Reno SEO, Web Design & Internet Marketing

Once in a while an SEO tool comes along that becomes absolutely invaluable and so priceless that you ask yourself how you ever survived without it. One of those SEO tools that occupies a primary spot in my SEO tool belt is the SEO Blogger Plugin from Wordtracker. SEO Blogger allows you to do keyword research right from the same screen you are writing in. You don’t have to launch another application or open another tab in your browser. Simply launch the plugin from the link at the bottom of the page and you are all set. Type in a keyword and the tool will pull up all variations of that keyword and the number of searches. Add the keywords you want and the tool automatically shows you the number of times you have used that keyword or phrase in your blog post, allowing you to optimize your post as you write.

See you next week for another Tidbit!

Creating a print stylesheet from scratch can be a time consuming matter and is more often than not overlooked when nearing the end of a web design or development project. One of the quickest and easiest ways to deploy a print stylesheet is to use the Hartija CSS Print Framework.

This is not an end solution and you will need to modify it to add your classes and ID’s, but it is a big boost over starting from scratch. When you’ve completed your print stylesheet simply link it like your other stylesheets.

<link rel="stylesheet" href="print.css" type="text/css" media="print">

Just make sure to set your media to print!

See you next week for another tidbit!

Many designers, developers, content managers and webmasters forget to utilize text or body copy for navigation and internal linking structure. Part of a strong optimization process involves capitalizing on your content for in-content or contextual links which link to pages deep within you site.

Use good anchor text that relates to the page you are linking to and if possible use text that is found within your title tag, description or page headlines. Of course this may mean rewriting some of these elements to be more optimized to your targeted key phrase.

See you next week for another Tidbit!

Ever need to quickly create a tab for a navigation element? With the Tab Generator it is quick and easy to generate any kind of tab you can imagine. Download it as a png and import into your design. As it says on the website – Tabs have never been easier!

See you next week for another tidbit!

Do not allow your administration page to get indexed by the search engines

With this one simple line added to your robots.txt file you can avoid having your content management system (CMS) administration or login page indexed by the search engines.
Disallow: /admin/
Note: change “admin” to whatever directory or page has your CMS login on it. For example in Wordpress this would be:
Disallow: /wp-login.php
For good measure you could also add this meta tag to the head of your login page or the index page in your login directory.
meta name="robots" content="noindex, nofollow"

See you next week for another tidbit!

We’ve seen our fair share of RFPs (Request For Proposal) and it seems as if all of them miss one or more important elements. Elements that we, the web design service provider, need to know in order to respond. So I have included our recommendations for writing a website design (or redesign) RFP. We hope this will help you when preparing your next web design RFP.

Company Information and Background

This should be a brief overview of the company, its history, services or products, business focus, marketing objectives and market demographics. These are just a few elements you could include here. Give as much information here as possible to create a complete business profile, but also keep it neat and short. Also include how decisions about the RFP will be made in this section. Is there a committee review process? Include the members of the committee here with their title and role in the committee.

Project Background and Objectives

This is where you can outline the project objectives, but not the scope or requirements, that will come later. Give the history of the website and how it currently used, both internally and by the general public or your customer base. Address how you see this use changing with the new website. Outline search engine visibility requirements, search engine marketing objectives and/or social media marketing goals. What are the goals for the website and how will you measure success?

Requirements and Scope of Project

This is probably the one area where businesses do not include enough information about their website design project. Start by addressing elements of the current website that should stay. These include any interactive applications, shopping carts or web forms to be transitioned to the new site. Include information on any other systems that interface with the website, or should interface with the website. These include things like an intranet, CRM (customer relationship management) system or email marketing system.

Provide an outline of how you want the content to be managed, by whom and what access they should be given. Specify where content will come from- whether imported from the current site, newly developed or a mix of both. Who will be responsible for generating content prior to the launch date and after.

Outline new applications and functionality as well as design requirements. Be sure to include relevant items from your brand standards guidelines if you have them.

Website Hosting Requirements

This is, by far, the most overlooked piece of information when compiling an RFP. We have lost more than one bid because we provided a solution for a Linux host and the prospect wanted the website hosted internally on their Windows server. If it truly does not matter to you then at least include a statement that hosting is up to the vendor.

Web Design and Development Experience of the Vendor and Key Staff

Ask for testimonials and/or references of other websites the vendor has designed or developed. Ask them to outline their responsibilities for the project. Request identification and resumes for key personnel who will be working on this project. Request information on their web design and development approach including items like revisions, design iterations, scope changes, standards and technologies utilized.

Project Timeline

This is the second most overlooked element of web design RFPs. Make sure to include your anticipated schedule. Even though these will often change as the project progresses, without one your project may never finish.

Project Pricing

This should include a detailed outline of all costs, both one-time and recurring, for the website redesign and development project.

Submission Information

How and when should the vendor respond to your RFP? Be sure to include the deadline and the format for submission, as well as who it should be sent to and at what address.

How do you convert a business prospect into a believer that what you are selling holds the true value regardless of what your competitors are selling? It boils down to testimonials and references.

True Website and Marketing Testimonials, References and ‘Real’ Outcomes Matter Most
Testimonials are and should be considered true marketing if they are written honestly, with real facts and the ability for new business to contact your references direct if needed. They provide the much-needed ‘proof’ for waivering prospects and can be used to convert more easily if given the ability and access.

It’s easy for us at Westward to sell ourselves and make promises that we have businesses best interest in the forefront of our minds but it can be an up hill battle to sing our own praises when we have other website and online marketing competitors that might brow beat us simply by price. Inorder to be able to compete in such a saturated and competitive internet marketplace here are four tips for how we make honest and competitive use of our testimonials:

1) Westward doesn’t over-edit. Our testimonials work best when they are in real people language. The real written language helps our readers connect which demonstrates that we are an honest company looking out for our clients each and every day.

2) Westward uses testimonials that fit. We place appropriate testimonials along with a particular point that we are trying to make and back it up with facts. Call us on it if you want. We’d be happy to deliver the information.

3) Westward never fakes it. While testimonials are crucial, we don’t take the risk to fake them. We figured that most people have well-trained ‘this is a crock’ detector and they can smell a fake a mile away. If you would like a list of our references – contact me direct: info@westwardstrategy.com.

4) Westward always encourages specifics. Whether a client gives us a testimonial on their own or whether we ask them for one, we do ask our clients to be specific on how Westward helped them. Wouldn’t you want to know exactly what we did as far as specifics for the client rather than a bland – yeah Westward Strategy was great cause they just were!

Visit our testimonial page to read ‘real’ accounts of how Westward Strategy has been an asset to our clients or if you would like, contact me direct for a list of references at info@westwardstrategy.com.

It is something we get asked all the time and it is akin to asking “How much does a house cost?”. Sure there are ways to determine some kind of median price point, but just like with a house the number of variables that affect the price are almost infinite. You need to ask yourself what “must-haves” you are really willing to invest in and what items are “want-to’s” that would be nice if your budget permits.

In the Reno/Sparks area a house might set you back $50,000 or $3 million. Just as a website from a Reno/Sparks web design agency might cost you $500 or $30,000. Do you want to live in a one bedroom apartment in a less-than-desirable part of town or do you want the sprawling estate in the foothills? Do you want a cookie-cutter template site or a robust custom web application? Plywood or hard wood floors? Iframes or AJAX? I could go on this way all day, but you get the point.

The beautiful (and the frustrating) thing many people fail to understand about the web is it’s flexibility. If you only have a $500 budget there are ways to get a website started for you. However, you need to be realistic about your expectations. You wouldn’t expect a $50,000 house to have marble floors, so don’t expect your $500 website to process online orders.

Your Website Should Cost Nothing

All that being said, a website should not cost you anything. Zip, zilch, nada, nothing. Your website should help you generate revenue or in some way get a return, therefore it is not a cost – it is an asset. If your website costs you money then your web designer or developer has done something wrong.  Yes, you will be required to invest something up front for this asset. Usually this investment will come in the form of time and/or money. If your website is a money pit with no discernible return on your investment it is time to ditch your designer. If you’re working alone stop trying to do it yourself and seek professional help.

Just like all your assets, your website will require maintenance to maintain and even improve it’s value. So make sure you are taking care of your website and are not neglecting it to the point where it becomes a liability. Once it becomes a liability then it will cost you money to bring it back to the point of being a valuable asset and this is always more expensive than maintaining it’s value.

Just remember, like most things in life, with your website and online marketing you get what you pay for.

Over the last couple of days I have spent quite a bit of time reviewing business blogs and compiling business blogging recommendations for several of our clients. Because many of our clients are local, a large portion of my time was spent reviewing the local business blog scene (including many of our competitors) and I quickly found that there are really only two types of blogs – cornerstone blogs and self-serving blogs. Cornerstone blogs are educational, useful blogs of quality with real and implied value in their posts. Self-serving blogs are marketing/seo driven blogs with little valuable content for users. Let’s take a look at both types below.

Cornerstone Blogs

For many businesses blogging has become the cornerstone of their web marketing efforts, a way to disseminate information and reach their target demographic/potential client base in a new way. It allows for dialogue with their clients, albeit still in a top down fashion. The business pushes content down and the masses respond. They could respond in many ways including comments, linkbacks or tweets and retweets. Many businesses use it as a test bed for customer service and/or marketing messages, but there is one overriding characteristic of these blogs. They all add value to the company’s brand image by being useful and providing quality information to their users.

At Westward Strategy we strive to add value every single time we post something. Sure, sometimes we post our own business successes, but more often than not we post the successes of our clients over our own successes. We do research and find supporting and/or opposing arguments to the topic we are writing on. We even publish articles that could be useful to anyone looking for search optimization or web design resources. And we do all of it with the readers/users of our site at the forefront of our minds. If you’re shopping around for a web design firm we hope you can use and/or educate yourself a little bit more with our “10 Questions You Should Ask a Prospective Web Design Company“. It does not matter if you choose to contact us about your project or not.

Now I know what you are saying…

“Chris, if a company uses a blog to publish quality content and that in turn garners more market share and value for the company, isn’t that self-serving?”

The answer – sure, in a way. The difference is cornerstone blogs focus on the customer first and the business second.

Self-serving Blogs

The other type of blog is the self-serving blog. The blog that gets added to an existing website and updated maybe once a month with posts that read something like this:

Reno Car Wash has the best reno car washes in Reno. We use only the best car wash soap and reno car wash equipment at Reno Car Wash. You should stop by Reno Car Wash and see our brand new car wash equipment and get a car wash from Reno Car Wash while you’re there!

Or even worse, they look like this with a bazillion links in them:

Reno Car Wash has the best reno car washes in Reno. We use only the best car wash soap and reno car wash equipment at Reno Car Wash. You should stop by Reno Car Wash and see our brand new car wash equipment and get a car wash from Reno Car Wash while you’re there!

Ok, that may be a little exaggerated, but trust me it’s not by much. It should be painfully obvious, like a frying pan to the skull cap, what the difference is between a cornerstone blog and self-serving blog. Sure the self-serving blog will manage to get information to the user that may be of some use, but really is that the way you talk to your customers? Is that the way you should talk to your customers? The answer to both is NO.

Self-serving blogs are like cheap furniture. They may have a nice wood veneer, but one scratch will reveal the shoddy construction and cheap materials underneath that thin cover. At that point it doesn’t matter what you put into the blog, you or your company will be seen in a not-so-friendly light.

So, the question is, why do you blog? Are you adding value for your clients, customers and website users? Are you helping educate them? Are you freely giving information and knowledge? Or are you posting for your own perceived benefit? Are you blogging to dominate the search results? (See SEO Myth: Blogging Means Top Rankings) Are you adding value or just creating white noise?

Why do you blog?

I’ve been working on Pay Per Click (PPC) Advertising campaigns for a little over 4 years now. I started dabbling in the online marketing space while working on a side project and quickly realized that I wanted to explore this advertising channel more. Along the way I have learned many things about ad structure, optimization, user behavior and keyword research. I’ve had my fair share of successful campaigns with CTRs and Conversion rates well into the double digits, but I have also had my fair share of flops that struggled to make it to the 1% bar.

A few weeks ago I decided it was finally time I took the Google Advertising Professional Qualification exam. Although I have spent hundreds of hours in the Adwords tool I was nervous about the test. I spent several hours going through the Help Center, taking quizzes and reviewing areas that I do not use all that often, like the API. Google requires that you have at least 90 days of account management under your belt before you can take the exam, but I can tell you it took all of my experience and the additional “cramming” to get through the test. I’m also fairly certain there was at least 3 trick questions in it.

However all the nerves and the extra preparation paid off because I passed the exam! I now get to use the spiffy graphic below on our website, business card and other marketing materials.

What the Exam is Missing

While the exam is a great test of your knowledge of the Google Adwords tool. It is not a test of your ability to create a great campaign that delivers targeted traffic and generates sales. In my mind, only experience can give you that kind of qualification.