We are proud to announce that we have been named one of the top digital marketing, SEO and branding companies in the greater Tampa area by Clutch! Clutch is a trusted B2B ratings and reviews firm that evaluates regional top-performing companies based on services offered, client feedback, work quality and market presence.

We at Webtivity Marketing & Design strive to always deliver top quality service to all of our clients and inquirers alike. This service centered focus began with our founding in 1999 and has been the cornerstone of our internal company compass as well as the raison d’etre of our success!

Although we don’t do it for the recognition it gives us great pleasure to see others recognize our customer centric approach to digital marketing.

Give us a call at 941-753-7574 or contact us for more information on how we can work closely with you to help your business achieve all of your digital marketing goals!

The post Webtivity Named One of The Top Digital Marketing Companies in the Tampa Bay Area appeared first on Webtivity Marketing & Design News.

We all want to be at the top of a Google search. The closer to the top of a Google search you are, the more customers will be able to find your business. Luckily, there are some ways to boost your Google ranking, thus increasing web traffic to your site.

Adding a Secure Sockets Layer (SSL)

Google has been talking about this for a while. We all want to shop and surf the internet safely. One of the best things you can do to increase your ranking on google is to get an SSL certificate added. Google recently announced that July 2018 will be that date that for all unsecured sites, Chrome will display a warning label of “not secure” in the address bar. This is a sure fire way to get people not only to not use your site, but to have google not promote your site as well. More than 50% of internet users use chrome for their browser.

Source: StatCounter Global Stats – Browser Version Market Share

Get a Mobile Website

More than 50% of internet users are using a mobile device in the last 12 months! Only 44% used desktops, and less than 5% used tablets. You are losing potential business if your site isn’t mobile friendly. Making your site mobile friendly will not only boost your google ranking, but will improve users’ experience. When people are making the buying decision, more often than not they’re using a mobile device. Currently, desktop and mobile search results on Google are indexed together. Google recently said that soon they will be moving sites to a “mobile-first index”. While they won’t say exactly when, it is coming.

Source: StatCounter Global Stats – Platform Comparison Market Share

Blogging

Google wants to see that your site is not only dynamic, but that it is updated often. This is easily done though publishing blog posts. Regularly updating your site with blog posts will not only increase your Google ranking, but by putting out this new content, it will draw customers back to your site.

Link Building

Link building takes time, so it’s important to start your link building work when your website is launched. Google wants to see your site build these links naturally, over time. This can be accomplished through social media, guest blogging, press releases, and link exchanges to name a few. And while results don’t happen automatically, Google does notice!

Contact the Experts

Webtivity Marketing and Design has been providing digital marketing services since 1999. From link building, to blogging, to website design and digital advertising, we do it all. Have we mentioned that we are a Certified Google Partner Agency? Give us a call at 941-753-7574 or contact us for more information on how we can work closely with you to help your business achieve all of your goals!

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The advent of the social media era on the internet marked a new age in business client relationship management. Not only could businesses big and small directly interact with clients and potential clients but they could, most of the time at no additional cost, generate leads off of platforms they paid no fee to use. This was unheard of in the digital arena long dominated by paid for listing professional directory listings to generate business. Facebook, and consequently, the Facebook News Feed kicked off this new avenue in true digital fashion; that is overnight with little to no warning for businesses to prepare.

Facebook has dropped another bombshell on the business community. It is estimated that up to 94% of all businesses use social media, 60 million on Facebook alone. Small business owners who often have smaller than average profit margins to meet flocked to this readily available method to generate leads for little to no cost. Facebook, Instagram, Google Plus, Twitter and other social media platforms represent a quick and easy way to reach former, current and potential clients directly while demonstrating your commitment to customer service in a public forum.

The Purpose of the Facebook News Feed Changes

Being on top is not always advantageous however as Facebook has recently learned. By nature, social media content is cloud sourced as well as community reinforced. It only takes a few unscrupulous advertisers or businesses to target misleading or erroneous content to known vulnerable communities to have content, news in this case, spread with little to factual background. Facebook, being the biggest social media platform by far, has been the most susceptible to this type of false information attacks. Accusations have gone as far as to blame Facebook for swaying democratic elections in some of the world’s oldest democracies.

Facebook responded to these concerns on January 11^th 2018 with several planned changes to the Facebook News Feed. The Facebook News Feed is the main way users interact with Facebook as it lists the posts Facebook determines to be most interesting to you when you open your Facebook app or page on a computer. It has seen several updates in the past but the new announced changes will change the way it fundamentally operates in regards to separating businesses and personal pages.

CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, described the new changes as shifting away “…from focusing on helping you find relevant content to helping you have more meaningful social interactions.” The details on the implementation of this new Facebook News Feed update are still far and few in between but the stated goal is to shift Facebook content away from all pages and users having similar weight in terms of appearing on the Facebook Feed to more priority given to personal pages.

Changes Thus Far

What we’ve seen thus far is a noticeable decrease in Facebook Business page reach and video watch times. This has carried on to less Facebook referrals to client websites probably due to loss of user content interaction. Facebook business pages that are newer seem to be more affected than their more established counterparts. This might be due to more consideration given to pages Facebook considers “trusted” by users which are usually pages with a large user following and a higher rate of post interactions.

Future Expectations

Based on the overall goal of the new Facebook News Feed changes there are several effects we can predict in this upcoming year. Viral pages will see their view shares drop more in the future. Small businesses whose pages are new with a few likes will see their already small Facebook interaction rate drop even further. Videos will have less of an effect than they have in the past at garnering user attention. For those established small businesses with high interaction rates we can expect that their posts will see more likes as they stay on users’ news feeds for longer periods of time.

Free Ways to Minimize News Feed Effects on Your Business Page

What do you do when your small business’ user intake funnel drops? Capitalize on those users who you already attract. There is no better time than now to spruce up your business’ Facebook page. Add widgets, customize the call to action button, add more pictures, and respond to user posts/reviews promptly. Earn your current users’ trust so that they in turn are more likely to recommend you to their friends. This has the added benefit of increasing your Facebook “trust” score as well.

Paid Ways to Minimize News Feed Effects on Your Business Page

 Facebook Ads have never been more important than now. The first thing businesses should do is ensure that they have a current interactive audience that is interested in their services that they can target. This can be accomplished quickly by launching a Facebook Like campaign. This is critical as all other Ad campaigns ran through the Facebook platform will depend on the size of this initial audience. Small businesses especially are vulnerable to having a smaller than ideal audience size.

As Facebook Ad revenue grows so does the tools it provides advertisers to use in their goal to generate more qualified leads. A shrewd advertiser should be taking advantage of all the aspects Facebook provides to reduce spending while simultaneously increasing profits. The Facebook Pixel, custom audience development, engagement ads, and website conversion campaigns are just a few of the tools now in your arsenal as an advertiser to assure a more successful ad campaign.

Consult the Experts

Show me someone who tells you that they know the entire extent of these new Facebook News Feed changes, and I will show you a liar. The fact of the matter is that the Facebook News Feed algorithm is a complicated beast that only Facebook truly knows how to manipulate. Take this same algorithm and add a major change to it and you have absolute turmoil. This is where it becomes important to have a competent trusted source of information of not only what is transpiring but how to adjust to the changes as well to minimize negative effects, and maximize their positive counterparts.

Webtivity Marketing & Design has been offering digital marketing services since 1999 with a strong focus on personal service. A point of view we found severely lacking in the online digital world. We specialize in providing a complete solution to all digital needs for small to medium as well as large business enterprises.

We are a Certified Google Partner Agency, winner of the Manatee Small Business of the Year Award, and other accolades.

Give us a call at 941-753-7574 or email Tim for more information on how we can work closely with you to help your business achieve all of your goals!

The post What Small Businesses Can Expect from the Facebook News Feed Changes appeared first on Webtivity Marketing & Design News.

Webtivity Designs recommends that ALL webmasters or site owners upgrade their websites with an SSL certificate.

An SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) certificate is a digital certificate that authenticates the identity of a website and encrypts information sent to the server using SSL technology.

SSL is essential for protecting your website, even if it doesn’t handle sensitive information like credit cards. It provides privacy, critical security and data integrity for both your websites and your users’ personal information.

This increased protection has not gone unnoticed by search engines. Starting in 2015 Google has slowly but surely increased the importance of having an SSL certificate to its search rankings. We fully expect the rest of the big three, Yahoo and Bing, to follow Google’s lead.

This is outlined on the Google Webmaster Blog.

This is a rare but incredible break in normal Google practices of never commenting on search ranking factors. They did not stop there with their pursuit of a more secure user experience. Recently the Google Chrome browser began showing a “Not Secure” warning on any webpage without an SSL that collects user data.

Where can you get an SSL Certificate? Webtivity currently offers SSL Certificates as well as installation and maintenance for a nominal fee. Certificates must be renewed every year to remain valid. We can provide a free estimate on the cost of the whole process.

If you do not go through us GoDaddy also offers SSL Certificates. Please note however that they do not offer installation or renewal services, just a certificate.

A key requirement of an SSL Certificate is a dedicated IP. This means a website has its own IP address. Typing in the URL of the website or its IP address would bring you to the same website. This has the added benefit of speeding up the loading time of your website further positively influencing SEO rankings.

Webtivity is here to guide you through this process regardless of which provider you use. We highly recommend that ALL of our clients upgrade their websites to this security level. This goes double for current SEO clients.

Please feel free to send any questions or concerns our way via email or phone call at: (941) 753-7574

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Why do online reviews matter?

You already know that online reviews are feedback left by past customers on websites, but why should you even pay attention to them? There are hundreds of reasons why online reviews make a powerful online marketing tool. Most important of all is customer relationship management. Client satisfaction is the cornerstone of the success of any business venture regardless of its size.

Before online reviews there were testimonials, an affidavit of a business’s quality of service.  In today’s fast paced internet world most people (91%) regularly or occasionally read online reviews. Online reviews have become the new word-of-mouth communication tool for customers among each other.

Search engines that cater to these very same customers have noticed how much emphasis users place on reviews. Therefore, they have enacted algorithm changes to the way they present search results to favor better reviewed websites. Online reviews are invaluable to Search Engine Optimization, especially to small businesses.

Top 5 best online review websites

If you are a small local business, like Webtivity!, you don’t have a huge amount of resources to begin with. Let your friendly local web design marketing company make mastering your online reviews game a whole lot easier. Here is a list of the top five online review websites you should be focusing most of your efforts on:

• Google – Head on over to Google My Business and claim your profile if you haven’t already done so. Google the biggest search engine on earth now includes your business’s ranking within search engine result pages.
• Facebook – Facebook has its own review section for your business’s Facebook page. This ranking is now included in the Google Business Pack as well.
• Yelp – Yelp is the next contender. It receives over 145 million unique visitors on a monthly basis!
• Yellow Pages – This old classic is still favored by millions as their go-to business research landing page. This fact does not look to be changing, as they are position themselves as an online marketing service provider.
• Bing Places – Microsoft’s answer to Google My Business this powerful review engine is not to be ignored. This is the second most popular search engine after Google, and yes, it does indeed include ratings as part of its rankings calculation.

How can I ask customers to leave online reviews?

You understand how important online reviews are to your local business’s success, but how do you get or encourage clients to leave those reviews? There are several ways to encourage clients to leave reviews.

The easiest approach is after a sale is made or a service is provided. This is when the customer has your business fresh in their minds; they understand the benefit your business has provided so they are more likely to make the effort to leave a review. Strike while the iron is hot so to speak.

To acquire reviews indirectly, businesses have employed feedback cards, QR codes, emails, and even phone calls to encourage clients to leave reviews. When suggesting to a client to leave a review, remember to focus on one or two of the major sites we previously mentioned where you need reviews the most.

How do I track online reviews?

Now that your business has started receiving reviews how do you keep track of all the various review sites? There are various solutions out there but they cost money. If you currently have a search engine optimization partner managing your digital marketing efforts, give Webtivity a look (hint shameless plug).

If you are more of the do-it-yourself kind of person, look into setting up a Google Alert on your branded name. For example for us that would be “Webtivity Marketing and Designs”.  You’ll be notified any time your business is mentioned online.

Another nifty online tool for review management is Social Mention. They will track a variety of social media platforms for mentions of your branded name as mentioned above. It is free and it allows you to set up email alerts for specific keywords.

It bears mentioning that none of these tools beat regular manual checking of your listings on the review sites we mentioned earlier.

How do I handle negative reviews?

Just like positive reviews, you should strive to respond to each and every negative review. There are several guidelines you should follow however to ensure you do not make an already bad situation worse. You will only serve to alienate the customer and anyone else who reads that review.

Do not write anything argumentative or even defensive. Instead seek to resolve the customer’s issue as fast and as directly as possible. Reach out with a message offering to help solve the difficulty this client had with your product or service.

If the issue is resolved, ask the client to update their review, most happy clients will. If they do not respond your response should act as a great signal to potential customers that you care about client satisfaction.

Finally, bury negative reviews with positive ones. Redouble your efforts to acquire more reviews to balance out the negative reviews. Most clients looking for reviews will only pay attention to the final business review standing.

3 biggest mistakes small businesses make with online reviews

• Not being responsive – The easiest way to lose potential clients, and subsequently search engine rankings, is by not being responsive to your online review platforms. Strive to have a 100% score on thanking all reviewers, as well as asking them for more feedback. In other words, reviews represent a unique opportunity to directly engage your clientele.
• Combative responses – Even worse than being non-responsive, is responding in a negative and combative manner. This signals to users that whoever is managing this business is not a mature individual. A lack of tact can ruin any business.
• Self or fraudulent reviews – This is the biggest no-no since no-nos were invented. You should never engage in this unethical practice. Review platforms have gotten sophisticated enough to be able to track false reviews. This earns a negative mark for your business and sinks your already floundering reputation even lower.

If I leave you with one thing…

Engage, engage, and engage. Please do not disregard the online review marketplace as a non-issue in your marketing efforts. Make sure your business is taking advantage of this free source of direct client to business engagement opportunity.

If you are ready to make the first step give us a call at (941) 753-7574 or schedule a quick conversation with Tim!

For more facts about online reviews check out this awesome infrographic from our friends over at invespcro:

Infographic by- Invesp

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TECHXPO HOSTED BY Manatee Chamber of Commerce

On November 3rd, the Manatee Chamber of Commerce will host the 2016 TechXpo at their Lakewood Ranch Office at the McClure Center 4215 Concept Court.

The Techxpo will feature an all-star lineup of local technology experts including Webtivity’s very own Terry Thompson, who will help business owners, managers, and in-house IT staff gain the knowledge they need in order to stay apprised of technology that can help their businesses grow and prosper.

Terry will be a participant in the Web Essentials Panel Discussion, an open forum to help answer questions you may have regarding best practices on web design, search engine optimization, tips / tricks / plug-ins to make your site stand out, and help your clients and customers have an outstanding online experience with you.

The schedule of events is as follows.

9:00 AM – 9:20 AM
Networking and mingling with local IT experts

technology experts

9:20 AM – 9:50 AM
Social and Mobile Computing

9:55 AM – 10:25 AM
Web Essentials Panel Discussion

10:30 AM – 10:50 AM
Disaster Preparedness & Recovery

10:55 AM – 11:25 AM
IT Security & Your Business

11:30 AM – 12:00 PM
Questions and Answers

Tickets are:

$28 – Manatee Chamber Members and Manatee Young Professionals
$38 – Non-Members and Guests

Enter our coupon code Webtivity to save $5.00 on admission.

Register here.

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