INVITE GOOGLE OVER FOR TEA

Using Google Sitemaps:

Show ‘Em What You Really Got

Search engine bots have long relied on site maps to simplify their mindless collection of letter strings. Site maps make it easy for spiders to assess the nature of the site, the accuracy of HTML tags and to detect new content faster and more easily. So, the development of a site map has always been useful to bots and to site visitors alike.

The importance of developing a site map has increased recently with the introduction of Google’s cool feature – Google Sitemaps, which is pretty much what it sounds like. Today any webmaster or site owner can quickly develop a site map for submission to Google’s SE for indexing. The benefits? Many.

Help Google. Help Yourself.

The proliferation of new websites has caused the Google gods to rethink their current processes used to spider and index the billions and billions of new pages of text coming online each year. It can’t be done, not even with all of Google’s resources. “Too much information.”

The solution? Let webmasters index their own sites. That’s what’s behind the new Google Sitemaps program. It’s a wonderful opportunity for e-biz owners to ensure that their sites are assessed and indexed properly on Google’s big ol’ hard drive, in effect taking ‘botness’ and placing it into the hands of site owners – humans with the ability for rational thought – something no SE spider brings to the table.

How Hard Is This?

No very. To get the most out of Google Websites, you’ll need an XML generated file on your site. XML stands for extensible markup language and you can find XML tutorials everywhere. Just Google XML and you’re on your way.

If you don’t know a thing about XML and writing code, no worries. This is something your programmer can develop in less than an hour, delivering better SE results and more highly-qualified visitors to your site.

The XML generated file is the ‘transmitter’ that sends site changes, updates, new content and other data to Google. No doubt, you’ve seen the ubiquitous red XML logo on the most up-to-date sites. Kind of a status symbol to those in the know. These XML-enabled sites provide more accurate SERPs, though it’s important to note that an XML generator won’t do a thing for your page rank. That’s another whole story.

XML Syndication

XML coding is used by most blogs because it’s a language that adapts easily to syndication. RSS – remote site syndication – employs XML to deliver your site’s content to other interested, like-minded sites in the form of XML/RSS feeds. It’s all part of the new dynamic of Web 2.0 – content syndication with lots of arrows (links) pointing back to your site.

In the case of Google Sitemaps, all the webmaster is doing is syndicating content directly to Google’s SE. This puts more control in the hands of webmasters to ensure that their sites are crawled accurately and frequently.

Even better, this program gives site owners control over several key weighting factors – variables, XML tags, attributes and so on.

Your XML Generator

It’s important that your XML site map be kept up to date since that’s going to be an important consideration when bots come calling. So, you need an XML generator. A what?

It’s easy. An XML generator simply spiders your site, identifies new content, lists URLs and notes any other changes and reports this data to the Google index. There are a slew of XML generators, some free, all low-cost, available on the w3. Just Google XML generator and take your pick. They all do the same basic thing and there’s one for every level of programming expertise.

Which Generator For You?

http://enarion.net/google/ is a php generator that you install on your host server. Once installed, your site is spidered and an XML sitemap automatically produced. Upload the new sitemap to your server. Then, run the generator to have your site map indexed by Google. It’s easy, even for the digitally-challenged.

But there are dozens of XML generators available – from pick-click easy to more-than-most-of-us-need-to-know-in-a-lifetime. So, to make things even simpler, and to encourage more self-indexing, Google has developed a list of 3^rd party XML generators that configure nicely with Google’s data hook-up. To see Google’s list of XML generators, simply click here.

Telling Google What You Want It To Know

The XML file created as part of your site will provide Google with lots of useful information that you submit only after every letter and symbol has been checked for accuracy. This information includes:

The location of your web page, i.e. your site’s URL. (Hello, I’m over here!)

Dates of content modification – what was added, deleted and/or changed since the last time you were spidered. This is very important for sites that change content frequently – especially informational or editorial content. Spiders love fresh content, as long as it isn’t page after page of hype.

Frequency of Content Change - SEs may view frequent content changes with suspicion, “thinking” that changing content may indicate gray-hat marketing tactics. Problem solved when the webmaster can indicate how frequently content changes from page to page. You can indicate change frequency from never to hourly, giving the bots a heads up.

Site Page Priority – Some pages of your website are more important than others. Obviously the homepage ranks high in importance, but so do high profit pages, opt-in pages and, of course, ordering pages.

Google’s Sitemap program allows webmasters to determine the importance of each page on the site! Pages are prioritized on a scale of 0.0 (least important) to 1.0 (most important). The higher the importance you assign to a page, the higher importance Google will assign to that page. No bump in page rank, however, since your priority rankings are only relative to the pages of your site.

Extreme Trust

Extreme trust is a new www concept, sort of like the honor system. Wikipedia, the online, ever-evolving encyclopedia is a project based on extreme trust. Anyone (even you) can make an entry to the Wikipedia site. Other readers can then go in and add, update and edit your information. It’s a means of harnessing the world’s knowledge in real time and it’s one of the most exciting uses of the web currently underway.

Now back to Google. Google has a well-established reputation for protecting its reputation and the quality of its search results. Sites have been gray-barred (banned) for seemingly minor infractions – sometimes even unintentional infractions. You don’t mess with Google. Period. Even big-time car maker BMW got penalized for less than exemplary reporting to Google. If it can happen to BMW, it can happen to you.

Banned from Google and you might just as well start over. Recovering your previous Google rank is all but impossible.

Now, apply this hard-edged business philosophy to the new Google Sitemap program. Believe this – you don’t get carte blanche. Spiders will still spider and bots will still bot. And if the information in your XML site map is out of sync with site text, purpose, components, tags or any other aspect of site descriptions, you better believe that you’re site is going to be slammed – and there won’t be a thing you can do about it.

Play It Straight

The black and gray hats out there are always trying to beat the system but the system grows more sophisticated with each passing minute. That’s why it’s best to use the Google Sitemap tool to your advantage – to ensure that your site is presented the way it should be and the way you want it to be.

To learn more about Google Sitemaps, click here.

And remember, when it comes to Google and every other search engine, play it straight. It’s the only way to go.

Haven't been indexed in two years? or just launching your new e-biz. yeah, well you want a little of that search engine love so submit sitemaps to all major search engines and show 'em what you really got.

Later, gator,

Webwordslinger.com

Does a Micro-Business Need A Website?

Does Your Micro-Business Need a Website?

In Three Words: yes, Yes, YES!

Whether you’re an accountant in Anchorage or a zookeeper in Xenia, your business needs a website. In fact, if you don’t have a business web site you’re missing a terrific marketing and promotion opportunity no matter what you do or where you are. And your competition is going to eat your lunch.

Selling Goods and Services

Most small businesses sell goods or services. If you own a termite exterminating business, you’re marketing a service – bug killing. If you sell little miniature furniture for doll house collectors, you’re selling goods – products. Either way, a web site is going to serve as an online billboard 24/7/365. And lots of people around the world are going to see that website and want to purchase whatever it is you’re selling.

What About the Cost?

In order to have a website you’ll need access to the information highway by way of a web hosting company. These companies maintain gigantic servers (just big, old hard drives, actually) that contain the web sites of thousands of small businesses just like yours. So is it pricey?

As with all technological advances, prices continue to fall within the website hosting business thanks to improved hardware (servers, routers and other gizmos about which you need to know nothing) and the proliferation of web hosting companies. In fact, all you need is a server (about $1000 for a good-sized one), some spare closet space to store the server and, guess what, you’re a web hosting company. Not a very good one, but a web host nonetheless.

However, stay clear of the unknown quantity – the web host that may be here today, long gone tomorrow, along with your web site, database information, the whole shebang. The fact is, you can find high quality, reliable web hosting services from a company that’s been around for years. Go with a company that has a track record and a long-term presence on the W3.

Now, cost. You can get a bunch of disk space (storage space for your site) and bandwidth (accessibility to and from your customers or clients) for less than $7.00 a month! You spend more than that on a couple of latte grandes on the way to the office. Staking your claim on the world wide web is the best, least-costly investment you’ll ever make to grow your business.

Do the math. Call your local newspaper and ask how much it will cost to run a small classified for a month. For the cost of that single, 30-day newsprint classified you can maintain a professional presence on the web for an entire year. In the battle between bang and buck, the web beats traditional print and other media advertising hands down every time.

In fact, you can cut print advertising costs significantly with a website clients can visit. Let the site do the selling. Let the print materials provide the map to lead buyers to the website. (See below.)

Yeah, but what about building a website? I’ll bet that’s going to cost a bunch.

Not at all. In fact, a good web host will provide an extensive tool kit that contains everything you need to construct, manage and grow a website – and it’s all FREE.

And it’s simple. You don’t need to know jack about HTML code, cascading style sheets (CSS), SEO, SEM, XML or other alphabetic mish-mash to create a professional-looking website in just a couple of hours. The entire process employs templates so you pick and click your way to site creation. You choose the colors, the design elements, the type face, the content, the site structure – you can do it all simply by going with a web host that provides the tools you’ll need.

Okay, but if I build it will they come?

Not if you keep it a secret. Once you’ve got your site up (easy), tested for bugginess (also easy) and launched (break out the champagne), it’s time to let the world know you’re here, you’re near and you’re open for business. How?

By placing your site’s URL (universal resource locator, also known as your web address) on every piece of marketing collateral you put out there. Got a business card? Add the URL. Stationery? URL. Marketing brochures? You got it, add the URL. If it’s printed on paper, it should include your site’s URL.

Also, remember that classified ad that was going to sock you in the wallet. Well, with a website, you can keep that classified short and sweet:

Tax problems? Call 555-1234 or visit us at www.taxproblemfixerguy.com

Boom! You don’t need to sell the service in print. Simply direct prospective clients to your website where you can go into great detail about all of the wonderful services or products you offer.

I don’t want to sell my services outside my local area so isn’t a website kind of a waste of money?

Au contraire. First, most of your traffic (site visitors) will find your URL by way of your print advertising, so you’re already focusing on the local market. Second, search engines like Google, Yahoo, MSN and Ask enable you to localize your search engine listings. This way, you aren’t selling carpet cleaning services to someone half way around the world.

You can keep it local by including your town’s or county’s name in your keyword list. Keywords are those words search engine users enter to conduct a search. For example:

carpet cleaners tampa florida (You don’t have to use capital letters; the search engine understands that you’re looking for a carpet cleaning service in Tampa, not in the UK.)

You can also localize the content of your website to appeal to the needs of local residents. Your air conditioning business probably won’t pull well in Yellow Knife (it’s in northern Canada) but it will generate business if you operate out of Corpus Christi where temperatures routinely hit the century mark during the summer months.

Localization allows you to target a very narrow demographic in the great scheme of online things. On the other hand, if you’re selling products, and you start getting orders from Istanbul, are you going to say ‘no’? Absolutely not. Just add a bit for the extra postage.

So, whether you want to keep it local or go global with your business, the best, least expensive way to do it is via the web, and a solid web host you can count on to be there for you next week, next year and forever.

The Prestige Factor

A professional-looking website (remember, you can build it and they will come) adds substance to your existing business. It adds that cachet of success and gives site visitors (or store visitors) the impression that your business is bigger than it actually is. You’re not just Bob’s Tuxedo Rentals down on Main Street.

You’re also www.bobstuxedorentals.com on the world wide web. This is sometimes called the prestige factor, creating (branding) an image that appears to have more substance than your simple, brick-and-mortar tuxedo rental store.

Okay, so how do I use my new website to best advantage?

Lots of ways. First, you can use your website to keep in touch with individual customers and your entire client base. For example, instead of trying to reach Ms. Jones on her cell, just drop her an email through your site. Simple, easy, effective.

You can also market to your entire client base through regular email updates or even a monthly or quarterly newsletter. The more often you put your company name in front of a potential customer’s nose, the more likely that nose will eventually buy something via the web, or by way of your store downtown.

Announce upcoming sales (exclusively for our valued customers), introduce new products or service offerings, provide advice and suggestions that drives traffic to your store – you can even send personalized birthday greetings if you can capture birthdates from existing clients. A website is a marketing bonanza.

You can also use your site to collect invaluable information on the buying practices and preferences of your client base. Provide a feedback form on your site (again, easy) to learn what visitors like and, more importantly, don’t like about your site. Collecting this marketing data will better equip you to adjust your product line, add new services, lower shipping and handling costs and identify the desires of your buyers. And you just can’t put a price on that. (Well, actually you can – less than $7 a month!)

Another good use of your website is to announce job openings – and even allow potential employees to apply online. Let’s say you own a couple of fast food franchises in Fresno. Employee turnover is always a problem. They come and go and finding new employees is costly using traditional means, i.e., the newspaper classifieds.

With a well-designed site you can announce job openings, pay rates, locations, benefits packages and more – much more than you could ever cover in a small newspaper classified.

The Keys to Online Success

So, whether you’re a start-up or a well-established business in the community or region, a website will boost sales and keep you in touch with your consumers. Just remember:

• Go with a web host that’s been around longer than last Tuesday. Go with a host with at least a five-year track record of providing hosting services. Longer is better.

• Choose a web host that provides software, tools and services FREE. This alone will save you literally thousands of dollars in start-up costs.

• Select a web host with 24/7 tech support – preferably U.S.-based tech support – for fast repairs and quick answers to any questions.

• Start small. You don’t need every bell, whistle, jim-crack and gee-gaw available to website owners. Keep it simple, start small and as you learn more about e-commerce, your site will eventually include additional features and contain more substantial information.

• Don’t worry about search engine optimization (SEO) and don’t pay an expert to optimize your site. Search engines aren’t your primary means of driving traffic to your business. Most visitors will find you through your print materials – business card, brochures, etc. – so ranking high in search engine results isn’t critical to the success of your business or your new website.

• Peg your URL to everything clients or customers see or hear about your business. If you’re running spots on local cable or radio, be sure to include your URL in all advertising. This way, you pique customer interest through the traditional media and make the sale on your site.

• Update your site. You can find plenty of sources of free content online. Give site visitors a reason to stop by again. And again. Hey, just include a daily horoscope (FREE) and you’ll start to see repeat visitors (especially Leos, for some reason).

Here it is, the bottom line: for the cost of a single, one-month insertion of a classified in the local newspaper, you can maintain a website and a web presence for an entire year. And it never closes, it never complains or calls in sick, and it never asks for a raise.

If your business doesn’t have a website, you’re missing out on one of the best, most cost-effective marketing tools available to the small business owner. So what are you waiting for?

Your competition across town already has her site up and active. And you’re sitting here reading this. Time to get moving.

Time to build your business website.

Just starting up. Give a shout before you blow a pile of cash on SEO voodoo and scam artists.

Later,

webwordslinger.com

SITE METRICS DON'T TELL THE STORY

THE NUMBERS DON'T MEAN A THING. YOUR ANALYSIS OF THE NUMBERS MEANS EVERYTHING TO WEBSITE SUCCESS.

Crunching Numbers for

Fun and Profit

So you opened your web store, went out and bought one of those site metrics software packs and now you’re staring at a bunch of raw data that might as well be written in Swahili. What does all of this stuff mean?

Site metrics – information gathering – is important to long-term site success. However, gathering data doesn’t do a bit of good if you can’t analyze it and, more importantly, develop an actionable strategy based on your analysis of the raw data.

So let’s look at the value of some of the information you can collect from most quality metrics software.

Analyze Inbound Links

Go ahead, spy on the competition. Enter a competitor’s URL and generate a report of all inbound links to that site And what can you learn from these links? Well, if these site owners were willing to link to a site similar to your own, they might be open to a link exchange. That’s always good.

Analyzing the competition’s inbound links might also get you thinking about links to sites you hadn’t considered before. For example, if you post an on-line newsletter covering the stock market, it makes sense to have links to various brokerages, i.e. E*Trade, etc. That’s a no brainer. But how about adding a link to a tax preparation service or a bank. These links might not be so obvious, but if they’re working for the competition, they just might work for you.

Next, enter your own site’s URL to see who’s linked into your site. Some are parasitic links farms that have nothing to do with the topicality of your site. And these unrelated links are hurting your PR so jettison them. See, your site’s looking sounder already.

Automated E-Mail

After finding a few good prospects worth contacting for a links exchange, tracking down the owners of these sites and finding contact information can eat up a lot of time. Some metrics analyzers, for example SEO Elite, provide the means to automate e-mails to site owners who show good potential and synergies for a links exchange.

Be careful, however. A lot of these e-mails will never make it through the spam filter and if they do, they won’t be read. They’ll end up in the trash. To truly reach out and touch someone, the personalized e-mail or better yet, a telephone call, will improve your success ratio but it’s going to take time – lots of it. Oh, the process is called “links begging,” which tells you a lot about how much fun it is.

allinanchor, allintitle, allintext

SEO Elite and other analytic software will show you how the competitions set up its sites. Search engine spiders crawl sites looking for keywords and the positioning of those keywords to determine if the text is spamlish (keyword gibberish) or actual content of use to a visitor.

Search higher ranked competitor sites using the allintext feature to determine keyword density. allintitle and allinanchor(text) provide a very useful blueprint of how these successful sites have placed keywords throughout anchor text, headers, sub-heads, banners and so on. Why reinvent the wheel when you can learn from the success of others?

Check for Dead Links

If you have a good site, you’ll discover that you have a number of links from different sites. After you’ve weeded out garbage links to unrelated sites or links farms, go back and check your site for dead links – links that are no longer active. Eliminate all dead links ASAP. Search engines consider them time wasters for users – and they are, so lose them.

Keyword Check

If you’re still using your original keywords to define your site for search engine indexing, time to drop the old and add the new. Metrics software shows you which keywords are driving site traffic and which are just taking up space in your HTML keyword tag.

With metrics software, you can see which keywords are pulling in visitors to competitor sites. Hey, it’s not top secret information so use it to your advantage. You gain two major advantages by regularly reviewing and updating your list of keywords. First, the closer your keywords match the topic of your site the better search engines like and trust you. Second, a refined, accurate keyword list will deliver more qualified buyers to your site and fewer browsers.

Are You Completely Indexed?

A site with five or 10 pages won’t have any trouble getting indexed by SE spiders. But what about sites that contain hundreds and hundreds of pages? How can you be sure all of your site has been indexed and properly indexed, at that?

Site analytics will indicate how many of your pages are actually part of the search engine’s inventory. If a lot of your pages have been mis-indexed, or just plain missed, there are a couple of things you can do.

Spiders follow links when crawling a site so add links to those pages that are missing from the search engine index. You can also submit a site map to Google, Yahoo, Ask and other search engines. This acts as a “personal” invitation” to a spider to stop by for another look. A site map can also provide links to all pages, ensuring a more complete indexing and a more accurate indexing.

Who’s Beating The Pants Off You?

Who are the heavy hitters in your market? Conduct a search based on page rank or on the quality of the site’s optimization, i.e. “see well-optimized sites.” Why?

What are they doing that you aren’t? If you’re an HTML coder, you can access the underlying code of any site using Internet Explorer so sneak a peek at keyword selection, title tags and content architecture. Also check out site navigation. The easier the better.

Keyword Searches

Two functions, here. First, enter your keywords to produce a list of other sites using the same keywords. If one of them is a behemoth site, add lesser-used keywords to by-pass the stiffest competition.

The second function is to refine your keyword list based on keywords that have been entered into the big search engines in the past day or two. Keyword rankings change as quickly as today’s headlines. If your site sells time sensitive content, services or products, it’s essential to stay up to date with the latest in keyword use.

Online success is all about the numbers, how you analyze them and alter your site accordingly. It’s a never-ending process of refinement based on what works and what doesn’t. And the only way to find out that…

…is to run the numbers.

Having trouble inserting Tab A into Slot B when it comes to metrics analysis. An incorrect assessment of site metrics can have disastrous (read expensive) consequences. Call me and lots crunch the numbers to develop a real marketing plan based on the empirical data. Interpreting is everything and remember, "post hoc ergo propter hoc." Man, that'll send you down the wrong pathway to success.

Later,

Webwordslinger.com

DOA: PROJECT CREEP WILL KILL YOUR SERVICE BUSINESS.

Putting A Stop to Project Creep:

Protect Yourself and Your Business

Any service provider is aware of the concept of “project creep.” The project is agreed to by both service provider and client but, as the project moves forward, the client asks for “just one more little thing.”

Now, you want to keep the client happy and coming back for more of your services but when the client asks for five “little things,” you’re losing money because none of these project elements was discussed before the project was undertaken.

Project creep gobbles up time and money (same thing, actually) that the small service provider simply can’t afford to lose.

Now, not all service providers are in the enviable position of vetting clients to determine whether they become part of the client base. Many of us simply have to take the work that comes our way – especially if we’re just starting out as SEOs, site designers or CPAs. It doesn’t matter. If you have clients, you need to understand how to prevent project creep.

The Dangers of Project Creep

The most obvious danger is, of course, the loss of time. Man-hours translate to dollars in a small shop so if you’re spending time doing just “one little sales letter” on top of contractual deliverables, it’s a give-away and you’re the one who’s giving it away.

However, there’s a more serious danger. WOM. Word of mouth. If you say ‘no’ to project creep, you may save a few dollars but end up with an unhappy client. And that unhappy client is not going to sing your praises at the next conference or seminar. Bad WOM spreads like kudzu. It should be avoided at all costs. Yes, even the little extras should be thrown in. Why?

Because if that client walks away feeling she got a good deal and good service from you, she’ll talk you up to her network and that one job that cost you a few hundred dollars in man-hours can deliver tens of thousands of dollars in new work – and an expanding, stable client base – one you don’t have to replenish. Repeat business is your bread and butter.

So, the dangers are: (1) you lose some time and money on project creep and (2) you lose the best salesperson you’ll ever have – a satisfied client.

Google The New Client and Do Your Research

If it breathes, it’s indexed in Google somewhere. Do a quick background search. Check out the company website and check Whois, the directory of domain owners. It’s always nice to know who you might be working with.

If it’s a big project – six figures let’s say – pull a D & B on the company. Dunn and Bradstreet report on all corporations doing business in the U.S. and provides background, credit history and other useful information.

Talk to the decision maker. If a face-to-face meeting is possible, great. Otherwise, check the company website for design and production values, features and other tell-tale signs of a successful, or at least well-run, company.

Know with whom you’ll do business. Request a credit check if there’s any doubts about how deep you want to go with a particular client. It may be better (if possible) to try a small project before jumping into a $40,000 website with every bell, whistle and live feed you can find.

The SOW (Statement of Work)

The statement of work is often a separate document from the work agreement or contract. The contract usually states that you or your small company will complete all work in the SOW to the satisfaction of the client.

So, that SOW should be very, very specific to prevent project creep and hard feelings down the road.

Work and Payment Schedules

The SOW should provide detailed milestones and payment dates. This does a couple of things for you. If you deliver early, you score points for promptness. You’re already ahead of the game. Also, with a payment schedule you never get too deep into a project – especially with a new client.

If the client misses a payment, the work gets put to one side – at least until the client makes good on his or her SOW agreement.

Deliverables Inventory

The list of deliverables should be extremely detailed, describing the deliverable, format, placement, number of revisions and any other project specs.

In addition, the SOW should also include a list of items that won’t be delivered as part of the agreement. For example, if you’re building a website and the client asks if you could do a quick “5-part, auto-responder series,” ARs should be on your list of components that are NOT included in the price.

The client may be responsible for product pictures, for example, or site text or baseline metrics. Make sure everyone is clear on what’s included and what isn’t in the SOW.

However, it’s good form to offer a discount on this additional work to keep the client happy. Just make sure you at least break even.

Make the Client a Stakeholder

This is often overlooked, even by long-time business owners.

If your company simply presents storyboards or sample web pages to the client, the client has no vested interest in those design elements. So, early in the discovery phase, ask the client to recommend things like color schemes he likes, fonts that she finds attractive and other design elements.

This makes the client a stakeholder in the finished project, whatever it may be. It’s difficult to say you don’t like the color combination when you picked it out. Don’t back the client into a corner, i.e. “But these are the colors you chose!” Great way to lose a client, who, as we all know, is ALWAYS right.

However, by giving the client a say in project development, you lock in design or other project aspects more quickly.

Deliver Pages

Throughout the process, stay in touch with the client and get approvals at every possible stage. Roughs, boards, reaction text (too hypey?), sample site pages or the quarterly financial report – keep the customer informed.

Clients hate to be ignored and this shows you and your team are on the job. It also enables you to make changes when they’re easy to make. This is a real time saver, and if the client knows what s/he wants, all the better.

Managing Project Creep

A solid statement of work is the best place to start. But don’t stop there.

If the client asks for an additional deliverables and you can do it in an hour and it’s going to make him happy, do it. However, recognize that you’ve opened the door for a few more “little things.”

At some point, early in the project, introduce the concept of client alterations – changes after approvals, additions, you know, project creep. Be straightforward. This project creep is hurting your business and “while I’d love to give you another 20 pages of site text, I just don’t have the time.”

You have to draw the line. Otherwise, the client will keep on adding to the list of deliverables and you watch as your margins grow thinner with each “little thing.”

Your time and your expertise are the two commodities you sell. If you give these assets away, you diminish their value in the eyes of the client. Remember, you’re not just being paid for what you do…you’re also being paid for what you know.

And that’s what makes you the best ever there was.

Site Promotion on the Cheap

Promo on the Cheap:

Got No Dough? No Problem!

The idea is sound. You built the website yourself on a razor thin budget and you’ve launched your on-line dream. Now all you have to do is wait for that traffic to start coming by and you can quit the 9-to-5 world forever, right? Oh, so wrong!

The only people who even know you’re on the world wide web are the people you told. You can wait for the next millennium before somebody stumbles onto your site – and that would be a total fluke!

In order to achieve success on the web (turn a profit or get your message out to more people) you must promote the site. Yeah, but doesn’t that cost a lot of money? It can, if you go to one of those high-priced boutique ad agencies, or even if you pay some on-line company $500 to distribute a grand opening e-mail announcement to six million people. But promoting your site doesn’t have to cost big bucks. And the bucks you do spend can be put to work delivering 100% productivity.

There are so many things you can do (must do) to promote your site and actually become a viable entity. Cheap. Real cheap.

Register With Search Engines

This one is a no-brainer, but how you register with the big three – Google, Yahoo and Inktomi – will make a significant difference in how quickly your site appears anywhere in search engine results. You can also ensure that your site is correctly and completely indexed. Not all sites are and their owners are trying to figure out what went wrong.

The best way to submit your site to a search engine is by sending the search engine a map of your site, aka, a site map. First, by sending the site map, you’re inviting the search engine to crawl the site. It may take a day or two but that’s better than the months and even years it takes for some sites to be crawled. One of the reasons for this is that spiders follow links. That’s how they find a site and index it.

When you provide the site map, you’ve given spiders complete directions to all of the site pages. This ensures that the site is completely indexed. Just because a spider crawled by doesn’t mean that it indexed all of the pages on your site – that is unless you provide a site map that shows all links to all pages.

A word of caution, here. Search engines (at least the big three) each want site map submissions in different formats. No surprise. But also, no worries. You can purchase site map generator software for less than $100 that will create maps of your site based on the quirks of each search engine. If you’re serious about promoting your e-biz, site map generators are worth the price – especially if your site changes often. Most sites do.

Submit Your Site to Directories

Directories are free and that’s always a good thing.

Directories like the Open Directory Project, the Yahoo Directory, Incrawler and others can drive a lot of traffic to your site. Directories review sites for quality issues, and if a site meets the directory’s criteria, it’s included and categorized by the topics of the site content.

Visit the Open Directory Project to see a great example of how these tools help connect buyers and sellers. You’ll find it at dmoz.org. Volunteer editors keep the site current and provide some quality assurance. The biggest problem, from the site owner’s POV, is that it can take weeks before an editor gets to your submission. However, you can get ready for that visit.

First, make sure the site is complete, all pages in place. An “Under Construction” page will exclude you. So will poor navigation, poor content architecture or little value to the typical directory user. Quality counts when you’re after a directory listing. And you should be.

Directories will point qualified prospects in your site’s direction. But it will also increase your link popularity – how many links connect to your site. This is one of the key factors in determining a site’s page rank. More quality inbound links from sites like the Open Directory Project or Yahoo is a real shot in the arm for an online start-up. Just be patient. It takes longer to get listed in a directory than it does to get indexed by a search engine. But it’s definitely worth the wait.

Pay-Per-Click (PPC) Ads

OK, not free, but also not too expensive if you use PPC effectively. Google AdWords is probably the best known of these programs but links off of other sites are also PPC.

There are a couple of nice things about PPC programs. There’s no long contract so if one program isn’t working you can try another. There are plenty from which to choose. Another nice thing about PPC adverts is that you can set a spending limit and once that limit has been reached the link disappears. You know, going in, what this thing is going to cost you.

Finally, since you only pay for actual clicks, 100% of the cost of your PPC ad delivers potential buyers to your site – motivated, qualified buyers who took the time to click on your link.

Start slowly. Test, rework and test again. Welcome to the world of e-commerce.

Exchange Links

Remember search engines like sites that are well “connected,” i.e. lots of links to other sites. There are web sites with lists of site owners seeking links exchanges. Also, you can often find link-seeking contacts on the forums or bulletin boards of webmaster sites. Exchanging links may improve traffic and give you a bump up in page rank (PR) but there are a few cautions.

First, avoid linking to sites that have a lower PR than your site. Of course, if you’re just starting out, you’ve got no page rank so any link helps. Well, almost any.

Search engines want to deliver quality, relevant results to their users. That’s what they do. And part of the relevance of any site is determined by its links. The links on your site should be related to the subject or products you sell. If you sell life insurance online, links to financial investment sites would be helpful in furthering a user’s search. A link to a clothing outlet store wouldn’t be useful. Make sure your links are related to the subjects of your site and that your inbound links are on sites related to yours.

Buy Links

You can, you know. There are sites that auction links. This enables sites with low PRs to link to sites with higher PRs, which improves the PR of the lower-ranked site. It can also drive traffic if the connection between the two sites is in sync.

Run a Google search for “link auctions” and buy your way to success. Just proceed slowly and make sure the link to your site remains active. Also, make sure it’s cost effective. Banner links, on average, have a click through rate of about 1%, which means for every 100 pairs of eyeballs that see your banner, one will actually click through to your site. Think about your own computer use. When was the last time you clicked on a banner?

The key objective is to get noticed by search engines and buyers – not an easy thing to do in the world’s busiest marketplace. If you’re just starting out, organize a plan that uses some or all of the above suggestions. It’s a time consuming process but one that pays dividends big time.

Need some heap with off site marketing. Call me. We'll get traffic to your site in just days,

Lator, gator,

Webwordslinger.com

WHEN GOOD SITES GO BAD

ARE YOU HAPPY WITH YOUR WEB SITE'S PERFORMANCE? YEAH, MOST SITES CRASH WITHIN 12 MONTHS.

ONE THING YOU CAN DO IS MAKE YOUR SITE BROWSER COMPATIBLE SO IT LOOKS GOOD ON IE, FIREFOX, CHROME, SAFARI AND OTHER BROWSERS ACROSS A VARIETY OF PLATFORMS.

Is Your Site “All-Browser” Friendly?

How Poor Design Makes a Good Site Look Bad

For most owners of an online start-up, their sites must be works of art. They spend hours and hours (or thousands and thousands of dollars) to develop a sharp-looking site that immediately catches the visitor’s eye. But is all of this really necessary?

And what about site visitors who still use dial-up connections on their 10-year old systems? They’re still out there and they still buy things. So, what can you do to make your web site picture perfect for any visitor using any operating system on any computer (except Coleco, which died in the early days of the personal computer era.)

KISS

Keep it simple, stupid. (No offense.)

Most first-time site owners want to use it just because they can, whether it’s a useless Flash demo or looped clipart stills that fade in and out every 10 seconds. If it exists and it looks cool, new owners want it because they’ve seen the feature on other “professional sites.”

But is simple better? All you have to do is go to the Google homepage for your answer. Plain white background, company logo, a few links to the back office and a search box. That’s it. No razzle-dazzle. Simplicity itself. Oh, and it’s one of the most visited sites in the world.

You may think all of that “web bling” looks hot, but it’s not. It’s so last week, it confuses first-time visitors (shock and awe online) and it slows download times by up to 300% - longer for dial-ups – and nobody wants to wait that long to see your cool/hot homepage. It may be your baby, but to visitors, it’s just another web site.

Site Usability for All Browsers

Somebody had the idea of the horizontal navigation bar across the top of the screen 20 years ago and it’s still the main means of navigating a web site. Originally, the only information you got was the actual link’s name – Our Products, About Us, Terms of Service and so on.

Today, navigation tool bars employ mouse-overs. Simply move your screen cursor over a link on the navigation bar and a flyout or dropdown menu appears, providing additional navigation options. Scroll. Click. You’re there.

The problem with many navigation bars is that they’re driven using JavaScript to connect navigation bar flyouts to specific links on the site – great if visitors have enabled JavaScript on their systems; unusable if the visitor’s browser isn’t JavaScript enabled. And not all are!

There’s a bigger point, here. Don’t assume that prospective visitors have certain features and capabilities available. Not all browsers are JavaScript ready. Not all employ 24- or 32-bit Truecolor. Not every computer system will have lots of VRAM (video RAM) to display color changes rapidly without other operations bogging down in the process. And not every visitor is going to have the really cool font you downloaded, and have used throughout the site.

When Good Sites Go Bad

What happens in these cases? First, some of your site’s features won’t function at all. What good is a Flash demo on the home page if the user hasn’t downloaded a Flash player? What good is audio if the visitor’s system doesn’t have speakers or (this is true of older systems) that the speaker batteries are dead?

Second, older browsers will make substitutions based on what it “thinks” you had in mind. It will substitute colors from the outdated 8-bit, 256-color spectrum and you don’t know what will end up on screen since your site design is based on 32-bit Truecolor. Posterized junk images with major color shifts aren’t unusual. And, if the visitor’s system doesn’t have the cool type font you use, and you fail to include the font as a separate font file, the browser may substitute something that looks just plain awful.

Looks Matter, But Not Too Much

Sure, a web site should look attractive and grab visitors’ attention – quickly. Sites should also read well, i.e. no typos. And sentences actually written in English. That’s not too much for any visitor to expect. But don’t get so hung up on the look of your new site that you forget about usability issues – how easy and comfortable is the site to use, i.e. read, navigate, access specific data and so on.

How do your programming conventions and latest tools in your web site builder kit translate to older systems, older browsers? Overall site usability, and accessibility to content, are more important considerations. And, remember, there are still web users who own computers with older CPUs, less RAM, limited color selection, terrible audio, no Flash player, no PDF reader and pokey dial-ups to the AOL portal.

Those older systems, with dial-up connections, are going the way of the rotary dial telephone and buggy whips. Even so, if you set the bar low enough to reach these borderline Luddites, you’ll expand the reach of your site. Even better, visitors with the latest systems and software will notice that you’ve simplified your site. Load times will shrink as conversion ratios expand.

Everybody wins – especially you.

Look, if you're just starting out in the world of e-commerce, call me first. You'll svae money and end up with a great looking site that converts visitors to buyers. And ain't that what it's all about?

Later,

Webwordslinger

Oooo, LET'S GET STICKY!

Always keep your site door open for repeat traffic and let's get sticky, eh?

Add Some Glue to Your Site:

Let’s Get Sticky

The world wide web is a jungle – especially for the start-up struggling toward profitability. With all of that heavy hitting competition, webmasters (you) have to spend increasing amounts of time marketing their sites and less time developing site improvements and adding new content.

The key to long-term success is to create site stickiness – a reason for visitors to return to your on-line shop over and over. Sticky content, by definition, provides benefit to the reader. It might be information, humor, the latest (very latest) news within a market sector, tips and suggestions – any information that keeps visitors returning and even book marking your site.

Sticky content could be as simple as the horoscope of the day, a Sudoku puzzle or even just a crossword puzzle. The objective? Less time on content development and more time on marketing while, simultaneously increasing site traffic. Think it can’t be done? Well here’s how to do it on bottle return money.

Post Your Publishing Schedule

If your readership liked article #1, chances are they’ll stop back to read article #2 – especially if you provide the reader with a publication schedule. If visitors know that every Thursday you’re going to post your latest stock prognostications, then all of those self-directed investors just might stop by every Thursday and read this week’s stock picks over their morning lattes.

Don’t push yourself to the limits, promising green content every day. You’ll get tired of cranking out the words and, after a few weeks, the content won’t be as fresh as you and your one-time readers thought it was.

Syndicated Content

Want free, relevant content? Visit sites like goarticles.com and similar sites. Here you’ll find well written (and not so well written) articles on everything from keeping pet turtles to how to make money in currency exchange.

It’s content that might appear on a dozen sites at the same time, so it won’t do much as far as search engines and page rank (too much duplicate content), but it’ll be green to your visitors and that’s what keeps them coming back daily or weekly.

A Newsletter

Hey what’s happening in the heavy equipment industry? Well, if you’re an authority you can probably put together a one or two page newsletter once a week on the topic of your site. These newsletters would then be sent to visitors who have signed up for the information (they’re called opt ins because they opted to receive your newsletter). In your newsletter, you can cover your industry, hobby, avocation or whatever your site’s subject is.

The Site Blog

A few years ago, the blog was almost unheard of. Today, even small sites can have blogs. The better web hosts provide the blog software gratis, so all you have to do is upload posts. The programming is super-easy.

You can control blog content and allow visitors to leave comments. Controversy sells so if you can work in the latest controversy within your sphere, all the better.

The Forum

It looks like a blog but it’s open for posts from anyone – including the nut jobs who populate the W3 landscape. In forums, people can deliver their screeds, rant and rave about this or that and, ultimately, create dialogue between site visitors. Your site becomes a source of opinions, ideas, warnings and other useful information to keep your site sticky like super-glue.

Site Convenience

RSS feeds (really simple syndication) allows you to pick up content relevant to your visitors from many different sites and deliver all of it in one place for sheer convenience. So, the visitor who once had to stop by five or six sites for the latest goings-on in Washington, D.C. can now stop by your site for content from all of those sites and more, saving visitors time. Plus, the content is updated regularly.

To gather RSS feeds you need an aggregator (collector). It’s free. Then, all you do is visit sites offering RSS feeds, click on the ones you think readers will enjoy and present them on your site. And once a feed is in place, you’ll receive regular updates that will keep visitors coming back.

Fun and Games

You can find almost any kind of fun and games free for delivery to your site daily. For example, funtrivia.com will set up a 10-question trivia game on your site every day. It will also provide daily scores, weekly and monthly winners. And it’s free. Once you get a few competitors going head to head, they’ll be back for more.

One of our favorite sites is freesticky.com which offers dozens of features to keep them coming back. A partial list, in no particular order: cartoons and jokes of the day, competitions, games (change them every day), horoscopes and astrology for star gazers, lottery results, maps, tickers, On This Day In History, The Daily Phrazzle®, free articles, viral marketing content, guides and directories and more. Much more. All free and all very sticky.

All you have to do is Google “free site content” and you’ll find hundreds of sites offering games, industry analysis, the latest from the Hong Kong stock market – whatever your readers will find interesting.

The Point of Getting Sticky

First, it increases site traffic – something search engines like to see. Second, you’ll get a lot of repeat traffic – something else search engines like. Your site will receive more page views per visitor, which means they stick around longer.

However, the most important reason to add a little glue to your site is because repeat visitors eventually buy something. Oh, they may not buy on their first, second or third stop, but if they keep coming back each day, eventually they buy. There’s an old Madison Avenue adage that says ‘A buyer most hear or see a product six times before it even registers’ and that was back in the day when TV was the main form of access to information.

Get sticky. Save time in content creation. Devote more time to marketing your site. In time, if your site becomes really sticky, you may be lucky enough to start a site community – friends who use your forum or message board to talk to friends.

If you’re working on a shoestring content budget, there are still plenty of options to create and deliver sticky content to your regulars. And in short order, those regulars will become buyers.

You’ll also see a little boost in your search engine rankings as an extra kicker. So start adding some glue to your site and watch that site traffic grow like never before.

That’s what site stickiness is all about.

Want to keep visitors coming back time after time? Youneed to get sticky stuff for your site. Drop me a line and let's get sticky.

Later,

Webwordslinger