Critter Twitter Revisited

[RJM62]

A while ago, I posted a thread here about the Twitter-like script I wrote for one of my clients. Basically, it's a simple application that lets his field technicians update the world about their goings-on. I wrote it in PHP so it's indexed by the search engines, with the idea that the frequent updates would help SEO.

What I've found is that the technicians' updates are actually rather varied, and some are almost comical. They also feel free to add little personal notes about their kids' graduations from school or starting college, as well as occasional frustrations with traffic, restaurant reviews, and so forth. There are also misspellings and grammatical errors, which I generally let stand.

When asked about these things, I pondered a bit, and finally told the client to let the techs continue to post the occasional personal note because I felt it humanized the site a bit, and I could always delete a post if it went over some line or another.

The site is at http://www.ridacritter.com/ . The tweet box is in the left margin. I'd appreciate any input on the tweets from the perspective of someone who would be seeking my clients' services. Do the occasional personal comments, misspellings, and so forth turn you off as a potential customer, or do they help humanize the site by giving you a peek into the techs' day-to-day lives?

Thanks,

-Rich

 

[RJM62]

By the way -- if anyone needs the script, let me know. Straightforward PHP and MySQL.

-Rich

 

[Henning]

I thought it was fine, there was this though:

Quoted a house for in mabelton for rats and coons.

Considering the multiple connotations for that word, it may be best to add the intended "Ra" prefix to the word.

 

[RJM62]

I thought it was fine, there was this though: Considering the multiple connotations for that word, it may be best to add the intended "Ra" prefix to the word.

Thanks, Henning. I'll change that and talk to the client about it.

-Rich

 

[jhausch]

I like it. A few questions from someone not in IT (me):

So the techs tweet from their cell phones and it posts to the web un-moderated?
Can anyone post to it if they know the address or is it restricted?
How does it help with SEO? Do the posts need to contain information related to pest control to be relevant to SEO or do frequent updates result in SEO because the larger website is about pest control? In other words, just wondering if the O in SEO is on target.

 

[EppyGA]

Very nice Rich.

 

[RJM62]

I like it. A few questions from someone not in IT (me):

So the techs tweet from their cell phones and it posts to the web un-moderated?
Can anyone post to it if they know the address or is it restricted?
How does it help with SEO? Do the posts need to contain information related to pest control to be relevant to SEO or do frequent updates result in SEO because the larger website is about pest control? In other words, just wondering if the O in SEO is on target.

Thanks. In response to the questions:

So the techs tweet from their cell phones and it posts to the web un-moderated?
​

Yes, subject to review. The client and myself monitor the tweets throughout the day, not on any particular schedule. But we've caught a few that we felt needed deletion, especially in the beginning. The techs, as well, occasionally text me directly when they post something they have second thoughts about, although that's very rare.

Only the most trusted techs and supervisors are allowed to post tweets.

Can anyone post to it if they know the address or is it restricted?
​

It's password-protected.

How does it help with SEO? Do the posts need to contain information related to pest control to be relevant to SEO or do frequent updates result in SEO because the larger website is about pest control? In other words, just wondering if the O in SEO is on target.
​

We've noticed some improvement in rankings since it was implemented. Maybe only one or two slots, but when you consider that we're in the top two or three for almost all geographically-targeted relevant searches, one slot is a big deal.

The frequent updates in and of themselves do help, but the techs also try to keep most of the posts relevant by mentioning both the job they're doing, and the town they're doing it in.

Of course, they also post the occasional family announcements, restaurant reviews, jokes, complaints about the weather, and so forth; but as I said earlier, I think those things, in small doses, may actually help conversion by making the guys real to visitors.

We take a really light-handed (and somewhat light-hearted) approach to this, mainly because it seems to be working well. And unlike an actual Twitter app, it's visible to search engines (because it doesn't use JS) and we have full control over what's posted. I could pull the whole app off the site in less than a minute, if I needed to.

You actually can play with a demo version of the app, if you like, at http://www.rjmwebdesign.com/tweet_demo.php . It's kind of kludgy there because of the way I had to implement it to prevent the page from reloading after every submission. But it will give you an idea how it works from the user side.

Thanks again,

Rich

 

[RJM62]

Very nice Rich.

Thanks.

 

[Keith Lane]

Looks to me like someone has rid the web of Ridacritter. I get server not found error.

 

[JeffDG]

I thought it was fine, there was this though: Considering the multiple connotations for that word, it may be best to add the intended "Ra" prefix to the word.

Taken out of context sure, but read in the context you read it, which connotation would you derive?

 

[RJM62]

Looks to me like someone has rid the web of Ridacritter. I get server not found error.

I'm not showing any failures this morning, and it gets checked every ten minutes. Must have been a real momentary outage, or else something between you and the server.

-Rich

 

[jhausch]

I've fwd'd our posts to our IT/Marketing person. I work in factory automation (for a distributor) and this might be interesting for us. I could see us posting about application successes. If it adds new content to the site and creates some SEO they may want to try it. If she is interested I'll send you a PM.