Web Design & SEO Articles

It is my great pleasure to announce the launch of blueplasters.com, Suppliers of first aid products, finger covers and plasters for the food industry.

The website has been kept simple and easy to browse and clients can register their details, buy goods and review product lines.

Unfortunately DVH Design did not win the most creative business over at the Best of Braintree over March.

But every cloud has a silver lining and my lining in this case was 12 very positive testimonials from my existing customers (also in most cases repeat customers).

A great big thank you to all my clients who both voted and had the time to leave their feedback, although I will also thank them personally when i get a spare minute.

It gives me great pleasure to announce the launch of the online portfolio of professional make-up artist, Rebecca Ryther.

The portfolio, presented in a slideshow format, consists of the recent photo shoots Rebecca has worked on. These vary from natural beauty make-up to fashion/editorial/conceptual.

Rebecca also has an online wedding portfolio featuring a showcase of her recent wedding work.

DVH Design has been nominated for the most creative business award at The Best of Braintree for March 2009.

If you do like my work or have worked with me in the past and liked it then please feel (very) free to vote for me.

Unfortunately I don't get an heavy golden thing to put on my mantelpiece, but I do get a smart graphic to add to my website on winning. Votes get counted on 31st March so you only have a couple of weeks!

Thank you in advance.

DVH Design is proud to announce that it is now covering the Suffolk as well as Essex.

We have also announced our new SEO advice/training and logo design services in anticipation to tomorrow's Enterprising Women conference being held in Cambridge.

The SEO training plan is designed for the small business owner and includes initial SEO, proceeded by a limited "hand-holding" period training the client in the key areas of search marketing, including keyphrase research, link campaigns and social networking.

Our logo design service displays a brief portfolio of the logos we have designed over the last 2 years. We also provide graphic design, intended to inject a little more pizzazz into your web pages.

The new look website of the Single Parent Travel Club has this morning been launched at http://www.sptc.org.uk

The Single Parent Travel Club provides a community for single parents nationwide to enjoy holidays, day trips with their children.

New features to the website include an online subscription form, a new logo and a new section catered for older children (as old as 17!).

Imagine the scenario: You have a new website and you're happy with it. Your web designer uploads it and now its there on the World Wide Web open for business. So you wait for some visitors to your website and in turn sales enquiries: No enquiries yet, but it's early days. You get a few friends come by and say "hey, nice website!" but you wait and wait and no enquiries still. So you check out Google, type in your main keyphrase (lets say novelty washing baskets) and you can't find your website listed on the top 10 … nor the top 20 … Oh my God, not even the top 100!

Reality Check

Before we start any type of analysis on what may have gone wrong, let's just take a quick reality check: Just because you have a website, does not mean that you are suddenly going to rank immediately for every keyphrase you've chosen. It may have worked 10 years ago when there were only a handful of websites on the internet, but nowadays there are literally millions all vying for different keyphrases.

To demonstrate my point, type your keyphrase into Google: How many results do you get? Google has 576,000 pages in its results for Novelty washing baskets. This can vary from direct competitors to a few pages that just happen to mention "novelty" and/or "washing baskets". If you're not within the first couple of pages for any chosen keyword, then don't expect many sales or enquiries.



Here are just a few things to consider before you begin to panic:

Does Google know you exist?

Google or any of the major search engines) aren't telepathic. You do have to let them know that your website is there to begin with. There is more than one way to tell the search engines about your website.

• Site Map: A sitemap is an XML file that includes every web page listed on your website. It can also provide additional information such as date of last update and relevance of each page compared to the rest of the site. Sitemaps.org can provide more information on the whole concept of sitemaps. Once this is completed you can submit them to the search engines.


• Directories: Although the jury is still out on whether search engines crawl and index online directories as much now as they used to, it is still good practice to submit to a few directories. The main directories include Yahoo directory, Dmoz and Best of the Web. Niche directories relevant to your trade or keyphrase can also prove valuable. They can be found by searching for your keyphrase +directory in Google.


• Submission to search engines: Although Google (et al) tend to find websites by following links on other websites nowadays, most of the main search engines still offer a page where you can submit your web address. But this can take anything from several weeks to several months.

Where is your Keyphrase?

The next thing to consider is if your main key phrase is listed anywhere on your web page(s). Search engines (certainly the top 3) don't use people, they use automated programs (aka bots or spiders) to crawl and index web pages. If novelty washing baskets isn't mentioned anywhere on your novelty washing baskets website then your customers won't find it when they come to search.

At best, your main keyphrases should be included in the page title, main page heading and within your textual content. There are many recommendations online for the number of times you should repeat your key phrase within your content but I shall cover that in another article.

Domain Age Algorithm

If the problem isn't any of the above then the chances are Google just doesn't trust you. I'll explain:

All new websites used to be subjected to a honeymoon period to see if they are trustworthy. At seminars, Google reps used to advise new website owners "Don’t expect any real results from the SERPs (Search Engine Results Pages) for about 6-9 months, even a year". Although, if you haven't made any effort to optimise your website for your main keyphrases then this figure could be as long as 2 years.

It is still hard for a new website to get up in the rankings, but not impossible. There a few things you can do to get your website noticed by Google:

• Links: Quality backlinks to your website can help you to override any domain age algorithm. Therefore start looking for related websites to link to your website. Ask Google directly by searching for your keyphrase +links. Also writing articles, social bookmarking sites (such as Digg and StumbleUpon), networking and just talking to other companies are some of the best tried and tested methods.


• Unique Content: Links and content go hand in hand: Websites aren't going to link to you if your web content is the same as everyone else's. So look at your content again. Is it unique? A list of FAQ's, a glossary, how to articles, or an online tool, to name but a few, will help visitors especially if they are researching your product/service or new to your industry in general.


• Google Tools: There are many channels of Google that are still quick and free. First of all, adhering to Google's Webmaster guidelines before launching your site will reduce Google's ageing delay, enabling your site to climb the rankings quicker. There is also:


• Webmaster Central: Web owners resource where you can submit sitemaps and see how Google is crawling your web pages.


• Google Analytics: Site analysis tool which can be used to monitor activity on your website.


• Google Shopping: Price comparison resource. Handy for online shops.


• Pay per Click: If the linking campaign is proving more difficult than you anticipated and you really want those visitors to come through the door, then consider a short term pay-per-click campaign. Google Adwords allows you to set up a daily budget and talks you through the whole process of setting up a campaign.

Conclusion

Google is responsible for 65% of searches on the worldwide web. It is good to get on their right side early on. I have only outlined some key areas today, which I shall elaborate on at a later date.

Any campaign on any website will take time and a LOT of patience, but if done correctly your site could rank in a matter of a few months.

Labels: advice, google, seo, top 10