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Someone I Don’t Know is Requesting Ownership of My Google My Business Page

Google My Business, Scams

Are you a business owner who manages your own Google My Business account? Have you received solicitations to transfer ownership over to someone you don’t even know? If so, you are most likely being scammed. Here is how it works.

You receive an email from Google My Business. In the subject line, it reads:

You’ve received an ownership request

This might be enough to shock your system. You may suddenly start to feel a bit helpless, as if someone is hijacking the Google My Business profile you’ve worked so hard on. You start to ask questions like,  “Has anybody ever heard of this guy?” “Who is this person? I’ve never heard of them!“

Your reaction is justified. What gives anyone the right to request a transfer of your Google My Business profile? Well, they really don’t but, Google has no way of preventing this fraud.

Why Does Google Allow Anyone to Request Ownership of a Google My Business Page?

To answer that question, we have to look at the flip side. As an Atlanta Website Design company, we here at Webstuffguy.com manage dozens and dozens of Google My Business profiles for our clients. We periodically come to situations where this “Request Ownership” tool is actually quite handy.

The easiest example is when a business is being bought out by another company. Along with handing over the website, passwords, and other administrative things, the Google My Business page also needs to be passed along to the new owner.

The idea is that you send a request for transfer of ownership, and the recipient receives the request, and then accepts it. 

Another example is when the Google My Business profile page has been abandoned for whatever reasons, yet still appears in Google Map searches. Perhaps that business address now belongs to a new company who cannot create a business page because it would share the same address.

The idea here is to request ownership of the page for the sake of then marking it as “business no longer exists.” Otherwise, the business page has just “gone rogue.”

What is the Point of This Scam?

Google has a rule. If you don’t respond to this email request, the scammer may end up having the page transferred over to them. They are banking on the hopes that you don’t check your email often, or that the email linked to the account is one you never log into.

So Why Would Anyone Want Your Google My Business Profile?

  • They may hold it for ransom. After they claim the page, they may ask for some bitcoin in exchange for relinquishing it back to you.
  • Their goal may be to tank the page. Your page may be performing very well, showing up in crucial keyword phrase searches. They may be another company in the same industry who wants to remove you from receiving calls and traffic.
  • They may want to claim your page, and then change all of the contact information so that all the calls come to them.

You Have Only 3 Days to Respond!

Here is what Google states will happen if you are the one sending a transfer ownership request, in their own words:

After you request ownership, the current profile owner has 3 days to respond. To check the status of your request, sign in to Business Profile or click the link in your confirmation email.

  • If your request is approved: You’ll be notified by email and can manage the Business Profile.
  • If your request is denied: You’ll be notified by email, and you can still suggest an edit to the profile. Also, you might be able to appeal the denied request.
  • If you don’t hear back: If you don’t get a response after 3 days, you might have the option to claim the profile yourself.

How to Deny the Transfer Ownership Request

So now that you know that you only have 3 days to answer, it’s important to reply to the email right away and deny the request. It’s a very simple option. There is even a field where you can leave a “nice little message” to the requester.

How to Stop it From Ever Happening Again

Well, until Google figures out a way, there is no way to stop any random person from requesting ownership. They can send as many requests as they want. And you will keep getting the requests and you will have to keep responding to them. If you really want to report it and hope that Google will perhaps do something about it, you can try to reach out to them here.

How To Prevent Any Chances of Losing Your Google My Business Profile

  1. Be sure to log into your account frequently. Apart from people trying to steal your account, you also have to worry about people “recommending changes” to your page. They can even mark you as “business closed permanently.” So when you log in, you may see that you have to verify new updates made to your page.
  2. Be sure that the email tied to your Google My Business Account is one where you receive all your important emails. That way, you are checking your inbox every day. Don’t make the mistake of creating your Google My Business account with an email that you never use.
  3. Add some administrators to help you manage your page. This way, you have multiple pairs of eyes on the account should you miss any alerts. Admins will get the same alerts that you do.
Conclusion

We live in a world where scumbag scammers have nothing better to do with their lives. It’s an unfortunate part of our life. From people trying to get you to pay them for your domain, to spam emails threatening to sue you for photos on your website, there is no end in site. So stay sharp, and stay ahead of the game.

Building Topical Authority For a Website

Blogging, Content Marketing, SEO, Topical Authority

Before we start, let’s talk about what “Topical Authority” is.

Topical Authority Definition

Topical Authority is the act of helping search engines (Such as Google and Bing) associate your website with certain topics that are closely related to what the website is about or what services they offer. It is yet another form of search engine optimization.

Topical Authority (Sometimes also known as “Topic Clusters”) can be  closely related to the overall business goals and objectives. By fine-tuning your topics on your blog or throughout your website, you can really gain an advantage over competitors who spend no time on it.

Why Topical Authority Efforts Should be Considered?

  1. Google is a search engine that works with what’s called “semantic associations.”
  2. Before your website could be ranked for the type of industry you’re in, Google has to be able to associate certain topics with your website content.
  3. Finally, many of your competitors are already heavily invested in greatly thought-out content writing services, for the sake of Topical Authority domination.

The Stages of Topical Authority Discovery by Search Engines

How do search engines become aware of your Topical Authority efforts? It happens in 4 stages:

  1. Discovering: Your content needs to be discovered by search engines. A great tool to achieving this is by submitting your content right away to Google Search Console. There is now a tool called “Index Now” which sends signals to Google immediately after publishing your new content.
  2. Web Crawl: Once your content is discovered, Google (or any search engine) will begin to “crawl” through the content, to learn more about how to “index” your website properly.
  3. Indexing: Now that Google understands what your topics are about, they then begin to “index” your content appropriately in their search results.
  4. Ranking: Based on how competitive your market or industry is (or how well your competitor’s SEO efforts are), they will place your website within the search results accordingly.

Evolution of Google Algorithms

  1. 2012
  2. 2015
  3. 2018
  4. 2019

  1. Mar, 2012
    Knowledge Graph

    In 2012, Google launched what’s known as a “knowledge Graph.” If you ever did a direct search for a company, you may have noticed a “panel” on the right hand side of the Google search result for that company. It is filled in with company information such as the contact info, photos, reviews, etc… All this is manipulated via Google My Business. 

  2. May, 2015
    RankBrain

    In 2015, Google announced a new algorithm that acts as a machine learning system that is used to better match search queries with their search results. They call it RankBrain. 

  3. Aug, 2018
    Neural Matching

    In 2018, Google introduced “Neural Matching” which is another algorithm to make better sense of concepts, and how people are now asking for things when they do searches. For instance, instead of typing in a question, they hit the microphone icon and ask their questions verbally. 

  4. Jun, 2019
    BERT

    In 2019, Google introduced “BERT,” a neural network-based technique for natural language processing pre-training, as a way to even better understand implicit and explicit language. 


animationanimation

How to Build Topical Authority?

Internally

Involves any proactive activity that happens on the website itself, where we have the most control. 

Externally

Include such things as:

  • Unbiased backlinking that come from relevant sources, relevant pages. The best way of achieving this is to have content that is so informative and well produced, that other websites want to share it with their base. 

Horizontally

Try to cover different topics without diving in too deep into any one specifically. 

Example: “Marketing” being the main topic

Vertically

Try to cover as many relevant “sub-topics” as we can for specific topics we’re interested in. For al the horizontals examples above, for instance, to break each one down even further. When you think about it, there are so many topics to cover!

Example: “Content Marketing” (taken from above) being the main topic:

  • what is content marketing
  • content marketing strategy
  • content marketing examples

What is the Best Strategy for Topic Authority

Unless you have all the time in the world, or have a limitless spending budget, you can start to see the difficulty of trying to capture each topic and subtopic per category. 

Your best approach, in this instance is to start with one of your most important categories, and stick with that one, until you have completely covered the topic. 

Don't forget to make sure your website pages have basic SEO implementation, just to be sure your efforts don't go unnoticed. 

How Can I tell if What I'm Doing is Working?

A good indication that you are truly becoming an authority for the topic would be when other websites start linking to your articles. How do you know if that is happening? With the use of good SEO tools or an SEO agency such as webstuffguy.com to help keep track. 

Get basic SEO for your website

Your Website NEEDS Basic SEO. Here’s Why

Advice, Local SEO, SEO, Website Design

Takeaways:

  1. Your website just went live but it doesn't possess a lot of the super powers you may be expecting.
  2. For the website to have any kind of presence on Google, there is a minimal amount of work that still needs to be done, whether you want SEO or not.
  3. These things were not done to your website because it's not considered a part of “website development” and it requires the expertise of an SEO expert, not a website designer.
  4. These small steps go a long way, and it's highly recommended that you get them done.
animationanimation

Your new website just went live. Congratulations. It’s a big step that goes towards growing your business. One thing, however, that is absolutely essential for you to know is that there is one more step needed before you can take your foot off the gas pedal.

Your Website Needs Basic SEO Implementations

SEO stands for “Search Engine Optimization.” This means work that is consciously done in an effort to have your website show up in Google searches.  Up to this point, Google and other search engines still have no idea that your website even exists. Even when they do start to take notice (which without any work done on your website, can take at least 3-9 months), it will pull up information based on their “best guess.” You do not want this. You want to be able to directly communicate with Google:

  1. Who you are
  2. What services you offer
  3. Why people should choose you over other companies

Why Websites Don’t Come With Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

In the most basic of terms, there is too much work to do in order to get your website completed. You paid for a website design, and all focus must to go towards getting that completed, flawlessly. This includes things such as good layout design, photos, good navigation, mobile design, setting up your hosting, and taking your website live.

SEO on the other hand, is an entirely different line of work, one worthy of it’s own service, even in it’s most basic of forms.

The problem is, hearing something like this can come off as a cheap sales pitch. It’s not.

Below are a list of things that:

    1. were most likely not done to your website
    2. why they matter to search engines
    3. why they weren’t done, and
    4. why they need to get done, if showing up in search results matters to you.

This is the most basic of SEO, and Every Site Should Have the Basics if You Want Any Chance of Ranking In Google Searches

Here’s an analogy: Imagine you’re a motorcycle enthusiast. You just saved all your money to purchase one of the nicest bikes on the market. You then had it customized so that it stands out from others of it’s kind.

The problem is, you don’t have a license to drive a motorcycle. So your new bike just sits there in the garage, not appreciated or seen by anyone.

It’s the same with websites and SEO

If your website doesn’t have the basics of search engine optimization, how will anyone find it, or even know it exists?

Types of On-Page SEO Optimization Your Website Should Have By Default:

1. Meta Titles

Everyone knows what a browser window is. When you have multiple browser windows opened, you have browser “tabs.” Browser tabs are kept organized for you, the viewer, by having titles on them. These titles, when hovered over with your mouse, will give you a full explanation of what the page is about. Helpful, right? 

Why title tags matter

By default, your meta page titles will look something like this: 

Page Topic | Name of Your Company

While this may seem just fine to the naked eye, there are so many ways to take advantage of this section to improve your search results. 

Additionally, meta titles also display in your search results. See photo below.

Why meta titles matter

2. Meta Descriptions

Meta descriptions cannot be seen on a website. They are modified on the backend. While visitors cannot see it, Google relies on it to use it search results. See the image below to get a better visual.

What is a meta description and why it matters

By default, your meta description is left blank or in other words, not optimized. When this happens, Google takes the initiative. They will try to grab the first few they find on the page. This is never a good idea. 

3. Paragraph Headers

Paragraph headers are the titles you read above any given paragraph. Paragraph headers give the reader an idea of what the subject of the paragraph right below it is about.

why paragraph headers matter

Similar to a Newspaper Article

Imagine seeing a newspaper stand from a few feet away. You spot a newspaper on top of the stack, and it has a big bold title. So big, that you know instantly what the story's about. You look below it, and you see a smaller title. This title also indicates what the subject below it is about. It's the same thing with web pages. The only difference is that this is a Google ranking factor. These page headers help Google know what the topic is.

Additionally, these “titles” or “paragraph headers” need to be marked as such on the back end. If not, then they are just regular words, like the rest of the page.

To mark these paragraph headers for Google, one has to do so on the backend.

Below are some examples of what paragraph headers are and what they look like on the backend. 

  • H1 Paragraph Header
    • The most important title on the page. Coded on the backend as:
    • (H-1)I Am the Most Important Title(/H-2)
  • H2 Paragraph Header
    • The second most important title on a page. Coded on the backend as:
    • (H-2)I am the Second Most Important Title(/H-2)
  • H3 Paragraph Header
    • The third most important title on a page. Coded on the backend as:
    • (H-3)I Am the Third Most Important Title(/H-3)

This goes on all the way to H6. H6 being the least important title on a page. It should be noted that an H1 paragraph header should only be used once per each page, and should have all the rest spread out a bit.

4. Rich Snippets

Rich Snippets are a relatively new feature that Google created in order to help itself produce better search results for their audience. In turn, it also benefits the business owner and their website.

Think of Rich Snippets as Another Tool in Your Arsenal

Over the last few years, you may have noticed a lot of changes in Google search results. You may have noticed that the search results do a lot more. Whenever you ask a question, you see more “like-minded” questions long with answers. You get suggestions on other ways of phrasing your question, along with answers. The answers are done with Rich Snippets, and your website could be hosting one of those answers. 


rich snippets for good seo

Rich Snippets come in many other varieties as well, all to which is a win-win for Google, the website, and the searcher. 

5. Internal Hyperlinks

Internal hyperlinks are links that are found throughout your website which are cleverly optimized to send signals to Google. Internal hyperlinks help bring value to whatever page is being linked to.

For Instance

You most likely offer some good services. These service pages on your website could use a boost with the help of internal hyperlinks. We do this by creating links on OTHER pages that point back to any given service page. 

This tells Google that the page must be important if other pages are talking about them. It's not just about creating these links on other pages, but it's how you do it. It's a difficult process to explain. It's best left to an SEO professional. 

About internal hyperlinks

6. Google Search Console Registration

By registering and setting up Google Search Console for your website, you are sending signals to Google that you exist. They will also start tracking your performance in searches.

Google's Toolbox

Along with many tools Google offers for website owners, one in particular is vital if you want to have any sort of web presence in Google searches. It's called Google Search Console, and you would be doing yourself a favor having it set up for you.  

why you need search console

7. Google Analytics Registration and Implementation

Google Analytics allows you to see the behavior of your website visitor when they reach your website. Things such as what pages they are drawn to, what pages they left the moment they arrived, etc…

It's Complicated

Setting up Google Analytics for your website is no simple task for the average person. Having it track things that matter to you requires the expertise of a Google Analytics expert, preferably one who has passed their certification exams.  

Conclusion

As you can see, without these most basic of  SEO implementations, your website may not stand a chance against your competitors. In fact, your website may not show up at all in searches. 

We Have a Plan For That

If you are convinced that it's time to give your website some basic SEO, webstuffguy.com offers a convenient package where we can knock all of these out for you. It's called our SEO One-time Setup. Get in touch if you're interested. 

Once your website is built, there are many things to do to make sure everything runs properly

Top 10 Things to Do After Your Website Goes Live

Advice, SEO, Small Business, Website Design, Website Health

Your Website Just Went Live

You've completed the website-build phase and your website is now live. That has to be a great feeling. At this point, you can do things such as:

    • Share your site with friends and family
    • Share your website on social media
    • Create a link to your website underneath your email signature
    • Create business cards with the URL of your website under the contact info
    • Submit your website to online directories, and more.

Normally, that would seem like plenty of things that you were unable to do beforehand. This is one of the reasons why having a website for your business is so essential. 

There are other things to consider. Some could be categorized as “must haves” while others are personal preferences. We have created a handy list of things to consider or check off, now that your website is live. 

1. Get an SSL Certificate

It's the difference of your URL appearing from this: “http://www.etc..” to “https://www.etc..” It also displays a small “🔒” icon next to your URL. This is a symbol of “secure and safe.” This is what people want to be assured of when visiting anyone's website, especially if they are making a purchase, filling out a contact form, or any other sort of communication with the company. 

This is Also a Google Ranking Factor

Meaning that Google has openly announced that websites that are not secured with an SSL Certificate will unlikely be recommended by Google inside of Google searches. 

How to Acquire an SSL Certificate

To get an SSL Certificate, you have to sign into your hosting account. That is, wherever your website is hosted. This is not to be confused with where your “domain” is hosted. (although sometimes your domain and hosting are all under one roof, which is fine). Your hosting company should offer it. 

Pricing for an SSL Certificate

Most hosting companies offer one for free for the first year, and usually comes packaged with a new hosting account. Some don't though. Either way, after the first year, you're looking at around $98 a year. 

Installing your SSL Certificate

This should be left to a professional, if you want it done correctly. Many things can go wrong if not done correctly, such as having a “mixed content” error. This is when half of your site is protected, but half of it is not. If you need assistance in setting up your SSL Certificate, see our package here. 

2. Set Your Products to Renew Yearly

Inside of your hosting and/or your domain account, you will want to make sure you set your products to renew automatically every year. This will give you peace of mind, as you won't have to ever worry about your products expiring. This could lead to not only your website going down, but to losing your domain, which would make it available to the public.

It's also a good idea to set a reminder to update your credit card information on your account anytime your card is due to expire. 

While you're inside of your account, go to your account settings, and just make sure you have the option enabled to receive important notifications regarding your account. With this option activated, you will receive PLENTY of warnings before something expires. 

3. Get Yourself a Domain Labeled Email

A lot of business owners are still using emails such as “Gmail” or “Hotmail” or “Yahoo” for their business email. An example of this would be: “andyspestcontrol@gmail.com.” Where it could now be something like: “info@andyspestcontrol.com.” See the difference?

It's just not a professional look and it could be the difference of you being able to charge more for your services. Sounds like a stretch, but it's true. This is because you appear more established and professional. Below are some reason why some business owners are not willing to let go of their personal emails in exchange for one ending in their own domain, followed by a solution. 

        1. I don't know how to set it all up:
          • Go to your hosting account and just order it. It's like $3.99 a month per email account. Microsoft 365 is a popular option and it has loads of options, such as being able to check your emails from your phone or your Outlook Express
        2. I want to be able to check my mail using my Gmail
          • Gmail offers a great option to give you the ability to send and receive emails using your Gmail account. So do other email services. It's not the easiest to set up, but once it's done, you will never have to worry about it again. You can even create separate inboxes to keep it all organized. Don't know how to do all this? We can help. 
        3. I don't want to pay for it. Right now, I pay nothing
          • We can actually tell you of a little known hack of getting around this. You will have to make sure that your hosting offers a “C-Panel” aka, a Control Panel. A place where you have a lot of options at your disposal for your hosting. If you have a C-panel, (and you most likely do), you will have an option to create your domain emails for free. It's something that most hosting companies will never tell you about, yet there it is. 

4. Schedule Website Backups Regularly

I couldn't tell you how many times having a backup of my website saved my life, not to mention my time. There are so many things that could go wrong, so having a backup shouldn't even be an option. It should be mandatory. We tell you how to go about this below:

        1. Set it up via your Hosting Account
          • Your hosting account will offer website backups. We recommend that you back up your site every 3 days.
        2. Use the C-Panel “Free” Option
          • If you have a C-Panel hosting account, you will find an option to backup your website. This is especially the case if you have a WordPress Website. Under the WordPress settings, there is an option to set up backups as frequently as you wish. 
        3. Use a Plug-in
          • We love the “All in One WP Migration” Plugin. It has many benefits, but for this example, there is an easy way to backup your website on the fly. You install this plugin to your WordPress website. Once logged into your website's dashboard, zero in on your new plug-in. Choose the “export” option. Give it a few minutes, and the plug-in will create a file for you. You decide where to save it on your computer. So long as this plugin is installed, you could always use the new backup file to bring back your website, should something go awry. 

5. Get Alerts Anytime Your Website Goes Down

If your website were to go down, how would you ever know it? How bad would that be for business? More importantly, how unprofessional does it look when a client has to call you and tell you that your website is down. 

I've seen cases where a website has been down for weeks, before the owner caught it. No lie. Another negative impact it makes is that Google will make sure to stop showing your website in search results. This is because they do not want to bring their searchers to websites that don't work. Below is an easy way to avoid all of this.

Use UptimeRobot

UptimeRobot is the easiest way to monitor your website for downtime. Registering is free. Simply create an account. Once logged in, enter your website and adjust the settings to make sure it knows how or where to notify you should your website go down. Here is the link. 

Once you get an alert saying that your website is down, it's time to figure out why it's down. Contact your website designer or your hosting company to get it resolved. 

6. Fill Out Your Contact Forms Regularly

If your contact forms weren't working correctly, how would you know? Funny things can happen to websites. Sometimes doing maintenance updates on your theme, on WordPress or on your plug-ins can cause conflict with your contact form plug-in. When this happens, your contact form may no longer be working properly. 

Take the time to visit your website, and fill out a form. Be sure to check that you received it. If you haven't, be sure to contact your website designer so they can troubleshoot the issue.

7. Check For the Mobile Experience

Your website looks great and you are proud of it, but have you checked it on your mobile phone? Did you REALLY REALLY check it?

Most people are now finding your website via their mobile phones. Just because your website looks great from your laptop, it doesn't mean that the mobile experience is just as great. As website designers, we have to make sure that things “break down” properly once the screen size goes down. This is known as having a “responsive” website. Meaning, the website is responsive to any screen size. 

Visit your mobile website and go page by page. Click on buttons, navigate to other pages, fill out forms, click on buttons. You may just discover that something is not working as it should. Put yourself in the shoes of a customer. Is it easy to get the information they are seeking? Are the words easy to read? Are the images fitting within the screen? All these things can have an impact on your customer's experience. 

8. Protect Your Website From Malware

It's an everyday threat, and the weakest of websites fall prey to Malware. Malware does not discriminate, it has no idea who you are. It just goes from site to site hoping a website lets them in. Once the website is injected with Malware, you are unlikely to know right away. 

Malware can create new pages on your website filled with spam, and you will never know it. Malware can cause things to break, and detecting or fixing it can become very difficult once the damage has been done. 

For a yearly fee, your hosting company may offer a Malware protection plan. This plan offers a worry-free service, by monitoring for Malware, creating backups, and eliminating harmful files injected into your file folders. 

Use a Plug-in

Plug-ins such as Wordfence and Jetpack are great options to take care of your website. If you have reason to believe that your website is already infected, such plug-ins can scan your files for you and find them. The last thing you want is to have to deal with a virus in your website, believe me. 

9. Update Your Plug-ins, Your Theme and WordPress Regularly

If you have a WordPress website, chances are that there are a number of plug-ins that were used to build the site. Plug-ins are great. They solve so many problems and can really enhance the website experience for your viewers. But plug-ins are updated by their creators regularly, which means in turn, you have to update them once the creator has made changes. 

A lot of the updates that are given to WordPress users deal with site security. Since hackers are always finding ways to break into your website, developers have to find ways to prevent it. By not updating your plug-ins, you are leaving your website vulnerable to hackers and malware. The same goes for the theme/template used to build your website and for WordPress itself- all offer regular updates. 

Your website designer may offer affordable monthly maintenance plans, where they can make sure your site is always updated, amongst other things. 

10. Get Your Website Optimized For Search Engines

A large misconception is that once your website goes live, Google (And other Search Engines such as Bing and Yahoo) will somehow magically discover it and decide to bring your website to their search results, making it easy to find your website. It doesn't work that way. 

Many, many things have to be done just to get your foot in the door. There are so many things, that I will explain it all in another article. What's worse, a lot of website designers are not skilled in this area. Their main focus is on the design and layouts of your website. So you cannot leave this up to them. 

Another misconception is that optimizing your website should go hand in hand with building the website. Wrong again. Search Engine Optimization (or SEO for short) is a science all in itself. Therefore, it requires a lot of work that is completely unaffiliated with the website build. 

As the saying goes, “What good is a website if no one can find it?”

After your website is completed, find yourself a reputable SEO agency or technician who has at least 5 years in the business. Make sure to ask them for examples of their work, and be sure to read their reviews. 

Stay away from agencies who offer contracts only, as you do not want to be locked in with an agency who does not deliver. 

Finally, be sure to understand what all is involved, how long it takes to work, and what the process is like. SEO is not an overnight service. There is no “instant gratification.” Your competitors took many years to establish themselves before they got to be number 1. You'll have to start where they did. If you have a reputable SEO agency on your side, you may get there faster than you think. 

Learn more about our Search Engine Optimization Services. 

10 Proven Reasons Your Company Should Invest In SEO

10 Proven Reasons Your Company Should Invest In SEO

SEO

Search engine optimization plays a key role in helping businesses grow. It improves traffic on their website and helps them reach a large audience. SEO marketing basically works on improving a website’s visibility in search engines, but in reality, it offers a lot more than this.
If your company hasn’t worked on SEO yet, you are missing out big! In the below article, we have listed 10 reasons why you absolutely need to have your website search engine optimized. Dive in to know all of them!

Organic Traffic

For small businesses, appearing in searches proves to be a difficult job. Paid search positions may work wonders for them, but to have long-term growth they need to have organic searches. Organic traffic starts with Google, where 75% of the search market resides. A vast majority of the world hits up Google almost every day to buy services. This means your business has a great chance to be found online by customers.

Companies that find Google’s algorithms difficult to understand often try to have a better position in other search engines. The truth, however, is that if your website is sufficiently optimized for Google, it will automatically show up in search engines like Bing, Baidu, or even YouTube. This happens because Google has an organic search market where SEO optimized sites take root there. They naturally get more traffic, views, and clicks which help them grow to large levels.

Better ROI

ROI or return on investment is undeniable with SEO optimized website. It is not just a marketing cost but a real investment.
The real job of businesses is to gain organic traffic and it may take them months to obtain it. And this is exactly why we call SEO a long term strategy. A well SEO optimized website gives positive results and high-quality traffic for a long time, given that you keep on investing in your site.

For ROI to work properly, companies hire search engine experts. Their job is to build up every aspect of a business including the website and social media accounts. They ensure a well carried out optimization strategy which gives more traffic and conversions. Better the SEO, better the leads.

Trust And Reliability Along The Way

A strong website starts with the trust and security it offers to customers. If your website appears on top of the searches, you naturally gain your customer’s trust and reliability. The problem is that earning this trust takes a long time as the process of SEO asks for commitment and patience. All the same, if your brand has something great to offer, then you are automatically going to gain a lot of credibility from users. A positive user behavior or feedback on your site increases awareness of your business and gives you a larger audience.

User Experience

With trust and credibility comes a great user experience. Companies in the digital world truly know how much user experience matter in marketing. Your only job is to have a quality SEO website on search engines like Google. By doing this, the user experience at your site will increase and will bring with itself more positive rankings, conversion rates, and brand awareness.

Brand Awareness

You need brand awareness for your business to grow. The more people see your business in their searches, the more your brand grows. In today’s market, there is a lot of competition between businesses, especially small ones.

Without your own identity, you can’t be popular among them. This is where SEO comes in. It helps you compete with other companies by making you more visible in search engines.

Cost Friendly

It might be costly for small businesses, but in reality, SEO is cheaper than other things in the long run. It is more like an investment that gives you a lot of benefits in the end. All the input you put results in more clicks and traffic on your website. Many companies don’t optimize their sites because of the costs but trust us, having your website search engine optimized is a must for your company. And the cost will be worth it!

Social Media and SEO

Social media and SEO are said to be bi-directional. The more popular you are on social media, the more popular your business is going to be and vice versa. In other words, a top-ranking page in Google Search is the likeliest to be shared on social media.

Your business website gets more clicks when you are popular on social media because of the increased brand awareness.

Local SEO

In recent years, as mobile traffic has grown, searches have taken a more local turn. This allows businesses, especially small ones to grow significantly as word gets around more in their own area. Local SEO helps a great deal in this regard. If your website is locally optimized, you are most likely going to get the majority of customers from your vicinity because people find it easier and quicker to connect.

Long Term Strategy

Well, there is no question about this one. SEO has been around for a long now and is continuing to grow. The more properly it is done, the longer it stays. SEO demands investment, hard work, and patience but whatever input you give, it comes back in the end and benefits your business.

Lastly, A Digital World

It is not anytime soon that we stop living in a digital world. The market is growing, and so is the competition. People stay online for searching and browsing nearly half their day.

A clear majority of the world uses search engines daily for so many purposes. According to a report, 3.5 billion searches take place every day. This means your business always has a great chance to be found by customers online.

Conclusion

As said, SEO has a lot to offer in the market. It greatly helps all types of businesses and companies grow to large levels. If you are still missing out on SEO, join the search engine now!

If your website goes offline, would you know about it?

If Your Website Was to Go Down, How Would You Actually Know?

Advice, Website Health

The Perils of an Unsupervised Website

Recently we had a business owner reach out to us because the number of phone calls they were used to receiving suddenly took a nose dive.  It was something they were aware of, but it took them a long time to actually do something about it. Since they never set up analytic tracking on their website, they were unaware of the cause and blamed the lack of business on other things, such as their marketing and customer service.

They then decided to do a Google search for their business and to their horror, nothing showed up! For many years, they enjoyed good search rankings and perhaps took it a bit for granted. Now that their focus was on the subject, they were looking for answers and solutions.

After a Website Audit

We took on the case and began monitoring the website to find deficiencies. From the outside, everything seemed fine. The website was there, it was running and everything seemed to work.

We then began monitoring the site for a period of 10 days, checking for any kind of activity. By doing so, we discovered that the website would “blackout” every few hours or so, but very consistently. As an example, the website would crash (go offline). It would go down for about 15 minutes, then it would go back up again. After we pulled our reports, we were surprised to find out that the website would crash, and come back on, about 30 times a day!

This kind of problem is hard to detect, because at any given time, you can visit the website and see that it was working. But when you weren’t on the website, it would be easy to miss that the site would go offline, then back online, multiple times a day.

The Website Stopped Ranking on Google

With so much disruption, it was no wonder that Google eventually caught on, and decided not to list the website into their search results. After all, Google only wants to show the best websites to their searchers. If a website is flawed, or is causing errors, they leave it up to you to fix it, but in the meantime, they will blacklist you until you figure it out.

The Problem Was the Hosting

We reached out to the website hosting company and found out that their servers were having problems which they thought they resolved, but apparently forgot about our client. After some time, they were able to resolve all the issues, and the site was no longer having disruptions.

The Client Had No Idea

If you are not monitoring your website, things like this can happen to you. Your website could be down for a few days, and you may not even know it’s happening. We were eventually able to get the website back to good ranking positions on Google searches, but a good lesson was learned.

We Can Monitor Your Website 24 Hours a Day

There are tools out there that help monitor your website. But even if you discover that your website is down, you most likely wouldn’t know what to do about. At Webstuffguy, we can take over the burden of making sure your website is always running at 100%. We offer monthly maintenance packages that include online monitoring, as well as upkeeping your website with plug-in updates and much more.

Atlanta Website Design & SEO

What Is The Importance Of Web Design For SEO?

SEO, Website Design

Your website is what runs your business. It connects you with the world where people turn to the internet for basically everything. When you set up your website, you actually decide how successful your business will be because a website is what boosts a brand.

Unfortunately, most businesses are unaware of the importance of web design and often end up not getting enough traffic, whether it’s online or on spot.

A good web design creates a positive user experience and better search engine optimization (SEO). In this article, we have highlighted the importance of having a good web design that positively affects your SEO. Designing a striking webpage with a reputable Atlanta website design company includes several aspects and is very important if you want to have far-reaching SEO.

First Impression Lasts Forever

You all know of this phrase pretty well but it is time you thought about it seriously as a business owner.

The impression your website is going to make on its visitors right after they click on your URL should be engaging enough for them to stay there and come back again, or else the user would end up pressing the back button and moving onto a competitor’s website.

This impression is literally built in seconds, during which the visitors decide to leave or stay even before they have read the content. To create a lasting impression, your webpage needs to be designed in a way that is appealing to the visitors.

User Experience

User experience on your webpage matters a lot. In fact, it is the key to having a successful SEO. This experience is only positive if your webpage is designed user friendly. The latter includes everything from your layout to design, webpage speed, content, and communication.

Besides, your page should be reliable and secure so that users feel no hesitation in signing up for notifications or newsletter. The page should maintain user privacy and enable cookies for better performance.

Remember that user experience and SEO practices go hand in hand. The more your website engages users, the more it is going to show up in search results. So spend your time and money in making your page user friendly.

Display

By display, we mean the visuals of your website that the user will see. It includes font, color scheme, images, and/or videos. If your color scheme is outdated or flashy it is not going to attract many people.

Instead, it should be on a professional approach so that your users enjoy scrolling through your website. The same goes for the font which should be easy to read.

Apart from this, the images and videos on your webpage speak a lot. They convey what you offer in your business to the users so make sure to choose images that gather interest and are content-related.
Quality visuals greatly increase user engagement on a webpage and improve its SEO. To create quality visuals, please keep in mind the points mentioned above.

Mobile Friendliness

Another important factor is that nowadays people hardly have the time or patience for irresponsive websites when they are browsing on mobiles. If the webpage they are going through does not adjust accordingly, they would just go back and search for another webpage, bringing your traffic scores down.

To avoid this from happening, make sure you design a page that fits properly on mobile screens and at the same time looks interesting.

Navigation

Navigation is also useful in having a successful webpage because the easier your website is in handling, the more clicks it will have.
Make sure you do not mislead the visitors with complex search engine crawlers, pop-ups, or numerous categories.

Your website should have clear navigation either by a menu or a side panel leading to all the components of your page. Also, try not to make the page crowded because that would make users frustrated and would eventually reduce traffic on your page.

Website Speed

In a good website design, the page’s speed is a very important factor. No user likes to waste time waiting for a page to load. Remember that if a page takes more than a few seconds to load, then the users will stay on it for long.

This will have a negative impact on your website’s optimization.

To avoid this, focus on making fast and responsive pages. Do not store images or content that takes a lot of space because that will make the page slow. Likewise, an irresponsive page is going to lose you customers. So use strategies to give a responsive gesture as it will make customers stay at your page and keep them coming back.

Website Content

Website design may sometimes mean design visuals, but the content is equally important in having more users on your webpage.
Make sure that your content is organic and related to your business. Even if it is brief, it should be interesting to engage users because the more the latter, the more the search engines will like your website.

On the other hand, having bland content on your website will push away users and reduce your optimization as well.

Communication

Communicating with users is extremely important if you want to have a promising audience. When a user has browsed through your webpage, make sure that there is some way they can connect to you.

It could be a chat box in the side panel, an email address to write at, or even a phone number to call. If your website offers none of this information, then you are risking losing a number of followers.
Since user activity and search engine optimization are so importantly linked, make sure that you are available to your site’s visitors most of the time.

Conclusion

Lastly, in a wrap, your web page design has a lot to contribute to the amount of online traffic you are getting. If your page is giving a satisfying user experience, then your audience will increase, and accordingly, you will have a positive search engine ranking.

Think smart and invest in web design because it’s worth it.

Attorney Website Design

Quick Design Tips to Enhance User Experience of Your Attorney Website

Law Firms, SEO, Website Design

As a business owner, you want to improve user experience on your website and here we are talking about improving your site for marketing as an attorney. The user experience on your website is not only going to show your name up more in the search results but will also generate leads.

Previously Google didn’t pay much attention to user experience, but now it assesses carefully what the users are doing after landing on your website. If a user had a successful experience, and this is determined by the time spent on the site, the number of pages visited and low bounce rates, Google gives a five-star rating to your site.
In this article, you will find some really helpful tips to improve user experience on your attorney website. These tips are told by a legal SEO and Atlanta Web Design Expert, Ish Laos.

Ish Laos’  Bio

Founder Ish Laos has been creating attorney law firm websites for over 10 years. Over the years, many of his attorney clients turned to him for SEO. Webstuffguy.com has the expertise and the know-how to get websites to rank no matter if you deal with personal injury, family law, immigration, criminal law and bankruptcy.

Now, let’s take go through the tips

Area-Specific Sidebars

On your website, the sidebars should be in context with the main content of the site. They can include contact forms or any other broad information about your firm. Whatever it is, make sure that it is specific with your content and does not choke the user. Rather it should be thoughtfully placed to avoid user lassitude. So, even when the user had dived deep into a topic, they will have no problem and disruption in altering back.

Lastly, your sidebars can be in accordance with the size of your website. For example, if you have a sidebar linking to pedestrian accidents, it should have information on what to do after the accident, how to attend to the pedestrian, and after-accident protocol.

Approachable Contact Forms

When a user browses through your website, contact forms are going to connect you and him. To make yours effective, you need to know the following:

They should be easy to find

For the ease of users, make sure your contact forms are easily accessible. They should be available on every page of your site. You do not need to put them up in sidebars or popups, but it is more convenient if they are just in range whenever a user wants to reach out to you.

They should be short

No one likes the hassle of filling in lengthy details. If your form is long, people may not go through the trouble of filling it. So make them short and precise.

Authenticate the data

To do things the right way, have the validation programming on your website that runs authenticity check on things like correctly configured emails, contact numbers, and that the data is filled where needed. But on the same hand, you do not want to be hard on your users so make sure your programming is not complex or annoying.

A Clear Order

The more organized your website is, the more it appeals to the users. Your content should be set in a way that the user finds easy to browse through. Your site should be based on a theme, with headings and subheadings branching off the main page so that it is easy to go through the required stuff.

For example, for a lawyer’s site referring to road accidents, it can have pages divided into headings talking about the kinds of road accidents, legal matters related to the accidents, and so on.

Guiding Clues

Without clues guiding you in the right direction, you would be lost when navigating through the internet. To make things easy for your clients, try to give them indications on your website by using menus, colors, and other tactics.

Here are some ways you can improve your website.

Menu items

For users to know which page of the site they are on, the menu items are really helpful. Your page with the menu items should be active and have a different colored theme than the rest of the site.

Breadcrumbs

To help your clients even more, use breadcrumbs. As directional links, they are a great way to show people which page they are on. Attorney websites should guide people in the right direction, and breadcrumbs help people see if they are in the correct place. If not, they can always go back to the main page following the same breadcrumbs.

Page descriptions

When browsing through an attorney website, users expect to have all the information on legal matters right where the heading shows it to be. So, make sure that you fill in correct descriptions on your site to save users the unnecessary bother of searching too much.
Contact information

As discussed earlier, every page of your site should have contact information so that if users feel like contacting the attorney at any point, they find it easy.

Page speed

No one likes to wait so if your site is taking too long to respond, users will move on to the next. This may also lower your organic ranking so it is better to check your page speed at Google’s Page Speed Insights and amend the problems if any in your page loading.

All set

Last of all, go through your site again and again to check if everything is in order. Ensure that your contact forms, menu items, image links, and everything else is functional. A properly working site is going to increase your ratings and a lot of users are going to come your way.

Final Words

In a wrap, these user experience tips are no doubt going to work wonders for attorneys and their law sites. The effective the site is, the more ratings there are, and more the ratings, the more the leads.

psychology of colors for your website

Choosing the Right Color Palette For Your Website

Advice, Pscyhology, Website Design

Remember learning about the color wheel and ROYGBIV in elementary school?

Turns out that understanding primary and secondary colors, and the emotions each color evokes, can help you select the right colors for your website and brand. This is key when communicating with your Atlanta website design company. Let’s head back to art class to learn about the psychology of color.

The Basics

Blue, yellow, and red are primary colors. Secondary colors, orange, purple, and green and created by combining primary colors. For example, green is created by combining yellow and blue. Adding more blue than yellow adjusts the shade and creates tertiary colors like teal.

Complementary colors are directly across from each on the color wheel. These opposites create the greatest contrast when used in conjunction to create brand logos, retail displays, or websites.

On the basic color wheel, a line is created to separate warm and cool colors. Green, blue and purple make up the cool side whole red, orange, and yellow represent the warm side. The theory is that color affects depth perception in our eyes and warm colors advance ahead as opposed to cool colors that recede.

Psychology of Each Color

Each color conjures a different feeling and emotion. For this reason, it is important to consider the impact of color when designing your website or brand.

Warm Colors

In general, warm colors remind us of sun or fire. These colors are energizing, passionate, and reflect energy and enthusiasm.

Red: It should not be a surprise that red is associated with fire or danger. The color can also represent excitement, passion, and power. The truest of reds can be overwhelming when used as the foundational color for design. Red is best reserved for a dramatic accent color.

Orange: Similar to the changing of the leaves in fall, orange denotes movement and even creativity. The color orange reminds us of the fruit by the same name and therefore can be used to represent health and vitality. Orange is strong without being as overbearing as red.

Yellow: Channeling the warm of a sunny day, yellow represents happiness, light, and sunshine. Including yellow in your designs adds a bit of cheerfulness.

Cool Colors

Cool colors remind us of refreshing water or serene relaxing feeling of grass between our toes. These colors tend to be more soothing and relaxed than warm colors. The inclusion of cool colors in your website can add a touch of professionalism.

Green: Combing the warm of yellow and coolness of blue, green provides stability and balance in design. This harmonizing color is often used for websites relating to nature or wealth.

Blue: Blue signifies calmness or responsibility, but the exact meaning can vary based on the shade. Dark navy blue is popular with corporate designs to represent strength. By contrast, light blues evoke calm and relaxation.

Purple: For centuries, deep purple has represented luxury and wealth. Inclusion of light purples, such as lilac, in your design adds a bit of romance.

Neutrals

Utilize neutrals in your website design to set the backdrop. From formal powerful black, to clean white, to wholesome brown, neutrals help to balance out your focal colors.

Selecting a Color Palette

Be deliberate when selecting colors for your website or logo. What impression do you want to send to your target audience? Use the psychology of color to select your primary website colors.

If you need help selecting coordinating colors and shades, use the Coolors color scheme generator.

Combine the science of the mind with the art of color to design your perfect website.

The Covid-19 CARES Act Gives Cash to Small Businesses

Advice, Small Business


As an Atlanta website design company who works hand in hand with many small business owners, we see first-hand the strain this virus pandemic has put on all of us. Small business owners right now have no choice but to lay-off employees and even close down businesses for an unforeseen amount of time. One client in particular, a bankruptcy attorney in Atlanta, has seen an influx of new cases and thinks it’s only going to worsen.

According to Chase, the average business holds cash reserves to cover only 27 days of expenses. If this is you, you already know that the clock is ticking and soon you will run out of money to pay your bills and mortgage.

The CARES Act May Be Able to Help You

The CARES act (an acronym for Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security Act) is a stimulus package that can help small business owners going through financial hardships. The key here is to figure out which one you qualify best for:

Economic Injury Disaster Loans (EIDLs)

EIDLs were created in the event of a natural disaster. The Coronavirus was recently declared a new type of disaster. Now businesses nationwide are eligible to apply for ‘Economic Injury Disaster Loans.’

The SBA (Small Business Association) Offers Some Very Reasonable Terms in Their EIDLs:

Here are some quick notes on it:

  • Loans for up to $2 million with a 30 year term
  • Interest rates at 3.75% for small business and 2.75% for non-profits
  • Your first month’s payment is deferred a full year from the date of the promissory note.

The EIDLs Expanded Provisions Include:

  • EIDLs can be approved by the SBA based solely on the appicant’s credit score and not repayment ability.
    • No tax return required
    • Bankruptcies do not disqualify you
  • Loans smaller than $200,000 can be approved without a personal guarantee and real estate is not required as a collateral.
  • Borrowers can receive up to $10,000 (even if you don’t qualify for additional funds since it’s based on the applicant’s credit score) in an emergency grant cash advance that could be forgiven if it’s spent on:
    • paid leave
    • maintaining payroll
    • increased costs due to supply chain disruption
    • mortgage or lease payments or
    • repaying obligations that cannot be met due to revenue loss
  • Sole proprietors and Independent contractors are eligible to apply
  • You can apply even if you already have an open credit line.
  • There are no loan fees, guarantee fees or pre-payment fees.

How to Apply for the Small Business Loan

To apply directly via the SBA go to www.SBA.gov/disaster. When applying, be sure to apply for Economic Injury for the Coronavirus rather than physical damage due to a disaster. You have to have been in business since January 21, 2020 to qualify. For more information, visit www.sba.gov/coronavirus.

As of now, there is no guaranteed timeline as to how fast you’ll receive the money, so the best advice is to apply now.

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