The top website and online marketing links of the week. Selling online? Check out this detailed post on how to write a good product description. A persuasive product description might be the very last chance you have to convince a potential customer to buy – just like high-quality photos are critical for ecommerce sites, so are well-written product descriptions. Here’s an interesting post about button design that I found when working on a new theme this week. Have you ever thought about the differences between rounded vs. sharp-angled buttons – especially if you use a plugin for creating lots of… Continue Reading
Self-Promotion and Marketing
Weekly Links Roundup – Podcasting Mics, WordPress Updates, Social Media Marketing
The top website and online marketing links of the week. Thinking about starting a podcast? Or already doing one, but need to upgrade your gear? Here’s a review of the top 10 podcast microphones and some reasons to justify getting one! Do you keep your WordPress website up to date? A recent study showed that only 36% of WordPress users have the latest version of the core software installed. That’s a big security problem. Did you know that the WordPress folks publish the details about the reasons for each update they publish in their changelog? That makes it easy for… Continue Reading
Should You Use a Page Builder in Your WordPress Site?
I’m not a big fan of page builders – those tools that help you create just about any kind of layout you can dream up in WordPress – mostly due to the bad experiences of my few clients that once used them. I’ve seen firsthand the huge mess of cruft (unnecessary code) left behind all over the site when someone decided to remove the page builder plugin; extracting the content is a painful, time-consuming job. I’ve seen clients frustrated by too many decisions. I’ve seen how they can slow a site to a standstill with the large amount of additional… Continue Reading
Weekly Links Roundup – WordPress and SEO, Google or Facebook Ads, Blogging, Getting Testimonials
The top website and online marketing links of the week. It’s true that WordPress is my favorite CMS (content management system). That doesn’t mean it’s the right CMS for every business. However, WordPress may be one of the best CMS platforms for SEO. Learn what makes WordPress so SEO-friendly and why it may be a good fit for your business if search engine optimization is important to you. If you’re considering advertising your business on social media, you have some big questions to answer. One of them may be where to advertise. Are Google Ads or Facebook Ads better for… Continue Reading
Weekly Links Roundup – Great Photos, Free Stock Photos, CCPA Compliance
The top website and online marketing links of the week. Are you a stickler for great imagery on your website to show off your products or services to the max? Or is it just one of those things that doesn’t get a lot of attention – you either have little imagery or use photos you took on your phone? Whichever camp you’re in, the quality of your site images says a lot about your business. Learn why having great images is so important to giving a professional impression to your customers and how high-quality photos improve your credibility. To follow… Continue Reading
Weekly Links Roundup – Top CRMs, Polling Plugins, Nonprofit Content Strategy, Local SEO
The top website and online marketing links of the week. Do you currently use CRM (customer relationship management) software for your small business that you like? Tell us about it in the comments below! But if you don’t, and you’re looking for one, here’s a review of 9 top CRM software tools for businesses. CRMs help you track notes, leads, contact info and much more for each of your customers. I use Freshworks for my helpdesk so am looking into Freshsales by the same company. Would you like to collect visitor feedback or run surveys on your site? Of course… Continue Reading
Weekly Links Roundup – Banner Ads, Blogging Ideas, VPN, Favicons
The top website and online marketing links of the week. Don’t know if you noticed, but if you logged in to your WordPress site in the last day or two and are using Yoast SEO, you would have seen a great big irritating animated banner advertising Yoast’s black Friday sale. There were so many complaints and so much pushback, they actually apologized and released a new version of Yoast SEO minus the ad. (WP Minder users, you’ll get this update on Monday!). Please think about the impact banners and popups have on your users, this one is a good example… Continue Reading
Weekly Links Roundup – WordPress History, Domain Names, Tracking Clicks, Product Photos
The top website and online marketing links of the week. I know it’s been a long time (about 6 weeks!) since the last post. Today’s post I hope brings an end to that unplanned break. It’s been a crazy summer that included a death in the family, a broken elbow and hand, a sad lack of paddle boarding, and a badly-needed vacation. But now that things have settled down, I plan to get back to weekly blogging (or thereabouts). Just for fun – here is the history of WordPress in 4 minutes. If you’re a long-time WordPress user, you’ll get… Continue Reading