Displaying items by tag: SEO | Search Engine Optimization

This video tutorial demonstrates how to create and duplicate search engine optimized content using WordPress.

WordPress is a robust website blogging software which provides endless expandability by using plugins, widgets and more. There are plenty of SEO plugins for WordPress Plugins that can help you navigate search engine optimization. However, the most important thing about SEO is having a strategy.  The strategy that I found to be successful is expanding my website to include intelligently titled articles which targets search engine users that enter in specific keywords and phrases.

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Website Design Client:  Free COVID Test Center

Illinois Locations: Wheeling, IL & Berwyn, IL

Florida Locations: Clearwater, Largo & Sarasota, FL

AdverGroup Web Design was contacted by a local Doctor's Office in Wheeling, IL who was forming a new company that provides free COVID-19 PCR testing at their various medical facilities in the State of Illinois and also at location within the State of Florida. This Doctor sought to work with a local website designer who could help create a professional medical website and also help to make sure that their various locations would be found in search engines. Furthermore, they needed Google Business pages created for each location to ensure that they were present on Google Maps.

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All business owners and entrepreneurs have the same goal:  That is to be found on page #1 of Google Search Engine.  That single objective requires most conventional businesses to travel along the same path. As a Creative Director based in the Chicago area, I have worked with countless clients over the years, these clients span countless industries. We work for old companies and start-ups, many of these clients even within the same industry, many of who are often even competitors. 

In any case, to become relevant in any industry or niche, the path these business owners must travel today, is not like the days of old.  They are not buying advertisements in the yellow pages or in newspapers (do either of those even still exist).  Client's seeking success in today's modern world of business are all looking to conquer search engines. CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE

In October of 2018 Google announced they would be "Protecting your data, improving our third-party APIs, and sunsetting consumer Google+".  Later in December another update would come as Google announced "Expediting changes to Google+". Most recently in December of 2018, deletion dates were provided when Google emphasized that it will shut down Google+, "due to low usage and challenges involved in maintaining a successful product that meets consumers’ expectations." as provided in Google's official statement.

While the number of mobile device users is growing, the number of social media networks is also constantly growing. However, with the recent news of Google sunsetting Google+, the "social media battle field" just got thinner. 

In 2015 Google notified all website owners of issues on their site relative to mobility issues. If your website was deficient and/or you have received an email that provided a warning stating that “Google systems has tested your site finding a percentage of your website’s pages to have critical mobile usability errors", then this is something you really should resolve.

Is it a valid concern if a website is not optimized for mobile devices? That question depends on the answer to another question. How many mobile device users are their versus desktop users. In May 2015, in the “Google Inside Adwords Blog”, within the article titled "Building for the next moment", Google stated that “Google searches take place on mobile devices than on computers in 10 countries including the US and Japan”. Furthermore,  www.statista.com authored an article titled "Statistics and Facts on Mobile Internet Usage" which reports that "mobile phone internet user penetration was 52.7 percent in 2015" and suggests the figure will climb to 63.4 percent by 2017.

If you don’t know who Matt Cutts is, then you probably have not been paying much attention to the world of Search Engine Optimization (SEO). If you own or manage a website and have an interest in growing your web presence, then its time you learn more about Matt Cutts.

When viewing Google’s Management Team Page, provided on their company website. You will not see a photo or even a description of Matt Cutts. I find this funny considering, that when Matt Cutts speaks, his words have a more significant impact on the world of SEO than any other Google staff member.

Perhaps you are more familiar with the "stay thirsty" ad campaign put on by Dos Equis Beer. Whereas their spokesman is a older distinguished gentlemen who is lauded as "the most interesting man in the world". I could not help but to rewrite many of the popular sayings so that they are relevant to the world of SEO and Matt Cutts.

"Search engines base their results upon his guidelines"

"His words are considered golden"

"He is fluent in all search engine algorithms, even those that have not been developed yet"

Is your Business located on Google Maps and Google Places for Business? 

If not, it should be! Despite the simple fact that search engines such as Google and Yahoo have replaced the stone aged telephone books, both of these search engine titans also possess business listing services. Google has Google+ Places and Zagat, while Yahoo has Yelp. All which utilize map based business listings. These map based business listings assist consumers in finding business near their physical locations. This is even more relevant in today’s age of mobile devices, such as smart phones and tablets.

For instance, as a consumer is driving on the Kennedy Expressway in Chicago. A person in this vehicle is seeking a coffee shop nearby. They grab their iphone, open their web search and enter coffee shops. Their mobile device will provide map results, prior to providing web page results because the search engine has detected that they are mobile. Will your business show up if a smart phone or tablet user searches for your business type? If your business is not listed on Google Places for Business or Google+ Local then the answer is no!

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Despite any modifications Google Search may implement in their search algorithms, depth of valuable content will always reign supreme. That being said, making sure your content is meta-tagged properly may be the single most important part of optimizing your website for search engines.

I always tell my clients that search engines like Google, Yahoo and Bing are not going to put words in your mouth! In other words, if you are a "Plumber", then search engines will not assume that you provide "Hot Water Heater Repair Services" or "Sump Pump Repairs" unless there are "titled articles" along with text content, meta description and keywords which exist on your site communicating this.

This article demonstrates the basic fundamentals of Search Engine Optimization (SEO), specifically coding metadata such as meta descriptions and meta keywords into your websites content and articles. Additionally, this article provides a real working tool "the Meta Tag Analyzer", which will assist you in ensuring that your content and meta elements are accurate and in harmony with one another.

The words and phrases that you utilize in this "meta data" is not a guessing game. You can also use the "Meta Tag Analyzing Tool" to assist you in knowing exactly which phrases and keywords to use (specific to each article's content). 

Before using the metadata analyzer provided at the bottom of this article, you would be best served by reading this entire article.

Back in the day, consumers relied on newspapers and/or the yellow pages to gain information and/or to select a contractor or business. With the birth of the Internet, it is clear that most people now rely on their favorite search engine to assist them in researching and selecting their contractors or company to do business with. Many of us have become so accustomed to using search engines, that it is really hard to believe that search engines did not even exist until about 1990.

Before getting into the nuts and bolts of what SEO is all about, it is important to understand the basic mechanics behind search engines.  What is a search engine? A web search engine is designed to search for information on the World Wide Web, in which results are generally presented in a line of results often referred to as "search engine results pages (SERP's)". Unlike web directories, which are maintained only by human editors, search engines also maintain real-time information by running an algorithm on a web crawler. One of the first "all text" crawler-based search engines was Web Crawler, which came out in 1994. Unlike its predecessors, it let users search for any word in any web-page, which has become the standard for all major search engines since.

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As many business owners have come to realize, having a quality web site for your business is no longer an option, it is a requirement. Where many business owners have gone wrong, is in thinking that just a having a simple info page satisfies the “web site requirement”. The key word is quality, not just in regards to design but in regards to SEO!

I will get straight to the bottom line in saying: Using a FREE WEB SITE BUILDER such as Wix, GoDaddy’s Website Builder, Jimdo and Zenfolio provide only one true benefit to businesses on a budget, it is FREE.   That single benefit of providing a “free website builder” is actually costing you more in lost revenues due to its weakness in Search Engine Optimization. Additionally, sites like Wix and Zenfolio cost much more on annual term to host. So your FREE WEB BUILDER is not exactly free. Compare Wix hosting with website at over $200 annually, to GoDaddy which will cost roughly $80 per year using Joomla or Wordpress.