Must Design

Adding Haiku Decks To WordPress

I love  Haiku Deck tool and figured out a way to add our decks to our blog:

http://www.curagami.com/marketing-haiku-decks/

I've been prodding  Adam Traitt, one of Haiku's founders, for a user profile (done) and more control over display (Haiku Deck team is working on it). In the mean time I decided to add my decks to Curagmai's  blog. Here's how we did it. 

*How To Add Haiku Deck To Your WP Blog*

1. Create a new Haiku Deck category on your blog. 

2. Create posts for every Haiku Deck to be added. You may want to use a date from last year or the year before to fool WordPress into moving your new Haiku Deck posts to the back of your stack. 

3.Create a grid we used WP Ultimate Post Grid and we upgraded to premium for the ability to filter by category. 

4. Redirect your WP posts to your Haiku Deck (we cheated and used the Twitter links, better to grab the nasty URL you can find in the embed area since we will drive up our Twitter share numbers artificially) we used Redirection plugin by John Godley. 

We wrote copy into this page mostly for   reasons. You can see a grid without copy here; http://www.curagami.com/magazines-2/ ;

We also use embedded  feeds behind the "Magazines" link. Each "Magazine" is firing from our Scoop.it feeds. This is how we see "websites" changing. Instead of a place where you creating everything tomorrow's sites will share your creations from all over and encourage visitors to collaborate and share too. If that sounds like we suggest you create online community you win a cookie (and I'm writing this from  so just tell me what kind you want :). Marty 

Learning From Video Game Designers
Video game designers can teach you a lot about how to great great ecommerce and B2B websites. Video games are gamified, social and understand the stimulus - response nature of online interaction in a fluid and must imitate ways.  

Here are WhatCulture.com's picks for the 20 best video game websites in the world. We like Gamers With Jobs and Kotaku (though we don't understand a lot of it).  

Google SEO Buzzcut
Google can cut our website's hair, but they aren't alone. We can be vicious barbers. Our unintended actions often mess with our URLs and that messes with the infinite universe we create whenever we publish.

Lessons shared here including an October update will help your site recovery from a bad Google or self inflicted haircut.  

With 22,000+ views SEO for Web Designers blew up thanks to a defined tribal audiences, advocates and luck. Discover tips on how to blow your content up too.

Tease marketing because in overwhelming times marketing needs to underwhelm, tease and inspire customers to find their truth and yours. Tease the click.

Made to Stick explains why some ideas become popular while others wither and die. What makes ideas ‘stick’ in the mind, and how to make them work for you.

Asking the right questions in the right way is key to online marketing success. How SMBs can compete with Amazon isn't as important as what is their why and how are they learning from Amazon's web marketing power.

Running into the web team from http://www.MoonandLola.com today after meeting them last week helped us realize we needed to add slides to our presentation. We HATE IT when that happens (lol).

Last week we spoke with about 40 Small to Medium Sized Businesses (SMBs) in a conference sponsored by FedEx and seeing the team at the Digital Summit today jogged our thinking. We forgot to discuss the importance of PLATFORM thinking.

We all know winning platforms such as Facebook, Twitter and my favorite Scoop.it. Platforms are winning because they play the "new SEO" game beautifully. We added Video Notes on YouTube to explain all of this (https://youtu.be/tSHeIxtrs4g ).

Find the Haiku Deck here: http://shar.es/1g7Kfb

Websites don't age well. Sooner than you think it's time for a web redesign, but don't forget the 5 CSFs (Critical Success Factors) shared here.

5 Critical Success Factors For When Your Web Redesign

• Start with Why.
• Listen to customer votes
• Test if you can, jump in if you can’t.
• 5 Easy to forget things.
• Prepare for rain, hope for sun.

This post features behind the scenes notes from our http://www.Moon-Audio.com redesign. Picture above is a "Before" and "After" view of Moon Audio's website. We spent a lot of time working on the site's information architecture.

We spent so much time because we have a lot of customer data now thanks to Google Analytics. We used that data to find the 80-20 rule and kept that finding in mind as we changed site navigation and categories.

This kind of "What Business are we In" work goes to the first two bullet point - Start with Why and Listen To Customer Votes. Another goal, not stated in the Curagami post, was to create an immediate sense of "I'm in the right place" scenttrail.

Ecommerce, especially in popular categories such as #headphones and #electronics, have two kinds of sties. One site is informational making money from passing customers over to sellers. Cnet.com is an example of a content site making money by capturing attention with great content and then passing customers on to a site where they can buy what they've just researched.

The New Ecommerce
We see the New Ecommerce merging Cnet and commerce to build sustainable online community. But there's a problem. Either of those missions is a full-time job - commerce, content or community. Merchants will need to delegate content creation to trusted members of their community and find ways to merchandise content and commerce more seamlessly than ever before.

The new Moon-Audio.com begins the move toward sustainable online content, commerce and community by clearly signalling THIS IS A STORE. Soon we hope to increase the signal to THIS IS A STORE WHERE YOU CAN LEARN TOO and finally THIS IS A COMMUNITY WHERE YOU CAN BUY AND LEARN.

Mashing up, curating and listening are the new skills needed to be a successful online merchant. No ecom site is GREAT at content, commerce and community...yet. Moon-Audio.com will fire on all three ideas over the next few months. Stay tuned.

http://www.curagami.com/magical-thinking/5-web-redesign-ideas/

Here A Wiki, There A Wiki, Everywhere A Wiki
What is a Wiki if not an invitation to create online community. The "open source" like collaboration Wiki's provide is a blueprint for creation of online community. After months working on http://www.Curagmai.com we've discovered how close Wikis are to...well everything.

Wiki Ideas To Steal Include:

* Open Source Like Content Collaboration.

* Use community to steer and de-spam ecosystem.
* Depend mostly on social reward.
* A healthy and competitive contest never hurts.

* Feature and thank contributors.
* Provide ways for contributors to know where they stand vis-à-vis other contributors.
* Create ways contributors can follow and communicate with each other.
* Include ways for contributors to create mini-tribes.

* Make sure "rules of the road" are understood and published.

* Communication with sponsoring agents must be easy too.
* Normalize greatness by sharing across ecosystem.
* Role of sponsors becomes more curators than creators.
* Ask for help.
* Provide social rewards (such as features) to contributors.
* Create ways to identify contributors in the world (t-shirts, stickers).
* Appreciate, be nice and thankful (always no matter what).

Following a few simple rules will dramatically increase the most important content you can't buy (User Generated Content or #UGC) and build sustainable online community. Sustainable online community means costs go DOWN even as other material rewards (UGC, followers, traffic, money) go UP.

This Haiku Deck is about why we are all in the Wiki business whether we realize it or not AND how to design for the Wiki-ization of marketing, brands and online community.

The "Web Design" category of general interest covers its fair share of ground. Informative articles on everything from UX to client management, to conversion psychology,...

Content Marketing Is Key
Important post from Scoop.it CEO @Guillaume Decugis because the 12 step program he outlines clearly cleaves content marketing pros from everyone else. We share this post in our Design Revolution Scoop.it feed because we would add 2 more items to a solid list:

13. You aren't designing for content curation and content marketing. 14. You are building community in

Designing for content curation means incorporating the automated feeds Guilluame discusses and leaving room for community and collaboration.  

Community's pillars such as user profiles, timeliens, following, comments, wikis and blogging have to be fuilt into a design or you are talking to yourself about yourself even if you follow many of Guillaume edicts. Guillaume's 12 Step Progam: 

1. You’re not tracking your results.

2. You’re not repurposing your content.

3. You aren’t automating at least part of your social media activity.

4. You aren’t automating some of your email marketing.

5. You’re only sharing your own content – you’re not adding any content curation to the mix.

6. You aren’t testing.

7. You don’t have a content strategy that’s tied to business goals and your buyers’ journey.

8. You haven’t defined your buyers’ personas or their typical journey.

9. You aren’t creating content strategically.

10. You don’t have a centralized “vault” of all your company’s content assets.

11. You aren’t promoting your content, either via social sharing or by making it visible to the search engines.

12. You have nothing to show for your work.

WordPress auto blogging plugins can help you to get new content for your site on complete autopilot, it is extremely important for every blogger

Designing a good website that accommodates a lot of content is a tricky balancing act to pull off. Does one attempt to present the user with all the information

Beating Content Shock
We don't disagree with author and web marketing guru Mark Schaefer. There is too much content chasing too little attention. Once you have attention you need to convert visitors to buyers.

Creating content "magazines" is a great way to beat Schaefer's content shock, create trust, win hearts and minds and engender loyalty. This LinkedIn Post shares a synopsis of tips shared on Curagmai including:

• Find 3 – 5 content groups that interest your visitors.
• Decide your schedule (we recommend monthly updates at first because that is a big commitment that must be kept to gain trust).
• Curate content from trusted sources such as brands, manufacturers and even competitors.
• Automate at least one of your content groups with feeds.
• Find and nurture free visual media sources such as Haiku Deck.

The Curagami post is here:
http://www.curagami.com/ecommerce/5-tips-magazine-content-marketing/?v=7516fd43adaa 

And The http://www.Moon-Audio.com example is here:
http://www.moon-audio.com/chord-hugo/magazine.html#

The LinkedIn Synopsis is here:
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/how-magazine-your-content-marketing-martin-marty-smith 
 

Canonical URLs Explained
The Yoast post provides an easy way to understand why rel=canonical is a powerful new SEO tag. Yoast has a dog in the hunt. They make a Magento plugin that easily writes the rel=canonical tag into a product page's head.

The explanation about WHY canonical URLs are so important is only half right. We have a million ways of expressing and sharing URLs these days. Without rel=canonical we end up duping content to distraction.

Here's the rub. All ecommerce sites dupe content. They must. When I was a Director of Ecommerce a single product accounted for 50% of our profits. You better believe I merchandised that product into every nook and cranny our site offered. I duped that product and it's content to distraction.

There are other ways to limit duplication including:

* Use of your Robots.txt file.
* Locking content behind a firewall.  

* Use of blockquotes & rel=canonical tags. 
* Rewrite duplicated content so it's not as duplicated (lol). 

We included our email output into a folder with a "no follow" line in our robots.txt. You may think such a move is enough. It isn't. Be sure NOT to drive links from spiderable content INTO that folder or you eliminate the effectiveness of the robots.txt.

In the end every ecom site worth it's salt MUST duplicate content. Rewriting sounds like a good strategy, but it isn't. Content = time and time = money when managing million dollar commercial sites. You will be duping content.

Best to use rel=canonical because it shows Google you aren't trying to STEAL anything. Reminds me of what a friend shared about the disavow tool (used to deny inbound links or signal they may be untrusted).

 My friend was using the disavow tool daily on his clients accounts. "So you are brown-nosing Google," I kidded him. "Exactly," was his answer. Rel=canonical tells Google you are TRYING to do the right thing and sometimes that is enough. 

Jetpack's cool icon feature creates, adds & shares a mobile app like icon & link for your blog on you & your customers smartphones for free. 

Why do this? Because coolest thing since sliced bread to hit your customers is their smartphones. Getting your blog linked there is ONLY a good thing for your content marketing, community building and ecommerce.  

Web Designer SEO
Our SEO Tips for Web Designers hit a nerve. It is heading to 13,000 views (probably today). We hit a nerve because web Designers are where SEO rubber meets the road. This Haiku Deck is full of SEO tips for web designer including:

* Know who has the banana and why.
* Know how much SEO you need to know.

* Learn what is MIST vs what is Gorilla.
* Listen Digitally.
* Understand how SEO & Content marketing work together.

* Design to Win Hearts, Minds and Loyalty. 

And More SEO tips designed for designers.  

What Is Your Favorite About Us Page?
Team +Curagami  is looking for great About Us pages. Our fav is http://www.rei.com/about-rei.html. +REI hits all the "great about page" pillars including:

* It SOUNDS like them.
* Includes A Creation Story.
* Guiding Values Statement.
* Save The World Cause.
* Movement Outline (so people want to JOIN).
* Some external confirmation (+Fortune Magazine for REI).

Share your favorite About Us pages and, if we use your examples, we will send a "Tech Cures Cancer" tee along with our thanks.

e: Martin(at)Curagami.com      #favaboutus

Thanks, Marty

Haiku Deck Zuru uses the power of artificial intelligence to transform your ideas into polished presentations. Become a charter member to get 6 months free.

Marty Note
Haiku Deck is one of my favorite visual marketing tools. Our 41 "decks" have generated more than 100,000 views. We got the idea about slides being a new marketing channel by working with this magic wand of a tool.

Now they've got something new up their sleeve and the entry fee is a whopping $30 bucks (lol). Let's see, 100K views for $30 bucks, we signed up today and suggest you do the same. Whenever their new tool comes out of beta we know it will be worth many multiples of $30 bucks :). M

Knowing your website's navigational taxonomy can mean the difference between millions in traffic and money. Here are 5 Simple Navigational Taxonomy Rules.

* It's About THEM not YOU.
* Create A Commons.
* It's FREE and EASY.

* Srart with Brands & Work OUT.

* Find Engagement & Work IN.

Easy to follow rules so your site's nav WINS traffic, hearts, minds, SEO and loyalty needed to be around for a bit.

An updated look at the hottest best web design trends of 2014 including a showcase of modern web design inspiration.

Marty Note
This @justcreative post hit many nails on the head when it was initially published and Jacob's update of Helga Moreno's post doesn't disappoint either. Things I REALLY agree with:

See Less of (PLEASE):

* Stock photography (no photos? ASK your employees / followers for help but please no more Stepford people in pics on websites).
* Flash (has killed more #seo and sites than you can shake a stick at and fact it is still alive is amazing).
* Capcha - spam sucks but so do capcha forms.

More of PLEASE:

* Content First (implied in Responsive or Mobile First Design is a new way of thinking about, tagging and presenting content).
* Interactive Exploring (BIG AGREEMENT see my post about Time is Money Online https://plus.google.com/+MartinWSmith/posts/RdjAjWoJTHw and tag this next to #gamification).
* Arresting pictures and Video (YES, your great content will be ignored or under-shared UNLESS it is paired with strong visual hooks and supports).

Great post by Helga for Just Creative and so TRUE to our experience of web dev in 2014 for leading ecommerce clients such as Moon Audio.com.