Microsocial: How tiny bits of data can make or break your website

Seen and unseen, tiny bits of data are hard at work on every website. Search engines and social networks are using this information. But are you making them work for you? Microformats, microdata, metadata, microcontent: what are they, what do they do, and how can you use them to attract visitors and improve SEO.

Following the presentation, attendees will leave with answers to the following:
1. What is microdata?
2. How is it influencing social networks?
3. How is it influencing SEO?

Transcript

1. Microsocial How tiny bits of data can make or break your website Shannon Smith Social Capital Conference All rights reserved © Café Noir Design Inc., 2013
2. Shannon Smith Web Developer Café Noir Design www.cafenoirdesign.com @cafenoirdesign
3. O father, what a hell of witchcraft lies In the small orb of one particular tear. -William Shakespeare
4. What We’ll Cover 1. Microcontent 2. Metadata 3. Structured Data
5. Does It Really Matter?
6. “Yes.” -Google, Yahoo, Facebook, Twitter
7. Microcontent
8. What Is Microcontent?
9. What Is Microcontent? Small Bits of Content
10. What Is Microcontent? “Microcontent should be an ultra-short abstract of its associated macrocontent.” - Jakob Nielsen
11. What Is Microcontent? “Today, microcontent is being used as a more general term indicating content that conveys one primary idea or concept, is accessible through a single definitive URL or permalink, and is appropriately written and formatted for presentation in email clients, web browsers, or on handheld devices as needed.” - Anil Dash
12. What Is Microcontent? Very small, basic units of digital content or media “that can be consumed in unbundled microchunks . . . and aggregated and reconstructed in hyperefficient ways”. - Umair Haque
13. What Does Microcontent Look Like?
14. Incoming vs Outgoing Microcontent
15. Who Is Using Microcontent? 1. Search Engines 2. Humans 3. Social Networks
16. Who Is Using Microcontent? Search Engines Microcontent Defines the Content
17. Who Is Using Microcontent? Humans Microcontent Is Part of the Content
18. Who Is Using Microcontent? Social Networks Microcontent Is the Content
19. How Can You Leverage Up? Create microcontent that is... • bite-size • shareable • context-independent • audience-specific
20. Metadata
21. What Is Metadata?
22. What Is Metadata? Data About Data
23. What Is Metadata? Meta Elements Meta Tags
24. What Is Metadata? Tags which contain content that search engines show to humans.
25. What Does Metadata Look Like?
26. What Does Metadata Look Like?
27. Who Is Using Metadata? Humans
28. An SEO copywriter walks into a bar, grill, pub, public house, Irish, bartender, drinks, beer, wine, liquor...
29. How Can You Leverage Up? Add metadata that is... 1. natural 2. human-centric 3. unique
30. Structured Data
31. What Is Structured Data?
32. What Is Structured Data? Data with Meaning
33. What Is Structured Data? “I have a dream for the Web [in which computers] become capable of analyzing all the data on the Web – the content, links, and transactions between people and computers. A "Semantic Web", which makes this possible, has yet to emerge, but when it does, the day-to-day mechanisms of trade, bureaucracy and our daily lives will be handled by machines talking to machines. The "intelligent agents" people have touted for ages will finally materialize.” Tim Berners-Lee
34. What Is Structured Data? Context for Machines
35. A Brief History of Structured Data 1995 Dublin Core 2004 RDFa 2006 Microformats (μF) 2009 Microdata (part of HTML5) 2011 Schema.org (Bing, Google and Yahoo!) 2012 Open Graph protocol (Facebook) 2012 Twitter Cards
36. What Is Microdata? By adding additional tags to the HTML of your web pages— tags that say, "Hey search engine, this information describes this specific movie, or place, or person, or video"—you can help search engines and other applications better understand your content and display it in a useful, relevant way. Microdata is a set of tags, introduced with HTML5, that allows you to do this.. -Schema.org
37. What Is Microdata? If Google understands the content on your pages, we can create rich snippets—detailed information intended to help users with specific queries. -Google
38. What Does Structured Data Look Like?
39. What Does Structured Data Look Like?
40. What Does Structured Data Look Like?
41. Who Is Using Structured Data? 1.Search Engines 2.Social Networks
42. Who Is Using Structured Data? Facebook vs.
43. Who Is Using Structured Data? Twitter
44. Who Is Using Structured Data? Google Authorship
45. Who Is Using Structured Data? Google Search
46. Who Is Using Structured Data? Specialized Search
47. Who Is Using Structured Data? Everyone. LinkedIn flickr Google+ Lego Last.fm Google Maps Target BestBuy TripAdvisor Twitter Zappos Wikipedia Amazon Apple store Anthropologie Office Depot Costco Netflix Google Search Toys ‘R Us NYT
48. How Can You Leverage Up? Add structured data that is... • standards-compliant • semantic • tested •useful
49. Shannon Smith Web Developer Café Noir Design Get the slides & worksheet: http://chroni.ca www.cafenoirdesign.com @cafenoirdesign