Archive for August 2009

My favourite web browser, Firefox, has now been downloaded more than 1 billion times. The milestone was passed last Friday, just as users start to upgrade to Firefox 3.5.

Firefox was first released in 2004 by the Mozilla foundation, since which time it has gone through several upgrades and developments. It’s a so called ‘open source’ platform, meaning that the code is made available to anyone who is interested. This also means that developers other than Mozilla are free to add ‘extras’ that can be downloaded separately by users.

The billion downloads indicates that Firefox has around a third of the browser market. I just checked Google analytics for our WebEden.co.uk and I can see that around 20% of visitors are using Firefox.

As you can see from the image, Microsoft’s Internet Explorer continues to lead the market. Google Chrome, Apple Safari and Opera all have just a few users. The continued growth of Firefox is very much at the expense of Internet Explorer. In my view that’s hardly surprising – you can read about why I like Firefox more than Internet Explorer.

The reason that Microsoft is so far ahead in the first place is that they bundled Internet Explorer with all computers running a Microsoft operating system, making it the default browser in every case. Microsoft is in talks with European competition regulators so that European buyers of the new Windows 7 operating system can choose from a range of browsers..

This isn’t the first time Firefox has broken records. Last year it set a new Guinness world record for the most downloaded software in 24 hours when Firefox 3 was downloaded more than eight million times.

You can track the total number of downloads on the Mozilla website, where they have set up a a new website, OneBillionPlusYou.com, in celebration of the milestone.

Are you a Firefox convert, or have you stuck with IE? Any Chrome, Safari or Opera users out there? Leave us a comment below.

This is where we start to open up the whole world of Google, to make sure that you are taking full advantage of all the services that the big G can bring you. Google is so much more than just a search engine. Its services including advertising, web analytics, mapping, email, spreadsheets… the list goes on. Google produces new products at a prolific rate, as we revealed in our Google the innovator series. And if you’re building a website, Google is there to help. The first step to gain access to all these great tools is to set up a Google account. Here’s how.

We reported previously that Microsoft’s newest search engine Bing had had a strong entry into the US market. And early data from Hitwise indicated that in the UK too it was do(b)ing pretty well, despite that lack of advertising support.

But more comprehensive data from Neilsen out this week shows that far from taking the UK market by storm, Bing is making little headway this side of the pond.

Whilst Bing reached 7 million unique visitors in May, that figure had dropped to just 6.4 million in June, down 7.7%. This decline reflects research published earlier this month by JP Morgan indicating that whilst users were prepared to try Bing out, they were far less likely to make a permanent switch away from Google.

In terms of ranking by unique users, this puts Bing 5th in the UK market behind Google, Google Image Search, Yahoo and Ask.com.

“While it’s very early days, Bing has no impact on the UK search results and hasn’t caused a ripple effect. The market remains very stable and hasn’t changed much in the past couple of years” said Alex Burmaster, European internet analyst at The Nielsen Company,.

Google continued to dominate, increasing its user base by 2.2% in June, with 31.6 million unique visitors.

In the UK we are yet to see the impact of Microsoft’s’ planned marketing activity for Bing, due here in the new year. Whilst it feels like we’re been talking about Bing for a while, ask your non-techie friends if they’ve ever heard of it – I bet you the answer would be no. And now of course with Microsoft and Yahoo combining their search business in the next few months, maybe Microsoft is less concerned about Bing standing on its own two feet, since it will become the default search engine on Yahoo too.

Have you been tempted away from Google? Does Bing have a feature you particularly like? Leave us a comment below.

The Twitterverse are wise too it, and even occasional tweeters are by now aware: the Twitter homepage has had a make over.

The changes are designed to help newbies find their way around the service, and understand what Tweeting is all about.

On his blog, Co-founder of Twitter Biz Stone said: “Helping people access Twitter in more relevant and useful ways upon first introduction lowers the barrier to accessing the value Twitter has to offer and presents the service more consistently with how it has evolved”.

Erm. Right.

He also said that Twitter had changed focus from a “rudimentary social tool based on the concept of status messages” into “a new kind of communication and a valuable source of timely information.”

And he added, in case we weren’t all having a good time:  “Also its fun.”

There’s no doubt that what people are Tweeting about varies hugely. Just have a glance at the ‘trending topics’ for sample of this. At the same time that some are talking about Iran, others are on about blue M&Ms.

The really big change, and the one that has got all the marketers excited, is the refocusing of the homepage into a search box. ‘Real time search’ – finding out what people are talking and writing about right now – is where it gets interesting. Giving businesses the chance to tap into this is where the money is going to be for Twitter.

This change is also reflected in the more weighty strapline. Twitter has gone from “What are you doing?” to “share and discover what’s happening right now, anywhere in the world.”

This is the first of many steps that Twitter is taking to hit its user target of 1bn by 2013.

Have a look at the Twitter homepage. Does it make the point of Twitter a little bit more obvious? Leave us a comment below.

Last week we invited everyone to submit articles and ideas for a guest posting on the WebEden blog. To kick it off, we’ve a couple of articles by Alison Cross from AlisonCross4Webs.co.uk on how to spot Spam on Twitter. Over to Alison.

How to spot Spam on Twitter

This is a screen shot from my own new Twitter account.  This area of an account can help you slice your spam.

1    See my ‘friendly web maker’ logo?  Real people load up logos or photos.  Spammers tend to keep the brown double-circle Twitter logo or have a ¾ pose of a really pretty girl. Beware; she may be a spam lure!  Look for additional clues…

2    Look at the yellow bio column, you can see that my followers/following ratio looks reasonable.  Spammers follow thousands of people and have few followers.  The followers they do have are accounts that have an automatic-follow set up, or worse, just other spambots.  Exceptions to this rule are well known names or brands.  Join the hundreds of thousands following Stephen Fry with gay abandon.

3    My postings are a mix of replies, questions and broadcast information. Anyone who just has solely broadcast information MAY just be spam….or a business whom you are following purely for info, not to chat with – eg @bbc @cnn.

Note: Many spammers have no tweets at all.  They are just building up a list to sell off the ‘parked’ twitter account to an advertising company ;-)  Am I sounding cynical?!

4    RT spam (retweeting spam). This is when spammers retweet one of your postings and, because you are flattered that someone thinks you’re so informative or witty that they share your comment with their followers.  You may be tempted to follow them (after all, they have shown some discernment by retweeting YOU!). Don’t be fooled, zip over to their timeline and check the above points – you’ll find that lots of them are spammers.

Finally, don’t block someone just because you can’t see an obvious reason why they would want to follow you. Twitter is about building up links, either for chatting or for business. Not every stranger is a spammer, some of them might turn out to be future customers.  Have fun!

Next week we’ve got the second part of this guest article: How to slice through Spam on Twitter.

About Alison Cross

Alison Cross lives on the Isle of Bute where she has built over a dozen websites using our software. She also helps people use Twitter to market their business. For more info or advice, contact see her website alisoncross4webs.co.uk.

Anyone following the news last week will have noticed the proposed hook up between Microsoft’s search business and Yahoo.

The two companies have been dancing around each other for the last 18 months, ever since Yahoo rejected a $45billion take over bid by Microsoft.

Since then of course Yahoo have had a change of leader with Carol Bartz stepping in to fill the shoes of departing founder Jerry Yang.

The last 18 months has also been filled by the ever expanding influence of Google, coupled with little or no innovation from Yahoo.

Under the terms of the deal, Microsoft’s new search engine ‘Bing’ will become the default search engine on Yahoo under a revenue-sharing deal.

For the first couple of years, Yahoo would keep 100% of the revenue generated, plus a further 10% – all according to tech blog AllThingsD. In the third year, Yahoo’s share would drop to 90%

The deal would give MicroHoo / YahSoft a combined market share of 30% of the US search ad market. This compares to Google’s 65%.

The US Department of Justice may well stand in the way of any deal, possibly seeing it as a collapse of competition. Last year a search ad deal between Yahoo and Google was blocked by the regulators. .

All this is probably a bigger deal in the US than it is in the UK, were Google’s market share is nearer 90%.

What does this mean if you’re trying to drive visitors to your website? Well it’s quite interesting. If you’re using sponsored search advertising (PPC), then it means that Microsoft’s AdCenter will be used more and more. That brought a collective groan in our office since it’s hardly the easiest thing to use.

When it comes to Search Engine Optimisation (SEO), things may get more complicated. At the moment all SEO optimisation efforts are made to boost a website up the results pages on Google, since that is where the vast majority of traffic comes from. If a second powerful player emerges, website owners will have to optimise for both. And since they have different ways of categorising and indexing web pages, that could be complicated. You don’t want to have to have two websites – one that you boost up Google, and the other that you boost up Bing!

What do you think of the deal? Will it have an influence on your website building? Leave us a comment below.

Ever since we started selling domain names, the most common support queries we have concern setting up email services on a domain name. WebEden gives away 5 free email addresses with every domain, which means you can send and receive email with your own personalised website address. You can access the email service either through webmail or using a desktop client such as Outlook.

For those who prefer written instruction, please see our earlier posts.

This is how you set up your first email address.

This is how to set up your webmail.

And this is how to set up your email using a desktop client such as Outlook.

For those who prefer a video tutorial, check this:

Let us know if you have any problems

Over the last few months an increasing number of you have been leaving comments, ideas and points as feedback on this blog. There’s lots of people who have lots to say, and your passion for building websites and all things Internet is plain to see.

So would any of you like to write a guest piece on this blog? If you’ve got something interesting, unique or relevant to say about building a website, search engines, social networking or any of the other topics we cover on here then please get in touch.

We can discuss your ideas, and if you’re happy to go ahead then its up to you.

Apart from the satisfaction of knowing that your opinion will be read by upwards of 10,000 people, you will also have the opportunity to talk about your own website and of course include a link back to your site.

My email adddress is ken@webeden.net. I look forward to hearing from you!

I hope that if you’re reading this you like building websites and you want to get more out of yours, and make it work a bit harder.

Research published last week by dotCommerce has revealed that many retailers in the UK are not making the most of their websites. They’re failing to use up to the minute tools, widgets and best practice on their sites. This means that they’re missing out on repeat visits, high value sales, and are spurning any brand loyalty their visitors may have.

The research looked at 20 of the UK’s largest high street retailers. Whilst most were found to have at least basic ecommerce functionality on their sites, many are missing out on the potential that Web 2.0 can bring them.

What do we mean by Web 2.0? It basically describes websites where the informational flow is not just company to customer, but goes the other way too, with customers contributing to and giving feedback on the website.

The sorts of things we’re talking about are blogs, videos, and user generated content such as reviews and comments. The 20 websites in the study also demonstrated little or no integration with other marketing tools such as email and social media sites.

The ones that score the highest were Marks and Spencer (82%) and John Lewis (78%). These were judged to have gone “beyond the basics” to deliver a rich website experience to visitors.

At the other end of the list were health and beauty retailers such as Virgin Vie At Home (62%), The Fragrance Shop (56%) and Avon (54%).

Most of the retailers simply placed their products on the page and allowed people to buy them. Just 45% had any kind of editorial on their sites. Only 10% had any kind of user comments or reviews. A mere 15% had a blog.

What they do get right is customer support: all scored high marks here.

dotCommerce Technical Director Simon Bird said: “With competition for every consumer pound at an all time high, it’s more important than ever for retailers to engage with visitors to their sites.

“It is also important to recognise the role that ecommerce sites can play in encouraging shoppers to sign-up for other marketing and promotional efforts, such as email marketing or loyalty schemes.

“This allows the retailer to begin building long-term relationships with consumers and maximising revenue from their existing base.”

What does this mean for you and your website? In short, it’s a huge opportunity. If the very wealthiest companies are failing to provide a great experience to their visitors, make sure you are using all the tools within WebEden to deliver them.

To start with, make sure your users have access to rich information about the product or service you’re trying to sell them. Don’t just place it on the page with a ‘buy now’ button.

In terms of Web 2.0, look at the option of adding social bookmarking features, forums, email to a friend, and of course a blog. Use the new membership features in order to allow people to become members of your website. Integrate your site with both Facebook and Twitter, and use your social networks to reach out to new people. All these things will transform your site from one that is just a shop front, into one with which visitors can have a real, rich relationship.

And make sure you get customer service right too. Make your phone number, email and contact details easily accessible. Make sure you respond to customers in a timely fashion.

And of course if you do get positive feedback and reviews, ask the people leaving those to do so on the sites that might influence other purchasers. You can read our previous post on getting good reviews.

Have you given your web visitors a better experience than our high street competitors? Leave us a comment below.

Adobe have recently put out a bulletin that advises users to check and upgrade the version of Flash Player that they are using. So we’re passing that advice on to you. All customers of WebEden should update their Flash Player version if they are currently running v9.0.159.0 and v10.0.22.87 for Windows, Macintosh, Linux and Solaris. Adobe are strongly recommending this upgrade.

To check which version of the Adobe Flash Player that you’re running on your PC, access the ‘About Flash Player page‘, or right-click on any Flash content and then select “About Adobe Flash Player” from the menu. If you use lots of different browsers (such as Internet Explorer, Firefox, Safari, Opera etc) on the same computer, make sure you perform the check for each browser you have installed. The page will indicate the ‘Version Information’ in a boxed section and list the version number e.g. “You have version 10,0,22,87 installed”.

If you are currently running Adobe Flash Player 9.0.246.0 or 10.0.32.18 then you don’t need to do anything. That’s the latest version.

However if you are running another version – especially v9.0.159.0 and v10.0.22.87 – then Adobe are recommending that you upgrade to the most recent version of the player. You can do this through the Flash Player Download Centre and take advantage of security updates.

If you want any more information about this, then check out the Adobe Website Bulletin page.