5 Steps to a Great Website
Forbes outlined 5 steps to consider in order to effectively plan out your business’s website.
1. How will you get people to your website? More specifically, what marketing techniques will you be using to attract your target audience? Is it search engine optimization? Pay-per-click advertising? Social media? PR? This step is very important, as it often answers many of the questions below. Tip: Calculate which marketing technique works best for your site, by figuring out which has the lowest cost-per-acquisition (how much you spent on getting a customer).
2. Who will be coming to the site? Your website needs to take all kinds of visitors by the hand and help them find what they are looking for. Within a few seconds of getting to your site, a visitor needs to know what to do next. Do they need to sign up? Should they click a link to learn more? Once you determine what visitors are coming, you’ll be able to determine what they need to do once they get there. Tip: Don’t try to please everyone, but have your site clearly laid out to direct visitors wherever they need to go. If you do too much your website will become busy and difficult to navigate. Focus on a few key features that majority of your visitors will benefit from.
3. What questions will my visitors have? Am I at the right place? How long have you been in business? Can I afford you? How do I know your product or service is any good? How can I learn more about your services and company? How do I contact you? Tip: Try to answer the questions before they are asked. For example, if your visitors come to purchase a specific product that you’re well-known for in the industry, have that product easily located so they know they’re in the right place and can access product details right away. Clear, short messages work great.
4. What do you want your visitors to do? Should they pick up the phone and call you? E-mail? Sign up for something? Buy your product online? A great website will guide your traffic where you want them to end up. If you’re selling a product, convince the visitors to buy and make it easy for them to do so. If you offer a service, let them know how and why they can benefit from it. Tip: Be clear and concise. Don’t make visitors think.
5. How do my visitors like to stay in touch? Keep in mind, that most people who come to your website won’t become a customer. In fact, the average conversion rate on the Internet is around one percent, meaning only 1 out of 100 visitors will end up contacting you, signing up, or buying something. Find out what forms of communication your visitors prefer and give them the means to stay connected: e-mail, a blog, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Google+, RSS Feeds, and more. Tip: Engaging your customers is important, as most people don’t convert on the first visit. Keep them coming back by identifying your target visitor and catering to the market that best reaches them. If they’re entry-level professionals and they’re constantly engaging in social media, have a social media presence and actively provide them reasons to return to your site. By engaging visitors you’ll give them incentive to return, convert, and hopefully invite their network to do the same.
The Experts At Appletree Mediaworks Know How To Get Your Company Off On The Right Foot.
Monitoring Your Brand Online
No matter how big or small your company, monitoring your brand online is an essential task that must be done on a regular basis. With the prevalence of social media, it’s far too easy for one person’s bad experience to go viral. Watching for and correcting these issues is the only way to ensure your brand remains in a positive light.
There are many tools out there to assist you with monitoring your brand, and most of them are free.
The easiest tool to use is Google. You can set up a Google Alert (sent right to your email) that searches regularly for whatever you want – in this case, your best bet would be your brand name. You can also refine it to just send you news, video, discussions, blogs, etc.
Another great tool is Twitter – using the Twitter search, you can monitor your name, your company’s name, or even your competitors, and have the results fed into an RSS reader for your convenience. And since Twitter posts are so rapid, you may want to use TweetDeck or HootSuite to keep a closer eye on things.
While not free, Trackur is an excellent tool for small business to keep tabs on social media. You can “monitor your reputation, your news mentions, your PR campaigns, your employees, or your competition. Trackur’s social media monitoring tools are easy to use, yet offer a surprising number of features.” With plans starting at just $27 a month, any small business can easily afford to sign up.
If your business is booming and you’ve got a little more to spend, try out UberVu. Their dashboard monitors and analyzes mentions on Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, YouTube, and more. You can also perform a “sentiment analysis” to find out what the general feeling is towards your brand, and you can even use UberVu to compare your brand to your competitors.
These are just a few tools that are available for monitoring your brand online – more in-depth research may uncover something perfect for your organization.
The Union Edge Talk Radio Show Interview on Union Tools for Websites
Union Tools for Websites
Appletree MediaWorks joined Charles Showalter on The Union Edge Talk Radio Show yesterday. Mentioned were some of the custom-built union tools that both the UWUA and P4A use on their websites. The full episode can be streamed from the Appltree Media page. Click “Listen” under the 12/5/2012 heading. Excerpts from the program can also be found below.
Here are some of the topics they discussed:
- Affordable, customizable union-made website packages that include social media integration.
- Social media is an important growth tool for unions – allows you to further your reach and share with other unions.
- Social media is easily updated and can be rapidly shared – this allows news and information to “go viral” – not only putting pressure on companies to resolve union matters faster, but also allows union members to organize quickly and efficiently when time is of the essence.
- Custom union tools for websites.
- Secure Intranets – areas for members and officers to log into, share information, and securely upload and store documents.
- Expense and Payroll Tracking Programs for Unions – including uploading of receipts for audit purposes.
- Member Dues Program – track, bill, and accept payments online for members. This includes custom reports and mail/email ready monthly statements.
- Certification Tracking System – Power for America Training Trust Fund utilizes this system in order to keep track of apprentice training and schooling. Also used by Utility Workers Military Assistance Program in Chicago for instructors to track grades.
- Test Taker Program – new program for P4A and Consumers Energy students to take tests online. Tests are secure, timed, and instructors get detailed results instantly.
- Currently in the works.
- New website for UWUA on WordPress featuring Web 2.0 upgrades.
How Much Do Small Businesses Spend on Social Media?
According to James’s recent post about Facebook, “Facebook was initially created as an exclusive club where university students could interact with other students. Zuckerberg did not worry about making the service profitable initially because he wanted it to be “cool”, shunning the banner ad approach in favor of a clean, polished look. This initial marketing helped to foster what is now known as a social network, where friends connect, keep up with each other’s lives, and even chat live. This friend driven social atmosphere becomes fertile ground for grass-roots marketing, where buzz can be passed between intermingling social circles that are already tuned in to listen to their friends.”
How much do small businesses spend on social media? View the following Infographic by VerticalResponse to gain insight on how much your small business might want to spend on social media, and make sure to contact Appletree MediaWorks today to learn about our packages!
CISPA
The Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act, or, CISPA, is a proposed law in the United States which would allow for the sharing of Internet traffic information between the U.S. government and certain technology and manufacturing companies. The aim of the bill is to help the U.S government investigate cyber threats and ensure the security of networks against cyberattack.
Its predecessors, SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) and PIPA (Protect IP Act) were blocked earlier this year; however, CISPA has been passed in the House of Representatives and is now awaiting attention in the Senate.
Overview of CISPA
While SOPA and PIPA were meant mostly for stopping pirated material from being transferred over the internet, CISPA is an entirely different can of worms. Succinctly put, it allows both the government and private businesses to share information about cyberthreats. (Cyberthreats are anything making “efforts to degrade, disrupt or destroy” vital networks, or anything that makes a “threat or misappropriation” of information owned by the government or private businesses.) CISPA rewards companies for collecting data from internet users, intercepting or modifying communications, and providing this information to the government.
What does this mean to you, as a company with a website?
CISPA mostly affects individual internet users, however, its intent is to allow companies to protect their computers and networks against global cybersecurity threats. Information-sharing with the government is voluntary; however, data anonymity is encouraged and not required (from “CISPA Will Improve U.S. Cybersecurity” by Matthew Eggers at the US News and World Report).
According to an article from the Electronic Frontier Foundation, “One of the scariest parts of CISPA is that the bill goes above and beyond information sharing. Its definitions allow for countermeasures to be taken by private entities, and we think these provisions are ripe for abuse… These countermeasures could put free speech in peril, and jeopardize the ordinary functioning of the Internet… These countermeasures could even serve as a back door to enact policies unrelated to cybersecurity, such as disrupting p2p traffic.”
Additionally, “Heritage [Foundation] discussed how CISPA gives private entities ‘clear legal authority to defend their own networks.’ While we think private entities should be able to defend their networks, they should not be able to do without accountability in a manner that threatens free speech or disrupts the Internet.”
Where do you stand?
Appletree MediaWorks believes privacy is of the utmost importance, however, in a democratic society such as ours, we recognize the need for discourse on all topics of this nature. Please feel free to comment with your opinion on CISPA.
Sharing
Oftentimes you’ll come across an article or website that you find interesting and want to share it with your friends. Most websites nowadays have sharing buttons integrated, which allow users to choose how they’d like to share the information, whether it be through social media, email, messaging, etc. From a web design standpoint, this is important for many reasons.
First, share buttons are a great way to get your readers to share your content without leaving your website. This way they can invite their friends while staying exactly where you want them – on your site.
Second, when share buttons are integrated into your site, they allow you to gather statistics such as number of views and clickbacks. This allows you to learn which topics are popular, and to focus your content on what your viewers want to see.
Third, share buttons allow potential users to be redirected back to the correct source, which means they’re not reading your article on Facebook – they’re actually sent back to your site in order to view the content. This is important because you don’t want another site getting the “credit” for your content.
Overall, share buttons are a way to increase traffic to your website and get the word out about your content. Contact Appletree MediaWorks today to learn how you can integrate share buttons into your site.
Backing Up Your Data
One of the most important (but also the most neglected) areas of computing is backing up your data. Most people assume they’re safe because they’ve never experienced a disaster in the past, but they are sadly mistaken. Disasters will happen, at some point, and you will be kicking yourself later if you neglect this important task.
What does it mean to “backup?”
Backing up refers to the copying and archiving of computer data so it may be used to restore the original after a data loss event. When a computer user backs up their data, they are storing a copy of their information in a safe and secure place. There are many options when it comes to backing up your data, and most of them are reasonably priced.
Why backing up is important
Backups protect you from hardware failure, viruses, theft, accidental deletion, fires, floods and other disasters. If you were to experience any of these events without first backing up your data, you run the risk of losing all your work and important files. It is suggested that you have at least two off-site backup copies of your data, however, many people get by with just one.
Recommended products to help you back up your data
There are many services out there to assist businesses and individuals in backing up their data, often with only a few clicks of the mouse. Carbonite boasts that they are automatic (they backup your data without you having to do anything other than purchase their service), secure (all files are encrypted), and affordable (plans start at $59 per year). Another great service is Crashplan, whose plans start at less than $20 a year.
For documents that you are constantly using and changing, you may want to consider a cloud storage option, such as Google Drive or Dropbox. Both of these options offer two-step verification for added security, as well as a small amount of free storage. More storage is, of course, available for purchase.
If a paid service doesn’t sound appealing to you, you can also backup your data yourself. Technology retailers have storage devices available for purchase and you can talk to a customer service representative to decide which storage device is right for you. The only downside to this is, of course, that you have to actually remember to back up your data on a regular basis.
How we protect your data
Appletree MediaWorks keeps your site up and running by always storing a backup – just in case. All sites are backed up nightly and the information is always stored in a safe place.
Building Connections: LinkedIn Networking Basics
We’ve heard it all before. Salespeople love to take off in the middle of the day for important “business meetings” at the local brewery… “I’m just going to meet with a client and go over… my proposal.” Salespeople tend to spend more time on the road than in the office. To a cubicle-imprisoned employee, it may seem unfair, glamorous, and perhaps a bit… fake. But this really IS how business connections are made, right? It’s called networking.
In many business relationships, the ability to sit down for a meal or a drink and entertain may be as important (or more important) to landing that big deal as any more tangible factor. But as salespeople already know, networking can be difficult to manage efficiently. When you are juggling 4 bowling pins, a flaming torch and a garden weasel at the same time, there’s no chance to really concentrate on any one thing. This is traditionally where CRM (Customer Relationship Management) software comes into play. By effectively utilizing CRM, a company can manage its customer base and keep track of where each customer is in the sales process. It may even be configured to send notifications and reminders: “…haven’t heard back from Sam lately, it might be time to follow up”.
CRM has an obvious limitation, though. While it is very helpful in managing existing business relationships, it is unable to generate new ones. This is where LinkedIn comes into play. On the surface, it looks and behaves like an online career planner and résumé builder. But with millions of professionals from around the world already using LinkedIn, the potential for online networking is vast. Sorry sales department, this might actually give you an excuse to sit at a desk once in a while… but the payoff will be great.
Consider the following strategies for building your online network:
- Add your existing contacts. If you’re just getting started with LinkedIn, chances are you’re one of the last people in your network to join – it shouldn’t be difficult to find the people you know. They’ll most likely be excited to connect to you and start recommending your exceptional work ethics to their colleagues 😉
- Join Groups relevant to your location or services. This allows you to join discussions with like minded professionals in your field. By taking part in discussions, you can quickly make friends that may evolve into business relationships.
- If a Group does not currently exist for your area or type of business, consider creating one. Keep in mind that you should not create a Group for your Company since Companies are automatically generated by LinkedIn.
