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5 Secrets of Homepage Optimization

Doug Williams @ 5:15 am

This blog entry was posted on March 29, 2011.

The homepage is the most important page. It is the main entrance to your website. Your home page must be optimized to attract AND convert visitors into buyers. It needs to greet with a relevant and persuasive message. The design needs to be professional and build trust. It needs to be optimized to attract search engine traffic (SEO). A primary call to action needs to be clear and visible. It needs to convey all of this in just three seconds.

  1. Design: Use your design to enhance your message, build credibility and build trust. It should speed communication of your message. Designers may love a showy site with eye popping Flash designs, but this will only detract from your message.
  2. Message: Visitors arrive looking for a solution to a problem. How will you make your customer’s life better? Make your central message clear. You have only a few seconds to communicate your benefits and how you are better than your competition. Use your page headlines, your graphics and your navigation to communicate your message.
  3. Action: Drive your visitors toward a desired action. Make it clear and highly visible. Placing an online form in the upper right quadrant of your web page makes it the most visible. Ask for the minimum amount of required information.
  4. Trust: People won’t do something that puts them at risk. Show visitors that you are trustworthy. Show prospects there are no risks. Build trust at every step. Show your phone number and address. Post a guarantee. Have a no-risk returns policy. Show your privacy policy. At an action step such as a sign-up for, reassure with an excerpt from your privacy policy.
  5. Traffic: You will create a highly targeted website around a focused topic. You can use organic SEO or an Adwords campaign to bring in highly targeted traffic. Focused and targeted traffic will bring in targeted leads that will convert better.

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Filed under: Internet Marketing



How To Do A SEO Audit Before Starting SEO

Doug Williams @ 5:44 am

This blog entry was posted on March 27, 2011.

The SEO audit is the problem identification step that uncovers the strengths and weaknesses affecting your website rankings. It should be the basis for creating your SEO strategies.

10 step SEO Audit

  1. Visual Impression: Does it have a professional image that shows trustworthiness? Is there a clear call to action? After all, if you successfully bring visitors to your website, will they decide to take action?
  2. Keywords: Which keywords is your website currently being ranked for? Go to keywordspy.com or spyfu.com and see. Your site should be ranked well for your key services rather than your company name.
  3. Canonical URL: You should NOT be able to see the www and non-www versions of your website. There should be a redirect that allows only one version to be visible.
  4. Title Tags: Does the Title tag contain keywords rather than the company name. Each page should have unique Title tag. Keyword phrases should be at the beginning and the company name should be at the end.
  5. Navigation: The navigation should be SEO friendly HTML links rather than JavaScript links or an image map. Look at the overall site architecture; does the navigation direct visitors to all major sections of the website?
  6. H1 Tags: Does the site make use of H1 heading tags? If so, is there only one and does it contain the most important keyword phrase for that page? THE H1 heading TAG is the most important visible text on the web page.
  7. Content: Each page of your website should have 250 or more words of text. Each page should include your most important keywords and if yours is a local business, your pages should show the cities that you serve.
  8. Pages Indexed: How many pages has Google indexed on your website? Use the site command (site:yourdomain.com) in the Google search par to find out how many pages has indexed on your website. You can do the same search on Bing.
  9. Backlinks: Backlinks are links that are directed towards your website. Use the SEOmoz Open Site Explorer to analyze how the number of backlinks and to identify which websites is linking back to your site.
  10. Anchor Text: Keywords should be used in the anchor text of backlinks for maximum SEO benefit. Use the SEOmoz Open Site Explorer to what the current backlink anchor text profile is for your website.

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Filed under: SEO Strategies



Review of GoToMeeting Vs Join.Me

Doug Williams @ 5:03 am

This blog entry was posted on March 25, 2011.

In my business, few of my client meetings are face to face. I use web conferencing to present and have online discussions. I have been a long time user of GoToMeeting. Recently I was introduced to Join.me.

Each of these platforms allows you to share your computer screen during your meeting. They allow you to change presenters so the person you are meeting with can present their materials.

GoToMeeting is a paid subscription web conferencing product. This is still my favorite because I can schedule a meeting and send out advance invitations. The quality is generally good and the audio conferencing is good. Meetings are easy to record and save as a video. I typically post these recordings of my session to my Vimeo account for clients to refer back to.

I share my GoToMeeting account with my team. This means that sometimes when I am on the phone with one of my clients and I want to show my screen, my GoToMeeting account is unavailable. This is where Join.me comes in handy.

Join.Me is a great product and best of all it is free. It is fast and easy to set-up an instant web conferencing session. I have my client go to join.me and I read off the 9 digit number and we have an instant web conference going. You can change presenters just like in GoToMeeting. I haven’t tried the audio service yet. The main disadvantage is that you can’t schedule a meeting and send out invitations. Join.me doesn’t have a record feature.

For a free service, join.me is top notch and a great service. I will still use GoToMeeting as my primary web conferencing because I am able to send advance invitations and record a session. But anyone could be doing web conferencing for free with join.me. I would be interested in hearing what experiences others are having with either of these services?

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Filed under: Internet Marketing



Google Base is Google’s Online Classifieds

Doug Williams @ 5:52 am

This blog entry was posted on March 23, 2011.

Google Base is a free service where you can upload almost any type of content such as images, PDFs, Word documents, etc. You can submit recipes, real estate properties and things for sale. A major part of the Google Base acts as an online classified ads service similar to Craigslist.

If you have a service for sale, an upcoming event, article, profile, review or ad that you want to publicize, you can advertise using Google Base.

You can submit items from via a data feed or via the Google Base API. Note that the Google Base API is scheduled to be discontinued in June of 2011. Things you submit to Google Base may be found on Google properties like Google or Google Maps.

Product sales that used to be handled through Google Base are now handled through the Google Merchant Center. The Google Merchant Center is where you can upload your product feeds and make them easy to find on Google Product Search.

Google Base has been a major place for uploading real estate listings. In January 2011, Google Base stopped accepting real estate listings. With the Google Base API disappearing in June 2011, we will have to see what the future holds for Google Base.

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Filed under: Internet Marketing



How to Apply Local SEO to Your Local Business Website

Doug Williams @ 5:24 am

This blog entry was posted on March 21, 2011.

Local businesses like a florist, a restaurant, a lawyer, or a plumber all need a website. Your customers expect it. Not only do you need a website, you need it to come up in the search results. Local SEO is the process of optimizing your website so it will come up when your customers search on Google.

  1. Local Keywords: This is how people will find your website when they search on Google. Use a keyword research tool such as Market Samurai. Choose local phrases which are broad terms + city or other geographic descriptor.
  2. Title Tags: Use your most important phrase at the beginning of the Title tag followed by your city and state. Place your business name at the end of the tag. Keep Title tags shorter than 100 characters with 70 being optimal.
  3. Meta Description: These are less about local SEO and more for attracting visitors. Description tags are used as the description in Google search results so make them compelling. Use unique page descriptions for each page that accurately describes the page. Include your phone number to encourage phone calls.
  4. H1 Heading Tags: H1 Tags are the main web page headline. They should contain your most important keyword phrase and grab an arriving visitor’s interest. For local SEO always include the city or state as part of the H1 tag. Each page should have only one H1 tag.
  5. Content: Each page of your website should have 250 or more words of text. Search engines detect text and not images. Each page should include your most important keywords as well as the cities that you serve.
  6. Address: Include your address and phone number on every page so the search engines know your local area. Include the cities that you serve. If you have multiple locations, create a separate page for each location.
  7. Google Places: Listings are free for any business; you will just need a local business address and local phone number. Fill out your listing completely including business hours. You can choose up to 5 business categories. Encourage your customers to review your business.

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Filed under: Local Search



Use Your Website to Build Rapport and Trust

Doug Williams @ 6:53 am

This blog entry was posted on March 19, 2011.

How do you connect and build a trusted relationship with your website visitors. To do this you need to understand their needs. Your goal is to build a long term relationship with them.

As people interact with your website, they evolve in their relationship with you. They will start out as a stranger, then a friend, and later (hopefully) they become fans. Each group will have different needs and interests from your website.

Strangers: They arrive to your site and do not know you. Perhaps they found you on a Google search or followed a link from another site. They are coming seeking simple answers to some problem. They didn’t arrive looking for you to talk about yourself or your company. Instead provide the answers that they are looking for. Be helpful and encourage them to return. They will sign-up for a free report if it is directly related to the answers they are seeking.

Friends have visited you before, are familiar with you and have a favorable opinion. They don’t have a complete picture of your business but know at least some of what you do. They are interested in learning more. Provide stories (case studies, testimonials) of the work you have done. Have a good “about us” page and maybe introduce your staff on a “meet the staff” page. Give them good reasons to keep returning. Friends are interested in doing business with you.

Fans are people that know and love you. They are your advocates and are willing to spread the good news of how you helped them. They are interested in your materials, free downloads, white papers, videos, etc. Consider creating a frequent buyer program, first access to your new products or special offers for them. Encourage them to connect with you on social media.

Understand the different stages of your customers and develop strategies to engage them. Use your website to develop rapport and ways to engage your website visitors.

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Filed under: Internet Marketing



Conversion Tip: Place Call To Actions Above The Fold

Doug Williams @ 6:13 am

This blog entry was posted on March 17, 2011.

Your website needs to communicate your message in the first few seconds. Your unique selling proposition and your opt-in forms need to be easily seen without scrolling down.

People search on the web to answer a question or solve some need. A visitor will arrive to your website and look around to see if your website will answer their question. If they don’t see what they are seeking, they will just leave.

What is the fold? This refers to the upper portion of the web page that can be seen without scrolling down. This term came from printed newspapers and referred to the upper half of the front page. This was the premium space reserved for the most important news articles.

Benefits: Visitors arrive wanting to know what’s in it for them. How will you make your customer’s life better? Spell your benefits out clearly on your home page.

Message: Make your central message clear. You have only a few seconds to communicate your benefits, how you are better than your competition. Use your page headlines, your graphics and your navigation to communicate your message.

Call to Action: You will want visitors to arrive and then take action. This could be to sign-up, join, call or buy now. Place your primary call to action where it can be easily seen and above the fold. It needs to be highly visible to arriving visitors.

Where do the eyes go first? Do they see the most important things first? Use placement of graphics and headlines to determine what captures your audience’s first impression.

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Filed under: Website Design



When Should You Redesign Your Website?

Doug Williams @ 12:06 am

This blog entry was posted on March 15, 2011.

Is it time to redesign your website? A visitor arrives and within an instant they make assumptions and create opinions about your business. All this based on how your website looks.

The average website should have its look and design updated about every 3 years. How do you know if it is time to renew, change and rejuvenate your marketing message?

  1. Old Design: Styles change and evolve with time. Older looking websites will date your business as not keeping up with the times. 7-10 years ago websites were designed for smaller monitors, many were full width and many had simple boxy looking designs.
  2. Uncompetitive Design: Look at your competition and compare your design to theirs. Do you appear like a leader in your niche? If you are a local business such as a restaurant or a medical office, compare websites with similar sites in other cities.
  3. Changed Strategies: Do you now have new business goals, strategies or products? Are you selling to the same market niche? You will need to update your website if your business direction has shifted.
  4. Not Converting: If your website is not generating leads or sales, then you may need to start over. Does your website answer the questions your visitors are trying to find? Do you have a clear offer and action that your visitors are guided into? Top producing websites are designed to be selling machines.
  5. No Traffic: Your website design may be preventing your website from being ranked well on the search engines. Perhaps your website was designed all in Flash? Maybe you never optimized your website for keyword phrases? Search engine optimization or SEO is an important part of generating business. After all, with no visitor traffic, you will generate no sales.

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Filed under: Internet Marketing



Turn Your Website into a Selling Machine

Doug Williams @ 8:44 am

This blog entry was posted on March 13, 2011.

Marketing with your website is less about technology and more about marketing. A website that produces sales is much more than a great looking design.

Know Your Customer: Do you understand why your visitor is coming to your site? What problem are they looking to solve? Your goal is to present a website that clearly solves their issue. You want to present the solution to their problem on your home page so that they can understand it with in the first 2-3 seconds of arriving.

Encourage Action: Create a solution to your visitor’s problem. Make it visible, clear and compelling on your home page. Design a selling sequence with a clear path to action. Take the time to answer the unasked questions. Design trust elements into your website to lessen their fears and show that you are indeed a trustworthy solution.

Engage Them: It is hard to create a lasting impression in a single encounter. Devise a way to interact with visitors on an ongoing basis. Use opt-in newsletters or have an interactive blog on your site. Add social reviews to your products you sell. Add in online surveys, email marketing, links to subscribe to your Twitter, Facebook or your blog feed.

Get Traffic: Decide where your traffic is going to come from before your website is launched. This could be Paid ads such as Adwords, organic SEO, social media, email marketing or some other search engine marketing method. The important thing is to bring qualified and interested prospects to your site.

Keep Improving: Measure the results of your website strategy, setup a measurement system such as Google Analytics. Establish your key metrics that constitute success and then chart these on a regular basis so you can see your progress.

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Filed under: Blog Marketing



Looking For Keywords? Start by Looking At Your Competition!

Doug Williams @ 6:10 am

This blog entry was posted on March 11, 2011.

Are you struggling with keywords for your website? You can get keyword ideas directly from your competition. See which phrases they are using. Are they relevant to what you do?

Jot down the best ones and then see how good they are using a keyword research tool like Market Samurai. Take the best ones and use them as you plan your website.

Here are some tips on getting keywords from your competition.

  1. Visit their site: Look at their titles, keywords and description tags. Look at their page headlines. This will show which phrases that they are trying to rank for. Record the keyword phrases that are relevant to your business.
  2. Competitor keyword Tools: Use tools like keywordspy.com, spyfy.com or ispionage.com to uncover which phrases your competitors are actually getting ranked for. Most of these tools will show organic and PPC phrases. The value of PPC phrases is they show the phrases that they want to get traffic for. Write down the keyword phrases that directly apply to your business.
  3. Anchor Text: Which phrases are your competitors using in their link building? These are likely the most important phrases that they are investing in. Use the opensiteexplorer.org backlink analysis tool to uncover which phrases they are using.
  4. Keyword Research: Use a keyword research tool such as Market Samurai to find which phrases that your competition is using will be the best for you. You can look at factors such as daily search volume and competing pages. I generally will research using “phrase match” or “exact match” to decide which specific phrases will give the best traffic potential.

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Filed under: SEO Strategies



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