Search Engine Marketing

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How to Track Goals in Analytics For Lead Generation Marketing

Houston SEO services know that once your website is up and running, one of the most important things to know is how it is functioning over time to achieve its intended purpose. There are many ways to determine the effectiveness of your site. Google Analytics is a very powerful tool for reporting site metrics, and that’s one of the web analysis tools we use here at Directory One. Every web site that exists for every type of business has its own specific structure and purpose; so custom metrics that are relevant to one type of business may be irrelevant to another. Make sure to tailor your custom metrics to the purpose of your site and business.

The first thing you need to do once you set up a Google Analytics Account and have the code up on your site reporting metrics, is set up Goals. This is a great way to track the effectiveness of your site’s lead generation marketing. A Goal registers a Conversion every time it is completed. This Conversion can be a URL Destination Page Goal such as a submitted form or shopping cart, a Time on Site Goal to track user interest. Goals can be further examined through Funnel Visualization, which shows where visitors abandoned the Goal in a series of pages such as a shopping cart checkout. Our Houston SEO web design prefers Goals for a destination url.

If your site has a URL destination page for a form that has multiple entrance URLs, custom reports may be more relevant than funnel visualization. It is possible to create multiple goals with a funnel designating each individual entrance URL. However, the metrics will be skewed and show conversions each time the URL destination is reached – whether or not the visitor actually reached it through the designated funnel URL.

A custom report can be created that tracks the landing pages for this conversion.  To do this, once you have logged into your account, navigate to “Custom Reports” on the left side of the Analytics navigation bar. Here you can further segment the data collected for your site beyond the basics of the dashboard, to the specifics of your site’s needs. Click to create a new advanced segment, and set up the metrics as “Total Goal Completions,” “Goal1 Conversions,” “Goal2 Conversions,” (etc. to the number of goals your site has) and the dimensions as “landing page.” If you like, you can set a secondary dimension to something meaningful to you, such as “source” or “visitor type.” Don’t forget to title the report – a specific name that you won’t forget such as “Goal Tracking from Website Landing Page.”

Some sites may have a pdf download as the goal. In this case, you would set up an Event Goal, and add an onClick event to the link using _trackEvent. To do this, you have to modify the site link with a snippet of code. This Event Goal tracks the number of downloads.

In order to find insights into the data reported on the Analytics site, you may need to set up additional custom reports and advanced segmentation. Remember that once Goals are set up, additional advanced segments and custom reports can always be created to analyze the data collected. Contact Houston SEO Directory One at (713) 465-0051 to learn more about advanced reporting and website analysis using Google Analytics. If you don’t have a website yet, or if you have problems with your site, our Houston website designer can build one for you quickly.

 

Houston Website Design: Connection to Internet Marketing / Advertising

Houston Website Design: Connection to Internet Marketing / Advertising

Houston website design and its connection to Internet marketing / advertising is not as well known as it should be. To learn more about Houston website design, Houston SEO services, Houston Internet advertising and more, call the friendly Directory One web design experts at (800) 477-1324.

More and more businesses today are beginning to understand that their Houston business marketing plan must include Houston Internet advertising. This means that their Houston Internet marketing plan has got to begin with Houston website design. From this point forward a regionalized plan to ensure a higher sales conversion rate is achieved is also key.

For a business to succeed it must first acquire customers. It must find some way of maintaining a repeat customer base. Equally as important for business success is generating new leads and obtaining new customers through continuous business marketing strategically aligned with the realities of the modern world.

Houston Advertising: Modern Realities

The fact is that the world is becoming increasingly high-tech with each new day. Eventually, the only way people may be attaining information will be through the Internet and by word of mouth. Word of mouth has to start somewhere and it must be maintained to have a viral effect. One person will only continue to provide references for so long. Eventually new business must be generated in other ways. Partnering the two is the most solid marketing plan one can have.

This means that a company needs public exposure and once they have that public exposure they must deliver on the products and services that they offer in order to receive referrals. Businesses interested in continuously generating new sales must maintain a marketing plan to consistently receive the exposure they deserve.

The beginning of a Houston Internet marketing plan is the building of a business website. The way in which this website is built makes a huge difference in determining how many potential customers will actually be viewing the company website.

Call Directory One today to learn about the Houston SEO services and Houston website design that go hand-in-hand toward achieving maximum exposure for a company and create a solid foundation for your Houston Internet advertising future.

Houston Internet Advertising

Houston Internet advertising that begins with Houston website design is a multi-faceted process involving the platform the website is built upon, the type of html code involved in the creating of the website, the specific website content utilized in the establishment of the website and the Houston website content that is continuously created by a Houston content development company.

Houston Internet advertising includes content development, website structure, link building plans, Internet advertising that is external to the website, competitor comparisons and analysis, key phrase analysis and updating services, streaming web video for business websites including video optimization and Houston video distribution, and much more….

Houston website design that efficiently supports an effective Internet marketing / advertising plan is delivered to clients of Directory One. We are the Houston SEO firm and Houston website design firm that understands the technical connection of website design and Internet marketing. We have been helping businesses to grow and succeed for over 20 years.

Many of our customers now receive nearly 100% of their business by way of the leads that their website alone generates because of the Internet advertising plan we have worked with them to develop and maintain. Call Directory One at (800) 477-1324 to learn more about receiving Houston website design for either a new website or to improve your current website so that you will actually begin to see positive results that increase with time from your modern business marketing campaign.

We are here to help you succeed through long-term, integrity-driven business marketing methods. Call today to give your business a chance for increased success!

Website Design Your Customers Will Love

Website Design Your Customers Will Love

Website design your customers will love is what we specialize in here at Directory One. Give us a call at (800) 477-1324 to learn more about we will help your business through cost-effective website building and marketing methods that are proven to work.

Your website should be a lead generating machine for your business. The only way this is possible, however, is if experienced SEO professionals such as the SEO experts at Directory One, are building, promoting and maintaining your website.

Contacting us will help you make sure that you are really getting the most out of your Internet marketing investment.

Internet marketing includes all the Houston website work that is involved in developing, designing and promoting a website. Search engines do play favorites and you have to know how to get on their good side in order to make sure that your company website is working for you.

How to Have a Customer Friendly Website

There are a lot of details involved in making sure that your website is customer friendly, search engine friendly and provides the maximum amount of results for your business.

You may have heard other business owners discussing the importance of their business website with regard to their continued success. This must make you wonder how you can get a piece of that action too with regard to owning and maintaining your own company website.

We at Directory One have the answers for you! Here is the 411 on your business website needs:

CSS Website Design

You may have heard this term before….or not…. Don’t be scared off. You don’t have to know too much about this if you don’t want….this is our website designing business to know these things. However, if you are talking to other Houston web designers about getting your website built, you should ask a few questions.

Do not assume that any good web designer is going to build your website on a platform that will work to bring customers to your website. Having a flashy and attractive website is all well and good, however, it will not be useful to you if your customers cannot find it when they are searching for your products or services.

Search engines require that Houston websites follow certain guidelines. When websites do not comply with these, the search engine spiders cannot crawl through the information, which means that you might have any number of glorious offerings and the search engines will never know to refer your business to your potential customers.

CSS website design is the alternative that will not only provide you with an attractive and user friendly website if your web designers know how to do it, the way that ours at Directory One do. CSS will also enable search engines to more quickly index your website appropriately so that your business has a chance to show up at the top of search engine results listings when your potential client-base is looking for you, but might not know it yet….

Houston Website Design Company

Houston website design company, Directory One, will create a business website, or update your business website so that your customers will be happier in their ease of finding a credible service to supply their needs. You should be that credible service that they are looking for and that they find right away!

Stop wasting your money on old print ads that do not target your buying audience.

Contact Directory One today at (800) 477-1324 and learn about the best ways for you to promote your business so that you can actually convert your marketing dollars into leads that your expertise will turn into sales.

Calling us today gives you the chance to increase the profit for your business. You have worked hard to start and operate your business. Don’t let the competition surpass you. It is simply not necessary when you can pick up the phone and call Directory One today! We deliver website design your customers will love.

How to Get the Most out of Your Landing Pages

Eric Brantner
SEO Content Writer

Great landing pages can help propel your business to the next level. When done properly, a landing page will either generate a valuable lead or close a sale. However, many companies don’t seem to understand what it takes to create a landing page that drives visitors to take action.

Here are some tips for helping you get the most out of your landing pages.
• Compelling Headline- It all starts with your headline. This is the first thing people see on your landing page. That’s why you need to make sure your headline connects with visitors and demands they read on. The headline should immediately help the reader understand what the problem is and what you can do to solve it. You can use either a leading question headline or a benefit-laced headline.

• Eliminate Distractions- One of the biggest mistakes you can make with your landing page is trying to do too much. Remember, this is a page designed to make users take a specific action. Anything that doesn’t contribute to motivating the reader should be removed from your page. Unnecessary distractions will kill your conversion rate. Keep it clean; keep it focused.

• Clear Call to Action- The centerpiece of your landing page should be your call to action. Without a great call to action, your reader will never take the action you desire. Your landing page design should guide the visitor’s eyes directly toward the call to action. In this call, you need to tell the readers exactly what you want them to do. If you want them to call you, tell them to do so. Also, let them know what’s in it for them. A call to action with an incentive tends to be quite effective.

• Revise Regularly- Testing your landing page regularly is a necessity. There are always little tweaks you can do to make the conversion rate go up a bit higher. You need to revise the landing page regularly to figure out which formula produces the best results. Editing is the key to success.
What is your secret to creating a great landing page? Share your tips in the replies!

Who Knew Facts Could Make SEO Content so Interesting?

Author: April Hall

Internet Copywriter

So, I’m a girl who loves to gab. I love to tell everyone what my opinions are from everything from the upcoming Presidential elections to the latest trend in preschool girls’ attire. (By the way, who in the world ever thought of printing t-shirts for five year olds with the words “Hottie”!?) As much as I think the internet community needs to read my op-ed pieces, however, I recognize that in order to make my SEO content interesting, useful–and therefore worthy of reading and sharing with others–it needs to be heavy-laden with facts, statistics, and perhaps even a chart or two thrown in.

Using proven facts in your page copy doesn’t have to be boring, however. In fact, boring content will quickly fade into the abyss of the internet, factual or not. It’s important to use facts and charts as just one means of creating enjoyable SEO content. You want your readers to feel as if what you say has merit; but you don’t want them to feel as if they have been forced to read through an academic journal to prepare for a final exam.

So, how can you successfully use pertinent facts without becoming tedious? It’s simple. Find some unique information that the common reader–perhaps even one who is not regularly involved in your industry–will find interesting. For example, the following chart is a stunning display of the current state of American Health:

Besides causing you to immediately gauge how obese you are in relation to the rest of your state (and, I admit, my home state is one of the least healthy…), how else could you work in this information?

  • A sporting goods company could write an article on the overall poor health of Americans
  • A gym could create page content encouraging people in their state to lose weight through daily exercise
  • A local tourism agency could tout the healthiness of their state and promote local outdoors activities
  • A Christian publishing company could lament the fact that the least healthy states are found along the Bible Belt region

This is just one example of how excellent content is easy to create, once you have found a core piece of information to work around. Looking through governmental sites for current information is a great place to start. Not only will you be able to find an endless source of inspiration for page content, but you will also become a walking source of random trivia information–which means you will be able to hold an interesting conversation at even the lamest dinner party.

10 Negative Crawling which Impacts Your Ranking Attributes

negativecrawling

Author: Thomson Chemmanoor
SEO Coordinator

The goal of every SEO is to build a site that ranks well with search engines. But building a website that ranks well with Google and other search engines has a great deal to do with how search bots see your website. With any type of SEO marketing, there are several factors that can negatively impact your ranking.

These following components may negatively affect a spider’s ability to crawl a page or Google rankings:

  1. Server is inaccessible for search engine bots.
  2. Duplicate of existing content within the site.
  3. Outgoing links to low quality/spammy sites.
  4. Duplicate Title/Meta tags on all pages.
  5. Overuse of Targeted Keywords (Stuffing/Spamming).
  6. Broken or missing internal links
  7. Wrong syntax in robots.txt file
  8. Wrong 301 redirects
  9. Characters in your web page URL
  10. Sites entirely built in frames and Flash

These are only some of the major factors that impact search rankings negatively. As you can imagine, there’s a host of other issues, such as no-follow links, which also make websites less crawlable.

At this point you’re probably wondering “Well, what can I do to enhance my site’s crawlability?” For starters, you can manage your site in Google Webmaster Tools to identify some other crawling problems your website may have. Also, ensure that your content is readable. Avoid excessive use of Flash animations and javascript. Supplement visuals with sufficient textual content. If you decide to outsource your optimization needs, make sure you’re not dealing with a bad SEO company.

Finally, continue to immerse yourself in website content usability tips and other natural search engine optimization resources. The goal is to build a site that is easily accessible to users as well as search bots. And as the saying goes, build it and they will come.