Have your web traffic numbers tanked lately? While the common black-hat tricks may give your inbound traffic a momentary boost, you can bet they’ll cost you in the long run. AppSoft Development specializes in search engine optimization and highly recommends you ditch any thought of implementing these SEO no-nos:

1. Hiding text: Splattering your website’s background with keywords in the same color as your site’s background is one of the oldest SEO tricks in the book. While it worked for a while, the search engines have become quite handy at catching on to this ruse. Try it and you’re headed for a stiff penalty and may even see your website banned. Seriously – Leave the hiding in plain sight to those in the Witness Protection Program.
2. Keyword stuffing: If your company, Wobbly Green Widgets R Us, sells wobbly green widgets, of course, you want everyone in the world to buy your wobbly green widgets. But why should they buy your wobbly green widgets, or anyone else’s wobbly green widgets, for that matter? Because your wobbly green widgets rock, that’s why. Unfortunately, all those wobbly green widgets in your wobblygreenwidgets.com website text just made your SEO rankings quite wobbly, indeed.
3. Cloaking: This is the cyber version of the old bait-and-switch scheme. The search engines want to see and index the same pages that your web visitors see. Get caught giving readers one page and the search engines another and watch your rankings plummet.
4. Over-submitting your URL: You’d think that submitting your website’s URL to the search engines weekly or even monthly would be a nice way to remind them that you’re there and need some search ranking TLC. Um… remember that crazy co-dependent girlfriend you had back in college who called and texted you every 10 minutes just to tell you she missed you? That’s kind of how the search engines feel. And just like your girlfriend got the quick, unceremonious dump, your website will, too. Same goes for those deals promising to quickly submit your URL to thousands of search engines. Turns out, upwards of 99 percent of those engines are powered by one of the SEO Big Three – Google, Yahoo and MSN – anyway. And they like to find you themselves. So make like a hot girlfriend and play a little hard to get.
5. Overdoing the flash: This ain’t Vegas. Going overboard on the cool flash and javascript, particularly in your navigation methods will backfire. Search engines have trouble reading them in the first place. Plus, web visitors typically jettison a website that takes more than five seconds to load.

Bottom line – Everything in moderation when it comes to effectively optimizing your website. For help in building and implementing a solid SEO strategy, call AppSoft Development at 800-736-9112.

StacksandStacks.com, an e-retailer of home storage and organizational products, found that shoppers who viewed an online product video are 144% more likely to add an item to their online cart than are other shoppers, says the company’s marketing director. Want to get in on some of that action? AppSoft Development’s web video production experts have a few tips for creating effective online product videos.

1. Understand that it ain’t about you. It ain’t even about your product, per se. An effective web video is all about the viewer, i.e. your prospective buyer. Make sure your script and images quickly and clearly spell out what’s in it for them – how it will make their lives easier, more productive, happier, etc. In fact, make the very first line of your script about the primary benefit of your product.
2. Keep it quick and concise. The most watched and most effective web videos last less than 60 seconds. After that, viewership drops off dramatically. While web video watchers are high in numbers, they’re short on attention spans, so you’ve got to convince them right off the bat. Open your script with the primary benefits of your product, then fill only the details most relevant to the customer.
3. Use what you’ve got. To keep web video production costs manageable, take a look at what you already have that can be repurposed. Examples are logos; graphs, graphics and stock images used in your marketing materials; and existing video from your company’s commercials, training films, etc.
4. Measure your results. The number of times a video is viewed, the number of unique viewers watching them, the amount of time spent viewing each video and the referring sources that lead viewers to your web videos can tell your marketers how effective your videos are. From there, they can make needed tweaks, such as dumping ineffective videos and boosting traffic to the videos that consistently lead to sales.

Sound a bit overwhelming? It can seem that way when you get to the technical stuff. If you don’t know your H.264 from your HTML5 and have no idea what a codec is, don’t worry about it. That’s what we at AppSoft Development are here for. We can help create, encode and post top-quality, branded online videos designed to drive buyers to your website and convince them to spend. To find out how web video can work for you, call 800-736-9112 today.

• Focus on simplicity: Clutter can be a website killer. Today’s website designs trend toward the simple, uncluttered look in both layout and animation. Clean lines and minimalistic backgrounds with fewer, but more dramatic images.
• Sliders: Image sliders across the top part of your website’s home page are a great way to convey quick bits of information and direct visitors to particular pages while minimizing the clutter. Again, keep it simple. A maximum of five sliders is recommended for most websites.
• Bright colors: Sedated, sophisticated neutral colors are so yesterday. The hippest sites on the web today are sporting bright, saturated rainbow hues. Red, pink and green are popular, as are retro blues and turquoises.  And since Pantone declared Tangerine Tango the color of the year for 2012, we expect to see it on more than a few websites. But don’t go too crazy. Just two to three colors should be used on one page.
• Big, loopy vector art: Bright colors and big, goofy vector art go hand-in-hand. Look for oversized mascot, icon and infographic images designed to grab your attention and lend a zany, fun feel. Circles are favored features. Good news: You no longer are limited to the same clip-arty stock images seen on umpteen different websites. This website branding trend has created a whole new niche for web art and graphic designers.
• Large, custom fonts: Large, textured fonts with depth, gradients, transparency, shadows and 3D effects are all the rage in 2012. Two to a page is ideal.
• Fixed position navigation: Making things easier on your website visitors is an increasingly important focus. Fixed position navigation means that as your visitors scroll up and down a web page, the navigation bar and buttons remain locked in place and visible at all times, dramatically improving website performance.
• Social & mobile: Consumers are more connected than ever before, and they expect to stay connected even while on the move. Integrating your social media sites into your primary website, and providing user-friendly mobile website versions and apps are a must. I you’re not doing this, you can bet your competition is. Retailers, restaurants, movie theaters, nightclubs and other businesses whose customers often make their destination choices while already out and about are prime candidates for this kind of web design functionality.

If you’re ready to revamp your website design, or need a whole new site, contact AppSoft Development at 800-736-9112.

The fact is that word-of-mouth advertising has always been the most trusted form of promoting goods and services. You’ll trust your friend’s opinion of such-and-such a product over a slick magazine ad or lively TV commercial any day. That’s why Facebook fan pages and like buttons work. If your friend likes a company, product or service via Facebook, you’re more likely to try it out yourself. Social media, and Facebook in particular, has digitized word-of-mouth.

Clearly, if you’re not making use of Facebook in a big way, you’re likely missing out on a revenue boon. AppSoft Development offers five great ways to get more people – current and potential customers – to like your Facebook fan page:

1. Post status updates regularly and creatively. Use them to let people know about sales and special deals, give tips on using your products and services and to find out what fans are thinking about your offerings. E3 Spark Plugs, a Florida-based spark plug manufacturer posts a “Wednesday Word to the Wise” car care tip on its Facebook fan page that never fails to solicit comments and new fans. Some of those comments are complaints. While that might seem a bad thing, it’s actually an opportunity for you to find out about glitches in your products and services, and to show other fans that you move quickly to address customers’ issues.
2. Add a Facebook Like button to your website. This allows people to show their Facebook friends that they support your company even when they’re not actively on Facebook. Like buttons can be added to your home page, to individual products listed for sale on your website, and to blog entries
3. Add a Facebook link to your email signature. This makes it easy for those on your email list to find and follow your social media pages. Try the wisestamp app, which allows you to customize your  email signature with your social media pages by showing readers your most recent blog post, your latest tweet or the cause you support.
4. Network with admins of groups whose members are your target customers. For instance, if you sell dancewear, contact the admins of Facebook groups that focus on dance. Offer to promote the group with a series of status updates on your page and ask that they do the same for you on the group page. You might even offer free gifts to the first five group members who join your page.
5. Upload videos to your Facebook fan page, then share them on other websites. Videos are among the most shared items on Facebook and can go quickly go viral. And any Facebook video embedded on another website includes a watermark link in the top left corner to the fan page where it originated.

For help implementing and managing your social media strategy or producing high-quality web videos, call AppSoft Development at 800-736-9112.

1. Resolve to create new link-worthy content at least once a week. Update stale web pages, post informative and entertaining new blog entries, post and send an e-newsletter offering special deals or discounts, add a sweet video or infographic to your site (videos and infographics are the most shared items online). Post links to each of them on your social media sites and then…
2. Resolve to get more social. The days of posting status updates and links to your website on your Facebook, Twitter and YouTube pages and expecting that to be enough to drive a little traffic your way are long gone. Consumers on social media sites often “like” a business or fan page once, then rarely visit the page again. Good for your ego, perhaps, but it does nothing for your business’ bottom line. Make sure your social media sites are more than virtual paperweights by giving your “likers” reason to come back to your fan page and click through to your website again and again. Engage with your fans by asking their opinions on your new products, answering their questions and offering special deals to social media users.
3. Resolve to look past the “Big Three.” If you’re old enough to remember the advent of cable television and the mentally intoxicating, sheer joy that came with having something to watch besides TV’s Big Three (NBC, ABC, CBS), then you might understand the importance of going beyond social media’s Big Three (Facebook, Twitter and YouTube). A growing number of effective alternative social spaces like Flicker, SlideShare, Pinterest, FourSquare and Gowalla each offer unique ways to reach new potential web searchers and customers.
4. Resolve to drop the deadweight. Old, outdated and repetitive content is dragging your website down the search rankings. Once a month, check each page of your website and update or cut any no longer relevant pages or content. This includes checking through your old blog posts, especially if you have committed the deadly SEO sin of minimally editing and recycling blog topics to save time. Search engines are suspect of duplicate or repetitive copy and will let you know it via a plummet to page five in search results.
5. Resolve to make sure others are getting it right. Check all online business directories that include your company and confirm that the information listed is accurate and updated. If your company isn’t listed on a great, relevant directory, submit it.

If you’re serious about amping up your website’s power in 2012, call AppSoft Development. We can help you boost your site’s effectiveness with a tailored SEO campaign or even a full, functional website redesign. Call 800-736-9112 or sign up online for a free SEO analysis.

Topping critics’ list of the pros of Google Plus brand pages are the features that drive a closer contact with customers and potential customers. And the hands-down favorite is the Direct Contact feature, which sends web searchers directly to a business’ Google Plus page when they simply add a “+” before a search query. Hangouts also look promising. The feature allows brands to virtually hang out with followers via video chat and, if used effectively, can boost the customer service experience and allow for hosting of live events. Google Plus brand pages also can amp up your SEO traffic. Google adds up the +1 button clicks and uses them to determine relevancy in Google Search results. And five page categories (local business or place; product or brand; company, institution or organization; arts, entertainment or sports; and other) allow searchers to find companies easier.

Not-so-hot is the fact that brand pages are bound to just one personal account and can’t be transferred, deleted or shared. Since when are most companies sole proprietorships? And what happens when the marketing exec who manages your Google Plus brand page leaves the company? If Google doesn’t make a change that allows sharing of brand pages between multiple employees of a company, they’re in for a slew of fake personal profiles. Also, Google Plus lacks any sort of verification process for smaller companies, which means if someone else (like a competitor, disgruntled former employee or unhappy customer) creates a page under your brand’s name, Google won’t do jack about it. Also, while brand pages help business boost interaction with customers, it’s local pages that better help potential customers find brands and businesses in the first place, via Google Maps and local search. These are two different page types and each must be managed separately. Critics are hoping Google eventually will combine the top feature of these two page types.

AppSoft Development can help you setup and manage your Google Plus brand and local pages, plus other social media sites, including Facebook and Twitter. We’ll integrate the look with your primary website and blog and help you devise a marketing strategy to best utilize social media features. Find out more by contacting AppSoft Development at 800-736-9112 or via our online contact form.

Image credit: AHMAD FAIZAL YAHYA / Shutterstock.com

Prompting the freshness move is the increasingly real-time content adds and updates via social media sites like Twitter, Facebook and Google+. Google now can crawl the content from social media networks, pinpoint which content people are most interested in and decide whether it’s relevant to search queries. Google also uses RSS feeds to determine which content from a particular website is the freshest. All of this means that no matter their size and budget, smaller businesses and brands can boost their chances of landing top spots in the search results.  Here’s how:

1. Post on your social media sites daily. A great way to get fans to interact is by asking questions that relate to both your products/services and to pop culture. For example if you sell auto parts, ask fans to rate the top movie car chase scenes in this year’s Oscar-nominated films.
2. Boost your blogging. Plan ahead and tie in your topics with current events, holidays, etc. Be sure to check topics that are trending in the search engines and find ways to work them into your blogs.
3. Add an RSS feed to your website or blog. Folks have been swearing RSS was going the way of the 8-track cassette, but Google’s freshness updates make them cool – and effective- all over again.
4. Update your web copy. Seriously, how long has it been since you’ve spruced up your copy? Read it over and you just may see that some of it is not only a bit stale, but far outdated. Employee bios are a main culprit. Many will read that “So-and-So has a decade of experience in such-and-such.” But if So-and-So’s bio was posted when he was hired back in 2000, he’s not getting credit for that second decade – and neither is your website.
5. Add a microsite. Microsites are like mini-websites within bigger websites and often have their own domains. They’re focused on particular brands, products, events or campaigns. An example is Pepsi Cola’s Refresh Everything project, which encourages visitors to submit or vote for the best community service ideas and has become a major web traffic driver for Pepsi products.

For help developing your website, blog and social media content, contact AppSoft Development. We specialize in designing and maintaining gorgeous, user-friendly and profitable websites that drive customers to your cash registers. Call 800-736-9112 or complete our email form to request a free quote.

Image credit: Annette Shaff / Shutterstock.com