This post was inspired by a panel I was a part of earlier this year at Digital Bridges to evaluate the effectiveness of local business owners’ websites in Milledgeville, GA.

Here are some of the things we looked for that can help you evaluate the effectiveness of your own website:

• Usability
  Your site needs to be easy for your customers and potential customers to use. They should be able to find the information they are looking for quickly and navigate throughout your website will ease. Links need to be labeled well and generally, users shouldn’t have more than 2 clicks before reaching the content they need. Every page of your site needs to have a “Call to Action” so the user knows what to do next. Your site should also be cross-browser friendly and load quickly, which are things your web designer should ensure.
• Design
  As most of you know, your website should be aesthetically pleasing; you need a consistent color scheme that suits the “personality” of your business and the field you are in. For example, it wouldn’t be effective to have a black and gray color scheme for a daycare’s website. However, that same color scheme may work for a fashion website. Your font(s) need to be easily read and an appropriate size as well.
• Effective content
  Your website’s content should consist of concise but informative text. It should be broken up into small paragraphs and headings and subheadings should be used and clearly labeled. Most web users don’t want to come to your business’s website and read a lot of information. They want to get the information they are looking for quickly. Your content should also include keywords about your business and field to help search engines and users know what the site is about. Include relevant contextual links to help search engines and users understand how different pages relate to each other. Last but not least, make sure to regularly update the content on your site!
• Easily found
  As we always say– What good is your website if no one can find it? You could have a great looking site with excellent usability and good content, but it needs to be easily found by your target audience in search engines. Although some of the things I have mentioned thus far should help with this, here are some other tips. Make sure to make your title tags, description tags, and H1 tags relevant to search terms your target audience will use to find you. If this sounds like foreign language to you, this is something a web developer can help you with. Make sure to include a site map with links to all of your pages listed in a logical way. It is definitely important to make sure your website is indexing in Google, Yahoo, and Bing. Visit these search engines and type in your URL to see what pages are and are not indexing on your site.

For a one-on-one consultation on your website’s effectiveness, contact us via our contact form or give me a call at 478-390-6770!

I was part of a panel at Digital Bridges Milledgeville called “Is your website working for you?” to evaluate the websites of various business owners in the community. Leia Eubanks was having trouble getting her website to index in search engines because she was using a free service to build it. We developed her website based on her previous design as a self-hosted WordPress blog to allow her to gain a better reach within search engines.

Leia Eubanks Consulting: Central Georgia’s Development & Event Consultant
Leia is a development consultant and assists nonprofits and public agencies with anything and everything fundraising related. From prospect research and grant writing to designing annual fundraising campaigns, membership drives, and events, she can help your organization achieve its fundraising goals. 

She is also an event consultant for weddings, grand openings, open houses, birthday and anniversary parties, and other events.

The new Christopher Macken Concepts website is officially launched! It now serves as a portal website for his other endeavours, including Christopher Macken Cosmetics and M Famous Couture Clothing Line. The development of the site included a restructuring of CMC’s web properties to put the cosmetic site its own domain, add a one-page site for M Famous, and included a new custom WordPress blog, which can be found at blog.christophermacken.com!

We are proud to have added Light Force Family Chiropractic to our portfolio! Our family has been getting adjusted here for years, and it is a truly amazing place with an even more amazing staff.

This website features a dynamic flash piece, an “Ask Dr. Sherry” corner where the public can get their questions answered, and a wealth of wellness articles in a custom designed WordPress blog that flows seamlessly with the rest of the website. Check it out today at www.lightforcechiro.com.

About Light Force Family Chiropractic
Light Force Family Chiropractic is a bridge to wellness for the countless families we attract. While initially people might be drawn to us for a pain-based problem in the neck or back or perhaps even headaches, what they find when they begin care is much more than pain relief. What they find is that oasis called wellness which is so elusive in today’s healthcare environment. We assist on the journey from sickness which is often manifested in physical pain or general malaise to true health and wellness which are displayed by a renewed sense of hope and increased energy. How long has it been since you felt really well? Is your idea of wellness merely the absence of symptoms or do you have a true sense of what your physical goals are? Do you plan to spend your golden years managing a list of prescriptions a mile long or do you want to spend them managing your life’s purpose? At Light Force Chiropractic we explore with you the answers to these questions and more.

Helping to brand your company is usually (and should be) a goal for every business’s website.  A website is an important part of any branding strategy.  Let’s talk a little bit about how to use your website to help brand your company. 

- Make your logo prominent in your site design.
It is so important when you are tying to brand your company to include your logo on all the marketing materials you create.  Your website is no exception.  Make sure your logo is prominent in the design of your website.

- Use your company colors.
Company colors are also an important part of building your brand.  Your website design should be in your colors so customers can easily recognize that they are at the right site as soon as they land on your homepage. 

- Include your company name in your domain name.
It is always a good idea to include your company name in your domain name.  This will help brand your company and help people find you. It is also important to go to a domain registrar like godaddy.com sooner rather than later to reserve your domain name.  Reserving it will ensure that it is under your control and that competitors and domain squatters cannot buy it or themselves.

- Maintain the look and feel of your business.
Your website is an extension of your business and should reflect the personality of your business– whether that is classy and sophisticated, hip and trendy, or fun and energetic. You know if you have achieved this if going to your website kind of feels like walking into the door of your business. And if you don’t have a physical location that customers visit, you have even more flexibility to create the look and feel of your business through your website.
Your customer needs to know within seconds of landing on your site that they have come to the right place. A lot of business names are similar so it is important that your website maintain a look and feel that is uniquely you.

With all the various options available for web hosting, business owners need to understand what to look for when shopping around.

1. 99.9% uptime guarantee! This means that 99.9% of the time, your website will be available. Every website experiences some downtime at some point or another because of maintenance or connectivity issues, but it should not be down for more than 1% of the time. This is less than 45 minutes every month on average.
2. Great support! You want to be able to reach your host as soon as you notice that your site is down.
3. Weekly data back-up! Losing your data is rare, but you don’t want to take the chance. If you have a host that conducts a weekly data back-up, you can rest assured that your site and content won’t be lost.
4. Affordability! Many web designers will charge you $20 or $30 for web hosting when in most cases, this is not necessary. Most small businesses do not need to pay more than $10/month for hosting. We offer hosting packages starting at $6.99, or $4.99 for websites that we design.

We guarantee all these things at Goebel Media Group. Check out are web hosting packages to see what plan best suits your business. Don’t see a plan you like? Create your own! Contact us for a price quote.