42. Why Small business needs a mobile website

July 18th, 2012

Since the first iPhone was launched in 2007, I have been a fan, some could say addict, of the information that is now available to me where ever I have a mobile signal.

Having all of this information available at a tap of a button, coupled with some very clever apps, has changed the way I, well a lot of people, make decisions on what services or products they are going to buy.

I will give you an example, in the next few weeks I will be best man for a friend.  One of my duties was to organise the stag weekend.  Over the stag weekend, I used the iPhone to make informed decisions on what bars and restaurants to choose.

Future trends

Research has indicated that the number of internet searches from mobile (smart) phones will over take those from desktop computers in 2013.

Challenge for business

As smartphones are designed to go in your pocket and be mobile, the screens are not very big.  This means that a desktop website may not display very well and may be difficult to navigate on the move.

Below is some key points from a 2011 survey by modapt.com.

  • 18% of smartphone users say their recent mobile browsing experiences have been frustrating.
  • Navigating websites (40%) and slow downloads (40%) are the biggest challenges among smartphone users, followed by information that’s hard to read or find (20%)
  • Smartphone users rely on their devices most for finding information about businesses (31%) and destinations (30%), but visiting social media sites is the biggest draw for roughly 20% of mobile audiences.

Therefore, it is important for businesses to have a website that is easy to use on a mobile device.  If not they will be losing out to competitors who do have a mobile version of their website.

Mobile website service

Over the past couple of months I have been working on a simple but powerful mobile website service.  I am pleased to say that a mobile website design service will be added to the range of services provided by Digital Ark from the start of August 2012.

Simple to use

The service has been deliberately designed to make it easy to find the typical information required on the move.  This meets one of the key requirements identified in the modapt.com survey.

Automatically detects mobile device

You can take a look the Digital Ark mobile website by simply visiting www.digitalark.co.uk.  The solution automatically detects the mobile and switches to display the mobile version of the website.  Again this ensures a good user experience as they do not have to do anything extra to view the easy to use mobile website.

Example of mobile website

Unlimited pages

Yes you can add as many pages as you want.  I would recommend that you don’t as you want to keep the user experience simple.

Make your own changes

Once the mobile website has been set up, you can change the content on the pages yourself, add new pages, change contact details, etc.  Or we can do this on your behalf as part of a managed service.

In Conclusion

The mobile web is here to stay.  The use of smart phones will continue to increase.  Users will want to be able to access data easily on a smart phone.  Therefore, it is important to get ahead of the competition by making sure your website can deliver a good user experience to smart phone users.

If you would like more information, please do not hesitate to contact us.

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41. Does you small business website REALLY contain the content Google now wants?

July 4th, 2012

In recent posts I have covered the changes to the Google search algorithm (Panda and Penguin) and in post 40, why you should not rely only Google for your traffic.  However, you can not ignore Google as they still account for around 80% of the search engine market.  So the question is, what is the most constructive use of a small business owners time to make their website appealing to Google?

What does Google want?

As mentioned many times, they want to provide the best user experience to the person conducting a search by providing the most relevant search results.  In order to do this, Google wants high quality content.

What does this mean to a small business?

Review the content on your website and ask yourself:

  • “does it provide value to the person searching”
  • “has it been written for the person searching or for the search engines”
  • “does the content answer burning questiond, provide information, etc”
  • “is the website easy to navigate, easy to find the information”
  • “can the information be improved and enhanced”
  • “is the information out of date / defunct”
  • “ask family and friends for their input”
  • “ask your clients (after all they know what they want”
  • “ask the people on your mailing list, followers on Facebook, Twitter, etc”

There are many other questions that could be added.  However, reviewing your site using the above will be a good start.

Take action – make changes

If you find areas that can be improved, make changes.  The sooner you make changes the quicker they will be picked up by Google.  Don’t sit back and wait.  If you have a big website, start that changes in tranches, don’t wait until you have reviewed all of your pages.

Action list

  1. Review website content
  2. Identify changes
  3. Rapidly make changes
  4. Repeat steps 1 to 3 on a periodic basis

Follow these simple steps and your website should become more useful to people searching meaning more relevant to Google.

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40. Is Google your single link of failure for your business?

June 30th, 2012

Since the creation of the Google search engine, as well as the much publicised “do no evil”, their main objective has been to return relevant search results to the person who is looking for information. It is important to remember this as their objective is NOT to help businesses and organisations promote their website (however good it might be)!

Old way to improve rankings

Due to this objective, many small business website owners have looked for ways to help their website improve in the search engine rankings. Some have had success, others have not. A whole industry offering search engine optimisation (SEO) has been created, again with a varying degree of success. SEO can be split into 2 distinct areas, on page (the structure and content that appears on a website) and offpage (inbound links from other websites, directories, etc). It should also be added that social media (how many Facebook ‘likes’, Google ‘+ 1′s’, etc that your website is receiving).

Over recent years, Google gave a very high ranking to websites with many inbound links, especially where the anchor text of link was an exact match to a search phrase. Anchor text is simply the text that appears in a link i.e. Click Here. Many SEO companies focused on adding links with the anchor text matching the search phrase a website wished to rank well in the search engines. So if you were running a building company in Colchester, the anchor text would typically be ‘builders in Colchester’, ‘Colchester builders’, etc.

Old way made the searchers unhappy

The Google algorithm used to equate many links with the same anchor text to mean that the website must be a good match for the search phrase. This resulted in websites who practiced this approach rising to the top of the Google rankings. Unfortunately, the results that reached the top were not always the results that the person searching was looking for. This means that the searchers were unhappy that in turn means that Google was unhappy for not meeting their objective.

Google comes to the rescue

In April 2012 Google addressed this my adjusting their search algorithm to discount inbound links that looked like they were artificial and / or being used to manipulate rankings. This change hit a number of websites quite hard, unfortunately many innocent websites were caught in the cross fire. While there is still much debate on what is the best approach for SEO (just search for best seo approach post penguin), one thing is certain, building links using the same anchor text is no longer as effective. In fact it can hurt your rankings.

Important lesson

Facebook Business PageLike in business, you should never rely on one customer for all your business. What happens if they go ‘bust’? The same is true for search engine traffic. Google often makes changes to their search engine algorithm. If you are unlucky, you could lose all of your traffic overnight. Therefore, it makes sense to look to other channels as well for search traffic. For example, Facebook is the 2nd most visited website each month with many people using it to seek buying advice. Every business should set up their own Facebook Business page. It provides another source for visitors, and lessens the risk of single point of failure with Google.

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39. Ideas for small business to benefit from 2012 Olympics

June 22nd, 2012

The stadiums and facilities are complete, the transport systems have had test runs for the extra visitors so all that is needed is the start of the 2012 Olympics in Stratford, London will start on 27th July.  If small businesses are not already thinking about how to benefit from the games, they should certainly start now so as not to miss out!

To help the thought process, here are a few ideas.  Obviously not applicable to all businesses.  However, the aim is to serve as a ‘kick start’ to the thought process.

Special Offers / Discounts

People always like to get ‘a deal’.  You can think about launching a special offer or discount that is related to the Olympics.  So offer on your leaflets, signs, website, etc would be something like “Olympic Games Special Offer”.  Describe the offer i.e. 20% discount, buy 1 get 1 free, etc.  Then, most important, create the urgency by saying the offer closes on 16th August 2012.

If you want to be really clever, you can link the discounts to the games such as 20.12% discount.  However, do think about how hard this will be.

It could be as simple as giving free chocolate Olympic medals to all the children who come in to your business.

Themed Events

You can hold special Olympic themed events:

  • Launching new products, services
  • Starting your summer sale
  • For a bar, cafe, restaurant launch an Olympic menu

If possible hold mini Olympics or Olympic themed games as part of your event.  Offer prizes to winners, proceeds to charity, etc.

If you can hold an event or special day.  See if you can drum up extra publicity by issuing a press release to your local paper or radio station.

 Extra Visitors

If you are based in or around London (including close to airports or ports), think about the extra visitors who will be arriving to the area.  If you run a B&B or restaurant, create offers that target Olympic visitors.  If you sell or manufacture products, such as furniture, ornaments, etc you have an opportunity to reach new customers.  The advances of the internet mean that more and more people are more than happy to place mail order purchasers via the internet.

Conclusion

This is only a quick post with generic ideas.  The aim is to start the thought process and, most importantly, prompt action to be taken so you can benefit from the Olympic Games.

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38. Local Search – make the most of citations

June 7th, 2012

As I have mentioned in previous posts, Google is trying harder than ever to ensure a good user experience.  This means an increased focus on returning local search results that are relevent.

This has meant that Google Places has gone through yet another update and now you will see an increased number of ‘blended’ search results.  This is where both normal organic and Google Places search results are displayed on the first page of Google.

local search results

This means that it is even more important to make sure that small businesses are set-up in a way to maximise the benefits of this service.

Action Plan

1. Claim your Places page

If you have not already, make sure that you claim (or add) your business page.

2. Complete the set-up

Make sure that you correctly complete all of the information, being mindful to take advantage of the different fields available to help people find you.  You must ensure the entry is 100% complete.

If you find any errors in the existing data and / or duplicate Places page, make sure you correct / get the duplicate page(s) deleted.

3. Reviews / Reputation Management

Check to see if you have any reviews.  If you do, and you find bad reviews, take action to contact the person who left the poor review and try to resolve their concern.  Likewise, examine your business and make sure that any deficiencies in your service that may have caused the bad review are addressed.

Get into the habit of asking your customers to add reviews.  If you don’t ask you don’t get!

4. Citations

Work on your digital footprint – mentions of your business across the internet (known as citations).  The more sources Google finds of your business name, address and (telephone) number (NAP), the more credible.

Downside is for Google to see a match, the NAP must exactly match your Places page.  So take care when adding your details to directories, websites, etc.  It is also worth searching and cleaning up old entries to gain more benefit.

Summary

Local Search is important.  Make sure you take the time to make the most of the trend.

If you would like a free local search analysis report for your business, send a mail to local@digitalark.co.uk with your website a 3 search phrases you are trying to rank your website for.

We are offering a number of cost effective local search packs to help get small businesses take advantage of local search.

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37. Google Penguin has changed the rules again for small business websites

May 7th, 2012

After the 23rd April 2012 did you notice any of the following for your website?

  • Drop in the number of daily visitors
  • Large drop on where your website appears in Google

If you did then your website has probably been hit by the recent change of the Google search algorythm, a change they have named ‘Penguin’.

Penguin

The Google Penguin change has been launched to try and address what Google refers to as ‘web spam’.  Websites that offer poor, sometimes duplicate content and / or engage in aggressive search engine optimisation  (SEO) practices to try and manipulate their position in search engine rankings.

Unfortunately, like with other changes by Google the end result is never perfect and some good websites have been caught in the crossfire.  The problem is that this is very unfair on the website owners, especially if it means in loss of business to competitors.

When Google make these type of changes it does act as a wake-up call, especially if you are guilty of (quite innocently) falling foul of these guidelines.

Link building can be risky

One area many small business owners get caught is buying a cheap deal to build 1000 links to your website for a very small fee.  What you don’t know is how those links will be built and, more importantly, the impact they will have.  For this reason it is very wise not to buy links.  In fact Google even states that links should not be purchased.

For a website with good content and serving a meanigful purpose, links will build up naturally over time.  The method of how these links are built will vary, not only by the ‘anchor text’ in the link but also the source.

For example, a natural link profile will come from directories, blogs, forums, press releases, social networks (like Twitter, Facebook, etc) and others.  They will also appear over time.  Buying links may result in 1000 backlinks all being built on the same day, all with the same anchor text and from the same type of source i.e. forum signatures.

Avoid duplicate content

Another important aspect of the change is to ensure that your website contains good quality content that is not duplicated across several webpages (or other websites).  Google can identify duplicate content and only gives credit to what they beleive is the source version.

This means that a small business owner should ensure that there is no duplicate content and ideally look to ensure that content is regularly updated.  This is where a pay each month service can be very cost effective by allowing regular updates to keep content fresh.

Google’s primary objective

I want to close by remnding you that Google is always thinking about search in respect of the user experience of the person searching.  If you keep this in mind when building your website and updating the content together with avoiding suspect SEO practices, you hopefully will not experience the wrath of the penguin.

If you would like more information, please do not hesitate to contact me.

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36. How Special Holiday Offers Help to Increase Sales

April 19th, 2012

In years past, Sunday was genuinely a day of rest and all the shops were closed. Bank holidays were a bonus day off where we would all pray for sun (inevitably we would get rain!) and hope to enjoy precious free time with friends and family. Nowadays for those of us lucky enough to be self employed or working outside of the retail industry we can still take full advantage of these “days off” how we choose.

However, for those in the retail industry these “holidays” are the perfect time to entice the rest of us off the beach, from in front of the television and out of our gardens to spend our hard earned money on the wares they have to offer. How do they tempt us? By way of huge savings and discounts for a limited time only.

One of the first examples of this is what has become known as “Black Friday” in the United States. Thanks Giving is a major holiday for all Americans, and initially employers would give their members of staff the following day off work to recover from whatever “revelling” they had partaken in. Now…having clicked on to the fact that most Americans are not at work, retailers have taken to opening their doors as early as 4am offering promotional sales in order to “kick start” the Christmas shopping season

The UK’s best example of this has always been referred to as “The January Sales”. Having spent a fortune on presents and entertaining the family over the Christmas period, we are persuaded to part with more money by way of huge discounts in every retail store from the first working day of the New Year.  Why it is still referred to as the “January Sales” is now a question indeed, as well before Santa has left the North Pole, we are being bombarded with adverts from retailers stating “SALE STARTS BOXING DAY”.

With the way of world and the economic climate such at it is today, we no longer spend these holidays in the traditional way they were intended. We work hard to earn our money and when it comes to spending it we love a bargain, so retailers will continue to attract us through their doors with promises of huge savings, regardless of it being Easter, Mayday or Christmas and no doubt we will continue to be happy to oblige!

If you have a pay monthly website service, like those offered by Digital Ark, you can add offers to your website for holidays (and other times) and remove them without having to worry about additional costs.  Other options include adding discount coupons to your Google Places page.

If you would like more information, please contact me.

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35. Every business does not need a website – they need an effective website!

April 17th, 2012

In the Time newspaper today (Tuesday 17th April 2012), they had their 3rd of 6 Small Business Masterclasses titles “Acquiring customers digitally” (I recommend reading a copy).  It talked about how no business, even small micro businesses like local plumbers and electricians, etc cannot afford to ignore the power of the web.

The main reason being that there has been a huge shift from established ways of attracting customers such as directories, parish magazines, leaflets, cards in shop windows, etc to more and more people searching for products or services online (either with a computer or increasingly a smartphone).

One of the alarming points the article states is “Research has shown that today people search the web even for services they can find next door, rather than look at their parish magazine or in a newsagent’s window”.

This article made me think of a recent conversation with one of my client’s.  They were expecting a visit from one of the long established directory services and wanted to discus advertising.  In the past they had been spending a lot of money on half page adverts.  While it was possible to advise the client on what size advert to take.  I did discus the trends of more people moving to online search and crowdsourcing to find products or service.  I also added that in many cases, hardcopies of directories do not make it out of the plastic wrapping before going straight into the recycling.  All very similar thoughts to those expressed in the article in the Times.  See our free resources on local mobile search that covers some of these points.

So what does this mean to a small business?

1. You must have a website that contains basic business and contact details.

However, there are more and more websites being added to the internet every day and landing a position on the first page of search engines like Google is becoming increasingly harder. So:

2. To really give you business the best chance online you need an effective website that has been designed to provide the content that people are searching for.

This means ensuring that you conduct key search phrase analysis before designing the website.  You could design the best looking website.  But if it does not relate to what people are searching for it will never appear in the search engine results, you will have not visitors meaning no opportunity to win new customers.

Points to consider

You could build your own website, it saves money.  However, it will take a lot of your valuable time and it may not end up attracting visitors.

The flip side, you could choose a web design company that understands how to design a website to target the key search phrases for your market.  It will cost you money.  However, what it saves in time and more importantly, the visitors (aka potential customers) it may attract will prove a sound investment.

If you have any questions or would like more information of the comprehensive range of website design and online services provided by Digital Ark, do not hesitate to contact me.

 

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34. Five things you should do when writing a small business blog

March 20th, 2012

A business blog is a place where your company employees can converse with existing and potential clients in their own unique voices. A company can demonstrate their collective knowledge and experience of the company and through these comments have a conversation with customers informally and openly. When writing a blog, think about the following:-

 

Content

Good content needs to have a purpose whether to inspire, educate, inform, assist or entertain. It should engage the reader and provide something they can relate to. Fresh information is better than stale so even if you are writing about a topic that is timeless, it should be done in a way to make it new and exciting.

 

Headlines

The headlines of your blog will the first and perhaps the only impression you make. Without a headline that converts a browser into a reader, the content of your blog may as well not even exist. A headline can grab someone’s attention, a great headline will entice the reader into the body of the text you have written. In essence, a headline should promise some kind of advantage or reward for the person reading it in trade for their valuable time to do so.

 

Keywords and Phrases

In order for your blog to get noticed by people other than those working for your company you need to maximise the potential for it to get noticed on the various search engines used by potential customers. It is important that you use the best and most unique keywords and phrases for your blog as they provide these search engines with a brief description of what your blog is about and the easier you make it for search engines the better chance your blog has of being noticed.

 

Writing Style

A blog is not an advert or flyer for your company. The other sections of your website should provide these bits of information, so try to sound like you are chatting to someone when writing your blog. Read your blog back to yourself before publishing, does what you have written invite your customers to initiate a response?

 

Frequency

You need to ensure that your blog is updated regularly. Content should remain fresh but not overstretch your resources. At minimum you should set a time each week, however depending on your business requirements you may have a need to respond to or update on posts more frequently.

If you are interested in starting a blog to help your business or organisation and would like advice and guidance, please contact me on info@digitalark.co.uk.

If you are ready to start, you may be interested in our reliable web hosting packages with 1 click WordPress install.

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33. Why a small business needs to make the most of client reviews

March 8th, 2012

When looking to purchase a product or use a specific service, many of us like to know that that the company and the product or service on offer is going to benefit us by way of things like quality, customer service and in some circumstances, after care such as warranties and maintenance. In order to gain knowledge in these areas we like to refer those who have already had experience with what we are looking to purchase.

 

Many companies will publish testimonials from the clients but how often do you see a negative review on a company’s website or within their other marketing materials? No-one likes to broadcast when a customer has had a bad experience or that their product is not all it’s cracked up to be.

 

With the introduction of the World Wide Web came a whole new way for companies for market their products. We no longer need to wait for a local directory or newspaper to be published or for an advert to appear between television programs. We now have instant access to millions of companies, products and services worldwide.

 

Further to this, social media websites like Facebook have not only changed the way we communicate with other socially but have also allowed us to express our opinions by way of forums and reviews on pretty much anything and everything and this includes the products and services we buy and use every day.

 

Many of us now refer to the masses rather than the few by way of these social media websites in order to build up a view on and ascertain if we would like to purchase a product or service. Client reviews are a powerful marketing tool; they give you independent opinions from other clients that have already used what you have an interest in and not just the company marketing it.

 

A lot of companies like Amazon that sell products from multiple manufacturers and businesses have taken on board just how important a tool crowd sourcing is and have adapted their websites so that both positive and negative responses can be left.

 

All companies small and large should embrace this approach as even if the response from a client is negative, honest feedback will help them review on a regular basis the products and services they have to offer, how their personnel are interacting with their clients but most importantly they will be able to implement changes in order to improve their products and services.

A very good service for local mobile search is Google Places please read our blog post 28. How Google Places can help a small business.

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