Blog: Web

Search Engine Optimization sounds good – how do you make it happen for your site? Here are five basics every site should have to maximize its SEO.

1. Choose keywords. The term, "keyword," describes a word or phrase search engines use to index a Web page. Decide what words and phrases you think Web users will enter into a search engine to find your site.

2. Use those keywords in the text of your Web pages. Search engines "read" the actual text of Web pages (not graphics). Use your keywords often in a relevant manner.

3. Use keyword title tags on every page. Make sure your developer is using title tags by looking at the header or tab of your browser. If you see a description of the page there, then title tags are being used. List the keyword subject of the page, then the company name. You only get 70 characters, including spaces.

 

4. Use the same keyword subjects as H1 headers at the top of the content of each Web page. H1 is a piece of code assigned to the main header of the page. Make sure your developer is using them.

5. Use Google's tools. Google Analytics will help you track site visits. Google Webmaster Tools help give Google the information it needs to index your site. Ask your developer to set up both.

Need help? Give us a call, 541-484-7052 or drop an email to dana@cawood.com.

 

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Your employees regularly search the Internet and come up with great stuff. But for the sake of your company, be sure that they are complying with copyrights. If you don’t have a license or permission to use documents, don’t send, make copies or post them to your site – that goes for internal distribution and Intranet sites, as well. Check out www.askbeforeyouact.com or www.copyright.gov.

When gleaning information from the Web or printed materials, you should know that it’s no longer necessary to have a © notice, or even register your copyright. Protections for originality and creativity are now a given in the eyes of the U.S. Copyright Office, which investigates and levies hefty fines for copyright infringement.

Copyright, a form of intellectual property law, protects original works of authorship including literary, dramatic, musical, and artistic works, such as newspaper or magazine articles, poetry, novels, photos, movies, songs, computer software and architecture.

It’s OK to send clients or colleagues a link to a site, but not the actual article. It’s illegal to provide electronic or printed stories without the consent of the media outlet that produced the story. Even if you credit a publisher and author, it is considered a copyright infringement. Why? Publishers want people to visit their websites as much as you want people to visit yours; increased site traffic drives revenue.

What about photographs? A person who takes a photo automatically has copyright protection, so be sure to get permission before using or publishing images. You also need releases from people in photographs if they will be used for advertisements or publicity purposes.

What’s considered public domain? First, anything not protected by copyright. That includes YouTube, which is a public domain (remember that when you post videos).

What’s the penalty for violating copyright law? A court can award both actual damages and statutory damages from $750 to $150,000 per infringed work – copy five newspaper articles to your site without permission and you could be looking at $3,750 to $750,000 in fines.

How can you avoid infringement at your place of work?
•Adopt copyright policies
•Educate your staff and encourage strong management oversight
•Keep a record of copyright permissions and license agreements
•Seek legal guidance, if necessary

It’s important to note that copyright law does not require the person committing the violation, or responsible for the violation, be aware that their actions are in violation of law. Ignorance of the law – or even lack of intent – does not excuse the violation and is not a defense in a copyright infringement lawsuit.

So, before you hit “copy” or “print,” be sure to get permission.

We’re here to help. At CAWOOD, we request and record copyright permissions for several clients. When questions arise, give us a call: 541-484-7052.

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Check out Pathology Consultants' new website! Our challenge was to create a look and feel that could transition to all materials used by the practice, which performs both clinical and anatomic pathology to diagnose and characterize disease by examining biopsies or bodily fluids.

The site was designed to provide information for both referring physicians and patients. For instance when patients are referred to Pathology Consultants' Fine Needle Aspiration Biopsy Clinic, they may have questions. Information on the site explains what will happen during the procedure, covers scheduling an appointment, and includes a map and driving directions. It's all in one convenient location. Physicians have a secure log-in to access results of the biopsy.

The design includes a large specimen image, as well as an easy to use navigation bar on the left. Overall, the site has a classy, yet lean feel. Graphics further underscore the connection between the pathologists, referring physicians and patients.

This site is informative, yet avoids looking like a traditional medical site. It reflects the physicians commitment to quality and to ensure patients and physicians are fully informed.

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I've been building websites for 15 years, on subjects ranging from music retail to building contractors to astrology. But I never thought I would build a web page for testicular cancer. Not until now. It reminds me of a database administrator I knew who took a job maintaining databases devoted to diarrhea. It is amusing in a low-brow, scatalogical way. But in all seriousness, it is important work nonetheless.

CAWOOD recently launched two new sites for Northwest Specialty Clinics. Originally intended to be one site, it was decided the content for the Cancer Care Alliance was large enough to merit a site of its own.

The main Northwest Specialty Clinics site launched in May, and it was a pleasure to build. A beautiful design, and very few gee-whiz-flashy web gizmos allowed for a smooth development cycle.

The Cancer Care Alliance site soon followed, launching just yesterday. Another simple and elegant design, but the content was a bit different with this one. Browse the Cancers section, and imagine having to carefully read and edit every word of these various forms of cancer and their symptoms. It was an unusual experience, to say the least.

I am glad to have had the experience and proud to be associated with these websites. I hope we, as humans, manage to abolish these deadly diseases someday, and I applaud those who work with them every day.

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An issue that has plagued Web designers since the inception of the Internet is the limited number of fonts available for Web pages. Technically speaking, a Web site can use any font installed on a user's computer. But because we all have different operating systems (PC, Mac, Linux), there are only a small number of fonts reliably known to exist for everyone.

As such, Web designers will stick to using these fonts to ensure user readability. This is why we see so many sites using Verdana, Arial and Helvetica (with the occasional Georgia, Times New Roman and Trebuchet MS). In rare instances, you may even see Comic Sans (but if this sentence does not look very comical, you do not have that font installed).

It is possible to create graphic images using any font a designer chooses, and display these on a Web site. Doing so, however, presents a few problems. Graphic text cannot be indexed by search engines (i.e. can't be seen by Google), often slows page loading time and is not selectable, meaning it can't be copied and pasted from the browser.

One method to get around these font limitations, and something CAWOOD employs on most every site we build, is sIFR. This ingenious workaround uses Flash technology to display the fonts of our choice. And the good news is that sIFR text can be indexed by search engines, as well as copy/pasted from the browser. Nearly 99 percent of computers have Flash installed. For those who don't, the text will simply revert back to a standard Web font.

You can see it in action on the following sites:

• Radiology Associates P.C. - by using sIFR on headers and sub-navigation, the distinctive text can easily be changed (or new content added) in the content management backend without requiring graphics editing.
• Market of Choice - here we use the Myriad font on the menu navigation to enhance the design of this award winning site.
• Eugene Pediatric Associates - the red "Directions" heading is sIFRized to match the font of the business logo.
• CAWOOD - This page you are reading has bits of sIFR throughout. The red "Blog" heading uses the Futural font.

sIFR is a free technology, but using it is an advanced technique with its own drawbacks. But we are glad to have mastered this technique so that we can create unique Web designs for our clients.

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