As a business owner, you are likely constantly looking for ways to improve your experience for customers. Luckily, the increasing presence of online reviews makes it easier than ever to learn what your customers do (and don't) like about your products or services. One way that customers can provide feedback online is through first-party reviews. In this guide, we'll outline what first party reviews are, why they are important, and how they can help improve your business's reputation.

If you want your business to have a strong digital footprint, then you want to make sure that you are making the most out of your Google My Business listing. One step you can take to optimize your listing is by taking advantage of Google’s attributes to describe your business.

SpaceCraft’s website solution offers user-friendly tools that make it easy to manage image libraries and image blocks. SpaceCraft has released a number of performance enhancements, dynamic image capabilities, and opportunities for SEO improvement so that users can easily build and customize their website.

Make the most out of local profiles

If your website is for a business, then you should make sure to have profiles on major local listing sites. At the very least, having listings on major aggregate sites like Google My Business, Yelp, and Facebook, are essential. These local profiles are important because they provide space for users to leave reviews. These websites also have a very high domain authority, so they appear prominently in search engine result pages. You should also create local profiles on industry-specific sites, like Angie’s List for home services or The Knot for wedding-related venues or services.

Of all the local aggregate sites, Google My Business is likely the most important. The information on your Google My Business listing displays in Google’s “local 3-pack” in the search results and on the map listings. If you want your business to have a strong online footprint, then you should make the most out of these listings by adding posts,...

Does your business or organization have a verified Google My Business profile? If you want your business to have a strong digital footprint, then a robust Google My Business listing is essential. The information in your Google My Business profile is what appears in Google’s “3-pack” and the map listing. Optimizing and verifying your Google My Business listing is important, especially after Google’s recent algorithm changes that favor local results

Luckily, the Google My Business interface is easy to use and customize. You can access via desktop or download it to your smartphone through iTunes or the Google Play store. It is also completely free to use. While it is easy to use, it does take some effort to live up to its full potential. Read on to see how to optimize your Google My Business listing.

In the early days of Google over a decade ago, search engine optimization (SEO) strategies were very different. In those times, the best way to drive traffic to your site was to show up on the first page of search results. Over the years, especially recently, Google has made many algorithm changes. This means that search rankings are not the same as they used to be.

Many business owners are aware of how important online reviews are when finding new customers, but many struggle with actually getting people to leave reviews. We all know that the best way to get 5-star ratings is by perfecting your customer service, but actually getting that review can be a bit trickier. We’ve put together a few ways to get positive reviews, faster, so you can grow your online authority.

As a business owner, you work hard to provide excellent customer service for your clients. Your may have perfected your customer service on the job, but what about on the internet? Your online presence is essentially an extension of your business, and online reviews bring extra opportunities to build relationships, solve problems, and also improve your business’s reputation.

At SpaceCraft, we're constantly looking for ways to improve our website building platform, and we're excited to announce that all SpaceCraft websites can now take advantage of HTTPS, the most secure protocol available for websites today. Read on to learn more about SSL web hosting and HTTPS, and discover the benefits it can provide website owners and visitors alike.

What Is SSL?

SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) creates a private session between a web browser and a website. During the session, the browser and the website use a cipher to encrypt data before sending it to the other party. The website, and the browser being used to view it, use a decryption key to decipher the data. Without the key, the data looks like a random jumble of letters, numbers and symbols.

What Are the Benefits of SSL Web Hosting?

SSL creates a safer web browsing experience, which is a great thing for you and your website's users, especially if your website gathers personal information such as credit card information, phone numbers, passwords, or medical...

At SpaceCraft, we're constantly adding new features to our platform based on client feedback, and we're excited to announce our brand new reporting tool. Quickly check your website's traffic right from the SpaceCraft dashboard. You can also see what devices your viewers use to browse your website. Best of all, there's no code to implement this new reporting functionality - we've already set it up for you. Professional and Concierge customers can simply click on the reporting tab within the dashboard overview page. From there, you'll see your unique website's stats automatically. Interested in boosting your website's traffic? Check out our marketing packages. With SpaceCraft, it's easier than ever to create, manage, and promote your online presence within one simple platform.

Real-time analytics are only available on our Professional and Concierge plans. Basic and Premium customers can upgrade through the SpaceCraft dashboard. To learn more about this new feature, contact us today.

Now that you've launched your beautiful new SpaceCraft website, it's time to start thinking about how to get more website visitors that you can convert into customers. The right approach to increasing online traffic can push your site higher in search rankings and put your business ahead of the competition. As you build your web presence, you'll notice that there are many ways to advertise your business online. At SpaceCraft, we offer marketing services that incorporate three common tactics for attracting more search traffic. Read on to learn the basics of these online marketing methods, and contact us today to see what kind of online marketing is right for your unique business.

Your website content plays one of the most important roles in creating your online presence. It can tell the story of your unique brand, illustrate your service or product, and drive potential customers to purchase. Now that you've chosen the perfect website template, the next step is to figure out what types of content your website needs most. From blog posts to logos, there are many kinds of content you'll need to consider if you want your website to accurately communicate your product, services, and brand. Whether you're redesigning your website or starting a new website from scratch, gathering and creating your website's content can quickly become overwhelming. To help make this process a bit easier, our designers have created an overview of the types of content you'll need when starting your website design, as well as some best practices to use when placing content on your website. Save valuable time by reading these tips before you start building your website.

How Many Pages Do You Really Need?

Before you start typing,...

The complex task of putting together a website for your small business becomes easier when you know how to choose a website template. A template provides a foundation to work with when establishing your web presence and makes building and maintaining a site easier than starting from the ground up.

Ready to build your own website, but don’t know where to start? Check out our tips for how to choose the best website template for your business.

Some companies believe websites are simply a tool for advertising their services and telling potential customers about themselves. While having a website to communicate your unique brand and services is the first step to broadening your company’s marketing efforts, online marketing is an ongoing task, and many companies fail to realize the importance customer feedback has on their online presence. Customer feedback and reviews can make or break your reputation both online and offline, and are a critical part of your online success. Read on to learn more about the importance of customer feedback, and why you should make online reviews a focus in your marketing plan.

If you've been watching your website's search engine performance, you know how important mobile-friendly web design is to Google. In fact, Google now processes more searches made from mobile devices than from PCs -- so providing great search results to mobile users is the company's priority.

Google recently announced a fundamental change to the way in which it will handle search queries in the future. The company plans to create two entirely separate web indexes -- one for mobile pages and another for desktop pages. Google will prioritize the mobile versions of pages on its search results pages, and it will display the desktop versions when no mobile pages are available.

Following the change, websites without mobile-friendly designs will likely receive significantly reduced search engine traffic. Is your website ready?

At SpaceCraft, we're proud to offer websites that are completely responsive and scale across all devices seamlessly. While these mobile-friendly features come standard on all our websites, we also want to give our customers the ability to easily edit the design on every version of their website. We've been working hard on improvements to our mobile navigation styling options to give our customers the power to easily change their website's navigation structure across desktop and mobile devices. While other website building platforms may require an expensive developer for these types of mobile navigation changes, our user-friendly CMS lets even those with no coding experience take back the reins on their website management. Learn more about our exciting new mobile navigation styling features!

At SpaceCraft, we're constantly looking for new and innovative ways to help our customers improve their web presence. We're excited to announce our new video gallery functionality that gives you the ability to add multiple videos on one page in a visually pleasing way. Engage your website visitors by adding various video resources onto one page, and let your video content take center stage.

A landing page without a powerful Call to Action (CTA) is like a boat without water - it will get you nowhere. CTAs encourage consumer engagement and prompt your customers to take action. Not just any action, but the specific action you want them to take when they land on your website.

Without a clear call to action, your website visitors are left in limbo not knowing what step to take next. Ultimately, this is where many online sites lose their potential customers. Why spend time designing a wonderful, dynamic landing page, without putting the same effort into creating a CTA that will help you gain more customers?

Ready to get started building your online presence with SpaceCraft? We created a short video to help you navigate our easy to use website building tool. From choosing a template as your starting point to adding a custom domain, we'll walk you through the basics so you can start designing your unique website.

Watch our Getting Started video today, and sign up for our 14 day free trial to start crafting your space online.

Your website looks best when you hire a photographer to get great shots of your workspace, products, and staff. However, we realize this isn't always possible. If custom professional photos aren't an option for your business, you can still get access to high-quality photos for your website through stock photography sites. Learn more about recommended image sizes and formats for the web, and try out some of the SpaceCraft design team's favorite stock photo resources.

Recommended Stock Photo File Formats and File Sizes for the Web

When you incorporate images into your site, you should favor JPGs. This file format is ideal for photos because they are "lossy", meaning additional data is not saved, so you end up with a smaller file size. The only exception to this rule is when you need a transparent background for your images. In this situation, you should use PNG files. We recommend minimizing the amount of PNGs used, as this format is lossless and retains all color data. Using more PNGs results in a larger file size, which may slow down your website...

At SpaceCraft, we're constantly looking for new ways to help our customers grow their businesses through our easy to use website platform. In our most recent webinar, we teamed up with the email marketing gurus at Emma to discuss what makes a killer CTA, and how to best capture potential customers at every step of the buyer journey. Listen in to learn more, and start growing your customer list today!

So you've just launched your brand-new website, and you're anxious for new customers to start rolling in, or want to make sure your existing customers can still find you online. What some business owners don't realize is that web users need to be able to find you online before they become a customer. Since the very beginning, web users have favored websites that show up higher in search results, as they want to find the information they need fast. Showing up on the first page of search results has become even more difficult as search engines have adapted to increased browsing on mobile devices, more ad space, and tougher competition as more and more businesses are getting online. That being said, following SEO best practices is critical to building your online presence and attracting customers to your newly launched website. Below are six critical SEO actions to take before you launch your new site or as soon as possible afterwards to give your website the best chance to rank against the competition.

Action 1: Redirect Old URLs

If you have an existing...

“How are you different than WordPress?” has become one of the most common questions that our team seems to get these days.

For some people, WordPress is synonymous with the word website. At SpaceCraft, we are quickly trying to change that mindset. Don’t get us wrong, WordPress is a good platform if you are a serious blogger, experienced developer, or have an in-house IT team.

Unfortunately, with a WordPress website, your site is only as good or optimized as the person who is building it. There are many creative shops building WordPress websites, but they’re certainly not all created equal. Our biggest warning to any client weighing their options is to make sure that they understand that choosing WordPress as their CMS won’t magically give them or their business a leg up on the competition.

We might be biased, but in our eyes SpaceCraft is a superior solution for small businesses needing a turnkey solution with beautiful designs, great support, and fantastic SEO, all while breaking their dependence on developers. (Don’t take our word for it, give it a test...

Our Image Galleries are becoming extremely customizable with the series of updates we have been putting together for you this quarter. A wide selection of gallery arrows are now available for you to choose from, 45 total options to be exact! That includes the option to add one of three colored shapes behind the arrow along with other detailed controls.

We are launching some fresh effects for your photos and image galleries today! A big request from our customers was to include Title and Descriptions as a feature for their images. We consider this a great option for photographers or businesses who are looking to add more descriptive content to their portfolios.

The SpaceCraft team is constantly cooking up fresh new features for you to use on your website! We are also always listening to our customers in an effort to keep our platform one of the leading website builders available in the market. This week, we are happy to include Parallax scrolling and Carousel slideshow options in our rich selection of design options: two new features in line with the advancing world of responsive and beautiful web design.

The customer experience is spoken of constantly. We are reminded everyday that this is the era of the customer. Their journey matters more than anything else. Their impression of your company can make or break your business, and one of the first impressions they may get is from your website. First impressions are important, right? So why isn’t your website doing it’s job?

The SpaceCraft team has been hard at work building amazing new features and functionality for our platform. You can now drag and drop images and update your website copy on the fly with our latest release. These powerful new features save you time and make it a breeze to update your website.

You asked for it...we listened. Check out SpaceCraft’s new image editing features. Now it's even easier to customize your image shapes, styles and sizes right from our design panel. You no longer need Photoshop or a separate photo editing software to make basic image modifications. This fantastic new toolset will save you time and allow you to customize your images for a professional look.

We recently started using SumAll to track our website traffic, social media presence and AdWords campaigns, and have been pleasantly surprised by how easy it makes it for us to analyze our effectiveness over time.

I got a slap in the face in Perth, Australia on one of my recent trips there to talk about apps, social media, and advanced web marketing strategies. I had one-on-one consulting sessions with artists for my firm, Cyber PR, and I was shocked to discover that a vast majority have a big problem.

• Thanks to HomeAway for inviting us to write a guest post for their Community! We're reposting a version of it here, but make sure to head over and check it out in their article base, and take a look around at their other resources for marketing your vacation rental property while you're there!

We stand by the assertion that responsive design is the most sustainable and user-friendly way to approach multi-device display of your website. Google, Bing, and many, many news sources and tech industry players agree. Per Google’s...

Anyone in sales or support at a SaaS (Software as a Service) platform knows the importance of improving your conversion rate and decreasing churn. On a basic level what this means is simple: obtain as many clients and lose as few as possible.

In most software sales positions, you can accomplish these goals by staying organized, learning the product inside and out, listening, treating clients fairly, staying driven, and being honest. But the rules of the game change when you're just getting started, as any entrepreneur or new small business owner will tell you. And being able to adapt and analyze these new rules can help accelerate business growth at every level.

Pinterest, the visually-driven social media website with over 25 million users, is a powerful (and fun) way to generate buzz around your business, drive traffic to your website, and engage your visitors. We make it easy to optimize your SpaceCraft website for Pinterest users so you can reap the rewards of this quickly-growing social platform.

Think about some websites you love. They’re clear. The information you need is easy to find. Key buttons are front and center, and when you click on them they take you where you thought they would.

We all want our websites to look great and graphics play a large role in this. Here's some practical advice on making graphics for your SpaceCraft website.

A few days ago, we noticed a free trial signup that was a little out of the ordinary. The website was created by a nonprofit organization for famine relief, and within a few hours of signing up, they had added a background pattern, some decorative typography, a bright green navigation bar with a dark grey header and footer, and had even customized some of their content blocks with containers and drop shadows. They'd also added colorful photos of smiling Africans and interesting information and statistics about famine. What caught our eye, though, was what they said on their "About Us" page.

Shopping online has never been more popular, more secure or more accessible. More and more people are taking the convenience of online shopping a step further by purchasing from their mobile devices. (In fact, mobile shopping has burgeoned into a $20 billion a year industry.) There are several options for taking advantage of this opportunity with your SpaceCraft website. Read on and decide which of the following six ecommerce solutions works best for your business.

There are so many things you can do with a custom-built form on your website, and SpaceCraft offers connections to two top-notch formbuilders, Formstack and Wufoo. Use them to gather information about your website visitors, take orders, open the lines of communication, and more.

Web designers and developers have recently been digging deep into new approaches to serving images on responsive websites.

Some of our favorite SpaceCraft websites are the ones restaurants have built...and not just because we like reading over the menus.

Sometimes I wish, I really wish, I could give people a peek into what goes on here at SpaceCraft. So today I'm going to.

It’s Friday.

There's been a big stir this week as Apple's suit against Samsung has gone to court.

Some websites work like service stations.

We're pretty darn committed at SpaceCraft to using the latest and greatest technology.

It’s the age of responsive design.