In references to the full article on the Guardia - http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2011/sep/08/google-carbon-footprint

This was a positive move by Google in terms of bringing more accountability to the IT sector. Yes, there are some terrifying numbers in there: 1% of the worlds electricity use is incredible!

The article does well to put some of the figures in perspective, the initial figure of 7g carbon for a search, which equates to boiling the water for half a cup of coffee is huge but Google have released this information to try and put these high-spirited claims down, providing the other factors involved in that figure they themselves are not responsible for. The users computer and it's power usage. 

As Google Apps approved resellers we are very conscious of the image of the search giant and the implications of being associated with some of the negative publicity it may receive. Privacy is a huge concern for many people and if we didn't feel Google hadn't stepped up with regards to their privacy issues we would have our concerns about recommending their products. 

Only once did we come up against a user questioning the environmental impact when using the apps suite. We were caught off our guard it must be said (this was a way back) because even though the technology is at the top of its game and achieving maximum efficiencies, the server farms and presence must add up. This article shows that it does, a lot! 

Google Apps with email and the video calling features alone have saved me thousands of miles in the car. (Thousands is a low estimate.) Google are looking into many renewable electricity schemes and spending some big numbers which will benefit us all as it will encourage invesment and development. Even if this is done with no concern in the environmental sector as this technology is put to use the environment wins and they save money and PR issues. 

There is a big argument here, but at the moment the benefits of google to the planet are hopefully outweighing the negatives, as I go to buy my new bike via a search, or look up SolarPV for my house or maybe find where I could spend $168m on a solar power tower plant! 

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As Google Chrome quickly climbs to almost a quarter of the market share of browser usage in the last quarter taking points of Firefox and IE. We are soon going to be hitting a pivotal point in our current "browser war".

Without creating a Potter themed discussion (older readers read Star Wars), as I am not entirely sure who should be the dark side anymore between Microsoft and Google. Firefox is sat in the middle of the two monsters of the search world.

Bing has been making leaps in popularity and Google are the undoubted search market leader; so why does Firefox even get a mention. Well, completely free and open source developed, Firefox has been pushing the fronts of browser user experience. It is fast, secure and has been introducing new and exciting features that often leave the big players playing catch-up. It exists because of donations and, primarily, royalties from the Firefox search bar, a large proportion coming from Google.

As it stands in the current market share as estimated by StatCounter of Google and Firefox stands at 50% which suggests a vast proportion of searches done through those browsers is done through Google. The cat among the pigeons moment will come in November 2011 when the current contract as default search engine for Firefox expires.

Google desperately trying to win market share in the browser war is maybe not going to want to be allowing their highly efficient algorithm to benefit the Firefox browser but a switch to Bing could see an IE + Firefox share of the market reaching around 70% where the majority of the searches would be Bing based.

Not to mention the monetary value that Firefox users bring to Google coffers. 450 millions users probably equates to a large amount of advertising dollars to Google.

November 2011 will be a big turning point. And with Bings improvements, especially in the maps area, (I like the driving maps) could we see a genuine challenger to the Google crown?

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There is always a stir and a raft of panic'ed emails and questions that come through when the blogs fire up their engines and discuss Googles new algorithm updates.

This update seems to be taking a swipe at the annoying, low quality websites that scrape information and you end up essentially clicking on a page that leads to another page with a load of similar queries and a couple of adverts none of which are relevant to your search.

People were playing a lot with back-links too. Which have been making a difference to searches (we have been doing some testing). Truth is we had been asked look at some of the less than kosher techniques because for a couple of clients it can be infuriating when a brand new site appears and leap frogs you.

We didn't, we stuck to our guns and that is why we are not remotely worried about the new update. Google are good at what they do, they hire the best and yes the British Medical Journal got hit but their content is quality and appropriate so I would bank on them bouncing back without a problems once things settle down.

Yes it could make our jobs harder for the next few months, I am sure we will see some performance changes. But that is the job.

.....There could also be some improvements to our sites in which case there may be an afternoon in this brief stint of sunshine spent in a beer garden somewhere toasting a job well done by Google.

(I would like to say some sites, like reviews sites and some travel comparison and review sites that work on a similar format to the pointless, useless irritating nothing sites did take a hit. Which is tough because they are genuinely trying to provide an important and useful resource to the net and consumers. Again stick with it and your genuine user base will pull the site through.)

**If you know who I should credit for the image please let us know. It came round in an amusing email last month.

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The debate is now officially in the full public domain as it featured in the brilliant office cartoon strip Dilbert.

Take from it what you will. It may not be about Google specifically. There are plenty of unscrupulous it could be.

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Boston, USA and Dublin, Ireland; Tuesday 4th January, 2011: Firefox overtook Microsoft's Internet Explorer (IE) to become the number one browser in Europe in December 2010 according to StatCounter company. The firm reports that in December, Firefox took 38.11% of European market share, compared to IE's 37.52%.

That doesn't tell the full story though for those of us working in England as IE continues to dominate on our shores with over 49% of the market when measured at the end of last year. And rather than Firefox being the big winner it seems to have been Google Chrome that has increased its share at IE's peril. 

With a 6% drop during the last year as displayed by the source www.statcounter.com IE has the bulk of that loss be made up by Chrome which grew 10% over the same period. Chrome made large gains during the latter half of the year as their offline marketing efforts increased with the most recent version and the release of the Chrome App store. 

It is a subject we will be keeping an eye on. 

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The 3M package is maintenance, monitoring and management for your hosting solution.
 It is important your site is available, working and accurate; the 3M
 package helps you achieve this. The 3M package is now included with all new hosting packages for sites we have developed. 

Maintenance - should there be any broken links, problems you have a resource on
hand that is available to look at that problem; we will also ensure 
that all relevant hosting software is up-to-date and server side tasks are completed. Maintainence includes regular back-ups and upto date security measures.

Monitoring - while our hosting packages guarantee a 99.9% uptime (and is 100% carbon neutral) the 
monitoring element tests the site for uptime and functionality,
 help identifying any broken links, search engine crawl errors and who is 
linking to your site to monitor any rogue visitors; we also monitor 
your bandwidth and traffic usage.

Management - this process really brings all these elements together
and takes care of the technical side of running a website and hosting without the 
need to use in house resource better placed for driving your business
 forward.

Any pre-paid studio time will now be catered for in a seperate agreement to be used for website updates or improvements.

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And a Happy New Year to you all! 

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As part of the continued developments here at vemm we are currently redeveloping our main site. You may have been re-directed here from the lead url.Thanks for stopping by.

This redevelopment is overdue since the structural changes and we need a site to accomodate the new direction.

The new site will provide:

- A clearer insight into our social media offering.

- Access to our new DIY HTML email marketing platform - v-mail.vemm.co.uk

- Details of our venture schemes and how your business can get involved.

- Updates on our current projects and information on develping your businesses internet presence.

If you would like any further information please don't hesitate to contact us - hello @ vemm.co.uk

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The only answer to this is the obvious one - 

Your customers. 
________

So now you are thinking you have stumbled upon another useless and pointless article about SEO. But my stupid comment makes sense in light of a couple of recent jobs we have been working on here at vemm. 

We never covet SEO jobs, they are time consuming and unpredictable in the wake of the masses of emails businesses receive unwittingly through their catch-all email addresses where people GUARANTEE the number one listing in Google. 

Let me break it to you: No one can guarantee a number one listing. The sort of companies that purport to often use sketchy ways to boost you up there, which don't last or (my favourite) fail to confirm for which term you will be number one - often this is your exact company name - quite easy to do and for which you probably are already at the top of the list. Useful. 

What I want to introduce is the Google Wonderwheel. 

Released in May 2009 Google Wonderwheel shows related search terms to the current searched query. So if you think your potential clients are looking for "integrated network solutions," "IP telephony" or "trade waste recycling south east" as are some recent terms, then wonderwheel can point you in the direction of what real users are searching for related to your company, product or service. 

Don't build or restructure your website without doing this first or you may find yourself having to make many changes. You never know, somewhere along the line an energy drink company may have been released with a very similar name to your company and for once you may have to think a little more about your own website content!  #practisewhatyoupreach!

This tool is not just great for SEO, but can be used for researching your position in a market or your products position. Finding feedback on your company, help with your PPC advertising and more.

Once you have been amazed by this, make sure you get to grips with the Google keyword tool. If both these things terrify you then it is time to get in touch with us. hello @ vemm.co.uk and we will arrange a discussion. Forgive us if it takes a few days to respond as we get a lot of email promising us the no1 spot in Google! 

TIP - newbie web freelancers - Google Wonderwheel provides a great graphic and visual representation to clients about the structure of search relating to your clients sites and market.

I promise the website is in development. Focus has been distracted by being nice and busy anyway and the launch of our revamped e-marketing tool and service, v-mail.

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In the web world many of us have been bemoaning the various issue surrounding IE explorers various versions and with the amount of users with this browser the response has always been "shut up and get on with it".

And really, rightly so.

However stats released today by www.statcounter.com reveal that Internet Explorer's share of the market has dropped below 50% for the first time. The real winner in all of this is Google's Chrome browser which has tripled in size to almost 12% of the market.

In Europe this share has dropped to an estimated 40.26% which is probably largely a result of the decision by the EC competition autorities to offer users a choice of browsers from March.

This may all seem very trivial to the average user but when it comes to developing your own website it is very important that your site displays correctly in the formats your users are accessing it from.

We recommend you use your analytics results to determine where your users are accessing from. For example aside from the desktop browsers we are experiencing a steady rise in mobile user coming through to our sites. How does your site perform on the iPhone or Blackberry?

We provide a Browser Compatibility Audit to our clients that will check their site in over 50 browsers including mobile browsers to see how their site performs and provide a list of recommendations to improve accesibility based on that.

You can perform your own visual checks by downloading the various browsers and checking your site(s) on them as they are updated. From there you can see what changes may be needed.

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Yet so is the development that is: Google Instant. Ok so it is just a script doing the search for you in advance, we have seen that for years on the mac. But this pulls results from an ENORMOUS index and the speed and reliability with which it does that IS impressive.

Consequently, we hear the standard calls that "SEO is dead!" (I don't need a reference here - just go on twitter!) Well, it isn't. This article from Matt Cutts explains a little more about the theory behind Instant. 

http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/thoughts-on-google-instant/

It is worth noting that although the search page does update afer a couple of seconds viewing, essentially providing the search engine function of pushing enter, this could negatively effect things if your search is being distracted and you are clicking on a link you see before you finish your string. Additionally, Google Instant may have an interesting effect on Adwords, because although you only pay for clicks, the impressions could change vastly with the instant loading.

For your business and for our clients we will be monitoring the changes, positions and keywords we find to be most successful over the next three weeks, and reacting as necessary to keep on top of Google Instant. I don't think it is going to be as big a change as Google Caffeine was. 

In fact, I believe that SEO has just became more important, so practice your fundamentals.  Make sure your house is in order and your site is hitting those productive keywords. I think the big change will be the increased relevance of up to date content and production of relevant content to attract visitors and new users by proliferating that content through avenues like Twitter, HTML email marking and such.   

We look forward to the the effects on the CPC, and will be keeping you and yours up-to-date.

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Is it pathetic that we are all really excited about this?? Yes a little, but it is a feature that has been missing.

I love the operational theories of the team at 37Signals and if you don't need the feature then don't get involved with the extra programming. But trying to collaborate with people through Basecamp can be made difficult when they have to learn these different strange codes especially if they aren't lucky enough to work in this industry and be familiar with coding.

Anyway check it out on their blog here:

http://productblog.37signals.com/products/2010/04/a-preview-of-the-new-baseca...

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A few days ago something that was actually vaguely useful was posted on our off topic blog. The off topis blog is usually a place where various members of the team post, well, nonsense. But I give them their dues, they update it far more frequently than we have since the switch to posterous.

The article discusses the potential pitfalls of sharing too much information via the various channels open to you.

We don't need to repeat the information here but it is a useful article by Matthew Melling.

http://ot.vemm.co.uk/location-sharing-a-new-privacy-lesson

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We always create a StumbleUpon account when working with our clients on social media partly because we like using it to find cool websites but in certain sectors we would be surprised at the response it would get. Maybe in the coming months I will get more people asking for "those social things, twipper and stumbly....." we will see! (The first half of that quote is true, we were once asked it they needed a twipper account) 

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We have done away with the old blog and decided to ditch the old content as it had become cumbersome and a little irrelevant in places.

You may see the odd article reappear back here when the appropriate time comes. For the most part this will be new information for the new group presence.

We look forward to hearing from you soon!

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