Forest Software
Web, SEO and IT & Business Advice for the Smaller Business
Reading Time: 3 minutes
Photo by Hal Gatewood on Unsplash
In the bustling online marketplace of the UK, standing out from the competition is no easy feat today. With a multitude of websites vying for attention, making yours truly shine requires a strategic and creative approach. Fear not, for this guide will equip you with the tools and tactics to elevate your website and attract the audience you deserve.
Know Thyself, Know Thy Audience:
Before embarking on any website revamp, a thorough understanding of your unique selling proposition (USP) and target audience is crucial. What makes your business exceptional? What sets you apart from your competitors? Answering these questions helps define your brand voice, messaging, and overall website strategy. Additionally, conducting thorough market research and understanding your ideal customer’s demographics, needs, and preferences ensures your website resonates with them directly. Continue reading
Reading Time: 3 minutes
In today’s world, where attention spans are shorter than ever, captivating visuals are crucial. This is especially true for small businesses trying to stand out in a crowded online space.
Think about it: how often do you scroll past a social media post without a single glance if the image doesn’t grab you? That’s why using photographs effectively is a game-changer for small businesses. Here’s how photos can take your business from good to great:
1. Showcase Your Products in Style:
Photo by Chad Montano on Unsplash
Imagine you’re trying to sell delicious homemade cookies. Wouldn’t a photo of warm, gooey cookies with chocolate chips practically begging to be eaten be way more appealing than just describing them with words?
Photos allow you to showcase the quality, detail, and even the “feel” of your products. Whether you’re selling hand-painted mugs, custom t-shirts, or handcrafted jewelry, high-quality photos that capture their essence can make a world of difference. Continue reading
Reading Time: 3 minutes
Mimzy May has released this “Paint Palette” image under Public Domain license.
In the UK, where grey skies and drizzle are often companions, the importance of injecting vibrancy into our lives becomes even more crucial. This extends beyond our wardrobes and living spaces – colour can significantly impact our work environments too. Studies have shown that the colours we surround ourselves with can influence our mood, productivity, and overall well-being.
The psychology of colour is well-documented, and its impact extends beyond aesthetics. It can influence our mood, focus, creativity, and even productivity. Understanding how to use colour effectively in the workplace can therefore be a powerful tool for any UK business looking to boost employee well-being and performance. Continue reading
Reading Time: 3 minutes
In today’s crowded digital landscape, capturing attention and building a loyal customer base can feel like an uphill battle for small businesses. Traditional marketing methods, while still valuable, are often crowded out by established players with larger budgets. However, this doesn’t mean the playing field is entirely uneven. By embracing new and creative approaches, small businesses can stand out and connect with their audience in memorable ways.
1. Hyperlocal Marketing:
Think global, act local. Leverage your unique, community-centric position by partnering with other local businesses for cross-promotion initiatives. Offer exclusive deals or host joint events, catering to the specific interests and needs of your local demographic. This not only saves resources but also fosters a sense of community and collaboration. Continue reading
Reading Time: 3 minutes
In today’s online-driven world, your business website acts as your digital storefront. It’s where potential customers learn about your brand, explore your offerings, and ultimately, choose to do business with you. But with millions of businesses vying for online attention, simply having a website isn’t enough. It’s not a case of “build it and they will come”, to quote the film “The Field of Dreams”. You need a strategy to ensure your website is visible to the right audience, and that’s where SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) comes in. Continue reading
Reading Time: 3 minutes
Last updated on June 20th, 2024 at 08:00 am
Image from https://pixabay.com/illustrations/seo-google-search-engine-896175/
Free for use under the Pixabay Content License
How to Read SEO Analysis Reports
At Forest Software we often get approached by clients who have all been contacted by salesmen from SEO companies. The common feature for all of them is that the salesman later produces a report saying how poor the web site is in terms of internet exposure and this has worried the client.
I thought that I’d post a few comments about the typical report in the hopes that it might stop clients and prospective clients from worrying too much and help people read between the lines of these reports, which are after all being used as a sales technique.
Typically the report has several sub-headings and I’ll go through some of these one at a time with an SEO professional’s hat on (the author has over 25 years SEO experience).
Analytics : Usually the report tells you how important analytics are to a business and while this is true they are only useful if you take the time to read and understand them (something that we do). From experience, most website owners are interested in two things – the number of visitors and the number of enquiries/conversions. You can get the first of these from your web hosts visitor statistics, assuming that they run these for you – and most analytics programs will not tell how many conversions they have, as the typical accountancy website for example is set up to get enquiries which are then converted by meeting or talking to the prospect.
Alternative Text : There was a new twist to this on a recent report in that the report claimed that it was illegal to have images with no “alt text” associated with it here in the UK. In fact only images that are essential for site navigation technically need this alternative text, images that are only there for decoration do not need it, although it would be a good idea to have an empty alt text so that it doesn’t upset users of “talking browsers”.
Incoming Links : If I had a penny for every report that says that the website that they are analysing has no incoming links on Google I’d have been able to retire years ago. Any respectable, properly trained, SEO person will be able to tell you that Google doesn’t report the correct number of incoming links on public searches, it hasn’t done so to my knowledge for many years (if at all). A follow on from this is often a question that asks if the website has been banned – a simple site:www.domain.com search on Google disproves this suggestion.
Meta Tags : Usually the report mentions keyword meta tags and sometimes the description meta tag. The keyword tag hasn’t been read by Google for about 15 years and Google also say that the description tag is not used in their ranking criteria – although, if it is shown in the search results it can influence people clicking through onto a page on your website. Just remember that Google doesn’t always show the carefully crafted meta description that you have worked so hard on.
URL Format : Again, the latest report that I saw said that the URL format for the site was poor as the site had .htm file extensions and that URLs shouldn’t have these extensions. If this were true then why would so many .htm / .html / .php / .asp (and other) urls appear in top positions in the search results? In fact several years ago I made up a file extension and got pages to rank in Google for their target phrases even though Google would have had no idea what type of file a .jkm file was.
As I say, many of these reports are generated in order to scare people into changing their website or move to a new designer and if you take the time to look at the report and think about it then most of the points can usually be “shot down in flames”. The problem that we see is that people don’t have the knowledge or time to think about the report and immediately say “if this big internet company say my website has problems it must have!”. I would suggest that you talk to your current web designer (assusming that they understand SEO and are not “paper experts” having read about it, or your SEO firm if you are already using one, and ask them to take a look at the report for you, you would probably be surprised by their comments on the report.