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Create a Successful Web Site

Is your website working for you? In today's tough economic times it is more important now than ever to have an effective marketing campaign. Your website is a critical part of that campaign. When people arrive at your site, do they feel welcomed in through the front door, or relegated to entering through the garage? This blog is designed to provide you with helpful hints and tips on how you can optimize your site for better search engine rankings, and how to market your site.

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Is My Website “Findable”?

Posted By Steve on August 5, 2009

Can your customers find your website?

Can your customers find your website?

Have you ever heard the phrase “that’s harder than finding a needle in a haystack”?  Well, anymore, that aptly describes getting your website found in the search engines.  So how do I make my site rank well - consistently?

 
Gone are the old ways.
I can remember the days when good design and good content, and a keyword meta-tag filled with quality key words were all you needed to get your site found and indexed by the search engines.
 
Today, the rules and definitions of what makes a highly optimized web page are constantly changing.  And the search engines all have different methods of determining a good site.
 
So what’s the key?  How can I make sure my site is being found and ranked well?  Over the next few newsletters, we are going to explore this topic in depth. 
 
As we begin, the first - and most critical part to SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is understanding how your customers will look for you.  You can have the most wonderful product or service in the world, and the best looking website … but if you’re not being found, what good is it doing you?
 
Getting the right emphasis in the right place.

How do I know what my customers are looking for?  I need to understand what their wants and needs are.  When they turn to the internet - specifically the search engines - looking for a product or service, it is usually because they have certain issues or pains that they are trying to address.  You need to understand what those are, and build your site (or at least a landing page) around those issues/needs/wants.

Search engines are a fantastic tool in getting potential customers to find you.  But don’t forget that this is only one piece of a very big puzzle.  To have a truly successful website, you must meet the needs and requirements of your customers - not just the search engines!
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Search Engine Optimization (SEO): how to make my website rank well in the search engines

Posted By Steve on May 20, 2009

Optimize with the Keywords meta tag

Optimize with the Keywords meta tag

So far we’ve talked about carefully choosing your top keywords and phrases, making sure your file names are optimized, revisiting your title tag to ensure it has your keywords in it, and optimizing your meta description tag.  What’s next?

Optimize your Meta KeywordTag.

 
 

The keywords tag used to be a very important tool when optimizing a site for the search engines.  This was the spot to put all your important keywords.  The search engine would read the words in that tag and index you accordingly.  Unfortunately, unscrupulous web designers began stuffing their keywords tag with dozens of completely unrelated (sometimes very offensive) search terms - so the search engines moved away from placing emphasis on this tag.

Having said this, it’s surprising to note that many of the smaller, yet popular, search engines are still using older technology, including the Meta keywords tag.  For that reason alone it’s worthwhile to still include the keywords tag in your optimization plan.

The Meta keyword tag is a piece of HTML code that goes inside the <head></head> section of the web page, usually placed after the Meta description tag.  It contains a list of keywords or phrases, always separated by commas, that describe the subject matter of that particular page.  Make sure that they keywords you provide are actually found within the content/body of your site.  It’s also helpful to have them in your Title tag, Meta description tag, and Alt tags as well.

Here are some important things to remember when writing your keywords tag.  First, keep the length of the tag under 500 characters (including spaces), and always use commas between each keyword.  Never repeat a keyword or phrase more than three times.  Be sure to place your most important keywords or phrases at the beginning of the tag.  Oh (for the sake of repetition), always … always use only keywords that are found within the content of that page - keep it relevant!

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Web Marketing: Is My Website doing its job selling?

Posted By Steve on May 6, 2009

Web Marketing: making my site do its job

Web Marketing: making my site do its job

One of the surprising things I’m running into alot these days is how many businesses don’t realize that their web site is a crucial part of a marketing startegy. 

Let’s ask a very basic question: What is the purpose of marketing?  Many people believe it is simply trying to sell your product or service to a potential customer.  May I respectfully submit that’s not it at all!  It is about helping your customer succeed at building their business and making a profit - and convincing them that you care about helping them do just that.

In our last issue we asked you to take a hard look at your website.  Is it all about you … or is it about your customer?  Look at your site from the perspective of a potential customer who is coming to you with a need/want/pain.  As they look at your site, do they get the feeling that you care deeply about them, or are you trying to convince them why you have the best product or solution?
I want to encourage you to take a look at your marketing strategy.  It might help to answer a few questions:
  1. What does my product/service have to offer that will help my customer succeed in their business?  You need to peak their interest by addressing their need/desire.
  2. What benefit(s) does my product/service provide to my customer?  Remember, people buy benefits, not features
  3. How can I state my benefit(s) in such a way that are not only believable, but accepted beyond a doubt?
  4. Is my product/service interesting?  How can I make it interesting?  Remember, people aren’t interested in your advertising, they are interested in your product/service and if/how it will meet their need.
  5. How can I motivate my customer to get involved?  There must be a call-to-action … something that gets them to Click Here or Call Now.
  6. Am I communicating clearly?  Remember that although you know what you’re talking about, your potential customer may not.  Are they getting the main point?
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Search Engine Optimization (SEO): how to make my website rank well in the search engines

Posted By Steve on May 6, 2009

Optimize your Description Tags for the search engines

Optimize your Description Tags for the search engines

So far we’ve talked about carefully choosing your top keywords and phrases, making sure your file names are optimized, and revisiting your title tag to ensure it has your keywords in it.  What’s next?

Optimize your Meta Description Tag.

 

Ok, so you’re at a search engine, you’ve typed in your search term and have been taken to a search engine results page (SERP).  You see a listing of various links chosen by the search engine that it feels is closest to your search.  You see the link, and then a brief paragraph of text below it, hopefully explaining to you what that site is about.  How did that text get there?  Well, one of the ways search engines know what to put there is by reading the web page’s description tag.
The description tag is a piece of HTML code that goes inside the <Head></Head> section of a web page, usually placed after the Title tag and before the Keywords tag.  Although it is not meant for human users, it does serve to tell some search engines and web browsers more about your page.
The purpose of the Meta description tag is to describe to the search engine, and thus your visitor, the content of the page accurately and succinctly.  It’s almost like a short advertisement, drawing your potential visitors to your site.  In this tag you want to display targeted keywords, not necessarily for ranking purposes, but to indicate key content of that web page to the searcher.
Although the Meta Description tag has taken on less importance in Search Engine Optimization over the last few years, it is still wise to  incorporate it into the site.  The keywords and phrases you use in the description tag will not affect your pages ranking in the search engines, but this tag can still come in handy in your overall SEO campaign.
So why should I even bother?  Even though some search engines, like Google, generate their own description based on the content contained within your web page itself, there are other search engine spiders that do use the description tag in their ranking algorithms (e.g., Ask, AltaVista, AllTheWeb and Teoma to name a few).  To that end, it is still very essential that you not only have a description tag, but that the content not be generic, or it could lead to your site appearing less relevant to the potential visitor searching for a specific word or phrase.  You see, to the visitor using those search engines, that information can have a direct impact on whether they click the link to your site or not.
Ok, I need to keep the description tag.  What is the best way to optimize it?  Unfortunately many designers try to stuff all their keywords and phrases into this tag.  Not a good idea.  The fact is, fewer, more targeted phrases will increase the relevancy of your web page in the “eyes” of the search engine, and your potential visitors.  
Each page of your site should be unique, so should the description tag for that page.  So are there any good strategies to use when writing description tags?  Certainly!  Be sure to differentiate the descriptions for different pages.  Using identical or similar descriptions on every page doesn’t help your visitor know exactly what’s on that page - and it won’t help them make the decision to click.  You need to create descriptions that accurately describe each specific page.
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Search Engine Optimization (SEO): how to make my website rank well in the search engines

Posted By Steve on April 14, 2009

Optimize your Title Tage for the search engines

Optimize your Title Tags for the search engines

So you’ve carefully chosen your top keywords and phrases, AND you’ve made sure your file names are optimized (see previous posts).  Now what?

Now we need to look at your page Title. The title tag has always been one of the most important elements in achieving high search engine rankings. You see, search engines use the text found in the title tag as their primary means of determining what the content of that web page is about.  And it’s what you see as the clickable link in the search engine results page.

If all you did was fix the title tags of your pages, you could see quick and appreciable changes to your rankings (although there is definitely more you should do - which we will share later). And because the words in the title tag are what appear in the clickable link on the search engine results pages, changing them may result in even more clickthroughs.

The text used in the title tag also appears at the top of a web browser when someone is visiting that particular page.  Just look at the top of your browser, the next time you’re on the internet, and look at the text in the blue bar - that’s from the title tag.

You would be surprised at how many websites have the word “Welcome” as their Title on their home page (as of this writing, Google found 922,000,000).  “So what should I put in my title tag?” you may ask.

Title tags should always contain specific keywords. For example, if your company is “Amers & Sons Inc.,” a manufacturer of Red Widgets in Denver, you shouldn’t just put your company name in your title tag, but instead use something like “Amers & Sons Inc. - Red Widgets Manufacturer in Denver.”

Each page of your site should have its own unique page title.  What dictates the text you should use in the title?  It’s the content of that page.  Always make sure that the title of your page is descriptive of what that page is about.  For example, the products page for Amers & Sons used to be “Our Products”, but when optimized reads “Red Widgets - all makes and sizes by Amers & Sons, Inc. of Denver”.

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Web Marketing Is My Website really a marketing tool?

Posted By Steve on April 14, 2009

Marketing Your Website - Marketing Yourself

Marketing Your Website - Marketing Yourself

What is “marketing”? That question will generate a plethora of answers, depending on whom you ask.

Simply put, marketing is the ability to get people to either change their mind to do business with you, or maintain their mindset of continuing to do business with you.

The fact is, every little thing you do, show, or say is going to affect people’s perceptions of you, your product and service. Now, let me ask you to consider this: with that understanding of what marketing is, would you say that your website is effectively marketing for you?

Marketing is your opportunity to help your customers (and prospective customers) succeed. Is your website currently leading the visitor to believe that you can do that for them?

Your customers want to succed at building their business and make a profit - that’s the bottom line. Do they believe that what you do/offer can help them achieve that goal? Remember, marketing isn’t about you - it’s about them.

So take a closer look at your website. Is it all about you - or does it show the visitor how they can succeed with your service/product?

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Search Engine Optimization (SEO): how to make my website rank well in the search engines

Posted By Steve on April 14, 2009

Optimize your site for the search engines

Use Filenames to Optimize your Site for the Search Engines

Ok, so you’ve carefully chosen your top keywords and phrases, now what do you do with them?

First take a look at your file names.  For example, if your site is focused on providing clients with Red Widgets, and your product page’s file name is “products.html.”, that isn’t going to help the search engines understand what you do.  But, naming the file, for example, “red-widgets-products.html” tells the search engines exactly what you need them to know - you sell Red Widgets!

Every file name should be relevant to the content/purpose of that specific page.  Besides your domain name (which should also contain a keyword if possible), the first thing search engines look at are your file names, why not have the name tell the search engine what your keywords are!

By the way, naming your files with keywords also helps you find the page quickly later on, anytime you need to make changes to the content.  For example, if I want to change some pictures of my specialized hand held red widgets and add some new text, I can scan my files until I see “hand-held-red-widgets.html” and there is the exact page I need to edit.  By the way, notice how that file name tells the search engines exactly what that page is about, enabling them to index that page for anyone who searches for hand held widgets.

So is there a particular naming convention you should use when giving your page a file name?  The only thing you need to keep in mind is that search engines see the hyphens in URLs and Web page file names as spaces.  This is important because using hypens aids in readability and organization of your site.

Instead of naming a file “RedWidgets.html” or “red widgets.html” (search engines see that space between “red” and “widget” as a “%20″ - in other words, “red%20widgets.html”) … instead, name the file “red-widgets.html”.

Also, be sure to keep the length of the filename as short as possible.  Instead of “red-widgets-with-purple-buttons.html” shorten it to “customizable-red-widgets.html”.

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Search Engine Optimization (SEO): how to make my website rank well in the search engines

Posted By Steve on February 9, 2009

In our last post, we introduced the concept and necessity of SEO, then began to share things that must be foundational to your website if it is going to be optimized for the search engines.  Today, let’s focus our attention on generating the right key words.

I would strongly argue that generating the right keywords is the first and most important step in SEO.  Think about it this way, the bulk of your site is built around the words and phrases you believe are important in describing your business, product or service.  From the title of each page, to the alt tags that identify each image, to the actual content of the body, every word and phrase is important.  Should we not, then, make the time at the beginning of a web design project to generate a carefully thought out list of keywords and phrases?

To do this you need to:

  • Understand each page you are going to have on the site (e.g., home, about, product 1, product 2, etc.)
  • Select a couple of general and specific keywords that are relevant to each page, product and/or service
  • Determine how you are going to use these words in simple, easy-to-read sentences

It is important to identify each page, what is it about, what is the message you wish to convey, and what is the call to action?  From there you can begin to formulate a list of key words that are consistent with the content of each unique webpage, as well as the overall theme of the site. 

It is important to remember that when you select keywords for your website, your goal is not to optimize the website all at once, but to optimize each page individually.

  • Never optimize a page for more than one or two key words
  • Select one or two keywords that best summarize that specific page
  • Make sure the content and tags emphasize the keyword(s) by using header tags or bold print and bulleted points

OK, we’ve given you some important things to consider.  Take an objective look at your site.  Is it optimized for your choice keywords?  What are you going to do about it?

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Web Marketing: how to benefit from LinkedIn

Posted By Steve on February 9, 2009

It has been conservatively estimated that there are over 20 million business professionals on LinkedIn, representing over 150 industries.  Yup, you read right … 20,000,000!  So what is so fantastic about LinkedIn and should I consider jumping on?

Lets start by asking a very basic question.  What exactly is LinkedIn?

  • LinkedIn is an online network of experienced professionals from around the world. Through this ever-growing network you can:
  • Find potential clients, service providers,  experts on almost any subject, and partners who come highly recommended
  • Be found for business opportunities
  • Discover inside connections that can help you increase your expertise and close deals 
  • Get introduced to other professionals through the people you know and expand your own network

The mission of LinkedIn is simple: help you be more effective in your daily work and open doors to opportunities using the professional relationships you already have.  But how does it work?

  1. Register for a FREE LinkedIn account.  That’s right, it’s free!  And no, you don’t have to purchase some upgrade to make it work.  Just click here to join!
  2. Create a clear and consice profile that summarizes your professional accomplishments. Your profile helps you find and be found by former colleagues, clients, and partners.
  3. Add connections to your profile by inviting trusted contacts to join LinkedIn and connect to you.

It’s that simple! 

I know, there’s still at least one more nagging question:  how is this going to benefit me?  The key is your network. 

  • The network you build starts with your connections, people you know, have done business with, and trust.
  • They, in turn, build a list of trusted connections - some you may know, most you wont.
  • That list of connections has their own list as well.

And from that 3-tiered list, amazing things begin to happen!  Like what, you ask?  Stay tuned to our next edition for much more!

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Web Marketing: how to make my website work for me

Posted By Steve on January 24, 2009

Are you properly marketing your site?

Are you properly marketing your site?

I remember a few years ago watching a movie where a mysterious voice told a farmer to build a baseball diamond in the middle of his crop.  The voice promised, “if you build it, they will come”.  And wouldn’t you know it, he did and they came!  Wouldn’t that be great if that were true of my website?  Unfortunately, it is not.

So what can I do to market my website?  How can I effectively (and inexpensively) let people know that they are missing out on the greatest thing since the electric toothbrush if they don’t visit my site?  Well, there are a lot of fantastic tools and methods available to us today that require no money (or at least very little) and a small part of your invested time. 

Here we are going to talk about such things as

  • Social Networking (using LinkedIn, Facebook, YouTube, etc.)
  • What is Google AdWords and AdSense (should I take advantage of them & how do I?)
  • Should I Blog (and if so, how do I?)
  • What methods work best to draw people to my site
  • Do I really need statistical reporting (and how do I interpret the stats?)
  • and much more

Each of the above is an important part of web marketing, and the more you become involved in them, the better opportunities you will have to get your website and your product/service exposed to greater numbers of potential clients.  Subscribe to our RSS feed, located in the upper right corner of this page!

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