Creating an Effective Website Series: Splash Pages and SEO
Creating an Effective Website Series
Splash Pages and SEO
This is the second article in a series of how to effectively build a site for your business. Previously we wrote about how you can effectively target each of your customers with Sub-Sites. Splash pages are a very important part of your overall web presence for a few main reasons:
- Overall organization flow
- Search Engine Optimization
- Presentation & Design (Pulling things together)
What are they?
A splash page is a “static” HTML page that comes up before your website. This page is very customizable and serves many different purposes. This page will support its own unique logo in the header, images links, text links, custom backgrounds, HTML tags (text), and HTML code. This will be the very first thing that your customers will see of your online presence, so put your best foot forward!
Organizational Flow
Sending everyone to the same place can be a major competitive advantage for your business. You only have to market 1 domain name and let the splash page act as a traffic director to your visitors. Link multiple websites, one for each genre of photography that you do, as well as a company blog and an HTML site. Let me show you some of the main advantages:
- Anyone can view it easily from an Iphone, Blackberry, or Dial-up internet connections. (We recommend also getting an HTML mirror site)
- This gives you options on how you want to display your website. ( i.e. In a new window, same window, or Full Screen)
- Acts as a great portal to redirect your customers to where they may want to go
Search Engine Optimization
This splash page can provide some very good search engine optimization for your website! Because it is an HTML page, any text will be recognized very highly by search engines. Placing some key information in the footer section of this page will allow for you to gain local recognition and higher rankings with Google, Yahoo, MSN, etc… Also be sure to check out a previous video blog on SEO.
Overall Design
When someone steps in the front door of your studio, do they know your name? Do they know what type of photography you do? Can they get an idea of your style and brand? The answers should be yes for both your studio and your web presence. A designer would come up with a layout, color scheme, and have a clear idea of the “Big Picture”. Draw something out on paper, take colors from your logo and brand, and order your links from left to right by popularity. Be creative, have fun, and call our team if you need technical help.
Be sure to give the best first impression that you can with a Splash Page. Keep an eye out next week for our last article in this series of Creating an Effective Website. Next week we will be “Putting the Pieces Together”. I’m going to leave you here with some great examples of Splash Intro Pages. Click here to see some great pages that PhotoBiz Fans have built!
