A common use of Twitter in business today is with API’s (Application Programming Interface). An API is source code communicating between websites. The Twitter API facilitates communication between the social media site, other digital solutions and websites. This is why we see Twitter feeds and share buttons on homepages. The share buttons make it easy for visitors to post content to their Twitter site which can have a positive impact on search engine optimization and ranking.

Depending on what you would like your website visitors to see, Twitter has more than one API. If you are interested in the easiest way to integrate your website and Twitter, the Tweet button and follow button offer a simple Twitter API option. For more in depth ways to communicate with customers companies use more complex API’s like the REST, search and streaming API’s. The REST API allows users to read timelines, tweet or follow. The Search API provides more relevant tweets through the use of queries. Lastly, the Streaming API allows tweets to go directly to your website feed as they are created in Twitter.

Twitter API’s are constantly changing just like everything else in the technology industry. Along with explaining the API, Twitter also has developer blogs, discussions and a Twitter account specifically for keeping everyone in the loop to any changes to the API that may occur. There are lots of benefits to using API’s including reinforcement of brands and services, and to introduce new products and promotions. Using an API can be difficult if you are not familiar with code, but systems and plugins can simplify the process for users with basic knowledge of technology and integration.

If you aren’t an API expert, using a content management system (CMS) can allow you to add content to your website without being incredibly tech savvy or knowing the latest code. A CMS organizes and makes sense of content. Several content management systems exist.  Auctori is a web CMS with navigation, image and form building modules, and it also offers a Twitter Feed module to advertise your Twitter account on your web page with no hassle. Whether you don’t have the time or the resources, you can participate in the latest trends including Twitter API’s. Click here to contact us and learn more information on Auctori and how you can enhance your website.

Whether or not you live in England, the global attention of the Summer Olympics allows an opportunity to prepare your company for a larger and more cultural audience.  If you manage your company website, keep in mind visitors from all over the world will browse the web during this time particularly in regards to the Olympics.  Having a website that offers multilingual translations is one way to open your services to this larger audience. Expressing support for the games is also a way to draw individuals into your site since they will be sharing the similar interest.

Local businesses can get involved with the Olympic community through special promotions to keep their businesses noticed throughout the long weeks of the Olympic Games. Take Cisco for example.  According to “IT industry set to take centre stage during London Olympics” article, not only is Cisco the main provider for Wi-Fi, security, email  and a number of other things, but they have a 10 question test on their website to check if your business is in shape for the London Games. It includes questions on employee absences, shipping routes and system security.  At the end of the test, the participants will receive the option to download a Games Readiness Checklist.  I would strongly advise companies to use this as a tool to stay on track of their website planning. Companies looking for a Many Lingual website that is easy to update on your own can utilize Auctori. Auctori  is a web content management system developed by Unidev, which is currently translated but not limited to Spanish, German and Chinese on this framework.

Samsung and Visa are also taking the opportunity to place themselves in front of the Olympic spectators. According to digitaltrends.com, these Olympic sponsors have created wireless payment systems. These systems will be stationed throughout the grounds allowing athletes and their fans to make quick purchases. Other technology companies that have partnered with the London Olympics are Asos, BT, Acer and Panasonic.

Local London businesses may have more face time with customers, but taking the opportunity to utilize an international event can only bring positive business via the web.  There are multiple ways your businesses can get involved this year.  Still not sure how? For more information on how to get involved and anything else you might want to know about the games, visit London Olympics homepage.

As the Auctori partner network grows, we continually look for companies who want to grow with us.  Auctori recently revamped the Auctori Partner Program to provide several partnership options.  As always, the Auctori Partner Program remains a formalized, structured program designed to encourage long-term and mutually beneficial relationships among Auctori users, developers and vendors.  But the partnership classifications have changed.

Today, Auctori offers a variety of different partnership options based on partner relationships, areas of specialization and desired level of involvement.  The various Auctori Partnership options include; the Auctori Network Partnership, Auctori Design Partnership and the newest category, the Auctori Development Partnership, which is currently in development itself.

Although Auctori does not currently offer the Auctori Development Partnership, Auctori is pleased to welcome three new design partners, The Net Impact, Kaffcorp Media and Little Chicken Design and Communications.  These design partners will contribute to the growth of Auctori by offering Auctori Web CMS as an option to their clients and partners.  Likewise, Auctori will provide the following benefits to their design partners:

• Exclusive Access, 24/7 Call Center Support
• Revenue Share
• Advance Access to New Auctori Versions
• Access to additional partner services at a discounted rate (TNI and Unidev)
• Sales Assistance, Training and Support
• Prelaunch website validation testing
• Listing in Auctori’s online Partner Directory
• Official Auctori Partner Program Logo
• Quarterly Partner Updates (e-mail Publication)
• Increased exposure and co-marketing opportunities
• Additional Web Design Training in Auctori CMS

If you’re interested in becoming and Auctori Design partner, we’d love to get to know you and your company better.  Auctori is currently accepting applications for Auctori Design partnerships.  For more questions about our Auctori Partner Program, please visit http://www.auctori.com/partners.

When it comes to creating, managing and updating your company’s website navigation, it’s important to look at the big picture before jumping right in.  Spend time looking at the company as a whole, determine how you want to portray your brand and figure out who the company is targeting.  Make the navigation tabs intuitively relate to the website content.

Tip One

Sketch out a drawing of a navigation scheme created from the site map.  The site map will help as a guide when creating a list of pages that go under each tab.

Tip Two

When naming your navigation tabs, keep the names of the tabs to 1-2 words.  Make sure the names of the tabs truly describe the pages under that tab.  Clearly defined tabs help improve content organization as well.

Tip Three

Arrange tab labels in an order that makes sense to your users.  An example of a company that has exceptional navigation is, The King and Prince Beach and Golf Resort.   Each tab is descriptive and is in an order that makes sense to visitors.

Tip Four

Many websites contain the top navigation in one form or another, sometimes with the side navigation acting as the sub menu. Figure out whether your website is going to have vertical navigation tabs, horizontal navigation tabs or both. To determine which method your website is going to use, review your competitor’s websites.  It might help you to make your final decision based on what your competitor’s use, what best fits their industry and the content associated with that industry.

Tip Five

Keep the navigation in the same place. Keeping these items in the same place will promote a more positive user experience. This makes it easier for the site visitor to find what they are seeking each time they visit the site. Think about adding supplemental areas of navigation as well. Supplemental navigation includes site maps, indexes and guides.  These are external to the basic hierarchy of a website and provide another way of finding content. It could help free up space on the main page as well as provide an area for a search box.

Learn more about Auctori’s Navigation Module or contact Auctori Web CMS today.

Locating documents on your computer can be a real time-waster but this year keeping your documents organized will be the last of your worries.  It’s important to implement a content management system (CMS) so you can take advantage of the elements it offers to its full potential.  A CMS is design to control access to data, assist in storage, reduce duplicate content, and improve communication between users.

It’s important to have a CMS that allows businesses to easily organize countless documents.  Here are a few tips to consider when using a document library.

Follow a specific naming convention.  Divide your documents into folders for customers, co-workers and personal. Give each folder a name to identify what the folders are related to so finding documents can be less of a hassle.

Be descriptive.  Describe exactly what the document is about.  For example, if you have a presentation document for The Big Shoe Co. your description would say The Big Shoe Co. PowerPoint presentation on social media.

Separate completed work. Some people prefer to store their current work on their desktop and move the file to a folder once the task is completed. Others tend to keep all of their documents in one spot, which can lead to confusion. Make it easy for yourself and separate your work.

Organize files by dates. Incorporating a date into the file name can help you determine which files are the most recent without having to open the file and read through the content.  It saves you some time so you aren’t scrambling to find the right document.

The Auctori Content Management System consolidates all of your documents into a centralized location allowing for easy access and sharing opportunities.  This CMS stores all of its documents in one location. Instead of emailing the documents to your co-workers, they can simply login to Auctori and find the documents they need.

The document library module makes finding new or old documents easy.  This module can track all your documents by name, description, author and date.  It can categorize documents by particular topics or author, assign roles to users to determine level of access, and also utilizes a search feature, which allows you to find any document quickly and keeps your documents in an easily accessible location.

Say goodbye to the unorganized documents in your computer folders and say hello to the Auctori document library module.

Contact forms help companies gather feedback, new ideas, and suggestions. But most importantly contact forms allow potential customers to reach companies they want to work with. When creating a contact form for your website, it’s essential to follow these best practice tips.

Each designer uses his or her own approach when creating a contact form. This post outlines best practices and new trends for creating contact forms.

Keep it Simple-

Make sure your contact form is short and to the point. If the form asks the customer to fill out too many questions it can push them away. The most common fields include: first and last name, email address and phone number. Add a comments or message field in case the potential customer wants to give more background information.

It’s also important to keep the submit button above the fold. Having it below could give the impression that the form is longer than it is. Keep the end in sight!

Placement-

Make sure your contact form is easy to find. You don’t want your customers to have to search to find this, make it easy for them find or “stumble upon”. Several websites place the contact form in the right side navigation. This capitalizes on how readers view a page, in a Z-shape from left to right. Include contact forms in the side navigation on all pages where the logical next step is to communicate with the potential customer.

Some websites also place a contact button on the top of the page. This button leads potential customers to another page with the contact form on it. If you opt to have a contact page, use that page as an opportunity to share some extra information with them. Link to your company’s newsletter, blog, press releases, case studies, whitepapers or social media networks. Having a graphic to add visual interest is usually a good idea too. Just be tasteful and don’t overdo it.

Most businesses list their physical address on their contact page. Adding a map or a map plug-in is a good way to direct potential customers to your location. Google maps and Bing maps both provide nice clean maps that most customers recognize as valid.

Where does the information go?

After submitting the contact form you can direct the information submitted by the potential customer to a few places. For example, you could send notice emails with the submitted information to the management team or to human resources. Auctori saves submitted files into a CSV document, which saves all of the data and allows you to see everything that has been entered in Microsoft Excel.

Finally, create a thank you page.

Sending the customer to a thank you page is a great way to let the customer know that you received the message. This would be another great opportunity to lead the customer back to your website. Linking them to the homepage, case studies, press releases and more.

Here are some helpful hints on how to create a successful archive page in Auctori content management system.

Keywords

Using the appropriate keywords is crucial. Make sure you act as a web searcher when adding keywords to fit your page.

Description

This description should be short and to the point. Try not to exceed 160 characters. Search engines like Bing, Google, and Yellow Pages only show a certain amount of information in search results. It’s important to make a good first impression.

The next few steps will help you once you begin adding content to your page.

Step One

It’s important to consider the type of information you want to share with your audience. It is essential to direct your audience to strategically located content. For example, if you look at this page from The Net Impact, TNI Web Marketing Speaker page, you can view the important content in the center, but can also obtain more information by clicking anything in our side navigation. It is wise to use reusable content on the side bars, that way you will have consistent flow throughout your site, linking the viewers to pages within the website and improving bounce rates.

Step Two

Think about what you would like to look at. Some find it easier to use pictures followed by the title and a brief description of what the content is about. If you choose to use pictures, make sure they are consistent with one another, the page should look professional. Again, looking at the TNI Web Marketing Speaker page, it shows a picture of each professional who has presented at The Net Impact. Notice all of the pictures are in black and white. This tone is kept throughout the page.

Step Three

When adding content to the archive page, I suggest creating a table to keep your content organized. Here is some basic code to set up a 3 Row 3 Column (3 x 3) table, 200 px wide with a 1 px border using HTML:

<table width=”200″ border=”1″>
<tbody>
<tr>
<td></td>
<td></td>
<td></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td></td>
<td></td>
<td></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td></td>
<td></td>
<td></td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>

You add content for the cell where it says “ ”. It might be helpful to make all current and/or future archive pages the same way because you can clone pages in Auctori. This will help keep all of your archive pages looking organized and consistent.

Step Four

Make sure all images and hyperlinks have a title. If a viewer puts their mouse over a link they should be able to see where the link will take them before they actually click on it. Let’s say a viewer comes across the TNI Web Marketing Speaker page and wants to view Geo-Targeting with Local Search, the title will say, St. Louis local search optimization | The Net Impact. This will take you to a content page that will discuss local search optimization. Auctori makes it easy for website content editors to add titles, alt tags and other meta data that help improve SEO.

Step Five

Before publishing your page, make sure all of your links work and lead to the correct pages. The last thing you want is to guide your audience to a random page of your website, or even worse a broken link.
Following those 4 steps will guide you to creating a successful archive page. Remember keep your audience in mind.

Auctori has relationships with many video production companies which gives our clients the resources to have a professional video created for their company which can then be implemented into their Auctori website.

Professional video production ranges from hundreds to thousands of dollars, and depending on your budget, you may not be able to outsource video production.
Mashable posted a story today announcing a new video editing website called Magisto.  Magisto takes raw video footage and turns it into presentable video suitable to embed on your website.

Magisto’s software technology is said to recognize faces and can tell the difference between human, animals, and landscapes.  I decided to try the program out for myself to see how easy it would be for our clients to use.

Sign up is simple.  If you have a Google account or a Facebook account, just input your email address and password and you’re registered!

Next, upload the video footage that you have saved to your computer.  Magisto allows you to upload up to 16 video files, add titles and soundtracks which are provided by Magisto or you can upload your own sound files.

I chose to try the software with a video clip from our Nonprofit Marketing Seminar in June 2011 with Dianne Wolferding discussing the Metro St. Louis Cinderella Project.  I attempted to upload several clips but the file sizes can be no larger than 600MBS.  Once I had found a clip that was around 500 MBS, I uploaded my video.

Once you have chosen which clip(s) you would like to upload, you can choose a title for your video.  Tip: remember to keep it search engine friendly!

You can then add the music that will play with your video.  Magisto provides music from a variety of genres or allows you to add your own music file.

If you do choose to use Magisto’s music, you’ve got nearly 15 songs in each genre to select from:

You will then receive an email when your video is complete – my 500MB video took around 10 minutes to complete.  Take a look at the finished product (keep in mind, this footage was unedited):

Still in its infancy, Magisto has a lot to improve upon.  What are your thoughts on this free video production service?

You might also make a list of what doesn’t work on your site.  Aside from 404 errors, you’ll need to look at what parts of your site aren’t getting visited.  An easy way to determine what is and is not receiving traffic from site visitors is to look at your content management system’s analytics.  The analytics will show you where the visitors are coming from, how long they’re staying on your site, which pages people are visiting the most, and which pages aren’t receiving much attention.

Make a list of the pages with low visits and determine why people aren’t staying on longer.  Do you need to re-write your marketing copy?  Is the approach too sales-y?  Is the content too long or too short?  Put yourself in a potential client’s shoes and ask yourself: “Is this effective?”

You may also want to seek the help of a professional to determine if your current copy will resonate with visitors and to give your company tips on approaching potential clients in a more effective way.
You’ll also need to take into account how soon you need your site designed.  For example, you’re heading to a tradeshow and want your homepage to look sleek as people explore your company after meeting you.  If your desired outcome requires an entire overhaul, they can take months.  If you simply need your homepage redesigned quickly, speak with the design firm about “re-skinning” your homepage.  This just means that your homepage will be redesigned and implemented while the rest of your site stays in the previous version until all of the pages are designed to match.  It’s a temporary fix but effective in inviting site visitors to explore the rest of your site.

Be aware of companies that promise to design your site quickly.  Sites with accurate meta information and robust usability are done so with a strategic approach and to be done correctly takes time to ensure all “i’s” are dotted and “t’s” are crossed throughout the site.

Compile a wish list to bring to your first meeting with the design firm; this will give you an opportunity to make sure both parties are on the same page.  The web design firm may also give you ideas to help enhance the site for optimal usability and search engine optimization.  The firm will also be able to walk you through the transition process from your old website to launching your new website.  It is imperative to work with a company that has both talented designers and SEO experts – without a search engine optimized website, you will lose a vast majority of potential clients who are searching online for the product or service you offer.

What matters most is becoming valuable; valuable brands are “sticky.”  Sticky brands are those that people refer to online for resources because you, the valuable – “sticky” – brand, provide relevant information.

You must first set out to market your [unsexy] brand with a goal in mind. 

• Do you want to change the public’s perception of the product/service?
• What is their problem?
  • How can your product solve it?
• What is their need?
  • How can your product fulfill it?
• How does your product untangle complexity?

Once your goal is determined, be sure to follow these rules:

1. Don’t sell anything. Stop tweeting, posting, shouting, publishing constant sales messages. Have a conversation.
   
2. Be compassionate. Attitude and sincerity show through messages – even online.  Stay authentic.
   
3. Become a resource.  Write and post valuable information.  Make people want to come to your site first.
   
4. Focus on intangible benefits.  Example: Your content management system can help save time which will allow business owners to spend more time with their families.
   
   Take, for example, Dove’s campaign to boost self-esteem in young women.  Dove wasn’t focusing on selling deodorant – deodorant isn’t sexy.  They weren’t focused on shampoo or lotion, what they were focused on were the intangible benefits that come with recognizing real beauty – confidence and self-esteem.  Through their videos and online resources they were able to reach a wider audience – not just the buyers looking for new lotion and deodorant- but the young women in search of resources and tools to help them through adolescence.
5. Build your brand, build buzz, stop branding for keywords. People will come to your site because of your original, relevant content.

Stop worrying about being trendy – if you’ve got a good product or service, then the people will come.  Build your marketing plan around your target market and what will complement your product the most.