May 10, 2016 | General
Does your business appear on Google’s first page when potential customers search for your chosen keywords? If you’re not at the top – or near the top – it can be frustrating. There is plenty of evidence to show that very few users venture beyond the first page of results when they do a Google search. In fact, they’re more likely to refine their search than to move on to the next page.
Fortunately, there are quite a few things you can do to help your website rank on the first page in 2016. Here are the top five.
#1: Google’s first page is more about authority than keywords
It’s still important to use keywords in your web content, but the days when high keyword density was the key to ranking on Google are long gone. In fact, your keyword placement is not nearly as important as the overall authority of your site. Google’s algorithms are very sophisticated, and they no longer rely on keywords in a title or H1 tag to determine if a page is worth visiting. Rather, they focus on contextual meaning and look for expected words to rank pages.
For example, it used to be that if you wanted to rank for a keyword such as “Best Legal Services” you’d have to use that keyword three or four times in strategic places to have a chance of ranking. Now, if you talk about competent legal representation, Google can tell that your page is relevant to the keyword even if you don’t use it more than a couple of times in your article.
#2: Pay attention to bounce rates and the time spent on your page
Another surprising SEO development for 2016 has to do with an evaluation of whether your page is providing visitors with what they need. In addition to crawling your page for keywords and context, Google also pays attention to what people do after they leave your page as a way of determining if your page is an authoritative one or a waste of time.
For example, if a visitor searches one of your keywords and clicks on your page, Google looks at how long they stay. A visit of several minutes might indicate that a user is engaged with the content on your page and has found what they want. However, if they spend several minutes on your site, return to their list of search results via the dreaded back button, and click on another site instead, it’s a good sign that your site did not offer what they needed.
If you have a high bounce rate, a good way to improve your search ranking in 2016 is to make sure that your site provides the answers to the questions implied by your chosen keywords.
#3: Optimize your website for mobile users
In 2015, mobile searches on Google outpaced computer searches – and that trend is likely to continue. Google has placed a great deal of importance on mobile search as evidenced by their Mobilegeddon mobile-friendly update in early 2015. If your site isn’t mobile-friendly, now is the time to get on board.
Fortunately, most businesses can switch to mobile-friendly or (ideally) mobile-adaptive sites with little trouble. Sometimes it’s as simple as switching the template you use for your site. For example, if you have a WordPress site, they have a huge library of templates available, many of which are mobile-adaptive. You may have to do some fine-tuning of your site to make a new template work, but it’s worth the work to get it done.
The beauty of mobile-adaptive sites is that they work by configuring to the specific mobile device being used. Mobile customers tend to be an impatient bunch, and they are unlikely to wait for a slow-loading page or scroll horizontally to read your content. If you take the time to optimize your site for mobile users, it can do more than anything else to improve your search ranking in 2016.
#4: Stay away from content that’s too short
It wasn’t that long ago that blog posts of 250 to 500 words were considered the norm. Short and snappy was the rule of the day, and the assumption that people wanted short content led to a glut of short articles that were light on value and meaning.
That has all changed. Truthfully, the trend toward lengthy web content has been happening for a while, but this year it has really become the rule rather than the exception. Research shows that web users are far more likely to engage with content that’s in the 1,000-1,500 word range than with short articles. Why? Because they want valuable information, and – with rare exception – it’s hard to convey that in just a few hundred words. Of course, you can offer a top 10 list that’s only 500 words long, but you’re not going to be able to explain why items are on the list as well as you would if you wrote a longer article or blog post.
The reason that Google is placing so much emphasis on length is that they want to make sure they are sending people to pages designed for humans, not search algorithms. If you’re worried about publishing long content, remember that you can make it more readable by breaking it up with subheadings and images.
#5: Make sure the user experience is front and center
In a way, this last point is a summary of everything that has come before it. Each one of the above points come back to one thing: user experience. Old-school SEO focused on tricking Google’s algorithms – to the point where many websites were far friendlier to computers than they were to human beings. More and more, Google is concerned about ensuring that their search results are leading users to sites that answer their questions. They want users to feel good about the search experience, something that’s unlikely to happen if they end up on a site that’s not mobile-friendly, or is packed with keywords but contains no real value.
There are many things you can do to test the user experience on your site, including split-testing individual components on your page. However, the best thing you can do is to do what you can to answer key questions that are implied by your chosen keywords and make sure that your site is easily viewable by any user, on any device.
Ranking on Google’s first page is always a challenge. Regardless of your niche, you will be facing some fierce competition. It might sound odd to say this, but the best way to rank is to forget about trying to rank. Don’t worry about algorithms and SEO tricks. Instead, focus on making your site a place where potential customers can find exactly what they need. If you do that, the search rank will follow.
At JVI Mobile, we are passionate about creating and growing awesome social relationships. Tell us how we can help! We’ve got a crack team literally at your fingertips!
If you haven’t already, check out our Digital Marketing Assistant. It’s a relatively new service we are offering where you can get expert help and ready access to the JVI team will all your digital marketing concerns and questions!
May 5, 2016 | Facebook, Social Media Management and Optimization (SMM, SMO)
Facebook advertising gets a bad rap at times, though perhaps only part of that reputation is deserved. You don’t even need all the figures to realize that an investment in Facebook advertising is a must-do to grow in today’s world.
Facebook Advertising
Kyle Taylor, the owner of The Penny Hoarder, recently shared the secret to his success in this channel in a recent post for Entrepreneur.com. You can get the full article here, but we’ve summarized his insights below. We couldn’t agree more!
- Facebook advertising can be challenging with changing interfaces and options. It takes some time to learn and master.
- Focus on sending traffic to your site, not on growing your Facebook page.
- Boosted posts, though at a higher cost, can dramatically drive more visitors to your site. You’ll still get likes along the way. Not only do boosted posts go live faster, but they also feel less “salesy”.
- You don’t have to spend a lot to see a good return. Between effective segmentation and watching the analytics, you can get clicks for pennies.
Social Media Retargeting
If you’re already spending on Facebook, you’ve got to consider social media retargeting as well. Social media retargeting is where the vacation you were just looking at online suddenly appears in your Facebook feed.
As Mary Long recently shared over at AdWeek:
“26 percent of customers will return to a site through retargeting. This is up from 8 percent of customers who return to a site without retargeting.”
And in regards specifically to Facebook retargeting that:
“When adding Facebook to an existing display retargeting campaign, advertisers saw a 92 percent increase in impression reach, 9 percent drop in cost per thousand impressions (CPM), and 27 percent decrease in cost per click (CPC).”
With results like that, how can you not get in the retargeting pool!
Here at JVI mobile, we specialize in unique programs in both Facebook advertising and retargeting geared to YOUR unique needs. Just ask us how we can help!
Apr 19, 2016 | General, Social Media Management and Optimization (SMM, SMO), Uncategorized
Is your company using Twitter to connect with customers? If not, you should be. There’s no denying that Twitter is becoming more popular as a communication tool for companies – but that doesn’t mean that many companies don’t get it wrong. Having a Twitter account that feels impersonal or doesn’t respond to customers in a timely manner is worse than not having an account at all.
If you’re going to maintain a Twitter presence, then you have to be prepared to think about how – and when — to use it. More and more, customers are expecting compassionate engagement from the companies they follow on social media. With that in mind, here are four great ways to market your business on Twitter.
Put Customer Service at the Forefront
One of the biggest mistakes that companies large and small make on Twitter is ignoring customer service questions and complaints. It’s important to remember that everybody who follows your company can see that you’re not replying to questions if they take the time to look. Stellar customer service can do a lot to boost brand loyalty and your company’s reputation.
The best customer service on Twitter is personal, meaning that someone monitors your account on an ongoing basis and answers customers directly with @ Tweets. A good example of a big company who uses this strategy is airline Jet Blue. An examination of their Twitter feed shows that almost everything they Tweet is a direct reply to a customer.
While responding to customers is better than not responding, beware of responses that seem cold or impersonal. Some companies try to keep customer service off Twitter by redirecting people who post questions or complaints to call their customer service number. You’re far more likely to engage customers – and keep them in the long run – if you embrace the idea that Twitter is an ideal platform to provide great customer service.
Provide Value to Your Customers
You might already know that Twitter is not the best place to be bombarding customers with sales pitches. You already know that the people who follow you are interested in what you have to offer, but the most successful companies on Twitter know that sending out a stream of self-promoting Tweets isn’t a good idea. Instead, they find ways to provide valuable content to their customers.
Let’s look at some hypothetical examples. A local pizza parlor might Tweet out fun facts about pizza, or even tips for reheating the perfect slice the next day. A clothing boutique might Tweet pictures of people wearing the clothes they sell. A dentist might link back to articles on her blog about tooth whitening or dental cleanings.
What all of these examples have in common is that their intention is to share information that is relevant and valuable to the customer. Sharing valuable content makes the people who follow you on social media feel a sense of obligation, which in turn triggers a cognitive bias known as reciprocity. In other words, giving your followers something for free can do far more for your marketing than overtly trying to sell them on your services.
Open a Twitter Dialogue with Your Customers
One mistake that a lot of companies make is to forget about the “social” in social media. People follow their favorite brands on sites like Twitter because they want to engage in some kind of communication with them. That doesn’t mean that they want to be your friend, necessarily, but they do welcome the idea of friendly and thoughtful communication.
Let’s talk about some ways to do that. One technique that can be helpful for local businesses is to re-Tweet chosen messages from their followers. You can use a tool like Social Mention to monitor social media activity and find out when your brand is mentioned. When a customer says something positive or memorable about you on Twitter, re-Tweet it. It’s a good way of showing customers that you’re paying attention to them.
Another option is to ask your followers a question. If you do it right, this can actually be a subtle form of customer research. For example, you might ask your followers a question about how they use your product, or why they like it. If you offer an array of products, ask which one is their favorite and why. Alternatively, you could ask an open-ended question. For example, a local restaurant could Tweet “What’s for dinner tonight?” and include a link back to their menu. Yes, the menu is a sales pitch – but it’s a subtle one. If you decide to try this method, make sure to answer the Tweets you get in response.
Host a Twitter Contest or Giveaway
Another clever way of using Twitter to promote your business is to use it to get the word out about a contest or giveaway. Everybody loves the idea of being able to win a contest or get a free product, and Twitter’s an ideal platform to promote such a thing. A contest has the benefit of adding value to customers while also providing you with an easy way to broaden your reach.
One way to get the most out of a Twitter contest is to ask users to re-Tweet the information about the contest in order to enter. Using this method actually wraps several of the other tips in this article, as well. For example, a contest is a good way to add value for customers and to engage with them directly. Sponsoring a contest is an effective way to find out how many of your followers are truly engaged with your brand, and asking customers to share your Tweet about the contest may help gain you some new followers too.
The bottom line is that Twitter can be an incredibly effective marketing tool if you know how to use it. The keys are to respond directly to customer questions and complaints instead of avoiding them and to remember that the people who follow you are people, not machines. They don’t want to be hit with a constant barrage of sales pitches. What they want is something that feels like personal engagement and compassion. If you can do that, then Twitter can be a strong part of your marketing mix.
At JVI Mobile, we are passionate about creating and growing awesome social relationships. Tell us how we can help! We’ve got a crack team literally at your fingertips!
If you haven’t already, check out our Digital Marketing Assistant. It’s a brand new Facebook Group where you can get expert help and ready access to the JVI team will all your digital marketing concerns and questions!
Apr 16, 2016 | General, Uncategorized
Are homepage conversions lagging behind your expectations? There is an art to designing a high-converting home page, and a lot of small businesses simply don’t give the content and appearance of their website enough attention.
The good news is that there are some very simple things you can do to increase your homepage conversions without having to spend a ton of time and money.
Our 11 Tips to Increase Home Page Conversions
The first thing you need to consider is the quality of the images on your homepage. A page that’s densely packed with text is not going to be appealing to the majority of internet users. On the other hand, a page that mixes text with effective images is far more likely to convert. A great image is one that accurately reflects your product or industry. If you can afford it, the best option is to hire a photographer to take pictures of your business and employees. However, if budget is a concern, don’t be afraid to use stock photos as long as they are unique and not cheesy. Stay away from anything that is obviously a stock photo and go for images that are striking and appealing. Also, you should strongly consider using pictures of people’s faces, which tend to draw customers in.
Use strong marketing copy that focuses on the things that are most important to your customers. When people search for a keyword, they are really asking a question – and most often, they are asking about a problem that they want to solve. When your home page uses language that plays to your visitors’ emotions, it can trigger a powerful response – one that’s very effective in terms of increasing conversions. There’s an old advertising trope that says that using fear, uncertainty, and doubt (FUD) helps drive sales. The most effective home pages don’t market openly in fear. Instead, they focus on a user’s problem (which may be making them feel one of those three emotions), empathize with it, and then offer a concrete solution.
- Make sure that your value proposition is clear. What are you offering, and why should people be interested? It’s not enough to have well-written copy. You need a strong headline that will immediately put visitors to your site in the proper frame of mind.
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Apr 8, 2016 | General, Social Media Management and Optimization (SMM, SMO), Uncategorized
Small Business Services- Essential services can make or break your business. Whether you’re just starting up or heading into your second decade as a business owner, you’re always looking for the best solutions to partner with and make you more efficient and more profitable.
We’ve collected a few essential small business services that we use together into one listing for you. Whether you’re a client or not, we know you’ll find them strong contenders for your business!
Small Business Services: Payroll & Accounting
If you’ve got employees or contractors getting them paid can be a distraction- not to mention a headache if it’s handled poorly. Gusto is the payroll system and it couldn’t be easier to use. Not only is it geared for mobile but it also calculates payroll taxes automatically. If you need it you can also work in benefits, employee discounts and more!
Any business needs an accounting package, and Freshbooks isn’t only a great value, but also lets you access your books from anywhere! Though you’re not likely to need live, real-time support, it is easy to get live help quickly- and they really know their stuff!
Email Management
If you want to launch email campaigns, there’s a lot of tools out there. But if you also want strong automation and great analytics you’ve got to check out Active Campaign. It’s also got a pretty darned CRM module too.
Social Media Management
We’ve got a couple of great tools that we use to grow and maintain our clients’ social media accounts. First of these is MySoPro. MySoPro is a free tool that serves as a personal social media assistant. This platform allows you to schedule social media posts in advance so you have more time to focus on the important things. You can manage all of your popular social media profiles in one location. You can also upgrade to the pro version for a small monthly fee.
Another great tool, but just for Instagram, is Onlypult. Onlypult’s great for not only scheduling your posts and reposting those of others, you can also optimize your Instagram campaigns for the best engagement.
Monetization
Of course, you want to take every opportunity to make money online. Part of any key monetization strategy is landing page creation and management along with payment and upsell options. The best system we’ve seen so far is from Click Funnels. It’s powerful and robust and can have your first landing page live in minutes.
Our second essential service for monetization is AdEspresso, which is a great tool to optimize your Facebook 
advertising and get the most traffic back to your offers. It’s easy to setup but they’ve also got a full suite of online guides and seminars to get you started. They’ve got a 14 day free trial, but even after that it is well worth the modest investment.
If you’re ever looking for an easier way to streamline your sales process and want to close deals faster, consider using Proposify. It’s an online business proposal software and serves as a great tool for delivering proposals to Clients. With Proposify, you’re able to maximize your time, organize your sales team and close deals faster than ever.
Organization
Of all of our essential services we’ve listed, Dropbox is one you’ve surely heard of before. Dropbox is a great tool both for keeping all your key documents in the cloud and having them accessible on most any device. It also allows you to share documents with folks either inside or outside of your organization. For smaller organizations, a free account may be all you need. For extremely reasonable costs you can get almost any amount of cloud storage.
Many busy professionals and business owners have a tough time staying organized, 
especially when it comes to keeping up with appointments and or scheduling/booking Clients. In order to stay on track, try Book Like A Boss. It’s an all-in-one scheduling platform for you to take appointments, sell your products and/or services and manage your business effectively.
If you’re like us, you’ve already thought of a dozen ways each of these small business services can make your small business more efficient and profitable. And if you’re already pulling your hair out over a lack in resources, dare we say implementing these might even make you happy? That’s at least one of the reasons you started your own business in the first place, right?
Did we leave something out that your small business can’t live without? Anything you use that is mission critical to your success? Let us know in the comments!
Does your business appear on Google’s first page when potential customers search for your chosen keywords? If you’re not at the top – or near the top – it can be frustrating. There is plenty of evidence to show that very few users venture beyond the first page of results when they do a Google search. In fact, they’re more likely to refine their search than to move on to the next page.
It’s still important to use keywords in your web content, but the days when high keyword density was the key to ranking on Google are long gone. In fact, your keyword placement is not nearly as important as the overall authority of your site. Google’s algorithms are very sophisticated, and they no longer rely on keywords in a title or H1 tag to determine if a page is worth visiting. Rather, they focus on contextual meaning and look for expected words to rank pages.
For example, if a visitor searches one of your keywords and clicks on your page, Google looks at how long they stay. A visit of several minutes might indicate that a user is engaged with the content on your page and has found what they want. However, if they spend several minutes on your site, return to their list of search results via the dreaded back button, and click on another site instead, it’s a good sign that your site did not offer what they needed.
In 2015, mobile searches on Google outpaced computer searches – and that trend is likely to continue. Google has placed a great deal of importance on mobile search as evidenced by their Mobilegeddon mobile-friendly update in early 2015. If your site isn’t mobile-friendly, now is the time to get on board.
It wasn’t that long ago that blog posts of 250 to 500 words were considered the norm. Short and snappy was the rule of the day, and the assumption that people wanted short content led to a glut of short articles that were light on value and meaning.
There are many things you can do to test the user experience on your site, including split-testing individual components on your page. However, the best thing you can do is to do what you can to answer key questions that are implied by your chosen keywords and make sure that your site is easily viewable by any user, on any device.
