Where is Your Website? - Ideas to be better seen.

Do you have a website?  How often are you asked this?  Do you ever ask it of others?  A contact in America recently asked if she could stock my books in, supposedly 4 shops.  I sent her all of my info and asked her for her website, she didn’t have one and said she has physical shops.  Really?

Many people now regard having a website as ‘doing it right, in a professional manner’ so we need to make sure that we invest into our websites.  I always say that a website is like a shop window, it needs to be visually attractive and convey your message quickly.  It is now said that the online attention of the average person is 8.25 seconds, so make the most of that time.

If your shop window isn’t right, people will drift on past your shop.  Marketeers use techniques to make you find, stop, stay and shop, so how does your window, your website manage to do this? 

Can you remember the day that your website first went live?  Did you shout, “Hooray, we are alright now.”  Have you, since then, realised that having a website is only the start and that you need to do far more work so that people can actually find you.

As an author, I often Google another author’s name so that I can visit their website, only to find out that they don’t have one or if they do have one, Google doesn’t find it.  So I’d like to now share with you a few tips to improve your website, if you don't already know these. 

Time to get excited

 

1.  SEO (search engine optimization) – Yes, this is still a thing and yes, it still works.            

·         70% of marketers see SEO as more effective than PPC (Pay Per Click) advertising.

·       Longtail keywords have 3-5% more click through than generic searches. (Use key content from pages)

2.    2.  Backlinks – Make sure that your website appears on as many other websites as possible.       I have 8 books on Amazon and in the description for each one, you can find my website’s         author landing page. 

• 91% of pages fail to see traffic due to lack of backlinks
• Top results on Google have 3.8 more backlinks

3.     3.  Mobile optimised – have you checked that your website works properly on a mobile               phone or tablet?  How often have you viewed a website on your phone, only to find the             content in a jumble, uncoordinated mess?

• By 2025 it’s estimated that 73% of internet users will access via mobile only.
• Nearly 24% of the top million websites are NOT mobile friendly.
• Only 30% of small businesses have mobile friendly websites

4.     4.  Secure site – Check to the  left of your website URL, is your site secure?  Does it bother         you if it isn’t?  It should.   

• 46% of users will not do business with you if your website is not secure.

5.     5.  Links out – Do you have links to buy your books? Don’t just tell people to go to Amazon,         include links.  Crawl Bots like links and they will find you easier, plus your customers can         buy easier.

6.     6.  Blog – This helps to keep your website alive and current.  Crawl Bots like sites that are            regularly updated.  

•       A blog helps to make your site easier to find and can actually help to rake in up to 126% more sales.  
•      Even updating and republishing old blogs with new content and images can increase  traffic by up to 106%

7.     7.  Newsletter – Do you have a Newsletter page?  This works in the same way as a Blog, in         that it keeps your site alive.  Linked with this, do you have a Pop-up Newsletter sign up             (with or without free offer)?  This tool will help to grow your audience faster than waiting for       someone to find the sign up form.

      8.  Video – If you are not using video on your website, you will be losing out.

• Videos grab 82 percent of all internet traffic. 
• Every single day, over 500 million hours of video is consumed on YouTube.  Video is 50x more likely to grab organic traffic.

1  9.  Social Links - How many social media platforms are linked?  A simple Twitter feed will           keep your site active and more visible to the Bots.

9. 10.  Branding – Do you have an easily identifiable look? - Logos, fonts, colours & images

1111.  Email Signature - Include branding and your website at the foot of your emails.  This               should be your first backlink.

I realise that this is a longer blog than usual, but hope that you find this useful.  Oh, by the way, if you don’t believe it works, try Googling my name and check out the first search engine results page (SERP).

If you need help understanding any of this, please just let me know. 

Brendan Conboy has an Advanced Diploma in Digital Marketing level 5 He is a creative Christian; digital marketeer, podcaster, film producer, poet, and author of 8 books, including 'The book of PSALMS in Rhyme.'  He lives in Stroud Gloucestershire.  There are 'self-made men' and 'God-made men', Brendan is the latter.  An associate speaker with Christian Vision for Men.  A member of the Association of Christian Writers and Evangelical Alliance.

Click here to visit Brendan's website

How do you cope with disappointment?

We are all different and cope with disappointment in different ways and if we are honest, we all face disappointment at times in our lives, such as:

> The ‘A’ grade student who gains a ‘B’ in their exam may feel that they could have done better and they start to chastise themselves. 

> The author who slaves away over a manuscript, only to face rejection after rejection from publishers.

> The couple who are desperate to have a baby, IVF has failed several times and they have been told that there is no hope.

I try not to ever give up, to always have hope and to remain positive, but it only takes one piece of straw to break the camel’s back.

I waited for three years on the transplant list for a new kidney.  During that time, I was called four times, only to be stood down and faced extreme disappointment.  Eventually, on my fifth call, the operation went ahead and I was given a kidney from someone that had just died.  I had the joy of that situation, but in the same event, a family suffered great disappointment, heartache and loss.  That was nearly three years ago and on 23^rd February I will once again celebrate my kidney-versary.

My latest disappointment is to hear today, that my shoulder surgery has been cancelled (again) for tomorrow.  This is the fourth cancellation in 18 months and I’ll be honest, it hit me hard.  It left me feeling flat and deflated, with the wind knocked out of my sails.  I felt my black dog (depression) snap at my ankles, as the dark clouds once again descended over me.  Can you grasp where I was at?

The title of this blog is ‘How Do You Cope with Disappointment?’  In the case of my latest disappointment, I could easily have allowed it to consume me, to rob me of my life and my creativity.  Instead, after a few hours of behaving like Eeyore, I wrote about it.  I wrote this blog and I shared my struggle and pain, I talked to you now reading this and I felt the joy creep back into my heart, albeit very slowly.

You may be facing your own disappointment right now and struggling with your own giants.  I know that it’s hard and that you may feel abandoned, rejected, hurt, in pain, at a loss, grieving, confused, angry, the list goes on and on.  If you are struggling, you don’t have to do it alone.  YOU ARE NOT ALONE.  Talk to a friend, a relative, a colleague, someone that you can trust or do as I do, write it down, share it and move on.

On my podcast, I’ve been chatting to various Christians who have struggled with brokenness, but found peace and comfort in being creative.  It has help them all in so many ways.  So, what is the best way to handle disappointment?  For me, it’s talk about it and create.  What about you?  I’d love to know.

Brendan is a creative Christian; a digital marketeer, podcaster, film producer, poet, and author of 8 books, including 'The book of PSALMS in Rhyme.'  He lives in Stroud Gloucestershire.  There are 'self-made men' and 'God-made men', Brendan is the latter.  An associate speaker with Christian Vision for Men.  A member of the Association of Christian Writers and Evangelical Alliance.

Click here to visit Brendan's website