Smart Online Marketing Advice and Information [ADVANTAGE Membership Required]

What Makes A Great Website?

What Makes A Great Website? People call me and say "we have a great website but we just don't get any inquiries." Guess what? Your website isn't as great as you think. . . . more

Web PAGE Design Not Web SITE Design

Web SITE design is different in many ways than web PAGE design. Here are some tips to consider when designing each of the pages at your website. . . . more

One More Reason To Love Google: Free 411

I hate getting charged $2.00 to call Sprint 411. It should be free for what they charge me each month for cellular phone service. So there was a big smile on my face when I heard Google was offering 411 service for free. . . . more

10 Reasons To Join My ADVANTAGE Program

10 Reasons To Join My ADVANTAGE Program 1. You'll Get Better Results From Your Website 2. You'll Beat Your Competition 3. You'll Will Improve Your Search Engine Positioning 4.You'll Get Exper . . . more

Common Online Marketing Mistakes

Common Mistakes and Misunderstandings: Counting Hits . . . more


Your Biggest Online Challenges (The Next 12-18 Months)

To get the best results from your website and online marketing strategy going forward you'll need to know what you are facing. Here is what you're looking at as the biggest challenges to your online marketing strategy in the next 12-18 months. . . . more

FLASH and Search Engine Optimization

FLASH and SEO: I get a lot of questions about FLASH and how it fits into, or doesn't fit into, search engine friendly sites. Here's my .02 cents worth (and the truth!). . . . more

Fire, Ready, Aim: How Well Do You Know Your Marketplace?

Part of any business plan, or online marketing plan, must include a review of the marketplace. While not one of my favorite things to do, understanding the numbers, the statistics, and even sifting through some raw data, is what you have to do. The Wedding Report from Shane McMurray will save you hundreds of hours. . . . more

How Much Does It Cost To Build A Great Website?

I get asked this question 10x a week. Here is what you need to know. . . . more

Online Marketing Q&A

Questions From The Front Lines of Online Marketing. Google Sitemap, Traffic and Inquiries Off, Starting Out With PPC (Pay Per Click). . . . more

Where Are All Your Inquiries Going?

If your inquiries are off there's a good chance it's because your search engine positioning and rank is slipping. If you don't know where you are it's hard to figure out where you're going. Knowing where you are at Google, Yahoo!, and MSN is the first step to developing an effective search engine optimization strategy. . . . more

What Is Viral Marketing?

What is viral marketing? Can you use it? (YES!). Does it work (YES!) How does it work? How do you get it to work for your business? Its easier than you might think. . . . more

Is Your Website Ready For Your Next Visitor? (Part Three: Conversion)

Conversion is where the "rubber hits the road", as they say. Nothing means much if you aren't converting the brides who visit your website into phone calls or inquiries. . . . more

Key Factors in Obtaining Top Search Engine Rank

There are many variables related to achieving top rank with search engines like Google, Yahoo!, and MSN. Here are some of the most important factors.

1. Search Engine Friendliness

Search engines use "crawlers" that visit and scan your web pages and assign points for a wide range of variables. When these crawlers, also known as spiders, can't crawl your website effectively it immediately puts your site at a disadvantage.

2. Page Title Tags/Keywords

Your page title tags must match the keyword search that brides are performing. If those keywords are not in your page title tags, your website has ABSOLUTELY NO CHANCE of showing up. Putting your company name in your page title tags is absolutely unnecessary (and brides are probably not searching for your company name, if they are they'll find it based on the page copy)

3. Inbound Link Popularity

The number of websites linking to your website creates a "popularity" factor. The more websites that point to your website the better. But even more valuable is when the rank and quality of those websites is high. Google uses a system called Page Rank to losely indicate page popularity and ranks a page on a scale of 0 to 10 (10 being the best).

4. The Text Used for Those Inbound Links

The keywords used in the links to your website play an important role. Links using your company name are of little value. Links using the description of your business as the keywords brides are searching for (i.e. Chicago Wedding Photographers) are incredibly valuable. Search engine spiders crawling the web note the words used in the links they follow and use them to establish theme and relevancy.

5. On Page Copy/Keywords

The words you use on your pages must be recognizable and crawlable by search engine spiders. The best chance at getting top rank comes after creating relevancy using your page copy and keywords. If search engine spiders can't read your page (i.e. FLASH) you have little chance against a competitor who is not using FLASH and has crawlable, keyword-rich text throughout their website.

6. Site Maturity (Age and Frequency of Crawls)

Like it or not, the longer you've been on the web the better. It can take a new website 12 months or more to even get into the top 20 listings on any search engine result page. If you have a domain name that has been active for three or more years, and you don't have top ranking for your keywords/category - you're probably not doing something correctly.

7. Topical Relevance

If you're a wedding consultant in Hawaii you have to make sure all of your pages clearly communicate a relevancy about that topic. Google particularly, but other search engines also, use algorithms to try and establish a site and page topic. Relevancy to the search being performed by a bride is critical to achieving top rankings.

Blogging Is Not The Magic BulletTo Top Search Engine Positions

Blogging is certainly the "buzz" these days but here's something that sort of puts it all in perspective, at least related to search engine optimization and online visibility, in general.

You never see a blog top ranked for ANY competitive keyword/phrase.

Try it, you'll see.

Can you find blogs? Sure. Is your blog being indexed and in the pile of search engine results pages? Absolutely.

But does your blog have a chance at being top ranked for a competitive term like:

Orlando Wedding Ministers

Probably not and REALLY unlikely at Google (MSN and Yahoo! seem to be more blog friendly - at this writing).

The challenge is that websites and blogs are two different things. As much as the line seems to be blurring, they are two different creatures. And today, websites are being given more "weight" in the SERPS.

Blogs are still very valuable and increase your overall online exposure, are great tools to build backward links, and allow you to easily update/edit news and information about your business without a webmaster/programmer.

Bad Advice Hurts Your Wedding Business

There's a lot of bad information about online marketing on the Internet. Usually, it falls into one of these categories:

Just Wrong
Vague
Misleading
Incomplete

1) Just Wrong

Almost daily I read articles that are just wrong. Yes, just wrong. The classic example is submitting your website to the search engines monthly. Another is that there are ways to optimize FLASH websites for search engines for top ranking.

If you do either of these things you are wasting time and money and you will not see the appropriate return-on-investment.

2) Vague

Many so called "online marketing experts" often talk about things just enough to pique your interest. They give you a few of the key buzzwords, but not enough information to clearly explain how it works, how you can apply it to your website, the benefits, the costs (time/money), the anticipated return on investment, and how long it might take.

A great example is search engine optimization. I hear people talk about meta-tags and keywords, but I NEVER hear anyone talk about the competitive nature of top ranking in just about any wedding category. It is almost impossible (YES, almost IMPOSSIBLE) to get top ranking at Google for positioning like: Chicago wedding photographers, Boston wedding bands, Orlando wedding ministers, Los Angeles wedding consultants...

3) Misleading

"Blogging is an effective online marketing tool..."

Sure it is, but I wouldn't put it on the top of your list of things to do. Should you do it, yes, should you drop everything else you're doing, put up a blog, add to it weekly, and expect brides to knock down your doors trying to buy from you? No. It doesn't work like that. Misleading information distracts you from what you should be doing. You end up spending a lot of time and money with little to show for it. Worse, you end up frustrated because you thought it would work.

4) Incomplete

A lot of the information I read or hear is incomplete. Do page-title tags play a role in top ranked websites, sure. But there are also 20/30 other elements.

OK "Mr. Expert" - what are those 20 other elements?

Wedding Minister Says: "I fixed my page-title tags, why is my competitor still showing up above me at Google?"

Chris Answers: "Who told you that would do anything by itself?"

5) TINSTAFL

Expertise, like in any industry, comes with a cost. You get what you pay for and there is no such thing as free lunch. Top rank in the search engines is worth thousands of dollars in new sales. A website (design) that converts the brides who find it into inquiries and sales is worth thousands and thousands of dollars in new sales. Staying ahead of your competition is priceless. To think you can do this "cheap" or do-it-yourself, in today's competitive marketplace, is most likely only wishful thinking.

Do This One Thing (and You'll Book More Weddings)

If you do just this ONE THING you'll book more weddings:

FOLLOW-UP ON ALL YOUR WEBSITE INQUIRIES BY PHONE

Forget email follow-ups. They're useless and 99% of the time ineffective.

The person who picks up the phone and calls a bride who took the time to make an online inquiry will book more weddings than a competitor who uses email to follow-up.

Add to this:

FOLLOW-UP THE SAME DAY OR WITHIN MINUTES OF RECEIVING THE INQUIRY

And you'll get even better results.

Keep in mind, it's pretty unlikely that a bride only made an inquiry at your website. In most cases, a bride looking for local services will probably have found four to six of your competitors. More if they don't like the websites they've seen.

If they find your website first, like what they see, you've effectively delivered a WIIFM message (what's in it for me) and a UVP (unique value proposition), make an inquiry, and you promptly follow-up BY PHONE...

You'll get more appointments and book more weddings.

Don't expect you're website to do everything for you. That's simply bad thinking.

Backward Links

The Importance of Backward Links

Everyone wants to be top ranked at Google, Yahoo!, and MSN and developing links TO your website from other websites, known as backward links, or inbound links, is one of the most important factors related to your search engine optimization strategy.

Backward links are VERY valuable and have a double punch.

Not only do they deliver traffic but, more importantly, they will have a positive impact on your search engine ranking. Actually, I’m confident saying that without backward links you’ll (1) have a hard time getting good search engine positioning or (2) keeping it if you have it.

How does it work?

Search engines track who is linking to your website. Let’s use Google as an example. When search engines like Google see a lot of other websites linking to your website they say “hey, there must be something there worth looking at, if all these webmasters are linking to that page).

When they see that those websites are quality websites, not just websites just made for linking purposes (sometimes called link-farms) and that those sites have a relevant content and a matching theme, your website is gets a few extra points compared to your competition who doesn’t have backward links.

Backward linking is one way to improve what I call “Google Love.”

Put another way, without a solid number of quality websites linking to your website it’s highly unlikely you’ll achieve top ranking – particularly with Google.

So, how do you get backward links?

It’s difficult, time consuming, and a slow process.

You can (1) ask for them from people you network with, (2) write articles or tips for other websites and make sure they link back to your website, and of course (3) buy them.

One think you MUST know. In order to get backward link “value” from another website a search engine must be able to crawl or see that link and it must be a link that has your website address – NOT A SCRIPT OR COUNTER.

If you go to my popular Wedding Planning Links website (http://www.weddingplanninglinks.com) and look at the top of the page, “Some of Our Favorite Links”, you’ll see an example of directly passed backward links.

If your link is at a website that requires brides to register to use it, or see a listing of advertisers where your website link appears - you’re not getting any backward link value with your advertisement.

If the link is not a DIRECT link to your website or if it is passed through a counter script or uses a session ID variable, you’re also not getting any backward link value.

Anything that keeps a search engine from seeing your “pure” link is an obstacle to receiving backward link value.