Just thought I’d share an example with everyone, saw this on Facebook today – the names & pics have been blurred to protect the innocent:
Building a good network, and asking for help couldn’t be more easy. Ten years ago, this would have taken hours and hours, now just 15 seconds.
We’re compiling a list of SEO Friendly CSS galleries for designers who are interested in getting a little link love while showcasing their work. To be considered, the galleries must either have a direct, do-follow link from the actual gallery or a direct do-follow link from a sub-page featuring the work.
We’ll update this page regularly, and hopefully provide an Excel download once the list grows a little bit – so feel free to comment with anybody we missed.
Rainmaker is pleased to announce a new partnership with Carolinian Boat Works, LLC. Carolinian has secured Rainmaker Web Design to handle their on-line and off-line marketing and brand awareness.
Our partnership will entail:
We look forward to the exciting opportunity and will of course post some updates here periodically.
My hats off Brandt Dainow for a great primer on SEO Step 1 for any business. The guy has been doing search engine marketing for over 12 years, which is a lifetime in this business.
First, why SEO over other marketing such as PPC?
Pay-per-click advertising is all very well, but it means you have to pay for every visitor. SEO is about getting free traffic from the search engines. Over the course of two years or more, nothing has a better return on investment than SEO. Thus, if you plan on having a website that runs for more than two years, search engine optimization should be a key part of your online marketing strategy.
So what is the worst SEO mistake that a company can make?
The most common mistake that organizations make with regard to SEO is bringing their SEO consultants into the process too late. Many companies fail to give SEO its due consideration during a website’s design phase.
So there you have it, from one of the godfathers of search engine marketing.
Brandt goes on to list several key aspects to a successful SEO campaign that need attention during the design process, or what we like to call “On Page SEO.” Some crucial SEO techniques your design might forget are:
For more in depth info. on the why a SEO consultant should be contacted during a website’s design phase, check out the whole article or give us a call for an informative chat.
We’re not all copywriters, but writing concise and compelling web content is essential to the success of any small business’s online presence. Here are a few tips to help get you started, increase conversion, and convey your message:
“Or does this quote grab a little more attention?”
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.
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.
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….
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 |
Timely fishing reports are a valuable commodity for fishermen in unknown waters and their local playground alike. The web offers an unparalleled opportunity to share your wealth of knowledge on a particular water body or species, and in turn, it can be a highly effective strategy for increasing charter boat and fishing guide bookings. The goal here is two fold: First, to generate human traffic (potential clients) whether they are visiting your website or giving you a call. Second, it’s a great way to increase your search engine rankings by including a link to your website in the report, or in the “About” section provided by some report services.
Here’s a list of 15 17 (*see below*) websites offering free services to post fishing reports on the web. Remember, you can post last week’s report to them all if you like.
***UPDATE: Thanks to the great response, we will be continually updating this list***
If you have or know of any other fishing report sites, please comment below and we’ll make sure they are added.
Have you ever typed in a search to the effect of “dry cleaner roswell, GA” and had a map pop up with dry cleaners in or around that city? If you’re not on the list for your trade area and industry, you may be losing out on highly targeted traffic to your website.
But never fear, you can sign up for Google Local and Yahoo Local within 10 minutes! Oh, and it doesn’t cost you a thing.
Google Local Signup
https://www.google.com/local/add/
*you will need a Google account to sign up, but it’s free too.
Yahoo Local Listings
http://listings.local.yahoo.com/
