Yearly Archives: 2011
Ian Lurie21 Mar, 2011
Writers: Portent needs YOU
If you’re a writer looking for freelance gigs, Portent needs YOU. We’re looking for great writers to do high-quality blog posts, articles and series on topics ranging from cloud computing and security to bikinis. Here’s the thing: Portent’s internal team is fantastic. They produce training, promotional and news content for our clients and have hit… Read More
Elizabeth Marsten17 Mar, 2011
Google Product Feed Updates & Rich Snippets
Technically this information isn’t strictly PPC, but it sure affects you if you are running or using a product feed for things like Product Extension Ads or Product Listing Ads and the feed suddenly disappears, disabling all your precious AdWords attributes and rendering the Auto Targets tab useless. Tragic, right? So here is a breakdown… Read More
Featured Ian Lurie15 Mar, 2011
Great ideas I got from Guy Kawasaki’s Enchantment
Guy Kawasaki is an egotistical jerk. That was my first impression. I was at Gnomedex a few years back. He stood up in front of the audience and said, “I’ve got lots of stuff I can talk about.” Then he presented three possibilities and let us choose. Are you kidding me? He didn’t even prepare?!… Read More
Ian Lurie14 Mar, 2011
Fluffy rainbow bunnies devour marketing agencies
OK, I have to admit: This post seemed better when I was slightly drunk and buzzed on sugar. But, I enjoy being mocked, so I’m putting it out there anyway: In a typical marketing agency, the fluffy rainbow bunnies prevail. Every idea has to get a fair shake. Every person has to get their say.… Read More
Ian Lurie11 Mar, 2011
The content revolution is coming, and it’s full of crap
‘2011 is the Year of Content!!!!’ That’s what the addled woman who smelled slightly of sour beer belched into her cell phone yesterday. We were both waiting in line to get food at the airport. She said it as if she’d just discovered the secret business success. She saved me $10, though, because when I… Read More
Ian Lurie10 Mar, 2011
Log files bring sexy back
Log files may not seem sexy. But if you want to do some better on- and offsite optimization, in less time, then you need to learn to use them. But first, a little history. My life as a college sex symbol In college and law school, I raced bikes. That’s bicycles. I sucked. And I… Read More
Doug Antkowiak10 Mar, 2011
Update: Facebook Iframe Bug Fixed!
Note: The following post was written on March 10, 2011. Facebook has since fixed Bug 15200 and pushed back the deadline for creating new FBML apps to Friday, March 18th as announced on the Facebook Developer Blog. Having trouble viewing a Facebook iframe via https? You’re not alone. When the Portent development team was hard… Read More
Ian Lurie9 Mar, 2011
New Hootsuite Analytics Reporting: First look
Hootsuite just launched a new analytics tool, and it’s pretty slick. It doesn’t do anything new, but it integrates Hootsuite, Google Analytics and other data in a really elegant, white-label-able interface. Cool features include: Nice PDF report export; Basic branding: Put in your logo, contact info; Track Google Analytics against retweets; Track Facebook likes/unlikes all… Read More
Featured Ian Lurie7 Mar, 2011
Generic link-building post designed to piss people off
SEO is dead for [insert industry here]. It’s all [choose one: Black Hat SEOs, Google, Bing, gremlins]’s fault. All SEOs are liars, so don’t listen to what they say. Don’t bother arguing, because I’m a(n) [choose one: expert, guru, god, jedi] of [choose one: business, marketing, internet marketing, SEO, spouting manure]. This post inspired by… Read More
Ian Lurie4 Mar, 2011
Cash flow management tips for marketing agencies
Unless you’re some huge, international conglomerate, you have cash flow problems. If you’re a huge, international conglomerate, then you’ve traded up to ‘liquidity crises’ and lay off 500 hapless employees when you’re in trouble. I don’t have experience with that. I do have experience with small agency cash flow. I guess these fit for any… Read More
Ian Lurie2 Mar, 2011
The perfect internet marketing dashboard
I want the perfect marketing dashboard. But I can never seem to find it. Here’s what it needs to look like: Why is that so hard? If I’m missing something, let me know.
Ian Lurie1 Mar, 2011
Science fiction and your web site revenue plan
Yep, I’m finally getting into the infographics game. Here’s my sketch of where most corporate internet revenue planning seems to end up: Yeah, I’m keeping the day job, don’t worry.
Ryan Moothart28 Feb, 2011
Three Keys to PPC Ad Copy You Should Be Aware of
Google processes nearly one billion search queries every single day. If you estimate that an average of four ads show per search query, it would mean Google shows around four billion PPC ads in a 24 hour period. Needless to say, that’s an absurd amount of online advertising being broadcast out to the world. With… Read More
Tom Schmitz24 Feb, 2011
Smart Internal Linking for SEO
If you charted your website’s internal links does it possess a logical order to it or does it look like a plate of spaghetti? Be careful before you answer. Strip away all the design and page names. Think of your site as dots (pages) and lines (links). Many websites try to link too many pages… Read More
Random Ian Lurie23 Feb, 2011
25 tips for building your own agency
These are the 25 tips I gave at my SearchFest presentation today. These are from the heart, based on my own personal screw-ups over a 16-year career (so far) running my own agency. Running your own agency is like wrestling with a s–t-covered bear. You may get mauled and eaten. You may win. But at… Read More