WSI Webworks Blog - Web Design, Search Engine Marketing | Greenville, SC

How to Rank #1 on Google

Doug Fowler — Wed, 16 May 2012 20:01:18 +0000

Here’s a funny mashup on Matt Cutts from Google.

Over optimization penalties

Doug Fowler — Wed, 25 Apr 2012 21:37:19 +0000

There has been a lot of buzz, panic and general confusion in the SEO world since Google’s latest algorithm update. We continue to receive inquiries from clients concerned about the recent changes. The good news is that no WSI Webworks clients have received any penalty, nor do we expect any of our sites to be penalized.

We have always followed Google best practices and avoided tricks to get short-term gains. It’s a longer process, but it has served us well over the years.

Besides making money, Google’s primary objective is to provide the most relevant and best search results to users. For years, many SEO’s have tried and been successful at manipulating the system to get high organic rankings. And they still do. However, Google continues to refine their ranking algorithm to weed out bad results. Every time they do, sites using questionable practices get targeted and penalized.

In the past Google never provided guidance as to whether or not you were being penalized. SEO’s and webmasters just had to figure it out. However, Google has recently started notifying webmasters of potential ‘un-natural’ links and many of these sites are being penalized, some significantly. If we are engaged in an SEO program with you, then we have a Google Webmaster account setup for your site that we monitor regularly.

We expect to see more updates roll out from Google this year that will continue to target ‘over-optimized’ sites. Un-natural links are the current buzz, but we expect Google to start penalizing sites that have “over-optimized” content as well.

Another thing that is evident is that Google will continue to reward sites that produce great, fresh content via media, such as video, blogs and social media.

If you have questions or concerns, feel free to give me a call or email. We will continue to follow things closely and you can rest assured that we’re on top of things.

Significant drops in organic traffic?

Doug Fowler — Mon, 02 Apr 2012 15:44:56 +0000

We received several inquiries over the last week concerning potential drops in organic traffic. It ranges from rumors of sites losing 60% of their traffic to just confusion as to what is going on.

If you’re doing SEO the right way, then there is no need to worry .

The truth is that Google just released another Panda update a little over a week ago – see Tweet from Google on 3/23.

The latest update is just another in Google’s continuing efforts to provide better search results by cleaning up low quality sites. This time is looks like they hit sites that utilize paid link networks and link farms (again). See BuildMyRank.com as one example – http://bit.ly/GAHHXb.

If websites were participating in these ‘black hat’ schemes, then yes. it is possible they took a significant hit in traffic. Google has and will continue to weed out sites trying to beat the system. The good news is that if you and /or your SEO company is following ‘white hat’ procedures, you should be fine. In fact, you may even benefit from competitors losing ranking. :-)

More evidence of Google’s initiative to target low quality sites is that they are now sending warnings about ‘unnatural’ or ‘artificial’ links via Google Webmaster. Previously, they may have been silently penalizing sites but now they are letting site owners know in increasing numbers. That’s also good news for a business, but now you know if you have a potential problem. Read more about Google’s warnings http://selnd.com/HNYfv2.

Take Away: Do things the right way and avoid the temptation for quick fixes and short cuts.

Is it time for website makeover?

Doug Fowler — Fri, 23 Mar 2012 13:00:12 +0000

Take a minute and answer these four questions. Trust me, it is well worth your time.

Question 1: When was the last time someone complimented your business on your website? It could have been anything from how professional it looks to how easy it is to navigate. Even better, when was the last time a prospect or customer mentioned your website at all?

Question 2: When was the last time you added new information to your website?

Question 3: How many leads (phone calls, emails, sales, etc.) is your website generating per month?

Question 4: How often do you mow the grass, trim the hedges and plant new flowers in your front yard?

The truth of the matter is that most businesses treat their website like it’s a yellow pages ad. Recycling the same gimmick year after year – spending thousands of dollars to reach an unseeable and unknowable mass of people, and when it doesn’t work or when times get rough, the website is the first casualty.

Fact: Your website is your hardest working and most loyal employee.

However, hard work and loyalty don’t automatically equal revenue. Your website needs to be optimized from the top down and maintained from the bottom up. It needs to be trained to do its job. This training starts and ends with web design.

Case Study: Corporate Intel has more than quadrupled their website visitors and leads in the last two years. It started by redesigning their existing website. Read the Case Study.

Designing / Redesigning Your Web Presence

Roughly 75% of new clients with existing websites that come to us need a complete web redesign. Consider the following criteria:

Your website is more than 2 years old
Your nephew talked you into a Flash website
You can’t update your website from your own computer in your own office
When you type your business name and address into Google your website is the 5th listing

I’m only partially kidding, but consider the industry standard today. The minimum you should expect from a new website is a clean and professional design that can be easily crawled and indexed by all major search engines. Your site should work in every major browser across every major operating system. You should have the ability to easily update your website from your desk. These are NORMS. If you don’t have a website that fits or exceeds these criteria then it is time for an update.

Get Your Customers Talking

Compliments build faith and boost morale. If you aren’t receiving them about your website, consider updating your web presence. It could be that people aren’t finding your website. It could be that they are finding it but they are leaving unimpressed. Whatever the reason, we can make sure that your redesigned website gets you the compliments you deserve.

Nobody Thinks Much of a Dead Yard

None of us would dream of going a full year without maintaining our yard. Your website needs that same kind of seasonal attention. It is never good enough to build a great website and then ignore it. The World Wide Web is always growing and changing (in many ways faster than the outside world) and your website needs to keep up. We can help you with this by giving you the tools necessary to maintain a healthy website. We’re here to point you in the right direction and we’re always there to help along the way, but ultimately the choice to grow your web presence falls to you.

Contact WSI Webworks for more info on your next web design project.

Don’t Lose Sales Due to Poor Web Design

Doug Fowler — Thu, 15 Mar 2012 19:20:18 +0000

Have you tried to save a couple of dollars and design your personal site? Or worse, have your unemployed brother in-law set it up? Don’t do this. Your company status could be affected. The thing is, just since you can manage to purchase the tools, doesn’t mean the knowledge in how to use them comes with the purchase.

I am not the design guru at WSI but I’ve come across enough bad designs through the years to understand what not to do. In the present world, online credibility often means the main difference between ever getting an opportunity to talk to a prospect. Have you ever thought about how many people find your site and leave immediately.

Listed below are seven of the very common mistakes website owners and business proprietors keep making with regards to websites.

Cluttered Webpages – You’ve most likely seen these websites – there’s a lot info on the page it causes it to be impossible to understand how to start first. Simplify the procedure and also have a obvious intend on in which you would like your customer to visit. To put it simply, allow them. Begin with getting rid of as numerous symbols and buttons as you possibly can. Eliminate that ‘Welcome to the site’ paragraph while you’re in internet marketing. Make it simple for the site visitors and they’ll not just hang in there, however they might just return, the industry very positive thing.
Animation – It was awesome within the 90s – it’s now considered annoying. Should you must use animation, the utmost the animation should “loop” is three occasions. You need to use animation to attract attention, however, you don’t want to bother your customer.
Backgrounds – You’ve had the experience, the web site that appears good before the background image loads and you cannot browse the text. The beach, heaven, your pet – I am certain they all are extremely important for you, just don’t use them as the background.
Inconsistent Text – Yes you could have different fonts besides Arial, Verdana, and Occasions New Roman, but don’t overload. Stay with one font for the text. Fonts like Arial or Verdana are simpler to see on-screen than Occasions New Roman. Keep in mind that if you are using a particular font for the text, your customer should have that font loaded on their own system to be able to notice correctly. You may create graphics with various fonts, but don’t forget, graphics can decelerate the download duration of your page.
Music – Music on the page adds no content but boosts the annoyance factor and also the page download time. It’s okay to incorporate music clips in your site, but give your site visitors the choice to pay attention rather than attacking all of them with the selection of music.
Color Combinations – The Web Palette includes the 216 colors that both Macs and Home windows systems display precisely. Lots of graphics are “too large” meaning they’ve “unused” colors inside them which make the graphics become bigger (in quality) than they should be. By removing these unused colors, it’ll make your graphics load faster. Sometimes up to 30%.
Overall Consistency – Don’t alter the layout and style of your website from page to page in your site. Rather, keep your feel and look consistent throughout. Keep your color plan, sight lines, navigation buttons and backlinks within the same places from page to page. This can provide the customer a much better experience because they can come to anticipate certain facets of the website showing up within the same places every time.

These seven “traps” are not the sole “traps” which could cause your site visitors to depart your website. Make sure to take a look at your website statistics regularly, evaluate the “top exit pages”, make changes and constantly test to obtain the optimum feel and look of the web design.

By understanding why individuals are departing your website, you may make changes and modifications to pages to ensure they are more desirable to the visitor..

Keeping Your Identity Safe Online

Doug Fowler — Fri, 17 Feb 2012 16:18:36 +0000

Mike Lane, our friend over at Available Technology recently published an informative post on “Keeping your Identify Safe Online”.

Read the full article to see what you can do to be invisible to hackers and avoid seeing your credit card funds disappear.

Leveraging the + Power of Social Media

Doug Fowler — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 16:46:30 +0000

If you have your own website or online business, an efficient social profile Page using Google+ will let you explore a whole new world of social media marketing, that is not only fun, but easy and profitable.

Google+ posts sent to “public” rank fairly well in Google search results. Merging Google properties into Google+ and integrating it with the search engines has a tremendous impact on where your company appears in search engine results pages (SERPs).
You can manage circles—distribute clients into specific categories and share different posts, news or deals with different circles accordingly. This is a great way to connect with fans and share information with clients.
“Hangouts” is another great way to engage your customers and colleagues. It’s a high quality video chat that allows you to interact with your fans face to face. This interaction will allow you to get to know them, answer questions as well as get live product/service feedback. Businesses can also use “Hangouts” for video conferencing, to push live events and seminars to customers.
Use the Google+ badge to promote your site and your Google+ page. Google+ badge links your website with your Google+ page and lets others know you’re here. When a visitor likes your site and clicks the icon they will be taken directly to your Google+ page and will be able to share and follow your posts.
Google+ Direct allows people to simply enter a ‘+’ before your company name when searching on Google and get directly to your Google+ page.
The +1 button on Google+ is an ideal way to have customers spread the word about your business and its presence on Google+. You can also connect your +1’s from your website to your +1’s on your Google+ page. People tend to trust recommendations from people they already know.
“Ripples” is a Google+ tool that allows you to watch your posts and information as they travel across social networks. You can easily determine who is sharing your content and who is paying attention to it.
With “analytics”, you can get information about your page’s followers, visitors, and the general traffic and social activity around your business.

Google+ for business is unique in that it has blurred the lines between personal social networks such as Facebook, and business networks like LinkedIn. Contact WSI to help you invigorate you web presence with the social media game changer—Google+.

A Guide to Google+, Today’s Hottest New Social Network

Doug Fowler — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 16:41:47 +0000

The official slogan for Google+ is “real-life sharing—rethought for the web”. Google+, is a social network operated by Google Inc, with integration across a number of Google products, including Google Buzz and Google Profiles.

Started in June 2011 as a test version, its popularity has grown by leaps and bounds. Google+ notices are posted inside users’ Gmail inbox, so it’s 100% real-time Gmail deliverability. When you write about a subject on Google+ and your circle friends Google that subject, your comments and links are displayed automatically on page one of Google. No back-linking, no on-site optimization, just free traffic. All these factors make it a social media platform that is likely to stay on the scene and gain increased favor.

What’s So Special About Google Plus?

One key element of Google+ is a focus on targeted sharing within subsets of a social group (or what Google calls ‘Circles’).
Also within Google+ is a section specifically for viewing, managing and editing multimedia. Google+ includes an image editor, privacy options and sharing features.
‘Hangouts’ is Google’s new group chat feature. Instead of directly asking a friend to join a group chat, users instead click ‘start a hangout’ and they’re instantly in a video chat-room alone. At the same time, a message goes out to their social circles, letting them know that their friend is ‘hanging out’ and that they are invited to join.

Building your Google+ Presence

Businesses are beginning to see the value of Google+ with the new Pages feature. The new Google+ brand Pages look similar to Google+ Profiles, except for the little square icon that indicates that it’s a Page rather than a Profile. Users can add brands to their circles, check out their information, and browse their photos. When users add a brand to their circles, it helps increase that brand’s follower count.

So what are you waiting for? Create a Page for your business and take advantage of Google +:

Before you can create a Google+ Page for your business, you need a Google+ Profile. The ‘You+’ link on your Gmail dashboard will direct you to the Profile creation page.
Choose a category to begin. Local businesses is good for smaller, less well-known businesses. Product or brand would work for companies and larger known businesses. Company, institution, or organization is mainly for businesses that don’t directly sell something, mostly not-for-profits.
Personalize your page with a photo/logo and tagline. You can continue with an introduction, information, and contact information, and finish with a photo strip of five different photos.
It’s time to start engaging with the Google+ community. For your business Page, you can create circles (networks), start posting information and news through your feed. You can also add your Google+ Page details to your existing website and share it via other networks.

Get ready to integrate Google+ into your Internet marketing strategy.

Location-based Marketing Tips

Doug Fowler — Mon, 09 Jan 2012 15:14:06 +0000

When it comes to location-based marketing and leveraging this new phenomenon of “so-lo-mo”, it can get complicating if you don’t know what you’re doing. Here are a few tips that will help you get started:

Learn how location-based services work. First things first; your company must understand how location-based services work –not the nittygritty technology aspect, but generally how people use location-based apps on their phones to “check in” whenever they go places. Essentially, global positioning satellites (GPS) locate the users and determine where they may be, thus providing options to select a location or create a new listing. Once a person “checks in”, their friends will know where they are at that moment or where they regularly visit. Through these apps, businesses can share promotions or special discounts so that people who “check in” will receive notifications of deals that are physically nearby. Location-based technology work on networks called “social location platforms” or “social location services”.
Learn about the platforms. There are many different platforms out there. Now that your company is looking at the opportunity of location-based marketing, it’s your job to become familiar with these platforms, learn which ones your target audience is on and decide how best to leverage them for your business. Before launching any sort of campaign, sign up for the networks, download the apps to your phone and learn how a person would use each platform.
Determine your goals. Playing with the app on your own mobile phone may entice you to get started with location-based services right away. But take a step back and think about the goals you want to achieve.
- Are you looking to increase foot traffic?
- Do you have an offer you want to promote?
- Are you trying to increase sales?
- Do you want to attract new customers?
Create a presence on the social location networks. Once you select your networks (by evaluating which ones your customers are actually on), it’s time to create your presence. Ensure your business is listed on all relevant social location networks and remember to validate the address, phone number and other contact details to ensure they are correct and up-to-date. Depending on the platform, you may be able to update your contact details yourself. For some, you may have to contact the network for help if you don’t have access to edit your listing.

Location-based Marketing –The Buzz Around So-Lo-Mo

Doug Fowler — Wed, 04 Jan 2012 19:06:59 +0000

With sites like Foursquare, Gowalla, and Yelp growing in popularity, people are connecting, sharing, interacting, meeting up and recommending places based on their location. For this reason, many businesses are starting to incorporate location-based marketing techniques in their strategy –a smart move considering a lot of other companies (likely your competitors) are thinking along the same lines.

According to eMarketer, location-based ad revenues worldwide will reach $6.2 billion by 2015, consuming 35% of total mobile ad revenues. This is a considerable increase over 5 years (from the $588 million spent in 2010) as you can see from the chart above. With this in mind, perhaps now is a good time for your company to take a look at location-based marketing and see how it can fit with your overall strategy.

The term “so-lo-mo” is popping up in our vocabulary, but what does it mean?

It’s the convergence of social media, local search and mobile marketing as a method of creating personal engagement with customers. When done correctly, so-lo-mo can help your company reach the right person, in the right place, at the right time. The idea of “checking in” has become the next big thing in social media. People are now sharing their whereabouts with the world. But why? What are some things that would motivate people (specifically your customers) to check in to your business? Here are some reasons:

Fun and games –Many “check in” programs are actually games that allow participants to earn virtual points, and people take part in them just for the fun of it.
Connecting with friends –A lot of “check in” applications allow your friends and connections to see your activity; often times the idea is to facilitate face-to-face encounters with your friends.
Recommending places they like –People also like to recommend and promote the places they like. Endorsing a good place and sharing opinions is another reason people “check in”.
Freebies and discounts –If not for the games or the ability to connect with friends and share feedback, people will “check in” to receive free offers and special discounts. This is a sure-fire way to encourage your customers to tell the world where they are.