Make your website mobile friendly

The digital marketing landscape in Australia is changing rapidly and small business needs to be proactive about keeping up with the pace. I can hear some of you saying, “But I’m not good with technology,” or “I’m not a computer geek.” However, you don’t need to be proficient in computer lingo, or to keep up with all of the latest apps, devices and social media sites, but you do need to have some awareness of what’s available and to take some interest in new developments, for the sake of your business. 

The number of Australian consumers who are now accessing the internet via a mobile phone, tablet or i-Pad is increasing rapidly. According to the Official Australian Google Blog, Australia has the second highest smartphone penetration in the world—ahead of the US, UK, and Japan. And as more and more people come out of existing phone contracts, those who haven’t already done so will no doubt upgrade their phone to a smart phone, which will in turn see even greater mobile penetration across the country.

So a very important question that you need to ask yourself is, “Does my website have a mobile responsive design?”

 

If you’re not sure what a ‘mobile responsive design’ is, you’re not alone, as there are plenty of other business owners who don’t what it means either But on the other hand, why be part of the pack when you can get an edge on your competitors?

A mobile responsive website design is a website that automatically adjusts to fit the screen size of the desktop computer, tablet or smartphone browser on which it is being viewed. On a non-responsive design, what you see on your smartphone will be exactly the same as what you would see on a desktop computer. However, because there is no difference, when you attempt to view such a site on a mobile device, you constantly need to zoom in. and then scroll around frequently so as to be able to read the usually very small text, or click on any of the buttons. In contrast, a mobile responsive design adjusts the layout so that the text fits the screen exactly and so becomes very clear and easy to read, while the buttons are in a format that is large enough for even the biggest fingers and thumbs to use. As you can imagine, all of this combines to make for a much more positive user experience.

Not sure if this applies to your website?

If you are using an analytics tool such as Google Analytics on your website, you can see for yourself how many visitors to your site are using a mobile device. Simply go to Audience > Mobile > Overview and you will see a pie chart showing the percentage of visitors coming to your site using a mobile device. If this number is very low, or there is a very high bounce rate, this would suggest that your site is not especially easy to read or use for viewers using a mobile device. 

Ultimately, if you are not providing a mobile-friendly experience for your customers they are very likely to leave your website and go to a competitor whose site is easier to use. Can that really be good for your business?

Written by +Denise Angus

Why Article Marketing is good for your business

Why Article Marketing is good for your business

Article marketing is an effective tool for promoting your business online to a broad audience. The aim is not to sell your products or services directly, but rather to give advice, share knowledge and help others with your expertise, for free. The more knowledge you give away, the more your customers - existing, new and potential - see you as an authority, which then in turn enhances your credibility. 

Not everyone wants to be sold to all of the time, which is why article marketing is an effective way of reaching new customers. Many people often want simply to learn more about a given subject and so your readers will genuinely regard your article as being of value if you provide good, useful, relevant content. Indirectly, you're selling them on your knowledge and expertise, which is invaluable. A well-written article may well then convince people searching for information that you have the answers to the questions they are looking for. 

There is also a greater likelihood that readers will follow the links to your website, blog or social media pages from an article with useful, valuable content and so in this way learn more about your business. It makes sense that people prefer to buy goods and services from businesses that they can get to know and trust. 

Articles can be used in many different ways to build your online presence. You can submit your articles to article directories, publish them on your own website, blog, or newsletter, or share them on social media. Well-written, well-researched and attractively presented articles can form an important part of building your online brand, which is what connects your business to the public. As Google itself puts it in its Australian blog: “Connected businesses are growing businesses”. 

For small and medium enterprises, article marketing is at its most effective when it focuses on niche areas of your business. For instance, if you are a retailer, direct your article marketing at a product range that you specialise in, or that you are the sole distributor for. Use article marketing to highlight products that you stock that your competitors may not. Alternatively, if you are a service provider, you can use article marketing to highlight one particular aspect of your business that you think you do better than anyone else, or that might be unique in your market. Article marketing works best when it has a specific focus in mind, rather than general promotion of your business. 

As with any type of online content, if your articles are fresh and original, they will serve you well. But be wary of content spinning software. Are you willing to put the credibility of your business into a software program? Would you trust a computer to write the kind of articles that people want to read? 

Article marketing, when it is done right, can be a sound long-term investment to boost your business profile. However, patience and consistency are the keys to success. Don’t expect article marketing to boost traffic to your site overnight - you need to put in a place a long-term plan for regular articles over an extended period of time to enable your presence really to be felt. Your aim should be to create a range of interesting and engaging content and to create new pieces on a regular basis, to ensure that your profile and presence online is always growing. 

Of course, not everyone has the confidence or ability to write effective and informative articles, nor do busy small business owners always have the time to devote to such tasks. However this doesn’t mean that you need to miss out on the value of article marketing. Media Gain uses the services of Cadogan and Hall, freelance writers based here in Adelaide, who specialise in writing compelling, engaging articles for all types of businesses and industries. Using a locally-based team of freelance writers has many advantages: the writing is of the highest quality; you can have as much or as little input into the process as you want or have the time for; and nothing is published or distributed without your approval. 

At Media Gain, we can advise you on all aspects of implementing a cost-effective, highly-visible article marketing campaign. For small and medium size businesses this can be a very positive and straightforward approach to enhancing your online presence.
Written by +Denise Angus

Affordable website design for Adelaide businesses

We invite you to view our video below, which outlines our website design and online content services for Adelaide businesses.

If you would like to find out more, please visit our website www.mediagain.com.au or you can email us denise@mediagain.com.au

Written by +Denise Angus

Understanding Meta Tags

Meta tags are used to provide additional information about your web page to search engines. Meta tags are placed at the top of your page in the HTML coding. Your visitors will not see the meta tags on your website; they are only used by search engines when your website is crawled.

Meta tags consist of a description and keywords. Each page of your website should have its own meta tags and should reflect the content of that page.If your website does not have a meta description, when your website displays in search results the description will generally show the first few sentences on the front page of your website. Sometimes this is not the most accurate description of your site, which is why it is best to create your own clear description. This description should be a concise summary of what your website offers; for example if your site is about town planning, make sure that the words "town" and "planning" are prominently displayed in the description. 

Meta keywords are words or short phrases that describe your website. Not sure what keywords to use? The Google Analytics tool is a great reference source as it will display the average number of local monthly searches for a particular keyword. Why is this helpful? You will be able to select words that you know people are using when looking for goods and services related to your business or industry. Using these keywords within your description is also beneficial. However don’t go crazy, if the keywords do not match the site content, then it will not help your site listing, as the robots that use these keywords will also search the website’s pages for the keywords mentioned.

The website title is also important. The HTML title tag isn’t a meta tag. Your title is different to the meta tags, in that it is written with both people and search engines in mind. This is the text that appears as the clickable link on a search engine results page. It’s important to have distinct, descriptive titles for each page of your site, particularly for large sites, so that it’s clear which particular page you are looking at, keeping in mind that individual pages are indexed and shown on the search results page. 

General recommendations for how many characters to include for each tag:

Title tag: 5-10 words, including your company name and relevant keywords, 60-70 characters Description tag: concise summary of the page, between 150-160 characters 
Keyword tag: keep your keywords simple and relevant, 6-12 keywords per page

Ideally you want to give your website the best possible chance of being found by search engines, and adding both meta tags and title tags to each page of your site is a simple way of boosting your website's listing and appearance in search engine results. It is not a miracle solution but every bit helps. 

At Media Gain, including meta and title tags is not an add-on which incurs an additional cost, as is the case with some web designers. Rather, this is standard practice for all the websites we build. 

To read this article in a downloadable PDF please click here
 
Written by +Denise Angus

Where do I start if I want a website in Adelaide?

Don't be intimidated when considering a website for your business. Everyone has to start somewhere. We've put together this simple document that will point you in the right direction. If you want to find out more we are more than happy to speak with you in order to make building your first website a smooth operation. For contact details please visit our website http://www.mediagain.com.au

Written by +Denise Angus