Palmer Web Marketing – Digital Marketing & Design

Voice Search Optimization: Preparing Your Content for the Future

October 8, 2024June 15, 2024 by Palmer Web Marketing

Hey there, forward-thinking marketers and content creators! Ready to dive into the world of voice search optimization? Grab your smart speaker (or just your smartphone) and get comfortable, because we’re about to explore how you can prepare your content for the voice-activated future that’s already here.

Before we jump in, let me share a quick story. Last year, Slinky Digital Agency worked on SEO for a local pizzeria – let’s call it Slice of Heaven. The owner, Tony, was skeptical about voice search. “People order pizza with their fingers, not their voice,” he’d say with a chuckle. Fast forward six months, and 30% of their online orders were coming through voice-activated devices. How’d we do it? Well, that’s exactly what we’re going to explore today.

Understanding Voice Search: The Basics

First things first, let’s break down what voice search actually is. In simple terms, voice search is a technology that allows users to perform searches on the internet or a device by speaking into a microphone, rather than typing their query. This could be through a smartphone, smart speaker, or any other voice-activated device.

For Slice of Heaven, we realized that people were increasingly using voice commands to find local restaurants and place orders. This insight formed the foundation of our voice search optimization strategy.

Why Voice Search Matters for Your Business

You might be wondering, “Why should I care about voice search?” Well, let me give you a few compelling reasons:

Changing User Behavior: More and more people are using voice assistants for everyday tasks.
Local Search Dominance: Voice searches are often local in nature, which is great for local businesses.
Featured Snippets: Voice search results often pull from featured snippets, giving you a chance to leapfrog competitors.
Natural Language Processing: Voice search is making search more conversational and natural.
Mobile-First Indexing: Voice search aligns perfectly with Google’s mobile-first approach.

According to Google, 27% of the global online population is using voice search on mobile. That’s a huge audience you could be tapping into!

How To Ensure You Become The ‘Near Me’ Law Firm When Prospects Search On Google

October 8, 2024March 15, 2023 by Palmer Web Marketing

SEO campaigns for legal firms and lawyers usually have several objectives, although some are more important than others. The main priorities of an SEO campaign implemented on behalf of a legal firm will tend to be focused on getting the law firm’s website ranking at the top of Google.

For those unaware of how SEO and Google’s search results are related, the main thing to consider is that rankings occur for every possible search term that someone might enter into the search box. For any given search, Google’s algorithm will instantly display the top ten websites on the first page of results that it has calculated to be the most relevant and suitable for that search term. SEO is designed to ensure that your website is the one that Google displays first.

User Experience

What Google wants to promote is user experience or UX. UX is what Google aims for, not just in its search results, but for the person searching when they click on any of the results it displays. This means that Google will measure and assess every website page and whether it offers anyone landing on it from a Google search a good user experience.

A good user experience will be subjective for each individual as each has different likes and dislikes, however, their actions when they arrive on a website will tell Google a lot about that website’s UX credentials. UX will manifest itself by a website being highly relevant to the search, having high-quality content, and ease of use, such as having simple navigation.

What An SEO Audit Of Your Website Should Be Assessing

October 8, 2024January 22, 2023 by Palmer Web Marketing

Everything and everyone that needs to perform functions cannot do so over the long term without some checks on their well-being. Whether it be an aircraft having safety checks, or a sports star having a fitness check, the same principles apply. The same can also be said for an SEO campaign, because if it is not checked and audited to assess what, if any, results it is producing then it potentially is serving no purpose.

An SEO audit is not just about checking internal links and anchor text on your website, albeit we do not say that to diminish their importance. Instead, we are referring to the fact that there can be as many as two hundred or more individual elements that influence the ranking of your website which is why it is often an SEO agency that business owners will turn to when they need an SEO audit.

However, if you wish to carry out your SEO audit there are going to be some checks that are more important than others. You will also find it easier if you take each category of SEO and check them in turn. Here are three of the main categories of SEO that you simply must check during your website’s SEO audit.

Technical Audit

Many who are new to SEO make the erroneous assumption that SEO is only about what people can see, read, and click on. Whilst these are all essential for SEO, they are not the only influencers of ranking. Much of that influence happens behind the scenes and is never seen by any visitors, although how the website behaves for them might be affected.

7 Marketing Tactics That Can Help Family Lawyers Boost Client Acquisition

October 8, 2024August 10, 2022 by Palmer Web Marketing

Unless family lawyers are seeing new clients request their services regularly, that practice is in danger of becoming unviable. Given the nature of family law, and that some aspects of it such as divorce and adoption, whilst prolonged procedurally, are ultimately a “one-time” event, the danger is that, as existing client cases are completed, there are no new clients to take their place.

Family lawyer practices that are aware of this issue have several options to try and attract new business, and one which has proven to be more effective than most is digital marketing. With the internet playing an ever-increasing role in everyone’s life, it is online where most people who might be seeking the services of a family lawyer will start their research.

Those family lawyer businesses which have taken the wise step to create a digital marketing campaign or have had one created for them, are the ones whom those searching online for the sorts of services they offer, will find. Those family law businesses which have done nothing will continue to see their client numbers, and thus their revenue, diminish.

Several online marketing tactics can be used to attract new clients, and by reading further you will see that we have outlined seven that have proven to be the most effective for family lawyers seeking to use the internet to boost their client numbers.

Top 7 Must-Have Digital Marketing Tools For Businesses

October 8, 2024August 8, 2021 by Palmer Web Marketing

The internet has had a significant impact on how businesses operate even greater than the industrial revolution of the 18^th and 19th centuries and it means that if a business wants to succeed today, then it must have a website or at least some form of online presence that allows them to market themselves.

Just as tasks in the offline world are made easier with the use of tools, the same applies online. There is a multitude of software and tools available to business owners and such is their quantity and diversity that it would take 1,000s of articles to explain each one of them, which we are not going to do here.

However, what we can do is point out 7 key areas of digital marketing that play a key role in a business’s online success, and highlight one of the top tools or software that assist in its implementation.

Social Media Management – Sprout Social

With the influence, social media has on so many people’s thoughts and decisions it is imperative that businesses have a presence on at least one social media platform where they know their audience is. To help manage their social media activities Sprout Social proves an array of tools allowing for post scheduling, responding to messages and analytics.

5 Key Questions You Should Ask Before Selecting Your WordPress Website’s Theme

October 8, 2024May 27, 2020 by Palmer Web Marketing

If the web design for your new or redesigned website is going to be based upon WordPress and its CMS, then there is no shortage of decisions that you need to make to turn your initial thoughts into a fully functioning website. Everything from the colour scheme, the number of pages, which pages you are including, content creation, and integration with other applications, are but a few of them.

Near the top of that list should also be which WordPress theme you are going to use for your new web design, however, that is not always an easy choice. We say that not because there are not any great themes available, but the exact opposite. Because there are so many excellent options, narrowing your theme choices down to one, is no easy task.

Ever willing to help our readers, we are going to try to make that task somewhat easier for you by providing you with 5 key questions that need to be answered as part of the process of selecting a WordPress theme for your website. Any theme where you are less than 100% convinced of the answer is a theme that may be best passed over. Here are those 5 questions:

Cyber Monday: Tarnish Your Brand, Slash Profit, & Kill Customer Loyalty, All in 24 Hours

October 8, 2024November 26, 2012 by Palmer Web Marketing

Ah, Cyber Monday is here: the peer pressure fuelled day when all retailers mutually agree to cut their profits and encourage their customer’s addiction to discounts and promotions.

I know that sounds a bit pessimistic, maybe even downright harsh, but hear me out.

There are really only 2 reasons why a retailer would offer Cyber Monday promotions: to gain new customers or reactivate old ones. Let’s talk about what deep discounting does in both situations:

Acquiring New Customers: Suppose a man offers a woman $1,000 to go on a date with him. She accepts. How much of a chance do you this couple has at a long term, quality relationship? Any business transaction based on bribery (and let’s be honest, that’s essentially what discounting is) only produces low-quality, low-affinity relationships. Customers acquired through steep discounting are far less likely to rebuy unless a similarly steep discount is offered again. If you’ve ever run a lifetime value calculation on these customers, you’ll undoubtedly find that it’s much lower than your typical customer LTV. (If you’ve never run this analysis on your customer database, please do yourself a favour and run it!) When discounting is the foundation of the relationship, future price increases are simply out of the question.

10 Tips for Mastering Google Remarketing Ads

October 8, 2024June 27, 2011 by Palmer Web Marketing

Remarketing is a popular topic in the web marketing world lately. And it’s no wonder why. Who better to show ads to than your previous site visitors? Personally, I’ve found the ROI on remarketing ads to be incredible, second only to email marketing. If you haven’t yet tried it, what are you waiting for?

For those unfamiliar with Google remarketing, here’s how it works. A visitor lands on your website. Google’s ad network writes a cookie in that person’s browser, identifying them as having previously visited your website. When this same person is visiting another website in the ubiquitous Google display network, your ad appears, “remarketing” them back to your site. The power of this concept is self evident. It’s far more effective to show ads to people who’ve previously shown interest in your products, versus the person whose never heard of you.

With that background in mind, let’s look at some tips for mastering this powerful tool.

4 Shocking Truths about your eCommerce Site

October 8, 2024April 26, 2011 by Palmer Web Marketing

#1 – Barely anyone sees your homepage
Far too many online businesses worship at the alter of the homepage. While certainly important, homepages today carry far less importance than in years past. When I review the analytics on most of the sites I work with, the vast majority of visitors never see the homepage. (When you have a moment, take a look at not only how many of your visitors never see the homepage, but also what percentage of overall pageviews your homepage represents, you’ll probably be shocked at how low it is.) This is due to a myriad of reasons, one of which is that people simply search for specific content, and Google does a pretty decent job of landing you on the specific page you’re looking for. There’s just no reason to pass through an overly generic destination like a homepage.

I believe one of the biggest sins in web design is promoting mission-critical products and promotions only on the homepage. I typically see sites where an email signup or free shipping promotion is highlighted only on the homepage. This is a tragedy, because there’s very little leverage in the homepage, compared with other, more frequently viewed pages. The time you spend redesigning and testing is much better spent on your product, category, or shopping cart pages.

Putting A/B Tests to the Test: 4 Pitfalls of Testing

October 8, 2024January 2, 2011 by Palmer Web Marketing

Website testing can be one of the most fruitful website optimization tactics in your arsenal. But, it can also be a huge waste of time. Below are 4 pitfalls I’ve found myself in at one time or another.

1. Testing “Everything”

A common axiom in website optimization is to “test everything.” The problem with this advice is it ignores the reality we all find ourselves in, that we have limited time and resources. If you have the choice to test between testing your checkout process or a different coloured add-to-cart button, which do you think will legitimately provide long term value to your visitors?

Quite frankly, not everything is worth testing. Yes, you might inch out a slight improvement to your add-to-cart rate with a flashy new button, but how will that translate to profit and lifetime customer value? My advice is to skip the gimmicks and test stuff that matters.

4 Reasons your Product Pages Don’t Convert

October 8, 2024December 28, 2010 by Palmer Web Marketing

I believe online stores focus too much on technology, too much on traffic generation, and even too much on site conversion optimization, and forget that it’s still all about the product. Everything else is just a tool. Below I’ll share what I believe to be the 4 biggest mistakes made on the product pages of today’s online retailers.

1) Too much imagination is required

All too many product pages require their customer’s to have a good imagination. For example, product images convey the product alone with a white background. Not exactly awe-inspiring. Online shopping can be devoid of context when product images aren’t show in use. Lifestyle and contextual images help create mental ownership by giving specific examples of use.

Yes, it’s a lot of work to get this type of photography on your site. But as I recently shared my experience in lifestyle images, it can be earth-shatteringly effective.

Don’t require your customer to have a good imagination. Paint a picture for them. How will it look in context, in their hands, in use?

The Ultimate Holiday Checklist for E-Commerce Success

October 8, 2024November 5, 2010 by Palmer Web Marketing

I’m making the list, be sure to check it twice to ensure success for your e-commerce website this holiday season.

#1. Offer Bounce Back Discounts: Your site will be flooded with traffic this holiday season. How can you harness that traffic to create year long business? Consider offering a good discount incentive for customers to come back and shop in January. You can automatically email them a coupon after each order, or send one along with the package. Don’t forget to email and remind customers to come back and use their discounts.

#2. Loosen Up & Emphasize Your Return Policy: While a 30 day return policy is commonplace for the rest of the year, it may scare off early shoppers during the holidays. Make it clear to your visitors that you will accept returns and exchanges on all Christmas gift purchases. Be sure to let visitors know early and often about your policy, such as on product pages and the shopping cart.

#3. Review Past Failures & Successes: Try this as you plan your busy holiday season. Take a look at you and your competitor’s website’s through the lens of the Wayback machine. What worked and didn’t work last year? What can you improve upon?

How to Build the Perfect Website

October 8, 2024July 6, 2010 by Palmer Web Marketing

If you’re seeking perfection on your website, stop reading this. It doesn’t exist.

In fact the search for perfection might just be more detrimental to your website than anything else.

That homepage that your designer has been tweaking for weeks, stop fiddling and make it live. That eBook you’re still perfecting, launch it now. If you have doubts, test it.

In the web world we are lucky to have a friend: instant feedback. Feedback in the form of customers, analytics, surveys, etc. If you were developing a tangible product or print material, you don’t have this luxury. You have to get it right the first time. There is no excuse for a typo on the front of your catalogue or a defect on your product. But a website is a living, breathing, evolving creature. Problems can be fixed. Inefficiencies can be optimized.

The Symptoms and Remedy for Homepage-itis

October 8, 2024May 23, 2010 by Palmer Web Marketing

Are you suffering from homepage-itus? The symptoms include:

The belief that visitors always enter your website through the homepage
You send all of your traffic PPC, SEO, or Ad traffic to the homepage
Promoting products, content, email newsletters, or promotions only on the homepage
The belief that the “wow factor” is the most important impression to a customer, so you make your homepage do a flash based song-and-dance
A disproportionately large amount of your web design budget goes to redesigning it obsessively

The truth is that visitor behaviour has changed drastically. Homepages don’t matter as much as they used too. First-time visitors enter deep into the site courtesy of Google’s more accurate search results. Repeat visitors enter through landing pages from email campaigns or bookmarks to specific pages that interested them. If you take a look at your analytics, I bet you’ll be shocked out how many of your visitors never even pass through the homepage.

3 Ways to Sabotage your Website

October 8, 2024May 17, 2010 by Palmer Web Marketing

Sometimes we’re our own worst enemy. Below I’ve reflected on 3 ways I’ve sabotaged my websites in the past. Hopefully you won’t follow my example.

#1. Completely redesign it – If you redesign your site from scratch, you’re probably throwing out the baby with the bathwater. No matter what your web design firm tells you, very few websites are so bad that it must be completely redesigned. When you do this, you end up distrupting features that worked perfectly fine just to fix features that didn’t. Instead, redesign your site incrementally around business objectives and customer needs, not the design whims of you or your company.

Unnecessary Detours on Your Website

October 8, 2024April 21, 2010 by Palmer Web Marketing

About Us. FAQ. Customer Service. Contact Us.

Odds are you have these pages on your website. Last week I raised a question about the value of site if your products disappeared. But here’s another consideration, what if the above pages disappeared?

If your About Us page was gone, would customers still be able to learn about your company, your beliefs, your values, your unique offering, throughout your site? Or is the About Page the only place you communicate who you really are.

What about an FAQ page? Is this the only place you answer common questions? If they’re really so “common”, why not answer them in context instead? In other words, it doesn’t make sense to answer common questions about your shipping policy on an entirely separate page, it makes sense to answer them with a popup box or mouseover in your shopping cart when people are actually choosing their shipping option.

Copying Success vs. Fixing Failure

October 8, 2024April 16, 2010 by Palmer Web Marketing

So much of our day revolves around putting out fires.

404 pages. 500 errors. High bounce landing pages. A low open rate on a marketing email. I’m going to suggest a radical solution to these problems: ignore them.

Why should you ignore them? Because sometimes fixing a failure isn’t the best use of your time. That new landing page with a 70% bounce rate, maybe you can optimize it down to 50%, but it still sucks. Maybe you can increase sales on that failing product 50%, but it still isn’t going to make a dent on your top line.

What if your products disappeared?

October 8, 2024April 5, 2010 by Palmer Web Marketing

Imagine that all your products disappeared from your website. Would anything of value remain? Would your customers still come back?

If your answer is “no”, than you’ve successfully commoditized yourself.

If you’re truly passionate about your business, your site should be overflowing with content and community, both of which should be natural by-products of your real products. Content and community will endure, even if your products were gone.

Creating Remarkable Touchpoints

October 8, 2024April 2, 2010 by Palmer Web Marketing

We spend a lot of time on obvious customer touchpoints such as our website, products, call-centre, and marketing creative. But what about these not-so obvious ones?

Packing lists/invoices – Most packing slips are cold and formal. What if the person who picked and packed the order took an extra 10 seconds to write “thank you [customer name]” and sign their name with a red marker?

Email notifications – Most shipping and order confirmation emails look like the digital equivalent of vomit. What if you added pictures of your staff and answered common questions regarding shipping and returns? What if you made it send from an actual person, instead of “donotreply@company.com”?