Small Business Design Resources

Quick Tip: Use No More than 3 Keywords Per Web Page

When writing content for your website be sure that each page focuses on no more than 3 keywords. Choose the keywords that you want to use for that specific page and use just those keywords multiple times on that page (of course keeping in mind that it should read well for your target audience).

The Best SEO Keyword Research Tools

There’s no question that search engine optimization is a key part of successful small business website design–without effective SEO, your customers simply won’t find your site. I’ve discussed some of the keys to search engine optimization before, and now I want to share with you some of the best tools to conduct SEO keyword research.

Choosing the right keywords for SEO is essential, because the keywords associated with your website will determine which and how many Internet searchers will find it. You want to be sure that you’re optimizing for keywords that your target audience is searching on. This is where keyword research comes in. Here’s a quick overview of the best SEO keyword research tools available:

Free Keyword Research Tools

Alexa

Alexa offers a wealth of free search analytics tools that can help you optimize your website. To conduct keyword research with Alexa, you can:

• Type in a search term to find out how popular that query is (“Query Popularity”) and how much competition there is from other websites for that particular query (“Query Competition Index”).
• Type in a competitor’s website to see what keywords they’re using to attract traffic.

Google
Google provides a number of free keyword tools, particularly for those who have created AdWords accounts. An AdWords account is how you buy advertising space on Google, but you can sign up and use the tools even without purchasing advertising space.

• Google Search-based Keyword Tool
  • Google’s Search-based Keyword Tool will suggest keyword ideas based on your website and your Google AdWords language and country settings, so you get suggestions that are particularly relevant to your needs. It provides info on the number of monthly searches and the competition for each suggested keyword, as well as a suggested AdWords bid price. You can also browse keywords by category. (This tool is very similar to the Google AdWords Keyword Tool, but provides a little more data.)
• Google AdWords Traffic Estimator
  • This tool will provide an estimate of how much advertisers are paying to have their ad displayed when certain keywords are searched–keywords with a lot of searches tend to be more expensive. Use the Traffic Estimator for keyword research by looking for keywords that are relevant to your website but are not the highest or lowest priced–the top priced keywords generate a lot of competition, and the lowest priced ones see too little traffic.
• Google Insights For Search
  • Google Insights for Search is how you can find out who is searching for what keywords. Enter your search terms and Google will provide you with an analysis of the keyword’s search trends relative to Google’s total number of searches. You’ll be able to see the change in search volume over time, amount of interest by geographic area, and similar keywords that are highly searched or that have seen an increase in number of searches.

Paid Keyword Research Tools
Wordtracker
Wordtracker is generally considered the gold standard in paid keyword research. There’s a free Wordtrack keyword research tool, but access to the features that make Wordtracker one of the best requires a paid subscription. They do offer a free trial, however, so you can see if you like it before you buy. You might also want to check out the Wordtracker-powered SEO Blogger plugin for Firefox.

Keyword Discovery
Another good keyword research tool which also offers a free trial. According to their website, Keyword Discovery has the largest keyword database, containing nearly 38 billion searches from more than 200 search engines worldwide.

Quick Tip: Use Unique Title tags for Each Web Page

Each web page on your website should have unique Title tags. A Title tag is reference to the HTML code where you should write your Title. The Title of a page can be seen on the top most part of your browser and this is also what the user will see when they do a search in a search engine. For example in Google the Title is represented as blue, underlined text on the search results page. The reason you should use a unique Title for each of your web pages is because you don’t want the search engine to mistake that all your pages are the same.

What is Flash and is it suitable for your business?

Flash is software that uses animation to create multimedia elements for websites. Flash on a web page is usually used to establish interactivity with visitors. It could be a button, form, movie, cartoon, or even a game. Take a look at the following examples of different uses of Flash:

Flash focused sites (full Flash sites):
Moodstream (brainstorming tool)
Uniroyal Fun Cup (racing game)
Chipotle (restaurant)

Sites with Flash elements (not full Flash sites):
Atlantic Vegas (only the game selections are done in Flash)
American Academy Casablanca (home page has a Flash photo gallery)
Conference Torquay (home page has 3 small rotating Flash photo galleries)

To use Flash or not?
There are few things to consider when thinking about using Flash on your website: your budget, Search Engine Optimization (SEO), and your industry type.

Consider your web design budget
A standard website can cost you anywhere from $500 to $3000 and that doesn’t include Flash. There are many factors that go into the price of a website, but Flash would be considered an added feature and therefore would cost you hundreds extra. So, when considering including Flash on your website, first take a look at your budget and see if you can afford it.

SEO and Flash
There are a couple of reasons why you would like to have a Flash site for your business, it grabs visitor’s attention and it’s interactive. On the other hand, you might not want to have a full Flash site for your business because they’re made up of graphics and graphics are not search engine optimized (SEO). It is very important to have your website be SEO friendly, but that’s a different topic. Your website can of course have Flash elements like those shown in the examples above.

Is your business in an industry that’s ready for Flash?
The type of industry that your business is in has also a factor of how much Flash on your website you should use (if you decide to use it). For example, if you’re in a Health Care industry your website doesn’t need any Flash, but you may still use Flash elements minimally. The main reason for this is because the visitors that would come to your website would not typically wait for the Flash to load, they just want to get in, find what they’re looking for and leave. But if you’re in the Arts and Entertainment industry, than it would be good for your website to have at least some Flash in it. I would at least suggest for your website to use a Flash photo gallery. When people come to an entertainment type of website, they are more interested to interact with your website and take their time to view things such as slide shows.

So before you consider to have your website designed in Flash, first thing about your budget, your search engine ranking and your industry type.

Website Critique: Jewelry inspired by nature

Arjeent is a unique jewelry making website. They make jewelry inspired by nature and also custom jewelry taken from a provided photo from a customer. The video website critique of their website www.arjeent.com gives suggestions on how to improve the navigation and make finding the right type of jewelry to purchase much easier for the average user.

Overall Improvements

• The current website is generic, make it pop more and showcase that unique feel that the products have.

Homepage

• Don’t just jump directly into showing the products, explain/show the user what the website is about. Because this is so unique, you need to find that “WOW” and bring it to the homepage.
• Use the homepage to show promotions, specials, and/or even advertise the custom jewelry from photo section.
• Create a call-to-action! Don’t make your users stop and wonder what to do or where to go on your website. A call-to-action prompts the user to choose to either do this or that and explore the website.

Swarovski product page example

Products

• Users are use to seeing a navigation where they can choose what product they want to shop by. Give them this option of choosing either to shop by the specific jewelry item or even by the animal type.
• Give more description to each product. This will not only help the user but will start improving your SEO.
• Under each animal that has multiple choice of jewelry items, you can say “also available in…”. This way you’re giving the user options of the jewelry type for a particular animal.
• Take a look at other well known jewelry websites and see how they showcase their products (see image of the Swarovski product page to the right).

More website critiques

Of course there are more things to dive deeply into making this site better such as search engine optimization, but this is a whole different subject and will require it’s own review.

If you’re viewing this review and want to add more suggestions, please add your comments below.

Disclaimer

The video website critique and suggestions are for you to review and take what you feel will better your business website. There’s no guarantee that the suggestions mentioned will improve your business. Design Leap is not held responsible for any negative outcome.