Baton Rouge Web Design

2013 Strategic Website Redesign

Published on December 20, 2012 by: James H. Hobson

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The beginning of the new year is when many business owners begin to think about a website redesign process. The most common objectives are increasing leads, improving search engine ranking and simply updating the look and feel of their website.

We applaud any business owner who seeks to be on the leading edge of internet marketing. This article will present some of the important considerations in 2013 to maximize the opportunities available when doing a website redesign and redeployment.

Website Redesign Tips in 2013

Upgrade to HTML5

HTML5 is the most current specification for coding a traditional (desktop) website. HTML5 enables your web design company to deliver more features with less work. Using HTML5 means that your website can utilize tags for video that allows streaming multimedia content directly into a browser, enable the placement of interactive content without Flash or plug-ins, enable better controls and features for forms, and is a huge advantage for employing special utility features.

HTML5 Canvas is a great example of how your redesigned website can deliver a much improved user experience. Rather than use the outdated Flash presentation, the CANVAS element allows you to draw graphs, graphics, games, art, and other visuals right on the web page in real time within the user's browser. HTML5 can really make your site stand out!

Use Responsive Design To Impress

The better customers, people with money to spend, have larger monitors. This means that a new website can easily be built around 25% wider than most sites that are over 5 years old. With responsive web design your website can be made to auto-scale to fill the entire viewing space which maximizes your impact on potential customers.

Rethink Your Marketing

The best performing business websites are far more than a "cool design" with some photos and bland text. Your website should be a strategically crafted marketing tool. Your website should reinforce your brand, influence and persuade prospects, and be ranked where the highest relevant traffic is searching.

A good website design copany shuld never require YOU to write the content copy. Certainly client input is valuable but the text must be refined for search engine optimization, visual presentation, optimal messaging, grammar and the typical behaviors of a website user. Additionally, your site architecture, intra-site linking, interactivity, and inclusion of downloadable content are all powerful marketing components.

A large percentage of local website companies are WordPress template tweakers that lack the business knowledge, professional expertise, and physical resources to create a well planned marketing tool. A review of a website designers portfolio, and an interview to discuss their processes should enable you to find the agency that will give you the most value for your investment.

Get A Mobile Website

It is very common for an entertainment venue, trades service business, or professional practice to soon find that 30% or more of their website traffic uses the mobile website. Without a mobile website your business stands to lose a lot of potential customers.

How is a mobile website any better? Your traditional website may display on a mobile device or smart phone without any noticeable problems but that does not make it a mobile website. A true mobile website design requires a different approach to meet browser requirements and deliver a better user experience. A mobile website auto-scales its size to fit the viewing screen whereas a traditional desktop website must be scrolled around or even pinched to expand the page to a size where the message can be read. A mobile website is coded to deliver the fast load times required by mobile devices, networks and platforms. And a mobile website is designed to leverage smart phone functions such as making your phone number a tap-to-dial feature.

Although the development of some features or functionalities still requires more time and cost, many of the valuable upgrades can be made with the same amount of effort as not using these options. When you're ready to redesign your website you should work with a company that has the knowledge and experience to truly move your site performance to true 2013 standards - and not deliver a rehash of what you had before.

For more information that includes valuable advice from a website redsign consultant you can view and download this free Website Redesign Guide.

SEO Link Building Tips - Anchor Text 2013

Anchor Text vs. Co-Occurrence

Published on December 11, 2012 by: James H. Hobson

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There is a growing belief among the leading SEO experts that the optimization value from keyword rich anchor text is diminishing. I think we can all agree that the individual personality of each link is usually tailored to affect a specific and targeted ranking. A devaluation of anchor text is a logical step in the progressive efforts being made by search engines to mitigate manipulation of SERPs.

A new observation made by these same SEO experts is that Google’s Phrase Based Indexing capabilities may be placing greater value on overall content specifics. A critical component of phrase based indexing is the ability to associate page content by somewhat averaging the meaning of anchor text. The term for this is co-occurrence, and although this term is new to most SEO companies it has been in play for quite some time.

Although we won't go into the related concept of co-citations it is an area of SEO that any bonafide local SEO company will explore and consider. Co-citation and Co-occurrence are going to be active parts of SEO discussions in 2013.

Anchor Text in 2013

Anchor Text Diversity Is Important

Let me first clarify that every link you acquire should be a the result of tying your great content to places where users would be interested in your information. When these quality linking opportunities are available you would be well served to use diverse wording for the anchor text. First, this keeps your link diversity ratios in scale, and second this is a favorable practice for trending anchor text evaluations.

SEO Experts Speak About Anchor Text Importance

Rand Fishkin of SEOmoz

Bill Slawski of SEO by the Sea

A very well written article on this subject, which was cited by Rand Fishkin of SEOmoz, is Not All Anchor Text is Equal which was written by Bill Slawski.

A teaser from this article, and a tidbit to demonstrate the quality of the article is the following pull quote:

The patent includes a number of features associated with a link, and I’ve included a handful that involve which text is actually used within a link, and how they might be analyzed.

• Actual words in the anchor text associated with the link.
• Commerciality of the anchor text associated with the link.
• A topical cluster with which the anchor text of the link is associated.
• A degree to which a topical cluster associated with the source document matches a topical cluster associated with anchor text of a link.

Just as exact match domains have become a detriment for many sites, so may become too many exact match links. And in the end this all comes full circle to what we have known all along - quit gaming the system and simply do things that best serve the user.

Types of Search Engine Marketing - Part II

Why Social Media Business Pages Matter

Published on October 19, 2012 by: James H. Hobson

This article is Part II in a series on the Types of Search Engine Marketing. This series will continue until the end of 2012, and will cover the different types and aspects of search engine marketing techniques and services.

Social Media Marketing

Social Media used to be considered the fluffiest form of search engine marketing. Almost every business we know stated at one time or another, "our customers are not on there". This position considers only the potential for a lead or direct sale. What was missing is the realization that social media marketing builds brand recognition and loyalty, can directly impact SEO, and it DOES generate leads!

In 2012, social media signals became a key element of Google's search engine algorithm. Social media is also a signature part of strategic inbound marketing services. Any business who clings to the notion that social media is not important is making a big mistake in their marketing efforts.

Social Media Business Pages

It is a fact that your business needs to establish social media business pages. Your company should have a social media presence that includes well structured business pages with graphics, complete profiles and links, and maintained with fresh content.

At a minimum, your company need social media business pages on Facebook, Twitter, and Linkedin. Other social media sites and pages may be useful, and should be selected based on your type of business and customer profile. Sites like Pinterest, Foursquare, and social bookmarking sites are worth considering. The amount of time to create each business page and provide all important information probably averages about one hour. When available this business page setup should include the creation of custom profile images and page main images.

Social Media and Inbound Marketing

Inbound marketing intertwines social media marketing, SEO and content marketing to drive traffic, generate leads and build branding. The role of social media is to allow a business to interact with potential customers in a non-sales fashion, present user friendly information and position the product or service for first-in-mind consideration.

Social media is how to build brand recognition, and serves as a nice channel to distribute links to articles, mention promotions and specials and educate consumers. Adding social media icons and links to your website is a strategic online marketing tactic.

Social Media and Your Website

Because social signals are part of Google's algorithm you need to link your website and your social media pages. Additionally you need to utilize content and calls to action (CTA) that drive traffic between these sites.

To learn more about why social media business pages matter you can visit our website or do some Google searches for social media and inbound marketing.