The 2008 Softletter SaaS Report is now available. Introductory price of $199; price raises to $249 on March 21st. Over 204 invaluable pages on every aspect of SaaS from the technology provider's viewpoint.

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The Softletter 2007 Website Security and Up Time Survey is Now Open

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This survey covers website security and up time. As you are undoubtedly well aware, doing business online can be a dangerous exercise. Recent security breaches involving the states of Massachusetts, Vermont, Connecticut etc., the massive loss of data at TJ Max, and a recent phishing attack at Salesforce.com only highlight the current state of online security affairs. This survey examines the potential impact of DDoS, hacking, and phishing/social engineering attacks on your site and business. All respondents receive a free copy of the complete summary results! Of course, all responses will be strictly confidential. We won't disclose or identify data about any individuals or about participating companies.

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Seth Grodin, Squidoo and Lenses

Two software companies Ive talked to recently (one company is in the education market, the other provides network administration tools) report theyre getting good search engine results from time spent with Squidoo (www.squidoo.com). Squidoo is a social networking site created in 2005 and is the brainchild of Seth Grodin, of permission marketing and Purple Cow fame. When first introduced, no one paid much attention to the new service, but over the last six months or so Squidoo has begun to gain some traction in the market and is now worth investigating.

The basic paradigm of the site is the lens, a filter that functions in almost the same fashion as a blog. To use Squidoo, you first create an account on the site (this is free). Youll then give your lens a name, normally a keyword or phrase linked to your website or business. (This will appear as a subdomain under the Squidoo name; we picked www.Squidoo/softwarebusiness). You also have the ability to include three other keywords and phrases during setup. Once setup is complete, youll be taken to a Squidoo template where you fill in information about the function of your lens and links to sites you believe are relevant to your keywords and phrases. Normally, most Squidoo lenses include a picture of the lens owner and basic bio information; we suggest you do this in most cases to give your lens a professional feel. Naturally, you will also include a link to your own site or sites. The initial setup process takes less than five minutes, but count on spending two to three hours populating your lens with relevant content.

Lens entries, which are primarily links to other sites or brief text entries, are placed on a single page. An interesting point about Squidoo is that you can create as many lenses as you want. The companies we spoke to were taking advantage of this ability and creating multiple lenses, each dedicated to specific keyword phrases they wanted to use to drive traffic to their main sites. Squidoo is one of the worlds top 700 sites and as of this writing, appears to be on very good terms with Googles search algorithims. Every lens in Squidoo is ranked and to move up the ratings chart you need to receive stars ratings from other lenses, generate high click-through rates, and post regular lens updates. Squidoo allows lens owners to create groups, and after analyzing the system, we believe this is one of the most effective ways to boost your lens ratings.

Another advantage of Squidoo is that the system provides built-in integration via RSS and tag and ping to the more popular social sites such as Del.icio.us and Technorati. The ultimate goal of all this social interaction is to create a ping pong effect of continuous interaction between your site, Squidoo lens(es), and key social sites while simultaneously keeping track of the keywords people are using to identify and visit your site. As you nourish this network effect and incorporate your keyword findings into your website, you should see a significant increase in your search engine rankings and site hits over time.

Both firms we spoke with stated that their Squidoo work had helped move their Google rankings for several keywords and phrases they were competing over into the top 10 listings. However, they also told us that to achieve this, theyd had to spend almost 12 months nurturing their lenses and monitoring their keywords. This is probably the type of work best carried out by an intern. Also, Squidoo boasts a fairly decent library of plug-in modules that can help automate the task of managing the site.

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