When I called Israel My Webmaster had disappeared, leaving my expanding Massage business in Hollywood, California without a website.
Israel Immediately put up a new URL at http://relaxitsjustmassage.info/
Not having a website was critical to me because much of my business books appointments online, and I sell coupons for a group of discounted massages that are a critical part of my income. To compound matters, I am in the process of expansion with locations in Hawaii and Arizona. We intent to become a franchise eventually, so out website efforts are very important.
I am a very qualified massage therapist and an excellent business woman, but had always relied on someone else to do my website and have had a series of bad experiences.
Israel not only got me up and running with Wordpress: he made the website rank for many searches:
relaxing massage Hollywood California Google Search
He actually, somehow, by writing about me, made me come up on many searches in multiple places on the page with the brand new site, something the other guy could not do on many times the budget (what I bought from Israel: “SEO Blog” was only $479)
One of our current partners, Brian Bentow, is a computer programmer who wrote a book about computer related injuries: his experiences prior to meeting us, and the processes he went through learning about self-publishing a book, are valuable to anybody who has something to say, and who wants to get the word out for pleasure and/or profit. In fact, this is easier and less expensive than ever before, but there are many out-dated methods and services to be avoided. This article will help the reader avoid spending the money, time, and anguish that Brian experienced on this, his journey:
“My name is Brian Bentow and I published my book called The Computer Athlete’s Handbook: Your Guide to a Happier, Healthier Techy Lifestyle through CreateSpace, Amazon Kindle, and MobiPocket over a year ago and had moderate success. I sold around 100 copies, mostly through Amazon.com, http://www.amazon.com/Computer-Athletes-Handbook-Healthier-Lifestyle/dp/0982044704/.
I had read Dan Poytner’s Self-Publishing Manual. I recommend reading that book. However, the version I read was a bit outdated and did not discuss the benefits of Print-On-Demand services at great length perhaps because they were relatively new at the time. Consequently, I had to do my own research and make my own decisions. I decided to do Print-On-Demand because it has the following benefits:
1. You can update the content of your book at any time and I wanted to get feedback and planned to make a new edition in the future (This turned out to be extremely important because after I broke up with my girlfriend, I needed to update my dedication page.)
2. You don’t have to worry about returns, shipping, or fulfillment
3. You don’t have to buy a few thousand books and invest several thousand dollars and garage space
4. Createspace has a special program to put your book on Amazon.com for you
5. You can always do a large print in the future if the book becomes very successful and distribute the book through bookstores
T hese guys deserve credit; this theme: Suffusion WordPress theme by Sayontan Sinha is the best, most user friendly, feature rich, customizable theme I have found: I have just changed mine to this one instead of the one I built from scratch, and I will be using this one for most WordPress setup.
In Two and a half hours I have done all three of these sites from scratch using this theme, which also allows for different numbers of columns, different widget areas, and any other modification you like, with check boxes that activate built-in style sheet and a blank CSS that automatically overrides the others:
According to this article at the California Healthcare Foundation website:
“
“New regional reports highlight variation in health care affordability, access, and quality
California’s sprawling size and the diversity of its regional health care systems result in care that is organized, delivered, and financed differently throughout the state.
As part of its continuing effort to explore this variation, the California HealthCare Foundation (CHCF) today published six regional market reports, providing a first-time, in-depth analysis of six distinct California health care economies. The goal is to better understand the market dynamics for each region studied (the San Francisco Bay Area, Sacramento, Fresno, Los Angeles, Riverside/San Bernardino, and San Diego). Topics include the supply and organization of hospitals, physicians, and other providers; and the accessibility of services for low-income residents — of particular importance during the economic downturn…”
The report goes on:
Once upon a time, building and promoting websites, if you were good at it, was a great business.
However, the best things on the Internet have always either been free, or so inexpensive that anyone could afford them.
When the code standards and options were more complicated, due to the gradual learning curve of users and a huge generational gap with computer technology in general, there was a nice market gap for Internet professionals, including me, who built huge multi-million dollar service companies providing Internet technology – and some still do.
Now you can have an E-Book marketing system blog by purchasing our amazing power immediately for $299, or complete with hosting for one year, your own domain, strategic posting and promotion, and ongoing training, promotion and support for as little as $479.00.
Why have a website that nobody sees? We promise traffic and functionality that puts you in control of your own destiny.
The best things on the web are either free or so inexpensive that anybody can get in the game – it is consistent performance and success resulting form the expertise to make it al work together that are hard to find!
When Roni German types into Google: Belfair Washington Real Estate into a Google search. Her Belfair Washington Real Estate Blog comes up on the third page instead of the first. (http://peninsulahomeresource.com/)
She has previously been on page one, even line one several times. The reason for the dropping is the title of this article: a website is never done, is always in need of upgrading and promotion. She still comes up line one on “Olympic Penninsula Homes“, a less competitive search without so much competition from huge lead generators like Yahoo real estate, Homegain, Homes.com, Realtor.com and the others who are on the first page. These huge sites are constantly adding new real estate clientele who pay them, and new information, and, since everything on the Internet is new, old, or dead – they rank.
A frequent question from many of our clients is “what do I write” or “how do I write.” Here are some good ideas for creating quality content for your site. Keep in mind that the article and/or post will be used for the first initial posting and/or initial article marketing efforts.
It must be unique – different from the information on your website.
This content is used to promote you as an authority in your field. You will need to compose (or have someone compose) an initial individual or company bio that invokes authority. It should say who you are, what your experience is and why they should respect your opinion and recommendations.
Many customers provide two posts, initially:
One as an introduction which contains a bio or description;
Another post, containing content that can be used for promotion.
Example: An article offering tips and advice or discussing industry-related problems and solutions.
Sample Posts
In order to illustrate this, here is a sample ABOUT/ARTICLE section of the questionnaire. In this example, Blue Widget, Inc. manufactures and provides specialized service and support for blue widgets in the widget industry. Their current website is a brochure site that encourages visitors to buy blue widgets and offers support information.
Author Bio:
Paul Smith is the president of Blue Widgets Inc, a manufacturer of premium blue widgets. He has 15 years of experience in the widget industry, dealing with small businesses as well as large corporate clients. He is interested in helping people discover blue widgets and has worked for hundreds of clients over the course of his twenty years in the field. Paul is a member of the Blue Widget Professionals’ Organization and holds an MBA from Washington State University, where he focused on blue widget fabrication techniques. Paul enjoys playing golf on weekends and spends as much time as he can with his family.
Examples of types of posts you can write:
1. Tip post
Top 10 Tips for using Blue Widgets in your industry.
Hundreds of companies have discovered the value in premium blue widgets. Once you’ve bought a blue widget there are some easy things you can do to get more out of them. Here are ten simple tips to optimize your blue widget usage:
- Be a _____
- Watch _____
- Be sure to ______
- Know ____
- Use ___ when _____
(Recap of news / industry related item)
“Blue Widget Sales up 1,000%
In the past week, Widget Magazine (link here) published a story about blue widget sales being up 1000%. This is another example of mainstream media giving attention to the new blue widget phenomenon. I expect growth to continue for some time, now.”
“From my experience as president of Blue Widget Inc, more and more smaller companies in the widget industry are seeing the tangible quality difference that sets blue widgets apart in their field. This shift is paving the way for a more large-scale industry migration towards blue widgets.” –Paul Smith, as quoted in “Widget Monthly Digest”.
2. FAQ Post
Q. What the difference between green widgets and blue widgets?
A. That’s a question I run into a lot, both from those who are new in the field, as well as those who’ve been involved in widgets for some time.
3. Further Ideas
a. Comment on a news item in your industry / field;
b. Answer a basic question that a perspective user / buyer may have;
c. Post and comment on some type of metric or article published somewhere else;
d. Relate personal stories or anecdotes, this is the place to be human and speak directly to your audience.
Here are some quick links to excellent articles about creating valuable content and a more effective blog:
http://socialmediasystems.com/11/12/business-blogging-tips-for-non-writers/
http://socialmediasystems.com/10/24/dont-be-an-im-a-realtor-too-site-stand-out-market-your-site-with-quality-content/
http://socialmediasystems.com/04/11/10-rarely-used-quick-and-easy-tips-to-supercharge-your-blog/
We hear this often: these guys had results immediately, while I have been doing everything and got no results. It is true: the same people continue to succeed, while others continue to fail: our beta testers in Denver who got immediate results, continue to succeed: they got 42 leads last month we just learned.
There are many reasons for this: I will list a few:
- I will get connected so I know it when I get a lead
- I will syndicate an RSS feed that originates at my Domain
- I will become an authority for my area and/or niche topic
- I will rank on the first page organic search results
- I will convert my dead site to be interactive
- I will become a do-it-yourself video blogger
- I will reduce my bounce rate to below 50%
- I will treat my website like an asset, instead of an obligation
- I will build value in my web-property real estate
- I will use my presence in my listing presentation
- I will blog testimonials
- I will add sticky social media features like forums
- I will stop letting my geek write my ad-copy
- I will seek reliable professional help this time
- I will get serious about online media in 2008!
How many times have you heard “Wow! Thanks for getting back to me so fast!”?
I thought so: me too!
I run into a lot individuals and companies afraid to jump into blogging, because they aren’t natural writers. Here is a video with some tips on how you can use blogs to increase your business even if you’re not a natural writer.
My take on Open Social:
Open Social is a revolution and I’ve already signed up on the dev list to gain access to the orkut sandbox. Soon everyone will have full access to the social graph across a vast number of networks (everything from linkedin to myspace or plaxo), the difficult task becomes creating widgets and server-less applications that use the social information in a meaningful way to spread virally, promote services, and provide value for the largest number of users.
Early adapters (as with all technology) will see HUGE traffic gains and increase their reach / user-base. I recommend moving VERY quickly and producing widgets and applications which use the social API as soon as possible.
What makes you stand out as a realtor from the dime-a-dozen me-too sites that abound in the real estate industry? Is it the cool graphics? Usability? Layout? These are all important factors, but people tend to pay more attention to them and less to simple components like good content, which can make a big difference in how successful your site is online.
For example, take a look at some of our local authors, especially prolific writers like Legacy Real Estate and Gitta. These clients have gotten tons of leads and traffic. Why? Because they consistently provide good content that is totally relevant to their readers.
In a competitive industry like real estate, everyone is searching for the best way to stand out and creating a steady flow of good content, from video and text to podcasts, is integral to gaining a strong presence online. People searching for real estate in your area WANT to know about it. They’re searching for the best location for themselves or their family; they want to know everything: where to find the best schools, markets, neighborhoods and more.
And who better to help them than you?
With years of experience as a real estate professional, you can help your readers and potential clients find what they need, when they need it, just as you do in every-day interactions offline. Approach any creation of content the same way you would approach a potential client and keep in mind the audience for which you’re writing. There is goldmine of information inside your mind, you just need to sit down and start typing. If you don’t want to write, record yourself talking and upload it as a podcast or create a video blog; there are numerous options available.
Text Specific Content:
The most common form content takes currently is text, but this is gradually changing. “But I’m not a writer” you might say. However, think about the accumulated knowledge in your head and how much you know about the areas you service and the real estate industry in general.
Before you start writing, take a moment and pick two or three target keywords. For example, a target keyword phrase if you’re a realtor in Orlando Florida might be “Finding Homes for Sale in Orlando, Florida” or “Real Estate in Orlando Florida.” Just think about what you’re going to write about and choose the keywords based off your topic. If you’re writing about home mortgages, make sure you include home mortgages once per paragraph. Simple elements like this will make your articles seo-friendly.
Here are a couple forms of common, highly effective article formats:
The Top Ten List
10 (or 5 or 7) Tips for Finding a Home in (City, State)
Intro paragraph – give a little background and stats about the city and state here.
1) Consider where you want to be in City, State
Always look at the areas in and around City, State. Decide which are is ideal for you and your family…
2) Find the right realtor
Find a realtor who really knows their stuff…
Tip 3
….
Tip 4
….
Tip 5
Tip 6
Tip 7
Tip 9
Tip 10
Conclusion- tell the reader why this area is great and why they should think about buying a home here, e.g. neighborhoods to see and things to keep in mind.
The Topic List
Buying Your First Home
Selling Your Home
Getting Your First Mortgage
Topics like those above can take any format you want, but the most effective are short paragraphs with headers:
Selling Your Home
Intro – Introduce and reiterate topic, then follow with something like ” If you’re thinking about selling your home in somewhere, here are some things to keep in mind:”
Get an experienced real estate agent.
An experienced real estate agent can make all the difference in getting a great price for your home…
Take your family’s home needs into account.
Think about the type of neighborhood or home that is best suited for your family…
Conclusion-why, when, how and where.
The answer most web designers will give without even a hint of thought is 1024 X 768. While on the surface that may seem like logical choice since according to most website’s analytics, it’s the resolution group with the highest amount of visitors. The problem with this answer is it doesn’t take into account who the visitors are and what their conversion rate on your site is. It’s turns out that (depending on the site) about 30-50% of your visitors at low resolutions will probably not be from the U.S., which is great if your target market is international, but not especially useful if it’s not.
I’ve also found a correlation between low conversion rates and low screen resolutions. Although 1024 X 768 may be the most numerous group, it may not be the most profitable. I would take a look or have your professional web designer / developers take a deep look at your analytics and help you figure that stuff out, it’s important. We provide analytics and analysis for our customers as we help them try to get the most of their website and target the right visitors.
Ideally I want a website to look it’s best in 1280 X 1024 and above, because those are the customers that are the most likely to convert and are the wave of the future as all resolutions are constantly increasing. It is important though, that a modern website be viewable and readable at 1024 X 768, in addition to working on mobile devices like the super hyped (and super cool) iphone.
Occasionally I talk to progressive companies that have taken the leap into social media and have implemented full social communities with lots of features that enable users to interact on the site, but when I look at their site I discover a proprietary custom scripted website. In most cases this is a GIANT Mistake.
I simply don’t understand why you wouldn’t build “on top” of an already existing open source content management platform. It’s much faster to develop, and more importantly much easier to upgrade and keep up to date. Things change online everyday, if you have a custom solution you’re spending tons of money to have developers keep it updated and add new features. Also, if you want to change developers, you’re screwed – it’s going to be slow and expensive for them to learn your system and then code for it.
Why not harness the power of thousands and in some cases tens and hundreds of thousands of developers constantly improving and updating possibilities by building on an open source content management system and then customizing it from there. It’s much faster to deploy, is more stables, has more features, and cost 1/10 as much. That’s what we provide. I got a lot of questions about our backend with many of the old school tech people expecting me to say we use proprietary scripts, – we don’t . We customize and modify on top of open source scripts and bundle everything with strategy and promotion which results in faster development and better sites.
In this article we’ll take a look at some of the dos and donts of website usability.
First, lets explore the dos:
Do make the call to action more prominent visually and make it stick out more on the page.
Do include a one sentence tagline that says what the site or company does.
Do add a search box to any website over one hundred pages.
Do give the visitors at least one call to action on each page, because each page should specify what it wants the user to do. For example, a call to action would be a link under an article that says “read more on this topic” or “read more.”
Do use color to distinguish between visited and unvisited links.
Do ensure that people are able to find what they entered the site or page looking for within three clicks. If you have a large website, this is more difficult, but keep it as low as possible. Also, even though you might have a hundred or more pages, you can still arrange the individual pages on your site to have information readily available in three clicks.
Now that we’ve heard some of of the dos of web design, let’s take a look at the donts:
Don’t make the font on your page too small. 12 point font and up is the way to go if you want to avoid straining people’s eyes. Also, stay away from fancy, hard to read, or all bold text. Go with web standards like Verdana or Arial. Remember that both Verdana and Arial were developed through hours and hours of research by Microsoft to find the font that was easiest on people’s eyes. And there is a reason these fonts are used on many major websites. These legibility problems are a major factor in the usability of a website.
Don’t have text that in one long block. Breaking it up into paragraphs, and better yet, paragraphs with headers, makes it easy to scan with the eyes. Text that is one long block is difficult and often annoying for users. People want information quickly and efficiently. Bold key words and break your information into paragraphs under specific headers to help your users find what they need.
Don’t have graphics and animation that don’t connect to page content. This is important for cohesiveness, and if its lacking, everything else on your site will be far less effective.
Don’t have a website that is compatible with some browsers and not others. Your browser needs to work in all major programs, like MozillaFirefox and Internet Explorer.
Don’t make your users fill out big, long forms. People hate long forms that take forever to fill out, and you probably agree. So stay away from them when optimizing your website for usability.
Don’t forget to check the log for your website periodically to see what pages your customers are entering and exiting on your site. If you find a large amount of customers exiting on one particular page on your website, that can be a sign of a usability problem.
For previous articles in our SEO basics series, please see below:
Creating a Usable Website That Converts – SEO Basics Part 4
Researching Your Keywords – SEO Basics Part 3
What is Search Engine Optimization? SEO Basics Part 2
What is a Search Engine? – SEO Basics Part 1
One of the most important considerations when purchasing products, services and/or software solutions for a website is the reliability, versatility, and loyalty of the vendors on which this important facet of your business depends.
There is much misinformation and scare tactics are common among vendors who have an ax to grind: they seek to scare you and keep you in the dark to control you and your purchases by keeping you ignorant and/or dependent on them for your technology.
Custom written, proprietary solutions have this disadvantage, and, unless you are a huge company with the resources to own and replace if necessary the personnel on which such an application depends, I must recommend that you use only open-source solutions. The problems with proprietary solutions are many:
In order to maintain our rankings at our old site (rothmanmarketing.com) (which now is a 301 redirect to this one) without losing our first page search engine recognition for:
…and many others too numerous to count: we had some considerations: we really should have taken the time to manufacture a special redirect for each of about 200 seperate articles which are syndicated at Webpro News, Real Estate magazine and others; but we already have significant placement at our 90 day old re-branded website (this one) because it has over 5000 incoming authority links and growing (due to our syndication as one of the most read blogs in the world): so we used a 301 (permanent) redirect instead: we used the Wordpress rewrite modual:
Many people do not know this, but the latest version of WordPress, combined with our optimized themes (this website is one) can fully automate a website, even for someone who knows absolutely no HTML at all, with limited computer savvy:
- As many static pages as desired can be built by simply posting, just like a blog post – the pages are automatically built from a stylesheet
- The programming itself can build a Google sitemap daily, and META tags completley eliminating on-site SEO
- When submitted and syndicated properly, each post pings the whole world to tell everybody the new data is there
- Coveted key words for targeted searches can be built into the title and descriptionto be re-printed linking back to the site
- The ever-increasing number of optimized pages and link-popularity resulting from such an effort creates search engine traffic and rankings
- The knowledge base form regular postings becomes a searchable internet resource for visitors, increasing page rank
- Many wonderful features like voting and author profiles make the site more sticky, increasing conversion rates
- Widgets from MyBlogLog and others can further enhance the experience by showing and tracking the visitors, and more
- Entire inventories can be easily uploaded without graphics expertise, and shopping cart technology can be built in in an SEO friendly way
- Because the information originates at the root URL (not on an outside blog) first page search placement is achieved on Google and others!
This is why we say that brochure sites are dead: http://socialmediasystems.com/02/21/death-of-the-brochure-site/
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