Marknet Group Blog

The first step to any successful website project is making sure we understand Patrice’s vision for the website. We want to feel like we are an extension of Patrice’s business. To help us understand a clients vision, goals and corporate culture, we ask them to fill out a website project questionnaire. We ask questions like:

• Use three adjectives to describe how your target audience should perceive your company and web site.

• Who is your target audience? Describe in detail.

Patrice filled out the web questionnaire and we held a conference call to review her responses and further develop some ideas for her new business. Now we felt like we were doing the tango with Patrice. The next step is market research, a focus group and brainstorming sessions.

It all started when Patrice Johnson called us to discuss her new project. Patrice is the founder of the fashion design incubator Imagineering Style. She helps emerging fashion designers get noticed and produced. With over 25 years in the garment industry of New York and several successful businesses under her belt, Patrice was ready to help the next generation of designers succeed.

Patrice spoke with great energy and passion. Five minutes into the call Patrice and I were exchanging ideas and fueling each other into a marketing frenzy!!

It was a great fit and Patrice hired us to create her new website. This was a real start-up. There was no company name, no logo, no brand…just the type of projects we love at MarkNet Group. A web development project that enables us to include our multi-disciplinary team: Creative Director, Project Manager, Graphic Designer, Ecommerce web developer, and Internet Marketing guru.

We signed the contract, briefed the team and got to work!

HELP my site is not showing up in Google or Yahoo, what do I do? This is a question I hear on a daily basis. A frustrated caller spent thousands of dollars on a beautiful website, then the website did not show up in the major search engines (Google, ahoo, MSN).

The caller is concerned and rightfully so since 75% of web users looking for a product or service start their shopping experience with a major search engine. [1] High search engine rankings will drive visitors to your website. Basically, search engine success means your website is helping you grow your business!

I immediately ask the caller for their website address. Then I visit the site to determine if it is search engine friendly. If it is not search engine friendly, I proceed to explain to the caller why they are not achieving search engine success and share with them information about search engine optimization.

So what is search engine optimization (SEO)? Search Engine Optimization is the process of achieving high rankings on the search engines. High rankings mean showing up on the top positions of the search engine results page. There is no magic formula to achieving high search engine rankings. Instead, it requires doing several things right.

So what do you do now? Implement what I call the building blocks of search engine success.

The building blocks of search engine success are:

1. Build a website that is search engine friendly. That means search engines can find your website and capture the content on your site.

2. Identify what search terms people will use to find your product or service and ultimately your website.

3. Identify reputable websites that can link to your website.

4. Analyze results and revisit the first three building blocks.

Achieving search engine success takes time - it simply does not happen overnight. The first step is to see how you currently fare in the search engines? Let’s take a test drive.

Step 1. The Search Engine

Go to: http://www.google.com

Type your product or service in the search box. Do not include your region for this search. In my example, I will search for a Honda car dealer. I search for “Honda dealer” and I get 4,950,000 results.

Step 2. Where do you show up?

Jot down how many results appear and note if you show up on any of the first three pages of results. The number of results is listed in the upper right above the results.

Do not go past the third page since most searchers will not either. Depending on your industry, it may be difficult to show up on the first page of results when competing with millions of web pages.

Step 3. Narrow the search.

Now, let us narrow down the search to your local area by adding your town or county and State. I will search for “Honda dealer Putnam County New York“. The results have been reduced to 62,200 and I immediately see www.brewsterhonda.com on top. Most people shop for cars locally; therefore, Brewster Honda has achieved search engine success.

Have you achieved search engine success? If yes, that is great! If not, stay tuned for next month’s newsletter where I will break down the first building block to search engine success - creating a search engine friendly website.

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[1] Source: Real Names Corporation Study