Google Analytics is easily the most robust website traffic analysis tools you can find, and it's super simple and free to install on your site. You don't need to be a coding genius or anything to get going either. Google walks you through the steps really efficiently. If along the way you run into some hiccups and need some help, feel free to contact us and we'll give you a hand!

Don't delay installing Analytics on your site. The sooner you begin collecting data, the better. This is because Analytics will give you insight into valuable things such as where your traffic is coming from and how people behave on your site.

To start collecting basic data from your website:

1. Create a new Analytics account if you do not have one. Visit google.com/analytics, click the Sign in to Analytics button (top right), and follow the on-screen instructions. Go here for a video on the first steps in Google Analytics.
2. Set up a property in the account you have created.
3. Follow the instructions to set up web tracking.

It's a pretty simple process really. Once your accounts are created, you'll simply be given a small section of code to copy and paste onto your website, and that's it.

With Google Analytics installed on your website, you'll be able to not only track traffic, but can also set goals. The goals will allow you to track when site visitors see a specified amount of pages, spend a specified amount of time on your website, and other things. This information can also be used in marketing - you can target remarketing efforts on those people who met specific goals, so marketing is going towards those people who have met certain qualifying criteria.

​You'll also be able to add and manage users on your Analytics account. This will allow other employees, or someone like us at Level 11, to keep track of your on-site activity as well. It's very simple to do so: when prompted, you simply enter the Google account of the party you wish to grant some degree of access to your analytics. If you would like our opinion of your website and what could  be improved, feel free to add analytics@level11.io to your Google Analytics, and we'll happily take a look at things for you!
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More knowledge can be found here: https://support.google.com/analytics/answer/1008015?hl=en

​About us: Level 11 Online Marketing is a fast growing digital advertising agency that is becoming known for disrupting the status quo. We specialize in digital advertising, video production, SEO, SEM, advanced analytics, custom web solutions via website design & implementation, social media strategies and conversion optimization. Headquartered in Utah, you will find Level 11 team members throughout Utah, Nebraska, Arizona, California, Idaho, and Colorado. We have the best creative minds in the industry backed up by the most talented software developers and video production teams, resulting in powerful, efficient advertising campaigns.

If you have questions, comment here or email us at info@level11.io today!

Phones are used at an incredible rate today. You may have been putting off getting a presence set up on social media because you don't have time, or because you don't think it's worth your time. Well, it's no longer just a "good idea" for most businesses to be on Facebook - with well over a billion people actively using Facebook every day, it's become a go-to part of almost any marketing strategy. At least having a Facebook page, even if you are not actively posting content there, will help your business.

To help you get serious about your social media presence, we're sharing a few insights for you to get your house in order. For more hints on creating and maintaining a profitable, worthwhile social media presence, go here, here, here, and here to learn more.

Step 1: Classification
To begin, go to https://www.facebook.com/pages/create.php. This page will showcase six different classifications to choose from (they'll each provide more relevant fields for your desired page):

• Local Business or Place
• Company, Organization, or Institution
• Brand or Product
• Artist, Band, or Public Figure
• Entertainment
• Cause or Community

Once you've selected your desired classification, you'll be asked for an official name for your business page. Be very careful in selecting your name - even though Facebook allows you to change your name and URL once, it's not a walk in the park.

Step 2: Basic Info
Facebook will automatically take you through the following four basic sections to complete the fundamental aspects of your Page.

Finish "About" Section

The "about" section will be the main short description of your company. It will appear on your main page, so make it descriptive but to the point. Make sure you include a link to your company website as well (if you don't have a website, or your current site needs an update, let us know). Also ensure that this section makes you stand out, so you attract new visitors.

This is also where you can select your unique domain (that, as mentioned above, can only be changed once). For example, we at Level 11 Online Marketing chose to use the domain https://www.facebook.com/Level11marketing/ and we love it.

Upload Profile Picture

Your profile picture will serve as the main visual icon of your page, appearing in search results and alongside any comments you publish. While any perfectly square image will work, Facebook recommends that the size be 180 x 180 pixels.

Add to Favorites

Each and every individual Facebook user has a vertical navigation bar to the left of their News Feed. You can add your page as a "Favorite" item here for easy access. 

Reach More People

You'll be prompted to create an advertisement to draw attention to your Page. Whether or not you intend to do any paid marketing at this point, it's best to not run any ads at this stage because there's no compelling content on the page yet that would convince them to ultimately "Like" your page or go to your website.

Step 3: Admin Panel
With your page now live, Facebook will ask if you'd like to "Like" your page. You probably should avoid doing so at the moment because doing so will appear in News Feeds of those you're connected to personally to on Facebook. Without any content on the page, we want to save that action for when you're really ready for people to view the page.

In the top bar, you'll see the "Settings" tab. Click that, and along the left side you'll see a vertical navigation bar with different sections should appear. We'll focus on three important ones for now:

• Page Info: Just like in Step 1, you'll be able to add additional details about your business here. You'll be able to fill out more fields here based on the classification you chose.
• Page Roles: Whether or not you'll be the main manager of the page, there may be others at your organization who need access to your Facebook page. Here, you can invite other colleagues to make changes to your pages. Some common needs include responding to questions and reviews or uploading/adding content.

• Notifications: Here, you can customize when and how you'd like to receive alerts from your business page. Set a frequency that fits your social media marketing plan and schedule.

Step 4: Content
Now you can finally get to adding content. There's much to be said about what to do and say on your page, so get started by going here. Content is king, so don't post for the sake of posting. Have a clear purpose in everything you do. Let us know if you could use a few ideas on where to start.

Posts

The rest of your page will fill up over time as you post more updates. Facebook currently allows you six different posting options:

Plain text status
Photo with caption
Link with caption
Video with caption
Event page
Location check-in

Keep in mind that statistically, videos have the highest rate of engagement, followed by photos/graphics, and lastly plain text or links.

Cover Photo

This is the large, horizontal image that spans the top of your Facebook page. This is usually a branded image, but can be whatever you think will help to attract people to your page. The official photo dimensions are 851 x 315 pixels.

Invite Others

Now that there's content on the page, we can start strategically inviting users to Like it. It could be helpful to proceed in this order:

1. Invite colleagues to Like your page and its content to build some initial activity.
2. Invite supporters into your network. Encourage them to engage.
3. Invite customers. With some activity now on the page, they’ll be more interested and likely to hang around.

With content published and users invited, you'll be able to monitor the activity of your followers through the "Activity" tab.

Step 5: Measure Impact
To measure your efforts to ensure you're making valuable decisions, click the "Insights" option in the top navigation to see the following:

• Overview: This tab shows a 7-day snapshot of your metrics such as page Likes, post reach, and overall engagement. 
• Likes: This tab shows your overall fan growth and losses. If you're paying for additional visibility, it'll show a breakdown of paid and organic growth. 
• Reach: This tab highlights the number of people your page is reaching every day. If you notice spikes on a specific day, review what you posted that day to see if you can replicate that reach. If you're running ads or boosting posts, it'll distinguish between paid and organic reach. 
• Visits: This tab indicates where on Facebook your viewers are coming from. You can see the difference in visits on Facebook Timelines, your information tab, reviews, and others.

And just like that, you're done! Now, if you're serious about using your social media presence to generate new business, talk to us today! We know what it takes for brands of all types and sizes to achieve significant, measureable success and growth via social media, and we'll certainly know how to help you (or at the very least, we'll be able to give you some great tips to get you on your way to improvement).

About us: Level 11 Online Marketing is a fast growing digital advertising agency that is becoming known for disrupting the status quo. We specialize in digital advertising, video production, SEO, SEM, advanced analytics, custom web solutions via website design & implementation, social media strategies and conversion optimization. Headquartered in Utah, you will find Level 11 team members throughout Utah, Nebraska, Arizona, California, Idaho, and Colorado. We have the best creative minds in the industry backed up by the most talented software developers and video production teams, resulting in powerful, efficient advertising campaigns.

If you have questions, comment here or email us at info@level11.io today!

A huge part of your online presence should be ensuring that you are easy to find. Setting up your Google My Business page should be one of the first things you set up as a business. We're often asked by business owners how it was that other businesses get "listed" by Google... yeah, you set up your own listing! Creating your page, and that your information is accurate, will be a huge step towards being found and generating business online.

The steps are simple: you'll simply go to the link below, and fill out your general information. Everything from your address, phone number, business hours, and description, can be put into your page. If your business is home based, and you don't want your address listed, you still need to enter your address (more on why later), yet you can hide that so the public doesn't see it.

Once all of your information is in the system, along with perhaps your logo and some photos you upload, the process is nearly complete. Make sure all of your information is correct and accurate. As with any business, things will change for you in the future, so it's easy to edit your business details anytime and they’re automatically updated on Google Search and Maps, all from a single dashboard.

The final step in your setup is verification. Through a phone call, or more commonly, a post card from Google sent to your physical address, you'll be able to verify that you are indeed you, and your business listing will be complete. 

With your Google My Business page completed, you'll be able to instantly gain more insights about the people that are looking for you and talking about you. You'll be the first to know when people are talking about your business (leaving reviews) so you can respond to them as the business owner, and track your ratings over time. You'll learn about your customers and how they’re interacting with your business, how they found you, and where are they coming from. With Google My Business, the answers are right there. 

Go here to get started, and feel free to contact us if you have questions along the way!

About us: Level 11 Online Marketing is a fast growing digital advertising agency that is becoming known for disrupting the status quo. We specialize in digital advertising, video production, SEO, SEM, advanced analytics, custom web solutions via website design & implementation, social media strategies and conversion optimization. Headquartered in Utah, you will find Level 11 team members in Utah, Washington, California, Idaho, and Colorado. We have the best creative minds in the industry backed up by the most talented software developers and video production teams which leads to powerful, efficient advertising campaigns.

If you have questions, comment here or email us at info@level11.io today!

Search engine optimization is a constantly evolving practice. As one variable is assumed to retain more value by search engines that variable soon becomes exploited by poor SEO’s. So, how do you approach SEO? Often times it ends up being a well balanced portfolio of various fulfillment tactics. At other times, “slow and steady” with establishing proper structures within your website never seem to go wrong.

1 – Diversity

By far, the biggest issue that SEO’s face is diversity. All too often, a website utilizes the same keywords and phrases too many times. What this results in is Google (or other search engines) flagging the website as being spammy, which means your website won't show up when a search would otherwise result in your site being deemed relevant.

2 – Title Tags

Title Tags have been through some serious trends. Found many times throughout any given website (they tell search engines what each page is about), Title Tags have been over- and under-emphasized over the years. Amazingly, during consultations, we'll often find both extremes: attempts to cram too many words in, and even completely empty Title Tags.

Our recommendation is to approach Title Tags as if they were an abbreviated, one sentence summary of what the page is about. That way you focus on what is most important to represent in the Title Tag, which helps limit saying too much. While Title Tags play a huge part in search engine algorithms currently, advances in technology may render them less meaningful over time in terms of importance in search rankings, but they can still help generate clicks. By displaying a summary of what the page is about, it increases the possiblilty that someone will click on that text if your page shows up in the search rankings.

3 – Fluff

Unnecessary fluff is everywhere on websites. From the excessive title tags mentioned above and unnecessary meta tags, to scraped content and old Flash, websites are going through a rebirth. Stuff from a few years ago is now often considered tacky. Much more importantly, a lot of the items from years ago use outdated and slow processes.

How does this impact SEO?  As older things like Flash is slowly overtaken by HTML5, and other coding improvements come along, a lean, mean, quick-loading-website machine is what search engines want to see. User experience means a lot to Google, so if your site loads slower than a competitor whose site has the exact same information, your site will lose because your competitor's load time is better.

4 – Scaled Images

A big issue with pages loading slow is that the images are often not served at proper size. A good example would be if a business owner wanted to display a 500px x 500px sized image of their storefront. They'll take their own picture, download the pic to their desktop, then upload it to their website and scale it to 500px x 500px. However, they didn’t resize it - they just scaled it. Now their website has to load a 3500px x 2500px picture, but display it at 500×500. Even though it is displayed smaller it still has to load the full size image. Why not resize it before loading so the website can quickly serve the smaller image instead? 

5 – Compressed Images

Another fix for images is to take advantage of lossless image compression. This method of compression retains the quality of an image while downsizing the actual file size by as much as 90%. Either compress images individually or use available plugins for popular Content Management Systems, like WordPress. There are also API’s available from popular compression tools for those that would like to integrate compression into custom website backends.

6 – Search Engine Friendly (SEF) URL’s

While it may be true that dynamic url’s/pages should get indexed with no problem, that doesn’t mean that pages with search engine friendly url’s won’t rank higher. All popular Content Management Systems like WordPress these days have the ability to enable search engine friendly url’s. Use it.

7 – .htaccess

The .htaccess file is a text file that is in the root of a website’s hosting directory. This is pretty technical stuff that only those who deal in the nitty gritty of web dev will totally follow, but it's still important to be aware of. This small, single file can literally make or break a website. With just a line or two of code it can help you add redirects when necessary, set caches and expires headers for quicker page loads, mitigate hacking, block IP addresses, all sorts of goodness. Or, it can crash you entire website because someone accidentally left an extra comma on a line. Use the files when you feel comfortable doing so, but don't push it. 

8 – Understanding your own site’s structure

This is basic housekeeping, but is often neglected. You need to keep up on what's actually in your website. Running a thorough audit with a program like WebMeUp will help webmasters know how many pages their website has, what pages have gone missing, where broken links are, what pages have empty Title Tags, etc. The simple task of understanding (or better yet, fixing) a websites structure can be one of the easiest to fix, because you can run audit programs, but is often one of the most rewarding for search engine gains. Treat this like Spring cleaning - occasionally take the time to check on the state of your site.

9 – Content

Unique content isn't just a fad. In fact, it’s always been important. The issue that website owners face is knowing what to write about and how frequently. There is no right answer that applies to everyone. We'd be happy to help you figure out what's right for you, so feel free to reach out for a little guidance. Creating compelling content to generate returning visitors is more important than keyword stuffing.

10 – Outreach

Now that you've got an awesome website and you've began to generate content, how do you spread the word? Outreach. Outreach is one of the slowest, yet most rewarding parts of SEO. Get involved in the local community. Go to business conferences. Offer free tutorials. By getting involved you will generate outreach without all of the awkwardness. Plus, you usually end up feeling good about getting involved with your peers. Be wary of those so-called SEO experts touting getting you backlinks quickly. It's usually just garbage you'll end up with. Developing mutually beneficial connections with partner websites (businesses with similar clientele as you, against whom you don't directly compete) will go a long way for you.

11 – Buyer's Remorse

We've talked a lot about this here, but just know that there's a lot of snake oil salesmen out there, claiming to help you conquer SEO instantly and with little effort. There is no "secret sauce" to SEO, and there certainly is no shortcut to awesome organic rankings. Don't believe in the hollow promises of these fly-by-night agencies.

Summary

While SEO methods and tactics will always change, it seems that many of the most impacting variables are the same as years ago, and will continue to be so well into the future. To be successful in SEO, focus first on the important website variables that don’t change so that you establish a solid foundation for your other efforts. Once you have the foundation in place, you can test the waters with other search engine optimization methods to increase your website’s exposure.

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About us: Level 11 Online Marketing is a fast growing digital advertising agency that is becoming known for disrupting the status quo. We specialize in digital advertising, video production, SEO, SEM, advanced analytics, custom web solutions via website design & implementation, social media strategies and conversion optimization. Headquartered in Utah, you will find Level 11 team members throughout Utah, Nebraska, Arizona, California, Idaho, and Colorado. We have the best creative minds in the industry backed up by the most talented software developers and video production teams, resulting in powerful, efficient advertising campaigns.

If you have questions, comment here or email us at info@level11.io today!

Your website needs to be mobile responsive. Amazingly (or perhaps this shouldn't come as a surprise by now), people are five times more likely to leave a mobile site that isn’t mobile-friendly (that's a direct-from-Google stat, as are the other ones here).

All too often, we encounter websites that were built before cell phones, and specifically, smart phones, were as common as they are today. This means that websites were built to look and function properly on a desktop computer, but are not constructed in such a way that allows for other screen sizes, like tablets and phones, to display the same imaging in a convenient way.

Due to the dated nature of many websites, visitors on phones need to zoom, squint, and stand on their heads in order to find what they're looking for. For this reason, so many visitors will simply leave a website instead of trying to navigate to what they're looking for. Bounce rates (a bounce rate is the percentage of visitors to a particular website who navigate away from the site after viewing only one page) for these non-responsive websites are consistently in the 90%+ range. Your visitors are simply walking away without giving you a chance, simply because of the design of your website.

Additionally, nearly half of all visitors will leave a mobile site if the pages don’t load within 3 seconds. The content and construction of your website will impact load time, and there are a lot of seemingly small things that can improve your load time drastically. We often encounter websites that have individual images that are larger (in terms of space... you know, kilobytes, megabytes, etc) than the entire website should even be.

And finally, if you think that having a website that only looks and works good on a desktop is adequate, think about this: 9 out of 10 people say that they use multiple screens for such tasks as booking a flight online or managing their personal finances. Nearly everybody online is completing some part of the buying process not only on one device, but on any combination of a laptop, a desktop, a computer, a phone, etc. To lose such a huge portion of your sales funnel simply due to a poor mobile experience is forfeiting easily-attainable revenue unnecessarily.

You can go to https://testmysite.withgoogle.com/intl/en-gb to test out your website's mobile responsiveness, then you'll have a good idea for what about your site could use improvement.

The world’s gone mobile. Now, it’s your turn.  Contact us now to get a free full website analysis. We'll show you a list of everything that can and should be done to begin increasing the business you generate from your website, and we'll kindly guide you throughout the entire process so you can focus on what you do best.


About us: Level 11 Online Marketing is a fast growing digital advertising agency that is becoming known for disrupting the status quo. We specialize in digital advertising, video production, SEO, SEM, advanced analytics, custom web solutions via website design & implementation, social media strategies and conversion optimization. Headquartered in Utah, you will find Level 11 team members in Utah, Washington, California, Idaho, and Colorado. We have the best creative minds in the industry backed up by the most talented software developers and video production teams which leads to powerful, efficient advertising campaigns.

If you have questions, comment here or email us at info@level11.io today!

​​Berra-isms (colloquial expressions that lack logic) are now countless, and many of them are just attributed to Berra, even if he never actually said them. As he so perfectly put it: “I never said most of the things I said.” Here's how 11 of his quotes apply to marketing!

1. When you come to a fork in the road, take it.
Marketing (and all things online) is evolving so quickly that opportunities will always be coming along. The awesome thing about some online marketing strategies is you can actually TEST something before you do it. So no, it's not impossible to take the fork in the road - you can actually try multiple options without even risking anything.

2. You can observe a lot by just watching.
The problem that many marketers have is they don't actually watch. They don't watch the campaigns they're running (gotta watch to make adjustments along the way to refine the approach), they don't watch their clients (how is the marketing impacting the client's business?), and they don't watch the customers (you cannot effectively market without intimately understanding the decisions buyers are making and why they're making those decisions over other options). We're watchers - always observing and always refining.

3. It ain’t over till it’s over.
Don't give up. If something isn't working, make adjustments and keep trying. The beauty of online marketing is the ability to refine the process continually based on actual DATA about your efforts and their results.

4. It’s like déjà vu all over again.
When you find something that works, do it again. Also, it should be noted that before we do any marketing, we dig into the data to determine where opportunity actually lies. When we do this, then deploy our marketing efforts later, we already have an idea of what will happen because we've already seen the numbers. It really is like déjà vu all over again.

5. No one goes there nowadays, it’s too crowded.
Don't think that just because everybody else is marketing in some way that you need to follow suit. Let the numbers (analytics) determine where you market. Don't just assume that because your main competitor is on some fancy new social media platform that you need to be there too - every aspect of your marketing should be justifiable in your ROI.

6. Baseball is 90% mental and the other half is physical.
Sometimes the numbers just don't add up. To make sure your numbers are accurate and to make sure you know as much as possible about your audience, make sure you have Google Analytics installed on your website. It's easy, it's free, and it's the most robust traffic analysis tool anywhere. Any marketing without analytics is running on partial power.

7. A nickel ain’t worth a dime anymore.
Marketing is not a commoditizable industry. There are countless agencies out there; some agencies are amazing (like Level 11 Online Marketing!), while others make promises they can't deliver on and end up declaring bankruptcy 3 times in 7 years (like Dex... please, if you're with Dex, call us now. You'll be blown away by how much better life can be!). Simply put, all marketers are not created equal, so be thorough in vetting.

8. You wouldn’t have won if we’d beaten you.
You can control your destiny. Your marketing efforts are 100% within your control, so you CAN win every time, if you do it right. Don't allow yourself to be beaten by being mediocre.

9. We made too many wrong mistakes.
Winners don't fail, they learn. A wrong mistake is one that you learn nothing from.

10. Congratulations. I knew the record would stand until it was broken.
Your progress as a business or brand will stop and begin to decline the moment you think you've "arrived." Complacency is the enemy to progress. Once you reach a goal, set another and get back to work.

11. You better cut the pizza in four pieces because I’m not hungry enough to eat six.
Problem solving sometimes simply requires a new perspective of the same problem. With something as dynamic as 21st century marketing, constant change require constant education and evolution. We always bring a fresh perspective to our clients' challenges and problems.

... and now the bonus quotes!
​
12. Always go to other people’s funerals, otherwise they won’t come to yours.

13. I usually take a two-hour nap from one to four.

14. Never answer an anonymous letter.

15. Slump? I ain’t in no slump… I just ain’t hitting.

16. How can you think and hit at the same time?

17. The future ain’t what it used to be.

18. I tell the kids, somebody’s gotta win, somebody’s gotta lose. Just don’t fight about it. Just try to get better.

19. It gets late early out here.

20. If the people don’t want to come out to the ballpark, nobody’s going to stop them.

21. We have deep depth.

22. Pair up in threes.

23. Why buy good luggage, you only use it when you travel.

24. You’ve got to be very careful if you don’t know where you are going, because you might not get there.

25. All pitchers are liars or crybabies.

26. Even Napoleon had his Watergate.

27. Bill Dickey is learning me his experience.

28. He hits from both sides of the plate. He’s amphibious.

29. It was impossible to get a conversation going, everybody was talking too much.

30. I can see how he (Sandy Koufax) won twenty-five games. What I don’t understand is how he lost five.

31. I don’t know (if they were men or women fans running naked across the field). They had bags over their heads.

32. I’m a lucky guy and I’m happy to be with the Yankees. And I want to thank everyone for making this night necessary.

33. I’m not going to buy my kids an encyclopedia. Let them walk to school like I did.

34. In baseball, you don’t know nothing.

35. I never blame myself when I’m not hitting. I just blame the bat and if it keeps up, I change bats. After all, if I know it isn’t my fault that I’m not hitting, how can I get mad at myself?

36. I never said most of the things I said.

37. It ain’t the heat, it’s the humility.

38. If you ask me anything I don’t know, I’m not going to answer.

39. I wish everybody had the drive he (Joe DiMaggio) had. He never did anything wrong on the field. I’d never seen him dive for a ball, everything was a chest-high catch, and he never walked off the field.

40. So I’m ugly. I never saw anyone hit with his face.

41. Take it with a grin of salt.

42. (On the 1973 Mets) We were overwhelming underdogs.

43. The towels were so thick there I could hardly close my suitcase.

44. Little League baseball is a very good thing because it keeps the parents off the streets.

45. Mickey Mantle was a very good golfer, but we weren’t allowed to play golf during the season; only at spring training.

46. You don’t have to swing hard to hit a home run. If you got the timing, it’ll go.

47. I’m lucky. Usually you’re dead to get your own museum, but I’m still alive to see mine.

48. If I didn’t make it in baseball, I won’t have made it workin’. I didn’t like to work.

49. If the world were perfect, it wouldn’t be.

50. A lot of guys go, ‘Hey, Yog, say a Yogi-ism.’ I tell ’em, ‘I don’t know any.’ They want me to make one up. I don’t make ’em up. I don’t even know when I say it. They’re the truth. And it is the truth. I don’t know.


About us: Level 11 Online Marketing is a fast growing digital advertising agency that is becoming known for disrupting the status quo. We specialize in digital advertising, video production, SEO, SEM, advanced analytics, custom web solutions via website design & implementation, social media strategies and conversion optimization. Headquartered in Utah, you will find Level 11 team members in Utah, Washington, California, Idaho, and Colorado. We have the best creative minds in the industry backed up by the most talented software developers and video production teams which leads to powerful, efficient advertising campaigns.

If you have questions, comment here or email us at info@level11.io today!