I came across a post a few days ago by my previous employer “Impact Web Design Makes a Big Impact With Our Graphics”. This post is about a web design company in Charlotte, NC, using custom graphics on their site, that are obviously the same as the graphics on 352′s website.

I do not want to get caught up in the back and forth of this issue – other than that to say using graphics without the owner’s permission is not right. However I do want to discuss the importance of keyword alerts for your business. It’s my opinion that if the Charlotte Web Design Company had keyword alerts set up, and/or were carefully monitoring them, they could address this issue very quickly.

Keyword Alerts are very important for your business, they allow you to keep track of what people are saying about your company online, whether it be good or bad. You can monitor keywords via a number of sites on the web such as Google and Twitter.

Google Alerts

Google Alerts are email updates of the latest relevant Google results (web, news, etc.) based on your choice of query or topic.

Google alerts are very easy to set up go to http://www.google.com/alerts (you must have a Google account). I would at very least set up a Google Alert with your Company Name, so you can stay on top of what the web community is saying about your company.

Twitter Alerts

You sign up and use a free service like http://tweetbeep.com/ – Keep track of conversations that mention you, your products, your company, anything, with hourly updates! You can even keep track of who’s tweeting your website or blog, even if they use a shortened URL (like bit.ly or tinyurl.com).