Mozak Design Blog

Using Twitter For Research

Twitter can be a great research tool. You can use the search at http://search.twitter.com to find the latest tweets on any topic you wish.

This can be a great way to keep track of new things happening on any topic.

You can use these for…

• Topics you blog about
• Products you own
• Your own name and business name
• Anything else you may need or want to track including your competition

Lets say I wanted to know what is said about my business.

I could go to Twitter Search and type in Mozak Design. Then I could click on “Feed for this Query”, grab the url, and add it to my preferred feed reader. Each search you preform generates a feed that you can add to your favorite feed reader and automatically see all the new things happening on Twitter for that topic.

I recommend at the minimum that you follow your name your business’ name.

Yes if someone replies using @mozakdesign it will show on my Twitter time line but if someone just uses the name Mozak Design in a tweet it won’t show up unless I am following them. It is always nice to know when someone is saying something good and even more important to know if it is bad.

Are you Watching your Twitter ROI?

Great tutorial by HubSpot

Craigslist – Advertising for Free!

Craigslist is one of the most popular websites on the Internet and presents you with a great marketing opportunity for your small business. The Internet has provided the world with a huge marketplace where people can advertise and market their goods or services.  Craigslist is a website that allows users to sell anything from furniture to real estate. It is a listing of classified ads that include job placements, personal ads, ads for home supplies, ads for pet food, ads for website designs for small business, etc. Craigslist is a flea market that is online and used by millions all over the world. 

People who visit Craigslist are looking for something that they want to purchase. If you advertise some product or service that suits their interest, you are bound to have an increased traffic to your website that converts to sales. For instance, a web design company based in Portland may advertise their services in Craigslist to expand their business worldwide.

Since the Craigslist site is conveniently divided into regions, it is very easy to place your ads in the city or country of your choice. Your ads will be displayed on the site for 45 days, but after that you can re-list them if you so desire.

Craigslist ads are given top rankings by search engines, especially Google. So, expect an increased flow of traffic to your site within a week of posting your ad at Craigslist. SEO web design for your web page ensures a good ranking at search engine listings. Make use of the same SEO techniques to design your ad by using the relevant keywords to ensure top-ranked listings.

There are a number of websites that allow you to post free ads. Posting ads at sites like Yahoo Classifieds, Backpage, Highland Classifieds or USFreeads will also help to increase traffic to your site. However, the volume of traffic generated through Craigslist posting is much higher than any of the other free classifieds sites available. This is the reason that Craigslist is so popular among net surfers.

Squidoo – It’s Truly Amazing!

There are numerous websites that allow you to create a web-page for any topic under the sun. One among them is Squidoo.com. It is a fairly recent site, created by Seth Godin, a marketing expert. The site is greatly popular among internet users for driving traffic to their own sites; in other words, it is a great marketing tool.

Squidoo web pages are known as ‘lenses’. Anyone can create a Squidoo lense. For this, you need not be a technical wizard, as you can have a lense of your own in three easy steps. The best part is that you can include all kinds of modules to make a site that is interactive and keeps your visitors involved.

Here are some examples of what you can include in your lense to SEO your small business:

• Creating Text Blocks enables you to make blog entries or post your articles.
• Setting up an interactive poll will keep your visitors involved in your business.
• You can keep your lense updated and active by allowing the visitors to give their comments. You may ask them to link their own lense to yours.

The best part of Squidoo is that it has the capability to drive appropriate traffic to your website, which in turn translates into large volumes of sales. Besides, you can also provide links to products sold on eBay, Amazon and other product vending sites. What’s more, you earn a commission for any sale that has taken place from these links!  And mind you, Squidoo.com is completely free!

Search engines like Google usually top rank long tail keyword phrases at Squidoo. You can thus create a network of lenses on Squidoo to target keyword phrases that will direct the search engines to your site. It is always a good practice to include some readable and informative content in the lense in order to target the visitors to your main site.

However, if the lense for your particular keyword is already in existence, you may need to get it transferred or purchase it. This is an ideal situation for you because you are getting a readymade lense without making any effort.

The early bird small businesses users of Squidoo.com are already earning the benefits. You can do it too. Since search engine optimization or SEO is the backbone of internet businesses, each relevant keyword phrase can have a squidoo lense devoted to it.

Building Customer Relationships

Shopping online is becoming increasingly popular and many enterprises are doing business through the Internet. However, a traditional store instills a greater sense of security and reliability for the customer as compared to an online store. Online stores cannot ensure the physical assurance but they can develop their relationship with the customers by building trust and familiarity through their websites.

• A well designed website will create a good first impression.
  The one principle that is common to both traditional and online stores is that business owners must think like their customers. This helps to get to know the customers better and anticipate their needs. Traditionally, methods for building customer loyalty ranged from offering dedicated customer service to conveniently placing the goods in the store. Similar methods can be extended to an online store/ web business in the form of a well designed website that is easy to navigate and provide customer service that includes prompt shipping of the goods.

• Familiarity builds trust.
  In order to make a lasting impression on the first time visitor the webpage must convey a feeling of familiarity when he /she views the home page. A website that sells clothes should have pictures of the items of clothing being marketed by it. A website selling garden supplies can be designed to look like a garden shed in order to incorporate the familiar concept of a garden store that the customer is used to. Retaining the visitor’s interest is the beginning of a good business relationship.

• Customers appreciate assistance while shopping.
  In case of an online store, you must have a web page where customers can get information on the products you are marketing. This may be in the form of an FAQ page or you could provide the product descriptions along with a picture of the product. You may also place testimonials received from your customers at strategic locations on your site so that visitors are assured of the reliability of your goods or services.
  Assure the customer that your financial transactions are performed on a 128-bit encryption system. This can be done by displaying the fact prominently on the sales confirmation page so that customers are aware of this security measure.

• Make efforts to improve on the relationship that your website has created.
  Once the visitor makes the first purchase, you must make sure that he returns to your site for more. You may do this by offering helpful tips and helpful material on the relevant subject. Offering perks and discounts on purchases made can be other options. You may invite visitors to subscribe to your newsletter and interact with them on issues related to your business and products.

Building customer relationships in the online world may be a difficult task, but by letting your website speak for itself, you can build up trust among your users.

Expand your Business with Google AdWords

Today, the Internet has become a way of life. From imparting knowledge to selling goods to providing services, the internet promotes all kinds of business. Therefore, most of the business ventures are going online and there is cut-throat competition in all areas of business. Advertising your business helps to gain an edge you’re your competitors and therefore entrepreneurs are spending huge sums of money on advertising.

An effective method of online advertising is to use Google AdWords. Google is the most popular search engine and over 80% of Internet users prefer the Google network. Since Google has a wide reach, it brings in a large amount of traffic to your website. This translates into more sales and profits for the business owner.

Some of the advantages of using Google AdWords are discussed below:

• Google AdWords is a simple and convenient way to advertize as once the link has been set up, the ad can be run immediately. They also have convenient pay-per-click schemes for ad campaigns.
• It is advantageous for small business websites that operate on a budget. Owners of such small or new businesses can put a limit on their budget per day and choose to stop the running of the ad once they reach the fixed limit.
• Advertisers have a control over their ad campaign; they can edit or improve their ads anytime they need to do so.

Google AdWords provides target marketing:

Using Google AdWords to advertise your online business is an effective tactic to increase the traffic to your website. This kind of advertising reaches the target market and increases sales leads. Online surfers are searching for a particular product or service; hence, they will click the relevant ad links in order to find what they want. Getting a high listing in the search engine results page is the goal of the website owner. By using specific keywords in the ad campaign, Google AdWords assists the web owner to achieve this goal.

Retaining customers:

It is one thing to attract customers to your website, quite another to retain them and entice them to buy your product. First impression is the last impression, so make sure that your home page is attractive, informative and interesting to viewers. Anticipate your customers’ needs and provide the relevant information about your product in a lucid manner. The website should be user friendly and easy to navigate. You cannot afford to lose your customers to the competitors just because of a badly designed site.

Connecting with Your Customer

What will you say to them?

It is critical that you speak to your client on home page. It is not time to speak about how wonderful your business is. Instead identify what brought them to your wordpress website and how you will offer solutions.

How will you connect with your prospective client?

The best method involves offering a complimentary service that the client views as valuable. Options include: free phone consultations, providing a article or monthly newsletter full of tips in exchange for the customer leaving an e-mail address. This provides your client with a service in exchange for providing you with a method for future follow up. Even if the client is not ready to purchase from you at that moment you have a method for future connections.

How will you build credibility with them?

Once you engage your clients on the homepage, they will want to navigate deeper into your wordpress website. This is where you continue to grow credibility by showing all your business has to offer. You can include information on services, products, and links to related resources. Wordpress Blogs & articles are a great method for providing quality information to your clients. Coupons, hours and location serve clients planning to visit your physical store. All of these pieces are resources to your customers; resources that they will appreciate; resources that will take your business to the next level.

Designing for Your Ideal Customer

Is it bringing the you the business your need?

So, who are your customers? This may seem like a silly question. However, I do not want you to focus on the breath of customers your serve. Instead, consider the ideal customer you want to reach. This is who you want to design your wordpress website for.

Imagine your perfect customer just walk through the door. Describe them:

• Who are they?
• Why are they coming to you today?
• How will you solve their issue?

Once you know who your ideal client is, you can design your wordpress website to serve them.

Robust CSS Website Design

I have seen numerous post by designers struggling to transition into the world of CSS from table based design. One book I have found extremely useful is “Bulletproof Web Design” by Dan Cederholm.

This is one of the first books I picked up when I was learning and one I still grab every now and then. It is readable, clear, and thorough.

Topics covered by this book include: Flexible Text, Scalable Navigation, Elastic & Fluid Layouts, and Creating Floats.

While each of these topics warrants it’s own blog (and hence its own chapter in the book) I want to highlight how each topic makes for a high quality final web design.

Flexible Text:

• This is the concept of using relative font sizing instead of hard coding in a font size. The author gives a great example of a website for eyeglasses where the font was hard coded at 11px. While this might work for someone with healthy eyes, someone searching for eyeglasses might prefer to have control of setting the default size to something larger. By coding text size in relatives, this allows users the ability to control the overall font size of the site. The design controls the relative font sizing of headers and content.

Scalable Navigation

• This next topic goes hand in hand with flexiable text. Now that the font size can change, the website needs to behave well with these shrinking and growing letters. Scalable navigation allows for this. Instead of having fixed size images for your navigation. Buttons can be created using thin images slices that can be arrayed. Link button names can then be written as text with the graphic slices arrayed as needed behind them. This not only saves design time & graphic maintenance it make the website faster and more accessible to search engines.

Elastic & Fluid Layouts

• This chapter provides a great discussion on the benefit of layouts without tables. Furthermore, it explains how to utilize your viewer screen size by defined sections as percentages of the entire space. This enables websites to present well on both a wide and narrow screen. It also enable the ability to have the html content order different from the website presentation order. In other words you can place higher quality content at the beginning of your html even if it is not the first item displayed on the website.

Creating Floats

• Floats is a powerful part of table free web design. However, with all the wonderful browsers out there that each seem to interpret directions differently getting things to work as desired can be tricky. This chapter does a great job explaining how to achieve cross browser compatibility.

These are just some of the topic covered in this book.

I highly recommend this book to anyone looking to refine their web design skills. It will take you from creating an okay site to building a high quality site you will be proud of.

How Mozak Web Design Began

Greetings, I am a SAHM of 2 wonderful boys ages 2 & 5. Eleven years ago I graduated from Stanford University with my Masters in Electrical Engineering. I then worked at Intel for 8 yrs as a Senior Design Engineer. While I enjoyed my job and was quite good at it, I found I was burning out being a mom and an employee. So with 8 years under my belt I found the courage to walk away from my life in Corporate America to stay at home with my boys.

I loved those three years going to the Zoo, the Park & the Children’s Museum. But with my children getting older and beginning school I began missing parts of my old life.

Since I have always had an interest in website design I began reading web design books. I found it fascinating (did I mention I was a geek). Web design is so complex. It is not just Html & Css. It is SEO & Cross Browser Compatibility. It is Performance and Graphic’s Design.

Within days I was hooked. I spent all my free time reading books and putting together sites for friends. I began to think about the possibility of creating my own business where I could control my hours.

One morning I was working at Me Too of Beaverton (an amazing café designed to give moms a break) I met a great financial advisor named Laurie Daven. I began speaking with her about my business ideas and she shared an amazing resource with me; Kaya Singer. Kaya is a career coach. Within minutes of speaking with Kaya on the phone I knew she could transform my business idea into a reality.

And here I am … I have my own successful business. This is an amazing journey I am on – I feel very blessed.