How Blogs are an Effective SEO and Marketing Tool for Your Business

December 22, 2020 by David Henderson

When was the last time you did an online search to answer a question or solve a problem? You probably did so at least once today. There’s also a fairly good chance that you found your answers on a blog. Every day, your customers are online doing exactly the same thing. Don’t you want to publish an article that gets their attention? Online marketing services can help make this possible.

Foundation for SEO

Search engine optimization requires content to thrive. Marketers then work hard to ensure this content ranks highly in search results and attracts your most likely customers. Website copy can achieve this, but this information is static. To truly improve your website’s discoverability, you need more content and you need to find room to fit the right keywords on your website. Blogging helps make this happen.

Traffic Driver

Did you know companies that publish blogs regularly attract far more traffic than those that do not? Hubspot attributes this to the fact that every new blog post is another indexed page for your website. This ties back to the importance of organic traffic from SEO. Blogs also improve the quality of readers you attract, because blogs tend to attract people looking for solutions.

Compounded Value

Business owners often feel discouraged when blog posts do not garner a lot of traffic on the first day or within the first week. However, that blog will continue to attract traffic for some time to come. Because of this, older blog posts tend to outperform newer ones, with exceptions for those that go viral. Hubspot estimates that 90% of its leads come from blogs published months before.

Passive Investment

You have likely heard all the perks of passive income. You do the work once and it continues to feed your bottom line for some to come. Blogs work in the same way. While you are sleeping at night or off on the weekends, the blog posts you published continue to work on your behalf. This organic traffic is much more cost-effective than relying solely on expensive ads and labour-intensive marketing strategies.

Branding

In the early stages of business, you may not feel as drawn to the concept of branding. However, as your business grows, you see more and more the importance of distinguishing yourself from your competitors. Blogs give you the opportunity to create and maintain a certain core message or tone. It also gives your company and its key workforce the opportunity to showcase their expertise.

Engagement

Creating content that informs is crucial, but creating content that engages is of equal importance. The more people like, share or comment on a blog post, the more value it earns for search engine ranking. It also makes your content more memorable and improves the chances of more people seeing it. Your blog post may even go viral.

Customer Experience

All around the world, more companies are investing in creating a good customer experience. Customer support is the primary tool companies rely on, but content offers a great opportunity as well. Companies often turn common customer questions into articles. They can then link to these expanded answers via the use of the “Learn More” buttons.

Partnership

Not all blogs published by your brand will live on your website. Sometimes, you earn the opportunity to write for major publications or popular blogs. This can help you tap into the overlapping audience of more established blogs. If the admins allow you to use do-follow links, it also helps your SEO strategy through link-building.

Blogging is a core component of online marketing services and compliments most digital strategies. If you would love to see it become a part of your own, contact Unwired Web Solutions today.

Checklist for Migrating Your Website Without Hurting Your SEO

November 18, 2020 by David Henderson

An important aspect of providing search engine optimization services is forming part of the core team business owners rely on during website migration. This stems from the fact that any changes to a website can affect how well it ranks in search engines. So, before you migrate your website, here are a few things to help you create or improve your checklist for protecting your SEO.

1. Determine the Type of Site Migration

Every type or example of site migration comes with its own unique risks, so it is important to pinpoint what you plan to do. This provides a good foundation for your IT, marketing and SEO teams to work together to ensure a smooth transition. Here are the five main types:

Site Location: This may involve changing the mobile setup, merging parts of the existing site, changing to HTTPS or HTTP2, changing the domain and general rebranding.
Structural: Common changes that fit into this category include reorganizing hierarchies, changing the mapped user journeys, altering navigation and making changes to internal links.
Platform: Examples of these changes are integrating multiple platforms, upgrading to a new version, introducing new features and moving to a new platform altogether.
Design and UX: Adjusting the media, updating the user interface across devices, adding site performance features and modifying the look or feel fall into this category.
Content Changes: Introducing new locations and new languages can have big changes in SEO; other big changes include consolidating pages, removing or adding pages and rewriting content.

2. Create a Strategy

Treat website migration like any other big project your business would take on. Migration has the impact to determine how you do business and how many customers you receive. For instance, for a restaurant, if the pages that make online orders possible disappear, the effect can be as impactful as reducing the restaurant’s capacity during renovations. Because of this, your team needs to determine how it intends to manage this project and create a plan. This plan must feature a clear strategy and detailed deliverables.

3. Include a Contingency

The contingency plan you come up with depends on the type of migration you have in mind. For instance, if you plan to change domains or rebuild the entire website, you could keep the old one up while creating the second website in private. Only developers and other qualified professionals could view the new website while it is being worked on. This allows you to continue business operations with no disruptions, at least for a time.

Unfortunately, websites can still fail after launch. Here are some common backup plans:

Revert to the old website during debugging.
Create a one-page stand-in that encourages people to email, text or call.
Add a texting option to your Google Business Profile listening.

4. Complete Thorough Testing

The good news is that testing can help you maintain SEO and prevent crashes when migrating your website. Testing should begin with trying all the features on the new website to ensure they work. When migration involves rebranding and big upgrades, ask a few trusted customers to review the new changes and become part of the testing process. Finally, perform testing in stages as you complete various milestones, so you have enough time to make adjustments before launch.

5. Rely on Our Search Engine Optimization Services

The smallest changes to your website can affect its SEO for better or worse. Even changing the platform and speed can lead to improved or lowered performance. Because of this, it is crucial to work with qualified professionals. Unwired Web Solutions has the skills necessary to preserve your existing SEO during and after migration. We are also committed to helping you improve your website’s SEO.

Contact us today to learn more about what our search engine optimization services can do for your business. We look forward to serving you.

The Importance of Good Website Design for Your Business

November 11, 2020 by David Henderson

When was the last time you updated the overall look and feel of your website? If you do not yet have a website built, do you plan to hire a professional for the web development process? The ideal answers to these questions are that you update your website regularly and rely on professional services to do so.

Why You Need a Professional Website for Your Business

Almost anyone can learn the skill sets to create a basic website. Because of this, most brands have a website to match, no matter how small they are. That makes a professional website the bare minimum consumers expect of companies when it comes to establishing an online presence. However, just any website won’t do.

Boosts Credibility

Because a website is a bare minimum requirement, it affects a company’s credibility when it does not have a good one. A company can use social media profiles to do business, but consumers view social media more as necessary add-ons than suitable replacements. In fact, 84% of customers believe a company with a website is more credible than one with only social media profiles.

Provides Ownership

When you use another company’s platform for your business, you are constantly at the mercy of that platform and how it develops. For instance, consider the brands that relied heavily or exclusively on TikTok or Google Plus. When you have a website, you can create a central hub where you control all the information that goes out about the brand.

Improves Search Engine Ranking

Control over the information on your website puts you in an ideal position to improve the SEO ranking of your overall brand. News agencies, brand partners and reviewers finally have a website to link to, which improves your link-building strategy. By upgrading other functional aspects of the website, you can further improve your SEO ranking over time.

Why Web Design Plays Such a Crucial Role in Web Development

When developing a website, the functional aspects are the most important. However, the design determines how well these functions work for potential and current customers.

Improves Customer Experience

Web design dictates how easy and fun it is for customers to find the information they need. Factors that contribute to this include logical site maps, fast loading speeds, no random music, no obtrusive ads and legible fonts. How much customers enjoy using the website also determines your bounce rates, session lengths and conversion rates.

Contributes to Branding

How much branding work has your team put into your company so far? When customers hear your jingle on the radio, come across your web pages and see your billboard ads, is it obvious they all belong to the same company? How clearly does your product line up? A website can create a starting point from which all the rest of your branding efforts can flow.

Affects the Functionality

The more bells and whistles you add to your website, the more data it takes to load and the slower it does so. Are there videos that start automatically or large photos to load? These and many other factors can slow down the rendering of the website, which makes for an unpleasant viewing experience. Website design can also affect how well the site adapts to different screen sizes.

How To Get Started

By working with a professional web development team and SEO specialists, you put your website in the best position to attract visitors and create customers. A professional team considers your business needs, the demographic of your audience and your customer preferences when creating a design that works.

Unwired Web Solutions can provide the skills and experience you need to make your new or improved website a success. Reach out for more information.

4 Tips To Help Improve Your Website on a Small Budget

September 29, 2020 by David Henderson

Online marketing is an essential part of growing a successful brand in today’s world. There are thousands or millions of potential customers waiting for you online. However, many websites and business owners only have modest budgets at best. Therefore, it is helpful to know some effective promotional strategies that can be implemented without spending a lot of money.

1. Do Some Keyword-Based SEO

Search engine optimization is the process of improving your online content to ensure that it ranks highly on search engine results pages. Advanced SEO requires knowledge, experience and the right tools. However, you can get started with some basic keyword research. For example, Google offers the Keyword Planner, which can help you find some valuable keywords for your website.

Look for keywords that are highly relevant to your site but not overly competitive. You are going to have a hard time ranking highly for “athletic shoes,” but you may have some success with “running shoe store in Kitchener,” for example. Add these keywords naturally into your website content.

2. Create a Content Marketing Strategy

Content marketing is a technique that involves publishing informative blogs or articles that your audience is likely to search for. Returning to the athletic shoe example, you could publish some guides on how to find the right fitting shoe for different foot shapes and sizes. Another option may be a list of common foot injuries from running and how to resolve them.

With the right content management system for small business websites, you can easily create and share web content. This technique is completely free but can be time-consuming to do yourself.

3. Create a Google Business Listing

Google offers numerous tools to help businesses easily reach their customers. If your business relies on a local audience, a Google Business Profile listing may be one of the most valuable options for you. When you search for a business, you may have noticed that some have a box on the right side of the results. This includes key information about the company. You can control this with your Google business listing.

Sign up for Google Business Profile. From here, you can edit the information in your business listing, including address, open hours, website, phone number and more. This is something that every company should do. However, it is typically most impactful for local brands. It is a must-have local SEO tool.

4. Establish an Email Marketing Campaign

You can create an email marketing newsletter. Collect emails from current and potential customers and send them periodic messages that include information on sales promotions, new products, and special events.

The key to effective email marketing is providing value to your recipients. In other words, your emails should be about topics that attract your readers. It can be helpful to segment your email list based on interests.

Gather emails by offering something free in exchange for contact info. For example, you could provide some useful content or a webinar that requires registration using an email address. Alternatively, offer free tickets to an event in exchange for subscribing to your newsletter.

Get Professional Help

The above strategies are either cheap or free if you do them yourself. However, they can be time-consuming. If you are struggling to keep up with the marketing workload or want to achieve better results, consider hiring professional help. It is often a smart investment to hire a marketing agency and dedicate your time to running your business.

Unwired Web Solutions can help. Our team has empowered brands in Ontario and the rest of Canada to reach their growth goals. We offer options for SEO, web design, content marketing, and other services. Contact us today to learn more about these services and how we can help.

Reasons To Maintain Your Marketing Efforts During the Global Pandemic

July 23, 2020 by David Henderson

Most businesses are scrambling to recover from the economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. The public health crisis has changed the way companies operate both internally and externally. More than ever, businesses need to connect with their customers by accelerating online marketing services and efforts. Maintaining a positive, consistent presence in your industry is vital to weathering the storm of the pandemic, recovering profits and continuing business development efforts. Read below for more information on why it is important to continue your marketing efforts during the pandemic:

What Is Content Marketing?

Content marketing is a digital form of marketing that helps companies establish and enhance brand visibility and build relationships with customers. This form of marketing aims to provide the customer with valuable informative content. Content marketing first started as blog posts and link building and has evolved to include more sophisticated strategies, including social media and SEO tactics.

Online marketing is not focused specifically on promoting products and services. Instead, current strategies involve providing the customer with relevant and timely information. It is important to offer valuable content especially during times of crisis. If you have useful information for your customers now, you can build a relationship that will be profitable in the future.

The Challenges of Marketing During COVID-19

While traditional marketing efforts involve travelling and in-person presentations, the pandemic has caused companies to reevaluate their efforts and redistribute budget funds. Because most companies can no longer attend large events, they need to refocus their efforts more on online marketing efforts.

Another challenge is shifting priorities within company leadership. Changing priorities may mean that you are forced to put a project on the backburner that you have been working on for a long time. The importance of projects must be reassessed and flexibility is more crucial now than ever.

Why Content Marketing Remains Important

Most people are spending more time than ever on the internet. Many people are working from home and few are leaving their homes as often as they normally would. A recent survey found that nearly 95% of people have bought something online in the past month. This demonstrates how online content marketing remains a successful way to reach customers. There are perhaps more opportunities than ever to expand your online strategy. You can turn in-person events to digital events and have the opportunity to scale them internationally and increase customer engagement.

The pandemic allows businesses to focus on online strategies they normally would not have considered. From paid advertising to social media advertising, this is the time to try new content delivery methods. In essence, the current market is an opportunity to experiment and find new content marketing strategies that help your business grow. You want your customers to know you are still open for business and are ready to engage with them. Here are content marketing strategies to consider implementing to remain engaged with customers during the pandemic:

Create more targeted landing pages
Perform market research on your audience
Invest in social media marketing efforts
Target younger audiences with adaptive content
Create and take online training modules
Use native advertising

Online content marketing during pandemic requires creativity and adaptability. If you make an effort to better serve your customers, they will recognize those efforts.

Contact Unwired Web Solutions Today

If you need assistance with your online marketing strategy, contact Unwired Web Solutions today. We want to help your brand expand its online visibility and grow sales. We offer services including SEO, web design, content marketing, and social media marketing to help your brand succeed in an internet environment. Contact us to find out how we can expand your company’s online presence.