branding
We recently launched a new website for the Mosida Meats company. The farm in Elberta, Utah started primarily in dairy (milk - mmm good) and is now offering local delivery of their Grass Fed - Corn Finished beef. I was able to take a tour of the farm and do a photo shoot to capture the essence of the operation for the website.
Needless to say I was impressed. We're glad to have been able to launch the new mobile friendly / responsive website so it can be seen well on smart phones, tablets and of.... read more
Hey Girl (or Guy), What's Your Name?
Steve Jobs wasn’t a fan of overt, ‘branding’ and ‘marketing’. ‘Dirty’ is how he described the two words, preferring instead to focus on educating his audience, providing them with value. Some will argue it’s semantics at best —and it is, at least on some level. Regardless, it’s a rather ironic twist of fate that in the end, Jobs and the icon company he lead and co-founded have come to be known, respectively, as being some of the great marketing geniuses of our time.
There’s no doubt that .... read more
What Are the Components that Make Up A Website?
A website is like a puzzle; many components need to come together to make the perfect picture. When you hear the words, domain, hosting, code and more being hurtled at you at 100 mph, it’s no wonder many feel that developing a web presence is overwhelming. Let’s take a peek at the components that make up a website and the services available to create one.
Domain
A domain is the unique name for your website (i.e. www.lunasoft.com). Type it in to the address bar and visitors will be able.... read more
Budgeting for SEO: 3 Secrets (Most) SEO Companies Won’t Tell You
‘Humbling’ isn’t often a word you hear people associate with marketing, yet having worked in online marketing for the past few years has proved to be an extremely humbling experience.
In the minds of many, SEO (aka Search Engine Optimization) is believed to be an exact science. Reality paints a picture showing SEO as being as much a science as meteorology. In other words, it’s predictable to a certain extent; however, there will always be those instances in which you find yourself caught in a d.... read more
Maximum Exposure: when is the best time to post to Facebook?
Despite a number of experts offering advice to the contrary, there simply is not a one size fits all solution when it comes to the best day and/or time to engage with your FaceBook followers. So, are there any words of wisdom can I impart? Of course there are… I mean, this would be an extremely short (not to mention pointless!) sentence otherwise, right? So, how do you determine what’s best for your business? Well, let’s start with this…
Forget knowing your audience —you must understand them.
.... read more
Too Busy to Blog? Not With These Time Saving Tips!
Unless you have the means to employ a staff of full-time content writers, chances are your business blog suffers from a lack of consistency. Don’t fret. Our list of time saving tips are designed to increase your writing efficiency and productivity without added stress.
Stuff the storage room with ideas.
While we don’t recommend post-its all over the walls, you do need a single place where you can quickly jot down ideas.
Carry a small notebook and a pen.
Make a voice memo using your smart.... read more
A Website Without a Logo - A Very Bad Idea
A Website Without a Logo
Ideally before you build a website, your logo/brand should be designed first. Then all other designs should compliment the brand/logo you've just established.
Here's a few logo tips to consider before jumping in and building your website.
Have a Cohesive Brand. If you have a logo and a brand style - your website will look more cohesive and established. You want your logo to look professional, and to fit the overall feel of your site.
Think abou.... read more
3 Reasons A 'FREE' Website Is Bad For Business
'Nothing in life is free,' my mum has advised me from a young age. As a business woman, I've come to see and realize firsthand, just how true that is. A free website is no exception. If you are considering a free or extremely low cost website, don't proceed unless you've educated yourself about the potential repercussions. Here are three strong reasons a 'FREE' website is very bad business for business...
1. A 'free' website is a horrible marketing tool.
You get the product for which yo.... read more
Exposed: An Insider's Guide to Twitter's Dirty Little Secrets
High social media engagement is one of the greatest public assets to any business or brand. As with any other valuable commodity, the passion (or all out war) of being #1 can be and often is a dirty game.
Spam Wars
There's the one that comes in a can, put there by a guy, in a factory in well... I'm not totally sure. The other is... shockingly similar to mass-produced 'meat'.
Unlike the oh-so-popular spam e-mails or ads encouraging us to 'click to buy cheap pharmaceuticals', social media spam .... read more
Small Business In Action: How to Navigate Common Social Media Frustrations
Social media marketing has quickly become a priority for many entrepreneurs and small businesses, and its appeal is only continuing to grow. Unfortunately, many business owners become increasingly frustrated by the fact that although they have increased the amount of time they spend on various social media websites, they aren't seeing the return they'd hoped.
Shared frustration
Their complaint is not uncommon. Although we've touched on the topic of maintaining a realistic social media ROI pers.... read more
Alternative SEO: Establishing A Business Presence on Yelp.com
When it comes to their business and search engine ranking, most business owners have one word in mind: Google. Although Google has its place, it's equally important not to discount the numerous alternative sites that can help you cultivate new leads.
First up: Yelp.com
What it is: a website that allows users to post reviews of businesses in cities all over the world.
Many business owners either love or seriously love to hate Yelp.com. The controversies are well documented across the internet,.... read more
The True Cost of Being #1: Maintaining Perspective in a Rank Obsessed World
I want to be #1 on Google!
If I had a dollar for every time a client or perspective client has said this to me over the past 3 years, I'd have purchased one of those private islands being advertised in Dubai. I hope you caught my humor, but here's the thing... I'm not really kidding.
It's okay; you can admit it: you want your website to be number one on Google and every other search engine. I get it... If you've read some of my recent blogs, you may already be familiar with some recent SEO in.... read more
Design Advice from the Pros: Why Simplicity Works
By now you've heard about the 'less than 5 seconds' rule when hooking visitors to your website. Unfortunately this leads many businesses trying to cram a single page with as much information as possible. Bad idea. Let's take a look at some simple (and not so simple) sites and we'll explain why simplicity really is more effective.
Not-So-Simple
The Problem: Too much information!
Most will likely agree that there's just too much going on here. In order to avoid this common mistake, it'.... read more
How To Expand Your Brand's Online Influence
For all the talk about successful online marketing and interacting with your potential client base, a common question on the minds of many business owners becomes how to gain a wider audience. Although we've covered many of the basics (engagement, consistent communication, etc...) there's a lot of information out there and implementing it may seem daunting.
So, how does one become influential online? Not only do you need to be knowledgeable and passionate, you need commitment. Yes, commitment. .... read more
SAAS (Software As A Service): What You Need to Know About Social Media's Popular Virtual Assistant
Being active in social media is a struggle for many organizations. Even those who understand the importance and genuinely want to be involved often lack one key necessity: time. Enter software as a service. Many of our clients are familiar with Luna's Social Media Module (SMM), and in fact, it's one of our most popular software offerings.
Social Media Meets SAAS (aka Software as a Service)
In the case of Luna's Social Media Module, as well as other similar SAAS offerings, the value is found .... read more
Maximize the Twitter Presence of Your Small Business
While out to lunch with my 80 year old father last week, he informed me that he wanted my help setting up his Twitter account. As I tried to wrap my head around the utterly terrifying prospect that my father was likely to become my new #1 twitter fan, I gave him general information about the site, what it does, how it's used, etc... Needless to say, we had a very long lunch.
In reality, there are many people like my dad who have heard of twitter, tweeting (aka 'sending a twit' in Dad-speak), an.... read more
Avoiding Common Web Design Mistakes
Because the internet is not going away, your website is the best piece of marketing your business has With that being the case, it is absolutely critical that your company website be designed and executed in the right way.
A common issue we've noticed over the years is that many business owners are extremely married to their idea of what, 'looks good'. Don't get me wrong, we want you to be happy with your site, however, a strong website will have the ability to reach your target audience, answe.... read more
Vine Means More Opportunity for Businesses (If You Know Where To Start!)
Social media is my well-documented addiction. Unsurprisingly, I'm currently pretty much obsessed with Twitter's new Vine app. While Vine had its share of early controversy, its popularity and fascination with six-second looping video is only continuing to grow. For business owners, Vine means one thing: opportunity.
Golden Goose
It may seem easy to write off, but business owners should ignore the potential marketing goldmine, Vine, can offer. Sure, many Vine videos involve cats, bad holiday sw.... read more
Reflecting Back on 2012
Did you accomplish everything you wanted to this year? Perhaps you didn't - but I'm sure the year had many highlights.
We recently looked back on our year and found we did indeed accomplish a lot. Did we do everything we wanted to.
Probably not.
But that's ok. Taking inventory allows you to reset, make new goals and see how great the year really was.
Here are Luna's top 10 of accomplishments during 2012...
Worked with Many Great People to Launch Many Great Websi.... read more
Branding: Tone and Voice
The core of a relationship to customers, clients, readers and audiences is always based on the way that we speak to them. It can’t be stated enough; creating an environment of trust and loyalty is based on the way you speak to your audience. Is your business creating a unique voice that your customers can identify with?
By taking stock of the current tone in your businesses marketing materials, site, newsletters, and contact with customers you can go a long way toward understanding .... read more
Building Brand Loyalty and Trust
The goal of every business is to solve problems. Any business, regardless of size or goals works to solve problems for it’s customers and clients.
Customers look for solutions. They search the web for answers to their problems. Daily, for hours at a time. Sometime these problems can be so embarrassingly simple that they avoid asking someone they know; and instead search the web.
It’s one of the great success of the web. We have created a human knowledge base where all q.... read more
The Secret To Blogging? Document Your Process
One of the easiest and fastest ways to generate content your website is to blog. But what to write about? The impulse to create lists of content drivel come strong to a beginner, but the secret to the maintenance of quality content that leads to quality traffic is providing solution to problems. The web and your website is made up of content. The content that we find ourselves searching for usually helps us solve a problem. Perhaps we want to find a 24 hour plumber? Maybe we’re looking for.... read more
The Power of Community
Creating new users is always important, but creating an environment for the ones that are already there is equally, if not more important. Anyone that works in client services will tell you that a new client is not the same as an old client that has come back. Making it a point to find new clients or visitors to our site is a worthy goal, but taking care of the people already in the fold is nearly twice as important. Creating customer satisfaction is critical at every step in the production pipe.... read more
Getting Visitors to Your Website: A High Level View
Some people wonder what it takes to get visitors to your website. I wouldn't say anything is really "secret" about SEO anymore - it's just a lot of hard work.
At Lunawebs.com we believe strongly in the power of SEO and Online marketing campaigns. While the work that we do is varied and detailed, here's a high-level view of our methodology to get visitors to your website. I'll develop each of these out in the future with how you can get each of these accomplished.
Research Market & Comp.... read more
Creating User Profiles for Business Success
How well do you know your customers? It’s an important question to ask because it’s a crucial first step before we start figuring out how to market, advertise, or engage with them.In the past, we’ve talked about finding out who our users are and how we talk to them, but these techniques are certainly used best when we know who we’re talking to. Taking the time to think about who your ideal customers are to can be an invaluable exercise. Designing the Profile We have two o.... read more
Pinterest? Digg? Twitter? Instagram?: Deciding Which Social Network
There’s no denying that social media can be a very powerful tool in the arsenal of a small business, but with all of the social networks out there to choose from, do you really have to be on all of them?
Probably not. In fact being on all of them might be a really bad idea.Spreading Yourself Too ThinEvery time you sign your business up for a new social media service you’re telling your customers that you care enough about a platform to use it. There’s really nothing wron.... read more
Introduction to Content Strategy
The web we know is changing. The time where we saw it as a group of static pages, brochures for businesses and the services is now in the distance. Where we are now is a much more exciting dynamic and interesting age for people who live, work and run business on the web.
Having a plan is more important than ever, and here’s the truth: your site isn’t going anywhere unless you have a plan for it.
This is where Content Strategy comes in.
Content Strategy is an emerging discipline .... read more
Deadly Assumptions: Why A Site Re-Design Is Only Part of the Puzzle
You recently made the decision to re-design your website. You found a great company, went all out, and the wow-factor of the new site is impressive. The work ends there, right? No. On the contrary, you're really just getting started. While a new design aids in building a brand image, continually adding unique and engaging content provides a hook. Not only is this a great way to aid in increasing site traffic, it can also provide an edge over the competition. When you offer additional value to yo.... read more
Using Social Media To Generate Credibility and Confirm Expertise
Previous models of advertising, communication and marketing have been based around the concept of interruption. Users and customer are increasingly become more attuned to what advertising and interruptions look like and are adopting patterns of media consumption that allow them to bypass and ignore content that isn't relevant to them.
So how do you create content that moves past those filters and also adds credibility and expertise to your business? The answer is simple: social media.
Creating.... read more
5 Must Know Tips for Better Content Generation
Here at Lunawebs we encourage site owner and entrepreneurs to generate their own content. For one, it allows business owners to develop a stronger understudying of their business. It also allows them to understand how they appear to their customers and clients.These are great tools for teaching entrepreneurs and site owners how content creation can add value to their business.
But while blogging, tweeting, and posting to Facebook sound like really easy things to do some entrepreneurs struggle w.... read more
Social Media: A Party For Your Customers - Part 2: Facebook and Twitter
This entry is 2 of a 3 part series. For the full experience make sure to read:
- "Social Media: A Party For Your Customers - Part 1: Joining the Party".
Facebook: The Living Room Party
Facebook can be, and is definitely used in a variety of ways. From disseminating information to saying hello to old friends.
The most rewarding use of Facebook for users comes from not being bombarded with information. Users of Facebook tend to see their stream as akin to a living room party.... read more
Video Made The Internet A Star
Here at Lunawebs we encourage video use by offering our clients a competitively priced in-house video production studio. Smart entrepreneurs and successful business owners realize that offering video clips on their sites and dedicated YouTube channels is a killer way to market their business as well as raise brand awareness.
Take into consideration that YouTube is the 2nd largest search engine in the world and you’ll come to the realization that video is more powerful than a l.... read more
























