FAQ
“The only dumb question is the one never asked”
Not sure who said that
You’ve Got Questions – We’ve Got Answers
SEO FAQ
Q. Do I Need to Submit my Site to Hundreds of Search Engines?
A. No – In the old days, that is to say before Google, there were dozens of search engines – none of them very effective – so it was important to submit your site to as many as possible. Today there are really only three that matter and one, Google, claims over 65% market share. The other two are Bing and Yahoo and yes, your website should be submitted to those too.
Q. Should My Site Be Listed in Directories?
A. Yes. The goal for any site is maximum visibility. In addition to the major search engines like Google, Bing and Yahoo, there are many industry specific search engines, or directories, and your site should be listed in as many as are appropriate for your business. Here is a sampling:
- In the trades? You should be listed in Angie’s List, Houzz, Home Advisor
- Own a travel website? You should be listed in Trip Advisor, Expedia, Travelocity
- Own a restaurant? You should be listed in city directories, Open Table
The point is that you want to give people as many ways to find you as possible
Q. What is Google Analytics and Do I Need it?
A. Google Analytics is tracking software provided by Google free of charge – and yes, you need it. Once installed on your website Analytics will provide a wealth of information about how users interact with your site. It’s vitally important that you view and analyze this data to determine whether your site is meeting its goals. Here is just a sampling of the information provided by Analytics:
- How many people have visited your website in the last 30 days (or 60 days or whatever time frame you set).
- How many visitors are new and how many are returning.
- How long are they staying on the site.
- How much time are they spending on each page.
- How did they find your site – from a Google search, were they referred by another site or did they type your domain name directly into their browser.
- What was the exit point – i.e. what page were they on when they left your site?
- If they found your site through a Google search, what keywords did they use to look for you?
- What devices are your visitors using when they view your site
The data provided by Analytics is essential for determining where you need to strengthen your website marketing efforts.
Q. What is Google Search Console and do I Need it?
A. Google Search Console is another free service offered by Google that helps you monitor and maintain your site’s presence in Google Search results – and yes, you need it.
Why use Search Console?
Monitor your site’s performance in Google Search results:
- Make sure that Google can access your content
- Submit new content for crawling and remove content you don’t want shown in search results
- Create and monitor content that delivers visually engaging search results
- Maintain your site with minimal disruption to search performance
- Monitor and resolve malware or spam issues so your site stays clean
Discover how Google Search—and the world—sees your site:
- Which queries caused your site to appear in search results?
- Did some queries result in more traffic to your site than others?
- Are your product prices, company contact info, or events highlighted in rich search results?
- Which sites are linking to your website?
- Is your mobile site performing well for visitors searching on mobile?
Q. How Long Will It Take for My Site to Get to Page One on Google?
A. Unfortunately, there is no way to know that with any certainty. There are so many variables at play in the process of improving a site’s page rank that it is foolhardy to guarantee specific results and time frames. The best we can do is apply the various SEO techniques available to us and continue to monitor the results. In our experience we have found that two months seems to be a predictable time frame for seeing improvements to a site’s search results. Again, though, this is not a guarantee.
Q. What Are On-Page Elements?
A. On-page elements are the options that can be controlled and optimized from within the pages of your website. These include meta tags like page titles and descriptions, header tags, images alt tags and most importantly your page content. All of these elements must be fully optimized for your site to rank well in Google searches.
Q. Okay Then, What Are Off-Page Elements?
A. Off-page elements are optimization opportunities that are not controlled from within the pages of your website but rather from sources outside. These include incoming links to your site from other websites, citations (listings in directories related to your industry), listings in Google My Business and Bing Places to name a few.
Q. Is Social Media Important for Search Engine Ranking?
A. Yes. Being active on social media will definitely have a positive impact on how your site ranks with the major search engine. When someone likes, shares or comments on one of your Facebook posts, Google considers this a vote for your site. These “social signals” as they are called, tells the search engines that your site is relevant and relevance is one of the most important ranking factors.
Web Design FAQ
Q. How long will it take to “do” the website?
A. Building the framework for the website can be done quickly but getting it launched can depend on several things. If you (the client) are responsible for providing elements such as content and/or graphics, the timeline for completion may be effected. The actual launch date will be determined after reviewing the scope and requirements of the project
Q. How much will it cost?
A. Many things affect the overall cost of building a website but in general the cost is determined by the site’s level of complexity. Sites can range from simple online brochures to full blown ecommerce sites and anywhere in between. The cost of your website can only be determined after Kaneworks acquires a comprehensive understanding of what your unique requirements are. Think of it this way – asking how much it will cost to build a website is like asking how much it will cost to build a house. In both cases a lot of information has to be gathered before an accurate answer can be given
Q. How do I update my website?
A. There are a couple of options here.
- We can negotiate a service contract where Kaneworks will update your website for a mutually agreed on monthly fee.
- Your site can be built using a content management platform that allows you or anyone you delegate to update your own site. This is a bit more expensive to build and requires some initial training but might be a good solution in the long run.
The choice depends on the nature of your website, how often updating is required, how many stakeholders there are, etc. We will work with you do decide on the best method.
Q. What About Website Security?
A. The threat of a website getting hacked is very real; unfortunately, there is no way to guarantee that it won’t happen. The good news, however, is there are steps you can take to reduce the risk. Here are a few of our recommendations:
- Use strong passwords – not your social security number, not your dog’s name spelled backwards, not your spouse’s name or initials, not some variant of your street name. We suggest that your passwords should be a minimum of 16 characters and include a combination of numbers, letters (some uppercase, some lowercase), punctuation marks, etc. Use an online password generator and be sure to copy the password and save it to your computer. Here’s a hint – if you can remember your password then it’s not strong enough.
- Monitor suspicious activity – we routinely use a security plugin that alerts us whenever anything suspicious is going on with a website. This could be brute force attacks (repeated attempts to login to the website from the same IP address), outdated plugins, repeated login attempts from blacklisted IP addresses or countries or harmful code that may have been injected into your website. Once we receive an alert we will take immediate to prevent it from becoming a more serious problem.
- Double Authentication – this is a security option that requires anyone attempting to log into a website to verify via email that the login attempt is valid. This technique acts like a dead bolt lock on a door and will generally discourages hackers and unauthorized users from coming back.
- Site Backup – We always ensure that our client websites are not only backed up on a regular basis but that the backups are stored in a safe location away from the web server. This ensures that we have a clean, usable copy of the website in the event that the site has to be restored