Why You Need a Mobile-Friendly Site Now

If you’ve recently launched or upgraded your website, chances are you’re in good shape for April 21. That’s the day Google will add “mobile-friendliness” as a search ranking signal.The company has even gone so far as to state that the change will have “a significant impact” in its search results. This is in response to the fact that, according to Google:

In the USA, 94% of people with smartphones search for local information on their phones… 77% of mobile searches occur at home or at work, [even though they are] places where desktop computers are likely to be present.

We’ve written before about the importance of a mobile-friendly website. If you’re not sure if your website will fit the bill, Google has a quick mobile-friendly test here. Just plug in your website address and you’ll get a pass or a fail.

This change will be rolling out globally over the next few weeks. A page is eligible for the “mobile-friendly” label if it meets the following criteria as detected by Googlebot:

?* To check what percent of your visitors are from mobile, from your Google Analytics account, select Audience > Mobile > Overview. To see the source of your mobile traffic, add Secondary Dimension > Acquisition > Default

Source: Google Webmaster Central

4 Simple Ways to Test if Your Website is Mobile-Friendly (aka, has a Responsive Design)

As the amount of web browsing done on smartphones and tablets continues to grow, the importance of having your website be mobile-friendly has never been more important. If your website isn’t easily accessible and navigable on mobile devices, you’re missing out on opportunities to connect with and convert potential customers.
It used to be that if you wanted your website to be mobile-friendly, you had to have a separate “mobile site”, often with a different web address than your desktop site. If a customer were to visit www.salesrenewal.com from a smartphone, its web server would detect that, and transparently forward them to m.salesrenewal.com, which would display the same information, but in a format that worked for phones. This approach, however, required considerable management to make sure content was always in sync on the two sites, and even when the content did match up properly, there were potential problems with search engines indexing the same content twice (which can hurt search engine rankings). Further, these mobile sites often were designed primarily for smart phones, so tablet users were still without a pleasant browsing experience.
Fortunately, there is a new technique for handling mobile browsing has arrived, called responsive website design. While it was first proposed in 2004, it wasn’t until 2010 that it was first put into use, and it didn’t become common until 2013. A good definition of responsive website design is (source):

“Responsive design is an approach to web page creation that makes use of flexible layouts, flexible images and cascading style sheet media queries. The goal of responsive design is to build web pages that detect the visitor’s screen size and orientation and change the layout accordingly.”

Put in less tech-y terms, that means that the design of a website will change dynamically based on the amount of space (in particular, the width)available to display a webpage: it still displays the same page elements, just rearranging them based on a set of rules in a style sheet. There can be multiple sets of these rules, so it’s possible to insure the website will look good for all display sizes. Since there’s only one site, there are no issues with content duplication, and the need for ongoing maintenance is greatly reduced.

Testing your website to see if it is mobile-friendly

If you’re wondering, “does my website work on a phone?” here are some easy ways to check if your website was built using responsive website design:
1. Resize your browser window
Since responsive websites change based on the amount of space available to display content, resizing a browser window on a desktop computer will activate the alternate rule sets. For example, on this site, once your browser window is narrower than 960 pixels, it switches from a two-column to a single-column layout. Once it’s narrower than 400 pixels, the navigation menu switches to a much more compact, mobile-friendly menu. If you see these same kinds of changes on your own website, it’s a good bet that your site is already responsive.
2. Browser tools & extensions
There are lots of great tools out there that will let you test different screen sizes to see how your website will display on different devices. One of our favorites is an extension for the Chrome web browser, the Responsive Web Design Tester.
3. Test on a phone
Or, even better, test on every phone you can find! While desktop-based tools can give you a good sense of how the site will display on a mobile device, there’s no substitute for looking at you website on an actual phone. Some interface elements – most notably menus – may work perfectly well when you have a mouse pointer to hover and click, but hitting the exact right spot with a fingertip can be a challenge. The opposite side of that coin is that some elements that work poorly on a desktop may function beautifully on a smartphone.
4. Test on a tablet
While smartphones are important, tablets shouldn’t be neglected in your testing, as their market share has also continued to grow, and while tablets generally have a much larger viewing area than a smartphone, they also have many of the same interface differences from desktop browsers. The best design for tablets often blends features from the desktop and mobile versions of a website.

Is it possible to make an existing website Responsive?

Absolutely and this is done all the time. When the Sales Renewal website was initially launched, for example, responsive website design did not exist, so we had a separate mobile site. As responsive design become more established, we switched over and killed the separate mobile site (saving a bit of $$ every month too). Other sites for which we’ve completed responsive conversions include Concord Flower Shop and Mendon Greenhouse and Florist. If you’re interested in a responsive conversion of your site and other ways we can help turn your website into an effective sales tool, contact us!

Hiring A Marketing Firm? 5 Questions to Ask First

Bringing on external resources to help with your marketing sounds great. There’s even a term for it – Outsourced, or Pay-Per-Performance Marketing. According to Wikipedia: “Outsource marketing is the art of handing over the entire marketing demands of a company to a third party.” Sounds easy, right?

But how do you know you’re handing over part or all of your marketing to the right third party? There are five key ways outsourced marketing can be integral to the success of your business. And they each present pitfalls if you choose the wrong marketing firm.

1. Outsourced Marketing means a marketing program designed to fit your business – Will the Outsourced Marketing firm work with you to create a custom strategic marketing plan, identifying the resources needed to meet your business goals, with your budget in mind? If the firm presents you with a take-it-or-leave-it package, leave it.

2. Outsourced Marketing means you can stay focused on your core business – Will the Outsourced Marketing firm provide an experienced team to integrate, synchronize and manage dozens of marketing disciplines to execute that plan? Ask how they plan to create cross-discipline synergies. For example, will they be able to use content created for a blog, use it in a newsletter, support it with online advertising?

3. Outsourced Marketing means a more level playing field – While you focus on business innovation, will the Outsourced Marketing firm focus on proactive and responsive marketing to meets today’s ever-changing business environment? Check out the firm’s blog (yes, they should have a blog!) -are they pitching 2009-era SEO techniques (“we submit your website to thousands of online directories”)? Visit their website on a smartphone – do they ignore the fact that responsive websites (sites that are easily viewed on a smartphone) are the norm for 2014?

4. Outsourced Marketing means access to expertise in every discipline – Does the Outsourced Marketing firm have a large pool of vetted and approved experts? If they do, it means they can provide:

• Marketing, e-commerce & mobile websites
• Pay per Click advertising
• Print advertising
• Blogging & social media marketing
• Direct mail
• SEO/Search engine optimization
• Email & print newsletters
• Public Relations
• Trade shows& events
• Telemarketing
• Analytics

5. Outsourced marketing means you can expand your marketing programs without necessarily expanding your staff – But beware of marketing firms that charge you by the hour. Their economic interests may not naturally align with yours. Instead, look for firms that offer pay-per-performance services.

JointSourcing from Sales Renewal

Sales Renewal clients know that Outsourced Marketing with Sales Renewal works.

This is because our unique JointSourcing (“joint venture” + “outsourcing”) model – a comprehensive sales, marketing and technology solution – lets you outsource all the day-to-day marketing and technology work that increases your revenue – and demands so much of your time – to Sales Renewal, while we share with you the management, and a portion of the rewards and risks (similar to a joint venture).

Since our success is so closely tied to the success of your marketing:

1. We work closely with you during our Blueprint phase to create a custom strategic marketing plan. Together, we review this plan quarterly (or more often if requested) to be sure it continuously addresses your business needs.

2. We manage the many disciplines defined in your custom plan (our Sell phase). Since you know the programs, plan and budget in advance, we are able to work independently, consulting with you as needed for approvals and other input.

3. We stay abreast about new strategies, requirements, recommendations to be sure all the components of your plan are optimized for the ever-changing business environment. If we find an option that we believe will perform better, we’ll present you with an explanation of why we’d like to make a change or addition to your plan. If we feel something just isn’t working, we’ll make an alternative recommendation.

4. We act as a general contractor. We pull from an ever-growing, dependable group of experts and top-notch vendors in every discipline we offer. And we stay on top of them, too. For example, if an ad firm just isn’t producing the results we expect, we’ll work with them, and replace them if necessary.

5. We focus on the ROI of each marketing program, and the plan overall. Because our economic interests are closely aligned with yours, when we are able to optimize your profit, we are also optimizing ours.

If your company is considering an outsourced, pay-for-performance marketing solution, make sure you know who you’re handing your marketing over to! And if you’re interested in learning how Sales Renewal can help, contact us, and we’ll show you.

Client’s Collaboration with Sales Renewal Leads to New Strategies, Brand, Site, Marketing Programs and … a Blue Ribbon

It is generally rare for two different companies, let alone a client and its vendor, to work together so thoroughly, on so many levels, that the resulting whole is greater than the sum of its parts.

However, thanks to Sales Renewal’s revolutionary JointSourcing Solution (a unique hybrid combining elements of joint venturing with elements of outsourcing, in which shared risks and rewards align Sales Renewal’s economic incentives with those of its clients), such synergies are the norm.

If you’ve been wondering how JointSourcing and its three, Blueprint, Build and Sell steps actually works in practice, in the real world, this latest installment of our JointSourcing in Action Case Studies series is for you.

This issue provides a detailed, step-by-step view of how Sales Renewal partnered with our client MATsolutions to overcome their business, marketing and sales challenges to produce a marketing & sales system neither company could have developed as quickly or efficiently on its own. One result of the collaboration: MATsolutions receiving the prestigious Blue Ribbon Small Business of the Year for 2014 award from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

As Steve Wedler, VP Sales and Marketing, MATsolutions has said:

“Over the last year with Sales Renewal’s critical assistance, we’ve rebranded the company, launched a new e-commerce site and introduced marketing programs and supporting technologies that truly distinguish MATsolutions from its competitors. Having two highly dedicated and bright teams responsible for this transformation has allowed us to deliver something far superior than either team alone could have. This award is a great acknowledgement of the advances we have made.”

Read the JointSourcing in Action case study.

How to Grow, and NOT, Grow Sales: SalesMemes 38

What is ‘Heartbleed’ and Why Does it Matter to Me?

So what is it?

Without getting too technical, Heartbleed is a software bug with a product called OpenSSL. Some sites use OpenSSL to provide a secure connection between themselves and your computer, and they use those secure connections when you are sending or receiving sensitive information. Normally, when information is communicated over a “secure” line, it is encrypted so that anyone who might be snooping around in cyberspace can’t read things you don’t want them to. Exploiting the Heartbleed bug, a less-than-scrupulous person could trick the server into giving up a chunk of its coveted secure data which could possibly include parts of its recent transactions.

The OpenSSL group has already fixed the problem, but affected sites have to install the fixed version of the software in order for the problem to be solved.

What does this mean for me?

Suppose you purchased a case of shiny new widgets from the online retailer of your choice. Suppose also that this retailer relied on OpenSSL for its secure communications. You put the case of widgets in your cart, and you check out. During the checkout procedure, you fill out a form that includes your credit card number, expiration date, security code, and the name (“as it appears on the card”). Maybe for good measure the site also asked you for your billing ZIP code.

When you click the “Purchase” button, all of this information gets sent to the retailer’s server where it gets stored in the server’s memory.

So what do I do about it?

The first thing to do is, to quote Douglas Adams’ Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, “Don’t Panic”. There is no guarantee that an affected site has been compromised. And unless an attacker has exploited the bug shortly after you have been active on that site, there is only a tiny chance that he got access to any of your information.

With that said, there is something you can do. You can spend some time and try to find a list of affected sites on which you have important accounts. While a comprehensive list is hard to find, there are some decent places to start:

The Heartbleed Web Site

A partial list of affected sites

Once you find an affected site that means something to you, you can check with them to see if they have fixed the problem. Most reputable sites should have already reached out to you with their own notices about the issue and information on when you can expect them to have installed the fixed version of OpenSSL. If the site has been updated, then you can safely log in and change your password.

If not, then changing your password will do no good since the bug makes the new information as easy to get as the old. In this case, you might consider logging in and removing your sensitive information. One possibility is to delete your credit card information so that the attacker can’t get it.

If you can’t delete it, replace your card numbers with test numbers. You can search online for a list of test credit card numbers which are numerically valid, but have been set aside for testing credit systems. Use one of these numbers in place of your real number until the site in question installs the fixed version.

As always, the best practice is to be vigilant with your online life. This applied to internet commerce before the Heartbleed bug made news, and it will apply just as much after the hype has faded away into history. You should always be scrutinizing your credit card statements, bank balances, and other account summaries very carefully to spot things that don’t belong there. If something appears, contact the vendor immediately and let them know to minimize the damage.

What if I have a secure web site?

If you are a Sales Renewal customer and your site is hosted with us, you have nothing to fear. None of our sites use OpenSSL for their secure connections, so we can categorically say that none of our customers’ sites are affected.

If you are not hosting with us, then you need to contact your hosting provider to find out whether your server(s) are affected by the issue. Most reputable providers will have taken a pro-active stance on this issue and applied the necessary fixes already. If not, then it’s time for a priority support request to fix the problem. If that doesn’t get it done immediately, then it’s seriously time to think about switching hosting firms.