Category: marketing

7 Search Engine Optimization Tasks for Small Websites

Posted on by Stephen

My current web design client Eleanor Bell, PhD came to me recently asking if I did Search Engine Optimization. Eleanor is a life coach specializing in internal family Systems and Hakomi. Eleanor mentioned that her site was not appearing when searching for her main coaching approach – internal family systems.

For large companies, SEO is a tedious, highly complex discipline, but sole proprietor and small business websites just need about 10 completed tasks to get 90% of their SEO goals accomplished. Depending on your business type these 10 tasks are slightly different. For example, if you your personality is a big part of your service, having a video bio of you is important. Eleanor has not done this yet, and we are in discussion, about creating one. Other businesses may not need a video.

Here are those 7 tasks:

  • Great content containing your relevant keywords. While writing the content for you pages or blog, think of what people are searching for in relation to your services. In Eleanor’s case, she knows people are searching for internal family systems therapy. The content she writes should highlight that keyword term in the titles and paragraphs of her pages and blog. How do you know what people are searching related to your business? Simply type in Google’s search bar and wait for suggestions. These suggestions will also be the most highly searched terms. Take it one step further by using Google Trends and research the volume these terms are being searched. For your most important keyword phrases, make a page or blog entry dedicated to that keyword phrase.
  • Have external sites link to your site using your relevant keywords. Link internally from page to page those important keywords. It’s easy to link out to external websites and think that helps your SEO, but it does not, because Google and other search engines know that can be misused. Instead, find colleagues with similar businesses as you to write about you, and link to you. Even though I do not do coaching, it is still a big plus for Eleanor’s business for me to link to her using her most important coaching term internal family systems therapy. Although, this too short not be overdone, because the all knowing search engines may see this as artificially manipulated. Less effective, but still a good supplemental strategy is to link from one page to another within your site. In the case of Eleanor’s site, she may mention Hakomi on the home page. To link Hakomi to an internal page that talks more about Hakomi helps the reader better understand the term, and slightly improves SEO.
  • Link these Google services to your site. You need to have a site map cataloged in the Google search engines. To best do that, if you don’t have a gmail email, get one. This is your easiest gateway to signing up with Google Console. Next create your Google Analytics account and put the provided code in to your website to track visitors. Finally, create a Google My Business account, and create a profile. This will be yet another way for people to find your website. There are many tutorials on how to do these three tasks.
  • Take out an ad in print or online. In the beginning of having a website for your new business, you are not getting much traffic, if any. Traffic to your site boosts your SEO. To give the visits to your site a little kick, try taking an ad out on Google, or your social media platform of choice, or newspaper or magazine relevant to your business or location.
  • Create a bio video. Creating a video is essentially is a pitch for you and your business. For many businesses, people like to see how you look and hear how you talk. Especially, if you are a big part of the service. Even though this article has been referencing many Google products, I’m not an affiliate of any. These free Google products simply help you with your business, not just SEO. From my research, Google rewards your business with good search results when you use YouTube and link it to your site. So, to complete the video making process, start a YouTube Channel, and upload the video to that channel. Who knows, you may like doing it so much, you might start creating others.
  • Start a blog to encourage dynamic content. I was skeptical of this tactic because I was often judging the short term effects. But, for my clients like CBT Westport, their blog has increased their visitors 5 fold! They consistently wrote an article twice a month. In two years, their 20 visits a day went up to 100 a day! I only recommend starting a blog if you like to write. Those my clients who did not like to write, may have started a blog, but they didn’t follow through and consistently write.
  • Write custom title tags, page urls, and image alt tags. Title tags are what you see when you hover over the browser tab for your site. Your page urls are the few words that follow the forward slash after your domain name. And, your image alt tags are the descriptions of your images for accessibility. These is the one time you are entering content that most people will not notice, but the search engines do. Especially your title tags. Make sure those do not just say “home” or “about”. They should contain those crucial keywords that people are searching.

Search Engine Optimization is not a one size fits all discipline. But, if you start with these 7 tasks, with you do it, or hire someone, it will be the foundation for you getting successful search engine results.

Search Engine Optimization

Posted on by Stephen

Search Engine Optimization is one of the most important aspects of a business’ online marketing. Search Engine Optimization could be a full time job, and is for some people, but what I prefer to do is offer it to a select few clients while I maintain my focus on being a web designer. Here are just some of the particular SEO tactics I use, to bring more business to you:

  • WORKING TOGETHER. A big part of improving SEO is we work together on specific tasks. I can’t get results without the client working with me. This means modifying page content, being willing to writing blog entries, and trying social media advertising.
  • ONLINE TOOLS. I use Google Webmaster Tools, Google Analytics and if you have a WordPress site—Yoast. My biggest advantage over using these free tools on your own is I use a paid service from SERPS.com that reveals the ways we can improve the SEO on your website and how to maximize the results of the most important keywords for your business.
  • MORE THAN SEO. To strengthen the results of your SEO, I consult and work with you to create a multi-layered approach of email newsletters, social media, online advertising, and other tactics outside of, but linked to your website.
  • PERFORMANCE BASED COST. Except for a non-refundable deposit, most of the cost is based on reaching particular goals we agree upon. You only pay for the goals that are reached. This is very different from advertising in a magazine, where you pay the full amount weather you drive up business or not. For example, if there are 6 specified goals and only 4 are reached, after the deposit, you pay two thirds of the cost.

Email Marketing

Posted on by Stephen

For those who need to remind their clients that they are active in their field, I recommend email marketing. Email marketing is also great for organizing and communicating with potential clients. I understand that email marketing for the receiver, can be annoying, but email marketing software companies make it easy to unsubscribe with two clicks at most. Before sending to anyone, be mindful of the policy most email marketing companies have that you are only sending to people who have subscribed to your email list. At very least only send to people who you sincerely believe would benefit from the service you offer. These policies are there to prevent spam.

Mailchimp would be my recommended email marketing software. My second recommendation is Constant Contact. If you are wanting a more serious presence, Contant Contact has branding that fits that mature presence, and this may be inportant to you if any of the branding of the email marketing software appears along side yours. But, if you don’t mind the playful and sometimes goofy Mailchimp branding, this company gives away so much of their services for free that almost all of my clients needs fit within the free tier of services.

Mailchimp used to offer an unbelievable free service. Accounts on a Free plan that were created before August 29, 2022 include up to 2,000 contacts and 10,000 sends per month, with a daily send limit of 2,000! I have this account. But, my guess is that too many accounts fell within that amount causing Mailchimp to work too much for free. So, recently they cut back. The Free plan now includes up to 500 contacts and 2,500 sends per month, with a daily send limit of 500.

My account was grandfathered in to allow for 3 different contact (audience) lists. They got rid of that a while ago, and now only allow for 1 list. But, if you want to send different mini-lists out due to different subjects or kinds of clients, you can cut up your list with the use of tags. For example, if you are a house painter and provide kitchen renovations, you can tag your contact list with two tags, painting and renovations.

People often come to me for a website. But, some fields, your website has little return on investment (ROI). Some businesses just need to remind people they are out there working. A good example is a carpenter who does renovations. Time and again I have been told by clients in building that their website doesn’t get them new work, it is just confirmation that they are active. But, websites are a passive form of marketing. Email marketing is active and goes one step further by going to client or potential client to relatively unobtrusively remind them you still there for them.

Social Media Marketing

Posted on by Stephen

Many of my clients are in such competitive fields that they come to me looking for a way to get their business found. Long ago the solution was print ads and word of mouth. Word of mouth is still powerful, and Yelp has become the digital version of word of mouth, but there are still many sectors of people who may want your service or product, but don’t know you exist. Organic search is important, but recently, for some business sectors, there has been a drop in potential customers and clients committing through websites.

One solution I have found to finding people who can’t find you is Facebook marketing. Just to briefly mention my morals on the topic of Facebook Advertising: I’m against Facebook selling the public’s data for outside business’ profit, and I even find it creepy how much Facebook knows about each and every one of us. But, what I do see useful about Facebook’s collection of data is (as long as the person who uses it has “good intent”) it is a great way for very small sectors of the population who actually would need your service or product to find you without the waste. Just think of all the junk mail you get in your physical mailbox that has nothing to do with your interests and buying, that you are getting just because of your address, or you bought something with a credit card. Think of all the wasted resources and energy that takes. With Facebook advertising, you can strategize a small list to just the people you want to see your services or product, and hopefully they will not mind seeing what you have to offer tucked in their Facebook and Instagram feed.

Schildbach Design is offering small Facebook Advertising packages to start. At the time of writing this, we have only done 5 campaigns. So, yes, we are new to this. But, in a short time we have discovered some new strategies that you may not know about. The biggest mistake we see small business owners make, is they try to do it themselves, but don’t take the time to dig in deep to the most effective technologies of the service. Some small business owners are great at their own marketing. But, there are several tactics you may not be implementing, and there are details you may be overlooking. For example, how familiar are you with Facebook Pixel—the code that allows you to retarget? And, are you using snapshots from your phone for the images? That is a subconscious message to your customer that bad photography reflects badly on a business. Or, are you spending thousands of dollars because your parameters for your audience is too large? Schildbach Design will be discerning about your ad settings. We do photography both in house and has excellent photographers in their design community. And, we work with you because you know your business best. Together, we come up with the best content and landing page to bring customers and clients to you.

Do Facebook Ads Work?

Well, does it work you ask? It really depends on your business. In your business, if you are able to pinpoint a small audience that you can be certain will be interested in your service or product, then there is a very good chance you will have success. The important thing to know is in the way Schildbach Design strategizes the campaigns, the cost is low risk. And, we back up all of our work with the data results provided by Facebook, your contact form results, and your website activity. Three month packages are recommended. The average 3 month package is $1,200 including FB advertising costs.

Inquire about Facebook Advertising with Schildbach Design.