One critical aspect to marketing online is having a website that is inherently search engine friendly and gives you the ability to blog. We highly recommend using WordPress for your website solution as it is the most popular web platform in the world and is the choice of top internet marketers and SEO pros.

We’ve been using WordPress for about 4 years and are active in developing themes and plugins for WordPress. If you have any questions, feel free to drop us a line. Whether you use our services or that of another professional, you will be making a wise-decision choosing a WordPress-based website.

Bernadot Studios was hired to redesign the Mister Twister website by the guys from DigiSage.  The intention of the new design is was to position the site as an e-commerce store. While you could always purchase products online, it was not the primary focus of the site.

Here is what we provided:

• Unique, modern e-commerce  design
• JQuery sliders to showcase products and customer testimonials
• New home page to showcase specials and marketing materials (catalog, newsletter, Facebook, etc)
• Product slider for popular, clearance and new products

Bernadot Studios was hired to redesign the Mepps website by the guys from DigiSage.  The intention of the new design is was to position the site as an e-commerce store. While you could always purchase products online, it was not the primary focus of the site.

Here is what we provided:

• Unique, modern e-commerce  design
• JQuery slider to showcase customers and products
• New home page to showcase specials and marketing materials (catalog, newsletter, Facebook, etc)

This site was a blast to build. It is based on the Taboo Theme from AlohaThemes.com and showcases the work of La Crosse’s very own Darin Reid Wagner.

Darin is a writer of pulp fiction, and wanted a website to capture the mood. The design and music really pull the site together to help Darin showcase his writings (which you can purchase online).

Boy, you’re making this easy….What you got going on here is pure dynamite!

– Darin Reid Wagner

Services include:

• Designed using our Taboo Theme
• sIFR to give us the cool font you see on the page
• PayPal and E-Junkie integration to manage online sales and delivery of digital goods
• Audio player
• Custom graphics and design

Owner, Scott Neader (friend of mine and one of the sharpest guys I know), contacted me to redesign his web hosting sales page to help boost sales and establish QTH as a friendly and reliable web hosting service. The new design has proven to be very successful and Scott recently sent me an email sharing how much he loves his new site and logo.

Just another thank you for your work with me on the QTH logo and site.  I am so proud of it, which is the opposite of the embarrassment I have had for so long.

I’ve been slowly adding the logo to different things as I have time (like the billing system’s auto-generated PDF invoices, or the custom logo in our SiteBuilder) and every time I see it, I am “proud”

I love it!  Thank you!!!

– Scott Neader

Services included:

• Logo design
• Website Layout & Design

Services We Provided:

• Site Design using our Salon Theme
• Easy to manage hours, social media links and news
• SEO
• Web hosting
• Email
• WordPress integrated website solution – self managed content
• Image gallery
• Contact form

What does this mean for you?

With local search starting to dominate Google rankings, you can claim another spot on the first page besides your Google place listing and your own small business website. Even a few percent increases in visitors to your Facebook can translate into thousands and thousands of dollars of increased sales over the lifetime of each customer.

Follow these steps to optimize your fan page and you may well be able to grab another on the first page.

1. Keep the Page Fresh: Every time you post a wall update, add new photos, events or discussions, the search engines will come back to your page to index or add the content to their available listings.
2. Get More Likes: The more ‘likes’ you makes Google think others will like it also.
3. Related Content: If you have a restaurant, Google expects content on your site to be about food, your restaurant and cooking. Keep your page content related to your business.. Use local search terms or keywords in your posts. An example in the restaurant market would be, “Come visit the best Italian restaurant in Aurora tonight for half priced appetizers from 4-7 pm.”
4. Facebook Website Address: Have the URL or address display the city name and business name/market instead of the ugly default address Facebook provides. As example: http://facebook.com/aurorapizzamamaallottas/
5. Facebook Shares: The more people share your page it with their friends helps to push your rankings up. Google sees this as you having great content.
6. Facebook Page Age: Google gives trust related to the age factor of the page. Not much you can do about this one except make sure you have the other 5 factors optimized correctly and you can outrank older fan pages.

Facebook gives you the great ability to communicate with your customers and be interactive which increases loyalty, sales and customer frequency. More and more small businesses have been turning to Facebook to increase sales and take business away from their competition. Take advantage of these tips today and enjoy the benefits and sales for years to come.

What we’ve done with this information

I just setup a new business page (fan page) called LaCrosseWebDesign.  I say business page, but it actually is actually more fun than business. We wanted to create something you would find useful. You should check it out now to see what I mean.

Featured in the National
Web Design Directory

Click here to view the live site.

This was a fun project, and I want to personally thank Michael Schieber, Riverfest President, and John Kockler, Riverfest Secretary, for selecting Bernadot Studios for this project.  We had a lot fun building it and we put this site together in just under a week. Lots of late nights and coffee for me, but I think it was all worth it.

Let’s take a look at some of the features of the site:

• WordPress Platform – built using the state-of-the-art WordPress platform (We’re WP junkies)
• Facebook Photo Gallery – this allows the Riverfest staff to manage all of their photos via Facebook and pull them into the website.
• Contact Form – we route your emails to the appropriate contact using this awesome software
• Facebook Integration – like button and link to our FB page
• RSS feed – stay in touch with your RSS reader
• Slideshow with featured events and links
• Easy menu management
• Banner Ad management for the sponsors
• Event Calendar with Fancy Box technology to display larger versions of images as well as navigation

Testimonial from Riverfest President, Mike Schieber:

Scott, I need to thank you for everything that you did for our Riverfest website.  You went above and beyond our expectations.  There are not a lot of people that would have done what you did.  When our previous web team informed us that they no longer were available to make the changes to our site, and our festival was 6 weeks away, I was totally at a loss for what we would do.  From our initial meeting to the to the completion of the new site, you had us up and running in 7 days.  I am going to recommend you to everyone!    Thank you so much for a wonderful experience!

Here are my top 3 favorite domain name finding tools

1. Bust A Name – This is my favorite tool. I have used this one for a couple years and have successfully found domain names using it.  You can add a number of keywords, and enable/disable a variety of parameters, to help you find domain name combinations that are available for purchase. I like this best because I feel it saves me a lot of time and does a nice job creating combinations
2. Domize – This tool searches availability as you type. Find out alomst in real-time what domains are available.
3. Domainr - If you need to get creative and are open to exploring TLDs (Top Level Domains) from other countries, check this little bugger out. It is a smart application that will help you find creative spellings and opportunities you probably haven’t thought of. It’s fun to play with, so give it a try.

Hope these help you on your quest. Let us know what you think.

WPMU DEV is an essential ingredient when building WPMU websites. Not only do they provide a suite of themes (many BuddyPress) and plugins, but their forums are excellent for receiving support when you get stuck. Andrew and James, the guys who run the site, are incredibly forward thinking and building new themes and plugins every month.

As a funny side note, I have somehow been chosen to be their featured testimonial on their home page. I was shocked to see my face on their site, but I am very honored as well.

I am soon to release the new hosted website solution for small business and organizations and organizations that is built upon the WPMU framework. I could not have built it without WPMU DEV. I will keep you posted with the progress, as I look forward to sharing this very valuable website solution with you.  Grab our RSS feed to stay in touch.