Imagine spending thousands of your hard-earned dollars on Super Bowl tickets to then be turned away at the door because the seat you bought wasn’t available.  You’d be pretty darned mad to say the least.

Did you hear about this in the news?  About 400 fans were locked out of Super Bowl XLV even though they had tickets.

You see, the temporary seating for the 400 ticket holders wasn’t approved by the Fire Marshall.  And the worst part is, the stadium officials supposedly knew about this for about one week prior.

Now how does this all relate to online marketing? Well, keep reading and I’ll tell you.

It’s a huge lesson in not forgetting about your customers.  Jerry Jones and his crew were so busy worrying about getting that coveted attendance record that they neglected the very people who were helping them create the record in the first place.

And this happens all the time on the internet.  Companies create flashy, innovative websites that look pretty but often neglect the visitor.

Many websites are heavy on graphics and low on content.  Sometimes the Flash on websites make it more difficult for other relevant elements on the pages to work properly.

Some websites  completely ignore user experience and create endless hoops for visitors to jump through to get the most basic of information.

Ughhh…why???

I’ll tell you why.  It’s because the site was never designed with the visitor in mind.  It’s often designed to satisfy the egos of the graphic designer, web developer or even the owner’s Uncle Chester (yes, I’ve encountered this before).

So when you take a fresh look at your website, is it set up to create a simple and easy user experience?  Does it answer all questions that visitors may have?  Are there obvious ways for the visitor to get a hold of you if necessary or do they have to hunt around?

If not, take a lesson from the Jerry Jones playbook.  He was so focused on appearance that he forgot about the basics: the fans.  Learn from this and make your website a good experience for your fans.

Now that Google has started using the new external keyword tool interface, there’s one thing I noticed that may trip some users up.

When you enter your keyword or website, just make sure to change the country to the one of your choice.

I’m in the U.S. and the country is usually pre-listed as Australia or the United Kingdom.

Hope this helps.

It can be a rude awakening. You’ve worked hard getting your site to the 1st page of Google and keeping it there.  But maybe you’re #7 and you want to move up a bit.

So you add or change your content or other SEO elements…then ugghhh…what happened?

Your site has dropped like a tons of bricks to # 28 way down on the – gulp – 3rd page!!!

The worst thing you can do at this point is panic and start changing things to chase Google.  More than likely Google is playing with you.

It’s what we SEOers call, The Google Dance.  See, when you make changes to your site, sometimes it’ll drop like a ton of bricks.

And yes, you’ll have to sweat it out…anxiously checking your ranking daily.  But more than likely, in about 10 days or less, you’ll end up at least where you left off.  In this case, #7 or maybe even higher!

So don’t panic if this happens to you.   Remain calm and wait for the mystifying thing we call, Google, to finish it’s dance.  And in the end, hopefully you won’t be dropped!