When Does Your Small Business Need To Think About Apps?

Feb 04/16, Toronto, ON - In 2014, Canadian smartphone penetration was 55 per cent. In 2015, that number increased to 68 per cent. In fact, it is estimated that approximately 3 million Canadians purchased their first smartphone in the last half of 2014.

With that in mind it’s important to know that mobile investment doesn't come cheap. When your small business is deciding whether to invest in purchasing, customizing, or developing a mobile app, your current business approach, your call-to-actions, your competitors, and your team's mobility are all part of the criteria.

Customers who are on the go seem more likely to engage with brands if they are localized. For example, if you operate an IT consultancy that serves a local community, you are more likely to get more leads from the people in that region if you have a mobile strategy.

Good customer support is crucial to keep getting new referrals, and mobile apps are an excellent channel for delivering support instantly. It is also a great way to scale your customer support by introducing new channels of communication and delivery directly from the app.

If you want to learn how customers are using your products and services and what they like and don’t like about them, a mobile app can be a simple method for collecting this sort of data. Also, you can learn more about your customers with a well-designed app. Everything from their geographic location, job roles, age, spending limits, and on to infinity. This data could be useful when you're tailoring communications and potential offers to them.

The cost of producing a mobile app can vary widely, but generally, you get what you pay for. For example, there's a significant difference between engaging a freelancer, offshore development team, or an agency. Similarly, having an app that requires a back-end server built or APIs integrated versus one that is completely standalone can differ drastically. Some apps are produced for as little as ten-thousand dollars. Others, over the life of the app can go as high as $750-thousand and beyond. The price almost entirely depends on the goal or outcome desired for that app and the support services that are necessary for the app to run properly and deliver the data it was built to gather or vend.

In any case, the moral of the story is to be prepared. Once again, app development is costly and not necessarily something that your small business must have immediately. But somewhere in the plan your company will have to address the cost need ratio for your small business and get out there into the “wild west” of digital marketing and make “one giant step” for your business by planning to invest in an app for your business that will deliver the performance driven data that your company will need to remain competitive. 

Setting Up Google Analytics For Your Web Server

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Setting up Google Analytics on Your Web Server

The Google Analytics tracking code collects data for your web property, and returns that data to Analytics where you can see it in reports. When you add a new web property to your Analytics account, Analytics generates the tracking code snippet that you need to add to the pages whose data you want to collect. You can use this tracking code snippet as is, or customize it to collect additional data. The tracking code snippet contains a unique ID for the web property that lets you identify that property's data in your reports.

If you want to find out if you have installed your tracking code properly, you can use the “View Source” function of your web browser. The tracking code or “snippet” will have been installed at the bottom of the code on the page. You will need to install snippets on each page you wish to track them in Google Analytics.

If you are not familiar with the code view of your website, usually the web host provider will give you a hand setting this up. Keep your eyes open though because it’s not something they’re going to do twice for you, unless your site is managed by a communications firm or a consultant, in which case they will probably charge you a fee for setting it up for you. However, if you’re going to be dealing with data from Google Analytics, it would be wise to get familiar with the back end of your site, if only for the monetary savings you’ll realize by not needing to contact your go to person every time you want to take a look. To get to the view page source option, right click on the mouse on a piece of open page and the menu will appear. Once you have the menu, click on “view page source”. 

This is what the view page source will look like in most  cases

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Once you release the mouse you will see the code view. As you can tell with this snippet, the Google Analytics code IS NOT installed. But don’t worry. It’s a simple cut and paste job to do so, at the bottom of The HTML at the bottom of your page. Remember, this exercise isn’t about changing or moving code about on the page. You simply have to look at the code, find the tail and cut and paste the code that Google Analytics has generated for you. 

Find the tracking code snippet for your property:

The snippet of code would be placed here. The snippet of code will look like this:

Sign in to your Google Analytics account, and select the Admin tab. From the ACCOUNT and PROPERTY columns, select the property you’re working with. Click Tracking Info > Tracking Code.

This is what the tracking code for www.screammedia.ca, looks like :

<script>

  (function(i,s,o,g,r,a,m){i['GoogleAnalyticsObject']=r;i[r]=i[r]||function(){

  (i[r].q=i[r].q||[]).push(arguments)},i[r].l=1*new Date();a=s.createElement(o),

  m=s.getElementsByTagName(o)[0];a.async=1;a.src=g;m.parentNode.insertBefore(a,m)

  })(window,document,'script','//www.google-analytics.com/analytics.js','ga');

  ga('create', 'UA-59151106-1', 'auto');

  ga('send', 'pageview');

</script>

-Wait for Part 2-

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What is a Wireframe? - Part 1

What is a wireframe?

Basically, a wireframe is an architectural representation of a website before it is actually produced. It allows you to define the information hierarchy of your design, making it easier for you to plan the layout according to how you want your user to process the information. Wireframing is a very good practice, so if you haven't done it yet, there's no better time to start. 

Initial wireframe for Scream Media site:

www.screammedia.ca

Just like you need to see the two dimensional drawings of house before you can understand the layout, thus is the purpose of a wireframe. Similarly for a screen design, you can't start building pixel layers in Photoshop, or writing blocks of code, without knowing where the information is going to go. 

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What is Copywriting?

What is Copywriting?

Copywriting is the creative process of organizing information and writing words (and sometimes suggesting concepts, structure, and visuals) used in creating effective sales and marketing documents. These include print ads, Internet banner ads, brochures, case studies, direct mail, sales letters, sale sheets, flyers, case studies, and new product announcements – and the list goes on.

Copywriters seek to inform, persuade and sell. The process sometimes goes by other names – marketing writing, sales and writing, persuasive writing, ad writing and public relations writing are just a few. Copywriting is a broad term. The words on a menu are copy. So are the words in an ad, product description, press release, annual report, announcement, invitation, package insert, sales letter, Web page, broadcast fax, CD ROM presentation, and food labels.

For the most part, copywriting is copy that sells, but sometimes the direct sales message within a marketing document isn’t obvious.

Direct mail certainly packs a deliberate sales punch. A direct mail package is designed to make an immediate buying decision, and the success of a mailing is measured by how many people from a given list respond. I can remember as a manager of the local Marie Brown’s in Bedford, Nova Scotia, my manager waiting patiently by the door and counting the number of people who came in with their coupons from the direct mail piece that he participated in.

But, of course, there are no guarantees. People may be fickle, or just not interested in what you’re selling. I have written many a news article thinking that this would be the one to light the paper I was writing for on fire only to have it dropped like a wet sponge from disinterest. It’s to no fault of the author, it’s just the way the masses read.

A lot of copywriters call copywriting “writing that sells,” but sometimes the direct sales message within a marketing document isn’t obvious. Direct mail certainly packs a deliberate sales punch. A direct mail package is designed to get you to make an immediate buying decision, and the success of a mailing is measured by how many people from a given list respond.

But marketing documents such as case studies, success stories, and features take more of a “soft sell” approach. They contain no direct “buy now” message. Still, copywriters tasked with writing any forms of marketing document, whether it be hard sell or soft sell, will use all the persuasive tools at their command in a deliberate attempt to with the hearts and minds of buyers. 

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SEO for Design

SEO FOR DESIGN

Much of Search Engine Optimization is really about common sense and simplicity in the Web design and development. The purpose of SEO is to make the website as search engine friendly as possible so that it is properly categorized and displayed as high on relevant searches as possible. While SEO doesn't require advanced knowledge of programming and search algorithms but it does require a basic understanding of how search engines work.

In general, there are two aspects of SEO to consider: how the web crawlers read and categorize websites; and how the search engines figure out which pages relate to what keywords and phrases.

Search engines collect data about each website by sending a little program called a web crawler (also known as a "spider" or "bot") to visit the site and copy its content to the search engine's database. These programs are designed to follow links from one page to the next, and as they copy content from one page, they record links and send other crawlers to make copies of content on those linked pages. This process continues over and over through all links found on the website - and continues on to subsequent sites, continually collecting data for the search engine.

Knowing crawlers and how they read information on a site is the technical end of basic SEO. Crawlers are designed to read site content like a human would, going through each piece of content - image and text - item by item. If the crawler encounters a link it can follow, it will record that link and send another crawler to copy and record data found on the page the link leads to. The crawler will continue through the site until it has recorded everything.

As spiders follow links and record everything in their paths, one can safely assume that if a link to a site exists, a spider will find that site. There is no need to manually or electronically submit your site to the major search engines. The search spiders are perfectly capable of finding it on their own, provided a link to your site exists somewhere on the web. Search engines have an uncanny ability to judge the topic or theme of pages they are examining, and use that ability to judge the topical relationship of pages that are linked together. The most valuable incoming links, come from sites that share topical themes.

Once a web crawler finds your site, helping it get around is the first priority. One of the most important basic SEO tips is to provide clear paths for crawlers to follow to each part of the website. This is easily accomplished by providing easy to follow text links directed to the most important pages on the site in the navigation menu or simply at the bottom of each page. One of these text links should lead to a text-based sitemap, which lists and provides a text link to every page in the site. The sitemap can be the most basic page in the site as its purpose is more to direct spiders than help lost site visitors though designers should keep site visitors in mind when creating the sitemap. Google also accepts more advanced, XML based sitemaps, which can be read about in their Webmaster Help Center.

Having web crawlers access all the areas of the site is half the battle - the other half is found in the site content. Search engines are supposed to provide their users with lists of pages that relate to the search terms people enter in their search box. Search engines need to determine which of billions of pages is relevant to a small number of specific words. In order to do this, the search engine needs to know your site relates to those words.

To begin with, there are a few elements, a search engine looks at when examining a page. After the URL of a site, a search web crawler records the site title. It also examines the description meta tag. Both of these elements are found in the "head" section of the page or template source code.

Titles should be written using the strongest keyword targets as the foundation. Some titles are written using two or three basic two-keyword phrases. A key to writing a good title is to remember that human readers will see the title as the reference link on the search engine results page. Don't overload your title with keyword phrases. Concentrate on the strongest keywords that best describe the topic of the page content.

The description meta tag is also fairly important. Search engines tend to use it to gather information on the topic or theme of the page. A well written description is phrased in two or three complete sentences with the strongest keyword phrases woven into each sentence. As with the title tag, some search engines will display the description on the search results pages, generally using it in whole or in part to provide the text that appears under the reference link.

Due to abuse by webmasters, such as using irrelevant terms, search engines place minor (if any) weight in the keywords meta tag. As such, it is not necessary to spend a lot of time worrying about the keywords tag.

After reading information found in the "head" section of the source code, crawlers continue on to examine site content. It is wise to remember that crawlers read the same way we do, left to right and following columns.

Good content is the most important aspect of search engine optimization. The easiest and most basic SEO rule is search engine crawlers can be relied upon to read basic body text 100% of the time. By providing a search engine spider with basic text content, you offer the engines information in the easiest format for them to read. While some search engines can strip text and link content from Flash files, nothing beats basic body text when it comes to providing information to the crawlers. You can almost always find a way to work basic body text into a site without compromising the designer's intended look, feel and functionality.

The content itself should be thematically focused. In other words, keep it simple. Some pages cover multiple topics on each page, which is confusing for crawlers. The basic SEO rule here is if you need to express more than one topic on a page, you need more pages. Fortunately, creating new pages with unique topic-focused content is one of the most basic SEO techniques, making a site simpler for both live-users and electronic crawlers.

When writing page content, try to use the strongest keyword targets early in the copy. For example, a site selling bananas might use the following as a lead-sentence:  "Bananas supplied by Weston Banana Emporium are the tastiest bananas available to the banana connoisseur, and are always ripe, fresh, and delicious."

The primary target is obviously connoisseur  of bananas. By placing the keyword phrases "bananas" and "banana connoisseur" along side other keywords such as the singular words, "ripe", "fresh" and "delicious", the sentence is crafted to help the search engine see a relationship between these words. Subsequent sentences would also have keywords and phrases weaved into them. 

One thing to keep in mind when writing page copy is unnecessary repetition of keywords, known as "keyword stuffing, is often considered spam by search engines, and might count against the website in terms of search engine rankings. For example, "Bananas When writing page content, try to use the strongest keyword targets early in the copy. For example, a site selling bananas might use the following as a lead-sentence:  "Bananas supplied by Weston Banana Emporium are the tastiest bananas available to the banana connoisseur, and are always ripe, fresh, and delicious."

The primary target is obviously connoisseurs of bananas. By placing the keyword phrases "bananas" and "banana connoisseur " along side other keywords such as the singular words, "ripe", "fresh" and "delicious", the sentence is crafted to help the search engine see a relationship between these words. Subsequent sentences would also have keywords and phrases weaved into them. 

One thing to keep in mind when writing page copy is unnecessary repetition of keywords, known as "keyword stuffing, is often considered spam by search engines, and might count against the website in terms of search engine rankings. For example, "Bananas supplied by the banana company Weston Banana Emporium are the tastiest bananas available to the banana connoisseur, and are always ripe bananas, fresh bananas, and delicious bananas. So we say or bananas bananas bananas today", could be penalized for overuse of the keyword banana.

Another thing to remember is that ultimately, the written copy is meant to be read by human eyes as well as search crawler. Read your copy out loud. Does is make sense and sound natural? If not, you've overdone the use of keyword phrases and need to make adjustments.

Another important element a crawler examines when reading the site (and later relating the content to user queries), is the anchor text used in internal links. Using relevant keyword phrases in the anchor text is a basic SEO technique aimed at solidifying the search engine's perception of the relationship between pages and the words used in the link. 

Remember, the foundation of successfully optimizing your site is simplicity. The goal is to make a site easy to find, easy to follow, and easy to read for search spiders and live-visitors, with well written topical content and relevant incoming links. While basic SEO can be time consuming in the early stages, the results are worth the effort and set the stage for more advanced future work.

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