SEO (search engine optimization) is growing ever more complex, with many businesses already having figured out their bottleneck problems in terms of fixing their website so it’s “SEO-friendly.” Link-building, however, is a trickier area, with agencies far and wide approaching this practice from all angles. Here are some top tips to make sure you are maximizing the most from your link building campaign and helping yourself create a powerful backlink profile! 1. Link Replication Look into the backlink profile of your competitors and see what sites link to them. Most of the time, you will find that you will be able to replicate the link to your own site. 2. Be Honest About The Links When asking for a link from a site, just be honest about what you need. Most of the time, you’ll find the relationship will work a lot better, not just for you, but also for other parties. 3. Bad link networks Be wary of – Read the full article
When I first heard about the upcoming Over Optimization Penalty, I sighed heavily and longed for the days when my knowledge of such things did not extend much beyond the pros and cons of PPC vs SEO. Sometimes, ignorance truly is bliss. After spending the past couple of years working for one of the best SEO firms in the country, I know all too well the panic an algorithm change of this kind can incite across the blogosphere. But as long as the Internet exists, SEO will serve a purpose and reports of its death are not just premature but completely ludicrous. Of course, if you are dependent on black hat techniques and invest in quick fixes instead of quality content, you should be afraid and that does not sadden me in the least bit. On the other hand, a change of this kind still has the potential to harm reputable sites that engage in ethical SEO practices and, as – Read the full article
I once heard a friend say, “If you ever decide you want to work your butt off every day, try opening a restaurant!” Ain’t that the truth?! The restaurant business can be one of the most grueling, thankless, frustrating businesses in the world. It can also be one of the most creative, profitable, and rewarding businesses. It all depends on how it goes for you. Like most businesses, restaurants seem to be getting more competitive all the time. Sometimes, it’s not even a matter of who has the best food or the best prices. It’s all the business nuances: advertising, management, personnel, accounting, management of funds. Here are a few ideas that may help you to keep on cooking: Maximize Web presence As you know, these days, Web presence is everything. If you don’t have a website, you don’t exist to most people. Walk-by traffic and word of mouth advertising are great, but you need more than that to really thrive. You need a killer website – Read the full article
With the boom of the Internet, almost everybody, from businesses to individuals, to the celebrity and even just the ordinary people have established a presence in the World Wide Web by creating their own website. Creating a website is very easy especially now that there are a lot of free and user-friendly content management platforms (like WordPress) where anybody can start a website. But because there are millions of websites that abound, competing to be known in the Internet world by ranking at the top of popular search engine results is difficult and can be a very big challenge for any website owner. This is where Search Engine Optimization or SEO comes into the picture. Website owners can implement SEO strategies to improve their site performance and position themselves to be found online. With WordPress, you can take advantage of the platform’s plugin architecture to enhance your ability to implement your SEO strategies. And there are loads of SEO plug-ins that have been – Read the full article
When you try and use Internet marketing and blogging to bring in more business, it is essential to think about each word that you publish. Each page of your website needs to have a goal and each blog post must be aimed at achieving the following: Providing readers with information regarding your business and industry Creating a call for action Encouraging sales Working on optimizing the website Providing customer service Building brand recognition Installing trust Fitting all that into a blog post of around 300 to 500 words may seem like a lot but with the help of SEO copywriters, each of your blog posts can achieve all of those goals for you. Working on Web Copy Your website will no doubt be split up into different sections; what they are will depend upon the services and products that you provide. Most websites will have the obligatory Welcome page, About Us page, and the Contact page. These need to be – Read the full article
If you’re going to ask us here at Lakeshore Branding which e-commerce platform we would recommend, there’s one answer: Magento. Why? Because it’s loaded with powerful features to help you drive sales: features like product browsing, analytics and reporting, catalog and order management, secure checkout, international support, and an array of marketing promotions and tools. (You can find out more about the platform here.) We’ll understand, though, if you choose to go with something else. Hey, to each his own, right? And there are loads of e-commerce solutions and shopping cart systems to choose from. One of these is OpenCart, an open-source e-commerce platform that’s as feature-rich, easy-to-use, and search-engine-friendly as Magento. Frankly, you won’t go wrong with either. We’ll even help you out developing your online store if you like. Anyway, like Magento, OpenCart also enables you to customize the way your online store looks and works. Because it’s an “out-of-the-box” solution, you can just install it, choose your – Read the full article
If you are the proud owner of a new website, then you know how confusing and downright difficult the process of designing and building a website can be. It’s not uncommon to go through the trouble of finding a hosting service and choosing a domain name, only to get stuck when it comes to actually putting a site together and making it presentable for viewers. Fortunately, there are some very basic things, even for newbies, that can make the process much easier. Here are some simple web design tips for new website owners: Templates. One of the fastest and easiest ways to design an effective website is to choose a customizable template. Customizable templates are easy to find. Simply search online, load them to your site, and make whatever changes you want to make the design your own. If you use a blog hosting service like WordPress to build your website, you will be pleased to find that you automatically have – Read the full article
In an October 2011 report by ComScore, it was found that smartphones and tablets drive nearly 7 percent of digital traffic in the US. The number is bound to increase, especially as increased Wi-Fi availability and mobile broadband adoption continue to drive connectivity. Other key findings in the report include: 116 million people in the US alone are users of mobile media. Nearly half of those who own tablets (such as the Apple iPad) made or completed a purchase using their tablet. Publishers are extending their reach to cross-platform audiences who own smartphones, tablets, and other Web-enabled mobile devices (such as the iPod Touch). What does this all mean? It means that if you’re a publisher, Internet marketer, online advertiser, SEO specialist, social media marketer, online retailer, e-Commerce store owner, blogger, developer, Web designer, etc. – if you, at the very least, have a website that’s meant to showcase your work or help you do business – then you now – Read the full article
