Search Engine Marketing – Get an eBusiness Card

Posted on February 27, 2013 by Chris Chase

Search Engine Marketing can seem like a daunting task, especially when the traditional method of self-advertizing is so much easier: you just pass out a business card! But while business cards are helpful in face-to-face environments, they have NO connection to the source most people use to search for businesses: Google. What if you could digitally “pass out your business card” to people searching for your name on Google? With EarthLink, you CAN!

EarthLink’s eBiz Card makes it easy to be found in Google search results. Your “card” will let you establish a search engine presence based around your name while generating relevant business inquiries. It’s a great way to get started with Search Engine Marketing, and can help you generate more call and website traffic and make it easy for prospects to find, contact and buy from you!

How does it work?

When someone visits google to search for your name, your “eBusiness card” will appear as a sponsored link in the Google search results (see graphic, above!). They will see you at the top of the results, along with the message you include “on your card” (which is actually a powerful Google ad). Your Google ad can include a brief description of your services as well as a link to your business website (need help getting a website? Click here). You can also include your phone number to make it easy for prospects to call you.

Why would you not want to have a sponsored ad promoting yourself on Google? Get your eBusines card today! (You can also call us to find out more: 1-800-201-8615)

Web Hosting Packages – Buy for Current Needs or Future Growth?

Posted on February 20, 2013 by Chris Chase

Web hosting packages vary in scope as much as businesses vary in needs. It can be tough to determine the right package to purchase when your company is new (or in a phase of growth) because you need to decide if you want to select a web hosting plan that fits your current needs and upgrade as needs change, or to pick a plan you can grow into so you don’t have to hassle with an upgrade.

Here are three scenarios of a business that will help you decide which option is the best fit for you…

1) Your Business is a New Start-Up

As a start up, the goal is growth. It can be tempting to try and cut costs when launching a business, but the time and stress of upgrading a hosting plan soon after purchasing it may not be worth the cost savings. If you plan on growing, why select as plan that fits your current needs, when you could go one step up and have room to grow?

2) Your Business is Established, but is Getting Online for the First Time

If your business has been established, and you’re simply getting yourself online for the first time, select a plan that fits your current size. Unless you plan on moving most of your sales to an online store, or plan on revamping the way you do business, chances are you will know the commitment to an online presence you’ll need. It could still be useful to select a plan a step above what you think you’ll need (especially if you’re adding an online shopping cart), but you can be comfortable selecting a plan that fits your current needs since you’re established instead of brand new.

3) Your Business is a Side Business or Hobby

Being a “small” business can be wonderful. Either it’s a side business, jut for fun, or the online component of your business doesn’t need to be huge (though you do need an online presence, as it’s expected by consumers in today’s economy). If you’re this type of business, feel free to select a small plan. If it grows, congratulate yourself and then upgrade, but if you know going into it that your web hosting needs will be conservative, there’s no need to chose a more in depth plan until you have to.

SEO Basics: How to Use EasySiteOptimizer for SEO

Posted on February 18, 2013 by Tom Sullivan

A couple of weeks ago we posted SEO Basics: How to Use Keywords for Website SEO to you get started with SEO.

This week’s web hosting post is a follow-up to show our web hosting and ecommerce hosting customers how to use EasySiteOptimizer Pro (free for EarthLink customers) to implement the keyword suggestions we offered.

Here’s how easy it is to get started with SEO:

Sign into your Web Hosting Control Center at with your EarthLink Web Hosting domain name, username, and password.
On the Build tab, click the EasySiteOptimizer button (shown above); a new window will open.
Click the Manage Keywords link.
Click the arrow next to the page you want to add keyword keywords to; it’s best to start at the homepage, which will often be listed under Choose pages as index.html or index.htm. Then click the Continue to Keyword Selection button.
If you don’t yet have any keywords yet, an alert message will pop up to let you know that. Simply click OK.
Enter the Title you want for this webpage (remember, anything over 70 characters won’t be displayed in search results). See our previous SEO Basics post about Title tags for additional guidance.
Enter the Description you want for this webpage. The description isn’t used for SEO rankings, but it is important. It’s the text that is typically shown in Google search results for your site (keep it under 155 characters, including spaces).
Under Active Keywords List, click the + Add Keyword link.
Add keywords one at a time for your webpage. When you’ve finished, click the Apply button to save your Title, Description, and Keyword changes to your website.
If you are just working on one page of your website, that’s all you need to do. If you want to optimize other pages, simply repeat the process, selecting a different page as you did above in step 4.

Remember to check our SEO Basics post about keywords if you need help choosing the best keywords for your website.

Experienced Web Hosting from EarthLink

Posted on February 13, 2013 by Chris Chase

In 1995, before Google, before Facebook, before NetFlix and Wikipedia, when AltaVista was the top search engine and email was new…there was EarthLink Web Hosting.

For 18 years (practically as long as the concept of “web hosting” itself has even existed!), EarthLink has been giving businesses (and individuals) a quality option to host their website(s). Many other companies have popped up (and will continue to do so, now that the cloud is here), but no one has the tried-and-true experience like EarthLink. Trust a brand new company, or one that’s proven itself for almost 20 years?

So, if you’re in the market for an experienced web hosting company to be your long-term, stable provider, look no further than EarthLink’s plans. There’s bound to be one that fits your needs; after all, we’ve been around long enough to know!