For companies with a local or regional customer base, Google offers a free tool to make them more visible to prospects. We asked our Google wizard, Arlene, to share some of her knowledge. Q: Let’s start at the beginning. What, exactly, is Google My Business? A: It’s a platform, offered free from Google, to help […]
Author: Mike Turner
Website maintenance: a measure of stability in uncertain times
Companies planning for the post-COVID era are doing so with less data and less certainty than they’d like. Ensuring website visitors enjoy a smooth experience is a low-cost, low-risk element of a smart recovery plan. Sites that sputter drive visitors away. And they all sputter, eventually, if they don’t get regular attention. The site could […]
What to Know About SEO
We asked our expert, Arlene, to share some of her knowledge. She offered clear observations about a complex topic. Q: We have heard a lot about the importance of user intent. Can you explain? A: The term refers to a more nuanced use of keywords. It contrasts with the simplistic notion that merely including a […]
The case of the missing translations
Tracing the root cause of a technical glitch can be fiendishly complex. Here’s why. A client asked us to fix a glitch with their website’s translation function. Our mission to diagnose and cure the problem illustrates how the complexity of the web makes it difficult to gauge the scope of a solution in advance. We […]
7 SEO Trends to Keep an Eye On
SEO best practices are in a state of perpetual evolution. Things change—things like Google’s algorithm. Also, the behavior of people searching for stuff on the web. Here is an update to keep you on top of developments. Voice search is popular. Apparently, people like to talk. Let’s face it: talking is a lot easier than […]
Why we diagnose websites before fixing them
It sounds obvious—of course we should diagnose first. But many new clients—fed up with their sites—ask us to skip that part because they can just tell us what’s wrong. Here’s why that’s a bad idea. Maybe a product image isn’t showing correctly, or a bunch of links lead to 404 pages. We understand the urgency—but […]
5 things to improve your website’s UX in the age of zero attention span.
Website owners must continually improve their user experience by making everything easier, faster, and more rewarding—because people are really impatient. Indeed, a study determined that goldfish can pay attention longer than humans. (No details on the experiment, but if it involved measuring how long a person could focus on a flake of fish food, it […]
Things website owners should know about malware. (And a few notes on those weird names.)
Hackers have devised any number of ways to get their digital destroyers to find cracks in websites. Below we take an illuminating overview of malware, including a few observations on those weird names. Viruses and malware are here to stay. We recently notified our website hosting customers that we were installing crucial updates on their […]
4 Trends that are Affecting Business Planning and Investment in Websites Trend #2 – More Features, Less Hassle
Your customers expect your site to be a breeze. Here’s how to deliver. Designers and developers are always cramming new features into their sites as bandwidth gets cheaper and devices more powerful. Each feature is an improvement (at least in theory)— but a truckload of improvements can destroy your site’s user experience. We get spoiled […]
Why you should care about National Aglet Day.
Aglets are those plastic tips on shoelaces. You should not care about National Aglet Day. National Aglet Day doesn’t even exist. But wait: Why not? We have a National Day for cheeseballs, rubber erasers and lumpy rugs. (Fact!) Why are aglets just flat-out ignored? If you’re saying “Because they are not important enough to get […]
Why you shouldn’t try to bamboozle Google.
A brief look at boneheaded attempts to dupe the algorithm. Here’s a devious idea. (Also, hilarious.) I was catching up with my niece’s husband at a recent family reunion. As we sipped beer from red Solo cups while waiting for the barbecue to work its magic, my kinda-relative was asking me about SEO. I am […]
Christmas Tree Ideas: What To Do With Your Christmas Tree After Christmas
It’s time to consider the many ways Christmas trees can be used once the holidays are over. Poor Christmas trees. We spend a whole season decorating and adoring them; then, when the festivities are over, we leave them out by the curb. This year, we say, enough is enough, and look to answer one of life’s […]
7 Website Mistakes that can Hurt Your Business
We get a lot of new clients whose first request is that we do something about their website. They don’t like it any more. (Or they hated it from day one.) As we get started on transforming their site, we often discover common website mistakes that can hurt businesses. If we were obnoxious snarksters, we’d […]
When To Use Professional Photography?
Amazingly, some stock photography doesn’t suck. So why hire a pro for professional photography shots? There was a time when every single stock photograph in the whole universe was an embarrassment to the very idea of imagery. I am still haunted by the memory of disturbingly phony models posing stiffly, their unnaturally white teeth glaring […]
RLM Holiday Blog: Christmas Stuff We No Longer Grasp
For this year’s holiday blog, we present our observations on yuletide traditions that are mildly confusing. All of us at Red Letter Marketing adore holiday customs and lore—even when we’re not really sure what they mean. Some traditions have been around so long that we in the 21st century find ourselves befuddled by them. For […]
Market Research: Friend or Foe?
Oh come on—of course market research is our friend. But some folks (particularly creative types) think of market research as a dastardly plot conceived by zombie hordes of humorless quants on a mission to destroy everything that is vibrant and alive in commercial communication. Why does anybody think this? Well, one theory is that these […]
Do we ever say no to clients? Yes. Here’s why.
Is the client always right? Well…no. Here’s how to spot when a client is going against their own best interests, and how to say no (politely). How to say no to a client? And when is it appropriate to do so? Sometimes, it isn’t appropriate. For instance, consider this scenario. Client: Shouldn’t the email blast […]
Our New Logo: Why We Sent a Perfectly Good Logo to the Great Style Guide in the Sky
For our four-year anniversary, we bought ourselves a new logo. And yes, “bought” is the correct verb. We’re paying for our new logo in both man hours and legal tender—so it is not an idle decision we made on the spur of our third flute of anniversary champagne. Was there something seriously wrong with our […]
Responding to Client Feedback: Unreasonable Responses to Reasonable Requests
How agencies should respond to client feedback—and how they shouldn’t In our first discovery meeting with a new client, we discovered how badly the company’s previous web design company had treated it. As a new website had taken shape, the client had posed reasonable questions concerning some of the creative decisions made by the designers. Among […]
