Take Control of Your Web Site with WordPress

Posted on February 1, 2012 by Randy Benton

WordPress.You may have heard the name before, but never learned what it is for.  You may know someone that blogs and uses it, but never realized how it can change your web strategy.

When used effectively for web site design, WordPress is a content management system (CMS) that can be used to build your web presence and give you the flexibility to log in, using any internet connection, and make changes and updates to your web site – instantly. That’s right, no more waiting for updates to be posted.  No more learning HTML or CSS or FTP.  Just a simple login and edit content using simple word processing tools just like you were writing a letter.

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Is Your Web Site Working?

Posted on January 22, 2012 by Randy Benton

Most all businesses these days have a web site. It has become one of the basics for starting and running a business. We put a great deal of time and sometimes blood, sweat, and tears, into getting the site up and running. But once it is running do you know if it is working?

Seeing how much traffic is coming to your website, and where that traffic is coming from is very important information to let us know if our site is doing it’s job and helping us. One of the best ways of doing that is using web site analytics. Sounds scary, but really it is fast and easy to use.

In my opinion, by far the easiest, and most powerful option for you is Google Analytics.  A full featured analytics package, Google Analytics is a time test and well developed program that can be easily setup on your website and within 24 hours you can start collecting all kinds of information about how your web site is working and who is visiting your site.

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Is your web site dated?

Posted on January 17, 2012 by Randy Benton

With the beginning of the new year there is some basic maintenance that I feel everyone should do on their website. High up on that list is updating your copyright. It is one of those forgotten parts of the site, that if left unattended could really make your site and your content appear outdated and irrelevant.

While most experts would agree that a copyright date has little to no impact on search engine rankings, it does have an impact on reader interest. Going to a site that has a copyright that is two or three years (or more) out of date, sends a messages to visitors that your site is not being cared for and is neglected.

How do you update it? That depends on your site and how it was built. Many times it is as easy as Continue reading “Is your web site dated?” »

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Google Places Labels for Business

Posted on January 12, 2012 by Randy Benton

I recently had a client inquiry about what he needed to do to get his business to show up on Google Maps and Google Places when someone viewed the map of the area. When you view a Google map, and just scan over an area, you will see certain businesses are shown on the map with their name, and either a square, or they might have a little icon next to their name. When you click on the listing, a small box appears that gives you basic details about the business and a link to their Google Places page.

Example of Google Places Landmarks and Place Labels

Google Places Labels and Landmarks Example

These are referred to by Google as Landmarks and Place Labels. Many of the icons are standard icons for particular industries like a knife and fork icon for restaurants, a gavel for attorney offices, a dollar sign for banks, etc. This is a nice feature because it can help people at a glance see what is close in their area.

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Web Standards

Posted on January 2, 2012 by Paul Sandel

Whenever a new house is being built, there are strict codes that must be followed. In many cases, there are inspectors that come around to ensure the house is built to code. The web, however, does not have this luxury. That’s why it is important to choose a web developer who understands and implements the web standards. The standards are there to help make sure your site doesn’t break. While this alone doesn’t ensure a quality web site, it goes a long way in that direction.

Standards, as used herein, refers to both the recommendations of the W3C and the set of universally accepted policies referred to as Best Practices. The standards help bridge the gap between web page developers and browser developers. There was a time, before the W3C, that every browser developer operated with complete independence. This led to each browser interpreting web-markup differently so a web page might look and act drastically different depending on the browser being used. This was a nightmare for web administrators as it was very difficult to predict how a web page might act in every browser, and often, web pages would become unusable in certain browsers.

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