by MIMO Solutions | Internet Marketing, Web Design
Mobile responsive design is one of the most exciting and liberating website design changes that’s come along in recent web history.
The change forced developers to design websites as a multi-channel, multi-tier canvas. Remember, people no longer engage with content just on a desktop. They might save that great blog they read in the morning at their work computer to read at home on their tablet or at the park on their smartphone. The key for designers is to put a strategy in place now to make your websites mobile friendly. If not, your prospects will read something else.
A recent article on the Copyblogger website further discusses responsive design and why it’s important.
“Being able to naturally and automatically adjust and adapt is a critical key to survival and success,” the article explains. “It’s true in sports, nature, business — and yes — web development.”
The Copyblogger article outlined five reasons why marketers should care about responsive website design.
- It works: When a website is responsive, the layout and content changes sizes based on the size of the screen. The pictures, text, headlines and videos automatically fit the four main types of screens: widescreen desktop monitors, laptops, tablets and smartphones.
- It’s cheaper: Mobile responsive design is revolutionary because it automatically delivers content customized for a screen without needing to spend lots of money designing multiple versions of your site. Responsive website design means you create one website with one design with no expensive apps required.
- It’s easier for readers: People don’t have to adapt themselves around your content. They can read and watch your stuff no matter where they are and what device they’re using. Ease of use is critical for today’s audience, which has so many choices for content.
- Small screen experience isn’t annoying: Most phones zoom out automatically so that people can see the entire website on the screen. This is frustrating because it makes text super small and difficult to find. Responsive website design means reducing the columns and making things bigger so that people browsing on a phone don’t have to do a lot of work to see your stuff.
- Critical info is easier to find: If people have a desktop, they have lots of space to find your address, hours of operation and menu. But mobile users don’t have that kind of screen real estate. Responsive website design gives them the options they need right away.
Source: Copyblogger
by MIMO Solutions | eCommerce, Gallery, Internet Marketing, Web Design
EyeDirect.TV in Dallas, TX gets a new website and online shopping cart courtesy of MIMO Solutions!
I am proud to announce the launch of our latest website! EyeDirect is an amazing device that allows film-makers and photographers capture direct eye contact from their subjects. It even works with amateurs, kids and animals! It uses a series of mirrors to reflect the director’s face or teleprompter directly over the camera’s lens, so the subject remains focused in on the camera even when reading or responding in an interview.
Check out the videos at www.eyedirect.tv to see more about how it works or buy one for yourself!
Now more about that new website:
- We used a WordPress platform to rebuild the entire site.
- It has a responsive template that will automatically change to match the screen size for tablets and smart phones. There are actually 3 design layouts in one!
- It has a complete shopping cart solution that includes Fedex shipping, sales tax, and inventory tracking, along with a bunch of cool display options.
- We set up a brand new FAQ page since this invention is completely new and there is nothing like it on the market.
- We added a full blog platform to showcase the EyeDirect being used across the world.
- It has a new but simple look and a cool slide shows and videos that work without Flash to be compatible on any device or computer.
- Of course we did some SEO, Internet marketing, and social media integration to take advantage of the new site and hopefully grow the demand for this new product.
Oh, and the best part is that is took us just over 20 hours to build! After being stalled for over 6 months and losing thousands of dollars with another web design company, Steve and EyeDirect have a new website and are up and running in less than 30 days!
by MIMO Solutions | Internet Marketing, Web Design
1. Are you happy with the current design of your site or would you like a new one?
2. Do you have a blog or a place where you can post regular updates yourself?
3. Is all the content and information accurate on your site?
4. Where is the website hosted?
5. Have you set up business pages on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter & Google+?
6. How often do you update those and do you have them linked together?
7. How do you map listing look in Google, Yahoo & Bing? Are you happy with where they show up in the results and the information that is displayed?
8. How many reviews and recommendations are you getting on the maps and social media accounts? Are the 90% positive?
9. Who are your two biggest competitors online?
10. Do you come up higher or lower in the search results?
11. Who has more fans, followers, and reviews?
12. Is anyone doing pay-per-click ads?
13. Do you currently sell anything online in a shopping cart on your website?
14. Would you like to?
15. If you do, how is it working? Is there anything that you want to improve?
16. Does it calculate shipping and accept payment?
17. How tough is the competition for your best keywords?
18. Do you sell locally, city-wide or nation-wide?
19. How many competitors would you say there are in that area?
20. Are you coming up on the first page for the keywords you want?
21. How often do you post new information on your website?
22. If you had a way to do that, could you handle it in-house or would you need someone else to do it?
23. Do you have access to helpful information for your clients that they need to know?
24. How many total pages does your website have?
25. Did you know blogging allows you to quickly create a large and powerful site for the search engines?
26. Do you currently send any regular email blasts to your clients and prospects?
27. Would you like to stay in touch with them more?
28. How professional do those emails look?
29. How is the response? Do you get feedback or comments about them?
30. Do your pages on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter & Google+ all look the same so people can recognize you?
31. Do you have a plan for how often you publish updates to social media?
32. Do those accounts give the impression you want your clients and prospects to have about you? Are you proud of them?
33. Are you currently doing any pay-per-click ads on Google, Bing, Facebook or LinkedIn?
34. How’s it going, or why not?
35. Would you be willing to pay for more traffic to your website?
36. How many visitors would you say that you get now on your website in a month?
37. Do you have Google Analytics installed to track your stats?
38. Have your visits been going up or have the plateaued or gone down this year?
39. Do you have a way to measure how many people actually buy from you from internet leads?
40.
Is there anything else you have always wished you could do on the internet?
If you think you might need some help, shoot me an email…
[email protected]
by MIMO Solutions | Gallery, Internet Marketing, Web Design
http://www.superiordoorserviceinc.com/
While the change might not look dramatic, the results are… I took them from a “law firm” template on Yahoo’s Sitebuilder tool to a custom designed website.
Here are some of the site enhancements we added during the redesign process:
- Add social media tools and contact information to the top left
- Created a slide show gallery with an animated GIF so it can be seen on Apple products and mobile devices
- Increased the photo, text and video sizes
- Changes from a vertical left menu to a horizontal top menu
- Changed headers and sub-headers to red to make them stand out
- Made the logo and contact information more prominent
- Added new product photos and videos
- Made search engine enhancements to the code, file names and photos
- Added vendor logos in a creative and organized way to the footer
- Matched the blog layout to the website layout
- Fixed and enhanced the contact page and added the Google Maps links and map
Already, in the first week they have gotten more activity on their social media accounts, and are seeing an improvement in traffic, search rankings and most importantly sales!
Oh, and I almost forgot the best part… I also tweaked their pay-per-click ads on Google.
Mike’s Adwords PPC Campaign
Campaign Budget – Clicks – Impressions – Cost-Per-Click – Cost – Avg. Position
$5.00/day – 350 – 403,807 – $0.38 – $133.55 – 3.2
Original Places PPC Campaign
Campaign Budget – Clicks – Impr. – CPC – Cost – Avg. Pos.
$7.90/day – 44 – 6,855 – $4.13 – $181.84 – 5.3
If you think you might like 10 times the visitors for 25% less cost, shoot me an email…
by MIMO Solutions | Internet Marketing, Web Design
Steve Montague
Happy Father’s Day, Everyone!
Here are some lessons I have learned my father, and how they apply to Internet marketing. I love you, pops!
Never let money stop you from doing what you want in life.
This was probably the best business lesson my father ever taught me. I think I was around 12 years old, when my father started saying this to me. I wanted to go to the movies or get a new toy, and my father told me to figure out how to earn the money, rather than giving it to me.
As far as internet marketing goes, this is a perfect lesson. Marketing on the web can be free to very cheap. You can start your own website and business for about $15, and look very professional. It gives everyone equal opportunity to earn money and do what they want. You can build a website for anything and dive into your passions with very little investment. You can be anyone and do anything on the internet. The question then becomes what do you want in life.
Work smart and hard.
A lot of people thing this one is “work smart, not hard,” but my dad taught me that if you can do both, the sky is the limit.
The same goes for internet marketing. Some people work hard and write thousands of posts. Some people try to produce a few really great pieces of content. Why can’t you have thousands of really compelling posts and status updates? If you work smarter and harder then everyone, no one can beat your audience.
Save up to half of what you earn.
This is a very difficult lesson to learn and practice. My grandfather never made more than $30,000 a year at a job in his life. He died in 2006 as a multi-millionaire. Saving gives you options other people don’t have to invest or take advantage of future opportunities.
On the Internet, you have to realize that making money is the key to longevity in business, and saving as much as you can allows you to invest in opportunities others can’t afford. When you are pricing your services, you have to remember the government takes a third, then you pay yourself half by saving it, and whatever is left is what you get to spend or reinvest.
Have faith that things will work out, and always be optimistic.
Do you look for ways things won’t work, or do look for ways to make things happen? There are 12 ways to solve any problem. Go find one. That is one of my dad’s favorite quotes. Yogi Berra said, “It ain’t over til it’s over.”
In internet marketing, the same applies. Anything is possible, so long as you keep trying. A website is never finished, and there is no problem you can’t solve. Sure, it might take longer or be more expensive than you wished, but there is a way to make your dreams come true. Go find it!!!
Take personal responsibility for things, even if they are not your fault.
Another tough lesson, but it makes life a lot easier, you a lot happier, and other people love and respect you more. I will never forget when my dad would ask me if I wanted to do something before he gave permission. For example, if my friends asked me to spend the night at their house, he would take me aside and ask quietly, “Do you want to?” If I said yes, he would say I could. If I said, no he would say we had plans at home and I couldn’t go this time. He didn’t care if some other teenagers liked him, but I did, so he would take responsibility for the decision for me.
On the world wide web, you will come across customer complaints, frustrated employees, and competitors lashing out. It is best policy to take responsibility and resolve the issue, rather than prove you are right. Things can go viral and get out of control very fast. One customer can tell millions of people about an experience within minutes. Keep that in mind, and decide now that it is your responsibility to protect your reputation online. No one else can do that for you anyway.
Don’t judge a book by its cover, but realize that other people will.
My dad went to college in the early 70’s and graduated with long hair, a beard, and some very bad and very loud plaid suits. He learned pretty fast that you should never judge other people by their appearance, but other people are always judging you. My dad’s favorite story is when a client asked him for his jacket, then threw it in the trash outside his office, before continuing with the sales call.
The lesson on the internet, is that you have between 5-8 seconds to make an impression on a visitor. Google has done the research and people who do not like what they see in the first 8 seconds will go back to the search and check out the next site. It is a brutal reality, but you have to be extremely prepared for this. It doesn’t mean that you need to spend $30,000 on a web design, but you do have to match your visitors expectation. It means you have to give your visitors what they are looking for in a package they want, and do it very quickly.
I have learned a lot more lessons from my father, but these are a few that I remember most today. I hope it helped you with your approach, and I hope you have a great Father’s Day!
What have you learned about business from your father?
Please share in the comments below…
by MIMO Solutions | Internet Marketing, Web Design
I hear so many mis-conceptions and perceptions about search engine optimization, that I decided to put them down in a blog post to save everyone time and headaches.
Many business owners don’t have the time to study SEO and what it means for their website, so they have to rely on the opinions of their people or sales people for SEO companies. Both of those types have a vested interest in telling you what you want to hear or making themselves sound more valuable…
No offense, but I don’t really care if you listen to my advice or not, so here is the truth as I see it right now. The internet changes daily, but I will try to keep an eye on this post and keep it updated.
Here is what every business owner needs to know about Search Engine Optimization – Hint: Also know as, SEO.
Myth #1 – SEO will get you ranked on the first page of Google.
Everyone wants to tell you that you need to spend $1,500 a month on SEO and that magic SEO wizards will tweak your site, then magically it will rise in the search engine rankings until they hit #1. Well, guess what, they are all full of crap.
It is true that you probably can’t get to #1 for a competitive keyword without doing some SEO. However, just stuffing some keywords in the page isn’t going to make it happen. There are way too many ranking factors for it to make much of a difference. Search engines like Google take into account 100’s of factors when selecting #1 and the stuff on the page is only part of it.
Back in the 90’s, keywords were the deciding factor. If you had more keywords in the right places than other sites, you would rocket up the charts. The search engines didn’t have much else to go on. The porn industry and other spammers knew this, so they stuff pages with keywords that had nothing to do with what they actually did just to get traffic. Google and others quickly figured out that they couldn’t take your word for it.
A few years ago, Google even admitted in a legal case that they don’t even use the keyword tag at all any more. They still take into account some other SEO factors like: title of the page, address, header tags, image tags, and a little content, but they know better than to trust the person who built the site. People lie to get ahead.
In fact, they started penalizing sites that did too much keyword stuffing on their page, so don’t screw that up or you can actually go down in the search rankings!
So in conclusion, it does help to let Google know what you are trying to rank for by having the key phrases in the right places, but that alone will not get you to where you want to go.
Myth #2 – Search Engine Optimization uses key words to improve your ranking.
This one is a little confusing, but I will try to explain. Originally, in the 90’s is was “key words” that helped you. As the search engines improved and millions more websites were built, it became necessary to use “key phrases” instead.
Sure it would be nice to rank for the keyword “tires” if you sell tires, but in all reality, unless you are at Goodyear, that is probably not going to happen. If you own a local tire store, you are going to have to focus on 3-5 word key phrases.
Key phases are also know as “long-tail keywords.” It has been hard to eliminate the word “keywords” from our Internet culture, so some people added the long-tail to more accurate describe what we are doing in SEO these days.
When you think about what you would like to be ranked for, finding a few good key phrases is very important. Most people just take the single keyword and add their location for local searches, for example, “tires kansas city.”
That may work depending on the amount of competition in your local marketing, but it usually helps to focus a little narrower. Something like “buy new tires kansas city” or “tire store in kansas city” or “tires on sale kansas city” will typically do much better.
My advice is to get hyper focused on your products. If you focus your efforts on “Goodyear 18 inch all purpose radials kansas city,” you should find it very easy to rank on the first page. There is also an added benefit. It cuts out all the people who are just looking around, and it only sends you people who are ready to buy!
Some people get frustrated and tell me that no one is searching for “Goodyear 18 inch all purpose radials kansas city” and there are thousands of people searching for “tires” or “tires kansas city.” While that may be true, I need you to think about how you search for things for a moment. Most people will do 2-3 searches before they actually find what they need and they get longer and more targeted each time, plus searches for generic keywords comes with a lot of researchers, image searchers, and unqualified buyers.
It is OK to miss out on someone searching for a picture of a tire. It is not OK to miss out on someone looking to buy “Goodyear 18 inch all purpose radials in kansas city” today.
Myth #3 – Google is a search engine.
Sure, Google calls itself a search engine and most people go to Google to search for stuff, but that is not what is important to Google. They take this stuff very seriously!
Google is a “referral” engine.
This is the easiest way I know to explain what Google does to a business owner. Google is in the business of referring people to the best place to get what they are looking for. Search engine implies some kind of impartial list of results, and that the search is in charge. When in fact, Google has said point blank, they do not treat all websites and searches the same, and they want to protect the user experience by getting them to answers as soon as possible.
I have good news and bad news. The bad news is Google doesn’t care about you or your website at all. They are in the business of referring people to the best sites as quickly as possible, wherever that may be. The good news is they don’t care about your competitor either, so let’s talk about what that means for you.
If you want to get qualified referrals from Google, there are things you can do to make yourself more credible to them. That is really what they want to know from any website they are trying to rank. Can they trust you?
Here are some things they look at:
- How long have you been around?
- How many other sites link to yours? (Other referrals)
- How trustworthy are the sites you link to and that link to you?
- How professional is your website?
- How quickly does it load?
- Do you differentiate each page to help them tell which page is best for each search?
- How far out did you buy your domain name, or do you think you might be gone next year?
- Do you have social media accounts and other online profiles?
- How many pages are in your site?
- How educational is your content?
- How do you label pictures and how many do you have?
- How many positive reviews do you have?
- Where is your physical location?
- How many comments and subscribers do you have?
The key is to treat Google like a real-life referral partner. You have to build trust over time, and develop the relationship. You have to monitor your online reputation and doing this in each one of those categories to improve your standing in the online community. Google needs to know, like, and trust you just like any other referral partner.
If you take that approach, you will consistently move up in the rankings, and never down. Some people try to mislead Google by buying a bunch of links from other sites, over-stuffing keywords, and partnering with other sites that do things to push the envelope. Those people will eventually be penalized as Google gets better at refining their criteria, and improving the results. Just like in real life, if you hang out with a bunch of crooks, eventually people will see you as one, regardless of whether you actually do anything wrong.
Conclusion – Take the time to build a strong online reputation, and forget about magic keywords.
Just like building a brick-and-mortar business in real life, there are no shortcuts or magic bullets. It takes time, energy, and resources. Fortunately, it takes a lot less money online than it does in the real world. All of the things I mentioned above are free if you take the time to learn how to do them. If you hire an Internet marketing professional, they cost money but with the right professional you can make Google and the other search engines your number one referral partner, and build a strong online business.
Search engine optimization has the highest return on investment of any type of marketing activity!
If you need help understanding anything on this post, please comment or email me and we can talk it out. I love helping business owners figure out how to do it right, since so many seem to be doing it wrong.
