Category: Website Content

The Role of Blogging in Your Business Strategy: How to Get Started

Beyond sharing thoughts and ideas, a well-executed blog can enhance brand visibility, establish authority, drive traffic, and foster customer engagement. Understanding the role of blogging and how to effectively get started is essential.

One of the primary benefits of maintaining a blog is improved visibility on search engines. By consistently publishing high-quality, keyword-optimized content, businesses can increase their chances of ranking higher in search engine results. This is crucial since a large percentage of online experiences begin with a search engine query. When potential customers find your blog posts, they are more likely to discover your products or services.

Establishing Authority and Expertise

Blogging allows businesses to showcase their knowledge and expertise in their respective industries. By providing valuable insights, tips, and information, companies can position themselves as thought leaders. This credibility can translate into trust among consumers, making them more likely to choose your brand over competitors.

Building Relationships with Customers

A blog creates a platform for dialogue between businesses and their customers. By inviting comments and encouraging discussions, companies can foster a sense of community. This engagement not only helps in understanding customer needs but also strengthens brand loyalty, as customers feel heard and valued.

Driving Traffic to Your Website

Every blog post is an opportunity to drive traffic to your website. By integrating links to relevant products or services within your posts, you can guide readers toward making a purchase or taking another desired action. Additionally, sharing blog content on social media platforms amplifies its reach, attracting more visitors to your site.

Supporting Your Overall Marketing Strategy

Blogging is a versatile tool that complements various marketing efforts. Whether it’s email marketing, social media, or content marketing, blog posts can be repurposed across multiple channels. Each post can serve as a foundation for newsletters, social media updates, or even video content, enhancing your overall marketing strategy.

Getting Started with Blogging

Starting a blog may seem daunting, but with a structured approach, it can be a rewarding endeavor. Here are essential steps to kick off your business blog.

Step 1: Define Your Goals

Before diving into content creation, clarify what you aim to achieve with your blog. Are you looking to increase brand awareness, generate leads, or establish authority in your field? Defining clear objectives will guide your content strategy and help measure success.

Step 2: Know Your Audience

Understanding your target audience is crucial for creating relevant content. Develop audience personas that outline their demographics, preferences, pain points, and interests. This information will inform your blog topics, tone, and style, ensuring you resonate with your readers.

Step 3: Choose a Blogging Platform

Selecting the right blogging platform is vital for ease of use and functionality. Popular options include WordPress, Blogger, and Medium, each offering unique features. Consider your technical skills, customization needs, and budget when making your choice.

Step 4: Develop a Content Strategy

A well-planned content strategy ensures consistency and relevance. Start by brainstorming topics that align with your audience’s interests and your business goals. Create an editorial calendar to schedule posts and maintain a steady flow of content. Aim for a mix of formats—how-to guides, industry news, opinion pieces, and case studies—to keep readers engaged.

Step 5: Promote Your Blog

Once you start publishing content, promoting your blog is essential to attract readers. Share your posts on social media platforms, engage in relevant online communities, and consider guest blogging on other sites to broaden your reach. Email marketing can also play a significant role in driving traffic, so don’t hesitate to include blog updates in your newsletters.

Step 6: Engage with Your Audience

Encouraging interaction is key to building a community around your blog. Respond to comments, ask questions at the end of your posts, and invite feedback. This engagement fosters a sense of belonging and encourages repeat visits.

Step 7: Measure and Adjust

Regularly analyze your blog’s performance to understand what works and what doesn’t. Tools like Google Analytics can provide insights into traffic sources, popular posts, and audience behavior. Use this data to refine your strategy, focusing on topics that resonate with your readers.

Incorporating a blog into your business strategy can yield significant benefits, from enhanced visibility and authority to stronger customer relationships. By understanding the importance of blogging and following a structured approach to get started, businesses can harness the power of content marketing to drive growth and success. Because consumers seek authenticity and connection, a well-executed blog can be the key to standing out and building a loyal customer base. Whether you’re a small startup or an established corporation, it’s time to embrace blogging as an integral part of your business strategy. Need more help with setup, copywriting, or hosting? Contact us today!

November 3, 2024
Understanding Hicks’s Law: Simplifying Decision-Making
In the realm of design and user experience, decision-making plays a crucial role in determining the success of a product or website. One principle that sheds light on this process is Hicks’s Law. By comprehending this law and its implications, designers and UX professionals can create more streamlined and efficient user interfaces. In this article, we will delve into the core concepts of Hicks’s Law and explore its practical applications.

What is Hicks’s Law? Hicks’s Law, also known as the Hick-Hyman Law, is a psychological principle that describes the relationship between the number of choices and the time it takes to make a decision. Named after British psychologist William Edmund Hick and American psychologist Ray Hyman, the law suggests that the time required to make a decision increases logarithmically with the number of available options.

The Principle in Action: To understand how Hicks’s Law operates, let’s consider a real-life example. Imagine you are at a restaurant and presented with an extensive menu featuring numerous dishes. In this scenario, making a decision becomes increasingly challenging as the number of choices grows. The more options there are, the longer it takes for you to select your desired meal.

Implications for Design: Hicks’s Law has significant implications for design, especially when it comes to creating intuitive and user-friendly interfaces. By minimizing the number of choices or steps required to complete a task, designers can enhance the user experience and encourage swift decision-making. Here are a few practical tips for applying Hicks’s Law in design:

Simplify User Interfaces: Reduce complexity by presenting users with a limited number of choices at any given time. By eliminating unnecessary options or steps, you can streamline the decision-making process and improve overall usability.

Categorize Information: Organize content into logical categories, making it easier for users to navigate and locate what they need. Grouping related items together reduces cognitive load and simplifies decision-making.

Prioritize Key Actions: Identify the most critical actions or choices users are likely to make and ensure they are easily accessible. By highlighting these key elements, designers can expedite decision-making and guide users towards desired outcomes.

Hicks’s Law serves as a valuable guideline for designers and UX professionals seeking to optimize decision-making in their creations. By understanding the relationship between the number of choices and decision time, one can implement strategies that enhance user experience and simplify the decision-making process. Incorporating the principles of Hicks’s Law into design practices can ultimately lead to more efficient and user-friendly interfaces.
June 7, 2023
How much content should a web page have?

In the ever-evolving world of search engine optimization (SEO), one question that often arises is: “How much content should a web page have?” It’s a crucial question, as the amount of content on a web page can greatly impact its visibility and rankings in search engine results pages (SERPs). In this article, we’ll delve into the topic and provide you with valuable insights on how to optimize your web page content for better rankings.

Understanding the Importance of Content Length

Content length plays a significant role in SEO because search engines strive to provide users with the most relevant and comprehensive information. While there is no one-size-fits-all answer to the question of how much content a web page should have, it’s essential to strike a balance between providing sufficient information and avoiding overwhelming your audience.

Quality over Quantity

While it’s tempting to think that longer content automatically equates to better rankings, search engines like Google have become increasingly sophisticated in their ability to assess content quality. Simply stuffing a web page with irrelevant or low-quality content won’t do you any favors in terms of SEO. Instead, it’s crucial to focus on creating high-quality, engaging, and valuable content that satisfies the needs of your target audience.

Consider the User Intent

To determine the optimal length for your web page content, it’s crucial to understand the user intent behind the search queries related to your topic. Different queries have different intents, such as informational, transactional, or navigational. By aligning your content with the user’s intent, you can provide the most relevant and valuable information, regardless of the word count.

Matching Competitor Efforts

Competitor analysis is an essential aspect of SEO, and it can help you determine the amount of content required to outrank other websites. Analyze the top-ranking pages for your target keywords and examine the length of their content. This analysis will provide insights into the content length that is deemed valuable and relevant by search engines for those specific queries.

Long-Form Content Benefits

While content length isn’t the sole determining factor for search engine rankings, long-form content often provides numerous benefits. Longer articles tend to offer more comprehensive coverage of a topic, giving you the opportunity to provide in-depth analysis, insights, and actionable information. Additionally, long-form content has a higher probability of attracting backlinks, social shares, and user engagement, all of which contribute to improved SEO performance.

Addressing User Questions and Concerns

One effective strategy for optimizing your web page content is to address common user questions and concerns. By anticipating and answering these queries, you can establish your website as an authoritative source of information. This approach not only enhances the user experience but also boosts your chances of ranking higher in search results. Incorporate relevant keywords naturally within your content to signal to search engines the relevance of your page.

Breaking Down Complex Topics

For complex topics that require a more extensive explanation, long-form content provides an ideal platform. By breaking down complex concepts into manageable sections, you can deliver a clear and comprehensive understanding to your audience. This approach helps build credibility and authority while ensuring that users stay engaged with your content for longer periods.

Structuring Content with Subheadings

When creating long-form content, it’s crucial to structure your text effectively. Utilize subheadings to break down your content into smaller, digestible sections. Not only do subheadings enhance readability and user experience, but they also signal to search engines the different topics covered within your page. Ensure your subheadings are keyword-rich, accurately reflecting the content beneath them.

While there is no definitive answer to how much content a web page should have, focusing on the quality, relevance, and value of your content is paramount. By understanding user intent, matching competitor efforts, and creating long-form content that addresses user questions and concerns, you can enhance your chances of outranking other websites in search engine results.

Remember to structure your content effectively with keyword-rich subheadings, incorporate visual elements and multimedia, optimize for mobile devices, and promote your content through various channels. Regularly updating and refreshing your content, measuring results, and adapting your strategies accordingly will ensure ongoing success in the competitive world of SEO.

May 17, 2023
How to create a WordPress blog post
Login to your WordPress Dashboard. Unless your web developer changed it, the dashboard will be found at: https://YOURDOMAIN.com/wp-admin/
(replace “YOURDOMAIN.com” with your sites web address)

Click the Posts link in the navigation menu.

Click the Add New button on the Posts page.

Enter a title in the available field. This will display on the top of your Post.

Enter your page content in the available field. You can use the Editor to format your text. You can also click the Add Media button to add images, audio, etc.

On the right side of your computer screen, you’ll see a column with content that changes depending on the tab you’ve clicked up top. Take a look now at the options under “Post” on the right menu.

How to create a WordPress blog post

With “Visibility“, you can click the word “Public” to choose other options such as “Private” or “Password Protected“. Marking a blog post “Private” will keep everyone, including the search engines, from seeing the post until you’re ready. By clicking on “Immediately” near the “Publish” option, you can choose a future or even passed date to make the post publish(ed) on. Choose the author’s name if different than your own in the case of multiple authors.

Below you’ll see the “Categories” option. You should always choose a post category here. You may create a new one by typing it into the available field or if a category is not assigned, the article will automatically be placed as “Uncategorized”.

Further down, click “Featured Image” to choose the image that should accompany the post. This image will be shown on your blog listings page and will also show when it is shared on social media. In order for this image to appear on Facebook, it should currently be at least be 1350 pixels wide. (always check the latest social channel requirements for best practices)

Once you have entered your information on the Post, click the preview link to see how it looks. You can save as a draft if you think it needs more work or click the Publish button. (Clicking the Save Draft button will save your work without publishing the Post publicly)

You are finished when you see a Post published message.

Did you decide you wanted to change something or delete the post altogether? These options are made available by hovering over the post title in the list of Posts – in the left-side menu of your WordPress website.
April 28, 2022
What’s An API? How does it work?
What is an API? In some ways, it’s not as complicated as you think but in other ways probably more complex than you might imagine. An API is an “application program interface” like a set of routines, protocols, and tools for building software applications. It directs software components on how to interact with one another. An API may be for a web-based system, operating system, database system, computer hardware, or software library.

Here’s a great analogy that was written by MuleSoft. “Imagine you’re sitting at a table in a restaurant with a menu of choices to order from. The kitchen is the part of the “system” that will prepare your order. What is missing is the critical link to communicate your order to the kitchen and deliver your food back to your table. That’s where the waiter or API comes in. The waiter is the messenger – or API – that takes your request or order and tells the kitchen – the system – what to do. Then the waiter delivers the response back to you; in this case, it is the food.”

So specifically… how can they help your website? The following list contains several examples of popular APIs that add a lot of valuable functionality and interactivity to a web page:

Twitter offers two APIs. The REST API allows developers to access core Twitter data and the Search API provides methods for developers to interact with Twitter Search and trends data.

Google‘s APIs lets developers integrate YouTube videos and functionality into websites or applications.

Google Maps APIs lets developers embed Google Maps on webpages. The Google Maps API is responsive and will work on mobile devices and desktop browsers.

The Flickr API is used by developers to access the Flick photo sharing community data.

Amazon‘s Product Advertising API gives developers access to Amazon’s product selection and discovery functionality to advertise Amazon products to monetize a website.

FedEx or USPS API returns the current shipping prices required to ship products purchased through an online shopping cart system.

If you’ve ever visited a website and received a message in your browser that the site is asking for your location, that website is attempting to use the geolocation API. APIs like this instruct the browser to access GPS or nearby Wi-Fi networks to find your current physical location.

If you’ve ever wanted to capture photos or video from an iPhone’s camera, you wouldn’t have to write your own camera interface. You would simply use the camera API to embed the iPhone’s built-in camera in your app. If APIs like this didn’t exist already, app developers would have to create their own camera software and interpret the camera hardware’s inputs themselves. But Apple’s developers have done the work so that the developers can use the camera API to embed a camera, and then get on with building their app. Best of all, when a developer improves their API, all the apps that rely on it will get the same improvements automatically.

This simplicity and ease of use offered to developers who take advantage of APIs apply to every platform. For example, if you want to create a dialog box on Windows, there’s an API for that. If you want to support fingerprint authentication on an app for Android there’s an API for that, too. APIs allow developers to make greater strides when building unique content or applications because they don’t have to spend a lot of time reinventing the wheel over and over but use the appropriate API to accomplish previously defined functionalities.

If you’d like help installing and integrating an API into your website, contact us. We’d be happy to lend a hand!
May 16, 2019
Is your negative copy sending people away?

How can you tell if your negative copy is sending visitors away?
When people come to me for advice regarding their website’s negative copy, their concerns are usually with how the search engines interpret what their text says in order to ensure proper ranking. If you think about it, Google’s AI is built to emulate humanity as closely as possible. So how can you use that same power of speech to ensure a positive outcome in business? There’s no denying that speech has a power that most of us have felt sometime in our lives. If you’ve ever read a story that moved you emotionally, or if you’ve sung along to a song with lyrics that evoked heartfelt memories, you know what I mean. Of course, the power of speech isn’t limited to fiction novels or top ten hits… it’s also an integral part of doing business both on and offline. Sounds like something straight from the mouth of Captain Obvious, but the implications aren’t just regarding the use of persuasion in advertising.
In the ongoing pursuit of the perfect way to properly describe product or service benefits, many advertisers like to employ an additional sense of “urgency”.
Urgency is often born from negativity which statistically, does garner more immediate attention and consideration when used for the tone of a headline (like the one on this post for example), however, copy that is written for more wide-spread and general use should convey a POSITIVE attitude.
In today’s hustle-bustle world, people are continually bombarded with bad news from the television, social media channels, and even their cell phone notifications. Time is money which adds even more stress to the situation causing a downward spiral that begs to be altered. The good news is, it’s easy for anyone to change things around! You don’t have to be a psychiatrist or a cheerleader and selling your building in trade for a cotton candy factory is not required. Just small tweaks to your normal correspondences and the copy that you use for your business will add a lot of shine to your approach.
In a nutshell, instead of identifying and pointing out the problem, concentrate on what can be done to solve it. Here’s an example:
A.) “Filing taxes can be a huge burden of confusion and anxiety with problems you may not anticipate. Call us for help.”
or
B.) “We’ll take care of all the details and quickly get you the tax return you deserve. Call now!”
Which of the above is more appealing? Which organization or professional would you rather contact? Although there may be instances when a negative situation has to be addressed, choosing positive language will always be the most effective way to ensure the best engagement. Discuss not only your positive outlook on solutions but also how your solutions have improved things for others in the past. Talk more about your reader and less about your self.
A great way to check out new copy can be to measure the ratio of negative terms that are included in your articles. Words like never, cannot, won’t, are the kind that should be kept to a minimum. Negative phrasing can carry a tone of blame or stress negative consequences. More positive phrasing will talk about what can be done and will offer alternatives. It’s more encouraging than bureaucratic and makes a better impression on others. There are many alternatives to negative words and phrases and rewriting copy to use them is always the best way to start. Try to focus on what’s possible to keep your reader from feeling a negative connotation. Even a neutral tone can be interpreted as negative by the reader because it can come across as too cold.
It’s good to remember that our tone of voice cannot be conveyed in print and instead, we set the tone with our choice of phrasing and verbiage.
Try your best to avoid words like – delay, difficult, doubt, error, or fail.
Choose words like – benefit, bonus, bright, easy, or effective.
Positive copy creates a positive environment that works to foster positive results!

August 16, 2018
How To Know If You Need A New Website
Every website owner comes to realize pretty quickly that truly, a website is never complete.
You can think of different improvements constantly whether they be code or design related. A website is an ever evolving conglomeration that grows with your business needs and digital technology every day. The use of mobile devices has greatly impacted the need for a proper design online.
Aside from personal preference, when do you really need to replace your website? A completely new build may not be necessary. Fortunately, sites built on what is called a “content management system” which use a database like WordPress or Joomla can most times get by with a new template integration. A new template installation and formatting would leave the current content intact while changing the appearance, element arrangements, and enhancing functionality.
Here are a few reasons to consider an overhaul or new build:
Your site is not responsive to mobile devices – 60% of your visitors are now showing up on something other than a desktop computer. Your site needs to do more than just shrink really tiny. It should have an alternative layout that is optimized for mobile viewers.
Your code is deprecated – While a website written in an expired coding language version might still look okay to the eye, search engines will not rank these dinosaurs since too many of the newer viewing devices are not able to utilize them correctly. If your code has been compromised by hackers, your site can be cleaned or rebuilt and replaced.
No call to action – If your website doesn’t tell the visitor who you are and what you want from them on the top section of the front page, you need a redesign. Again… the popularity of mobile devices have done away with long-winded explanations and stories. You need to make your point fast from the first page load. Contact information should always be included there as well.
Too much text or whitespace – Nobody wants to have to read war and peace on their cell phone. Visitors who have to scroll through huge sections of text or whitespaces will become frustrated and will likely, click away. Keep your sections tight and make your margins responsive using percentages instead of hardcoded spacing. Use collapsible sections or excerpts with links to more information.
You’re not getting a return – If your website design is not accomplishing what you built it for, of course, you might consider a new build. Consider the possibility that your current site could be optimized for better search engine optimization or visitor flow as well. A/B testing can be used to determine the best path to guide the viewer through from arrival to purchase or contact.
If your site has any of the problems listed above or you just want something more beautiful, functional or competitive for the new year, contact me. I’ll be happy to work with you toward achieving your online goals and would love to surpass your expectations.
Best,
Eliyahna
December 17, 2017
How To Lower Your Websites Bounce Rate
If you need bounce rate reduction, go back to basics.
Try to re-evaluate to get bounce rate reduction… what do you want your visitors to do?
Space can be an expensive commodity, especially online. Viewing screens get smaller every year and no one wants to read “war & peace” before they can buy or try your products or services. There is some psychology to color use and element placements for greater bounce rate reduction… but without getting in too deep, here are a few easy tips to help you keep it together!
Use accordions for grouped lists. Set them to “closed” until someone clicks on the title of the section they really need to see. This can be a great way to hide huge gobs of information that may be entirely relevant but not always necessary. The visitors who have come to find the information will still get what they came for and much faster since they won’t have to wade through multiple volumes of other data to find it.
List your options with bullet points that are linked to their own respective product or service description pages. This is always a great way to highlight information of interest and creates a bounce rate reduction by
assisting the viewer in finding the particular subject they’re searching for
much faster
Especially with multiple products
and service options.
If you’re using forms to interact with your visitors, try conditional fields. Conditional fields stay hidden until they’re needed and help to save a lot of room by not displaying options that are irrelevant to the user. Sometimes a very large form with too many optional fields gives the impression that it will take “too much time” to get through it. Keeping the optional fields hidden until necessary is a great way to accommodate users that might send you correspondences for a multitude of different reasons without forcing them to evaluate pages of unnecessary form fields.
Use descriptive titles and subtitles to organize your data so that if you do need to present a lengthy bit of text, it can still be skimmed through effectively if someone’s in a hurry. Kind of like the way we made our bulleted topics in bold text on this article. You can quickly skim through to get the gist, or you can linger and read more about each topic in greater detail… either way, the user should come away with something applicable.
Utilize submenus to offer more information as an option on central topics of interest. Again, submenus can be used to further refine the subject relevancy to specific requirements freeing the viewer from wading through too much useless data. You’ve most likely already begun using your site’s menu system to organize things and manipulate traffic flow. Keep this technique in mind when parsing your copy for visual digestion.
Embed small descriptive paragraphs in a bold font and/or images into your articles periodically to convey key concepts and break up long text areas. You can really get bored fast with all text. Especially when it’s all the same size, color and without any inflection or alteration. Too much of that will send readers running for the search engines.
Eliminate or rearrange extraneous text on smaller screen sizes while allowing larger resolutions to retain full sized elements. Google’s new algorithm is checking for mobile device load time. 60% of viewers show up on a mobile device. There’s no way around it. You must accommodate them in order to reduce your website’s bounce rate effectively.
Provide pdf files or ebooks with full-text pages as instant downloads in exchange for an email address. This will give you an extra option for future contact or information exchanges.
Use videos – but only as an option. Those visitors whose devices that don’t support videos or for visitors who don’t have the privacy to play your videos out loud will still want a viewing or download link. A lot of people have even begun providing video libraries. Organized by topic with a thumbnail and excerpt description is a wonderful way to showcase this kind of catalog.

Get to the point. What do you want from your visitor? What do you want them to know, buy or try? Explain your mission or offer in plain language right away without a lot of irrelevant images or sections of text that only add confusion. Keep your objective clear and concise and don’t be afraid to strip out all the fluff.
Keeping these tips in mind should keep your mobile visitors happy to use your page and should also help you to better meet your bounce rate reduction objectives with your visitors.
Best Success!
November 29, 2016
Conversion Optimization and How To Achieve it

So you have a beautiful website that’s responsive to mobile devices with a great sales funnel in place to successfully convert all of your traffic to potential clientele… what next?
Is it still possible to improve your website’s customer conversion rate?
First, determine your site’s existing customer conversion rate. This is the total number of leads generated from your website divided by the number of visitors over a certain period of time. For example, if you have 100 visitors per day and 2 of those fill out your form, that is a conversion rate of 2%.
Conversion optimization can be achieved by tweaking many aspects of your site or sales funnel that many site owners aren’t aware of. For example, if the contact form that you’re using to collect visitor information features a submit button that says “Submit”, that button will get fewer clicks than a button that says something like “Sign Up Now”, “Learn More” or “Get More Info”.
Studies have also shown that red buttons are clicked more often than green buttons. Colors, language, font choices and even the shape of the page elements can have a direct impact on conversion numbers.
Because too many choices can work to scatter your visitor’s attention, sometimes taking things away can improve your numbers more than adding new or different content. Removing the navigation bar from your landing page for example, can work to increase your conversion percentages right away by simply narrowing the clicking options down. Remove unnecessary images that take up valuable real-estate above your contact form. Remove images that are obviously “stock” images that do little to add aesthetics but draw attention away from the form.
Be sure to include a clear bold headline with a short paragraph of copy. A subheading with some bold elements thrown in to draw attention to and confirm key features might not look as clean but it can actually increase your conversion by up to 35%.
Arrange your landing page copy and key phrases to match the ad that directed the viewer to this page. Something like “You’ve Arrived!” or “Now for step 2” will also increase conversion.
Videos are a wonderful addition to your sales funnel pages to impart information in a slightly more interactive way, however, placement is paramount. A landing page with the video all the way at the bottom and the signup form all the way at the top of the page will win out over one that is vice versa every time. The objective should be to minimize elements that will draw the user’s attention away from the form or push them down to the bottom of the page.
There are many more tricks to increasing customer conversion optimization on your site besides increasing traffic. If you need help optimizing your sales funnel to increase your customer conversion rates, contact us today!

March 25, 2016