Seems pretty clear to me!

To your success,

Karl Foxley

Not the best start to the day; I was in this site’s admin area (I use Wordpress) and I was happily checking stats and reading the new comments from our lovely readers when the website disappeared and returned a server error page. As soon as my website stopped loading my desktop email alerts popped up confirming that the website was unavailable.

I checked all my websites on the same hosting account, yup, every single one of them returned the same error message.

I promptly pointed my browser to HostMonster, my main hosting account, logged in and went straight over to the Help Section. HostMonster are using a Live Chat client to help them promptly deal with their customers requests.

I sent my message of to the customer support representative that I was connected to. He quickly confirmed that they were doing some major work and all would be fine in an hour or so.

Today’s events prompted me to write this quick blog post for two reasons:

Firstly, to remind you that YOU need to know before anybody else when your website is down and then take the steps necessary to get it back online again as quickly as possible. It really is no good to have a customer email you with a message like ‘I’ve been trying to access the site all day but it isn’t loading, so I figured I’d email you to find out what’s going on’. Just imagine all day without any customers!

I use a few services to track my sites and these are:

InternetSeer.com

Montastic.com

FreeWebMonitering.com

All of the services are free (or have free basic plans) and include email alerts when your website is unavailable and when it becomes available. again.

Secondly, good customer service really does go a long way to making a good service great.

Okay, my traffic nosedived while my websites were unreachable but does that mean I should abandon HostMonster and start looking for a new hosting account. I don’t think so!

You see, they did send an email ahead of time to me letting me know that they were going to be undertaking some work that may result in my website being unavailable for a short period of time: I simply forgot about the email (my fault!).

HostMonster have always dealt with my support requests in a timely manner and this is of great importance when your business depends on your website (your store front) being available to your customers.

Remember, when you get a support ticket or an email from a customer needing support, be as prompt as possible. Happy customers will go on and tell their family and friends about their experiences with your company just like I’m sharing my experience of the great customer support HostMonster provide.

Your take away action for today: Go grab yourself a free account with one of the website monitoring services I mentioned above, set up your email alerts and be the first to know when your website is down.

To your success,

Karl Foxley

What is great about using Wordpress as a content management system (CMS) is the ability to change themes, and essentially your whole website, with a few clicks of a button.

I’m not going to lie, some themes require a good knowledge of coding and access to Adobe Photoshop to be able to fully customise the look and feel of your site, however, many do not! Don’t let this put you off though as you can hire someone to make any changes for you, for a small fee, from places like HireMyMom or Project4Hire (you can also contact us to discuss your needs).

I think you’ll agree our new look is Pretty Awesome if I do say so myself! The theme we are using is the eBusiness Theme from Elegant Themes. By saying that this theme cost me a massive $19.95 I would only be telling you half of the truth. You see, $19.95 is for a yearly subscription to every theme from the Elegant Themes catalogue, and this includes any new themes that are released in the future.

To put this in perspective, some Theme companies sell a multi-theme licence from $197 – $397. Currently, your $19.95 will give you access to 24 very unique looking themes that will meet a variety of website needs. Some theme titles can be changed within Wordpress itself, using the theme options, meaning you will not need Photoshop.

Visit the website to see the many different themes they have on offer.

I used two Plugins to manage the transition from one theme to another and you may also find them handy. Maintenance Mode allows you to instantly hide your website from visitors leaving them with a splash-page. You can use the splash-page to tell your visitors what you are doing and when your website will be live again! This plugin is great for when you are making big changes to a theme and the content.

Theme Preview allows you to test a new theme on your site without actually making the changes live to your visitors. This is a great way to work on a theme without disrupting your visitors.

We would love to hear your feedback about our new look, any suggestions, any blog topics you would like us to cover, so send us an email or use the comment box below.

To your success,

Karl

A premium Wordpress theme will save you the cost of employing a web designer to create a website for you. Premium themes are usually totally customisable allowing you to create a unique look and feel for your business blog. You can usually test drive a theme so you can see what it will look in action, making it easier to see which one will be right for you.

Here are the themes:

Studio Press

Brain Gardner and the Studio Press team create some very nice looking themes that will match a wide variety of business websites.

Studio Press Themes start at $59.95 and they also have multi-theme packages.

Affiliate Theme

The Affiliate Theme isn’t just for the affiliate marketer but, if you are, you will love this one!

The Affiliate Theme is recommended by some very big names in the online marketing world and for good reason, it ROCKS! Theme starts at $97.00. Visit the site here!

Press 75

If you have $275 to spare you can purchase the entire range of Press 75 themes, past, present and future!

As you can see from the Press 75 screenshot, all single themes are $75.oo. They have some amazing themes!

Thesis Theme

The Thesis Theme website has a video showing you the theme in action.

The Thesis Theme costs $87.00.

Woo Themes

Woo Themes have some exceptionally designed themes.

Woo Themes have a permanent special offer, buy one theme get one absolutely free.

Gorilla Themes

Gorilla Themes may have a questionable name but their themes are of an exceptional standard.

The Gorilla Themes start at around $79.95.

Theme Shift

Theme Shift have some nicely designed themes that look very professional.

You can purchase a theme from Theme Shift or you can download one of their free ones.

Style WP

Style WP not only offer some great premium themes but also a wealth of blogging information.

Style WP also offer free themes and paid versions.

Blog Oh Blog

Blog Oh Blog have a small catalogue of quality looking themes.

The Blog Oh Blog themes have free and paid for themes.

Classifieds Theme

Ever wanted to run your own Classifieds website? This theme is for you!

The Classifieds Theme comes complete PayPal integration. The theme starts at $59.99.

Press Box

Press Box is a great theme that is ideal for a news type website.

Press Box comes in two flavors, light and full! You can test both by visiting the website.

Elegant Themes

Elegant Themes have a great range of blogs that you can gain access to for one very low yearly subscription.

As the screenshot shows, the yearly fee is only $19.95. Visit the site to take a look at the Elegant Themes.

What ever theme you choose for your online business you’ll find a one that fits your needs above. If you have a theme that you would like to be included on this page why not drop me a line with the URL and I’ll take a look.

To your success,

Karl Foxley

Further reading:

Wordpress.org Free Themes Directory

Wordpress.org Plugins Directory

Just take a look at the coverage on Fox News by playing the video below.

This trend will only spread so I urge you to start looking at the Internet as a viable and cost-effective alternative for advertising your business.

Just take a look at how easy it is to have a website up and running.

1. You can grab a domain name from GoDaddy for under £5 for a year.

2. I recommend Host Monster for hosting your website because it is cheap, packed with features and the customer support is simply amazing (all important when you need technical help quickly). This will cost you around £4 a month.

3. You can perform a simple few clicks installation of a website like Foxley Marketing Solutions using Simple Scripts Wordpress Installation feature within the cPanel area of Host Monster. If you use this option then you can purchase a top notch professional Wordpress Theme from Studio Press for as little as £36.95.

4. If you don’t fancy using the power of a self-hosted blog using Wordpress another alternative is to use a dedicated piece of software to custom build your very own website and the perfect tool for this is XSitePro. This software is super powerful and puts you in total control and will cost you around £120.

5. Lastly, your website will start being indexed (listed) in the search engines when you start adding content and receiving visitors. The easiest way to rank highly in the search engines is to target specific keywords for your businesses target market. We other SEO packages that will meet any budget. When you have your website up and running or ready to launch then give us a call on UK 0798 802 6719 for a personalised quote and to discuss your needs.

There are many ways to market your website online that will be much more beneficial and lucrative to your business. Take action today and set up your business website or optimise your existing website for the search engines. You can learn more about online marketing by becoming a newsletter subscriber as you will also get instant access to our Website Promo Success 7 day mini-course.

The recession is the time to really take stock of trends that will grow your business, stop wasting money by purchasing advertising in the Phone Book Directories and get yourself online.

To your success,

Karl Foxley

P.s. You can gain access to a wealth of training materials that will help you grow you business over at one of my favourite resources, Online Biz. The forum is open to the public and you quickly learn a lot about marketing.

The answer is a resounding YES!

Just imagine having a member of your team promoting your products 24 hours a day and 7 days a week.

Here are just a few of the benefits to having a website:

• a website will take payments while you sleep…
• a website will work on bank holidays, school holidays, public holidays and won’t need a day off…
• a website will NOT cost much money to set up and maintain…
• a website can answer your customer’s questions without you ever having to pick up the phone or answer an email…
• a website will (when done correctly) increase your profits and returning customers…
• a website can help you build long-lasting relationships with prospects and customers…
• and much more…

You don’t need much to get started. You don’t even have to pay a professional design team as you can have optimised sites created on the fly using specially designed software.

What you will need:

• A domain name – this will be what people type in to find your website. You can purchase a domain for next-to-nothing from GoDaddy.com. If possible purchase a .com and a .co.uk (if you are in the UK) and redirect the .com to your .co.uk URL.
• A hosting account – this will be where you host your newly designed website. I highly recommend Host Monster for the simple reason they have great customer support and CPanel in the admin area (I’ll cover CPanel in a future post but you really need a hosting provider that uses CPanel).
• A website design software. X Site Pro allows you to design websites on the fly that are totally customisable. Don’t pay for over-the-top content management systems when you can do it all yourself using X Site Pro. Visit the site and watch the video to see if the software is the best fit for you (it doesn’t cost much in comparison to the CMS systems being promoted by website design companies. X Site Pro can is as easy to edit as a Word document.
• Another essential must is to get an account with a dedicated email service provider. You can visit iContact and sign-up to receive a free mini-course all about email marketing. Briefly, you need an ESP so you can put opt-in forms on your website to capture the names and email addresses of your prospects and customers. This will allow you to build relationships through newsletters, updates, tips etc, and you’ll easily increase your profits with a successful email campaign.

You’ll find plenty of step-by-step information on the websites mentioned above making it easy to get started. The only thing you’ll need to know once you’ve got your website online is how to market your business for constant streams of visitors. You can get as head-start by signing up to our mini-course, Website Promo Success, and by optimising your website with our ‘tailored to your business’ SEO.

Be sure to get your website online as this is certainly one way of ensuring your business is adapting to current trends. You’ll be amazed how easy it is to get going.

To your online success,

Karl Foxley

Website usability analysis is an important element that must be factored into your business monitoring. You can use Google Analytics and other visitor tracking software to get statistical data that can draw up a clearer picture of how your users are finding your site, interacting with your site and leaving your site.

You should have some form of tracking in place but to really test usability it is better to watch someone navigate your website. One way of testing your website for ease of navigation is to conduct sessions with a variety of users; always use people who computer savvy and those that hardly ever use a computer. This will ensure you get a broader picture of how easy your site is to use.

You’ll want to watch people use your site with no object in mind but, more importantly, you’ll want to give people specific tasks to see how easy they are to complete. For example, you could give the following instructions:

Find an item, add it to the shopping basket and proceed to the checkout page.

Find the contact page and submit a question.

Find product x add to basket, continue shopping and add item z, now empty basket.

Along with your observations it is wise to ask each person to complete a questionnaire where you ask for their feedback regarding ease of use. You can always use friends and family to do this but be aware that they may lean on giving you feedback that is more positive due to your relationship (you’ll be best to judge this).

An additional tool that can really help with your website usability analysis is to record visitor sessions on your website. Clixpy is free to register with and they give you a number of credits to get you started. You will be able to play-back visitor sessions and see exactly what your prospects and customers are doing on your site.

You’ll be able to see exactly what people do. Let’s say the sessions you record show that people are consistantly adding items to your shopping cart software and then not completing the checkout process. You may be able to deduce that the checkout button is not visible on certain pages, or is not clear enough, or the page you thought was live is actually returning a 404 page not found message.

Clixpy is a great service and purchasing additional credits is very cost-effective. You can find a setup tutorial on my personal blog by clicking here. You can get 100 captures for as little as $5 and they accept PayPal payments. Register for you free account with Clixpy by clicking on the link below:

www.clixpy.com

To your success,

Karl Foxley