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It's like you can't even use a safe web browser nowadays! Germany and France have issued warnings to stop using Internet Explorer because of a major security hole. This hole had something to do with the recent attacks on Google in China. There's been a movement for years to get people to stop using Internet Explorer 6 (IE6), which has been dubbed the worst web browser ever. IE7 was a fix but still not great. Most people have IE8 installed and are using it as their default web browser. If you are using IE6 or IE7, please discontinue using it immediately! You are very vulnerable to attacks when visiting certain web sites. If you are using IE8, then please be sure to...
Posted on 19 January 2010 | 4:19 am
Ouch! What was that? Who put that sofa there? Why didn't I see it? Oh, the lights were not on. Yeah, that would help me to see where I'm going and avoid things. I'd also get to where I want to go without problems. Ok, that's a dumb example but many companies have that same exact logic if they're not checking out their website statistics. They want to do web marketing but don't know where they're going because the lights are off, basically. Make it a goal this year to dig into your web stats. You've put your website out there, so how are people using it? Where are you getting the most traffic? What's working and what is not?...
Posted on 13 January 2010 | 8:47 am
We've decided to extend our Maintenance Blocks Bonus Blocks Sale until the end of the week since some people may have been out for the holiday break. Through Friday, January 8th 2010, you can still get the bonus Maintenance Blocks. Update Your Website I was thinking this morning about some people that have websites and all they may want to do to them is just change their copyright date at the bottom from 2009 to 2010 so that their website looks current. Yeah, you should do that but that's not nearly enough. Make it a resolution this year to update your site monthly or weekly. As I've been explaining, that's a great use for a blog. Make your own news. Subscribe to...
Posted on 4 January 2010 | 3:43 am
Hello and Happy New Year! If you're in the Southern Wisconsin area, you can participate in the Million Pound Challenge (http://www.princetonclub.net/mpc/). Keep your New Year's Resolution this year and lose some pounds. When you do, you're donating food to our local food pantries! Here is how it works: For every pound of weight you lose, the Princeton Clubs, and our corporate sponsors, will contribute 10 pounds of food, to the Second Harvest Food Bank of Southern Wisconsin, up to ONE MILLION POUNDS. That’s 500 tons of food! Go, sign up and join the Webstix team or start your own team! -Tony
Posted on 29 December 2009 | 9:44 am
As we wrap up 2009, it's good to think about what's coming up in the next, new year. Of course, search engine optimization (SEO) is on everyone's minds. We all want to be found in the search engines. How will search engines change next year? The way I see it, they always have to change. New websites are being launched every few seconds and hundreds of thousands of new pages are added every minute. With this rapid development of online information, the ways it's sorted just naturally has to evolve. What this means for you and your website is that it may become increasingly more difficult to rank. Your website has to be in tip-top shape and very much look like...
Posted on 15 December 2009 | 6:10 am
It happened again. I just approved a new website listing on MadisonClick.com (http://www.madisonclick.com/) and saw something kind of strange. It's something you should look for when hiring a website design company. (Also see my Meta Tag Keywords (http://www.webstix.com/meta-tag-keywords.html) post) I think this website is actually a competitor of ours (they seem to do website design on the side or something), but what they've done is put 67 (I counted them) keywords in their keyword meta tags. Not only is that way too many but they are single words, not multi-word keywords (key phrases). So with this logic, they're hoping to rank well for words like: club, door, dry, fleet, box, digital, etc. There are a number of problems here, let...
Posted on 4 December 2009 | 6:04 am
Hello! Happy Cyber Monday everyone! If you do retail sales on the Web, then this is a fun time of year. Predictions are that it will be better than last year. Hopefully you have your website all tuned up and ready for the blast. Something that takes effect tomorrow (Dec 1, 2009) is the way you can use testimonials on your website. The FTC came up with some new guidelines ( Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising ). They can be found starting here: FTC Publishes Final Guides Governing Endorsements, Testimonials (http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2009/10/endortest.shtm) (www.ftc.gov) If you have testimonials on your website, you should review it and seek legal counsel. I'm not a lawyer (again, seek legal...
Posted on 30 November 2009 | 3:12 am
Many people are looking for CMS web design but may not know what it is and what is involved with creating a website with a CMS (content management system) behind it. You should first understand what a CMS is. It stands for Content Management System and it does just that. It's an easy way to manage content on your website and there are tons of advantages. Basically, you can login to your website using just your web browser. No other software is needed. You find the page you want to edit, edit that page using a word processor-like interface, save your changes and then your website is instantly updated. There are many, many advantages to using a web content management system. Beyond...
Posted on 19 November 2009 | 7:36 am
Here's an interesting blog post I found today: 5 Signs You Need A Website Redesign Now (http://www.elance.com/p/blog/2009/11/5_signs_you_need_a_website_redesign_now.html?rid=1NEPI) (www.elance.com) Question 1: In terms of speed, how fast is your website? You’ve worked hard to get your visitors to show up at your website’s door – don’t put them to sleep with long load times. Numerous studies have been conducted and all of them have found the same result: Longer load times = less visitors = less business. A study conducted by Akamai in 2006 found that if your website takes longer than four seconds to fully load, 33%, or one-third, of all visitors will abandon your site. Additionally, Amazon found that a 100ms increase in site load time...
Posted on 17 November 2009 | 4:24 am
One thing we've noticed is that when people actually find out what kind of website traffic they're getting, where the traffic is coming from and what people are looking at, they start to take notice of their website. I can recount many instances of when we've reviewed website statistics with clients and you almost see their jaws drop. You can tell they simply had no idea what was going on with their website. If you think of your website as a salesperson, that would be like never checking on their progress and just keep paying them. The first step is knowing. Knowledge is power. Assumption gets you nowhere. Once you know what's working, expand on it. People may be coming to page on...
Posted on 11 November 2009 | 8:16 am
I wrote an article / blog post recently called Google PageRank vs. SEO (http://www.webstix.com/google-pagerank-vs.-seo.html) which talked about how Google's PageRank should not be considered an SEO meter. And the latest Google Dance as it's called (where the PageRank is updated in the Google Toolbar) on November 1st, seems to keep pointing in the same direction as many sites again lost PageRank points. But, as a website owner, should you worry about PageRank? Here's a great article about the latest Google Dance with some quotes that I really liked: Google Updates PR in Toolbar (http://www.kingpin-seo.co.uk/webmaster-magazine/google-updates-pr-in-toolbar/01101/comment-page-1) (www.kingpin-seo.co.uk) Yet, a Toolbar PageRank update means little when it comes to your site’s ranking positions moving anytime soon. The PageRank...
Posted on 5 November 2009 | 3:51 am
We now have most of the Content Management System (CMS) training videos online (http://support.webstix.com/tutorials/cms-training.html). The missing ones are coming soon. If you have any ideas for more lessons, let us know.Thanks,-Tony
Posted on 29 October 2009 | 8:45 am
If you somehow haven't been thinking of Christmas sales on your website, then it might be too late by now. You can still try though.I posted recently how it looks like traffic is up on websites already just for Halloween and because it's getting colder out. The biggest shopping day of the year is less than a month away now.At the very least, if your website sells products, you should make sure all the content on your website is up to date. Updating text, adding more text or finally uploading the image coming soon pictures on your website's store would be something to get done now.You're going to need time for search engines (like Google) to spider your...
Posted on 28 October 2009 | 6:38 am
It seems like October has been a good month for website traffic so far. We host a number of sites and I have a few myself and in looking at the traffic reports, October seems to be a good month.Part of the reason, at least locally, is that the weather isn't as nice. I've always noticed more website traffic during the colder months since people are indoors a lot more (even though I'm probably outdoors more in the winter since there's skiing to be had!). There's usually a big drop-off in traffic around late April and May because the weather gets nicer. A lot of the sites we host are for clients in the area, so that's why this phenomenon...
Posted on 26 October 2009 | 6:07 am
My brother (also in the SEO industry) forwarded this article to me about how Google has removed PageRank from Google Webmaster Tools. It's an interesting article. I've put my favorite lines below and then I have some comments, too... Why Google Pulled PageRank from Webmaster Tools (http://www.straightupsearch.com/archives/2009/10/why-google-pulled-pagerank-from-webmaster-tools.html) (www.straightupsearch.com) Their reason for removing it from Webmaster Tools is that webmasters, site owners, and SEOs often focus too heavily on this one metric. PageRank should not be an indicator of SEO success. In fact, if I were a site owner that was paying an outside vendor to improve my organic visibility, I would care less about PageRank. PageRank can provide a level of insight which can be used...
Posted on 22 October 2009 | 9:29 am
I was just approving some website listings on MadisonClick (http://www.madisonclick.com/) and still continue to notice websites that have both the www and non-www version of their URLs working.You really need to stick with one or the other and not have both working. Google does seem to now pick which domain is favored, but you still could get penalized for having duplicate websites out there. Matt Cutts (http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/seo-advice-url-canonicalization/) explains this well: Q: What is a canonical url? Do you have to use such a weird word, anyway? A: Sorry that it’s a strange word; that’s what we call it around Google. Canonicalization is the process of picking the best url when there are several choices, and it...
Posted on 15 October 2009 | 4:03 am
It has been said a kajillion times but I'll say it again... content is king! If you do tons of SEO work, get the incoming links for a certain keyword but that keyword is not even mentioned on that page (which would be a lot of work to make that happen), then when people come to that page, they will not find what they're looking for and leave. So what's the point of all that work if your bounce rate is sky high? One big thing I've learned over the last year about SEO is that you need content - totally original content that's quality. Don't just regurgitate the same stuff on a page in a new way, do some research. Write...
Posted on 13 October 2009 | 4:27 am
We're kind of kicking around the idea of having a class in maybe January. It would be a series of 4 classes - one a week. There would be me teaching it and maybe 1-2 guest speakers. You'd get a book with notes. There would be a cost.With these new details, let me know if you're interested. People are still signing up for the next SEO class here on the website and people keep asking us about when the next one is, so it seems there is some interest.I've learned a TON since last year and there are simply some steps you can follow to get your website ranked well. A good portion of it is not even on your...
Posted on 9 October 2009 | 10:14 am
I just had a phone call with a client and thought I'd blog about it quickly.We're planning a slight redesign for them. They're really happy with the design we made for them years ago, so they don't want to tweak it much. We're just going to make it wider for them, move some thing around for them on the home page and give them the Joomla 1.5 upgrade.He mentioned that they get a lot of compliments on their website. I told him that we just hope the website matches the type of service and quality that we know they provide, which is true. They are really service oriented and do provide outstanding quality - the type of client we love....
Posted on 8 October 2009 | 5:12 am
Hello! It has been a busy week so far but I wanted to take a minute to point out some of the à la carte services that Webstix offers. These are available to virtually any website owner, so you don't need to be one of our current clients to take advantage of these services: WordPress Updates (http://www.webstix.com/shop/website-services.html?vmcchk=1) - If you have a WordPress website and need help keep it up to date in terms of new versions and updates to plugins, we can help. This frees you up to work on your business or content for your website. You never know what could happen with an upgrade. Sometimes an upgrade causes certain plugins and software to go haywire. What...
Posted on 7 October 2009 | 8:36 am
I just took a look at a site and they're using one word keywords in their meta tags and they're really general, too - like sport and so forth and there was one misspelled keyword, which didn't look like it was that way on purpose. That's sloppy and probably not worth having meta keywords.What you want is multi-word keywords. We call them long tail keywords which means they're specific keywords. These target the traffic you want because you will be found in search results and people will be coming from search engines to your website. That kind of traffic is gold. They're specifically looking for what you're offering, they come to you and your website hopefully...
Posted on 29 September 2009 | 8:00 am
I don't know why this is coming up again. I thought everyone has upgraded by now but I'd had this issue come up a few times recently. Here's what I wrote to a client just now: Unfortunately we don't support IE6 with our web design. And honestly, anyone using it needs to upgrade it immediately because it's so full of security holes. Some websites post warnings to people using IE6 warning them to immediately upgrade. It's a seriously bad thing to use that browser - so there's no use in making websites to support that browser. Sorry. Please urge them to upgrade right away - for their own benefit. http://www.shlomifish.org/no-ie/ (http://www.shlomifish.org/no-ie/) http://www.google.com/search?hl=en q=stop+using+ie6 (http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=stop+using+ie6) Please stop using...
Posted on 24 September 2009 | 10:14 am
We have a CMS training class (http://www.webstix.com/cms_training_class.html) today but I'm cancelling next month's class so that I can use that time to record some tutorials and then get them online shortly after that. So we will have Joomla tutorials online shortly. I think that will help everyone a lot if they can just pop in and watch a video. I'll break them up into separate chapters so that you don't have to run through the whole thing. They'll be bite size and informative. In the meantime, here are a few online tutorials for Joomla: Joomla Tutorials (http://www.joomlatutorials.com/) And for WordPress, here are some tutorials: WordPress.tv (http://wordpress.tv/) I'll see some of you later today! -Tony
Posted on 23 September 2009 | 5:32 am
Hello! It's nice here in Wisconsin but they're saying we're going to get back to normal temps instead of these above normal temps we've been seeing. Oh well, it was nice while it lasted and I think the farmers want some rain now. The leaves are even changing colors a little already. Well here's another article I found about Twitter and it's kind of a Twitter Basics article to explain how to use Twitter for your business. I've blogged about Twitter a lot lately. From what I've seen, you can get a lot of Twitter followers and traffic if you post a lot and post about things people are looking for. Twitter marketing really works. Tweeting 101: How...
Posted on 15 September 2009 | 6:47 am
Ok, so right now there's Twitter and it's amazing because it's real time. People love it. I use it a lot and it's great for doing Internet marketing. Side Note: Please don't confuse marketing with Internet marketing or business plans. I've heard from some people that they needed help marketing and it turned out that they needed something even more foundational... a business plan. The result of research is a business plan, which drives your marketing and one part of marketing is Internet marketing. Just to be clear: your business plan drives your marketing - you need that first. If you don't know what your business does, it's impossible to market it, right? Sorry for the rant, back to...
Posted on 11 September 2009 | 4:44 am
I was on the phone with a client last week. We're working on their design and they were considering removing the blog because they didn't know what to blog about. I strongly encouraged her NOT to do that. Blogs are so important. They get you so much traffic and are just a great place to casually talk about your company or industry. Some things I've written: Get Extra Traffic When You Blog (http://www.webstix.com/get-extra-traffic-when-you-blog.html) If Business Blogging Sounds Boring, Try This... (http://www.webstix.com/if-business-blogging-sounds-boring-try-this-html.html) Business Blogging (http://www.webstix.com/business-blogging.html) Sometimes your blog posts get picked up and you get all kinds of unexpected traffic: Local News Story Gets National Attention on the Web (http://www.webstix.com/local-news-story-gets-national-attention-on-the-web.html) So where do you get ideas and content...
Posted on 10 September 2009 | 7:05 am
I think the term viral marketing is over used and not used correctly much of the time. Viral marketing is why any marketing campaign spreads on its own, like a virus. Social marketing has aspects of viral marketing but the two are not equal. When I think of viral marketing, I think of the best, most strongest kind... funny videos. The good ones are not usually cheap to make but when they hit the mark, they're really good and go far - and for a long time. There are other kinds of viral marketing, of course. A killer coupon is a good example. Here's an article that @GuyKawasaki Tweeted: GuyKawasaki (http://twitter.com/GuyKawasaki) How to go viral: http://om.ly/Irle (http://om.ly/Irle) The article is...
Posted on 10 September 2009 | 6:49 am
I just wanted to call attention to our Support Blog post about TDS SMTP Server Alternatives (http://www.webstix.com/alternatives-to-tds-smtp-server.html) since we've received a few calls and email about this and their deadline is approaching. That article contains good information some alternatives.You can read more about Webstix SMTP (http://www.webstix.com/e-mail-settings.html) if you like.-Tony
Posted on 30 August 2009 | 3:09 am
I've blogged about how to blog a few times now (most recently: If Business Blogging Sounds Boring, Try This... (http://www.webstix.com/if-business-blogging-sounds-boring-try-this-html.html) ) and I thought of another tip to use either to help you think of a blog topic or else to help you get more traffic to your blog. If you relate your blog topic to a current, hot topic then you should get more traffic. What happens is, a topic starts getting blogged about (and shows up on Twitter) and Google then flags those keywords and is looking for all the content it can about that topic. Again... think like Google - you want to give what people are searching for. Google even keeps track of this information at...
Posted on 24 August 2009 | 9:12 am
Here's a tip that's great for communication. You've probably noticed how you sometimes later get an email from people who you decide to follow on Twitter. How do they do that? Well, it's easy and it's automated. What you do is sign up for an account at TweetLater.com (http://www.tweetlater.com/). They have a lot of cool services for Twitter - including the autoresponder and auto-following people who follow you. Once you sign up, click on the Accounts button or the Add Account button to add a new account - yes, you can manage multiple Twitter accounts with just one login here, which is nice. Then you enter the username and password for your Twiter account. Scroll down and select the...
Posted on 20 August 2009 | 7:30 am
Here's an interesting article I found about if you should tweet the same thing multiple times: How to Drive Traffic with Repeat Tweets (http://www.openforum.com/idea-hub/topics/the-world/article/how-to-drive-traffic-with-repeat-tweets-guy-kawasaki) (www.openforum.com) ...Fast forward to today. While there is still kumbaya going on via Twitter, many people are now using Twitter as a twool. They’re not trying to have a one-to-one conversation. At best, they want a one-to-many conversation if not out-and-out broadcasting in the advertising and marketing sense. The other day, I found my original Twitter sign up email that they send to you. I saved it for some reason and it has been almost a year. A year ago, I had no idea of the potential of Twitter but now I get it. What...
Posted on 19 August 2009 | 8:57 am
I've been doing a lot of research on keywords in the last year and I've noticed something that I thought I'd quickly blog about. You can, as you know, get a lot of mileage out of a bunch of longer tail keywords. They're basically a goldmine. Since people get so many results for typing in something general, they've learned to be more specific and that's how you get long tail keywords. Because people are trained that way now, it really seems like a much better plan to really concentrate on long tail keywords. One particular word in the long tail keyword phrase keeps showing up and I think it's really interesting. That word is: best. So take whatever your main...
Posted on 17 August 2009 | 9:21 am
I know it's a Friday right now but I thought of a good goal for everyone to do next week!With your Twitter account in the next week, find 50-100 people to follow. Here's how to do it...Look at who is following you and follow them.Look at who is following you and click on their profile.Look at who they are following and find some more people to follow.Rinse and repeat.Set aside just 15 minutes each day to do this and you'll reach that goal easily. And make sure you're tweeting. Find some interesting websites that have to do with your company and post tweets with links, etc. Say something - communicate!Throw in some personal things, too (for sure). In fact, maybe...
Posted on 14 August 2009 | 6:20 am
I saw a stat posted that 69% of the people using the Web today still don't know what Twitter is or get it. I honestly have to say that I was in that group at the beginning of this year. Like David Letterman, I didn't get what all these people were doing following each other. Why would I want to micro-blog my life and who cares about it? What I've found out is that using Twitter is very interesting if you're following people that use it. I personally follow other people I found that are into web design and marketing and they've posted links of some very cool things that I wouldn't have know about otherwise. How I got to know...
Posted on 31 July 2009 | 4:48 am
Although it's still getting going and is a little rough yet, I wanted to introduce our Project Knowledgebase (http://www.webstix.com/project-knowledgebase.html). It's a listing of articles that explain parts of the website design process and answers to questions that people commonly have. It just has 5 articles now but will continue to grow. We also will be moving our support website (http://support.webstix.com/) over to the main Webstix.com website sometime this year. Our plan is to create some CMS support videos and have other tools available for our clients. These tools are meant to be an online resource for our clients and for people interested in doing business with Webstix. These are not meant to replace the personal communication that Webstix provides. If you have...
Posted on 30 July 2009 | 8:02 am
I really don't mind blogging. I think it's fun, actually. I know a lot of people aren't like that though. They don't know where to start and see it as this huge task that's impossible to finish. If that's you, then don't worry. I'll give you some tips to tame that tiger. We had a meeting with a client about 2 weeks ago now and we talked about blogging. Their hurdle was that for their industry, it was hard to come up with things to blog about because what they do is so technical. The information needed to create a blog would basically have to come from a scientist or engineer and there was no time for that. But then we...
Posted on 29 July 2009 | 9:59 am
Good question, I'm glad I asked! Long tail keywords are keywords phrases with several words in them - like 4 or more words. For example, we could try to optimize the keyword website design (http://www.webstix.com/) but there's way too much competition for that. Instead, we optimize for website design madison wi (http://www.webstix.com/) which is what people are typing into search engines and a better match for us for the kind of clients that we want. One cool way to do this optimization is blogging. Here's an example - we rank #1 for us commerce association scam (http://www.webstix.com/us-local-business-association-award-or-scam.html) because I blogged about that once - no wait, twice I think. Ok, that's not exactly the traffic we want...
Posted on 27 July 2009 | 7:39 am
I was sitting here, you know... doing my thing in my office, and heard all this noise. I must have had the radio off. It was a flock of geese just passing through. There were a lot of them, check them out: The area behind the office here is very green as there are not many buildings. We're right on the edge of Madison, right off the Interstate. I haven't seen deer yet but I'm sure they're out there - if they make it over the highway in one piece. :-)-Tony
Posted on 20 July 2009 | 11:26 am
Here's a new one we just launched this morning: www.amfammortgages.com (http://www.amfammortgages.com/). They do commercial property loans and lending throughout the United States. They have an online loan request form. The website is professional and clean. It has a custom Lending Guidelines module on the right side of most pages which easily explains some main points about what they offer. I really like how this site looks. Many people come to us and want a website that looks clean and professional. We hear that all the time, which makes sense because that's exactly our style of design (not that we can't do anything else but we're experts at clean and professional website design). This design will give them some good mileage as...
Posted on 17 July 2009 | 5:59 am
I just had to blog about this one...On our way back from a client meeting this morning, I saw a big billboard in a prime location for a local builder - one I really haven't heard of before. I get back to the office and look up their site... oh my! They should not even have a website up - seriously.The page titles are set as Untitled Document of course. So when people would find them in Google (like Google would list that site), that is the text that's linked and what people would click on to go to that site. As if anyone would think that site is what they're looking for.The images on the page were...
Posted on 16 July 2009 | 8:33 am
This will be a short post because I have a lot of work to do today. I just wanted to link to this article: Link exchanges: The poor man's SEO (http://news.cnet.com/8301-17939_109-10285606-2.html?tag=newsEditorsPicksArea.0) (news.cnet.com) Please check this out if you're interested in SEO and link exchanges. They're worth it. -Tony
Posted on 15 July 2009 | 5:39 am
On Friday night, we enjoyed the Mallards game in our suite with some clients and friends. It was a good game with great weather. We had a lot of fun but the Mallards unfortunately lost the game in the final innings (http://www.mallardsbaseball.com/box-score-mallards-vs-beetles-7-10-09.html). We had great food and about 25 people there. During the game, I was thrown on a velcro wall to try to catch a home run and win a free car (it didn't happen that time - oh well) and we got most of our group out on the field during the 7th inning stretch to sing Take Me Out to the Ballgame , which they sang really well and loud! We've got another suite for their last game...
Posted on 14 July 2009 | 5:33 am
A month back maybe, Facebook made vanity URLs available and that was big news. Twitter has just exploded this year and has become huge. So kind of like securing a .com domain name, it's a good idea to secure both Facebook and Twitter logins / URLs.If you don't have a Twitter account yet for yourself or your business, it's worth just going there and grabbing the username that you want. Someone could grab it before you can and it's free to do it, so why not? I just got one for MadisonClick.Then if you want help using it, let us know. We have some ideas and it's a great way to get out some interesting news to people...
Posted on 14 July 2009 | 5:11 am
This is making big news on Twitter right now: YouTube Will Be Next To Kiss IE6 Support Goodbye (http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/07/14/youtube-will-be-next-to-kiss-ie6-support-goodbye/) (www.techcrunch.com) All web developers absolutely hate Internet Explorer 6. It was the worst web browser of all time and is so full of security holes that there are active campaigns out there to inform people to upgrade - immediately. There's a Joomla plugin available that looks to see if people are using IE6 and it warns them to upgrade and gives them detailed instructions. If you're using this browser, I'm sure you have viruses on your computer. Yeah, it's that bad. So the fact that YouTube (Google) is actively stepping in is huge. Finally! Thank you! We owe you a beer!...
Posted on 14 July 2009 | 4:40 am
A great way to get some extra traffic is Twitter. We've got our blog set up so that when there's a new post, it automatically goes out on Twitter as a tweet. A link is made to that blog post so that people can read the whole thing.The more you put out there on Twitter, the more followers you'll have since people are searching for things and will start following you if they're interested in what you tweet about. These are people that want to hear from you - just like an RSS feed or e-newsletter. It's great.And the more you blog, the more content you get on your site. The more content you put on it, the better you...
Posted on 9 July 2009 | 4:55 am
Hello everyone! Have a good Fourth of July? Here's an article I found today that I have some comments on but before I do that, one quick note... People look at the task of blogging as such a chore. It's not. One thing I do is subscribe to a number of these daily e-newsletters that have to do with topics that relate to this blog. I then either quote parts of them and add in my own commentary or use them for inspiration for new, original posts. It's really not that hard. If you're not blogging, you should be. If you don't have a blog, then get one - even if it's at blogger.com. Start writing something. One post a...
Posted on 7 July 2009 | 8:19 am
I noticed some changes this morning and I found an article saying that PageRank was updated on June 23/24, 2009: Google PageRank Update : June 2009 (http://www.searchenginejournal.com/google-pagerank-update-june-2009/11367/) (www.searchenginejournal.com) Google PageRank (the visible toolbar PageRank that is) was updated around the web on the 23rd and 24th of June, changing the visible PageRank scores which appear on the toolbars of Google users all over the globe. I saw an increase in a few sites that I watch and have. I thought this was interesting: Google hands Bing a pagerank 9 (http://www.searchcowboys.com/news/699) (www.searchcowboys.com) PageRank is all about inbound links. It's different from search results but the two are somewhat related. I've know of sites that have been around for...
Posted on 26 June 2009 | 4:59 am
Lennart had a good post the other day: If your website was a shirt... would you wear it? (http://www.webstix.com/if-your-website-was-a-shirt-.-would-you-wear-it.html) That's a phrase we came up with a while ago and it sort of stuck. Websites are definitely first impressions a lot of the time. If your site stinks... take it down. Seriously. If I want to find out about a business, am I going to look them up in the phone book, get in the car and drive over to their building, walk in and start asking questions. Somtimes, but hardly ever. I'll look them up on the Web. If their site stinks, I might infer that they might care the same about the products and services that they offer...
Posted on 23 June 2009 | 7:53 am
If you are in the Madison, WI area or Milwaukee, WI area and have a website, then you qualify for a free website analysis by Webstix, Inc. This 20-point website analysis covers how your website is set up, how it's functioning and tells you what is missing. It covers things like: Is your website coded well? How good is the navigation of your website? How effective is the copy (text) of your website? Has your website been search engine optimized (SEO)? Does Google know about your website? You'll get a final website design analysis score along with a short, face to face meeting where we present our findings to you. This can be done at our...
Posted on 19 June 2009 | 7:52 am
Thanks to all who joined us on a night with great weather at the Madison Mallards (http://www.mallardsbaseball.com/) game. They unfortunately lost (http://www.mallardsbaseball.com/home-win-streak-derailed-in-4-3-loss-to-la-crosse.html) but we had fun and someone in our suite even got a home run ball, hit by a Mallard. We enjoyed a catered meal during the game and also saw the laser light show after the game. A good time was had by all. We have another suite next month, so hopefully they can pull out a win for us. Go Mallards! -Tony
Posted on 15 June 2009 | 6:21 am
I saw this article this morning. It's worth checking out: Are PPC Ads Now Counting in Google Organic Backlinks? (http://searchenginewatch.com/3634027) (searchenginewatch.com) In the past, I've said there's no direct correlation between editorial rankings and paid advertisements. Well, it seems I was wrong. Paid search really can affect organic search. The article talks about how paid ads on Google and Yahoo using terms that the site was not optimized for are giving websites better results when people search on those same keywords. If this is how the rules are now, it changes things because you can essentially buy a top position in Google's supposedly organic results. One nice thing about SEO (search engine optimization) is that you could spend...
Posted on 10 June 2009 | 4:24 am
Hello! We've got a new blog up now. It's our Webstix Support Blog (http://www.webstix.com/support-blog.html) and it's where we will post information about hosting and other important announcements, including security information.We will also be moving our support site over to our main Webstix site, so watch for that change, too.One article I just posted is about how web servers get hacked and generate spam / junk email. It's called Hacked Servers Generate Spam (http://www.webstix.com/hacked-servers-generate-spam.html) and I invite everyone to read it today.Thanks!-Tony
Posted on 9 June 2009 | 6:21 am
Wow, it's been a busy few weeks! We've been hard at work launching some websites that we've redesigned and we're proud to present them: Monkey Bar Gym (http://www.monkeybargym.com/) Do you hate going to the gym? Do you think running on a treadmill is boring? Yeah, I do too. Remember when playing on the jungle gym on the playground at recess was fun? You got the exercise you needed, you could easily run around, jump, climb and just have fun. Why not do that same kind of natural exercise? You'll build strength and get better alignment so that you also feel better. The new Monkey Bar Gymnasium website features a brand new look with better organization, daily workouts, course listings, an online store, location...
Posted on 1 June 2009 | 5:59 am
Hello! I've had this blog up a few months and it seems to be getting good traffic, so I thought I'd just give a shout out to all the people just discovering my website design blog. I write a lot about SEO but also about other things related to website design, website promotion, marketing, email or whatever else comes to mind along with announcements on new websites we've launched. I also write about new Webstix products and services. Sometimes, like now, I just say hello. A good way to stay on top of this blog is to subscribe to the RSS feed (http://www.webstix.com/rd-rss/4.html). Click on that link and you should be able to use that page's URL in your RSS reader. For...
Posted on 21 May 2009 | 9:59 am
Location is everything, right? I've said it before and it's true. Companies like McDonald's and Starbucks spend money out the wazoo just researching locations for their stores before they're built. And we all have seen those stores that change over every 8 months or so... it used to be a flower shop, then it was a gym, then it was an oil change place. It changes because of the terrible location even though optimistic business owners think it'll work for them and I give them credit for trying (since sometimes it works, amazingly). How Do You Search on Google? Do you do a search and go straight to page 10 or even page 5? No, you're looking at page 1 and maybe...
Posted on 13 May 2009 | 10:30 am
Oh... the horror!Ok, Twitter is kind of new and people are getting used to the protocol or etiquette to using Twitter - I know I still am. But I can't believe people still don't understand how to use email correctly. They're out there, right? We all know them. They don't reply to all or include the original message. Some of that's understandable and not the end of the world of course - so no big deal.But I just got an email with pretty much the worst thing you can do from a former client since we're apparently still on their list (which is fine, I'm not griping about that but trying to explain a point). It was from a local...
Posted on 12 May 2009 | 4:44 am
This is one of those ideas I had a while ago but Google actually had the resources to do better than I would have (well, maybe not better but different). Google Profiles! It's like an online business card with maps, pictures and links. They're free and the best part is, they appear in some search results! I'm seeing mine at the bottom of the first page of results for Tony Herman (http://www.google.com/search?q=Tony+Herman) which is fine because I pretty much own the first few spots, if not most of the page. It looks like some people are making them just for their business. Check out the Tony Herman Google Profile (http://www.google.com/profiles/tcstix). Another cool thing is you can do a search. Here's a...
Posted on 8 May 2009 | 9:46 am
So I'm driving into work this morning and I see that someone parked a car along a main road in the grass, which is the universal way of saying it's for sale. Sure enough, it had a for sale sign on it. I didn't stop and look or anything but I thought that whomever was selling this car didn't quite understand sales. I'll explain. The car was like an early 2000s Cadillac sedan. I'm not up on my cars like I used to be or I'd say which model it was. It was white and looked clean, so they at least did that much right. But then there were the wheels. They must have been 18 wheels and they shined...
Posted on 1 May 2009 | 7:47 am
Ever wonder that? Not everyone comes in through the home page, you know. Many people see an inside page first - which makes you want to check if your contact information is on every page and if every page of your site tells people what you do. If you're site's using frames, you're even in more trouble - but that's another story altogether. So how do you know? You can try to ask people on your contact us form where they heard of you - and you should be doing that, but that's only getting a tiny bit of information. There's a whole world of information available about every single visitor that comes to your site. It's almost scary how much...
Posted on 21 April 2009 | 5:41 am
We're really excited about some new website packages that we're offering! We just launched these packages today. Check them out: Get a WordPress site set up with custom website design, we add 5 pages of content and you get 6 months of website hosting. All for just $2895.00! Get a Joomla site set up with custom website design, we add 10 pages of content and you get 12 months of website hosting. All for $5995.00! So what's the catch? There is no catch! It's a custom designed website that you're able to update yourself. We set it up and you're off and running. You can add pages easily and those pages can include images, text and links to other pages....
Posted on 20 April 2009 | 5:05 am
I guess that would be a decent tweet but not a very interesting one. :-) We've got more about this microblogging phenomenon and even an article about nanoblogging. Pretty soon it'll be down to blogging about Sesame Street sponsors (The Letter 'A'). So here are a few more articles about Twitter. First, here's part two of the one I mentioned last time: Twitter 101, Part 2 (http://searchenginewatch.com/3633276) (searchenginewatch.com) And another one, which I like the title of a lot: Everyone is Twittering, But Is Anyone Listening? (http://searchenginewatch.com/3633277) (searchenginewatch.com) So is Twitter just a popularity contest? Personally, I think it's just a fast food way of supposedly keeping up with your friends without actually having to spend time with...
Posted on 6 April 2009 | 8:50 am
I promised that I'd blog more about this topic, so here it is. Some information about SEO keyword research can be found in this previous article that I wrote - please read this: Pick Good Keywords and Increase Website Traffic (http://www.webstix.com/pick-good-keywords-and-increase-website-traffic.html) Basically, what you're doing is trying to match up specific keywords on your site (your website content) with the terms that people are searching on. Search traffic is targeted traffic because people are looking for something specific. Your goal is that they end up at your website instead of your competition. So it's all about keyword research. Let's say I sell website design. Wow, what a coincidence - I do! Of course, there's a lot of competition for those keywords...
Posted on 31 March 2009 | 7:31 am
Ok, honestly I haven't really caught the social networking bug yet. My brother works at a company that's really into it and we're getting clients asking about it. I do know it's a great way to get people interested in your company or brand - if you're the right kind of company. A company selling industrial trash compactors might not have a huge fan base... that much is true (sorry, Ryan). But for other websites out there, things like Twitter (http://twitter.com/) and Facebook (http://www.facebook.com/) can work really well - provided that you have the resources to do it well. Some companies devote teams of staff to managing Twitter and Facebook - it's that big of a deal. So here's what looks...
Posted on 30 March 2009 | 10:31 am
I own a few websites and very often get requests for trading links. At first, I thought that email was just spam. Sure, some of it may be to websites that aren't reputable but the majority of those requests are from legit websites. They're people just like you and I who want inbound links. They're working hard at it, too. Sometimes these requests come from people at companies and you see their title as things like Link Manager so apparently some companies out there get online marketing or people are just giving themselves that title. Either way, cool! I get asked about these emails and if you should trade links with these unknown people. My answer is YES! Links are...
Posted on 25 March 2009 | 8:16 am
Admittedly, I don't have a formal marketing education but I'm glad that I don't. I'll explain why. Although the college experience is great (and a lot of fun and hard work), I don't think it's suited for the real world. In a lot of ways, I think a technical college will get you where you need to go and maybe steer you out of some bad habits. What I mean is, in college you do a project, hand it in and get a grade. It's instant. Well, that's not how it works in the real world in many cases - especially with marketing. So when there are no instant results, people get frustrated because their expectations were not met. With...
Posted on 12 March 2009 | 7:09 am
Ok, you've got a website. You know it needs to be updated. You know you need more traffic. You want your website to do more for your company. You have a limited budget. What should you do? It depends on what kind of website you have. Here are some quick ideas based on different types of websites: Brochure-type Websites - If your website just has a few, static HTML pages that talks about your company, then you should first get it up to date. Update contact info, the copyright line, your products/services pages and then update the paragraph or two on the home page. Second, add a blog. Adding a blog makes it easy to update your site, talk about...
Posted on 27 February 2009 | 3:46 am
To get good traffic from the search engines, your website needs to focus on the right keywords. To do it well is not difficult but you'll need to invest some time. No wait - not just some time but lots of time! Here are the steps to SEO using keywords: Research your market. Who is your target audience? Not who do you think they are, who are they really? You may have several target audiences. Give them names and characterize them. What is the primary focus of your target audience? Choose keywords....
Posted on 26 February 2009 | 6:57 am
If you need a new website host, we're here to help. We use one of the best hosts in the country, Rackspace. They have fanatical support and outstanding uptime. We've had virtually no problems using them. To check our server status and see any notes about hosting, please go to our Support (http://support.webstix.com/) page. And if you need a domain name registered for a great price, go to our Webstix Domains website and purchase a great domain name. Have a great week! -Tony
Posted on 22 February 2009 | 11:46 pm
I read an article today with some good ideas on how to do more with your website and web marketing with little to no cost. This is great for our clients, since most of them use our Content Management System (CMS) and can update their websites themselves.Here are some points from that article, slightly modified: More Low- or No-cost Marketing Strategies (http://www.sitepoint.com/newsletter/viewissue.php?id=2&issue=434) (www.sitepoint.com) Create video tutorials or talks and post them on video-sharing sites. Post screen shots of your work on photo-sharing sites. Create an email newsletter. Spend time understanding SEO. Try asking for (and rewarding) referrals / testimonials. Some...
Posted on 19 February 2009 | 6:57 am
We just soft launched a website this morning and we're just putting the final touches on it still: Precision Surface Industries (http://www.precisionsurfaceindustries.com/) They're in Madison and offer custom counter / countertop fabrication and installation for kitchens and baths. The website was built using our Content Management System (CMS) so they can edit pages themselves or even add new pages, pictures and links themselves. The design is beautiful and has a good color palette and depth. There's a fading picture on the home page (or some people call that a rotating picture - which I sometimes imagine a picture spinning like crazy when people say that :-) ) Their Resources (http://www.precisionsurfaceindustries.com/resources-.html) page offers PDF files of information, which they can also upload...
Posted on 19 February 2009 | 4:10 am
Here's a good article I found today: Clear And Effective Communication In Web Design (http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2009/02/03/clear-and-effective-communication-in-web-design/) (www.smashingmagazine.com) Communication is one of the foundational elements of a good website. It is essential for a positive user experience and for a successful website that truly benefits its owners. All types of websites are affected by the need for good communication in one way or another... ...Text is, of course, the most obvious form of communication that takes place online. ...Images can often communicate a message faster, more clearly and more emphatically than text. ...Human nature is to want to know something quickly, and especially when on the Web. Titles and headers help to communicate major points and ideas...
Posted on 12 February 2009 | 6:28 am
Good question! I'm glad I asked! Not all websites are created equal, so it depends on the website. The first question is, do you have patience? If it were easy, then everyone's website would rank high... oh wait, not every website can rank high - so it must not be too easy. And not every keyword is searched the same either. So we've got a lot of variables in our equation. Some people don't quite understand that... Give SEO Time! (http://searchenginewatch.com/3632743) (searchenginewatch.com) Like last week, when I received a request for proposal from a ticket reselling company. In their RFP, they said they understood that their business was highly competitive for organic search. ...They would give the SEO...
Posted on 10 February 2009 | 5:38 am
Does your business have a blog / weblog on its website? Should it? Yes, business blogging is hot and is a great way to add easily content to your website. You're reading one right now! :-) Here's a good article on business blogging with some excerpts: How To Make Blogging Work For Your Business (http://www.wordtracker.com/academy/business-blogging) (www.wordtracker.com) Another distorted and slightly disturbing view of bloggers is that they are amateur diarists, offering daily entries with such fascinating nuggets as what they ate for breakfast, fascinating things their many cats have brought into the house, and that strange dream they had last night. Thankfully, while folks like this do exist, this is not what blogging is about when it comes...
Posted on 4 February 2009 | 4:18 am
I saw this article today and thought it would be a good read for you all. He gets into terminology and some practical tips: Link Building 101, Part 1 (http://searchenginewatch.com/3632647) (searchenginewatch.com) Basically, search engines are saying that if your site is any good, other sites should link to it. If nobody links to your site then it has little relevance. The more links you have, the more votes you have on how popular your site it. Thus, the act of link building can be likened to campaigning. ...A page that Google has already rewarded with a decent PageRank (or PR for short) is sometimes called an authority page. Once you have a PR...
Posted on 2 February 2009 | 5:59 am
Want a good, cheap and easy way to promote your website? Well, how much email does your company send out? We got this request from a client a week or so ago. We made some adjustments to it and they're really happy with it now and will start using it. Because of that, I've brought back a page we used to have on our website about animated email logo/signatures (http://www.webstix.com/ser_email_anim.html). You can see the EGA Products one we made there. We can design an HTML email signature for you and you get the HTML to put into your email program so that the HTML signature shows up in every email that you send out. We can also do animation if you'd...
Posted on 29 January 2009 | 4:45 am
Google's way of rating websites is called PageRank. It's their own system and not all search engines provide tools like PageRank and it's technically a secret how it works but there is a lot that we do know. Pages (not just sites but individual pages) with a higher PageRank rank higher in search engine results pages (SERPs). So the million dollar questions are: How does PageRank work? How can I get a higher PageRank? I found a good website that answers a lot about PageRank (PR). I'll summarize some key points here but feel free to follow the links below and learn more. Factors that increase PageRank: How often your pages are updated. Pages updated more often obviously get...
Posted on 23 January 2009 | 7:22 am
I found a few articles today that are interesting: Are Rankings Still Relevant? (http://searchenginewatch.com/3632419) Are we heading toward an age where site ranking doesn't matter? While a site appearing on page 20 of the search results will never receive the same attention as a site on page one, Google is collecting more information on search habits and patterns in an attempt to personalize results. He explains how the voting arrow on Google and the Google Toolbar are gathering useful information about search. I like what he says here: Search is one of the only fields of marketing that relies on an artificial number (ranking positions) to measure success. Maybe we've been relying on rankings as a crutch when...
Posted on 20 January 2009 | 9:54 am
Channel 27 (WKOW) did a story about a girl who bought a computer not knowing that it was running Ubuntu instead of Windows. It apparently caused her so much trouble that she had to quit school. The news story quickly circulated the Web since there are a lot of Ubuntu users out there who wanted to defend their operating system. Since a lot of these users surf the Internet a lot and since the story was put on Digg.com (the perfect audience for that kind of story), Channel 27 got a lot of web traffic about it. Here is their news story with a note about how much traffic they got: 27 News Troubleshooter: Woman blames Dell for missing online...
Posted on 16 January 2009 | 7:33 am
With our CMS, it's actually pretty easy to make a jobs / career center on your website. You can easily list jobs as new articles which is useful because if you have the same position that opens and closes from time to time, all you do is publish and unpublish that article / job posting. This saves your HR department lots of time. Here are a few clients that are taking advantage of this great feature: Care Wisconsin Jobs (http://www.carewisc.org/job_listings) Administrative Jobs (http://www.carewisc.org/adminjobs) Clinical Jobs (http://www.carewisc.org/clinicaljobs) Support Services Jobs (http://www.carewisc.org/supportsvcsjobs)...
Posted on 15 January 2009 | 9:49 am
I was talking with a client this morning who I happen to meet at Starbucks about getting some SEO copywriting done. It's a smart move. Most people don't think about doing this and do not put enough importance on the copy that's on their website. When I saw this article pop up today, I figured I should blog about it: Training Your Content Developers on SEO Copywriting (http://searchenginewatch.com/3632365) This aspect of understanding the vernacular of your prospects is where usability and SEO meet, i.e. you don't have to trade off one for the other. If you think about your content development as an opportunity to communicate with your customer, and keyword tools as a way to...
Posted on 14 January 2009 | 7:02 am
I just saw a link on another website about a Search Engine Submission service that they offer. That's kind of old, isn't it? When I do a search on that, it seems that most websites that used to offer this service have switched to Search Engine Optimization instead. That's good. That's what you need... well that along with search engine friendly website design (http://www.searchenginefriendlywebsitedesign.com/). Mass submitting your website is not the correct way to get into the search engines. Please don't do it. It's better to do it organically. To have a website all of a sudden with 100 new links looks really fishy and it's not natural, so it doesn't help anymore. Maybe 6 years ago it was...
Posted on 14 January 2009 | 6:48 am
To do your website the right way, you need to select key pages (inside pages I'm talking about - not the home page) to target as what we call landing pages. So you need to research which keywords are good and then match them up with specific pages on your website. Which keywords or key phrases are good? Good question! Good keywords are the keywords that people are typing in when they do a search on search engines like Google. You want to match what they're typing in. To find those keywords / key phrases, you can use several good, online tools that are out there. These are the kinds of tools that we use. Google Keyword Tool...
Posted on 13 January 2009 | 5:54 am
Google updated PageRank in the Google Toolbar on New Year's Eve (12/31/08) for their Q4 update in 2008. It doesn't seem like a big update but there were some changes - especially for new websites. I'm beginning to not get really excited about what Google shows as PageRank in the Google Toolbar since it's just a glimpse into how Google ranks websites. You can tell more about how your site ranks with other ways - like doing searches. Google PageRank Update on New Year’s Eve (http://www.searchenginejournal.com/google-pagerank-update-on-new-years-eve/8224/) Sure, the PageRank which is shown on the Google Toolbar is not an accurate indicator of how Google ranks or values a site, and is only on of many factors which goes into...
Posted on 12 January 2009 | 4:30 am
It's very important to keep building incoming links to your website. You never know when a few that you have out there will cease to exist. When building links, you should think short and long term. Here's an article that mentions a strategy that's more long term or more ground floor you could say: Don't Overlook These Link Building Opportunities (http://searchenginewatch.com/3632298) People often pass over new sites since they have few inbound links and no PageRank. The thinking is, they're worthless for link development because they have few inbound links. In reality, if a new site has a passionate owner, or is from a publisher with a history of success, it can be a goldmine....
Posted on 9 January 2009 | 3:08 am
Here are a few Madison WI area websites that we've launched recently - take a look: Realty Yard Posts (http://www.realtyyardposts.com/) - Durable, lightweight plastic yard posts that do not require big holes in your lawn and are maintenance free. You can purchase yard posts online. Friendly Poke in the Eye (http://www.fpite.com/) - An interesting book by a local author, Hans Schick. And there are more new websites on the way - believe me, we're keeping busy. -Tony
Posted on 9 January 2009 | 2:51 am
What is a site map anyway? There are two basic types of site maps. HTML site maps. There's the site map that's on your website that people can see (like the sitemap on the Webstix.com website). It contains links to every page on your site. This is done for two main reasons. First, for robots/spiders (programs sent out by search engines to crawl your website and gather information about what is on it so that this information can be put into search results). The HTML site map makes sure they know where every page is. Second, HTML site maps can help people find a page on your web site...
Posted on 8 January 2009 | 5:34 am
What is the best CMS (Content Management System) if you want to rank high in search engines? Good question - I'm glad I asked! So you want a CMS so that you can update the content on your website yourself and do it often. Great. We agree, it's the way to go. But which one do you choose? There's WordPress, which is good but is it just good for a blog or can you (or should you) build a corporate website with blogging software? There's also a flurry of other CMS software out there like Drupal, Joomla!, OpenCMS, Mambo, PHP-Nuke, TYPO3, or XOOPS? Should you go Open Source or buy from a vendor where you get more support (maybe) but pay...
Posted on 6 January 2009 | 6:11 am
It's time to vote again for the best businesses in Madison with Madison Magazine's Best of Madison (http://madisonmagazine.com/bestofmadison/2009ballot.html) awards. You can vote online. Since we have an office in Madison along with several clients in the Madison, WI area, here are our suggested picks: Upscale Restaurant or Restaurant ambiance: Cloud 9 Grill (http://www.madisonclick.com/dir/index.stx/info-5902-Fine_Dining-Cloud-9-Grille.html) (not a client but we like it) Neighborhood bar: Brasserie V (http://www.brasseriev.com/) Coffeehouse: Cool Beans Coffee Cafe...
Posted on 5 January 2009 | 7:15 am
When buying domain names that contain keywords, I was wondering if it was better to buy the domain with dashes (hyphens) in it or without. There seem to be some pros and cons to having dashes in a domain name. Pros: Domains with dashes help separate keywords so that there's no confusion with SEO. For example, today I bought the domain name madison-seo.com (http://www.madison-seo.com/) to help Webstix get more exposure with our SEO services in the Madison, WI area. I like the dash in the domain name because without it, it could mean Madison's EO which I don't know what that is but maybe it's something. Maybe EO will mean something...
Posted on 5 January 2009 | 6:43 am
It's important to hire a website firm that does their research - especially if you hire a firm that's not local: Wis. Web site image sends Capitol to Minneapolis (http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1120ap_odd_wrong_skyline.html) Capitol offense: Building's in Madison, but skyline's in Minneapolis (http://www.jsonline.com/news/wisconsin/36839699.html) $1 million Wisconsin web site features photo of Minnesota (http://ohmygov.com/blogs/general_news/archive/2008/12/30/1-million-wisconsin-web-site-features-photo-of-minnesota.aspx) Oops, That's Not Wisconsin (http://www.todaystmj4.com/news/local/36864259.html) cfis.wi.gov (http://cfis.wi.gov/)) shows the Wisconsin State Capitol building in the design but the skyline is from Minneapolis. It was a Connecticut based website design firm that did the work. Oops. The website is using frames, has no SEO done to it and is not the best looking thing I've seen. Sorry for the rip but part of my job here at Webstix as...
Posted on 30 December 2008 | 4:45 am
Here's a good post from Seth Godin's blog (http://sethgodin.typepad.com/) and some highlighted excerpts: In search of competition (http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2008/12/in-search-of-co.html) The only way to enjoy competition is to have something different, or better, or something that scales. You need to offer a community that increases in value as it scales, or a unique perspective or technology. Do you do better when you're the only choice, with all the power that this brings, or when there are many choices, with all the audience and excitement that this brings? You can pretend that you are unique, that you have no competition and never will. Inevitably, this will create an attitude that, while fun for a while, will probably harm you...
Posted on 29 December 2008 | 6:07 am
I found another good article today that relates to 2 other posts of mine: Website Christmas List (http://www.webstix.com/website-christmas-list.html) 10 Things that Every Website Needs (http://www.webstix.com/what_every_web_site_needs.html) Here is the new article: A Small Business Year-End Marketing Checklist (http://searchengineland.com/small-business-yearend-marketing-checklist-15811.php#more-15811) The article lists things like: Claiming your Google Maps listing Set up Google Alerts (I've done this a while back, it's a good tip) Set up Google Analytics Get directory listings Check your website's contact information Review your autoresponders Update your website's copyright and privacy policy Test your outgoing links as they may have changed And yet some more to-do items: Make sure your domain name(s) is up to date and registered...
Posted on 18 December 2008 | 7:22 am
Yes! We Are Green (http://www.yeswearegreen.com/) This website is for businesses that have green / energy saving / environmentally friendly business practices. Site Features: There are over 190 business categories, which can be added, edited or deleted. Applicants have to fill out an application that explain their green business practices, which produces a score for that listing. You can set and charge an application fee. The website is currently connected with the Authorize.net payment gateway for real-time online fee payment. Integration with other payment gateways is possible. Run Google AdSense ads or other ads on every page to generate more revenue. This site runs on a leading Content Management System (CMS) that lets you:...
Posted on 18 December 2008 | 5:52 am
Just another example of how software always needs to be updated: Millions of computer users at risk from virus affecting Internet Explorer (http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,24813650-661,00.html) Serious flaw in Internet Explorer not fixed yet (http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5gGrwHSPBoys1ouBd7lHjbMs9dgUgD953Q2800) Emergency patch for Internet Explorer coming tomorrow (http://blogs.zdnet.com/hardware/?p=3194) AVG 8.0 Protects Against Dangerous Internet Explorer Vulnerability (http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/AVG-80-Protects-Against-Dangerous/story.aspx?guid=%7B505EE597-57BF-4CEF-95CF-7529EA52AD94%7D) Watch for the next Windows update... or just start using Firefox (until that one has problems, too). I should be happy they don't make it for the Mac anymore - even though it stinks when developers only develop for IE and alienate all Mac users. Yeah, that makes sense. But seriously, it's a dangerous hole / virus. Do not use IE until it's fixed. -Tony
Posted on 16 December 2008 | 3:12 pm
Well, this will probably be my only post this week as I'll be out of the office most of the week. It's a good one though! Here's an article about how to boost online website sales, it's not bad: 10 Quick Tips to Boost Site Sales (http://www.wdfm.com/marketing-tips/boost-site-sales.php) Small changes can often make a difference in whether a customer at your Web site purchases from you or hits the back button to look for a better alternative. Let me highlight a few things and add in my 2 cents... Yes, it is all about small things: Does your website look respectable or is it cluttered and pieced together? How many clicks does it take to check out? Are you...
Posted on 8 December 2008 | 7:23 am
I hear the ads on the radio. They're promoting a custom website that you can update yourself for like $40 a month. A few comments about that: This may be a good deal for some companies. I always say that every business needs to be on the web. If this is all you can afford, then great - just make sure you submit your website to MadisonClick.com (http://www.madisonclick.com/) if you're a local, Madison area business. :-) When they says custom website it's not custom website design. Let's make that clear. It's a template design that you customize with your company name and text, so in that sense it's custom because it's for you...
Posted on 5 December 2008 | 4:08 am
I bought a condo a few years ago. It was my biggest investment so far (maybe besides starting 2 companies) and I'm glad I did it. When I was getting interested in buying a house, I looked on the web. That's nothing new, Tone. I know, but think about it... Internet access is everywhere. Broadband is at homes, at work, at coffee shops / restaurants, libraries, the airport, on some city streets downtown, on my phone - everywhere! Gone are the days of first contacting a realtor and telling them what you want. People do that part themselves now. The world has changed with this world wide network of information available at your fingertips virtually anywhere. That's amazing. All the big...
Posted on 4 December 2008 | 6:39 am
I saw this today on Search Engine Watch (http://searchenginewatch.com/) and it gives some important advice about link building: High-Value Link Building is Hard Work (http://searchenginewatch.com/3631957) Backlinking your competitors and building a mailing list for all the sites that link to them, and then sending out mass mailings is the big no-no here. ... After all, forum spam, blog spam, and WordPress template spam is pretty cheap, but you aren't going to get anything authoritative that way. The other factor that must be central in your mind: one authoritative link can potentially be worth 10,000 times more than one of those blog spam links. Basically... if it were easy, everyone would be doing it... and that proves itself...
Posted on 3 December 2008 | 10:26 am
Well, it's December. It's winter-like weather here in Wisconsin even though it's not officially winter yet. People are busy getting ready for Christmas (I've got a party this Saturday already) and businesses are thinking about the end of the year spending. Some businesses need to either spend their budget in order to get more for next year and others want to show as little profit as possible for tax reasons. So where do you spend it? You already know what my answer to that is (spend it on your website), so here are some things that can be done to really almost any website - if we made it or not: Do some Search Engine Optimization (SEO). If you get ranked...
Posted on 1 December 2008 | 7:22 am
We all know SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is important and we've been telling you (and showing you) how all the information you need to know about SEO is out there. You can do it yourself, if you have the time... just like learning how to repair your car. With that said, it's still good to know how to tweak your website to rank better. Yeah, I can't rebuild an engine but I can change the oil on my car. So while for large sites in industries that are very competitive an SEO expert or SEO firm (http://www.webstix.com/search_engine_optimization.html) is needed, for most small websites you can do a lot of SEO yourself. Here's another couple of articles I found today: The 5...
Posted on 25 November 2008 | 6:04 am