Tips to do Mobile Keyword Research in 2013?

It’s no longer a query of whether your business needs mobile SEO. But now it’s an important question of how well you do it? If you have dabbled into Search Engine Optimization before, you must believe Smart Keywords research is the cornerstone of every great Search Engine Optimization campaign and when it comes to mobile Device, there’s no difference.

Before you jump for Keyword Research, you have to know how you are going to quantify success and failure. Why spend your valuable hours if you don’t have “Defined Goals”. Keep in mind that while adaptive websites may look good, we are talking about having a specific mobile site.

You could seek a percentage of total mobile volume or sort by mobile volume in order to find popular keywords (which you can sort by platform if need be). However, before you do, you need to define what you want your viewers to do when they reach your site, do you want to convert offline, want them to download something, just have them provide views, or actually buy a product?

Find your keywords
You know what you want to do â€" now how are you going to get there? The following list of tools will help you narrow down your options when it comes to a keyword search:

 â€¢ Google Webmaster Tools â€" You can use this to find out how people are currently coming to your site when using a mobile device. Face it, if you are not actively running a mobile-optimized site already, this will not help much, but at least it provides some basic information you can use.

 â€¢ Google Analytics â€" Look at the right hand navigation and use Audience > Mobile > Overview to see mobile keywords. You now see the keywords that tablet and mobile users often use.

• Google Keyword Tool â€" Perhaps the sole mobile-only keyword tool that will give you keywords that are mobile-specific, even if your site is not optimized for mobile yet. Go under Advanced Options and Filters, and then select all mobile devices. The goal here is to think about outside the box and not restrict your search to desktop context.

Keyword qualificationNow that you have done that, you probably have a ton of mobile keywords, how do you go about deciding the best ones for you? You can use volume to estimate competitiveness and traffic, but it will not be enough by itself. Consider these factors as well:

• Queries count by platform â€" You can use the mobile search queries report by Google Webmaster Tools to compare mobile queries with desktop queries and see the differences in search behavior. The more information that you have, the better your results are going to be.

 â€¢ Mobile/non mobile tag cloud â€" Want a quick (and fun) overview of the differences between mobile and desktop search? Upload any keyword list that you get from Google and use it with a tag cloud generator such as Tag Crowd. Now you can instantly see potential differences.

• Mobile % of Total Traffic Report â€" Using the Google Keyword Tool will tell you the estimated percentage of mobile searches within the total volume of searches

As you can see, keyword research for mobile does not have to be an intimidating task. It is certainly going to require time and effort, but ultimately the results are going to be worth it

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Agencies, Product, and the Business of Building for People

Agencies, Product, and the Business of Building for People

Lessons learned in building a company that creates for clients and products.

“You have clients? So you’re an agency?”

For the first two years of One Mighty Roar, the question of “What do you call yourself?” came up a lot. Externally, people saw as a company with a growing portfolio of brand clients and a trail of websites and social campaigns behind it. Internally, our team saw a growing stockpile of self-made code and tools which tied those projects together. Whatever OMR was didn’t feel exactly like an agency, but it was close enough. So we relented and embraced the byline of “Digital Agency” for the next two years. It wasn’t a perfect description of what we thought made the company great, but the people who mattered understood the difference and that was good enough for us.

A funny thing happens when people hear you have clients â€" they categorize. Consultants have clients. Agencies have clients. Product companies have customers. Customers who buy widgets or subscriptions to things â€" prebuilt stuff.

The “sort of” agency

In the early years, being labeled an agency on the outside wasn’t bad. We got to solve challenges for a constantly evolving group of interesting brands and individuals. The answers tended to be websites and mobile applications, but the freedom to build foundations for others inspired us. Our team approached client projects like a product team would. Instead of building for an expiration date of rotating seasonal campaigns, we focused on making reusable building blocks. Some of those blocks were pieces we would later assemble to be products.

At the time we thought product companies required outside funding to get started, and being self-funded is an opportunity you protect. Unlike many early product companies, our business model did not require hitting user count or investment milestones to succeed. Our “funding” came from the projects we contracted. Building for others was great because we were handed challenges to solve pre-validated by the brands and budgets behind them. It afforded us the opportunity to remain self-funded with access to top brands.

From agency to product thinking

Client services aside, One Mighty Roar has two products with enough traction and revenue to have “made it” as independent business models.

One is You Rather, a giant predictive modeling engine based around the game of “would you rather”. At time of writing, it tracks about â…" billion responses and a few million views each day. The second product is Robin, a platform that connects digital and physical things by bringing digital layers into physical environments. Despite being early to the “connected device” and “Internet of things” game, Robin has been fortunate to see use from global brands and has grown to a key initiative that powers much of the work we do.

When we interview for open positions, these are the things we talk about first. Without understanding our toolbox, a candidate won’t understand the problems our team can solve. When prospective clients come to us now, we greet them with thinking that supports the products we’ve made. In many cases, it works better than the mobile application or Facebook campaign they originally wanted.

We don’t view product as a way to escape client work. It’s all the same â€" our client services help evangelize our products. Our products are designed to make certain problems easy to solve. We love when there is a fit, but it’s not a requirement. We are like a toolbox filled with both general tools and some that are unique to us. Some of our best web and mobile application projects have led to new internal workflow, open source projects, and foundations for future products.

Product is a foundation not a department

The products are a part of our thought process right from the start. This is one of the things that a lot of larger agencies get backwards. Let’s take the recent “labs” trend popping up among large agencies. A 500+ person agency tries to recapture its agility by creating a “labs/innovation” department. On paper, lab initiatives feels like product â€" smart people in a room tinkering with the latest technology to build things their clients can use. What happens instead (unfortunately) is the lab becomes little more than a media kit checklist item to show they are forward thinkers. A handful of interesting experiences might come out of it every year, but the rest of the company doesn’t benefit from the new process, only the results.

Today’s 500+ person agency doesn’t have the cultural foundation to support a product startup inside of it. Hell, there are fifty person agencies that would have a hard time making the product shift. They scratch itches instead of solve problems and fail the test of “different or better?”. Being scrappy is something you can lose with size, but scrappiness is also the catalyst needed for compelling product direction. Scrappy can’t afford to build things with expiration dates.

Clients can sponsor features

Clients can (and should) have goals that extend beyond a single project launch. When building with a product toolbox mentality clients become sponsors for new features, either directly or indirectly. The client gets what they want for their project and we get a good reason to bump a new, client validated feature to the top of the list.
This isn’t to say that you build generic results. The difference is in approach. Simply asking “How would this be done if it wasn’t just for this use case?” nets a lot of design and development decisions which ultimately make stronger product design.

Good products come from domain expertise

People build solutions to their own problems. If enough other people have the same problem, you have a product. If enough people buy in (and they don’t always), you have a business.

Building to a product rather than a project means something is always left to improve. We believe in constantly iterating towards a goal or at least a larger narrative. Whether the product fails or succeeds, you’ll still have the “why did we make this?” to inform the next steps.

Product people and project people

At One Mighty Roar, we are product people who take on client projects. When we interview people from larger agencies, a common thread for departure is burnout from shelved projects or great work that doesn’t exist anymore. Dan Ariely covers a lot of these points in his talk called “What Makes Us Feel Good About Our Work.”

In project based work, it’s harder to be deeply invested in something the moment an expiration date is established. Product represents something to always come back to. Coupled with the diversity of challenges and the brands agency style work comes with, we find a product company with client services gets the best of both worlds.

The fabled “20% time”

Our friend, Richard Banfield of Fresh Tilled Soil, recently wrote an interesting piece which cautions design companies that try to tackle agency and internal product work. One topic covered is the danger of viewing 20% time as an adequate amount of time to develop a product. This magical time is the first to go in busy situations, which can all but halt product development.

Interpretation has changed over time, but the gist is a company spends the majority of time thinking specifically, and the minority is thinking broadly. Google and 37Signals get a lot of credit for being the pioneers in this regard, but it’s 3M we have to thank for subsidized personal projects at the workplace.

We don’t believe that client work disqualifies a company from doing product if you hire the right people and build for the right companies. Put another way, we spend 80% of our time building out customized iterations of our services, then 20% refining for the big picture.

It’s a business, not a lottery ticket

Products aren’t lottery tickets to aid in the escape from your core business. We’ve come to view products as a broader framework for solving problems by improve the toolbox and workflow we tackle projects with. You can’t force it, but if you’re looking for opportunities they will come up a lot more than if you have project tunnel vision.

Products are often, to quote the famed Bob Ross, “happy accidents”.

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Don’t Wait: 5 Great Android KitKat Features You Could Get Right Now

By Justin Dennis on 9th November, 2013 | Google Android |  No Comments

Android 4.4 KitKat is finally here! But as longtime Android users know all too well, its official rollout will be slow, gradual, and for many, non-existent. That’s why many people don’t wait around for official builds to pass through carriers and hardware manufacturers, instead opting to flash custom ROMs or download leaked APKs. Yes, it’s a tad impatient, but for us techie folk who like to live on the bleeding edge, it’s worth it.

Now, KitKat didn’t introduce that many ground-breaking features, and it didn’t reinvent the mobile landscape; it simply refined what has become a solid operating system. But that’s not to say that it doesn’t have some cool features.

Thankfully, a few of those cool features are available now, either through official APKs or third-party apps.

Google Experience Launcher

The new stock launcher in KitKat is all about Google. Scroll all the way to the left, and you’re making a Google search. Tap on the persistent search bar at the top, and you’re making a Google search. Say, “OK Google” at any time, and you’re making a Google search. I think you get the idea.

But this newfangled launcher is actually a pretty sweet improvement over the stock Jelly Bean launcher. To get it requires installing three different APKs because for the launcher to work, it also needs Google Now to be updated and Play Services.

You can view some detailed instructions and get help over on the XDA-Developers forum for the topic, but the basic premise is simple: Download this ZIP file (mirror), unzip it, place the three APK files on your phone, and install them. When you press the home button, it should prompt you to select “Launcher” as your default launcher.

Hangouts 2.0

One day, Hangouts will be the amazing, all-encompassing communication app that the world needs, but that day is not today. However, that day is a little bit closer as Hangouts jumps from version 1.2 to 2.0 with the KitKat update, allowing for the app to handle SMS, MMS, animated gifs, and improved Emoji support.

Unfortunately, Android users don’t get the calling features and Google Voice integration that iOS users received recently (Why, Google? Why?), but they have promised to bring those features “soon.” Oh well. In the meantime, you can enjoy using Hangouts as your default SMS app, and don’t forget to snag some awesome animated GIFs to make use of the new feature.

To get started, download Hangouts 2.0 from one of the mirrors below, transfer the file to your Android device, and install like normal. If you have any major issues, you can always uninstall it and reinstall version 1.2 from the Play Store.

• Mirror #1 â€" Android Police
• Mirror #2 â€" Android Police
• Mirror #3 â€" Android Police
• Mirror #4 â€"  XDA-Developers Senior Member l.m.prowse

(Big thanks to Android Police and I.m.prowse for the mirrors.)

Screen Recording

KitKat supports native screen recording! Hooray for all those tutorial makers! But we’ve actually been able to do that for a while as long as you have root access. If you’re new to rooting, be sure to check out our extensive Android rooting guide.

There’s a number of apps that will let you do this, a quick search of the Play Store will show you that, but my favorite is SCR Screen Recorder. It’s simple to use: you just install it, tap record, grant it root permission, and you’re on your way. It also has a settings menu so you can adjust things to your liking if need be.

There is a free version as well as a $5.21 paid version that removes the watermark, notification icon, and allows you to record for longer than 3 minutes.

Caller ID

The new caller ID in the KitKat dialer looks awesome. It searches through Google’s databases for people or businesses registered to that number and shows you their name and photo even if they’re not in your contacts. Unfortunately, there hasn’t been a lot of luck getting the dialer to function properly on non-KitKat devices, so you’re stuck with third-party options.

There are some great choices out there, though! We’ve gone through four great caller ID apps that should tie you over until you can break yourself off a piece of that KitKat. Above are some screenshots from Thread, the best of the Caller ID apps that displays relevant information from whoever’s calling, including their picture, previous text messages, and social media updates.

Gallery

Keeping up with Google’s continued efforts to improve Android’s photo capabilities, the new default Gallery has a quality photo editor built-in. Aside from that, it looks largely the same.

The editor has a few preset filters, preset border options, the ability to manually tweak many aspects of the filters, and options for cropping, rotating, mirroring, and straightening your photos.

There’s even a slide-out menu to the right that displays your edit history, allowing you to revert back to any point at any time. Plus, the photo editor is nondestructive, so any changes that are made are saved as a new photo, ensuring that your original photo is preserved.

You can download the Gallery apk from this XDA thread. To install it, though, you’ll have to use a file browser with root permission to place it under System > Apps and then restart your phone.

Other

KitKat comes with a lot of new features, but most of them are pretty minor. Some of the smaller updates include the stock apps like Email, Clock, Camera, and several new fonts, wallpapers, sounds, and boot animations. All of these can (hopefully) work on your Jelly Bean device thanks to the amazing folks over at Android Police and XDA-Developers. Follow the links for installing/flashing instructions.

Conclusion

This is part of what makes the Android community so great. A new version comes out and suddenly everyone’s up in a flurry grabbing APKs, explaining how to get certain features now, modding, rooting, and flashing everything they can get their hands on. It’s fun, and it also makes for a great smartphone.

What’s your favorite new feature in 4.4 KitKat? Will you be flashing a new 4.4 ROM when it makes it to your device? Let us know in the comments.

Check out more about: android, android app, mobile phone customization

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Are You Looking For A High Quality Giclee Printing Service? We Just Found!

After we have published the previous post on our blog, about printing services for business cards, we received a lot of questions and feedback from people who were looking for a place to print larger photos online, so we decided to dedicate a whole new post for those of you who are looking for a high quality giclee printing service. No matter what kind of photo are you attempting to print, whether it’s an ordinary picture from your family album, or a high quality professional shot, once printed on a giclee canvas, the photo will get a completely new look and feel, and you will be able to proudly hand it on your wall in your living room.

The key problem is, no matter where you live, US or Europe, or anywhere else, this kind of printing is terribly expensive and often inaccessible to most people, since it requires you to personally go and visit a photo-store that specializes in this type of printing. On top of the unreasonable local prices, dictated by the lack of competition, not all stores are equipped with convenient software for loading the digital images, thus resulting is very little control over the end result.

This is where point101.com printing services comes in handy. If you are looking to submit photos for print, from the comfort of your home, using their revolutionary easy-to-use online upload system, and at the same time benefit from unbeatable  prices and incomparable quality â€" you shouldn’t look any further, because we already did our homework for you. Comparing some of the top giclee printing providers in the UK, Point101.com seems to beat the the competition when it comes to customer services, prices and quality. You won’t need to compromise on any of the 3 most important factors! Moreover, throughout their website you will see  the “price promise” badge, guaranteeing the lowest possible price.

Point101 was established back in 2003, and for 10 years has been providing thousands upon thousands of satisfied customers with top quality services. If you are looking for a fast, professional and convenient way to print your masterpieces, definitely gives them a go!

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Guided hierarchical co-assembly of soft patchy nanoparticles

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Guided hierarchical co-assembly of soft patchy nanoparticles. Animal and plant cells are prominent examples of how nature constructs ever-larger units in a targeted, preprogrammed manner using molecules as building blocks. In nanotechnology, scientists mimic this ‘bottom-up’ technique by using the ability of suitably structured nano materials to ‘self-assemble’ into higher order architectures. Applying this concept, polymer scientists from Bayreuth, Aachen, Jena, Mainz, and Helsinki have recently published an article in the prestigious journal Nature that describes a new principle for the self-assembly of patterned nanoparticles. This principle may have important implications for the fundamental understanding of such processes as well as future technologies.

The research team is headed by Professor Axel Müller, who was holder of the Chair of Macromolecular Chemistry II at the University of Bayreuth until his retirement in 2012; he is now a Fellow of the Gutenberg Research College at Mainz University. The other members of the team are Dr. André Gröschel (previously at the University of Bayreuth, now Aalto University Helsinki), Tina Löbling and Dr. Holger Schmalz (University of Bayreuth), Dr. Andreas Walther (Interactive Materials Research Center at Aachen University), and Junior Professor Dr. Felix Schacher (Friedrich Schiller University Jena). The research was conducted at the University of Bayreuth and funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG) within the Collaborative Research Center 840 "From Particulate Nano-Systems to Mesotechnology."



/©: Müller Research Group The self-assembly process described in Nature commences with chain-like macromolecules, so-called triblock terpolymers composed of three linear sections connected to form a chain-like structure A-B-C or A-D-C. The block in the middle has been marked green or black, respectively. Block A (gray) has to interact with other particles; block C (rose) is a corona controlling solubility. By way of self-aggregation the macromolecules formed nanoparticles, which by way of co-aggregation formed the next higher level in the hierarchy. This way a co-assembled superstructure develops, for which Müller's research team has coined the term "caterpillar micelles."
The self-assembly process commences with chain-like macromolecules with a size in the range of 10 to 20 nanometers. In chemistry, such macromolecules are called triblock terpolymers. They are composed of three linear sections (blocks) connected to each other in sequence. They are generated using a special synthetic process, i.e., the so-called "living polymerization," and are readily available to researchers. The research team was able to guide the triblock macromolecules into soft nanoparticles with a diameter of roughly 50 nanometers. The choice of solvents played a key role in this macromolecular self-assembly process. The solvents were precisely selected and used so that the varying solubility of the three blocks and the incompatibility of the polymers with one another contributed significantly to the quality of the desired interior structure of the nanoparticles.

The scientists applied this technique to two types of triblock terpolymers. These differed with regard to the chemical properties of the middle blocks. The block sequences of the macromolecules were A-B-C and A-D-C, respectively. The first results in nanoparticles with a single bonding site and tends to form spherical clusters, while the latter creates nanoparticles with two bonding sites and thus tends to form linear superstructures. Importantly, in both cases the structure of the nanoparticles is preprogrammed by the chemical structure of the source macromolecule in the same way as the structure of a protein is determined by its amino acid sequence.

However, the process of self-assembly does not end with the nanoparticles. If the nanoparticles formed by each type of macromolecule were left to their own, spherical superstructures would result on the one hand and linear superstructures on the other. Müller's team has developed and implemented a different approach. The nanoparticles with one and two bonding sites are mixed so that they aggregate together into a completely new superstructure in a process of co-assembly. In the final superstructure, the nanoparticles originating from the A-B-C molecules and nanoparticles formed by the A-D-C molecules alternate in a precisely defined pattern.

When viewed under a transmission electron microscope, the new superstructure bears a strong resemblance to a caterpillar larva, because it also consists of a series of clearly separate, regularly ordered sections. Müller's research team has thus coined the term "caterpillar micelles" for such co-assembled superstructures.

The research findings recently published in Nature represent a breakthrough in the field of hierarchical structuring and nano-engineering as it allows creating new materials by self-assemble preprogrammed particles. This could be a game changer, because so far only top-down procedures, i.e., extracting a microstructure from a larger complex, are widely accepted structuring processes. "The limitations of this technique will become all too apparent in the near future," explained Müller. "Only rarely is it possible to generate complex structures in the nanometer range."

However, a bottom-up principle of self-assembly based on that employed in nature could well represent the best way forward. One factor that makes this particularly attractive is the large number of macromolecules, which are readily available as building blocks. They can be used to incorporate specific properties in the resultant superstructures, such as sensitivity to environmental stimuli (e.g. temperature, light, electric and magnetic fields, etc.) or give them the ability to be switched on and off at will. Possible applications include nanolithography and the delivery of drugs in which the time and site of release of active substances can be preprogrammed. Here, the similarity to the structural principles of animal and plant cells becomes apparent again, where various properties are compartmentalized into areas of limited space.

The macromolecules carrying diverse functional segments can be hundreds of times smaller than a micrometer. The superstructures that such macromolecules produce have correspondingly high resolution. "Future technologies â€" such as tailor-made artificial cells, transistors, or components for micro/nano-robotics â€" may benefit significantly from this particularly delicate structuring," explained Müller. "The research findings we published in Nature do not yet have any immediate real-world applications. Nevertheless, the better we understand bottom-up processes starting with molecules in the nanometer range and moving on to the higher hierarchical levels in the micrometer range, the more likely future technologies will be within our grasp." The caterpillar micelles are in no way the only superstructures that can be produced with the self-assembling nanoparticles. "Such soft nanoparticles can be combined with inorganic or biological nano- and microparticles to create previously unknown materials with specific functions. The number of possible combinations is practically endless," concluded Müller.

Contact Professor Dr. Axel H. E. Müller Fellow of the Gutenberg Research Center (GRC) Institute of Organic Chemistry Johannes Gutenberg University D 55099 Mainz Tel +49 6131 39-22372

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Wireless Charging

As we can see from the release of the Nexus4  Wireless Charger, inductive charging or the method of charging without connecting a cable directly into the phone has become widely available.Currently the iphone has not got the function but there are sleeves which can add the ability to wireless charge and the rumored iphone5s may come with bulit-in wireless charging.There are many options to charge devices wirelessly. I think this way of charging will become the norm and may be built into tables to enable quick charging of devices.
How wireless charging worksEngadget Review of the Nexus4 ChargerDroid Life review of Nexus4 wirelss charger
Below are some options for wireless charging Duracell power mat Nexus4 Wireless ChargerNokia wireless chargersEnergizer wireless chargerNokia Wireless Charger Commericalhttp://youtu.be/_lBPL7mGO3g

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CSS Framework For Responsive E-mails – Ink

We used to see lots of CSS frameworks for website layouts but it is hard to find one for e-mails.

Ink, by Zurb, fills that gap by simplifying the creation of HTML e-mails that look the same on all major e-mail clients.

The framework includes the styles for a table-based grid, buttons, panels, retina images and more.

Once the e-mail is ready, you can use the web-based Inliner tool to get all styles inline.

And, to get started quickly, take a look at the ready-to-use e-mail templates of Ink.

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