Blog
Tips, tutorials & design trends
Generating an automatic thumbnail image
Although it seems like it should be automatic to all of us, most times when you post the URL of your website to social media, there is not an instantly generated picture that shows up. This is something that we are currently building into website automatically now, but on older sites, it is actually an add-on to every project because it does take additional configuration, beyond the website itself. We are happy to give clients a properly sized image of their website to manually announce on social media if they would like, which may be all that’s needed for most people. read more…
Unexpected technical issues
In most cases, we expect that technology is going to have a few little hiccups along the way, and it’s part of our job and we know how to handle most issues that come along. When a client comes to us and has never had a website before, we are starting from scratch, and can set up their domains, email, hosting, SSL certificate, etc. all at one company to make life easier for all of us. read more…
Applying filters to organize your email
We often put contact forms into the websites that we create, as it is a way to gather specific information from people who want to contact you, and it also looks professional. Sometimes though, as we’re building the site, or setting up custom email accounts for the first time, the software that you use for your email will send mail from the contact form into either a spam folder, or another folder that’s not the primary inbox where you want to make sure it goes. It’s pretty easy to fix that by using a filter to direct incoming mail in your account. read more…
Setting up a custom email address
There are different options when setting up a customized email address such as [email protected] that matches your site name and looks more professional than a free address. If you have your domain name, there are email plans that you can purchase to have your matching address. read more…
Connecting your Instagram feed to your site
Improving rankings beyond basic SEO
For every website we build, we automatically include basic Search Engine Optimization, which includes all Google readable text and fonts, proper heading and image tags, the installation of an SSL certificate, and responsive programming. However, some clients would like more than the basic SEO, and for those people we have some suggestions to features we can add to your site. read more…
The benefits of blogging
As social media gets more and more clogged with ads and mysterious algorithms that change weekly, newsletters and blogging are having a resurgence as a method for content marketing and establishing brand niche. A blog is a great way to share ideas, promote your expertise and increase your SEO, as search engines favor active sites that have new and unique content. We generally don’t encourage clients to get a blog if they don’t think they will write in it, but if they do, that blog content can do triple duty in newsletters and social media posts as well, so that everything can work together. But as with all marketing, consistency is key, as well as sticking with it through the beginning phase. read more…
Why should I register multiple domain names?
You only need one domain name to have a website, but when it comes to your business and brand, you definitely do not want to leave similar names available for copycats to register and take advantage of your search engine results or create confusion for your clients or within your industry. A strong brand is important to differentiate you, but it also helps to register every domain name iteration that you can think of. read more…
Basic SEO included in every website
SEO optimization is one of the most important features for your personally branded website. Basic SEO friendly website setup includes website image optimization for faster page loading, alt and title tags on all images along with SEO friendly titles & descriptions for each page for better SEO and search engine ranking. The following are implemented into every site we build:
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How do I stop contact form spam messages?
Unfortunately the convenience of having a website contact form, which is supposed to protect your privacy, can become an inconvenience when it’s used for spam messages. This has been happening more and more lately. Hackers attack websites in many forms, either direct or with hacker bots. They’re always looking for some type of weakness in order to exploit or to annoy. Staying on top of this type of issue is always a priority.
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Optimizing images for best website performance
After we finish and launch a website, we give the username and password along with some basic instructions over to our clients in case they would like to maintain their website themselves. Many people do a pretty good job, but one very important thing that many miss is optimizing images for their website before uploading them. If you’ve ever gone to a website and a page was very slow to load while either a background or other image was filtering itself in, then that means the image was not properly optimized. read more…
What is an SSL certificate and why would I need one?
Until just a few years ago, sites that had Ecommerce ability and had forms for credit card info, etc. needed to have something called an SSL certificate on it in order to encrypt the data and keep it secure. You can see which sites do or don’t have this protection by looking at the URL bar and seeing if there’s a padlock before the address or not. Secure sites also have a prefix of “https” rather than “http.” read more…