To Plan Ahead wished to have a website with better functionality that illustrated their commitment and understanding of technology. Burst Marketing designed them a site that is devoted to providing current and future customers easy-to-find information and answers to their questions.

To Plan Ahead wasn’t getting new business through leads coming to their site. In order to grow their business and be more strategic, Burst Marketing developed a clean, crisp, professional website for To Plan Ahead. The new site is informational and easy to navigate, and will help the company to attract new customers and grow their successful business.

When customers go into a restaurant and see a dirty floor, for example, they’re going to walk out, Borland told FOX23 News anchor Stephanie Grady. The same is true for websites.

Watch the complete clip below.

40 updates in one month is actually a new record for Google, and there’s been some buzz about it, but don’t panic just yet. Google making changes, even numerous changes, isn’t anything new. Google is constantly tweaking, changing, improving and updating all of the products that they offer, and those changes don’t always make a huge impact.

With this latest round there’s plenty to sift through, but what likely matters most to businesses can be easily summed up in two parts.

Link Quality

Google indicated that it would be making a change to the way it evaluates links. Specifically, how they evaluate a link as a means of determining the topic of the page being linked to. Unfortunately, Google was characteristically cryptic in exactly what that change is.

Google did say that they are “turning off a method of link analysis that we used for several years.” Since we don’t know which method that is, we can only speculate for now how that will impact rankings.

So let’s speculate!

Back in January I gave a little presentation on Google and some of the big changes of the previous year, and in it I caution business owners to be on the lookout out for updates to Panda. Specifically, I stated that Google is likely to refine how it evaluates backlinks. My advice was to ensure you have plenty of backlinks from quality sites, and to taper off dependency on a high volume of low quality, low relevance links.

That strategy used to work shamefully well, and in many cases it still can, especially if your competition isn’t doing anything. But if Google is “turning off” an old method and trying to improve how it delivers results, then associating your site with low quality sites via backlinks is probably not a sustainable strategy.

Local Search

Typically, if users want local results, they might add their city in along with their search phrase, and this would likely produce relevant local search results. Recently though, Google has been working hard on improving local search functionality to produce local results for all search phrases, including those without a city or location added.

Google is able to accomplish this by using your location information and matching that with webpages that feature compatible location information and are also relevant to the search phrase used. To be clear, local search results may come in the form of a webpage with a geographically relevant address, a homepage of a local business that mentions its city, a Google Places listing, or a combination of those. Essentially, Google is working towards providing relevant local results to a user without requiring the user to explicitly state their desired location in the search phrase.

What does this mean for businesses that want to ensure they show up in local search results?

Well, as always, creating, claiming, and optimizing a Google Places listing is crucial. Beyond that, there’s plenty of optimization that should take place on-site. Add the business address, use the city name in content, or even create a location specific landing page. The latter is basically required if your business has more than one location.

Ultimately though, the specifics of how best to optimize for local results aren’t clearly defined, and they probably won’t ever be (Google wouldn’t want that). What’s important to keep in mind as a business owner, is that it’s crucial to do more things correctly than the competition.

Google wants to deliver the best results for search phrases, and will always be working towards that goal, constantly improving on how it delivers what it thinks are the most relevant results to the user. In order to rank highly and beat out the competition, your business needs to actually be the best result.

Is it?

Magsoft Corporation had an outdated website that was difficult to make updates to internally. They wanted a site that is dynamic and that is able to be expanded to include items such as a mobile website and QR codes.

Burst Marketing developed a new site for Magsoft Corporation that is completely in WordPress to allow for ease of expandability, function, and updates, as well to be able to tie easily into 3rd party social media tools. Because Magsoft mostly got its business through ‘word of mouth’ until now, the new site will increase business through a better website that people are already being driven to see.

Magsoft Corporation was founded in February 1986, and is a top 5 world leader in marketing Computer Aided Engineering [CAE] simulation tools for computing physical phenomena.

What Is Foursquare?

Foursquare is a location-based social media application. It uses maps of local areas to promote social interaction and also includes games. Users can utilize the Foursquare application on their mobile devices to ‘check in’ at businesses and locations they are patronizing. Foursquare is free for users and the trend for ‘checking in’ is still growing. Users can also add a business they frequent if it is not already listed. For each check-in, Foursquare users will earn points, accumulate badges, and ultimately become the ‘Mayor’ of different businesses based on their check-in frequency.

How Does Foursquare Help Grow a Business?

Foursquare, like other social media outlets, can help bring a business to the forefront of the target audience. In many cases, the business itself does not have to be a very active participant in using Foursquare to successfully use it for promotion. As more people are proactive about using the application, businesses are reaping the rewards of word-of-mouth advertising.

Customers do a lot of your promotional work for your business on Foursquare as they can leave tips for other people patronizing your business. This can help to build your reputation in the online community. The more people share their location at your business, the more work will spread.

Effective Foursquare Business Strategies

There are a number of ways to use this social media application to improve your business and grow your customer base. Here is a look at some of the common concepts business have been using to promote the products or services:

Race for Mayor – users of Foursquare can hold the distinct honor of becoming the Mayor of your establishment based on how often they check-in at your location. To provide extra incentives for customers to seek the position of Mayor, a business can offer specials including free merchandise, gift cards, or exclusive discounts to whoever is crowned mayor.

Monthly Foursquare Events – through your Foursquare account, a business can offer exclusive deals or events that are only available to users of the application. Not only can this increase the interest in a business, it can also help encourage people to learn more about Foursquare itself thereby growing your potential audience.

Customer Incentives – there are many simple but effective marketing campaigns you can provide to your customers through Foursquare that offer incentives for checking-in that can be promoted through other social medial applications including Facebook.

Since Foursquare is an ideal way to make direct contact with your target audience, it is worth the time to learn more about the many ways it can be used to market your products or services in real-time. Consistency and active participation are the two most important ingredients in a successful Foursquare marketing strategy for any sized business.

Ready to try it for your business? Sign up here. Would you like a hand setting up your account and brainstorming some other social media ideas? Let the experts at IntelliSites and Burst Marketing help.

Maple Leaf Childcare Center in Upstate New York needed a new website developed in an easy-to-navigate format that highlights their caring staff and child-friendly facilities.

Burst Marketing created their brand new site in WordPress to allow for easier management of the website. Maple Leaf’s goals were to attract new students to the center and to be able to provide information to parents of existing students. The site draws attention to Maple Leaf Childcare Center’s strengths of encouraging children to grow in an active play-oriented environment. Since 1988 Maple Leaf Childcare has been giving children ages six weeks through twelve years the foundation they need to become life-long learners.

Interstate Commodities needed a professional website with a web-based solution to be able to make edits to the site themselves.

IntelliSites provided Interstate Commodities a website that could display information such as schedule changes, weather related updates, and other items that they are able to edit. We also created a landing page based on the look and feel of their new site that was developed. Interstate Commodities provides merchandising, logistics, and risk management of grain and feed ingredients for producers and consumers domestically and internationally.

Take a look at their new website www.icigrain.com and see how we improved their site.

IntelliSites developed a new website to reflect the unique nature of the Preserve’s mission. Visit the Discovery Center at the Albany Pine Bush Preserve for hands-on exploration of the Capital Region’s backyard!

Over the years the Albany Pine Bush Preserve Commission has undergone significant changes and additions–including the building of the Discovery Center–but its website was no longer modern nor attracting as many visitors. IntelliSites came to the rescue, creating a site that reflects the unique nature of the Preserve’s mission. Not only a special habitat spread out over 3,200 acres to protect many of the Capital Region’s plants and animals, the Albany Pine Bush Preserve allows visitors the opportunity to enjoy interactive exhibits and activities. With nearly 18 miles of nature trails, you can participate in recreational pastimes including hiking, jogging along nature paths, nature studies, cross-country skiing, horseback riding, among others!

Check out www.albanypinebush.org to see the website IntelliSites’ created to help plan your next outdoor adventure and learn about our natural habitat!

Olde Greene Consulting wanted a professional website so they could be found directly on the web to help their clients reach their goals.

The IntelliSites team created a custom website to attract clients and to appeal to Olde Green Consulting’s target markets. Old Green Consulting is a traditional accounting firm providing business and personal income tax returns with ongoing financial consulting throughout the year. They help clients take charge of their future.

Visit their website www.oldegreen.com to see what IntelliSites did for them.

How many is too many? When it comes to browser toolbars, usually one or two is plenty.

A problem we see all the time is a browser with too many toolbars.

They can crop up unexpectedly – especially if you unintentionally install them.

Like that painting you bought last year and hung in your living room, it’s easy to overlook toolbars after just a short while.

These days it’s not uncommon to still have a small monitor or a laptop screen that’s blown up so you can read small text. But if you have too many toolbars at the top, your browser window size could be diminished by a third or even half (we’ve seen it before)!

First off, why do you need them? Are you really using the toolbars or were they neat for a day and now you’re not sure how to get rid of them?

Second, they could be harming your computer by allowing malware, viruses, etc. in without your knowing.

Third, it could be slowing down your browser. Those little bars are loading every time you open your browser.

Getting rid of toolbars

So you’re ready to delete those space-hogging potentially dangerous toolbars. Congratulations.

Really all you need to do is right click on the toolbar itself and uncheck the toolbars you don’t need. There may be many of them.

You may also have to remove the root program as well through your computer’s Control Panel. You may want to ask your friendly office IT person to help.

Remember that when you’re browsing the Internet, be careful to read those messages that pop up so you don’t get suckered into clicking yes to download something you really don’t want.

Still wondering about how end users might see your site? Let the experts at Burst Marketing and IntelliSites help!