Don’t worry all the same great content is still under the hood, we’ve just tricked it out with a new look and feel.

Interested in what people are saying about a post?  The three most recent comments are now on the home page, right below that post.

Want to find that old favorite article you loved?  Checkout the accordion menus on the left side.  No more gratuitous scrolling.  Or check out our search bar in the upper right.

Need some 140 character or less words of wisdom?  Check out our twitter feed, now easily found next to our RSS button for your tweeting and feeding convenience.

Wonder which John has the razor wit (Lynch) and which has just half of one (Rhea)?  Check out “The Herd” and see who these people are.  While you’re in the area, also click on over to Take it in-house, our one stop shop for resources to help companies take their digital marketing in-house.

Anything you like?  Anything we should have done better? Tell us what you think in the comments.

Related posts:

1. Blogging 101 Part 2 – post launch
2. Things That Go Bump in the Internet: Identifying and Dealing with Trolls Part 2: Disarming the Vagabonds and Turning Trolls to Stone
3. Twitter “Lists”
4. Pay Per Click (PPC) Case Study
5. SES London 2008 – European Search Marketing Case Studies

We’re just not sure if this relationship is working anymore.

I mean, I know we’re witty and we’re great with analytics and marketing.  But, you’re just not reading us anymore. Sure, you scan us for a provocative headline here and there.  But, I’m just not sure you’re getting much out of this relationship.

I know I promised you three more parts on Video Games last time, and I’m gonna come through, I swear.  But, we never talk anymore. You rarely comment and we just feel like we’re talking to the wall (who, by the way, does not happen to be a particularly responsive piece of stucco.)

This is no Dear John letter.  The last thing we want is you checking out that hot little technology blog from across the Internet. No, we want to get back to that place where you’re thrilled to read our content. Where you get that twinkle in your eye after you finish a story.

But, how do we get back there? How do we catch your interest and keep it? We don’t want to just slip into a hot new site design (which will be coming to better match our redesigned corporate site) and hope you’ll stick around for the long haul.

We want to catch your eye and your heart with stories, content, and perhaps videos that interest you, inform you, and make your day. We want to talk with you again, really talk, and listen, and try to bring the passion and fire back to your RSS reader.

We’re in the process of a full-rethinking of this blog, and we’d like your–scratch that–we yearn for your input like a meat-eater trapped in Vegan country longs for steak. What do you want to see in this blog? Is there something we used to do really well, but don’t anymore? Is there something we do particularly poorly that you never want to see again? How can we help you better? How can we provide better content?

You, our readers, are our most important resource and we want to make sure that your voice is always heard. So, leave us a comment or send me, John, an email directly at jrhea (at) serengeticom (dot) com.

Let me thank you in advance for joining the conversation and helping us be the best blog we can be. A warm thank you to all of our long-time readers (I’m looking at you Nate’s Mom), and I hope we can serve you even better in the future.

In case you were wondering, here’s our blog strategy so far. Let us know what you think

Related posts:

1. Blogging 101 Part 2 – post launch
2. When Spammers Listen
3. Another SEM blog?

1. Make navigation headings clear, concise, and descriptive. But, you just said be concise, how can I be concise and descriptive? Use strong words that communicate rather than words that could mean almost anything. Just like moving, it’s easier to find something in a box when the box is well labeled.

2. Role play. Pretend you are a customer and try to find some pertinent piece of information using only navigation headings. (For double points, count how many clicks it took you to find it). If you can’t find it, how’s your customer ever going to?

3. Get someone outside your company to review the site. Who knows less about your company than a new client? See what that person says, but take it with a grain of salt. What did or didn’t work for them might be different for another person.

4. Take giant categories and break them into smaller, more refined categories. Make it easier for someone to find the content they’re looking for by making the boxes smaller. It’s easier to search a shoe box than it is to search a refrigerator box.

5. Put tiny categories together into larger categories. This and #4 are a balancing act. Breaking everything into small categories gives you a jabillion categories and makes it harder for a user to find the information, but only having two categories creates refrigerator boxes.

Happy Moving!

Related posts:

1. 3 Ways to Improve Your Home Page
2. Spending more money doesn’t always make you the best
3. Designing an Effective Company Blog
4. Why Analytics is a Discipline
5. Online Shopping Sites — What Makes a Good One?

In the past I’ve used MSProject, Excel, multiple whiteboards (it started with a single whiteboard, then scaled up to 3… when we started to run out of wall space), BaseCamp, and none of the above.  Currently we’re using ClockingIT, the first benefit of this application is that it’s free… yep, that’s right, no cost, just like that apache server you’re using.

ClockingIT was developed by a married couple in Oslo, Norway.  Like Apache, the source code is available, should you desire to do some development work on it yourself, and contribute to the community.  So what does it do?

• Time tracking
• Milestones
• Task Dependencies
• Timeline and activity log
• Notifications – email & RSS
• Multiple language support
• Individual user security settings
• Integrated wiki

What about the concerns?  Well, the server that they host it on is based out of their employers ISP, this could be an issue should their employer no longer be their employer.  Again though, you can take the source code and install it on your own server should that be a major concern for you.  Another concern is the development cycle.  What happens when you identify an issue that is important to your business?  Well, in our experience, if it’s been something that improves the product, it gets in there fairly quickly.

So far, for us, ClockingIT has provided everything that it said it would, at a price that anyone would like.

Related posts:

1. Mistaken Identity – A Reputation Management Problem
2. Email Standards Project Unveiled
3. The Basics of Online Reputation Management
4. Reputation Management in Search Engines Not A Balancing Act
5. 2008 The year of Reputation Management?

Last Monday I promised that this week I’d give an overview of the performance of the RBDRodeo blog, and that’s exactly what I’m going to do now.

This blog launched on June 6th of 2007, so it’s been live for close to 7 months now. In that time, between all of us here we’ve managed to put out 126 posts (this is no. 127), which comes out to just under one for every business day since the site’s been live (work does sometimes get in the way). Those 126 posts have received a total of 130 comments. Not bad, but we’d always love to hear more about what people think about our posts / suggestions for topics that you’d like to see covered. Oh, and our comment spam software blocked 1,257 spam comments, which just goes to show that you must have spam protection set up on your blog.

What were the most visited posts for the year?

1. Google Grants Enforces Spending Cap 11.4% of all blog traffic
2. SES Chicago – Dealing with Difficult Clients 5.17%
3. SMX London – Cutting Edge Linking Tactics 4.98%
4. Google Grants Application Process for NonProfits 4.87

So that shows that people like it when we write about Google Grants, and when we do conference session recaps. Hmm, maybe Nan should give a presentation on Google Grants at SES New York and I’ll write it up…

What did we write about? Well, analyzing the categories that we’ve assigned posts to, we can see that this blog primarily talks about:

1. Non-Profits – 38 posts
2. Social Marketing – 37 posts
3. Education and Training – 34 posts
4. SEO – 31 posts
5. Reputation Management – 26 posts

Which are the topics that I would expect to see showing as those that we focus on. For 2008 I would expect to see Analytics make a big push into the top 5 as our newest team member Joy Brazelle writes more about her tips and insights for Analytics
Where did our traffic come from?

1. StumbleUpon 38.21% of all traffic to the blog
2. Google (organic) 19.61%
3. Direct 14.42%
4. SearchEngineLand 2.46%
5. Sphinn 2.38%

All in all there were 233 different sources of traffic that we logged, with Yahoo not showing up until 9th, which actually placed it below the green social network Hugg.com.

What about the keyword that people used to find us?

1. rbdrodeo
2. rbd
3. paypal nonprofit
4. youtube berlin
5. political emails

What about some of the lower traffic but more interesting terms that people used to find us?

• Causes of Shame
• butter knife
• chunnel
• chicago sports pro bono
• escape route through Berlin Wall

Thankfully the Berlin Wall has been torn down, so we don’t have to feel bad about someone attempting to get from the FDR to the West via this blog.

Speaking of Germany, where did our visitors come from? Well we had visitors to the site from 112 countries; the no.1 country for visits is rather obvious, and as you’ll see the top 4 are all native English speaking countries, with Ireland showing up in 11th behind 6 non-native speaking countries.

1. USA
2. UK
3. Canada
4. Australia
5. India
6. Germany
7. Italy
8. Holland (Netherlands)
9. France
10. Romania

So that’s the old, what about the new? Well, I’m sure you’ve noticed that the name of the blog has changed, it’s no longer RBDRodeo, it’s now EndlessPlain.com. Why have we done this? Well, it’s all to do with the rebranding that Nan announced a few weeks ago. As of Jan 1st 2008 the RBDRodeo team will work for Serengeti Communications. As you can imagine, Serengeti and Rodeo’s don’t fit well thematically, but the concept of the Endless Plain works well with the new name. We’re going to keep talking on this blog about issues that we think are interesting for our audience, and that will help you navigate the endless plain of your digital marketing strategy. Why is it endless? Your marketing effort doesn’t have a final destination, but it does need to have direction, and we aim to guide you in the right direction towards higher ROIs and better and bigger things for your company / nonprofit.

So thanks for reading this blog in 2007, and we’ll look for you in 2008.

Related posts:

1. Happy 1st Birthday to Endlessplain.com
2. Process Donations Free with Google Checkout
3. Google Grants Enforces Spending Cap Policy
4. Time to Move
5. RBDRodeo Program Notes

Send your resumes to Nan: nan at redboots.com or ndawkins at serengeticom.com

Related posts:

1. New White Paper
2. RBDRodeo Program Notes
3. Another SEM blog?

Why Serengeti? We believe that today’s Internet is a vast, digital plain, full of opportunity, but operating under some important new rules of engagement in a Web 2.0 world. Navigating this complex ecosystem requires an understanding that stretches beyond traditional concepts of marketing, as well as a holistic view of multiple channels such as search, email, social media, mobile, etc. Marketers need agencies that understand the new rules and can shift dollars strategically between channels as necessary to achieve and maintain high ROI. Hence, our tag line: Vast Digital Landscape. One Guide.

The brand is new, but what we do and what we offer to our clients hasn’t changed. The reality is that we’ve been steadily expanding our services – and our grasp of this new Web 2.0 world — as the marketplace and our clients demanded it. We will continue to add new staff in 2008, so you will see many new names and faces contributing to the Blog (which will also have a new name soon: Endless Plain).

One recent addition to our staff of notables is Joy Brazelle. Joy will serve as our Director of Analytics. She comes to us from ClickTracks, where she was the Director of Professional Services. Analytics is fundamental to everything we do, so Joy is a welcome addition to the team.

We’ll keep you posted as we ramp up for the switch-over in January.

Related posts:

1. Welcome Li Evans and John Lynch
2. Serengeti welcomes Beth Harte
3. Training – On-Site or Remote – What’s Works Best?
4. Out with the old and in with the New…
5. Don’t Fire Your PR Firm

At the time this is published I’ll be on vacation in England. However this trip is not just for me to travel to the wilds of Hadfield, Driffield, Manchester, Hull, and Upper Poppleton, the main reason is that I’ll be speaking at SMX-London this Friday. In fact, over the next month there are going to be a number of opportunities to hear one or more of the RedBoots team speaking at conferences on digital marketing tactics, tips and techniques. Simply go to our events page to find our schedule, and if you’re going to be in attendance, feel free to drop a comment here, or just walk up to one of us and introduce yourself.

For those of you that are unable to attend, we’ll be putting any and all presentations that we do at these conferences in the resources area for your downloading pleasure. But what about those sessions that non-RedBoots people are talking at? Where can you get that information? Well, I had so much fun at SES-San Jose doing liveblogging that I’m going to have another crack at it at these conferences, where it makes sense (plus it gives me a chance to really try out my brand new laptop which came complete with that most necessary of liveblogging tools – the spare battery).

Related posts:

1. Training – On-Site or Remote – What’s Works Best?
2. Upcoming Conferences
3. Google’s “New” YouTube Program for NonProfits
4. Paypal Pushes NonProfit Program
5. eMetrics DC 2008 Conference

Subject: Important Notice: Security Breach

Normally I would mentally file this away to the ‘phishing’ email scams, but since the email came from CARE I opened it immediately hoping that my donation information from the past has not been ‘breached.’

Apparently, the only information that was taken from their database on or about October 23 – November 1 was your email address and password for maintaining your account information on CARE’s system.

It was not reported how many email addresses were taken, but with an organization the size of CARE – it could be a pretty big number.

What does this mean? Well, my thoughts are that these people are going to be getting a lot of spam pretty soon. And they will need to rebuild trust with CARE as an organization that takes PRIVACY of your data seriously – until they are hacked. Remember though, it it not their fault – but that of Convio who should be doing more to protect the data of it’s customers. A larger percentage of the bigger non-profits use Convio, so the problem could be wider than anticipated. And we could see a temporary increase in spam, and a decrease in overall responses over the next few weeks. (During this important year-end giving season)

BE PROACTIVE WITH YOUR CONSTITUENTS.

Now is a good time for ANY organization, regardless of email platform to make sure the data is safe, and send out an email communication that informs users to pay careful attention to any suspicious emails that are sent during this peak online/email giving time of year. It may be wise to include alternate methods of donating if you feel that your data has or could have been compromised. Create a special toll free number that is included ONLY in your email communications.

And remember to inform your constituents that you would NEVER ask for any personal or financial information.

You may need to skip your first November email appeal in order to take a step back and do some member/donor cultivation and let them know that their donations are safe.

We know this type of activity occurs occasionally, so it’s a good practice to inform more frequently to avoid potential fraudulent activities.

Related posts:

1. Stop. Think. Who’s this coming from? Open Rate Research findings
2. Online and Offline Donations beginning to balance? Year-end Giving Strategies
3. Think before you personalize.
4. Steps to Create a Successful Email Appeal Series
5. Communicating with Younger Audiences and Cultivating Future Donors

First Email Send

This email will create the need that the organization has, or the supports a campaign that is taking place offline. Generally the ask is pretty straightforward and the subject lines have been tested to get the most of the open rate. The email should be segmented by donor group or interest area, but many organizations still neglect to do this simple step (many times, the email system has limitations and segmentation is difficult – or legacy data won’t allow it.)

The goals are very straightforward – communicate the need, and raise dollars or actions.

The Second Email Send

The second email send consists of multiple components. A follow-up email to those recipients that opened and did not respond, or the recipients that did not open. This is technically TWO emails.

The goals for the email to the recipients that opened and did not respond should be to clarify the statement of need from the first email, providing a little more information. Perhaps the recipient did not donate or take action because the goals were not clear enough, or there wasn’t enough supporting information required to convert.

The goals for the recipients that did not open should be a little different, and at this point the subject lines should be tested again or the copy in the initial paragraph or in the preview pane of the email reader should be re-worked to generate an open or a response.

The Third Email Send

This email is crucial in continuing the relationship building with donors or supporters. The full list should be emailed (probably about one month after the initial send) This email DOES NOT include any hard ask. Instead, this email reiterates the goals of the campaign, and reports on any monies raised or actions taken. The main goal of this email is to let constituents know that they are appreciated and that you are communicating on their efforts and results. This email may close with the introduction of the next campaign (for the following month) – by including a P.S. or other news about upcoming campaigns, the later responses will be greater because the member/donor will associate actions taken with a report on the results, and the seed will be planted for the next appeal.

The Thank You.

Many organizations forget to thank their donors on a regular basis. Many believe that the auto-generated thank you email is sufficient in acknowledging a gift. Most – if not all – email systems do not report on the actions or open rates of autoresponder emails, so it is almost impossible to know if a donor even opens this ‘thank you’. I consider these receipts. Hardly ever do I scrutinize a receipt from a store.

The last email should be sent to those that have donated or taken action as a result of an email appeal or ask. It’s a simple email. Thank You for your gift, here’s how it helped, here’s how we used it, it wouldn’t be possible without you. You will be surprised to find that if you segment donors (much like in offline techniques) you will see increased responses to future email efforts. You will also see a second gift at the time of the thank you email.

It’s very important to follow just some of the basic advice given in this blog entry – don’t just stop after you send the first email. THINK of all the follow up communications and opportunities to cultivate your list.

Related posts:

1. Think Again. Part Two in a multi-part Email Strategy
2. Steps to Create a Successful Campaign
3. THINK. A multi-part Email Strategy Series
4. Online and Offline Donations beginning to balance? Year-end Giving Strategies
5. Delivering on Your Email Capture Promise