If you’ve been on the Internet or involved in any kind of business development I’m sure you have heard the term, Search Engine Optimization or SEO for short. This is nothing new. Ever since search engines or directories have been on the Internet companies have wanted to be at the top of the listing.

I hate to use the term “early days” but the previous mindset regarding preparing a web site to be easily found by a search engine involved some back-end technical steps which at one time made sense when search engines and portals had more of a directory approach.  The initial approach involved adding what is known as “meta tags” in the code of the web site and while some of these are still important to a degree modern search engine optimization is focused and hopefully will always be focused on the actual content in terms of text, images and other non design elements.

In terms of marketing this is actually a huge advantage in terms of competition, making updates known quicker and standing a better change at being found. Provided a web site has compelling content and is updated frequently.

What are some ways to to optimize, design and develop a web site so one can make frequent updates and provide compelling content? Here a few things to consider;

• Have a web site designed around a content management system - The makes it easier and faster for the non-designer, i.e. owner or employee of a company to update a web site without asking the web designer to make those updates.
• Incorporate a blog feature on your web site - The search engines love frequent content and writing on the topic related to your business on a frequent basis increases your search engine ratings
• Register your domain name for more than one year. The more years the better as search engines like Google rate domains with a longer registration period higher as it makes them look less, “fly by night.”
• Include words in your title tag you think people will use to search for a business like yours
• When writing, write naturally. Be sincere and don’t try to trick the system by stuffing keywords in the document.

These are just a few tips but they are ones they have helped us tremendously in the past few years to the point we rank on the first or second page of important search terms, many of which we have a lot competition.

Some SEO resources you may want to look at include;

• The Search Engine Academy of South Carolina
• The Wikipedia SEO entry
• Google’s page about working with SEO companies

Again these are just a few resources. We are constantly looking at ways to optimize web site for our clients and also our own business so we can not only get more customers but also practice what we preach and become more experienced to help others. If you are struggling with getting good search results for your web site contact us and find out what tools and resources we have that can help you be more successful. Of no one can guarantee you will be number one, that’s impossible and always changes but we can help you get achieve greater visibility amongst all the other choices out there. What are your SEO Success stories or concerns?

I find it very interesting that some companies will brand themselves by the product they produce or service they provide and another company that does the exact same thing will brand themselves by the problems they solve or even long standing  industry terms.

Take our company for example.  We provide design and development services in the realm or web, print, photography and podcasts. You will have advertising agencies that provide the exact same services, you have other companies who say they are “marketing” companies also provide the exact same services. What gives?

It’s true that a bulk of the work we do is web design and web development, especially e-commerce and content management. It’s where we started and and it’s not big secret that it’s one of the easiest businesses to get into because of the low cost of entry. It’s probably one reason we have so much local competition within that realm. In the mid to late 90’s web design was the cutting edge technology and to a large degree it was an experiment in the early days when most people were on dial up and the design specs were restricted to the limitations of the technology at the time. We do consider our web work as a “hub service.” Whenever possible we want our print products to lead people to our clients web site, Podcasts which take on a “life” beyond the a web site definitely call the clients web site home and a majority of the photography work we provide is optimized for the web as a way to effectively tell a story.

If you are looking for a company to design a web site ask if they provide other media marketing services as well/ You may be surprised that they do! If they only specialize in web design what is their mindset in regards to integrated media and consistent branding? Of course we are not talking against other companies who call themselves web design firms, marketing firms or advertising agencies but we do want to make it clear the we provide many of the same services they do but our niches and clientele may be different.

What are your perceptions who you hear the terms, graphic designer, marketing firm, ad agency, web designer, creative professional, etc?  Is it confusing to you?  Do many tend to do the same things from your perspective? Have the industry names not caught up with technology and skill sets of the work force?

What can we do to better communicate SpinningSilk Multimedia doesn’t “fix computers” and how can we make it clearer that we provide more services than web design as some people we have talked with are so easy to latch on to in conversation?

Over the weekend I set up linkerjpatrick.com. I don’t use it a lot on this site but most places on the Internet such as forums, Flickr, commenting on blogs, Twitter , Linkedin and Facebook to name a few.  The site will me mostly a blog to a place to “work my personal brand.”  I wanted a place I could test more things out, do some affiliate marketing and talk about things that are better suited for a personal blog than a business blog.  Yes, I could have set something up on a “free service” but I wanted to secure the user name under it’s own domain. Feel free to follow that blog there if you are interested in getting to know the “whole me.” 
The site will also serve as an example of using a web site for personal branding. 

We have already covered the topic of branding in a previous series but without rehashing too much it’s important to consider how branding fits into your overall marketing plan. The more I read about branding the more I realize it’s an everyday strategy, not just part of a campaign.  Yes, It’s important to have a “brand awareness” campaign or to have those times when you need to refocus on your who you are, not only as a company but also a person and representative of that company.

Is your brand consistent across all your marketing efforts?  I’ve mentioned before the importance of business blogging and involvement in social media as Internet tools for spreading your message. Sometime blatant but more often subtle.  Are you aware of your branding efforts in virtual and live networking events? Is your logo just an obligatory mark or does it tell a story?

I don’t think this will be our “three word mantra” but I found it interesting the Idea Sandbox Blog referred to us as, “Just Good Stuff” in the categories of blogs they link to.  Hopefully we can improve and be know as, “Totally Great Stuff!”  Thanks Idea Sandbox, we think you’re good stuff too.