Firstsearch Home Page Own Operate Manage Work in a Business in Wanganui Submit Site to Custom Search Engine Article: How to have a search engine friendly website Article: Are agencies interested in the best interests of their clients

How New Zealand Businesses Waste Money and Upset Customers. I do not know of many people who buy a newspaper looking for a particular advertisement. I don't know many people who turn on the radio, waiting to hear a particular advertisement. I don't know many people who turn on the television for the advertisements, but I do know people who go on the Internet looking for information. About now someone is thinking, what about the Real Estate and Employment ads. Fair comment, but if a person wants to buy a house or is looking for a job they are not waiting around until the newspaper is printed; they are on the Net searching for the information. The following is not about bashing the other media; all have their place and audience. Some people read, some listen, others watch, but increasingly customers are online searching for information. What the following is about is the customer and the Internet. The Web is changing how customers and potential customers source information. Which business has what they want What it is about is how businesses waste money when they build websites that are not search engine friendly. Thousands of dollars are spent to create a website that cannot be found in the search engines because the rules and protocols have not been followed. A website that cannot be found in the search engines is a business that cannot be found by the potential customer. Scary isn't it, all that money spent and all that time wasted and customers turned away. Let us consider some of the barriers businesses put in front of the customers. Flash: You have got the customer to your site, why turn them away, unless there is a very good reason don't use flash. The first thing customers want to see is the proposition, how you can assist them, you have what they want. Write copious text about the product (s) or services offered. Search engines thrive on text and so do the potential customers. They want to know the detail. Pictures: Use pictures to support the text. A picture all by itself is not going to tell the information hungry search engines and customers a lot. By the way search engine cannot read pictures. Frames: So yesterday, a site build with frames is not rated as being particular search engine friendly. CMS: Content management systems, they have their place but understand session ID's are poison to spiders. They are taught to avoid them or not to delve to deeply. There are workarounds possible, so work with your website developer to ensure your site is fully accessible. Title Tags: When you write the text for a webpage consider what are the key phrases a customer would type into the search engine when they wish to find your site. Weave these key phrases into your webpage text (don't over do it) and place these key phrases in your Title Tag (s) Description Meta Tag: A précis of the webpage in one or two logical sentences containing the key on-page phrases. The search engine may or is likely to use this information or bits of it when they display the results in the Search Engine Result Pages. Not hard is it. Simple rules and protocols and your website is on its way to earning money for your business. Need data to support the above: View A Friendly Website Try some reverse engineering, think of a website and the products or services offered by that business. Key into a search engine search box the words you consider you should key in when someone wanted to find that particular site. Did you find it. Ignore the directory listings; you are looking for that company's website. If you did not find it, type the businesses website URL into the "address bar" in the browser. When the site appears, select "view" in the top tool bar and from the resulting drop down box select "source" this will tell what key phrases they are targeting. Are they appropriate phrases, are they likely to attract customers with the words they use. Try it with Motels Wanganui. Remember you are looking for the actual website url of the business not their listing in a directory. Why is all this so important. Quite simple really, customers are online and if businesses cannot cope with the basics, how are they going to cope with the business changes that are to come. A web presence is not longer a nice to have, it is a commercial necessity. Customers are online and if they cannot find you, they will go to someone they can find. Contact Us