Susan Newman Design inc

Tips on Building the Most Effective Website for Your Business

November 23rd, 2011 | Posted in art, Blog, marketing | 3 Comments
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This an excerpt from my collaborative Teleclass series with Andrea Rosenfeld,
Broadcast Louder – Class #4 – Blogs, Websites, CMS and E-commerce, Oh My! Which is Right For Your Biz?

Clients and designer interaction about website design

Before you even think about creating a blog or website, have you developed your brand identity? Because the look and feel of your website has to incorporate your branding, picking up the fonts, colors and style. You can’t present your creative work or create a site to offer your products and services that doesn’t build upon your brand.

Designers, Programmers and SEO Technicians

Some business owners are extremely savvy and search in Google for a website designer and for other sites that they admire to get ideas of what they want and don’t want.  Others may ask a friend to recommend someone or even post a query in community sites and social media. But how do you know if the person you’re selecting is the right person for you? This of course is why web site designers have online portfolios and samples to look at. However, just because they have an extensive portfolio and offer beautiful and creative work, doesn’t mean they are skilled, technically and they MAY not be able to build you a site that can “do” everything you desire or know how to get you great SEO (search engine optimization) to give your website increased ROI (return on investment).

Let’s begin by distinguishing the BIG difference between a website designer and a web technical programmer

Just like a jewelry designers and carpenters are quite different, so are designers and programmers. Of course there are those who can do both, but they will typically be stronger in one area or the other. There are two very different parts to a website, the designing and the building.

The issue of designer vs programmer is confusing because programmers can call themselves designers and vice versa. I will say this. When you visit a designer’s website, most times, you should be able to tell if they are more of a creative or more of a technical programmer, just from the look of THEIR own website. It also helps to click on the sample sites within their portfolio and read through their website, so you are crystal clear about their qualifications.

Different CMSs and why they are Great

Today a website shouldn’t really be built without using a content management system.Why? Because most individuals and companies want access to their own website once it’s built, so they can maintain the content themselves, add new pages and change products when THEY want to, not have to wait for their web designer or pay extra for maintenance.

How do you decide which CMS to use?

I have built websites using WordPress, Concrete5, Joomla, Drupal and more… Some sites are even a combination of a few CMS’s. For example, I recently worked on a combination of Drupal and WordPress, while in another project I used, WordPress, aMember and aWeber. Basically, what you need to know is that the plan and functionality drive a site and each CMS can manipulate the site’s functionality, therefore one may be better than another depending upon your needs. The designer will recommend which CMS to use for your particular site, but because you are in the planning stage, get to know the difference platforms and their functionality, to determine which might be best for you.

Each business has a different set of goals and so their site is structured and designed in a different way.  Some creative businesses want to show off their amazing artwork, while others want to sell products. Some have a mission and are looking for a following, so their opt-in is the focus or directing people to sign a petition. In each case, the site must be designed and structured to meet those goals.

Susan’s Top Tips!

1- Title tags, descriptions and keywords for every page and post.  Each page and post you create must have a page title that is relevant to the content, a short description and keywords that are relevant to the page or article content.

2- Update your website often so fans know you are busy and working, otherwise they may think you’ve gone out of business!

3- Social media connect buttons easily displayed and share buttons underneath your posts and pages so that your visitors can share your content with others. This is VERY important because you want your content spread around the internet to increase your visibility.

4- All your images within galleries or within your site’s pages should be named and sized properly and be in the right format! RGB, not CMYK and either jpg, gif or png. Don’t upload images with numbered names or that are 4-5 MB in size, the web can’t handle it and no one’s waiting around for the image to load.

5- If you haven’t yet stepped in front of the video camera, get moving… YouTube is listed at #2 of the most searched websites! An don’t forget to name your video with titles, and tags also!

Building A Tribe of Social Media Advocates for Your Brand, Cause and Business

June 29th, 2011 | Posted in Blog, marketing | Comments Off
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Building up your Facebook fan pages and Twitter followers is a good thing, but building a tribe of brand advocates is the most powerful way to stand out on the social networking sites. People really do love to share quality, interesting, humorous, touching or valuable content with each other. What if you could count on a group of people consistently sharing your high quality content? That’s the foundation of the Social Buzz Club community.

social buzz clib logo

Did you know there are 29.6 million small business owners, 69% of whom want help getting customers using the internet?

Most of them don’t understand internet marketing, they won’t take the time to study social media, and they don’t have a clue about search engine optimization (SEO).

Business owners today realize that online marketing is a problem they MUST face and capitalize on. They also understand that traditional marketing doesn’t work on its own. They need systems and tools, and social media professionals who know how to attract the eyes and ears of their marketplace.

Do you know how?

Many social media managers focus on building numbers of Facebook fans and Twitter followers only to be disappointed that no one is really paying attention. You must create a dialogue, not just randomly follow. These social media professionals are missing a key ingredient: Third party endorsement. Have you noticed that when someone else promotes your brand or links to a quality post on your blog, you get more traffic? Assuming that the social media and blog managers are adding interesting, engaging and quality information to their social media feeds, then brand advocates will be extremely helpful in getting results.

Social Buzz Club founders, Kathryn Rose and Laura Rubinstein, surveyed some of the internet’s most active social media pros and discovered that 90% of social media pros and business owners find that getting the word out about their brands effectively is the number one challenge when using social media sites.

Since it’s founded on the principle of reciprocity, the Social Buzz Club is set up to attract social media managers who participate weekly in sharing content and buzzing out other people’s content. It’s a brilliant way for any social media manager to get the word out about his/her companies because every member must share about others before sharing about their companies. The Social Buzz Club is a social marketing tool making social media managers more effective at doing their job. It turns social media managers into social media influencers.

The critical factor is that everyone in the tribe must have at least 1 year’s experience on the social networks and have an existing following (minimum of 1,000 twitter followers and 150 facebook friends and /or fans). Each of these proven social media users are established credible resources on the social networks and have value to offer to the members. Quality content from quality people who collaborate together to build a robust brand- boosting tribe.

If you’re a social media savvy professional who loves the idea of collaboration and qualifies for membership, then click here and give the Social Buzz Club a whirl for free. 

Try it here: http://ow.ly/5eLc0


Here’s to your awesome Brand, Cause and Business, so create your social media success now!

Staying at the Top of Google When Someone Has Your Same Name

April 27th, 2011 | Posted in Blog, marketing | Comments Off
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Last week a colleague of mine, Lana Goldenberg sent out an email blast reminding us how important it is to have your “profile” filled out on Google. Not just your company’s profile like I’ve talked about previously on Google Maps and Yahoo local.

So this got me wondering, what can you do when there are other people with your same name, and you’re all competing for that top spot? For me, there is a Susan Newman that is a child psychologist and author and then there is Paul Newman’s daughter, Susan Newman.

So, I went back into my profile to be sure it’s all filled out completely. Next I secured a few new domains with my name.

In a search within the image area of Google on my name, I didn’t see many photos of myself, but lots of other women, so I’ll add a few more images within my website space that are just named with my name, this way mine will be newest and there will be more of me.

What’s most important is to keep all your information on Google and elsewhere up-to-date. If you do this you’ll be able to stay in that top spot.

susan newman #1 spot on google

Branding Bonus: Social Media Pages To Match Your Website or Blog

February 25th, 2011 | Posted in Blog, marketing | Comments Off
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Exclusive Offer!

Social Media in Search of Brand Identity – Brand your Social Media Pages to match your Websites and Blog Themes

You have a brand new website and/or blog, but Facebook, YouTube, Google+ and Twitter are calling and need branding too!!

If you purchase this Social Media Branding Package which will include these essential features:
For Facebook: Facebook Timeline graphic image, profile image, custom welcome page including:

  • Graphics and html content about your company
  • A special offer you’d like to advertise or your product featured graphically
  • A sign-up form to capture emails, if you have an email marketing provider
  • A YouTube video embedded (which you already have created) to sell a special offer or talk about your company
  • Recent blog posts or special links to important pages or offers
  • Social media icons linked to your other accounts

For Twitter, Google+ and YouTube: Top banner and or profile graphic, background graphic design.

Cost:  Starting at $700.

I’ll add this BONUS Item FREE!

  • Branded Email marketing template design (Value = $350)

Here are a few examples of the new Facebook Timeline Page Design

Prospectors Run Facebook Timeline Cover and Profile Graphics

Broadcast Louder Facebook Timeline Design

Frogs Are Green Facebook Timeline Design Cover and Profile Image

Ready to Brand your social media? Email Susan today!

In a Slow Economy, Why Your Website & Social Media Are So Important

July 2nd, 2010 | Posted in art, Blog | Comments Off
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For almost two years now the economy has been pretty awful and because of this so many small businesses cut their advertising and promotion budgets. In addition, as I walk around both Jersey City and Hoboken, I see many stores have closed and new ones are not opening so fast in their place.

There are so many different reasons this is happening, but what I’d like to discuss is why these stores need to stop thinking about the local business and foot traffic and start thinking globally. There are so many little stores that don’t even have a website, the most basic one-page of here’s where we are and this is what we do. If you’re a hair salon, restaurant or shoe store, you’ve got to have the most basic of a web presence.

Most people search via the internet now, and very rarely ever pick up that yellow book. If you’re not listed in the directories of Google and Yahoo, as a business, no one is going to know you exist. Just because you might have a website, doesn’t mean you’re listed in the business local directories, so if you haven’t done this, do it today.


So many of my clients who I’ve built websites for, haven’t touched them lately, adding new content or galleries. Even if your website has tags, and keywords, if it’s not current, it’s listed way, way back in the search engines. Google and Yahoo are only interested in displaying the most current information on a particular topic. That’s why blogs are most successful, because bloggers write often and keep adding more content and tags.

Through social media, especially Facebook, you can reach millions of people. As you develop contacts, or “like” pages (companies or causes) you gain strength in who you know, and who they know, and so on. You can advertise to send people to your pages, & you can write on company’s walls, which others can see and if curious, look into who you are.

You can hook together Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn, so each statement is broadcast in these three different places at once.

Most of this is free or very inexpensive and can really grow a business when the economy is down. So stop thinking that all your business should come from the neighborhood where you are.

Case study: Goehrig’s Bakery, Central Avenue in Jersey City, NJ
About 18 months ago we launched this bakery’s new website. Before that, the bakery did not have a website or any pages on social media. Since launching the bakery’s e-commerce website with a custom cake builder application, their revenue is up by approximately 15-20%. The orders are coming in from across the country and abroad. (Not just Jersey City). About 4-5 months ago we established a Facebook company page and a Twitter account and now Goehrig’s Bakery is broadcasting his latest and greatest work, and growing in reach.