Design your website for your visitors

Your site needs to look professional and give your visitor confidence that you know what you’re doing.

Good design allows your web visitors to find what they want quickly

That’s why good website design is essential – not just how pretty it is but getting the right information to the visitor that they want immediately. Design is about functionality, logical navigation and useability. Make it easy for your visitors to see what they want from you. And it does need to look good and reflect your target market values.

Make sure your visitors know where they are

Consistency of content across your website is vital.

When your web visitors land on any page (and with great SEO, the first page is often a product or service page, blog article or other page), they need to know within seconds where they are and what that page is about.

For example, if you have product pages, they should all look like your product pages. You’d be surprised how many websites do not follow this rule – and pay the price with visitors going elsewhere.

Be specific with your call to action

If you want your web visitors to call, make it easy for them

What is it you want your web visitors to do? Buy your product, request a quote, call you, sign up for enews, request a brochure – these are just some of the calls to action that businesses need to include on their websites.

Sometimes it is strategic to give visitors options: ask for a brochure, request a quote, email or call. It can be beneficial to have your main call to action on your header so that no matter what page the visitor is on, they can easily find what you want them to do.

In the case of purchasing services or products online, the buy button needs to be on the product pages and be easily found.

Include secondary calls to action

This may be as simple as including ‘Request a quote’ or adding a Facebook ‘Like’ icon. In the case of ecommerce, a wish list button will enable visitors to come back and purchase items they like.

Make it easy to contact or buy

If the goal is for visitors to email you, give them the option on every page

Whether you have an ecommerce website and you want your visitors to buy product or you want your web visitors to take the next step and contact you, make it easy for them to do so.

Simple checkout systems with one page completion before buying is ideal. The checkout page has a high abandonment rate (this is known). Simplicity is the key as is security. Make sure your checkout is secure and give purchase options such as a credit card gateway and PayPal as the minimum.

Add a value proposition

What’s in it for the web visitor? This is a question that your website needs to address.

Get a free download of ‘something that your visitors want’. Test reducing the prices of your products. Add a free bonus gift with a purchase.

All these things can add value and help to convince your visitors that you are the business they want to use.

Give visitors something free such as a free download

Help, help, sell is a good proposition to keep in mind for your website. Don’t be afraid to give some things away.

It’s a moveable feast

Your website is never finished so be prepared to keep working at improving your website. Use Google Analytics to find out which pages are working. Find out how to write good quality, key word content to improve your search engine optimization. Add an interactive element. Change the homepage content.

Revise, refine and rewrite if you have to. Be patient and listen to your visitors/customers.

Last Tip:

Add Facebook's Like and other social icons on your website

Don’t forget social media that allows your web visitors to stay in contact with you even when they don’t come to your website. With millions of people using Facebook every day and checking in on their Facebook page, make sure they like your website so you can stay in touch with them and convert to your customers.

Follow these steps to successfully converting web visitors to web customers.

Bold Type can help design and develop a truly excellent website that will deliver more visitors and more conversions to customers.

We can also help build your search engine optimisation, write web copy and ensure your website is seen by your targeted audience.

Contact Bold Type today for a free quote.

Call Sue Stevens today on 0410 037 635.

Keep improving your website to maintain your success converting visitors to customers

Captivations sports apparel business Facebook page: it's simple and it works! Bold Type work with Captivations to develop content for their website and social media pages.

According to some IT gurus, one in eight minutes spent on the Internet is spent on Facebook. It’s the second highest ranked website after Google with 750 million active users.

That’s why businesses can’t afford to ignore Facebook as part of their marketing strategy. Facebook allows businesses to connect directly to their potential and active client base.

Here are 10 ways to make Facebook work for your business

1. Create your business Facebook page then put some effort into branding your Facebook page to enhance usage and direct visitors to your services or products.
2. Introduce new products on Facebook first and offer some incentive to your Facebook fans.
3. Build your email marketing list with Facebook and likewise build your Facebook fan base through your email marketing campaigns.
4. Post meaningful content on Facebook. What are your fans interested in? Not just your products but get to the core of what your people are interested in. If you have an online clothes business, ‘looking good’ and everything to do with looking good is meaningful to your fans.
5. Keep it light, keep it bright, keep it fun to encourage comments. Write engaging posts that ‘start a conversation’ with your fans. Getting feedback about posts is a good sign that you are on the right track.
6. Video is big – post your YouTube videos directly to your Facebook page to keep your fans on your page rather than sending them off to YouTube.
   

   Virgin Australia has a customised welcome page with 'Like' prominent to encourage people to like the page

7. Get interactive. Run a competition, a quiz or conduct a poll. Add info about it on your website blog and tell people via your enews. It’s all about getting people to communicate with you via your Facebook page.
8. Like other business pages on Facebook. Find other Facebook pages that relate to your business: customers’ Facebook pages, suppliers and other stakeholders. You like them, they may like you and this is good for both!
9. Welcome visitors with a customised ‘welcome’ page. Make your Facebook page yours!
10. If all else fails, there’s always Facebook advertising to build traffic to your Facebook page.

Read more about:

• making social media work for your business
• creating a successful online business.

Steve Jobs with the iPhone – can't live without mine!

It was sad to hear about the death of Steve Jobs. I’m one of millions who admired his work. I’m an Apple girl – have been since first buying my Mac Classic some time last century.

So, with his passing, what can we learn from the man, Steve Jobs?

There is no doubt, the man was inspiring. For business people and just people generally, some of his speeches are worth listening to more than once.

Here’s a few famous Steve Job’s quotes

Things don’t have to change the world to be important.

Stop trying to change the world. Just get on and do it. It’s in the doing that we can find some sense of pride in ourselves and our work.

It’s really hard to design products by focus groups. A lot of times, people don’t know what they want until you show it to them.

I wish some of our politicians would take this on board. True leaders lead and create environments, ways of thinking, products even, that we come to embrace. If you think you have a good idea, you don’t need to get sign off by every person. If you try, you probably end up doing nothing at all.

Loved my Mac Classic – it was so innovative at the time!

I think if you do something and it turns out pretty good, then you should go do something else wonderful, not dwell on it for too long. Just figure out what’s next.

A follow-up to the last quote, keep going. Keep doing. Keep learning. And remember, we learn most from our failures. This is the big message from Steve Jobs. He was removed from Apple in the 90s and came back after time in other businesses, to transform Apple into what it is today.

At the risk of going to far, some of the words that come to mind:  innovative, creative, outstanding.

Here’s two more Steve Jobs’ quotes to finish with

Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know of avoiding the trap of thinking you have something to lose.

And … Stay hungry, stay foolish.

His speech at Stanford University in 2005 is magical: truly wonderful.

What's new in Internetland? Plenty!

It’s worthwhile making the effort to go to conferences particularly if the speakers are giving you the latest, greatest information and not just selling their wares.

The Internet Show today had some very good speakers willing to part with their knowledge. We’re all learning just some are at different stages of the learning curve – nothing is static or not for long in Internetland.

Here are some of the memorable things I learned at the Internet Show – at Darling Harbour, Sydney, 27 October 2011.

1. Mobile is predicted to outstrip computers for searching the Internet in 2013. Australian businesses are slow to take up mobile technology for websites, but it’s going to be essential.
2. Optimized mobile or iPad versions of a website can reduce the bounce rate dramatically. 
   
3. Twitter can be used more effectively than I thought. At the seminar on ‘unleashing the power of social media’, the presenter was speaking to 60 people but he had 36000 tweets about it during his 45-minute presentation.
4. Whatever we do, the end goal is to get people to take the action we want them to take. To do this we need to build trust on our websites: customer ratings and recommendations are believed by 90% of web users. Get ratings and recommendations features on our websites!
5. People love good video content that informs, educates, entertains, explains, is interesting and succinct – it improves a website ranking on Google, is good for adding to social media pages, and people love it.
6. Free shipping of goods is one of the best incentives to give to people buying on the Internet.

Read more about how to have your website (and other online media) work for you 24/7.

If potential clients can't find your business on the Internet, your website is not really working for you

It’s all about SEO – search engine optimization for your website. And it’s not rocket science. It does however require knowledge about how SEO works, how to maximize keywords on webpages, metatagging of pages and so forth.

It also helps if small to medium businesses set up their websites so that they can manage their own SEO. That’s what Bold Type can do for small business owners whose websites are not ranking highly on Google; websites that don’t have good SEO. We can improve business!

27000 page views and rising

One Bold Type client has blitzed the competition with his new Bold Type built website. From about 3000 page views a month (with their old website that we replaced), in 12 months they have gone to 27000 page views for the month of August and they’re expecting September to be higher again.

What has increased web visitors and page views?

Bold Type built the new website for this small business using WordPress, a content management system that allows anyone to keep their website up to date. It went live in August 2010 and immediately there was an increase in traffic to the website. Great metatagging and navigation, increased number of pages all helped. Not only new traffic but very targetted traffic so that business immediately picked up.

New product? No problem. It’s so easy to use that, if you can use type on a keyboard and hit ‘Publish’, then you can use this system. So the company, a small business, can post their own new products, change information as required and make sure that their website is completely up to date. Oh yes, and we supplied a manual on how to metatag new webpages and how to improve SEO.

Because the business is generating so much more new business, and because the owner realises the value of keeping the SEO going strongly, he contracts Bold Type to look after his monthly SEO management. For a minimal cost of around $1000, his business generates up to $30000 more – each month (than it did with the old website). Not only is our SEO management working to increase visitors, we are making sure that the right visitors – potential clients that turn into clients – are targetted. You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to work out that that’s got to be good for the business.

If you want your business to be more visible on the Internet, i.e. generate more business from your website, contact Sue Stevens at Bold Type.

Read more about SEO on our website.

See some WordPress websites we have built in our website portfolio.

What is search engine ranking?

Google is the biggest search engine so it's important to aim for a high Google page ranking

Search engine ranking is the value that the big search engines, Google, Yahoo and Bing, ascribe to a website.

Search engines constantly index websites on the Internet so that when someone types in a search term, the search engine can find the most appropriate websites and put them on page one of the search list or SERP (search engine results page).

What do search engines look for when ranking your website?

There are two primary elements to indexing pages:

1. content on your website
2. who is linking to your site.

Indexing content on your website

Search engine ‘bots‘ are constantly trawling the Internet (and your website) looking for relevant information for any search term. The bots look at topics on your website and read the back-end code for title tags, description tags and other clues as to what each webpage on your website is about.

It might be considered a cliche, but content is king when it comes to search engine ranking

This means how you write your content and how you write your metatags to match that content is vital. Each webpage should have its own topic and focus with some keywords that give ‘bots’ the clue to what the page is about.

Be specific and write for a human audience. If you write only to improve SEO (search engine optimization), chances are you will overshoot the optimum keyword density.

Adding content regularly is also important – at least one webpage a week. Having a blog or news section on your website enables you to write one story or webpage about a particular topic relevant to your business, products or services.

Make sure each article has a clear topic and stay focused on that topic. There are no easy shortcuts to improving your ranking. Good content that is clear, concise and stays on topic is a sure winner.

Read more about how to write content for your website.

Who is linking to your website?

Inbound links are a clear indicator to the search engine ‘bots’ of the authority of your website in a particular field. It is not just the number of inbound links, it’s the significance of the website that is linking to you.

Build the number of websites linking to your website to improve your search engine ranking

Another issue is the anchor text used on the other website. Do not link your URL, your website name. Rather, use some relevant keywords that are the anchor for the link.

‘Web Development Sydney’ is excellent anchor text if this is what you do and where your office is. Create the link to a particular webpage on your website that is about web development rather than to your homepage.

Note: internal links on your webpages to other webpages on your website should also link from relevant anchor text. This shows search engines that the page you are linking to is about the keyword or phrase you used as your anchor text.

At Bold Type, we help business people to understand how to optimize their websites, how to write appropriate content, build inbound links and network with social media.

Our aim is to empower people so that they can improve their Google ranking, get more targetted web visitors and build their businesses.

Check your inbound web links free @ W3C, the web standards organisation.

How is your website ranking?

Here’s a simple test. Search for the keywords that best describes your business. Type in the geographic location if this is relevant. Is your website showing on page one of Google? You can get there and Bold Type can help you.

Contact Bold Type today for a free evaluation of your website.

One of the ways to encourage incoming links is to add a ‘Link to us’ page on your website to show how easy it is to create a link. Make it easy for the web person who will be putting the link on their website by adding some options of different image sizes with the code so that all they need to do is copy and paste the code in the appropriate place.

Here’s an example that we did for one of our clients, Captivations.

The image is coded with keywords specifically for netball clubs, organisations and businesses who want to tell their members or customers about Captivations for custom netball uniforms.

Link your logo or another image from a website

Having your logo on the website with the incoming link is easy. When a business adds the code below to their website, this is what appears:

Looks great and a click on the image takes the person to the Captivations website. Because we used ‘custom netball uniforms’ and other keywords, Google can read the alt text and see that Captivations makes ‘custom netball uniforms’.

This is the code that the web person added to upload the image.

<a href=”http://www.captivations.com.au”><img title=”Captivations for Custom Netball Uniforms” src=”http://www.captivations.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/Captivations_custom_sportswear-e1313994502447.jpg” border=”0″ alt=”Captivations – Custom Netball Uniforms” /></a>

What if a website only wants to link text from their webpage?

Not a problem. If a website prefers to link text, it is best to provide both the text you want linked and the HTML code as well.

This is what the link would look like on the website with the link to Captivations:

Captivations: for all your custom netball uniforms, netball bodysuits and dresses.

If the web person wants to copy the code, this is what they would use.

<a href=”http://www.captivations.com.au”>Captivations, for all your custom netball uniforms, netball bodysuits and dresses.</a>

Ask for incoming links in an email

Another way to get incoming links is to email targeted websites and simply request a link from their website. Reciprocal links, that is, both websites have links to each other is beneficial for both websites. Avoid programs that promise a world of links as Google will blacklist websites that they perceive as scamming the system.

Incoming links can make a huge difference for attracting new customers. Bold Type can help you to develop your link-building strategy. Contact Bold Type today.

A feature of Linda Magson's new website is the background image which is a part of the business' branding

The latest website built by the Bold Type team was in fact taking an existing website from one content management system (CMS) to another. We moved Linda Magson Counselling from Joomla to WordPress.

In effect, it was a rebuild. Moving files across was not an option as Linda wanted to improve her search engine optimization, add pages such as a blog and improve the navigation with a two-tier drop down menu (DDM).

Our first step was to modify the existing design that Linda wanted to maintain. With the redesign of the homepage, web visitors can access different webpages such as the latest blog posts, the three service areas: counselling, consulting and coaching. We also improved the top header including these key services to allow people to know immediately what services Linda provides.

We also included many features that radically improve search engine optimization: adding meta titles and meta tags on all pages, all-in-one SEO plug in and improving the structure of content on each page with highly-searched keywords.

The best part is that Linda finds it very easy to add content and to change content if she needs to. WordPress is a brilliant website platform that has an easy-to-use content management system.

Linda loves her new website and we know it will work for her to build her business – this, after all, is what an effective website is all about.

Website makeovers can transform your business

Top tips for building search engine optimization

Seven great strategies to turn your website into a money-making machine

Grow your business

Sharon from Glitterbox accepting the award for best hair salon at the 2011 Inner West Business Awards

We’re thrilled as well at Bold Type. After building the Glitterbox website, we have continued working for Glitterbox posting news articles on the webpage, ‘What’s going on’ and developing the photo gallery on the website.

We’re particularly proud of the Glitterbox website because it reflects the business culture and the hair salon decor perfectly. And we know it brings in lots of business from people looking for a hairdressing salon online.

Congratuations to Glitterbox. We’re not surprised because they are the best hair salon in the inner west, but delighted that the judges thought so too.

Read more about the Glitterbox website.

Before you start writing for the web

Searching keywords using the Google Keyword Tool

Go to Google Keyword Tool and search different keywords that relate to the information on the webpage you are writing. For this article, I searched:

• keyword content
• SEO relevant
• SEO web content

From this I found that SEO Tips ranks highly as does web content. Keep in mind that it is best to try to be as specific as possible so I finally settled on:

1. SEO Tips for Web Content Writers

This heading should rank more highly on Google and attract more readers – that’s the plan, anyhow.

Keyword Focused Content

Make sure to add variations to the keywords for this webpage in headings and body text

Each webpage should have its own list of keywords that you are targeting: don’t get distracted; keep to the point and keyword focused for that webpage.

Keywords in Headings

Make use of headings: H1 and H2 are the main ones to focus on even though many websites drill down to H5 or H6. Use keywords that you have identified as relevant in each of your headings. The title tag (see below) should have the primary keywords and H1 and H2s variations of the keywords.

Title Tag

The title tag is the main heading of the webpage that often goes unrecognised by web visitors but is vital for SEO ranking.

Use your best keywords for the Title Tag of your webpage

Use your best keywords here. Some websites also allow you to add a descriptive tag text. WordPress, for example, has an SEO All In One plugin for this which is brilliant.

What you write in the descriptive tag appears on the Google search

The Descriptive Text Tag is what appears on the search under the main heading so it’s important to include keywords from the webpage here in a natural flow (no more than 160 characters).

Bold Keywords

Make keywords bold using the B in WYSIWYG in the body of the text. Bold or ‘strong’ text in the body of the webpage content is a good idea. Best to use bold text at the top of the page to maximise SEO benefits.

Body Text with SEO Keywords

Use variations of your keywords in the body of your text but make sure that it reads naturally. Don’t overdo this. For example, SEO Tips can be used as tips for SEO, tips for search engine optimisation (English spelling) or search engine optimization (US spelling).

Variations of the keywords creates a more natural flow and is still beneficial as Google now recognises the relationships between different words.

Linking Keyword Text

When linking text on your webpage, try to link meaningful keywords. For example, it’s best to link Read More SEO Tips and link to another page on your website rather than ‘Click Here’ which means nothing to search engine robots.

For external links, again use the term such as Google Keywords Tool as a link rather than words such as ‘Click Here’.

Image ALT text

Adding ALT text on your images is very important for SEO

When using images on your webpage, make sure that you add ALT text which is the text that is ‘readable’ by blind people. Google wants us to develop websites that are inclusive of all people. ALT text is not only the right thing to do, Google sees it as the right thing to do.

Read more about this in the web glossary under ALT text and W3C guidelines.

Relevant, meaningful content

Write content that your prospective web visitors want to read.

'How to' webpages, news and blog articles are a great way to engage web savvy readers

It might be a ‘how to’ webpage or article that is relevant to your area. ‘How to use Google Keyword Tool’ would be an example of a web article that has relevance to my web visitors.

Newsworthy stories or webpages are excellent for going viral and getting links back to your webpage. With a Facebook Like icon on your webpage, you’ll have a better chance of achieving viral-ity!

Research information and write about it. If you are a sportswear supplier, information on the superior fabrics you use and how they will perform for your customers is valuable information that some people rely on before making a decision.

By giving factual information, you are also showing that you know your product.

Giving information in this way subscribes to what a good website does: help, help, sell. You need the help, help online to get to the sell.

Adding humour into your web writing

Have a bit of fun. Use some humour. It doesn’t work for all businesses but a little humour goes a long way to keeping the reader’s attention.

Edit and Proofread Your Writing

Before posting your writing to your website, make sure you edit and proofread your text

Before you post your web content page or article, edit your writing to make sure it has a natural flow and reads well. Too many keywords that you keep repeating is boring and will turn people off. Proofread your work or get someone else to proofread it for you. Editing and proofreading can make a world of difference.

Looking after the finer details gives you more credibility. There is nothing worse than spelling errors that disrupt a reader’s attention.

A pet hate – use the apostrophe properly

Even some of the biggest companies in the world use the apostrophe on FAQs so that it is FAQ’s – this apostrophe is wrong! Apostrophe is only used when something belongs to something else. Susie’s red dress but never for a noun such as FAQs which is simply the plural of FAQ. Read more about this unforgivable grammatical error on my Bold Type Blog.

Get into social media

Add Facebook and other social media codes to your webpages to make it easy for people to share your content with others.