To Flash or Not to Flash?

Oh how I love flash! I do, it makes the sometimes boring, mundane web surfing much more fun. I suppose you could refer to me as flashy, but I’d really rather that you didn’t.

There are so many cutting edge websites out there that are flash based design. Check out a few pretty neat ones:

Mark Aurel Designer
HBO
The Simpsons Movie
Office Max Elf yourself

If you are interested in ranking high in the SERPs (search engine results pages) based on SEO (search engine optimization), you should probably forgo the flash. I know…I know…so sad! But it’s true. Rather than having a flash intro that takes a long time to load and causes your visitors to close the browser for lack of patience, why not add a little flash element to your homepage instead?

If you are a big brand name company, you can get away with putting up an all-flash site. People are already going to be Googling your company name to get to your site. If you’re a smaller company that hasn’t established its brand – you should stick to searchable content for your sites pages. You need to have content on your home page that the robots and spiders can read and index.

You can add flash elements such as a flash advertisement to drive customers through your sales funnel, or maybe a flash slideshow that showcases your highest selling products.

Another element to consider would be a flash header/ menu (which we have), just remember to also include text links to your main menu pages so that the robots and spiders can follow the links and your visitors who don’t have flash can find your content.

I wish the big 3 would just come up with a way to easily index all of the content in flash sites, until they do – the little guys have to play it straightforward.

Joanne

What is Hosting?

If you have a website online, you have a hosting account. As I’ve mentioned in previous articles, hosting is similar to paying “rent” on the Internet. In order to be visible, you’ll need to be on a server.

I decided to write about hosting today when out walking this morning with a friend. We were discussing how many companies are still paying a hefty monthly price for hosting when it really isn’t necessary.

Some companies went out and got their website in the early stages of the Internet. They were cutting edge by being up on the latest trend and getting involved early. However, since that time, they haven’t updated their site, optimized it for the search engines or even looked at the numbers in quite a while.

If you fall into this category, you may be surprised to know that you don’t have to pay $100.00 a month for your website hosting. You can get hosting for less than $10.00 a month for your small website.

In addition to hosting, if you are wondering whether or not your site is optimized for the search engines, try doing a Google search using your keywords for the products/services you are selling. Do you come up within the search engine results? If not, then you aren’t optimized for search.

Another exercise you can try is to Google your company website (domain) name. Are you the first result? You should be – this is your business! Most likely if you aren’t coming up, your site was built using the old methods and you really could have so much more visibility on the web and more success as a business owner if you were to opt for a site re-design.

I can’t emphasize enough how important it is to continually update your site with fresh content. If you are stuck with your old hosting company/website design firm and they haven’t contacted you to help your business grow – you are throwing your money away every month.

Steps you should take:

• Do some research and see how much companies are charging for domain name renewal (often times you are being over-charged), you can usually pick one up for around $12.00. The longer period you purchase the name for, it will be cheaper and it has a benefit for your SEO! Some algorithms rank your site higher if you have a longer registration of your domain name.

• Find out what hosting packages are going for these days. You can move your existing site to a new host for a nominal fee and start saving money right away!

• Learn as much as you can about SEO and then find a new website design firm that can help you with all of the elements you need. You don’t want to get stuck in the same situation you are in now. Plunk down a few extra bucks to invest in a CMS so you’ll be able to update your site yourself and keep your content fresh.

Remember, you don’t have to pay a small fortune for hosting and the company that you are doing business with should pay attention to your needs and not just leave you out there floating in cyberspace without guidance.

Joanne