Posts tagged Portland Web Design

Alberta District – Portland Web Design

By on September 25, 2009

Global Link provides local web design for the Alberta District in Portland, Oregon. Our services are professional, affordable and creative.

The Alberta District in Portland is a residential and business area known for it’s fine art galleries, excellent restaurants and botique shops featuring unique items. On the last Thursday of every month, Northeast Alberta becomes one large street fair as local businesses display their goods for sale.

The Alberta District has its own unique vibe. We at Global Link not only understand this vibe, but we embrase it’s creativity and originality. If you have a gallery or business in the Alberta district, Our local designers can create a website that accurately communicates your original uniqueness while also capturing the culture of Alberta and weaving it into the look and feel of your website.

We are a local Portland web design company located next to the Pearl District in Oldtown pdx. Contact us today for more information about our services and how we can help your business succeed on the internet.

This entry is filed under Portland Web Design and tagged , , .

Battle Ground WA Web Design, Portland & Vancouver SEO

By on September 25, 2009

Global Link is a Portland web design firm serving Battle Ground and Vancouver.

We are a custom web site design company that develops high quality websites. We balance both creativity in design and technology that is optimized for the web. Our graphic design is specialized for web sites which makes for quick downloading without compromising on quality. If your web site graphics are too large, then it will slow down your website and cause visitors to leave before they see your pages. This is why it is crucial that your pages are lightweight and fast.

Search Engine Optimization SEO is critical for your business to succeed on the Internet. With the exploding growth of businesses going online, SEO becomes more vital by the day as more websites compete for viewers.  SEO is still fairly new and many web designers don’t fully understand it. As a result, SEO is either neglected all together or incorrectly implemented. If your website is deployed with improper SEO techniques, it could have devastating effects on your website and create long term damage. If you have a Portland web developer who employs “black hat” or unethical SEO techniques, then Google and other search engines may remove your website completely from their indexes.

At Global Link Technologies, we employ only ethical and safe SEO techniques that have a proven track record of success. Successful and effective SEO is a mix of common sense and old fashioned hard work. There are no shortcuts. It’s that simple. We understand what it takes to get your business web site to rank high in search engine results.

Our other services include ecommerce website development for businesses in the Portland area who want to sell their products online. If you have an outdated ecommerce website that needs to be redsigned, or need a new ecommerce site designed from scratch, we can help. We have a strong track record in developing fully featured and robust ecommerce websites for businesses in the Portland area and various states throughout the nation.

We also provide Portland web design services that include content management systems, blogging software configuration and customization, web hosting, Internet marketing and more.

Contact us today for more information on our Battle Ground web design services.

This entry is filed under Content Management Systems, Ecommerce Solutions, Web Design and tagged , , , .

Portland Vancouver Web Design & SEO

By on September 24, 2009

We are a full service, professional web design firm located in Portland and serving the Portland-Vancouver metro area.

We provide custom website design at affordable rates. Our web design is creative, refined and optimized. All the graphics are optimized for quick downloading. It is vital that your website’s pages appear as fast as possible on your visitors’ computer screen. That is why we make sure your web pages are as light as possible without compromising on quality.

Search Engine Optimization must be an essential factor in web design and redesign. In order for customers in the Portland-Vancouver metro area to find your website, it must rank high in search engine results.  SEO is a major focus of our web design from start to finish. Many web designers do not fully understand SEO and there is a lot of bad information out there that can actually harm your website and get it banned from Google. If a web designer does not have a strong understanding in SEO, they may employ a bad SEO technique and seriously damage your searchability.

At Global Link, we understand SEO thoroughly. We employ only safe and ethical SEO techniques that are based on common sense and hard work. There are no short cuts in SEO. It takes a lot of effort and discipline. And the benefits will enable you to rank well in Search Engine Optimization.

Online sales via e-commerce websites continue to grow as more and more shoppers learn how convenient and safe shopping online has become. If you have a business that is not selling your goods and products online, you are missing out on an incredible market and also loosing significant potential sales and income.  We develop robust ecommerce websites that are secure and robust. All have powerful shopping carts with product databases you can manage yourself. Multiple payment options are available including real time credit card processing.

Content Management Systems are a powerful option for businesses who need to have multiple users publishing content quickly to their website without knowing any HTML or web specific skills. We develop CMS websites that are customized according to your specific requirements.

We also offer reliable web hosting and a number of other web design services as well. Contact us for more information on how we can help your business.

Global Link is a Portland-Vancouver Web Design & SEO Company. Contact us for more information on our web design services.

This entry is filed under Content Management Systems, Ecommerce Solutions, Search Engine Optimization, Web Design and tagged , , , .

Sandy & Portland Web Design

By on September 19, 2009

We provide effective web design for Sandy, Gresham and the greater Portland metro area. If you are a business in Sandy or in the Portland metro area and need a website designed or redesigned, we can help.

We provide SEO upgrades to existing websites. Customers in Sandy and Portland are searching for products and services like yours on a daily basis using the Internet to do so. Search engines like Google, MSN and Bing need to be able to index your website easily and effectively so it will show up in search engine page results.  We employ SEO techniques that are multifaceted. They are also ethical. We do not use any “black hat” seo practices.

Our graphic web design is professional and high quality. We use eye catching and creative design that is inspired and original. Our web graphics are also lightweight and streamlined so your website’s pages download quickly.

Our ecommerce services provide a full range of online solutions including customizable shopping carts, self managing product databases, encrypted online transactions and real time credit card processing and more.

We are a Portland web design & SEO company. Our office is located in downtown Portland in Oldtown, right next to Portland’s Pearl District. Contact us today for more information.

This entry is filed under Content Management Systems, Ecommerce Solutions, Web Design and tagged , , .

The Basics of Understanding Internet Marketing

By on September 9, 2009

What is Internet Marketing?

This is a brief introduction of Internet Marketing. Here we will differentiate between Internet Marketing and Search Engine Optimization. Actually Internet Marketing covers several different marketing strategies.

1. SEO: Search Engine Optimization or SEO is the process of generating more traffic to your website from search engines like Google, MSN and Yahoo by having it ranked well in search engine response pages or SERPS.  When a user types in a keyword or keyphrase into Google’s search box, the search engine will return the most relevant pages. Usually the websites that are closest to the top of the first page get clicked on the most. SEO helps your website rank better in SERPS which in turn causes greater traffic to your website.

2. Pay Per Click PPC is paying for ads, usually in the form of keyword ads on search engines like Google. When a visitor clicks on your add and is taken to your website, you pay for that click. Google does not charge for impressions or when your add shows up on their results pages. You pay only when a user clicks on your link.

3. Banner Ads are graphic designed ads that are posted on a website and generate traffic to your website when a user clicks on them. Banner ads work on a PPC arrangement

4. Email Marketing: Keeping your customers and potential customers informed of your products and services, special sales and discounts is a key function of email marketing. However, with the explosion of SPAM, email marketing does have its challenges. If you send only to people on your list who want to receive your newsletters, you should be fine.

Together, these four areas above make up Internet Marketing. As the web evolves, this list may change and grow.

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Global Link is a Portland web design & Internet Marketing company specializing in SEO.  Contact us for more information about our web design services.

This entry is filed under Internet Marketing, Search Engine Marketing and tagged , , , , , .

What Are Content Management Systems CMS?

By on September 8, 2009

This is a brief introduction to understanding Content Management Systems.

A CMS is web site software that resides on the web server which has a built in word processor. At least one administrator can set up multiple accounts for people to create web pages. This allows for people to log into the CMS control panel on the web server with a username and password and type web pages without needing any HTML or web design knowledge. The writer can create a new web page or edit an existing one all without having to look at any HTML code.

The benefits of using a CMS are mainly in publishing new content quickly by multiple users without relying on a web designer.  A web page designer is usually needed to initially set up and configure the CMS, but after that, pages can be self published. CMS make the “do it yourself” website a reality and excel when you need to publish content quickly from multiple sources.

There are, however, some disadvantages and trade-offs using a CMS compared to a traditional website. If it is most important to give your web site a high end custom design that is complex, then designing for a CMS may be limiting.  When using the online web page editor, it is important to know the limitations. There are ways to edit the layout if you know HTML and Cascading Style Sheets. However, apart from adding pictures and doing some basic text formatting, these editors are not meant to do much else.

If you can be flexible on your design expectation and your most pressing need is the publishing of content from multiple sources, then a CMS may be right for you.

There are also many added features that can be added to the core CMS software packages. These add-ons or mini-programs can be modules, plug-ins, widgets etc and depending on your CMS. They are implemented and behave a little differently, but all give your CMS added functionality. The power of add-ons is that they can be added a later date when needed, at a fraction of the cost of having a programmer custom develop the same program manually. This provides you with excellent value and tremendous savings in cost and cuts development time to almost nil.

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Global Link is a Portland web design firm that develops Content Management Systems CMS for small and medium size businesses. Contact us today if you have any questions or to find out more about our CMS design services.

This entry is filed under Content Management Systems, Web Design and tagged , .

How to Market Your Website

By on September 8, 2009

Tips on how to effectively market your website

You can have the most cutting edge and professionally designed website, but if people are not visiting it, then much of the effort and cost in designing it is wasted. If your website is not getting the traffic it should, then it is important to make sure you are working to promote your website.

1.  If you don’t already have a website domain, chose a domain name that is simple and easy for people to remember. If you can, use a keyword in your name. A keyword is word that people use to find web sites in your industry. For example. If you are a real estate agent in Portland, people would most likely type, “Portland real esate agents” in to Google’s search box.  Now, the domain “www.portlandrealestate.com” and similar ones are taken, so you need to carefully research domain name options.

Remember if you can’t weave a keyword into your domain name, that’s OK, too, as long as it is easy to remember. Amazon.com for example, says nothing about selling books or online shopping, but everyone knows the name and it is easy to recall.

2. Make sure your web site domain name is prominently printed on all your business cards, letterhead., brochures etc. Make sure it stands out from the rest of the information. If you have a physical office or store front, have a sign promoting your website. Many companies put their website domain on their vehicles’ windows. Also have your website url at the bottom of your emails along with your other contact information as an address. You can also mention your website address on your voice mail message.

3. Posting discount coupons for your products or services on your website that can be printed out is a great way for people to visit your website and become more familiar with your offerings.

4. Search Engine Optimization: SEO is the process of structuring your website’s content, design and architecture so that it ranks well in search engine page results.  SEO in itself covers a lot of ground, so I’ll just touch over it here. At the very least you need to make sure you understand the search terms people are typing into Google and other search engines in order to find your website and other web sites in your same industry. You can go to Google’s keyword tool to research your industry’s most popular search terms: https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal

The Google Keyword tool is very effective in discovering not only your industry’s top keywords and keyphrases but also how many searches each one is getting per month.

I recommend not only focusing on the top keywords and keyphrases, but also on niche keyphrases. These are search terms that may not be searched for as much, but will also drive traffic to your website when you optimize your web pages with them.

This is only a very basic look at SEO. In order to learn more, search on our posts using “SEO” in the search box. More content will be added regularly.

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Global Link is a web design & SEO firm in Portland. We serve clients both locally and nationally.

This entry is filed under Search Engine Marketing, Search Engine Optimization, Web Design and tagged , , , .

Using Google’s Keyword Tool

By on September 4, 2009

Using Google’s Keyword Tool

Google’s keyword analysis tool is very useful in helping you determine the most used keywords and keyword phrases that people are using to find web sites like yours. The tool tracks all search words and phrases people are typing into Google’s search engine and ranks the results from most searches to least in number.

Yahoo’s keyword tool used to be widely used, but it no longer provides reliable results, since it only tracks Yahoo searches. Since Google has un-seated Yahoo as the world’s most powerful search engine, it follows that Google’s keyword tool is much more reliable than Yahoo’s.

Here is the link to Google’s keyword tool:

https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal

To discover your industry’s most effective keyword tool, type a phrase into the text box. The results will help you discover words you may not of considered. Try typing other phrases as well. The more you research, the better you will be able to define your industry’s most popular keyphrases.  It will also help you discover what words may not be the best to use.

Once you determine a list of the most popular keywords, you can now begin writing your web site’s content.

This entry is filed under Search Engine Optimization, Web Design and tagged , , , .

Website Evaluation Questions

By on August 31, 2009

Website Evaluation Questions:

The following list will help you evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of your current website and help you discern what changes you should make to your website and what things you want to leave as is. Hopefully this  will trigger other ideas for you. If you are a large company with different departments, it would be good to include each department head in this evaluation.

Content:

Does your current website accurately communicate your organization’s purpose, values and mission?

Is there any content that needs to be updated or changed?

Who is your web audience and how can your current website’s content be refined to better reach them?

What new areas would be helpful to add in communicating with your audience?

Design:

What do you like about your current website?

What do you dislike?

What other 2 or 3 websites do you like and what do you like about them?

Search Engine Optimization

Are new customers finding you on all the major search engines like Google, Yahoo and MSN?

Has your website’s content been crafted using your industry’s most effective keywords and keyphrases?

Functionality & Interactivity

(Note: The purpose of a static or “brochure” website is to provide general information that is usually unchanging in nature. A site of this type provides little or no interactivity/ functionality.)

Does your website need added functionality that it does not currently have?

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Global Link is a Portland web design & SEO company. We serve clients throughout Portland, the Northwest and the nation. Contact us today if we can answer any questions or be of any help to you.

This entry is filed under Search Engine Optimization, Web Design and tagged , , , , , .

Web Design Process

By on August 31, 2009

During the web design process, we welcome any input from you. Some people want to have complete control over each step as we design your website, others want very little interaction, and want us to decide.  We are flexible and can work with you in whatever capacity you chose.

Here’s a rough outline of the process:

  • You can fax, email or post to us any content you already have.  Brochures, Flyers, vision statements, advertisements, etc. Or if you are local to the Portland area, we can stop by your office to pick up the material.
  • Send any photos and/or graphics you would like have on your website. If they are digital, you can simply email them to us. Otherwise, if they are printed photos, you can mail them to us and we can scan the photos, then send the them back to you.
  • If you don’t have much information, already, we can work with you in crafting the right content for your pages. We can craft the web page content for you with SEO in mind.
  • We can also create custom web graphics that will be highly optimized and professional. We can create logos if you need them.
  • Determine website structure: We can work on this together to decide on what each web page should contain.
  • View other websites in your industry and get an idea of what you like and don’t like. When you find several websites you really like, you can email us the links to them. If you are using Internet Explorer for your browser, you can go to file at the top left, then click on “send” then on “send page by email” or “link by email”. Or simply cut and paste the address from the browser’s address menu into an email.
  • Decide on what colors you would like for your site. If you already have a color scheme for your business, we can use that. Otherwise we can help you chose what colors are best for the web.
  • As we build the website, we will post drafts of the pages for your review and OK. These will be posted in a sub directory on Global Link’s server.

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Global Link is a web design and SEO company located in Portland. Give us a call or email us if we can answer any questions or be of any help for your web design needs.

This entry is filed under Search Engine Optimization, Web Design and tagged , .

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