I recently had a new client ask me to do Internet Marketing for their new website including SEO, Google Adwords(PPC) and branding of their name.
This was a new site that they had put a lot of time (6 mths.) and of course cost to develop. Now when you first look at the site it is visually appealing and seems to be easy enough to navigate thru. and thus it should be ready to launch which they did.
Ok so you say why is he posting this article if everything is so great about the new site, after all the owners wouldn’t have given the go ahead if there were any problems right?
Many owners of new sites put a lot of pressure on the designers to get the new site up and running and do not check to make sure even the basic operation of the website is functioning the way they thought it would.
We ended up having to redo the entire site to catch all the little details that were wrong or missing. Here are just a couple of problems we found.
1. Can you imagine having a “Online Request Form” that defaults all the emails to the original designer of the request software? Yes they hadn’t received one request! Oops!
2. The template design for all pages had to be redone as they wanted to add more content on each page and because there was no floating Footer you could only work between the existing graphics.
3. When the designer realized this mistake he added all the great content as PDF files for you to “click to download” which wasn’t a great move for SEO purposes and very annoying to navigate.
I could go on about this one but I think you get the point, remember it’s your site and ultimately your responsibility to make sure everything is working.
Check that your emails are working properly.
Check that your pages link properly both internally and externally.

Spider Choice Inc.
“Web Marketing Solutions”
SEO – Internet Marketing – Pay Per Click
info@spiderchoice.com

Many online marketing consulting firms look at SEO and search engine advertising in a vacuum. They don’t consider the big picture. The idea behind all search engine marketing is increased revenue. That requires conversions, not just more traffic. And certain website design problems can kill your conversions!

Don’t Destroy Your Online Marketing Results with Bad Website Design
Copyright (c) 2009-2010 Paul Marshall

So, you’ve embarked on a search engine advertising program, maybe even SEO. Whether you’re doing this on your own or using an online marketing consulting firm, there are key points to become aware of.

If you miss these, you won’t increase conversions.

What good is a Number 1 organic search engine ranking or AdWords ad listing, if you don’t have increased sales or if you don’t generate more sales leads?

Too often, we get all focused about the Internet marketing — the ads, the offer — that we don’t think the whole process through step-by-step and consider the experience our website visitors will be having.

If we did, we’d be thinking “big picture” and we would head off some of these potential problems before they occur.

Overcoming Your Website Visitors Anxiety

When people come to our website it’s natural for them to feel anxiety. After all, look at all the cr*p on the Internet today, all the too-good-to-be-true products and services.

But when you and I offer REAL products or services, we have to overcome that concern, even if we’re treating our site visitors fairly and not making outrageous claims.

So, how can you overcome these anxieties?

1. Offer more than a 1-page website. Credible companies have multi-page websites, including Privacy Policy, Terms of Use | Service and About Us pages.

They also have more than 1 page about their products or services.

I’m surprised by the number of 1-page websites I see from companies using infomercials to advertise their products. Often, they have the purchase form right on their home page, their only page (and often their page isn’t secured for credit card ordering).

Websites that are only 1-page don’t seem credible. And having the purchase form right on the home page comes across as very pushy!

Doesn’t this type of site seem all about the company and NOT about their customers? Why would we want to buy from that type of company?

What kind of online marketing consulting firm did these companies use…or did they use any??

2. Next to any sign up or contact form buttons clearly state that you don’t sell your customers’ private information and link to your Privacy Policy page.

3. Effectively communicate what your Value Proposition is, also called your Unique Selling Proposition. If you don’t know why someone should buy your product or service versus your competitors’, now is the time to figure it out. (And by the way, based on my experience, if you don’t know this, you’re not alone, by any means.)

But our websites have to be about more than just us. They have to be about our visitors. What’s in it for THEM, to do business with us? What unique voids in the marketplace can we fill?

As a Small Business Owner, Personally Relate to Your Site Visitors and Communicate Directly with Them

People don’t buy from websites, they buy from people! So, how can you apply this to your own website?

1. For many small businesses and solo proprietorships, their website text should speak to your visitors directly in first person.

This should be written from the voice of the Owner or President. They shouldn’t use third person, institutional-sounding language, getting rid of “we” and “our”, using “I” instead, speaking first person, in an actual conversation. Don’t try to sound like you’re Microsoft!

And while your at it, be careful about overuse of words about you…whether “I”, or those words, “we”, “our” or “us”.

Check out the WeWe calculator (Google: wewe calculator). Make sure to focus on customer-focused words and NOT on words about you or your company.

2. Include your picture on your Web pages.

For a larger small business trying to make that personal connection with their website visitors, try the idea used by the nutritional supplement company Lumina. (Google: Lumina Health Contact Us)

In this execution, notice how Lumina gets you to relate to their customer service department. I still remember it was John I spoke with and that’s been over 1 year ago that I called them!

Again, people buy from other people, not from websites.

For us as small businesses, why should we sound large, pretending to be something we aren’t? And why should we run from our advantage of being small: low overhead, friendly, personal service and accountability, among other advantages.

Make Each Step in Your Marketing a Smooth Handoff from One Step to Another

Whether you’re using AdWords, SEO, or both, make sure your title and description matches the experience your website visitor will have when they come to your landing page.

Quite often when I’m Coaching my small business owner clients or performing online marketing consulting, I find the wording for their organic listing or AdWords ad says one thing and their landing page says something that doesn’t sound the same.

This causes confusion is the best case scenario. In the worst case, it causes a lack of trust. Dangerous!

We should understand our products or services. And we know what we want our visitors to do on our site.

Our potential customers may not understand either. We need to think like them, when we explain what we have to offer them and how to use our website to take advantage of what we have to offer.

And when “shifting” from one page to another, we need to hand-off from one page to another naturally and smoothly, like a car with a smooth automatic transmission.

Don’t advertise one offer in AdWords or organic search, only to have your landing page sound like it was written for another advertising offer. I see this problem a lot!

Often times, having an affordable online marketing consulting firm reviewing what you’re doing can offer easy, inexpensive fixes that can yield big improvements in your search engine advertising and SEO conversions.

Your Action Plan

Let’s review what we’ve talked about.

First, overcome visitors anxieties by offering a multi-page website which answers questions about your company and your services or products, while inspiring confidence in your company. Effectively communicate your Value Proposition.

Second, personally relate to your site visitors. Avoid using the wrong words that may put off your site visitors. Use your picture on your Web pages.

Third, hand-off from one page on your website and one step in your selling process to another smoothly and naturally. We should understand what we want our site visitors to do, but they won’t unless we make the process really clear.

Whether your using an online marketing consulting firm or doing the work yourself, if you take these steps, your search engine optimization | advertising plan will convert at a MUCH higher rate, when you take these steps.

About The Author:
Marketing online since 2004, Paul Marshall can help you market on a budget. He’s an Online Marketing Consulting expert offering marketing services (and d-i-y Coaching). You can learn more about Paul on his Internet Marketing LinkedIn profile and at Strategic Web Marketing.net.

Read more articles written by: Paul Marshall

If you have any other questions about website design, search engine optimization or Internet Marketing pls. feel free to contact the Spider Choice Team
info@spiderchoice.com

I was recently asked by someone who is just starting to think about their first website if selecting the Domain name is really important and what should they be looking for.
I only wanted to provide them with enough basics to start their thinking process at this time, and I think that the following article posted by Rand Fishkin (CEO, SEOmoz) does a great job even if it was posted in 2007.
I would like to thank Rand for giving me permission to post it on my Blog

12 Rules for Choosing the Right Domain Name
Posted by randfish on February 5th, 2007 at 12:01 am Webdev

A long time ago, I wrote a post on domain name selection that’s sorely in need of an update. Time to deliver…
For 99% of the projects we take on, a domain is already part of the equation. However, in some circumstances, we’ve been called on to provice advice for naming a domain, either for a new blog, a company launch or even just a friend’s website. Below, I’ve listed 12 tips I find indispensable when helping people select a great domain name.
1. Brainstorm 5 Top Keywords?
When you first begin your domain name search, it helps to have 5 terms or phrases in mind that best describe the domain you’re seeking. Once you have this list, you can start to pair them or add prefixes & suffixes to create good domain ideas. For example, if you’re launching a mortgage related domain, you might start with words like “mortage, finance, home equity, interest rate, house payment” then play around until you can find a good match.
2. Make the Domain Unique?
Having your website confused with a popular site already owned by someone else is a recipe for disaster. Thus, I never choose domains that are simply the plural, hyphenated or misspelled version of an already established domain. I still believe that Flickr desperately needs to buy Flicker.com – I hear kids in their 20’s tell parents in their 40’s and 50’s to see photos on Flickr and always envision that traffic going straight to the wrong domain.
3. Only Choose Dot-Com Available Domains?
If you’re not concerned with type-in traffic, branding or name recognition, you don’t need to worry about this one. However, if you’re at all serious about building a successful website over the long-term, you should be worried about all of these elements, and while directing traffic to a .net or .org (as SEOmoz does) is fine, owning and 301′ing the .com is critical. With the exception of the very tech-savvy, most people who use the web still make the automatic assumption that .com is all that’s out there – don’t make the mistake of locking out or losing traffic to these folks.
4. Make it Easy to Type?
If a domain name requires considerable attention to type correctly, due to spelling, length or the use of un-memorable words or sounds, you’ve lost a good portion of your branding and marketing value. I’ve even heard usability folks toute the value of having the letters include easy-to-type letters (which I interpret as avoiding “q,” “z,” “x,” “c,” and “p”).
5. Make it Easy to Remember?
Remember that word-of-mouth and SERPs dominance marketing (where your domain consistently comes up for industry-related searches) both rely on the ease with which the domain can be called to mind. You don’t want to be the company with the terrific website that no one can ever remember to tell their friends about because they can’t remember the domain name.
6. Keep the Name as Short as Possible?
Short names are easy to type and easy to remember (the previous two rules). They also allow for more characters in the URL in the SERPs and a better fit on business cards and other offline media.
7. Create and Fulfill Expectations?
When someone hears about your domain name for the first time, they should be able to instantly and accurately guess at the type of content that might be found there. That’s why I love domain names like Hotmail.com, CareerBuilder.com, AutoTrader.com and WebMD.com. Domains like Monster.com, Amazon.com and Zillow.com (whom I usually praise) required far more branding because of their un-intuitive names.
8. Avoid Copyright Infringement?
This is a mistake that isn’t made too often, but can kill a great domain and a great company when it does. To be sure you’re not infringing on anyone’s copyright with your site’s name, visit copyright.gov and search before you buy.
9. Set Yourself Apart with a Brand?
Using a unique moniker is a great way to build additional value with your domain name. A “brand” is more than just a combination of words, which is why names like mortgageforyourhome.com or shoesandboots.com aren’t as compelling as branded names like bankrate.com or lendingtree.com. SEOmoz itself is a good example – “SEO” does a good job of explaining the industry we’re in and creating expectations, while “moz” gives a web association, and an association with being free, open, and community-driven.
10. Reject Hyphens and Numbers?
Both hyphens and numbers make it hard to give your domain name verbally and falls down on being easy to remember or type. I’d suggest not using spelled-out or roman numerals in domains, as both can be confusing and mistaken for the other.
11. Don’t Follow the Latest Trends?
Website names that rely on odd mis-spellings (like many Web 2.0 style sites), multiple hyphens (like the SEO-optimized domains of the early 2000’s), or uninspiring short adjectives (like “top…x,” “best…x,” “hot…x”) aren’t always the best choice. This isn’t a hard and fast rule, but in the world of naming conventions in general, if everyone else is doing it, that doesn’t mean it’s a surefire strategy. Just look at all the people who named their businesses “AAA… x” over the last 50 years to be first in the phone book; how many Fortune 2000’s are named “AAA company?”
12. Use an Ajax Domain Selection Tool?
Websites like AJAXWhois and Domjax make it exceptionally easy to determine availability of a domain name – just remember that you don’t have to buy through these services. You can find a name you like that’s available, then go to your registrar of choice.

If you would like more information about how selecting the right Domain Name can affect the Internet Marketing of your website feel free to contact us direct at info@spiderchoice.com

Spider Choice Inc.
Web Marketing Solutions
SEO – PPC – Internet Marketing
Toronto, Port Dover – Canada

Many online marketing consulting firms look at SEO and search engine advertising in a vacuum. They don’t consider the big picture. The idea behind all search engine marketing is increased revenue. That requires conversions, not just more traffic. And certain website design problems can kill your conversions!

Don’t Destroy Your Online Marketing Results with Bad Website Design

Copyright (c) 2009-2010 Paul Marshall

So, you’ve embarked on a search engine advertising program, maybe even SEO. Whether you’re doing this on your own or using an online marketing consulting firm, there are key points to become aware of.

If you miss these, you won’t increase conversions.
What good is a Number 1 organic search engine ranking or AdWords ad listing, if you don’t have increased sales or if you don’t generate more sales leads?

Too often, we get all focused about the Internet marketing — the ads, the offer — that we don’t think the whole process through step-by-step and consider the experience our website visitors will be having.

If we did, we’d be thinking “big picture” and we would head off some of these potential problems before they occur.

Overcoming Your Website Visitors Anxiety

When people come to our website it’s natural for them to feel anxiety. After all, look at all the cr*p on the Internet today, all the too-good-to-be-true products and services.

But when you and I offer REAL products or services, we have to overcome that concern, even if we’re treating our site visitors fairly and not making outrageous claims.

So, how can you overcome these anxieties?

1. Offer more than a 1-page website. Credible companies have multi-page websites, including Privacy Policy, Terms of Use | Service and About Us pages.

They also have more than 1 page about their products or services.

I’m surprised by the number of 1-page websites I see from companies using infomercials to advertise their products. Often, they have the purchase form right on their home page, their only page (and often their page isn’t secured for credit card ordering).

Websites that are only 1-page don’t seem credible. And having the purchase form right on the home page comes across as very pushy!

Doesn’t this type of site seem all about the company and NOT about their customers? Why would we want to buy from that type of company?

What kind of online marketing consulting firm did these companies use…or did they use any??

2. Next to any sign up or contact form buttons clearly state that you don’t sell your customers’ private information and link to your Privacy Policy page.

3. Effectively communicate what your Value Proposition is, also called your Unique Selling Proposition. If you don’t know why someone should buy your product or service versus your competitors’, now is the time to figure it out. (And by the way, based on my experience, if you don’t know this, you’re not alone, by any means.)

But our websites have to be about more than just us. They have to be about our visitors. What’s in it for THEM, to do business with us? What unique voids in the marketplace can we fill?

As a Small Business Owner, Personally Relate to Your Site Visitors and Communicate Directly with Them

People don’t buy from websites, they buy from people! So, how can you apply this to your own website?

1. For many small businesses and solo proprietorships, their website text should speak to your visitors directly in first person.

This should be written from the voice of the Owner or President. They shouldn’t use third person, institutional-sounding language, getting rid of “we” and “our”, using “I” instead, speaking first person, in an actual conversation. Don’t try to sound like you’re Microsoft!

And while your at it, be careful about overuse of words about you…whether “I”, or those words, “we”, “our” or “us”.

Check out the WeWe calculator (Google: wewe calculator). Make sure to focus on customer-focused words and NOT on words about you or your company.

2. Include your picture on your Web pages.

For a larger small business trying to make that personal connection with their website visitors, try the idea used by the nutritional supplement company Lumina. (Google: Lumina Health Contact Us)

In this execution, notice how Lumina gets you to relate to their customer service department. I still remember it was John I spoke with and that’s been over 1 year ago that I called them!

Again, people buy from other people, not from websites.

For us as small businesses, why should we sound large, pretending to be something we aren’t? And why should we run from our advantage of being small: low overhead, friendly, personal service and accountability, among other advantages.

Make Each Step in Your Marketing a Smooth Handoff from One Step to Another

Whether you’re using AdWords, SEO, or both, make sure your title and description matches the experience your website visitor will have when they come to your landing page.

Quite often when I’m Coaching my small business owner clients or performing online marketing consulting, I find the wording for their organic listing or AdWords ad says one thing and their landing page says something that doesn’t sound the same.

This causes confusion is the best case scenario. In the worst case, it causes a lack of trust. Dangerous!

We should understand our products or services. And we know what we want our visitors to do on our site.

Our potential customers may not understand either. We need to think like them, when we explain what we have to offer them and how to use our website to take advantage of what we have to offer.

And when “shifting” from one page to another, we need to hand-off from one page to another naturally and smoothly, like a car with a smooth automatic transmission.

Don’t advertise one offer in AdWords or organic search, only to have your landing page sound like it was written for another advertising offer. I see this problem a lot!

Often times, having an affordable online marketing consulting firm reviewing what you’re doing can offer easy, inexpensive fixes that can yield big improvements in your search engine advertising and SEO conversions.

Your Action Plan

Let’s review what we’ve talked about.

First, overcome visitors anxieties by offering a multi-page website which answers questions about your company and your services or products, while inspiring confidence in your company. Effectively communicate your Value Proposition.

Second, personally relate to your site visitors. Avoid using the wrong words that may put off your site visitors. Use your picture on your Web pages.

Third, hand-off from one page on your website and one step in your selling process to another smoothly and naturally. We should understand what we want our site visitors to do, but they won’t unless we make the process really clear.

Whether your using an online marketing consulting firm or doing the work yourself, if you take these steps, your search engine optimization | advertising plan will convert at a MUCH higher rate, when you take these steps.

About The Author:
Marketing online since 2004, Paul Marshall can help you market on a budget. He’s an Online Marketing Consulting expert offering marketing services (and d-i-y Coaching). You can learn more about Paul on his Internet Marketing LinkedIn profile and at Strategic Web Marketing.net.

Read more articles written by: Paul Marshall

For more information about Website Design and how it can affect your Internet Marketing campaign contact us at  info@spiderchoice.com

Spider Choice Inc.
Web Marketing Solutions
SEO – PPC – Internet Marketing
Toronto & Port Dover, Canada

A well designed website is a necessity for any Internet Marketing strategy no matter what service or product you have if you wish to get a good ROI from your site.
Not only should your site be informative, visually pleasing and easy to navigate, it needs to be designed by a knowledgeable designer with a good understanding of how search engines work. Now we see lots of websites that meet the first 3 criteria and rank near the top on the SERPs mostly for non competitive low traffic keywords but if you want to compete with the big boys you will need a properly designed website from the bottom up.

Spider Choice Inc.
Web Marketing Solutions
SEO – PPC – Internet Marketing
Toronto & Port Dover, Canada