The quality of content they produce has nosed dived, so much so that all new posts are dull, unhelpful and not worth sharing. Even when you grow to 100 thousand readers, you can’t let the quality slide…

I believe that several issues are at play:

1) The focus stops being the reader

For the bigger websites I suspect that the focus from the top comes down to unique visitors, ad revenue and so on. We all know the bottom line is why we’re all here but there has to be a balance, you can’t keep churning out the same crap content.

2) Overreaching

Big sites usually expand into a network of other websites which makes sense. However with this expansion, it feels like editors are pushed too far and can’t focus on the reader. Once again, the metrics take precedence.

3) Unable to get the talent

Another issue which is very understandable is getting reliable quality content writers. To get the best, you have to pay good money. When large sites are under pressure to post once or several times a day then this becomes a huge issue however the focus should always be on good quality over quantity.

Round Up

My feeling is that too many sites are forgetting what made their site great. No matter what Google is doing to its algorithm or whatever the latest trend is, it will always be about content. If you invest the time and money into creating it then you’ll build a great user base, if you don’t then you will suffer.

It’s my sincere hope that some of the big blogs/websites realise this, for a few years now I’ve watched them slowly descend. I hope they will change however I won’t hold my breath…

For some strange reason it just wouldn’t load and thus the theme couldn’t track traffic, and more importantly, couldn’t track eCommerce data. After lots of searches in Google to no avail I finally found the solution…

What Was The Problem?

After turning on Google Analytics in the Configuration (System -> Configuration -> Google API) and flushing the cache, the Google Analytics tracking script wasn’t appearing in the websites code.

What Was The Solution?

The short answer is that I missed an important include in the template files. Fortunately, something that is very easy to fix.

Navigate to:

app/design/frontend/default/YOUR_THEME/template/page/

Check 1column.phtml, 2columns-left.phtml, 2columns-right.phtml, 3columns.phtml and any other template files you have for the following line under your opening body tag:

<?php echo $this->getChildHtml(‘after_body_start’) ?>

It’s always a good idea to reference the base template files if you ever come across an issue like this. If you have any bugs you have solved or questions then feel free to leave a comment below!

The types of mistakes I am talking about are the types of mistakes that cost you and your website money or leads or conversions. So the point of this article is to ask the simple question, does your website work? Below are a few of the things you should check if you currently run a website or are having one built.

Title/Meta Tags

Title tags and Meta Description tags are things I love to write about, I could have a generic piece that I just copy and paste into each of my articles. The reason I go on so much about them is because they are so important.

These two tags display in the Search Engine Results Page and are two of the most important on page factors that help you rank for your keywords. But not just that, the title tag is visible to the user when they browse your website!

That’s why each page should have unique tags that describe what the page is about. I’ve talked about these tags before in other posts so feel free to read in more detail.

Cross Browser Compatibility

This is one of the biggest things that usually gets missed when a site goes live. Each browser has its own way to display the code of your website. The developer’s job is to make sure each browser displays the website in the same way (or very closely) however this is quite often over looked.

Internet Explorer is by far the most unpredictable browser. Nine times out ten there will be a compatibility issue with IE. Over the years several versions of IE have been released and each one has its own way of displaying websites. The discrepancies between versions means that the changes can be as small as a column being a little too long or as large as buttons missing, huge layout errors and so on.

The list of potential problems is huge. Each one could cost your website valuable conversions that you have worked so hard to achieve or potentially paid for if you’re using PPC.

However, with the right tools it’s very easy to check your website in the browsers. My personal favourite tool for testing IE, which is where the problems usually lie, is IETester. It’s a completely free program and allows you to test all the versions of Internet Explorer in one place. I highly recommend downloading it straight away and go through your website. Click through your pages, fill in the contact form, try and purchase a product and so on. Spend some time navigating your website with all the different versions and see what looks out of place or doesn’t work.

With a little time and patience you can spot errors in your site that previously went unnoticed.

and each one displays a website in a slightly different way thus causing major headaches for developers and potentially you if these issues haven’t been corrected.

These issues in the older versions of Internet Explorer (and in fairness, some other browsers) can leave your website with a slight alignment issue or a fundamental problem where the website is unusable.

How Easy Is The Website To Use

A website shouldn’t make you think, if your site leaves you wondering how to do something then there is an issue somewhere. No where is this more true than eCommerce websites.

Get a friend who isn’t technically minded to try and perform some actions on your website.

Can they find your contact details? Can they make a test order? Can they find a product? All are common tasks that visitors do every time they visit your website, but have you ever taken the time to see how easy they are to do?

If you find any of these tasks hard then you should look at correcting them. Analytics will be able to show you information on how long visitors are staying on your site, how many pages they visit and so on. With a bit of ingenuity you’ll be able to see how visitors are finding your website to use.

Closing Words

It still shocks me that these things aren’t considered and checked during the planning and building stages of websites but spotting and correcting them can make the world of difference to your website.

If you would like a professional to look at your website for not just these but all the potential search engine, usability and compatibility issues then get in touch!

Get more content

This one should be obvious but many many people forget to keep adding content to their websites. The search engines are always after fresh content that is interesting or helpful or funny, and if you’re lucky then all three.

A blog is a fantastic way to get new content onto your website, especially if the latests posts appear on your websites homepage.

Force yourself to keep writing new content, make it part of your schedule, do it when you have 20 minutes free. But don’t just write the piece and put it onto your website, get it shared amongst the community and get valuable links back to your website.

If you create a very good piece then get in touch with some big websites in your market, get them to publish your piece in exchange for a link. Not only do you get your name out there and links back to your website but you’re building relationships with much bigger websites that can help you later on.

Create Link Bait

Creating content that naturally attracts links is very hard work, you can (and most likely) will fail several times before creating something that will get spread amongst your market/niche and attract natural links that the search engines love.

Try and come up with an idea that will either help someone, be interesting or funny and create it for your website. For example, a quiz for an upcoming sporting event if you’re in the football shirts market.

But again, once you have made it, don’t just let it sit on your website hoping that people will find it. Go out and add it to the social bookmarking sites, get in touch with other larger websites drawing their attention to it. Perhaps take out some PPC to attract people to it. The list is endless but never hope that people will just stumble upon it, always go out and spread the word.

Link Build

Link building is just as much hard work as link bait and could land you in trouble with the engines but it’s a strategy that certainly has the ability to get you those positions in the SERPs. Participating in forums where you can have signatures, blog commenting, etc can help you to build a wide array of links; both follow and no follow that gives the appearance of a natural link profile.

You can also go out and buy links from large websites in your market. Be warned though, this is a risky strategy and could get you a black mark from the engines but it also has the ability to send you to the very top if you play your cards right.

So if you’re stuck, these strategies if applied consistently and correctly will help you get out of your pit and back into the world of SEO. Each is hard work but there are no easy wins in SEO. It’s all about your commitment to creating great content, perfecting your strategy for whichever niche you’re in and ultimately getting your website to the top.

What do you think?

If you have any comments or input i’d love to hear it below!

Every page except the homepage would produce a 404 error. Which as you can imagine wasn’t ideal. So how did I fix it?

Well the fix was extremely easy…if you know where to look. You need to edit a file called 000-default. Run this command to edit the file:

sudo nano /etc/apache2/sites-enabled/000-default

Then changed AllowOverride None to AllowOverride All.

Do a quick restart of your server using the following command

sudo service apache2 restart

And your problems should be solved. If you ran into this problem or if you have another problem I’d love to hear about it in the comments below!

+1 Is Googles Version Of Facebooks Like And Twitters Tweet

By now I’m sure that you will have seen the famous Facebook Like and Twitter Tweet buttons all over the web. They easily allow you to approve and share content that you find interesting or cool and it’s pretty much the same deal with Googles +1 button.

+1 Is A Way To Recommend Sites You Like

The system is tied into your Google profile and when you +1 a website your “recommendation” will show for people you have connected with in the SERPs.

Will It Affect Rankings?

So we can see that they are following the tried and trusted way of sharing these days. But what will it mean for rankings? Will Google value the +1 as a ranking factor?

Likely That It Will Affect Rankings But As Part Of All The Factors

I’d guess at yes, but not as much as you might think. Google has been battling with web spam and link manipulation since they started and will surly know that black hat SEOs and spammers will be able to create thousands of Google profiles and just +1 their sites to gain an advantage. I’d imagine Google will make it part of the ranking factors but they will use all the signals to gauge if the site they are looking at is legit. For example:

A site with 50,000 +1s but with no links, no Twitter or Facebook shares and pages of duplicate spammy content is going to be easy to spot. Well…you would hope.

The +1 Only Available In America At The Moment. Still Bugs To Iron Out.

Currently the +1 button is only available to America, it will be a while before the rest of the world gets it. From articles around the blogosphere it would appear that the button is having a few performance based issues that they’ll need to iron out before it gets passed to the rest of us.

Is It Worth Having?

But do I think the button is worth having? The simple answer to this is, it depends on your website. If it’s easy to integrate and doesn’t detract from your website and you’re already active in the social area then sure.

The +1 button has the potential to either be a massive flop or quite popular amongst users as a way to “like” content. It’s certainly one I’ll be looking out for and watching with interest to see how it affects rankings and how much the black hat community can use it to their advantage.

Check out my recent post on SEOmoz for some great actionable information into increasing the speed of your website!

Comments and thoughts are welcome.

Apple have sold 15 million iPads since launch

I’m not saying it’s going to replace people who use desktop PCs or laptops but it certainly change how things work right now. Since the iPad launched, Apple has sold 15 million devices. It’s a safe bet that most of those are being used to surf the web and the same applies for iPhones and Android devices. So what does this mean for us?

You risk losing sales if your website isn’t mobile friendly

It means that the days of having a website that isn’t mobile friendly are coming to the end. It’s a simple case of step up or die (not literally). Already, since the iPhone launched we have seen people slowly moving to ordering online and viewing content on their phones. No longer can you miss out on these sales if you are a small or medium sized website. Especially if your competition sees the value in making their website mobile friendly.

Making your website mobile friendly isn’t as hard as you might think

And making sites mobile friendly is so easy with the amount of resources online. Any developer worth his salt will be able to write a CSS Stylesheet or use a library like jQuery Mobile to make your website friendly and it won’t cost you the world either!

Check your analytics to see how many are browsing your website using a mobile device. You may be surprised

For anyone even remotely interested in increasing their conversions please go and check this out! Go check your analytics, go see how many people are browsing using mobile devices, go compare it to last year or the year before if you have that data. You may realise that you are killing any chance of converting these people because your website is simply unusable in smart phones or tablets.

Don’t be left behind by technology

So don’t be left behind by the innovation in technology. For web developers, making a website friendly for smart phones or tablets shouldn’t be more painful than making it work for the various versions of IE (ok…maybe a bad example. I’m sure it’s much nicer than fixing IE6).

What do you think? Is the mobile browsing era going to be short lived. Will everyone keep using their PCs and laptops or is this something we should all embrace? What are your experiences with mobile visitors. Let me know in the comments below.

But What Is Social Media?

Social media is the term that describes a group of websites/mediums where users share content and interactive with each other, a few example are Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, YouTube, etc.

The Success It’s Had

For some social media can revolutionise their businesses. The popular tech website Mashable did a post not so long ago on the success that five small businesses had with social media that you should check out here.

BlendTec, a company that produces blenders saw an unbelievable jump in their sales after running a YouYube video series putting their blender to the test against glow sticks, magnets, an iPhone and more*.

And let’s not forget the last US election where social media helped to raise $500 million for President Obama’s campaign trail*.

* Source – Search Engine Watch. You can read more stories on social media success here.

Can It Work For Me?

It can, but it’s not the get out of free jail card that people believe it is. Like any internet marketing tactic, it takes time, dedication and of course, the knowledge to make it successful.

I feel that it also depends on your customers. For example a cup cake business may post hundreds of videos/photos online of their products which shows how great they look which makes people go and buy them. However how would you do the same trying to sell plumbing services? I’m sure there is a way to do such a thing however it comes back to having the knowledge and insight to successfully use social media for your own circumstances.

Why You Shouldn’t Just Jump On The Bandwagon

Personally I find social media to be very hyped at the moment and although it works fantastic for some this doesn’t guarantee that it will for you even if you put a huge amount of cash, time and effort into it.

By all means go and experiment to find out what works for you but don’t forget the other mediums that have served us so well for so long – pay per click, SEO and Affiliate programmes and so on.

To think social media is the solution to all your problems is naive, it is just another tactic in your arsenal to use to increase conversions (whether that be sign ups, sales, etc).

Have you seen success with social media or has it let you down? Let me know in the comments below.

And I guess the same is true if you switch the question.  Why would you put thousands into internet marketing if you have a terrible unfriendly, unusable website.

I think becoming successful online takes a good website – not necessarily the best looking, but certainly usable, and consistent marketing. Whether that be through search engine optimisation, pay per clicks ads, an affiliate program and so on.

Once you have both and you have consistency put effort into the latter then you’ll start to see results. However in most cases if you just have a fantastic website with no marketing then you’re not going to get anywhere.

What do you do if you have no marketing planned?

So what should you do if you do fall into the situation above, you have a great website but do no marketing or you have a terrible website and do a load. Well the simple answer is take a step back and make a plan. I’ll say that again…step back and make a plan.

If you have a great website then invest into making it grow

Decide what you should do, if you have an amazing website but no traffic and no conversions then investigate into search engine optimisation, invest into pay per click, decide if you should join an affiliate program, etc.

If you have the cash but not the time then hire someone who knows what they are doing. If you have the time then there are many great resources online to help/guide you.

If you market well but have a lousy conversion rate then investigate

If you already have your marketing sorted then check your data, what are your conversion rates like. If they are 1-3% then you’re most likely doing ok. If they are below 1% then you may need to look at your website, what obstacles could stop your user, what information are you giving them, what aren’t you giving them. Do usability testing to make sure you aren’t missing the obvious.

The list of things you can do is endless but the main thing is you begin to tackle the problem of why your conversion rate isn’t as high as it could be and proceed from there.

This article was just a little overview of some of my recent thoughts but with a website there is ALWAYS something you can be doing to increase traffic or increase conversions and if you’re not doing it then you’re missing out and you are at the risk of others who will do these sort of things to grow their own business.

What do you guys think?