Blog - Kombi Media

The importance of Meta data and SEO

Your website contains a variety of meta data that is important to both the users experience and the way in which search engines view your website. This data should form the basis of your website search engine optimisation.

The Meta Title is possibly the most important piece of information a web page contains, it is used in a number of ways including at the top of the browser window, as the tab title, when a user bookmarks your page, by social media when a page is shared or linked to and by search engines in search results.

The Meta Title should describe the page with a keyword rich unique sentence including the website title in no more that 10 words, words can be separated by a hyphen (-) if needed. For example a e-commerce shop selling books may use "Paperback fiction books from xyz.com"

To update a pages meta title in your Kombi Meida control panel once logged in you need to:

1) click on the pages link in the menu
2) Find the page in the list and click the Edit Advanced link
3) Enter your text into the Meta Title field
4) Click the update button at the bottom of the page

Each product can also have a unique Meta Title, to update a products meta title in your control panel once logged in you need to:

1) click on the View Products link in the menu
2) Find the product in the list and click the Edit link
3) Enter your text into the Meta Title field
4) Click the update product button at the bottom of the page

Meta Keywords are not seen by the user but are sometimes used by search engines along with other text on a web page to assertion the content of the page. You should write a list of up to 20 words related to the content and subject of the page that you think people would use to search for your content.

To update a pages meta keywords in your Kombi Meida control panel once logged in you need to:

1) click on the pages link in the menu
2) Find the page in the list and click the Edit Advanced link
3) Enter your text into the Meta keywords field
4) Click the update button at the bottom of the page

Each product can also have a unique set of Meta Keywords, to update a products meta keywords in your control panel once logged in you need to:

1) click on the View Products link in the menu
2) Find the product in the list and click the Edit link
3) Enter your text into the Meta Keywords field
4) Click the update product button at the bottom of the page

The Meta Description is second only to the Meta Title, it can be displayed by search engines in search results under the page title if is is deemed relevant to your page content. The description should be unique and approx. 155 Characters in length.

To update a pages meta description in your Kombi Meida control panel once logged in you need to:

1) click on the pages link in the menu
2) Find the page in the list and click the Edit Advanced link
3) Enter your text into the Meta description field
4) Click the update button at the bottom of the page

Each product can also have a unique Meta description, to update a products meta description in your control panel once logged in you need to:

1) click on the View Products link in the menu
2) Find the product in the list and click the Edit link
3) Enter your text into the Meta Description field
4) Click the update product button at the bottom of the page

The page headings are also important, they are normally displayed at the top of each web page above any other content although different designs use them in different ways. The main H1 heading should reflect the page content in the same way as the Meta Title and give a overview of the purpose of the page.

Each heading should be a short unique sentence that ideally is displayed on one line and should included your main keyword for the page.

To update a pages heading in your Kombi Meida control panel once logged in you need to:

1) click on the pages link in the menu
2) Find the page in the list and click the Edit Advanced link
3) Enter your text into the H1 field
4) Click the update button at the bottom of the page

Each product can also have a unique heading, to update a products heading in your control panel once logged in you need to:

1) click on the View Products link in the menu
2) Find the product in the list and click the Edit link
3) Enter your text into the title field
4) Click the update product button at the bottom of the page

please contact us If you would like more information or advice on search engine optimisation.

Five ways to attract website users

Building a great looking website for your business does not guarantee any users will visit it or that the website will convert visits into sales or leads if no users (or the wrong user base) are finding the website.

Some website owners become disappointed with their website’s performance and ROI (Return On Investment) because they fail to understand that once a website is live, the job of marketing the website really begins. Luckily there are lots of ways to attract the attention of users within any given vertical..

We have compiled five basic principles of marketing a website with the view to increasing hits from a targeted group of users.

1) Content / Link Bait

The most important part of any website is the content; this could be product information, a description of your services or a blog. When adding content to your website you should think about what a user would want to know. Think about what you look for when looking at similar websites and how you would go about finding that information.

2) Search Engine Optimisation

Once you have good quality content on the website, you can think about how to optimise each page to get the best results in search engines. This is a massive topic that requires research and analysis of individual websites, but at the basic level you should ensure your content includes words and phrases to allow your website to appear in search engine results for when these keywords are searched for. You should also make sure each page on the website has a unique meta title, meta description and set of meta keywords that relate to the content of the page.

Remember to choose your words carefully and think about a mix of popular words that users will search for and less popular words that may have a smaller amount of searches but with which you may stand a higher chance of ranking well for if less websites are targeting them.

3) Social Media

Social media can be a very powerful tool to use but requires an investment in time to get results. If you don’t think you have the time to invest then it may be worth not having a social media presence; after all a Twitter feed with no updates is more damaging to a brand than no feed at all.

If you do have the time to invest in social media then think about what platforms you would like to target and how they can complement each other. Users very quickly notice if you just repeat the same comments over multiple platforms, so try to tailor your posts to each set of users.

Try to post comments regularly and where possible include links to content on your website as well as images and videos when you can.

4) Link Building

Link building is a foundation of attracting targeted users to your website and should be a regular task. You can gain links to your website in multiple ways including swapping links with other websites in the same vertical and writing guest posts on blogs. You should aim to only get links from websites with a similar theme so that the visits you get are from users interested in your content and ensure the website is of good quality so your link is not considered spam.

An excellent way of quickly building links is to sign up your website to business listings websites. Some will be free but others may charge; think about if your business is location based or if you can target more national customers.

5) Advertising

Advertising both on-line and off-line can take many forms; from the basic adverts placed on website using services such as Google Ad Words, to campaigns including print adverts with landing pages created on your website. Remember to promote your website on your stationary and to tell people about it at networking meetings.

If you have any questions about the concepts in the article or would like advice on what you can do to increase visits to your website please contact us.

New Cookie Law

As of the 26th May 2012 all UK websites using cookies to track users data will be required to make users aware of this fact and ideally link to further information about their use on your website.

How do I know if my website uses cookies?

The vast majority of websites use cookies in some way to pass information about a user from one web page to another or to track usage.

Examples of cookie use:

Google Analytics or similar statistics packages to track visitors
Advertising on your website such as Google Ad Words
Shopping Carts
Any areas that users are required to log into with a username and password

What do I need to do?

If you are using cookies you need to make the user aware you are using cookies and display information about what they are and why you use them.

You should:

1) Clearly display a link to a privacy policy on your website that sets out how you use cookies and what users should do if they do not wish to be tracked.

2) Display a message on your website each time a new user views your website to tell them you use cookies and provide a link to more information.

Need Help?

If you would like more information or advice on this new law please contact Kombi Media

There are a number of things we can do to implement this on your website from a simple message to allowing users to choose if they would like to use the website with or without cookies.

If you would like us to audit your website and tell you what cookies are used or require help choosing a solution please get in touch

More Information

For more information please see: http://www.ico.gov.uk/for_organisations/privacy_and_electronic_communications/the_guide/cookies.aspx

The best plugin to build this quickly can be found here: http://www.civicuk.com/cookie-law/index

A good example of a solution in practice is the Nationwide website: www.nationwide.co.uk

March 2012

There has been a lot of talk around Facebook regarding the upcoming changes to business pages and the compulsory change to the 'timeline' layout. I know a few people are panicking but then there is always some resistance to change and Facebook do seem to do it regularly. Embrace the change though as there are some really good aspects about it and with use it will become easier to navigate.

One of the biggest changes and the source of a lot of recent custom for us is the timeline cover photo. This is an image at the very top of your Facebook page which is additional to your profile picture. You now have two main images for your page. The profile picture is a square image which nestles in the cover graphic (you need to bear this in mind if you are creating your own, anything in the bottom left will not be seen as it will be hidden by your profile picture). Your profile picture is the icon that will be used everywhere around Facebook every time you comment on something.

Facebook

The cover image is great to show off you, your products and services. Do bear in mind though that Facebook do have a few rules about what can and cannot be used on the cover photos. For a full and up to date list please look at http://wwww.facebook.com/help/?faq=276329115767498 In a nutshell however this means that you cannot have:

Price or purchase information
Contact information (this all needs to go in the "About" page on Facebook)
References to user interface e.g. "like us", "share"
Calls to action e.g. "get it now", "tell your friends"

What you have got though, is a really nice big space to use to show off your work; a fabulous place for lots of imagery / a nice big logo, what you do.

We think it is great and have been using it for a while now. The best thing about it is instant brand recognition. You can also customise your tabs to tie everything in. Branding is so important we cannot stress this enough. In fact it’s a whole topic on its own so watch this space!

If you need any help do get in touch. If you already have branding in place and your logo, we can create a custom timeline graphic for you for only £10. If you need a logo creating then we can do this for you for £50 and the timeline comes absolutely free!