct Marketing.

You're at a party with a bunch of friends and see a gorgeous girl.
One of your friends goes up to her & pointing at you says, "He's very
rich. Marry him."
That's Advertising.

You see a gorgeous girl at a party.
You go up to her and get her telephone number.
The next day you call and say,"Hi,I'm very rich. Marry me."
That's Telemarketing.

You're at a party and see a gorgeous girl.
You get up and straighten your tie;
you walk up to her and pour her a drink.
You open the door for her,pick up her bag after she drops it, offer her a
ride, and then say, "By the way, I'm very rich "Will you marry me?"
That's Public Relations.

You're at a party and see a gorgeous girl.
She walks up to you and says, "You are very rich, I want to marry you."
That's Brand Recognition.

You see a gorgeous girl at a party.
You go up to her and say, "I'm rich. Marry me"
She gives you a nice hard slap on your face.
That's Customer Feedback.

Google: Click fraud costs us $1 billion a year

Cut me in on a piece of that pie! A very small slice will do... So get on over to the Google ads on the right side and bottom of the page and start clicking, good people! Seriously... No, seriously, just don't make it fraudulent.

» Google: Click fraud costs us $1 billion a year | Between the Lines | ZDNet.com

Coca-Cola redesigns cans

A new Coke can design was introduced in Japan in January. This preceded the world-wide introduction due in March. Used to drink LOTS of Coke, but it makes you fat... or in my case, fatter :|

Japan Today - News - Coca-Cola redesigns cans:
Coca-Cola redesigns cans

Tuesday, January 23, 2007 at 09:25 EST

[The newly designed Coca-Cola can, right, will go on sale in Japan on Jan 29, ahead of its worldwide release in March.]


The newly designed Coca-Cola can, right, will go on sale in Japan


TOKYO — Coca-Cola Japan Co has redesigned its cans and bottles as part of its 'The Coke Side of Life' marketing campaign. The beverage maker said Monday that the new look can will hit the Japanese market on Jan 29 before its introduction to the world market in March. 'We live in a world where we make choices every day and 'The Coke Side of Life' encourages people to make those choices positive ones,' said Marc Mathieu, senior vice president for carbonated soft drink core brands, marketing, srategy and innovation. 'This new campaign invites people to create their own positive reality, to be spontaneous, listen to their hearts and live in full color.'"

Dell's Ideastorm - A new way to get customer feedback

Dell is hard at work trying to win back old customers and gain new ones. They recently opened up the DellIdeaStorm web site, a customer feedback site. I've never had a problem with Dell's products or customer support, but many people have. Michael Dell has recently taken back the CEO title he had relinquished a couple of years back. This is one of the first signs of the new leadership and direction for this company.

Dell Idea Storm

Seven Secrets for Improving Your Alexa Rating

Interesting article... I'm not sure if getting my Alexa rating up really matters. Some speculate that it only really matter to the top-tier sites, but I really don't know myself. I will have to look into this, but I will also get started on some of these and see if the improvements happen over time. In the meantime, read and decide for yourself if these are worth your time...

7 Proven Strategies for Improving Your Alexa Ranking

By Michael Fleischner | Marketing Expert | Internet Marketing Secrets*

After spending two years building my own website, I was very disappointed that my Alexa ranking was still higher than one million. Alexa ranks each website based on the number of visitors it receives. The top ranked website, Yahoo! has an Alexa rating of 1 or 2. Less popular sites could be ranked up to 5,000,000.

In order to improve my Alexa rating, I spent about three weeks combing the web to find tips, secrets, and proven strategies for increasing my Alexa ranking. Unfortunately, many of the sites offering advice didn’t even have a high ranking themselves. Finally I discovered a number of sites ranked within the top 100,000 that were all applying the same “Alexa techniques” to improve their ranking. I’ve begun implementing a number of these techniques and have improved my Alexa ranking by 250,000 spots in just one week.

Here’s what you need to know. The basis for many of these techniques is the fact that your Alexa ranking is based reach and page views. However it only counts those who visit your site and have already downloaded the Alexa toolbar. Anyone can download the toolbar for free which is automatically added to your browser and tracks the sites you’re visiting. Increasing visits from those who do not have the Alexa toolbar installed will not help your Alexa ranking.

I’ve summarized the 7 strategies that I’ve discovered and applied to my own website to increase my Alexa ranking. Apply these strategies to your own website and see your ranking climb towards the top.

1. Download the Alexa toolbar and use it every day to visit your own website. Alexa even gives you the ability to co-brand the toolbar with your own logo and give it away. You can download the toolbar here: http://pages.alexa.com/prod_serv/associatetoolbar.html

2. Use Alexa redirection whenever you can. No matter when or where you provide a link to your website, be sure to use the equivalent Alexa redirect URL. For example, when providing a link to my website, I use http://redirect.alexa.com/redirect?marketingscoop.com. If you copy this URL into your browser, it will take you to MarketingScoop.com. To use this technique, simply replace the name of my website (marketingscoop) with yours.

3. Encourage your website visitors to add their positive testimonials on Alexa’s detailed listings page for your website. This can be done by placing a link to the appropriate Alexa page on your website and asking visitors to “Click here to rate this website”. You can find your detailed Alexa page here: http://www.alexa.com/data/details/?url=marketingscoop.com. Again, just replace the name of my website (marketingscoop) with yours. By clicking on the URL, visitors will be able to reach your detailed rating page and write a review using the review link located on the left hand side of the page.

4. Write your own site reviews on the top 100 rated Alexa sites and include your redirect URL. The top 500 domains, according to Alexa can be found at http://www.alexa.com/site/ds/top_500 When you write a review, be sure to use the redirection URL we discussed in number 2 above specifically for your website [http://redirect.alexa.com/redirect?marketingscoop.com].

5. Download the Alexa ranking button, traffic history graph, info links, and other traffic counters onto the page of your website that receives the most traffic. For example, at the bottom of my home page http://www.marketingscoop.com, I’ve added the Alexa ranking box. You can do the same for your own site by visiting http://www.alexa.com/site/site_stats/signup You’ll notice that I haven’t added the traffic history graph. This is because it wouldn’t look appropriate on my home page and because Alexa is only providing detailed history on the top 100,000 sites. So if you’re not in the top 100,000, site stats would not be available.

6. Take an inexpensive advertisement out on the ExactSeek search directory for only a few dollars per month at ExactSeek.com Search engine results are directly correlated with Alexa rankings. You’ll notice that if a website is highly ranked on ExactSeek, chances are that it will be highly ranked on Alexa.

7. Get listed on as many search engines as possible by placing a free listing in DMOZ. This is the largest human edited directory on the web and is co-branded among hundreds of thousands of sites. Be patient though, it often takes up to 5 months before you see your website listed after submission. Even though it takes longer than it should, you have little say in the matter because it’s so widely used across the Internet.

These simple Alexa strategies are easy to implement and will make a huge difference in your Alexa ranking. Ultimately you want visitors to do more than visit your home page, you want them to interact with your site. Be sure to optimize your home page for SEO purposes, ease of use, and interaction. Creating a positive user experience will get visitors to return again and again.

*Michael Fleischner is a marketing expert and the president of MarketingScoop.com. Visit today for free marketing information and marketing blog directory. Michael has more than 12 years of marketing experience and had appeared on The TODAY Show, Bloomberg Radio, and other major media. Visit his marketing blog for further details.

2000 Bloggers lives on

Wow, lots of stuff today...

On the subject of the 2000 Bloggers social experiment, I can't put it much better than this from TwoKnives...

Two Knives » Blog Archive » Lessons learned from blogging about blogging