Our beloved Lysa Miller, 3 Media Web invited me to do a presentation for her amazing MetroWest Women Networking event. I was happy to accept the invitation because doing a SEO workshop for small businesses was one of my yearly goals.
I have learned so much, over the last couple of years, studying various website source codes, which were designed either by professional web designers or amateurs. In mind educator mind summarized most mistakes and badly wanted to tell people about. So I already had a presentation in my mind when we started talking about the event with Lysa. I just had to choose a good name and the title became: DIY your SEO.
What businesses need to know about Google-friendly websites
The presentation was about the major mistakes people make building a website and don’t know anything about how Google works and how Google goes through the content on a single page.
The audience learned about the Heading element (h1, h2, h3)
The importance of NAP ( business name, address, phone number)
The pros and cons of starting a blog
Starting a website project on your own?
Writing great content and creating a website and keep all the tools and advises in mind is really difficult. There are different professionals who are specialized in each of the small pieces. There are people for Marketing Strategy, Content Writing, Social Media, Website Design, Content Strategy and SEO and you name it, it exists and people are great doing it.
But small business owners want to do all of these on their own. They learn how to design websites, they write a copy for their home page and services page, they take pictures, the write social media posts and blog posts. They do it all!! Congratulations to all of you who are doing it all for your small business!
If you think you need some help with your website SEO, ask for a 2-hour SEO consultation because it will help you a lot!
Who can blame solopreneurs, entrepreneurs and small business owners for looking thoroughly at where they spend their marketing dollars? The options seem countless, and some strategies work better than others. Below, I gathered seven free and low-cost ideas for budget-conscious people running their own business that are worth considering.
Cross-promote your products and services with other local businesses
Teaming up with other small businesses provides an opportunity to get bigger exposure to your potential clients. You can combine your resources for promotional materials before an event. Add each other’s logos and send info out to your client list for an extended reach. Successful cross-promotion opportunities can include a co-branded resource booklet, a co-produced informational video, a shared booth at a local fair, and even shared coworking space.
Ask for referrals
Once you’ve been able to show your skills, or sold products and have satisfied customers, it’s time to ask for referrals. Referrals are free to ask and give, so don’t be shy, and take advantage of this resource. People trust other people’s recommendations, and word of mouth is the best marketing.
Start a contest and promote it in all your
online and offline groups
Most of us love playing games or enter challenges, so why not make it fun, and create a contest. You can offer a gift basket of your products, provide tickets to an upcoming event, or raffle a gift card.
Sign up for the Help a Reporter Out (HARO) email list
It’s a less known resource, but it can be a valuable one for you and your business. HARO collects reporter requests from a number of newspapers, magazines, and online media outlets. They’re looking for experts in different topics to quote and contribute. Imagine what it would mean to your business if you get exposed in a national magazine. It might require some due diligence to keep your eyes out for the opportunity in your area of expertise, and several submissions before yours gets accepted.
Add or claim your business on Google My Business
This is an untapped marketing opportunity for many still. Even though Google + went away, claiming your business and filling out as many details as you can will get you visibility on Google. You can also post here on a regular basis to increase traffic on your website, or on Google Maps. There are rumors that Google My Business will become a paying option, so take advantage of it while it’s free.
Plan a local business workshop
Depending on your marketing goal, you can offer it free, or charge a small fee. At the very least, you can collect contact info from people new to you. You may want to use this opportunity to talk up another event or promote your products or services.
Advertise on Facebook, LinkedIn or Instagram
You can expect more engagement
and brand recognition if you include paid campaigns in your social media
efforts. A well-designed and targeted ad is still very reasonable compared to
magazine or TV ads. Choose the appropriate platform depending on the type of
your business. You can expect most success on LinkedIn if you serve other
businesses, Instagram if you run a creative business, like jewelry, and other
art. Facebook ads target most other potential clients.
Even if you run a small business or a part-time side business, there are countless opportunities to market what you have to offer. Explore some of these options or find your own perfect fit.
Monika Anderson is an entrepreneur and a small business marketing specialist based in Highlands Ranch, Colorado. She started her own digital marketing agency in 2016, called Kameleon Digital Marketing. She serves clients in the IT, travel, health and wellness, finance, and banking industries. She enjoys exploring new marketing ideas and has a passion to guide small business owners through the intricacies of online marketing.
Did you know that you can optimize your images for SEO? That means you can use your images to help improve your search engine ranking. Unfortunately, small business owners, who update they website regularly with blog or new content aren’t aware of this and are missing out on getting free traffic from Google.
So what exactly is website SEO? SEO stands for search engine optimization. SEO is the process of optimizing your content so that you get organic traffic to your blog from search engines like Google, Bing and Yahoo.
I know SEO is confusing. It covers so many different steps that most people do not understand.
The tips I’m sharing with you today are extremely easy to implement.
1. Change your file name
I know that it is easy just to upload your pictures from your phone with the name like “20180310_143742.jpg”, or if you buy images from stock websites, like Depositphotos.com, “Depositphotos_156590_original.jpg”. But it does not help Google at all to know anything about the image on your website. The images on your site talk about the content of the site as well. When saving your image to your computer, give it a descriptive file name.
2. Give Your Images Alt Text (Alternative Text)
If you upload a picture of a green backyard to your blog, it’s clear to you and your readers that the image is a backyard.
However, search engines can’t actually see your images, so they use your alternative text (alt text) to determine what the image is about.
To edit your images alt text, in your media library in WordPress (Media > Library), click on your image, and place a short description of the image in the “alt text” box.
3. Give Your Image a Title
Never keep the images default title (such as 20180310_143742) when uploading images to your website. If you saved your image with a descriptive file name, you can use that as Title.
For example, if saving an image of “children_at_backyard.jpg”, you can name the image “children_at_backyard”.
To name your image title in WordPress, go to your media library (Media > Library), click on the image, and insert your title in the title box.
4. Pay Attention to Image Size
Your website load time also contributes to your SEO ranking. Keep your blog speed up by re-sizing your images. WordPress has a couple of option to resize your images.
You can upload to your site and in the Media Library click on the Edit image button and use the side options to scale your image to a web-friendly site. 2000px width is OK for a heard image, but if your image is just part of a page and take only the half of a website width, keep it around 700px.
You can also crop and flip images in WP, and cropping can also help to reduce the size issue. There are also Plugins to resize your images.
At the end, or maybe at the beginning check out how fast your website download and where Google Speed Test find some issue.
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