Florist SEO Watch

FTD.com & FTDSUCKS.com

2009-10-22T20:14:00.000-07:00

FTD.....in an effort to control their online reputation, just days ago bought FTDSUCKS.com. For those that may not know, FTDSUCKS.com was a rant website where users could submit their complaint stories. Over the last couple of years I have observed ftdsucks.com getting more search exposure.

Any way, what is a little humorous to me, is that they masked the FTDSUCKS.com domain over FTD.com instead of killing the domain. To see what I mean, go ahead and click here www.ftdsucks.com

Proof of registry. From the WhoIs database:

Registrant:
FTD Inc
3113 woodcreek Drive
Downers Grove, IL 60515
US

Domain Name: FTDSUCKS.COM

Administrative Contact, Technical Contact:
FTD Inc
3113 woodcreek Drive
Downers Grove, IL 60515
US
630-724-6673

Record expires on 04-Aug-2010.
Record created on 06-Oct-2004.
Database last updated on 22-Oct-2009 23:11:26 EDT.

Domain servers in listed order:

NS1.FTDI.COM 208.13.72.9
NS2.FTDI.COM 208.49.170.8

Incontent Link Showing in Google Search

2009-09-14T08:29:00.000-07:00

I'm noticing new incontent links appearing in the snippet area of Google search. I ran a search query for "seo marketing" and the 2nd organic result is showing an incontent link in the snippet area:

A click on the link will take you to the same main result page but will jump you to the exact paragraph that Google thinks you are looking for (similar to site links, but a little different because it is in the snippet area).

It appears that Google is doing some testing on this feature for future use as it is selectively appearing for various searches.

New Restrictions on FTD's FOL Websites

2009-09-05T09:36:00.000-07:00

On September 1st, a new restriction for FOL florists emerged in the administration area of the FOL portal related to updating text on the homepage of YOUR website.

In that regard, after you attempt an update you will get this:

"The Content you've requested requires support assistance. Please contact FOL support at 800-576-6721."

After calling the number I spoke with a FTD FOL rep. by the name of "Muigel" who told me that FTD must now manually approve update requests due to recent "federal rules and regulations that have been put in place."

Your comments are welcome.....

1800Flowers At Proflowers.Com?

2009-08-17T08:54:00.000-07:00

Interesting, today I performed a "site" command on Proflowers.com and lo and behold a page from Proflowers on Martha Stewart with information about "delivery to your door from 1800flowers" populated. Check it out:

Now either 1800flowers is partnering with Proflowers, or Proflowers is trying to brand rank in Google for both Martha Stewart and 1800flowers.com. If it is the latter and not the former, I'd say Proflowers is going to be in hot water.

Teleflora: Now Offering "Cheap Flower Arrangements"

2009-07-04T17:21:00.001-07:00

Teleflora is now engaging in competitive price point marketing in an effort to compete with Proflowers and FTD.com. Their marketing strategy is to offer product at $19.99 as displayed in their Adwords campaign:

According to the landing page, if you are looking for "cheap flower arrangements," then their your florist of choice.

I've circled in "red" below the promotion price of $19.99. At present, this marketing strategy seems to be only offered via a click on their Adword campaign and is not available by way of directly going to Teleflora.com. This implies they are testing the water.

Google Adwords Testing through Proflowers

2009-06-26T14:37:00.000-07:00

Last week, WebProNews reported that:

"Google started inviting advertisers to participate in a beta program late last week. According to an email, product ads will appear in the Sponsored Links section and "complement" standard text ads."

Looks like Proflowers is now apart of this program. Below you'll notice a "plus" symbol that appears directly in the advertisement:

After clicking the symbol a field then populates with product imagery which pushes the number 1 ranking website down quite a bit.

At present, this new way of advertising seems to be only tied to general floral searches. I have not yet noticed it showing for local searches.

PageRank Sculpting

2009-06-13T15:15:00.000-07:00

Interesting interview of Stephen Spencer (of Netconcepts) on PageRank sculpting by Mike McDonald of WebProsNews.com. For those who may not know, Googler Matt Cutts dropped a bomb at the SMX expo in Seattle on how Google will handle PageRank flows in the future. Click here if the video below doesn't play.

More WebProNews Videos

While all the major floral players currently do a little PageRank sculpting, as do the wire-service hosted websites (FOL & EFlorist), I don't think the overall impact will be felt much.

-Just my opinion.

Yahoo Search Ranking Changes Scheduled Tonight

2009-06-02T12:50:00.000-07:00

Yahoo issued another algorithm forcast today:

Weather Report: Yahoo! Search Index Update
We’re rolling out some updates to our crawling, indexing, and ranking algorithms over the next few days. During this process, you may see some ranking changes and page shuffling in the index.

BING.Com MTV Movie Awards 2008??

2009-05-31T23:57:00.000-07:00

With all the hype in the last 24 hours regarding Microsoft's new Decision Search Engine, I decided to stay up late and try it out before most of the world woke up to it in the morning. Within minutes of the announcement, I realized I wasn't the only one up late for it. In fact, Google's own Matt Cutts was already engaged with Bing on Twitter about it.

In their exchange, @Bing asked Matt to type "mtv movie awards 2009" so he did......and what populated was a 2008 search result:

Matt then pointed out that Google correctly populates a 2009 result. This exchange was of course a little humorous to me since I witnessed Bing inviting Matt to the experiment, which immediately went sour. But it got me thinking, if it is inferior here, it's probably inferior in a lot of other searches.

To add insult to injury, as of this writing, "MTV Movie Awards" is trending in real-time on Twitter.

PageRank Update May 27th 2009

2009-05-27T19:52:00.000-07:00

There has been a Google PageRank update that just happened 7:45pm. Check all your websites!!

The Future of FlowerComplaint.com: SEO & Twitter

2009-05-16T09:24:00.000-07:00

My little side project with flowercomplaint.com is working out better than expected. Google's year long aging factor has had minimal effect on its web-presence due to the lack of competition regarding its focus. Currently flowercomplaint.com ranks on the 1st page of Google for all the following searches:

1800flowers complaints

Proflowers complaints

FTD complaints

Teleflora complaints

Justflowers complaints

Wesley Berry flowers complaints

In an effort to build user content for the website while the domain ages in authority, I've utilized the social media outlet Twitter and have created a flower complaint account. In the past 4 days, I've uploaded 55 complaints that have come through both Google and Twitter.

As time moves forward I'm going to take all the holiday complaints and upload them on to their own page. The idea behind that is to rank the holiday page for that particular holiday. For instance, next year for Mother's Day you can expect to see flowercomplaint.com in the top 10 for "Mother's Day flowers" searches (unfortunately, I don't believe that flowercomplaint.com will have harnessed enough domain authority in time to rank for Thanksgiving or Christmas, but maybe for Valentines Day searches).

A couple of days ago 1800flowers criticized my effort to build user content for my own gains, but let me state for the record that I make nothing from flowercomplaint.com. In fact, it costs me money. Perhaps some day that may change, but right now it is 100% percent expense out of my own pocket. The gain is not my own, rather the gain is in giving some of the real paying customers of 1800flowers/Proflowers/Justflowers/Teleflora/WesleyBerry a platform of high visibility.

The complaints posted on flowercomplaint.com are real-customer experiences.....and there is a demand for a place to go and tell of their experience. Flowercomplaint.com provides that platform within a positive outlook for our industry: "Tell others of your experience - Only you can shape and refine the future of the floral industry!"

I think Teleflora and 1800flowers now see that there is a demand for such a website, as they have both asked for me to help them connect with some of the posters. In that regard, I've recently added text in red font to their complaint pages requesting that the poster add their order number to the complaint.

I'll work with these major floral companies the best I can, but their future hangs in the balance of their past customers who want to connect with potential future customers.

I'm just the middleman :-)

Mother's Day Aftermath

2009-05-10T14:02:00.000-07:00

I hope all you local florists had a successful Mother's Day!! Special shout going out to my favorite florist in Saint Louis! It's going to take me a while to recover so I'm probably only going to be able to tweet posts for the next few days.

I've been on the design table for 5 days with little sleep. I'm sure many of you florists can identify with that.

Sleep well.

P.S. Of interest, I've got a list of emails to upload to my Flower Complaint website (too tired to post them now). I'm sure that list is going to build over the next few days.

Teleflora's Mother's Day Commercial on All EFlorist Websites

2009-04-28T23:23:00.001-07:00

I like the new Teleflora Mother's Day commercial, but I'm not sure how I feel about Teleflora uploading their commercial on to the entire fleet of their Eflorist websites. Yes, that's right, yesterday Teleflora uploaded their commercial to every hosted Teleflora website. If you OWN a domain that has a Teleflora hosted template, you'll see it on YOUR website.

Google Does Forgive: "Reconsideration Request"

2009-04-25T11:48:00.000-07:00

Yesterday Google published an interesting video on "reconsideration requests." For those of you who don't know, a reconsideration request is for websites that have been penalized. In that regard, websites are often penalized for artificially manipulating Google's algorithm.

The moral of the story below.....is that if your website has been penalized you must come clean with everything you did (in detail)....ask for forgiveness.....and promise to never do it again.

The frustrating thing about a Google penalty, is that Google does not tell you if your website has been penalized, nor will they inform you of why your website was penalized. It is up to you to spill your guts.....and hope that Google here's you. So if you ever find yourself submitting a "reconsideration request," think of it as a prayer.

In some cases, it appears to work.

Mother[']s Day:To Optimize With or Without the Apostrophe

2009-04-25T08:42:00.000-07:00

I was just looking over last year's search stats (2008) for a floral website that I run that ranked in the top 5 results (in Google) for all of the following keywords. Of interest in that regard, is the search volume difference between the use or non use of the apostrophe.

These stats represent the 5 days leading up to Mother's Day.

Keyword	Visits	% visits
mothers day flowers	2,366	44.69%
mother's day flowers	1,585	29.94%
flowers for mothers day	427	8.07%
flowers for mother's day	158	2.98%
flowers mothers day	84	1.59%

"SEO Marketing" Showing in Local Results

2009-04-21T17:02:00.001-07:00

Local search has worked it's way over to the SEO field for the first time today. A search on "seo marketing" will now yield local results below the top ranking websites.

It hasn't yet carried over to search phrases like "SEO" or "SEO company" or "SEO firm" but I'm sure it will. I find it particularly intriguing that "SEO marketing" is given special value as the 1st to include local search among other SEO terms.

Have you ever heard of MajesticSEO.com?

2009-04-15T00:00:00.000-07:00

MajesticSEO.com offers some great free tools on website backlink discovery as it pertains to charting link-vote activity over long periods of time. Of interest, if we apply this tool to FTD, 1800flowers, Proflowers, and Teleflora, we can see each floral company’s offsite SEO push at different stages. In the graph below, highlighted in blue, we see that FTD made a huge push in late 2007 thru early 2008.

Color codes below: FTD, 1800flowers, Proflowers, & Teleflora

Check out the tool here

SEMRush.com

2009-04-12T13:31:00.000-07:00

Have you ever heard of SEM Rush? If not, SEM Rush is a great competitive research tool that can be used to peer into the search volumes of websites other than your own. Of interest in that regard, are the monthly averages of the major floral players:

Teleflora.com - 300.3k a month

Proflowers.com - 755.0k a month

FTD.com - 851.0k a month

1800flowers.com 2680.0k a month

I have a handful of tools that I use everyday, and SEM Rush is counted among them.

Have fun with it!

Multiple Brands Experience "Sitelinks" at Once

2009-04-02T00:59:00.000-07:00

Just days ago I blogged about Google running an IP-based local algorithm within general search for single keywords like "flowers" and "florist" etc... As we saw in that post, Google is now ranking 3 brand websites followed by a local IP-based 10 pack. As I mentioned back then, this is a breakthough for local business exposure as it now evens the search field.

Fast forward to today, and now Google has implemented another feature called "sitelinks" to their brand ranking process. Yes, sitelinks are nothing new as they have always been reserved for the top ranking website only (not all top ranking websites can generate them) as we see in this example:

But now Google is giving the top 3 brand rankers all "sitelinks" at once for the keyword "flowers:"

Google PageRank Update April 1st

2009-04-01T22:30:00.000-07:00

There was a PageRank update today. Not much to report as far as the major players are concerned. The only real difference is that Google removed FlowerPetal's apparent penalty reduction that happend back in Feb. and reinstated it to a PR5.

The following chart covers the last 5 updates.

PageRank Prior to Sept. 27^th 2008	PageRank Update Sept. 28^th 2008	PageRank Update Dec. 30^th 2008	PageRank Update Feb. 28^th 2009	PageRank Update April 1^st 2009
FTD PR7	FTD PR6	FTD PR6	FTD PR6	FTD PR6
Proflowers PR6	Proflowers PR6	Proflowers PR6	Proflowers PR6	Proflowers PR6
1800flowers PR7	1800flowers PR7	1800flowers PR7	1800flowers PR7	1800flowers PR7
Teleflora N/A	Teleflora N/A	Teleflora PR6	Teleflora PR6	Teleflora PR6
Justflowers N/A	Justflowers N/A	Justflowers N/A	Justflowers PR4	Justflowers PR4
Flowerpetal PR4	FlowerPetal PR5	Flowerpetal PR5	FlowerPetal PR2	FlowerPetal PR5
Wesleyberry flowers.com PR7	Wesleyberry flowers.com PR5	Wesleyberry flowers.com PR5	Wesleyberry flowers.com PR4	Wesleyberry flowers.com PR4

Local Algorithm Showing within General Search

2009-03-28T10:30:00.001-07:00

It looks like Google has rolled out an algorithm where a local algorithm is now being shown within general search terms. For instance, ever since the recent brand ranking algorithm was implemented in January the top 4 floral companies have seemingly appeared secure in their dominance for many general floral keywords like “flowers,” "flower delivery," “florist,” etc…

Fast forward to today, and it looks like Google is now attempted to aid mom & pop shops. Here is a search on the keyword "flowers:"

I live in California so it appears Google is reading my IP address and populating local results in apropos. However, if I click on “change location” above the local algorithm is removed and replaced with a field box with the option to enter a new location. So if I wanted to locate a particular Baltimore Florist or just look for funeral flowers in a particular area, I would change the field box to populate that areas florists. This is a different from the usual text in the upper right corner that says: "Customized based on recent search activity." In that circumstance, a simple refresh removes the customization. But this in not the case in the new algorithm, you actually have to physically click "change location."

Also, the local listings seem to be from areas *near* my IP address location but not directly *in* my IP address area. If Google could just perfect that element to populate truer local listings this algorithm will be a breakthrough in favor for the local florist.

March Yahoo Algorithm Update

2009-03-27T04:54:00.001-07:00

While there hasn't been a weather report released by Yahoo as of yet regarding an algorithm update, I am seeing changes in how they pull results.

Check your rankings.

Cut Flower Commission & TaxPayer Money

2009-03-24T18:27:00.000-07:00

Hot off the press regarding California's Cut Flower Commission and use of taxpayer money. Source is cited at the bottom:

On The Money: Cut Flowers
SACRAMENTO (CBS13)
Its a business with a more than $10 billion dollar impact on the state!

Flowers, and many of the buds you buy are grown here in California. The largest growers actually have to pay the state to do business in the form of fees to an agency called the Cut Flower Commission. In fact, the commission runs of those fees, as well as federal grants paid by your income taxes. Critics say Governor Schwarzenegger has told all state agencies to cut travel costs and since the commission is a state agency they, too, should watch what they're spending.

So we wanted to know what the Cut Flower Commission spent on travel and found a lot of money spent on things that had nothing to do with flowers.

Kasey Cronquist holds the title of Executive Director - and Ambassador - for the commission. While they have a Sacramento address, Cronquist is based in Carpinteria, California. He spent thousands in travel last year, travelling all over the country, from Salt Lake City to Cleveland to Washington, D.C. He even made a trip to Bogota, Columbia.

Nearly every time he's come to Sacramento, he's stayed right across the street from the capitol at the Hyatt, spending upwards of $120 or more a night.

Nearly every time he leaves town Kronquist stays at expensive hotels like a Radisson or the Fairmont in Washington, D.C. He's paid $7.00 per bottle for water; charged up to $60 for laundry; ordered room service nearly every time he stays in a hotel; hit the mini bar; and charged hundreds of dollars for fancy dinners every time he's out of town.

They seem to be wasting fee payers revenue, says Jon Coupal, president of the watchdog group the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association. He says they're spending money every trip for things that are quite purely fluff.

Coupal says at a time when state agencies are being asked to make cuts, the commission is spending too much.

Whether its a non-profit or a government entity people need to understand they have a fiduciary obligation to the people who pay the bills, says Coupal.

Kasey Cronquist refused to speak about his expenses on-camera, but told CBS-13s Sam Shane that he believes all the expenses are acceptable. He sent us this statement:

...room service meals and the occasional snack or bottle of water from the mini-bar are expenses that I'm confident any frequent business traveler would find reasonable.

He also adds that "We are passionate about what we do and all our travel takes place to help ensure a positive business environment for our growers to thrive."

But critics like Jon Coupal say it doesn't take cross-country travel for the flower business to grow. There's still no concerted effort to look at the expenditure side, says Coupal, and see if Californians are getting the best value for their dollar and quite frankly, they're not!
Source: CBS13

Teleflora Link Bait SuperBowl Video

2009-03-22T23:40:00.000-07:00

A recent blog post over on SEOmoz about Comedy Central's use of video link bait reminded me of a similar situation where the SEO for Teleflora.com embedded their SuperBowl Ad with text links aimed at ranking the giant for "flowers," "florists," and "flower delivery"....

Notice the blue font text links above. The SEO for Teleflora is hoping that bloggers will do as I just did and post it. As more and more bloggers post the video Google begins to credit Teleflora to rank better for those terms.

Unfortunatly, in order to tell of this, I had to post the video.

Update: I replaced the live link bait with an image of it. I was just educated by my wife on the Fn + PrtSc key.

FlowerComplaint.Com Debut

2009-03-15T20:58:00.000-07:00

I've been working on a little website project and I think it is ready for its debut even though I'm still tweaking things.

The website is www.flowercomplaint.com . Respondents can instantly upload floral pictures via email or mobile device to the appropriate company category e.g. Proflowers, FTD, 1800flowers, Teleflora, Justflowers.

For those of you in the floral industry the website may strike you in an odd way but rest assured the intent of the website is to give people a place to vent of their floral experience within the context of a positive outlook for our industry.

The slogan: "Only You Can Shape & Refine the Future of the Floral Industry!"

The idea for flowercomplaint.com was born right out of Google's Analytics tracking for Florist SEO Watch. Yes, that's right, I decided to create flowercomplaint.com based on how some people are reaching this blog through search. So desperate are some people to vent of their negative floral experience that they either contact me directly or look within this blog for the floral company that messed up.....and comment thereat where the context of my post doesn't match their complaint. Now they've got a place to express their frustrations.

Over time as more and more user content gets added to the website I'll be giving well-written substantial complaints their own page in an effort to make it difficult for the major floral players to perform reputation management on flowercomplaint.com.

I'm also going to try to incorporate related news pieces as they become available before the holidays.

Any way, the site is brand new and a project in motion. Feel free to express your view of the site and any ideas you may have to help better it. Or, if you think it's not a good idea, take your complaint over to flowercomplaint.com!! (just kidding)

February Search Engine Market Shares

2009-03-13T14:44:00.000-07:00

ComScore just released stats related to search engine market shares. No surpise, Google is up 0.3 over the previous month:

February 2009 U.S. Core Search RankingsGoogle Sites led the U.S. core search market in February with 63.3 percent of the searches conducted, followed by Yahoo! Sites (20.6 percent), Microsoft Sites (8.2 percent), Ask Network (4.1 percent) and AOL LLC (3.9 percent).

Full report can be read here.

Matt Cutts on Brand Ranking: "Vince's Change"

2009-03-04T21:07:00.000-08:00

Matt Cutts seems to down play the significance of the new "brand" algorithm and brushes it off as one of "Vince's changes" in the following video. The tone in the video is such that the change is not as significant as SEOs are making it out to be. The problem with Cutts' commentary, is that the facts DO suggest that the change is significant, and top Google engineers like Eric Schmidt have expressed in the past that Google will be headed in a brand ranking direction.

Local Florist PPC vs SEO Pricing

2009-03-03T10:42:00.000-08:00

As we move forward into this tight economy, marketing analysts are predicting that PPC will continue to decline while SEO continues to rise. Media Post News is reporting that:

"Search Marketing Trends: Back to Basics," suggests that growth will decline for paid search from 15.9% in 2009 to 11.3% in 2013--while SEO growth will jump from 17.7% to 20.3%, respectively. (see full report)

When local brick and mortar florists inquiry with me on how much I charge to SEO their site, the first place I go is Google's Traffic Estimator to help me get a value read on what would be their most primary keyword combination for their area. In every case, my cost is pennies compared to what the PPC is running for that same phrase (which is of course tallied from competitive bids).

While most SEOs price based on full court optimization, my pricing for local florists is based on a keyword basis (which is priced against search volume and competition levels) because I know that full court optimization FOR THE LOCAL FLORIST (only) is not worth the cost. Other SEOs may think I'm crazy in saying that, but it is true for the local florist industry. How do I know that? Because I am a real-florist (who is aware of real-florist budgets) with SEO knowledge.

For instance, if you had a shop in say Houston Tx....why pay an SEO for a full court SEO job to rank your website for multiple keywords....which would include keywords like "Houston flower delivery" when only 1 search a day is performed on that phrase; or for "Houston funeral flowers" when zilch ("o") searches are performed on it.

It would make much better sense to pay an SEO to focus on ranking your website for just "Houston flowers" as roughly 200 searches are perform on that phrase each and everyday (and price it out according to that search volume). By concentrating on one or two primary keyphrases it keeps the SEO cost down for you, and ultimately pays off in the same way a full court optimization would. After all, you would be ranking for what the bulk of people are actually searching for any way. Of course, if you are in area where you serve multiple large cities (and there is a search volume present), you'd want rank for those cities too.

To give you a better example of a PPC to SEO comparison (which applies to my service only), let's look further at the search term "Houston flowers." Google's Traffic Estimator indicates that it costs an average of $720 - $1,170 a day to rank in the top 3 Sponsored Ads for that particular search. Yes, that's a day!! My cost, $450 a month for a top 5 organic ranking.

If you are in a smaller populated area with less search volume my cost would be that much less. Many of my florist clients are paying as little as $300 a month for search volumes that are averaging 4,500 searches a month. If you are in area where search volumes are even less, my pricing will be priced off the volume of searches for your area.

Any way, that's how it works.

Take your phone book budget and replace it with SEO. There's a reason those books are getting smaller.

PageRank Update February 28th

2009-03-02T23:49:00.000-08:00

As some of you know, Google updates their PageRank meter once every three months or so*. In an effort to document changes in PageRank values for the major floral players as the updates happen, I've created a table. I'll be posting an updated version of this table after every PageRank update. The latest update occurred on Feb. 28th with the most noteable change going to FlowerPetal.com.

I started keeping track of when updates occurred on the Sept. 28th 2008 update...

PageRank Prior to Sept. 27^th 2008	PageRank Update Sept. 28^th 2008	PageRank Update Dec. 30^th 2008	PageRank Update Feb. 28^th 2009
FTD PR7	FTD PR6	FTD PR6	FTD PR6
Proflowers PR6	Proflowers PR6	Proflowers PR6	Proflowers PR6
1800flowers PR7	1800flowers PR7	1800flowers PR7	1800flowers PR7
Teleflora ?	Teleflora ?	Teleflora PR6	Teleflora PR6
Justflowers ?	Justflowers ?	Justflowers ?	Justflowers PR4
Flowerpetal PR4	FlowerPetal PR5	Flowerpetal PR5	FlowerPetal PR2
Wesleyberry flowers.com PR7	Wesleyberry flowers.com PR5	Wesleyberry flowers.com PR5	Wesleyberry flowers.com PR4

*While it is true that the PageRank meter is updated once every three months or so, there are times when a real-time PageRank update is imposed on a specific website usually for a negative purpose.

Note: This most recent update has caused much discussion in the SEO world because it was hardly noticed compared to other updates. While some SEOs have labelled it a glitch....as we see above some websites have changed. So I'm treating it like a PageRank update.

FlowerPetal.com PageRank 5 to PageRank 2 (Dunce Hat)

2009-03-01T12:29:00.000-08:00

Back in 2008 I had a watchful eye out for flowerpetal.com as they suddenly began to rank 3^rd in Google for “flowers.” Back then, I noted that some of the tactics they were employing to rank were very risky. Sure enough, just a couple of weeks later they didn’t even rank in the top 1000 for the same key-phrase. At the time, they had a Google PageRank value of “5” and were drawing most of the energy to rank from the following websites which also had PageRank values of “5”:

[As I mentioned back then, if you clicked on the links above and scrolled to the bottom you saw a variation of this: "Need flowers for your night out? Click here to send flowers."]

Fast forward to 2009 and it appears that not only has Google devalued the PageRank values of flowerpetal’s network websites (from PageRank 5s to PageRanks 3s & 4s), but flowerpetal.com itself has been hit the hardest going from a PageRank 5 to a PageRank 2.

Yes, while this PageRank devalue is like a public spank equivalent to having to wear a dunce hat, flowerpetal.com continues to rank good for geographical florist searches even though primary ranking for popular general terms has been taken away from them.

But they’ve been publicly spanked nonetheless.

Yahoo Algorithm Weather Report - February

2009-02-28T22:47:00.000-08:00

Yahoo recently issued a weather report regarding changes to their search index. I haven't heard much discussion on the effects of the changes by other SEOs, but from what I've seen most of my clients fared well.

Hard to believe that Yahoo now only makes up 15 percent of the overall search market.

Flowers - Brand Ranking & Geographically Devalued

2009-02-28T12:13:00.000-08:00

As has been recently observed across all industries, Google is now favoring well-known brands in their search results for popular phrases related to that industry. Fortunately for the floral industry, we only have 4 brands (Proflowers, FTD, 1800flowers, Teleflora) to contend with which is far less than most industries. Yes, I know the dynamics are quite different in our industry as most florists have to deal daily with these brands, but speaking from a search perspective there are still 10 slots allotted to 1^st page ranking.

Unlike the electronics business where there are dozens of brands and no room for the little guy on the 1^st page, real brick and mortar flower shops can still compete for primary key-phrases because of the lack of brands in our industry. Proflowers/FTD/1800flowers/Teleflora may NOW dominate primary search phrases like “flowers,” “flower delivery,” “send flowers,” “funeral flowers,” “birthday flowers,” etc… but there is still room to rank for the brick and mortar flower shop. The same can not be said for most other industries.

Regarding geographical florist search phrases, since the time of Google’s new brand emphasized algorithm (January 18^th), I have observed that the Proflowers brand which used to dominate geographical searches for florists is no longer dominating. While it is difficult to prove my observation by way of fact for every zip code in the US, all the cities & towns that I monitor on daily basis lack the dominate presence that Proflowers once had.

It just may be that Google is also now devaluing geographical brand ranking thinking that brands need only be dominate for general searches.

Local Search Spammer - Florist Concierge by Wire

2009-02-26T21:47:00.001-08:00

If you would like to complain about Florist Concierge. Please visit www.FlowerComplaint.com

Looks like we have an order gatherer spamming Google's local search for many rural florist search queries. The spammer is using a pattern that is easily identifiable:

1. [Insert City/Town Name] Concierge by Wire

2. [Insert City/Town Name] Directory by Nationwide 411

3. [Insert City/Town Name] Florist Directory

4. [Insert City/Town Name] Flower Shops Directory

Here are a couple of snapshots so you get the idea. All the phone numbers are connected to the same nationwide outfit that identifies themselves as "the Florist Concierge." Check your listings. Large cities seem to be uneffected.

Updated 5/31/09. [The information below was submitted by a Florist SEO Watch reader]

Nationwide 411 Florist Directory Inc.

Mark Misiak

Director

2428 Lake Vista Ct Apt 306

Casselberry, FL 32707

Seminole County

Andrew Russo

Director

2428 Lake Vista Ct

Casselberry, FL 32707

Seminole County

Incorporated by Mark Misiak and Andrew Russo, Nationwide 411 Florist Directory Inc. is located at 2428 Lake Vista Ct Apt 306 Casselberry, FL 32707.

Nationwide 411 Florist Directory Inc. was incorporated on Tuesday, September 18, 2007 in the State of FL and is currently active.

Florida Filing & Search Services, Inc. represents Nationwide 411 Florist Directory Inc. as their registered agent.

Source: Public Record data from Florida Department of State - Division of Corporations

Florist Concierge
6236 Kingspointe Pkwy, Ste 1
Orlando, FL 32819

Proflowers V-Day Domination

2009-02-26T09:51:00.000-08:00

According to statistical blog Seeking Alfa, Proflowers dominated Valentine's Day:

"Today’s economic climate is certainly not news to anyone. As consumers tightened their sweetheart budgets, the leading online florists pulled out all stops to gain market share (one going so far as advertising during the Super Bowl). In 2009, ProFlowers.com clearly outperformed its top rivals by having more online transactions than their top three competitors combined."

What amazes me about that fact is that Proflowers had a delivery charge of $22.98 which was far more than any other online florist (see here).

In fact, in the week leading up to Valentine's Day, my store recieved several calls from would-be Proflowers customers who said they backed out of Proflowers' shopping cart because their delivery fee was too high. I'm sure other florists got the same type of call.

Google Favoring Brand Names for "Flowers"

2009-02-25T12:00:00.000-08:00

There is a lot of talk in the SEO community that Google is now favoring brand names in search.

To test that theory, I went to Google and typed “flowers” (like I do everyday) and sure enough Teleflora in now ranking for that term. The last time I checked on Teleflora’s ranking for "flowers" they weren’t even in the top 100.

There are over 50,000 searches performed on "flowers" everyday and now the results are beginning to resemble a billboard of brand names.

The term "flowers" is so much bigger than these companies.

Added note: See Chris Crum interview with Aaron Wall on branding.

Conversion Rate Stats for January

2009-02-23T15:44:00.000-08:00

Back in December 2008, it was reported by Nielsen Online that Proflowers led the e-commerce world with the highest conversion rates. Looks like things have changed a bit:

Hoogasian Flowers – Doorway Page

2009-02-19T21:41:00.000-08:00

Back in January, Floral Management Magazine ran an article on Hoogasian Flowers regarding their SEO tactics on organic ranking (see issue: Jan. 2009, pg 33). In that article Harold Hoogasian noted that in years past he had spent “tens of thousands of dollars” on “pay-per-clicks” with little to show for it. Something I think most of us can identify with.

As Harold reflected on his coming strategies for this year, he told Floral Management that he is solely going to focus on ranking his website organically. In that regard, Harold mentioned that it is imperative for his website to rank for “San Francisco flowers;” which is of course understandable. After all, according to Google’s Traffic Estimator, just over 600 searches a day are performed on that phrase; roughly 18,000 searches a month.

After reading the article I went to Google with interest and searched for Harold’s website under the search terms “San Francisco flowers” and “San Francisco florist” but the results returned a ranking for hoogasian.com at 94^th for former and 174^th the latter.

Thinking that was rather odd as the article implied he was ranking on the first page, I returned to the article to re-read it slowly incase I missed something. Thereat, my eye-raised when I re-read that Hoogasian’s “landing page serves as a doorway to his e-commerce site” and that Hoogasian “has spent a lot of time trying to outsmart search engines.”

Knowing that Google frowns on doorway pages because the intent is always to “outsmart” them, it became clear to me why hoogasian.com is not ranking: because Harold did NOT “outsmart” Google. Yes, Harold’s site has been caught and is currently being disciplined.

What should Harold do? I recommend immediately removing any and all linkage from hoogasian.com to his FOL site and re-strategizing. If Harold simply got spanked by Google, his website should bounce back in the top rankings within a month. There is little reason for a website that has a PageRank value of “5” to rank so far back unless it has been penalized.

Just because Wesley Berry may get away with their doorway pages, doesn’t mean others will. Wesley Berry is apparently an exception to the rule.

FTD FOL Sites - Valentine's Day & Easter Bunny??

2009-02-14T00:12:00.000-08:00

Those FTD members who have a seasonal FOL template design will find this Valentine's Day morning that their Valentine's Day template has changed 24 hours earlier than it should have.

Look for the Easter Bunny at the bottom of the page.

Too funny.

"Valentines Flowers" - Search Volume 02/08/09 thru 02/11/09

2009-02-12T08:48:00.000-08:00

Thought I would post a search stat related to a website I'm monitoring that currently ranks in the top 3 search results for "Valentines flowers" in all of the major search engines. The stats are from Feb. 8th thru to Feb. 11th (yesterday).

As some of you know, I am a floral designer so I won't be leaving my design table much in the next 48 hours. I hope to post more stats a little later, but there's no guarantee as things are starting to pickup.

Here you go, for "Valentines flowers:"

Site Usage

Visits

1,513

Pageviews

1.59

Pages/Visit

73.84%

Bounce Rate

00:00:34

Avg. Time on Site

95.27%

% New Visits

Traffic Sources Overview[remove]
Search Engines887.00 (93.17%)
Referring Sites52.00 (5.46%)
Direct Traffic13.00 (1.37%)
view report
Keywords[remove]
Keyword
Visits
% visits
valentines flowers
375 42.28%
valentine's day flowers
100 11.27%
valentines day flowers
69 7.78%
valentine's flowers
61 6.88%
valentine flowers
56 6.31%
view report

Keyword	Visits	% visits
valentines flowers	375	42.28%
valentine's day flowers	100	11.27%
valentines day flowers	69	7.78%
valentine's flowers	61	6.88%
valentine flowers	56	6.31%

Search Engines[remove]
Source
Visits
% visits
yahoo
419 47.24%
google
367 41.38%
msn
54 6.09%
live
25 2.82%
aol
15 1.69%
view report

Source	Visits	% visits
yahoo	419	47.24%
google	367	41.38%
msn	54	6.09%
live	25	2.82%
aol	15	1.69%

Google Penalized Google for Paid Links

2009-02-12T08:26:00.000-08:00

Interesting read over at Search Engine Land on Google penalizing Google Japan for paid links. Confirmed by Matt Cutts:

Matt Cutts twittered that Google.co.jp was penalized for paying for blogger reviews. If you look at the FriendFeed details, you will see Matt first said, “Google.co.jp PageRank is now ~5 instead of ~9. I expect that to remain for a while.” And then when he was questioned if this was a paid link penalty, he said “yes.”

Online Florist Reviews

2009-02-09T17:10:00.000-08:00

There is an excellent news piece just posted on WINK News about ordering flowers online. You can watch the video here. As you watch the video you can read the statements released by Proflowers, 1800flowers, Teleflora, and Justflowers.

Google Checkout Feature

2009-02-05T19:55:00.000-08:00

It appears FromYouFlowers.com is utilizing a new checkout feature from Adwords where extra promotions can be made visible in the results. I don't know too much about the feature as of yet, but I have noticed in the last 48 hours that FromYouFlowers.com is the only floral entity doing it.

All the more reason to be doing a little title-tag marketing yourself.

Valentines Flowers & Google Doubling Up

2009-02-05T12:58:00.001-08:00

Of interest, just 4 weeks ago the only search results showing in Google for the search phrase “Valentines flowers” were the Sponsored Ads and organic listings. As we moved into February, Google began inserting Google News and Shopping links directly into the search results. As search volumes have increased even more in the last 2 or 3 days, we now have Google Images showing in the results.

Google’s holiday algorithm clearly favors Google’s interests rather than searcher interests as links to Google News & Google Images & Google Shopping already exist at the very top-top of each and every search result. Hence, Google has double listings for Valentine’s Day which increases the level of SEO needed to rank organically as one of the top two domains. Ranking 3^rd, while good, will miss much of the hurricane search volume as visually it appears as the 16^th link when you count all the sponsored links, news links, image links, and shopping links that appear above the 3^rd organic spot.

Can be quite annoying if you are the 3rd guy ;-)

The Early Show & Proflowers

2009-02-03T19:25:00.000-08:00

Did any of you catch the CBS Early Show this morning? Scathing review of Proflowers.

What did you think of Teleflora's Super Bowl Commercial?

2009-02-01T16:43:00.000-08:00

Feel free to comment on what you thought about Teleflora's Super Bowl commercial. View it here:

Great? Good? Ok? Bad? Waste of Money?

Updated 01/02/09

Scathing reviews are now popping up on various outlets as reported on flowerchat.com....

Adweek

Quote:

Let’s get to the bad spots. Teleflora was so awful that it exploded the space/time continuum.

Examiner

Quote:

By the way, I want to nominate Teleflora.com for the second worst commercial that showed a box of flowers that humiliated a woman at work. It was humorless and obnoxious.

Marketwatch

Quote:

Out of all of them, Adgate thought the Teleflora ad was the most tasteless.

Alert: Google Penalty Under Way for Floral Related Websites IF….

2009-01-31T10:07:00.000-08:00

If you have a link on your website that links OUT to the following URL with your web-address included in the middle portion: www.mshlinks.com/YOURWEBSITEADDRESS/index.html

Your website is at very high risk of experiencing a Google penalty. A number of sites have experienced a penalty in the last 5 days.

Solution: Remove the link from your website immediately.

Reason: Google has identified the network associated with the root mshlinks.com as spam. By linking out to msnlinks.com you are identifying your website as part of the bad neighborhood.

NOTICE: Many Eflorist and FTDFLORISTONLINE websites appear to be involved due to individual websites owners seeking optimization assistance from the Search Engine Firm associated with mshlinks.com: Mainstreethost.com (link goes to the whois data base regarding who owns mshlinks.com)

Update-2: Perform a site command in Google to view more florists than what is listed below by clicking here

Update-1: The following are just a few of the flower shops I found that are at high risk of incurring a Google penalty:

Alice's Flower Shop
Bethel Connecticut Florist

Chandler's Flowers
Durham North Carolina Florist

Expressions Florist
Placentia California Florist

Fletchers Flowers
Latham NY Florist

Floral Fantasies
Dallas Florist

Flower Kingdom
Phoenix Arizona Florist

Flowers by Lady Di
Alliston Ontario Florist

Inland Flowers
San Bernardino California Florist

Mills the Florist
Mills the Florist in Palo Alto California

Orginally Yours
Saginaw Michigan Florist

Presidential Flowers
Philadelphia Pennsylvania Florist for Philadelphia PA flowers

Quinn's Blooms & Greenery
Cobourg Ontario Florist

The Gateway Florist
Annapolis Maryland Florist

Towers Flowers
Long Island NY Florist

Suspended In Time
Flower Preservation Services

The Hidden Garden Floral Designs

Dogwood Tree
Raleigh’s premier event design

English Garden Raleigh

Always In Bloom
Wilmington North Carolina Florist

Anthurium Gardens Florist
Miami Florist

B&B Florist
Chandler Arizona Florist

B.c.B's Flowers & More
Dover, DE florist shop and fresh flower arrangements

Blooming Scents
Serving Ottawa

Hearts and Flowers
Charlottetown Flower Shop

Suzan M Flora's
San Diego California Florist

Teleflora SEO Laced News Release for FindaFlorist.com

2009-01-27T22:45:00.000-08:00

Well...well...well....

A couple of weeks ago I was a little hard on Teleflora regarding an SEO news release that was masked under an announcement of their up coming Super Bowl commercial. Thereat, I blogged that while Teleflora had every opportunity to optimize the news release to influence the rankings of both Teleflora.com and their local florist directory FindaFlorist.com, that Teleflora chose only to optimize it for Teleflora. Thus, the reference that they made in the news piece to FindaFlorist.com was apart of the masking process as their SEO did not pass any ranking influences to FindaFlorist.com.

Fast forward to today, and low and behold we have an SEO laced new release focused on influencing the ranking of FindaFlorist.com for the keyword “flowers.” This marks the first effort where a wire-service has actually made movement toward offsite SEO for their member’s directory.

The actual news release can be found by clicking here.

Two words come to mind: "I'm impressed!"

If only FTD would do the same for FTDFloristonline.com

Update 01/28/09: MSNBC is now picking up the release. Lot's of link juice being passed.

Are Web Designers & SEOs One IN the Same?

2009-01-26T09:08:00.000-08:00

MSN.com recently posted and article on the top “Five Careers That Sail Through a Tough Economy.” Topping that list is “Web Designer.” According to the article:

“As companies look for ways to cut overhead costs, demand for Web design grows. The Internet has evolved from an information resource into a robust economic platform. Companies take advantage of low-overhead Internet storefronts to tap new markets worldwide as they market and sell their products online. They need a compelling Web presence to reel in customers -- and that's where you come in.”

[emphasis in red font is mine]

A common public misconception is that “website design” and “SEO” are one IN the same when they are not. No disrespect to “web designers,” but most web designers do not understand how the conceptual model of the web works nor do they care (at least, that has been my experience in working with web designers). That’s why companies like FTD, 1800flowers, and Proflowers, hire SEOs independent of their web designers.

In my opinion, MSN is wrong to list “web designer” in their report when clearly they are meaning an “SEO.” A “web designer” is usually just that, a “web designer.” An SEO however, is focused on strengthening their client’s web presence through various strategies that have little or nothing to do with design.

Of course, having both work together is ideal, but that’s not what we are talking about here.

What say you? Did MSN make a mistake in correlating a “web designer” with an “SEO”?

If so, who is now #1??

Reminder on Claiming Local Google Listings

2009-01-25T20:00:00.000-08:00

If you haven’t yet claimed your free local Google listing, you better get it done as your unclaimed listing is at risk of being hijacked by a competitor.

Order Gatherers, that goes for you too. The following major players have listings unclaimed:

FTD.Com: Florist Downers Grove, IL

1800flowers: Florist Carle Place, NY

Proflowers: Proflowers San Diego, Ca

Justflowers: Florist, LA, Ca

And my favorite plagiarist, Wesley Berry Flowers: Florist West Bloomfield, MI

Takes less than 2 minutes to claim it.

Paid Link Shift for Valentine's Day

2009-01-25T13:42:00.000-08:00

Of interest, I’m noticing a shift in the way Proflowers.com and FTD.com are mounting their link-vote campaigns for this coming holiday, Valentine’s Day. For those who have been following me for the last three or four months, we’ve seen these two floral entities involved in traditional old school methods of placing link-votes in the sidebar areas of blogs and other web properties in an effort to influence Google’s algorithm. But this holiday things are different as the two floral entities appear to be following the stealthy ways of 1800flowers.com by placing link-votes directly in content areas.

[You can follow me on Twitter off to the right of your screen where I’ll often tweet about link-votes as I come across them.]

While Google still considers this practice to be outside of their guidelines because it is artificial at the core, it doesn’t compromise the integrity of Google’s algorithm to the same level as paid sidebar link-votes due to relevant context. In that regard, it’s kind of like seeing a Coke sign during a movie scene verses an actual commercial: the Coke sign is always somehow a part of the context. Hence, it just *may* be that Google is less critical of contextual link-vote placement.

Having said all that, Proflowers is still active in old school methods as in the last few days I’ve noticed a lot of new sidebar link-votes go up for “florist” around the web. Proflowers behavioral pattern has always been more brazen than the other floral entities which may ultimately trigger their SEO demise once (or if) Google starts watching them more closely.

In my opinion, creative link-votes in 2009 are going to be key for long term success.

Detecting New "Googlebombs"

2009-01-24T21:54:00.000-08:00

Today Matt Cutts posted on the Google Public Policy blog the following note related to Google Bombing:

Detecting new "Googlebombs"
Saturday, January 24, 2009 at 7:28 PM
Posted by Matt Cutts, Software Engineer

Though the spirit of change may be in the air in Washington, some things apparently stay the same. Yes, the old online prank called "Googlebombing" returned for a brief while recently, when Google searches for the words words [failure] and [cheerful achievement] returned President Obama's biography as the top result.

You may remember this issue from a few years ago, when the query [miserable failure] led to the biography of President Bush. For some reason, all those links pointing to the Bush bio were redirected to Obama's. Some people have asked in the past whether these results are a sign of political bias on Google's part, and we've explained that this isn't the case.

Rather than edit these prank results by hand, we developed an algorithm a few years ago to detect Googlebombs. We tend not to run it all the time, because it takes some computing power to process our entire web index and because true Googlebombs are quite rare (we joke around the Googleplex that more articles have been written about Googlebombs than there are actual examples of Googlebombs).

After we become aware of this latest Googlebomb, we re-ran our algorithm and it detected the Googlebomb for [cheerful achievement] as well as for [failure]. As a result, those search queries now return discussion about the Googlebombs rather than the original pages that were returned.

Be sure check out search engine analyst Danny Sullivan's post from yesterday. He does a great job explaining the history behind this and how it all works.

Proflowers: "Just Say No to Red Roses"

2009-01-22T19:08:00.000-08:00

Today Proflowers put out an odd press release stating:

"ProFlowers is urging women to take a stand and Just Say No" to red roses on Valentine's Day. Instead, ProFlowers will offer dozens of mixed bouquets, stylish "shortie" bouquets, multicolored Passion Premium Roses, and even flowers for men on Valentine's Day! And, for those who are slow to accept change, don't worry, ProFlowers will still continue to sell red roses."

According to the article, "Research Finds 76% of Women Do Not Want Red Roses on Valentine's Day." The full press release can be found here.

Local Search Title-Line Revisited

2009-01-21T20:25:00.000-08:00

A few days ago I blogged that the title-line in local search can be manipulated for marketing purposes.

After blogging about that a couple of my colleagues expressed concern that it wasn’t a good idea and one of them pointed me to the following discussion between Google Map Guide Joel and a person asking a question related to the title-line of local search:

This is an interesting case of spam - I'm glad you both posted here.

I've linked the quality guidelines below. Those listings that don't follow these guidelines are subject to removal. I wanted to highlight two points:
1. "Represent your business exactly as it appears in real life. The name on Google Maps should match the business name, as should the address, phone number and website."

Interestingly, the title LV Photo Party Las Vegas Photo Booth Rental, in my view, is committing what we call title spam or keyword stuffing. The business name doesn't match the name provided on the website.

Quoting from the guidelines again:

2. "Google Maps is intended to be a source of information for users and business owners alike."

The ShutterBox Photo Booth listings appear to have their business appropriately named. It is strange, however, that the address information isn't on the website. The addresses on listings should be useful to customers. If I were a customer, I'd expect to be able to drive up and get service from ShutterBox Photo Booth in both the locations in Las Vegas as well as the locations in Chicago.

Each of you have an opportunity to clean up the listings as necessary. I'll check back on these listings in a few days. Please make sure they follow our lisitng guidelines.

Thanks,
Joel

I no longer recommend local search title-line marketing.

Search Engine Bomb set to fade away…

2009-01-21T00:02:00.000-08:00

The famous “miserable failure” Google bomb that was defused by Google administration a few years back is set to disappear from Yahoo at any moment as the page has been removed. A strange oddity, Yahoo’s automated algorithm is tiering Barack Obama’s page for the same term:

Proflowers Conversion Rate for December

2009-01-20T21:05:00.000-08:00

Like November, Proflowers leads the entire ecommerce world on conversion rates.

Marketing in the Google Local Listing Tag

2009-01-19T08:02:00.000-08:00

01/21/09 notice: I no longer recommend marketing in the title-line of local listings as discussed below.

Last month I ran a piece on “Claim Your Google Map Listing” by the SEO for 1800flowers.com, Jordan Glogau. In that post, Jordan stressed how important it is for local florists to claim their local Google listing before an unethical competitor hijacks it for their own gain.

What follows here assumes the reader has already secured his/her listing and wants to market within the listing itself....

As many florists know, it is not uncommon to see major floral entities market product price points directly in Google’s search results by way of a Google Adwords campaign like we see here:

In an effort to stay competitive with that type of price point marketing I’ve recommended in the past that local florists should use a small key portion of their title tag title area to visually capture the same audience:

But did you know that you can also market a price point in the local listing title area? Indeed you can…

A carefully crafted tag line can not only put a competitive price point directly in the search result page, but it also makes your listing stand out as different from the rest and is likely to draw potential customers in your direction.

Combine on all tag line marketing efforts, and you will dominate your local area search.

Proflowers Conversion Rates Explained??

2009-01-16T11:29:00.000-08:00

In an article posted today on PracticaleCommerce.com, the author touches on a question I asked a few days ago related to the high conversion rates over at Proflowers.com.

While the article’s focus is on the fact that “people are psychologically conditioned to ignore most ads,” Proflowers has learned to get around that barrier by not advertising in an interruptive manner. Rather, they advertise contextually and use stories that people can identify with.

Here is an excerpt of the piece:

Telling Authentic Stories with Your Ads
In December 2008, ProFlowers.com had one of the highest conversion rates in the ecommerce business, transforming 31.1 percent of all site visitors into paying customers, according to The Nielsen Company's MegaView Online Retail study. So what is their secret? I believe that ProFlowers is so successful because its ads, particularly radio ads, tell such authentic or real stories.
If you have ever listened to talk radio, you've probably heard a talk show host endorse ProFlowers. Invariably, the host tells listeners about his experience using ProFlowers. He speaks of how fresh the flowers were and of how fast they arrived. To the listeners—who are fully aware that the host is being paid—the story about ProFlowers is less of an ad and more of a recommendation from a trusted friend. Any campaign that takes this tact, telling real stories about an ecommerce company's products and services is—I believe—welcomed by consumers. Tactics that tell these stories include:
Endorsements. If you can afford to have a radio host endorse your store, you will see a boost in sales.
Blogs. Telling your company's story becomes a form of word-of-mouth marketing that will reach an audience that would sleep through a slick television ad.
Buzz or promotional marketing. Consider offering free and exclusive discounts that spread by word-of-mouth.
Print advertising that is based on a worldview, not a product. Print advertising can still be very effective, especially if the ad fits the context of the publication and adds to the publication's theme or ethos.
Summing Up
Interruption advertising is a fading tactic that is no longer as effective as it once was. But there are still lots of advertising tactics that will help ecommerce sites increase web traffic.
Full article can be read by clicking here

Teleflora Job Cuts

2009-01-15T10:59:00.000-08:00

A news release on job cuts over at Teleflora was posted yesterday on paragoulddailypress.com.

Teleflora cuts jobs

Local management refuses to comment

By Carol Haynes/Daily Press

Published: Wednesday, January 14, 2009 12:12 PM CST

Although Paragould Teleflora human resource manager Hal Wyatt had no comment, the Daily Press learned Tuesday morning that some employees were terminated.

In a statement released from Teleflora president Shawn Weidmann in Los Angeles, said, “Teleflora reduced a select number of positions across all business units to align costs with current and long term business priorities.

“As a long-time employer in Paragould, Teleflora remains committed to sound business practices and providing the local community with continued employment opportunities.”

Weidmann said because Teleflora is a “privately held company,” the number of jobs cut Monday would not be released, nor the number of current employees.

Some employees who lost jobs were unwilling to make comments, and others did not return calls when contacted by the Daily Press.

However, Larry Gibbs, who lost his job as a hardware technician, said the Press he holds “no ill will.”

“Business is not good, and it affects us like everyone in town ... We are at the mercy of the market as well,” he said. “I understand the economic situation, he said. “If work is not there, we can’t keep a workforce in place.”

He opted not to comment on severance packages or other options that may have been offered terminated employees by the company.

Gibbs said while he had no official warning of job cuts, he had suspicions “something was coming for awhile.”

Anyone who watches the news, or follows the economy understands the possibility of cut jobs, he said.

“It happens,” he said. “I’ve never allowed myself to be defined by my job ... My job is what enables my life.

“My family is life.”

In a press release Tuesday, Teleflora announced it will premiere a commercial in conjunction with Super Bowl XLIII, scheduled to air on NBC on Feb. 1.

According to the press releases, “This marks the first time in the company’s 75-year history that it will advertise during one of the world’s most watched and celebrated sporting events. Teleflora’s 30-second spot will air during the game’s second quarter.”

Reuters news service reports a 30-second commercial spot during the game will cost $3 million.

Valentine's Day Flower Delivery and Service Charges

2009-01-14T19:36:00.000-08:00

I bounced around a few of the major floral players today in an effort to know how much they will be charging beyond the product amount on Valentine’s Day orders. In that regard, Proflowers.com will have the highest additional charge for flower delivery on Valentine’s Day.

Proflowers Shipping Charges:

Product & Accessory Price

Saturday Valentine’s Day Delivery

$0.00 - $45.00

$22.98

$45.01 - $60.00

$24.98

$60.01 - $70.00

$25.98

$70.01 and up

$27.98

The reason Proflowers.com will have the highest charge is because Valentine’s Day falls on a Saturday and FEDEX weekend rates will apply. Proflowers.com will also be limited by FEDEX in what areas can have delivery as FEDEX doesn’t service many of the areas they service during the week.

As for the other floral entities, this is what they will be charging….

FTD.Com Service Charge: $14.99

1800flowers.com Service Charge: $13.99

Teleflora.com Service Charge: $13.99

Teleflora & Super Bowl XLIII

2009-01-13T15:51:00.000-08:00

In conjunction with Teleflora’s recent announcement that it will premiere a commercial during Super Bowl XLIII to boost public awareness of local Teleflora member florists, Teleflora today released an SEO laced news release focused on influencing Google’s algorithm to favor Teleflora.com for searches on “flowers” and “florists” and other floral search phrases.

According to the release, the intent of the commercial is:

"Our main priority has always been to support our member florists [hyperlink to Teleflora.com removed] and during these hard economic times, Teleflora wants to help our members generate sales and foot traffic into their shops," said Shawn Weidmann, President, Teleflora. "The opportunity to reach 90 million potential buyers less than two weeks before Valentine's Day - one of the largest flower [hyperlink to Teleflora.com removed] buying holidays - is something that couldn't be passed up."

However, when looking beneath the words of the release through an SEO lens, it is discovered that the intent here is to rank Teleflora.com for popular search phrases and not their local florist directory FindaFlorist.com.

One would think that if Teleflora was really serious about generating public awareness for local florist members, they would also want to help rank their local florist directory FindaFlorist.com for popular search queries. Instead, we see Teleflora only interested in ranking Teleflora.com.

Note: In the image above the red areas are where Teleflora.com cast link-votes toward their website in an effort to rank in Google for those words.

Actual news release can be found at: sev.prnewswire.com/retail/20090113/LA5845013012009-1.html

Think Like A "Black Hat" by Matt Cutts

2009-01-13T08:23:00.000-08:00

More Title-Tag adjustments for Valentine's Day

2009-01-12T21:11:00.000-08:00

Following the lead of Proflowers.Com, FTD.com uploaded their new homepage title & meta tags today to reflect Valentine's Day searches on flowers.

The adjustment in tags worked to move FTD into the 7th position (up from 10th). At present, there doesn't appear to be a link-vote campaign in place so I don't think they will advance into the top 5 (but that could change).

Also, Google's algorithm for "Valentines flowers" searches has picked up on the general interest of Valentine's Day. Yesterday Google began showing its own "Shopping results" in the middle of the main results which will make ranking in the top 3 imperative.

At present, Proflowers & 1800flowers have the monopoly on the upper primary real estate.

Time will tell if these two major players can continue to dominate "Valentines flowers" searches.

"Valentines flowers" Tiering

2009-01-08T22:39:00.000-08:00

Proflowers changed their homepage title-tag today to reflect Valentine’s Day and also added on-page text.

As result, Google’s algorithmic automation picked up on the change and tiered their homepage to a secondary result below their Valentine’s page for “Valentines flowers” searches. A similar circumstance happened with 1800flowers a few days ago which means the two floral entities now occupying a good percentage of primary searchable real estate.

From an SEO point of view, this is exactly what you want as it pushes the competition down and gives double exposure.

Is Dell.com using paid text links too?

2009-01-08T14:02:00.000-08:00

Staying on topic with my recent post on Proflowers and paid links......

Hot off the press today from BlogoScoped.com is an analysis that Dell.com is either involved in paid link schemes or a competitor is making it look like Dell is involved.

The article can be read here: Is Dell Buying Text links?

I tend to believe the former scenario than the latter.

Paid Text Links & the #1 Online Retailer on Conversion Rates

2009-01-07T23:37:00.000-08:00

In a recent article by Mark Jackson of Search Engine Watch, the author expressed his frustration with Google on its lack of policy enforcement as it pertains to “paid links.” Jackson explains how hard it is to convey to clients why “paid links” aren’t a good idea all the while knowing that they work. In his own words:

“I want to scream to the spam police at the major search engines. If you want us to operate in an ‘ethical’ manner, show us that you're penalizing the Web sites that abuse your guidelines! Not just one here and another there. That doesn't get our attention.” (See reference)

I can think of no better example for Google to make a statement than with the #1 online retailer on conversion rates: Proflowers.com. As is common knowledge among many SEOs, Proflowers.com has been actively engaged in influencing Google’s algorithm through the use of “paid links” for several years now and is quite brazen about it.

I started writing about paid text links in the floral industry over a year ago and more recently here on Florist SEO Watch. The article I wrote over a year ago actually ranks in the top 10 results for the search phrase “paid text links” and directly covers Proflowers.com. I sure find it hard to believe that a member of Google’s spam brigade has never read it given its exposure.

Here’s my take on paid text links: Google’s policy may state that buying text links is outside of its acceptable guidelines, but the level of tolerance is by fact unknown. When I look at the link campaign for Proflowers.com I am utterly floored by the excessive amount of paid text links that I see. To me, when I compare their efforts to others of the same caliber, Proflowers.com stands out as a heavy link buyer. Is Google clueless to all this? I don’t think so.

It has been said by other SEOs that Google is more lenient & tolerant toward large company violations, but if that is true then Mark Jacksons’ “scream” falls on deaf ears and will continue to. Penalizing smaller companies is not a sign that Google is serious. In fact, giving larger companies diplomatic immunity sends a confusing message to smaller businesses who often try to copy larger businesses for success.

Google Continues to Widen the Gap of Search Volume

2009-01-06T11:59:00.000-08:00

More stats coming in for November regarding: “search.” Google continues to dominate with 64.1% of the overall search market. (Source credit and more info)

For those who were following my postings regarding my Thanksgiving website that ranked 1^st for “Thanksgiving flowers” in the days leading up to the holiday, you may remember that I placed 1^st in Google, 2^nd in Yahoo, and 1^st in MSN. Of that placement, I only received less than 20 visitors from Yahoo, less than 5 visitors from MSN, but Google generated 2,949 visitors for us.

If you rank in MSN & Yahoo but not in Google for a primary keyphrase, you’re missing out on a lot of visitors.

Proflowers Leads E-Commerce Conversion Rates

2009-01-05T20:08:00.000-08:00

Of interest, for the month of November 2008, Nielsen ratings is reporting that Proflowers had the highest conversion rate among ALL retail websites. The report says:

“almost one-third (30.6%) of all visitors to ProFlowers.com made a purchase” (See article)

It’s not just the floral industry they are leading. It’s the entire online retail industry as a whole! There's not even a close second; and 1800flowers had a 17.8% conversion rate.

Why do you think that is? What do they have that others don’t? Your thoughts....

HonestFlorist.com

2009-01-02T14:17:00.000-08:00

Just hours ago Honestflorist.com put out an SEO laced news release intended to influence Google's algorithm to rank the website for the search phrase "flowers."

Just two weeks ago they had an Ad listed on Craigs list in search of an SEO provider. Over on Flower Chat, the owner of Honestflorist.com, said that he was willing to spend 100k a year on SEO services.

This SEO laced news release implies he filled the position. The site is now on my radar and should be interesting to watch what methods are employed to rank.

PageRank Update Dec. 30th 2008

2008-12-30T19:22:00.000-08:00

There is a PageRank update underway. FTD.com, Proflowers.com, Teleflora.com: all PR6. 1800flowers.com: PR7. Running from memory here, but I think only Teleflora and 1800flowers increased by 1 point.

Update Dec. 31st: PageRank has been confirmed by Matt Cutts of Google via Twitter and his blog:

"Yes, Google updated our toolbar PageRank values today. Consider this the confirmation"

Yelp.Com

2008-12-30T10:13:00.000-08:00

Ever heard of Yelp.com? If not, chances are you will. While the website has been around since 1996, only in recent time has it been updated to give Google exactly what Google is looking for: user content. In that regard, Yelp pages are now starting to popup for city searches around the nation. According to the header of the website:

“Yelp is the fun and easy way to find, review and talk about what’s great – and not so great – in your area.”

PageRank strengths on the site are strong enough to rank pages for various geographical florist searches. More specifically, it appears the SEO for Yelp is aware that more people type “flowers” after a city name than “florist” so all their floral related pages are optimized in apropos of.

However, like I said in my recent post on Justflowers.com and other order gatherers about being stretched too thin, if you optimize your website to just rank for your geographical area you’ll outrank them. A website that has PageRank of “0” can out rank a website of a PageRank of “5” if it is focused.

It has been said of Yelp that they tend to favor bad reviews in the way they organize their website so it is important to rank above them.

To learn more about Yelp, visit Wikipedia

Florist SEO Watch

FTD.com & FTDSUCKS.com

Incontent Link Showing in Google Search

New Restrictions on FTD's FOL Websites

1800Flowers At Proflowers.Com?

Teleflora: Now Offering "Cheap Flower Arrangements"

Google Adwords Testing through Proflowers

PageRank Sculpting

Yahoo Search Ranking Changes Scheduled Tonight

Weather Report: Yahoo! Search Index Update

We’re rolling out some updates to our crawling, indexing, and ranking algorithms over the next few days. During this process, you may see some ranking changes and page shuffling in the index.

BING.Com MTV Movie Awards 2008??

PageRank Update May 27th 2009

The Future of FlowerComplaint.com: SEO & Twitter

Mother's Day Aftermath

Teleflora's Mother's Day Commercial on All EFlorist Websites

Google Does Forgive: "Reconsideration Request"

Mother[']s Day:To Optimize With or Without the Apostrophe

"SEO Marketing" Showing in Local Results

Have you ever heard of MajesticSEO.com?

SEMRush.com

Multiple Brands Experience "Sitelinks" at Once

Google PageRank Update April 1st

Local Algorithm Showing within General Search

March Yahoo Algorithm Update

Cut Flower Commission & TaxPayer Money

Teleflora Link Bait SuperBowl Video

FlowerComplaint.Com Debut

February Search Engine Market Shares

Matt Cutts on Brand Ranking: "Vince's Change"

Local Florist PPC vs SEO Pricing

PageRank Update February 28th

FlowerPetal.com PageRank 5 to PageRank 2 (Dunce Hat)

Yahoo Algorithm Weather Report - February

Flowers - Brand Ranking & Geographically Devalued

Local Search Spammer - Florist Concierge by Wire

Nationwide 411 Florist Directory Inc.

Proflowers V-Day Domination

Google Favoring Brand Names for "Flowers"

Conversion Rate Stats for January

Hoogasian Flowers – Doorway Page

FTD FOL Sites - Valentine's Day & Easter Bunny??

"Valentines Flowers" - Search Volume 02/08/09 thru 02/11/09

Site Usage

Traffic Sources Overview[remove]

Keywords[remove]

Search Engines[remove]

Google Penalized Google for Paid Links

Online Florist Reviews

Google Checkout Feature

Valentines Flowers & Google Doubling Up

The Early Show & Proflowers

What did you think of Teleflora's Super Bowl Commercial?

Alert: Google Penalty Under Way for Floral Related Websites IF….

Teleflora SEO Laced News Release for FindaFlorist.com

Are Web Designers & SEOs One IN the Same?

Reminder on Claiming Local Google Listings

Paid Link Shift for Valentine's Day

Detecting New "Googlebombs"

Today Matt Cutts posted on the Google Public Policy blog the following note related to Google Bombing:

Detecting new "Googlebombs"

Saturday, January 24, 2009 at 7:28 PM

Proflowers: "Just Say No to Red Roses"

Local Search Title-Line Revisited

Search Engine Bomb set to fade away…

Proflowers Conversion Rate for December

Marketing in the Google Local Listing Tag

Proflowers Conversion Rates Explained??

Telling Authentic Stories with Your Ads

Summing Up

Teleflora Job Cuts

Teleflora cuts jobs

Local management refuses to comment

By Carol Haynes/Daily Press

Valentine's Day Flower Delivery and Service Charges

Teleflora & Super Bowl XLIII

Think Like A "Black Hat" by Matt Cutts

More Title-Tag adjustments for Valentine's Day

"Valentines flowers" Tiering

Is Dell.com using paid text links too?