“Internal links are the superhero of SEO.”

At a recent virtual conference called WooSesh, SEO consultant and WordPress expert, Rebecca Gill, shared that insight during her presentation on SEO, impressing upon attendees the importance of internal links and the boost they can give a small business website. But, first and foremost what is an internal link?

An internal link (aka interlinking) is simply a hyperlink that you place within some content of your website that leads your visitor to another page on your same website. While an external link will take your website user to a different website, an internal link keeps your visitor on your site, but just takes them to a different point than where they originally entered.

For example, the two links in the first paragraph of this blog post takes you, the reader, to other websites, which causes you to leave this one. However, this link to the eWebscapes portfolio page takes you away from this article, but keeps you here at the same website. Go ahead and click on it, then click your browser’s back button to return to this blog post.

Now that you’re back, let’s address the importance of internal links:

1. Internal links keep your visitors on your website. Why send your potential customers away from your website to discover more information? If you provide that information on your site, lead your visitors to it while keeping them on your website. The longer you can keep a user clicking on your website, the better chance you have at converting that visitor into a customer.
2. Internal links improve user experience. Again, your website visitor may want even more information, and when you provide them with that, they’re grateful. Internal links have a way of making website users feel satisfied with your website experience.
3. Internal links enhance your SEO efforts. They inform search engines what type of content will be found at your site, what related content will be found at your website, and the value of that content. So long as you are intentional and strategic about your internal link placement and do not over stuff links, an internal link strategy could significantly impact your search engine results. In other words, make sure the anchor text you use for an internal link directly relates to that link. Do not insert an internal link for scheduling an appointment at your dental office website to random words. Very often at this blog, you’ll see the words ‘contact us’ directly linked to our Contact page. That makes sense to a search engine. Additionally, do not place so many internal links onto a web page or within a blog post that it looks littered. Be mindful. A web page or blog post that has many internal links may appear spammy to a search engine, which will have a negative effect on your SEO.

Bonus tip: try to avoid the typical “click here” copy as your anchor text. Instead of inviting your readers to “click here,” invite them to “learn more about your services” and link your services page to the word ‘services.’ Or, invite them to “contact us,” and link to your contact page. Find another way to say click here without directly saying it. Doing so just creates a more pleasant reader experience.

Hopefully, you’re convinced and plotting where to place internal links on your small business website. It’s simple really:

• Place internal links within the text of your blog posts. The topics of your small business blog should be related to your business, therefore, within the content of your blog posts, exists opportunities to internally link back to your Contact, About, Products, Services, and any other web page on your site that has the potential to convert your reader into a client.
• Place internal links on your product and/or service page(s). Products are an easy win. Recommend other products that complement the one they are browsing. For a service web page, you will definitely want to link to your About page so the user can learn more about you, as well as any blog posts that perhaps expand on your services, giving the user a deeper understanding of what you can do for them.
• Place internal links on your Home and About pages. The content of these pages are usually brief, requiring internal links that provide the visitor with more detailed information should that person want it. For example, a restaurant website with no other text on their Home page other than the words “Best Asian-Mexican Fusion” will probably want to add an internal link that leads to the About page so that a curious diner can learn more about what Asian-Mexican fusion is.

Take a look at your website content—not just your blog, but all of it. Where could you strategically and thoughtfully place some internal links? Review this blog post you just read. How many internal links did we include? (Feel free to answer that in the comments below.)

It’s true. Internal links are the superhero of SEO. We hope you take advantage of benefiting from their power.

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If, like me, you like to get your hands dirty, you need to read this chapter. WordPress users who create their own themes do so in the interest of

Individuality: You can have a theme that no one else has. (If you use one of the free themes, you can pretty much count on the fact that at least a dozen other WordPress websites will have the same look as yours.)

Creativity: You can display your own personal flair and style.

Control: You can have full control of how the site looks, acts, and delivers your content.

Many of you aren’t at all interested in creating your own theme for your WordPress website, however. Sometimes, it’s just easier to leave matters to the professionals and hire an experienced WordPress theme developer to create a custom look for your WordPress website or to use one of the thousands of free themes provided by WordPress designers (see Chapter 8). Chapter 16 also tells you where you can get ten free WordPress themes.

Creating themes requires you to step into the code of the templates, which can be a scary place sometimes — especially if you don’t really know what you’re looking at. A good place to start is by understanding the structure of a WordPress website. Separately, the parts won’t do you any good. But when you put them together, the real magic begins!

Key takeaways:

• WordPress themes allow you to build a website specific to your individuality and personality.
• WordPress themes also allow for full control.
• With proper WordPress understanding, you can even manipulate the code within your template for further customization.

Purchase WordPress for Dummies, 8th Edition at a bookstore near you or online at Amazon.

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Getting Customer Testimonials

As if you don’t have enough to do running your small business, now you have to collect customer testimonials? Yes, add this task to your to-do list, but there are ways to make it a less daunting chore. Here are the two simplest ways we can think of.

Ask for them.

• Receipt or Purchase Confirmation – The process varies from business to business, but upon purchase, your clients receive some type of confirmation, right? This usually occurs on your website, which is then followed up with an email. At both points of contact, take advantage of these opportunities to ask for feedback.
• Website – If your business is eCommerce, each product page (whether it’s a physical or digital item) should include the opportunity to provide a testimonial. If your company is service-based, use your contact page to invite past and current clients to submit a customer testimonial.
• Email Newsletter – Requests for reviews and feedback should always be a part of the content of your email newsletter.

Take them from review websites.

Whether published on Yelp, your Facebook page, TripAdvisor, or any other online review platform, positive reviews about your small business can be featured on your website. Just be sure to give credit to the source from where you got the review. Some sites (such as Yelp) even have options for you to embed a review.

Displaying Customer Testimonials

Now that you’ve done all this work to capture rave reviews, we urge you to showcase them. Now is your chance to let website visitors know what is so amazing about your business.

Feature them on your homepage.

Forget about being humble. Feature your favorites front and center. We recently redesigned the website for All Natural Dog Beds. The image below is of the testimonials displayed on their homepage. It’s only three, but, wow! What a great impression they make. Take note of the Read More Testimonials button in the lower right corner. This brings us to our next recommendation.

Build a testimonials page.

An entire page of good customer reviews gives potential customers even more reason to consider purchasing your product or service. Be mindful of keeping it fresh. You may love that review that Ruth S. from Texas gave you three years ago, but a recent online review submitted just a month ago is more likely to instill trust. Take a look at the customer testimonial page we built for our client All Natural Dog Beds. It even includes images, which adds interest and charm.

Another thing to consider, especially as you invest time into gathering customer testimonials, is that these pieces of feedback (even the negative ones) provide you with market research and help you learn more about what is working and what isn’t working for your company. If you’re running a restaurant, and diners are saying your service is slow, wouldn’t you want to know that so you can make improvements?

Customer testimonials are like precious gems. Use them to their fullest potential, and never be afraid of showing them off. They have impact. Take advantage of that.

Are you featuring reviews and testimonials on your small business website? Tell us how in the comments below. If you need assistance figuring out how to display what your customers have to say about your company, contact us. We’d love to help.

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• Your website visitors, potential customers, current customers, social media followers, and members of the media want information about your business and industry.
• Regular blogging fuels website traffic.
• Sharing information about your line of work positions you as an expert. Consumers want to do business with reputable professionals.

Convinced? Good. Now, let’s talk about how to start your small business blog. Consider the following your to-do list.

Add a blog to your small business website.

We’re writing this article under the assumption that you already have your small business website launched. If not, contact us to get started on your new website.

Depending on the platform you’re using for your website, the method for adding a blog to it will vary. If your small business website is like 31% of the modern internet and powered by WordPress, your site already has the capabilities for a blog incorporated into it. All you need to do now is create a place for your blog posts to land (essentially, you may want to build a new page for your blog) and add it to your menu(s) so that its presence is evident from every page of your small business website. This step-by-step tutorial will show you how to add a blog to your website, but if you find the process overwhelming, again, just contact us. We love building blogs for clients.

Select your subject matter.

While the whole point of your blog is to promote your small business, blog post after blog post about your business and only your business can be a turnoff. Company news should be shared, but you should also write altruistically about concepts and ideas that benefit your customers.

For example, let’s say your small business is chiropractic care. Here are the types of blog posts you should be publishing:

• Company news – Share updates about new doctors practicing from your business, new team members, new locations, new insurance you’re accepting, etc. Celebrating an anniversary? Announce it. People want inside information about your company.
• Industry news – Did a new study about chiropractic health publish? Write about it and give your readers your opinion. Is there a new piece of equipment that has just hit the market that could help your patients with their care? Inform your clients. This is your chance to display your expertise.
• Tips – What can your patients do to care for their chiropractic health? Are there exercises to recommend? Is there a specific type of office chair that they should be using at work? What about multivitamins? Offering advice and tips is an opportunity to be generously helpful to your potential and current clients without asking for anything in return. Consumers appreciate free help. When they’re ready to book an appointment and pay for help, they’ll remember you.

Decide on frequency and plan a calendar.

Many, many people decide on frequency and plan their editorial calendar after launching their blog. However, we think it’s best to decide these things prior. You can always tweak both later when you learn more about what works and what doesn’t. But before you officially start your small business blog, set some structure for yourself by committing to frequency. We recommend blogging at least once per week, but if you can publish more often than that, you should definitely go for it.

Now that you know your subject matter and frequency, open up a spreadsheet and start plotting your topics and dates. Again, doing this beforehand gives you some structure and guidance. You don’t want to feel lost after starting your new small business blog. Planning your editorial calendar in advance is like having a road map.

Write your first blog post.

You can do it! Write your first blog post. Acknowledge that it’s the first. Make a big deal about it. Tell your readers what they can expect, and invite them to comment. Your blog posts don’t need to be 5,000 words. In fact, they shouldn’t be. Authenticity and accuracy are more important than length, when it comes to blogging. A blog post between 350-500 words is sufficient. Here are some other blogging tips:

• Optimize your content for search engines. Choose your keyword or key phrase and make sure it is used in the blog post title, URL slug, throughout your blog post in a natural manner, and with whichever plugin or extension you’re using for the SEO of your website. (We recommend and use Yoast.) For example, ‘small business blog’ is the key phrase of this blog post. See how it’s used in our title, above in the URL slug, and throughout this post?
• Proofread. Look for typos, misspelled words, grammatical and punctuation errors. We recommend proofing and editing blog posts at least twice, but preferably three times.
• Insert internal links. Looking over your blog post, what words or phrases could be appropriately linked back to pages within your website? Go up to the top of this blog post. In the first paragraph, second bullet point, we cleverly linked back to one of our blog posts. That’s an internal link meant to lead you to another page on this same website. Hey, we’d keep you here all day if we could, which is your goal, too. By inserting internal links, you could be keeping your website visitors around longer.
• Insert external links. Next, consider peppering an external link or two into your blog post. Be selective. External links should take to your readers to reputable and trustworthy websites only. While you certainly don’t want to send your customers away, external linking is just a method for supporting statements you make in your blog post while also letting search engines know that you play nicely with others on the internet, sharing your web traffic. Search engines reward you for that.
• Use impressive imagery. Include a stunning feature image at the top of your blog post, which can be used when it’s shared on social media.
• Invite people to engage. Many of your blog posts will inspire conversation. At the end of those posts, invite your readers to leave a comment and feedback.
• Invite people to subscribe. Give your website visitors the opportunity to have your blog posts land in their email inbox. Read this article for recommendations and guidance on adding a subscription option to your blog.

Congratulations! You did it. You wrote you first blog post. There, that wasn’t so scary, was it? Now… click Publish. (Or, schedule it for later.)

Next steps…

• Announce it. For your very first blog post, consider also writing and sending out a press release to the media announcing the launch of your new small business blog. It’s a big deal. Invite everyone to read it.
• Share it. Every single one of your blog posts should be shared and promoted on all of your social media channels and email marketing campaigns.

Running your own business is a lot of work, that’s true. And adding regular blogging to your list of tasks may seem daunting, but it’s a a task that’s as necessary as keeping your financial accounts updated.

Are you going to add a blog to your small business website now? Tell us your ideas for your new blog or ask us any questions in the comment section below.

The post How to Start Your Small Business Blog appeared first on eWebscapes.

WordPress for Dummies, 8th Edition by Lisa Sabin-Wilson

Is it any wonder that we recommend a book by our very own COO and founder? Lisa Sabin-Wilson is a WordPress and website design pioneer with a passion for guiding others toward a journey of empowerment and success when it comes to their own websites. Whether you’re a seasoned WordPress user or a newbie, WordPress for Dummies is chock-full of information about how to download and install WordPress, use plugins, create content, optimize images, and more. Everything and anything you need to know about running your own WordPress-powered small business website is in this book. Why depend on Google each time you have a question about your WordPress site or encounter a glitch? Just open this book up and locate the solution yourself. It’s like having a website support tech available to you when you need them.
 
 
 

Search Engine Optimization All-in-One for Dummies by Bruce Clay

Once you’re learned about WordPress and small business website creation and management from Lisa, now it’s time to turn to Bruce Clay, author of Search Engine Optimization All-in-One for Dummies, for guidance on SEO. Even experienced authors struggle with the intricacies of SEO. That’s because the strategy goes beyond merely blogging and requires knowledge of keywords, search engines, and audience profiles. This book begins with the basics, for those readers who know absolutely nothing about SEO, but for those that do, there are also sections that dive deep into the technical aspects of SEO. Think of it as the SEO guide for practitioners of all levels, making it an essential book for your small business website.

The Zen of Social Media Marketing by Shama Hyder Kabani

It’s time to play Pied Piper, boss person. If your business fans and customers are hanging out on Twitter, you had better make the effort to connect with them there and lure them back to your website. That’s where social media marketing comes in, and who better to learn about the nuances of social media than from a Millennial? In The Zen of Social Media Marketing, author Shama Hyder Kabani takes you through the basics of online marketing to the power of podcasting. The opportunities that social media has to offer are endless and multilayered. Shama gives you tips on using them all. If you have ever felt overwhelmed trying to figure out how your small business website can benefit from the merits of social media, this book will help you solve that.

The Associated Press Style Book

Which words should be capitalized within a blog post title? When is it appropriate to use compliment versus complement? Should punctuation be placed within quotations or outside of them? Unless you’re an English teacher, chances are that you have forgotten much of the grammar and spelling rules you learned in school. It happens to the best of us, but keeping The Associated Press Style Book (aka AP Style Book) on your desk will jar your memory. Sometimes you’re not even sure where your confusion lies, making it even more difficult to Google it. Keep an AP Style Book nearby. It will be easier to find your answers than typing your query into a search engine.

Bonus tip: While the AP Style Book is updated yearly, there’s really no reason why one from two or three years ago wouldn’t be of use today. You don’t need to buy a new one every year. Unlike technology, the rules of English grammar and spelling do not change severely year after year.
 
 

Dictionary

As if we weren’t being old fashioned enough by recommending (gasp!) books, here we are recommending one of the oldest ones ever—yes, the dictionary. It doesn’t matter if you get one by Merriam-Webster or Oxford, a simple dictionary will open up a world of words to you. While some online tools are not compatible with Google Docs or WordPress, one thing that never conflicts with either is a dictionary. Every small business should have one.

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It’s your responsibility

When it comes to website security, there are multiple angles to be considered. I have previously written about how you, as a website owner, even if you aren’t the technical person in your company, still play a very important role in your website’s security. It’s critical that everybody in your organization realize the part they play in your website’s security and that article is a great way to introduce them to it. Please share it with your team.

Whether you have a designated in-house IT professional, a vendor to whom you outsource your website maintenance tasks, or a tech-savvy nephew who enjoys managing your website for you, you as the business owner still have a responsibility to ensure the security of your website. Not doing so can have an adverse affect on your bottom line. A hit to your profits should be enough motivation to make you sit up and pay attention.

Now you’re asking, “But John, what can I do to my website to increase security?” Well, I’m glad you asked. Because that’s exactly what we’re going to talk about here today.

Be relentless about passwords

Just this past week, you probably heard that Facebook had a security breach that exposed account details for 50 million users. Now, let me ask you, are you using a plugin that allows you or your users to login to your website using their social media logins? Sounds scary.

Having a strong password is obviously important, but it’s not enough to create a strong password and then never change it. Yes, it’s a pain to be changing your password on a regular basis. But, isn’t that a lot easier than having to deal with your website being hacked?

If you have trouble remembering strong passwords, look into password management tools like 1Password or LastPass.

Use a good host

If you do a search for “cheap website hosting,” you will find literally thousands of hosting companies that are happy to set up your website on a shared server with thousands, maybe even tens of thousands, of other websites all on the same box. You think you’ve found a great deal because you’re able to host 100 websites for 10 bucks a month, but should your search for a reliable website host be a race to the bottom of the barrel? Is that what your website is worth to you? I didn’t think so.

With cheap shared hosting, you run the risk of poor performance simply due to the amount of sites crammed onto one server, but there are also security risks that come with it, too. One such risk is the possibility of your site being affected by a vulnerability on another site hosted on the same machine. For example, if another site on your same server inadvertently gives a hacker access to the server, your site is at risk through no fault of your own.

Think about paying for good hosting as you would paying for insurance. It’s expensive, but you will be glad to have it when an issue arises.

Use a security plugin

You need to understand that a hacker almost certainly isn’t interested in your website alone. But since roughly 30% of the top million websites on the internet are built on WordPress, that puts a large target on any and all WordPress websites. The reason is that hackers are inherently lazy. They aren’t going to spend hours trying to hack into YOUR website. Instead, they’ll spend their time working on automating scripts to attack a lot of websites all at once. Face it, most of us don’t have the time or skill set needed to thwart determined hackers. For this, we need help.

Rather than trying to brace yourself against one specific style of vulnerability, you should look at a tool like iThemes Security. It will help you shore up holes in your website’s security that you may not even know you had. Protection from brute force attacks, strong password enforcement, file change detection, and locking out users with too many failed login attempts are just some of the ways it can help protect your small business website.

Security monitoring and site backups

If you’ve ever seen a movie where a hacker takes over control of a website, they always show it as a big glowing skull and cross-bones being displayed on the affected website. That is, of course, Hollywood exaggeration. Honestly, that would be easier to detect and deal with. Alas, that’s far from how hacking usually works. Instead, a hacker may do subtle things that you may not notice for months, years, or maybe not notice ever. For example, they might inject links into old blog posts on your site. That may sound pretty harmless, but depending on where they’re linking to, it could affect your SEO or even get you blocked by search engines entirely.

In a perfect world, we would be able to block all hacking attempts. But, as the news of Facebook’s recent breach reminds us, no matter how big the company and no matter how much effort you put into blocking security risks, bad things can still happen. This is why it’s extremely important to set up security monitoring. Services like Maintainn, a WordPress maintenance and support company, can keep an eye on your site and let you know if something unexpected is going on with it. They can also assist you with offsite backups of your website. If you find out your website was hacked a week ago and you have a backup from the week before, getting your site cleaned up and back online quickly becomes a snap. Without a site backup, it can be a Herculean effort.

Don’t be scared, but don’t be complacent

I know very little about working on cars. Okay, fine, I know nothing about working on cars, but I do know that if I don’t change the oil, or have somebody change it for me, bad things will happen. I know that if I don’t lock my car, somebody may steal my belongings in the car, or steal the car itself. I take a few simple steps that can cost me a little money, but they protect my car from harm. This doesn’t mean my car isn’t still at risk, and bad things might still happen, but I’m doing what I can to lower that risk.

My goal here isn’t to scare you. But, if you’re knowledge about websites is anything like my knowledge of cars, it’s important to educate yourself and at least learn the basics. If you’ve read this far into the post, that’s a great first step. Now, go check out some of the resources I pointed you to and sleep soundly knowing that you’ve taken steps to protect your website and your business.

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WordPress comes packaged with one very useful default theme called Twenty Seventeen (named after the year 2017 and released in version 4.7 of WordPress). Most bloggers who use WordPress usually don’t waste any time at all in finding a theme that they like better than the default theme. The Twenty Seventeen theme is meant to get you started. Although you’re not limited to the default theme, it’s a very functional theme for a basic website. Feel free to use it to get you started.

Free WordPress themes, such as those I discuss in Chapter 16, are popular because of their appealing designs and their ease of installation and use. They’re great tools to use when you launch your new site, and if you dabble a bit in graphic design and CSS (Cascading Style Sheets), you can customize one of the free WordPress themes to fit your own needs. (See Chapter 9 for some resources and tools for templates and template tags, as well as a few great CSS references.)

With thousands of free WordPress themes available and new ones appearing all the time, your challenge is to find the right one for your site.

Key takeaways:

• WordPress comes with a free default theme that is fully functional and ready to be used immediately.
• There are thousands of free WordPress themes available.
• Free WordPress themes are not only appealing because they’re free, but they also feature attractive designs and are easy to install and use.
• While the default theme that comes with WordPress provides enough function and style for any basic website, you’re not limited to it.

Purchase WordPress for Dummies, 8th Edition at a bookstore near you or online at Amazon.

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