Patricio Robles

Google changes the game on PageRank sculpting, starts following JavaScript links

At the SMX Advanced conference in Seattle this week, Google's Matt Cutts revealed that Google has implemented two changes that may have an impact on your SEO efforts.

The first one has to do with the way Google deals with PageRank sculpting and the second has to do with Google's following of JavaScript links.

by Patricio Robles 04 June 2009 09:27am 4 comments

Can you trust Web 2.0 companies with your money?

In a post last month, I pointed out that some of the most popular Web 2.0 companies still haven't figured out Customer Service 1.0.

Even though they're related, customer service is one thing and your money is another.

by Patricio Robles 04 June 2009 09:00am 0 comments

Adobe's BrowserLab is every web designer's dream come true

Internet technology seems to advance at warp speed but if you're a web designer, the process of testing a website for cross-browser compatibility hasn't improved much since the days when knowledge of Microsoft FrontPage made someone a 'web designer'.

But a new service from Adobe looks set to change that.

by Patricio Robles 03 June 2009 10:48am 5 comments

Google empowers local businesses

The internet can be a powerful tool for local businesses but in many cases, it's the mom-and-pop shop down the street that doesn't have the resources or tech savvy to make the most of the web.

Google is trying to change that and yesterday announced the launch of a Local Business Center dashboard that gives local businesses a set of free tools to monitor and analyze their business listings on Google.

by Patricio Robles 03 June 2009 09:02am 2 comments

New studies: Twitter is the Twilight Zone of social networks

What is Twitter? Quite simply, it's pretty much anything you want it to be.

But who is using it? How are they using it? The results of two new studies might surprise you.

by Patricio Robles 02 June 2009 16:55pm 0 comments

Keeping social media sustainable

Many businesses are interested in employing social media to their benefit but there are a number of challenges that make social media a challenging proposition.

One of them is making social media sustainable. As exciting as it can be to start using Facebook, Twitter and other popular social media websites, excitement usually wears off real fast and many businesses struggle to sustain their social media efforts.

by Patricio Robles 02 June 2009 09:43am 6 comments

Google may take BBC's iPlayer global

Google's bread and butter may be search and the recession may have led Google to cut back on projects that weren't bringing home the bacon but that doesn't mean that Google isn't looking to expand its already large footprint on the web.

It just announced that by the end of the year, it hopes to be offering its publishing partners the ability to sell ebooks through Google Book Search, putting it in competition with Amazon in the burgeoning ebook market.

by Patricio Robles 02 June 2009 08:47am 1 comment

Q&A: Peter Shankman, Founder of Help A Reporter Out

Peter Shankman is the founder and CEO of The Geek Factory, a New York City-based marketing and PR strategy firm, and the author of Can We Do That?! Outrageous PR Stunts That Work and Why Your Company Needs Them. He's also the founder of Help A Reporter Out, or HARO, which helps connect reporters to more than 100,000 expert sources.

Peter is the trainer for Econsultancy's Online PR and Social Media Workshop in New York next week, which explores how PR has radically changed thanks to the growth of social media.

I spoke to Peter about online PR, social media and HARO.

by Patricio Robles 02 June 2009 11:08am 1 comment

Is Facebook's incubator a joke?

A big chunk of the 'Facebook economy' doesn't belong to Facebook: it belongs to individuals and companies who have built Facebook applications.

By some accounts, the revenue generated from these apps will surpass Facebook's own revenue this year. So it's no surprise that Facebook is looking to do more to take direct advantage of the ecosystem it's built.

by Patricio Robles 01 June 2009 09:01am 6 comments

HuffPo founder: subscription business model is for porn only

Arianna Huffington, founder of The Huffington Post, is a poster child for 'new media'. But a poster child does not an expert make.

On stage at AllThingsDigital's D7 conference, she made one of the most ill-informed comments I've heard in a while: subscriptions are only a good idea for porn sites.

by Patricio Robles 29 May 2009 10:27am 15 comments