Phishy Business

Tuesday, March 31, 2009 by Dan Nolan

I’m pretty nonchalant about my online security. Apart from keeping my copy of Norton up to date, I don’t worry too much. I’m not entirely naive about online safety, though: I never reply to emails from Nigerian princes and I certainly don’t presume there is a problem with my bank account based on the advice of an email skulking around in my junk mail folder.

Still, when I discovered over the weekend that my internet banking site of choice now looked like this, I was a little perturbed (click picture to enlarge).

• A request for my 16-digit card number?
  
• A plea for my memorable word?
  
• Broken html tags?

I knew instantly that I had been a victim of phishing. Clicks to other online banks such as Halifax and Lloyds had identical results, bringing up a host of sinister copycat sites.

Links from banks to their secure log-in facilities also took me to their evil phishing twins. I had contracted a virus from a suspect document and it was causing my laptop to phish like a bear downstream. My Maginot Line defences had crumbled.

Resisting the urge to log into my Facebook or Twitter accounts to document these findings (lest my keystrokes were being recorded), I phoned a friend to discuss the problem.

The phishing virus was forcing a redirect every time I tried to visit a legitimate banking site, sending me to an almost identical one-page form designed to trick me into entering my details. Aside from the giveaway broken tags and poorly constructed English (“Simply follow the steps 1-2”), the site looked genuine. Indeed, if someone had spent thirty extra seconds proofing their html, and if I didn’t work in the internet-savvy environs of an online marketing company, I might have fallen for the trick.

Not everyone is in this position. Phishing scams are becoming more advanced, more covert. Looking at the screenshot above, it is easy to see how some people, perhaps not fully versed in internet security, could be drawn in to these scams. My advice is to be careful; evidently we are not as safe as we think.

Tom Mason

Google launches Street View

Monday, March 30, 2009 by Dan Nolan

Google has launched its long-awaited Street View service. The street-mapping facility allows internet users to take a virtual stroll through the roads of 25 UK cities via a series of photographs. Cities featured in the Google application include Manchester, Aberdeen and Norwich. The facility has been compiled from video taken along 22,369 roads in the United Kingdom.

The Street View from near theEword offices, showing the Imperial War Museum (right) and Media City UK development (left).

The Google Street View service has immediately come under scrutiny from civil liberty groups claiming the service constitutes an invasion of privacy. Street View includes photographs of individuals, which groups such as Privacy International claim infringes public privacy rights.

The group has submitted a formal complaint to the Information Commissioner claiming that it has 200 cases of members of the public being identifiable via the service. This complaint comes despite Street View using face-recognition technology to blur out individuals featured in the service.

Google maintain the application is lawful and acts within the privacy laws of the United Kingdom. A Google spokesperson said:

"The images in Street View are lawful. The Street View feature only contains imagery gathered on public property. The imagery is no different from what any person can readily capture or see walking down the street."

Google has already taken down a number of images from the application after private requests from members of the public. Removed images include an individual being arrested and an office couple captured in an apparent compromising position.

theEword announces two new appointments

Friday, March 27, 2009 by Dan Nolan

We’ve bolstered the ranks of our SEO and PPC online marketing team yet again with the addition of two new members of staff. The appointments come during a continued period of growth for theEword during which we have taken on ten new starters.

Adrian Mursec is appointed senior developer, and will be working on the coding and development of all theEword’s internal and external projects.

Adrian joins theEword having previously worked for one of Manchester’s biggest SEO companies. He has nine years experience in web development and his freelance portfolio includes contract work for the National Health Service and numerous bespoke projects.

Stephen Dixon joins the team as a designer, working on a range of new and existing projects within theEword’s ever-growing portfolio.

Stephen has seven years experience in web design. His work to date has included online marketing for DJs and clubs including Manchester’s Sankeys nightclub, for whom he designed web flyers and banners.

Speaking about the new recruits, theEword managing director Al Mackin said:

“These appointments reflect the company’s increased output over recent months. We picked up some major new clients at the end of last year and our success on those projects has led to a greater number of commissions.

“We feel that the people we’ve brought in are more than well-equipped to meet the needs of both ourselves and our clients.”

theEword to offer Manchester Masters placement

Thursday, March 26, 2009 by Dan Nolan

theEword is proud to announce its involvement in the upcoming Manchester Masters project.

Manchester Masters is a graduate initiative aimed at attracting, and keeping, the best post-grad talent in Manchester. Students were invited to apply for the scheme by uploading a 30-second video of themselves to the web. From this, a shortlist of 50 candidates will be chosen, with a final ten being accepted into the full Manchester Masters scheme and the remaining 40 given placements at a number of Manchester-based creative agencies.

Sandy Lindsay, project director for Manchester Masters said: “I am very excited [that] Manchester Masters has evolved from offering 10 graduate jobs to potentially creating up to fifty employment opportunities.”

theEword will provide one Manchester Masters entrant with a three-month placement, giving them the opportunity to sample working in a marketing role. In exchange for offering the post, the company will benefit from having one of Manchester’s best young minds as part of its team.

theEword managing director and founder Al Mackin will, along with selected colleagues, sit on a judging panel tasked with finding the best candidate to take up the work placement at our offices in Trafford Park.

The final Manchester Masters workshop will be on April 7/8, with the first graduate placements starting in June.

Clientwatch: theEword helps Topcomms to achieve record figures

Tuesday, March 24, 2009 by Dan Nolan

All of us at theEword are pleased to announce the details of our latest success story, having helped our client Topcomms achieve record figures for turnover and traffic.

• Turnover has increased by 200% over 18 months.
  
• Traffic in Q1 2009 has increased 30.38% over Q4 2008.
  
• Pageviews up 38.17% over the same period.

theEword was instrumental in the development of Topcomms’ e-commerce arm, designing and building the Topcomms website and implementing tools and back-end systems aimed at maximising the efficiency of their online operation.

In addition to this, theEword built, optimised and continue to manage four additional sales channels for the website.

Speaking about the results, theEword managing director Al Mackin, said:

“These figures are fantastic news for both companies. They prove that our technology-led approach, coupled with the new tools and managements systems we’ve put in place, have helped Topcomms achieve the sort of results they desire.

“For them to be performing so well given the current condition of the telecoms market is remarkable.”

theEword is a thriving digital marketing agency specialising in e-commerce, electronic marketing and commercial website design. The Trafford Park-based company was founded in 2006 by Al Mackin (managing director) and Tom Glass (creative director), and currently employs 12 members of staff.

The company handles PPC (pay per click) and SEO (search engine optimisation) campaigns for its clients, employing a development, content and optimisation strategy that has seen them generate millions of pounds worth of sales for its client base.

Does Google put more weight on brands in rankings?

Monday, March 09, 2009 by Dan Nolan

Recent reports that Google puts more weight on brands in rankings have moved Search Quality main man Matt Cutts to post a YouTube video on the Google Webmasters Central channel, clarifying the company’s position regarding branding and search. You can watch the video below.

In it, he explains that Google’s latest algorithmic change (“one of three to four hundred we make every year”) does not necessarily prioritise big brands in SERPs, but aims to maintain those important tenets of the Google philosophy, “'trust' 'authority' 'reputation' 'PageRank' [and] 'high quality'.”

“It's not that we always try to return brands. We try to return whatever we think the best results are for users,” says Cutts. "Inside of Google, at least inside the search ranking team, we don't really think about brands.”

His advice to SEOs is not to fear the changes, but to continue striving to provide users with the highest quality websites (and information) possible.

We try to return high-quality results... And so, what you should be doing doesn't change: try to make a great site. Try to make it a site that is so fantastic that you become known as an authority in your niche," Cutts said. "And it doesn't have to be a big niche. It doesn't have to be a huge, well-known keyword. It can be a smaller niche, and if you're still the expert, that's the sort of thing that people are going to want to link to, that they'll talk about, the sort of thing people really enjoy. Those are the sorts of sites, the experts, that we want to bring back."

We welcome Cutts’ clarification at theEword. Our philosophy of providing clients with high quality, tailored content is one we will ardently pursue, especially in light of this fresh vindication of our approach to SEO.

It doesn’t matter whether you’re the biggest multinational on the planet or the smallest SME, Google will rank you according to the quality and relevance of the information contained on your site. Our SEO content team comprises editors and journalists with years of experience in researching and writing high quality copy, meaning our clients’ sites meet not just their visitors’ needs, but also Google’s desire to see valuable, resource-like information set out in an accessible way.

If you would like to know more about theEword, please get in touch.

Phorm behavioural advertising to be regulated

Friday, March 06, 2009 by Dan Nolan

The news that digital technology company Phorm is teaming up with BT to target customers with behavioural advertising may sound like evidence of the latter’s growth as an ISP, but for others it has raised the issue of online privacy.

Many sites use behavioural advertising and SEO to target a specific audience. And while it’s a useful tool for some, there are fears the targeted nature of behavioural advertising violates users’ rights in regard to sites taking their personal details without permission.

BT secretly conducted trials of Phorm in 2006. It intercepted and profiled the web browsing of 18,000 broadband customers, leading to the company being reported to City Of London Police by anti-Phorm protestors.

And while no action was taken by the police, Phorm, AOL, Google, Microsoft and Yahoo have agreed to commit to a code of practise drawn up by the Internet Advertising Bureau, looking specifically at behavioural advertising:

• Notice
  A company collecting and using online information for behavioural advertising must clearly inform a consumer that data is being collected for this purpose
  
  
• Consent
  A company collecting and using online data for behavioural advertising must provide a mechanism for users to decline behavioural advertising and where applicable seek a consumer’s consent
  
  
• Education
  A company collecting and using data for behavioural advertising must provide consumers with clear and simple information about their use of data for this purpose and how users can decline

Whether you think that behavioural advertising invades user privacy or not, websites will now be operating through a regulated system that reduces any suspicion.

The implications of behavioural advertising for online marketing are such that it will now be possible to target consumers in a more specific way than ever before. However, in reducing something of the ‘hit and miss’ nature of advertising, ISPs, data sellers and marketers must maintain a respect for the privacy of internet users.

SEO content should be optimised for users as well as search engines

Thursday, March 05, 2009 by Dan Nolan

SEO copywriter Karolyn Judge joined theEword last month. Here, she offers some reflections on the balance needed to ensure content meets the needs not only of search engines but also the people who read it.

Since joining theEword, I have found SEO copywriting to be a disciplined and challenging field in which to work, one where creative principles must be balanced with an acute commercial understanding.

I believe it shouldn’t be an issue for any professional writer to structure their work under the constraints and conventions of SEO. It’s the same with any commercial copy, online or not; you have to be completely aware of what audience you are writing for, their needs and their aspirations.

Rather than just producing any old piece of SEO-tinkery that might help a site towards the top of Google’s rankings, I believe readers deserve quality writing that is thorough, interesting and more importantly trustworthy. There is nothing worse than online writing that purports to be from a professional source but which turns out to be poorly formatted, keyword-stuffed and riddled with mistakes. The internet, and its users, should be treated with the same regard as print media.

This is where, for me, the technical and reader requirements of SEO meet. I structure my work in such a way that it is naturally geared towards to the audience, who will act on what they are reading. The way I see it is that if they are reading the piece, they are interested in the topic and are more than likely to understand subject-specific terms and its purpose.

From my past experience working for newspapers, I have good news sense. At theEword, I have learned to balance that with the commercial aspect of writing more than I ever have before.

And coupled with this, it’s been a beneficial and interesting challenge to utilise SEO disciplines including linking, html, and most importantly, balancing keywords with quality content – allowing creativity to complement the technical requirements of my job.

A website of two halves

Tuesday, March 03, 2009 by Dan Nolan

The Guardian online steals my time. While their award-winning news coverage, investigative features and breathtaking dedication to SEO often merit a couple of clicks, it’s their most recent application – the Guardian Chalkboards tool – which has been filling my spare time over recent weeks.

An innovative piece of software for every budding Alan Hanson, the Chalkboard system allows users to compare data from football games. Wait, it gets more interesting. Containing detailed records of every single Premiership game in the last three years, the application allows users to compare every shot, tackle, and cross for every single player.

Cleanly displayed on a green chalkboard, users can compare games, players and tactics. It’s incredibly detailed. And, much to the chagrin of my employer, annoyingly addictive. Here, I compared Wayne Rooney’s pass rate for two different games versus Chelsea.


by Guardian Chalkboards

For those with an unhealthy interest in the beautiful game, it’s a modern marvel. More interestingly though, the Guardian have cleverly thrown a bit of social networking into the mix. While the media giant already has an impressive online community, Chalkboard promises to attract more users to the site through its interactive and sharp-focused content.

Managers-to-be can post their chalkboards online – through Digg, Facebook et al - while other users can comment on posts in your tactical back catalogue (you can save any chalkboard on your user page). If you craft a chalkboard demonstrating the technical prowess of Paul Scholes over Frank Lampard, it’s quite likely that another user is going to call you on it.

The site inspires debate and calls for users to get involved. The application offers a wide scope for discussion and user interaction. There’s also the chance of your chalkboard going viral if it’s particularly amusing or controversial. It’s a social networkers dream.

All this is good news for The Guardian; a site which is light years ahead of its daily competitors in the SEO race. Still, there’s time yet for The Times and their ilk to catch up. Meanwhile, there are more than enough fixtures on Chalkboard to tide us over for the time being.

Tom Mason