Online Marketing

Google+ Has a New Interface…

April 13, 2012 by
google-plus-toolbar

Wow, is all I have to say... you turn around and things have changed again! Improved even. People who write off Google+ still seem to be using it on a daily basis, (see Michael Gray on that one). New Tool Bar to the left: to me this is much more useful and logical than Facebook has ever been. Much of Facebook is still inscrutable. Quick sort your stream using Circle buttons at the top: I find this one instantly appealing and a big improvement over the disorganized stream on Facebook. Hangouts now prominently displayed on the right: I'm excited to try these, actually, for company meetings » More

Filed Under: Google+, Online Marketing Tagged With: , , , ,

Everything is Marketing, Everything…

December 16, 2011 by

The mantra for 2012? Back to basics, do the fundamentals and do them exceedingly well in order to succeed. If I may make the following suggestions: NO email should EVER go out without a short, to the point Subject line. Having no subject line is a way to get your email ignored/forgotten about/hard to find/marked as spam. You should improve your Reply To email identity by adding "- Your-Domain-Name.com" to the Your Name field in your email settings. This will give people a visual indicator of where you are from if for a minute they don't recognize the name. It will end up reading "Business » More

Filed Under: How to Succeed Online, Online Marketing

To Succeed: Become a Curator of Important Information to your Industry…

September 11, 2011 by

We are drowning in a tidal wave of data. The businesses that are REALLY making money off the Interweb are the ones (read Google) that provide relevance: they help you get to the truly useful information. Here are two gentlemen that know a thing or two about the web. They are making a huge, expensive bet that people need help sifting through all the noise. You can benefit from doing this for your site visitors yourself: become the place they visit and link back to by sharing truly useful bits of information with them via your site or monthly email digest. It can't always be about sales, you » More

Filed Under: How to Succeed Online, Online Marketing

Critical Components of Website Success

June 23, 2011 by
components

Abraham Maslow theorized that people have an inherent hierarchy of needs which must be met to fully develop. Just like the hierarchy of people's needs, a website has basic and fundamental needs too. No, the image to the left is not the latest get-rich quick pyramid scheme. The pyramid to the left, shows the fundamental important needs at the base of the pyramid. Each higher tier represents needs that cannot be realized until all needs below are satisfied. Level 1: Content & Keywords Content is king. It is what people AND search engines are looking for in a website. By developing » More

Filed Under: Online Marketing, Search Engine Optimization, Website Development

Your Most Important New Hire: Your Web Site

May 23, 2011 by

This is not a statement we make glibly: it can be backed up by data. Analytics Your web site can and should act as a sales person for your business 24 hours a day, 7 days a week for the foreseeable future. Monthly Performance Reviews are the standard for these new employees. Market Your Business with Every Addition We know Search Engine Optimization so you don't have to. Keeping up with the latest developments in online marketing is a time consuming job: our job. Let us do what we do best so that you can concentrate on running your business. We will make sure that every addition we make to » More

Filed Under: Online Marketing, Search Engine Optimization

Business Owners Should Re-Evaluate Phone Directory Advertising

May 15, 2011 by
Reevaluate Phone Directories

I haven't opened a phone book in over ten years and I am not the only one. At one time for small businesses, if you weren't in the yellow pages, nobody knew you were in business, unless of course they walked by your office or storefront. For decades, business owners have spent a lot of money to be included in the phone directories as a main avenue of advertising their services. What used to be the bare minimum advertising effort for local businesses, is now in great decline. This is not breaking news to anyone who has been in business for the past decade. Sally Witzky at Traction Group » More

Filed Under: Online Marketing, Search Engine Optimization

The Strange Case of the Parasitic Web Guy

May 11, 2011 by
parasitic-web-guy

The story you are about to read is true. Only the names have been changed to protect the innocent and not so innocent. A client of mine was approached by the former web developer & Search Engine Optimization guy of their main competitor. My client was very up front with me and told me that they wanted to hear what the guy had to say and that they would tell me what transpired. This person met, they talked and my client called me to give me the gist of things. Apparently he and his former boss had had a falling out and had since parted ways. He now promised to do what he had done for » More

Filed Under: Online Marketing, Search Engine Optimization

What’s a QR code?

April 19, 2011 by

Have you seen these wacky looking black and white squares on signs, stickers, billboards or magazine ads? They’re called QR codes  (Quick Response), and they are a great way to link humans in the real world to your information online. What is a QR code? A QR Code is basically a fancy barcode, which has encoded in it a URL (web address), text, or other information. It can be read by a QR code scanner, on smartphones, ipads etc. What’s the point? QR codes link the real world to online information, or make it quick and easy for people to access information without typing in a URL, phone » More

Filed Under: Mobile Websites, Online Marketing

Information Architecture in a nutshell.

March 23, 2011 by

What is information architecture? Before the look and feel of a website begins, the content of your website needs to be organized.  Information architecture is the process of organizing and mapping out the content of your website. This process is one of the most important steps in designing and building a website, Because this is how your users will find the information they are looking for. The process of information design or information architecture includes the development of special documents to illustrate the content organization called Site maps and wireframes. Site maps show the » More

Filed Under: Online Marketing, Website Development Tagged With: ,

Search Engine Optimization and Interactive Marketing

April 21, 2008 by

Everyone wants to be #1 in Google or Yahoo for their industry search terms, however getting there takes a great deal of expertise, initial planning as well as a sustainable plan for maintaining and improving their site's placement in search engines. The world of Search Engine Optimization (SEO) can be confusing and with good reason. There is a lot of erroneous information and well guarded secrets out there regarding SEO. To top it off, search engines themselves are constantly changing the way they index and rank websites in constant effort to deliver the most relevant content to their » More

Filed Under: Online Marketing