1) The graphics files that make up your website are too large. Web graphics are different than print graphics. If you use graphics meant for print on a website, it’s going to take forever for those graphics to load on someone’s screen.

2) There’s too much extra code behind the scenes of your website.

3) Your hosting account is slow. Your hosting account is like the gas for your website. If you have a junk hosting account, the site’s going to always run slow no matter what.

What’s the fix?

A) Have a web professional like myself or someone else have a look at your website for a free quick assessment.

B) Try switching to a new hosting account. I won’t name names but some are notoriously slow. Want a fast one? Here’s a company I recommend: Unlimited Domain Hosting Only $9.95 a Month

While it’s a piece of cake to register domain names and build a D0-It-Yourself website for cheap that you will quickly realize must be replaced by a professional site if you have any hopes of generating business with it, it’s a royal pain when you’re ready to cross that bridge.

Rather than bore you with all the technicalities or the system, it would be like handing a bag of  ’86 Toyota Tercel car parts to a master mechanic and asking him or her to build a Porsche.

What do I wholeheartedly recommend? Scan the sidebar to the right of this post for the answer.

Violations are not determined by the size of your company. And, when they contact you it’s not for a citation or for negotiations, it’s because you’ve already been tagged for the violation.

What’s the fine? I know of 3 businesses that were fined one for $25,000, another for $85,000, and a third for $100,000. And the last one was simply for not obtaining verifiable parental consent prior to collecting personal information from children.

What’s the solution? I personally use and recommend Len Thurmond’s Auto Web Law.

It’s a simple piece of software that you download and use right away. You simply choose the form you want, fill in the blanks and click “Get Document”.  Instantly, you have document you need for your website. Then you just cut and paste the text when you need it.

Here’s a screen shot of how it works:

For a closer look at Auto Web Law, click here.  They have 2 options:

1) Auto Web Law Pro – Has almost 70 documents. This is not a blanket legal forms software. This is for website owners and is being constantly updated as new laws regarding the internet come into effect.  (THIS IS THE ESSENTIAL PACKAGE)

2) Auto Web Law Pro + IPPP Intellectual Property Protection Plan – Includes legal forms to notify those who are stealing content from your website or digital books.  (THIS IS FOR ULTIMATE PROTECTION)

Both include Privacy Policies and Terms of Use forms.
Again this is exactly what I personally use to legally protect my websites.
If you don’t have it, get it.
Visit the Auto Web Law website HERE.

So, the thought quickly permeates the entrepreneur and small business world that websites cost SO much money. Well, if your website isn’t making you sales, it could actually be costing you much more than you even paid to get it built in the first place. The real question is, “How much money is your website costing you?”

Let’s look at  a fictitious scenario that may be all too real for some of you. You may never look at your own website the same way again. Read at your own risk.

Kip the Carpet Cleaner – Kip owns a new small carpet cleaning business. In fact, he bought the best carpet cleaning equipment there was to offer. At first he operated off of word of mouth referrals and did a darn good job. However, after he had cleaned all of his friends and family’s carpets, his well of business leads was almost dried up. So, he decided to look into getting website. His brother-in-law once built a little website for his son’s karate team, and said he’d do it for him cheap. Cheap is what Kip wanted. After all a good businessman gets things cheap right? So, he pays his brother-in-law a couple hundred bucks, and gets his website . . . 4 months later. While he was waiting for his site, Kip had to get a part-time job at the grocery store to make ends meet. Hey, that’s okay, we have to do what we can while we’re building our businesses, right? When he finally got the site, it was nothing special, and looked like those free ones you get with some hosting plans. In fact, it might have been just that, but Kip couldn’t tell, but he paid for it. Well, when Kip got his website, nothing changed. The site was boring, it wasn’t search engine optimized so nobody ever found his business online, and those who he gave his business card to, with his web address on it, went to his website and quickly left, not impressed by his online business-front. Kip kept working at the grocery store and still has some nice carpet cleaning machines out in his shed.

Randy the Rug Magician – Randy also started a carpet cleaning business. Although his equipment wasn’t best money could buy, it was good enough for the average carpet, and he would respectfully decline jobs that he knew he couldn’t handle. Randy had decided to invest his money into a marketing plan that included a professional website that cost him 4x what Kip paid for his. Randy’s plan was to focus on marketing so that he could get a steady stream of customers that would help him pay for the top of the line equipment he desired. So, while Kip was waiting on his brother-in-law to do his website for 4 months, Randy got his professional website in 2 weeks, and started marketing it online immediately. His website was professional, search engine optimized, and built to convert visitors into customers. In fact, when you went online to Google.com and searched for “AnyTownUsa carpet cleaning”, his website came up on the first page of the results. When potential customers went browsing for the right company, Randy’s professional website told his clients that he really knew his stuff and would do a great job. The result, Randy had steady flow of business from his investment in a quality website that was search engine optimized and built to convert visitors into buyers. He quickly was able to upgrade his carpet cleaning machines, and then franchised his operation to neighboring towns.

What does, Kip’s website cost him? Well, it cost him his business.
What does Randy’s website cost him? Absolutely nothing. It’s a money-making lead-generating asset.

What is your website costing you?

Ready to make a change? I can help. Visit my company website here.

For those of you who have been attending my workshops on a regular basis, you know that I often recommend a specific company by the name of GoDaddy for registering hosting and domains. Well, things have changed for me and I have new hosting and domain favorites,  and what are they?

For domains, I recommend NameCheap.

For hosting, I recommend HostGator.

Now, I’ve played with both in the past but over the last 2 weeks I’ve experienced the quick power of both. Why the switch you ask?

Well, don’t get me wrong, GoDaddy is a good company. In my opinion, their customer service for the newbie is unsurpassed. However, here’s what put me over the edge and has me converted to NameCheap and Hostgator:

As some of you may know, my wife has a stand up paddle lessons school. Well, every month we organize a big cleanup where we invite anyone who wants to come, to paddle up the river and gather as much trash as we can from the riverbank and bushes, then bring it back down the river and throw it all away.

The event has been growing in popularity, and yesterday in the local paper, an article was printed announcing the next cleanup, which is this Saturday. The problem was, the article directed people to go to www.anahulucleanup.com for more information. I DIDN’T EVEN OWN THE DOMAIN NAME YET!

A few weeks ago, I registered some domain names with NameCheap and used Hostgator for the hosting, and I had a website live in about 10 minutes from domain registration to uploading the site. I was definitely impressed. Well, in a rush I decided to register the domain with NameCheap, then use my GoDaddy account for hosting. The domain registration and configuration went off without a hitch. Then, I went to GoDaddy to link the domain name to the hosting account hoping it would all come together quickly.

I submitted the request to GoDaddy, and quickly whipped up a crude website just to get something online. Everything was ready to launch and I was still waiting on GoDaddy! I waited at least an hour for it all to go through, and it never happened.

Fed up with waiting,  I canceled the request with GoDaddy, went into my HostGator account to add the domain to my hosting account, and shazzam! The site was live in about 2 minutes! Perfect. And, I was converted.

What does that all mean? If you don’t have the patience to wait on your domain or hosting account changes, like me, I recommend NameCheap to register your domains, and Hostgator for hosting. It’s quick, easy, and changes seem to happen instantly.

Hey, if you’re planning a product launch, you don’t want to be waiting on your hosting account or domain registrar make your site live. You need it now! You don’t have time to wait on www.GoDaddy.com to update all the necessary settings for your website.  Go with my new recommendations and you may save yourself a headache. Now I know why GoDaddy has to have good customer service.

On a side note, I also don’t agree with GoDaddy’s marketing plan and would have started moving my business elsewhere for just that. I found my new favorites just in time!

We’ve been growing an email list for about a week now and the results have been fantastic. We’re now moving into the next stage of the pre-launch and expect his list to continue to grow in the coming weeks. For those interested, here’s the squeeze page we built that is pulling about a 50% opt-in rate!

That’s right! Almost 50%…. a full 1/2 of all visitors are opting in to the page! How? And extremely targeted launch with a intricately crafted squeeze page.

We started the pre-launch about a week ago at midnight, and by 8:30 in the morning I got a call from Scott, in awe with the response we got in such a short period of time. He sent me an email that said, “Is this for real!?” I replied, “Yes, it’s for real. . . and we’re just getting started.”

Is a 50% opt-in rate possible? Yes! I’ll keep you posted on the progress of the campaign. And for those who want to see the squeeze page, go to www.racehawaiistandup.com/powerglider.

Here’s the proof. The /powerglider/ page is the squeeze page. The only way to get to the preview page is to enter your name and email address and opt-in. Notice 444 views of the squeeze page and 213 views of the preview page. Almost 50%. . . Sweet!!! And the numbers are excellent for the niche market we’re targeting after the first phase of online marketing. I just rolled out phase 2 today, and we have about 5 more pushes before the pre-launch is completely on autopilot.

Here’s a letter I recently received from Scott of Race Hawaii. . .

“If you have a product that needs to be introduced or brought to the market, and your website brought to the forefront of the search engines, I’d like to recommend Nate Burgoyne or Integrity Online Marketing.

I am aware a lot of people are good at web design and are capable in this generation of electronic expertise. Nate not only stands head and shoulders above computer literate web mastering and design competitors, but brings a special talent with the written word to describe and capture the essence of the product.

This has proven invaluable for me in making a new patent pending product known.

Nate and his business relationships fire on all cylinders because he is smart, he listens, and then he creates what is needed.”
Scott Bucknell
RACE HAWAII

eCover Created by eCover Generator

Hey gang! If you’ve been wondering how to make ebook covers, this is the blog post you’ve been waiting for. There’s a piece of software I’ve been using over the years that creates covers for my eBooks, digital audio files, and special reports. So, I thought I’d share it with you. It’s the same software I used to create the eCover to my audio book, “The Truth About Online Marketing: Confronting the Biggest Mistake” that you see to the left there.

This software creates eCovers for reports, books, software, and CDs. You upload the pictures or create them using the software, then you simply choose the size, angle, and shadow of the images. The software does the rest and “presto” you’ve got slick covers to your ebooks!

You don’t have to be a design genius to use it. The software was developed so that anyone can use it right away. After you get the software, you simply download the file, double click it to install it, and it’s ready to do the hard work for you.

What does this mean for your business? Well, first of all you don’t have to pay a graphic designer big bucks to make 3D images of your ebooks. And, secondly, now you can give a professional look to all the information you’re selling or giving away to your website visitors. The software is called eCover Generator. Enjoy!

Most entrepreneurs and small business owners quickly come to the realization that they need to a website. Here’s how the process goes. And, hey, I’ve been through this cycle myself so if this describes you, I’ve been there myself.

I love stories! Let’s take an entrepreneur named Jane, and follow her through her search for an aggressive online presence. Jane is an accountant with her own small business and has decided she needs a website.

First, Jane goes to all the do-it-yourself website creation companies out there where you pay anywhere from $10-$60 per month to create a website for your company with pre-built templates. She signs up for an account and starts shuffling through the templates, and picks out nice one with a blue background and a picture of an office building at the top of the page. It doesn’t really represent her business and she can’t put her logo on the page but she feels it’s good enough.

Jane spends all of her spare time for the next week and a half trying to learn how the template builder works and trying to get her website to look just how she wants it. On day 10, she’s run out of patience and decides to leave it how it is and hope for the best. She’s a little hesitant to send prospects to the site because it’s kind of home-made looking and doesn’t really represent her business but she does it anyway.

After a couple weeks, Jane’s business has been stagnant, and she’s thinking it’s because she’s sending her prospects to a cookie cutter website that looks like everyone else’s home-made cookie cutter website. So, she starts to look at other do-it-yourself website creation companies to see if there are better templates out there. . . maybe the $19/month company has better templates than the $10/month company. So, she makes the switch. . . and goes through the same cycle of choosing, learning how it works, and trying to customize it with no results.

It’s at this point that Jane starts thinking that maybe she should look into getting a custom site done. So she talks to some web designers and asks the question, “What web design software do you use?”. Well, from her previous two experiences with building websites, Jane thinks that professional web design software will build her a professional website.

So, Jane buys the same web design software that the pros use. It’s kind of expensive but she figures it’ll be worth it. Well, after downloading the software for 4 hours, she installs in on her computer. Then, after opening up the software, her face goes white as she quickly realizes that the software is not going to build the site for her. In fact, it occurs to her that asking a web designer what software he or she uses is like asking a car mechanic what tools he uses, buying them, and hoping the tools will fix the car for her.

Now, she has decision to make. Does she spend the next couple months learning how to use the software and basically learn to be a web designer while her accounting business suffers? Or, does she hire someone to just build a professional site for her?

Jane goes on Craigslist, asks friends, and family members, and starts looking for the cheapest web designer she can find. After all, she just spent all her money trying the home-made site services, and buying the expensive web design software, plus her business has been suffering from the time she’s been taking to sort out the website. So she finds the discount web guy who says he’ll do her site for $199 and make it perfect. Well, unknown to Jane, the $199 web guy is a college student that build his brother-in-law a website for his tree cutting service once and that’s about it. So the cheap web guy builds Jane a site that looks almost as good as the do-it-yourself website she had build herself months ago. She bites the bullet and pays the guy.

Well, now she’s back where she started. She now has a homemade looking website, expensive software she’ll never use, a dragging business that she hasn’t been giving proper attention to, and a big fat headache. Now, Jane has a decision to make. Should she hire a trusted professional to build her site exactly how she envisions it or keep her “new” website that looks like it was built in 1992?

As humorous as it may seem, believe it or not, this is a very real and very common scenario my friends.

Had Jane, simply hired the right person to build her site from the beginning, she probably would have had her site live online in about a week with no problems. She would have saved about $1700 on website creation software, do-it-yourself trials, and bottles of ibuprofen. And who know how much money she lost by minding her website instead of her business. Had she hired the right person, her site would have been clean and professional right from the start and she would have been able to confidently send her prospective clients to her website for information.

Wow! What an adventure!

So the moral of the story is. . . before you launch a new website or get an old one upgraded, talk it over with a professional web designer that you can trust. A good web designer will be able to take care of your needs a let you know know what your best options are within your budget regardless of whether or not he or she gets your business.

I know, I know. . . you still want to know what web design software I use don’t you?

Well here it is:

And, of course, there’s no way I could end this post without a plug for my web design and SEO company: Integrity Online Marketing – a Honolulu web design company

Peace.

In the past years, John’s pest control business leads were generated mostly through door knocking, yellow page ads, etc. . . Lead generation was extremely labor intensive and actually expensive. In fact, it was costing him about $100 per lead to knock doors.

Well, things have changed. No too long ago, John updated his website and got it search engine optimized. Now he’s on the front page of Google for search terms like “honolulu pest control” and “oahu pest control”.

Now, he gets leads automatically coming to his email box without knocking one single door and business has never been better.

He was telling me how businesses don’t see the picture of what a quality search engine optimized website can do for  a company. Now, I didn’t build his website, but I did look through the html code for it, and it looks like he’s doing things right.

And the great thing is, once the website is online, most internet marketing is free. No more yellow page ads, no more ads in the newspaper, no more flyers and door knocking, and no more cold calling. It’s an automatic lead generating machine that, if done right, can easily return your investment 10 fold.

I couldn’t let the blog post go without a plug and a nice link back to his website. Right now he’s #4 in Google for “Honolulu Pest Control” and I know he’s going for #1 so here’s a sweet link for you: Honolulu Pest Control.

If you are a business owner or entrepreneur and you’re ready to upgrade your website or take your business online let me know, and I’ll make sure you get a killer discount from my Honolulu web design company Integrity Online Marketing.