Why You Need Good Product Descriptions

There is a lot of talk about SEO these days. Everyone is trying to get to the top of the search results on Google and other sites using targeted keywords. The idea behind this is that if certain keywords and phrases are entered in a search engine then, if you optimize around these keywords, you will have a higher search engine ranking. This works well for many companies, but what about an online retailer that offers many different, and possibly unique products? Optimizing for one or two keyword phrases may exclude the majority of your products.

There are a few things you can do that can actually help bring in more customers and help them find your products. If you are familiar with SEO, you may have heard of a term called “Long Tail.” This refers to longer search phrases, more than 3 or 4 words that people are searching for when they are searching for something very specific. For example, let's say someone is looking for a new pair of jeans. Your potential customer already knows the style, the color, the fit, the brand, and maybe they are looking for a sale or discount, so instead of typing in blue jeans, maybe they would type in “30 32 Levis 501 blue sale.” It would be silly to optimize your whole website around this one phrase, but by having well-written product descriptions for each of your products, your website will contain the phrases that people are searching for when they are looking for something very specific.

HIT Web Design can help you write product descriptions for you products. We also offer SEO URLs where each of your individual products has part of the product description right in the URL. With good product descriptions and SEO URLS, you will increase the chance that someone will find your site and buy your products.

For more information, please visit http://www.hitwebdesign.com or call 1-866-211-0743.

What is Meta Data?

You may have heard of meta data or you may have not—but it is one of the most important aspects of your site when it comes to how search engines find and rank your site. Meta data is information about your website, or more precisely each of the web pages on your site, that is not part of the main body of the text. Meta data works behind the scenes to tell web crawlers and the search engines what your site is about, and because of this it is important for it to contain keywords to help your sites Search Engine Optimization.

The three main elements of meta data are the Page Title, Page Description, and Keywords.

Page Title
This is the most important piece of meta data and should be keyword phrases that accurately describe what your site is about, and a phrase that people are searching for. The Page title appears at the top of each of your web pages.

Page Description
The page description tells in only a few sentences what your website is about. It is important to use keywords here as well, while accurately and concisely describing your website. This is the information that appears when you do a search on a search engine under the results.

Keywords
Due to abuse, the keywords meta data is not as important as it once was when determining a websites search engine ranking. However, it is still used and listing keywords here can be of some benefit to your site.

HIT Web Design writers can help you find the keywords and write content for your site that can help improve your sites search engine rankings.

For more information, please visit http://www.hitwebdesign.com or call 1-866-211-0743.

Link Baiting

Links are a very important part to Search Engine Optimization (SEO). There are many ways you can get people to link to your site, but perhaps the best way is to provide compelling content that people will want to link to on their own. It takes a little work to get the initial interest in your site or blog, but once you have regular traffic on your website or blog the more compelling content you have the more likely you will be able to get others to link to you.

One thing you can do is create blog posts or have a page on your website that contains content like a how to article, or a “Top Ten” list such as “Ten Reasons to Not Buy a....” Content written from the point of view of an expert giving tips and advice is a great way to get people to want to link to your content.

Another thing you could write about would be a well-thought-out argument on a controversial topic. The idea is to get people talking about what you write about and make them want to share it with others. You want to create conversation about your blog post or website content so more and more people will link to it. The more people you get to link to your blog or your website, the more it helps your search engine ranking.

For more information, please visit http://www.hitwebdesign.com or call 1-866-211-0743.

Utilizing Internet Directories

So you have a new site and you want to help people to find it. Internet directories are a great way to help generate links to your site as well as help search engines find your site easier.

Good PR
There are two kinds of Internet directories, ones that are human-edited and ones that are automated. Human-edited directories have a higher Google Page Rank (PR) and create better quality links to your website which can help increase your own sites PR. Having a good PR will help increase your search engine ranking. Automated directories tend to not have as good a PR. When choosing what Internet directories to submit your site to, make sure they have good PR.

There are free Internet directories as well as paid directories. Make sure you check out each one carefully, and remember more is not always better. The directories you choose to submit your site to need to be able to create quality links to your site. Paid directories can range in price from $30 to more than $80. The links they create can increase your sites Search Engine Optimization (SEO).

For more information, please visit http://www.hitwebdesign.com or call 1-866-211-0743.

Copyright and the Internet

There seems to be a lot of confusions about copyright and the Internet. Copyright law itself is complicated, but with the Internet, where so many different me forms of media come together, the situation becomes even more complicated.

To help avoid problems with copyright, there are several things you should be aware of:

Just because a site does not have a copyright symbol (©) on the bottom of the page does not mean the information on the site is not copyrighted. In fact, just about everything on the Internet is copyrighted. Text, pictures, even the design of a site are considered copyrighted. Do not copy and paste text from other sites, or use pictures from other sites, because doing so can make you subject to a potential lawsuit and fines.

Make sure you have permission before you use anything from other sites or sources. Even Wikipedia has restrictions about using the text from their site.

The safest way to make sure you are protected is to create your own text and use your own pictures. This not only protects you from any copyright issues, it also gives you unique content for your site that can be targeted specifically to your customer base.

For more information, please visit http://www.hitwebdesign.com or call 1-866-211-0743.

Website Search Bar Navigation

Website navigation and usability are important aspects of web design. Traditionally, websites have buttons and links for navigation. This may require visitors to your site to read a lot of information on your site to find what they are looking for. Adding a search bar to help navigate your site will not only help people find what they are looking for more quickly, it will also help you know what they are looking for.

We all know that most people will not spend too much time on your site if they can not find what they are looking for. The search bar will allow them to do a quick search for the information they are looking for on your site, in the same way a search engines like Google may have brought them to your site in the first place. This means you will need to have well-written text on your site using keywords that accurately describe your services or products.

Also, by adding search bar navigation on your site through HIT Search, you will be able to gather information about what people are searching for on your site. If several people are searching for a product that you do not carry, maybe it is time to start carrying that product. If they are searching for an informational topic on your site, maybe it is time to update or add to the content on your site. Knowing what they are searching for can help you customize your sites content to your customers.

For more information, please visit http://www.hitwebdesign.com or call 1-866-211-0743.

Blogs a Powerful Tool for Improving SEO

Blogs can be a great way to update your site with relevant information, provide more text for search engines to use when ranking your site, and increase the likelihood that others will link to your site and increase your rankings.

When undertaking a blog, the important thing to remember is consistency. Starting a blog can be a fruitless endeavor if you are not committed to maintaining it and posting regular new quality content.

SEO blogger Lee Odden lists several reasons why a blog can become ineffective. He says that sooner or later, the dynamo for staying focused on a blog can fizzle, resulting in less time spent on improving a blog's visibility and effectiveness as an SEO generator. The antidote: time and effort. This may be difficult, but the results of providing a frequently updated, well-written blog can be worth the effort.

“That's all well and nice,” you might say, “but what am I supposed to write?”

Seopher.com's Steven York offers some tips about the purpose behind blogs. He says they should engage readers, providing content they can use—not just a mundane record of internal business developments. Use it to offer information and advice about different aspects of your industry, he advises, and people will begin to think of you—and your business—as an expert in the field.

For more information, please visit http://www.hitwebdesign.com or call 1-866-211-0743.

Right Keywords Will Set Your Website Apart

When someone begins searching for products and services in your industry, it only makes sense that they should find your website. That's why creating text that revolves around the “key” search words people type into search engines is essential in bring traffic to your site.

But that's easier said than done. In fact, a whole industry has arisen around this technique of Search Engine Optimization (SEO). Here are some things to remember when optimizing your text for better search-engine ranking:

• Before you create text for your site, research what words people are using in search engines to find similar products and services as yours. There are many tools for this, including using free reports from Google and other sources, as well as utilizing website tracking tools and paid SEO keyword databases.
• Keywords can range from very broad to very specific, and each has its advantages.
• A broad keyword is one that describes a general aspect of your business or service, like the word “bathroom” would be to someone who remodels bathrooms. The advantage is that because it is such a generalized word, a large base of people will use it in searches, potentially bringing more to your site.
• A specific or targeted keyword appeals to people searching for something specific. So, if someone specifically refinishes bathtubs and showers, then refining your keyword to “bathroom and bathtub refinishing” would correlate with people who are looking for that service specifically. Though fewer people will be as specific in their searches, the advantage is that they are more likely to purchase the service or product when they find it.

For more information, please visit http://www.hitwebdesign.com or call 1-866-211-0743.

The Call to Action

Have you ever shopped at a retail store that didn’t have someone working behind a cash register? Of course not! In most stores, cash registers are easy to find. They have a light with a number on it, a sign that says check out or pay here, or some other way of letting you know where you can trade your money for a service or product.

Most websites are selling a product or service—not all of them have a store page. Each page on the website should have a purpose (usually selling something).

The “purpose” for each page can also be called the call to action. Placing a call to action on each page gives the website’s customer a place to trade their money for a service or a product. The call to action may be “give us a call to find out more information!” It might be “To sign up for an appointment, please fill out the form below.” You may be trying to get the potential customer from the home page to the services page. No matter what the call is, you should work it in to every page of text. If there is no call to action on the page, then why even have the page on the website?

In many cases, a call to action is associated with contact information. Because of this, you probably want to include contact information in a visible spot on the page, not buried beneath (or mixed with) a lot of text.

For more information, please visit http://www.hitwebdesign.com or call 1-866-211-0743.

Tips for Creating SEO Friendly (and Visitor Friendly) Content

Remember that site visitors want text that is easy to read. Adding too many keywords and/or hiding keywords on your site (keyword spamming) are not acceptable practices.

Once you have written your content, you will want to create a page title for each page. A well-written page title will help your Search Engine Optimization. Your page title should have 5-6 keywords and include a keyword phrase.

You want to create a page title that is visitor friendly. In addition to great content and a page title, you can add a site map and a blog (with well-written, informative blog articles). Site maps and blogs can help bring people to your site and increase your natural search rankings.

Before you begin optimizing your site, make sure you’ve spent time educating yourself.

For more information, please visit http://www.hitwebdesign.com or call 1-866-211-0743.

Keywords and How They Effect Your Website Traffic

In SEO, content is king. Google’s Search Engine Optimization Starter Guide says, “Creating compelling and useful content will likely influence your website more than any of the other factors discussed here. Users know good content when they see it and will likely want to direct other users to it. This could be through blog posts, social media services, email, forums, or other means. Organic or word-of-mouth buzz is what helps build your site's reputation with both users and Google, and it rarely comes without quality content.”

Your quality content should have enough keywords to benefit your search engine ranking without annoying your customers.

What is a keyword, exactly? A keyword or key phrase is the word or group of words that your potential customer enters into a search engine.

Do your research and see what keywords and phrases your potential customers are using. You can then add these keywords to your text. The more specific your keywords are, the better. For example, if you are an auto dealership, you would want to use a phrase like “black 2008 Mazda CX7” rather than “Mazda” or “new vehicle.”

For more information, please visit http://www.hitwebdesign.com or call 1-866-211-0743.

What is SEO?

Building your web site is only the first step in having a successful online business.

Once your website is up and running, you need to do something to get people to it. SEO, or Search Engine Optimization, encompasses several ideas that, when implemented, can increase your natural search engine rankings.

It can be a big challenge. After all, you may be competing against companies that spend tens of thousands of dollars a month on Search Engine Optimization.

Fortunately there are things that you can do, at very little or no cost, to optimize your site.

When you are considering Search Engine Optimization and your website, you need to think of every page of your site. Some website owners spend a lot of time and energy optimizing their home pages but neglect optimizing the other pages of their site. For each page of your website you should include, as a minimum, excellent keyword-enriched content and a page title.

For more information, please visit http://www.hitwebdesign.com or call 1-866-211-0743.

Increase The Chance Your Email Is Read

When it comes to emails most people will only scan the email for a few seconds before deciding if they will delete it or want to read more. There are a few things you can do to help make sure your email is more effective and more likely to be read.

The subject line may be the most important part of the email, make sure you think of a good subject line while avoiding words and phrases such as “Free...” that would likely be determined to be spam.

Send your emails during business hours and not over the weekend. More people check their email during the work week.

Make sure it is easy to tell who the email is from, put your company name where it is easily seen or in the subject line.

Use meaningful headings for multiple paragraphs in your email. Make sure they accurately describe the content and generate interest. When scanning the email this may be all the recipient looks at.

Try to keep the email short. If it is too long then it may never be read at all.

For more information, please visit http://www.hitwebdesign.com or call 1-866-211-0743.

Email Marketing: Avoiding Spam Filters

Any email can be determined to be spam by email spam filters and automatically sent to the junk folder. So how can you make sure your email makes it to your customers inbox? The best way is to understand how spam filters work.

The best way to avoid spam filters is to avoid phrases that are often associated with spam. Spam filters look for phrases including words like, Cash, Free, and Click Here. There are several common spam phrases that we always see when we happen to check our email junk folder. Make sure you limit or eliminate these phrases from your email and never use them in the subject line. Spam filters also look for emails in all caps, and multiple !!!, never do this in your emails, it will not only never get read it is also considered poor etiquette.

Here are a few other things to avoid when sending emails, sending e-mails that are only images, sending HTML emails with poor coding, and using bright colored fonts. These are also characteristics of spam emails and will often end up being sent directly to the junk folder.

For more information, please visit http://www.hitwebdesign.com or call 1-866-211-0743.

What Makes an Effective Email Subject Line?

If your subject line is too good to be true, the email probably won’t be opened. Subject lines like “Sign up today for a free website!” or “Earn $100 per hour!” may have worked 10 years ago, but they don’t work today. If you want your subject line to be exciting, it’s all about word choice—forget the exclamation point! Exclamation point = delete me now because this offer is too good to be true!

Does the email text match the subject line? To help avoid subject lines that have nothing to do with the email, write the body of the email first and the subject line last. You will want to write three or four subject lines to use as you test and fine-tune your email campaigns. Let us know what subject lines work for you.

You also want to make sure that the body of your email is related to your landing page. You should have a link in the email that directs customers to your website where they can make a purchase.

For more information, please visit http://www.hitwebdesign.com or call 1-866-211-0743.

The Importance of a Good Subject Line

Your subject line can be the key to success (or lack of success) in your email campaign. Your subject line should be to the point. Subject lines should be 40 characters or less. Include your company’s name in the subject line so that the email recipient knows who the email is coming from.

People are bombarded with specials and discounts offered in a subject line. Most often, “discounts” and “great deals” are considered as spam—that is how your email will most likely be treated if you choose to be too “salesy.” This is especially true if your customers opt in for a newsletter. If they sign up for specials and promotions only, then you can be more creative with your subject lines. Do split testing to see what results you get.

For more information, please visit http://www.hitwebdesign.com or call 1-866-211-0743.

Keeping Products Related When Cross-Selling and Up-Selling

Cross-selling and up-selling are great ways to promote the products in your online store, giving your visitors a wider selection of items to choose from and possibly making you more money.

When attempting to cross-sell and up-sell, make sure that the products you are promoting are in some way related to what your visitor is looking for. When your visitor searches for a particular item you gain valuable knowledge as to what interests that person has and need to use that to your benefit.

It does no good to promote ballet shoes when your visitor is searching for golf clubs. You want to promote other items that the client would be interested in, such as golf balls, bags, tees, or apparel.

If you bombard your visitors with a myriad of products that are not relevant to what they are searching for, your visitors are more likely to ignore your suggestions and not notice a product that they could potentially be interested in.

Cross-selling and up-selling are integral parts of creating a successful online store. Making sure the products you promote to your visitors are related to what they are searching for will increase your bottom line and keep your visitors coming back.

Ask about HIT's Recommended Products Module and how you can take advantage of cross-selling and up-selling on your website.

For more information, please visit http://www.hitwebdesign.com or call 1-866-211-0743.

More Common Site Design Mistakes and How To Avoid Them

You’ve spent a lot of time designing your site and marketing it. It is hard work to market your site and has probably cost you a lot of time and a lot of money. You are getting visitors now – and no one stays to see what you have to offer/sell/say. There are a lot of reasons this might be so but today I want to go into a common mistake that costs people a lot of visitors – slow loading pages. The number one reason people get annoyed and leave a page is because it takes forever to load. Making them wait for graphics isn’t going to wow them; it is going to irritate them.

Graphics aren’t the only thing that can cause your site to load slowly though, and are also not the only thing that can annoy your visitors to the point where they want to leave. Slow loading and distracting flash banners and entry pages, music that you force them to listen to and slow loading java scripts are all killers and will turn your viewers/buyers away quickly. Unfortunately we have social networking sites these days like MySpace that have made these kinds of things popular – believe me there is a world of difference between a MySpace page and a page you are using for commercial purposes. Under no circumstances should you use annoying animated gifs or bright and flashing Flash banners – nothing screams out “leave here immediately” more.

Don’t mistake me, MySpace can be a great tool and can be a form of marketing for you in itself. You can and should make a MySpace page to network and promote your regular website. I would have it designed so it matches the look of your webpage, but don’t base your website design on the design of a MySpace page! Looking through MySpace pages you can see in any five pages pretty much every violation of good website design. Why spend all that time and money to get people to your site so you can then hold them captive and make them watch something that you think is great but they may or may not is interesting. Just let people get on to the business of buying something from you. Make it easy for your customers to spend money with you.

For more information, please visit http://www.hitwebdesign.com or call 1-866-211-0743.

Avoiding Common Mistakes in Marketing Your Website

Today’s topic is something that I’ve been thinking about for a while. Looking around the web at different professional sites and keeping track of trends is sometimes a full time job in itself. I’ve seen a lot of sites out there and many different approaches to marketing them. One thing I see over and over that makes me want to leave a site immediately is obvious misspellings. Nothing turns me off faster and makes me trust someone less. Why would I trust someone to perform a service for me or sell me a product if they can’t even take the time to spell check their website content?

Grammar and punctuation mistakes can be forgiven. Much of the time I don’t even notice them until or unless I’ve read the material several times. However, misspelled words stick out like a sore thumb. They are distracting and unprofessional. Whenever I see them I think to myself how sad it is that the person doesn’t care enough about their reputation or their customers returning to take the time out to use spell check.

Use a spell check in your word process program, hire a professional writer or just take your time and check each word, but whatever you do, avoid misspelled words on your site. There is absolutely no faster way to turn your customers away from you than to have blatant misspellings. At least let someone else look at the text you’ve written and proof read it for you. There’s absolutely no way you can build credibility and a reputation for reliability unless you show you’re willing to go to the work of making sure the text on your site is correct. After all, if you go to a site and the first thing you see is “Welcom too are websid” believe me it says worlds about the care you’ve taken and what a customer can expect from you. Leaving a detail like that unfixed can make someone believe you are trying to run a scam or rip them off. HIT Web Design employs a staff of full time writers who do nothing but spell check our customer’s content and our own website content as well. This is the least I can recommend to someone wishing to look and sound professional to their customers and site viewers.

For more information, please visit http://www.hitwebdesign.com or call 1-866-211-0743.

Products and a Call to Action Make a Complete Landing Page

Short and to The Point

Your site is a way to market your business or products, but too much text on your home page may turn off a visitor to your website before they even know what you have to offer. Most people only scan the text trying to find what they are looking for.

Keep your audience in mind when you choose the text for your home page. Sure you want to tell them everything about your amazing products or services but you need to capture their interest first. Save the detailed information for other pages. Use keywords and focus on one or two products or services that will pique your visitors interest and encourage them to want to learn more.

Once you have caught their attention the next step is to tell them what to do. Having a call to action is essential for your home page. Asking a visitor to your site to do something will increase your sites effectiveness, even if it is something as simple as going to your service page or store.

For more information, please visit http://www.hitwebdesign.com or call 1-866-211-0743.