Archive for month: October, 2012

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Getting your website noticed by the search engines

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Getting your website noticed by the search engines begins with a good website. Your website is your shop window, so consider what you want visitors to see and remember that first impressions really count. Once you have decided on your website, make sure you consider how to get it on the search engines. This aspect can be very confusing to people and there are many ways of doing it but make sure you only use approved ‘white hat’ methods.

We are often asked – How do I get my website to come up in Google?

Well the answer could be a one liner “let us do it for you” – but this is a short article on the main things you can do for yourself or ask your web designer to help you with.

Start with a good website

It’s all very well putting in lot’s of effort to getting your website found, but if the site is poor in quality and information it can have a negative effect on your business.  Make sure that your website is packed with compelling and genuinely useful information for your Dream customer

Make sure it is Search Engine Friendly

  • How do I get my website found in Google?Ensure each Page has a proper Title (seen in the bar along the top of the window and on the taskbar button along the bottom)
  • Each Page should contain different Description Metatags (special hidden code that suggests what description to use and what words people might use to find your site)
  • Use Search Engine Friendly URL – e.g. bbc.co.uk/weather
  • The website is regularly updated at least once a month with some change (e.g. news, or events). Click here to read on

Further reading

Getting your site seen by the search engines

Getting your website ranked and found in Google

Adding a site to Google

10 telltale signs that your website needs a redesign

The importance of good website copy

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It is so important to ensure that you have good copy on your website, not only does it make interesting reading for the visitor but it also attracts the search engines. Without the search engines your website would not be found and targeting the right audience is so important so having good copy and changing it regularly will take you a long way to being found by the search engines.

One of the main stumbling blocks when getting your website designed is the content. It can take ages to write and become a bit of a chore. However, it is something that you should not cut corners on.

If you are competent at writing then you can create your own content, if not you should hire a copywriter.

Persuade your visitors

Good content informs visitors about your products or services and it persuades people to take the actions that you want them to (buy from you, contact you, sign up for a newsletter etc). If the copy isn’t good, it can prevent people from converting. If people don’t convert, then your site is failing you.

Help your search engine rankings

Good copy helps you rank well in the search engines. Search engines such as Google like to see a decent amount of information on a web page because it indicates that it is informative. It also tells the search engines what the page is about and therefore helps them decide whether it is relevant to a searcher’s query. Click here to continue

Further reading

How to turn your website into a selling machine

5 things that belong on the front page of your website

Flushing kittens, roadkill recipes and improving your search rankings

Making the most of your SEO

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Making the most of your website is what all businesses strive for so it is important that you have good SEO implemented. There are many ways of using SEO to boost your site’s ratings with the search engines but it must be done correctly and within the rules.

One of the biggest challenges for any business, not just in the SEO sector, is being able to accurately forecast and measure the size of their market opportunity.

For decades successful businesses have been built, grown, and acquired, partly based on their ability to measure opportunity and work toward attainable forecasts.

Now, not every forecast is 100 percent accurate and that is certainly not the subject of my post today. Developing a discipline of forecasting and using that information to focus on the most attractive value opportunities in the competitive field of SEO puts you, as an agency, independent specialist, or brand ahead of your business competition.

My last post offered some ideas on how to measure ‘Share of Voice’ in order to get ahead of the competition. Now let’s go one step further, talking about search opportunity forecasting and explaining why estimating the future value of SEO matters.

We are in an industry that is 15 years old and growing rapidly. SEO is a $2.2 billion industry, according to the Forrester US Interactive Marketing Forecast 2011 to 2016. Hence, if you want people to think of SEO as the critical business function that it is, then it’s only logical to treat it like one. Click to continue reading.

Further reading

Local SEO: Reviews and recommendations

Utilizing SEO to improve your online ranking

Making time to execute your SEO campaign

Google disavow tool: effects, implications and theories

 

Pinterest has captured the imagination

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Pinterest has really captured the imagination where social media is concerned and there are many businesses that use it as a shop window. It has become particularly popular with small home based businesses. There are many ways to  use social media to market your business and Pinterest is one that you should not neglect.

 

PINTEREST is a social network centred around sharing images and the odd video. Users sign up to share their favourite images by creating (pin) boards to match their interests.

To each board they can “pin” relevant images and leave a small explanation or definition. Any image can be pinned, either by uploading a picture from a computer or by “pinning” it from the website you saw it on. Pinning the image from a website is the same as liking something on Facebook. The Pin appears on your relevant board to your audience.

The growth of Pinterest has been phenomenal. In November 2011 Pinterest had around 4.9 million users. By July 2012 the social network had 21.2 million. In context, this is nothing compared to the Facebook audience nearing one billion, but still an impressive number.

With a largely female audience, Pinterest has become an important social channel for any business wanting to put their product in front of this fast growing audience.

But why are people pinning? What is the point? A Pinterest user is most likely pinning for inspiration, aspiration or recognition.

Creating a board allows the user to pin images that are relevant to a theme. It could be “home decor”, “new kitchen” or “my honeymoon”. These boards become a collection of relevant images that act like a virtual scrapbook of ideas.

These boards can be used as inspiration, an easy way to collect inspirational ideas around a theme, from a wedding outfit to decorating a new home. The social nature of sharing these boards means the user can be seeking other opinions on the choices, or allowing others to add suggestions to the board.

Further reading

Pinterest CEO says marketing was key to success

How to generate leads with Pinterest

Does Pinterest really drive more sales than Facebook?

How to make Pinterest work for you

What is responsive web design?

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You may have seen various things on the internet about Responsive Web Design but do not really have much idea of what it is or what it does. We have found some information to guide you.

Whether you’re a beginner or a seasoned web professional, creating responsive designs can be confusing at first, mostly because of the radical change in thinking that’s required. As time goes on, responsive web design is drifting away from the pool of passing fads and rapidly entering the realm of standard practice. In fact, the magnitude of this paradigm shift feels as fundamental as the transition from table based layouts to CSS. Simply put, this is a very different way of designing websites and it represents the future.

Over the past year, responsive design has become quite the hot topic in the web design community. If all the buzz has you feeling like Rip Van Winkle waking up in the 21st century, this summary will help you catch up with the times.

 

What is responsive design?

Let’s just get right into it: Believe it or not, the Treehouse blog that you’re reading this article on is actually a responsive design! To see it in action, open this article on a desktop browser and slowly make the browser thinner and wider. You should see the layout magically adjust itself to more comfortably fit the new width of the browser, even if you make the page as skinny as the resolution of a mobile phone. Here are some screenshots of what the Think Vitamin design looks like at various screen resolutions:

Y98Nc Beginner’s Guide to Responsive Web Design

Further information
 

Help with your mobile SEO strategy

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SEO can be difficult at the best of times but if you are trying to make sure that your site is optimized for mobile users, you might find yourself sinking into a mire. There are several ways of ensuring that your site is accessible to most people and we have found some helpful articles for you.

As with most things in life, mobile search engine optimization (SEO)-the art and science of ensuring your content is easily found on tablets and smartphones-comes with a carrot and a stick.

First, the carrot. All those people browsing the Web and using apps on their mobile browsers are often highly motivated to take action-such as buy a product or service from your site. For example, Mobile Marketer estimates that 70 percent of all mobile searches result in user action within one hour. Nine out of 10 mobile searches lead to some action, and over half of the time, it’s a purchase, according to Search Engine Land. Ensuring your content is easily found by mobile users and renders well on their screens could deliver a bottom line boost.

Now, the stick. If you don’t optimize your site for mobile users, you could get left behind. According to Gartner, mobile devices are expected to overtake PCs as the most common Web-access devices worldwide by 2013, while a BIA/Kelsey report predicts mobile local search volume will surpass desktop local search for the first time in 2015.

Mobile search is big and getting bigger. Some estimates suggest that mobile search now accounts for 25 percent of all U.S. search traffic. Users are increasingly tapping keyword searches on touchscreen keyboards. They’re also asking questions of Siri, Apple’s virtual assistant that rolled out to more iOS devices on Sept. 19, and Google Now, the virtual assistant that debuted in Android 4.1 Jelly Bean.

The good news is that mobile SEO doesn’t require significant changes as compared to your desktop SEO strategies, says Vanessa Fox, author of Marketing in the Age of Google and founder of Nine By Blue, which provides search analytics software and SEO training. SEO best practices-using relevant keywords in title tags and H1 headers, developing great content that people will engage with, attracting quality links from other sites, and so on-are essentially the same with mobile and desktop, she adds.  Read more

 

Further reading

Getting your head around mobile SEO strategies

4 tips for your mobile SEO strategy

The new mobile SEO strategy

Finding relevant information and getting your website noticed

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Sometimes it can be difficult to sift through all the information that you are looking for on the internet but if you can focus your search on what is relevant to your requirements, you can pick up some really interesting information. For instance, there is so much stuff out there on Google’s latest Panda update and a lot of it is very informative and useful but some of it is not so good and even confusing. Trying to get your website noticed is always the goal and if you can understand at least some of the rules and regulations, you stand a decent chance of getting that. Try and keep up to date with internet news and see what you can gain from it.

Since late May, internet marketers have waited for the latest Penguin update from Google. Matt Cutts, the company’s distinguished engineer, said earlier this summer that Panda updates would likely be more minor moving forward with Penguin having the largest impact on SERPs. That wasn’t exactly true, as Google confirmed last week that its latest iteration of Panda rolled out on September 27. The version, dubbed Panda 20, impacted 2.4 percent of search queries, Search Engine Land reported, and Google’s Penguin update on Friday was comparatively small.Matt Cutts announced the rollout of Penguin 1.2 last week.

Brafton reported that Panda 20 comes at an interesting time since another algorithm rolled out the following day. Unrelated to either Panda or Penguin, Google announced a new algorithm that removes low-quality content from rankings even when the site’s URL exactly matches a query. For sites that saw traffic gains or losses around this time, it may be difficult to ascertain what the cause was.

and informing prospects….More at Internet marketing news roundup, October 8

More Reading

 

New apps being rolled out all the time

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With the rise in business being done on mobile devices, ever more apps are being developed to make it easier. Pinterest has grown in popularity over the last year and some of the other social networking sites are trying to offer similar services.

Last week StumbleUpon launched a new-look iOS app with a slew of new features. Today, the revamped StumbleUpon rolls out for web users. The layout looks quite similar to Pinterest, and even includes new “Pinterest-esque” lists. The new design also features the slick StumbleDNA that uses color to categorize content by topic:

Each user has a personal color code, or StumbleDNA, assigned to them based off of their likes. The redesigned multi-column layout lets users view more content and make better decisions on what they’d like to see. Images are pulled in for all stories as well as headlines and friends’ activities. The color coordination helps users identify content quickly and surprisingly isn’t…More at StumbleUpon Gets “Pinterest-y” New Redesign & Enhanced …

More Reading

Google Panda Update

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Google have released another update to their Panda algorithm but this is not just a data refresh, it is an actual update which will hopefully not cause the issues that previous updates have created.

Last Friday, Google announced the EMD update. It was billed as a small and minor update, but the effects seemed to be fairly large, with many webmasters claiming to have been hit. Google’s Matt Cutts made it a point to say that the algorithm change was unrelated to both Panda and Penguin.

He then said it was not the only update that was rolling out during that timeframe, noting that Google makes changes every day (over 500 a year). He didn’t happen to mention that there was a new Panda update, however. Finally, he has dropped the news that there was indeed a Panda update going on at the same time as the EMD update (and it’s still rolling out).

Were you impacted by one of these updates? Are you able to discern which one it was?

 

Further reading

5 reasons why Penguins and Pandas are eating your site alive

Google page quality algorithm changes

Google Panda update 20 released

Google reveals another domain related algorithm

 

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