SEO

Weekly Links Roundup – WordPress and SEO, Google or Facebook Ads, Blogging, Getting Testimonials

February 21, 2020 by Debbie Campbell

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 your business? This is a big article with a lot of info and it may provide the answers you need to move forward with your ad buys.

Here is yet another ultimate guide to blogging, but this one from Yoast is an easy read. It covers everything from how to get started and what to write about to marketing and maintaining your blog.

Finally… I always encourage clients to collect and share customer testimonials on their websites. Whether they are within your site (my favorite plugin for managing them is Strong Testimonials) or on a third-party site like Google Reviews, it’s easy to display them on your site and gain the credibility and trust benefits. Learn how to get good testimonials from your customers.

Did you find this information useful? Please share with your friends and colleagues! And comment below with questions or observations.

Weekly Links Roundup – Banner Ads, Blogging Ideas, VPN, Favicons

November 30, 2019 by Debbie Campbell

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 of being pushy.

Next… Do you ever draw a blank when trying to come up with something to blog about? It can be hard sometimes… Here’s one of those posts that might help: 25 blog post ideas for when you’re stuck. This tool looks interesting, I’ll be trying it myself: Answer the Public.

Do you work on your website in public – at coffee shops or other locations with free wifi? If you do, you really should be protecting yourself by using a VPN (virtual private network). If your site uses SSL (it has an https address) that’s great, because it means your connection to the site is encrypted. But if not, a VPN is in order. It will act as a middleman to protect you from security problems on the free wifi network, where it’s frighteningly easy for hackers to watch your activity and gain access to your site. Learn about three VPN options for WordPress users.

Finally – all about favicons. What they are, why they matter so much. What’s the easiest way to get your favicon into your WordPress site? This plugin by RealFaviconGenerator.

Did you find this information useful? Please share with your friends and colleagues! And comment below with questions or observations.

Weekly Links Roundup – WordPress History, Domain Names, Tracking Clicks, Product Photos

October 18, 2019 by Debbie Campbell

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 a kick out of this. Maybe. I did.

Looking for a domain name for your new business venture? It’s more important than you might think to make a solid decision. Learn about domain names and how to choose the best one for your organization.

Tracking link and button clicks in your site is an important part of understanding site traffic, yet Google Analytics doesn’t let you do this very easily. Setting it up to track in Analytics is a tedious process. This tutorial shows you how to use the MonsterInsights plugin to track those clicks. This will help you do things like track clicks on a phone number or on a link that goes outside your own site.

Finally… The importance of having high-quality product photos for your ecommerce site can’t be overstated. Learn how to take great product photos that really entice your visitors to buy.

Did you find this information useful? Please share with your friends and colleagues! And comment below with questions or observations.

Weekly Links Roundup – WordPress Resources for Beginners

June 14, 2019 by Debbie Campbell

The top website and online marketing links of the week.

Are you brand new to WordPress? Or considering moving to WordPress but not sure if you’ll be able to get the hang of using it? Don’t worry! Today’s post is all about resources for WordPress newbies.

First is the user manual – WordPress doesn’t come with one, but there’s a great alternative in Easy WP Guide. It’s free, it gets updated frequently (unlike a real book) and is easy to read and use. Just don’t print it – it’s big and it updates too often to make that worth your while.

Next is a post about common mistakes made by WordPress beginners (and plenty of experienced users too). The biggest two: forgetting to update, which opens your site up to all kinds of security and functionality problems, and not using a child theme. If you ever decide to edit the theme, always always always make a child theme. Never make changes to an original theme.

Just because your new site may be starting small doesn’t mean it won’t be a target for hackers and other malicious threats. Adding a security plugin is a smart (and necessary) move to help keep your site safe. Here’s a review of some of the top WordPress security plugins out there right now. I’m currently using iThemes Security Pro on my clients’ sites, but other good choices are Sucuri and Wordfence. I would stay away from the SiteLock service from painful personal experience.

If yours is a business website, you will most likely be doing SEO (search engine optimization) for it. I recommend using the extremely popular and useful Yoast SEO plugin and referring to this thorough guide to WordPress SEO.

Last but not least, if you want your site to grow and become more easily findable in search, you’ll want to start a blog. That can be a big undertaking. Fortunately, the excellent website ProBlogger has a handy collection of many tips on how to blog that can be a great resource for bloggers (at any level).

That concludes our collection of resources for WordPress beginners. As always, please feel free to contact me about any of these topics if you need help, or just post a comment below.

Did you find this information useful? Please share with your friends and colleagues! And comment below with questions or observations.

Weekly Links Roundup – New Business Location, URL Shorteners, Small Businesses Without Websites

May 24, 2019 by Debbie Campbell

The top website and online marketing links of the week.

Adding a new brick-and-mortar location to your small business empire can be very exciting! But even though you’ll probably remember to update your website with your new location’s information, you might not remember to edit your Google My Business local search listing. Here’s a guide to understanding how opening a new business location can impact your local search strategy.

Not using Google My Business? Even if you don’t have a physical location, it still matters for most businesses! We can help get you set up.

If you use Google URL Shortener as a way to provide short, memorable links to your customers and prospects, you know that a simple link is better than a long one. Google URL Shortener stopped its service in March (though old shortened links still work). Here are 8 alternatives to Google URL Shortener that will do the trick, too.

Here’s a big one as far as I’m concerned – small business that still don’t have websites. Studies show that 30% of people won’t choose a business if it doesn’t have a website. People turn to online search first these days. If you’re not one of the sites that comes up for them when they search for a product or service, most of them will never know your business exists. They want an easy way to learn about your business, and whether it fits their needs, and whether your business has credibility.

Social sites alone don’t cut it – if you rely on Facebook alone and your account gets removed, then where are you? And by relying on social sites, you’re letting them create first impressions for your business – they call all the shots. You don’t own the page or the contacts you made, the social media network does.

All small businesses need websites. Contact Red Kite if you’re ready to get started – we won’t judge, and we’ll make the process as pain-free as possible!

Did you find this information useful? Please share with your friends and colleagues! And comment below with questions or observations.