Posts

This one always winds me up, and makes a perfect rant.

Dodgy whiplash claims and spiraling car insurance costs. Here in the UK it has got out of hand, with insurance companies selling information to solicitors, who then try and convince people to make a claim, with this no win no fee culture.

The end result, everyone (apart from insurers and solicitors) loses as premiums keep increasing.

Be interesting to see if this is a worldwide epidemic, or is it a UK/US one?

Apparently even staged crashes are on the rise, so people can fake whiplash claims

At least in the UK it's been flagged by MP's, so maybe something will finally happen?
BBC News - MPs demand action on spiralling whiplash claims

Brace yourselves for the latest major Google Update, in it's ongoing drive to make search more relevant for users and life ever harder for businesses

This latest update is called "Search Plus Your World". It went live on Tuesday for some Google.com users and will be gradually rolled out, no idea when it will hit the Google UK or anywhere else.

The idea is that a new "Personal Results" view appears when you do a search, blending general results with personal information, from maybe Google+, shared photos, info from social connections etc.

There's already a storm of protest brewing in the States regarding privacy issues etc, but from a business point of view, it will be interesting to see how this latest change to the search results impacts your keyword search results etc.

Guess for now we will have to watch this space.

Danny Sullivan from Search Engine World has a good post and screen shots about this new functionality.

Google's Results Get More Personal With "Search Plus Your World"

So what does anyone think, good bad or indifferent?

lol mrb, great idea

So if you want to show your age, and reminisce in a pre-internet world, what was the first vinyl record you bought?

Mine was the Night Shift by the Commodores

Yup old Heston was amazed, the "cooks" didn't have any thing to cook on other than a microwave, so he refitted the place with a new kitchen if I rem rightly. Bet approach and menu never got rolled out, whole thing smelled of a PR stunt at the time by Little Thief bosses

The SEOmoz link is a cracker.

Have stickied the thread because this is a must see for anyone new to online marketing, and a useful refresher!

Its a shame, but I think Bobo's right, WH Smith will be next.

Maybe the age of the CD is over, and the kids nowadays just download them?

Personally I like to have a rummage through the CD's, and will occasionally pop into HMV, but I'm not exactly a target consumer

Suppose we will have to explain to our kids about this old fashioned thing called a record, which we used to save up our pocket money and buy

I'm amazed they are still going! Definitely seem part of a bygone era.

Saw the documentary a couple of years ago when chef Heston Blumenthal tried to revamp their menu. Was hillarious, and none of the food was actually cooked, it was all done in a microwave

BBC News - Little Chef to close 67 outlets costing around 500 jobs

Agree 100%.

Online Reputation is becoming more and more important every year. I'm anal about ours, and dive on any negative comment when I find it. Tools such Google alerts are invaluable.

But with so many online marketeers, SEOers, hobbyists, professionals and inbetween, it is getting quite easy to stand out from the crowd. The crowd just want a quick link dump, and as you say, pointless forum post, blog comment, 5 line article etc.

People who take their reputations seriously, and want to be known and associated across multiple online medias, spend time and craft comments. They understand the idea of communities, and the power and influence a positive reputation or perceived knowledge of a particular area can have on their business.

You can see it on this forum and countless others, the quality responses, and the passing through link dumpers. It doesn't take long to spot familiar posters across multiple forums and blogs etc who are making a name for themselves, which can generate familiarity and trust. The rest of the crowd tends to disappear into a link chasing and dumping frenzy, with all the single line posters poor efforts blurring into one.

The 21st century has changed the way we do business. Companies now actively go out and engage with their customers or prospective customers via social media. Nobody has to put up with bad service any more, it takes about 5 minutes now to do any research on any company in the world. How anyone can not take their online reputation seriously, or would risk damaging it is beyond me. Whats worth more? People associating the web link in your signature as a trust worthy resource or even potential supplier. Or associating the link with low quality posts, spam, and steering well clear.

Unfortunately Johnny Spammer and Mr low quality link dumper are here to stay, just looked at our Spam Blocker stats, in the last 6 months, we have automatically blocked 57,324 spam user registrations! But then that's why I personally think its quite easy to shine...

The majority of people can't be bothered

Great story if you haven't seen it.

Google got caught red handed doing paid links for its Chrome Browser download page, breaking its own T&C's, so demoted it's PageRank to 0 for 60 days

Matt Cutts (Googles SEO Public face) said that after the penalty period, Chrome's download page could be returned to its search good graces. "Someone on the Chrome side can submit a reconsideration request documenting their cleanup just like any other company would," Cutts said.

Google downgrades Chrome ranking after paid-link monkey business - Computerworld

Guess that answers the question, who polices the police, it's the police

Sam is back in the house! Its been quiet without you