Content Management System 3 - Old City Web Services

2011 In Review: Part 1

December 7, 2011 by anoadmin Leave a Comment

A recap of the knowledge we’ve shared this year.

It’s been a great year! We hope you have enjoyed our Customer Education Program and have learned some valuable tips and tools to promote your business.

Just in case you missed some of our articles, we’re going to do a quick recap this week and next week. You can also visit our blog to catch up on all of our tips from this year.

Here are some of the topics we discussed in 2011:

Website Development
This year we’ve shared some pointers on all the major parts that make up a great website including:

• Writing excellent, action oriented content
• Organizing your website navigation in a way that is simple and user-friendly.
• Creating a purpose-driven website for your business.
• Incorporating all the elements of a great design into a professional, clean look.

Content Management Systems
We’ve also discussed the value of a content management system and what all it can do for you including:

• Giving you the ability to make changes to your website with any computer connected to the Internet.
• Expanding your website with additional plug-ins like slideshows, picture galleries, blogs and calendars.

Mobile Websites
Another advantage of Content Management Systems is the ability to add a mobile plug-in that will automatically convert your website into a mobile friendly format for your visitors.

Search Engine Optimization
This year we spent some time talking about the importance of using search engine optimization to drive traffic to your website. We went over some of the important keys to SEO including:

• Understanding how Google works.
• Using keyword rich content on your website.
• Targeting specific, relevant keywords and phrases.

To read more about each of the topics above you can review all of our weekly tips, tools and tricks on our blog or just give us a call at 904-867-4112!

5 Seasonal Updates Your Website Needs

October 13, 2011 by anoadmin Leave a Comment

Keep your website fresh and up to date with these seasonal changes.

1. Business hours.

Summer is long gone and the holiday season is around the corner. Has your business changed its hours accordingly? Make sure your website has the correct hours displayed on every page.

2. Holiday promotions.

Are you offering any specials for visitors during Thanksgiving or Christmas? What about discounts during non-peak hours or mid-week? You should let your clients know by displaying the information on your website.

3. Seasonal events.

Is your business participating in a seasonal event? From special tours to Christmas open houses, get the information out there now so that people can start making plans to attend. Also include details on where customers can purchase tickets to your event (if necessary).

4. Holiday Closings.

If your business is going to be closed over the holidays, let your customers know with a short message on your website along with the dates and/or hours that you will be closed.

Special Tip for Restaurants: Let people know now if you will be open or closed for Thanksgiving and/or Christmas so they can make their plans accordingly! Also give out information if you’re offering a special holiday meal on those holidays.

5. Photos and graphics.

Last but certainly not least, decorate your website for the holidays with seasonal images and graphics. If you don’t have a content management system that allows you do this yourself, give us a call and we can give you some information and ideas on what we can do for you!

5 Ways to Add Extras to Your Website

August 31, 2011 by anoadmin Leave a Comment

Add function and flair with ease.

Many websites today go beyond the basics to provide visitors with interactive tools and professional displays that help illustrate the importance of your business. If you have a content management system, Old City Web Service can add these extras for you to take your website to the next level:

1. Monthly Calendar: Share events and activities on an easy-to-use calendar that you can update from home.

2. Photo Gallery: Display photos in a professional slideshow or give visitors to the option to browse through a thumbnail gallery of your images. Either way, customers will be impressed with what they see!

3. Mobile Plug-In: Are your customers constantly on the go? Let them view your website on their phone with a mobile plug-in. This addition will automatically convert your content into a mobile friendly format.

4. Contact Forms: Give potential customers an easy, instant way to contact you with a short form that’s sent directly to your email.

5. Social Media: You can not only add a link to your Facebook/Twitter, you can display recent posts/tweets and other features from your social media pages right on your website.

Let us help you make your website more exciting!

To add some new features to your website (including a content management system) contact your team at Old City Web Services via phone 904-867-4112 or you can send an email to us at letusmarketyou@oldcity.com.

5 Things You Need to Know About Writing Excellent Web Content.

August 16, 2011 by anoadmin Leave a Comment

Once you’ve got a great, professional web design, the next step is to create professional text that will inform your potential customers about what your business does and how they can sign up for your services. We have put together a couple of quick tips to help you write excellent website content:

1. Be Original: Don’t start off your home page web content with a generic “Welcome” message. As soon as a visitor sees a standard greeting like that, he or she will stop reading and move on to something else. Grab their attention, give them the information they need to know and finish with a call to action.

2. It’s okay to be repetitive: Users can enter your site on any page, so it’s okay to repeat some content. Make sure the key points of your business—services offered, target clients (are you reaching out to contractors or soccer moms?) and a point of contact—are mentioned on every page.

3. Break it up with headlines: Separate long paragraphs of text with headlines to point out certain sections. This is another way to grab the visitors’ attention and pull their eye to certain sections of text, it also creates visual appeal in your content.

4. Keep it relevant: Focus on the most important things you want your customers to know. You want your text to be long enough for people to get your message and decide that you’re the right business for them. Any extra information will just create confusion and steer them away from what you want them to do.

5. Call them to action: Just like the rest of your marketing materials your website should drive users to contact you. Close out every page with a call to contact you for more information or to schedule an appointment, whatever it is that people need to do to engage your services.

We can write professional website content for you!

If your time is maxed out doing all the other things it takes to run your business, contact us about writing your content for you. Whether you have a new website in progress or an old website that needs some updating, we have talented writers on staff who can write great content for your website.

For more information call 904-867-4112 or send an email to us at letusmarketyou@oldcity.com.

Make quick updates to your site from anywhere

June 22, 2011 by anoadmin Leave a Comment

Note: This month we are reviewing the most popular topics we’ve discussed so far this year, with links to previous blogs as well as some new information on each subject. If there’s a subject you’re interested in that we haven’t discussed, please let us know!

Imagine that you’re out of town on a business trip or vacation when something urgent comes up with your company’s website. Maybe it’s a new announcement, a special sale or a change in your business’ hours—whatever it is, it needs to be taken care of immediately. Rather than spending hours tracking down an employee with the access and ability to update your site, you jump on your Internet-connected laptop, log-in to your site and make the change yourself. In less than five minutes, you’re back on the beach or in your meeting and the change is live on the web.

That story can be a reality with a content management system.

Old City Web Services can build a new website for you with a built-in content management system (CMS) or convert your old site to the new program. In addition to making updates with ease, the CMS also gives you the ability to boost your search engine rankings and add functionality to your site including mobile features and photo galleries.

Read more about the benefits of a content management system by viewing some of these previous blogs:

What is a content management system?

Increase your search rankings with a content management system

Give your visitors what they want with a content management system

If you would like more information on adding a content management system to your website, call us today at 904-867-4112 or email letusmarketyou@oldcity.com.

Your customers will be outside this summer, can your website go with them?

March 31, 2011 by anoadmin Leave a Comment

As the weather continues to improve in St. Augustine, more and more people are going to be outside enjoying all that the city has to offer, which means they will need information on the go. If your website doesn’t make it easy for them to find your location, hours and other important details while surfing on a mobile device, you’re going to lose business.

We want to help you get that business with a simple mobile website. We offer two affordable options for converting your existing website to mobile. Both options will automatically detect whether or not a visitor is using a mobile device and send them to the appropriate site. There’s no need for additional domains or any additional content.

Send us an email or give us a call at 904-867-4112 so that your website can get outside and start recruiting business for you.

Do you really need a mobile site?

When it comes to the rise in mobile website traffic, you don’t have to take our word for it. Google Analytics can provide statistics on exactly how many visitors to your website are using mobile devices. For example, we can tell you that mobile traffic on our web portal OldCity.com has increased 37.79% in the last 30 days. Of the 87,696 visits OldCity.com has received since February 27th, exactly 9,145 of those visits came from mobile devices.

If you don’t have Google Analytics on your website, call us and we can install it for you free of charge. You’ll be able to access the statistics and judge for yourself what kind of mobile traffic you receive. You can also use Google Analytics to track online advertising campaigns, measure your search engine rankings and find out more about the visitors to your website (i.e. geographical location, browser type, etc.).

Call or e-mail us and we can have Google Analytics added to your website in less than 24 hours. Let the statistics tell you where to invest money in your website.

– Old City Web Services

Spring forward with your website changes.

March 9, 2011 by anoadmin Leave a Comment

Saturday, March 13^th is the day to get your spring chores out of the way—turn your clocks forward for Daylight Savings, check the batteries in your smoke detector, and update your website!

Your customers want to know what’s new at your place of business and we can help you get the word out. Here are a few questions you should ask yourself to determine what updates you can make to your website:

Will you change your hours for spring/summer tourism traffic?
Do you have a new spring line of products or services?
Are you offering discounts to spring break travelers?
Is there a calendar on your website without any current events listed?
Do you have upcoming events you would like to promote on your website?
Are there any weekly specials you offer such as buy one/get one promotions or discounts on certain days of the week?
For restaurants, do you have any seasonal dishes to add or remove from your menu?

Most simple text and photo changes take less than a half hour for our designers to complete, which means you could have an updated website for less than $50 and just a few minutes of your time.

Call us today and we’ll get started on making your changes!

Facebook Logo

Facebook now offers business pages without a personal profile.

Great news from the land of social media! Facebook has finally updated their fan pages so that businesses can start their own fan page without having to create a personal Facebook account. Now you connect with your clients where they spend the majority of their time—right on Facebook! Give us a call to find out how we can set up a Facebook page for your business.

Give your viewers what they want with the click of a button!

January 27, 2011 by anoadmin Leave a Comment

What IS a plug-in?

A plug-in is a tool that you can use to add new features to your website. If you have a content management system (CMS), you already have access to a network of available plug-ins so that you can get the most functionality from your website.

We have put together a list of popular plug-ins below, but the list doesn’t end there. Contact us today to see how we can add more function to your site. You choose–e-mail or call us, whichever meets your busy schedule.

– Old City

4 Great CMS Plug-Ins for Your Website.

1. Social media links.

Like we talked about in our Blogging 101 discussion last week, it’s important to promote your blogs through social media. There’s a plug-in that can make this easier for you by automatically tweeting a link to your blog with the click of one button. Twitter and other social media networks (like Facebook) also have plug-ins that allow you to display your recent tweets, comments and more right on your website.

2. Mobile-friendly website.

We recently converted OldCityWebServices.com into a mobile website that can easily be viewed and navigated on any mobile device. This was done through the use of a CMS plug-in that translates your navigation menu and content into a condensed version that’s more friendly to mobile users. The plug-in automatically detects mobile devices so that users on a desktop will still see your full website, while mobile users will be redirected to the altered site. Visit OldCityWebServices.com on your mobile device to see this plug-in in action!

3. Photo Gallery.

Whether you run a bed and breakfast or a dog training center, photos can easily make your website stand out from others in the crowd. Showcase your photos with an easy to use gallery plug-in. You can upload photos, manage multiple galleries and more. Our favorite photo gallery plug-in can also pop out into a separate window so that your website visitors can easily scroll through your full size images.

4. Professional Slideshow.

When a photo gallery just isn’t enough, show off your photos in a professional slideshow. This plug-in (coupled with an installation of SlideShowPro) adds beautiful slideshows with built-in transitions, a thumbnail scroll and optional captions. You can create multiple albums to show on different pages of your website. Use this program to showcase your products, facility and more.

Give your website a boost with a content management system from OCWS.

Call us today at 904-867-4112 or send an e-mail to letusmarketyou@oldcity.com.

Increase your search rankings with a content management system.

January 17, 2011 by anoadmin Leave a Comment

Know your stats!

As we continue to discuss the different elements involved in search engine optimization, it’s important to keep an eye on your website statistics. How many people visit your website each day? How long do they stay on your website? What pages are most popular? Are they finding you via a search engine or direct traffic?

When you host with Old City Web Services, we provide you with access to comprehensive site statistics that will allow you to answer all of the above questions. Knowing the details of your web traffic will allow you to better plan your online marketing campaigns and select advertisements that give you the most traffic.

You can also use statistics to determine why you might not be getting the most out of your website. If visitors are leaving your website after only visiting the home page, you might want to re-assess how user-friendly your website is. Do visitors not know where to go next? Or is your content not giving them a good idea of what else the site has to offer?

If you don’t have trackable statistics on your website yet, Google Analytics is one of the best, most popular programs for tracking your website stats and it’s completely free. Give it a try!

Google will like you more if you use a content management system.

THE PROBLEM: SEARCH ENGINES DON’T LIKE STALE CONTENT.

Every minute of every day, search engines like Google, Yahoo! and Bing have little cyber spiders crawling through all the pages of the Internet to extract information that goes into the database that we search through when we look for something on a search engine.

It’s incredibly important to them that the information they gather is as up to date and as relevant as possible, so if your website hasn’t been updated since the Clinton administration, the search engines are going to skip right over you. Worse, they’ll start to worry about you. Are you still in business? Do you still offer the same services? If they can’t answer these questions, they don’t want to show your website to people doing searches because it might make them look bad.

THE SOLUTION: CONTENT MANAGEMENT SYSTEM

In order to help your website come up in the search engines, you need to update your website content at least once every few months. Using a built-in content management system you can accomplish this on your own, or with our help. Your time is valuable and at some points, updating your website is out of the question. That’s where we come in. Whether you have a content management system or not, we can update your website in the blink of an eye, and here are just a few suggestions for where those updates can be made:

1. Seasonal Changes

Change your website text once a quarter by re-writing some of it to reflect seasonal changes. Mention spring specials, summer deals or holiday sales. In addition to the search engines seeing new content, your visitors will also know that your website is up to date because it reflects the current season.

2. Blog.

Blogs can seem scary and time-consuming, but they don’t have to be. All you have to do is post a blog once or twice a month with information relevant to your industry. For example, if you’re a lawyer, you can share recent changes or case studies with your clients to show that you’re staying on top of the latest legal news. We’ll go over some more suggestions for blogging next week in our Blogging 101 post.

3. Company Profile.

If you have an About Us page or something similar, you definitely want to keep it as up to date as possible. Make sure former employees are removed and current employees’ bios are up to date. With a content management system, you can quickly update these profiles and add new staff members to the website, too.

Don’t let the search engines miss you, use a content management system!

Give your text and photos an update with an easy, secure content management system from Old City Web Services. We have affordable solutions to give you the latest technology you need to not just keep your business afloat, but motoring.

Call us today at 904-867-4112 or send an e-mail to letusmarketyou@oldcity.com.

What is a content management system?

January 10, 2011 by anoadmin Leave a Comment

Happy New Year!

We can hardly believe it, but 2011 has finally arrived! What will the new year bring for you and your business? Our resolutions are all for continued growth and prosperity, not only for us but for all of our wonderful clients as well.

To help make that resolution a reality, we are going to continue our Customer Education Program featuring weekly e-mails with tips, tricks and other information you can use to grow your business on the web.

We are open to suggestions for topics–if there is anything you’d like more information on, let us know and we will see if we can work it into our weekly newsletters.

Let’s work together to make 2011 a successful year!

– Old City

What is a content management system?

Imagine having the ability to jump on any computer–in your office, at home, or on vacation–and instantly change the text and photos on your website to advertise a new sale, new product or seasonal special. With a content management system, you can do all of the above in the blink of an eye.

A content management system (CMS for short) is essentially a program that allows you to view and edit your website much like you would edit a document in Microsoft Word. You can add and format photos and text, then with a click of a button you can make the changes live on the Internet. It’s simple and easy to use.

Here are some Frequently Asked Questions that might help you better understand how a CMS can benefit your business:

Q: Do I have to install any software on my computer?

A: Nope! Our preferred content management system, WordPress, is accessible through any computer with an Internet connection. You simply enter a certain URL into your Internet browser, type in your username and password, and you will have access to the system. No software or installation required!

Q: Can I use this with my existing website?

A: In most cases, yes, we can add a CMS to an existing website. There might be some design changes that have to be made to accommodate for the system, but we can adapt most existing websites to work with the program.

If you want to upgrade your website with the CMS feature, however, it might be a good idea to use the opportunity to re-design your website as well. A fresh look and fresh content will keep visitors returning to your site and help you boost your SEO rankings.

Q: Is there anything that I cannot change with my content management system?

A: Yes. The CMS will allow you to change text and photos in the body of your website and in most cases, the sidebar as well. But anything in the header at the top of your website, the main navigation or the footer will still have to be changed by a website designer to ensure that the integrity and function of your website is maintained.

Q: Will you teach me how to use the program?

A: Absolutely! Whether we are converting your existing site or building a new website for you with the CMS, we will bring you in for a brief training session to show you how to use it and give you a chance to ask any questions that you might have. We’ll also provide you with a packet of information you can take home and use as a reference when you’re working on your website.

Add a content management system to your website today!

Give your business a fresh start to 2011 with a content management system from Old City Web Services. We have affordable solutions to give you the latest technology you need to not just keep your business afloat, but motoring.

Call us today at 904-867-4112 or send an e-mail to letusmarketyou@oldcity.com.