Good Relations microdata for Ecommerce websites

SEO is getting more complex. But it's evolving in good directions. Good Relations is an example of the new ways HTML5 microformats can be used. Structured markup microdata is enabling search engines to be more semantic about search queries -- get better at interpreting the sentences, instead of responding robotically to keywords. 

Google states: "If Google understands your website’s content in a structured way, we can present that content more accurately and more attractively to Google users. For example, our algorithms can enhance your search results with “rich snippets” when we understand that your page is a structured product listing, event, recipe, review, or similar. We can also feature your data in Knowledge Graph panels or in Google Now cards, helping to spread the word about your content."

http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2013/05/getting-started-with-structured-data.html

Also: "By using microdata markup in your web pages, you can specify reviews, people profiles, or events information on your web pages that Google may use to improve the presentation of your pages in Google search results....

Microdata has the nice property of balancing richness with simplicity. As you can see, it’s easy to add markup to your pages using a few HTML attributes like itemscope (to define a new item), itemtype (to specify the type of item being described), and itemprop (to specify a property of that item). Once you’ve added markup to a page, you can test it using the rich snippets testing tool to make sure that Google can parse the data on your page.

As with microformats and RDFa, the vocabulary that we support -- including which item types and item properties are understood by Google -- is specified in our rich snippets documentation as well as on data-vocabulary.org. Marking up your content does not guarantee that rich snippets will show for your site; Google will expand the use of microdata markup gradually to ensure a great user experience."

http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2010/03/microdata-support-for-rich-snippets.html

Schema.org should be implemented in all websites now. Your SEO or web designer should be putting it into your HTML document for your website.

SEO is evolving rapidly. It's now about blogging abundantly, adding new themed webpages based on emerging keywords, video optimizing, image strategy, personalized branding, mobile optimizing, correct use of meta tags, and incorporating the new micro-data in the HTML.

Ask your web designer or SEO specialist about Schema.org, what it is, why we need it, and how to do it.

Chances are, if you say, "You know, Schema.org structured micro-data markup to comply with Google Hummingbird semantic and clickless search," they'll look at you like you're speaking Greek (abstract philosophy) or Icelandic (a very difficult language).

Anyway, there are alternative linked data and deep meaning code proposals out there. Here's one specifically for eCommerce.

http://www.heppnetz.de/projects/goodrelations/

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Joyce Carol Oates short stories and SEO

SEO and Modern Literary Giants

New addition to my literature library: short story collection by Joyce Carol Oates. SEO content writing can be influenced, should be in fact, by literary experience with the great authors, novelists, poets, lyricists, journalists, and humorists.

SEO includes writing content that connects with people. Famous writers have connected with people, often both the average person and the literary critics. To connect with the common herd and with specialists means you are good at communicating in a precise and popular manner. Too many websites have generic, boring, unimaginative content. 

Even when speaking of dry details, one can have some flair and finesse. Reading the good stories and books are key to SEO content creation.

About Joyce Carol Oates

In 1973, Oates began keeping a detailed journal documenting her personal and literary life; it eventually grew to "more than 4,000 single-spaced typewritten pages." In 2008, Oates said she had "moved away from keeping a formal journal" and instead preserves copies of her e-mails.

Frequent topics in her work include rural poverty, sexual abuse, class tensions, desire for power, female childhood and adolescence, and occasionally the supernatural.

Violence is a constant in her work, even leading Oates to have written an essay in response to the question, "Why Is Your Writing So Violent?"

She is a fan of poet and novelist Sylvia Plath, describing Plath's sole novel The Bell Jar as a "near perfect work of art"; but though Oates has often been compared to Plath, she disavows Plath's romanticism about suicide and among her characters, she favors cunning, hardy survivors, both women and men.

In the early 1980s, Oates began writing stories in the Gothic and horror genres; in her foray into these genres, Oates said she was "deeply influenced" by Kafka and felt "a writerly kinship" with James Joyce.

QUOTE

It is my conviction that all human beings "create" personality.

Some do so passively, helplessly, and are in a sense created by others, whom they come to fear or hate.

Others create their personalities half-consciously, and are therefore half-pleased with their creations, though they suspect something is missing.

A few human beings, gifted with the ability to "see" themselves as "other," and not overly intoxicated with the selfness of the self, actually devise works of art that are autobiographical statements of a hypothetical, reality-testing nature, which they submit with varying degrees of confidence to the judgment of their culture.

-- Joyce Carol Oates

END QUOTE

Also see Joyce Carol Oates "The Myth of the Isolated Artist"

 http://celestialtimepiece.com/2015/01/26/the-myth-of-the-isolated-artist/

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50 Shames of Grace

"50 Shames of Grace"

Steamy tale of a female CEO who subjugates a failed rock star and teaches him the real meaning of pain by mocking his lyrics. Watch him try to break away and get his band back together, but is haunted by the torture of hearing her lipsynch with vinyl records of Beyonce played backwards at 78 rpm.

My new movie comes out February 29, 2015.



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Ecommerce Tip for Increased Sales - Promote Solutions, Not Products

Want to improve your ecommerce website and get more sales?

Forget about sales. Focus on solutions.

Realize you are NOT selling products.

You are providing solutions to problems.

Businesses in the Peoria, IL area need to know that SEO looks at your overall marketing strategy. To really gain a strong competitive advantage, try orienting all your marketing toward customer needs, rather than product inventories.

Say that with me right now: "I'm NOT selling products. I'm providing solutions."

This means you need to figure out what problems your customers are having, and then figure out how to most effectively talk about how your products solve those problems.

Dump that stupid sales mentality and focus on being helpful, informative, and educational. Solving, not selling. This is the key.

You'll sell a LOT more product when you switch to a SOLUTIONS mindset.

EXAMPLE: Don't say "We've got wonderful coconut milk soaps. Buy some now." Rather, explain "Get these 12 skin health benefits from our fragrant, creamy, coconut milk soaps." and go on to describe the superiority of your products FROM THE CUSTOMER'S POINT OF VIEW.

Describe how luxurious it is to bathe or shower with these beautiful, aromatherapeutic, bars of cleansing, moisturizing, skin rejuvenating soaps. Use an engaging narrative about how you'll be pampering yourself with these products. Then follow that with bullet points that give details backing up your claims.

Quit trying to push products on people. Stop just listing products with minimal specifications. Never again think you can just tell people what you've got or what you do.

Instead, educate, inform, enlighten, define, describe, compare, contrast, and clarify.

This is beneficial both psychologically and for SEO value.

Google will not send people to your ecommerce site because you list a bunch of stuff for sale. Google will send people to you ONLY if you provide answers to customer questions.

90% of SEO nowadays, since the new Google Hummingbird semantic search engine was implemented, is CONTENT. Rich, relevant, frequent, original, unique, well-written, informative, FAQ format content.

Grind out content in the form of new webpages with keyword themes, constant updates to the News page, and blog posts embedded in, or linked to, your website.

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How To Sell More Product on Your Ecommerce Website

Almost nobody will ever visit your website if all it does is list products with brief descriptions. Your website has to be answering questions customers are asking about issues related to your business.

You must speak directly to the problems and needs of customers, using their language (not corporate fluff and generic ad copy) -- and THEN explain how your products provide the best solution.

The business with the best content on their website will totally dominate the market, while the "just tell them what we sell" websites will cause businesses to go bankrupt.

Welcome to the new world of Google Hummingbird semantic search.

The rules of SEO and web traffic are all different now. Will your business survive?

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Your website needs to keep pace with customer questions

Do you have a website that explains what your business is and what you're selling? No wonder you're failing.

Your website must do far more than just tell people who you are and what you do. It must answer questions that customers have about their problem, needs, and interests. An FAQ type format is ideal.

Customers don't care about you or your company or your products. They care about solving a problem or enhancing a lifestyle. Your website must be a fantastic source of well-written information that customers are seeking.

For example, if you're a hospital or health care business, is your website just blabbering about your facilities and how "patient-oriented" you are?

Or do you have a process for developing new webpages on hot topics in the medical realm? Is your website keeping pace with news items in the health field?

Does your hospital website contain definitions of medical terms and answers to questions people have about acid reflux, mammograms, vaccines, boosting the immune system, measles, Ebola, childhood obesity, lyme disease, food allergies, weight loss?

Does your website have enough original, relevant information to make Google rank it high in search results for various questions people have?

A static "finished" website is a thing of the past. Google considers a website with stale content that is never updated, to be outdated, perhaps even irrelevant. and of poor value to people who seek the latest information.

You need to be grinding out fresh, unique content constantly.

You can do that with new webpages, your News page, and your blog that is embedded or linked to your website.

If you're not committed to continually improving your website, Google is going to start ignoring it and your competitors are going to take advantage of your vulnerability.

Web content development is one of the major keys to having a website that is productive, that actually results in sales and customer loyalty.

What is the ROI on your website? Are you using Google Analytics to track conversions? Do you have an exclusive phone number that is used ONLY on your website, so you can tell how effective it is?

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