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So, you’re ready to create a website for your business! When looking into this, you’ve probably come across a single-page website design. But when should you choose a single-page website design for your business? Keep on reading if you want to know more about it.

What is a single-page website?

A one-page website is a website where all the content sits within the same, single, webpage. In other words, a single-page website consists of one long webpage only. Even though it’s a long website, this doesn’t mean that your visitor will have to scroll endlessly to find what he/she needs. With (menu)links, your visitors are guided from one area to another on the same webpage.

Why choose a single-page website?

There are many different reasons why a single-page website is a right choice for your business. Below we’ll explore some of them:

1.  The price of a single page website and the maintenance of it are low
   If you’re on a tight budget a single-page website might be a good solution. Single-page websites often require a one-time investment and monthly/yearly maintenance costs for the hosting, domain name registration, security, and technical maintenance. Costs for this are often lower than websites with a multi-page design.
2. One-page websites make it easy to target a specific audience
   One-page websites are perfect for businesses that target a specific audience. With a one-page website, you can encourage your visitors to perform a specific task by steering them in a specific direction.
3. Single-page websites often provide better (mobile) user experiences
   A one-page website promotes one thing in a simple and uncluttered way. It immerses the user in a linear navigation flow that has a clear beginning, middle, and end. This makes one-page websites great for people that are using mobile devices. There is no need to click on additional pages or tabs on small devices and visitors can easily find what they are looking for.
4. Single-page websites are easy to maintain
   Single-page websites have much less content than multi-page designs. This makes it easier to implement and maintain.
5. Single-page websites often have increased user engagement and a higher conversion rate
   Staying on a single-page website is easy, which also makes it easier to stay engaged. Instead of having visitors click through multiple pages to find what they want, all they have to do is scroll down. With call to actions at the right place, conversions are quickly made.

In short, single-page websites are great for businesses that have one clear message, call to action, or product to sell. They are often used for weddings, events, freelance portfolios, brochures, and restaurants.

Are you interested in creating an effective single-page website? We can help you out! Contact us here

Cyberattacks can lead to several situations, from having to close your business to personal consequences. With over half of all cyberattacks affecting small to medium businesses, it’s more and more important to do everything to keep your business safe online and protect potentially critical data. Think of things such as credit card numbers, employee IDs, and even your customer’s account info.

How can you protect your business?

Keeping your business secure is an ongoing process. But this is where you can start:

1. Create strong passwords
   Passwords are your first defense against people with bad intentions. Therefore, it’s important to create strong passwords. How? Make them as long as possible complex, use lowercase letters and capitals, and add special characters and numbers.
2. Make sure that all of your accounts have unique passwords
   By doing this you only have to handle 1 issue when one password is leaked.
3. Create good recovery options
   If you ever forget your complex password, it’s important to know how you can recover it. Adding a mobile phone number or second email can help you protect your account and will make recovering it easier.
4. Fight email “phishing”
   Phishing happens when a hacker creates fake messages that look like they come from a business partner, bank, or even the government. They look real but aren’t. To fight phishing, you need to be careful with links and email attachments. Furthermore, it’s important to regularly check if any unauthorized parties have access to your account.
5. Make sure you’re visiting secured websites
   You can do this by checking if the website address begins with https://…
6. Make sure your devices lock automatically
   By making your phone, tablet, laptop and computer lock automatically when not being used, you’re sure no one can access them when you lose them.
7. Keep your software up to date
   Always make sure you’re running the latest software version on all of your devices. To make sure you always have the latest version, you can enable automatic updates.
8. Add two-factor authentication
   Two-factor authentication, also known as 2-Step Verification, can prevent hackers from accessing your accounts by requiring a second form of identification.
9. Store your data safely
   Storing all of your data in one place is a recipe for disaster. The best thing you can do is to store your data in a secure, encrypted place in the cloud.
10. Choose a good hosting provider for your website
    Choosing a good hosting provider for your website is key when it comes to security.

Do you need help with your web hosting?
Contact us!

A beginner’s guide to Virtual Private Servers.

In order to make a website available online, it has to be uploaded to a web server, which is usually done by hosting providers. This service is called web hosting. If you’re ready to get your website up and running you’ve probably come across VPS Hosting.

In this beginner’s guide to Virtual Private Servers, we’ll discuss everything you need to know about VPS hosting and answer all of your burning questions.

What is a Virtual Private Server?

VPS stands for Virtual Private Server. Let’s break it down:

• Server – A web server is a computer that runs websites or web-based applications through storing, processing, and delivering.
• Virtual – Virtualization technology is used to split a single server into multiple virtual servers.
• Private – The server is “private”, which means that you don’t have to share server resources like RAM and CPU with other users.

How does VPS hosting work?

With VPS hosting you share a physical server with others. However, with virtualization technology, the server is split into secure individual compartments. This means that you don’t have to share any of the resources and are able to install your own OS and software.

What is the Difference Between Shared Hosting, Dedicated Hosting, and VPS hosting?

In order to fully understand what VPS hosting is, it’s important to understand the basics of web hosting: shared hosting, dedicated hosting, and VPS hosting.

Shared Hosting
Shared hosting is the most common form of web hosting. With shared hosting, you share the server and resources like RAM and CPU with other website owners. This means that traffic on other websites can influence your website’s performance. It’s a great option for businesses that are on a budget and don’t expect a lot of traffic.

Dedicated Hosting
With dedicated hosting, you get a server that is fully reserved for your website. You don’t share any resources and have 100% control.

VPS Hosting
VPS hosting is usually described as a stepping stone between shared hosting and dedicated hosting: you get some of the benefits of having a dedicated server on a shared physical server.

Self-Managed or Managed VPS Hosting?

When choosing a VPS hosting plan you can usually choose between self-managed services and managed services.

In order to self-manage your hosting, you need technical knowledge. You need to be familiar with things such as troubleshooting, server administration, and managing the application and software on your VPS.

Are you unfamiliar with these skills? Then a managed service is a better option. With managed services, the hosting company takes care of the technical side of things.

Do you want to get all the benefits of a VPS but not worry about the technical side of things? Check out our managed solutions!

Imagine you want to eat Greek tonight. Chances are high that you’ll type something in Google and end up finding a nice restaurant. This is what your potential customers are doing as well: searching on the internet. However, it’s not that simple: searches can be done in many different ways. Some people search with a few words, whilst others prefer full questions or even detailed phrases.

To do Search Engine Marketing (SEM) you need to figure out which searches are relevant for your business so that your business can show up in the search results. To make sure you’re not wasting any money and reach the right people you have to pick the right keywords.

How do I know which keywords to use for Search Engine Marketing?

Even if you hire someone to manage your SEM, you’re the one that knows your business best. Therefore, the best place to start what you already know about your business, your competitors and your customers. Think about what questions your customers ask you, what your competitors are doing online and what describes your business best.

Make a keyword list

It’s good to start with 3-5 small and specific keywords. For example, if you’re the owner of a Beeswax business, “wax” would be too broad. With a keyword that’s too broad, you’ll get a lot of competition from any wax related website.

To make it less broad, you can use short phrases as a keyword. So instead of using “wax”, it could be good to use “beeswax wraps” or “beeswax candles” (if that’s what you’re selling of course). Also, keep in mind that every single word has to be hardworking – no “if, “for”, “and” or “but”.

Where do I find ideas for a keyword list?

Once you have a few keywords on your list, it’s time to make it grow! There are a few things you can look at:

• Your own website – check your product pages, about page, the brand, and any other relevant content on your website. This can all become a keyword!
• Your customers – it’s important to start thinking like your customers. Do you have a search box on your website? Perfect! Then you can check what your customers are looking for on your website.
• Your competitors – are they using any relevant keywords? If so, add them to your list!

What tools can help me with finding new keywords?

There are many tools that can give you ideas for new keywords. Generally, all you have to do is add some “seed” keywords and the tool will give you related keywords. Examples of some good keyword planner tools are:

• Google Keyword Planner
• Google Trends
• Ahrefs Keyword Generator
• Bing Keyword Research
• SimilarWeb

Analytics tools can help you to find out which keywords people used when visiting your website. Some of our favorites are:

• Google Analytics
• Compete

Do you need help with your Search Engine Marketing? Contact us

Whether you’re choosing an image to share, want to add a new profile picture, change your cover photo or add any other social media image, it’s important to get the dimensions right. Every social media platform uses different image dimensions and every platform scales the dimensions to a different size. To get the best result, you will have to scale your images multiple times.

It’s useful to have an overview of the right dimensions per medium. Therefore, we have prepared one for you.

Facebook GNNN GD

• Profile picture: 180 x 180 px
• Cover photo: 820 x 312 px (minimum)

Extra information 
Facebook is a lot more flexible than it used to be when it comes to images in posts. Nowadays, images work fine in 1080 x 1080 dimensions. The advantage of this is that you can use the same image for Instagram!

Have you created an event on Facebook? The ratio that is used for the header is 16:9. For the best results on all screens, you will have to use an image with dimensions 1920 x 1080 px.

Instagram

• Profile picture: 180 x 180 px
• Normal posts: The ratio for a normal post is 1:1 for square images. A minimum of 1080 x 1080 px is required.
• Landscape posts: The ratio for landscape posts is 1.91:1 with a minimum of 1080 pixels. This means that your landscape image must be at least 1080 x 608 px to be properly displayed.
• Instagram stories: 1080 x 1920 px is well displayed on any screen.

LinkedIn Company Page

• Logo: 300 x 300 px
• Cover: 1536 x 768 px
• Sponsored content: 1200 x 627 px
• Hero image: 1128 x 376 px
• Business Banner: 646 x 220 px

LinkedIn Personal Profile

• Profile picture: 400 x 400 px
• Header: 1584 x 396 px

Extra information
Do you share images with your updates? Then it’s important to use 1200 x 1200 px for desktop and 1200 x 628 for mobile. Are you not sure where people will see your images? Then it’s good to use the mobile formats. This is the same size as the recommended sizes for sponsored content.

Twitter

• Profile Picture: 400 x 400 px
• Header: 1500 x 500 px
• Image Tweets: 440 x 220 px

Do you need help with resizing your images?
Check our Support Services!

Nowadays, having a mobile-friendly website for your business is more important than ever. In fact, websites are expected to work properly on several different devices: tablets, desktops, and smartphones. If your business doesn’t have a mobile-friendly website, chances are high that your visitors will quickly leave and look elsewhere. Users simply want websites that are easy to read and navigate. Therefore, today we share a checklist that will help you ensure that your website is as mobile-friendly as possible.

1. Say no to dual websites: choose a responsive design!

A while ago, it was normal for businesses to design a separate mobile-friendly website for their users alongside their already existing desktop website. Nowadays, Google frowns upon it. So, if you still have two separate websites for mobile and desktop, it’s time to switch it up by creating a single website with a responsive design. By doing this, you’ll get better search engine results and no longer have to worry about the content of two separate websites.

2. Is your website loading fast enough?

Nothing infuriates smartphone users more than a slow website. In fact, page load speed plays a major role in the user experience. Therefore, Google says that the load speed of any page should be around 2 seconds.

3. Do you prioritize the most important information?

It’s important to always think about the needs of your visitors. Users of mobile devices are often on the go and need to find information as quickly as possible – they need to see this first. On the contrary, desktop users might have more time to read about your companies’ history. To fit both the needs of desktop users and mobile users, it’s important to put the most important information first.

4. Check your fonts and button sizes

Even though this seems fairly obvious, a lot of websites still use fonts that are too small, too big or difficult to read. This also goes for touch elements such as call-to-action buttons. For mobile websites it is super important visitors can select the relevant touch element. This means that the font needs to be the right size, the button needs to be big enough and there has to be enough space in between buttons.

5. Are you using mobile-friendly content?

Some forms of content are not playable on mobile devices. An example is flash related media that requires having a flash player. To give visitors the best online experience possible, it’s important that your content is mobile-friendly.

6. Did you do the Mobile-Friendly Test?

Doing Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test will give you an overview of how mobile-friendly your website is. It even shows what can be improved to make your website more mobile-friendly.

7. Is there a search box at the top of your website?

To make it easier for new visitors to find what they are looking for, it’s important to add a search box at the top of every page. By making it easier for people to find what they want, the chances of getting a conversion are bigger.

8. Avoid ads and popups

We totally understand that you want to monetize your site somehow. However, it’s super important that your mobile website does not include a lot of ads and popups. Ads that take up too much space and pop-ups can hinder user experience. When it comes to conversions, user experience is way more important than monetizing your website.

9. E-commerce? Test the online shopping experience!

For e-commerce websites, it’s super important to test the online shopping experience on mobile devices. Even when the desktop shopping experience is great, this doesn’t mean it’s the same on mobile devices. Some things that are important to check:

• Can you check out as a guest?
• Does the website let you know if you forgot to enter any important information such as your zip code?
• Does your website have a search box?
• Are all the payment methods working?

10. Did you add enough visual elements?

With significantly smaller screen sizes than on a desktop, it’s important to share information visually – “pictures are worth a thousand words”. With infographics, pictures, and videos you can get more information across. Make sure that your visual elements are high-resolution and that your videos are playable on mobile devices.

Do you need help with your website? We’re here for you!
All you have to do is to create an account and contact our professionals.

When deciding which is the best web hosting package for you, it’s important you know the differences between them. Only then, you’ll be able to make the right choice for your online business. That’s why today we’re sharing the most important differences between Shared Hosting, Virtual Private Servers, and Dedicated Servers.

Shared Hosting

With Shared Hosting, also known as Normal Web Hosting, you share a single server and IP address with many other websites. This makes it a lot cheaper, but also limited regarding security, bandwidth, and performance capabilities. Shared hosting plans are a great option for small businesses that are just starting out, want something that’s super easy to use, and are on a tight budget. However, these (low budget) shared hosting packages may have a negative impact on the performance of your website as one user may impact the total performance of the server.

Virtual Private Servers (VPS)

With a Virtual Private Server, you still share the resources of a single server. What’s different is that the hosting provider places restrictions on who can use these resources and how much of it they can use. This means that you are protected from other users.

The benefits of having a Virtual Private Server are that you get more control, the performance is better, you have more customization options, and that they are more flexible. Virtual Private Servers can handle a lot more traffic than Shared Hosting.

Furthermore, most hosting providers offer managed and unmanaged VPS hosting plans. Managed plans are a perfect solution for everyone who wants the good performance of a VPS, but doesn’t want to deal with the technical side of things. With managed plans, the hosting provider is responsible for this. Unmanaged plans are great who want to do the technical maintenance, installation, and everything else related to the server’s software themselves. One big advantage of a VPS is you will have a dedicated IPv4 address that is not shared with other users.

You can find our VPS hosting plans here

Dedicated Servers

A dedicated server is ‘dedicated’. This means that the server only serves your website. The greatest benefit of this is that you’re not sharing any resources, can use the server however you want, and that it’s a lot more secure. The only downside of having your own Dedicated Server is that you will need to invest a bit more. However, you will get all the benefits of the best performance and a very smooth running platform. A Dedicated Server is a great solution for high-performance webshops.

Shared Hosting, Virtual Private Server, or Dedicated Server?

If you’re serious about growing your website or online business, then it’s a good idea to consider moving from shared hosting to either a Virtual Private server or your own Dedicated Servers.

For most small business owners, a VPS is a perfect solution, because it gives you the power and flexibility, at a low cost. If you need even more space or are worried about security, it’s time to switch to a dedicated server.

Keep this in mind when choosing a hosting provider

• When you’ve chosen a hosting plan that’s right for you, it’s important to check some things with your hosting provider. Two important factors to keep in mind are support and uptime.
• It’s good to know what type of support is offered and that they know how to help you when you’re in need. Are they available 24/7?
• Furthermore, it’s important to know the SLA regarding up-time. You should always aim for 99.9% uptime. Unless it doesn’t matter to have your business down for days of course 😉

At Affordable Media, you’ll be sure to get great support and an uptime guarantee of 99.9%

Find our hosting packages here

Do you remember the last time you met someone you never saw before? Their hairstyle, posture, and clothes probably gave you a quick impression of them. If you spent more time with them, you probably got to know them a bit better and got to see whether that first impression was true or not. Businesses often don’t get the chance to do the latter: visitors can leave right away without ever getting to know the business.

This is where images come into play: they give you the opportunity to quickly show what your business is about. But what’s the best way to use images?

Here are some things you should check

1. Are your pictures crystal clear?
This is especially important if you have a webshop. Visitors of your website often like to see the products you’re selling up close. A good way to make this possible is to have crystal clear pictures that can expand. Would you like your images to stand out even more? Then it’s a good idea to place it against a contrasting background.

Do you have a service-based website? Then crystal clear pictures of people are often a good option. These can, for example, be pictures of happy customers, business partners, or employees.

2. Make sure your images are consistent and fit your brand style
No matter what kind of business you have, it’s important to have good images that fit the color scheme of your website and your brand’s style. Always make sure you use similar styles, image sizes, orientation, and backgrounds. This will make your website look like a whole, make it recognizable and clear.

3. Are you using your own pictures?
A good way to make your website stand out and be authentic is to use your own, unique pictures. To do this you can invest in a professional photographer. Is that not an option? Then you can always use stock photography.

Do you need help with stock photography or videography? We’re more than happy to help!

4. Are your images the right size?
To prevent your website from having a slow load time, it’s important to keep image files as small as possible. Also, make sure you have not more than 5 large images per page. Keep in mind that you shouldn’t make the images too small. Making them too small will make them look blurry and distorted when expanded or added to a larger space.

5. Are the images the right format?
Your images should be JPSGs or PNGs (only if transparency is needed). These work the best on websites. If your images have a different format, it’s important to convert them.

6. Give your image a good name, and fill out captions and alternative text
This has to do with your SEO. Don’t call an image “Image1.jpg” or “Screen Shot 2020-06-05”. Give them descriptive names such as “big-ben-01”. Furthermore, it’s important to fill out the captions and alternative text of your images. Alternative text gives search engines a better idea of what your images are about. This is especially important if you have a webshop.

Follow your customers’ journey with digital metrics

Tracking your customer’s journey with digital marketing makes it possible to know whether your digital marketing is working or not. However, figuring out what you’d like to track is not always an easy task. Often, a customer journey consists of different stages: from getting to know your brand to the outcome you want (purchasing something, applying for something, brand awareness, etc.). What you need to know is: how do customers behave when they visit your social media channels and website?

When it comes to digital marketing, you want to be sure that you inspire meaningful interactions. In the end, you want people to be engaged with your website.

What are meaningful interactions?

Meaningful interactions are positive responses to your digital marketing efforts. Examples are:

• Watching a whole video you published and sharing it with friends and family
• Visiting your website multiple times, and/or visiting multiple pages
• Landing on your website and staying for a while
• Sharing, retweeting and liking your content

It’s important to figure out what kind of behavior adds value to your business. Ask yourself: what do you want people to do when they visit your social media channels, website, and/or app? Do you want them to visit specific pages, order a specific product, watch a special video, or share something? As soon as you know which behaviors add value, you can start tracking them!

How do you track meaningful interactions?

There are a lot of tools available that can help you track metrics on your owned channels. These are channels that you control, such as your own website. There are also tools available for rented channels, such as social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. Examples are Google Analytics, Adobe Analytics, and Buffer.

For both owned and rented channels, there are different metrics you can look at.

Let’s start with the owned channels

On your own website, it’s important to track the ‘bounce rate’. A bounce rate is the % of people that land on your website and immediately ‘bounce off’. Imagine a woman called Kate visits your website because she accidentally clicked on one of your ads. She immediately hits the back button and leaves your website. In this situation, your bounce rate will be high.

This is of course not our goal. What we want is a low bounce rate. A low bounce rate means that visitors are sticking around. This shows that your website is matching with what people are looking for.

You should also track the number of pages people visit and how long they stay on your website. Together, these stats will tell you if your website is resonating with people.

Lastly, it’s especially important to compare the metrics of your website on different devices. If your bounce rate is higher on mobile devices and people don’t visit a lot of pages, you may want to improve your mobile design.

We can create a fully responsive website for you!

You can find our offers here

Metrics on rented channels

On rented channels, it’s important to look at the number of likes, shares, and comments on your posts. When people share your posts, they spread it beyond your audience. For channels such as YouTube, it’s important to check your views and how many people watched your entire video or ad. If numbers are high, you know your content is resonating with people!

Do you want help with your digital marketing? Then you’ve come to the right place.

Create an account and we do it for you.