Agog Digital Marketing Strategy Ltd (Agog Digital) was awarded as the No.1 Hong Kong search engine optimization (SEO) company in March 2011 by an independent search authority, Topseos.

Agog Digital is really pleased with the achievement, especially as Agog Digital insists in using white-hat SEO techniques only. “In Hong Kong, many SEO service providers adopt search engine spamming techniques commonly referred to as black-hat techniques. It can gain a quick-fix result but may risk clients’ websites’ long-term presence in search engines,” Mr. Jimsun Lui, Senior Project Manager of Agog Digital said.

“When SEO is done properly, it can help clients’ websites to get found by hundreds or even thousands of keyword phrases free and without paying the expensive pay-per-click search advertising fee to search engines. However, search engine ranking algorithm is complex and evolving, and it requires in-depth knowledge and hand-on experience to optimize a website and gain maximum search engine visibility,” Jimsun further elaborated.

Topseos compiles the monthly list of leading Internet marketing firms after a rigorous evaluation criteria that includes:
- Competitive advantage
- Superior services and pricing
- Customer and technical support
- Response to client problems
- Innovations that set it apart from the competition
- Overall efficiency
- Overall performance

“The whole industry looks to us to identify reliable and accurate benchmarks and Agog Digital Marketing Strategy has proven by its performance that they deserve to be awarded,” shared Jeev Trika, partner at topseos.

For more information about Agog Digital, visit http://www.agogdigital.com or http://seo.agogdigital.com

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The website from Direct foreign investment of Hong Kong provides useful information for those who want to setup business in Hong Kong, the useful links include:

hong kong company incorporation

Business Registration

open business bank account

Hong Kong tax system

Hong Kong innovation and technology industry

If you want to understand Hong Kong business environment, Hong Kong Lifestyle, , you should also visit the site.

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Sometimes, you may want to design and make your own business card, and see the design if you like it.  If you can do it online without technical skills required, it is sweet.  You may consider using the following online business card maker tool:

http://www.degraeve.com/business-cards/

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British firms are making the most of the internet by getting on board with social networking.

British companies are using social media to build their brand, a new report has found.

UK small and medium-sized firms (SMEs) are as likely to have a dedicated social media page than they are to accept payments online for a parcel delivery, according to a study from the Boston Consulting Group.

Commissioned by Google, the report shows that 30 per cent of SMEs have a social media page, while 29 per cent accept online payments. A fifth of firms has corporate blogs or make Twitter updates.

The study authors describe the UK as ranking first in e-commerce globally, with the country’s online economy worth 7.2 per cent of GDP.

Google managing director for the UK and Ireland Matt Brittin said the internet has changed the way people do business.

“Now for the first time we can see how its adoption by British business has become a major contributor to the UK’s GDP and that the internet is a central pillar of the UK’s economy,” he added.

The news comes after IMRG/Capgemini reported that e-retail sales surged in September to £4.8 billion, up 24 per cent on the same month in 2009.

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You can find ample of ecommerce websites online, many are offering similar type of products/services which makes the competition very fierce. There are certain traits which differentiates successful ecommerce websites from the normal ones. Manner in which a visitor perceives a site makes a large difference. It can be referred as visual effect of a website on a visitor. A site that looks pleasing to the eyes has high appealing, it has to be attractive in terms of content, graphics, images, animations, website layout, etc. Complete look of the website should be presentable and convincing, do not overstuff it with images and content. Ecommerce website design should look professional and clean.

A visitor should get feel good factor when they visit your site. In a professional language smooth navigation is expected by the users. Easy and user-friendly navigation goes a long way in holding back the prospective customers. With minimum number of clicks a user should be able to find what they are looking for in your website. Professionally the product description is best kept at the third level which is accessed by third click of the mouse. Overall layout must be simple and easily understandable too. Visitors should not feel lost or confused when scrolling through your site.

Successful closing a deal is the final and important step of every sales process. Likewise in online shopping ‘the check out processes is the final thing to do. The ecommerce website owner has to take note of many small details while planning it. Like its length, the details that has to be discussed here for customers sake. Certain important issues have to be addressed while designing the check out process in an ecommerce website. If this last step is not perfect, you may lose the customer at the final moment.

Most obvious reason why people are hesitant shopping online is products can only be seen not touched or felt. No matter how attractive the visual image of the product is, the buyer has to get convinced about its features and quality. Here comes the importance of a well-framed product description. Complete information in a professional set-up prepares strong base for product selling.

Many people who are new to ecommerce website concept are afraid to do online money transactions. They want that their personal financial details are not misused. Thus financial data security should be given through online security certifications like SSL and use PayPal like methods which are well known and trusted payment junctions.

Source:

SPINX – is a Leading Web Development and Web Design New York company providing different services of Ecommerce Web Design New York, Website Design and Graphic Design in New York and Worldwide.

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Despite some skepticism about America’s appetite for purchasing digital virtual goods in games and on the internet, the “virtual goods” market is growing at a healthy clip, according to an industry report issued Tuesday.

The research group Inside Network says the U.S. virtual goods market will hit $2.1 billion in 2011, up from $1.6 billion this year.

The group, which also owns a blog about Facebook, attributes much of the growth in that market to social online games like “FarmVille.”

“One of the biggest trends we see in the technology industry in general right now is the growth of social gaming, and how it already has become nearly a billion-dollar market itself just in the past couple of years, primarily on the Facebook platform,” said Justin Smith, founder of Inside Network.

Inside Network released a summary of its report to CNN in advance of its release on Tuesday but would not make the full text of its report public.

Nick Thomas, an analyst at Forrester Research, said the size of the virtual goods market is difficult to define and that, in general, purchase of online and digital goods is still outside the mainstream.

“There are a few companies doing this very well and executing this very well, so by the time you factor in ‘World of Warcraft’ and one or two others, then you’ve probably got a fair chunk of the market,” he said. “There are not hundreds and hundreds of companies doing this well.”

One problem for the industry, Thomas said, is that only 1 to 2 percent of people who play social games actually purchase goods to keep playing.

Generally, players can opt to buy digital goods and equipment that will help them play a game more successfully, or they could log more hours in the game to earn those bonuses and power-ups. The term virtual goods refers to digital items that are purchased for use online, in games and on mobile phones.

Online news stories could be considered virtual goods in the loosest sense, Thomas said, since some people will pay for an article that does not exist — or at least is not tangible — in the real world.

Inside Network, which based its analysis on dozens of interviews with companies and investors involved in the virutal goods market, says it includes the following areas in its analysis: social games, online free-to-play games, virtual worlds, mobile games, and purchases made through console gaming systems.

Mainstream media companies would be smart to watch the development of the virtual goods market, Thomas said.

“The big media companies are rightly trying to keep on top of emerging trends,” he said. “Whatever’s hot for consumers, they should be on top of and try to understand.”

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More than 190 million visitors per month isn’t bad for a web phenomenon that is widely criticised for being inconsequential, ephemeral and narcissistic. But despite the huge popularity of Twitter, which scores 370,000 new users every day, making money out of its customers has proved more of a challenge – until yesterday, when the social network unveiled a new look that will have advertisers salivating. 

 The changes, which will hit all users’ screens over the next few weeks, see a two-pane layout replacing the straightforward list of tweets; the second pane can perform a number of functions, but the most significant is displaying media content relating to that tweet without the user having to visit another website.

 Yesterday’s launch was, according to Twitter co-founder Evan Williams, “not for the sake of advertisers”. But the redesign will excite marketeers traditionally inhibited by the site’s stripped-back look. Twitter may finally be on the brink of demonstrating why $160m [£103m] of venture capital has been ploughed into the company so far.

Twitter’s popularity – much like Google’s – has been built on its simplicity. You post a message, or a link to a website, and anyone bothering to pay attention will see it. If they want to, they can reply. Easy. But as Twitter has grown and new uses have been found for it by individuals and organisations, there has been a heavy reliance on third-party services that help to organise and display Twitter-related data in more user-friendly ways.

 Applications such as TweetDeck or Seesmic help fit more information on one screen; it could be an image-hosting service like yFrog or Twitpic; or devices that shortened web addresses such as is.gd that help squeeze long URLs into Twitter’s 140-character limit. In effect, a whole industry has grown up around enhancing Twitter and addressing its shortcomings. Williams himself admitted to shortcomings at yesterday’s launch, and this revamp is a bold attempt to persuade the estimated 22 per cent of users who tweet without visiting the site itself that it is time to come back.

 No wonder advertisers are eager; thus far, marketing messages on the service have been restricted to “promoted tweets” (the opportunity for a company’s tweet to appear at the top of Twitter search results) and “sponsored trends” (corporate branding of a topic that’s getting a lot of attention). Even these have been shown to be powerful; Coca-Cola’s recent foray into sponsored trends saw them achieve 86 million page impressions in 24 hours.

 Twitter users are regarded as less passive than the average web user, and with more screen “real estate” now available to advertisers, their engagement is predicted to become more intense.

 As the new-look Twitter gains traffic and collects more data about our clicking habits and interests, it will become even more valuable in the corporate world as advertisements can be targeted at users more specifically. The only danger Twitter faces is the risk of upsetting a significant proportion of its users who aren’t concerned about commercial pressures on the company, and would rather have an ad-free experience.

 Facebook’s past blunders in particular have shown that our tolerance of prominent marketing messages can be low. Twitter has always prided itself on a gently-gently approach; the new-look site will be introduced slowly, with the opportunity to switch to the old interface if we wish. But a Twitter service that’s so light on advertising can’t last for ever; after all, a business without an income isn’t a business at all.

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Online marketers understand the importance of getting top search engine rankings in major search engines. Therefore, they spend many time in optimizing website content. However, many of them ignore the fact that web design structure has a role in search engine optimization (SEO). To acquire top search engine ranking, you cannot totally rely on web designers because they could be good at web design but not good at SEO.

This article reveals several important web design elements you must consider during website optimization process.

1. CSS Stylesheet

It is recommended to use CSS stylesheet to format your website layout because it can standardize the appearance of your website. For the sake of convenience, some web designers use internal CSS. It is no good! You should use external CSS stylesheet so that your HTML coding becomes consise, and mainly compose of your website content. It is an essential SEO practice.

2. Content Management Software (CMS)

If you use CMS to manage your website, make sure your CMS provides these features:

a. Allows you to define different templates for different sections/pages. It gives you flexibility in optimizing website content.

b. Allows you to define Title and Meta tags for different web pages. Again, it gives you flexibility in optimizing every web page.

c. Allows you to generate static HTML pages instead of dynamic pages. Search engines are not good at reading dynamic web page. Accoding to Google webmaster guideline, Google may not index dynamic URL with more than 2 parameters within the URL.

If your web pages cannot get indexed, you definitely get no rankings no matter how many SEO effort you make.

3. HTML Code Compliance

As a good web design practice, make sure your HTML coding is compliant to some well recognized HTML standards such as W3C standard. Some search engine optimizers reported that non-compliant web design could cause difficulties for search engines to index and analyze your website. It hinders your website to get top search engine ranking.

4. Use of Graphics

You must optimize the file size of your images. As search engines like to read text, you should consider avoiding the use of graphics near top of your website, whenever it is possible.

5. Multiple-level Navigation Menu

Many websites use Javascript to build multiple-level navigation menu. However, the Javascript code usually leaves in the HTML body, it makes the HTML coding becomes bulky. This is no good in terms of SEO. I recommend seperate Javascrpt from HTML coding by using external Javascript file.

6. Bad Web Design

To make your web design search engine friendly, you must consider avoiding:

a. Use of frame. Search engines have difficulties to index all your frameset. Even though they can index some frame pages, users would only access to part of your webpages only in case they can find your website from search engines, e.g., only see a left-hand side navigation menu with a blank page on the right-hand side.

b. Re-direct techniques. For some reasons, web designers may make some redirect pages or adopt Javascript re-direct techniques and redirect visitors from one page to another content pages. Search engines do not welcome these techniques due to the potential of spamming.

7. Full Flash Site

Web designers may sell you to build a flash website or make a flash intro page as your home page. Their point is that flash makes your website more appealing and it will improve effectiveness of your website. However, it is not always the case.

Visitors want to find information fast. Flash sometimes could make your website very slow and require visitors to install plugins before they can see your website. In terms of SEO, simply speaking, search engines treat flash as a graphic and cannot analyze content inside a flash file. The implication means a flash website is hard to get top search engine ranking.

Conclusion:

For small business to succeed online, you must strike a balance between SEO and fancy web design. A too fancy web design, in many cases, cannot give you any business as no one can find your website from search engines and the “entertaining” elements sometimes annoy your visitors.

Source:  Provided by SEO expert from Agog Digital Marketing Strategy.

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The search marketing team of Yahoo! says that firms need to upgrade their search engine optimization (SEO) campaign to make sure they get better return investments.

In the search engine’s blog, marketers were advised to do proper keyword selections, saying that this area is important especially when a company starts using professional SEO services.

Depending on the goal of an SEO campaign, sites will need to focus on high-volume search terms or product-specific phrases.

It is also important for an SEO campaign to respond to consumer behavior.

The Yahoo! marketing team explained: “Users are more sophisticated in their searches now, and we’ve seen that up to 20 per cent of searches in any given month can be search queries never seen before by a search engine.”

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If you have an AdWords campaign set up to reach searchers using Google’s mobile search, you’ve got a new feature to enhance your efforts. Google is enabling click-to-call phone numbers in the ads that appear on mobile web browsers.

Google Jan. 28 took its AdWords click-to-call ad program out of beta, offering advertisers a potentially lucrative new way to connect with their target audiences through high-end smartphones with HTML Web browsers.

Click-to-call ads let advertisers add local business numbers alongside their destination URLs in mobile search ads. When users of smartphones, such as Apple’s iPhone or Google’s Nexus One, search for a local business from their mobile phone and stumble upon ads that have these numbers, smartphone users can click on the ads’ phone numbers and a call is automatically generated. If a smartphone user is searching for a local pizza place on their mobile device, then they can now simply click on the ads phone number and order up their favorite pie.

Since Google’s mobile click-to-call ads are generated based on location, if your company is a chain, an ad will be served up with the closest location to a user – and will contain the appropriate phone number. This Adword feature is important because it allows users to find out the most approriate phone number when the company has multiple shops.

How to utilize this Adwords feature?  To add click-to-call in mobile AdWords ads, simply set up location extensions and add your business phone number. Then make sure your campaign is set up to appear on mobile devices with full Internet browsers.

Google explained its rationale for offering such ads, and how searches made on mobile devices differ from those on computers, in a blog post:

“When people search for goods or services using their mobile phones, they often prefer to call a store rather than visit that store’s Website. Whether they’re placing a direct order, making a reservation or inquiring about services, the ability for prospective customers to easily call your business is a key distinguishing feature of searches made on mobile phones versus computers.”

BroadPoint AmTech analyst Benjamin Schachter said in a research note advertisers pay the same cost-per-click for a call as they would for a “click-through” to the destination URL.

Schachter added that a meaningful percentage of mobile queries are for phone numbers or local information, making a phone number associated with an ad a highly relevant component on a search engine results page.

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