I discovered an interesting thing when looking at my 'webmaster tools' on Google…
I’m not one to obsess over analytics and keywords and SEO… I try to optimize things for all of my websites of course, but I could drive myself crazy and never get to picking up a paintbrush if I looked at all the many ways to analyze a website.
But for some reason I was compelled to go take a look. If you sign up for a Google account there are so many free trackers and tweakers and tables that you could hire a full-time employee to manage it all. (Not in the budget so it’s me, at random intervals.)
As you can imagine, I would like the www.ArtLicensingInfo.com site to come up well with the keyword “art licensing”, and it does. It currently has the #4 position. (Yeah!)
But an interesting thing happened when I looked at the “Keywords” table… what on EARTH is “00pm” the keyword Google thinks has the most significance for my site? Next most significant? “00am”…
Well, I clicked on it to discover that Google thinks the WebCalendar, that I don’t even think anyone really looks at, is the most important piece of ArtLicensingInfo.com. Google says, ‘”Below are the most common keywords Google found when crawling your site. These should reflect the subject matter of your site.”
ACK! They aren’t Google! They aren’t!
Anyway, I felt compelled to share. Sometimes it is good to go see if what your site is about and what Google or another search engine thinks your site is about, matches. If it doesn’t, the people you want to find you aren’t going to find you. How many of you have done a search for “OOpm” in hopes of finding information about art licensing? I’m not a betting girl but I’m going to bet NONE.
So… the web calendar is history. It takes time and is apparently a Google SEO gremlin in disguise.
I encourage you to go see what your site looks like to the Google robotic eyes… for more information about webmaster tools, go to http://www.google.com/webmasters/
Here’s to your creative (and SEO) success!
– Tara
If I had to get a "real job"…
I’d give Dennis the boot at Google and be in charge of the doodles! In fact, in honor of my recent visit to the New York offices of Google, I created my own Halloween Google Doodle and emailed it to Dennis — along with written permission to use it on Friday. Fingers crossed!
_
Now I know there are a lot of artists who aren’t so keen on Google’s involvement in art these days, but I did take a few minutes to explain my concerns while enjoying the view from the cafeteria. Here… enjoy the view with me… pretty spectacular huh? (That’s the Empire State Building, front and center) The food was just as good… and a job perk, not a cash register in sight.
Did you know they have food stations every 50 feet in their offices? Everything from espresso to M&M’s (someone labeled them “semi-food”) to organic nuts and tons of protein bars and oatmeal in between.
I was fortunate enough to be able to eat and tour the offices since Craig’s friend works at Google. Of course, being the man that he is, Craig had no idea he worked for Google until we showed up — it ended up being one of the highlights of my trip.
Ask anyone who knows me, I LOVE to go places not everyone can go… and Google is one. Tight security! No secrets will be revealed here… no siree! (I promised Doug… plus I didn’t see any.)
But I did see a bunch of Razor Scooters. Google is in the very large Port Authority building so they have scooters throughout the halls– they don’t want their employees wasting time going to meetings so they provide the means to SCOOT around quickly.
If you work at Google and need a break –head to the game room. There you can play ping pong, Dance, Dance, Revolution, Guitar Hero, and more. There are massage chairs… not sure about hula hoops but I wouldn’t be surprised. They pull out the stops for their people at Google.
SO… I just had to share! It was fun! If I ever get a real job, I want Dennis’.
Or better yet, if I ever move out of my home and have a larger studio space, I’m getting cement floors and Scooter Parking signs. If you have to spend your day doing something, make sure it is fun!
Have a fun and creative day!
~ Tara
P.S. To see the note from Dennis and an archive of his Google Doodles, click here
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