Receiving organic traffic via the search engines is a wonderful thing – especially given that it’s free. However, problems can arise if you rely solely on search engine traffic. Your website may rank well today, but what happens if you wake up tomorrow and your site’s rankings have suddenly dropped? What if you suddenly can’t seem to get new visitors? Will you be able to communicate with most of the people who’d previously visited your online business? Stay Connected You would be very wise to diversify your traffic sources for your website and, more importantly, find a way to keep in touch with the visitors that you have attracted in the first place. One way to do that is by offering a free product, such as a report or an exclusive E-newsletter to anyone who visits your site in exchange for his or her E-mail address. Be mindful, though, that a freebie that has little value will only encourage people – Read the full article
As mentioned here last week, 2011 is about to bring lots of hotness on the World Wide Web. One of the things that we mentioned was the emergence of HTML5, a new markup revision of the HTML standard, and which is expected next year to extend its reach even wider. While HTML5 is still under development, developers, programmers, and tech companies are already adopting a number of its features. Even some of the world’s most popular websites are enabling support for HTML5. How fast it will replace Adobe Flash – if HTML5 will replace it at all – remains to be seen, but just in case you’re keen on checking out what the HTML5 buzz is all about, we’ve compiled a list of websites whose HTML5 features you can test-drive – right now. Dive into HTML5 Authored by Mark Pilgrim, this book explains and demonstrates HTML5 in a no-BS language that’s easy to understand. In the introduction, Pilgrim notes how – Read the full article
Did you know that 20 percent of all searches on the Internet are for specific locations or businesses? Search giant Google did, and that’s why they changed Google Local to Google Places and began to display – for every search query that may be locally or geographically influenced – the local information for businesses, maps, and directions in the search engine results pages (SERPs). Right now, Google displays seven Places results for every search, as well as a map on the right side of the SERP that shows exactly where these seven places are. Obviously, Google Places pages help customers search these maps for local information while finding businesses within their area that are relevant to their search. Meanwhile, for small businesses, mom-and-pops, stores, offices, and other organizations with a physical address, Google Places is a unique local search tool that can drive and direct those who are searching to those who have something to offer or sell. Leverage this – Read the full article
We all get it from time to time: blogger’s block. Like we’ve completely run out of ideas for our blog or website. Like we’ve completely run out of time. Drinking gallons of coffee to no avail; staring at a blank screen for hours; pressing “Save Draft” over and over when, sadly, there isn’t really any “draft”. And with the onset of this “writerly” disease, we wonder: will traffic go down? Will readers soon unsubscribe? Will my online presence suffer from this inability to generate creative, engaging blog content? What about my business? Have I turned into a vegetable? It’s a scary thought, especially considering that one of the best ways to gain visibility, name or brand recognition, and search-engine love in this information-crazy world is to write or blog as best as you can. Calm down. Throw your worry about your writing room window. And beat blogger’s block by following these great tips below: Keep an idea journal. You never – Read the full article
It is no secret that Google has become a dominant influence in the way the Web is accessed and used. The word “Google” itself has become a verb, and people will often begin their web sessions with Google, even if they know the exact URL of the site they want to access. From E-mail to search to maps to shopping, Google dominates the Web experience of millions of Internet users. Google, however, is not just a passive player. The search engine giant extends its influence over every aspect of the Internet it touches and has aspirations to reshape the whole Web in its image. The purpose here is not to determine whether those goals are good or bad, but to highlight the many ways in which Google has already changed the web and what might be on the horizon over the next few years. Searching for Anything and Everything Google’s bread-and-butter is still search, and they have systematically nurtured their – Read the full article
A business today needs to be mobile. Your customers are using their cell phones to access business information. If you aren’t easily accessible on their mobile phones then they’re going to start overlooking you in favor of businesses that are. Here are the tools that you need in order to go mobile with your business: Reinvent your website for the mobile platform. You may have a really amazing Flash website with a lot of interactive features that looks terrific on a desktop computer. However, that’s not going to work correctly on most mobile phones. You need to also have a mobile version of your site. (Lakeshore Branding has a list of really sweet tools here.) Each different mobile platform offers a browser WebKit to help optimize sites for the web. It’s worth it to work with a professional who is knowledgeable about making your website ready for mobile devices. Do local search engine optimization. Doing SEO for your website means taking – Read the full article
First impressions last. That’s why, when it comes to marketing yourself through a website, your homepage will have to be love at first sight. And while the other pages of your website deserve equal attention, they aren’t necessarily of equal importance. A homepage, by its very nature, will typically have a unique set of design goals, content objectives, and mood in order to catch and sustain the attention of visitors. Here’s a list of seven best practices for a more effective homepage: Communicate concisely who you are, what you do, and what your site is for. Don’t leave people in the dark – show them the light, and show them the light in the first five seconds upon arrival. Your company’s name is Charlie’s Tees, and you sell funny shirts and vintage shirts, and your online store is the source of sartorial awesomeness. See? Concise and clear. Do that and you’re off to a good start. (Bonus tip: Make sure that these – Read the full article
If you run and manage your own website or blog, chances are you probably already know what a sitemap is. And what it looks like. But do you know exactly what it’s for? A sitemap is essentially a list of your website’s pages – often organized in hierarchical order, showing how each of these pages are linked or related. It can be in the form of a document, or an actual web page, with a general top-down view of the overall contents of your website – much like, say, a “table of contents” would list and describe the pages of a book. A sitemap will typically also identify the URLs of each web page, and the data under each section, so that arriving at any one of your website’s pages is just a click away. Okay, that’s cool and all, but why do you need to create your own sitemap? How will it affect your website content, if it’s nothing – Read the full article
