Whether you're just starting a business or want to move your existing brick and mortar business online, you'll need to locate a website builder to get you and your brand online. Website builders come with a variety of options, so it is important to find one that fits you and your website. So what is a website builder exactly? A website builder is software that allows you to create a website online. The software will reside on a web server at a hosting company or be part of a hosted SaaS ... Read More
Small Business Websites
The Sad Truth About US and Canadian Small Business Website Usage
The below chart represents internet usage, and more importantly growth, across US and Canada. If you step back and let those figures sink in, you'll realize this is amazing growth. I show you this graph because there is a severe disconnect between user internet adoption and US and Canadian small business website usage. Over 50% of businesses are missing out. The Canadian Internet Registration Authority has an amazingly awesome website that provides statistics for internet usage in Canada. ... Read More
One Stop Shop Web Design is Buyer Beware
This afternoon I thought I would duck out of work and take my son for "bessert". Bessert is dessert before dinner and it must be done in late afternoon. As we exited the Dairy Queen I looked up to see a storefront window for a computer repair shop. The long list of services with website design and hosting at the bottom struck my interest. Enough so, that I had to snap a shot of it for further investigation. When we finished our ice cream and errands I returned home to look up the website URL ... Read More
Successful Web Design Projects: 50+ Questions to Ask Before You Start
With every new web design project I get excited. After years of doing this, you’d think I’d be over the thrill of creating something new. But I’m not and I try to transfer this excitement over to the client in an effort to get them geared up for the project ahead. The cheerleader in me is there for a reason – the majority of our clients underestimate the workload involved in preparing for and executing a web design project. Companies struggle with website projects because they incorrectly ... Read More
Creating Law Websites that Rule the Internet
Over the years we’ve worked with or talked to a number of law firms and lawyers who needed assistance with their websites, blogs or SEO efforts. Their struggles with internet marketing inspired us to create a stock WordPress theme specifically designed for their industry. This month we released a new law WordPress theme designed for smaller law firms. In preparing for this theme design and launch, I researched some of the best practices associated with legal website design and online ... Read More
Browser-Based Enlightenment
Open Up Your Browser and Take a Good Look at Your Online Presence Immanuel Kant defined enlightenment as “The emancipation of the human consciousness from an immature state of ignorance and error." The term enlightenment reminds me of the small business owner and his undeveloped view of internet marketing and more importantly, how he and his company fit within today’s internet dependent culture. Now don’t take that comment as a negative view on the small business owner or small business in ... Read More
Bad Website Architecture: The Silent SEO Killer
My focus is small business marketing, so I encounter a lot of people who have tried a do-it-yourself SEO approach to internet marketing. The semi-savvy business owner thinks his SEO knowledge is pretty darn good, yet he just can’t figure out why he isn’t seeing increases in website traffic. In our conversation he provides obscure long-tail keywords to illustrate his SEO tactics are working. He also tells me he lacks traffic and real revenue resulting from all the time he has allocated to his ... Read More
SEO Can’t Help a Website That Sucks
Each week I speak with potential SEO clients who ask me to “make their phone ring”. It is an honorable request, but I struggle with this because in many cases, SEO alone can’t solve their problems. SEO can help, but once the website visitor arrives to their website, they’ll run screaming for the hills. I’m not a website snob and I value the small business owner and his desire to bring sales in through the internet. I think internet marketing is critical for many small businesses, because it ... Read More
Have a Seat Ms. Website Owner, It’s Time for Introspection
When a client signs a contract with me for a web design, the first thing I do is send them a three page questionnaire and request they answer as many questions as they deem appropriate. This questionnaire helps me get inside their heads and it helps me better understand their marketing objectives, the opinion of their existing website, and their overall view of internet marketing. I ask a lot of questions about the current and future state of their sales process and marketing programs. While ... Read More
If You Connect With Website Visitors They Will Convert
The Problem With Most Websites A lot of small business owners launch their website with the simple goal of using the site as an information portal and a mechanism to talk about their company. It is basic human nature to be egocentric. The problem with this methodology is that it generic. Simply talking about yourself isn’t a differentiator for your website, product, or service offering. It doesn’t compel your website visitor to take action. No matter what the search criteria is, a typical ... Read More
A Box for Every Website Visitor
I tend to compartmentalize things and people. I mentally place people in boxes and segment them out into groups like my nuclear family (husband and kids), my extended family, my neighbors, my best friend and so on. I’ve often referred to these groups as my “boxes” and I do not like them to intermingle or randomly change. These boxes structure my communication and they dictate how I interact with one individual versus another. For example, I know I can pretty much tell my best friend anything ... Read More
Local Search Will Become the Golden Child in 2011
There’s been a lot of talk about local search recently. A lot of SEO experts, including myself, feel local search is still in its infancy stage and as it matures, it will have a major impact on search engine optimization and internet marketing. Many of us feel 2011 is the year in which local search will come of age. Not only come of age, but also become an important part of the internet marketer’s bag of tricks. Remember when most people had no idea what social media was, what it meant, or ... Read More
Migrating a Website Owner Through the Five Stages of Grief
In college I was a Psychology major until I realized I’d have to reach a PhD level education to obtain a job with any real earning potential. That meant staying in college and thousands more in student loans. With much sadness I switched career paths and moved into a world of technology. Flash forward twenty years and I now claim to be an Internet marketer who spends many hours as a WordPress designer and an SEO expert. I love what I do, yet still miss my first love of Psychology. Recently my ... Read More
Fifteen Questions to Ask Your Future Website Designer
Recently my sister decided to launch a website and blog. With my encouragement she selected WordPress as her platform of choice and then set out to locate a WordPress consultant. Why didn’t she come to me you ask? Well honestly, I didn’t want to work with family and I could not begin to meet her list of needs. Sisterhood aside, we both knew we were not an ideal fit for each other. She wanted a cute blog with minimal website functionality and that isn’t my strength. I’m a B2B or B2C girl who ... Read More
Each Page of Your Website is Like a Handshake
Each page of your website is like a handshake. Really. To illustrate this statement, let me set the stage for you. You are manning your company’s booth at a trade show and a prospect wonders by and is within reach. This person looks at your booth, pauses, and then takes a brief moment to ask about your product or service offering. What do you say? Remember - you only have about one minute to make an impression and keep their interest. You have about the time it takes to shake someone’s ... Read More
When a Website Designer’s Good Intentions Go Bad
Today I am meeting with a client to review the design and build of his new website. Quite frankly I’m not looking forward to this meeting. I am the barrier of bad news. When I originally accepted this project, I could see Google had indexed about 1,000 pages within his domain. While it would take some time to migrate and optimize this many pages, I was up for the challenge. The goal is to give him a more SEO friendly site that he can maintain himself in WordPress. If that meant throwing ... Read More
WordPress is the Liberator of Growing Businesses
I have always been a fan of WordPress. Okay, let me rephrase that. Since I discovered WordPress, I have always been a great fan. Similar to other people, I was hesitant at first. I thought it was simply a blogging application with limited capabilities. I equated it to Google’s Blogger and thought it was solely used for bloggers and it was much to limited for a real corporate website. Thankfully, I was wrong. WordPress liberated me and it has liberated many website designers and business ... Read More
Gomez Launches Cool Gizmo for Website Developers
Gomez just released a cool gizmo that reviews a website and displays how it looks across various browsers. Why does this matter some may ask? A single website page can look differently across different browsers such as Internet Explorer, Safari, or Firefox. In fact, different versions of Microsoft's Internet Explorer can make the same website look different if it is not written to manage IE's quirks. Yes, the fact that web developers have to worry about this amazes me as much as it probably ... Read More
In Website Design, Beauty is in the Eye of the Beholder
When it comes designing websites, small businesses are many times victim to the old saying that states "beauty is in the eye of the beholder." Unlike large corporations with large in-house website design and Internet marketing departments, small businesses are left to their own ill-equipped devices or left in the hands of an outsourced website design firm. It generally takes a third party to point out a website's physical and esthetic flaws. Sometimes it takes a few hundred of your dearest ... Read More
Do I Really Need a Website?
Unless you live in a cave and sell your products and services to other cave dwellers, you need a website. As my friend once said, "I have to have a website because everyone else has one." He is right. While he may not be the most technology focused person I know, he is a small business owner and he sells products and services to every day people. Since most of his B2C (business to consumer) prospects use the Internet to research their future purchases, the company must have a website for ... Read More
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