by nottmarketing | Nov 26, 2022 | Promotion, Search Engine Visibility
Home Page Pop ups May Increase Bounce Rate
When it comes to Pop up ads and Google, it pays to get familiar with Google’s current policies and penalties. If you rely on your website to attract new business, give the visitor a reason to stay on the site a while. Websites that assault the visitor with an ad, a form, or a lengthy promotional message lose prospects early. Lacking engagement with your content, the visitor “bounces” off your website. Bounce Rate is the amount of time a page is viewed before the visitor leaves the site or “pogos” back to the search bar.
My first rule of thumb for pop ups on your home page is this: it should not load before the home page, and it should not obstruct your view of important page content. Sometimes – only while shopping – I welcome a discount purchase code served up in a pop up ad. Unless you are giving the visitor a great incentive for staying on your website, consider carefully timing the appearance of your pop up message or subscription form.
Google Penalties for Pop ups
As a disincentive to using invasive interstitials on your home page, Google states they will downgrade your website’s relevance and make it harder to find. If a pop up obstructs the visitor’s view of important information, especially on a mobile screen, your website loses some credibility on the web. An interstitial is NOT considered invasive if it is contained to a small area and has a clear link to close the ad.
Since 2017, Google altered their opinion on pop up ads. Their policy states that Intrusive interstitials and dialogs are page elements that obstruct users’ view of the content, usually for promotional purposes. That’s why, starting after January 10, 2017, pages with pop ups that make it hard to access content may hurt your website’s ranking in search results.
What is an Intrusive Interstitial?
An intrusive interstitial is a pop up ad, a form, or an overlay that blocks visitors from viewing the content they are trying to view on your website. This is especially frustrating for mobile users, who may have to work a little to locate the “close” button. Not only does this annoy and inconvenience your visitors, your ad makes it difficult for Google and other search engines to understand your content.
Do you hire a web designer to install your pop up and/or pay for Search Engine Optimization or social media ads? You risk throwing away all the traffic you have paid for only to hide your homepage behind an annoying obstacle. When you must install a pop up containing some type of dialog, use banners instead of full page interstitials. A thin html banner ensures that your visitors and search engines can get to the content they are looking for. More from Google:
Avoid common mistakes
Unless they’re legally mandatory, avoid the following common mistakes when designing a dialog or interstitial to help Google Search crawl and understand your content:
- Don’t obscure the entire page with interstitials.
- Don’t redirect the user to a separate page for their consent or input.
My bottom line on pop up announcements that overlay your home page: I do not recommend them. Like many people, I cannot tolerate pop ups or ads flying into a home page, and I leave right away. Since most modern websites have full-width hero images or banner slides, you can put your important message on the first slide. It will be the first content your visitor sees, and they may freely access the information they seek.
Sources:
https://developers.google.com/search/docs/appearance/avoid-intrusive-interstitials
https://www.justuno.com/blog/googles-updated-policies-on-mobile-pop-ups-overlays-and-interstitials/
by nottmarketing | Nov 18, 2022 | Search Engine Optimization, Search Engine Visibility
Search Engine Optimization.
One of my favorite challenges is improving SEO for Connecticut business owners. When launching your new company, it is crucial to understand how search engines find websites in local search requests. I have invested thousands of hours in successfully improving online search results for Connecticut business owners. If you have a website that is not appearing in local Google search requests, I may be able to help you. Search engine optimization is, in my opinion, the least expensive method I have found to get page-one placement in major search engines like Google and Bing.
How long after your grand opening can you afford to operate without new customers? If you are a Connecticut company operating in a limited service area, wouldn’t you like prospective customers in your region to easily find you in search results? Of course, you can pay Google to place a paid advertisement linking to your website. Pay-per-click advertising is costly for new companies. When you cancel your paid listing, you may not appear in search results at all.
What are Natural or Organic Search Results?
Natural or Organic results spring from well-coded, well-written copy and current information submitted to Google.com on your behalf by your webmaster. Page-one and page-two results for your company will quickly grow your business. When you open Google or Bing and request a search, you will notice a lot of ads at the top and bottom of the pages. These are paid advertisements. The page links sandwiched between the classified sites are local companies that are looking for your business using a service/town request. The results you see are listed on the first page because the websites work with search engine robots to deliver the results you requested.
What You Need for Successful Search Engine Listings
You want your company to appear in local search requests based on region and service criteria. I recommend a WordPress website that customized to accurately reflect your values, services offered, and service area. You don’t NEED galleries, but quality photos of jobs you have done can really lend credibility to your company. You have seen slick websites with photography purchased for the website, and that may result in a really pretty website. But a pretty home page with slick animations will not bring you business.
Your home page should honestly represent your values, your mission, your experience, and years in business. Your photos will be tagged with descriptive text, often with a town, which lends to information gleaned by the robots that scan your web pages. Construction, electrical, drainage, septic, HVAC, drainage, or remodeling companies benefit from before-and-after case studies. If you don’t have any video or onsite photos of your own, start collecting them.
Most companies can start with a 5-page website, adding project pages or specific service area pages. All copy, headlines, and photos are placed to enhance search engine success. Implement a regular blog posting schedule. Select counties or towns you want to service, then feature posts describing your services or show jobs you have done. Your headlines, photos, and paragraphs contain the keywords and key phrases that will promote targeted natural search terms.
On the interwebs, your page or post headlines will NOT lead with your company name. Unless you are well known in the region, many of your prospects are searching for your services.
…to be continued…
by nottmarketing | Mar 27, 2022 | Online Visibility, Search Engine Visibility
Case Report and a Cautionary Tale?
This is a repost of an old Case Study published in May 2014, entitled ‘Who Are You? Is your online identity crisis hurting your organic search visibility?” I often speak to small business owners about improving their online visibility, notably in local search results.
Does your website suffer from an identity crisis? In this post, a local antique store asked why their website was not performing well on Google searches.The antique shop website had four separate functions. I found a constantly rotating stock of consignment items that were not adequately described for search bots. Also, none of their informational pages were composed using key phrases or descriptions. Sometimes I am asked to take a look at older websites to determine how to improve sales, increase qualified leads, or position the company as an expert in whatever it is the proprietor does best.
Almost a decade ago, I was called by a prospect who explained his profession, qualified himself as an expert in his field, and asked whether I might be of assistance in stimulating online sales. We spoke for at least an hour. I took careful notes and perused his website during the conversation. I asked who managed the online store, and was told their “programmer” managed the database. The task as I comprehended it was to improve online sales.
Three Hours Later…
Three hours later my phone rang and the prospect’s wife gave me a new diatribe about what she expected from her website. She wanted people to give them consignments to sell in their store. More stuff to sell versus more online sales. I told her the plan I had detailed for her husband: that I would take a look at the content and improve the meta tags and other source code on their web pages. When I said “meta tags” I heard her hold the telephone out and yell across the room to her husband that she didn’t know what I was talking about.
So conversation number three begins and they now want me to be their webmaster. The site they wanted help with was not e-commerce enabled. Random items were rotated through the home page and an internal search engine accessed the inventory database. The online showroom and company story were melded together with trivia and unnecessary information. Now they were talking about overhauling the online store so every item would have its own page… for an inventory of 900 items. I offered to start with keyword and description improvements on important pages, then assess the results.
My Analysis and Recommendations
A month later after finally being given access to the web pages, I uncovered some messy code, some best-practice errors, and silly keyword and description choices. Repairs, tests, more tweaks and tests were made, and after carefully reading the active and defunct pages, this is what I discovered. The plain HTML pages revealed four separate identities and goals for this one company website: as a venue for
1. e-commerce sales for their vintage and collectible wares
2. asking for consignments for sale in the online and/or physical store
3. obtaining appraisals, particularly for estates
4. offering showroom floor or cabinet display space in the physical store
What I Changed
All page titles, keywords and phrases, and descriptions were tailored to the category or the information on each of the main pages. A sitemap was prepared and submitted to major search engines such as Google and Bing. I wrote a detailed report, mailed it to the company with my corrections with an invoice. They never paid me, they would not answer their phone when I called, and within a year they had closed their doors.
If you have an existing website, especially an extensive product catalog, decide how you want to frame your online identity. When your brand has a good reputation and your company longevity makes you known for more than one specialty, be sure to have a separate page for each specialty, and don’t be shy about editing the page source code titles, descriptions and keywords for each identity. Remember that your content is being read by humans, but indexed and given relevancy by search bots. There is no point in citing keywords in the source code that do not appear in the page content.
by nottmarketing | Aug 20, 2021 | Online Visibility, Search Engine Visibility
How is your company’s Online Health?
Why is an online self exam important for Connecticut business? If you have not taken a look at your business listings and search engine visibility in the past six months, set a few hours aside to evaluate your company’s online visibility. Imagine an outdated business description being found by prospective customers. Are your products or services up to date? Have you refined or added to your business services? Are contact details accurate? Is your address spelled correctly?
My first step in what I call the ‘discovery’ process prior to a new business consultation is to go to three major search engines and perform some due diligence. I review the sponsored links, I count all the links in which the business name might appear, I take stock of page density, peruse industry directories, look for directory listings, and how many other thriving websites where your name may appear.
In my work, I am solicited by international companies trying to sell me advertising, partner with me, and share website links in directories I have not yet heard of. Like many other very small companies, my own listings are the LAST ones I research. For many of the local small businesses I contract, I also look at what the competition might be using to get a leg up in the listings. If you have a lazy Sunday afternoon, do yourself a favor and see if your business listings are accurate and up-to-date.
Finding Yourself: The Online Self Exam is a Process
STEP ONE
Type in your company name in Google, Yahoo, Bing, AOL search. Follow all the links, notice how many listings appearing on each page, and how many pages in which you can find yourself. I strongly suggest claiming your Google Business Listing and keeping the business info current.
STEP TWO
Type in the industry or service + your local area, region, county or town (i.e. “northeastern connecticut”, “central massachusetts”, “new england”, “downtown Boston”). Will all your competitors appear before you? Do you show up at all? You may want to rewrite your website page titles or descriptions.
STEP THREE
Type in your website address (URL) in Google or any other major search engine service – then review all the links that appear. Are there any dead links, obsolete pages, incorrect entries? How many pages of links do you dominate? This morning I discovered an entry created for me in a website designer business directory. For the most part this listing was accurate, however the word “tiny” had been substituted for the word “small” in the phrase “small business website specialist”, making me a “tiny business website specialist. I found no photo, no logo, and a misspelled street name. My company profile was incomplete. Also missing were descriptions of services, and an opportunity to add nice details for a reciprocal link on my website. I claimed this ad and it is now being reviewed.
STEP FOUR
Look at the websites of your closest competition. Do the pages load in quickly? Are there any dead pages or graphics that fail to appear? How does your website performance measure up? Pay attention to the page titles displayed in the top of the browser on the competition versus your own website. If the competing websites are real class acts with current social media posts, you may need to rethink your online marketing plan.
Help is a Call Away
Search engines vary in the number of characters or words allowed in titles and descriptions in your web pages. Testing the copy in various analysis services is a must. Most research and discovery sessions to evaluate business/website visibility will take between three and six hours. Corrections to website copy must be published and tested. Often times, the findings require the client to roll up sleeves and claim free listings to update or correct on his own behalf. A client that expects a hands-off approach to his online presence is setting himself up for failure. The internet is 30 years old, and ignorance of computer operation can no longer excuse you. Consider hiring a third party to take appropriate action in commercial directories and/or social media resources. When your online self exam reveals you are effectively invisible online, give me a call. Office/Voicemail: 860-774-4467.
by nottmarketing | May 16, 2018 | Search Engine Visibility, Social Media
Get a jump start on website promotion when you utilize social media in a small business. Anyone with a Facebook account has been asked to participate in “likes”, “follows” and “comments” by vendors, service providers and blog sites. You feel you should be utilizing the new social technologies in your marketing efforts, but what do you do after opening your account?
Keeping it real on Facebook
Facebook has been described as the number-one time suck on the net. As a platform for families, extended families and friends, folks can be themselves, reveal their inner children, share the fun, and continue conversations. Facebook ‘friends’ were friends, the site was a neat place to meet, share the love, plan real get-togethers, and share pictures of vacation spots and the grandkids. Many offices have their staff wired to the internet, and many people keep their facebook page open all day!
The environment for the entrepreneur and business, though, is not casual and carefree, and commentary is not always friendly. A spontaneous comment or shared political post potentially opens your thread to everyone, including people who have little else to do than spew (ever see YouTube or Yahoo comments threads?) … there are haters, spammers and flamers lurking everywhere.
This summer I found an award-winning social media marketing training resource which outlined the basic tenets of today’s major social media sites. Though Facebook dominates (today), there are new sites opening up every few months. While you may have dismissed Facebook as a fad, know that it dominates the social sharing world (today), and thousands of companies are exploiting the site as a low-cost marketing medium.
If you are like me and other busy sole-proprietors, you may have experienced “paralysis by analysis”. If you have a company Facebook page, a LinkedIn profile and a list of existing clients, I can help you learn the basics, and together we can map out a long-range plan to monetize your efforts or attract new clientele. Existing clients will be billed at my prevailing website design rates and may contract my services on a monthly basis.
