Product enhancement frameworks

When a product is launched it is important it is continuously changed in order to keep it relevant with time.There are chances that some product performing exceptionally well and some are not.Therefore,it is necessary to identify the right kind of features/changes that needs to be done for the product in order to improve its performance with time.
                                  Based on my experience,I will share various frameworks which can be used for this purpose.

1.Goal Push vs conversion Framework

This framework is about identifying whether the push to different pages is optimum or it needs to be changed in order to improve the product performance.In this framework , push to different pages can be ploted on X axis and the conversion of that page on Y axis.Conversion here can be anything based on company's goal and page goal.The page conversion can help in identifying the top performing pages.This framework help in identifying which pages should the traffic be pushed.Right changes can help in increasing the push to right pages.
                                                                                 Once the top performing pages are identified the changes should be made to improve push to the right pages.This may not be applicable to eCommerce site where there is a standard flow.However in this also it can help in identifying the right category pages to which user should be pushed.

2.Clicks vs position

In this framework one can find out which section in the page is most useful to the user and which particular feature can be enhanced to make it more useful.The number of clicks can given an idea about the usefulness of the section.Though number of clicks depends on position of the elements it is quite possible that a section which is lower down the order in page gets more clicks.In this case it is quit obvious that the section deserves to be moved up the order and also needs to enhanced.There are various online products tools available which can help in understanding the click behavior.

Mailer Optimization

Mailers plays a critical role in any Digital marketing strategy. They helps companies to reach out to broader user base .There are lot of challenges which one come across when using mailer as marketing tools.
          Mailer are used not just for communication but also for creating brand awareness, generating leads etc...A good designed mailer can help companies to easily achieve its objective.

There are basically

Communication/Interaction mailers:

This mailers are basically about communicating to the user regarding the transaction which  user has done with a site. For ex.. when you buy a product from a site you get confirmation mailer. When you drop a lead on a site you get lead confirmation mailer etc..

Lead generation mailers

These mailer are basically product promotional mailer. In these kind of mailers companies tries to generate leads for a particular product. For eg.. companies send mails on promotional offers for products etc.. comes under this category

Brand awareness mailers

In these kind of mailers, marketers tries to make people aware of the new product or feature that is being launched in order to help the product to get traction. These kind of mailer tries to make product popular by highlighting its USP.

Design Guidelines for Mailer

1.Identify the goal of  mailer

It is very important to understand what one trying to achieve through the mailer. The design should follow the goal of the mailer

When the goal is communication about recent transaction then the mailer should ensure that the communication is the highlight in the mailer. The information should be comprehensive enough for user to understand

When the goal is lead generation it should be ensured that lead generation element is properly placed and highlighted. The mailer should ensure that there are not many option to click expect the lead the elements. The content of the mailer should contain the following

• User  needs that product fulfills: User will drop lead only when he feels the product is as per the requirement
• USP: What makes this product special will provide additional traction for the products
• Offer: In case there are any offer available it should be clearly highlighted

In case the mailer is regarding the brand awareness for a product it should contain the following elements

• Product detail: It should contain the complete detail of what the product feature are
• Launch date: In case the product is getting launched on some date it should contain the date
• Link: In case there is any link which explains what the product is, it should be share to the user so that he can learn about the feature

2.Determine what make user open the mailer

The open rate of the mailer depends on the subject of the mailer. The bench mark open rate for the mailer  is 8 -10%. The subject of the mail will decide whether the user will open it or not. Try with different subject lines and check which has better open rate and use it for future mailer

3. Ensure enough content to avoid going to SPAM 

When the mail does not have enough content there are high chances that mail will go the spam folder which will drastically reduce the open rate of the mailer. Avoid lot of images as google consider it as spam

4. Send from popular id

The id from which mailer are send should be popular enough. Ensure that user save the id in its contact which improves the credibility of the id. When the mailer are send form unknow id there are high chances that mailer which land into SPAM folder

Things to be avoided in SEO

SEO stands for Search engine optimization. When some one searches on Google/Bing  the links which comes below the ad are SEO links. These links are governed by the complex ranking factors which the search engines uses to rank various pages and site.

SEO is very critical for any organization which wants to grow its online business and survive in this cut throat competition. Growth in SEO traffic can be sustained for longer time in case one avoids doing common mistakes.

                                               Google and various other search engine uses 100+ signals in order to assign ranks to various pages of the site. Though no one can exactly say how various factors impact the rank of your page, there are some basic things which should be avoided while doing SEO.

1.Avoid multiple H1 tag

 Google considers H1 tag as one of the important signals in understanding the content of the page. In case there are multiple H1s on your site then google will not be able to understand what are the important keywords you are targeting which will negatively impact your SEO performance.

2.Avoid duplicate content as much as possible

 Though duplicate content cannot be totally avoided on the site it should be reduced as much as possible. Introduce self canonical for each page to tell google that this is the main page. Identify the URLs which have same content and keep one URL and delete the remaining.

3.Avoid Cloaking

 Cloaking may seriously affect the ranking of your pages. It happens when the content you show to the google bot is different from what you show to the user. It is allowed for some renowned site but for normal site it should be avoided else their can be heavy penalty on the rankings of your pages.

4.Avoid spam listings

 In order to increase listings many company upload listing which are not much different in content this reduces the quality of data on your site and can negatively impact the rankings for the keywords targeted by page.

5.Avoid dynamic URL

Dynamic URL is identified by "?" appended to the URL. When the URL is dynamic google would not able to identify the content of the page from URL and also user would not be able to make out what the page is about with dynamic URL. Always use static URL which contains information about he page content. This helps google in easy understanding what the page is all about

6.Avoid having too many links in footer

When there are two many links in footer the juice which google passes to the page get reduced as google not able to tell which are the important pages for you.

7.Avoid coding language which cannot be crawled

The pages will be ranked only when google is able to crawl your site property.Google can crawl HTML pages effectively.So ensure that the pages you want to crawl are in HTML.The crawl status can be seen in webmaster also you can user Cache:site name to see how the page looks to google.

8.Avoid posting multiple google reviews from same IP

Do not post multiple reviews about your site on google from same IP .Google consider it as SPAM and can penalize ranking of your site

Components of online products

Online Products are defined mainly by three major components
1.Interface:This is basically the various elements that you see on any website,mobile APP.
2.Interaction:This is about how user interact with the various component present on the Website,Mobile APP.
3.Navigation:This is about how user navigate through the various pages on the site/APP i.e the various links that are present on site and APP

The success of any site depends on how well these three attributes works for the user.Each of these components have various guidelines that needs to be followed

Interface

Reduce the clutter

Ensure that number of elements on the page are optimize to the space available.The elements should be arranged such that it become easy for user to access each element on the site.In case more number of element required for a particular action show them in different steps instead of showing them together on a page.
The major challenge arises when it is responsive design.In this case the design should be tested in various devices and should be adjusted to the size of device

Provide proper textual information

Each element should be self explanatory i.e user should be easily able to understand what is the use of that element.In case any additional information to be shown tool tip should be attached to that element

Arrange components as per user requirement

All the component should be arranged based on the user goal .For ex.E-commerce may have detail page about a product which may different information segments such as price ,offers,specification,Reviews,popularity etc...These components should be arranged as per the order in which user would like to see these segments.It helps in easily understanding the information and

Interaction

Make it easy to use:

The elements to be used for each steps should be chosen such that it is easy to use.For ex. in order to select a  product type we should check whether a drop down would be better or click based selection would be better.This should be chosen based on how many options are available for user to chose from.In case less option provide click base selection or else dropdown

Reduce the clicks:

Good experience also depends on the number of  events/clicks a user has to perform to achieve a particular task.For example when user want to search about a particular product on a e-commerce site ,how many clicks does he do to accomplish this particular task.The component should be chosen such that number of clicks get reduced.


Navigation

Provide appropriate links:

User comes on a site with a particular goal.Identify the various things which user want to accomplish through your site.The navigation should be defined by clearly understanding the user needs and providing the navigation which would help in achieving those needs.

Understand the current user flow through goals:

The current user behavior on the site helps you understand how user is navigating through your site.Identify the area where there is more drop out and improve those components through better navigation

Easy discovery of links:

User can easily navigate through your site only when he easily find the navigation links.Ensure that navigation link are placed at contextually right positions so that user can easily discover those links.

How to come in featured snippet

Featured snippet is the zero position search resultswhich come above the normal organic results.This snippet belongs to one of the top 10 results which come in organic search results.When one manages to come in featured snipped it can boost organic traffic by good percentage since the CTR is highest for zero position result.Feature snippet displayed mainly in below three formats based on type of query and the expected result

• Paragraph
• Table
• List

Google displays featured snippet taking into account various factors.In this blog will discuss on how to appear in featured snippet based on my real time experience on it

1.Structured data

The entire data of your page should be properly structured which means it should have proper heading tags,schema,meta information enclosed in right format.When data is properly structured it is easy for google to find out the right data to be picked and show it in featured snippets.When google crawls the page it looks for the right information which can be shown in feature snippet and it becomes easy to find when your data is structured

2. Valuable and comprehensive information

One site may be ranking 1 in organic search results but that does not guarantees feature snippet .The site which ranks below the 1st position results can also appear in feature snippet if the information it provides is valuable enough for the user to appear in featured snippet.The information should be comprehensive enough to attract google attention to it.The information should be added by asking below question

What are the keywords that user searches?

What information does user want from search results?

In what format user want the information to be presented?

Based on answers to above question one should collection the information and  format it as per user expectation

3.Rank in top 10

In order to appear in featured snippet one should ensure that the page is in top 10 organic search results.Google only shows one of the top 10 results in featured snippet.

4.Target the right keyword

Properly do keyword research on which keywords does google show the results in featured snippet. Identify the right set of keyword and create information which address that need of the user .This will help in ranking for that keyword in featured snippet

Top 5 Innovations in Advance Big Data Visualization

Today organizations are presented with the challenge of managing huge volumes of data that keep coming in from multiple channels. This data not only needs to be carefully stored but also has to be managed so as to derive useful insights from the same and this task can only be accomplished by data scientists.

There are lot of challenges in big data analytics.Thankfully, Business Intelligence companies like NSimpl have come up with innovative solutions that not only make data warehousing easy but visualization effective too. Here’s a list of the year’s best advanced big data visualization techniques and systems that have been applauded for their innovative and forward looking solutions:

·         IBM’s data visualization platform combines all three aspects, namely hardware, software and services. This technology also integrates desktop based data visualization and the system is ideal for what if queries. This system is also good with planning use cases which are generated from write-back functionalities.

·         The Web FOCUS platform that has been designed by Information Builders is ideal for data analytics that is done on a very large scale. It also has features like Info Assist and Active Reports. In-memory data exploration and discovery is also another added advantage of this software.

·         Microsoft may not be as upto the mark in terms of data visualization but users who are comfortable with the Excel User Interface will find this entry level system quite comfortable.

·         The Business Intelligence platform that Micro Strategy offers is ideal for organizations that need to visualize big data from various data sources. This is made possible due to the ROLAP engine that the organization offers. The system is a little complex and requires time to master but is quite effective in its functionality.

·         The BI systems offered by Oracle can be deployed across various work domains. The facilities that Oracle’s BI platform offer include dynamic planning, what if scenario queries, interactive big data visualization as well as data discovery.

Along with these big players many other Business Intelligence vendors have come up with innovative solutions wherein they are using tools like Google charts, Tableau, Fusion charts etc. to present data in readable as well as visually appealing formats. So, if you are still struggling with the data that you have accumulated from multiple channels it is time that you take the help of Business Intelligence vendors.

Best practices for back links

Back-links are important part of SEO-off page optimization.Content marketers right the content with the goal of providing back links to the site/page. Backlinks from good sites help in boosting the rank of the page however when the back links are not from the right site it can even negatively affect the ranking of the page.Content marketers needs to put effort to ensure that they are getting links from the right kind of site.
       Based on my experience will explain what are things to check for existing back links and new back links.


1.Check the relevancy:

How relevant is the site which providing you the backlinks. Do the site deals in the similar category in which your site deals with?If not then it is better to disavow the link.Below are example of good links and back links.Only exception are partner sites which can provide link to the partner sites

Your site	Back linked site	Link status
Car discussion forum	Car Review site	Good link
Real estate site	Mobile selling site	Bad link
Movie ticket selling site	Movie review site	Good link

2.Remove Directory links

Directories are basically sites which only has links such site are considered as SPAM sites. Backlinks from such site can negatively impact your site rankings as google considers links from such sites as low quality links

3.No follow Forum post

There are chances that  people may post on your site to build back links to their site.The post may be just spam which are done basically to promote their site links.In such cases ensure that your site page has "No follow" rel attributes which tells google not to pass any link  juice to the backlinked site.SPAM posts can negatively your site rankings .

4.Check Domain authority of site

Check the domain authority of the site which is providing the back links to your site.In case the domain authority is pretty low then it is necessary to check out how old the site is and the content of the site.In case if you feel that site is of low quality then disavow the links from that site

5.Avoid paid links

In the past it was practice to pay a site to get backlinks from them.Google now has become smart enough to identify such links and site.When backlinks are coming from paid site it is necessary to remove those links as google considers it as unnatural ways of getting links.

In order to know more about SEO check out SEO mistakes to be avoided
                                                                     
Also check out:Common SEO issues
                                                                   

Usability testing -How to do?

To create user centric design, it is necessary to test design with set of users and get there feedback in order to know how good is the design from the user point of view.The feedback can guide the designers in making right changes to the design in order to achieve the goal of best in class user experience.User testing is all about getting the right feedback from the user.User testing may not be succeed in providing the right results in case it is not done properly.

                                                                   In this blog will discuss on how user testing should be done.

1.Pick the right users:

User who are picked will directly impact  the quality of the output of user testing.The users who are chosen for the testing should not have any direct involvement in the product .Users selected should be tech savvy and they should also be regular internet users but they should not be expert in the design as it may lead to bias in their judgement.User selected should be from diverse background since it will help in getting feedback from different perspectives.

2.Ask right set of question

The questions which are asked to the user should not lead them to answer what you want to hear as it does not provide the right feedback.The question should be centered around getting feedback on below point

1.Ease of navigation
2.Ordering of the data
3.What he did not like?
4.What he liked about the design?
5.What could be added?
6.Display text infrence

3.Create a complete prototype

The prototype which is being tested should be complete.It should have all the navigation which the original product will have so that you get better idea and the entire design can be optimized accordingly.The HTML should also show the right text for CTA button so that one can analyze user reaction to the text being displayed

4.Detailed documentation

User testing can be of little value if the user feedback is not recorded against each question.This should be done in order to identify the most genuine concerns of the users which help in addressing the right issues which users are facing.

New Product SEO audit

Whenever a new product/page is launched it is necessary to ensure that it is optimized from SEO perspective.If the product/page does not follow SEO guidelines then there are chances that it may negatively impact organic traffic and so it can lead to drop in value extracted out of the product.

                   It is also necessary to keep track of what is changing in the new page when compared to old page so that when something goes wrong in new page the reason can be easily identified and fixed.Below are the things that needs to be checked from SEO perspective when launching new page..

1.Meta title and description:

It should be known that when Meta title and description impact the keyword you are targeting. When meta is changed it may lead to drop in rank or also reduction in quality of the traffic.So it is necessary to check the meta before launching the page.In case the meta is automated ensure that logic is working fine

2.Link from the page:

The new page should be linked from the other pages so that google can find the page and crawls the  page.It also help google understand the links.

3.Rel attributes:

Rel attributes are the ones which signals the bot what it is expected to do the page.Ensure that all the rel attributes such as no follow,canonical,prev next etc... are properly place on the page.If these are wrongly placed or missed that it can create a lot of problems in terms of indexing and ranking of the page

4.Links not working on page:

Ensure that all the links on the page is working so that when google crawls the page it does not leads to 404 error  for page which can again impact your SEO rankings

5.URL path changes:

The URL for the page also plays important role in making bot understand what the page is all about if the URL is changed ensure that 301/302 redirect are properly placed so that link rank get transferred to new page

6.Heading tags

It is quite possible the current heading tags have been changed in the new page.It is necessary to ensure that all the heading tags are as per the requirement to ensure that google properly understands the keywords your page is targeting.