What a Small Business Website Should Do for You
I’m short on time with six sites going live in June, but I simply had to share an article I just found on Business Week about the good, bad, and the ugly concerning small business websites.
Whether you are looking to contract Rainmaker for your next small business website or somebody else article by Steve McKee should be required reading.
Read “Make Your Web Site Work for You”
Here are some highlights:
Even in the age of technology there’s nothing more powerful than a first impression, and your Web site increasingly is your introduction. I used to counsel startup companies not to underestimate the need for a professionally designed logo. I stand by that advice, but now I extend it to their Web presence as well. You simply can’t afford to look anything less than first-rate online.
The Flash introduction is a little cheesy, but it does seem to capture the personality of the company. What it doesn’t do is communicate anything about what Health Barn is or does. That’s a big missed opportunity, especially given the short amount of time parents can spare.
Revat, which describes itself on its site as “the leading self-defense program for adults living in an urban environment,” appears to be off to a good start, but it’s missing the drama. The fear of being accosted is powerful, yet the Web site doesn’t capitalize on that. Imagine how compelling a mini-movie dramatizing Revat training would be to its prospective customers.
Posted by: Wade Sonenberg | Tuesday, June 10, 2008 | one comment | 
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New: Fishing Report Syndication Service
Post your fishing report to 12 websites with one email!
We have just launched our new fishing report syndication service, which allows fishing guides and charter services to get their fishing report posted to twelve fishing report websites by simply sending an email. Find out how it works, builds traffic, and helps establish great search engine rankings by visiting our fishing report syndication section.
Posted by: Wade Sonenberg | Friday, May 16, 2008 | no comments | Email This Post
New: Outdoor Link Exchange Message Board
We couldn’t find a place for owners of Outdoor related websites to get together and trade links, banners, and blogrolls…. so we just created one. Everyone is welcome, and it’s of course free for all outdoor webmasters.
Trading links with relevant websites is a great way to increase your traffic and search engine rankings, so come on over and start trading links today.
Go to:
Outdoor Link Exchange Message Board
Posted by: Wade Sonenberg | Friday, May 16, 2008 | one comment | Email This Post
8 Ways to Monetize your Hunting or Fishing Website
Internet advertising revenue is exploding across the web, while print and traditional media advertising is losing traction. Want to be part of the party? Here’s eight ways to earn cash by advertising on your hunting, fishing, or outdoors related website.
- Pay Per Click (PPC) Ads
Google Adsense is the grandaddy, but Yahoo and Microsoft offer PPC programs as well. Pay Per Click advertising works by displaying contextually relevant ads on your site, and allowing advertisers to bid on keywords. Once a visitor clicks on an ad on your website or blog, you get a percentage of the earnings. - Direct Placement
A simple advertise here link or button where the ad will be placed can do the job. This can be easy as an agreed dollar amount per month, or more complex such as setting up an ad-server to track impressions and click-throughs. - Sponsored Posts or Reviews
Yes, you can paid to review products and services on your website or blog. Disclosure and ethics are a topic for another day, but if you’re interested check out: PayPerPost and SponsoredReviews - Text Link Ads
Surprisingly, text link ads can be a big money maker due to their value in search engine optimization. And it’s really simple to do, just insert a link into an article, page, or and get a monthly fee. See TextLinkAds and LinkWorth - Sell Products
You can now sell products through your website that you never have to see, touch, or ship. You don’t even have to handle credit cards. Popular setups include selling some of Amazon.com’s millions of products through an Astore (do a search on fishing lures, there are tons of them), or selling everything from hunting or fishing related T-shirts, coffee cups, and mouse pads from CafePress.com - Affiliate Programs
Affiliate programs work by you placing affiliate links or ads on your site. If a visitor clicks on the ad and ends up buying something, you get a commission on the sale. There are many, many general affiliate programs out there, but here are some Outdoor Industry related programs:
- BassPro Shops
- Cabelas
- Associate Programs (Outdoors)
- LandBigFish.com - Donations
Doing good work, or have something really worth reading? Simply create a paypal donations button. Remember - if you don’t ask, you don’t get. - Newsletters
Got a newsletter with a good circulation? Add a sidebar or banner advertising for fishing or hunting related products. Get advertisers by sticking an “advertise here” link on your sign up page or in the newsletter itself.
How much $$$?
Traffic amounts and the competitiveness of your site’s niche will largely dictate whether you’re making beer money or enough for a new boat. But remember, there’s nothing wrong with beer money…
Posted by: Wade Sonenberg | Friday, May 16, 2008 | no comments | Email This Post
Does Your Website Look Good? Are You Sure?
Unfortunately, websites display differently on different computers. What may look perfect on your setup, may look horrible on others. The obvious problem with this, is that many of your customers may be running any of them. Websites layout differently due do different browsers, operating systems, as well as the actual website encoding itself. Some computers support a million colors, some support sixteen. Even valid XHTML/CSS designs will jump all over the page in Internet Explorer 6.0!
While diagnosing and fixing problems may or may not be easy, discovering a problem is very easy.
Enter BrowserShots.org to the rescue. BrowserShots allows you to check your web site’s appearance on literally dozens of browser and operating systems for free. You can then either view or download JPG images of how your site lays out in all of them. It usually takes 15-30 minutes to load them, but you can go do something else while it loads.
An example of AmericanVagabondPhotography.com in the Netscape Navigator browser on a Ubuntu Linux operating system. It’s not important that I don’t know what either of those are, what’s important is the site looks clean in whatever they are….
Posted by: Wade Sonenberg | Thursday, May 8, 2008 | one comment | Email This Post
American Vagabond Photography goes Live
Quick note: AmericanVagabondPhotography.com has gone live! John & Dave came to Rainmaker in April wanting a slick yet simple gallery site that allowed them to sell photographs over the web. We answered with a Gallery2 + Paypal gateway integration, and yes we even gave them a blog. These guys have some stunning photos from all over the place and live quite the adventure, so check them out.
Some more notes on site features:
- Paypal (CC) integration
- Content Management System
- Lightbox.js
- Photo ratings and comments
- Slideshow
- Panoramic Display
Posted by: Wade Sonenberg | Wednesday, May 7, 2008 | 2 comments | Email This Post
24 Fishing and Hunting Directories
Submitting your guide service or outfitter to directory websites is a good idea for two reasons:
First, because many of these sites come up in major search engines for a variety of phrases, which can lead potential clients to your website. Second, it can help build your search engine rankings by giving you high quality, relevant inbound links to your charter or guide website. Most are free, and some require you to link back to their site from yours (reciprocal linking), but all offer web links as well as contact info pointed towards your business.
Fishing Directories |
Hunting Directories |
Posted by: Wade Sonenberg | Sunday, April 27, 2008 | 6 comments | Email This Post
10 Tips to Save on Gas at the Marina
Gas isn’t getting any cheaper, especially on the water. Here’s a few tips to get the most out of your fill up this summer.
- Install a fuel flow gauge if you haven’t already.
Not only can you find out what speed is most efficient for your vessel, but it will help you evaluate the effectiveness of these and other gas saving measures. - Tune up.
A yearly work over will keep inboards and outboards alike working at maximum efficiency, and will easily pay for itself in gas savings over the course of the year. - Lose some weight.
Too often we leave the dock with everything we ever need on the water. Try to lighten up by leaving unnecessary items, especially the heavy ones. Examples- full water tanks on a half day trip, or trolling motor (and battery) while heading out deep. - Throttle back.
Running your boat wide open uses a tremendous amount of energy. Throttling back to 80% can offer huge savings in both MPG and GPH. - Maintain that plane.
Once up on a plane, a boat will use much less gas even if only going a couple knots faster. - Plan it out.
Try to minimize miles traveled by planning the best route, or doing a little research before hand. Wondering for hours will certainly burn more gas, and may not get you more fish. - Check your prop.
Lower pitch props. may help you get out of the hole faster, but will bleed efficiency at higher speeds. Remember to check for dings, dents, and chips that will affect fuel economy and balance. - Balanced running.
While it’s a great idea to test MPG for different trim levels on your boat, it is certain that it will perform better while balanced evenly from side to side. - Drain livewells.
Out of bait or done fishing? Drain those wells before leaving to come home, at 8 lbs. per gallon the weight can add up. - Keep it’s bottom clean.
Whether it’s barnacles , or slime and grime, it’s slowing you down. And it’s costing you at the pump too.
Bonus tip:
Warm up time…. Most new engines with electronic fuel injection, etc., don’t require lengthy warm up periods. Try warming a minute to three depending on engine size and age.
Posted by: Wade Sonenberg | Sunday, April 27, 2008 | one comment | Email This Post
NEW: Great Outdoors Photo Contest
We’ll make ya famous.
April’s Photo Contest Theme: Fishing in General
What do you win? We’ll feature your shot & contact info. on our homepage for a month.
….. and we’ll announce it in our Outdoor e-Marketing Newsletter too.
Who decides? You do. Winners are chosen by votes from all the participants.
Always Fishing? No. We’re thinking about a hunting theme in May, maybe gobblers? Suggestions welcome.
For rules, deadline, and how to enter visit the Photo Contest page.
Posted by: Wade Sonenberg | Sunday, April 27, 2008 | no comments | Email This Post
DIY SEO: Blog Commenting
Another simple way to increase to increase your website or blog’s inbound links is by commenting on blogs related to your industry. It takes just a few minutes to gain high quality, one-way, relevant inbound links - and you might just learn something you can use while you do it! It’s important to stick to blogs about your particular industry, since Google and other search engines give higher priority for links coming from pages with similar topics.
Where to find relevant blogs?
- Simply Google the industry + “blog” For example, the term “fishing charter blog”
- BlogCatalog directory (there are many other directories). Browse or search
- Technorati Search your targeted keywords, and check out the top results
Add to the Conversation
Nobody likes the guy who posts “I’m the best Fishing Guide in FL, check me out.” Blatant advertisement is likely to be deleted quickly, and very few people will follow the link to your site this way. Rule of thumb is to either add something complimentary, or something thoughtful is even better - it doesn’t have to be esoteric however.
How to Comment for Maximum SEO Effect
On most blogging platforms, there will be three boxes that you’ll need to fill out. Here’s a couple tricks to get the most out of the comment you’re about to enter:
- Name
The name attribute is what’s going to make up the written text of the link. It helps (greatly) in SEO to have keywords in this text because it tells search engines what the link target (your website) is all about. Now some bloggers won’t take kindly to the name “best Florida fishing guide.” That said, if you’re business name includes some of your target keywords, then it should be OK to use that name. To simplify, entering the name “Bob” doesn’t help much unless your trying to rank well for “Bob” in Google. - URL/website/address
Called by various names, but in all cases it is the target of the aforementioned link. Usually you want to include your home page, but it’s good practice to vary them a little bit, especially when you have a page that is relevant to the blog post at hand. Also, if you have other content rich pages that you’d like to rank well for a given term, include it here. An example of this is if you operate a guide service off of a particular island or offer an “overnight” charter option.
Posted by: Wade Sonenberg | Wednesday, April 16, 2008 | 3 comments | Email This Post
