Beauty has always been in the eye of the beholder, except when it comes to websites.
For business owners beauty is always ROI that can be measured and defined. It used to be that great content and design were enough. Today new factors determine a website’s success. Here are some free tools to measure the 4 critical components of Great Websites.
2017 high ranking websites must-haves:
:: Strong performance
:: Mobile optimization
:: Search engine optimization (SEO)
:: SSL security enabled
First Step – The Hubspot Website Grader
Start by checking out how strong your website is in terms of the above four areas … and what to do about it with Hubspot’s Website Grader.
I also heartily recommend Hubspot’s Marketing Grader which measures the marketing effectiveness of a website and provides an inbound marketing score incorporating website traffic, SEO, the blogosphere and social media. It also provides some basic advice on how your website can be improved from a marketing perspective and how your site fares against the competition.
Second Step – Is Your Site Mobile Friendly?
Find out. Take Google’s Mobile Friendly Test now.
Mobile is changing the world. In the US, 94% of people with smartphones search for local information on their phones. 65% of email gets opened on a mobile device before a desktop computer. Surprisingly, 77% of mobile searches occur at home or at work, places where desktop computers are likely to be present.
You absolutely need a mobile-friendly website. Reason #1. Google. To much fanfare last April, Google Search expanded its use of mobile-friendliness as a ranking signal. Websites that aren’t deemed “mobile friendly” by Google’s own analysis tool will fall lower in search rankings than those that do.
The fall in rankings only affects searches done on mobile phones and not tablets or desktop computers. But almost half of all Google searches now come from mobile devices, so this could have a significant impact.
Responsive design is Google’s recommended design pattern. When a website is responsive, the layout and/or content adapts based on the size of the screen it’s presented on. A responsive website automatically changes to fit the device you’re reading it on.
Third Step – SEO
93% of online experiences start with a search engine.
Search engine optimization is key to getting found online today. People make billions of unique searches each month and unlike Facebook flittering, those people are in focus mode. In other words, compared with most Internet traffic, searchers are the most motivated people to hit your site.
Hubspot reports that of the 26,093 websites they measured, scores for SEO were remarkably low. They recommend website owners perform an audit of their websites, seeking out and addressing missing page titles, heading tags, and meta descriptions.
For your SEO needs, do contact us so we can help you achieve your online goals. Our search engine marketing services are quoted based on the campaign size, competition, and current rankings.
“If a customer-focused content marketing program is the sandwich, then SEO is the mayonnaise. It touches nearly everything and enhances the overall flavor of the sandwich, but on its own, it’s not very appetizing!” – Lee Oden, toprankblog.com
Fourth Step – SSL Security
Hubspot strongly recommends that your content management system such as WordPress have SSL capabilities enabled. For Google security is also a top priority. “We hope to see more websites using HTTPS in the future. Let’s all make the web more secure!”, they note.
– By Marcia Coffey
Find Marcia on Google+
Call Marcia at 561.906.3436