Nancy McCord – Page 45 – McCord Web Services The Web Authority

December 3, 2018December 1, 2018

Site Chat Apps Close Sales

Nancy C. McCord, Owner of McCord Web Services LLC

Site chat apps do generate leads which do turn into sales. I am a living testimony to that. Since I have installed the Drift app, which is an online chat app, I have had about 20 chats, some just about questions but four about services. One moved into contract and will spend about $2,500 for my services.

I’d say that having the chat function on my website has been good for business. What’s even better is that I am always on, but do not always enter a response immediately to a chat. Even with a live chat function, you can have weekends and a real life. Your business does not need to own you.

I do feel that my prospects do like the friendliness and immediacy of live chat. The paid version of Drift, which I am using as a free version, does has an automated bot that fills in the gaps with responses which is nice and I may upgrade to it if I get more big sales.

I find that the really serious clients start out on the chat app but then move readily to email and then to phone calls. The client that found me via my online site chat closed in less than one week.

So, if you are looking for more sales, I do recommend installing on your website an online chat function. Drift is just one of them to consider, but there are others.

I invite you to subscribe to our monthly newsletter to get more tips and information that you can use for your own business.

November 28, 2018November 23, 2018

Domain Management Tips

Whether you have a new online business or an existing one you’ll want to review my tips on domain name management.

Review
Periodically review the domain names you own. If you don’t need one or are not pursuing that aspect of your business, save money and don’t renew a domain name you won’t need in the future.

Secure
When you start your business, secure domain name variations of your company name to protect your brand. Consider buying the .us variation in addition to the .com if you are a U.S. based business and other country extensions if you have a presence there.

Save Money
You don’t need to buy hosting for every domain name you own. You can use domain forwarding to point domains you own to your main desired domain where your website resides.

Select
New or old, periodically it makes sense to review the domain names you do own. For those you are using for your website and online presence, set your renewal in five year increments. For those you may let go in the future consider one year or two year renewals.

Need help with our domain name management? Contact www.McCordWeb.com today.

November 26, 2018November 23, 2018

Domain Don’ts

Thinking about buying a used domain name? Be careful, very careful, even if a domain is offered to you for a great price and it really looks like a great keyword match, take a deep breath and do your homework before you jump on buying that domain name.

Why should I be careful?

It today’s environment when great domains become available it is typically because they have been burned out by spammers. A domain will carry history, it is not just a name and when you take it over thinking you are getting a fresh start; it may be banned by spam registries, Internet Service Providers, and been used and abused by spamming or black hat SEO’s.

Even $200 is too much to pay for a domain that has been abused. You may never be able to use the domain name in an email address and the history may be so tainted that you will never be able to remediate it and place on any search engine with it.

My recommendation is – No Go.

My candid recommendation on buying a used domain, based on how things are, is that I would pass. A domain name does not assure SEO placement, and if you really love the domain you may be able to buy it fresh and clean and never used before as a .us or .biz.

If the price tag is even higher, hire an expert to do due diligence for you. I’ve seen domains go for $10,000. You’d hate to pay that kind of money and find out that the domain had been horribly abused making its value to you nearly nothing. Be careful and do some Google searches first before you consider buying any used domain names.

If you need savvy help reviewing statistics before you buy a domain, contact us at www.McCordWeb.com.

November 21, 2018November 16, 2018

Google Changes the Definition of Average Position Part Two

Continued from Monday.

As noted in the announcement, Google rolled out new column sets you can turn on to get a better idea of your new “Average Position” based on their new definition of what Average Position now means to them.

These new items are:

Impr. (Absolute Top) % – the percent of your ad impressions that are shown as the very first ad above the organic search results.
Impr. (Top) % – the percent of your ad impressions that are shown anywhere above the organic search results.
Search (Absolute Top) IS – the impressions you’ve received in the absolute top location (the very first ad above the organic search results) divided by the estimated number of impressions you were eligible to receive in the top location.
Search (Top) IS – the impressions you’ve received in the top location (anywhere above the organic search results) compared to the estimated number of impressions you were eligible to receive in the top location.

Are you confused yet? The bottom-line is that we have seen many client accounts suddenly have a drop in Average Position in the regular column set now that the definition of what Average Position is according to Google.

The resulting action is that we have had to push up click costs or move to automated bidding algorithms in Google Ads in order to get back to ad positions that allowed for our best number of clicks and conversions.

Obviously clients are not happy about this. It is obvious that Google has adjusted the definition and algorithm for ad placement in order to drive greater profits.

As I manage many top performing accounts across a wide and diverse sector of verticals it is most unusual to see many accounts have the same performance dip in one month and on one specific date when other factors do not come into play.

The bottom-line is that you have to be very sophisticated in approach and management operating in Google Ads at this point in time. This platform is not a place for the inexperienced or do it yourselfer.

If you are looking for a savvy and affordable Google Ads account manager or AdWords Consultant, I invite you to visit our website to learn more about our services.