Small Business SEO

Small Business SEO

If you are a small or start-up business this article describes the financial cost, risks and benefits of Small Business SEO Services.

In today’s world of high speed digital commerce it’s vital that every small business maintains an internet presence. That’s a no brainer, however, having an internet presence and being found by customers are two different things. Tuning in to the keywords your customers use and providing content that fulfils their wants and needs and builds confidence in your company is a skilled chalange. But let me just start of by saying that Small Business SEO isn’t just about rankings, well its part of it, it’s the leading the horse to water part. You still have to get the horse to drink!

SEO in its most simplistic definition is simply a means to an end; it’s just about gaining rankings and getting visitors to your site. Well the SEO industry has matured a great deal in its short history, Small Business SEO Services go way beyond this basic interpretation. If they didn’t, the worth of SEO would be much less than it is and rather than having to turn business away, professional SEO’s would be sitting on their hand waiting for the next job to come along.

Has Reality Set In Yet

SEO is in demand not just because it drives search engine rankings, but because it drives sales and profitability. The thing is, top search engine rankings don’t necessarily correlate to increased sales, unless you target the right keywords that attract the right customers and provide them with the information that they seek. Yet, every day businesses all over the world businesses launch websites thinking that sales will just automatically happen. It doesn’t take long for reality to set in.

If this is the stage you’re at it’s worthwhile considering your options, how do you get visitors to your website and get them to buy the products and services you provide?

How Much?!!!!

Often when I break the price to a client there is a long pregnant pause while it sets in, after which the response “How much?” is uttered a tone that can only be described as a full octave higher than then the clients normal pitch. SEO comes with a large price, after all, you are buying the expertise of someone who can turn an also ran into a racing certainty.

And therein lies the risk for small business, it can represent an investment that can rob finances other vital areas of your business. But there is a better way that is slowly being adopted by the SEO industry and one that completely removes the financial risk.

Pay For Performance SEO

The concept of Pay For Performance SEO is simple, you pay nothing until the results you want are achieved. It makes much more sense than charges based on ‘time on job’, As a client you probably care little about how many hours it takes to accomplish the goals you have set out. Nor does it make any sense for a small business to pay up front for a service that can’t be guaranteed to succeed. Pay For Performance SEO is performance based, after all SEO is a performance based industry, so you only ever have to pay when prearranged goals have been successfully achieved.

Sure you still have to pay, every silver lining has a cloud, at that time however, you will already have achieved your goals and enjoying the rewards that come with it. Many Small Business SEO packages now include Pay For Performance as an option.

The Benefits of Small Business SEO Services

The benefits of SEO for the small business are many, too many to fully cover in one article. The point is customers are online right now searching for the products or services that you provide. By having a website that can’t be found you are playing an important part in the success of your competitors. Every time they make a sale its one lost to you.

SEO raises the visibility and awareness of your products among your target customers, it extends the reach of your products and opens up a global markets that was hitherto unreachable. If you are interested in Small Business SEO Services Talk to an SEO Today.

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How To Set Up Keywords And Also Keyword Phrases Effectively On Your Website

Lots of people start building links when they want to get a better search engine ranking, when in fact these individuals should first make sure their Internet site is optimized correctly. Placing your keywords properly all through your website will be able to help you get a far better ranking in the search engines. Here you will learn exactly where your keywords should be placed in order to get better search engine rankings for your Internet site.

A lot of you may already be aware but your keyword or keyword phrase needs to be in your URL, this is the actual website address. Obviously this exact same thing goes for all you bloggers out there, every post should the keyword inside the URL. If you happen to utilize the wordpress platform you are able to change the perma-link as you’re creating your post, just make certain that the perma-link is your keyword phrase.

You also have to be mindful of all the tags on your site including the header tags such as the H1, H2 and also the H3 tags. All those tags listed must have your keywords inside them. What this is going to do would be to help the search engine spiders see that the first thing on your website or page is your keywords.

Many of you have likely heard of the first sentence rule. This basically means that every single page you develop should have the keyword or keyword phrase within the first sentence of the content. Now the last sentence rule is one thing I bet the majority of you do not know about. Essentially the same as previously mentioned you have to have the keyword in the last sentence of the content.

There’s one more factor you need to manage referred to as keyword density and this is also very important. This is actually the amount of times your key phrase is found on the website compared to the number of words on the page. A keyword density of 3 to 5 percent is where you will want to be. Any more than that and the various search engines may well target you for keyword stuffing.

One more thing you will want to take care of is how you format all of the keywords on the page. When ever feasible, and in every case you will need to use the bold, underline and the italic settings on your keywords. So every time your keyword is found in the content it needs to be in one of those three formats. You will additionally want to make sure you mix them up. Don’t just place all your keywords in bold print throughout the entire page.

If you stick to these simple keyword rules any time your creating websites or posts you will end up with a higher ranking. Yet another thing on the building backlinks portion, is that you will need to start developing links to all the pages on your website or blog and not focus on only the home page.

If you do not have the inclination or spare time to manage your SEO and would prefer a professional to manage for you then you should hire the services of a professional SEO firm. If you would like some help with your SEO strategy then why not visit www.evosystems.co.uk, a Midlands SEO company.

Getting Residual Income as an Website Developer

Have you ever wanted to learn how to make money online as an internet marketer? This is an extremely difficult question to answer because there are so many complex factors involved. Specifically they techniques you employ in your Internet marketing campaign as well as the execution of these techniques can determine whether or not Internet marketing will work for your business. Additionally, the likelihood of your target audience using the Internet and responding to your marketing efforts should also be considered into the equation. This article will outline the potential for success in an Internet marketing campaign.

Content on your website can influence the size of the target audience you are able to reach by helping to improve your search engine rankings. With your content capable of doing so much, it is clear you should be hiring a professional content writer to assist you writing the copy for your website. This article will delve deeper into the importance of providing accurate, concise and informative content on your website when you are marketing online.

Conducting market research can do a great deal to help you determine whether or not you should invest in an Internet marketing campaign for your business. This step is very important because it will give you a good indication of whether or not you should even begin marketing your business on the Internet. Hiring a firm specializing in market research is recommended because they can conduct this research quickly and efficiently and will likely gain a great deal of valuable information as a result of their research efforts. If they determine your business can benefit from an Internet marketing campaign, it is time to start thinking about how you want to advertise your business online.

One of the most basic reasons why the quality of the content on your website is so important is because visitors to your website will likely form their initial opinions of your website based on the content on your website. If the copy is poorly written, does not hold the visitors attention and does not promote your products and services well visitors are likely to exit your website without making a purchase. Conversely, if the copy on your website is well written, engages the reader and promotes the products and services you offer the visitor is more likely to investigate the website further to learn more about the products and services and may make a purchase. The content of your website will be one of the aspects of the website which is first noticed by visitors so it is important for this content to be well written.

Well written sales copy can also be very persuasive and may compel visitors to the website to purchase the products or services offered on the website. This is important especially if the main purpose of the website is to sell the products or services.

Search Engine Marketing Scotland

Search Engine Marketing Scotland: This post discusses how search engine marketing can benefit Scottish businesses and why it should be considered an important component of any well balanced marketing campaign.

The largest part of search engine traffic goes to those Web pages that are positioned on the first page of search engine results. This traffic represents potential customers who (through the keywords they use to search) are openly declaring an interest in the products or services they are searching for. Many are searching for the products and services that you sell and have already made the decision to buy.

The Local Market

In October 2008 the printed Yellow Pages were relegated to second place for local search surpassed by online search. The information available to consumers through Yellow Pages is limited and the expectation that every company has an informative website somewhat marginalises the benefits of printed directories like Yellow Pages.

The International Market

Scottish products are exported to every corner of the globe and brands like Baxters, Camp Coffee, Ultimo (designer lingerie brand), The Macallan and of course our other national drink Irn Bru are globally recognised household names. The perception of Scottish products abroad is one of quality and value. 

Search Engine Marketing

Top 10 search engine rankings for a broad range of relevant keyword phrases means your site is far more likely to get traffic from a local, national and international perspective. Search engine marketing allows you to deliver your marketing message directly into the offices or sitting rooms of your customers regardless of whether they are located on the other side of the street or the other side of the world.

How To Avoid A Nervous Breakdown Updating Your Website!

Introduction

When I decided I needed a website for my business I had no idea of the planning involved. Like most people, I thought web design meant deciding on the graphics and the look of the pages and then by some magic it would all happen.
I have a friend who is in the business of web design and Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) so I approached him for a quote. As a complete novice who is computer literate up to a point, I was amazed at the depth of initial questioning required to find out exactly what my requirements were.

I had no idea about the various aspects and the structure of the site and I found it mind blowing when I learned about the amount of work involved. So I thought other people would be interested to know more about this complicated process and I have asked my friend to supply the technical information for this article.

Stages in the Process

Target Audience

Before building a website there are important questions to consider. I was asked who would be my potential audience. Who are my customers likely to be? Would they be children, businesses, home owners, sales people, parents or teenagers and so on?

The objective of the website

Then I was asked, what was the objective of my website? Did I want to sell products on line or use it to market my business and get more leads for possible customers? Maybe I would want to use it as an online brochure to showcase products. Another possibility was to use the website to foster a community so that I was in contact with other like-minded people, with chat rooms, online discussion and being supported by advertising on the site.

I hadn’t quite realised the scope of a website but as I was asked these questions it became clear that a lot of careful planning went into the preparation before building a website.

How to be Found on the Web

One of the first questions I was asked was, ‘Do you want it to be found by Google the main search engine?’ If I did then there was a whole process of establishing Keywords. So finding the best keywords are vital if you want to be found in Google. Generally most users only look at the top ten results so you will also want to promote your website to get on this page for your chosen keywords. By using a keyword research tool you can find the single most popular keyword for your industry.

Your Domain Name

Choosing a domain name is often quite a challenge because every name you initially come up with will almost certainly have been taken. Domain names ending in .com are by far the most popular and internationally recognised; the snag is that it’s very popularity means that the majority of the shorter names have already been registered.
So looking at names with endings such as .net; .co.uk or .info may be able to provide you with the domain name you are after.

When a building is scheduled for demolition part of the process is to undertake asbestos survey research which our company does, we were able to register a domain name with the word demolition in it back in 2004 because we were given good advice and this ties in quite well with the service meaning we get quite a few enquiries about it via our website, apparently these days there are less choices for really good domain names but given enough time and creativity you can usually find something suitable.

When choosing your domain name it is very important to include one or more of your keywords if possible as this can apparently help with search engine rankings. So although the name of your business is the obvious choice for a domain name, it is not necessarily the only option.

Creating a Site Map

As with any project you must have a plan, the better the plan the better the project turns out. A site map for a web site is part of the plan for the site. The importance of creating a site map is to get it clear in your mind of all the pages you will have on your website so you can prepare the content for each page and begin to design the flow through the website, such as when a user adds a product to their basket, then enters their delivery and billing address and makes the credit card payment in the correct order.

The aim is to make the site as simple to use as possible so that there are no barriers to getting into the website. For that reason often user name and passwordz are set for the customer so that they are not put off making a purchase by having to register.
For a non e-commerce site things are simpler with a contact form which allows you to receive enquiries by email without publishing your email address on the website, thus avoiding spam.Web forms can also validate the information before you receive it, so ensuring that the phone number provided does not contain words, and that the email address is in the correct format, for example. These things may sound very technical to us lay-folk but I assure you everything has to be decided in advance before starting on the construction of the site.

Copy

The next stage is preparing the content. This is not the design of your website – just the words and visuals you want to have one each of the pages.Having gathered all the above information you will need to decide what imagery you want to use within the website content. As we all know, a picture speaks a thousand words and remains in people’s memory far longer than just words.For each image you could also have a caption, as the caption of an image is the next ‘most read’ words on the page after the page title. Images and their captions need to be clickable. When you click on a picture it should take you to the next stage of the process such as the sale page or placing an enquiry if your website is for lead generation.

Navigation

Another important consideration when building a website is how you want your navigation to work. You can have links within the content of your website, in the text, so there are not just links from the menu. You will need to decide whether the links will open into a new window, retaining your original page open. Next time you go online, you will realise how much thought has gone into the way in which a website works.

Website Design

Finally we come to the design of your website. Obviously everyone is different and what we like differs from person to person, web design is no exception to this rule and so when it comes to designing websites for SEO it is hard to please all the people all the time, unless you are an exceptionally talented designer.

What one person might like, another person might not like. If you are setting up a website for yourself alone then you will probably have some idea of what you want to see on the site. But if, as so often happens, the website is for a large corporation there will be inputs from many people or departments and you can be sure that they will never all agree!

There are a number of ways to approach website design but ultimately you need to create a design brief for the designer(s) to work from. Look at other websites and your competitor’s websites to find out what you like or dislike. The design brief should give reference to the logo, any existing brand guidelines or schemes and fonts and colour schemes, and should also detail which pages of the website that the designer is being tasked with creating visuals for.

The very best results will be achieved by using a graphic designer, and beware – not all graphic designers are the same. A graphic designer who designs specifically for print is working in a different discipline than a graphic designer who designs for screen and specifically the web. So choose your designer carefully, look at other work that person has done and determine whether or not you like their style.

If you are working in the big time and budget allows, use multiple graphic designers who have all been given the same design brief and request three concept designs from each designer. If the client themselves also do a graphic design, even if it’s a back of the envelope scribble, you will then have 10 concept designs. The next step is to get them all together and select the preferred elements from each design. Then give the work to the preferred graphic designer to work up as the final artwork.

The artwork should be finalised and agreed on by everybody before construction of the site begins.

Production

Finally the preparation has been done and the site is ready to be constructed. Now for the more technical stuff! You will need to have decided which programming language to use to build the website. There are two main types for developing a website, one is Unix based, and the other is Windows based. Each one has pros and cons. If you are starting from scratch then it probably won’t matter, so you can go with the preference of your professional doing the work. My website is built on the Unix platform (apparently!) which is the same as many of the more well known websites such as Ebay, Facebook, Google and Amazon. Also your website hosting must be compatible with the development language with which your website is built.

Accessibility and Compliance

The website has to meet the current standards for website coding and doing so insures that disabled users, such as the visually impaired, can still access the entire website if they are using a screen reader.

Website Development

The best way to develop a website is on the web Server where the site is going to live. This way, those involved in reviewing the work can see work in progress and provide comments throughout the development.

Unforeseen items

There are always some things that arise in any project which you suddenly realise you have forgotten, so no matter how well the web developer prepares and asks the right questions, there will always be a last minute change or addition. The main aim is to minimise the number of glitches that might arise because they aren’t calculated in and they could cause extra costs and delays on the date of the web site going live.

Going live

The moment of excitement comes when your site finally is published to the internet and you see the results of all the thought that has gone into the whole process. After all the hard work it was great to get our website launched. Who would have thought so much work would have to go into a little old demolition project website.

Reporting and Monitoring

Once your website is up and running, you will want to know how many people visit your website and from that number how many actually buy the products or place an enquiry. From these statistics you can work out the ratio of hits to sales and gradually make changes to improve the ratios. There are some reliable statistics packages such as Google Analytics or Web-Stat.com which allow you to collect and review website visitor data in near real time. All you need to do this is to have a small block of code inserted into each web page on your site.

Another useful service that Web-stat.com provides is to monitor the website and warn you by email or text message if the site is offline. Google Analytics doesn’t yet provide a comparable uptime monitoring service, maybe they just decided it was too much of a headache as it is an intensive service checking a website every 5 minutes to make sure it is still responding and indeed web-stat do promote this difference as one of their unique selling points but it is pretty hard to compete with free. In fact Google Analytics is not quite free, which makes it an even better marketing decision for Google because sometimes it is harder to give things away for free than it is to sell them! Google Analytics is a free service available to Google AdWords advertisers, you don’t actually have to have any AdWords campaigns running but it will cost you a one-time activation fee of £5 (or similar in your local currency) to open your AdWords account, but once you have done that you can go on to use Google Analytics for as many websites as you like.(I am sure there probably is an upper limit to how many websites you can monitor from one account but my web design friend says he has not yet hit that limit and he’s got about 50 sites being tracked in his account!)

Marketing

Once the website is live there are lots of things you can do to market your product or service. The first step is to submit it to the search engines and at the same time write articles, and press releases. Getting links to the site from forums, blogs and other social networking spaces are other options. For more on this subject ask your designer about SEO

Conclusion

Wheww. What an amazing amount of work! I hadn’t realised when I started the process of getting a website up and running, how complicated it all is and how many factors you have to consider before even designing the website. The word web design is really a misnomer, as people often think it’s just about the graphic design on the home page, and the branding of the product. Unless you are a computer buff, most people have no idea how much goes into designing and building a website and the systems that support the work you want it to do. I hope that this article will give readers an understanding and insight into the whole process of website development from start to finish.

My New Website

Introduction

When I decided I needed a website for my business I had no idea of the planning involved. Like most people, I thought web design meant deciding on the graphics and the look of the pages and then by some magic it would all happen.I simply hadn’t had any exposure to the planning and build process which I now know to be extensive!

I have a friend who is in the business of SEO web design and web content management systems so I approached him for a quote. As a complete novice who is computer literate up to a point, I was amazed at the depth of initial questioning required to find out exactly what I wanted to achieve.

I had no idea about the various elements and the structure of the site and I found it mind blowing when I learnt about the amount of work involved. So I thought other people would be interested to know more about this complicated process particularly if you consider yourself a non computer person and have to get a website built. I have asked my SEO friend to supply the technical information for this article.

Stages in the Process 

Target Audience

Before building a website there are important questions to consider. I was asked who would be my target audience. Who are my customers likely to be? Would they be children, businesses, home owners, sales people, parents or teenagers and so on? If you are not clear on your target audience then you are not going to be able to set the tone of the site correctly so this is a very important consideration.

The Objective of the Website

Then I was asked, what was the purpose of my website? Did I want to sell products on line or use it to market my business and get more leads for potential customers? Maybe I would want to use the site as an online brochure to showcase my services. Another possibility was to use the website to foster a community so that I was in contact with other like-minded people, with chat rooms, online discussions and being supported by advertising on the site.

I hadn’t quite realised the scope of a website but as I was asked these questions it became clear that a lot of careful planning went into the preparation before building a website. I realised it is like any project, the majority of the work is in the preparation, a bit like decorating really!

Creating a Site Map

The importance of creating a site map is to get it clear in your mind of all the pages you will have on your website so you can prepare the content for each page and begin to design the flow through the website, such as when a user adds a product to their basket, then enters their delivery and billing address and makes the credit card payment in the correct order.

My friend who specialises in SEO UK services, says that all the best websites they have built have been where the client has planned the site out with a sitemap even before they have contacted him.

The aim is to make the site as simple to use as possible so that there are no barriers to getting into the website or making a purchase. For that reason often user name and passwords are set for the customer so that they are not put off making a purchase by having to register. How many times have you gone to buy something online and then been faced with having to choose a user name and password to create an account, and fill out all of your address details and decided not to bother in the end? Well they just lost a sale!

For a non e-commerce site things are simpler with a contact form which allows you to receive enquiries by email without publishing your email address on the website, thus avoiding spam.Web forms can also validate the information before you receive it, so ensuring that the phone number provided does not contain words, and that the email address is in the correct format, for example. These things may sound very technical to us lay-folk but I assure you everything has to be decided on before starting on the construction of the site.

Your Domain Name

Choosing a domain name is often quite a challenge because every name you initially come up with will almost certainly have been taken. Domain names ending in .com are by far the most popular and internationally recognised; the snag is that it’s very popularity means that the majority of the shorter names have probably already been registered. However, you can usually think of some domain name that is available, which is much less time consuming than trying to purchase a previously registered domain name from its existing owner, most of the time just contacting them, and getting a reply is a challenge.

So looking at names with endings such as .net; .org .co.uk or .info may be able to provide you with the domain name you want. When choosing your domain name it is very important to include one or more of your keywords if possible as this can apparently help with search engine rankings. So although the name of your business is the obvious choice for a domain name, it is not necessarily the only option. You will no doubt have heard the Hoover/vacuum cleaner story, where Hoover is actually a brand name of a certain type of vacuum cleaner, but these days most people still say they are doing the ‘hoovering’ ! This is an important concept to bear in mind when choosing your domain name as hoovers4u.com might be a much better domain name than discountvaccuumcleaners.com, also vacuum is a tricky word to spell so think about things like that too. Also how easy is it to give out your domain name over the telephone for example? Classic examples of this are paydotcom.com and Slashdot.org confusing or what?

Copy

The next stage is preparing the copy. This is not the design of your website – just the words and visuals you want to have one each of the pages. A good idea before writing the copy is to have created your site map and decided on your SEO keywords, see below sections.

Having gathered all the above information you will need to decide what imagery you want to use within the website content. As we all know, a picture speaks a thousand words and remains in people’s memory far longer than just words. It is a popular concept that people don’t read, and is even more true on the web today, so use as many images, diagrams, cartoons and illustrations as possible.

For each image you could also have a caption, as the caption of an image is the next ‘most read’ words on the page after the page title. Images and their captions need to be clickable. When you click on a picture it should take you to the next stage of the process such as the sale page or placing an enquiry if your website is for lead generation. All images should also have alternative text or alt tags. Alt tags will display the hover text when you position your mouse over the picture, but also they are used by screen readers to assist visually impaired users know what the image is about.

Website Design

Finally we come to the design of your website.

Creative web design can be one of the most difficult stages in the site build because unlike something technical, it is not a simple case of black and white, it is determined by how the person, or people, viewing the designs feel about it.

There are a number of ways to approach website design but ultimately you need to create a design brief for the designer(s) to work from. Look at other websites and your competitor’s websites to find out what you like or dislike. The design brief should give reference to the logo, any existing brand guidelines or schemes and fonts and colour schemes, and should also detail which pages of the website that the designer is being tasked with creating visuals for. See the Sitemap section below.

The very best results will be achieved by using a graphic designer, and beware – not all graphic designers are the same. A graphic designer who designs specifically for print is working in a different discipline than a graphic designer who designs for screen and specifically the web. So choose your designer carefully, look at other work that person has done and determine whether or not you like their style. It is also worth remembering that design is a personal thing, just because you have used a company before and liked their work, do you know the same person will be doing the work if you use that company again?

If you are working in the big time and budget allows, use multiple graphic designers who have all been given the same design brief and request three concept designs from each designer. If the client themselves also do a graphic design, even if it’s a back of the envelope scribble, you will then have 10 concept designs. The next step is to get them all together and select the preferred elements from each design. Then give the work to the preferred graphic designer to work up as the final artwork. Once you have reviewed the final visuals the artwork files will then be provided to the developer, usually in layered Photoshop files.

The artwork should be finalised and agreed on by everybody before construction of the site begins. Otherwise it can lead to costly and time consuming changes and frustration for both the developer and the client.

Navigation

Another important consideration when building a website is how you want your navigation to work. You can have links within the content of your website, in the text, so there are not just links from the menu. You will need to decide whether the links will open into a new window, retaining your original page open or just change the page to the one clicked on. Next time you go online, you will realise how much thought has gone into the way in which a website works.

Production

Finally the preparation has been done and the site is ready to be built. Now for the more technical stuff! You will need to have decided which programming language to use to build the website. There are two main types for developing a website, one is Unix based, and the other is Windows based. Each one has advantages and disadvantages. If you are starting from scratch then it probably won’t matter, so you can go with the preference of your professional doing the work. My website is built on the Unix platform (apparently!) which is the same as many of the more well known websites such as Ebay, Facebook, Google and Amazon. Also your website hosting must be compatible with the development language with which your website is built in.

Work In Progress

The best way to build a website and be able to monitor work in progress is on the web server where the site is ultimately going to live. This way, those involved in reviewing the work can see work in progress and provide feedback throughout the development.

Going live

The moment of excitement comes when your site finally goes live and you see the results of all the thought that has gone into the whole process.

When the demolition company website for my firm eventually went live I was really pleased, but also relieved that it was eventually done!

As soon as the site has gone live there is no substitute for real world testing though, so ask as many of your friends and colleagues to view the website from their own offices and give you their thoughts.

Accessibility and Compliance

The website has to meet the current standards for website coding and doing so insures that disabled users, such as the visually impaired, can still access the entire website if they are using a Braille web browser. It is also a good idea to also discuss conformance moving forward, particularly if you have a web content management system, because and accessible of compliant site may become un-accessible after six months of being edited by you if you do not add or edit the website content in an accessible manner.

Unforeseen Items

There are always things that arise in any project which you suddenly realise you have forgotten, so no matter how well the website designer prepares and asks the right questions, there is bound to be a last minute change of mind or addition to the site. The main aim is to minimise the number of glitches that might arise because they aren’t calculated in at the start and they could cause extra costs and delays on the date of the website going live.As a general rule it is always a good idea to get he site live to the original plans and then look at an update after it has gone live, unless it is a very small deviation from the initial plans.

Reporting and Monitoring

Once your website is up and running, you might like to know how many people visit your website and from that number how many actually buy the products or place an enquiry. From these statistics you can work out the ratio of hits to sales and gradually make changes to improve the ratios. There are some reliable statistics packages such as Google Analytics or Web-Stat.com which allow you to collect and review website visitor data in near real time. All you need to do this is to have a small block of code inserted into each web page on your site.

Another useful service that Web-stat.com provides is to monitor the website and warn you by email or text message if the site goes down.

Marketing

Once the website is live there are lots of things you can do to market your product or service. The first step is to submit it to the search engines and at the same time write articles, and press releases. Getting links to the site from forums, blogs and other social networking spaces are other options. For more on this subject ask your designer about SEO, remember that’s search engine optimisation.

How to be Found on the Web

One of the first questions I was asked was, ‘Do you want it to be found by Google the main search engine?’ If I did then there was a whole process of establishing Keywords. So finding the best keywords are vital if you want to be found in Google. He says there are two main types of keywords. The first is the trophy, or generic, keyword for the industry which in my industry is simply ‘demolition’. The second kind of keyword is the long tail keyword. These are not searched for as frequently but if you can get a match then they are much more likely to convert into customers. A good example of this in my industry is ‘factory demolition company Derby’. So it is very important to do a lot of research on keywords to find both those that are the most popular and the most specific. Generally most users only look at the top ten results so you will want to get your website promoted so as to get on this page for your chosen keywords. By using a keyword research tool such as the keyword lookup in the Google Web Master Tools kit you can find the single most popular keyword for your industry.

Conclusion

Wheww. What an amazing amount of work! I hadn’t realised when I started the process of getting a website up and running, how complicated it all is and how many factors you have to consider before even designing the website. The word web design is really a misnomer, as people often think it’s just about the graphic design on the home page, and the branding of the product. Unless you are a computer whizz, most people have no idea how much goes into designing and building a website and the systems that support the work you want it to do. I hope that this article gives you an understanding and insight into the whole process of website development from start to finish.Next time you type in a web address or click on a link to a website, remember all the above work that has probably gone into it!

 

SEO Training Makes Absolute Sense

Simply put, increased search engine rankings means more of your customers will hear your marketing message and come into contact with your products and service. If the success of your web site depends on consumer traffic then SEO cannot be ignored. SEO is one of the most cost effective marketing channels open to any business and the possible returns can be significant. However, as always, before return comes investment.

One option is to invest in the services of professional SEO Company. The cost of these services can vary from $300.00 to $30,000 and more depending on the complexity of the project and the competitiveness of your niche. Another option is SEO Training; this is a realistic option that not only represents an investment in your website but also an investment in yourself.

The growing trend amongst business owners to learn SEO is sensible when you consider that no one knows your products, your marketing goals and your customers better than you do. Furthermore, small businesses find it hard to justify the high ticket price of hiring a professional SEO when money gets tight or markets slump, yet this is the perfect time to take advantage of SEO.

Teach A Man To Fish…

Hiring the services of a Professional SEO company will get you the results you want, but remember, it’s not the only option open to you nor is it necessarily the best given your particular circumstances. SEO Training can provide the knowledge and hands-on skills to take your own website to the top of the search engines. So what are you waiting for, Learn SEO Today.

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