web design billings mt Archives - Website Design and Marketing

The Latest Web Design Trends We Love

admin — Thu, 06 Oct 2016 01:34:09 +0000

You can easily tell the year a photo was taken based on the hairstyles that people are spotting or even the clothes that they are wearing. It is the same case when it comes to web design; you can quickly ballpark the year a given website has been created just by looking at the design it has.

However, it is not about using a web design that is hip and cool; it is about having a web design that is responsive to the changing needs of your users. The needs of users are dynamic; it is all thanks to the evolving ways people can easily access content. With the changes taking place in technology, this means there is also a change in interfaces. Thus, web design will need to keep up. Below are four of the latest web trends that we love.

1. Rich Typography
The internet has suddenly seen the real beauty the written word possesses. As websites are being filled with images full of color, text is also forced to find creative ways to compete. Accordingly, texts are evolving and becoming more like the colorful pictures, as they can offer users a visual enticement to read on. The trick behind this is to pair decadent typeface with the conventional one; this will allow readability while it is still able to capitalize on the visual appeal.

2. Go bright and bold
Throwbacks are the new trend in town especially when it comes to color combination. Lets us try to think back to the 1980’s family pictures, now imagine those bright and bold colors on a wed design. It is going to be one of the web trends we love, as it reminds us of when the muted hues and earth tones were more fashionable.

3. Moving elements
The use of animation is also a hot trend; however, the key is to keep the animation relevant and small. It is important that you clearly define what a simple animation would serve. Let us say; the animation could keep your users entertained while content is loading or even while they are processing a transaction. On the other hand, it could be used to draw the user’s attention to a particular page. The essential thing you will need to note is to keep it low key rather than distracting.

4. Having some video headers
When you include a video header, it gives your website that extra wow factor, especially in this era where the connection speeds are increasing to ensure video loads seamlessly. Additionally, your users are also becoming more accustomed to the concept of embedded videos, so this concept does not feel as intrusive as it did a few years back.

With the advances taking place, websites are increasingly becoming a place where users feel they have expanded autonomy, while they are still establishing a personal connection through their screens. Accordingly, it is important to note, the ways that we consume the web it changes how we design websites, thus keeping up with the trend is paramount.

Contact Blast Creative for all of your website development needs!

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6 Reputation Management Tips to Look Good Online

admin — Sat, 11 Jul 2015 05:11:44 +0000

When it comes to the reputation of your business online, it definitely is a global village. With a click of a mouse, potential customers can check out reviews and find both negative and positive comments. According to the Huffington Post, 90% of customers are influenced by online reviews.

In this environment, your business lives and dies by its reputation. Taking care of how you are perceived on the internet is a must for any business.

You may choose to not deal with it, but the situation won’t go away. You are at the mercy of your reputation. Smart businesses are proactive.

Why Reputation Management Is Important

Consumers rely on the testimonials and reviews of people who have used specific products and services. Whether it is Yelp, Facebook, Twitter, Angie’s List, Google, forums or blogs, customers are not shy about getting the word out about their experiences with online and brick and mortar businesses.

Every business has occasional troublesome encounters with customers. This is to be expected. It can be a package that wasn’t delivered on time, a widget that broke, an app that had a glitch or a meal that was served by a surly waiter.

The goal of all smart business owners is to resolve problems as soon as they come up, preferably before reviews are written but definitely as soon as you hear about it. This keeps a customer and prevents word of mouth from scaring away others.

Here are six tips that have helped successful businesses protect and manage their reputation online.

Manage Your Brand

#1. Take control of your brand.

Make sure you are the one in control of your brand name, on including domains and social media platforms. Use the same name to be consistent. Use a service like KnowEm.com, which provides a list of social networks and domains to check in order to be sure only you have claimed it.

Pick three to five major social media platforms and get active on them. The major players are Facebook, Twitter, Yelp, Angie’s List and Google+. But it might serve your business to look into YouTube, Tumblr, LinkedIn and others.

To establish an active presence takes consistent effort and time. More than five outlets will be more than a businessperson can handle alone. Don’t overdo your social media efforts or your will end up not establishing a strong presence anywhere.

Set up your brand on each of the platforms you choose. Use the same logo and name for brand recognition.

#2. Post consistently.

Put up new info and answer questions at least once a week, though two or three times is better. Do it regularly so people know you care.

#3. Track your reputation.

Keep an eye on how you are perceived online. Use online monitoring tools to help you keep up to date on your reputation, like Twitter Search and Google Alerts.

Tell People About Yourself

A solid, consistent presence online will help people get to know you. If you feel like an old friend, people online will tend to discount negative reviews and give you the benefit of the doubt. This leads to positive word of mouth if a negative comment is posted.

#4. Be active on your blog.

Write regularly and don’t worry that you don’t sound like Hemingway. Simply let people know what is new at your business, write about things that inform your readers and entertain them. Your blog is your safe harbor online. It gives you a channel to respond to bad reviews or situations.

#5. Use testimonials.

Prominently display on your blog a link to testimonials on your website. These are an excellent antidote to negative reviews.

#6. Respond immediately to problems.

Reply right away to negative posts and comments on your social media accounts. Jump on them quickly before negativity spreads. Ask what the problem is and listen to the response. Don’t act defensive or aggressive.

Listen, apologize, explain if it will help and offer to reimburse them if that is appropriate. Do what it takes to make the situation better.

Then fix your payment system, sales info or whatever was the source of the problem. That way it won’t happen again. Never argue with an angry customer online. EVER!

Following these six steps consistently will help maintain a positive reputation for your business online.

If you are a business owner in any of these genres, financial, photographers, dentists, hotels, restaurants, construction, HVAC, hardware stores, real estate, or any business owner and want more information on Instagram or Social Media Marketing, please contact Blast Creative today!

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BLaST Creative SEO Marketing Tips

admin — Wed, 10 Jun 2015 05:01:37 +0000

Search Engine Marketing is being talked about all around the world. Today, I will give you an exact definition of what it refers to, and how it relates to both Web Search and Web Marketing.

Search Marketing is also known as Search Engine Marketing (SEM), and as such we will refer to it as SEM.

Search Marketing is a part of business marketing efforts that is aimed at increasing traffic (the number of visitors) to your website from the search engines. Additionally, it addresses conversion (the percent of visitors who become buyers). The first is achieved by increasing search engine visibility, i.e. the position of your site in search engine results for certain keywords that people type in the search box to obtain these results.

For instance, if someone wants to find a landscaper in MT, they will go to a search engine such as Google and type “MT landscaper” in the search box. Google will list, in this case, a bazillion results. If you are a landscaper in MT, offer any related services, your site may be listed among these results. Here, everything depends on how deep you are. If you are on the first or second page of the search results, it’s more likely that such visibility will bring many visitors and customers from Google. If you are the 300th result, it’s unlikely that anyone at all will come to you from Google.

Together with the power and size of your banner / ad network, your affiliations and partnerships, SE visibility comprises a broader concept – Web visibility (aka online visibility).

Generally, there are two main methods of carrying out SEM: 1) Search Engine Optimization (SEO) 2) using pay-per-click and paid inclusion listing models.

Although paid inclusion and pay-per-click advertising methods seem like the fastest methods to search engine marketing, website owners prefer to adopt a more time consuming search engine optimization method to obtain better marketing of their website on search engines.

Organic rankings are results that you get for free. That is, you create Web copy and publish it, then after a certain period of time a search engine robot finds it (either by itself or as a result of your submission).

Finally, the robot reads your content and puts your site into its index. Now your site will be found by this search engine when people query for some words contained within your pages. Obtained this way, your positions in the result list are called your “organic search engine rankings“.

Paid listings are different: pay a search engine and it guarantees the inclusion of your site in the index. Moreover, many search engines offer advanced pay-for-performance programs, such as showing your site / ad in the search results for keywords of your choice. These are the so-called “sponsored” results. Most commonly, you will have to pay a specified rate for each visitor that comes to your site from this search engine that clicks on these ads.

Mastering both methods and their proper combination can provide maximum search engine visibility. Because things keep changing, search engine marketers need to devote a good deal of time staying on top of the SEO industry and its trends.

The aim of SEM is not only to find a proper balance between organic and paid listings, but also to achieve maximum conversion of visitors into loyal customers. Nowadays SEM relies on the statement that it’s not the traffic itself that matters, but how targeted and convertible it is. The way your traffic converts also matters a lot – even more than your site rank on a search engine. You can rank worse than a competitor and yet the percentage of your visitors that turn into buyers can be high enough to actually outperform a competitor several times over.

SEO Services cover a lot of areas like email marketing, directories, and the list goes on and on. If you have questions, post them on the blog, or contact BLaST Creative.

SEO Resources

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Auditing and Improving Your Website

admin — Fri, 29 May 2015 05:00:04 +0000

This article will give you sufficient knowledge on how to maintain a site’s quality level that avoids visibility and usability problems.
You may ask yourself why site maintenance is relevant to search engine optimization, promotion, and internet marketing – isn’t this the job of the webmaster or site administrator?

Remember that the Integrated Approach considers site quality maintenance as a secondary yet obligatory addition to your promotion campaigns and traffic analysis. The content of the website is the foundation upon which to build the online business. The higher the quality of this material, the more successful the business will be.

It is strongly recommended that you start your SEO campaign with a site quality assessment, especially in the following situations:

When providing SEO / SEM services and being hired to promote a website already created by somebody else. In this case, you should cooperate (if possible) with the site development and administration team to properly prepare the website for the SEO campaign.
When you have just developed a website of considerable size but cannot afford the time or resources to double-test every page and function.
When a website you’re working with uses a dynamic technology and/or is constantly changed and updated with new materials, products, news, etc.
When the website you’re working with is developed, maintained and managed by a group of people on a regular basis. Even if the team is well coordinated, this usually means that site quality will still yield some gaps.

Site quality assessment means detecting and troubleshooting the two principal factors that ultimately determine site traffic and visitor conversion: site visibility and usability.META and TITLE tags and other elements important for the search engines), it means you’re having visibility problems.
When you’ve removed all errors and breaches that could potentially damage your visibility, pay attention to usability flaws: missing or incorrectly displayed images, broken links (these can frustrate not only spiders but human visitors also), missing JavaScript included or CSS styles. These types of usability problems appear in your site by not displaying or functioning correctly.
Remember your audience is always split into human visitors (the “visible” audience) and search engine spiders (the “invisible” audience). If your site isn’t initially spider-compatible (has broken links, lacks META and TITLE tags and other elements important for the search engines), it means you’re having visibility problems.
Finally, whether you’re a hired hand or running an SEM campaign for your own site, you may want to clean up the technical waste which emerges when a website has been on the Web for a long time or when it lacks proper supervision. This generally means orphaned files which are no longer included or linked to from anywhere and just clutter your hosting space.
For more information on Search Engine Optimization,Internet Marketing or Web Design, please contact BLaST creative today.

SEO Resources

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Web Hosting

admin — Thu, 23 Apr 2015 04:52:18 +0000

You will also need a reliable web hosting provider with at least 99.5% uptime guarantee (source: iPage Review Guides). Aside from reliability, also consider the speed, features, usability etc like how Web Hosting Price Watch based their web hosting reviews. Know the different types of hosting and find out what fits your needs and budget by visiting Web Hosting Provider List.

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Pinterest Spam Problem

admin — Thu, 23 Apr 2015 04:44:27 +0000

So while we do S ocial Media Marketing for a living at BLaST Creative, we don’t use Pinterest because of all the SPAM! I heard a rumor last week that Pinterest had dealt with the issue. Sadly, I am here to tell you that it is not true.

I created a BLaST Creative account last week and started adding a few boards and pins, within 1 hour I had over 50 spam emails and continue to receive between 50 to 100 spam emails a day. It is absolutely ridiculous! Is Pinterest selling our email addresses?

We use Facebook and Twitter and don’t have anywhere near the spamming problem. Pinterest is a nightmare and yet it is a good marketing tool! So what do you do?

Don’t use Pinterest!
Set up a second email address that you use only for Pinterest so that the spam emails go there and you don’t have to deal with them.
Block the spam emails as they roll in-which is what I did.
Continue to complain to Pinterest, but that doesn’t seem to be doing much good.

Because of the popularity of the site, Pinterest seems to be attacked by spammers and doesn’t have the appropriate safeguards in place. So enter at your own risk, for the moment, spammers control Pinterest!

If you are a business owner in any of these genres, financial, photographers, dentists, hotels, restaurants, construction, HVAC, hardware stores, real estate, or any business owner and want more information on Social Media Marketing, please contact Blast Creative today!

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Honesty, Integrity and Loyalty Do They Exist in 2013?

admin — Thu, 23 Apr 2015 04:32:01 +0000

I’ve been thrown under the bus so many times in my lifetime by business partners, associates and friends that the tread marks have left excruciating scars and I sit here wondering if honesty, integrity and loyalty exists in 2013! I hate not trusting people, but time and time again I get slapped in the face by reality. I recently read an article on Katie Couric’s website:

Want to know how to spot a liar? Here’s how!

From Janine Driver, body language expert and author of “You Can’t Lie to Me.”