Nielsen Online recently released some data from the top 1,000 influential blogs (determined by inbound link popularity) and discovered that gift recommendations, reviews and gift buying guides were all the buzz in the blogosphere.
As you would expect, gadgets, gaming gifts and other techie stuff was most discussed according to the press release. Which makes this leaderboard a bit of a head-scratcher:
Top Online Retailers Ranked by Buzz Growth for Week Ending December 2nd
Online Retailer
Week over Week Buzz Growth
1. Overstock.com
122%
2. Orbitz.com
97%
3. JC Penney
94%
4. Dell
52%
5. Travelocity.com
49%
6. Netflix.com
40%
7. MSN Shopping
30%
8. Hallmark
22%
9. Lowes
22%
Source: Nielsen Online
Are these really the top discussed retailers for product reviews and recommendations? Hallmark? Last time I checked, Hallmark wasn’t sellin’ no iPhones or Wiis. So I looked under the hood at Google Blog Search, and found that there were a lot of results for Hallmark on deals/coupon sharing sites, Hallmark buildings, the Hallmark Channel, and Paris Hilton suing Hallmark for cards like this:
Today kicks off a weekly tradition (though definitely not original) here at Get Elastic. Every Friday I will be posting a Blogger’s Digest that recognizes outstanding content from around the web of interest to ecommerce marketers, managers, bloggers and SEO-types to give you some rainy day reading for the weekend (especially if you’re in Vancouver/Seattle).
Aaron and Giovanna Wall put together a nice little SEO Guide for Bloggers including keyword research, analytics and marketing, w00t!
SEO for a blog is different than SEO for most other websites, largely because of the social elements baked into blogging technology. SEO for blogs is less about buying links or tricking inadequate search technology. SEO for blogs is more focused on giving people something to talk about and creating something worthy of attention.
Google’s Spam Terminator Matt Cutts resurrects his video blogging with a thorough explanation on how the search engine snippet works.
Not long ago we posted a list of ecommerce blogs from 2006’s Internet Retailer Top 500 List, with many blogs only days old! Well it’s been a few months and we thought you might be interested in how many RSS subscribers (readers who sign up to read each post through a blog reading service like Google Reader, Bloglines or Netvibes). Because Google and Bloglines allow you to check out how many subscribers you have through their readers, I was curious to see what kind of following the ecommerce blogs have, and have reported my findings below.
If you’re wondering how you can check out your own Google Reader and Bloglines stats, I’ve got a tutorial for you as well. Of course, you can always sign up for a Feedburner account (recommended) and get more information on which services your subscribers are using, but make sure you read “Stay Master of Your Feed Domain” first.
Wanna spice up your blog marketing? Bloggers can use this list to gain some relevant backlinks to help SEO and boost your exposure through RSS feed promotion. Or if you’re an ecommerce marketer, check out these sites to find bloggers in your niche.
Thanks again to Neil Patel for being our special guest today to chat about social media marketing for online retailers. And thank you to all who joined us live and engaged us with some great questions.
In case you missed our live Webinar, here are some highlights of what we covered. Let’s keep the discussion going. We’d love to hear your thoughts and further questions in the comments section.
What is Social Media, Anyway?
Social media is a tricky space for ecommerce marketers to explore. Not only is it relatively new and largely unknown, but it’s also labor intensive and highly strategic. We kicked off the discussion with the definition of social media — simply put, “human interaction on the Web.” More specifically, we’re talking blogs, social networking sites like Facebook, community forums, video sharing sites, social bookmarking and you could throw in social shopping sites and user reviews in the mix too for us ecommerce types.
The entire blogging community has jumped on the BlogRush bandwagon, and we are no different here at Get Elastic. A-list bloggers are adding this new blog traffic widget to try and generate additional exposure for their blog content. How does it work?
Simply add the BlogRush widget to your blog and for each visitor your blog recieves, you will earn a credit to display one of your posts headlines on a related blog in the network. It reminds me of the old Webring days.
The treat is, there is a MLM component to it, and you will also receive credits for people who sign up for the service - up to 10 levels deep. That is some serious velocity. At first I was hesitant as the posts did not seem that related to the topics we cover here on Get Elastic, but over the past 24 hours it has actually gotten better. I have started to discover some excellent blogs from post titles appearing in the widget. I have actively clicked through and found the content engaging enough to subscribe to the feed.
As more blogs are added to the network, I believe it will get even more accurate and this widget will become a mainstay like the MyBlogLog widget has become.
* Note: links to BlogRush contain a referral ID - if you sign up, you become part of our extended network and we get extra credit. If we can pull reports on who signs up under us, we will blog about our network and you will get a high quality link from us.
They discuss the power of blog comments, sock puppet blogs, being a dull person and how blogs shorten sales cycles with plenty of examples and anecdotes including how to buy a hammock.
When veteran companies like Random House embrace very forward thinking marketing practices like ecommerce widgets, the winds of change must be blowing.
What is a widget? Simply, a third party item that can be embedded in a web page. The most common being embedded Google AdSense ads or YouTube videos (most often found on blogs and social networks like MySpace). What is an ecommerce widget? Well a widget that helps sell stuff of course.
Random House ‘gets it widget on’ in a similar fashion as the popular Amazon ‘Search Inside’ feature with something called ‘Insight‘.
Bloggers and social networkers can embed their favorite book widget so visitors to their blog or profile can:
view the book cover
view inside the book (or in the case of audio books, listen to a sample)
buy the book (links into the product page of the online store)
Ecommerce blogging has a number of benefits, but are you taking full advantages of blogs in regards to search engine optimization?
Using keyword text appearing naturally in your posts and interlinking your product pages and even related blog posts gives those pages additional keyword relevance and page strength in the eyes of search engines. You’re essentially telling the search engine that the page you’re pointing to is all about “keyword phrase.” This also helps direct visitors that stumble upon your blog content to your e-store. And since most ecommerce product pages do not have any external links pointing at them (not counting affiliate links), this can give you a real leg up on your competition!
Take this fictitious blog for a company that runs two ecommerce websites: a florist / flower delivery shop and a garden supply company.
The blog post doesn’t necessarily have to presell your products, in this case it is providing some useful tips for caring for gardenias. This content is not only helpful for this company’s customers, but could be found by anyone searching for such information through a search engine.
Within the post are several opportunities to link to deeper product pages of the gardening e-store. The links here could potentially link to:
“care for your house plants” - another post on the blog or an in-depth guide offered on the main site, even an affiliate link to a relevant book on Amazon.com
“African Violets” and “Poinsettas” - category pages for these particular plants, even though they are not the subject of the post
“Gardenia arrangement” - a more targeted term that someone who was further along in the buying cycle would use, more likely a higher converting keyword than “gardenia” itself, pointing to a gardenia arrangement product page on the florist site
“bouquet of tulips” - the tulip arrangement product page on the florist site, again, another complementary keyword, using a longer tail variation
“acid fertilizer” - to the garden supply site’s acid fertilizer category
So if you have a corporate or company blog, make sure you’re taking advantage of interlinking opportunities using keyword-rich link text. And if you’ve built up a content-rich blog already, it’s not too late to go back in and add links. And keep this in mind when you write your next post.
Ryan starts by breaking through some of the hype around blogging (”Heck, the blog has gained such widespread popularity that it’s almost become passé in some circles “) and then seeks balance between writing for interest and writing to encourage sales.
The ’soft-touch’ technique makes his Top 5 Tips list, … {drumroll} … in at #2 is, “Write about subjects related to your business, such as news and trends. Establish yourself as the expert in your field. As you do so, subtly link to pages within your website that showcase products and services.”
Chiming in on that delicate fine-line is EP’s VP Markerting, Jason Billingsley, (followed by fellow BC biz blogger Tris Hussey),
A notable byproduct of blogs is the way they provide websites with a ton of fresh, original content.
Jason Billingsley, vice president of marketing for ecommerce software company Elastic Path, says blogs also give businesses the opportunity to associate their websites with popular keywords related to products and services.
“We still keep it at arm’s length,” he said, referring to posts that could be considered too promotional.
Hussey noted, though, that blogs can still indirectly boost your business. “People come to the blog to read interesting stuff,” said Hussey, “but you are allowed to earn a living and still blog.”
Comments(0) 
Nielsen Online recently released some data from the top 1,000 influential blogs (determined by inbound link popularity) and discovered that gift recommendations, reviews and gift buying guides were all the buzz in the blogosphere. 
Today kicks off a weekly tradition (though definitely not original) here at Get Elastic. Every Friday I will be posting a Blogger’s Digest that recognizes outstanding content from around the web of interest to ecommerce marketers, managers, bloggers and SEO-types to give you some rainy day reading for the weekend (especially if you’re in Vancouver/Seattle).
Not long ago we posted a list of 
Wanna spice up your blog marketing? Bloggers can use this list to gain some relevant backlinks to help SEO and boost your exposure through RSS feed promotion. Or if you’re an ecommerce marketer, check out these sites to find bloggers in your niche.
