Cerebra

A significant pillar of search engine optimisation [SEO] has always been relevance. Delving deeper into present-day search algorithms however, has revealed a development that surely challenges the SEO principles we’re all accustomed to.

Consider this: invisible search engine filters ensure that you and I receive tailored, and therefore, very different SERPs when we individually do a Google search on the topic of, for example, the (see the screenshot below for my results; share yours with me).

This morning the office was abuzz with talk of Facebook’s latest change – seems the company has rolled out preliminary testing on their messaging service. Basically, should you wish to send a private message to someone who is not a connection, Facebook will charge you anywhere from $1 (approx. R9,46) to deliver your message. If you don’t pay, your message will be sent to that recipients spam folder.

I tried to test this today by sending a message to a colleague who is not a friend on Facebook, and my message went through just fine. So although this testing phase has been rolled out in South Africa, it’s clearly only to a percentage of the South African users, for now.

The majority of all the sessions I attended had one key point - explaining how humans behave on the web, and how we can take "advantage" of that behavior.

Sounds easy, but it seems most of us, as much as we use the web, take little notice of the finer human nuances to how people share, gather, read and talk. In a talk about cyber bullying with the creators of itgetsbetter.org, they highlighted the fact that in certain communities people enjoy being anonymous. This simple human truth - that we all have secrets and don't necessarily share everything with everyone - is why many LGBT forums exist, allowing people to come together in a closed community and talk about their challenges or fears. Community, even in anonymity, is strong.

Anyone who knows anything about SXSW knows that it is a frenzied week of interactive conferences, film and music. This year it is even bigger as its the 20th anniversary of the event, which means there are over 5000 events in the city of Austin.

Born in 1987 as a music festival only, the organisers added the film festival and interactive conference in 1994. Johnny Cash was the keynote speaker in 1987 and in 2013 the main keynote was Elon Musk.

This is a clear indication of how the super conference has evolved over the years from music dominating the scene up to 2009/2010 to the switch to interactive becoming the biggest pull for people. The numbers speak for themselves, as you can see in the table below.

After 6 years of research into why businesses succeed or fail in China, Emily Chong, the AVP of Design and Marketing for Frog innovation specialists, tackles the subject of survival strategies for brands in China. The parallels and differences in marketing to South Africans were startling.

Here are some of the insights for anyone thinking of taking their products or services East, or for anyone venturing into new territories.

Stop thinking these are nascent markets