Showing posts with label SEO. Show all posts
Showing posts with label SEO. Show all posts

Wednesday 25 November 2020

New Free Keyword Research Tool - The Perfect Keywords Everywhere Alterna...

You probably already know how important it is for the reach of your content that you use appropriate keywords.

Many people use Keywords Everywhere but not everyone is happy that it has become a paid product.

In this video another free alternative is presented, Keywords Surfer, which works as a Google Chrome extension.

Check out the video to see if it is right for you

Friday 4 September 2020

Write Articles 7 Different Ways For Easier, Faster, Better Results

 If you want an insight into the techniques authors use to get SEO effective copy out there, Ruth Barringham explains it right here

There's a reason that online marketers spend time (and often money) to find the right SEO keywords, and that's because the more targeted the keywords are, the better the results.

But personally, I found that all this keyword research, and then writing the resulting keyword-rich articles, takes time. Sometimes it takes too much time, especially when you want to write really information-packed and entertaining articles.

Fortunately I found a way to really speed this process up and get better search engine results at the same time. Not only that, but it also makes it all much simpler and faster to do.

The way I do it, is first I look for long-tail keywords that have an average search volume and low competition. This is so that my articles are more likely to be on the first page of the search results, because, let's face it, getting on the first page is THE most important thing when it comes to search results and it's what we're all aiming for.

Next, I write my article and I usually, but no always, place my main keyword in the title and the first paragraph.

Once I've completed my article the hard work is done because I then rewrite this article several different ways which gives me more unique articles all written from just one original article so that the keyword research and the article research are already done.

I have perfected my article writing system so that I can write one article a total of seven different ways.

This works really well for search engine marketing because it means that anyone competing for the same long-tail keyword (and there won't be many because I use low-competition keywords) have to compete with me seven times for the prized number one spot in search engine results.

Also, using this seven article system helps to increase my chances of being on the first page of results seven times.

Look at how this works:

Say I write just one article and it shows up third on the first page of results. That's not bad and it will probably bring me plenty of online visitors to my website. And using long-tail keywords means that my visitors are more targeted which helps increase sales.

But when I write seven articles, not only can my original article show up as the third result, but my other articles can also show up as number four, five, six and seven. So working this way means that my site shows up seven times more in search results.

It also means that writing multiple articles seven different ways will help me dominate any niche and get seven-times more visitors to my site.

And I do all this using my simple article writing system.

Try my article marketing system for yourself which not only shows you the seven different ways to write an article, but also how to write an article in 15 minutes or less AND shows you 10 different ways to earn money writing articles. https://ruthiswriting.com/books/15.html

About the author: https://EzineArticles.com/expert/Ruth_Barringham/38265



Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/10344934

Thursday 3 September 2020

How Google's Mobile First Indexing Is Affecting Your Website

As more of the world is online every year, a larger percentage is accessing your business through mobile devices rather than traditional computers.

In line with this the big players are adjusting their indexing towards mobile devices as priority.

Will you keep your game up with them? Laura Wolf wrote this article alongside the timing of Google's foray into mobile first indexing.

Things have only ramped up more since the article was first written


If you would like to make sure that you are holding on to your SEO results and are keeping your search engine rankings, you'd better pay attention to the latest updates of the largest search engine; Google. Below you will find a few reasons why Mobile First Indexing might be affecting your page.

Mobile Usability Issues On Your Site

If your site has mobile usability issues, and it is hard to navigate on tablets or phones, it will hurt your search engine rankings. you will need to ensure that the links and buttons are not too close together, and the text can be read on every screen. Chances are that - if you are using an older template - this will be a problem. You might want to get a responsive theme, but this is not enough.

Mobile Speed Test

Once you are confident that your site performs well on mobile screens, and it is giving your visitors the best user experience possible, it is important that you test the speed. Most sites, such as Google page speed checker and Pingdom Tools will tell you about the page speed on desktop and mobile devices. Anything under three seconds is good, but anything over six seconds will simply ruin your search engine rankings.

Google Page Score

You will also have to look at your page quality and performance score. Log into your Google Webmaster Tools account and search for issues. If there are none, you can still make improvements, especially if your site is loading slowly. Take into consideration the origin of traffic. If you have an international audience, you might be better off using a CDN service. CDN stands for Content Distribution Network. As an example, if your host is located in Austin, Texas, and all the servers are there, and your traffic is coming from Europe, it will take while for the server to respond. A CDN service can solve this issue.

How To Get Your Site Updated

It is important that you get your website updated and check the loading time regularly, especially after installing new plugins or widgets. However, changing to a lighter theme is another option that can work really well. Instead of paying thousands to a web designer to create a new site, you can just add speed optimization plugins or change the settings manually. Getting a fresh installation will be likely to solve the problem. You can also get a mobile first optimised site developed by LMNts Marketing.

Your website's mobile performance matters. Make sure that you check your rankings and your page speed to keep the traffic flowing.

Laura is the owner of the UK online consultancy firm: LMNts Marketing.

She is devoted to helping small and medium sized businesses achieve their marketing goals, by creating customized websites, integrated automatic sales funnels, and engaging online marketing campaigns at a low price,

She is also the winner of Corporate Vision Awards 2015, and an expert in responsive web design. She holds a marketing degree and a PhD in Journalism, studying business administration in her spare time.

Her motto for customers confused about online marketing is: "Leave it to Laura".

About the author: https://EzineArticles.com/expert/Laura_Wolf/382255



Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/10153146

Wednesday 2 September 2020

Google Begins Mobile-First Indexing: What Is It?

In the first of two features here, we look at Mobile First Indexing, which Google started in 2018

This is a really easy to follow guide by The Quint

Thursday 27 August 2020

Use These 3 Tips to Boost Your ECommerce SEO

arina Popa presents some useful tips to keep in mind for maximising your SEO effectiveness 

Use Relevant Keywords

In order for product information to be user-friendly to shoppers as well as search engines, a website should be easily found, read and understood in terms of its colors, measurements, sizes and prices, among other details. When its viewers come from different regions, it should have standard and/or metric measurements. The images of these products should match the physical items to make sure their color and size are accurate.

There are sellers who only display the prices of their products when these are added to the cart of users. Perhaps this is because they either have a special promotion or are trying to avail the minimum pricing of the advertising policy. However, even if hiding prices does not directly affect SEO, shoppers tend to leave at once when the product page does not show the pricing details. This can lead to a higher bounce rate, which will be discussed in the following section.


Design Thinking About Shoppers

A website and product page should be designed in such a way that will provide a great shopping experience. Granting that businesses offer the best products with the most reasonable products in their industry, if their website is difficult to search or navigate, shoppers can get frustration and leave.

Design is also an essential part of SEO. When search engines discover that a website has an exceptionally high bounce rate, wherein visitors leave as soon as they land on its web page, the site's rankings will begin to plummet. A website that is designed well is able to lower bounce rates and let visitors browse a number of pages even though they do not easily find the information they need or want.

For an eCommerce website to become successful, it should be easy to find and navigate, have reasonable menus and navigation options that let visitors know the information they will see once they click a link. Images should only be used sparingly because loading them can take time, which can make shoppers impatient and hit the back button. In this regard, load time is also a ranking factor. Therefore, it is best to have web pages that load fast.

Do Not Add Cluttered or Complex URLs

Visitors are able to access a webpage on an online shop by means of an address, which is called URL. This includes a lot of information squeezed into a small space. It can contain product names, category name, types of files and/or actions such as "_blank" to allow users to open a new link in another window

Based on SEO standards, URLs should be possibly clear and easy to read, with keywords that are relevant to the text on the resulting page.

Search engines can obtain many, different pieces of information from a URL like lawnmowers for sale or offers of a green and gas-powered variety. At first glance, users should be able to see what a URL leads to. When they send the link to others, the recipient will see that the site is about lawnmowers and click to view the products. A complicated URL such as the first example could confuse people, who would not know where it would lead to.

Do you need Las Vegas SEO services? Are you searching for a Las Vegas website design company? Come and visit our website to learn more about!

About the author: https://EzineArticles.com/expert/Karina_Popa/1432444



Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/10335259

Wednesday 26 August 2020

Monday 24 August 2020

Google AdSense and AdWords - Like Yin and Yang

You're probably aware of AdSense and AdWords, but would you know how to go about using them?Nicholas LaPolla gives a great overview.

Many websites include a section or two with the "Ads by Google" above it or below it. These are ads displayed via Google's AdSense. When you do a search on Google and see ads in the search results pages, they are generally AdSense ads.

AdSense - The Yin:

Google's AdSense is programming that "senses" the content of a page or search. It finds keywords on a web page or in a search phrase to determine the subject of the content. It does this by either "reading" the page, or taking a look at the search term that was typed into Google Search. It can "Sense" which ads in the system are relevant to the content or search and display them - thus: "AdSense."


Before ads on a page are displayed, AdSense searches its database of advertisers and finds ads that are associated with keywords on the page or in the search. Now AdSense needs to decide which of the thousands of ads vying for position are actually displayed. To make this decision, AsSense looks at the advertiser's bids for the relevant keywords. The advertisers that have a combination of the highest bid, keyword relevance and best click through get displayed first.


Google tracks clicks on ads and advertisers pay Google the bid price for each click. When the AdSense ad is on someone's web page, Google pays the website owner a portion of the payment for each click. The term "monetizing" your site refers to taking your existing site and placing ads like AdSense on it to make money (or finding other way to make money with websites). If you get 10,000 visitors and 10% of them click an ad that pays you, theoretically, $0.75 per click, you just made $750! Not bad for just copying some AdSense code (which Google provides) into your popular website's HTML (if your site is not popular, learn about SEO - Search Engine Optimization - from sites like AcmeWebResources).

AdWords - The Yang:

The other side to AdSense is AdWords. AdSense ads have lists of relevant keywords associated with them. Each keyword is bid on by the advertisers for placement in the results pages and on web sites around the world. The words that will prompt a display of an advertiser's ad are bid on by the advertiser. When an ad matches the words on a page, the ads are displayed; thus: AdWords. AdWords is the system in Google that is used to place ads that display in AdSense.


You can enroll in AdWords to pay for AdSense ads to drive traffic to your site. The first step is to sign up with Google. The next step is to associate keywords to associate with your site.


The idea is to drive traffic to your site through the use of relevant ads. The more relevant the ad to your content, the more targeted your traffic will be. Compose your articles around your list of keywords. Next, write an ad based on the keywords and assign keywords to the ad. You will bid on the keywords at the time you associate keywords with the ad. If one of your keywords is searched for or relevant to a site, and you have a good bid and relevant ad, your AdWord ad will be displayed. Only when someone clicks your ad are you charged by Google.


The more popular keywords are wanted by many competitors, so the prices per click can get pretty high. It is not uncommon for a click to cost $5 or even $10. If you have 10,000 ad clicks, after you account for your conversion rate (the rate that you convert visitors into buyers) you better be sure you are making more than the ad click costs! But it should never break your bank because you can set the bid limits and the monthly budget.


What if you can't afford $5.00 per click? Since the more popular keywords are so expensive, it is best to bid on less popular keywords because the cost per click is lower. Google presently has a minimum bid of $0.05 per click. If you can get those, you can reduce your advertising budget.


A popular site can make a lot of money, however, a lot of money and time can be wasted. To avoid waste, you have to learn as much as possible and get the right tools to do the research.


Author bio: Author Bio

Nicholas LaPolla has been a web applications developer for 11 years. He created www.AcmeWebResources.com to help others build or improve, market, and monitize their websites with a focus on web design, website seo / internet marketing, and working to make money online.

Article Source: http://www.articlegeek.com/internet/website_traffic/11303-googleadsensean.htm

Thursday 20 August 2020

5 Blog Traffic Sites With Over 750M Visitors!

In looking to help people understand why so many are blogging and how it can help your businesses we thought we'd share this article that Deon Christie put out earlier this year.

  • What is supply and demand blog traffic?
Supply and demand blog traffic is just that. Also known as establishing a common need. Which is done through engagement. And the options are endless from Groups and Pages to Communities and Forums. There are various techniques to create traffic. Leveraging popular blogs and blog sites for example. To drive traffic to new blogs and established blogs alike. Supply and demand blog traffic is the cornerstone of your blog. The key however is to create curiosity. Therefore, presentation is of paramount importance. You can only supply something that sells. Once you have established a demand for it.

Google SEO is all about strategy. A sequence of objective steps in the right direction. Which is what this blog post is about. More than just the method of driving traffic. But rather the technique to attract buyer traffic. Therefore, not only will you get a few great traffic methods. But also learn how to optimize your content.

Driving traffic to a new blog, however. Starts before launching the blog. While the supply and demand research. Contributes to the quality of traffic attracted by the new blog later through SEO. And strategic target keyword placement.

  • Commenting Techniques that drive supply and demand blog traffic.
Commenting. Which also contributes nicely to building reputation. But the key is to add value to the conversation. Therefore, also important to read the post you plan to comment on. Read other comments to see what the audience is looking for. And then create curiosity by offering something the audience can use. Never hold back, share your knowledge.

Use tools like "Put My Link" and "Drop My Link" to research sites to comment on. Search for blogs with the CommentLuv Premium plugin. That way you will also display your latest blog post in your comment. Just get to know your way around these tools. And search for specific keywords. Directly related to your content.

Attracting visitors will also depend where you comment. And you need to check on the amount of traffic a site receives. But also, the quality of visitors to the site. Focus on top tier country volumes. By using a Google Chrome Extension called "Similarweb" you will be able to determine all that. But you can also use another tool called "Check Page Rank" to target the high authority sites. And access popular blogs.

  • Social Networking for WordPress Blogger Traffic.
The whole point of social networking to drive blog traffic. Is to target the right audience. From followers to share and likes. Your content is shared with likeminded people. Create Facebook pages and Groups. And although I would love to guide you. All these methods cannot be covered in a single post. There are steps to follow with everything you do online. Just follow the steps, you'll be fine.

When you create a new group, then change the settings. So new group members must be approved by admin. Set your Twitter to "Protect Your Tweets". Then all new followers will have to be manually approved. Build a targeted audience. And to drive supply and demand blog traffic you need followers and audiences related to your blog niche. Carefully targeted through common interests and demography. Which also determines affordability. Another aspect of supply and demand blog traffic.

All social profiles must be as professional as possible to generate supply and demand blog traffic. And your content must be proof of your resume. You cannot be an SEO "expert" but don't have a blog for example. Or a social media management "expert" with a faceless profile. Be who you say you are!

  • Supply and demand blog traffic for WordPress through SEO.
With SEO the snippet appearance is important. Therefore, also the importance of the blog title. And must create curiosity. Which is why rich snippets being so important. The blog title should be short and suggestive to generate supply and demand blog traffic. Almost like breadcrumbs for search engines. But target keyword placement is discussed in another post. Along with LSI keywords. What they are and why they are important to dominate search result pages. - Writing Dominant SEO Content Strategically.

Blog post and page content should be 1000 - 2000 words. Although word count is not a ranking factor. It is a great way to generate supply and demand blog traffic. Strategic keyword placement is of paramount importance. Especially when starting a blog. Along with sub-headings. The table of contents contain the sub-headers. H2 sub-headings along with H3. Use WordPress blog plugin called "LuckyWP Table of Contents". And ad a table of contents to your WordPress blog.

To generate supply and demand blog traffic. Also consider word count. Paragraphs do not exceed 300 words. With sentences no more than 20 words but preferably less. Supply and demand blog traffic is simply turning research into targeted goals.

Create compelling featured images. With titles, alt attributes and descriptions. Because search result snippets on mobile will display the image in 2020.

  • Leveraging Facebook pages and groups.
Don't go on a posting frenzy with blog links and blog posts. Driving supply and demand blog traffic with Facebook Groups and Pages is about a whole lot more than that. Especially when you want to drive traffic to new blog. It's not about how much you post. But rather the quality of your post. Research each group and check the demography. Groups with large amounts of members are not necessarily the best ones to join. Facebook groups is a great way to explore and attract supply and demand blog traffic. Joint the ones most relevant to your target keyword. And then engage and post consistently, not frantically.

With Facebook pages you may want to focus more on engagement. And a little less on posting content. Two to four great posts per group/page per week is quite enough. The rest must be comments and engagement. Build your recognition with engagement. Find the supply and demand blog traffic. By establishing what audiences are looking for.

  • More supply and demand blog traffic to your WordPress blog.
Create memberships on the following sites to drive supply and demand blog traffic. And include a link to your blog in your professional profiles. Engage with the audiences, find out what they need. Answer questions on Quora and comment on blogs using Disqus. With BuzzFeed try sharing original pictures and videos. Nothing edited or software generated videos. Here are over 750 Million visitors combined over these sites. How you make them curious and drive traffic is entirely up to you.

Quora (485 Million visitors / 55% US | UK | Canada | Australia)

Medium (147 Million visitors / 45% US | UK | Canada | Australia)

Buzzfeed (135 Million visitors / 75% US | UK | Canada | Australia)

Disqus (25 Million visitors / 60% US | UK | Canada | Australia)

To drive supply and demand blog traffic requires a lot of work. Because your content must be better than already ranking blogs. Do the research and sacrifice the time to create outstanding content. And compelling design.

Affiliate Marketing with SEO for consistent passive online income. Learn to leverage SEO and generate online sales with affiliate marketing. https://easyinternetmoneyandjobs.com

About the author: https://EzineArticles.com/expert/Deon_Christie/2244072



Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/10269802

Wednesday 19 August 2020

Free Article Writing Tips to Increase Website Traffic

 

To get people to your website and interested in your business you'll need to be telling them things about it. A big part of this is letting your customers know you have the expertise they are looking for John Michaels' article really assists in understanding what you need to think about.


If you're not doing so already, you may want to consider writing articles about your website's topic. Writing copyright free articles is a great way to:
  • Establish your credibility and build your reputation and brand
  • Establish yourself as an expert in your field
  • Increase your exposure on the internet
  • Gain laser targeted traffic to your website
  • Increase the number of one way links to your website, which should help your website in the search results.

Writing articles about the topic of your website is a fantastic way to demonstrate your expertise and credibility and at the same time allows you to build your reputation and your brand. Submitting your articles to the various free article sites gives your articles the opportunity to be picked up by other webmasters for their websites and newsletters. When your articles get used on these other websites they must be used with the author bio section un-edited. This means that you can generate one way links to your website, which in turn leads to greater exposure and better rankings in the search engines. If the readers of your articles on other sites click through to your site, you gain targeted traffic.

Some Article Writing Tips
To get the greatest benefit from your article writing endeavors, try to keep the following article writing tips in mind:

  • Try to stay away from turning your article into a sales pitch. Give your readers credit - they will be able to distinguish a sales pitch right away. Once they think they're just reading another sales pitch they will quickly click away from your article. I can just about guarantee that no one will pick up your sales pitch and use it on their website, unless it's one of your affiliates.

  • Don't include too many hyperlinks within the article body and stick to only one in the author bio section. Most webmasters will not pick up an article, no matter how good it is, if there are too many outgoing links. I would recommend not having any links within the article body but sometimes this is unavoidable.

    Which situation would you rather have: 1 article with 1 outgoing link to your website that gets picked up by 1,000 webmasters or 1 article with 10 outgoing links that gets picked up by 10 webmasters?

  • Check, re-check and then check your article again for typos and grammatical errors. Have someone else proofread it for you before submitting it. Nothing says amateur more than typos and grammatical errors.

  • Write articles that complement the topic of your website. Don't write about something totally unrelated to your website. Remember, you want to establish your credibility and expertise. Write about what you know.

  • When adding that one link back to your site, make sure to include a keyword targeted link back to your site. I'm talking specifically about the words between the anchor tags. For example, this is how you should structure the link back to your website: <a href="http://www.yourwebsite.com">keywords go here<a>.

    When the search engine robots come across this link they will index the anchor text and it will help you with those keywords in the search engines. Do not waste this valuable link by just having your website address (www.website.com) as the anchor text unless you have your main keywords in the website address. Try to vary the keywords a little as well when creating this link. There is speculation that having too many "uniform" links to a site may hurt you - just something to keep in mind.

  • Do not place a copyright notice at the top of your article. This leads to confusion and may cause webmasters to stay away from posting your articles on their website and in their newsletters.

  • It may be a good idea to write completely new content for your articles. Some writers just copy and paste parts of their websites and put them into articles. This may lead to a "duplicate content" penalty and may end up hurting your search engine results. I would recommend that you should play it safe and come up with totally new content for your articles.

How Many Articles Should I Write?
The number of articles that you will have to write really depends on how good your competitors are. If you're competing against many highly optimized websites, then you may have your work cut out for you. On the other hand, if you notice that your competitors are not all that great at the SEO thing, your road to article writing will be much shorter. Any way you look at it, writing articles can bring too many benefits that are yours for the taking.

Author Bio
John Michaels is a part-time editor for ArticleGeek.com. John has developed many websites over the years in many different business areas. He is a professional web developer/designer/architect. ArticleGeek is a free website content resource for publishers and webmasters and a place where authors may submit articles for FREE!

Article Source: http://www.ArticleGeek.com - Free Website Content

Monday 17 August 2020

Creating A Blog To Promote An Existing Business

Who would keep a blog and why? Mal Keenan gives the reasons why blogging can help your business and how to make it effective

If you belong to any of the following groups, then this article is for you.

You already have a business and a website that serves as the official hub for your online sales. The website may be serving as an online store for your enterprise.

You need a venue wherein you can promote your affiliate links.

Your already have a website, which may not necessarily be a commercial one, and it is enrolled with a Pay Per Click (PPC) program, like Google AdSense.

Success in these fields depends on one essential principle which you might have already realized: traffic is the key to your online business thriving.

You may have in your digital inventory the best products in the world, but they won't mean squat if no one would get to see them. This is why each and every online businessman will fight tooth and nail just to have a piece of the Internet traffic. After all, the more visitors who get to visit your site, the more potential clients you have.

And blogs can most definitely help you drive visitors to your pages. Here is how you could use them to achieve such a purpose:

1. Download the Wordpress blogging software, which is available for free at www.wordpress.com . An alternative is to go with blogger.com. I have posted instructions for setting up a Blogger blog at your own server in this PDF file:
www.pluginprofitstraining.com/blogsetup.pdf

2. Remember that good content is always at the heart of a progressive online traffic stream. People are always looking for information, and if you will give them that, they would read what you have to offer. Dedicate your blog to the subject of your main website. Publish informative entries that would hook your readers and make them come back for updates. In between purely educational entries, strategically include a link to your site by suggesting their importance to your readers.

3. Using the above mentioned strategy, you could also include your affiliate links to pre-sell your affiliate products. The more traffic you drive to your affiliate merchant's site or sales page, the more chances you will have of effectuating a successful sale and bigger commissions.

4. Links from blogs are unilateral, meaning, they are one way links to your websites. The more traffic a unilateral link generates, the more it becomes prominent in online searches. Avoid reciprocal links at all costs! Do not include a link to your blog from your website. Search engines abhor reciprocal linking.

5. 80% of your traffic will come from the search engines. You have to tweak your blog to attract the attention of the search engine spiders. Now, blogs are already search engine friendly. However, there is a very big possibility that you would be competing with other blogs on the same subject. You have to make sure that once you upload your blog, it is able to outperform its competitors in the search engine rankings.

One way you can do this is by using the title of your post to match the keyword phrases you are targeting, plus put a sprinkling of your keyword phrase in the post itself. I am doing this with great results.

6. Check your blog offline. It should be as readable and as navigable as possible for your prospective readers. Make appropriate adjustments if necessary.

7. Upload your blog to a reliable server that has enough bandwidth to accommodate many viewers.

8. Constantly update your blog. Search engines love regularly updated content, so publishing new entries will greatly increase your blog's page rank, and consequently, your main website's traffic.

9. Accepting links from other related blogs will also bring to your site some traffic from sources other then search engines. The way that a blog is designed fosters the building of a community of blog sites, and this will provide for an added stream of visitors for you.

10. You could also decide to enroll your blog site in the Google AdSense advertising program. This will give you an additional income stream. We will discuss this in future articles.

Blogs are excellent promotional tools for your existing business. Use them well and you will harvest the rewards in a matter of weeks.

Author Promo from Mal Keenan
Get Your Hands on My FREE and Exclusive 7 Day Blogging Report by Sending a Blank Email to freeblogreport@getresponse.com In this Report I Reveal All The Secrets for Creating and Running A Successful Online Blog.

Article Source: http://www.articlegeek.com/internet/blogging_articles/blog_promote_existing_business.htm

Saturday 18 July 2020

5 Steps to Help You Build an eCommerce Store

In need of a reminder of how to get started in E-Commerce?
Susan Friesen gives us a great guide to get going

Let me know how you intend to get going (or how you first got started)


If you have decided to take the plunge and set up a web-based shop, starting an eCommerce business can be a rewarding venture but it can also be a stressful one. Here are 5 steps to starting an online business that will help make the process clearer and less stressful.

Your Guide to Starting an Online Business

Whether COVID-19 pushed you to pivot from a brick-and-mortar store to an online environment, or you’ve decided to take the plunge and set up a web-based shop, starting an eCommerce business can be a rewarding venture.

From 2017 to late 2019, approximately 28.1 million Canadians made purchases online. That’s a lot of people who are landing on webpages and whipping out their wallets if they like what they see. 

But there’s more to the process than buying a domain name and loading your site with products or services. There are technical aspects to navigate and content to consider.

Do you DIY with a website builder or hire a pro? Should you stick to SEO or focus on paid ads too?

As a small business owner, I’ve helped many clients create successful online companies. So I’m sharing this five-step guide to starting an online business with you to make the process clearer and less stressful.



1) Figure out what you want to sell.

If you’ve already got an established store, this might be a breeze. But if you’re just starting an eCommerce business and are focusing on products, you’ll need to think about what you’ll offer, and where you’ll get it from.

The first thing in figuring out what to sell and in what form is to ensure it’s relevant to today’s consumer. COVID-19 has made consumers much more in tune with their spending habits. Ensure there is a consumer first and foremost who is willing to spend their money for the product you aim to sell.

Next define how you want to sell your products. Here are just a few of the options:

Business-to-consumer (B2C): This is the most common business model, with many different approaches. Basically, you sell to the end user, but there may be a third party acting as a middleman (think Amazon).
Direct-to-consumer (D2C): From design and manufacturing to sales and promotions, the company does everything. Dollar Shave Club is a good example of a D2C business who started small and grew using this model.
Subscription service: Books, clothing, organic produce, baby gear...I could go on and on. Nearly every industry out there has harnessed the power of subscription services to deliver cost and time savings to customers on a regular basis.
Dropshipping: Rather than having to stock a warehouse full of products, when you sell a product on your site, you’re essentially purchasing the item from a third party, who ships it directly to the customer.


2) Buy a domain name.

If you already have a business name, this part could be simple. However, you’re not going to get a short and sweet dot com name unless you lay down big bucks. And you don’t want a domain name that runs five words long or is difficult for customers to remember (or spell).

Ideally, you use your company name like we did, with a dot com—or a dot ca if you’re in Canada. There are a lot of other TDLs (Top Level Domains) to consider such as .net, .co and .org but strive to get the revered .com as your primary domain if at all possible.



3) Build an eCommerce store

From incorporating branding into your layout to loading products/services, there are so many things to consider when you’re starting an eCommerce business, including:



Your shopping cart software. Shopping carts can be built with a variety of coding languages including ASP, PHP, JavaScript and HTML. They can be provided by a 3rd party service provider (such as Shopify) or installed in your Wordpress website like WooCommerce to avoid monthly fees.

Choosing the best shopping cart software requires a lot of pros and cons analysis of each choice. Many times the choice depends on your needs, your budget and the desired functionality.
The visuals (copy and images). How your store looks and feels to the shopper has a significant impact on whether they will trust making a purchase from you. Moreover, how each of your products are described along with using professional-looking photos can make or break a sale if not done properly.
Installing a Secured Security Layer (SSL) Certificate. This keeps your website secure and is mandatory in today’s online commerce environment. Even Google will favour your site’s search ranking if it detects an SSL installed.
Your shipping model. If you’re selling physical products, you need to decide how they are going to get into the hands of the purchaser. Are you sending customers items directly? Or are you using a third-party? Will you offer free shipping, or ship internationally? Do you want the shipping automatically calculated on checkout or will it be a flat shipping rate?
Your payment gateway. Are you going to accept only credit cards, or debit cards and PayPal too? Will you use a hosted gateway that takes people off your site to pay, then redirects them back, like our client Ripping Vintage Packs? Or is an integrated payment gateway more your style?
This is where it is so worth it to hire a professional web development company. You won’t have to spend your time Googling “SSL Certificates” or trying to set up shopping cart software. Learn how much cheap SEO and website design really costs you here.



~~~~~

READ: 3 eCommerce Challenges & Solutions for Tough Times


To call these “tough times” may be a bit of an understatement to you, or perhaps you’ve pivoted your marketing strategy nicely and aren’t negatively affected by the COVID-19 crisis.

There’s no arguing this pandemic has led to increased internet traffic as people work, socialize, and entertain themselves online.

That’s why I’m sharing 3 eCommerce challenges and solutions to help you maintain and even grow as an entrepreneur during this crisis.

Read more here.

~~~~~



4) Focus on SEO

Did you know that SEO has the highest ROI of any online marketing tactic? Despite this fact, many small business owners build their sites with very little consideration of how the search engines see their content.

SEO means doing keyword research to discover the keywords that your target audience is using to find what they need.

Your SEO strategy will be focused largely on on-page techniques like keyword-rich content and meta tags.

5) Create valuable content

Your customers don’t just want to see pages and pages of products, or a one-liner selling them services. They want you to be a trusted expert who can provide them with everything from useful tips to reassurance that their credit card info is safe.

Content marketing is an ongoing process. If you want to please your target audience and the search engines, you’ll need to be regularly posting articles, blogs and videos that are valuable to your audience.



No matter what your small business model is, you’ll need to keep testing and tweaking after you build an eCommerce store. You’ll want to dive into your data to see your customers’ behaviour, like:

Are they spending time reading your carefully crafted content?
Is there a broken link that’s causing people to abandon their shopping carts before they’re finished buying?
How many of your website visitors are converting into customers?
Of course, there’s a lot more to starting a web-based business than what I’m able to cover here! From promoting your business on social media to creating paid ads to drive traffic, you’ll want to have a marketing strategy in place as you move forward. But this guide to starting an online business will help you lay a solid foundation for a successful eCommerce site.



To your business successFree Reprint Articles,

Susan Friesen

Article source: http://www.articlesfactory.com/articles/ecommerce/5-steps-to-help-you-build-an-ecommerce-store.html

Thursday 16 July 2020

How to Find Products to Sell on Amazon: The Ultimate Guide

Amazon is one of the most well known companies in the world today.
It is also one of the best places to build your ecommerce business around.
But what about product selection for effective selling?

Dale Harris has investigated this and his article gives some great tips. What do you think?

When was the last time you were scrolling through Amazon looking for something to buy? There are loads of different options and an almost unlimited amount of products selling on this giant global marketplace.
But deciding what are the best items to sell on Amazon can be a nightmare with all this choice.
If you have a business or are looking to earn some extra cash as an Amazon seller, here’s all you need to know about how to find products to sell on Amazon.

1. Know Your Market

The most important aspect of selling online is knowing your market. You need to understand who you are selling to and what products they purchase.
When you understand this you can start to understand your competition and how you can conquer them.
One way in which the market can be divided up and the traditional way it has always been done is by country. An American customer might not necessarily purchase the same products as a British person or an Indian customer. A product that sells well in one of these markets might also not sell at all in another.
However, the rise of the internet and hyper-communication through social media has broken down these barriers to a certain extent. 
If you are selling for the female market – for instance, beauty products – then there are ethical concerns you need to consider about the ingredients that are used in the products and whether they were tested on animals and are vegan-friendly. Some countries also have different regulations on what chemicals are allowed into the products.

2. Sell Great Products Not Cheap Junk

It is easy to think that selling cheap products at low prices is the easiest way to make a quick buck on Amazon. But this couldn’t be further from the case. Customers are savvy and will soon stop purchasing a product if they feel it is inadequate.
Furthermore, most customers use Amazon’s review system to leave reviews of products for future customers.
Instead, you should focus on sourcing or even creating your own great products to sell on Amazon. You should do this even if you have to charge a higher price than your competitors.
Customers are willing to pay a higher price for a product if there is a clear justification or it offers something special and unique. You can easily generate excitement around these products with a clever marketing strategy. 

3. Choose a Product That You Can Market Well

Customers don’t always buy the product based on purely practical considerations. Often people buy a product because they are buying into the vision or the lifestyle that the product represents.
This is often down to clever marketing. The best products are ones that can be marketed well. Often they are simple and it is obvious what they do. 
Apple is a clever example. Ostensibly, their products are laptops, smartwatches and cell phones. But they cleverly marketed these products, suggesting that owning all of these products together is a lifestyle choice.
Those who own them can use them in tandem to have an easier and more fulfilled life, able to be more productive at work as well as in the gym and during exercise routines. Simplicity is the key to Apple’s message even though what they are selling are extremely complex products.

4. Do Some SEO Keyword Research

Another way in which people access products is not always through Amazon itself but through affiliate links and blogs and websites that have been Search Engine Optimized.
If you’re struggling to get your head around this then be sure to hire a company that specializes in amazon seo services might be of use to you.
Using an SEO keyword research tool you can help you see which products and keywords are currently ranking highly on Google. Once you have established what products are popular you can start to see where products that you want to sell might fit in.
Remember though SEO does take time.
Once you know where the products fit in terms of Google and which keywords you want to target you can then start to think about ways of increasing its profile on Google which will then lead to increased traffic to its Amazon page.
You can pay blog owners to include an affiliate link to your product along with the keywords that are likely to boost its ranking on Google and you can also extend this to social media as well, hiring influencers to help you.

How to Find Products to Sell on Amazon? Marketing is Key

The key to selling great products on Amazon is not just product choice but also great marketing. By creating a buzz around your product and ensuring that you are selling a lifestyle or a brand as well as the product you can start to build a loyal client base.
On top of this, you can then start to grow this audience through SEO. By ensuring your product ranks highly on Google you can increase the traffic to your product.
Part of SEO is also reaching out to other brands and websites to see if they can include an affiliate link to one of your products in their own blogs or content. Of they will want a small fee for doing this but it can be rewarding.
Finally, social media influencers can also ensure your product as a strong following on Instagram, Facebook, and even Pinterest.
If you are interested in learning more about how to find products to sell on Amazon or the best items to sell on Amazon be sure to check out the rest of our site.

Friday 10 July 2020

Welcome to the SEO Unlocked! Free SEO Course with Neil Patel | SEO Training

Two days in a row I'm featuring content from Neil Patel!
Some of you may involve Search Engine Optimization (SEO) in your strategies.
This video introduces you to Neil's approach to SEOs

How do you maximise SEO effectiveness?

Friday 19 June 2020

How to Monetize Instagram Threads with SociSmart Threads Academy

Threads: the Secret Player in Business Social Media Marketing Did you know that Threads the new Meta rival to Twitter, unlike its sister pro...