My blog posts are primarily about helping you, the small business owner, to navigate the mysterious world of the Internet and more specifically those pesky websites everyone keeps telling you you need. I don't spend a lot of time tooting our own Your Web Department horn because that would be too pushy and unseemly. And when it comes to features discussions I leave Flavio Mester, a co-conspirator, to reveal YWD's inner workings. But recently I had an encounter that really showed off some unique capabilities of YWD, and how it just makes us different from the usual open source rabble.
One of these features I call The Headless Page. No, it's not the vampire version Your Web Department, it's a feature found in what we call Page Properties. Every page has it's own Page Properties that lets you manage banner, backgrounds, SEO. It also has a "Special" tab. It's the Special tab that lets you manage what layout elements show on a page. It lets you easily turn off the banner, or the menus, side bars, etc. This feature has been a huge hit for several customers that wanted to make a 'headless' page for other people. That's a term I made up for a page that others can iFrame (insert with code) into their own site removing the banner or menuing. It's your page in someone else's site. When you update it, it will change on the other person's website.
Okay, so why am I so proud of this feature? One of our customers is providing this feature to their affiliates, but when it came time to get one of their suppliers to provide a headless page to them they said it would take 6 months of programming and cost $20,000. Really. A few clicks in YWD versus 6 months and $20k for another system managed by hundreds of IT specialists. To me this is a great example of how we've engineered YWD to just work better than other systems. It's also a feature that is hard to explain and not on the top of everyone's wish list, but it's there if and when you need it.
Paul Chato has been many things: a graphic designer, programmer, comedian, head of network TV comedy, game producer, 3D animator, playwright, event host, director and anything else that matches his fancy. Most of the time he is a managing partner at Your Web Department and is most excited about LiveBuild™. Check out LiveBuild
This past week: Facebook has been busy working on making their website better; and it seems the new changes will favour the end user, not that most will appreciate the changes. I expect the same amount of complaints and threats to quit Facebook that we saw in previous updates. Personalization of the news feed and more emphasis on branding and images are the main points for the new update. How will these changes affect businesses on Facebook? It is not very clear, but I'm sure Facebook has not forgotten their source of revenue, which is advertising. Facebook is not the only one upgrading their social network interface, Google+ has launched a redesign of their interface as well, making it way easier to navigate. Although, I don't expect the same amount of complaints that Facebook creates. For the small business this is great; competition from two internet giants leads to better opportunities to spread our word.
Without further due, my tweet collection for this week; full of tips to do better business online.
Listen and reach out-> 10 Ways to Use Social Media to Skyrocket Your Customer Loyalty
"Here are six strategies to keep in mind that will kick your word of mouth marketing to the next level." This is true, social media marketing has become the online version of word of mouth. When visitors share your website pages or posts, when users make comments on your product or like your Facebook page all these are endorsements. Endorsements that are viewed by all the friends of the person making the share.
You wanted to find out, well here it is [Video]-> How Google Search Works, Explained By Google
This the first time Google explains how their search works. Although they don't mention how the algorithm works you get a good idea of the effort involved to return relevant results when you do a search on Google.
And only 48% of Canadian SMBs have a website-> Update- 75% of U.S. Businesses do not have a website
Very hard to believe, even when it is so easy to get a website (even a single page) going these days. It has to be a generational thing, most business owners are baby boomers and they feel intimidated by the internet. Do you agree?
There are more eyes on phones than desktop screens-> Why not being mobile friendly is costing you sales
It took 38 years to reach 50 million users, TV 13 years, the internet 4 years and mobile 2 years (after the launch of the iPhone). This unprecedented growth on mobile browsing has left most people awestruck and scrambling to react to the new medium. And this is just the beginning smartphone adoption is not even close to plateau.
Content Marketing as it is called nowadays-> How to Write Effective Website Copy
Google has repeatedly mention that they look for original, quality and relevant content to return on search results. If you want to be found in your space you need good content and the more it is shared the better it is for your search result rankings.
Your Biz needs to be online-> 2013 Social Media Predictions for Small Businesses
"if you don’t have an online presence (or don’t know what that means), you are in big trouble. As I've pointed out in my article about online reviews, 86% of consumers are searching for local businesses online and 85% research products or services online before they decide to make a purchase. In other words, if they can't find information about your business online, they will probably look for another business." If your business doesn't have a website don't even bother with social media or any online marketing strategy.
Mobile influenced $159 B in sales 2012-> Inside The #Mobile Showrooming Threat That's Changing The Retail Industry
This is a consequence of this new technology; it is too easy to price compare while shopping nowadays. This one of the reasons why Best Buy moved to do price matching. Retailers need to adapt to consumers changing habits.
Interesting stats: Women of #socialmedia are more influential than women in general-> The Women Of Social Media
"The study of 2,000 respondents identifies women who are influential in social media and provides new and unique insights as communicators evolve their strategies in this new era of digital engagement."
Next Friday I'll have another round up, in the meantime you can follow me and YWD on the networks below:
Gustavo Jabbaz started his digital career as a designer and then became a developer and these days spends most of his time as a digital marketer. A founding partner of Your Web Department, he's responsible for day-to-day operations, marketing and development strategy. He is who you talk to when you need support with SEO and/or Social Media. Gustavo Jabbaz on Google+ | Twitter
The Web is obviously rich in information, coming from hundreds of millions of different sources. If you own a small business, you probably don’t want to waste time every day searching for the same things that interest you. And visiting many separate web sites frequently to find out if the content there has been updated can take a long time.
The easiest way to do that is to use what’s called an aggregator. It lets you subscribe to what’s called a feed so that you don’t need to look for the content; it’s delivered automatically to you. One of the most popular aggregators out there is Google Reader. It’s simple to use and free, and can save you time.
Google Reader lets you to subscribe to your favourite websites and blogs. To do that, click the big red “SUBSCRIBE” button. You can either search by the feed’s name or paste the feed URL.
There are many tutorial videos on Google Reader out there. I found the one below to be short and easy to understand:
How to subscribe to this blog
Sure, why not start by subscribing to this blog itself? Easy. All you need to do is click Google Reader’s “SUBSCRIBE” button, and then type our blog’s address -- blog.yourwebdepartment.com -- in the field:
Click the “Add” button and Google Reader will start fetching our posts for you automatically. You can also enter a search term there. And keep adding other feeds.
Another way to add a subscription is to do it from the blog itself. Most blogs have an “RSS” button that allows you to do that. RSS, which stands for Real Simple Syndication, allows you to do just that: it will syndicate the content from the source (e.g. a blog) and feed it into the aggregator (e.g. Google Reader).
In the case of this blog of ours, you’ll see the RSS button on the right column, somewhere down the middle. When you click it, you’ll be taken to a page where you can either “Add to Google homepage” (a somewhat deprecated alternative) or “Add to Google Reader”. Selecting the latter will automatically add that website/blog to your list of subscriptions.
Once you form your subscriptions list, you’ll only need to go to Google Reader to quickly browse through your latest news and articles from your favourite sources, without having to visit all of them individually.
LiveBuild™ For the Business Owner - We design & build your website for free and ready in 1hour yourwebdepartment.com/LiveBuild
Flavio Mester is a graphic designer as well as a systems analyst (in a distant life he was an architect). A founding partner of Your Web Department, he's responsible for the design and development of all the YWD website management platform interfaces. Flavio Mester on Google+ | Twitter | LinkedIn
I came across this great infographic from Prestige Marketing Inc. (www.prestigemarketing.ca) about email marketing best practices. It supports my previous post "Email Marketing for your Business Website", and includes great statistical data, such as: 93% of online consumers interact with brands through email more than any other platform or 64% prefer promotional emails compared to 8% for social media sites. The best practices section is clear and dead on; relevant subject lines, good content and avoid cheesy spammy words such as: Sale and Cash.
Overall it shows how important emails are for your online marketing strategy. On the technical front it addresses the need for emails to display well on mobile and in text only format. Take a close look at the infographic and try to follow the advice and make it part of your overall marketing strategy.
Gustavo Jabbaz started his digital career as a designer and then became a developer and these days spends most of his time as a digital marketer. A founding partner of Your Web Department, he's responsible for day-to-day operations, marketing and development strategy. He is who you talk to when you need support with SEO and/or Social Media. Gustavo Jabbaz on Google+ | Twitter
Okay, last week I wrote about a US census survey that indicated more than 75% of U.S. small businesses did not have a website. Now I've just seen a Canadian survey that makes the case that only 48% of Canadian small businesses have a website. That means 52% of you don't. It is a huge improvement over what is happening south of the border, but come on, that's nothing to be proud of. How can anyone do business these days without a website?
"With the majority of consumers choosing to research and shop for products and services online, businesses without a web presence are missing a significant opportunity," says Jim Mulligan, national director, Retail, RBC Royal Bank. "Businesses need to be visible where consumers choose to be, so investing in an online strategy is fundamental to attract new customers and stay competitive."
In fact, 56 per cent of the entrepreneurs in the survey rate finding and keeping clients as one of the top business challenges that they will face over the next year, yet only 41 per cent of those surveyed promote their business using a dedicated website.
What is the inhibiting factor? Do the majority of non-believers not need a website? Perhaps many are like the consultants who have been recently approaching Your Web Department in signifiant numbers who are telling me things like, "My business is completely based on word-of-mouth, but now people are immediately checking out if I have a website after our first meeting. It's getting embarrassing, not having one."
A website is the new business card. It's impossible to think of not having one. And just like a business card many small business owners are happy with the raised ink business card website equivalent, which gets me onto my next tangent neither the American or Canadian survey indicated if the existing websites were any good. My experience is that about 80% of small business websites are truly awful. So, taking the Canadian example, if only 48% of small businesses have websites and 80% are dreadful then only 9.6% of websites are doing their businesses any good. That's like being attacked by a zombie frightening.
We know why this is, I've been over this before: money, time, inclination, fear. If you can't get your email up and running then how on earth could you even consider tackling a website? Yet, some day, you will have to. And we can help. Just call us at our unhappy website hotline: 1-866-986-3464 ext. 2 and let one of our trained website emotional support staff help you.
Paul Chato has been many things: a graphic designer, programmer, comedian, head of network TV comedy, game producer, 3D animator, playwright, event host, director and anything else that matches his fancy. Most of the time he is a managing partner at Your Web Department and is most excited about LiveBuild™. Check out LiveBuild
This past week: No major news to talk about, but I did notice a few things that are about to change the mobile landscape. First is the release of Firefox mobile operating system; open source, free, runs well on low end hardware and phone providers are allowed to brand the interface. Clearly Firefox will take a piece of Google's Android share and offer alternatives for consumers. Second is just a rumour but it has a good point; SamSung has now 40% of mobile devices powered by Android. This is making Google un-easy since SamSung now can demand more from the partnership from Google. Tension are rising and both players have options; Google recently bought Motorola Mobile (so they could do without SamSung) and SamSung could look into Ubuntu for phones the linux based Desktop and Server OS now for mobile. Yet to be released (October 2013 release date) will be the first mobile operating system that can run a full Unity desktop environment when plugged into a docking station. What does all this big companies drama means to us simpletons? Choice, and we are in need of some right now since the market is just divided by Apple and Android (or should I say SamSung). Unfortunately Microsoft and BlackBerry are not making headway in their mobile efforts, therefore we need more players. As a small business we are well aware the benefits that mobile technology provide from both personal and business perspective; the last thing we need is to be confined to just two choices. Having said that, this week's list is all about expanding your business horizons.
It is connected to too many Google things-> Why Google plus is good for business
Google's ultimate goal is for you to spend more time on the internet. Hopefully you will spend that time mostly in Google's internet realm, which is avery big and very compelling to use not only for a business but also on a personal level.
Very good tips, get writing!-> How to Write Articles That Go Viral
Yes, not only videos can go viral. Quality posts that solve a problem can have the same effect.
Content Marketing the new way of things-> SEO Consulting in 2013: What the Pros Know that You Don’t
With the recent search algorithm released by Google (Panda) they have mede clear that good original content will take precedence. Therefore the keyword stuffing and dubious back links techniques will be penalized. This is good news for any business, now you only need to focus in providing the best possible content for your customer base and you will be found.
Short answer yes! see how-> Is Social Media Worthwhile For Local Businesses?
It is all about where the eye balls are and where your customer demographic is most likely to be in this social media map. But rest assured they are there. And all those shares from your website counts for your page rank.
Solve your audience problems and they will be leads-> Start Helping, Stop Selling
Provide solutions for your audience's pain and you will build loyalty and customers.
Making use of that big data-> 6 Data Tracking Services For Your Small Business
When you don't have the resources of Facebook or Amazon to do it in house, these services could be helpful for making your next marketing decisions.
Good case study-> How B2B Marketers are Benefiting from Facebook
"Y Scouts, a small executive search firm that started in 2012 in the Phoenix area, needs to foster brand recall in a crowded field in an industry that frankly isn’t very sexy." Read their approach for marketing on Facebook.
I use it pretty handy-> Review: IFTTT connects social media, photo and other Web services
If This Then That, I started using it (Free service for now) when I first heard of them a while back. It is very helpful for sharing in multiple social networks, but you can set it up to more than just sharing. You can also be alerted when something is uploaded or just mentioned.
Next Friday I'll have another round up, in the meantime you can follow me and YWD on the networks below:
Gustavo Jabbaz started his digital career as a designer and then became a developer and these days spends most of his time as a digital marketer. A founding partner of Your Web Department, he's responsible for day-to-day operations, marketing and development strategy. He is who you talk to when you need support with SEO and/or Social Media. Gustavo Jabbaz on Google+ | Twitter
The Web is obviously rich in information, coming from hundreds of millions of different sources. If you own a small business, you probably don’t want to waste time every day searching for the same things that interest you. And visiting many separate web sites frequently to find out if the content there has been updated can take a long time.
I came across this great infographic from Prestige Marketing Inc. (
Okay, last week I wrote about a US census survey that indicated more than 75% of U.S. small businesses did not have a website. Now I've just seen a 
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