I was recently asked at a networking event, how to find a good web designer. “Should I just Google Web designers in my area, or should I ask for a personal recommendation?” I’d say always go by recommendation like you would any tradesman, but there are a few other ways to find a good web designer that you can work with.
It’s easy to think that a website is just a website. It doesn’t really matter what it looks like, as long as it works, right?
Well, I have to disagree. Just like a picture says a thousand words, your website is saying all kinds of things about you and your business.
Many businesses and organisations use the Google AdWords advertising program to promote their products and services in Google’s search results. It’s often a great way to supplement an SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) campaign if a business operates in a very competitive market as Google AdWords allows you to compete with some of the bigger players and see your website appear on the first page of search results for your chosen search term. This can happen in a short space of time whereas an SEO campaign may take several months to see the website appearing so high up.
If you serve local markets, it’s going to be hugely beneficial to you to have an up-to-date Google+ profile.
Google+ isn’t as big as Facebook yet, and the facility to search local Google+ pages from within a Google+ account may not be well known, however, your Google+ Local page will still be displayed in Google’s search results with a pointer on the map for people searching for services in a particular area.
If you’ve been browsing the web recently (and who hasn’t?), you may have noticed that more and more websites now have some kind of cookie warning when you first visit the site. It may be a banner across the top, a pop-over window that greys out the background content, or a more discreet tab in the bottom corner. These cookie warnings will usually ask you to accept or decline the use of cookies.
If you use Hootsuite to manage your tweets, you may have noticed that it will show you the number followers you have, the number of people you’re following, how many updates you’ve made and your ‘Klout’. In this article, we aim to explain a little more about what Klout actually is and whether it’s something you need to worry about.
Any business with a website needs that website to generate income for the business, whether directly through an e-commerce website (online shop) or indirectly through a brochure-style website with a means to contact you.
Let’s take a quick look back at 2012 and a brief glimpse into 2013 – how have you been marketing your business online and has it been successful?
Everyone knows that Google provides a huge proportion of traffic to websites through its search facility and, in some more competitive industries, appearing on the first page of Google for your key search terms may be very difficult to do. Google AdWords provides a way for you to appear on the first page, alongside your competition. AdWords listings appear across the top (in the shaded box) and down the right hand side of the search results. If you look closely, you’ll see the ‘Ads’ text at the top of these sections. The listings that appear here, although they look similar to the other listings, are actually paid advertisements. Advertisers are charged an amount every time someone clicks on one of these listings and visits their website.
Last Thursday, I had the pleasure of speaking at the December meeting of Ladies 4 Networking in Ossett. I had 10 minutes to give an insightful talk about what I do and hopefully impart some wisdom on the ladies who attended.
The title of my talk was “What does your website say about your business?” and here’s the write up: