Designed by Krista
Web Design

Search engine optimization (SEO) is a key part of any successful website because most internet users will find your site via a search engine. It’s a good idea to check your site to see if there are any areas you could easily improve in order to maximize your search engine rankings.

There are two tools I like to use, both free, shown below. It is unlikely that you will get a perfect score, so don’t fret if your score is low the first time. Some factors that impact your score are out of your control, such as inbound links, retweets, etc. The key is to improve as much as you reasonably can.

In each case, the tool will grade your site based on criteria that are important for high search results. From that, you can make a to-do list of improvements. I suggest working on the “low-hanging fruit” first – if there are any easy changes, do those right away. Then, you can consider the more difficult tasks and weigh out their relative importance for your particular site.

I’ve shown some examples below for my own site. In each case, I spent about an hour making small improvements, but there were also several things that I don’t plan to do, or can’t reasonably do. For example, I don’t plan to list myself in Yahoo!Directory because I do not need the additional marketing boost, so my $299 could be better spent elsewhere.

So, take a moment to grade your site and see where you can make easy changes – every little bit helps!

Website Grader

Before: 78
Interim: 81 (domain name renewal not included)

SEO Warnings:

• The domain for this website is set to expire in less than a year [Fixed]
• Permanent Redirect Not Found for designedbykrista.com to www.designedbykrista.com [Fixed]
• designedbykrista is not listed in the Yahoo! Directory. [Um, yeah - like that's gonna' happen at $299 a pop...]
• We could not find a Twitter account associated with your website. [Fixed]
• The web page does not seem to contain any type of signup form where visitors can subscribe to a newsletter or future updates. [Imagine Dana Carvey saying, "Not gonna' do it..."]

SenSEO Firefox Addon

Before: 85
After: 93

SEO Warnings:

• Meta Keywords: use only keywords found in content of page [Fixed]
• Too many meta keywords – keep it to 10 or less [Fixed]
• Use Robots declarations to control Search-Engine access. [Fixed]
• Use H2 and H3 tags. [Fixed]
• Domain should include all keywords. [Don't I wish...]

Today, I had a “what not to do on your website” moment. I’ll note the lessons I learned, and then you can read on for the whole sordid tale.

Usability Lessons:

1. Don’t make your newsletter subscribers login to unsubscribe – they just want to be free!
2. Place login tips very close to login error message. This gives the user the information they need (how to troubleshoot login issues) when they need it (they have a failed login attempt).
3. Make your login prominent. Ideally, it should be in a standard location, typically a “Login” link or a userid/password box in the upper right corner.

Sordid Tale:

I was trying to unsubscribe from the email newsletter of a reputable company. I clicked the unsubscribe link and was taken to a login screen. I’m already a little bummed out, because I want unsubcribing to be just one or two clicks, without having to remember my  userid and password. It asked for my email address and password. I typed my email address and password and I got an error. I tried a couple other password variations, and I still got an error.

I tried clicked the “forgot password” link, thinking, “This is really becoming a hassle!” I typed my email address in the forgot password form. I got the following error: That email address is not on file.

Um… what? I mean, the only reason I came to the site is to unsubscribe from an email newsletter – I know that they have my email address. I was mystified.

I thought maybe I could login through the home page and went to the home page. I could not find the login on the home page. Really -  you can look for yourself, to the right. Note: It is not the “Account Access” link in the upper right – that’s only for event organizers, and I am not one.

Giving up on that, I went back to the email and clicked the unsubscribe link. I finally noticed a link “I can’t login” at the bottom of that form. I clicked on it to find out that they have converted their login system and I needed to update my account. “Whew!” I thought, “At least I know what’s going on.”

I converted my account, at the end of which process it asked me to login. I clicked continue and was taken back to the home page… and I still couldn’t find the login link! I finally went back to the email newsletter, clicked the unsubscribe link and was taken back to the login form. I logged in and saw the “manage your subscriptions” page. I think I heard angels singing in the background….

Although, I still don’t know where login is.

Web usability expert Jared Spool recommends that you make your hyperlinks 7 – 12 words long for optimum usability. Now, I would have thought links that long would be too hard for users to scan easily, but his research has shown that users are more likely to find what they want on your site if you have just a few more words within your links. Why?

Success Rates are best if Hyperlinks are between 7 - 12 words, Source: User Interface Engineering

Users will come to your site looking for something – let’s say it’s a woman looking for a shirt to wear on a beach vacation. She will have some term in mind for this item – maybe “beach wear” – and she’ll be looking for that word on your webpage. We refer to this as her “trigger” word.

What are the chances that you will happen to name your women’s shirt section “beachwear”? Well, if you are only using 1 – 6 words in your link, such as “Ladies Shirts” the chances are low! However, if you are naming things a little more specifically, such as “Women’s Wear for Beach, Lounging, and Casual Day at the Office” – there is a much bigger chance that any given user will spot their trigger word in that link.

However, my initial reaction (short links are more scannable) was not completely off-base – it turns out that links which contain 13 or more words tend to be overlooked, because they are now too long to be scanned quickly.

What the heck is a long tail keyword … and why should you care, right? Internet users, like you and me, type a word or phrase into a search engine, like Google or Yahoo!, and these are generally referred to as keywords. A “long tail” keyword indicates that the searcher typed in a phrase – not just one word, but maybe half a dozen words to search for.

In order for you, the website owner, to have your page show up first in the search results, you need to have those words strategically place on your web site. However, there is a lot of competition for the most common keywords on any given topic – the most common keywords are on so many sites that it’s hard for any one site to pop up first on search engine results.

The good news is that if you begin to focus on the longer, more descriptive terms – a.k.a. long tail keywords – you can achieve some great results because these longer phrases account for 94.3% of website traffic! For example, if you focus on the keyword “books,” you’ll have a very difficult time competing with Amazon.com. If you change the focus of your pages to “books for preschoolers” or “books about curing depression,” you have a far better chance to placing highly on search results.

Chance are that your site is already set up to optimize pages by the title of the page. So, consider your titles carefully – can you add more description to your blog post title? Subject of your forum post? Name of products in your store? Category or tag names in your store or blog? If you get stuck, you can start typing your keyword in Google, and then choose a name from the list of search suggestions that Google gives you.

Why Long Tail Keyword are so valuable. Source: www.wordtracker.com

I just finished an in-depth review of 8 PHP/MySQL ecommerce applications, but I started with this list of 27 ecommerce applications. Read on to get a quick comment on each shopping cart. The following applications were recommended through various internet sources, listed at the bottom of this post.

Sources

• Shopping Cart Review
• IT Web Experts
• Shopping Cart Reviews
• Top Ten Reviews
• Hot Scripts
• Authorize.net Certified Solutions
• PayPal Compatible Carts

I standardized on osCommerce for all my clients in 2006, and have become steadily LESS satisfied with that product ever since. In fact, I have recently stopped a project that is near to roll-out because I just can’t bear to have another client on this shopping cart. Instead, I’ve been reviewing popular and well-rated shopping cart software applications, and I have some preliminary results to share. I’ll have more details soon, including an in-depth feature comparison for the top 8, and a way for you to rate it yourself! If you would like me to email that to you in Excel right now, just post a comment and I’ll send it out.

Top-rated: CS-Cart, digiShop

These ecommerce apps really had the “wow” factor. So many valuable features are in the base package, the price is reasonable, and the support is great.

Still Good, but don’t quite cut it: SunShop, X-Cart

These shopping carts had a lot going for them, but were missing some key features. Mainly, they would be decent options if I didn’t have anything better. (but I do)

No, thank you: CubeCart, OpenCart, osCommerce, PrestaShop

These carts are mostly free, which is always nice, but you will more than pay for it with the amount of headache. A number of important features are not in the base package, which means you (or someone else you may have to pay) must find and install a plug-in for it. If I was really trying to save money… I’d go with CS-Cart. If you can’t raise $285 to buy a cart for your business, you should strongly consider using eBay, etsy, or some other free option.

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The following quote is often attributed to John Ruskin, but that is currently in dispute. However, it’s tough to dispute the meaning of these words – a more elegant way of saying that you get what you pay for. What does this mean for web design? It means that saving money is about trade-offs, and I’ve compiled a list below to help you weigh these out for your web project. In some cases, the trade-offs are worth the risk, perhaps because you are a non-profit or just starting out your small business. There is nothing wrong with this, because you can always upgrade as funds become available, but knowing what you’re getting can help you make the best choice at your budget level.

“It’s unwise to pay too much, but worse to pay too little. When you pay too much, you lose a little money; that is all. When you pay too little you sometimes lose everything, because the thing you bought was incapable of doing the thing it was bought to do. The common law of business balances prohibits paying little and getting a lot. It can’t be done. If you deal with the lowest bidder, it is well to add something for the risk you run. And if you do that, you will have enough to pay for something better.”

Risks of Paying Too Little for Your Website

Do-it-Yourself: You may have to do all or much of the work yourself. This can work if you are technically savvy and you have reasonable writing skills.

Templates: Most websites in the $200 – $500 price range are built using pre-made templates. This means that your site will not be perfectly unique, but it can still be very serviceable. Watch out for search engine ranking problems, though. (see below)

Inexperienced Designers: If the hourly rate of your web designer is very low, he or she may possibly be just out of college and can’t demand any more. Everyone has to start somewhere, though, so just do your best to make sure the person sounds like they know what they’re doing and that they have a good work ethic. It may not be worth the risk if you have complex programming needs on your site.

Language Barriers: Off-shore web developers are becoming more common, and usually offer attractive pricing. If you are satisfied that they are experienced enough for your project, you must decide if a non-native speaker can write effectively in your language and if you will be able to understand them even when discussing technical issues.

No Search Engine Optimization (SEO): Many low-end websites are not constructed with search engine rankings in mind, and this is detrimental to your site, especially if you are running a for-profit business. Does the template or developer use a lot of tables? Is key text, such as your company name, shown only as an image? Is the browser’s title bar show just your company name, or worse, just a generic term like “Home” or “Welcome”? If so, you are likely to get low search engine rankings.

Websites that don’t work: Broken links, misspelled words, missing images, and random error messages all detract from your professional image, and usually make your users go to another site. If you choose to work with a low-end provider, make sure to do a lot of testing yourself to try to prevent these things from the outset.

Conferences are great for networking and keeping up to speed on technology. Don’t you find, though, that it’s hard to actually take a step back from the designing and coding to go learn about designing and coding? I made it my goal this year to break away and get to a conference, and I reviewed several great options online. See the dates and cities below, along with my impressions of each from their websites. Did I miss any good ones? Let me know!
UPDATE, 2/18/2010: I found some more to add, courtesy of SitePoint, listed below…

Adobe Max, Los Angeles, October 24 -27

Impressions… Focus on Adobe products (understandably). Personally can’t afford to spend this much time on all Adobe. To repeat a quote I heard recently: “Real developers use notepad!”

An Event Apart, Seattle, April 5 – 7 (other cities offered)

Impressions… Corporate, perhaps even stuffy, though I would love to be a fly on the wall to hear Microsoft Product Manager’s topic: Microsoft: Help Us Kill IE6. I’ll do my part, Pete!

A Day Apart, Seattle, April 7

Impressions… Spend a day getting the latest on HTML5 and CSS3. Can I say goodbye to Verdana and Tahoma? I may attend just for that!

Future of Web Apps, Miami, February 22-24

Impressions… Cutting edge, beach parties and so forth; focus on application development.

In Control, Orlando, February 22-23

Impressions… Good coverage on a wide range of topics; perfect for a freelance generalist such as myself. *my choice*

Internet Week, New York, June 7 – 14

Impressions… Can’t tell, because the schedule is not online, but I don’t think I could do any conference for a whole week: overload!

MinneWebCon St. Paul, April 12

Impressions… Focus on education, though the topics seem to be a great overview in one day.

Microsoft MIX10, Las Vegas, March 15-17

Impressions… Not as product-centric as I expected, but probably still not for someone (like me) who is determined to remain product-agnostic…

SXSWeek, Austin, March 12-21

Impressions… Focus on music & film.

Usability Week, Various cities/dates

Impressions… Focus on usability.

Web Directions, Atlanta, Date TBA

Impressions… Based on a brief look at past events, seemed high on theoretical, low on practical.

WebVisions, Portland, May 19-21

Impressions… Only 1 of 3 days are currently scheduled, but what is there looks intriguing: HTML5, CSS3, iPhone Apps, and Photography tips.

International

I can’t justify heading off to New Zealand or London, as much as I would love to, but here are some International web conferences if these countries are closer to home for you.

• @media: London, June 8 – 11
• Design It, Build It: United Kingdom, April 28
• Form,Function & Class: Philippines, July
• UX London: London, May 19 – 21
• Webdesign International Festival: France, June 4 – 5
• WebhostingDay: Germany, March 17 – 19
• Webstock: New Zealand, February 15 – 19

More and more people are making their own webpages via blogs, site wizards, and even editing their own pages in HTML. One habit people get into when making hyperlinks or “anchors” – i.e. the stuff underlined in blue – is using “click here” for a hyperlink text. A quick way to improve your website usability is to remove these words from your vocabulary!

Why? First, it’s too generic – it doesn’t tell people what they will get it if they click. When users scan your page, the hyperlinked text stands out, and they don’t have time to click every link to see if it will be useful to them. So, tell them what clicking that link will do for them.

Second, it’s redundant – the fact that the text is underlined or looks like a button tells people that is where to click.

Finally, you lose an opportunity to highlight keywords for search engines. Search engines will automatically assume that the words contained in the link are pertinent to your site, so make sure you have keywords or phrases in there.

Examples:
BAD: Click here to review our services
GOOD: Website Design Services

BAD: Click here to register
GOOD: Register for Website Design Seminar

How do you know when it’s “time” to get a website? Is it really worth it? Your return on investment (ROI) for a website will vary based on how well the site is constructed, how competitive your industry is within the online community, and how much profit you gain from a single customer.

Ultimately, the decision regarding if and when to get a website is a decision that each business has to make individually. There is no hard and fast rule, such as “every business should get a website if they are 10 years old” or “every business should get a website if they are this size.”

Some businesses do not need a website. For example, if you already have as many customers as you can handle and you do not want to grow your business to accommodate more, you would not want to have a website. Alternately, you may be certain that your potential customers won’t use the internet to find you. For example, no one will use the web to find a “7-11” – convenience store traffic is always based on customers driving by the store.

On the other extreme, there are some businesses who require a website, such as when their product or service is only sold online.
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