Website Design
Google Pulls the Plug on Sites Created through Their Business Profiles
If you created your company website with Google Business Profiles, it may be time to build a new website. Google has announced that, come March, these websites will be switched off. Until June 10, visitors to your site will automatically be redirected to your Business Profile, but beyond this date, all bets are off, and your customers and potential customers will come up against the dreaded page not found error. If this is where you’re at, it’s time to have The Web Guys rebuild your site using a fresher platform.
It May Be Time for a Website Redesign
Your website shoulders an immense responsibility for your business. Not only does it set the tone for your brand and serve as an invitation for searchers to learn more, but it also guides user experience, which is critical to conversions. You put a lot of thought, time, and effort into your website when it was originally created, but you may not have paid much attention to it since. Keeping your website fresh in terms of aesthetics and content as well as up-to-date in terms of technology can help you maximize your business’s growth potential, get the jump on your competitors, and offer all those potential customers a hassle-free online experience. While regularly tweaking your website can keep it in good working order for years, sometimes a redesign is the way to go.
Digital Accessibility and Return on Investment
You likely don’t need a survey to tell you that the vast majority of business owners and web experts cite expense as their primary concern when it comes to digital accessibility, but if you do – there are plenty of surveys out there that make exactly this point. Naturally, many businesses are also concerned about having to rebuild their websites from scratch in order to maximize the browsing experience they offer – and about the investment of both time and money involved. Fortunately, there’s good news on the horizon.
Your Search Bar: A Big Deal You Should Deal With
The future of search is now. Your customers and potential customers alike can go directly to your site’s handy-dandy search bar to plug in exactly what they are looking for and go directly to it, and the convenience cannot be denied. Search used to be nothing more than a workaday tool that helped searchers hammer their way through labyrinthian websites, but no more. Search has the potential to serve as a powerful conversion tool, which should be used to your advantage.
The Interplay of Site Quality and SEO Chops is Real
Quality is an elusive concept, and the interplay of your site’s overall quality and SEO is no exception. Distinguishing between those sites included in your link outreach that are forwarding your ranking, that are just hanging around and not doing much, or that are actually getting you penalized is an important but challenging matter. The goal is creating quality while bolstering the impact of your link building and reducing your overall risk, so let’s get going.
A Deep Dive into On-Page SEO
The best way to grow your website is with organic traffic from the big search engines out there. The only way to garner the necessary clicks, however, is to rank high enough in the first place. Unfortunately, finding a balance between the two is where too many websites spin out of control. The surest search engine optimization (SEO) strategies incorporate both on-site and off-site planning. While the building blocks of your off-site efforts are all about honing your backlink portfolio, which you likely have a fairly solid handle on, your on-site or on-page plans involve SEO elements that are more content-driven, including meta tags and keywords. This is the stuff that speaks both to your target audience and to the search engines, and it deserves closer attention.
The Need for Speed: Page Speed Optimization
If the notion of page speed conjures ideas really complicated technology in your head, don’t worry, you’re not alone. Page speed is and always has been integral to search engine optimization (SEO), which means that understanding the basics is definitely worth the effort. You get that web pages are loaded, and if you also get that the ones that load more quickly are awarded bonus points, you’re ahead of the game. Things get more complicated from here, but the experienced digital marketing professionals at The Web Guys can help you get your site get to where it needs to be.
Your Website Redesign: Searching for the Answer
If you’re ready to consider a website redesign, there’s plenty to think about. A redesign signals that big change is afoot, and there is one very good reason for this – it’s time, and The Web Guys can help. You want your website to work for you and to reflect who you are as a business, and if yours isn’t hitting its marks, it is very likely time to dive deep into project redesign. The fact is that those retroactive tweaks we all make can only go so far – and, worse, can leave you with a site that feels like it was hastily thrown together. If you’re looking for anything, you’re looking for a sleek, streamlined design that masterfully reflects the heart of your business, and that performs like a thoroughbred while enticing, enlightening, and educating prospective customers. In the end, these goals all hinge on you having a … Continued
Do I Need Outbound Links for Blog Posts? #FAQuesday
As a form of online content, links provide a great value for users. Without links, a blog post is simply a dead end and may not be very helpful if people need more information than what is offered in the article. SEO industry experts often mention the importance of getting backlinks to your website, but should outbound links be totally left in the dust? What Are Outbound Links? First off, outbound links, also known as external links, are defined as links on a web page that link to pages on other websites. Examples of outbound links include press releases, industry-relative blog posts, and government regulations. While overloading your blog post with a large quantity of outbound links is not an effective digital marketing strategy, linking to other articles with high quality content can help provide additional sources for your audience. A big part of incorporating outbound links is understanding which … Continued
Why Do Websites Cost So Much? #FAQuesday
It is now 2016. Every business needs a website. The size and scope of that site varies by company, of course, but a presence on the web is a must to help grow and spread its reach. Web design professionals are frequently asked why websites are so expensive to design, create, and manage. The answer is fairly simple: there are a lot of moving parts at play. Let’s take a look at some of the forces behind building and maintaining a website. The Design Everyone holds their brand near and dear to their heart, and they should. Your brand is a representation of you, your employees, and the work you do. This needs to be incorporated into your site. In order to accomplish this, you need to sit down with a designer and go over what is important to you. The important pieces of your business need to be highlighted … Continued
