We hope everyone had a wonderful holiday!  JDae Designs is definitely excited for the New Year!

For our next marketing activity, we are suggesting you set up a link exchange with other businesses.  To set one up, all you have to do is have an agreement with another business to feature a link on your website to their website if they are willing to do the same. Setting up a link exchange with other businesses is EASY and FREE- the important part is to do your research.  First go through you contact list, maybe there are some businesses you already support and send referrals to that would make sense to have featured on your site.  After identifying the ones you would like to have on your site, check their site out.  Are they keeping their site current? Do you agree with all their business practices/products? Is this a complimentary product/service? If the answers are yes the next step is to contact those business and ask them to participate in the exchange.  Lastly, when they have agreed, add a link to their website on your website.

Be sure to mention to the other business the benefits of creating this exchange:

1. It will help drive more people to their website
2. It will help increase their search engine ranking, making it easier for people using places like Google to find their product/service.
3. Best of all it is EASY and FREE!

If you are unsure of how to add links to your website or would like to participate in a link exchange with JDae Designs feel free to contact us any time: 208-861-9841 or valerie@JDaeDesigns.com

We are setting a goal for ourselves.  Starting today we want to provide our clients with marketing activities that are proven to yield results for little to no cost.  To meet this goal, every Tuesday we will be posting a marketing activity that is easy, cost effective and focused on getting you results.  This is our way of helping our clients make the most of their marketing budget.

Activity #1: Updating Your Website

Updating your website sounds like a basic concept right?! It also sounds easy right?!  Well it is!!!! Go to your website once a month and use it like a customer would.  When surfing your site are there things that need updated like: your current specials, your phone number, your new holiday store hours?  Is everything functioning properly: are the links working properly, are photos displaying correctly, is the contact page sending the email to the correct place?  The best part of keeping your site updated and current is that it is one of the ways to get your ranking higher on search engines like Google.  This is sure to give you a professional edge amongst your competitors. And all this takes is 20 minutes once a month.  Make a commitment to your business; go to your calendar right now and put “Updating Website” on your schedule.  You will be surprised how many things you may be able to find once you start looking.

If you need assistance with your website or still need to build one we are here to help. Call us or email us anytime for a free quote: 861-9841 or Valerie@JDaeDesigns.com.

Did we mention that this activity is FREE!!!

While surfing on Entrepreneur.com I found an interesting article by blogger Carol Tice, explaining the top five things she hates about small business website.  The reoccurring theme of this article is you should, as many times as you can, let people know how they can contact you.  Here are the Carol’s 5 Things She Hates About Small Business highlights and our comments on them:

1. Your contact information is not visible on your home page. — In all actuality people might ony be visiting your website to contact you, so you info should be easily available.
2. You only offer me a fill-in email form.– This is reference to the form pages that you can add to your site, where people people can fill in their contact info to contact you. While you may capture some people this way, others may want to contact you directly– just add your contact info above the form as another option for your clients.
3. You have no phone number. — There is just no reason to not have your phone number available on your site and a million reasons to. Just add it to your HOMEPAGE!
4. Your ‘About Us’ page doesn’t tell when your company was founded, or by whom. –Be detailed about the founding or creation of your business. People are interested in the person behind the company. Learning how your business started may inspire people.
5. Your ‘News’ or ‘Press’ page has no media contacts.– This may not apply to all of you, but if you have a page featuring media you have been in be sure to add your contact information there as well.

Check your site. Is you contact information on your homepage? Is there more than one way listed to contact you? Is your contact information in as many places as seem appropriate? This is an easy fix, so add this to your to do list this week.  And if you need help contact JDae Designs today. We are here to help!

Our info:
208-861-9841                                                                                                                                                                                                                                            Valerie@JDaeDesigns.com

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