WONDERING WHEN TO SUMMONS WEBSITE DESIGN SERVICES FOR AN OVERHAUL? HEED THESE WAKEUP CALLS

 

Your website is essentially your company’s biggest asset online. In today’s digital-first world, people prefer to first window shop online before visiting a brick-and-mortar store.

Subsequently, your website is often your first point of contact with customers. The question is: Do you know whether it’s time to conduct a major overhaul for your website?

Remember, people want information at the tap of a finger or the click of a mouse. If your website is dragging its tail and writhing below sea level when it comes search engine results, navigation, and current, valuable content, then it’s more than likely a liability rather than an asset. Following are some key indicators that tell you not to waste a moment in contacting web design services for an overhaul. Read more from this blog: http://bit.ly/2ud5b61

A RESPECTED SEO CONSULTANT DISCUSSES HOW SMALL BUSINESSES CAN OUTSMART BIG COMPETITORS

 

If you own a small business, it often feels like you’re a small fish in a big pond—one that’s occupied by industry giants who are more than willing to outspend you on marketing.

What if there was a way to outsmart rather than outspend your rivals? The good news is that with search engine optimization (SEO), you can do just that. In a nutshell, SEO is the art and science of getting your website and pages on top of Google’s search results.

According to a study done by MineWhat.com, 81 percent of shoppers research product and services online. This means that if you can establish online visibility, people are more likely to visit your website and patronize your business.

But, how exactly can you take advantage of SEO to take down the Goliaths in your industry?

Create a local listing

If you search for a term, such as “plumber in New York,” Google will often show the top results along with additional information, such as addresses, contact numbers, operating hours, and even star ratings. Read more from this blog: http://bit.ly/2vEKRs0

A GOOD WEB DESIGN PROVES AN ESSENTIAL INGREDIENT TO A SUCCESSFUL BUSINESS PL

If you want to establish a prominent online presence nowadays, you must be able to adroitly blend valuable content, superb functionality, and alluring aesthetics. At its base, content keeps your target audience returning to your site. Dependable functionality expedites their exploration of your site and creates a more pleasant experience. Similarly, attractive aesthetics enhances the experience and retains their interest in your site.

When all three facets complement one another, you are set up to succeed when it comes to winning over your audience and ensuring that they return to your site. Bottomline is, such synchronicity in your site enables you to foster a loyalty to your brand while increasing your sales and securing your brand’s longevity. Read more from this blog. http://bit.ly/2f2xSLc

AN SEO EXPERT DISCUSSES BEST PRACTICES AND STRATEGIES FOR INTERNAL LINKING

Many extol external links as a means to help your website look more authoritative in the eyes of search engines. After all, citing major news websites or the latest research shows you’re in touch with the latest trends in your industry.

However, don’t neglect the importance of internal linking at the same time. By linking to your other pages, you provide audiences with related content that might prove useful, while also helping search-engine spiders index content that lives deeper in your website, thereby improving your search rankings. Here are just a few internal linking best practices worthy of employing in your company’s website. Read more from this blog. http://bit.ly/2gFrtWf

HOW YOU CAN IMPROVE YOUR WEB DESIGN TO IMPROVE YOUR ONLINE PRESENCE

Most business owners already recognize the importance maintaining an official website for their brand. However, they often tend to miss the mark on making the right choices when it comes to its layout. It may seem like a minor dilemma, but it can actually come at the expense of your brand’s image and accessibility.

Whatever the reason may be for poor web design choices, it’s important that you know which steps to take to remedy the situation and minimize your loss of opportunities in exposure and connections with your target market.

Check out some of the elements you may want to review within your web design that may require a reliable professional to fix for you. Read more from this blog. http://bit.ly/2f2uBLT

A QUICK EXAMINATION OF HOW SEO SERVICES AFFECT THE SUCCESS OF YOUR BUSINESS

It’s well known that SEO is a critical component in presenting your brand to your target market online. It’s all about helping you to be found easier in search engine results. More often than not, however, being easily accessible to your target market is just the first step. Ultimately, your end goal should be to establish a rapport and relationship with your clients to instill trust that leads to loyalty and referrals, not to mention sales.

If you still need convincing, following are some more instances clearly depicting how SEO services actually affect the success of your business

Improves PR

With a solid implementation of SEO strategies and proper supplementation of other digital marketing strategies, you can improve your brand’s online image. Word association plays a crucial role in SEO. Read more from this blog. http://bit.ly/2gFrbP8

WEBSITE DESIGN SERVICES HELP ESTABLISH AN EFFECTIVE ONLINE PRESENCE

Even with the onslaught of digital media and marketing strategies, a lot of business owners still prefer to invest in traditional marketing methods, simply because this is what’s more familiar to them. This attitude, however, simply won’t be of any help to your business, especially in this day and age. If you want your business to grow and develop, and if you truly want to be able to touch base with your target market, you go where they go—online. One great way to do this is by investing in your own website.

Finding a Presence

As it is, the online market is already heavily congested. The sheer volume of people logging into their accounts to do their business transactions, update their social profiles, and curate personal content is more than enough to compel any business to pursue a piece of the action.

Read more on this article: http://bit.ly/2oItxyM

Websites – Design Your Own or Hire a Pro?

Business owners who are maximizing their potential by using digital marketing very frequently face the question above – Do I design my website on my own via a free or cheap site builder, or do I hire a professional?

Here is some advice from Freelance Web Designer Heather Wood:

• Problem 1: Unfortunately, You Never Own Your Website

The majority of most free and/or inexpensive website builders is that they are designed to help you create your own website, except your hosting company continues to own it.

So technically, you are really just “renting” the “space” your website has been built on.  If the time comes when you want to export your website to another domain carrier, you are not allowed to transfer the site which you have created with your original domain carrier’s software.

• Problem 2: One Size Does Not Fit All

The pre-formatted site builders we are talking about are considered “one size fits all.”  Yet, every business is different.  If, for example, you own a franchised restaurant you will want to present a different atmosphere and a different menu unique to who you are.  You don’t wish to appear like everyone else because you’re not like everyone else.  Your website should be a reflection of this, it needs to highlight what you want to say, and not what a generic template has available.

Cookie-cutter sites are generic.  They are designed in a way that will work for a restaurant, or real estate agent, a lawyer, or a writer.  They look generic.  Generic does not set forth the idea of professionalism.

• Problem 3: Your Customer Service Rep Knows Nothing about Websites or SEO

An unfortunate thing to remember is that most customer service reps are really just phone agents working for the company.  They don’t know HTML, they don’t know CSS or PHP, and most importantly they don’t know SEO (Search Engine Optimization)!  The majority of these agents can tell you what SEO is and build up what they are saying with big words and faux-technical talk.  Yet, get into anything actually technical and they know very little.  Also, you know that when you call back, you will not get the same person; there is no consistency in customer or technical service.

An additional problem is, if they do offer SEO services, these results are often computer-generated at a monthly fee.  Their computer is most likely using very old SEO practices.  Most SEO is about content and how individuals speak, and then structure our website.  There is no right or wrong way to do it, it’s up to the discretion of your SEO and what will get clicks.

Sometimes, a new startup will spend its money on all kinds of things they need, but really cut corners when it comes to their website and advertising.  So, listen here, Freebie Freddy and Cheapo Charley, think about finding yourself a professional web designer – they can be found at a pretty reasonable rate. Professional web designers understand what works on a website, how to effectively tinker with your site’s SEO and they’ll be around for maintenance, questions and upgrades! Plus, most will know what works specifically for your type of business.

This is where I strongly urge you to treat your website just as you would your brick & mortar business. It is the first impression, your business’  virtual ‘bread-and-butter’the beginning of your sales funnel. Employ a professional web designer who will work with you to properly build your business online. If you need a good place to start, try the web designers at All Web, LLC.

Digital Eye Candy: Elements of Great Web Design for Atlanta Businesses

When looking for Atlanta web design companies, you’ll probably find dozens of firms that offer different viewpoints of what makes up a great website. From responsive webpages to color combinations, sliders and more, you should know that each opinion caters to a different audience and target market. Regardless of what type of web design appeals to your target market, the following key elements should be factored in:

Dark Text Over a Light Background

This doesn’t mean you should necessarily shy away from Atlanta designers who use light text against a dark background, but the vast majority of your website should use dark text. Studies have shown that dark text and light backgrounds are much more popular than the other way around. The combination is easy on the eyes and visitors tend to stick around longer. Light text and dark backgrounds should be used ideally only for styling purposes, such as header or footer sections of your website.

The Less Clutter the Better

While it may be hard to believe, clutter is still a huge issue as many website design services like to add numerous features as possible on one page. Flashy graphics and large pictures are a thing of the past. A simple and sleek website design is now the norm, and search engines prefer simple sites because they load faster. The homepage should be especially clutter-free because you want browsers to focus on the key elements and products of your business.

Navigation and Layout

Navigation and layout are two essential factors that an experienced website designer knows how to optimize. The layout of your website should direct the reader on the most important aspects of your business. The navigation section should be located on the top or on the left side of the page. Most web designers prefer to have the navigation bar located at the top because it will look better on mobile devices.

Navigation is important because your customers must be able to get from one webpage to the next without exerting too much effort. Each webpage should have a visible link that points to the succeeding page and one that points to the previous page. Your navigation options should also be repeated in the footer section of your site.

First-rate website design services from established companies like All Web, LLC are essential to the success of every local business in Atlanta, Douglasville, and other areas. It will help convert more browsers into paying customers and help improve a business website’s search engine ranking.

Sources: 

 

10 WEB DESIGN ELEMENTS THAT YOU SHOULDN’T OVERLOOK, WebDesignerDepot

Web Design Elements: Examples And Best Practices, Smashing Magazine

Web Design in Atlanta: Responsiveness and Long Scrolling for Mobile

The popularity of mobile phones as the primary access of users to the Internet have created dramatic changes to consumer behavior online. Though Google doesn’t specifically mention any website setup as the best, the search engine giant does recommend the responsive web design for business websites in Atlanta or elsewhere.

There’s also the recent trend of long scrolling or infinite scrolling in a single page rather than navigating through several pages. Since mobile screens are generally smaller, web designers have to restrict the volume of information to fit into a compact screen size by either removing important details, scrolling, or forcing the content to shrink. Scrolling seems to be the most preferred and effective option among mobile users.

The Responsive Configuration

According to an article from SearchEngineLand.com, a mobile website has three options when it comes to configurations, but may only run in one of them. These are the responsive, separate URL, and dynamic server setup. Though the first one is the recommended design, not having your website developed in this way doesn’t indicate a complete loss to your business. There are actually enterprises, particularly small businesses, with functional websites in either of the other two configurations.

Note that dynamic serving refers to the setup with a single URL, but different HTML and CSS codes that servers respond to. Meanwhile, a website is said to have a separate URL configuration if its desktop version has a different URL than that of mobile.

The responsive structure means that the website has a single URL that easily adapts into any device with the same HTML and CSS codes. Google encourages its use because it is both convenient to its algorithms and to digital users.

Benefits of Long Scrolling

Before the advent of smart gadgets, websites follow or adhere to the print industry’s practice of “above the fold,” wherein important facts or details are positioned on the front page’s upper half to capture the reader’s attention. Developers ensure that from the first page or screen, more visitors are influenced to drop by and explore.

With the innovations of Javascript and CSS, and the growth of social networks like Facebook and Twitter, web designers have discovered that online visitors actually prefer scrolling down the site for more information. Previous studies even confirmed that around 66% of a user’s attention span on a printed page is focused “below the fold.” This has apparently become a necessity today as devices, not only mobile phones, have slowly reducing screen sizes.

To have your own website that scrolls down in one page, consult with an established marketing agency like All Web, LLC, which uses the WordPress format for their clients and offers other internet marketing services as well.

Sources:

Why long scrolling sites have become awesome, TheNextWeb.com

Infographic: Mobile SEO Tips to Help You Survive the Coming Google Mobilegeddon, Searchengineland.com, April 6, 2015