Learn SEO | Search Engine Optimization Tips and Techniques

Garry Conn is at it again. The premier make money online guru is once again giving of his talents and time. Gary has “A Surprise Christmas Bonus With Over $1500 In Free Gifts“.  I don’t know if you follow Garry or not, but if you are interested in how to make money online then I highly recommend you make his blog a daily stop. I have made mention of Garry Conn in past postings at x7SEO.com and he never ceases to amaze me. He obviously knows what he doing and is a successful internet marketer with skills to share. When I first started learning how to make money online and the whole SEO process my top sites I visited included such famous bloggers at John Chow and Jeremy Schoemaker but lately they seem to have turned into nothing more than giant advertising billboards, not offering much of substance any more.

Ever try to ask some of the top make money online bloggers a question and get an answer? Not that easy is it. Garry has taken care of that as well with the setup of BloggingQuestions.com where you can submit questions and get an answer. This site covers a wide range of topics important to bloggers and website developers and provides straight up answers. To top it all off it is FREE as well. I am a big believer in the old adage “what goes around comes around”.  I think that is why Garry is seeing so much success in his online endevours. He gives away a lot of information that normally would take weeks if not months to research.

Like I said before, if you haven’t made GarryConn.com or BloggingQuestions.com one of your daily stops then you need to now.

If you are number one on Google Trends (volcanic) and a visitor goes to your website and sees Account Suspended……….. you might be in trouble.  Think about it. There are literally hundreds of thousands of websites that would give anything to be in the number one spot on Google Trends and get the traffic that comes with it.

It appears that the Tumbleweed Tiny House Company has a hot product that people want to know about. The url for this website is www.tumbleweedhouses.com (maybe this link will be active again very soon). This company sells tiny tiny houses and they are getting very popular.

I wonder if they realized just how popular they were going to become. A lot of things can cause a hosting account to be suspended. The most likely reason is the bandwidth limit has been exceeded, at least that is what I am thinking.

The moral of this story – dont take the cheap route on hosting with the minimum bandwidth allotment. If the hosting company is any good they should have sent an alert to the website that they were fast approaching their bandwidth limit.  Once again this is my speculation.  Of course there could be other reasons.  Lets hope they get back on line quick.

During the past couple of weeks I have had some absolutely terrible experiences with two of the largest companies on the Internet. Why were they so bad? It took forever to speak to a live person. Now I realize that it is a huge undertaking to have enough staff to handle every call that comes in, but lately it seems the automated response systems have gotten out of control.

My experiences this week were with ATT and Apple. Both had extensive automated systems and neither gave me the option to go directly to a live person (tech support). In fact finding a phone number was not very easy. It is almost as if they want your business but once payment is made they want to be difficult to contact.

Do your website visitors have the ability to call and speak to a real person? It is definitely something that will add an incredible amount of value to your business. Any website that I manage that has a service or a product for sale always has a phone number visible above the fold and when you call you will get a live person.

To Apple and ATT – My experience with tech support was great once I was able to speak to someone. My experience getting to that live person was both frustrating and maddening at the same time. For companies involved in communications, your communications suck.

Your online reputation is a key factor on whether or not people decide to purchase from your website.  It doesn’t take much to put a black mark on your online reputation and once it is there it is difficult to get rid of it. Customer service needs to be a top priority when conducting commerce on the Internet.  With so many ways for people to voice their displeasure with a product of service, it is easy for a dissatisfied customer to post your website address on a formum and then recommend no one purchases from you. That is all it takes and for a small e-tailer that can mean life or death of an online venture.

What are the factors that make up your online reputation?

• Deliver what you say you will deliver
• Do not hide extra charges
• Make sure your processes are handled in a timely matter
• Ensure shipping is fast
• Ensure your site has sufficient security if you are processing credit information
• Have your contact information readily accessable
• Place a phone number where it is easy to see
• Offer a money back guarantee on products and services
• Prompt and courteous replies to inquiries
• Honesty and integrity
• Honesty and integrity
• Honesty and integrity

Marketing VOX has a very good short article on the impact bad reviews have on small e-tailers and it is worth reading and heeding.

What is your online reputation like?

Hi. Thanks for checking in on me.  I have been having a good time checking out your website. Once I got all of my information from your header area of code I hopped in my bot-mobile and took off. I had a pretty good idea of what to expect from your page title and description. It didn’t take long for me to hit some text which really gave me a pretty deep insight into the message you are trying to get across.  After I passed by some CSS links and a few other “design” instructions I hit an H1 tag. That was great because it told me what this first section was about. I like that. The text that followed was pretty specific and I even found a couple exits off of your home page to other pages that gave even more detail about the word that was on the exit ramp.

Looking ahead I saw a bunch of signs that told me I could see other areas of your website. It looks like each word on this sign area will lead me to different sections of your website. I am guessing this is your website menu. Thank you for using words instead of images to show me where to go from your home page. I have issues with pictures. What can I say, I am limited in what I can read. I love text.

After a while I came across an image. Like I said before I can’t see pictures.  That is probably pretty good though as I get easily distracted. You were kind enough to tell me what the photo was showing though when you put that “alt” sign there. You know, I have heard of a few “uber geeks” out there who actually don’t like images on their sites so they turn that capability off and they get a red x where the photo should be. But when you put that “alt” tag there they can read what the photo is. I like the way you named the photo with a name that associated the photo with the subject of the page I am on. Once again it didn’t confuse me.

After a few more lines of text I ran into another H1 tag that told me to expect a slight change in what I would find. It appears to still be related to the subject on the page so that is cool. I see some more exit ramps to other pages and you have once again been kind enough to name these exits with key words that tell me what to expect on that page. I really like driving around your website. You seem to have taken some time and planned this page so I can tour it easy.

Wow, it looks like your website is going to be great and I will definitely be back soon. I like the fact you didn’t put too much here on the first page. Sometimes I visit a new webpage and I drive and drive and drive and I start to think will this ever end. Sometimes I get tired and turn around an just go away. Your first page was just right though. Not too short and not too long and you let me know exactly what to expect. Since this is my first time at your site I have collected quite a bit of info for my friends back at the server I am going to turn around and head back home and unpack the info.

I have made a note of those off ramps to other pages on your site and the next time I visit you I will start to take some of those exits and see what I can find. By the way, I don’t mind if you change the text info on your opening page periodically. I am an information junkie and the more new text content I see the better. Think of me as PacMan and your text are the little dots. I eat them and eat them.  Well, I am off to the server  and I’ll be back in a few days.

See you later………… W-Bot7