Going Mobile to Boost Your Business Visibility
You would not believe the number of websites I come across when I’m out in Milwaukee or Brookfield that are not optimized for mobile viewing! I come across websites when I’m looking up a restaurant’s menu or a quiet place to have dinner with my girlfriend that are not easily viewed on smartphones or the smaller tablets that are hitting the market today.
Think about it – what if your businesses’ website was optimized for mobile viewing? What’s the return on the investment? Think about the people that have money to spend at bars and restaurants – and I’m not talking college students here. Baby boomers that are older and have a hard time seeing (and sometimes using :-P) smartphones with small font. What if someone from that demographic was looking for a place to eat, came across your website, but couldn’t read it because it was not optimized for mobile viewing? You just lost a customer, and potentially a $50-$75 table depending on your venue.
Mobile optimization is relatively mainstream now, and costs very little, sometimes only a couple hundred dollars, to implement. I’ve done super simple websites for bars and restaurants in Milwaukee! A couple of pages, a photo gallery and a contact form with some social media integration – that’s all it takes to grab a potential customer’s attention. If 20 more customers visited your establishment in a month just because you had a website that made it easy to view your happy hour and other specials, would you invest?
Michael Damico creates beautifully designed websites for several industries in the Wauwatosa, Brookfield, West Allis, Greenfield, Glendale, Mequon, Brookfield area.
Want a website designer in Milwaukee or Waukesha?
If you wanted to build your own website, would you want it to look like countless other sites all over the Web? That' what you get with most services like Wix, or templates from GoDaddy.
Most big website design firms provide sites that all look the same. Website design is an art, and a good site should have a personal touch that makes it memorable. That's what you will get with my websites. By adding a touch of personality and working closely with you, I can design a site for you that will help you stand out from your competition.
Contact me today to find out more about my website design services.
Landscaping Websites in Wauwatosa, Brookfield
Spring is right around the bend, and requests for landscaping websites are pouring in! The common trend of all of the inquiries from business owners is, 'What do you need from me to make a great looking website?' The requirements are the same for small and large landscaping companies who want a website designed.
Landscaping Services
Landscaping and IT/Web work are a lot of like. Generally speaking, a landscaping company can do just about every service, but has some specialties they prefer whether it's because they get a better return on those jobs, or because those jobs are recurring (think lawn maintenance, trimming). In order to leverage your ranking on search engines, be sure to list your core services that you want to promote on your website. Written content that is keyword rich helps, but recurring posts on social media outlets about landscaping trends will help boost your ratings (see my article 2014 - The Year of Content Marketing)
Project Portfolio
Statistically speaking, the most requests for landscaping services come after a website visitor has viewed the companies project portfolio or photo gallery. Once prospective customers see images of the past work that the company has done, the more inclined they are to contact the landscaping company for work. Be sure to take plenty of pictures of before and after projects to be used in a rotating image gallery. Consider a couple of pictures of your crew actually performing the jobs.
Free Estimates
A free estimate form is a great way for a potential client to get a feel for what it will cost them for landscaping services. This form can be as simple as a contact form they will fill out with information required for the company to get in touch. Some companies prefer to have complete forms that a lead can fill out that describes the services they are interested in, the approximate square footage of the area in question, as well as the number of trees they want trimmed. This paints a clear picture for the landscaping company, so they can provide an accurate quote for the work to be done.
eCommerce Websites in Wisconsin 2014 - The Year of Entrepreneurship
2014 is the year of entrepreneurship!
It's never been easier to get a professionally designed eCommerce website or mobile shopping website for your company or brand. I recently launched TheMiniClassy, a Milwaukee based start-up that sells chic styles of harems and shirts for kids. Their request was to have a simple, elegant looking website that was easy to navigate, and it had to have a shopping cart embedded that could show several pictures of their products. I took it a step further and made the website responsive. Now they could tweet about new products, and people following them could make purchases right from their smartphone. They've sold product all over the world!
You don't need to be a huge corporate entity to have an eCommerce website!
I have several friends that design jewelry, make clothes, write custom music, and even bake delicious sweets for others to enjoy. The common theme among them? They are all small businesses or sole proprietors that had an idea to market something they were good at. They took the next step and started selling their products online!
Simple setup, one and done!
The neat thing about eCommerce stores today is that they are incredibly simple to setup and manage. There are a lot of big name competitors out there that will charge you a monthly fee for your eCommerce store AND take a percentage of the sales that you make. The stores that I have designed for friends and small businesses in the Milwaukee and Wisconsin area don't have those monthly fees, and I certainly don't charge for each sale on your website. After a couple of meetings you'll be up and running with a new eCommerce website!
Get in touch with me at 262-366-8950, fill out this contact form, or This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Michael Damico provides website design, custom web development, and other web related services to individuals and small businesses in the Greater Milwaukee & Wisconsin area. Other ventures include business intelligence development using SQL Server Reporting Services, Music and Content Marketing. Other interests include Tennis, Hiking, Swimming and Music
2014 - The Year of Content Marketing
SEO is dead. The competition for keywords has grown incredibly fierce, and now more than ever business is becoming increasingly local.
Years ago keywords, meta tags, browser titles and H1 tags were the hottest thing for your website to climb the search engine ladder to the first page. The advent of social media changed the entire landscape for website ranking for the foreseeable future.
2014 will be the year of relevant content, one of the driving factors for bringing visitors to your site. This, blended with a carefully crafted social media presence with rich content, will drive your website back to the top of your favorite search engines first page.
For retailers this could be a sign of relief. The more chatter about their brand, the more positive reviews and people sharing their experiences across social media, the better. Retailers have it easy. B2C markets have always been relatively easy to market to, especially for the bare essential services that we all need; food, clothing, etc.
What about B2B marketing? Where will businesses who are trying to market to other businesses be left? This is one thing that some businesses that I’ve done websites for struggle with. How does a company that offers landscaping services to other businesses get the word out about their brand?
Traditional advertising and marketing are still key tools that businesses need to leverage in order to gather new leads and generate new business. They should also learn to use social media in a way that helps their customer base with simple ideas and solutions for everyday problems.
Take the landscaping company from the example above. In order to help generate new leads and drive traffic to their website, the company should continually blog on their website and link from social media accounts to their website. Additionally, ‘Free’ whitepapers help prove they are the expert on the topic.
A website is like a garden, and you have to care for it regularly with fresh content that keeps search engines coming back for more. By doing this, your reach to consumers will continue to climb. Consider creating a video and introduce your company and team to potential customers.