WS Website Template Tips

[CHR]

Tired of seeing your WS hosted website lost in Google, Yahoo or MSN search? Why don't these search engines connect your site with the location of your shop? Why don't they know you're one of the most relevant sites for your city name?

In a nutshell, it's a problem with duplicate content and lack of placing 'on page' information about your business. Your site looks the same as everybody elses - and the search engines penalize that.

For a TF template:

Does your name, address and local phone number appear on the home page? If it's only in the graphic on the upper left hand corner, the search engines can't 'see it'. Request TF add that info ASAP. How about the cities you directly service? Add those too!

Does your 'About us' page read

"'Your Shop Name' proudly serves the 'City Name' area. We are family owned and operated. We are committed to offering only the finest floral arrangements and gifts, backed by service that is friendly and prompt. Because all of our customers are important, our professional staff is dedicated to making your experience a pleasant one. That is why we always go the extra mile to make your floral gift perfect.

Let 'Your Shop Name' be your first choice for flowers."

Well, so do about 12,000 other sites. Rewrite the 'About the Company' section to include unique details such as years in business, awards, staff abckgrounds, and the like. Tell something about your own company.

Tweak the info on the rest of that page as well and make sure your name, local address and local phone number are repeated in the appropriate section.

These simple steps will really make a difference and are a good starting point to improve rankings.

For an FTD Template:

Does Your About Us page read

At 'Your Shop Name', we are committed to quality and service. Our 100% satisfaction Guarantee is our personal commitment to creating long term relationships with our customers. Your satisfaction is our number one priority, not just because it's our job, but because we care.
We choose only the freshest, highest quality flowers and our shop has a professional and caring staff to serve all your floral needs.

Your gift will arrive beautifully presented and personalized with your message.

Need help with a special event?
We'll help you choose the perfect flowers for the occasion.

So do thousands of others! Again, write something about your own business and be sure to include a unique image from the interior or exterior of your shop.

I passed on this tip to a FlowerChat member last week and her site has already jumped from 'no where to be found' to the first page of results on Google when searching for a florists in her city! Your results may not be as dramatic since many other factors play a part in being found. But it's a start.

Anyone else with tips on these templates is invited to add theirs. We have had a TF template since 2002 and have been very pleased with the results overall. But most of the success has come as a result of our customizing the products and text. Remember - uniqueness matters.

HTH

 

[BOSS]

This can not be stressed enough.... little things like this, changing copy on any page you can, will help to increase page rank as you build individuality...

 

[CHR]

Google Wants to Find Moms and Pops

OK Template-based site owners, there's good news and bad news. A recent interview with Matt Cutts aka Google Guy aka the Mick Jagger of the Search Engine World bodes well for Google's commitment to help small companies and sites be found. (emphasis mine)

Mike Grehan wrote an article about the rich get richer effect of sites ranking at the top of the search results. Does Google counteract this? If yes, how so?

We try to. A non-trivial fraction of our time is spent thinking about how to return the right sites for queries, and small or mom-and-pop sites are a large part of that. It's a real challenge when some of these sites have one or two (or zero!) links to them. At this point, when I go on a trip or visit a street arts fair, I end up writing down 3-4 urls each time, so I can go back to Google and see whether the sites will come up in Google. I carry a hipster PDA (a little notebook from Office Max that costs like $1.09) so that I can write down stuff when I'm away from a computer.

The good news is that Google wants to find mom-and-pop businesses. The bad news is that your template-based site needs your help to help them find you.

I still see many, many template sites that have little or no unique-to-the-business information and zero inbound links from other sites. It's unlikely that Google will "see" your shop as a mom-and-pop business if your site looks like thousands of others; not just in arrangement images, but in written content. (Go back a read the first post in this thread for more on unique content.)

Who links to you? Go to http://www.msn.com and type in link:www.yoursitename.ext (ext=com, net, org or whatever your URL ends with). What are you up against?

http://search.msn.com/results.aspx?q=link%3Awww.1800flowers.com&FORM=QBRE - 13,742 links
http://search.msn.com/results.aspx?q=link%3Awww.justflowers.com&FORM=QBRE - 14,680 links
http://search.msn.com/results.aspx?q=link%3Awww.ftd.com&FORM=QBRE - 23,504 links

These companies have full-time employees working to get inbound links every day, and Google knows it. That's why they try to tweak their algorithm and work to keep the same companies from dominating the results over and over again.

Look at the inbound links received by your biggest competitors. I guarantee you'll learn a lot.

Where do you get links?

Mlou gave some good advice here.
Some free links:
- request a listing in the Real Florist Blog (details here) (BTW, this is one heck of a good link to have. )
- list your company in Wikipedia's Free YelloWikis
- associated local vendors like photographers, caterers, bakeries, wedding location sites, etc... You should be able to link to them, too.

Try to spend some time this week requesting links. Results in search engines usually take a while to show, but I promise they do make a difference over time.