I thought: we are always talking about SEO and the diversity of content but that we don’t really talk about the lighter side of SEO. And one of the lighter sides is jokes.

So to do the SEO treatment to SEO, here are a few jokes to tackle SEO from a new angle.

And just so you know George Clooney loved them.

Q) What’s an SEO-ers favourite film?

A) SEO-biscuit

I’m sorry it’s not amazing but I thought I’d go from worst to best, so that I could finish on a high.

Q) What’s a SEO-ers favourite animal?

A) A SEO-gul

Again I’m sorry, I had to.

Q) Where do SEO-ers fill up on petrol?

A) The ES-EO (ESSO)

That’s probably the worst one and doesn’t really work written down but never mind.

Q) What’s an SEO-ers favourite part of Thailand?

A) SEO (it turns out it’s a real place but this is only funny if you have an intimately knowledge of Thailand).

Q) What’s a SEO-ers favour Roald Dahl book?

A) SEO-trot

From recollection it is quite a funny book about a vicar who can’t help but say words backwards. So “God” becomes “dog” and “tortoise” becomes “esio-trot”.

Q) What’s a SEO-ers favourite footballer?

A) SE-O Ferdinand

Q) And finally, what’s a SEO-ers favourite song?

A) D-I-S-E-O wohoho.

That’s my favourite, just because it’s wasn’t forced.

I hope you’ve enjoyed my Penguin style SEO-based jokes; hopefully they have brought a smile to your face. And hopefully it has also shown you how fun SEO can be.

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

So after trying to find a way to inject some fun into my day, I had a look at my usual websites and tried to find a new story or two to entertain myself. Not much was going on, news of note for myself was the sad passing of Alex Higgins, the legendary snooker player.

I then went on to Facebook, oh yes the time honoured tradition of going back to Facebook and my lovely Twitter account to keep up with what my friends were doing. I’ve now got a drink to go to with a friend on Tuesday from an old job and passed time away talking to another about what I was doing with myself now that I am back from Canada.

All in all, it turned my morning that to put politely was a blank canvas that I didn’t want, into an opportunity to catch up and sort out a few things for next week. I’ve even been trying to find out my new holiday destination for my weekend break that I will be having in a couple of weeks time (sorry Amy! Will discuss this with you first ).

It has to be said, aside from the inane blabber you get about people waking up with a hangover and that they think Ben & Jerry’s ice cream is the best thing ever, Facebook really has changed the way that we can communicate with people.

The public declarations we can make on our walls and status’s mean that people are never to far away from finding out what you are doing, or checking out those photos of you when you went on holiday. Even though you aren’t directly in touch with that friend on your Facebook, by participating you keeping people informed indirectly about your life. This is the nice, shiny part of Facebook that I’m sure you are all familiar with.

Summary for those that couldn’t keep up: Facebook is ace, entertained me on a boring day.

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Plan your design before you start coding: This will allow you to iron out any potential issues before you start getting to the nuts and bolts of the site. It’s much easier to make any layout changes here than it is further down the line and the more time you spend on this stage the easier the building stage will go.

Plan your on page SEO after the design: Once you have your design you can map out the flow of the site and make sure everything is in the correct order. This includes the usage of correct header tags , your sidebar elements and your navigation flow to keep Google on your side.

Build and style your site following the design and SEO plan you already have. This should save you a massive amount of time because you don’t have to make any changes on the fly.

Post-build jobs can almost be endless but the big important ones to remember are to submit your sitemap to Google, add your stat tracking software and, if you use webmaster tools, then register your site with that too.

Content – the final step of course is to fill your site with the relevant content that it requires to get it noticed by the search population.

Now you should have a good looking, functional and search engine friendly website that didn’t cause you the usual headaches to build, well done!

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Amy is most likely Andy, with her toys, Selena as wise old Slinky, Javaria as Bo Peep, Matt as Mr Potato Head (who else could put an eyebrow on their chin?), myself probably as Rex and Milton is obviously the little green alien.

It seems that we’re not the only ones either – the amount of hype around this film is absolutely astounding and represents a potential goldmine for SEO.

Keywords are an important part of creating successful content – segueing into toy story 3 might not be the easiest thing to do, but it can definitely help to create a buzz, even if the premise is a bit woody. However, by focusing on popular trends and keeping up to date with the news, we can ensure that our content has the best optimisation and is as popular as possible.

Here at Redsauce we are a veritable toy box of goodies and potential benefits for your website. We have the same co-ordination and camaraderie as the toys – we may not be as pretty, but we are experts in the field of content and SEO. We all fear the claw though. THE CLAAAWWWW.

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Something that come to light to me, especially now with me more involved with social media than ever that there are some observations that on the surface seem very trivial but can make the difference in being seen as understanding and just ignorant.

An old cliche that I came across when I first got into the online marketing world was that if you send an email and its not dealt with in a short amount of time then that company isn’t too busy to help you, it is just too lazy. I’m not going to pick holes in that statement right now, but it looks pretty reasonable to be busy, you have to be indeed busy doing other things.

Social media is about people sharing, and if you are in a point of authority giving value to someone else. When you are posting on someones Facebook wall a link that you think is laugh out loud (or LOLZ) funny or outlandishly shocking (or ZOMG), then it is fair to say you expect some kind of reaction. Usually just thank you is enough or a “lol r woz nt expectin dat!” commented under your link.

I know, this isn’t anything special but thats the whole point really we do want validation (for the most part) for taking our time out in finding something that was funny/shocking/interesting and then thought sufficiently enough of someone that you passed it on. Some worrying things tend to happen though, some people just don’t react. It doesn’t mean they haven’t ‘dealt with’ your link or post, it just probably means they were too busy to say something, or generally too busy to check it out. Do you feel consoled by that?

Truth is it depends on how you use your chosen social media platform, there are the value givers, the connecters and the reactors (note I’ve not called them takers as that really wouldn’t be fair) and if we stick with the theme of Facebook, take a look at your friends list, I’m sure you know quite instinctively now which ones should be given the chosen title from the three categories above.

Generally, you are always going to reflect your personality when it comes to these observations of etiquette that have manifested online. Though it is “only” the online world, it is fair to say most people wouldn’t like to think they ignore you, yet everyone falls into the trap. You can’t always keep on top of things, but as things like Facebook get integrated into mainstream communication it will say more about you than ever.

That’s made your Sunday more cheerful I am sure!

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

The designer will always want to use as many graphics and images as possible potentially slowing down the load times of the site.  Flashy JavaScript, giant header images and video can also cause load bottlenecks but sure do make a difference when it comes to looks, and there aren’t many people who can’t appreciate a nice looking site.

The usability experts will always say that well laid out sites that appear natural and instinctive will rule over any amount of visual candy, and they wouldn’t be wrong.  We have a host of conventions and standards that typically rule the traditional layout of a website and where we expect, and often need things to be in order to successfully navigate a site.

With the ability to compress images, create sprites to load multiple pictures at once, merge JavaScript files and the introduction of new CSS rules that will soon give you a whole host of lighting fast browser rendered visual effects we have all the tools needed to create visual and functional sites.  And once we mix these tools with proven usability layouts and functionality you’re surely onto a winner.

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Now, I don’t own a television – I don’t watch that much of it, can’t afford a license at the moment and I have the internet which offers me just about the same. However, one thing I used to be slightly hindered with is the news. It tends to be the olds by the time I get to it.

BUT thanks to the power of the internet, Twitter and a handy little widget shown to me by hung-over Matthew, I can keep up-to-date with notifications and opinions of Tweeters I am following.

As powerful as Google News is, news is rarely real-time as results are collated from different sources – granted some news sites such as BBC, Sky News and FIFA offer real-time updates, but you are restricted to remaining on the specific page.

So how can this help with SEO?

As has already been established, Twitter is a powerful tool within SEO, particularly in regards to its integration with Google searches and the effect of trending topics. By re-tweeting or posting updates on the news, you can get your name out there effectively, boosting your influence within the Twitosphere (or whatever it’s called nowadays).

Obviously Twitter is not the be all and end all of SEO and marketing your website, but it can be incredibly powerful in keeping you up-to-date, posting your company news updates and getting your name out there. Oh, and install Chromedbird or Echofon (depending on your browser) – they’re amahazing.

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

The early favourite was Spain, with them being European champions currently and going on from strength to strength since then. Though Spain started with a 1-0 loss to Switzerland, they are now in the final after some glorious possession football that has killed teams off.

Not everyone is a fan of the Spanish way though, some say it is boring as they play their patented ‘tiki-taka’ rhythmic passing and keep the ball for long periods at a dull, slow pace. It has been incredibly efficient though and it is fair to say that Spain have not scored many goals at all, all their knock-out games have been 1-0 wins.

Against Germany, the counter-attacking masters, Spain kept the ball in a majestic fashion with Germany only able to make one real chance at goal from Toni Kroos that was easily saved by Casillas. Germany kept men behind the ball and just waited for their opportunity to counter, unfortunately for them Spain created an impressive amount of chances and it was only a matter of time before one counted.

A turgid affair is predicted tonight at best, Mark Van Bommel and Manchester City’s Nigel De Jong will try their best to spoil the passing game of Spain but the other sub-plot  is more interesting in my opinion. David Villa and Wesley Sneijder have a chance to win the Golden Boot, which is the award given to the top scorer of the Tournament.

Both Villa and Sneijder are tied on 5 goals each (along with Diego Forlan and Mueller but they cannot add to their tally tonight) and it seems the betting market is backing Villa. Otherwise we might have the unique situation of the Golden Boot being shared between four players!

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

If you are trying to design with the basic fonts on your computer you may have noticed there aren’t really any with much personality or design flair.  Well you can bolster your resources by visiting some of the free font sites out there on the interweb.

Blambot is a great resource for comic fonts that can come in really useful when designing more light hearted websites that don’t need to have that business edge.  Just check out their selection of free fonts in the various categories here.

Font Squirrel has a massive selection of fonts for every type of design job and it’s really worth just spending an hour or two on here picking up and downloading a batch of fonts from each category and getting them installed on your pc.  You can visit font squirrel here.

If you want to get more in depth with the whole matter of typography then you may want to hop on over to http://typographica.org/ where you can check out features on the topic and other good stuff.

If you want something a little easier to navigate just hop on over to http://ilovetypography.com/ where you can read all about fonts, typography and well more fonts and typography that’s it!  You really shouldn’t expect much more from the URL if we’re being honest.

For type used in logos then check out http://www.logodesignlove.com where you will also find a serious resource list if you ever think you will need it.

Blog post image by ~mrtyn

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

In Crackdown 2, the world of Pacific City has become over run by infected members of the public. Your character is a genetically modified, advanced agent that has to go through the city, eliminating all threats to the public. As you go through the game, you will unlock more and more secrets about what actually went wrong in the first place to release this ravenous horde of zombies.

Throughout game-play, you’ll increase your abilities and, before you know it,  you’ll be well on your way to being able to stop the terrifying amount of beastly adversaries that you will cross amongst your game-play. You will also be able to take part in the ultimate cooperative and competitive multiplayer experiences. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to bring back justice to Pacific City by any means necessary!

Whilst you are fighting amongst this nightmare of never-ending nastiness, you may also wish to have a look back at what you have achieved – once you have reached the end, you will be wanting to piece together the secrets of Pacific City that you have unlocked and find the culprit for this mayhem and stop them!

The set out of this game is a lot like a website; you will want to use good, well-worded content to eliminate all chances of  search engines not finding your website – rather a lot like setting a trap of nice, juicy brains to attract attention from all the zombies roaming around out there. Also use the best navigational structure possible – make it nice and easy to get around the website so people don’t get confused and end up leaving. Just like Crackdown 2, the agents need the navigation, otherwise they will end up getting lost and being devoured, ALIVE!

It’s like a death trap out there, so be careful!

Bookmark It

Hide Sites