The Minneapolis Mirror has an incredible first-person recollection of a robbery last Saturday in the parking lot of the Cub Foods on E Lake St. Here’s a sample:
As she spoke Spanish through sobs, I noticed that we were surrounding a heavy-duty pocketknife lying on the ground watching raindrops bouncing off the shiny metal as it lay there. Through her sobs, she revealed that it belonged to the attacker. Like CSI’s Detective Bonasera, I secured the crime scene and told everyone not to touch it.
As we all stood in the rain, the gentleman who had called the police, interpreted for her. She explained how two Latino males had pulled up in a vehicle and the passenger had jumped out and pulled a gun on her, demanding her purse. He threaten to kill her if she didn’t surrender the purse as her young son must have watched and listened in horror. She confessed that she didn’t want to give it up so easily; all the money she had earned was in that purse. Money for her children and her car keys were in that bag. She motioned that he put the gun to her neck as he yanked the purse from her. Then he jumped back in the vehicle and sped out of the parking lot. My son confirmed her recollection.
I mentioned earlier that traffic from Google Images isn’t of the highest quality. On average, people leave after just more than one page view, which means they likely came to see a particular image and had no interest in anything else on the site.
I looked at my Webmaster Tools account on Google to get a feel for what types of images searches are driving traffic to The Deets, and now have a better understanding of why people don’t stick around. Below is a list of the top-20 search terms people typed into Google Images and ended up at The Deets from:
1 wrestling
2 emo
3 beer
4 arm in arm
5 arm
6 arm wrestling
7 arm wrestle
8 sexy girl
9 sax
10 ipod boobs
11 gay sumo
12 sax animation
13 girl sweeping
14 sexy girl website page
15 generic beer
16 bull wrestling
17 minneapolis
18 sexy emo girl
19 ipod
20 immagini emo
All are issues that have been discussed here at some level, but none really represent the theme of the site. Well maybe generic beer but even that’s a stretch.
A Shakopee Cub Foods had a scare on Tuesday when store employees thought there was a gas leak. Fortunately, that wasn’t the case. Here’s what really happened:
After inspecting the store, someone from Centerpoint Energy determined there was no gas leak and the smell was from sewage, according to an emergency dispatcher.
Ah, much better. No problems here. Back to business as usual. It’s just a sewage odor.
Wait a sec. Is that normal in Shakopee? Personally, I don’t expect to smell sewage inside places I shop for groceries.
Perhaps this is being overly critical, but doesn’t the term “featured” imply that there is something of value? I mean, things are featured for a reason, right?
With that in mind, check out this “Featured Comment” from the sidebar of a StarTribune story today:
It’s great that the StarTribune is experimenting with new features like “Featured Comments” but I think a label such as “Random Comment” or “Our Readers Will Say Anything, and Here’s an Example that Proves It.”
Also, if there is only one comment (like in this case) is it really a “Featured Comment?”
A human touch could really turn this into something valuable rather than laughable. No human would refer to the only comment on a story as a “Featured Comment” but a script will if that’s the way it’s programmed.
As long as I’m in a sidebar bashing mood, how about bringing in some slightly more relevant stories than the ones shown? I imagine there were other U of MN or basketball stories that would be more relevant links for further reading. Jumping from basketball to fishing or football fans is a bit of a leap.
Ideally, labels should reflect the content. That’s all I’m sayin’.
Now, turning the mirror on The Deets for a sec, I run a sidebar type feature on here that’s currently labeled “Related Posts” where titles from previous posts that are, well, related in some way to the current post are displayed. Whadya think of that label? Over on MNteractive, the term “Algorithmically Related Posts” is used to describe the results of the plug-in that’s used to generate the recommendations. While that is more accurate, I think it’s a mouthful so have kept it simpler for now. What’s your take?
1. Be nice to Google. One thing I’ve done recently is update the copy in old posts that were pulling top-10 rankings to make them slightly more aligned with popular searches. This moved quite a few posts into the top-3 results on Google for relevant terms, bringing in an extra 10-15 visitors per post per day. That adds up.
2. Getting linked up on MNSpeak can deliver a lot of traffic. Here’show to make that happen.
3. It’s always great to see direct traffic rising, since that’s largely regulars who’ve bookmarked the site.
4. Google.com referrals are generally Google Reader or iGoogle. If you don’t think RSS drives traffic - even with full feeds - check that out.
5. As far as I can tell, the CityPages traffic came from Jim Norton linking me up a while back. Thanks Jim. Keep the links coming.
6. I publish a lot of images, and always include relevant ALT tags with the images. This seems to bring in a lot of traffic but the bounce rate is high. Basically, they rarely stick around to do anything. not a big deal, really.
7. Poor Yahoo. But at least it made the top-10 unlike MSN or Ask.
8. Outside.in. If you write about local issues, submit your site for inclusion. If you don’t consistently write about local stuff (like me) submit an RSS feed of local content (on wordpress, add /feed/ to a category’s URL to do this).
Game 6 against the Pittsburgh Penguins at the old Met Center.
It’s interesting to check out the sponsors on the boards. US West and Norwest are now part of Qwest and Wells Fargo. I don’t remember Northgate Computer Systems.
Oakwood offers a variety of activities. Sand Volleyball on the weekends. Horseshoes, shuffleboard, petanque, Texas Holdem Tournaments every Saturday night, swimming, archery range, club dinners, theme dances and much more.
Do nude poker players have additional “tells” to worry about? Would your body language reveal your pair of aces?
Marketers call it the product lifecycle. Every neighborhood goes through it, and Downtown Minneapolis is still on the upward curve. Once we mature a bit, the numbers will have a bit more meaning.
Until then, activity is still good. Showings for listings in our office are ahead of last year for roughly the same number of listings. New construction continues to sell, and not everyone is singing a sad song.
He may be onto something here. There is little new ground being broken at this point, so inventory comes from an ever-decreasing number of new units together with resales. Once you can’t buy something brand new for the cost of a used unit, pricing will enter a new phase. At least, until the market changes and new developments start taking shape.
This seems a like a little much for concrete block sales. Menards exclaimer, this is something that should be saved for your great deal on salted Nut Rolls.
The Deets is the personal blog of Ed Kohler. Views represented here are his own. Views of comments on The Deets are their own and Ed does not necessarily endorse the views of commenters. Ed's wishlist can be found here.
