How to Protect Your Small Business from Search Engine Fluctuations

Search engine optimization, or the practice of optimizing your website for search engines, has become a great way for small business owners to attract leads and prospects to their websites. Unfortunately, search engines like Google are constantly making changes to their algorithms to prevent spam and to improve their search results and as a result fluctuations in rankings can lead to fluctuations in the number of leads and prospects a small business website can produce. For small business owners looking to obtain a little more stability in their rankings, check out the following article and tips for small business search engine optimization.

For the sake of keeping things simple, I’m going to focus on Google instead of focusing on all of the major search engines because all search engines have different search algorithms to determine relevancy and results. When it comes to Google if you’re going to optimize your website for their search algorithms it’s probably a good idea to check out their webmaster guidelines: http://support.google.com/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=35769 and Google’s info pages on search engine optimization: http://support.google.com/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=35291

According to Google’s Terms of Services, it is against their terms of service to attempt to manipulate search engine rankings. For most novice SEOs, webmasters and small business owners, search engine optimization has changed from actually optimizing a website for search engines to building and acquiring inbound links in an attempt to build links. Google has actually gotten pretty good at detecting and removing websites that exist only for the purpose of selling links for the purpose of manipulating search engine rankings. If you’re in the practice of buying and acquiring links for the purpose of improving your search engine rankings you may want to rethink your strategy.

While most search engines rely pretty heavily on inbound links to determine relevancy, it’s still not a good idea to go out and build or acquire a bunch of low-quality links because they usually only result in temporary rankings or even worse they could result in your website getting penalized and removed from search engine results altogether.

Content is Key

As a small business one of the first things you want to do if you want to improve your rankings is create awesome content that other people will want to link to. But you shouldn’t stop there. Creating great and compelling content is just the first step to a sound search engine optimization strategy.

In your spare time, you should consistently work on getting involved and participating in your niche’s community and find out which social media channel is the most used. Participating in social media and networking with people associated or related to your niche is a good idea because they most often have followers that could be interested in what you have to say but more importantly could be interested in what you have to sell. Furthermore, folks that participate in social media are more likely to share the content you share with them with their followers!

On-Site

You’ll want to make sure that you have your targeted keywords in all the right places and you’ll want to place special attention to your information architecture. Information architecture refers to how you website is laid out and how you inter-link between the different pages of your website. The best thing you can do to ensure you have good information architecture on your website is to first decide what the goals of your website are and then draw up a blueprint that corresponds with your goals. Basically you want to make sure your most important pages are the most prominent and linked-to pages on your website but obviously good information architecture entails a lot more than that.

Tips for Finding and Hiring Good Contractors

Hiring a contractor for a home improvement or renovation project can be a lot more complicated than most homeowners think particularly if they’ve never had to hire a contractor. While there usually is a good supply of qualified and experienced contractors, they can often be hard to find or get a hold of because they’re typically pretty busy with work given to them via references and past clients who were happy with their work. If you have a remodeling or home improvement project coming up, check out the following tips below to help you find a good contractor.

Vet Potential Contractors

In my opinion the biggest mistake home owners make is they find a contractor, they agree on a price and the contractor is hired to do the job. The absolute worst thing a homeowner can do is hire a contractor without vetting the contractor. By vetting the contractor I mean things like checking out references, checking out feedback and basically doing whatever you can do to ensure the contractor you hire is a good contractor who has a very high likelihood of doing a good job. I’ll get into more in-depth detail on several things you can do below:

First and foremost, it’s in your best interest to obtain at least three bids for any work you’re planning. That means you’ll have to find at least three different contractors that will pass a quick “vetting.” Obviously you’ll want to obtain references from neighbors, friends and family but you don’t stop there because you’ll want to vet those contractors as well. It’s not a bad idea to start off with a list of about five to seven contractors to begin the vetting process. To round out your list of contractors, just do a search in your favorite search engine for the profession you’re interested in along with your city for example: Plumbers Toronto.

The search results should include local contractors and if you’re using Google, the results should also include the number of reviews the contractor has on his local Google page. You can get a lot of feedback about a contractor and find several reviews by searching on the internet for reviews, complaints and feedback from a contractors past clients. This is one of the best ways to get some quick feedback and give yourself a quick idea of the contractors reputation. Below are some more things you can do to ensure the contractor you’re dealing with is an experienced professional.

Certainly something else you should do to vet potential contractors is check to see if they are licensed and bonded. Hiring a licensed and bonded contractor will give you a few more options for recourse should the contractor produce bad work. Hire an unlicensed contractor and there’s no telling what you’ll get and you will also have few options for recourse should the relationship turn sour. If it’s a big project you may even want to contact your local licensing body to see if any complaints have been filed against any of your potential contractors. Along the same front you can also contact the Better Business Bureau to check for complaints.

Something else you should definitely ask about is whether or not the contractor has insurance. At the very least you’ll want the contractor you hire to have some form of “general liability” insurance to cover any damage that may/could occur during construction. Workers compensation insurance is also very important if the contractor you hire will be using employees for your project.

Finally when you get a chance to meet with potential contractors, it’s a great idea to ask them for any client references they may have. References come in all shapes and sizes so you may have to vet them also! In all seriousness, make sure to at least contact the references and find out what they have to say about the contractor. If you have a sizable project coming up, you’ll probably also want to ask the references if it’s possible for you to stop by and check out the work first hand. You may even want to ask the contractor to help you set up these meetings if the size of the project merits it.

At the end of the day, the fact remains that there are several experienced and reputable contractors out there. The challenge is sometimes in finding them and that’s where the tips above are meant to aid you in uncovering them. For more tips on how to find good contractors in your area, check out http://contractorhiringtips.com.

K1 Fiancé Visa – Why You Should Hire an Immigration Attorney

The K1 fiancé visa application process can be lengthy, thorough and meticulous and any misstep in the process can lead to delays and extensions. And let’s face it…. If you’re trying to bring your foreign national fiancé to the United States any delay can seem like an eternity. Below are some good reasons to hire or at least consult with an attorney prior to proceeding with the K1 fiancé visa application process.

First and foremost any good immigration attorney is familiar with any recent changes in immigration laws and is also familiar and adept with the K1 fiancé visa application process and associated processing times. It’s this experience and knowledge that will get you through the application process as quickly as possible and hopefully with no delays. If you value bringing your foreign national fiancé to the United States as quickly as possible then hiring or consulting with an attorney is a good idea.

A Brief Explanation of the K1 Fiancé Visa Process

A K1 fiancé visa allows a foreign national fiancé of a United States citizen to travel to the United States to get married with his or her American sponsor. In order to qualify for the K1 visa the couple must bot each be free and legally clear to be married. Any previous marriages must be legally terminated before the couple can proceed. That means if you’ve been married before you will need to submit a divorce or death certificate to prove that you are free to be married. The couple must also get married within 90 days of the visa recipient entering the United States. There are also other requirements like the couple having to have met at least once in the previous two years and the visa applicant having to prove that he/she will be financially viable once they enter the country. There are several methods for accomplishing the latter and a good immigration attorney should be able to apprise you on how to do that as well as inform you about any other possible obstacles or road blocks.

The K1 Visa Application Process

The first step of the K1 fiancé visa process is filing form I-129f with the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services. Although the application is only a few pages long there are a lot of requirements and details within those few pages. This is where it pays to be meticulous and thorough because submitting an incomplete application or not submitting it as required will result in delays in the application process or even worse an outright denial.

The filing of form I-129F is where a lot of potential mistakes occur and is the most challenging part of the process for the United States citizen. There are a lot of forms that need to be submitted, you’ll have to prove that you have a legitimate relationship with your foreign fiancé and you’ll have to return a package that is exactly as required by the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services. Once the application is process and approved, it will be forwarded to your foreign fiancés country where the local U.S. Embassy or Consulate will finish processing the visa application.

While an immigration attorney is not required for the K1 fiancé visa application process, an experienced attorney can reduce the amount of time it takes to process your K1 visa application. At the very least, it’s a good idea to consult with an immigration attorney to familiarize yourself with the visa application process and apprise yourself of any potential road blocks or obstacles.