The internet regulator has approved plans to allow non-Latin-script web addresses, in a move that is set to transform the online world. The board of Icann voted at its annual meeting in Seoul to allow domain names in Arabic, Chinese and other scripts.

More than half of the 1.6 billion people who use the internet speak languages with non-Latin scripts.

It is being described as the biggest change to the way the internet works since it was created 40 years ago. The first Internationalised Domain Names (IDNs) could be in use next year. Plans for IDNs were first approved at a meeting in June 2008, but testing of the system has been going on for two years.

Technical upheaval

The move paves the way for the internet’s Domain Name System (DNS) to be changed so it can recognise and translate non-Latin characters. The DNS acts like a phonebook, turning easily understood domain names into strings of computer-readable numbers, known as Internet Protocol (IP) addresses.

“This change is very much necessary for not only half the world’s internet users today but more than half, probably, of the future users as the internet continues to spread ” Rod Beckstrom President of Icann

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (Icann) said the “fantastically complicated technical feature” allowing IDNs would represent the “biggest change” to the coding that underlies the internet since it was invented four decades ago.

BBC technology correspondent Mark Gregory says in the early days of the internet, language posed no problem, as most web-surfers spoke English and those that did not usually wrote in languages based on the Latin alphabet. But this is no longer true, adds our correspondent.

New system to be up and running by middle of next year

Icann said it would accept the first applications for IDNs by 16 November, with the first up and running by “mid-2010″. It is likely the majority of early non-Latin net addresses to be approved will be in Chinese and Arabic script, followed by Russian. Some countries, such as China and Thailand, have already introduced workarounds that allow computer users to enter web addresses in their own language. However, these were not internationally approved and do not work on all computers.

Autonomy

Our correspondent says the point of the Icann vote was to create a universal internet address code that will work in any language and every place so all the world’s computers can connect with each other. “Of the 1.6 billion internet users today worldwide, more than half use languages that have scripts that are not Latin-based,” said Icann president and CEO Rod Beckstrom earlier this week. “So this change is very much necessary for not only half the world’s internet users today but more than half, probably, of the future users as the internet continues to spread.”

Icann, set up by the US government, was founded in 1998 to oversee the development of the net. Last month, after years of criticism, the US government eased its control over the non-profit body. It signed a new agreement that gave Icann autonomy for the first time. The agreement came into effect on 1 October and puts it under the scrutiny of the global “internet community”.

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/hi/technology/8333194.stm
Published: 2009/10/30 05:13:22 GMT

If you operate an ecommerce website then the frequency of your shopping cart abandonment rates is likely to be high on your list of major frustrations.

Imagine getting a customer all the way to your checkout page with a cart full of products or services – only to have them change their mind at the last minute and quit the order!

According to a recent report by the e-tailing group, nearly 60% of US online retailers, experience shopping cart abandonment rates above 20%.

A study by PayPal and comScore also found that 45% of US online shoppers had abandoned their shopping carts, multiple times, in just three weeks. The average cost of abandoned goods in those shopping carts was $109. If you do the maths, there would appear to be a significant amount of potential revenue going begging for online retailers, which is obviously cause for concern.

So the question every online retailer should be asking is “Why are customers abandoning my online shopping cart?”

According to the report the main reasons for abandonment are as follows:

• High shipping charges: 46%

• Wanted to comparison shop: 37%

• Lack of money: 36%

• Wanted to look for a coupon: 27%

• Wanted to shop offline: 26%

• Couldn’t find preferred pay option: 24%

• Item unavailable at checkout: 23%

• Couldn’t find customer support: 22%

• Security concerns: 21%

By making relevant changes to your  ecommerce website, online retailers should be able to deal with these issues and improve the shopping cart abandonment rate. Even the 36% with ‘no money’ might be persuaded to purchase a product or service if a discount is offered at the point of abandonment.

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It is a well known and established fact that high rankings on Google and other search engines can only be achieved if a website has both optimised web page content and good quality inbound links.

Having your website professionally optimised is a worthwhile investment and will ensure that your SEO efforts produce the best return for you. However securing good quality, one way links, to your web page content as always been the more difficult part of the overall search engine optimisation process.

A tried and trusted link building method for many Webmasters and a relatively easy way to start building one way links to your site is via online directories. But do website directory submissions still have value when it comes to your search engine rankings?

I recently came across a case study which evaluates if it is still possible to increase the position of your website in Google’s search results, by using this method.

A Webmaster tested three pages of a website that did not have any inbound links pointing to them. These three pages were created to provide valuable content to search engines.

The three pages were submitted to three high quality, paid directories (Yahoo, BestOfTheWeb and Joe Ant) together with a range of free online directories.

Approximately 45 days after the links went live, the web pages had achieved increased visibility on search engines. Visits and conversions also increased and the tracking statistics indicated that at least 50 percent of the results could be attributed to the website directory submissions.

The final results concluded that there was a major improvement in increased traffic to the site and an increase in monthly sales conversions of 45%.

What does this mean for your website?

Securing One Way Links from online directories is still a worthwhile exercise and should be a fundamental part of any search engine optimisation strategy. However in order to be successful you must also build one way links from a wide range of other sources. Google will give a higher reward to those sites that have a more natural link building profile.

Links secured from Website Directory Submissions are only one part of the link building jigsaw. In order to out perform your competitors, you should also secure links from websites that are related to your content, such as blogs and social media sites like Facebook, Digg etc.

If you found this post helpful, why not subscribe to my Blog by RSS Feed or Email and receive free Professional SEO Tips and Market News, direct to your inbox. As ever, please feel free to comment on this post.

Have you ever considered how the loading time of your web pages might impact on your search engine rankings?

Both Google and Yahoo! have commented on this issue recently, so it might be a good time to take a closer look at how long it takes your web pages to load.

Google’s position on the issue has always been that the time taken for a web page to load does not have any impact in their ranking algorithm – until now! As part of their initiative to “Speed Up The Web“, Google have stated that page load times might possibly become a consideration in the future.

Google’s Matt Cutts has stated that, “We want the web to be faster and we want sites to load more quickly”, so it’s very possible that, in the future, Google could consider rewarding fast loading websites, via improved search engine results.

Take a look at what Matt Cutts has to say about the topic below:

Another interesting development has come from Yahoo!, who recently filed a patent with regards to web page loading times.

Their Patent Abstract summary states the following:

“Methods and systems are provided that may be used to characterise in some manner the performance that a user may experience when accessing a web document.”

The patent application goes on to discuss establishing some kind of “user experience information” which could be used to rank search results. Obviously web page load time will play a big part in the user experience, so this would be a contributing factor.

The patent application states:

“For example, information relating to whether a user might abandon or wait for a web document to be displayed may be useful when establishing certain quality or relevance factors for the web document.”

As both Google and Yahoo! appear to be placing increased relevance on the issue of page load times, it might be a smart move to ensure that your website has been optimised to load as quickly as possible, ahead of any potential changes to the search engine algorithms. Your Web Site Designer should be able to help you with this.

Apart from helping to make your site more search engine friendly, any improvements in speed will definitely help to improve your sites appeal to your visitors as well as improving your Web Page Optimisation efforts.

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A study of the global state of broadband has put the UK 25th out of 66 countries in terms of the quality of its networks.

The research for Cisco found that countries such as Latvia and Bulgaria were better prepared than the UK for next-generation net applications.

The UK was listed among countries whose broadband is “meeting needs for today”.

Korea and Japan continue to dominate the league table, largely due to their commitment to fast networks.

LEADERS IN BROADBAND QUALITY      

South Korea

Japan

Hong Kong

Sweden

Switzerland

Netherlands

Singapore

Luxembourg

Denmark

Norway

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/hi/technology/8282839.stm

Published: 2009/10/01 00:20:06 GMT