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Website SWOT Analysis – A Real Life Example

Do you wonder what is happening to your Internet Business? Why is that you cannot get traffic to your website; the conversion rate is too low; or opt-in visitor is too few?

I was faced with a similar situation lately and I attempted to use what I knew about SWOT Analysis into my Internet Business. I use the same technique to perform a SWOT on a website and had surprisingly discovered some valuable facts for my Website

In this article, I share with you my real-life example of my Website SWOT Analysis. You are invited to use it as a reference to your won Internet Business.

Below is a sample website SWOT Analysis performed on my own Total Quality Management website I published in year 2001. It was written based on a knowledge-based approach. The ranking for this website is on Google page # 9 and has a PR=2. After 8 years published, it has never moved up to within Google page#3. Some of you may know that my newly published 3 months old SWOT analysis Blog has ranked Google page#1 for the last 3 months. This success story has prompted me to wonder why my Total Quality Management website page ranking is so far behind.

My objective is to move my Total Quality Management website to Google page# 1 – 3 and I performed a Website SWOT Analysis using the SWOT Analysis template and example as my guides. Below are sample my Website SWOT analysis:

The SWOT Factor – Strengths

S1 – 8 years old website – matured

S2 – website contained focused practical examples and case studies of Total Quality Management

S3 – website ranked Google page#1 on Google.com.my with single keyword – “tqm”

The SWOT Factor – Weaknesses

W1 – design of the website is not professional

W2 – website content remain static for several years

W3 – navigation of the website is not comprehensive

The SWOT Factor – Opportunities

O1 – online research on Total Quality Management has high demand

O2 – availability of TQM case studies and report are limited on website

O3 – online website builder software are commonly available

The SWOT Factor – Threats

T1 – website with fresh contents and blogs have moved up to top Google page

T2 – visitor to this TQM website is very low (from awstat)

From the four SWOT factors, I continue to evaluate the seriousness and impact of each factors as a way to prioritize as I continue to use the SWOT template to formulate strategies. Once the strategies are formulated, then only I can take action. I encourage you to take this sample as a case study for your own Internet business or website and Application SWOT Analysis

Learn How You Can Start Your Own Online Business Without Building And Hosting Any Website

Since the inception of information and communication technology, almost everything is now computerized, even businesses are now operating online, and so on…

So many people – Nigerian and some other part of the world keep talking about online businesses, and so many other source of income online. Yes, no doubt there are a lot of online businesses, but getting to know and understand the basic scope and approach towards the different online businesses that can turn to money generating system is another problem so many people face. Some people even go to the length of stressing the fact that they are not oppurtuned to take part in such online businesses based on their financial capability of starting it. Yes, it is true that the online business involve some start-up capital, such as building and hosting your own website, buying of reseller right of some information e-book to sell on your site and so on…

All this emphasis on financial capabilities are an excuse, as there are so many means and method you can use in starting your own home based online business without building or hosting a website nor buying any reseller right e-book for sale, for a start.

You can start your own home based online business by taking it through blogging and just selling information with the help of affiliate marketing and Google AdSense. To start with you are require to register for a blog through BLOGGER.COM. The registration process is as simple as ABC, and it is free, meaning that it does not require any payment for you to sign-up for your blog. After the sign-up process, you can now proceed on deciding on the type of information you wish to sell depending on the area of interest you desire to target.

The area of information you desire to target decide your subject. Subject is another vital appealing scope which is required in every blog. It is an interesting step that determine the class or level of AdSense Google will place on your blog as soon as you sing-up for the Google AdSense.

The moment you have decide on the subject, you are require to learn how to write the content in your blog to the best of it effect by learning how to effect key words and phrase people frequently use when searching for information on internet, as it play a vital role on how it is been rank by most search engine.

You are to also note that the quality of the content you post on the blog, you also will need to make sure the appearance of your blog is appealing. Part of this is to make sure the pages are configured so they load with relative ease. No one likes to wait forever as the elements of a page load. This is particularly important if the readers you want to reach are more likely to live in areas where dial-up services is the only way to establish a connection to the Internet. Select colors, graphics, and images with care, and make sure the entire page looks great and loads within a reasonable amount of time. Doing this will insure that you will get more attraction from various visitors to your blog.

Effective Website Design: How to Turn a Visitor Into a Customer (Part One)

One of the biggest challenges of a business website is how to turn a visitor into a customer. You only have a few seconds to grab the attention of your prospect, keep it long enough to build your credibility, and make them choose you over your competition. How do we convert these potential customers into a sale?

You do it with effective website design.

Your website design determines whether they like you, and whether they want to do business with you. It’s as simple as that. If you can build enough interest, there will be a tipping point that turns them from visitor into a customer. I am going to share with you some effective website design elements that will deliver those customers. This article is part one.

Website Branding

When I sit down with a client who wants to build a website for their business, the first thing I ask them is if they have a logo. Why? Because this is a good starting point to see if they have created any kind of branding for their business. What’s a brand? It’s a visual element (or a group of elements) that helps your target market identify you from your competition. When the market sees your brand, they think of you. For example: When you think of the insurance giant Aflac, what comes to mind? The duck, right? You might also think of their logo with its specific font, specific shade of blue, and of course, the duck with the orange beak. Your website should be no different. When someone lands on your home page, you need to arrest them with a very distinct look and feel that sets you apart from your competition.

A recent example of this is from a client’s website we just launched a month ago. Even though he had been in the label business since 1995, he had absolutely no branding; just a really lame logo with no colors, and a lousy font. As I started researching the competition, I noticed that most of his competitors’ websites also had terrible branding (which made me happy), and were rather impersonal. Something I noticed about my client was that he had only one leg (he had lost it the previous summer from diabetes). So, I went for broke and said, “Let’s make you the icon of your business with your one leg”.

He loved the idea.

So, I took a picture of him with his one leg, and put it up on the site. I wrote a few paragraphs with the heading, “A Leg Up on the Competition”. It was written from his point-of-view. We had him talk about losing his leg, and not being discouraged about it. I then had him urge people to donate to the American Diabetes Association. Instant personality and branding. It was real, and real engaging. After doing some search engine optimization for his website, we now have it in the top 10 (nationally) for the search term, “labels for bottles” on Google. He is starting to get some good feedback from his site even though it has only been launched a few months.

By creating a good brand for your company up-front, you’ll have a much easier time building a website that connects with your intended audience. Good branding will set you apart from your competition, and make your potential customers choose you to do business with instead of other websites.

There are three other elements to capturing visitors to your website, and turning them into customers. I will be writing parts 2-4 for EzineArticles.com in the coming months, but if you would like to read about these three other elements now, you can visit my original article on the subject of effective website design (link shown below).

33 Reasons Why You Need a Website Right Now

People are more internet savvy than ever before. However, there are many businesses that feel that they are OK even though they don’t have an online presence. There over 100 reasons why businesses need a website. In this article, we will only talk about the 33 reasons why you need a website right now.

#33. Your Competitor Has A Website – Whether you choose to compete or not, there is someone trying to earn your potential customers’ business. When price isn’t the issue, and 1 reference isn’t good enough to close the deal, your website can be used as a tool to gain new customers. If you don’t do it, your competitor will.

#32. Your Customers Are Looking For You – In a perfect world every customer that you ever service will keep your number on their refrigerator, or in their cell phone. When they need you they would simply go to the frig and give you a call. Unfortunately wives throw items away from the frig without asking and cell phones get lost or broken. When you customer needs your service again, it is likely that they will know your name and not your number. In many cases they will then look for your website.

#31. Your Customers Need Your Help – A happy customer would love to help you gain new business, however if someone is asking about your work and your previous customer doesn’t have you phone number off hand they may be forced to search for your business online. With no website, you give your competitor a perfect opportunity to impact your potential customer’s decision.

#30. Many People Use Websites to Research Before They Buy- Many people love the fact that they can research a service anonymously before they make a decision. No pushy sales people, only information on a product or service. Position your website properly, and you can have the greatest impact on a their final decision.

#29. Establishes Credibility- Years in business, Testimonials, Photos, and Pricing Information all help to establish credibility. Your website is a perfect tool to provide this information and much more for the customer that has never heard of your business.

#28. Shows Quality of Work – You may be able to provide the best service or have the best product, but if no one sees your work, no one will buy from you. A professional website gives a potential customer a sense of your style, a chance to see your work, and a chance to determine if you can provide the best service.

#27. Create a Fan – There are many potential customers that are not ready to buy from you right now. A website can be used as a tool to make them a fan so that you can communicate to them with your expertise until they are ready buy.

#26. Before and After Effect – Show your potential customers that you understand their needs. Use your website to tell a story with before and after photos. The better you are at showing that you can solve a problem, the sooner you will earn a customer.

#25. No One Knows The Business Better Than You – As a small business owner there is something that brought you into the business. There is something that makes you unique. Maybe its your price, or quality of service. It could be your time of completion on your job. Use your website to show customers your expertise, and what makes you different from your competitors.

#24. Many People Won’t Buy Unless You Have a Website- Where there is one person who doesn’t mind doing business with you without a website, there may be one more that would like to see your website before they make a decision. The question you have to ask yourself is, which one of these customers is more likely to spend the most money? If your answer is the customer that is looking for a website, then you need to act quickly to reach those customers right away.

#23. Your Domain Name May Be Purchased By Anyone – There are companies that buy domain names only to sell to the owner of a particular business. The more successful your business is, the more at risk you are of being a victim.

#22. If you completed Your Website Today You Are 4 – 6 months away from seeing consistent traffic – A well optimized website in a competitive market like Atlanta will take about 4 – 6 months to achieve exceptional ranking. That means that if your site was complete today, you would not be able to see the true potential of your website for some time.

#21. Your Competitors Need Your Help – You read this reason right. Your competitors may need your help. Every week I have customers that get calls from other businesses to provide a service that they don’t offer. Let’s take a roofer for example. If this roofer only provides roof repairs and cleaning, and a potential customer needs a new roof. He is not likely going to train his technicians on how to install a new roof. He is more likely to give this to a company who can provide this service. Many companies get calls like this in their industry all the time.

#20. Your Customers Don’t Know What You Do – Many times your greatest opportunity to grow your business is by up selling you current customer base. A website is a great tool to show your customers all of the services that you offer. I call it, making sure you get the low hanging fruit.

#19. Your Name Doesn’t Say It All – In #21 we talked about a roofer who doesn’t do new roofs. What if you are a car insurance company that offers health insurance as well? The key here is that your business name doesn’t say it all. A website is your opportunity to show the customer all of the services that you offer.

#18. Your Safety Net – Plan on advertising in the yellow pages, billboard, tv, radio, or even a magazine. You need a website right away. If someone sees your billboard, but couldn’t write down your phone number on the road, they will probably look you up online when they are avail-able. If they hear your radio ad, or see your television commercial they may search on the internet for more information. Your website will help to protect your investment in other forms of advertising.

#17. Your Dream Customer Is Looking Online – Do you know your perfect customer? If you do, make sure that you show them that you provide the service they are looking for, answer the questions they usually have, show some examples of completed projects, and give them the price they want. If you are successful at providing this information, you will attract the perfect customer every time.

#16. Search Engines Need Your Help – The purpose of search engines is to provide people with information. By adding information about your product or service, you help provide the search engines with answers to the questions that users may have. Fortunately for you, sometimes this information will attract new customers.

#15. It’s 2010

#14. Why Not Have Two Businesses – When people come into your brick and mortar business they can take a look at the products and services you offer, get pricing information, and make a purchase. Many people won’t leave the house until they have decided what they are going to buy. A website for many people is a second business, in that it reaches a group of people who would probably never come to your physical location.

#13. Website Design Is More Affordable Than Ever – There are more internet advertising companies than ever before. This competitive market means you win. With some companies building websites for as low as $250, the question isn’t how much anymore it is “what does this include?”. While website design is important, be sure to add an effective internet advertising strategy as well to your program.

#12. Time Is Running Out, But It’s Not To Late – With the rapid growth of the internet, many businesses are learning how important it is to advertise on the internet. The more websites that are built in a particular industry means the more competition. The search engines have factors that they use to help some websites perform better than others. One major factor is time. If you build a site today, and your competitor builds his in another year, you have the upper hand on keeping high visibility.

#11. Instant Policy Information for Customers, Phone numbers, and Business hours – Have you ever needed to get a specific department of a company, but had to be transferred several times to get the person you needed to speak to? Are you making your customers do the same thing? Give your customers a point of reference to follow for your product or service online, as well as, people to contact for more information.

#10. Reach Potential Customers 365 Days a Year, 24 Hours a day – Many people choose to research a product or service before they buy. Unfortunately, for many businesses they need to do their research after business hours when they get off work. Give these potential customers relevant information about your product or service, set their expectations on what they can expect if they were to hire you for the job, and you have a tool that will reach people 24/7, 365 days a year.

#9. Collect Email Addresses of Potential Customers – This is my secret weapon of lead generation. You would be blown away by the amount of people who would prefer to leave their contact information such as email instead of phone number. What I would have you consider is, what person is so busy that they would rather communicate through email than pick up the phone and call? You guessed it! Someone who is very busy, or said differently someone who is very successful. Someone you would like to talk to.

#8. Save Money – A website will save you money because it saves you time. It will save you time by, shortening your sales cycle. You can also use your site to narrow your market to a product or service that brings a higher return. Reduce calls for services you don’t offer. Protect Your Brand Name. Last but not least, protect your investment in other forms of advertising.

#7. Reach Local Market – If you can’t be the King of Rome, be the King somewhere! Market your site locally, and dominate your local area to generate quality leads from people who are ready to buy right now.

#6. Answer Common Questions – How long have you been in business? How much does your product or service cost? How long will your service take? When can you start? What do you need to do to get started? Where are you located? What is unique about your product or service? The questions you answer every time a new lead calls you. Save yourself time and speed up the sales cycle with simple answers to common questions.

#5. Test New Products or Services – Is there something unique about your product or service that no other company has? Have you created something that will save people time, save them money, or perhaps even make them money? Reach people quickly and receive feedback from the people who need it most. If you have something worth sharing people will invest in you.

#4. Speed Up The Sales Cycle – Provide a complete resource of information on your website that people can use to make a decision on your product or service online and you have shortened the sales cycle. Save people time, and they will give you money.

#3. A Sales Tool Outside Of The Office – Provide sales tools for your account representatives to use in the field. Give them log in and password to access spreadsheets, pricing information, or power point presentations. Consider allowing them to process sales and payments online so they will not have to carry sensitive customer information like credit cards, or checks. In many cases, this will save your representatives time, leaving more time to do what you need them to do. Sale!

#2. Protect Your Brand Name – Thousands of businesses can be tremendously impacted by the effects of 1 negative review. If a business has been around for more than 2 years, there is a very high chance that there is some information about them on the internet. Yellow page directories, search engine map listings, and BBB will often provide a platform for customers to give feedback on a business. Unfortunately, happy customers won’t usually take the time to find these directories to write reviews. Without a website, you are at risk of 1 single negative review being seen by every potential customer that looks for your business online. Give your happy customers a platform to write positive reviews about your business and perhaps a person who was going to write a negative review will reconsider based off of the work you have done over the years.

#1 Search Engines Want To Help You Grow Your Business – That’s right Google, Yahoo, and Bing wants to make you money! Think about it… If you became wealthy off of online marketing with Google, who are you going to spend money on for advertising? Big businesses and large corporations have already figured out how to get customers from internet. The search engines biggest opportunity to grow their business is to help you grow yours.

There are many reasons why you need a website. I hope this article helps to you know 33 reasons why you need a website right now!

Thanks for taking the time to read my article

8 Benefits of Having a Real Estate Website

Whether your old school or on the cutting edge of technology in your dynamic real estate business, everyone needs a website in this day and age. The benefits of having a real estate website are many in number, and the risks of getting left behind without one are very real. So, what exactly are these benefits? Read on for a brief sample.

1- Build a Strong Web Presence

Get found easier and instantly, via Google searches or links on other sites. Have your office’s address, phone numbers, e-mail address, logo, current listings, and specialization displayed at the click of a mouse. Show up in more places, under more categories, and associated with specific strategic keywords. If you combine your real estate website with the rest of a comprehensive marketing campaign, people can find you in so many different ways, your business will be hard to miss!

Make sure to create a listing on Google My Business for local listings, which are area-specific. Yes, you can select who sees you first, depending on where they live.

2- Generate More Leads

This is a no-brainer. Gone are the days of paying thousands of dollars for Yellow Pages ads and highway billboards, hoping enough people will see it and maybe call your office. Do you also want to pay someone just to answer the phone for you full-time, and rely on methods that the average client no longer uses? Your real estate website is like your modern-day “head office”. This should be the first and most important place your potential clients find you, and if you use an online form to collect client info, then the real estate leads are immediate, free, and warm. A website can also serve as the place that you direct clients to your social media, or vice versa, and have the public sign up for your impactful newsletter for regular announcements.

You’ll also now have a thorough database of potential client info for ongoing listings distribution or announcements.

3- Provide More Exposure to Your Properties

The bulk of a real estate website should be dedicated to property descriptions. This is the opportunity to display full-detail descriptions, brilliant digital photography, and 360-degree virtual tours. You can use as much or as little space as you like, provide clickable links, and make it a more interactive experience for the visitor. The listing created on your real estate website can also be shared (for free) via external links to your own social media pages, other real estate websites, community websites, or anywhere else your marketing efforts lead you.

Again, gone are the days of paying for paper advertising in a weekly or monthly magazine with black and white photos, lost among thousands of other listings in the same book. This just isn’t effective anymore, and can even be a waste of money.

4- Tell Them More About You

A real estate website is the perfect place for potential clients can learn more about you as a professional. This is more important in real estate than almost any other service business. Talk about and splash photos displaying awards you have won, events you participate in, community involvement, as well as your personal background and qualifications. When people get to know you this way (as an individual) they get to like you and trust you. This complements your social media and other real estate marketing strategies perfectly.

5- Tell Them About Your Business

Why wait for a local journalist to write an article about you in the paper or local magazine? Want to be known and respected in the local community? Modern technology puts the power back into your hands. Put the information out there yourself, and draw readers in to see it through strategic web techniques.

For no extra cost, you can regularly publish and update details such as the regions you work in, your years of experience, and areas of real estate expertise. Do you have a knowledgeable team? Are you influential in a hot part of town? Do you specialize in condos, revenue properties, or commercial buildings? Put that out there, forever and visible to the entire world. Include high definition photography and videos to reinforce the message, and make a strong first impression they won’t forget.

6- Create a Brand for Your Practice

If you’ve never succeeded in transforming yourself (and your practice) into a brand, or maybe never thought about it, then this is the way. Think about the biggest, most successful, “celebrity” real estate brokers in your area. They are household names, aren’t they? The public is familiar with their names and faces, the same way they know the name of the local grocery store, florist, or school. Top of mind awareness is ultra important in any business.

Think about it. Your picture everywhere, a logo people will remember, a slogan that rolls off the tongue. A properly executed real estate website can begin this process for you, and position you and your agency as the brand of choice in your local market.

7- Use It as Part of Your Listing Presentation

A listing presentation is what an agent shows to the home seller to convince them that he/she is qualified to sell their home. It usually includes stats, a marketing strategy, pricing, relevant experience, and the added value the agent brings to get the job done. If much of this information is already on your website, you save time and effort. Maybe your potential seller already saw a lot of these details and is already impressed by you before even placing the first call.

8- Exchange Information More Easily

No need for potential new clients to call and wait to speak to your receptionist. This small gesture alone can turn off the ultra busy and impatient 25 to 50-year-old shopper, who is used to having questions answered instantaneously these days. No more need to set up an appointment, drive to meet each other, and invest time just for some initial “this is how we work” info. All this can be accomplished with a few brief lines on your real estate website, which people can read within seconds and move onto the next step.

No need for clients to wait for a form to arrive by fax, or stay on the phone during business hours, to fill in their personal info.

This also allows existing and potential clients to provide feedback in an open forum, so you know what they’re looking for. All this can be done 7 days a week, 24 hours a day, and not just during your office hours (when potential clients themselves are most busy).

9 Website Design and Marketing Tips to Improve Your Local Business

The top 9 local search engine marketing tip series intends to help business owners better reach a local demographic using web sites and tools on the Internet. If you do not have a well coded website, get one. Then, use these local search engine optimization tips along with other research because this article alone will not cut it. This article is just a summary to follow, and you should seek out more information on how to increase your Google Page Rank and lower your Alexa Rank.

Tip #1: Create Quality Content With Plenty of Keywords.

Search engines and customers use keywords and phrases to find your website. Make sure you use plenty of the words you would like to be found for in the text of your website. Website designers and owners should create plenty of pages that display all of the content necessary to tell a search engine to show you as an expert for your keywords.

Take the time to look at your competitors’ websites and try and have at least as many pages as they do, if not more. One last important tip for local search is to take every opportunity to put your location in your text. This helps for Google Local rankings, and the value of your Alexa ranking means you can charge advertisers higher fees for placing banners on your blog.

Tip #2: Update Content Often With Local Information.

Take every opportunity to add new pages to your site which discuss local topics and events. Search engines will see that you are discussing local events with local keywords and move up your ranking as a local expert. Participate in local events and get your company name on charity and community websites with links back to your websites. These types of links are invaluable and can only be acquired through hard work and giving back to your community.

Tip #3: Use Available Resources – Some Recommendations and Examples Provided

One of the best tools we have found to help promote websites locally is the Google Business Tools suite. This amazing resource center allows website designers and managers analyze, manage, advertise, and invest in a websites online presence.Google has put most of their main business tools together in one location for easy use and understanding.

Check the relevant website design resources out, read about them, and sign up for the ones that apply to you: Google Website Optimizer, Google AdWords, Google Apps, Google Webmaster Tools, Google Base, Google Local Business Center and Amazon’s Alexa Internet Business Suite.

Tip #4: Pay Per Click – Monitor Closely and Spend Wisely

If you can set up and optimize your pay per click campaign it can be very successful and sometimes the results are amazing. That being said, we have witnessed many different cases where Pay Per Click advertising has burned through an entire budget in a couple of days. This can happen if you don’t take the time to read through the entire process before making your section. Use Local words in your PPC campaign to save money by competing locally instead of globally.Remember, spending money to make money is necessary, but spend wisely.

Tip #5: Local Search Engines: Google Maps, Yahoo! Local, Bing Local

This is an obvious and easy way to increase your local exposure. We have all use Alexa search tool that has given results with a map and indicator dots on related business locations. If you would like to come up for these types of local searches,carefully submit for these specialized location based results. The search engines will often request some sort of verification through call back or traditional mail and pin verification.

Tip #6: Yelp!

Take the time to list yourself on Yelp and register your business. Make sure that you spend the time on these postings that you would for any piece of marketing material for your business. Yelp!, or websites like it, is sometimes the only chance to give an impression you will have with a customer.Be careful. These types of listings are double edged swords. If you don’t maintain a high standard of service and quality, this will also be the location that customers will go to vent about their frustrations. These listings will also count as a quality inbound link for search and is useful to increase your search ranking.

Tip #7: Chambers of Commerce

You should become members with at least one local chamber of commerce. This is a great way to establish credibility and become a member of your local business community. Once you have this membership, make sure that your listing on the chamber website is a direct link to your website. Chambers of commerce are considered to be local experts, and their link to you is a valuable one.

Tip #8: CitySearch

CitySearch is very similar to Yelp in that it is a popular local search engine. Make sure that you spend some quality time explaining yourself and your business. You should also make sure to check back and monitor your reviews often.

Tip #9: Press Release Services, Face book, and Twitter

Social Media and local publicity can be very important for local results. Make sure to use locations and city information in your profile descriptions. Search engines will look at social media websites, and if you do a good job of mentioning local search words with your search engine keywords, you will begin to see additional results in the social media results sections of search engines. Press releases can be the most important local marketing item a business can employ.

Implemented wisely, a well optimized press release or social media blast can bring you first-page visibility for your keywords very quickly. Sometimes, you can take over more than one spot on the first page of Google. These same items used in their traditional roles of simple media notifications will get you nothing in terms of search results, make sure your marketing and PR companies know what they are doing. It could be hurting you. Your Alexa rank will tumble down and enhance your profile, even as your page rank climbs.

5 Reasons To Use a WordPress Website Developer to Build Your Business Website

WordPress is a hugely popular platform for small business owners and bloggers alike. Primarily because WordPress does not require payment for hosting at its basic level as well as having a user-friendly dashboard. As a small business owner, there are countless benefits for using this platform, including saving the time and expense usually associated with setting up a website for your business.

Even though it is possible, to create your own website using the free WordPress platform, it’s a daunting project to take-on, on top of the usual tasks involved in running your business. For a beginner; the learning curve is steep.

Most business owners find it saves them time, money and frustration enlisting a professional web design company to build a custom website for them using the WordPress platform. Do your business justice by increasing its potential to continue to grow and expand your online presence, with a professional designer to guarantee a seamless user experience.

But what does a professional web designer really bring to the table?

1. Customize the look, feel and functionality of your website to suit your brand

WordPress popular for its abundance of ready to use website templates, however, if want a unique brand experience for your visitors, even the templates need considerable tweaking. A developer can upgrade a basic template to suit the look and feel you want for your site. The free templates might seem like the easy option, however, I can’t even count a number of times I’ve been asked to step in a takeover from well-meaning business owners who’ve come to realize the time investment in customizing a template is significant, without the necessary the skill set.

2. Optimal and responsive website performance

Anything less than a friendly user experience will cause your hard-earned traffic to click off your site at warp speed. A professional web design and development engineer will not only help with aesthetics but also guarantee a seamless experience that will surprise and delight your site visitors. Use your designers’ experience to choose the right plugins to complement the functionality of your website without compromising performance.

3. Your website developer is your troubleshooting guru

WordPress is known for its regular updates which keep the sites safe, secure and offering the latest functionalities of your plugins. Unfortunately, sometimes plugins and updates wreak havoc with each other in the background causing issues and can even crash on your site. Save yourself the panic and headache of troubleshooting issues as they arise.

4. A professional website development company will have SEO options to suit your budget

You want your content to get picked by the major search engines, business directories and blogging platforms offering do-follow backlinks that are SEO compliant and work to attract targeted traffic to your site.

In addition to this, professional SEO services offer keyword research, heading creation, sitemap creation, URL generations, Google Webmaster, Bing Website Master and Google Analytics creation. Some services will also include Robots.txt generation, meta tag generation, image alter tags and check your websites crawl errors.

5. Create and support a responsive website on all devices

WordPress is our first choice for building small business websites because making it easy to design a responsive and mobile friendly website on. When you add content like images, videos, links and other feeds, you want them responsive on all devices too.

A professionally designed and developed website gives your business a competitive edge.

Best Google Website Tools in 2018

Google Analytics

In this digital age, the importance of data to a business/website should never be underestimated. In fact, without proper tracking of website traffic, a business is literally lost, especially when it comes to how to optimize the website and make full use of it.

Whether your website is run in the form of a personal blog, news portal, business or corporate page, ecommerce store, Google Analytics is considered an essential tool for every website. The more you use this highly powerful Google tool, the bigger advantage you have.

Google Analytics is a web analytics service offered by Google that tracks and reports website traffic. You can create goals and conversion tracking to get the most of your analytics information and use it to improve your website’s content, user experience and optimization for better online sales.

Out of so many features in Google Analytics, I think the ability to identify the Source / Medium to your website is one of the best website tools. Based on the data shown, you can find out if your marketing efforts have been paid off or not. This can provide a solid reference for your next decision making in enhancing your website performance.

Google Data Studio

Trust me, for beginners, you might be overwhelmed by all the amount of data shown in Google Analytics. To be frank, sometimes you just need a simple report with chart, graph or pie to summarize the performance of your website.

Here is a free tool from Google called Google Data Studio, which gives you everything you need to turn your analytics data into informative, easy-to-understand reports through data visualization.

Analytics has always been a challenge for digital marketing, however, Google Data Studio allows you to create customizable data visualization and report. Besides, you can even share with your clients – a huge plus especially if you are working in a big group.

Quick tip: You can check out Google Data Studio Gallery to duplicate their samples and modify to your website use. After that you will be able to change and edit the metric according to your needs. Quite amazing, right?

Google Search Console

Previously known as Google Webmaster Tools, now rebranded to Google Search Console, this free web service is designed for webmasters. It allows you to check the indexing status and optimize the visibility of your websites.

This free tool is a MUST for Search Engine Optimization (SEO). The power to track your site’s search performance is the most precious data to understand what the audiences want for your site.

Once the website is tracked by Google, you’ll be able to view your organic search results right alongside the performance statistics for the organic search queries. This information helps you better understand how paid text ads and organic search results work together. If you analyse deeply enough, you will find many opportunities like identify relevant search queries that have low organic traffic volume and target these keywords in Google AdWords. This will increase your overall traffic, tailored to the objective of your website.

Google My Business

Are you operating a brick and mortar business? If you are, this free tools from Google is one of the most local SEO strategies to strengthen your website. Google My Business is a powerful tool for businesses and organizations to manage their online presence across Google, like Google Search and Google Maps.

As smartphone penetration in Malaysia approaching 100% by 2018, the majority of Malaysians are using smartphones for navigation, searching for instant answers or browsing social media platforms. Your business and brand need to be found online with the correct information.

Make sure all the listed information is correct, up-to-date and reflect your business. Remember, those info will appear when people search for your office or physical store via Waze or Google Map. We often see some of the business hasn’t updated their address, phone number and business hours to the latest. Wish to gain my traffic to your website?

You should try the new the features from Google My Business called “Posts”. The published content will display your image and short description with call-to-action link to your intended URL. For example, blog post “Should I hide or even remove client inquiry on my Facebook?” will appear at the bottom of our business info.

Google Keyword Planner

Building a website without keyword research is exhausting and time wasting in long-term. In order to reach the right customers with the right keywords, you should use Google Keyword Planner to discover relevant keywords. Inserting those keywords into your website will ensure your content remains relevant.

*To access Keyword Planner, you need to sign in to your Google AdWords account at http://adwords.google.com/KeywordPlanner. Create the account is free of charge and fast.

Yes, it’s completely free, you can find new keyword ideas that are relevant to your product, service and target customers. Keyword planner will show you the search volume data in historical statistics which is one of the most important key factors for your website.

Furthermore, the data from keywords ideas is a useful tool for SEO to your website. Analyse the information and turn it to your next content marketing strategy. Based on the search terms data, you should have plenty of ideas what should can be inserted to your text to make it more relevant to your audience.

Google Tag Manager

This free tool helps you update tags and code snippets on your website and mobile app quickly and easily. You can insert JavaScript and HTML tags used for tracking and analytics on websites in Tag Manager without touching the back end of the website.

Many websites do not deploy tracking function or have unreliable data collection because of messy codes injection. To solve this, we highly recommend using Google Tag Manager to consolidate and manage all your tracking codes or scripts.

The best example of using this tool is to use Facebook Ads. While more and more businesses are spending on Facebook Ads, most of them do not install Facebook Pixel into their website for conversion tracking, optimization and remarketing purposes.

Facebook Ads is already integrated with Google Tag Manager for smooth and easy installation. All you need to do just click and follow the instructions given without any need for complicated coding.

Test My Site from Think With Google

In order to rank well in mobile Google Search, your website should have fast loading speed and a mobile-optimized website. Use the Test My Site tool from Think with Google to check your website score on mobile performance. After a few minutes, you will receive recommendations on improving website performance across all devices.

Nobody wants to wait for slow websites or browse non-mobile friendly websites. The suggested time is 3 seconds from Google, which means if your site doesn’t load completely within 3 seconds, most people will most probably go elsewhere.

Just insert your email address and you will obtain the detailed analysis about your website. The content of the report is simple, but provides valuable insight into how Google ranks your website speed.

The report will become a crucial reference to your webmaster or web developer to further optimize the website. If you need even more in depth report about how Google renders and indexes your website, you should use the PageSpeed Insight tool.

Google PageSpeed Insight

If you have web developers or web designers that really want to understand the factors to increase your website speed, give PageSpeed Insights Tool a try and check your score on your website’s speed and optimization.

The latest version now shows the data from your First Contentful Point (FCP), the measurement when a user sees a visual response from the page. DOM Content Loaded (DCL), as well as the measurement when HTML document has been loaded and parsed.

PageSpeed Insights is handy in providing insight on how Google indexes your website differently for desktop and mobile versions.

Here are some website speed optimization tips from PageSpeed:

Avoid landing page redirects
Eliminate render-blocking JavaScript and CSS in above-the-fold contents
Enable compression
Leverage browser caching
Minify CSS
Minify HTML
MInify JavaScript
Optimize images
Prioritize visible content
Reduce server response time

Google Trend

Wish to see the latest trends and data from Google? You can search anything via Google Trends and even narrow down to specific country or category. This tool is useful to identify latest trends or viral news in your location.

Ideally, once you identified a trend, you can craft new blog posts, new promotions or ideas that reflect the said trend.

Don’t forget that you also can view the interest traffic of search terms using Google Trends.

With this, you can spot the best time to launch specific campaign. This is helpful for seasonal campaign or annual promotion because you can discover the best timing for your ad hoc digital marketing campaigns.

Google Alert

If you want to be aware of a particular topic and all the related information that bubbles up in the news, you can have them all automatically delivered to you with Google Alert and get notified every time when your keywords or phrases have new updates.

Google Alert is good for simple keyword monitoring, with updated on every mention of those keywords being sent to your email inbox for almost real time notification. Of course, you can choose the frequency at which you’ll receive them – once per day, once per week or even get them as they just happen.

A useful tip when creating the Google Alert is to avoid using generic keywords but create alerts that are more unique to your website. The more precise the keywords, the more relevant are your alerts. For that, you should utilize the search filters wherever possible, such as languages, region or sources.

Summary

So, that’s it, above are the 10 must-have free Google tools to improve the performance of your website. Make full use of all tools from analysis, research or monitoring to achieve the objective of your site.

What are your favourite tools from Google? Do you know any other Google tools that we should cover? Let us know in the comments below!

How to Optimize Your Website for Voice Search

Voice Search Trends: Is Your Business Ready?

When Google launched the Voice Search app for the iPhone in 2008, it was far from perfect. Over the years, speak-activated technology has become much more accurate and human-like. Stats show that Google’s English recognition accuracy rate is now over 95%.

People want instant solutions when they’re searching for something online.

While typing a query into a search bar is quick, simply speaking into your device and getting the same results is even quicker. On average, a person can type around 40 words per minute and speak around 150 words per minute.

To try a spoken search, you can activate your phone’s assistant (Siri, Google Assistant, Amazon Alexa, for example). Or, try it online: click on the microphone icon to the right of the Google search bar, to the left of the magnifying glass.

You’ll be prompted to “Speak now” and you’ll see the results come up after you’ve made your request.

What Voice Search Means for your Business

If you’re a small business owner, it’s a good idea to start thinking of ways to optimize your website for voice search.

Many consumers already use it to find what they’re looking for and according to ComScore, 50% of searches will be performed this way by 2020.

Here’s how to make it work for your business:

Think phrases, not keywords. When we type something into the search bar, we tend to keep it short, like “Canada Food Guide fruit servings.”

However, when we talk to a device, we use a conversational tone, so it would be more like “How many servings of fruit each day does the Canada Food Guide recommend?” Before optimizing your site, research longtail keywords that someone might use to find your products or services.

Stay local. Mobile voice-related searches are three times more likely to be locally based. Use your location with keywords in your site content, and don’t forget to keep your Google My Business page updated.

If you have accolades or awards, include those too – users are often searching for the “best of” or “top” products or services in the area.

Be overly informative. A virtual assistant pulls information from the Internet, so you want to make sure there’s lots of it to be found.

Keep your website, Google My Business, Yelp and other third-party sites updated with things like your contact info, hours of operation, location and menu.

However, that’s just the basics. Dive even deeper – does your business accept American Express? Does your boutique sell clothing by local designers? Is your business a good place to take kids, pets or a date?

The more you can put out there, the more questions you can answer. Creating a FAQ page is a great way to provide both typers and talkers with relevant info.

Speed up. Your mobile page load time matters. The average spoken search results page loads almost twice as fast as a web page, so you’ll have to keep up if you want to get noticed.

Google also includes page speed as a ranking factor, so faster is always better. Check your site’s speed.

It’s going to become more and more relevant – and necessary – to make it easy for customers to “talk” to your business. Instead of waiting for your competitors to catch up and outrun you, start working on optimizing your site now.

Getting Traffic For A Website Should Start With These Three Powerful Ways To Harness Social Networks

Are you using social networks to generate traffic for a website you might have? You would be surprised at how many people aren’t. Making use of social networks is an extremely powerful way to generate traffic these days. If you are not using it then you are leaving a lot of potential money on the table. In this article I’m going to discuss the powerful ways to harness social networks, many of which you might already be using for entertainment purposes.

The first way to harness social networks when it comes to getting traffic for a website would be search engine ranking. Being on social networks will improve your search engine ranking. A presence on a social networking site creates more links to your main website, which creates higher search engine rankings and more traffic for your website. Search engine optimization done by you will take far more work and energy to accomplish.

Secondly, another way you can harness the power of the networks to get traffic for a website would be collecting friends. By collecting friends you allow your best customers to demonstrate their loyalty publicly, leading to more branding and viral spreading of your message as the friends of your friends investigate each other’s interests and see your marketing messages. But you want all of this to take place naturally, by actively contributing.

One of the last ways social sites can be harnessed to get traffic for a website would be by putting content out there you hope will be picked up by other media. Other media might include journalists, who are looking on social networks for story leads. Understand that it is part of the media’s job is to find experts in various niches to interview. If you come off as one of them it is possible you may be chosen.

I’ll close out by saying that getting traffic for a website should always start with you focusing on those areas of the Internet that have ready-made sources of traffic. The best ready-made sources of traffic would include social networking sites. After reading this article you should understand a few of the ways you can harness their power.

These ways would include improved search engine ranking, collecting friends who would be able to demonstrate their loyalty publicly, along with other media members possibly learning about you and talking about you. Fact of the matter is, every phase of social networks leads to a possible benefit that can cause a crushing wave of traffic for a website.