Why, you may ask are we still doing this? Because Nosheen bought a BlackBerry and that was reason enough for us to indulge in some cool GIF imagery.

Note- Let your eyes linger on this for more than a minute or two, and you will notice cheeky head shakes, some rather curious actions and most importantly smiles on all the faces

From Left to Right – Thesis(in the making) and Mandy

For about a span of 5 Days, co-workers passed by looking at Mandy as if he was painting the wall with ambiguous figures. From the first day, to the next day and the next the excitement kept building up, until their came a day, when we saw her, in full form.

And now, it is hard to pass by without a glance. In fact we know of some who come to hall under the garb of getting some coffee or playing pool, but what they really want to do is take a glance at her, in the hope that she may open her beautiful eyes and say those magical words-

Yep, the beauty of Thesis doesn’t lie in her voluptuous hair, or her eyes, or the way she seems to be gliding farther and farther away from you, but in her maker, her creator-

Thank you Mandy:)

Thesis (Greek θέσις Thesis) is a Primordial Goddess of Creation.

Benchmarks can be quite stagnating so when CueBlocks.com reached the 5th year one, it was time to take things to the next level. We had to make the sixth year more exciting and awesome enough to carry forward the spirit on to the seventh as well. So let’s see what the sixth year was about and was it promising of a brighter future?

Bigger & Better Office – While CueBlocks.com warmed up its position on the web, its space expanded in real time too. We occupied the floor below and transformed it into a new extension of the CueBlocks office. It now houses our much loved entertainment area with a pool table, table tennis table, PS3 & Wii and other great stuff! Oh and the web development division is also on the same floor.

Certifications – CueBlocks, already a Google Adwords Certified company, recently became a very proud Magento Professional Partner and a Microsoft adExcellence company. Woohoo!

Goals – We made our foothold stronger as an eCommerce Design, Build and Marketing agency. CueBlocks is thrilled to offer tried, tested and trusted services in eCommerce and mobile commerce development & marketing. We ensure that any store (as long as it’s online), big, small, medium or multi-channel will create enough buzz on the web with us.

Being Fun & Fantastic – Hell yeah! This is something, that no matter how many years go by, will always remain a core value at CueBlocks. Whatever we undertook in the year gone by and will undertake in the years to come, will not be without our stamp of making it totally fun and fantastic!

So here’s to another stepping stone and another year of striving for excellence!

Great job Cuebies (current and alumni)! Congratulations and cheers for the exciting times ahead.

And now if we could only decide on where to party!

What makes web user experience?

Functionality:
If we compare an online store to a physical store, functionality of the store would mean how does your customer locate, choose, pick and purchase what they need (out of your products range). If it is easy for them to shop on your store/ online store, then your store gets full marks on functionality and it rates high in user experience. Functionality includes, usability, interaction channel, payment convenience, site speed, site accessibility.

Psychology:
In a situation where there are many more stores selling the same products on the same price and same quality, there comes one more area which can be taken advantage of, or we can say that virtual stores has one more area to prove itself, it is called genuineness. If your website interacts with the psyche of your customers and instills trusts, you are a winner. Positive psychological influences can be accomplished by achieving data security, shipping policies and return policies.

Content:
When we speak of content, we speak of the aesthetic and visual side of website. The design, feel and the semblance of your website, helps create a good user experience. Design is a part of user experience but not the only thing that matters. Content includes design, style, communication and various methods of marketing. So make sure that you’re putting enough thought into it.

Web user experience is a combination of all the above mentioned factors and goes beyond the traditional marketing mix. All these factors are handled/ managed by designers and developers. And that’s why we say it is these warriors that fight the battle of user attention for the companies operating online.

Search engine optimizing a copy (SEO) is one of the many factors that you can improve on in your quest to get a higher ranking in search engines. Every website owner wants his or her website to rank high in search engine results. By using targeted keywords and well optimized content, you can achieve that goal and make your website visible on the first page of search engine’s results. At the end of the day what matters is conversions for the website owner and to make that happen good SEO copies are needed.

5 SEO Essentials that a SEO Content creator shouldn’t live without

Though there are no set guidelines to implement better SEO but the 5 essentials mentioned below would be really helpful:

Title Tags – Title tags are extremely important to get a higher ranking in search engines. Keep your title tag concise and focus only on targeted keywords. This helps you create good content for the title tags. Also if you want to brand your website you can use the website name along with the keywords in the title tags. This makes your company’s name appear several times in the listings of a search engine. However, if the name is too long then you can pass this.

Description tags – The meta description tags will also not show up on the page but will come as small descriptions on the search page. Use the important keywords from the meta tags as these are highlighted in bold when searched for. With your well crafted meta description tags you can influence your buyers and increase the probability of customers clicking on your tag. Call to action must be added in the meta tags.

Headings – Title tags and headings should be synchronized so that the most important keywords are repeated in the beginning itself. Also use H1, H2 and H5 tags for headings and sub headings to highlight the important keywords. Keyword variation leads to uniquely created tags, which helps and works too.

Internal linking – Hyper-linking and internal linking of pages is extremely important. Link important pages to more relevant information related to that topic on some other page. This also helps build the authenticity of the pages in search engines. Though excessive linking is never recommended yet it should not be underused as well.

Usage of keyword – Keyword usage has been a debatable topic for SEO experts and copywriters. How to infuse keywords and in what density is very important to know! Keyword usage should never lead to keyword stuffing in an article. Use keywords at important places like in meta tags and title tags. These should be used in the beginning of the article and sporadically in the entire post. When making meta tags ensure that the keywords are inserted wisely too.

No one wrote the rule book of SEO copywriting as yet and a lot can be added to the above mentioned points to increase your website’s ranking in search engine results. While we analyse more essentials that work up a rocking SEO content strategy you start out with these.

Google+ is called a social project and there is a reason for it. With Google+, the search engine master has brought the concept of sharing to all its products. Google+ once open to everyone will be available right from the grey Google taskbar, which after its new addition will be wearing black.

What else? Google+ also has a recommendation button, called ‘+1′ (http://www.google.com/+1/button/) which is already available for use. You can easily locate one right there, placed side to side with the historic ‘Like’ button. Google+ adorns a neat, white and spacey design with simple, self-explanatory icons spread neatly across the page, which is very much in tune with Google’s minimalistic design approach for all its products.

There’s more – Google has named its social features Circles, Hangouts, Sparks, and Huddles, just  what’s it like in the real social circuit!

Things to look out for in Google+

• The +1 button
• Instant photo upload
• Group video chatting
• Photo editor
• Huddle (a circle messaging feature)

While Google has got more to pull out of its bag, the limited version has already created a ‘buzz’. The conclusion to the predictable and eventual Google+ vs Facebook debate is already underway even before the launch! Let’s see if FB should be putting on the thinking caps yet.

Carlos & Chatur - Peace after the Frenzy

No, they’re not a bunch of pop musicians or a band of karaoke singers but furry, fuzzy, cute beagle puppies! Coming from the same litter, both Chatur and Carlos have made their way into our hearts and office recently and are making everyone fall in love with them. And what’s interesting is that their mother is named Poison (for a reason ) and we hope that this time around the children don’t take after their mother. So far so cute!

From running after them and saving the server wires from being eaten away, the cubies are doing all in their power to make them feel and behave like at home instead of them making the office their playground. But you can only do so much when the ‘idiomatic’ puppy face is multiplied two times and accompanied by an overload of tumbling acts and puppy tricks.

Ready to meet them? Here’s a trivia that will come in handy on the day of encounter.

Chatur - The Cute & the Restless

Chatur – is two months old and loves to play
Likes – Mud, toys, biting on things, creating chaos and playing with his brother too

Dislikes – Interruptions during play-time, being confined to a room or someone’s lap
Eats – Mud (as implied in ‘Likes’), and dog food

Carlos – is also two months old and takes the Latino name way too seriously for his image and so is quieter than his brother
Likes – Mud too (common ground between the two or may be genes), only likes to play with his brother. Follows when you don’t pay attention.
Dislikes – His brother hogging the limelight and his bullying but he is usually fine with most other things.

Carlos - The Quieter One Contemplates

Eats – Mud (check ‘Likes’ again) and co-incidentally dog food again!

But these traits will change and interchange just as we do their identities sometimes.

And of course they don’t bite, because they don’t have teeth as of now but we’ll make sure that it does not happen even when they do have teeth, only for the inner tribe for the rest we’ll see!

While we enjoy the ‘Doggy-see-Doogy-do’ you keep tuning in for more updates on the woofy moments at CueBlocks!

What do you love? (http://www.wdyl.com/) is also a search medium but with a totally new zing to it. Yes, now you do not have to browse through a number of search results to find (not your love but) what you love.

‘What Do You Love’ search engine allows you to just type in what you love in the search box and what you get is absolutely pleasing to eyes. 20 different widgets on a single page show you everything related to your search. The search results on the WDYL page include:

• Google News
• Translators
• Maps
• SketchUp
• Patent Search
• YouTube
• Google Voice
• Google Books etc.

The idea here is to allow a user to find everything he wants to know about his search on one single page.

WDYL has all the results you want and the way you want
Pictures, videos, maps, trends, calender entires and other important things can now be found on one destination and that is WDYL. Google WDYL is also being hailed as the dashboard consisting all Google products for all you want to know about your search. With this Google has tried to make search for some particular product, place and brand more detailed and quick view. Users now have the choice to search either for result oriented Google search or for more attractive, detail based wdyl.com search. If the search is related to something/ someplace very specific, you can use http://www.wdyl.com/ and go on about exploring and enjoying at the same time.

Why WDYL?
Many are of the view that Google has used this new search tool to advertise its products and services like Google Voice, Google Patent Search, Google Groups, Google Trends etc. The motive is to make users familiar with the very useful services Google offers. And what can be better than a well presented display of all of those on one single page. When people see the quality of results delivered to them with such a tool, they would want to use other services too.

We don’t know how will it influence Internet Marketing strategies or eCommerce marketing techniques but it sure is exciting to think about the future where we may replace ‘google it’ with ‘heart it’.

In all we don’t know if it is actually really useful for many of you but it definitely looks good and has a catchy name. To start, see if the results for Scotland make it your dream destination!
http://www.wdyl.com/#scotland.

Enjoy hearting it !

When creating an ad copy, don’t go filling more air in the balloon, keeping it simple and light is the key. For example,

“Our food is fresh. Our customers are spoiled.”

This ad belongs to Fresh Direct which is an online grocer that delivers fresh food on order. Their ad says they sell fresh food which can spoil you. Isn’t it so apt! It’s a one-liner, witty & crisp and does demand both attention and action or a likelihood of action. And what really makes it unique and shining like a bright star is the conviction that comes through so naturally.

Successful advertising is NOT a complex bundle of words. You do need to impress your audience but confusing them will get you nowhere. Use creative copywriting as your tool to break through the onslaught of other messages that consumers are exposed to day in and day out! All that you really need to achieve this are the two things:

1) Know the Product
2) Trust its Goodness

So the lesson to learn here for the copywriters is to believe what they’re selling like its their own. And ads will automatically appear to strike the bull’s eye or the customers’; depends whoever is drawn to it first.

If you’re ready to sweat it out with the big guns of eCommerce web development then CueBlocks (a Magento Solutions Partner Company) will be more than happy to see the fire in your belly.

One more thing: Not made Magento your top game yet? Don’t worry impress us with your PHP & Zend Framework know-how and we’ll train you in Magento.

Also, Opportunity rarely knocks again; so if you’re listening then act now by:

Sending your Resumes/ CVs at careers@CueBlocks.com

Before you blink and pass this one, let us assure you that every Seth Godin/ Steve Jobs and (oh how could we forget!) Mark Zuckerberg was anonymous at some point in their lives. So, its all good, you still have the ground under your feet and some really great potential to shake the same!

We’ve all been in and through a phase that meant no comment streams, no likes (off or on FB), no mentions and worse of all the ever so friggin demoralizing rhetorical question – is it even being read?

Pre- Socia Media B(l)oom!
Before the dawn of social media broke and down came the angels, read social media experts, parting the smokey clouds; we writers had no choice but to rely on our writing ability (or disability) to initiate that hard-to-get response from the reading tribe. Remember the time when you couldn’t tweet or viral your post and prayed to Apollo (Or may be that was just me ) for sending your way some readers who understood you or what you wrote.

Times changed and became incredibly social and before we knew Facebook and Twitter made the dead and gone word-of-mouth strategy seem alive and kicking!

Living in the Social Media B(l)oom

Now that we’re part of the bubble, we ask the same dreadful question: Is it being read? Well if you’re again shirking away from the question, then we got a problem. Also if you’ve tried every social media strategy there ever was to get those readers to your page and still wait for the first legitimate comment to pop-up; first like to come from someone you don’t know, we again got a problem and that to a big one!

How to Get Read

Depending too much on social media isn’t qutie enough. If you thought that Twitter was going to put the spotlights on your blog then you were very hopeful. What social media does is put it out there for everyone to know that its there but it can’t force those poor beings to like or comment on it if they don’t want to. Social media is indispensable in making your title read at least or bring the read to your post. However, for the reader to respond to your post; you’ll have to be old school and follow the traditional rule of Writing Brilliant Copy!

And that means….

• Intrigue your readers
• Pick their interests
• Address Problems, offer solutions
• Involve them, weave them stories
• Inspire a response – One that you can see. A person nodding in agreement with you looking at the screen won’t do you any good. So don’t forget to add relevant call to action to your copies

We don’t guarantee a Steve Jobs for your blog but definitely it will be more alive then it already is. Sometimes all that is required is to face our fears and answer questions more honestly to get to that promised land of fame and obviously ‘Likes’!

The one for us reads like – I tweet, therefore I am or I FB therefore I am and they’re those whose worlds are their vritual lives. As a copywriter doing 3000 – 4000 or more words a day, can you replace think with write in the original Cartesian assertion and do it without blinking?

If you blinked then there may be more to you than just being passionate about words. This is not that bad a thing per se because the copywriting tribe is as such doubly disposed – familiar with the classic Killer and the Poet Ogilvian split?  Read more at: http://www.copyblogger.com/get-rich-copywriter/

May be I am, therefore I write could be more appropriate for writers.

Think, Be & Write
Our thoughts make our being – that’s what Descartes said in the 16th century and defined existence.
When we write, we think and become, not necessarily in that order. There’s a correlation in thinking, being and writing and if  you want you can go be whatever and write whatever. A faculty that comes in very handy when you writing a sales copy or content for websites, in other words -

When Writing to Sell
We can’t let go off either the marketer or the artist in us while creating persuasive copies for products or services. A writer having multiple ‘selfs’ must ‘be’ what he or she is writing. We write but before the keypad is punched or the pen finds the paper, we think and become. And who we are is what makes our copies and eventually the influence it exerts on its readers.

A writer’s thought-process and the self he/ she dons is very powerful and can actually transform a nonchalant copy into one that can trigger a buying revolution. So don’t push aside your thoughts even when you have to deliver 10 articles in a day. I know it gets very hard to keep the mind sharp as a saw after draining on 10 different topics but if you don’t stop and think, you’ll lose on all that made your copy readable, better-than-others and unique. Also a copy that is mechanically written is likely to have more errors than the one written with a cogent thought and personality behind.

What to Remember
A sales copy or online content written to engage readers is not Post-Modern poetry wherein any and every thought goes and may be kept in a Post-modernist museum. Content is a well crafted message that communicates information useful for the readers and is vital to their making buying decisions.

A writer who thinks like a user or becomes the user can hit bulls eye in his or her copy. I know it’s hard to be all of them at the same time but once you ace it, that creative drive won’t dwindle.

So what does your Cartesian statement read like – ‘I think & write, therefore I am’ or something else?

The lifestyle these days does not allow people to remember more than required! Corporate blogging provides you with a great avenue to stay in contact with your audience, talking about what they would want to know.

Corporate blogging is not your personal blog page where you talk about your experiences. You can use that element in corporate blogging, keeping in mind certain principles. Corporate blogging is carried out by organizations keeping the focus away from marketing the organization – its products and services.

Important corporate blogging tips:

• Design a great blog page and set an attractive theme for it.
• Avoid sales pitch in corporate blogging. Shun the marketing instincts of yours for a while and just write on the topic focusing on what the reader would want to read. May be about the latest developments in your industry.
• Keep your blogs open to feedback! Even if it is negative. Keep the comments on your blog page open. You can always have an internal policy to delete the spam comments. But make sure that you reply to all other comments on your blog page.
• Interact with your audience as much as you can. That is what corporate blogging is all about – establishing a connection with your patrons, readers or customers.
• Don’t forget to have share buttons on your blog page. Your regular followers would love to share your work if they like it.

Let employees do the talking!
Most often, companies have a team to take care of the corporate blogging division. Many organizations also encourage their employees to blog about their respective professional fields or something more general. Employees must not pitch about the company, in fact they must write on topics that are either related to their field of expertise or anything that readers would like to read. It must not be something that they should boast about. We can never discover the problematic.

Many companies have the policy of having 3-4 authors for a single blog post! This stamps on each post a personal touch and also brings an individuality to it and by sharing real life experiences, they are able to build a great relationship with their readers.

Why Corporate blogging helps

It helps employees sharpen their skill sets while assisting a great deal in reputation management (especially during crisis). Plus corporate blogging enhances brand awareness and provides insight into the working culture of an organization. A company can even attract prospective associates, clients or even employees with the help of corporate blogging.

Are you sitting on your desk yet?