More than anything else, 2020 may be the year that small businesses were left out in the cold. Literally as of this month. The effects of COVID-19 on the small business community have been sudden, shocking and heartbreaking. I’m a web developer who works exclusively with small businesses, and I’ve seen it firsthand. I’ve watched … [Read more…]
It’s been a turbulent year during which the norms we’ve been accustomed to have been thoroughly turned upside down. The small business community has been no exception; suddenly businesses are being required to pivot, develop new business models and market to new customer bases. This has been a crazy year for me personally as I’ve … [Read more…]
Way back in 2017 I wrote an article on the long, harrowing road to becoming an independent marketing consultant. Times were good in terms of the business climate at the time, which was partly why I included this particular nugget that now in hindsight seems ominously prophetic: It’s easy to coast along by not holding … [Read more…]
This article is not about George Floyd, but I cannot begin the article without discussing him. On May 25th George Floyd – a black man – was killed by then-Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin – a white man – who kept his knee pressed down on the right side of Floyd’s neck for nine minutes … [Read more…]
I like talking about positive things, cool stuff and gushing about WordPress on this website. Unfortunately our responsibility as ethical web developers also includes safeguarding people against unethical behavior that rips people off. Even more unfortunately, there’s a lot of it in this industry. If you’re a small business that’s gone the traditional website route – … [Read more…]
If you’ve got even a tiny website that gets an incremental amount of traffic, odds are that you’ve gotten some strange, suspicious looking E-mails from “content marketing companies” offering to post “sponsored content” on your blog. You’ve likely gotten these E-mails even if you don’t have a blog. These companies are far from discerning or … [Read more…]
I almost decided not to publish this article. I’ve been mulling over one like this for a while, but it needs to be said. Especially after a meeting with a prospective client who was increasingly crestfallen when I told him the price range of an search engine optimization campaign for his highly competitive regionally-driven keywords (SEO … [Read more…]