As 2016 is quickly coming to an end, the Advanced Digital Inc. Team thought we’d share with you our Top 10 favorite resources of the year. These range from specific articles that spoke to us, to tools that helped us create some of our web design projects this year and achieve our search engine optimization goals.
1.) Smashing Magazine’s post from August 17th Photoshop Etiquette For Responsive Web Design is one of our favorite articles from 2016! For almost 10 years, Smashing Magazine has provided quality articles and resources for programmers and designers.
2.) Dreamstime is one of the many stock photo resources our team uses. Conveniently, customers are able to either purchase subscription packages or pay by the photo.
3.) By using Lynda, our team is able to expand their knowledge, learn additional skills. As SEO is constantly evolving and there are many layers involved in it, it is important to keep on top of skill-sets.
4.) We all have our routines and our Friday’s usually start off with a White Board Friday video from Moz and a cup of coffee. Each video is packed with great tips for our search engine optimization team. One of our favorites is 8 Rules for Choosing a Domain Name.
5.) Keyword research is a large part of search engine optimization and one of our favorite tools to use to help with this is, Google Keyword Planner. If you’re planning on running an Adwords Campaign, all of your keywords can be saved to use at a later date.
6.) With over 1,000 fonts to choose from, Google Fonts make choosing fonts and pairings easy for all of our web design projects.
7.) Adobe Color has analogous, monochromatic, triad, complementary, compound, shades and custom rules available. Easily create a custom color palette for your design or marketing materials. Check out our blog post from October on Color Psychology!
8.) GetHub is a large depository for programmers. The open source community allows programmers to contribute their skills, follow other projects and more.
9.) Bootstrap is our favorite way to program responsive websites for all of our clients. The easy framework is set up with 12 columns that collapse for tablets and mobile devices.
10.) Lastly, WordPress is our choice for a content management system. With 1,000’s of plugins and themes available, this content management system is customizable to any business and is perfect for our clients.
Do you have a favorite resource? Let us know in the comments below and be sure to follow us on social media!
A blog is a great way to create content, build a following, share relevant information for a business’s industry and create link building opportunities. You should not just stop at creating the content, by commenting on blogs in the industry, it allows you spread your business name and establish your business as a leader in your industry and more!
The Benefits of Commenting on Blogs
Credibility – Posting knowledgeable comments on blogs can help create a credible name for your business. Comments similar to, “Great post, keep it up.” could damage your name instead of help. Comments should spark a conversation, so add to the key points of a blog post.
Visibility and Exposure – After leaving comments on blogs, you may notice an increase of traffic on your own website. Commenting consistently on fellow industry blog posts, you present the image of being engaged in your industry out side of your own company. For many, this would read as your company valuing customer service and genuinely showing a passion for what you do.
Creates Opportunities – Once you have established yourself as a leader in your industry, you may find you have guest blogging opportunities. It is important that your guest post has valuable information and does not read like an advertisement. Add calls to action to follow you on social media platforms and leave comments on the post.
Increases Traffic – Becoming a credible leader in your industry, increasing your visibility and exposure, and taking advantage of guest blogging opportunities, you’ll find the traffic of your website and social follows have increased.
Let us know in the comments if there are additional benefits you experience after commenting on blog posts. Follow us on social media for additional holiday fun this December!
On Monday we discussed the Top 5 Questions you should be asking your Web Designer. Today, we will go over the Top 5 Questions you should be asking your SEO specialist! First, what exactly is Search Engine Optimization? SEO, for short, is the process of organically ranking a website with both on-page and off-page methods.
1. How will you improve my search engine rankings?
Your potential SEO specialist should be able to explain to you the strategies they will be using to drive up your rankings. Steer clear of a consultant who is hesitant to discuss their strategies, or who may keep things vague as this may result in their strategies being of the black-hat SEO variety. During the proposal meeting, ensure your SEO candidate’s proposal includes an initial review of your website which would include weeding out any initial outliers or flags that could potentially hinder your search engine rankings; this can include error pages, broken links, poorly structured content pages, or inconsistent meta tag usage.
2. What types of SEO work will you do?
This may come up naturally in the course of your meeting, but if it does not – take a moment to ask the question, straight out. Ideally, the SEO candidate would bring this up during their proposal. Take note during their proposal review of the types of SEO optimizations are offering or focusing on. Have they mentioned “off page” SEO, or will they only focus on, “on page” optimization? On-Page focuses on the content of the site and how well it is optimized for keywords, as well as the overall experience for users. Just as important, is Off-Page SEO wherein the focus is on websites outside of your own and the inbound traffic they can bring to yourself. As Google now takes into account backlinks as part of your ranking, your SEO candidate should be able to speak to Off-Page SEO strategies.
3. Do you follow Google’s webmaster guidelines?
The only answer that should be accepted to this question is simple: Yes. And it should be a resounding one, at that. Simply put, failure in adhering to Google’s webmaster best practices may result in being relegated to a low search ranking, and could go as far as Google banning your website from search results altogether. While the end goal may be that #1 ranking slot, it shouldn’t be at the expense of less ethical SEO practices. Familiarize yourself with these guidelines, and do not hesitate to question your SEO candidate about said guidelines to ensure peace of mind that your website is in good hands.
4. Can you guarantee my website will achieve a number-one ranking on Google, Bing and Yahoo?
In an ideal world, the answer that both your SEO would like to give and you as the customer would like to hear would be “Yes!” However, it’s important to note that the end result, and what your SEO should be working towards consistently is progress and improvement. Be wary of an SEO who can guarantee you a Top 3 ranking in a 30 day time frame. Any specialist who is making such claims is either simply trying to make a sale, or could be participating in black hat tactics which can detrimentally hinder your website in the long run. Put your faith in a company who focuses on the improvement of your SEO and can back it up with their methods of improvement (see: Question #1).
5. How will we communicate and how often?
The answer to this may vary by the client. Truthfully told, the answer to this comes down to what you as the client would prefer. At the very minimum, on any given week you should have a good idea of where your website’s SEO is standing. This could be due to a weekly phone call, video chat, or simply an e-mail if that is what you prefer. If you know going into it that you would like an every other day touch point, or you simply are seeking a once-a-month breakdown then you should be able to communicate this to your SEO specialist and they should comply.
Search Engine Optimization is multifaceted, but none of the tactics used are proprietary. While it may be a bit intimidating to ask some of these questions, what you’re looking for most of all in the answers is a level of transparency to ensure their methods are adhering to Google’s webmaster guidelines, as well as specifics as any good SEO specialist should be willing and able to discuss with you their strategies to improve your overall ranking.
While hiring a professional web design team, it is important to ask a few key questions to ensure they’re the right fit for your business. A web designer is going to communicate your business’s image and message online to reach additional potential customers.
It is important the web designer has experience, skills and resources to get the job done successfully. When choosing a web designer, here are a few key questions to ask:
Five Questions to Ask a Web Designer
1.) How will I make changes to my site?
Content management systems will allow you to make changes to your website easily on your own time. Some companies will have a 48 hour turn-around time and when you need something changed quickly (such as a 24-hour special, closed notice, etc.), it is vital to update your website in a timely manner with that information. Be sure to ask if there is a training session for the content management system as well!
2.) Do I own my site if we part ways?
Be sure to not toss money away! The website purchased should be owned by you when it has been completed. Should the relationship with the web design company turn sour, ownership will allow you to transfer it to another web host easily. Admin access for the content management system, cPanel and FTP access are all required to make this transition go as smoothly as possible.
3.) Is my site responsive?
Being able to access all areas of a website on a mobile device is extremely important to customers. If a website is hard to use on mobile devices, there is a possibility of customers navigating to another website. Additionally, a responsive website is important to search engine optimization.
4.) Do you have examples of work in my industry?
Having a designer that has worked with clients in your industry could be beneficial to you. The end result is also going to depend on communicating your business goals, what functions you would like to see on your website and what you find to be important. If you’re looking for a team that can achieve a specific look, feel or function, the first meeting is the perfect time to ask this question.
5.) What is the expected launch date?
Depending on the scope of the project, the timeline can be anywhere from a week to a month. All design teams have different methods. Communicate your timeline to the design and programming team and ask for a to-do list to complete (website photos, content, hosting and domain information, etc.). Everyone on board need to have the same launch date goal to keep things on track.
The process of choosing a design team can be overwhelming, but it doesn’t have to be! Ask questions, communicate your wants, needs and goals. Leave us a comment and let us know what questions you ask your web designer!
Welcome to Day One of Advanced Digital’s 12 Days of Christmas Blog Series. Every other day, from now until Christmas Eve, you can expect a new post spanning many topics from Search Engine Optimization, to Web and Graphic Design as well as some Marketing information. We hope you join us this December!
We kick off this series talking about the importance of hashtags. Whether you love them and find yourself using them in your every day life for every one of your social media updates just because they’re fun, or you hate them as you don’t see the point in them: there is no denying that hashtags are an integral part of using social media.
Hashtags are utilized on many social media platforms in this day and age. From Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook to Pinterest, Google+, and Youtube, the likelihood of you running into a piece of content without hashtags is very slim. But why are they important and what benefit do they bring to your business?
When clicking a hashtag on any of the aforementioned platforms, you’ll find many other public posts that include the same hashtag. For example, we use “#ADTipTuesday” on all of our Tuesday tip posts throughout our social media platforms. Not only will hashtags provide users with content relevant to their search, but it allows customers to track a specific news story or event easily.
The Do’s and Don’t of Hashtags
DO Keep it Relevant. There are many generic hashtags that receive a lot of views, and while it may be tempting to tack on a tag or two to your post in hopes of getting a little more traffic, consistently doing this can set the precedence that your brand cares more about the number of likes rather than the quality of content and conversion.
DO Research Your Brand Hashtag. Research the hashtags relevant to your brand. Has the hashtag been used previously? Is it going to help get your brand seen on social media? It is important to keep these stats in mind when generating content and choosing hashtags on your platforms.
DO Be Mindful of the Platform. You may notice Facebook posts have less hashtags being used, however Instagram and Twitter uses them more frequently. It is okay to have personality when using hashtags! A photo of a cup of coffee may have the tag, “MondayMotivation” or even “InstaGood”.
DON’T Tag Full Sentences. It is important to tag only relevant keywords in your description or comments. Tagging full sentences, while quirky or fun between friends in conversation, can become a nuisance or hard to read in a professional setting..
DON’T Over Do It. As mentioned previously, tagging relevant keywords is going to help your impressions and conversion. Choose the keyword phrases that fit the message of your content. You may track or use 30 hashtags, however, they don’t need to be used all at once.
It is important to be consistent with your brand hashtag across all social media platforms you use. Users should be able to hop from searching your brand on Instagram to Google+ and still find the same quality of content.
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