Problems for Lefties on MacBook Pro Trackpads

I guess I noticed something was odd about my new MacBook Pro's trackpad while I used it over the past couple of days, but most of the time I was using a mouse so I didn't really notice it. I also chalked it up to the trackpad's iPhone like abilities.

However, this morning, as I was pulling out my laptop for a presentation at MEBSR's 15th Annual Sustainable Business Conference I discovered that the button on my trackpad wasn't working. Basically, it was behaving as if it was the 2ndary button on a two-button mouse. To further frustrate the situation, I couldn't manage the trackpad through System Preferences because THAT required a primary button click!

Luckily, I was able to work around using my laptop at the conference, but I was still pissed. After the conference I came back to the office where I had a mouse. I plugged it in and played around. The mouse worked fine, but the trackpad continued to behave like the secondary button on a two-button mouse. I couldn't figure it out.

On a whim, I opened the mouse control panel and switched it back to the righty/default position: left button as primary button Boom! My trackpad behaved correctly.

Now, who's the genius over at Apple who would have the primary button control affect the behavior of a one-button mouse!?! Is there not one lefty on quality assurance in Cupertino? (Please note that on all previous versions of the MacBook Pro changing the primary button on the mouse had no affect on the trackpad button's performance.)

Luckily, thanks to this thread at the Apple Discussion board, I discovered Steermouse, a free application that fixes this bug/feature.

You just need to install Steermouse, restart your Mac, and then open up Steermouse through the System Preferences.

I'm sure Apple will fix this bug in a later release, but if you can't wait--and trust me, you can't--download it now. There's a lot of other features in Steermouse worth checking out, but if you're a lefty like me, it's a life saver.

Rich Brooks
Southpaw

The Value of Providing Free Advice

Many people I speak with are concerned about giving away too much free information on their Web site. Their concerns range from providing ideas to their competition to giving away all their best ideas to do-it-yourselfers who will, well, do it themselves.

My experience has been that the more you give away, the better you do. Of course, every business and industry is different and YMMV. (Your Mileage May Vary.)

By providing free information on your site you increase your search engine visibility and establish your expertise. For everyone who takes your advice on organic gardening or search engine optimization and runs with it, more people will realize that they're too busy or inexperienced to do it on their own. Those people are looking for professional help, and you've just established yourself as that professional.

Just today, a prospect shared with me that the reason they were talking to me was because of how I had positioned myself as an "expert" on Web marketing, and how they wanted to do the same in their own industry. They wanted my help in how to best leverage the Web to make it happen. This meeting wouldn't have taken place if I was worried that my competition was reading my blog and stealing all my best ideas.

Whether it's on the Web, or in giving speeches, or teaching classes, what you lose in giving away free advice is made up 100 times over in marketing and establishing your credibility.

Go ahead, give it a chance.

Rich Brooks
Free Web Marketing Advice

What Google Knows About Spam

Matt Cutts, one of the more famous people at Google, recently presented at the Web 2.0 conference on what Google knows about spam. Although I wish he had given a few more concrete examples--i.e., "getting off the beaten path" to avoid spam--this is a good overview on spam and how to avoid it.

Via Search Engine Roundtable.

Rich Brooks
Search Engine Marketer

Do Longer Term Domain Registrations Help with Search Engine Visibility?

Recently my friend Josh Hurley sent me the following screen capture. He asked "have you seen this -- it is part of the up-sell strategy when renewing with Network Solutions:"

In case you can't read that:

Did you know? Registering a domain name for a longer term not only saves you money, but helps to increase your search engine ranking. Consider a 5-year term!

Why it works: Search engines perceive domain names registered for 5 years or longer to be more legitimate than domain names registered for a shorter term, and therefore rank them more highly.

I was intrigued; on one level it makes sense. On another level, lots of good-sounding, completely-untrue SEO info gets passed around as gospel because people don't look at it critically.

So, I headed off to the forums at HighRankings and found this recent thread on the length of domain registration as it applies to search engine visibility.

Short answer: only Google (and Yahoo, etc.) know for sure, but it appears to have little to no effect on ranking from the little anecdotal evidence collected. If Google ever did put a lot of weight on that particular algorithm it seems insanely easy to abuse and is like to be the target of scam artists.

Just goes to show you that you can't necessarily trust businesses to provide accurate information when the outcome may benefit or hurt them financially. Nope, the only sure way to increase your search engine visibility is a business blog. Guaranteed.

Rich Brooks
Business Blog Designer

A Web Marketing Tool with Great ROI

Today's issue of flyte log is entitled A Web Marketing Tool with Great ROI. It looks at a tool that I talked about a while back in this blog called Siphs.

Siphs allows your site visitors to easily share your content with friends via email or post it to popular social media sites such as Digg, Facebook or Twitter. It also provides reports on how people are sharing your content: which pages, how often, and using what methods.

If you'd like to extend the reach of your Web site or blog, check out Siphs. If you'd like to get flyte log delivered monthly into your email box and get great subscriber-only material like 10 Questions to Ask Before Setting Up a Web Site and The 11 Commandments of Writing Web Copy for the Non-Copywriter, sign up now!

Rich Brooks
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