Speed is a bit of an obsession for most web users, and we at Preation are no exception. We fret over our Internet connections’ and mobile connections’ perceived slowness, and we go bananas for a faster web browser. This is why we released the new speed improvements to all Eden customers last summer and are continually thinking of ways to improve it further.

Given this better-faster mentality, the consequences for slow-loading pages can be dire for site owners; most users are willing to navigate away after waiting just three seconds, for example. And quite a few of these dissatisfied users will tell others about the experience.

What’s more, our entire perception of how fast or slow a page loads is a bit skewed. While we’re waiting for a site to materialize in a browser tab, pages seem to load about 15% slower than they actually do load. The perception gap increases to 35% once we’re away from a computer.

But for the precious milliseconds site owners can shave off page load times, they can see huge returns. For example, Amazon.com increased its revenue by 1% for every 100 milliseconds of load time improvement. And Aol said its users in the top 10% of site speed viewed around 50% more pages than visitors in the bottom 10%.

Site optimization firm Strangeloop has provided us with a slew of graphically organized stats on just how long pages take to load, why they take as long as they do, and just how long the average Joe or Jane is willing to wait around for your site.

Check out the infographic to the right (click to see it at full size), and in the comments, let us know about your experiences with site speed.

As an early New Year’s present, we’d like to share an awesome infographic with you. The infographic shows you what gifts you can give your web site this holiday season to help you focus your attention on keeping your site traffic and sales up through next year. Click on the infographic on the right to expand it.

To all of your Eden customers out there, be sure to focus on Days 1, 2, 3, and 5. The advice conveyed in those items directly correlates with the functionality you have available in Eden.

Have you created a Google+ brand page for your business?  Are you receiving a lot of +1s?  Do you think this will catch on and be a valuable asset to businesses?

Google says that the new algorithm knows that different types of searches have different freshness needs, and weighs them accordingly.  For example, a search for a favorite recipe posted a few years ago may still be popular enough to rank highly, but searches for an unfolding news story or the latest review of the iPhone 4S should bring the newer, fresher content first, followed by older results.

How does this change impact Eden users?

This is certainly great news for Eden users.  We’ve been preaching for over 8 months to create a content schedule and stick to it by adding and optimizing at least one page to your site a week.  Google is now going to reward websites that have fresh content by pushing them up higher in the search results.  Be sure to take advantage of this update!  Thank you Google!

We at The Eden Platform believe that SEO and content management should be easily accessible and understood by everyday small business professionals. SEO is not some sort of rocket science only reserved for the super-techy. It’s actually a somewhat simple concept that once grasped, can propel your website to the top of the search results, and in turn grow your revenue!

What is your web company doing to help you with your marketing efforts and SEO? Do they provide you with step by step instructions on how to properly optimize your pages? Do they suggest implementing strategies to generate more leads? Do they know the current optimization trends and techniques used to boost results? Do they teach and consult you so that you learn the SEO process and understand why you’re doing what you’re doing? If you’ve answered no to any of these questions, it’s time that you give Eden a try.

We are dedicated to the online success of our clients.  Our goal is to empower small business owners with the tools necessary to take their online marketing efforts into their own hands and teach them along the way so they can be self-reliant and self-sufficient in the future. The holidays are almost here!  Don’t waste another minute being held hostage by your web firm and paying too much for results!  Grab the reins and take control of your marketing destiny!

Looking at the graphic on the right (click for expanded view), you’ll see a sales funnel graphic that is representative of a 4 month period for an Eden client, Southern Energy Management. The funnel is broken into three sections/rungs.  The top rung is monthly website visitors, those visitors filter down through the second band, monthly visitor conversion percentage, then down to the third/bottom rung with is conversions per month. Southern Energy Management was able to use Eden’s SEO and Offers features to effectively maximize their online sales funnel potential. As a result, Southern Energy Management increased their on-site conversion percentage by 419%.

We asked Heather Pownall, Director of Business Operations at SEM, how Eden’s Offers Feature has optimized their conversion percentage and as a result, increased their leads significantly. Here’s her response:

“We now know exactly what messaging works best at convincing our online visitors to fill out our lead forms. Thanks to Offers, our we marketing program is now performing better than ever!”

For a more in-depth description on how this process worked for SEM, check out their Offers case study.

With only 59 days until the holidays, the time to get your marketing site up and running is wearing thin! If you want to see the same results that SEM has seen, you need to get started right away building a content schedule, creating/optimizing at least one page of content a week. You should also add some intriguing offers to provide additional incentive for your visitors to convert and implementing them on your pages.

Sign up for a free 15 day trial of Eden today and get started generating leads immediately!

If you look at the graphic on the right (click for expanded view), you’ll see a sales funnel graphic that is representative of a 4 month period for an Eden client, The Healing Arts & Massage School.  The funnel is broken into three sections/bands.  The top band is monthly website visitors, those visitors filter down through the second band, monthly visitor conversion percentage, then down to the third/bottom band which is conversions per month. Healing Arts was able to use Eden’s SEO optimization features to effectively maximize their online sales funnel potential.  As a result, Healing Arts increased their targeted traffic by 412% and their online conversions by 400%.

We asked Keith Bouchard, CEO of Healing Arts & Massage School, where they get their leads and how they’ve been able to increase traffic/enrollments on their website.  Here’s his response:

“Google searches are our primary source of leads from marketing. I add and optimize 3-5 new pages to the website each week. Enrollments are way up and have more than tripled or quadrupled in the last three months.”

Do you want to see these types of results on your site?  The opportunity to get started preparing your Eden site for the holiday traffic boom is now.  All you need to do is set a content schedule where you can create/optimize at least one page of content a week, then think of some intriguing offers to provide additional incentive to your visitors to convert and implement them on your pages.  Don’t miss out on this great opportunity to increase your qualified traffic and revenues!

Don’t have an Eden site yet?  Sign up for a free 15-day trial today!

Small businesses are gearing up for a holiday season chock-full of online shopping and e-commerce transactions.  With gas prices through the roof, less shoppers will be taking the trip down to their local shopping malls to purchase gifts.  Therefore, having an online presence that acts as a marketing/sales tool for prospective buyers is paramount for increasing holiday revenues.

Ask yourself this: is your marketing site ready for the holidays?

You can bolster your qualified traffic numbers this holiday season by using Eden, but you need to get started TODAY.  All you need to do is create a content schedule and follow these 3 easy steps and you will set yourself up for some generous holiday traffic numbers.  The math is simple: more optimized content + more qualified visitors = more revenue.  Don’t get caught being a naughty procrastinator.  You might just miss out on all those nice sales!

All you need to do to get started is sign up for a free trial of the Eden Platform.  Then create 10-15 prospective offers aimed at generating interest in your products and/or services.  Add one well optimized page to your website per week that highlights your products/services and add the offers element to them to drive conversions.  After you’ve added 1 page to your site every week for a year, the result will be 52 new pages that generate free organic search traffic to your site for the various keywords that are tracked in your Optimization module.  There’s no guesswork when it comes to what keywords to optimize your pages with because Eden will tell you, plus, you won’t have to shell out the cash to someone else to do it.

The holiday season is quickly approaching, and these keyword searches will continue to increase as the end of the calendar year draws near.  This presents a huge opportunity to focus your optimization efforts and beat out your competitors.  Increasing your search engine rank just one or two positions can have an extraordinary impact on the number of visitors and customers your website produces for your business.

What’s the best way to prepare for the holidays?  Take a look at your Eden Optimization Keyword Report, find your high opportunity keywords (highlighted in red), then create pages and optimize them for said keywords.  In other words, create a content schedule and stick to it.  If you can launch 1-2 articles on your site that are optimized for your product/service offering every week between now and the holidays, you’ll more than likely jump up the rankings and beat our your competitors.

‘Tis the season for preparation.  Don’t wait until the last minute to get started.  If you start now, you can have your fruit cake and eat it too!

This post was brought to you by Preation’s Eden Platform.  Try Eden today for free!