The aim of the original algorithm update was to penalise sites that were violating Google’s rules of good practice. Sites that used keyword stuffing, duplicate content and dubious link schemes would find themselves with a lower SERP ranking than those adhering to the rules.

Speaking at the SMX conference Matt Cutts spoke of the imminent Penguin update saying, “we don’t want low quality experience merchants to be ranking in the search results”.

What changed last year?

Links

Initially the approach was that the more links you had on you site pages the better it was. Unfortunately this was also a method commonly used by spammers. Consequently, when Google Penguin was introduced, websites that contain a large proportion of this type of links have seen their rankings plummet.

Anchor text

Previously the best way for Google to understand what keywords you should rank for was to ensure people used keywords when linking to your site rather than your brand name. Unfortunately this resulted in websites only having keyword based links and not links with their brand name. This practice was also common to some of the sites that Google didn’t want to rank highly!

• • When building your links use branded terms, keywords and a combination of the two.
• • Use tools such as MajesticSEO or OpenSiteExplorer to understand how people are linking to you. How does it differ from sites ranking highest for your target keywords?

Spun Content

The exchange of content was previously seen as an easy way to get links. You provide the blog with a link back to your website and the site gets free content to sell adverts against. People then looked for cheaper and easier ways to provide content in exchange for the ‘golden’ link. ‘Spun’ content is where an original article has had some of the words swapped around for synonyms or some sentences rewritten. If your links have been built using this type of content it could be affected by Penguin, in which case you may need to remove the links.

How could Penguin change things this year?

Predictions are that more recognition will be given to social site links that not only add to online authorship, but also track ownership of the content. The consistent theme appears to be quality not quantity, while Google state their algorithms do not punish sites that provide quality, organic links.

Were you affected by any of the updates last year? Do you think the next update will catch those unethical sites or will those sites abiding by the rules get de-ranked too?

The post Google Penguin Algorithm and Your Website SEO appeared first on WP Design Genies.

Grey areas arose from the legislation as companies appeared to be able to judge for themselves, which parts of the gathering of information were overly intrusive and how much they considered responsible tracking. Should email address collection come under the directive?

The ICO had given companies 12 months to prepare for the directive and May 26th 2012 saw the legislation come into force. At the time the legislation was due to ‘go live’, through a survey of 17,904 audited UK sites only 53 were found to be compliant. (source Ezine articles).

With a penalty fine of £500,000 (the maximum amount that a company can be fined for breach of the legislation) the omission could be an expensive affair, not to mention reputation damaging.

Many brands may be unaware or have lost sight of the reasons for introducing the directive. The EU’s implementation arose from the 70% of Europeans who were concerned that their personal data could be misused by businesses and 72% who were concerned at the amount of personal data gathered when visiting websites. A very high percentage who were uncomfortable with using websites to do business.

In a move towards a consistent and less complex data protection the EU considered the new directives would improve trust and confidence on the internet.

As users of WordPress sites, various plugins are available, they are easy to install and place on your website and your website will be compliant with the ICO legislation.

Some new developments have emerged since the initial announcement 2 years ago.

The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) has said that anyone who visits its website from “the end of January 2013″ will receive cookies. It said individuals will be given “clear, detailed information” about what cookies have been set and will also be given access to an “easy way to remove them” if they do not want them set on their machines or devices. The ICO said its change in policy was “consistent” with guidance it has issued on obtaining “implied consent” to cookies. It said the purpose of its change in policy was to enable it to “collect reliable information to make our website better”. Read the announcement here.

What this means: you don’t have to have a pop up box or alert on your website requiring users to opt in to use cookies in order to view your website. You can simply list Cookies and Privacy Policy link somewhere prominently on the website and assume users’ implied consent when visiting your site – unless you make significant changes to how you use cookies.

As we approach the anniversary of the introduction of the directive , do you find more websites have the cookie information or that there are still a number that are still non-compliant? How do you deal with the situation?

The post EU Privacy Regulations – Are You Still Compliant? appeared first on WP Design Genies.

First of all, when setting up your business you can trade as a:

• Partnership: if you are trading with a partner or partners you require a Partnership Agreement or Shareholders Agreement, which will set out entitlements and what happens if the business relationship breaks down.
• Limited company is one with limited liability. If things go wrong with a customer they only have recourse against your company and not against you personally.
• Self-employed sole trader, simplest of all you notify HMRC that you are starting a business, then pay self-employed NIC and prepare self assessment tax return each year.

Next when naming you business, check:

• for similar names to an existing registered trademark
• that your name can be trademarked if you want, at some point in the future
• your name isn’t registered already at Companies House
• your name doesn’t contain sensitive words – otherwise you will have to obtain approval form the Secretary of State when registering as a limited company
• domain name or names are still available

When building your business website…

If you are using a website designer, have a written contract in place to ensure both parties know what is expected of them, scope of the work, time scale and pricing.

This about intellectual property: a designer often owns the IP of whatever they have created, logo,layout, pictures, unless you ask for an expressed assignment of the copyright.

If a designer is unwilling to assign the IP, ensure that if it is licensed  it is on reasonable terms. If you have employees, anything they design while employed by you is owned by you the employer, unless otherwise stated in their employment agreement.

Register domain names in your name or your companies name. A domain that is registered to anyone else can be claimed by them and you could find your site hi-jacked, with an expensive court case necessary to gain control of your domain.

Information required on all UK websites:

• name,
• geographical address,
• your details and email address,
• VAT number (if you are registered),
• details of relevant supervisory authority, if you are subject to an authorisation scheme.

Company websites also require:

• company registered name, number,
• area registered in the UK,
• address of company’s registered office.

If you are a member of a regulated profession (solicitor, doctor or similar) you need to have details of the professional body or institution with which you are registered, your professional title and country in which it was awarded, together with a link or reference to the professional rules applicable to you.

Terms of Use

Without website’s Terms of Use a court could decide that there is an implied licence to read and use the content for other purposes. Protect yourself.

Privacy Policy

Reassure customers that their personal data will be kept safe and used responsibly, especially if you are collecting data on your website for marketing purposes by offering newsletter sign up form or to register details to obtain information or a quotation.

Cookie Policy

In May 2012 ICO introduced the new cookies law. Your website should inform visitors of how cookies are used before they view the information. Non-compliance could cost you up to £500,000.

Acceptable Use Policy

If users are able to upload their own content to your website or forum, protect yourself with an acceptable use policy. Your removal of defamatory statements placed by third parties cannot be seen as an infringement of their intellectual property right when you are protected by the policy. The policy also provides you with additional protection from users who introduce trojans or worms, any intrusion into your site (hacking), illegal copying or re-selling your content. (more on Computer Misuse Act 1990 here)

Third Party Links

Links may be seen as a way of getting more visitors and commentors to your site but their links maybe be unsuitable. The use of a linking licence will enable you to regulate how and when others link to your website. Check prospective links to other websites, do they have a linking licence?

E-Commerce Terms and Conditions

Trading over the internet requires carefully drafted e-commerce terms and conditions. They are required by law and are there to protect both your business and your customers. The information you provide for your e-commerce customers is very detailed and covers at least 15 separate items. A well drafted e-commerce terms will protect you in different ways:

• establishing cancellation periods,
• cost of returning goods is borne by the customer,
• limitation of liability for breach of contract
• and other similar areas where if you say nothing, your silence is taken as your accepting liability. All of which can be an expensive affair.

For the e-commerce terms and conditions to be legally binding, the terms must be brought to the customers’ attention before a contract is made, and that they accept T&C before placing an order.

A professionally drafted terms of business is an essential investment to protect you and ensures all transactions are legally compliant. A moderate outlay – which could save your business life.

To find out more and to get your Policies and Terms professionally drafted speak to your solicitor today.

The post Legal Terms, Laws and Your Business Website appeared first on WP Design Genies.

Well here are a few ideas that may help you get the sparkle back in your blog.

Ride the learning curve

Don’t stop learning new things. It may be scary and daunting when you first see something you know very little about but dive in and learn all about it. Push yourself to do things differently, continue to learn and challenge yourself. The added boost to your confidence flows into your work and therefore into your blog.

Keep in touch

Make connections with your favourite bloggers, read what your inspirational people have to say and reconnect. Visit them and leave a comment about how they inspire you. Don’t just look to your heroes, connect with like-minded bloggers and the Twitter feed that makes you laugh or entertains you. I have several photographers that I find produce uplifting photos, just right for shifting you onto a higher level, on a glum day.

Balancing Act

Balance your socialising and take time out for yourself. Chill with a good book or whatever you find soothes and balances your life. Listen to some music that you enjoy. A quiet coffee in a local coffee shop. It’s all too easy to put everything into your work and not give thought to how you feel. Take time out and you will return with renewed vision, and able to love your blog again.

Time away

No matter how much you love all that you do, and how difficult it is to remove yourself from your work, taking a break from your blogging and writing is beneficial. Continuous work leads to burn out but with scheduled time away you return more creative and more energetic. A short walk improves mental clarity and mood. Time spent walking, riding or whatever you choose to do, may seem like time out of your busy day you feel you can ill afford to lose but in fact it will increase your productivity. So take a break.

And if you have other tips that keep you motivated and energised in your business (and blogging!) please do share below in comments.

The post Business Blogging Burn Out? appeared first on WP Design Genies.

Here’s why your website needs regular housekeeping.

Ongoing maintenance

WordPress recommend updating your website theme and plugins between 3 – 6 months. Primarily just a click of a button, this can be a false and costly move. Applying updates can cause problems, it can cause errors on your site and stop features working properly.
Updating software means changes to your website code, so applying them in a test environment first and backing up your live site are advisable steps to take before applying updates. This may put the work involved beyond many website owners capabilities, and makes the employing of a WordPress designer cost-effective and stress-reducing.

WordPress recommend website backup 3 – 12 times a year, obviously the more you have on your site, the more often you will need to back up. You can use plugins like BackWPUp or Backup Buddy to schedule backups and set up to automatically delete backups after a time, to reduce space used on your web hosting account.

Broken Link Checker as it says on the box is designed to check for broken links. Broken links will display on your WordPress website admin dashboard. Installing the plugin, automatically run and receive emails when broken links are found. Broken links can appear when external sites change their URLs, they then appear as broken links on your site. BLC plugin picks up on these, helps you rectify the situation and keeps your site up-to-date.

“Spring clean” to optimise performance

As with all files and folders your WordPress website can become cluttered especially if you don’t delete as you go along. Optimum performance, quick and smooth running are achieved by a WordPress website which contains the bare minimum. Decluttered files and folders also take up less space on your web hosting account, reducing the risk of problems arising when you update your site.

De-clutter by:

• Deleting spam comments – easy to do in the comments section of WordPress admin.
• Remove old themes if you have tried different themes. Do not delete the default theme, but go to appearance /themes and remove all others apart from your default and current themes.
• Remove plugins that are unnecessary. This can be a task but they can soon add up, taking up space and slowing down your website.
• Remove unused images. In the media section delete all images that are not in use. This may happen if you have tried several versions of an image before settling for the most suitable one for your website.

Browser testing (and don’t forget mobile devices)

Make some time to test how your site displays in all the web browsers, it’s worth checking regularly, as browsers are updated consistently and may change how your site is viewed.

Website content refresher

Updating your website content regularly keeps it relevant for your customers, factually correct and helps how your site ranks in the search engines. You might find some old posts no longer relevant or up to date – so it’s a good time to either publish necessary updates or remove them completely (and not forgetting to redirect old links to a Blog page or another post).

An experienced WordPress designer can streamline your site by:

• Tidying up underlying code
• Removing blank spaces and unneccesary line breaks
• Removing commented out codes and tags from theme template files and stylesheet
• Optimising your website database and security measures
• Validating your website code

A well maintained WordPress website will reduce the risk of hacking and security loopholes happening. It will help with speed and performance, provide an-up-to-date service for your customers and keep the dreaded broken links at bay. Apply updates in a timely manner – delay in doing this increases the risk of the website ‘breaking’ when the updates are applied.

If you are able to do the work yourself, create a schedule and establish a routine for applying the principles. Otherwise employ a WordPress expert to maintain your site and check it’s running at its optimum. A cost effective way forward, when you consider how much a site will cost you if you are off-line because the updates hadn’t been applied or if your site is hacked!

The post What Is WordPress Maintenance & Why Your Site Needs It appeared first on WP Design Genies.

Crazy Egg has various packages available and offers a free 30 day trial, so you’ve nothing to lose. All packages include heatmap, scroll map, overlay and confetti tools to help you discover what you are missing with Google Analytics.

Crazy Egg are also offering increase your website’s conversion rate or revenues within the next 30 days… or your money back. Heat maps can help you define and design your page when you discover:

• if your calls to action are clear and visible
• if users are confused by any part of the design
• if your copy is communicating with your target audience

Crazy Egg shows you exactly where people click on your site, so you are able to see if your call to action is working.

Using the scrollmap you can determine how far people scroll before giving up on your page. Some peoples scrolling is very brief, I know mine is, especially if the page is all copy! The scrollmap will show you what your audience loves. When they don’t scroll you need to improve your design.

Crazy Egg is able to segment your traffic so you can tell where different traffic sources click on your site. Using this knowledge you are able to identify the most profitable traffic source and optimising your site becomes extremely easy to do.

Crazy Egg is able to track actions to a link, and even if you have two links that go to the same place, Crazy Egg can identify which link the clicks came from. Google Analytics counts all clicks and doesn’t always distinguish, which link they have come from, just the number.  Discovering where and when on your site people click links can provide you with valuable information for designing your pages.

Crazy Egg provides information in a very user-friendly way. Their simple, easily understood layout shows you exactly where you need to make improvements.

If you find Google Analytics over the top it may be worth a look at Crazy Egg, they provide all the same data (and more) in a clear and simple way. The free trial will allow you to test your website design, copy and user experience it offers.

If you need help with either Google Analytics, (still, brilliant as a free tool) or Crazy Egg (free for 30 day trial, thereafter various packages available), software installation contact Tamara.

The post Website Heat Maps – How They Work & Why You Should Try It Out appeared first on WP Design Genies.

How do you overcome this problem and get your site looking right?

Check your site for mobile performance at http://ready.mobi/.

Here your site can be checked for mobile-readiness. The tools evaluate various areas and shows you how and where you need to make changes. It’s a comprehensive check so if you need any help, please get in touch.

You can build a mobile-friendly site from scratch but if you have a WordPress site then you have access to several plugins available both free and paid for.

WordPress Mobile Pack

This plugin has a mobile switcher which selects a theme, according to the mobile device being used to access a site. It is possible to change the colours to match your branding by editing CSS code and further customise the plugin if you have coding experience. Without any customising it’s very basic but it is free.

Wapple architect mobile plugin for WordPress

With Wapple architect you can customise your blog very quickly.Your current site style is retained and the url remains the same whether viewing on mobile or desktop. So, no redirection for your mobile version of your site. The plugin does require a dev key which can be time consuming to set up and also has a cost to take into account. As a plugin for simple sites and blogs it is ideal, but if you have a more complex site it may be better to develop a custom responsive theme.

WP Touch

A very popular, easy to use plugin. The theme is stylish and easily customised. Customisable by style, colour, branding options, 10 languages to choose and much more. There are both premium (paid) and free versions available. The paid version supports custom post types, it may be advisable to invest in this if your site is complex. Very simple to use and no changes to coding necessary.

WPTap

Automatically this plugin detects the type of mobile browser a user is viewing your site with and activates the mobile theme you have chosen. Multiple mobile themes can be installed and linked to different mobile browsers for optimum performance.

If you have a mobile website or WAP this plugin will detect and allows you to redirect your mobile traffic to the mobile/WAP site.
It could be worth considering a pre-made mobile theme (free – http://slodive.com/freebies/free-wordpress-mobile-themes/) to get the most from this plugin.

At the moment, if cost is a problem, any of the above WordPress plugins can be used to get you onto a mobile screen, which considering the proliferation of mobile technology, is an absolute must.

Reviewing your site at MobiReady will give you some insights into what problems you are up against and how you could make a website more mobile friendly. It may alter how you design your blogs and pages.

Need some help? Speak to Tamara, or contact us here.

The post How to Make Your WordPress Website More Mobile-Friendly appeared first on WP Design Genies.