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Tips, Tricks & Reviews

A blog dedicated to the WordPress community for designers and administrators

Adding the city name in URL to boost local SEO in that area

I disagree with Yoast’s assessment that putting the city name in a URL can have a negative impact on your customers. Unless you require customers to come to the business location to get a product or service, there is no harm. Maybe you’re a bakery with a physical storefront that people can walk into and purchase goods. If you deliver to nearby cities and not lying about the physical location there should be no downside to the user experience. A lot of grocery stores offer delivery to nearby neighborhoods. The trend of home delivery is ticking upwards and you can only benefit from it.

May 28, 2018 News, SEO

Yelp files formal complaint against Google

I find it pretty ironic that Yelp, of all companies, is advocating for user’s rights when it comes to Google’s local searches. What I would really like is if Yelp took a long hard look at its own policies. If you try to challenge a negative review, they just turn the other way. I’ve had issues in the past where clients of mine have been left with bad reviews. Reviews from customers that were unable to prove that they actually conducted business with my clients. I have no doubts that these reviews stem from competitors looking to damage the reputation of these businesses.

May 25, 2018 News

Google Home uses structured data to read aloud recipes

While I’m not a fan of voice assistants, I can’t deny their ever-growing popularity. It makes sense for Google to intertwine their assistant with search features. What’s more, is that I can see the value of a person in their kitchen searching for recipes and having the ingredients and/or steps read back to them. Since schema makes that possible, not only do you get the visual benefit in the search results but now also the advantage of being communicated verbally to searchers.

May 24, 2018 News

The power of using domain names for branding and marketing

I used to have the mindset that a business needs only one domain name to maximize its potential. I started to realize that if you want to market a particular product or service, a short domain can work wonders. Take for instance the domain precise.host. I registered it for the sole purpose of redirecting to our lengthy services page. With such a short name I can put it prominently on a business card without trying to cram it in. Since it is so short, it is easier to remember and can be quickly typed in.

May 23, 2018 News, Tips

Dealing with the blogging blues

Why you should quit blogging

Yep. I fell for the title. I thought the author’s post was going to be a holier-than-thou outlook on blogging. I’ve seen plenty of other articles with similar scolding titles. Reasons why you SHOULDN’T build an Amazon affiliate website comes to mind. It’s as if they’re saying, you can’t do this so don’t even try. Of course, you’ll only be successful if you can stick through the rough times. You also have to accept failure but not give up if that makes sense.

May 22, 2018 News, Tips

The context of internal links

When I talk to other website designers, they all understand the importance of SEO. A lot of them think that content and backlinks are the only really important factors when it comes to ranking for terms. They’re right in the sense that both of these things are crucial to achieving good rankings for targeted keywords. However, not too many value the other factors such as on-site optimization. This doesn’t just mean how well or fast a website performs for a visitor, but also how the content is structured.

May 21, 2018 News

Consumers will now be notified of business review responses for Google Reviews

I missed this announcement. Granted, it only happened a few days ago. The author of this article makes a great point. Now that notifications are going out to business owners, the expectations of a response by the consumer will surely increase. In the past, I’ve always looked at writing a review for a business as a way to show appreciation or to vent. I generally don’t like writing negative reviews unless the service or product was extremely unsatisfactory. This includes deceptive practices by the business or rude/uncaring staff.

May 18, 2018 News

Looking for hosting? Make sure cPanel is available

cPanel has made quite a name for themselves in the web hosting industry. From shared hosting to dedicated servers, their presence is almost assured on any reputable hosting company’s platform. I can’t imagine maintaining my clients’ websites without it. With so many features that make administration a lot easier than you’d think, it can sure save you a lot of headaches.

May 17, 2018 News, Tips

SE Ranking – Keyword Research at its Finest

Some of you have probably noticed the banner I’ve recently added for SE Ranking. Yes, I do have an affiliate tracking code attached to the link. And for the sake of transparency, the links in this post also have my affiliate code. However, I wouldn’t advertise any products or services that I don’t personally endorse. Over the past several months I’ve searched long and hard to find a toolset for SEO that is accurate and affordable. For a variety of reasons, after thoroughly testing a service, I wasn’t quite willing to pull the trigger and pony up for a subscription. […]

May 16, 2018 Reviews

Amazon releases text-to-speech plugin

This could be a very beneficial plugin for bloggers looking to reach a wider audience. Everyone knows how popular podcasts are. Usually, you have the ability to read transcripts of recorded podcasts. Now, it seems that this plugin can do the very opposite.

May 15, 2018 News