Web designer provides small business tips

by Buffy Queen

Special to the Mountaineer

Finally, you have a web site for your business! You're thrilled. Perhaps it was self-made, free of charge or a web designer charged anywhere from $100 to $3,000 or more to create the site, but it’s now finished. The business has its own domain name where customers can go for online services. New business cards were printed with the Web address and stationary, as well as print advertisements, were updated to reflect the new global accessibility of the business.

Advertising your new web site on business cards, or your stationary, for instance, is very limiting. It only reaches existing customers who receive the business cards or locals who already know about the business. They don’t really need to use the new Web site because they already go in the store, shop or office. 

In other words, for the Web site to bring more business through the door or to receive more orders on-line, it needs to be seen by new customers who may not have the Web address; may live outside the area; and/or people who are looking for specific types of business or products on the Internet.

Search position is the key to bringing you new business from your web site. Internet users depend on search engines (such as Google, Yahoo or AOL) to “search” the entire world wide Web to find businesses who offer what they are seeking. Each search gives results (Web sites that match what they are looking for), from highest match to lowest match, and, hopefully, your site turns up high on the results list. This is where Web site owners sometimes hit a brick wall.

Local businesses can find help from web designer and business owner Jimmy Harvey, of Waynesville, who offered some helpful ideas during a recent interview that will bring more business and income from a Web site investment. 

Harvey is the owner and web designer of www.Mountainshops.com. This web advertising directory (similar to an internet Yellow Pages) for Western North Carolina businesses and services has been in business for seven years.

In a directory format, he designs and hosts the mainly one-page web sites for small business owners of all types, including home-based handicrafts and service businesses that have limited advertising budgets. Mountainshops.com, which specializes in real estate and vacation rentals, provides links from each category into a business’s web site, whether designed by Harvey or someone else.

For less than $225 per year, his clients get a custom designed, one-page web site and free hosting, including links from appropriate categories in the directory. He also offers a smaller, picture/paragraph ad for $125 per year which links the viewer to the advertiser’s web page directly.

But the most valuable service that Harvey brings to each client is this: he optimizes every web site and/or category so that search engines can readily find them.  

“Helping a search engine find my clients’ web sites or categories is the most important thing I do. It is called ‘optimizing.’” said Harvey. “After each site is written, and pictures placed, I add appropriate page titles, body text and meta tags, among other things, and then submit each optimized page to the search engines.

“Only at this point can a search engine ‘crawl’ (index) each site to know what is being offered on that web site and can then list the business’ web page for its unique products or services,” he said.

“It’s complicated and time consuming to optimize a site. And if you have a web designer optimize your site, it can be very expensive. Many people who design their own sites get poor search results because they don’t know how to do an accurate optimization,” Harvey said.

“But it is such a crucial part of effective web design that I invested time to educate myself about optimization,” he said. “Now, as the final part of my design process, I am able to get most of my clients’ sites or categories listed extremely well with the search engines … and bring them new business.”

Harvey got into the web design business after attending Southwestern Community College. He had recently left Coast Guard service after ten years and was looking for a business that had good potential, was creative and could be done at a home office.

Harvey began his business in Clyde and now his office is in the Dellwood area of Waynesville. 

“The biggest error I see business owners making is believing that just because they have a web site, that’s all they need,” he said. “Actually, that’s just the beginning.”

Test your site position “A simple exercise to find out how easy or hard it is for somebody to find a web site involves going to Google.com,” said Harvey. “In the search box, type in some words that describe the business or something unique they sell. Then type in the town or county you are in.”

When the results come in, being listed on the first page is good, but being listed on the last page is bad.

If you don’t have good results from your Google search and your Web site seems to be invisible to search engines, don’t despair. “If you built your own web site and need some help, then you can go to www.mountainshops.com/tips and there are search engine optimization hints there. If you paid a web designer to build your site, then ask him/her what they have done to optimize your site and follow through that way,” he said.

Once a site has been optimized and submitted to the search engines, it might take weeks or months before it shows up in search engine results, so plan for that, Harvey said.

“If you’re counting on a big web splash in the spring, get going with optimization now. Keep in mind that optimization is not the only criterion that search engines use to rank sites. Your site will also be ranked higher if other sites link to it, which makes it more ‘popular,’” said Harvey. "Mountainshops.com is listed quite highly because of our seniority (we've been in business since 2000).

For more information, go to www.MountainShops.com, or call Jimmy Harvey at 828-400-4009. He is also available for consulting work to optimize web sites that are not his design.

Inquire about advertising your business here!   Mountain Shops Jimmy Harvey / Owner / Designer • Phone: (828)-400-4009 (9 AM - 7 PM) Mon-Sat 127 Happy Acres Road - Waynesville, NC 28785 • Email: webmaster@mountainshops.com