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  1. Link Building: What Websites and Cities Have in Common

    Every city is different.  Some have multiple
    opportunities for adventure, others are known for a certain culture,
    and some are known for particular types of commerce, but they all have
    one commonality – numerous streets, highways and interstates bringing
    traffic in and out of them. A well-marketed website has a lot of similarities
    with a city. The roads leading into and out of the city are comparable
    to links on a website. And just as having more roads facilitates more
    traffic for a city, the more links to your website, the greater the
    traffic as well, resulting in greater revenue for you.

    Implementing Link Building

    A web link is a connection from one web
    site to another, or even another place in the same website. Link building
    is the process of building a large quantity of incoming links. "Incoming"
    means that another website links to your website, and not the other
    way around. Effective link building is best done by using the following
    approach:

    1. Set aside a regular block
      of time to dedicate to link building.       Although link building is
      not tremendously complicated, it does take time. In addition, it is
      critical to consistently review your link building and actively seek
      more links on a regular basis. Unfortunately, link building is never
      "done" as there are always more things you can do to build
      links, so setting up a regular time devoted to link building will enable
      you to avoid getting complacent with your link building efforts.
    2. Evaluate link building
      partners.        Use tools like the Google Toolbar (with page rank enabled) which identifies what
      search engines think of a sites quality/reputation. The higher the page
      ranks (from 0-10) the more a link from that site to yours is worth in
      boosting your search engine ranking. Just like a positive referral from
      a previous employer would be more valuable to your resume than a referral
      from your mom, websites also have varying levels of value.

      Find potential link building partners
      by searching for phrases that you would like to rank for. You want to
      look for reputable sites, such as professional organizations that offer
      articles and news posts on their site. Then write an article and submit
      it to them to use. If they approve your article, they will most likely
      be happy to credit you at the bottom with a link back to your website.

    1. Use directory services
      such as the       DMOZ Open Directory Project and the Yahoo Directory. These sites feed thousands of other
      directories, so being listed in them will result in building a mountain
      of incoming links to your site over time.
    2. Set up a blog. This
      is one of the best ways to build traffic to your site. It is done by
      creating a lot of good content that other people would want to link
      to. A blog is a great way to informally build pages of content to your
      site over time. Make sure to have your web developer install the blog
      locally on your site if possible (i.e. website.com/blog), rather
      than using a free external blog to get maximum results.
    3. Post articles and press
      releases.       A great way to build links is by writing articles and
      press releases then posting them on numerous article syndication or
      press release websites.
    4. Use social media. Social
      media sites, such as Facebook, Twitter, or LinkedIn all can be used
      to build more traffic to your site. Experiment with a few social media
      sites, find one that you like and dive in. Become an active participant
      – read posts, answer people’s questions, actively look for opportunities
      to link to other people and for opportunities to promote your blog or
      other articles. However, be careful not to come across as only caring
      about promoting yourself as nothing will turn people off faster than
      that.
    5. Be patient!
      Link building is an ongoing process and it can take time to reap the
      benefits of your hard work, but rest assured that if you keep at it
      you will find significant boosting for your site on search engines.
      And the best part is that most of these things don’t cost you a penny.

    Forms of Link Building:

    There are several forms of link
    building to consider.

    • Contextual links– These are links that are found within large blocks of content. These types of links have high value to search engines.
    • Cross linking – When 2 or more websites simply exchange links, but the sites do not have any relevance
      to one another and is done only for the sake of building links;
      although this used to be a valid and commonly used link building
      practice year ago, this is not highly recommended anymore as the links
      often cancel each other out as far as page rank is concerned.
    • Deep linking– Deep links are links that go to a subpage within a site rather than the site’s home page. These are very valuable when link building.
    • External links– External links simply mean they are linking to a website other than your own.
    • Link bait- Targeting,
      creating, and formatting content to encourage others to direct links to
      that specific page. Often this is done with polls, contests, really
      good content or other materials that other pople find valuable.

    When you take the time to implement link
    building, the roads into your city can become numerous. Yes, link building can be time consuming, but link building is one of
    the keys to high page rankings. The key is to get started, jump in and manage your time wisely!

  2. The Reason for the Season

    It’s that time of the year again where we find ourselves in the hustle and bustle of the holiday season. There’s decorations to hang, shopping to do, and a million other things on our plate and it’s easy to get overwhelmed by it all. I regret that I have to remind myself why we celebrate at this time of the year…

    ChristmasThe story of
    Christmas is about more than presents, and shepherds and wise men and a manger. While spending time with family and friends is one of my favorite aspects of this season, it’s about more than even that.

    We set aside December the 25th each year as a time to celebrate the birth of Jesus 2000 years ago in a little town called Bethlehem. Historically speaking, there has not been another person to walk on this Earth to have such a great impact on our world. Spiritually speaking, this little baby Jesus began his journey here on Earth
    as God in the flesh – A journey that would lead the creator of the universe to a
    cross in Calvary to pay an awful price and die, despite no wrongdoing of his own.

    Here is how it is recorded in the Bible in Luke chapter 2, versus 1-11:

    Now in those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus, that a census be taken of all the inhabited earth. This was the first census taken while Quirinius was governor of Syria. And everyone was on his way to register for the census, each to his own city. Joseph
    also went up from Galilee, from the city of Nazareth, to Judea, to the
    city of David which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house
    and family of David, in order to register along with Mary, who was engaged to him, and was with child.

    While they were there, the days were completed for her to give
    birth. And
    she gave birth to her firstborn son; and she wrapped Him in cloths, and
    laid Him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn. In
    the same region there were some shepherds staying out in the fields and
    keeping watch over their flock by night. And
    an angel of the Lord suddenly stood before them, and the glory of the
    Lord shone around them; and they were terribly frightened. But the
    angel said to them, "Do not be afraid; for behold, I bring you good
    news of great joy which will be for all the people; for today in the
    city of David there has been born for you a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.

    This year, take a moment to contemplate what Christmas means for you. 

    This holiday is about celebrating the one gift that we
    all were given. A gift that was free, but was not
    without cost. An innocent man, God’s one and only son, was put to
    death as payment for the sins of the world. For your sin and for mine – so that we may not incur the punishment that we all rightly deserve. And that is certainly worthy of celebrating.

    Merry Christmas, and may you be blessed during this holiday, and throughout 2010!

  3. 3 Great Ways to Analyze Incoming Links to Your Site for SEO

    One critical element of planning for a link building campaign or to do some competitive analysis is to find out how many incoming links you have to your (or a  competitor’s) website and what those links are. There are a ton of great resources out there that help you do this. Here are three free ones that we have found to be very useful.

  4. Websites Should NOT Make You Think

    When it comes to designing a good website, I always think of the book "Don’t Make Me Think" by Steve Krug. It’s an oldie, but a "goodie." As a web developer, we are always faced with the battle between usability and aesthetics. Not to say that you can’t have both, but they are often at odds with one another. Throw in the need for a website to be search engine optimized and you get even more complexity. Here’s the thing to keep in mind: USABILITY SHOULD ALWAYS WIN.

    Why, you may ask? Although it is critical for a website to be found on the internet, and the look of a website can leave a serious impression on a user, having a website that will get your visitors where you want them to go as quickly and easily as possible should be your goal when (re)designing a website. Take a look at a few very successful, yet very simple sites, Google and Craigslist. Both look like they were designed by a middle schooler in 1992, and yet, their simplicity is why they succeed. Both sites make it undeniably simple to do what you should be doing on them.

    Craigslist Screenshot

    Sometimes we have to "coach" clients that insist that a website design must contain a 3D spinning logo, long Flash animation or absolutely zero text, but they also tell us that ranking on a search engine is critical to their business. Don’t get me wrong…all of those elements do have their place occasionally, but often the people asking for them don’t have a clear purpose in mind. So, we create what we call a "Predesign" for all of our clients that gives them a wire-frame look at how their site would be organized, based on the client’s initial feedback and the research that we have done in their industry. We use a tool called Basalmiq that makes it super simple to throw together a mock-up. While, it’s certainly not the most robust layout tool, and it’s interface is a bit clunky, it gets the job done quickly and it’s hand drawn look makes it very obvious to our clients that we are not tackling aesthetics with these mock-ups.

    Think with Purpose

    A website should be structured so that once you identify the 3 things that 75% of all of your visitors will be looking for, make those things very painfully obvious to get to. If you want your clients to fill out a contact form…ask them to do so on your home page, but don’t pop up a window that obstructs the view of the rest of the page that will really annoy someone just looking for your phone number. If you have a lot of information on your site, make a search box easy to find. If you have a really hot product, feature it on the home page. If you want to establish credibility, feature some testimonials or association links. But the critical thing to remember is every element on the home page (and every other page, for that matter) should have a specific purpose…and that purpose is 98% of the time NOT to entertain the visitor with a cool presentation. And don’t even think about using a "splash page" with just your logo on it that clicks through to your home page. That just introduces an extra layer of clicking to get to your site and almost begs them to go somewhere else because they won’t find what they are looking for here.

    Of course, there are exceptions to these rules, but the main idea here is to think about WHY you are doing what you are doing with your website, and preferably do that before you get into the aesthetics of how it will look. It’s tempting to jump right into that, and we often get asked for proposals where we give an aesthetic look for a site….but without any data on who will be using the site, why they would be there and what services or products they need to sell, etc.

    So the next time you are ready to update your site…think before you shell out the big bucks….or at least hire an expert to think for you. And TRUST them.

  5. Top 3 SEO Tags that You Must Use to Rank

    I often get asked questions like "If I only could do one thing on my
    site to make it be better optimized for search engines, what would it
    be?" Well, this is by no means an exhaustive list, but it is the 3 most
    important tags that you need to address on your pages in order to be
    properly indexed by search engines…

    1) The Title Tag

    The title tag is the text that appears at the VERY top of a search window and it’s used when a page is bookmarked.

    Title Tag Screenshot

    Since the title tag is not on the web page itself and many people pay it no attention this is a great place to use keywords that may look strange elsewhere. However, resist the urge to stuff too many key phrases in here. The more you use, the less weight they have, and you run the risk of looking spammy to Google, so choose wisely! Use our SEO Meta Tag Tool to make sure you don’t go overboard. Make sure that EVERY page on your website has a unique page title.

    2) Header Tags

    Header tags, similar to title tags, are what tell search engines what that page is about. The header tag that holds the most weight in a search engine’s eyes is H1 and there should only be one of them per page. There can be multiple H2, H3, H4, etc. tags per page, however. It is important that you really use the header tags and not just a font, div or span tag with a CSS class telling it to be big and bold. Search engines don’t look at CSS, so identifying a title as such in the code to search engines is critical. You can always use the H1 tag to style with CSS anyway. Again, every page should have a unique H1 tag.Here is what a header tag looks like when you view the page source in your browser:

    H1 Tag Screenshot

    3) Meta Description

    The Meta description tag is completely hidden from people visiting your site, and it actually does not help your page rank any higher in search engines at all. So why is it number three in the list?  While the meta tag doesn’t help a page appear in search engine results, it does determine WHAT shows up in search engine results. So put things in your meta description tag that would make someone want to click on your listing over your competitor right next to you. This is NOT the place to load up on key phrases and limit yourself to around one good sentence. Notice it will also show your title tag here as well.

    Search Results Screenshot

    There you have it, my top three tags for effective search engine optimization. Enjoy

  6. Element Analytical Website Goes Live

    I hate that in the hustle and bustle of operating a business we often miss the opportunity to announce the launch of one of our client’s new websites, but today Element Analytical, an engineering analysis, investigation, and inspection solutions company located in Knightdale launched their new website, which sports a clean look, easy-to-use content management system, and a news area to post updates on their industry. One of the owners happens to be a good friend of mine, so check out their new site and tell them how much you like it!

  7. Free SEO Title and Meta Tag Tool SEOMetaTagTool.com

    We just launched a new free tool for those who want to make the most of their title, meta description and meta keyword tags on their website.

    Click here to check out our SEO Title and Meta Tag Tool – SEOMetaTagTool.com.

    As you may know, there is a certain number of characters you should optimally shoot for for each of these fields, and yes, we know that the meta keyword tag is virtually useless for SEO anymore, but we felt it was best to include that while we were at it

    Just put in your information, keeping an eye on the counter to stay out of the red, and when you’re done hit the "Generate Code" button and get the HTML to put into your site. It’s that easy. Check it out!

  8. Improve Your Business Using Twitter and Facebook

    One of the aspects of link building that we tackle for our clients is making sure that they are effectively using social media apps like Facebook and Twitter. These are the two really hot social media apps right now and not getting up to speed on these fabulous services can be a detriment to the success to your business. One of the things I hear a lot is "Those things will never impact my business" and I cringe a little, because the people usually saying that know very little about what these websites actually do. I’m not saying that these sites or any social media is going to double every business’s revenue every time, but it could…and it’s free to use, so why not at least give it a try? Once you know what these services are capable of, I’d be suprised if you don’t see the value in it for your company. Here is a basic description of what these services are and a few reasons why all business owners should be in the know regarding the two currently most popular social media sites out there.

    Facebook for Business

    Facebook is a website that lets you connect to friends by entering the high school and college you attended and finding other people that may have been in your class. You can also enter tons of other information about yourself like where you work, what church you attend, movies you like, etc. and that helps other people to find you and request to be a "friend" of yours. When you become a friend with someone, any updates they post on their account will show up to you when you log in, so you’ll see if they uploaded a new photo from their vacation in Tahiti or if they’ve posted a status update saying they are "on their way to an internet marketing workshop." There are also functions that allow you to post notes (which are similar to blogs), photos, videos, events and even other 3rd party applications that let you play games, rate movies, identify all of the places you’ve ever travelled to and much, much more. Every aspect is centered around other people following what you do on Facebook and commenting on it. For example, if you updated your status saying that you are a Twitter addict, one of your friends may reply and welcome you to the club 😉

    One important aspect of Facebook is that you can create causes, groups, and more importantly "fan pages" for a company or organization that allows other people to become a your "fan." This is a good way to get more exposure for your business, share information about your company and interact on a more personal level with your clients or customers.

    Twitter for Business

    Twitter, in my opinion, is a very simple way for people to get a taste of how social media can affect your business. Twitter is, by definition, a "micro blog." That essentially means it is a way to share very short thoughts with other people. It could be a recommendation of a company, or movie, website or it could be a reply to a post that someone else has made (which is called a "ReTweet.") Blogging can be a very valuable way to build your online presence and establish your authority in your industry but many people are intimidated by the thought if writing a daily, or even weekly article. The great thing about Twitter is you are limited to 140 characters, so all rules of grammar (okay, maybe not ALL ) are thrown out the window in favor of brevity and it requires MUCH less of a time commitment.

    One of the more powerful aspects of Twitter is that people can search for relevant tweets and find people. So if you "Tweet" about a new special that you are offering at your business, someone may be searching on Twitter and find your post and then decide to start following you. Just like becoming a friend of someone on Facebook, when you follow someone on Twitter, it means you will see their posts when you log in, so you can keep up with what they have to say, and they will then see your posts from that point on as well.  This is very powerful for a business owner as you can follow other experts in your industry and grow your knowledge (not to mention more personally connect you with anyone in the world – even the President), but it also establishes you as an expert as well. The key thing to remember is to keep your personal posts to a minimum and try to remain focused on your industry, if you want to keep the attention of your followers. Chances are, they started following you to find out more about your industry expertise than what you had to eat for lunch 🙂 Read our article on Twitter for more information.

    Great, Why Should I Care?

    One interesting development of how people have responded to the increasing popularity of social media is they now check these sites when determining who they want to do business with. Having a Facebook fan page for your business with a ton of fans and positive reviews speaks a wealth about who you are and many people tend to trust this non-biased feedback over brand identity alone. So this means that you need to be careful to put your best foot forward when you post on any social media site, because they are public, afterall.

    Be polite, be relevant and keep it short and sweet.

    If you plan to use Twitter for a great deal of personal updates, great! BUT, create a separate account for you personally that is separate from your business account so you can create a distinction and allow people to follow what they are most interested in – you personally or you professionally.

    Another thing to be wary of is that there are people out there that use these social media apps for sending junk or solicitations. So it is best to get email notifications when new people follow you or become your friend and check them out to make sure you approve their association with you. And if you don’t like what you see, simply block them. 

    In conclusion, these tools are only as good as you make them. If you do not use them, they won’t help you. But if you do use it, it’s important that you keep up with your friends or followers and make sure that you are protecting your brand and actively participating with them. There are a lot of ways to burn your time on the internet, and these two can definitely fit that bill, but as long as you use these with a purpose in mind, you can build your business. Also, you can’t keep up with every social media site out there effectively, so pick a few to stick with. These two mentioned in this article are good ones to start with, and if you are feeling particularly spunky, another good social media site to check out for your business is LinkedIn.

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