Users will know that various changes have been made to the site to mark its sixth birthday, and the latest entails Facebook allowing Bing – Microsoft's "decision engine" – to include richer, more comprehensive search listings.

The intention is to move beyond link-based results to provide richer answers and boost the speed of the search experience.

Furthermore, whereas Bing had previously only secured search on the American version of Facebook, a global switch opens up the engine's results to a significantly larger audience.

As part of the overhaul, Microsoft will no longer be responsible for display ads on Facebook since the latter claims its own ads are better suited to the site.

In a statement, the social network's representatives explained: "Ad formats that feature social actions perform better and provide a better user experience since they are more consistent with the look and feel of Facebook.

"This combination of targeting and social relevance is the primary driver behind the shift in strategy."

“This is one of the most common mistakes for newer internet markets”

So back to basics, what is the online buying lifecycle? Let’s take for example a weight loss product:

1. New Generic Search – I have a problem to solve, lets search online for a solution
2. Researched Search – I like the sound of that method, looking to learn more
3. Specific Search – That type of solution sounds like its right for me
4. Brand Search – That product looks like the best, what do others say

Some people may work through this cycle very quickly possibly even skipping steps, however the majority of people will want to take their time to ensure the solution they have found is right for them.

Top Tip: It is normal that people will never take one source of information as fact, we like to compare and understand all the alternatives and make feel that we are making an ‘informed’ purchase, it is very important that you allow people to enter your website at each stage of this buying process.

Building your website with the above in mind!

OK, so now we know how people want to buy, how do we make sure people either stay on your website throughout this process? We need to ensure we funnel the visitors down though the buying cycle as follows:

The biggest search volumes are for generic keywords there are thousands of combinations for each niche and with article pages and content pages you can easily pickup traffic from longer tail keywords, for example it is very easy to rank an article for a phrase like “lose that weekend indulgence weight”.

Now I doubt very many people search for that made up phrase but the more articles/content you have, the more chance you will pick up traffic. The more popular key phrases like “weight loss” are much more competitive, however you can start to rank for more competitive terms as you build more power and reputation.

Once you have landed traffic to your website from these longer tail keywords it is then your mission to direct them to your “power pages” these are the niche specific pages which introduce the surfer to some solutions to their problems, using the example from before:

“Lose that weekend indulgence weight”

You may have a few links throughout your article linking to a page which is all about weight loss pills, “If you are looking to lose that weekend indulgence weight, you should look no further than a fat blocker”.

Pushing the surfer to your “power page” which talks about “fat blockers”, this page is designed to convert, whereas your article page is designed to get traffic.

Once you have the surfer on your “fat blocker” page, you then need to convince them of the following:

In your “power page” the main aim is to give the surfer a clear recommendation of where you want them to go next.

Either on the same page or on a specific “product comparison page” you need to clearly demonstrates why your recommended product is the best for them, giving the surfer the ability to choose from multiple options.

The main aim of the product comparison is to pass them through to the product review page.  This page is the end point in the funnel and where you want to get as much of your traffic to as possible.

This is also the final step in the buying lifecycle, if you can get your visitors from your long tail keyword pages to the product review page though the lifecycle then you have done your job fully.

The product review page should complement the merchants site, pass across the key selling points and pre-sell the customer, you want the customer to leave your product review page desperate to purchase, this will ensure visitors go on and buy from your site.

A poor pre-sell will result in the surfer searching for the brand and possibly coming across other affiliate reviews and buying from them.

Top-Tip: Make sure you only link out to the merchant site from the product review once they are ready to purchase, however ensure on the product review pages there are plenty of outbound links.

“Throughout the rest of your site push the visitors down your funnel!

Give them a CLEAR path to take! ”

Google Analytics, which monitors website traffic and the effectiveness of marketing strategies, can now be used in Bulgarian, Greek, Lithuanian, Slovak, Catalan and Vietnamese, bringing the total languages available to 31.

In a blog post, Dai Pham and Jeff Gillis from the Google Analytics team cite the "amazing" growth in the global use of website analytics they've witnessed over the past few years, adding: "As usage and the analytics dialogue scales internationally, our product, team and ecosystem are scaling right along with it."

An overview of the benefits Google Analytics presents to businesses is one ingredient of an upcoming masterclass being hosted by the search giant in London's Earls Court.

Google UK product specialist Gilli Goodman will host the session at the Technology For Marketing & Advertising event happening from 23-24 February, revealing how the analytics tool provides the information needed to write better ads, strengthen marketing initiatives and create higher-converting websites.

Another Google session looking at mobile products and advertising will probe smartphone developments and the rapid growth of the popular Android operating system.

The new content-driven website is aimed at showcasing the successes of Film4's production arm, from cinema smash Slumdog Millionaire to new release The Lovely Bones. It also highlights the Film4 TV channel and will stream exclusive short films from up-and-coming directors.

Explaining the broadcaster's intention to exploit its unique position of having both a TV channel and a production unit, Film4.com editor Hillary Perkins affirmed: "This makes us stand out in a crowded marketplace. We have unique content that we can make use of."

"On the old site there was a lot of content but it was difficult to understand what we were about," she added to New Media Age, noting that the Film4 production arm's access to casts and crews on movie sets can offer "a real insight" into the industry.

One online marketing channel the broadcaster has chosen to promote the new site is that of social networks.

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Many affiliate networks use a small and unreliable variety of methods to ensure clicks and sales are tracked through their networks – in many cases becoming dependant on cookie tracking which, although easy to implement, can often be highly inaccurate and unreliable for affiliates, in some cases losing up to 27% of sales generated.

MoreNiche is known for its existing patent pending MixiTrack™ technology which uses a mix of 4 different tracking methods. This week sees the launch of Trusted Sites – another string to the MixiTrack™ bow. Trusted Sites means that sales can be tracked simply by the referral traffic to the merchant landing pages. On its own Trusted Sites is an excellent tracking feature however combined with the existing MixiTrack™ technology means that MoreNiche offers the most powerful and comprehensive affiliate tracking software available.

Andrew Slack, Managing Director for MoreNiche commented that “Affiliate marketing is an actively growing sector and technology should grow to accommodate this flourishing sector”. He went on to highlight that “MoreNiche already has a market leading method of tracking providing piece of mind for all our affiliates and merchants however to maintain our high standards and stay ahead of the competition, our proactive approach to affiliate marketing allows us to offer something that no other affiliate work does”.

In it, he responds to a user query centred on the importance of page load time and "recentness" compared to a website's content relevancy. Cutts emphasises that the latter remains the most important factor in Google's search results, though he acknowledges the pertinence of a given website's load time.

"If you have two sites that are equally relevant (same backlinks … everything else is the same), you'd probably prefer the one that's a little bit faster, so page speed can be an interesting theory to try out for a factor in scoring different websites," he remarks.

"But absolutely, relevance is the primary component, and we have over 200 signals in our scoring to try to return the most relevant, the most useful, the most accurate search result that we can find. That's not going to change," he continues.

Caffeine, the updated version of Google's "search architecture", increases the speed at which the engine can index website content, which is what led analysts to suggest webmasters "help their sites along" by making them as fast and user-friendly as possible – within reason – while maintaining content relevance.

At the end of last year, Cutts also hinted in a video interview for WebProNews that speed could make its way into the engine's natural search algorithms: "It's sort of fair to say that if you're a fast site, maybe you should get a little bit of a bonus. If you really have an awfully slow site, then maybe users don't want that as much."

This article was brought to you by Newsvend – delivering online news and unique website content.

Representatives for the network say Orange Shots will enable businesses to create "rich, creative, engaging and fun" advertising campaigns targeted at customers' interests and preferences.

Working across SMS and MMS mobile platforms, the service is aimed at encouraging customers to message back and give their views and opinions, promising high response rates, strong returns on investment and viral potential.

Marc Overton from Orange UK reveals that the service has already been trialled by brands including 4Music and Snickers, who claim it's provided higher conversion rates than other media. As a result, he believes mobile advertising "as we know it" is ripe for transformation.

At TFM&A in Earls Court this month, Google's Sarah Speak is lined up to host a session entitled "The future is mobile", covering the Mountain View giant's developments in search, display and local and learn strategies, as well as best practice for developing mobile sites and campaigns.

Held in London, the Social Media in Financial Services event sought to outline how and why the internet is "rapidly changing" financial services distribution.

Organiser Philip Calvert explained that the financial services industry currently engages with its customers the least online, when it actually "has most to gain" from using social media.

"The event proved once and for all that there's a misconception that social media is all about marketing, but it goes a lot deeper than that," he added. "IFAs can use the technology to listen to consumers and industry experts [and] learn and share best practice."

He also singled out the channel's search engine optimisation benefits, its potential for attracting website visitors, building brand loyalty and "creating buzz", networking and building relationships and facilitating promotion and sales.

"We saw once and for all that all consumers of all ages are now actively using social media, and IFAs who assume otherwise are in for a nasty shock," he concluded.

This article was brought to you by Newsvend – delivering online news and search-engine-optimised website content.

"It is a versatile channel that can be used strategically for brand building and tactically to promote special offers and events," notes Matthew Gordon from online marketing firm eBrains.

Sara Borland from East Coast points to the benefits of combining the email marketing channel with social networks, highlighting that a recent "one-way fares" campaign by the rail firm saw hundreds of travel customers share the offer on their Digg, Facebook and MySpace pages.

"Seventeen per cent of posted links garnered at least one open, and 33 per cent who opened a post then clicked. These are people we may never have reached otherwise," she reveals.

Citing targeted email campaigns used for subscribers in different age groups, the Society of London Theatre's Philippa Salvoni adds: "Using an age-centric subject line, we managed to double average open rates for subscribers in the 16-to-26 age group."

Even when you’ve found a suitable web host actually registering and setting up your account can be a time consuming task – but what if it wasn’t? What if you could set up your online business in less than 5 minutes?

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If you’ve ever explored the world of free web hosting, you’ll no-doubt know that free hosting is a minefield of popup/under advertising banners, slow and unreliable servers and a convenient platform for spammers to distribute their content.

MoreNiche free hosting is the complete opposite offering reliable uptime and performance, a safe and respected server IP location, no advertising and mirrored content backups – whatever happens, you’re assured that you’re website is always going to be live and meeting the demands of your visitors.