Our friends at 360 Innovations Roofing recently reached out to us about creating a website to target the 75205 zip code of Highland Park, a top-notch suburb in North Dallas. And thus, roofing75205.com was born. Roofing 75205 dot com will serve as their primary sales site in the Park Cities area. This is an affluent suburb with countless amazing roofs and houses to potentially work on. 360 is a top-tier roofing service and this setup should work well for them going forward.

Services they offer include the usual commercial and residential options including:

• Gutters
• Downspouts
• Roof replacement
• Roof repair
• Leak repair
• Help with insurance claims
• and more

The site is still under construction but we plan to have it live soon. 2019 is looking good!

Most people have hair. And if there's one constant about hair, it's that it grows. Fast. No but seriously folks, hair stylists will always be in demand and it's a service that will always be important to the people of Dallas, Plano, Frisco, etc. 

That's why we are thrilled to announce a partnership with our latest client, hair stylist Annette Burns of Plano. Annette specializes in corrective color treatments and handles haircuts for men and children as well as women's hair, her speciality.

No matter what your hair needs are, Annette is here to help. She has been faithfully serving the city of Plano for over 2 decades and has a great rapport built up with countless clients in the north DFW area. We were referred to Annette by a mutual friend who suggested to her that it was time to, well, get with the times and build a website.

Obviously having a website isn't enough and Annette wanted to make sure her new site was found by people looking for the best in hair care and styling. We were more than happy to oblige. Annette is a great friend and we recommend her to anyone looking for a quality cut at a fair price. No matter what your needs, she has you covered. Cheers, Annette!

Find Annette's Room at Salons on the Creek on Google Maps

Our friend Erin over at Apartment Fit (www.apartmentfit.com) contacted us for advice on getting her site some visibility. Her old web designer had her site set up to not allow spiders to crawl her HTML data.  This is something that needed to be changed and we obliged. Apartment Fit is planning to open more offices across the state of Texas, with Austin and Houston next on the list. More to follow.

One of the fastest-growing industries here in Dallas, and really all over the country, is iPhone repair services. Yes, our smart phones are amazing pieces of technology that keep us connected and functioning in 2017. It's a sad/strange addiction but it's the truth. However, for all their engineering beauty smart phones are also very fragile. And since we use them constantly, there's a constant risk of dropping them. Then they shatter. Ouch.

Luckily, there's a massive groundswell of companies in the Dallas area that repair mobile phones, specifically the glass screens that can shatter in an instant if your phone slips out of your hand. One such business is G&S Wireless Solutions - an on-site phone restoration service that also has a new retail location in the 75220 zip code near I-35 and Walnut Hill. If you need help immediately, hit up their contact page.

Gilbert, the owner, was referred to us by a mutual friend and former client. He has an amazing vision for his business and wants it to be known as the very best in the DFW area. We want to help him get there. We're re-designing his website, as well as expanding his online reach to include Youtube how-to videos. 2017 should be a great year for G&S and we look forward to being along for the ride.

There's ethical, honest, "white hat" SEO. That's us :)

Then there's shady, off-shore, cloaked, "black hat" bad-guy SEO. That ain't our scene.

And then there's.... uh.... "ULTRA-SHADY, GET SENTENCED TO PRISON FOR 36 MONTHS" SEO. In the Dallas area, no less!

Huh?

​Basically, some guy named William Stanley (age 53 and complete with plenty of aliases) was recently arrested and sent to prison for attempting to extort money from companies in the Dallas area. After being hired on to help with SEO services.

Lovely.

The full story can be found here. I'm spotlighting this article because in all my years of doing SEO, I've NEVER seen anything like this. 

One of the best books on website design (and online advertising in general) is Don't Make Me Think. It blew my mind the first time I read it and it's a must-read for anyone who owns a business. Yes, it's that important.

Why? Because it's the only book on web design you need. When a visitor reaches your site, he's presented with options. Learn more about your company, read testimonials, coverage area, etc. He's bombarded. And that's not good.

Obviously you want to present information that's relevant. This info should be presented "above the fold" to use a newspaper analogy. While it might be tempting to fill your site with a long history of you and your business, most people don't care.

What they do care about is how to get in touch with you. If you own a carpet cleaning business, I don't need to see 100 pictures of you standing in front of a company van, and I don't care that your business was started in 1994 and has grown. I care about getting my carpets cleaned and that means getting in touch with the company.

If your existing website doesn't feature a phone number or contact form prominently displayed, you might want to find a different web designer. I know, I know - this site doesn't feature those things, and that's on purpose. But the vast majority of the sites we see and work on do.

Your conversion rates will sky rocket because LESS IS MORE. Don't make a visitor think when he hits your site. You only have a few seconds to get to the point before he clicks "back" and is on to the next (competing) company's website. 

Also - make sure your contact form works. This happens way too often and there's no excuse for a non-functioning contact form on a website. It makes you look amateurish and only frustrates the end user.

Your website doesn't need to be flashy. In fact, the opposite usually works better. People don't want Youtube videos exploding on them when they hit your site. They don't want 100 links to sift through. They want a clear, concise presentation about who you are and what you can offer them.

If someone really wants to read about the history of your business, or view a slideshow, they will seek it out. And that's fine. But most people are as busy as you are and just want to speak with someone about their problem/need. Make it easy and you'll get more business.

Our friends at Little Elm Tree Trimming recently reached out to us regarding a basic site overhaul and we were happy to oblige. The owner's son, Sean, had built a basic site using a free site builder and we wanted to step the look up a little. Our philosophy with local business websites has always been clean and simple and we never want creativity to get in the way of the company's message. We implemented this design strategy yet again with a new site that is both functional and good looking.

Tree trimming services abound here in DFW and we look forward to helping this local company stand out from the crowd in the years to come. Since Little Elm is a popular destination for new home construction and has over 30,000 residents (and booming) this should be a win-win over the next few years.

Update: Little Elm Tree Trimming has been acquired by our friends at North Dallas Tree and Sod.

We've been fortunate to have some great referrals in cities like Dallas, Royce City and Keller over the past few weeks. Some of our latest projects include work for:

DFW Landscaping - this was formerly a division of DFW Tree Trimming that has become a separate venture in the Dallas area. Specialties include xeriscaping and custom landscape design work.

Michael Nail's Retaining Wall Division - this new division specializes in residential work in the Keller and Southlake areas. They also have a pool removal division that we will be doing some consulting work for.

The DFW Fence Dr.'s Staining Division - Bryant has been a trusted client for years and his new fence and deck staining division is equipped to handle a variety of touch up services. This is one of the larger fence companies in the Dallas, TX area and they always produce great work.

We look forward to a busy summer and appreciate the referrals that brought these great businesses to us!

Our buddy Chance at Best Texas Appliance Repair in the Keller, TX area contacted us because he felt he wasn't getting the most out of his website. While it had good content, the old site wasn't HTML friendly and therefore wasn't search-engine-friendly. He was missing out on some huge opportunities since his site actually had plenty of credibility.

Since Best Texas offers services like:

• Washing machine repair
• Dryer repair
• Oven and dishwasher help

and eventually all of these appliances break, the competition for this type of work online, even in smaller suburbs like the HEB area, is pretty intense. We look forward to working with Best Texas for many years and expanding their online presence ethically and honestly.

Find Best Texas Appliance Repair on Google+

The "Contact" page is often the most misunderstood part of a website. Look at how most local service businesses lay their contact forms and pages out and you'll see a number of problems. Below are tips on what to do and what not to do when it comes to your company's "Contact Us" page if you own a local service business:

Bad Ideas:

• Not having a contact form - I see this way too often. The contact page simply has the email address and no real contact form. You click on the email address in hopes of getting a bid or scheduling an appointment and suddenly your Outlook is popping up and your computer goes crazy. You get frustrated and leave. Cobalt's contact page is a good example of what it should look like.
• Asking way too many questions - Some business owners think this looks more professional, but the longer the contact form, the lower the conversion rate. Why? Because people don't want to answer a laundry list of questions to get a simple answer or set up an appointment. You're catering to them. Not the other way around. Cut down to the essentials and your conversion rate will rise. See below.

Good ideas:

• Get to the point - The best contact form layout is to require a Name, Phone Number, Email (optional) and a Comment section. Why? Because this is the bare minimum you as a company need to make contact with a customer. Asking anything else is redundant and wastes their time. Make it easy for people to contact you while still getting the important info. If someone doesn't want to be called before noon, they will probably specify this in the "Comment" window. You don't need a separate drop-down menu for this.
• Let them know you don't sell info - A basic "We respect your privacy" disclaimer (you do respect their privacy, right?) at the bottom of the contact form ensures they know you are an ethical company.

In a nutshell - don't make the Contact page obnoxious and difficult to fill out. A simple contact form wins, every time.