Landing Pages & SEO

Landing pages - we've all seen them. They're not your average home page. They're straight to the point, and deliver a lot of information in short amount of time. They've got a simple call to action, and invite users to purchase a product or a service. But we're not talking about your every day landing pages, we're talking about building an SEO campaign that involves landing pages to better track, filter, and guide customers to the information they're looking for.

I'm sure you've been to a website with a landing page that serves as an introduction to a website, often flashy graphics or even "welcome" animation. This is not the type of landing page that will help with your SEO. In fact, it can often hurt you.

Landing pages with regards to SEO and marketing campaigns are the pages that a customer will go to when they click on online ads, or e-mail links. These specialized pages draw special attention to a particular product or service. By having a special page to direct customers to with your internet marketing (be it ads or e-mail campaigns), you can better track how effective these marketing strategies are, and have a more precise conversion rate than your standard web page. Only users who view your ad or e-mail will be visiting the landing page, so you know how much traffic you are receiving from your marketing efforts.

Your landing page in and of itself could be optimized for particular keywords. The domain name, title, and content could be so focused on one aspect of your business that it gets better search results than your main website. You could have a landing page for each of your products, or each of the services you provide. It helps your customers get the information they are searching for right away.

Beware of "SEO" companies who want to offer you a landing page to help track your website, or even ones that give you a new phone number to help "track" leads. This can become very dangerous. The "landing page" they are creating for you is often on their domain - giving them better SEO, not you. Additionally, if you choose to discontinue the company's service, search engines will still point to their website and phone number, resulting in potential leads lost. If you truly want to get better search engine results, go for a more organic approach. These "smoke in mirrors" tricks to getting better search engine placement can only hurt you in the long run.

If you're interested in learning more about landing pages, or would like to get started on your ad or e-mail campaign, contact us at Avallo. We can get you started on the right track with your online marketing strategies.

Get Noticed with Facebook Pages

Facebook profiles, groups, and pages. What are they, and how can you use them to your advantage? Which one best fits your goals for your business? Read on to learn more about how to optimize your Facebook page for your followers, and how to get noticed in the multitude of Facebook pages.

Facebook Profiles

Facebook profiles are intended for personal use. One of the biggest faux pas I have seen is a business or organization creating a Facebook profile. Why is this wrong? For one, it's difficult to find a business or organization that's linked to a Facebook profile. Profiles are also set up to be more private than a group or a page. Instead of just clicking "like" and immediately becoming a fan, you must submit a "friend" request. If you want to have thousands of fans (and who wouldn't!?), you would then have to accept each of those friend requests separately. Additionally, you cannot contact all of your customers at once. Both groups and pages allow you to contact all of your customers with one quick message.

A profile also limits to you one account to modify, update, and change information. To have multiple administrators, you would have to pass out the user name and password to the profile to everybody, which has its own security problems. If an employee decides to leave the company, you would have to change the password and alert all other employees of the change. It's not very efficient.

Bottom line: if you're a business, corporation, or organization, stay away from profiles. Profiles are great for individual employees, but a Facebook group or page will better represent your company.

Facebook Groups

Groups, while more public than profiles, are also originally intended for personal use. Groups allow you to choose the network the group will appear in, as well as allow an administrator to approve members. This proves useful for organizations that are invite-only.

Like Facebook profiles, there is only one user to administrate the group. You can, however, add group officers to help administrate the group. However, if the creator of the group decides to part ways with your company at any time, they will be stuck as the admin. If this is a concern for you, a Facebook Page is a better choice.

When your customers interact with you, they will be listed as "Members". Their feed will be updated with "Customer Name has joined the group, "Your Organization Name"".

Bottom line: While great for organizations or clubs, Facebook groups don't offer the functionality that business or corporations would need.

Facebook Pages

Intended for businesses, brands, organizations, or even public figures, Facebook pages offer a variety of options that neither groups nor profiles provide. A Facebook page, much like your company, is a separate entity. You can add or remove administrators easily, and administrators are not listed on the account - they remain anonymous. This means that activity reflects on the company as a whole, and not one particular admin.

Facebook also makes it easy to create advertisements for your Facebook page so you can promote it and hopefully gain more fans.

The biggest difference is that pages allow you to add apps to a page, but not a group. Apps allow for greater flexibility and customization for your company. Take Avallo's Facebook page, for example. Instead of seeing the Wall when you visit our page, you are greeted by a full-color and fully customized landing page that points our customers to our website, blog, and other valuable offers and information.

By customizing your Facebook landing page, you can stand out from the crowd. Add some color to the normally blue-and-white Facebook, and get the most important information and updates to your customers.

Even more importantly, pages are indexed by search engines. This means that if someone searches for your company, it's very likely your Facebook page will appear in the results. Groups are not indexed.

The bottom line: Facebook pages are intended for businesses. It only makes sense, if you're a business, to take advantage of a Facebook page.

So what's best for you?

Both pages and groups have their strong points. Ultimately, it's up to your company to decide which will work best for your marketing strategy. Pages are a public company profile that allow you to interact, create events, and send updates to customers. Groups are a more exclusive club that allow invite-only members, and even allow you to send messages to everyone in the group - but this functionality is revoked when you have over 5,000 members.

Pages are indexed by search engines which means it will be easier for your customers to find you. They also allow you to include applications, making it incredibly easy to customize your page and stand out from the crowd. Both pages and groups allow you go create events and interact with your customers.

Once you've decided what you want, let the experts at Avallo help you set up your Facebook page or group, and even create custom apps or landing pages for you. While you're at it, become a fan of Avallo on Facebook and receive a free chocolate bar! You will also be entered into our monthly t-shirt drawing. How awesome is that?

Regular Website Maintenance

So you have a website. Now what? I hear it all the time: "I know my website needs to be updated, but I don't know what to do." Your website is often times the first impression customers get of your company. If your website is old, has dated information or pictures, or just doesn't even look usable, you can drive people away.

One of the easiest and most obvious ways to keep your website updated is by having a "Latest News" section. Here you can announce special events, promotions, new products, new/retiring employees, trade shows you may be attending, celebrate your upcoming "XXth" anniversary, or anything else your company may be doing in the community. Even if your company isn't doing anything news-worthy, you can post a thank you or testimonial, or even plug a partner company. Who knows, they might even return the favor on their website. If your company has frequent events, try updating once a week. If you're having trouble keeping up, just post something once a month. If you really can't come up with something, a generic "Happy St. Patrick's Day" can keep your website content looking fresh. Just remember to update it after the holiday has come and gone.

Another way to keep your website content fresh is to post a blog. It may be time consuming, but depending on what your company does, it could be an important platform to get information to your client base. Setting up a blog is incredibly easy. There are a multitude of blogging interfaces out there, including Blogger and Wordpress. If you're interested in seamlessly integrating your blog into your website, you can talk to your favorite web developer, and be blogging in no time. Blog once a week, once a month, or even once a quarter - just get blogging. By having a place to talk about common questions, issues, or news in your industry, people will no where to turn when they have questions. You can also encourage your customers to subscribe to your RSS feed, so they don't actually have to go to your website to read your latest blog post.

If you're already e-mailing monthly or weekly newsletters, consider publishing the newsletter on your website as well. That way, you can also encourage users to sign up for your newsletter, or subscribe to an RSS feed of your newsletter. Newsletters are a great way to keep an open communication with your customers, so even if they aren't in the market for your service at the moment, when the opportunity does arise, your company will be the first thing they think of.

Another way to update your website that is often overlooked is to simply update the pictures on the website. Be it by taking new pictures of your building, employees, or products, or by finding new stock photography, new photos can breathe new life into your website, even if the content is the same.

If your website is difficult to update - or you don't even know how to go about updating it - it may be time to contact your web developer. Web updates can be as simple or as extensive as you want. And, if you want to be able to make these changes yourself, consider a custom content management system, where editing information is as simple as writing an e-mail; and adding new pictures is as easy as uploading an attachment.

If you want to learn more about how to breathe new life into your website, contact us here at Avallo. We have the resources, knowledge, and experience to get people to your website. And with Avallo Panel, you can easily make changes to your entire website in just minutes.

Web Standards & Validation - The Basics

I've often spoken of the importance of having valid markup on your websites - but how do you know if your markup is valid? Fortunately, the organization that is in charge of standardizing web, the World Wide Web Consortium has its own free online validator: http://validator.w3.org. With this tool, you can check your website for any errors or problems. The results come back with line numbers to make fixing these errors easy.

Similarly, a CSS validator checks your Cascading Style Sheets in the same manner, by cross-checking with standards set by the W3 Consortium. There are some that will also tell you which CSS attributes are supported by different browsers. This validation tool is also available from the W3 Consortium: http://jigsaw.w3.org/css-validator

So why validate your website?

1. It helps with cross-browser, cross-platform compatibility, and the future compatibility of new browsers.
2. Search Engine Visibility: Search engines love valid markup - it makes it easier for them to sift through the content. So, more often than not, a website with valid markup will get higher rankings than one with messy markup.
3. High quality and professional website - many web designers either do not validate or do not know how to fix a site with errors. Top notch web designers do.

The W3 Consortium Web Standards Checklist

1. Quality of code

1. Does the site use a correct Doctype?
2. Does the site use a Character set?
3. Does the site use Valid (X)HTML?
4. Does the site use Valid CSS?
5. Does the site use any CSS hacks?
6. Does the site use unnecessary classes or ids?
7. Is the code well structured?
8. Does the site have any broken links?
9. How does the site perform in terms of speed/page size?
10. Does the site have JavaScript errors?

2. Degree of separation between content and presentation

1. Are all decorative images in the CSS, or do they appear in the (X)HTML?

3. Accessibility for users

1. Are "alt" attributes used for all descriptive images?
2. Does the site use relative units rather than absolute units for text size?
3. Do any aspects of the layout break if font size is increased?
4. Does the site use visible skip menus?
5. Does the site use accessible forms?
6. Does the site use accessible tables?
7. Is there sufficient color brightness/contrasts?
8. Is color alone used for critical information?
9. Is there delayed responsiveness for drop down menus (for users with reduced motor skills)?
10. Are all links descriptive (for blind users)?

4. Accessibility for devices

1. Does the site work acceptably across modern and older browsers?
2. Is the content accessible with CSS switched off or not supported?
3. Is the content accessible with images switched off or not supported?
4. Does the site work in text browsers such as Lynx?
5. Does the site work well when printed?
6. Does the site work well in Hand Held devices?
7. Does the site include detailed metadata?
8. Does the site work well in a range of browser window sizes?

5. Basic Usability

1. Is there a clear visual hierarchy?
2. Are heading levels easy to distinguish?
3. Is the site's navigation easy to understand?
4. Is the site's navigation consistent?
5. Does the site use consistent and appropriate language?
6. Does the site have a sitemap page and contact page? Are they easy to find?
7. For large sites, is there a search tool?
8. Is there a link to the home page on every page in the site?
9. Are links underlined?
10. Are visited links clearly defined?

Check out your website with the links above and see if it validates. Pass the info on to your web designer. If they can't fix your site, find someone who can. Our programmers here at Avallo write obsessively clean markup and code, and we pride ourselves on the quality of websites we develop. If your website isn't validating, give us a call.

Using Social Media to Grow Your Business

I am very busy just like most of my clients, family and friends. I didn't think I had the time to blog or use social networking sites. But here I am! And so as I do with most things... if I am going to do it, I learn how to do it as well as I can.

My business is based almost solely on referrals and business partners. I network like crazy every week - choosing which events to attend carefully and trying not to waste my precious time. So that is how I am approaching social networking and how I approach it with my clients. With so many choices out there, do you just sign up for all of them? Which ones fit best with your business' goals and clientele?

Which social media sites are worth your time, and more importantly... how do you use them to your advantage?

The answer isn't as simple as the question; it varies with every business. Ask yourself this: where do your key customers hang out online? Is your company B2B or B2C? What demographic do your clients usually fit into? It's pretty obvious, but if your customers don't bother with a social networking site, you probably shouldn't either.

I am constantly learning more...but here are a few things I have learned on the social media journey so far:

• Don't think old school marketing will work in social media - Don't push your products or services out of the gate. You need to entice, educate and entertain the person into coming to you and asking for your service.
• It takes time and energy to be a valued participant in an online community. You don't need to do everything yourself. Below is a list of popular social media sites, some creative ways companies have used them, and whether or not they may be right for your business:
  
  
  1. Blogging: This is great for just about any business. I blog weekly for two reasons: first, to prepare content for networking commercials I do every week, and secondly, to share my knowledge of online marketing to clients and potential clients. My blog also appears on Facebook automatically, making it easier for me to update Facebook on a regular basis. With my blog appearing on Avallo's website, it keeps our website updated and always has something new for visitors. One fopaux that many new bloggers make (and I'm even guilty of this at the beginning), is to start strong with updates and eventually fall off the wagon. Eventually, your most recent blog post is months... or years old! Stick to it!
     
     If you're having trouble thinking of what to blog about, sit down one day and write up a whole bunch of potential blogging topics. Or, think about questions you are frequently asked that you could answer in a blog. You could even answer e-mails on your blog if you think it would pertain to a large number of your client base. There is always something to blog about - don't give up!
  2. Facebook: Avallo has a business site for fans. Here, fans can post on our "Wall", share links or testimonials and view our photo galleries. I have been doing a lot of Facebook research and it can be a huge marketing opportunity for businesses. For example, it is now possible to have full screen color graphics on a business Facebook site. The ideas are limitless with this including video, polls, contests, coupons, and links going to your site. Facebook is perfect for retailers, restaurants, hotels, and companies selling consumer driven products. It's all about fun and buzz!!
     
     IKEA recently used Facebook in a creative way: they posted pictures of some of their newest merchandise on their Facebook, and the first fans to "tag" the item with their name got the furniture for free. By doing this, IKEA received thousands of fans, and every time someone got "tagged", it alerted their friends, which encouraged friends of friends of friends to become a fan of IKEA. A brilliant marketing idea.
  3. Twitter: More and more, tweeting is becoming a great way to communicate with customers. Share useful information and links, special offers, updates on what you're doing, and answer questions. Because Twitter is so instant, it's often a good platform to offer quick deals or information that might be useful to your customers.
     
     For instance, a massage therapist has been using her Twitter to fill up empty appointments: she simply tweets the time and date she has an opening, and the first person to respond gets 1/2 off the appointment.
  4. LinkedIn: This is a great tool for business people to connect with people who can refer you, advise you and create awareness for your business.
     
     A few things to remember:
     
     • Fill out the profile completely
     • Join industry and alumni groups related to your business
     • Link your status updates with your other social media accounts
     • Use LinkedIn to research your prospects before meeting or contacting them - so make sure your profile says what you want
     • Make recommendations for valuable vendors and clients (they will appreciate the attention)
     • Set up to receive your LinkedIn messages via your email so you can respond fast
     • Post job listings to find the talent you are looking for
     • Post info on new products, new contracts and anything else new you want to share

Remember, the most important thing with social media sites like Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn is that it's a two way communication. If you want your clients to talk to you... talk to them! Make your updates informational and something that will be useful to a broad range of clients. And don't waste your time with social media sites that don't mesh with your business goals.

New Years Website Resolutions

Just about everyone makes New Year's resolutions for themselves, like making more money or spending less time at the office. So why not a New Year's resolution for your business? Or better yet - how about a New Year's resolution for your website and have your website work harder and make you more money to help your business run smoother so you can spend less time in the office.

Here is a list of New Year's Web Resolutions for small business:

1. Get more potential customers to your website: This is an obvious one, but it's often easier said than done. If you don't have people coming to your site or don't know to get them there, make this your priority for 2010. There are many ways to attract potential customers to your website, but the easiest way is to have good, informative content that helps customers make a decision, or learn more about your product or services.
2. Add new content to your website frequently and keep it up to date. This not only helps your search engine ranking, but it also will keep your customers coming back. Once they learn they can get up-to-date information, they will return when they have future questions or want to make future purchases.
3. Get all of your internal and external forms online. Going digital not only saves trees, but also saves you and your office time and money. Storage and retrieval is a snap compared to shoveling through papers and file cabinets. Additionally, it makes it easier for your clients to get important information to you. No more faxes, postage stamps, or driving to drop off forms.
4. Make sure all of you advertising pushes customers to your website for more information – to a special landing page for tracking is best. By having a separate landing page for your marketing purposes, you can gauge how effective your marketing campaign is. Using special tools, you can track the number of people going to this website versus the number of hits you're getting to your regular website.
5. Use your website to collect new potential customers interest and contact information. It's one thing to get people to your website, but by collecting their information, you can keep in contact with interested customers with e-mail marketing, or letting them know about special promotions. You could also offer special monthly promotions to only those on your mailing list, which would encourage clients to sign up.
6. Create separate websites for your best selling products and services - link them all together. By having landing pages for specific products, and having different domain names for these pages, you can improve your rank for particular products or services. By linking them all together, you can lead people to your website, where they will find additional information about all of your products, not just the one they were searching for.
7. Use your website to become an expert in your field. Having well written content is important, but the content should also be informative and pertinent to your customers needs. By offering as much information as possible, you can have an advantage in the market. Clients will come to your website because they know you will answer all their questions - which will help them make a decision faster.
8. And finally - find a website development company that can help you achieve your New Year's Website Resolutions. Whether you want a website that can be easily updated or you want a complete website redesign to meet your New Year's Resolution needs, Avallo can help you achieve your goals. Call Julie today and please, visit our website at: www.avallo.com.

5 Steps to Take the Mystery Out of SEO

I've met SEO "experts" that charge thousands of dollars but only spend about 5 hours on a site doing search engine optimization. Why are people paying them so much? It's because their clients have no idea what SEO is and are desperate to get people to their site.

I met with a new potential client a few weeks ago whose page titles listed services that they didn't offer. When asked why, they said their SEO company said it was the highest search keyword under their field of business. They field daily calls on it and refer them to someone else. That just doesn't make sense. Let me simplify SEO for you: Use common sense and have quality content that customers need to make that buying decision. Don't try to trick the search engines or you can be penalized. Listed below are 5 steps that you can do to optimize your website for search engines.

1. Your Very Own Internet Real Estate: Your Domain Name

Choosing a local domain name, such as www.twincitiesdental.com will provide tremendous value in your ability to rank in search engines for highly searched key phrases. This is one of the first places search engines look. If you type in "twin cities dental office," you can be assured that www.twincitiesdental.com will appear high on the list.

If your domain name isn't performing as well as you'd like, you can still give your site traffic a boost by purchasing more optimal domain names and creating a landing page that represents a particular aspect of your business, products or services. This landing page can get high rankings by being very specific and detailed about your product or service with quality content, and can lead potential customers to your website.

2. Titles & Keyword Optimization: Think Like You Are the Searcher

Think of titles as your first impression. When someone searches for a term or keyword, the websites are displayed by the title of the page. Page titles should be informative and to the point, not bloated. Don't think of it as another place to stuff keywords, just use it as a introduction to your company, product or service. Reassure them that your website is exactly what they are looking for.

Page titles should be diverse and different depending on which page of the website you are on. This allows search engines to differentiate between the pages, and tells your customers what information is available on different pages.

Think carefully about what people may be looking for when they come to your website, or come to a particular page, as well as what information is available on that page. Google Keyword Tool External and Google Search-based Keyword Tool will provide you with keyword ideas based on actual searches. Use common sense.

3. Submitting to Local Guides

For small and local businesses, its important to get a foothold in your community before branching out to regional or even national sales. To gain traffic at a local level, its in your best interest to publish your company's information on some local guides. Google Maps will display the most popular businesses in local searches. To help your ranking on this "popular business" list, make sure you're listed in the following directories:

• Citysearch
• DexKnows
• Google Local Business Center
• Yahoo Local
• Best of the Web Local
• Yelp
• InfoUSA

Submitting your information to these sites is completely free. Think of it as free advertising. It only takes a moment. Be sure, however, to keep track of which websites you have posted on, and any log-in information. If you move down the road, this will make changing your address or phone number fast and easy. It will save you the headache of trying to clean up your web presence down the road... which is another issue altogether.

4. Linking Strategies

Search engines work like end users often do: they like to know where they're going. By cleverly linking common keywords and phrases on your website to another page (on your website) that describes the product or service in greater detail, you can lead visitors deeper into your website. Additionally, using terms like "click here" or "learn more" are vague, and don't tell your visitors (or search engines) what the link is. "View our Map," or "More information about -Your Keyword Here-" describes more clearly what your visitors will accomplish by clicking the link.

When blogging, link to your website - and do it often. When search engines crawl your blog, and find a link to a web development website, or even graphic design, this keyword will be associated with that page on your website, giving you an extra boost in search results.

5. Be an Expert in Your Field

Become the go-to expert in your field through networking and social media. Create a blog, post informative or interesting tweets on Twitter, and use sites like LinkedIn and Facebook to promote your business. Offer classes, tutorials, or seminars to help educate your clients about your business.

More importantly, make sure that the content on your website is up-to-date and accurate. By keeping your homepage and all your content updated, your customers will know to come back to your website if they have any questions. By becoming the go-to expert, you will also find yourself receiving the ever-valuable referral.

If you need help making these changes to your website, or want more information on getting your website to appear at the top of search results, contact me! We at Avallo know the ins and outs of Search Engine Optimization - and we won't charge you a pretty penny to let you in on the secret.