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Weekly Links Roundup – Product Photos, Current Content, Google My Business, Blogging Lessons

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The top website and online marketing links of the week.

Sometimes, convincing clients (especially new ecommerce site owners) that they need to invest in high-quality photography for their site falls on deaf ears. And that’s a shame, because great photos are critical for ecommerce sites; the quality of your images reflects the quality of your products. And displaying poor-quality images speaks volumes about your business; if you don’t care about the photos, do you actually care about the products themselves? Learn more about why it’s so important to have high-quality imagery.

New research on customer satisfaction with websites shows that 39% of users will think twice about using an outdated website. Do you update your site content on a regular basis? Does your site look fresh and provide the latest info about your business? If not, you may want to take a look at this.

If you don’t have a brick-and-mortar store but instead run a service-area business (like a web design studio!) this is just for you: Google My Business is rolling out a new setup process that’s more friendly to us service-area companies.

If you’re a veteran blogger, trying to be a better blogger, or even just getting started in blogging, this post might be helpful. It’s the result of a survey of 1,000 other bloggers and might teach you some new tricks to make your own efforts more effective and efficient. Check out 5 lessons you can learn from 1,000 bloggers.

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

Weekly Links Roundup – UX, Google and Trust, Scene Generators

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The top website and marketing links of the week.

Does your website delight your users? Or does it leave them with a less-than-satisfied feeling? Read this article about UX (user experience) and find out how poorly designed websites are a lot like having a cranky receptionist with a bad attitude.

Did you know that Google gets around 30 billion search queries every month? That’s staggering! And I’m sure you’ve heard the recent talk about potential biases in the major search and online news providers. Here’s an interesting recent post about how much trust people put into Google search results.

And finally… Do you use stock photos on your website? If you do, you’re certainly not alone. But did you know there are stock images that can help you show off your products? These are called (I didn’t know this) ‘scene generators.’ They can help you display your clothing, print designs, food and drink offerings, apps, identity and more. I’m actually using one on the home page of this site… View a collection of scene generator examples and see if they can benefit you, too.

 

Make WordPress Content Images Look Great

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After a site launches, and clients get familiar with using their new WordPress site to publish content, I’ll occasionally pay their sites a visit to see how they’re doing.

Formatting could be better...When I look at their blog posts (which I’m happy to see, since blogging is such a great way to promote a business website) far too often I’ll often see something that just doesn’t look very good.

See the images just stuck on the page, with no relationship to the text content around them? So lonely… but it doesn’t have to be that way. I’m going to show you three easy ways to make your images look like a pro added them (and after a bit of practice, you’ll be that pro).

1. Getting Images Into the Flow

WordPress makes it simple to add images but often you might not know what settings to use. Images that are included in the flow of your text, with text wrapping around them like you’d see in a newspaper or magazine article, looks much nicer than an isolated image hanging out by itself. [Read more…] about Make WordPress Content Images Look Great