CMS Continued

There are a lot of different Content Management Systems out there. Joomla, Wordpress and Drupal just to name a few. Available templates, themes and extensions allow the CMS to "extend" it's capabilities.

You can install picture galleries, Image sliders, Contact Forms, Social Media buttons, E-commerce solutions, Booking solutions, Calenders etc......there are so many extensions out there that can really enhance the functionality of your website.

Many people think that you are restricted to certain styles and colors when you have a site built with a CMS. While that can be somewhat true, you can custom code any of these sites to gain the look that you want. Most changes can be accomplished for a little extra money but still save thousands of dollars off the cost of having a custom web site built from scratch.

Plus, having a Content Management System allows you (the business owner) to create your own unique content without paying the webmaster to do it for you. For example: let's say that you own a restaurant and being a good restaurant owner, you would like to promote your daily food specials. A CMS allows you to go into your site and change the daily specials everyday. Having the freedom to change the daily specials yourself can add tremendous value to the SEO of your site along with the fact that your customers can go to your site everyday and look at the daily specials and decide if they want to come up to your restaurant for lunch or dinner. A CMS gives you this flexibility. You can change your own website without knowing any coding at all.

A CMS built web site can give you huge value going forward....




Jeffrey Dean
LMS Website Services
248-804-9744

Why Content Management System....

Why CMS?

CMS stands for content management system. It is a software based system for creating a website.You can either code a website from scratch or you can use a CMS.

Coding a website from scratch can be a very arduous and expensive way of creating a website. Everything must be coded from scratch. Whereas, a CMS created website you can leverage the structure of existing templates and the software core to have a jump start on the coding. You start from a base and customize from there.

CMS has allowed the website creation companies to be able to create affordable websites for smaller companies! No longer do websites cost 10's of thousands of dollars. You can have a very creatively designed website now for just hundreds of dollars.

Remember though, having a website and having a website that is "found on the Internet" are two different things. Anybody can make a website but not everybody makes websites with on-page SEO created right into structure of the website......

Click here for an example of a CMS created website

More to come.......


Jeffrey Dean
Owner of LMS Website Services
www.lmswebsiteservices.com
248-804-9744

Professional Websites VS Do It Yourself Websites

Comparing a professionally built website with one of those "do it yourself" websites is a self serving subject. Since I create professional looking websites packed with good SEO juice, I'm probably biased!!! Well, not probably, I am biased. But for good reason....

There is a huge difference in a professionally created website. I will just give you some facts and let you decide for yourself.

In my experience, I can always tell when a "free" website was made by the owner of the company. (Free is really not always free in the end now are they?). Sites that you get "free" from like YP.com or ATT when you sign up for a listing (and here is where "free" is not really free since you are paying to be listed and your "free" website is included in there.....) are short on features. They look homemade. Kinda like when you look at someone's landscaping. You can always tell if the homeowner did it themselves or if they had a professional landscaping company with a landscape designer come out and do it for them. Same thing with a website.

Through the years I've looked at so many websites that you could tell were "home made". Now, is this really the impression you want to give your customers? Probably not......

A professional website looks professionally made. Your customers will go online and call you because your website says "professional company".

These particular types of websites (home made websites) are probably worth what was paid for....nothing!

Now some of the free online website creation services are much better than these "homemade" websites but are still, in the end, do it yourself websites. I will give them credit for appearances (which is important) but what about SEO (search engine optimization). They do have tools to use to help you in this but really, what do you know about SEO? With your limited knowledge of SEO do you really think you can get the results of a professional?

With Google constantly changing their algorithms how can you possibly know how to get yourself found on the Internet. And if you can't get found then what good is a website?

For example, there was a time that back links would give you great relevancy with Google and really kick start your ranking. The reasoning was, the more back links the higher the ranking. The higher the ranking, the higher you were found on Google (and let's be real, if you aren't on the first page of Google than you really aren't anywhere. And I know that the 2nd and 3rd pages are "good" too but most searchers don't even go that far). Well, now if you have too many "low quality" back links Google may even penalize your site and drop you completely off the radar (see my previous back link blog).

Have you ever heard of the Panda update? How about the Penguin? These are things a professional website creation company knows about and the average Joe doesn't. So there is incredible value in using a professional firm that can do the right thing for your company.

So if you are serious about getting into the 21st century with your marketing and you have a "homemade" website, you probably aren't getting the results that you anticipated. Creating a website built from the ground up with SEO in mind will be a great start towards your marketing goals.




Jeffrey Dean
LMS Website Services
http://lmswebsiteservices.com 

Is Your Company Website Mobile Ready?

Mobile friendly websites........is your website Mobile friendly?  Because if not then your missing out on a very important aspect of Internet marketing.

First of all, Google wants your site mobile friendly.....need I say more? If Google wants your site mobile friendly then you should make your website mobile friendly. With so many people these days searching the web for just about everything, your website should show well on mobile devices.

People that search on the go (people on the road) want their information fast. They want convenience and speed. If your website loads slow or is not optimized for mobile then these people will go somewhere else. They want simple and fast (did I already say fast??). They don't want to have to search your website on a small screen that is hard to navigate on their mobile. Google knows this and is rewarding sites that are optimized for mobile (so they can enhance their users experience) and penalizing sites that are not mobile friendly.

Two ways to make your site mobile friendly. Either have a separate mobile site that links to your main site or have a responsive website design.

A separate site can be a simplified version of your main site. Something easily navigated with a link to your main site so people can go there if they want to.

A responsive website "responds" to the device used to find your site. If a tablet, then the website will adjust its size and rearrange its components to fit the screen size. If a mobile device, same thing. Your site will appear differently on a desktop, tablet or mobile but it will still be your main site. Google prefers this method. They want (as of now) responsive sites.

Ok, nuff said about mobile optimized sites for now......



Jeffrey Dean
LMS Website Services
http://lmswebsiteservices.com 

Do You Need To Market Your Website?

Website marketing. SEO. Search engine optimization.

These are terms that I was surprised to find out most of my clients didn't know what they were! I've been doing website creation and Internet marketing for so long I forgot that the average person doesn't know how to speak computer-ese. Or Internet marketing-ese. Or SEO-ese.

I start talking about this subject and eyes start glazing over. Hmm......lol. Well, having a company website is great but having a high quality website that gets "found on the Internet" is more important! Not all websites are created equal. A high quality website should have on-page SEO built into the site. Optimized meta tags, optimized title tags, optimized description tags, keyword density etc. See what I mean? Am I still speaking English....lol.

Plus, images should be optimized for faster page load. CSS should be compressed and minified. Gzip compression should be used. I could go on and on but your eyes would probably glaze over. The point is, that there is so much that goes into a high quality web site that Google will find relevant.

But this blog is about marketing your website. On-page SEO is the first step in a good marketing plan for your website. Once the on page aspect is taken care of now we need to "market" the website. Local SEO is different from national or even global SEO. Most of the websites I manage are local so I will focus on this area in this blog.

Claiming your website on Google+Local (Google My Business) is one thing you can do to market your site (the correct category listing in Google My Business is critical). Getting your site onto other directories like Yelp, Manta, Merchant Circle, just to name a few, is one step to perform. Getting citations and back links is important. These are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to marketing (advertising) your website. 

If you were to put up a brick and mortar store would you then advertise your new store? If not, how is anybody going to know that the store is there? Or how will people patronize the store if they don't even know it exists?  Marketing your website is just as critical for the same reasons. SEO is the number one method of advertising your web site. It's very important to get visits and hence new business.

In conclusion, of course you need to advertise (market) your web site! How else will people know how and where to find you? One caveat. If your only reason for having a website is because you feel like you need an online presence (and really, doesn't everybody?) and don't want your company website to generate new business then I guess you don't need to market your site. Okay?

Nuff said for now, eh?


Jeffrey Dean
LMS Website Services
http://lmswebsiteservices.com

Back Links

Stuff About Back Links

Google likes back links. The more links you have from other sites that link to your site is a vote for your site. Google sees all the links that link to your website and they see that as a vote of confidence for your site. The more "votes" your site has, the more relevant Google finds your site. The more relevant your site, the more page rank. The more page rank, the higher you go in Google's search results. And that's what we all want don't we? To be found higher and higher on Google's search results.

If you can sift through all the directories on the first page of Google, you may be able to find some of the relevant sites that pertain to your search.

In my experience, the first page of Google search results is filled with directories such as: Yelp, YP.com, Angie's List, Manta, Merchant Circle etc. And it goes on and on. So every time you search, let's say for a retail carpet store, you will be inundated with directories and probably see about 2 actual carpet company websites on the first page (that is in the organic search results).

Why is this? Because the large directories have teams of SEO (search engine optimization) people constantly working on this aspect of their online marketing campaigns. And they have lots and lots of back links that link to their site.

SEO is a constantly evolving thing. And Google's algorithms keep constantly changing (for our good they say) so it's hard to always get and keep your website on the front page of Google.

Every back link you acquire will transform to a vote of confidence to Google. So getting back links (high quality links from high quality websites) is a highly desired thing. Do not under any circumstances partner with a company that promises lots of back links for a price. These will be low quality back links and Google will see through the strategy and penalize your site (this is a very bad thing).

Back links should happen naturally.

More soon........


Jeff Dean
LMS Website Services LLC
http://lmswebsiteservices.com

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas everybody from LMS Website Services. Remember the reason for the season.

Jeff Dean
LMS Website Services