How many characters in a page title and meta description?

By pandraos | Published: September 4, 2010

This is a quick post to provide the answer to a question that I have heard way too many times during my work in the Web industry.

How many characters in a page title and meta description? The answer for most search engines, including Google is:
page title: max 60 characters
meta description: 160 characters

Reminder: Page titles are a key element in defining how your site is ranked by Google and other search engines. Make sure to do some research on what keywords users are using to do a search, a great tool for this being Google Adwords‘ keyword tool (you’ll need to create an adwords account to access it). Then do some creative writing in order to insert as many keywords as possible in your page title while still remaining coherent to the user.

As for meta descriptions, as SEOmoz describes it perfectly: “while not important to search engine rankings, [they] are extremely important in gaining user click-through from search engine result pages”. Make sure to sell the content of your page to the user so that he clicks on your link and not the ones below or above you in search engine results.

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Some tips regarding B to B newsletters and e-blasts

By pandraos | Published: August 10, 2010

My blog is back after a 3 month hiatus due to my traveling and other bad excuses which I won’t bother you with. The current post is intended to share some of the knowledge I’ve gained while preparing a B to B e-blast for a client.

How to measure the performance of a newsletter or e-blast ?

There are several ways to measure the success of a mass mailing, but the 3 most important performance indicators are:

- the delivery rate is the proportion of emails sent that have reached the recipents’ inboxes. This rate provides information regarding the quality of an email database.

- the open rate is the proportion of delivered emails that have been opened by users. This rate provides information regarding the visibility of an e-blast and is mostly influenced by the sender ID, the email title and the moment when it is sent.

- the click rate is the proportion of opened emails in which at least one link was clicked by the user. This rate provides information regarding the email’s content relevance and quality.

How to improve the performance of a newsletter or e-blast?

These 3 elements can have a great impact on the performance of your campaign and are easy to control:

The email title: the key factor which determines your open rate.

- The email title should be a maximum 50 characters long (including spaces) in order to make sure it is not truncated in the recipient’s inbox.

- Titles should be as precise as possible. One would think that a mysterious or vague title can lead curious users to open an email but the truth is users want to know what they are clicking on and are likely to disregard your message if it’s not appealing enough.

The email content: has to be relevant while encouraging users to click on the various links provided.

- There is no ideal lenght but the email should be relatively short and long paragraphs should be avoided at all costs. It is ideal to repeat the email title and to have an introductory paragraph which sums up the email’s content.

- You should have at least one explicit call to action which invites users to click and reach a landing page with more relevant content. Make sure to avoid the words “click here”. For example, say “discover this product” instead of “click here to discover this product”

The delivery time: An often-overlooked factor, this can have a huge impact on open and click rates.

- In the case of B to B campaigns, the best day to send your newsletter or e-blast is on tuesday, wednesday or thursday. since employees have to deal with a great number of emails on monday (included those received during the week-end) and they often disregard commercial emails on fridays in an effort to clear their inbox before the weekend.

- The ideal time to send a newsletter or e-blast is during the late morning to early afternoon period (between 11 am and 2 pm) since the morning’s email rush has been dealt with and there is still enough time left in the afternoon for an employee to take the time and read your email.

Many of the tips included in this article are a summary of the many great articles which can be found on the Mailchimp articles section, which I strongly encourage you to read to get more information.

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The REAL power of social media – or can Facebook save a life?

By pandraos | Published: May 21, 2010

Talking about social media has become so mainstream my head hurts every time I hear about an upcoming conference on “how to use social media in a business context” or when I see an article in an business paper with the title “the power of social media”. I was telling myself get over it, social media is here to stay, it’s been done, it works, bravo.

But then a story like this happens, and I realize that the power of social media is a big deal after all.

A couple of weeks ago, someone close to me who grew up with a severe heart condition saw his health deteriorate fast. His doctors all agreed: only a heart transplant can save him. The only things is, Philippe El-Hage lives in a Lebanon (where there isn’t enough equipment to perform a heart transplant) and he does not have medical insurance. It order to live, he has to go to Paris to have his operation, which is to be paid in full by his family. Needless to say, they don’t have the required 220 000 euros (minimum) to pay for the surgery.

This is where Facebook comes in. The groupe Un coeur pour Philippe was created in the morning of wednesday May 19th. Two and a half days later, there are over 3,600 members (by the time you read this, the figure will probably be  much higher) many of whom have made donations through paypal. We don’t have exact figures yet, but we know the donations are in the tens of thousands, if not more than a hundred thousand dollars. Events are being organized throughout Lebanon, in Paris, Montreal etc…

Can Facebook help save a life? If yes then all I can say is that in the end, social media does deserve all the hype. The REAL power of social media is not just in allowing people to connect or allowing businesses to create awareness their brand or product. It is still about gathering people from around the world to support a just cause.

If you want to help, join the group and donate through this paypal page. Thanks!

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Intercolonial Trade within the French Atlantic World, 1708 – 1763

By pandraos | Published: May 14, 2010

Yet another random post, but I’ve been wanting to publish this one for a while now. In a (not so distant) past, I was a Master’s student in McGill’s history department, destined to become a gentleman and a scholar. Then I discovered the world of interactive media and all hell broke lose.

In the meantime, many people have told me that they would like to read my Master’s thesis (technically, it’s a Research Paper though), and I have always thought that I’d rather publish it on the Web in the hope that one day it might be useful to someone. If you’re a historian and you read this, feel free to contact me. I love to talk about history and I’d love the share my limited research with you.

My paper was written in the spring of 2007 under the supervision of Professors Nicholas Dew and Daviken Studnicki-Gizbert and was entitled Intercolonial Trade within the French Atlantic World, 1708 – 1763. Frankly, it was a fascinating and under-studied topic that allowed me to combine my interests for Economic History and the History of the Atlantic World during the era of European Colonialism.

Here’s a pdf version of my paper: Intercolonial Trade within the French Atlantic World, 1708 – 1763

And a summary for those too lazy to read it (it’s OK, you don’t have to pretend to want to read a 50-page paper just to be my friend):

Between 1708 and 1763, metropolitan officials tried to promote a system of intercolonial commerce between French possessions in the Americas because of France’s inability to provide sufficient supplies to its colonies. The goal of this policy was to create a self-sufficient economic sphere within the French Atlantic World. While legal intercolonial trade rose to significant levels during the eighteenth century, it was overshadowed by the great quantitative superiority of illegal contraband commerce between British and French colonies. Because of a variety of structural factors, as well as a series of inefficient policies, illegal commerce was more profitable for French colonies than legitimate intercolonial trade, and this eventually led to failure of the ‘Colbertist’ economic system that had prevailed in the colonies since the 1670s.

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5 raisons de me choisir comme blogueur représentant les Pays-Bas lors du mondial 2010

By pandraos | Published: April 26, 2010

Vous avez peut-être entendu parler du concours de Radio-Canada, qui cherche un blogueur pour représenter chaque pays participant à la Coupe du Monde 2010? Personnellement, je trouve que c’est une excellente initiative qui démontre comment une grosse organisation peut faire du Web participatif afin d’augmenter à faible coût la valeure ajoutée qu’elle apporte à son public.

Cet article a donc 3 objectifs principaux (oui, j’adore les listes chiffrées…):

  1. Démontrer au comité de sélection de Radio-Canada que je mérite le rôle de blogueur représentant les Pays-Bas pour la Coupe du Monde 2010.
  2. Prouver à ces mêmes personnes – et à ma blonde – que je suis tout à fait capable de bloguer en français (je n’ai pas passé dix-huit ans de ma vie au Collège Marie-de-France pour rien!)
  3. Expliquer (enfin!) à mes amis et connaissances mon obsession pour l’équipe nationale des Pays-Bas.

Voici donc les 5 TRÈS BONNES raisons de me choisir comme blogueur officiel des Pays-Bas pour le mondial 2010:

  1. Bien que ma famille ne soit pas d’origine néerlandaise (mais alors là pas du tout) ma soeur s’est mariée à Rotterdam. J’ai donc passé deux mois aux Pays-Bas au courant de l’été 2001 et ceci n’a fait qu’amplifier mon amour pour ce pays.
  2. Je suis probablement la seule personne au Québec qui possède l’immonde maillot orange fluo de l’équipe nationale néerlandaise qui ne s’est pas qualifiée pour le mondial 2002. La preuve:
  3. J’ai failli me faire casser la gueule à cause de ce fameux maillot le 9 juin 2008 alors que je courrais au milieu de la Petite Italie après la victoire des Pays-Bas 3-0 face à l’Italie. N’ayant pas appris de mon erreur, j’ai répété la manœuvre en face du Massilia sur Parc quatre jours plus tard alors que les Pays-Bas ridiculisaient la séléction française 4-1.
  4. J’ai passé près de deux ans de ma vie à prendre Feyenoord à Football Manager 2005 pour essayer d’en faire une équipe championne d’Europe. Je pense que le jeux est truqué, car malgré tous mes efforts, je n’ai jamais pu passer les quarts…
  5. Mon DJ préféré est hollandais (Tiësto), ma bière préférée est hollandaise (Grolsch) et mon joueur préféré est holandais (Van Persie). Si ça existait, mon joueur de hockey préféré serait hollandais!

Si vous n’êtes toujours pas convaincu que je suis le candidat idéal, pensez à ceci: quel autre non-hollandais serait capable d’adorer cette équipe avec autant de passion alors qu’elle nous a si souvent déçue, notamment au Mondial 2006 avec une défaite en huitièmes face au Portugal, et à l’Euro 2008 avec une défaite en quarts face à la Russie… ?

Sur ce je vous laisse avec les moments forts de cette fameuse leçon de soccer que nous avons donné au Français, ce 13 juin 2008:

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