ATILUS - Web Design | Internet Marketing

New WGCU Website

I am very proud to announce the release of the new WGCU Public Media website.

For those of you not familiar or not in Southwest Florida, WGCU is the local public broadcasting affiliate, delivering National, International and locally produced television and radio content to millions of viewers and subscribers throughout Southwest Florida (Estero, Fort Myers, Naples, Cape Coral, Sanibel, etc.).

The Unique ID Web Design team has been hard at work for the past couple of months secretly working on our latest creation. The newly redesigned website is the culmination of months of planning, preparation, design, and development by everyone at Unique. From the beginning every person in our team has been hard at work, adding comments, suggestions, making updates and corrections in each of our respective specialities in order to release what I am proud to call, our biggest and most successful project to date.

Some of the biggest features of the site include:

• Upgrade to .NET
• Gorgeous new layout
• Standards XHTML & CSS
• Search Engine Optimization
• New Mini-sites (WaterWoes & Get Up Get Out Get Active)
• See and view previews of locally produced programs such as Gulf Coast Live, Untold Stories, and Health Sense
• Listen to live radio broadcasts on their computers
• Find out more about corporate support

And, we are only in phase 1!

Without revealing too much there are at least two more yet to be released phases that will include some amazing new technologies and social features. The new features will allow local users and people in the Southwest Florida community to interact, and create content in new and exciting ways as well as streamline many of WGCU’s business processes, increases sales and productivity.

I would like to thank everyone involved in the creation of the website including the staff of WGCU & everyone at Unique that created this amazing site.

The Always Open Web

With the 4th of July just hours away I got to thinking.

Oh, by the way, I’m Jermaine a new Client Representative for Unique ID. My primary goal is to connect our clients’ pains with our solutions (most everyone likes a good healer).

Anyway, I was thinking that there are many businesses that will close their doors tomorrow and won’t open again until Thursday. But even though the doors will physcially be closed, the Internet will still be cranking out millions pages. People will be searching and finding all sorts of information from entertainment sites, to medical sites, but either way the Web will be on.

Here’s the question, will your company be online or even found? Instead of someone calling your business and hearing a voice recording, why not have them see your website and view your products and or services. If they cannot find you, why not? Think about what your site needs in order to increase its rankings. Think ourside the box and use social marketing or maybe it’s time to open your first blog. One thing to think about is with so many people off from work there will be people, maybe for the first time in a long time, who search the Internet to find something and maybe this fourth of July they may find you.

Have a safe and happy 4th of July!

Straight From Google, The Four Biggest Search Rank Factors

I was using Google’s video search yesterday and stumbled upon some of Matt Cutts’s videos. For those of you unfamiliar with Matt Cutts, Matt works for Google handling search engine optimization issues, answering many common questions on his blog as well as his videos.

Basically Matt Cutts is the gate keeper for how sites get ranked on Google search.

Although some of the videos are now nearly a year old, they are still very relevant, with a lot of helpful, straightforward information.

In one of the most interesting videos Matt reveals the top four biggest search ranking factors. From top to bottom here they are:

• Crawlability
• Sitemap
• Good Content
• Marketing

Crawlability

Crawlability refers to the ability for a search engine to read the content on your website and get through it, navigating to each page. Crawlability may not seem like it should be an issue dozens of years after the birth of the internet, but according to Matt it is still a major problem, with many sites being un-crawlable. This is definitely something we’ve witnessed with many web designers opting to create websites entirely with photos, embedding text, links, etc. in unreadable photo files - it may look nice, but to a search engine it is valueless.

Sitemap

Sitemaps are pages that reference every other page, much like a book’s index or table of contents. It is just one place for a user (or search engine) to visit in order to find everything on a site, or quickly find just one thing. Having a sitemap referenced on every page is a great search booster and very user-friendly addition to any site.

Good Content

Good content is a major factor in determining a sites value. Besides some rumors that Google has hired librarians, english professors, and is using its book scanning project to learn more about the flow and style of correct human generated text, good content is essential in attracting visitors, getting those visitors to return, and getting others to link to your site.

Marketing

Spread the word about your site, write good content (see above) and start spreading the word. You are only limited by your imagination in the number of ways you can market your site on or off line. Create plans to write articles and back them up with a supplemental print and e-newsletter.  Attend local events with pamphlets on your website, include your website at the bottom of each email you or your colleagues send out. You must actively market your site.

The Secrets to a Great Landing Page

I recently had the opportunity to co-host an exciting, informative, webinar about “The Secrets to a Great Landing page.” I was the co-host, invited by nationally recognized article marketer and landing page guru, Lisa Sparks.

The hour+ webinar was primarily focused on the secrets to a great landing, how one should structure their landing page for success and my part, how to correctly and efficiently communicate to your web team or web designer your needs and physically create the landing page.

It was a great learning experience. I have been creating and testing landing pages for years, but Lisa taught me a lot about a few subtle changes that can make a big difference. Without giving too much away (the webinar will soon be available via download) I thought I would share a few of the most interesting tips I learned:

The Secret Outline to a Great Landing Page:

• Title on page - related to the subject of the linking page
• Subtitle (optional) more info related
• Bullets - important things the user/visitor will receive if they do what you are asking
• Testimonials
• Contact form

Great Question:

How long should a landing generally page be?

Landing page length will vary greatly depending on three factors, your audience’s sophistication or skepticism, the value of what you are offering, and how much information (contact form) you are asking for.

Check back often for more information on the secrets to a great landing page. The entire webinar will be available as a download shortly.

You Are Not Your Clients The Most Powerful Tool in a Web Marketer/Designer’s Arsenal

I had the opportunity of attending a seminar recently on Social Web Design, and creating websites that cater to the social lives of users. The 2 hour seminar was very helpful and, among other things, helped me figure out why MySpace is so successful for those not in the web design community, web designers HATE MySpace, as it is a poorly coded, ugly site with lots of errors and constant problems:

http://www.myspace.com/soybuddha

Anyway, the seminar host, renowned Social Design guru, Joshua Porter was asked many questions during the length of the presentation. One came to mind as most important: An attendee asked about some statistics and metrics Josh had used in one of his conclusions asking “what tools are used to gather this data?” I, along with most of the audience, expected some kind of software to be named, but instead Josh responded with “interviews.” That’s right, much of the data he had gathered on social networking sites and the behavior of users was gathered in two ways, physical observation and INTERVIEWS!

As business owners and site designers we often take for granted our breadth of knowledge in our respective business. Many of us use the lingo particular to our industry. I for example sometimes throw around “SEO” forgetting that not everyone knows it means search engine optimization.  Likewise visitors to your site and clients of yours may not yet be familiar with your industry terms, so find out. Create some kind of questionnaire or survey and send to your clients, e-mail, physically mail, or better yet drive to their business and ask them to help you answer your important questions.

You are not your audience; you are not your clients. The next time you want to do something on your website, tweak the layout, adjust the site for some keywords or create a pay per click account ask your clients:

• What do your clients do online?
• What keywords did they use to find your business or a business similar to yours?
• Do they find a particular component of your site helpful or distracting?
• Is there a particular tool that executives in their industry would find helpful that you could create on your site?

Do you want a better websites, better keywords, creative marketing ideas?

Just ask your visitors and your clients.