Wow - a government site up with the play on syndicating content.

Canadian Government site RSS page

This page provides a useful overview of RSS, including the benefits and how to access RSS feeds, for the uninitiated.

Worth taking a look if you have no idea what RSS is!

Have updated the demo version of osCommerce to 2.2MS2:

osCommerce Demonstration

I plan to read this over the weekend - I am sure the NY Times must have the answers.

unanswered questions of science

Guidelines for a usable homepage? I think the importance of a few of these are marginal. Good for another perspective on your homepage.
Ten Most Violated Homepage Design Guidelines (Jakob Nielsen's Alertbox)

Related:

Home Page Design Guidelines (Alertbox May 2002)

TIME Magazine: Coolest Inventions 2003

Consider whether or not you need an "About" section. If users come to your site and can't figure out who you are and what you have to offer, there's a big problem. Your home page should automatically jump out at visitors and say, "You've landed on a great site from a great bunch of people who want to help you. Here's how we can do just that!" If visitors have to click on a section to get the answer to, "What's it all about, Alfie?" ...well, you've blown it.

Let's Talk About Us

The article ends by suggesting what to include in an 'About Us' page.

After seeing a Simpsons episode where Homer grows a tomacco (combination tomato/tobacco) plant - an Oregon man successfully achieves this:

Wired News: Simpsons Plant Seeds of Invention

Is it true?

The Pareto Principle: Applying the 80/20 Rule to Your Business


Bryan Eisenberg discusses the idea that "a small number of events produce the majority of results" in relation to shopping sites and has the following three recommendations:

1. Use best-seller lists - make the most popular products easy to find.
   
2. Find out what to optimize on your Web site - analyze your site for the most popular pages hit and perfect the way these pages sell.
   
3. Fix or discontinue problematic products and services
   

Came across this on another weblog:
THE MEATRIX

A creative way to spread their message.

Nick Usbourne quoted part of this excerpt from the interview with Seth Godin I mentioned here yesterday:

Now if they're smart, what they'll do -- and this is where a lot of ventures fall apart -- is they'll stop trying to find customers for their products and they'll start trying to find products for their customers. Their job is to find stuff for me, not to find more people like me who will buy their stuff.

reveries - seth godin - across the hall

Refreshingly simple way of putting it really!

He goes on to talk about Howard Dean. If you haven't heard of Howard Dean, he is seeking to be the Democrat candidate to run for US President. Dean's campaign has arguably revolutionised political campaigning online and fundraising online. The official Howard Dean campaign weblog has had a big part to play in this. It will be interesting to see how closely his campaign has been followed by the New Zealand political parties and whether they attempt to emulate his use of the Internet leading up to the next New Zealand General Election.

Howard Dean is another perfect example of this. Howard Dean says that 200,000 people gave him 80 bucks. Well, if he can get those 200,000 people, over time, with their permission, to give him a thousand more dollars, he will have made more money than any candidate in the history of American politics.

This changes things in two ways. One, it makes it easier for him to raise the money. Two, it makes it less necessary for him to raise money, because all the people who have a small stake are more likely to go out and vote for him, and bring their friends when they do.

... in a preview of Microsoft's upcoming overhaul of its operating system, code-named Longhorn, Bill Gates noted that RSS subscription ability will be provided right on the desktop.

MarketingWonk: Microsoft Backs RSS; Move Away From Email Publishing Assured
What does this mean? Well, like the piece suggests, this will be a major challenge to email as a publishing medium. Get set for a host of new and creative uses of RSS (for example Comics by RSS) which, in my opinion, will drive Internet users to it even before Microsoft makes it easy for the masses.

The Google Toolbar certainly makes life easier. The latest from Google:

Google Deskbar

Google Deskbar enables you to search with Google from any application without lifting your fingers from the keyboard. Installs easily in your Windows taskbar.

Just catching up on my reading on web marketing. More changes in pay-per-click land! Google has bought Sprinks, which sells pay-per-click advertising on About.com.

Google AdWords FAQ - Transitioning from Sprinks to Google AdWords

Example statistics showing where web traffic is originating and points to the dominance of Google (90% of traffic).

Google Search Engine Dominance

This is consistent with what I have seen on the sites I deal with.

Analysis of how Google Adsense works and could work for Bloggers:

Blogging for Dollars

A couple of my clients are experimenting with Adsense on their business websites (not webblogs) and the income is at least offsetting their hosting costs.

From an interview with Seth Godin:

"When I challenge people in my seminars I say: Tell me in one sentence what you want this website to do. Tell me in one sentence what you want person "A" to tell person "B" about what you do.

And they say: "Well, it's complicated -- it's blah, blah and blah." Then they're invisible. They don't exist. They need the discipline to say that if they don't have one thing to say, they have nothing to say. Then they will be able to be a lot more cogent."

reveries - seth godin - across the hall

"Amazon.com is trumpeting statistics gleaned from the first five days after its "Search Inside the Book" feature was launched, saying sales growth for searchable titles outpaced non-searchable titles by 9 percent."

Amazon Touts Conversions from Book Search

Cited by MarketingWonk

Read some of what Amazon.com has to say about Search Inside the Book and here is a Search Inside the Book FAQ

d2r: an introduction to weblogs
No idea what one is?

Caffeinate Your Hypertext

The hyperlink is the most basic, most powerful part of the Web.

A good reminder that the medium of the web allows powerful ways to connect the user to information within the text of a webpage.

This article:

Sell the Information-Gatherers

relates similar ideas to search engine marketing and internet advertising. The nature of interlinking sites on the web means that typing words into a search engine is only the start of a process. People tend to move between sites and browse their way to find the information they require. This browsing creates new opportunities to capture the viewers attention beyond the initial search.

Good Information Architecture Increases Online Sales

The role of good Information Architecture is to make the Website work not in the technical sense, but from a functional, organized, conceptual perspective. Tidy navigation, meaningful labels, and consistent screens all help enhance the shopping experience.

Advice for shopping sites, including ways to reduce shopping cart abandonment rates and improve the shopping cart purchase process.

Inc.com | An Internet Model That Works

Case study of the advantages the web offers a traditional business with particular attention to sales and marketing.