online + marketing + design
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:
Keep in mind that literally EVERYTHING you do is marketing from now on.
Posted in How to Succeed Online, Online Marketing · December 16th, 2011 · Comments (0)
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 have to "give to get" on the internet.
If you need help, we're always available.
Posted in How to Succeed Online, Online Marketing · September 11th, 2011 · Comments (0)
Google, Bing and Yahoo have all announced support for Schema.org, a semantic markup protocol that could provide websites with valuable search exposure. Schema.org attempts to enhance the information transfer from website data to SERPs.
All the current SEO standards will still be supported for a long time to come, but with potential for abuse not everyone is overly concerned. Still, the big 3 Search engines are on board, so it's definately something to keep an eye on.
Mashable just posted a good writeup about this here.
Posted in Search Engine Optimization · July 1st, 2011 · Comments (0)
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 engaging and compelling content around relevant keywords for your site search engines will be able to accurately guide traffic to you.
Level 2: On-page Optimization
Behind the scenes, a website needs to be structured properly and optimized for search engines to be able to analyze the content of your site. Well structured web page code, page load time and special instructions for search engines (.htaccess and robots.txt files) must be used to tell them what content to index and crawl.
Level 3: Design & Usability
A website should be designed to make it easy for visitors to find what they are looking for quickly and with ease. This will optimize the visitors experience on the site and help eliminate obstacles to conversion or confusing calls-to-action. The focus should be on delivering a preferred user experience that makes it easy for visitors to find what they are looking for.
Level 4: Inbound Links
Inbound links are links into your website from other websites. These links are an essential part of the success of any SEO campaign because they are a highly valued factor of search engine ranking. There are many ways to increase inbound links, from link trading and paid placement to users sharing your content on social networking sites.
Foundation: Analytics & Analyses
Web analytics and statistics are the foundation on which your online marketing campaign is built. Implementing analytics from the beginning of a project provides a baseline from which to measure the effects of your online marketing and SEO efforts.
Posted in Online Marketing, Search Engine Optimization, Website Developement · June 23rd, 2011 · Comments (0)