Articles by Ian Lurie
Ian Lurie // 28 Apr, 2006
SEO, Trust and Other Issues
An article on Search Engine Watch notes that around 90% of American consumers now distrust advertising. That’s a lot. It’s also a fairly new development. How do you respond? One strategy is to focus on marketing venues that aren’t perceived as advertising. Search engines are a great example. Online PR/Blog marketing is another. It’s easy… Read More
Ian Lurie // 31 Mar, 2006
Fifty Reasons
Scott Heiferman has a great list of 50 reasons folks don’t use your web site: 50 Reasons Why It’s a great read. Enjoy!
Ian Lurie // 29 Mar, 2006
Amazon Marketing Bloopers
Mike sent me a priceless e-mail from Amazon.com. Here’s the important content: “For the next few days, you can pre-order your copy at a savings of 0% by following the link below.” Then below you see that the price is $6.96, for a savings of $.03. No doubt, this was generated by some of Amazon’s… Read More
Ian Lurie // 24 Mar, 2006
Ugly Websites Win
Ugly websites work best. Think back on the most successful sites on the internet: Google? Ugly. Craigslist? Ugly. Ebay? Ugly. Yahoo? Most successful when they were ugly. IMDB.com? Astonishingly ugly. And right behind them come Blogger.com, Amazon.com, etc.. None of these sites will win any design awards. They have faces only an investor could love.
These sites succeed because they put message and function first, form second…
Ian Lurie // 13 Mar, 2006
When Creativity Overcomes Good Sense
The state of Washington is launching a new, $442,000 marketing campaign. They undoubtedly invested a lot of time in coming up with a slogan to rival ‘I love NY’ and ‘What happens here, stays here’. In the end they came up with ‘SayWA’. Yes, SayWA. Huh? After choking on my morning cereal, I decided that… Read More
Ian Lurie // 17 Feb, 2006
Most Web ‘Pros’ Don’t Measure
You don’t have to take it from me. A Forrester Report states that only 13% of web professionals at 89 online companies said they actually measure the ROI of all web site changes. Only half said they measure the ROI of major changes. Half said they don’t measure the ROI of any changes at all,… Read More
Ian Lurie // 13 Feb, 2006
Search Engine Optimization Fraud
The Wall Street Journal posted an article about a search engine optimization company called Traffic Power. It’s a great lesson in how not to hire an SEO firm. Traffic Power’s tactics included ‘doorway pages’, which are pages invisible to users but crawlable by search engines. These pages are packed with keywords, in order to draw… Read More
Ian Lurie // 1 Feb, 2006
Judging, 2: That Cover Thing Again
Previously, I talked about the moment when a web site visitor decides to stay or leave. Seth Godin has another great post about it: Wait!. Be smart, be focused, and don’t ignore the needs/wants/questions of your audience, or they’ll end up ignoring you.
Ian Lurie // 31 Jan, 2006
Tested, Two: In A Nutshell
Tested Advertising Methods distills marketing and advertising down to a few critical rules: That which works, sells. That which looks good and works, sells better. That which looks good but doesn’t work, sells nothing. No wonder I love this book… See my previous post about this book.
Ian Lurie // 31 Jan, 2006
Tested Advertising Methods
I am rereading Tested Advertising Methods, by John Caples. It’s the definitive work on effective advertising, copy and ad testing. If you want to learn all there is to know about successful ad campaigns, read this book. It provides great insight into testing ad campaigns and then adjusting those campaigns for the best results. Here’s… Read More
Ian Lurie // 17 Jan, 2006
Judging a Book By Its Cover
A Canadian study has shown that users judge the aesthetics of a web site in less than one-twentieth of a second. Translation? The simplest appropriate design is best. In that space of time (less than a blink), do you think your audience will take in ten product photos, five logos, an animated image and a… Read More
Ian Lurie // 15 Jan, 2006
Math Rocks
Business Week has a new article about the growing power of mathematics in our lives. In Internet Marketing math has been essential for some time. As more and more consumers move online, we can construct increasingly accurate models of behavior, and mathematics play a bigger and bigger role in our lives. The real story, though,… Read More
Ian Lurie // 6 Jan, 2006
Why didn’t I think of that?
Nothing else needs to be said, really: www.milliondollarhomepage.com (note – as of 1/13 this site appears to be having some bandwidth issues, so you may get a ‘not found’ or ‘site busy’ error when you click the above link)
Ian Lurie // 30 Dec, 2005
Even More Cookie Hysteria
ABC news has a story up about the White House web site. Apparently, they use WebTrends to measure site traffic, and were horrified to find out that WebTrends uses cookies: http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/wireStory?id=1455081 OK, people, let’s set some priorities, shall we? We face terrorism, domestic spying by the NSA, natural disasters and the like, and we’re writing… Read More
Ian Lurie // 27 Dec, 2005
Google Print Ads: No Measurement, No Joy
Google’s been dabbling in print ads, and the results so far haven’t been great, says Business Week. They cite lack of flexible pricing, higher costs and an inability to target ads the same way Google Adwords does online. I think there’s a different reason: Measurement. Folks flock to Adwords pay-per-click ads because they can measure… Read More