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Posts Tagged ‘affordable search engine optimization’

How good web design can impact your website conversion rate and search engine rankings.

Tuesday, June 23rd, 2009

 

marshafriedman1

Not all websites are designed equally. All you have to do is go out and search the internet for a few websites and you’ll see the quality difference between competing websites. How do businesses generate a lot of leads and sales from their websites? How do the highest ranked websites get there? What happened to the ones that end up on page 20 for their keyword phrases? Well, besides the obvious answers of content and keywords, there is also design. Website design can have a huge impact on how your website is ranked, how it is found on the search engines and most importantly whether it converts your website visitors into leads or paying customers. Every web site needs to consider certain design aspects in order to reach its full potential. Here are some things to consider:

 

  

1. Web Sites that are Graphics Heavy

 

Have you seen those websites with all the pretty graphics, pictures and busy flash? These sites are definitely attractive, but they are not keeping your visitors tuned in nor are they being found very easily in the search engines. Why? Pictures and Images are large files to begin with and the pages take a long time to load. People are impatient, and they don’t have the time to sit and wait for it to load, websites with such characteristics are also extremely difficult to optimize. The problem is that search engines cannot read text within graphics or animation. If you feel that you must have a lot of images and flash on your website, be sure to use alt-text and then create an html-based side of your site that is also available to visitors, if you don’t know what this is and you’re working with a professional designer, it’s something to be discussed before proceeding. This will reduce your bounce rate (fewer site abandonment after the first page), also this version of the site will have the potential of being found on the search engines and your prospects will also have the option to go to the other version, with the pretty pictures. Of course, we are available for a free web design consultation on this entire process.

 

2. Dealing with Dynamic Web Pages

 

Are you a large online retailer with hundreds or thousands of products available? These types of web sites have data that is generated by a large database and create what are called “dynamic” web pages. The problem for these sites is that some pages may not get indexed by the search engines. So what can be done about this? The first thing is using a site map. This lets Google know that you do in fact have permanent content on your site. You’ll also want to have a good internal linking system set up. These two tactics can go a long way in helping your dynamic pages get found.

 

3. Proper Use of HTML

 

One thing that is pervasive on the web is bad HTML code. Worse yet, much of this code, generated by pretty bad web design software, is not search engine friendly. You don’t want the search engines seeing line after line of font and position formatting. This is not relevant content and doesn’t employ the best HTML design. The best website design firms out there make use of CSS (Cascading Style Sheets), which significantly reduces the amount of text formatting in HTML code. You want to be sure your designer uses the very latest coding techniques to ensure your site is ranked high.

 

4.Content is King

 

Typically, you want to design for a large site. In other words, plan on growing the number of pages you have over time. Why? Google loves it. They reward you for updating your content frequently, hence the reason a lot of businesses are now adding a business blog onto their website. You want to ensure that the design you use on your site lends itself to being built out over the next year, and for as long as you own the business. If you have only a few pages on your site and your competitors have many, you’ll have a tough time competing with them for that top search engine spot. You also want to keep visitors on your site as long as possible, as well as keep them coming back, and they will do this if there is a lot to see on your site.

 

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Facebook URL Could Mean BIG Boost For Your SEO Efforts

Wednesday, June 17th, 2009

  facebook

Greetings! 

You’re probably wondering, what the heck a facebook vanity url is or if it should mean anything to you?

 

You see up until 12:01 am EST on Saturday May 13, 2009 facebook users did not have an easy url to direct their friends, colleagues or customers to. Typically their urls would look something like this www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=123456789 . Well as of last Saturday at the stroke of midnight that has changed and industry experts are highlighting the major boost that this could mean for search engine optimization and driving traffic back to your website.

 

Facebook is a highly searched and highly ranked social networking site with over 150 million ACTIVE users. Now, imagine for a second that you sell barbie dolls and you are able to register the following highly searched keyword as your facebook vanity url such as www.facebook.com/barbiedolls. Once a searched is conducted for barbie dolls because of the weight that facebook holds in the web world, your facebook page could very well be one of the first that’s shown organically. 

 

Now just as domain names,  these vanity urls are going like hot bread. The key is to conduct  some research to see which keywords would benefit your business the most. I suggest you create a list and see which ones are available. You can go here to check for availability and to setup your vanity url http://www.facebook.com/username/.

 

Now, there is a little road block to getting a vanity url from facebook. You must have been signed up to facebook by May 31, 2009 or else you would not be able to get a vanity url. This is a measure that was taken to prevent people from squatting  on others names. Think Bill Clinton and the RNC.

 

Secondly, you need to put serious consideration into the name that you are choosing, because you will NOT be able to change or transfer it. 

 

Now, happy hunting and best of luck in getting the best name that would mean traffic boost for your business.

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The 5 SEO Basics Every New Website Should Have…

Wednesday, April 1st, 2009

Search engine optimization is about making your site easy for search engines to find.
If someone does a Google search for “web Design Company in NYC,” and that’s what your company does, good SEO will increase your chances of your site showing up in that search. And of course, your site needs to show up so that your prospects can find you.

SEO is a cost effective way to market your business. It can help you reach prospects who are searching for your services at the exact time when they need it. Top placement in search results is not guaranteed, but by following five basic steps, you will improve your chances of getting good rankings. While Pay Per Click advertising is the only surefire way to get front page placement, SEO is an effective, low cost marketing technique. When done properly, it can have a significant impact on your business.

You don’t have to be a professional search engine optimization company to implement some basic SEO that will help the ranking of your site. (If you need a refresher on the basics, check out our basic introduction to SEO.)

Here are the 5 basic SEO techniques that every website should take advantage of:

1. Keywords. You should understand which keywords and phrases your prospects are searching for so you can use them throughout your site. But, it’s not about which keywords are the most popular. It’s about which keywords best describe your business. The phrase “search engine optimization” is very popular, but the phrase “affordable SEO in New York City” might better describe your business. Check out the Google Keyword Tool for keyword ideas.

2. Use keyword rich content throughout your site. The search engines read the content of your website, and use it to determine your ranking. So it’s important that your keywords are present in your actual website text. It’s important to remember that the content of your site has two jobs, to appeal to the search engines, and to appeal to the reader. See our article, The Content of Your Website Has Two Jobs. Another great way to have constantly updated, keyword rich content in your website is to have a blog.

3. Use descriptive page titles. A page title is one of the most important things search engines use to find your site. (The title is what you see at the very top of your internet browser.) Remember, titles aren’t just seen by the search engines, they are also seen by your websites visitors. Don’t overload your title with keywords or phrases, just concentrate on the most important ones that really represent your business.

4. Use keyword rich meta tags. Meta tags are the html tags at the top of your web page code. They are another way that the search engines find your website. Make sure to use a description tag for your web pages. A good description tag is usually two or three sentences and has the strongest keywords or phrases incorporated into it. Search engines aren’t paying as much attention to keyword tags, but there is no harm in putting 5 or 6 keywords into a keyword tag on your site. Don’t overload your tags—less is more.

5. Remember the importance of incoming links. The quantity and quality of incoming links are important to the ranking of your website. There are many ways to increase incoming links to your website. Some include posting comments on blogs, writing articles, utilizing social networking sites, or finding partners to link to your website.

Even if you don’t have a professional SEO company working for you, you can still utilize the basics of search engine optimization to help your website to be more search engine friendly.

By implementing these basics, you will have a great advantage to other new websites that don’t.

If you want to be more advanced in your SEO pursuits when developing a new website, consider hiring a professional web design & SEO company to handle it for you.

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Search Engine Optimization (SEO) – What is it and How it Works?

Tuesday, March 24th, 2009

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Search Engine Optimization or SEO is the process of making your website easy for Search Engines such as Google, Yahoo and others to find.

For example, when a person living in New York City uses Google to locate a website design company in New York, they will likely type “website design New York” into Google’s search field.

The top results that come up first, under “sponsored links,” will be paid links. This means that people have paid for this placement through a program called Pay-Per-Click advertising.

The results immediately following these paid links still enjoy the same prime real estate space—without having to pay the ad costs.  How did they get that level of ranking without paying for it? The answer is SEO. They knew how to make the most of their websites’ SEO potential.  And with this article, you’ll develop some understanding of how you can, too.

By using SEO techniques properly throughout your site, you can achieve higher search engine rankings for the keywords that you optimize for.

When you search for a term in a search engine, like “website design New York,” the search engines want to provide you with the very best and most relevant websites for your inquiry. It’s important to understand how search engines work in order to understand SEO.

And the first thing you should know is that search engines prepare ahead of time for your keyword search. Here’s how:

· Crawling: Search engines have already used programs called “spiders” to automatically “crawl” the web. The spiders have made their way around the web and its files to get an idea of where and what things are. The spiders crawl websites on an ongoing basis.

· Indexing: After a website and its pages have been “crawled,” the search engines put these pages into categories (called indexes)—so that they are easier to find later. This is one of the reasons why ongoing SEO is important—because each time they crawl, if your website has been updated with fresh content it will be re-indexed.

When you do a keyword search in a search engine, here’s what happens:

· Let’s say you type “website design New York” into a search engine.

· The search engine checks its index and finds all the websites that match your request.

· Then, the search engine uses an algorithm (mathematical sorting equation) to determine which of these documents is the most relevant to your query of “website design New York.”

· The search engine displays your results.

· Therefore, the websites that were optimized for the search term “website design New York” are far more likely to show up in these results than those websites that haven’t been optimized. This is where SEO can do wonders for your business. If you have properly optimized your website, then your site is more likely to show up every time someone searches for keywords that are related to your business. This will ultimately increase the traffic, and leads to your site.

Why is ongoing SEO important?

The major search engines change their algorithms frequently, so staying on top of your SEO is an ongoing process. Each of these algorithms places different amounts of importance on things like keyword density, meta tags, links, indexes, and unique content. What works today may not work tomorrow, so ongoing SEO efforts are essential to gain rankings, and keep them.

In closing, search engine optimization is all about making your site visible to the search engines for the keyword searches that are most related to your business. SEO is not advertising. The idea behind SEO is to increase your search engine ranking because your site is relevant to a particular search term, not because you pay. Because of this, SEO is often referred to as “organic” or “natural” placement.

The other thing about SEO is that unlike paid Pay-Per-Click advertising, it doesn’t guarantee first page placement. However, when done properly, it can significantly increase your chances. As a matter of fact, any website that doesn’t take advantage of some basic SEO is doing itself a disservice, and missing out on viable traffic.

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