» uk-netmarketing: roundup: 27-10-2000

Get Your Mitts Off My Meta Tags
UK-Netmarketing Weekly Round-up - October 27, 2000

One of the mystic arts of search engine submission is tailoring your site's Meta tags. So, when you check whether your hard work has made your site shoot up the rankings on the search engines only to find a competitor's instead. You check their Meta tags to find your name listed. Eeek. What do you do?

Jason Dale faced exactly this problem and asked the list, "What's the situation regarding another company using another's site name and domain names in the meta tags of their site? Anyone know?"

Lee Rickler responded, "Just the same as if I went around saying that I have something to do with Loquax and claiming credit for your work. In other words DON'T DO IT! Read this first, then this"

Matthew Holbrook added, "I advise my clients not to do this. A garage could put Ford, Rover etc. in its keywords because it could be selling such vehicles. But one of my clients wanted to use the names of other garages in the area. Because they did not have a legitimate use for these names, they could have been in big trouble if the other garages found out. But I imagine this is largely untested in law. I know many people use celebrity names to boost their stats."

David Burrows outlined his research on the legal position, writing, "... finally found the information I was looking for ... Funnily enough it's from our lawyers (Nicholson, Graham & Jones, highly recommended) and in their latest IP newsletter they mention a recent decision on this matter. A company called Mandata got taken to court by a competitor, Road Tech. Mandata had used two of Road Tech's registered trademarks 'Road Tech' and 'Roadrunner' in it's Meta tags and as hidden text on it's front page. To cut a long legal document short, Mandata were found guilty of trademark infringement and in the 'passing off' charge were entitled to a summary judgement. Net result: £15,000 damages, Mandata had 'taken a ride' on the back of Road Techs successful website and the court said the infringement was 'blatant and unsophisticated'. So, If someone is doing it to you, get on the phone to the lawyers. If you doing it, stop it. It's a stupid idea in the first place."

Chris Meachin added, "It's a bit childish really, and unlikely to be that effective, but can be annoying. In my experience, a letter threatening legal action does the business if you have a competitor behaving badly like that. Here are some US examples of where it's all turned nasty and ended up in court. http://www.searchenginewatch.com/resources/metasuits.html"

Following on this topic, Katie Jones asked, "What if your site is personal, and as such un-copyrighted?"

Melanie Beech replied, "If the content of your site is original, you own the copyright on it. Also, as a personal web site, it reflects directly upon you, your personality and your reputation. The first thing you can do is ensure that you have a basic copyright notice in evidence on the site, which can be used to deter unauthorised use of your domain name, content etc, as well as to form the basis of a copyright infringement case. At this point you can politely request that the offending site remove the tags as they are in breach of copyright. After that, see whether the site which has included your domain name or any other personal reference to yourself has done so in such a way as to damage your reputation. The most obvious infraction here would be libel."

Recruiting a quality new media team is tough work at the best of times, but keeping your staff happy, motivated and loyal is a critical part of building a business. So, Tim McGuire asked, "

1. Techniques/tips you would suggest to maintain team cohesiveness despite rapid company growth.
2. Whether team building in a dot.com differs from a traditional bricks and mortar company not subject to rapid growth or change
3. How does good team working and team culture make a difference to your business (some examples would be really helpful).
4. Scenario: A new team is to be formed to complete a project, what qualities do you look for in an individual who might join the team, are there any specific team activities you would employ to get the team to reach high performance quickly."

William Robb responded,

"
1. Forget all the game-playing and pseudo- team problem games - try a more direct and honest approach.
2. Set aside a half-day.
3. Seven days or so before this ask all team members to list at least six things they are concerned about, or that they think is hindering the team working better together. You'd be surprised that the issues that arise - interrelationships, not knowing where they are going and lack of proper equipment etc.
4. During the half-day workshop divide the team into two smaller teams. They each take one hindrances and try to list solutions. After 20 minutes regroups and agree on necessary action. Have a scribe record who will do what by when on a flipchart.

In a half-day you should cover about 7 big issues. Do not rush the process. The benefit comes from the mutual understanding that arises from detailed discussion. The Hard actions are a bonus. You can monitor how much progress is being made.

Do this once per quarter. It sound simplistic, but I do them in the Oil and Gas industry and the motivating power is excellent. There are refinements such as a meal in the evening or even some fun event such as quad bikes clay pigeon shooting etc."

Mary Loosemore shared her experiences,

"
1. weekly end of the week round up - informal, over beer and crisps (how old labour) - where everyone tells their colleagues what they've been up to. Keep hierarchy to a minimum - your receptionist's work is as valuable to your business as you CTO's. We had a 'stop the week' award too for someone who's gone beyond the call of duty, or done something particularly impressive - just an A4 DIY certificate, but it mattered!
2. when you have any 'all-hands' activities/events, make sure that everyone feels able to contribute - don't let the 'leader' types/personnel dominate. One of the real values in team building is getting to know the person behind the job title/function.
3. going out and getting drunk together!"

Mary continued, "An excellent team culture/cohesiveness can be destroyed by a single person. Get someone to do personality profiling (Myers-Briggs?) on your current team and identify where you have gaps, and look to bring on board a team member with those characteristics. It's extremely powerful. Knowing what makes your colleagues tick and what makes them fume - whether it be in how you present information to them, or how you ask for their input - means you can get the best out of one another. Any team building activity needs to be backed up with enthusiastic and evident support from your CEO."

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