Paul Fleming

Or: The Purpose of Press Releases Has Changed. This week, a client asked me to explain ‘why’. I’d suggested a press release topic and he wasn’t sure about it. “What would the focus be?” he asked. “I want to make sure that we’re adding to our message, not diluting it.” It was an absolutely valid …
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It’s a crowded, noisy market. Sure, you’ve honed your niche and offer a solid product. But what should you do if the guy down the road has a brighter neon sign? Websites are your shop-front. You want people to step inside, take a look, buy things and come back again. The question to consider – …
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Riding the New York Subway today, I noticed a number of people clutching onto their mobile phones as if it was a part of their body. Some were listening to music, others were playing games but a sizable number were just sitting and holding, waiting until they could get signal again (I presume). If I’m …
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Every now and again as we’re planning out a campaign or building links or performing an analysis, I think about that easy button that Staples put out. Click…keyword rankings #1. Click…huge traffic increase. Click…huge conversion increases. Click…me on beach drinking beer or possibly umbrella’d cocktail. I have a feeling that sometimes our clients wish that …
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Catching up over a coffee, a friend asked me how to write a press release. Even though I write them every day, it was interesting to define exactly what makes one press release stand apart from another. Of course, what you’re writing about makes a huge difference – some topics are more exciting and newsworthy …
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Our company has evolved over the last 5 years. Some of it has been to accomodate new trends (influence of social media for one), some due to Google’s whims (the many algorithm updates) but mostly it has been the result of experience. The company started by recognizing that there was a specific need. We would …
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I was reading about Customer Relationship Management (CRM) the other day and how to connect with your audience using social media. Something that piqued my attention was the concept that the social customer considers their peers as a most trusted source. No surprises there. If I’m looking for a hairdresser, I ask my circle of …
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We’ve suspected it for a while now but it was recently confirmed by extremely reliable sources (Matt Cutts from Google actually) that social media is having a greater influence on search rankings. A web page stacked up against another web page with the same credentials will apparently be given greater weight if it is shared …
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In the SEO world we see untoward activities on a regular basis. Mostly folks trying to game the system for themselves or their clients to increase rankings or decrease competitor rankings. These are called black hat techniques and most of their actions may result in websites being penalized by having their websites completely removed from …
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When we search, we expect the right results straight away. When we get to a website, we expect to be able to find what we are looking for immediately and if not, easily. So it seems that a lot of clients expect instant results from their SEO campaign as well. As Abe Lincoln appropriately suggests “Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe.”
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