Archive for July, 2006

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Feedback on Affordable Web Sites

Monday, July 31st, 2006

I generally don’t blog when we launch a ProSite, flyte’s affordable Web site options.

It’s not because we’re not proud of the work or that we don’t want to promote our clients’ new Web sites. We’re psyched for all of our clients. But we feel it’s more important to promote our custom designed Web site launches. Just a business decision.

However, we recently received two very nice, very unsolicited compliments from different ProSites clients, so I decided to reprint them here. (With permission, ‘natch.)

Emptylap
Robin, Beth, Rich:

Thank you, thank you, thank you! I’m so excited! I really like the site. I’ve started spreading the word!

You’ve been wonderful to work with, erasing my fears along the way, making the process understandable. (I say that as though our relationship is ending when I know it’s not.)

Wow! Now that it’s up and running, I want to take a moment to catch my breath and enjoy it!

Thanks again!

Edwina L. Kaikai, author of Stomach In My Lap: 25 Lessons Learned Confronting the Doubts, Fears, and Excuses That Piled on the Pounds

And from John over at Megquier & Jones…

Megjones
Robin, Beth, Rich & All:

I wanted to thank all of you for the `hand holding’ throughout this process as this was new to me, and everyone else here at M&J. The site looks better than I could have expected, and I found Flyte’s approach as far as communicating information and keeping in contact simple to use and very efficient. We’re all very pleased with the outcome, and I’m looking forward to seeing the results here!

So, enough of the blubbering…thanks again, and hope we can work together again soon.

John MacGregor III
Megquier & Jones
Structural Steel Fabrication and Light Gauge Steel Trusses

<shameless plug>

So, if you’re looking for an affordable Web site, take a look at our ProSites starting at just $499. We can add a customized, complementary email newsletter and/or a customized, complementary blog for $499 more each.

</shameless plug>

Rich Brooks
Shameless

Posted in flyte news, Web Design & Development, Web Site Launches | No Comments »


Flyte’s New Digs

Friday, July 28th, 2006

136commercial_1
I’ve been holding off making an announcement as we’ve had a few false starts before, but it looks like this time it’s for real: flyte’s moving!

The lease has been signed, the keys have been handed over, nothing could poosibly go wrong now!

We’re not moving far, just a few blocks down Commercial St. to 136, right in front of Jay’s Oyster Bar. As you can tell from these aerial shots, we’re right off the water.

This shot is from Ask.com maps, which has significantly better aerial photography of Portland, Maine than Google Maps.

Our current space, although we love it, just became a bottleneck for us. Seven hundred square feet just isn’t enough for six people. The new space will be just shy of 1,900 square feet and give us room to grow and get us that conference room that we need so dearly.

We’re not moving in until November 1st, but we’ll call you when it’s time to move the desks. Remember to lift with your back.

Rich Brooks
flyte new media

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Posted in flyte news | 4 Comments »


TypePad Adds Technorati Tag Fields

Thursday, July 27th, 2006

Adding Technorati tags to posts has never been easy in TypePad. In fact, I created a little movie a while back so that clients could watch it as many times as they like.

But now TypePad has added a Technorati Tags field near the bottom the New Post page. Just separate your tags with commas and you’re all set. No need to muck around with the Edit HTML tab.

While this is a good solution for most users, not being able to get under-the-hood does frustrate me on a few points:

  • I don’t like to brand my tags as "Technorati Tags."
  • I like the flexibility of sending those links to places other than the Technorati tag pages. I.e., a tag on Search Engine Optimization could point to my page on SEO at flyte.biz.
  • I prefer pipes over commas. (I know, small thing.)

Rich Brooks
Still looking under the hood…

Posted in Business Blogs and Blog Marketing | 2 Comments »


Freelance Web Design Opportunities in Maine

Thursday, July 27th, 2006

Flyte_sign
We’re looking to build a relationship with a few qualified graphic designers out there for ongoing freelance opportunities.

Your responsibilities may include:

  • Participating in design meetings with flyte and the client
  • Creating design layouts for client and flyte review
  • Revising layouts based on client feedback
  • Delivering the finalized design as a layered PhotoShop file

We’d prefer to work with local artists (near Portland, Maine,) but if you really shine we’ll consider you, too.

Please check out our ad in JobsinME.com before responding, and use the link to send your resume and links to your work.

No phone calls, please!

Rich Brooks
Maine Web Site Design

Posted in flyte news | 2 Comments »


SEO for Firefox

Monday, July 24th, 2006

Have you ever wondered why pages rank the way they do at search engines like Google and Yahoo? Or how many incoming links your or a competitor’s site has?

And since .edu and .gov links tend to have more weight (they’re less prone to commercial interests), how many of those type of links you may have?

All that info and more is now available to you as a free plug-in for Firefox, called SEO for Firefox.

Once you’ve installed the plug-in (if you can click on a button you can do this) you’ll be able to get a wealth of information in a Google or Yahoo search.

Seoff

In addition, you’ll also have access to some cool tools like Google trends, Overture bid tools and more.

Rich Brooks
Search Engine Marketer

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Posted in Search Engine Marketing, Web Marketing | No Comments »


The Domain Registry Support People Are Putting In Overtime

Friday, July 21st, 2006

The telemarketers at the Domain Registry Support must be putting in overtime, as traffic to my post on Domain Registry Support: Ignore It! from May, 2005 is generating huge amounts of traffic and has 94 comments as of today.

If you’ve been getting calls from these guys, or if you’re interested in who’s calling you from 323-510-2661 or 800-591-7398, check out the post and feel free to commiserate.

Rich Brooks
To Protect and Serve

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Posted in Ignore It! | 8 Comments »


Pediatric Associates of Lewiston, Maine

Thursday, July 20th, 2006

Pediatricassociates
This morning we launched a Web site for Pediatric Associates of Lewiston (Maine.) Pediatric Associates has been offering pediatric services to the Lewiston/Auburn area of Maine since 1989.

When I first met with them a few months back to review our proposal I was blown away by their facility. If my childhood pediatrician had waiting rooms like this I would have gotten sick a lot more often! They actually have several waiting rooms, including one specifically for teenagers.

The site also contains a section called Caring for Children: Health Care Information for Your Infant, Child and Adolescent, which includes great information on everything from Asthma to Vomiting.

Rich Brooks
Maine Web Design

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Posted in Client News, Web Site Launches | 1 Comment »


Visionary Business: An Entrepreneur’s Guide to Success

Wednesday, July 19th, 2006

Recently I joined the board of MEBSR, Maine Businesses for Social Responsibility. Which is interesting, because I’m not really sure what it means to be socially responsible.

Is social responsibility about what your company makes? How it treats the environment? How it treats its employees? Its clients? Its vendors? Do I need to recycle or work in a green building? Do I have to do all of these things, or is a score of 80% or above enough?

As if in answer, I just finished listening to the audio version of Marc Allen’s Visionary Business: An Entrepreneur’s Guide to Success.

The format of the book is the oh-so-annoying business fable, but at least it’s not written for the three-year-old comprehension level that most business fables target.

The story follows a start-up business and the angel investor that takes interest in the fledgling company. It starts with sound business advice on how to put together a business plan, but then gets  into what a business needs to do to be socially responsible.

Bernie, the angel investor and mentor to the book’s narrator, believes that businesses have a responsibility to do good. The book leans far left at times: the "good causes" that businesses are supposed to invest in may have be ripped right from MoveOn’s to do list. However, if your political alignment doesn’t go that direction you can substitute your own "good causes."

There are some good ideas on how to keep employees motivated and engaged in the business, and there are progressive, compelling ideas on employee benefits. I found myself thoroughly engaged in the ideas of the book and wished I had a notepad or recorder while I was listening.

I did find the audio was of a surprisingly low quality based on other books I’ve gotten through Audible.com.

If you’ve been looking for some guidelines on how to create a socially responsible business, I strongly recommend picking up a copy of Visionary Business.

Rich Brooks
Socially Responsible Web Design

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Posted in Business Philosophy, Entrepreneur & Small Business | 4 Comments »


ListingCorp.com – Not Exactly a Scam

Monday, July 17th, 2006

Today I got a "solicitation" from ListingCorp.com. It was for my "Annual Website Search Engine Listing" for $65.

Although it does say "this is not a bill", it’s purposely made to look like a bill, including a notice date (giving it a feel that it’s going to be due soon,) and the "annual" in the title gives me the impression that I paid for it last year, so why wouldn’t I just renew?

If you receive this "solicitation" from ListingCorp, be sure to immediately place it in your circular file.

Rich Brooks
I Got Your Back

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Posted in Ignore It! | 12 Comments »


The Three Faces of Blogging

Monday, July 17th, 2006

When I start talking to business owners about the benefits of blogging, I talk about the three faces of blogs. By using a blogging platform such as TypePad or WordPress, you can extend and leverage your content and experience in (at least) three different ways.

The Blog as Web site. This is often how most people discover a blog: they visit the URL or Web site address. The blogging platform generates Web pages and directories to host all of your writing, and organizes it by date and category.

Since the content is served up as a Web site, search engines can find and archive your material. Most blog platforms generate search engine friendly material with tons of links and focused copy. Other sites and blogs can also link to your copy, generating more traffic and PageRank.

The Blog as Newsfeed. More sophisticated blog readers–you know, the ones who have raise their pinkies when mousing around–tend to read many blogs. However, visiting dozens of Web sites a day to see if there’s an update is a waste of time. Instead, people can subscribe to the feeds of these blogs and have them delivered to one central place: their newsreader.

A newsreader is to blog feeds like an email program is to emails. You can organize feeds into different categories: Maine News, Small Business, Tom Cruise Crazy Watch, etc., to create a virtual newspaper tailored to your interests. A newsreader can be a standalone program like NetNewsWire or a Web site like Bloglines.

Visitors can also get your posts to show up at their My Yahoo or My MSN pages as well. Reviewing my blog traffic I often see referrals from My Yahoo pages; in other words, people who have carved out a little of their personal page to receive updates from flyte.

There’s no additional work you, as the blog owner, need to do. Blogging platforms will create the newsfeed for you automatically.

The Blog as eZine. Most of the population still doesn’t "get" newsfeeds. However, everyone "gets" email newsletters. With a little extra work, you can add an email version of your posts so that people can get your posts via email. This of course extends your reach as well.

There are a number of different services you can install to offer this type of email delivery of your feeds, including Feedburner and Feedblitz.

Even if your readership is savvy enough to understand newsfeeds, adding an email newsletter component is a great investment. I’ve found that sometimes I’m overloaded with the amount of unread posts in my newsreader, but I almost always skim the blogs I’ve subscribed to via email.

So, if you haven’t added blogging to your Internet marketing toolbox, you’ve got three new reasons to get started.

Rich Brooks
Business Blogging Expert

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Posted in Business Blogs and Blog Marketing, Email Marketing, Entrepreneur & Small Business, Search Engine Marketing, Web Marketing | 6 Comments »

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