Erina, who was referred to LocalWebHub by a fellow food blogger and a satisfied customer, had presented the following requirements:

• Custom appearance, inspired by a collection of favorite features and preselected color combination
• Minimalistic clean and simple design with easy-to-read text
• Similarly-sized photos within the posts and featured thumbnails
• Ease of interacting with visitors
• Inter-connectivity with popular social networks – Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram
• Automated Recipe Index
• Search engine friendliness
• Integration with email marketing system
• Automated blog broadcast to subscribers, conforming with the CAN-SPAN regulations
• Fast loading pages for professional look and feel

LocalWebHub team put together a step-by-step migration plan and set up a redirect from the previous web site, making sure that all original articles and their respective links will continue to be active, while redirecting the visitors to the new location.  In addition LocalWebHub set up a blog broadcast email marketing campaign that sends out newsletter-style updates every time a new article is posted on the site.  Finally, our team conducted a training session on search engine optimization and best practices, to ensure that Erina’s articles will attract increasingly more attention from existing readers and search engine visitors alike.

LocalWebHub’s team enjoyed working with Erina and wish her continued and much deserved success as a food blogger and, as of  recently, a reality TV show contestant!

While reviewing the existing website we’ve discovered a number of significant flaws with the original design:

• The site relied heavily on Flash, making it invisible to all iOS devices (iPhone / iPad, etc.)
• Search engine visibility was ignored entirely, making it hard for search engines to index the content
• The proprietary platform on which the original site was hosted lacked control and flexibility, requiring significant expenses in making even the smallest changes to the design
• The site lacked social interaction
• The company’s blog was hosted separately on the Blogger network, lacking continuity and uniform design
• The site’s content was spread over two separate subdomains, further complicating search engine visibility and making it difficult to navigate

The client agreed with the assessment and the decision was made to move the site to a WordPress-based platform, addressing all of the shortcomings of the original design, while significantly reducing operating costs.

LocalWebHub team worked closely with the client in order to re-create the website to the client’s strict aesthetic and functional standards.  Here are some of the highlights of the finished product:

Front End:

• Custom-designed gallery slideshow built per exact specifications
• Custom fold-out front-page logo animation without the use of Flash
• Intuitive navigation and feel throughout all areas of the site
• Facebook and Twitter integration and interactivity features
• SEO-friendly design
• High-performance hosting coupled with performance-oriented design resulting in lightning-fast page loads despite their image-heavy nature

Back End:

• Talent management console allowing for entry and storage of three picture galleries per talent and video profiles
• Private searchable client database
• Feature-reach talent event calendar, allowing device synchronization and views based on specific talent, client or agency as a whole
• Industry-specific “package” creation utility, allowing quick composition, mailing and tracking of talent profiles to sent selected client(s)

Professional And Consistent Site Design

The static website was migrated to a modern content management system, powered by WordPress.  Local Web Hub Web Design provided and customized a “theme” based on the elements of the original design, which allowed integration of all the features requested by the client, while maintaining consistently-professional look across all areas of the website.

A custom “slider” was created for the front page of the website in order to highlight some of the services offered by the studio, while showcasing yoga sessions in-progress (images were provided by the studio owner).

Enhanced Functionality

One of the main goals of the site redesign was to allow the admittedly non-computer-friendly studio owner to modify and add new content to the website with ease, which was accomplished by the implementation of the content management system.  Here are some other requirements and highlights of this project:

• The design of the new website was taking place while the original website was up and running with virtually zero downtime.
• Simple and consistent site navigation
• Custom pricing table to highlight the offered services
• Integration of official company blog
• Social media integration: Facebook, Twitter
• Addition of Customer reviews section
• List of external resources where customers can find information about the studio: Yelp, Facebook, Foursquare
• Optimization of all available pages for search engine visibility based on targeted key phrases
• Integration of statistics and tracking
• …and more!  Please visit the site to see for yourself!

The project was completed and delivered on time and on the allotted budget.

Below are some of the highlights of the design requirements, implemented per customer request:

Modern Design For Galleri MDA

Galleri MDA is an established art gallery, based in Helsingborg, Sweden.  It is widely know for featuring very prominent European artists, such as Pablo Picasso, Salvador Dali and many many others, with frequent exhibitions across Europe.   The owner of the gallery requested a complete overhaul of the existing and outdated website, with an emphasis on search engine optimization and ease of management of the content.

Creating a professional presentation was crucial, as was integrating the functionality desired by the client.  In the image to your left you can see the screen capture taken of the old site, which you can compare to the current version designed by the LocalWebHub professionals.

Custom Featured Artists Slideshow On The Home Page

The custom “Featured Artists” slideshow visible on the homepage is designed to attract attention to the chosen subset of portfolios.  The simplistic and airy hover-over functionality was designed to the exact specifications of the client and is managed via a simple-to-use user interface .

Custom Navigation For Galleri MDA

Ease of access to the large number of hosted portfolios was one of the most important aspects of the design.  The  intuitively-alphabetized drop-down menus and animated sorting of the categories are some of the many custom-made features that contribute to seamless navigation and improved visitor experience.

Other Custom Functionality

Galleri MDA were very specific in both the design of the customer-facing front-end as well as the backend website management features. Here are some of the examples of customizations created specifically for this one-of-a-kind website:

• Creation of custom artwork classification attributes for sorting and display
• Multiple available views based on category
• Ability to feature the latest additions on the front page
• Separate sections for current and past exhibitions by GalleriMDA
• Google Maps integration and various contact forms for getting in touch with the Galleri MDA
• Native integration of Search Engine Optimization options for each piece of content
• Security and high performance with ultra-fast loading web pages
• …much much more! Please visit the site to see for yourself!

Why Google Places For Business Is Crucial?

Answer to this one is extremely important and instead of creating a lengthy explanation I want to simply show you an image:

What you see above is a screenshot of listings when I perform a search for “home remodeling company“. Since 2010 Google begun integrating multiple elements into their search results, such as maps with locations to relevant business, video, etc. but what is important for us is that Google Places for local business often displayed above Natural Search Results.

That means if you have even a semi-decent Google Place created in Google for free – you have a chance to rank very highly for your most desired keywords! Not only does it give more exposure to potential customers but also provides you with opportunity to get actual calls with request for service!

While Optimizing Google Place listing is actually quite an extensive topic in itself as it has many “technical details” that goes way beyond this article, I want to help you get started with basics.

Claim Your Google Place Listing

Google provides it for your business FREE and yet, simple check reveals large number of local businesses fail to take advantage of it! So let’s discuss how to use it to YOUR advantage!

1. You need to have a Google Account in order to claim your Google Places listing, so if you don’t have one – create it for free and once logged in – proceed to next step.

2. Search For your business name or main phone number, chances are – your listing already exists. Once you have located your business you will have couple options, depending if you already have any reviews or not, click on what applies to your listing, see image below:

Once you arrive to actual Google Place listing and assuming you haven’t verified ownership yet, you need to click on “Business Owner?” link provided in top right corner.

3. On next step you are presented with several options, choose “Edit my business information.” and click “Continue” button to proceed to next screen. I will do my best to provide you with relevant information here to help you:

Fill in all appropriate fields, important that you use your correct business name. Use description to explain what you provide while using your main keywords.

Categories: First category has to be chosen from one provided by Google and you need to find one that is most targeted for you business. Google also provides you with option to add 4 more categories of your choice to explain services provided, be sure to use them all and include your main keywords in each. Important note – category should be about Who You Are, not what What you do!

In next sections be sure to provide correct information on Service Location, Hours of Operation, Payment Options. Don’t skip anything!

4. Images and Video.

These are very important so please be sure to upload up to 10 images and URL’s up to 5 videos. I like to use first image that includes your phone number but Google frequently changes it to some other image after initial listing, so it might not have too much of an impact although creates nice visual presentation to visitors If you don’t have any videos or images you can edit your Google Place later and add them, once you have it.

5. Google Places Additional Details

This section is most under-used by most business and what we personally like to add here are links to other sites where our business can be found with reviews, such as your Facebook Page, Yelp listing, any other industry specific review sites:

Once you completed – click Submit button.

Verify Your Google Maps Location Listing

Changes to your listing will not be visible until you actually verify that you are the owner and once you click Submit in previous section you should be sent to a page with options to Verify your listing. Most common is via Postcard to your business address. Select this option and Google will send you postcard, generally within 7-10 days you should receive it.

Once you receive you Postcard login back into Google Places and proceed with verification as shown below:

This action verifies you as business owner and allows you to edit your Google Place as well as track some statistics provided for free.

Google Places and Local SEO

It is important to note that if you complete this tutorial – you will have a nice and fairly optimized Google Small business listing but I can only cover basics in form of the tutorial.

In order to get better local SEO rankings there is much more that has to be done, which is well beyond the scope of this article:

• Your website search engine optimization to correlate to your Google Paces listing – without it you will be hard pressed to rank high!
• Number of business citations across multiple web properties
• Proper optimization of images and video prior to adding them to your Google Place listing
• Marketing analysis of your competition Google Places listing in order to beat them for the position
• Keyword research and optimization not only of your places listing but also website.
• Link building campaign to correlate to your listing
• And much much more, which can be a separate topic of discussion for each

If you are interested in getting your own small business ranking high for Local Searches I suggest you take a look at some of the packages we provide, even a basic Local SEO will help you beat many competitors!

Evaluate Your Options

Search Engine Positioning Video

While this video provides you with details necessary to understand the importance of search engine positioning for you own site it is a simple presentation.

If you would like to learn how your site is currently ranked, get some additional training video tutorials, please visit our local seo page and access more video guides or just contact us for a free report on how your site currently ranks.

U.S. Commerce Association’s Award Plaque Honors the Achievement

NEW YORK, NY, December 5, 2011 — Alyans LLC – Small Business Internet Marketing has been selected for the 2011 Best of Virginia Beach Award in the Miscellaneous General Business Services category by the U.S. Commerce Association (USCA).

The USCA “Best of Local Business” Award Program recognizes outstanding local businesses throughout the country. Each year, the USCA identifies companies that they believe have achieved exceptional marketing success in their local community and business category. These are local companies that enhance the positive image of small business through service to their customers and community.

Various sources of information were gathered and analyzed to choose the winners in each category. The 2011 USCA Award Program focuses on quality, not quantity. Winners are determined based on the information gathered both internally by the USCA and data provided by third parties.

About U.S. Commerce Association (USCA)

U.S. Commerce Association (USCA) is a New York City based organization funded by local businesses operating in towns, large and small, across America. The purpose of USCA is to promote local business through public relations, marketing and advertising.

The USCA was established to recognize the best of local businesses in their community. Our organization works exclusively with local business owners, trade groups, professional associations, chambers of commerce and other business advertising and marketing groups. Our mission is to be an advocate for small and medium size businesses and business entrepreneurs across America.

SOURCE: U.S. Commerce Association

CONTACT:
U.S. Commerce Association
Email: PublicRelations@uscaaward.com
URL: http://www.uscaaward.com

Portfolio - EverydayMaven.com

Result – The blog attracted over a hundred Facebook and Pinterest followers in the first several hours after becoming public.  It has also scored 1st, 2nd and 3rd listings for its keywords on Google after the first week.

Note: only 6 latest versions kept as backup and as time goes by – oldest gets overwritten.

But before we will discuss how to recover your content – I want to talk about Preview feature available with each and every site that allows you to actually see how your page or post will look like before it is published.

Using Preview Feature

As you create your post or page you can see what latest saved version will look like on your website. To manually save content before doing preview simply click “Save Draft” button on right hand site, as shown in image below:

Or as mentioned above – it will be auto saved every 180 seconds. Now you can actually preview your page by clicking “Preview Post” or “Preview Page” link available above new content you are creating. I recommend you right click and choose to open either in new window or new tab, depending on what browser you are using:

If you like what you see- simply continue to edit or add new content but if something happened and you page or post doesn’t look right – you have an options to recover older version, in very simple way.

Recovering Content From Autosave

Below all the option available to you when creating or editing page r post you will find Revisions widget that contains list of all 6 latest revisions of your content (in image you only see 2 that exist for the post I’m currently working on):

This list is actually hyper links that leads to a page, when clicked will provide you with a list of revisions, options to compare different versions by selecting old and new and ability to restore revision you need by simply clicking restore, as shown in image below:

Very simple and effective way to recover you work. In most of the cases this list of revisions will also contain saves from previous date, if you are editing existing content and would allow you to easily recover it.