AI-GENERATED TRANSCRIPT - MAY CONTAIN ERRORS
Jules White: So hi. Today we are diving into a website, SEO audit for Natalie Ford. So hopefully by the end of this episode we'll have identified some simple, quick wins for Natalie's website.
So welcome, Natalie. It's so great to have you here.
Natalie Ford: Good morning. Thank you for having me.
Jules White: Yeah, you're welcome.
So, um, before we start, a little question I always ask before these audit episodes is, if we were to meet in six months' time and you were telling me about the amazing things that were happening with your web, with your business, how would your website be helping with that?
Natalie Ford: Well, at the moment it literally just sits there. I had a website 'cause that's what people told me that I needed to do, but I literally do nothing with it. It just sits there. But I would very, very much like it to be an integral part of, um, representing me online, but also, um, to attract new clients to me.
Jules White: Fantastic. That sounds like a good plan. Definitely. And I think there's definitely that thing of, we, we kind of feel like, oh yeah, I have to have a website.
And I think it is really important in business, but it's not just about having it there. We don't just want a digital brochure. We want it to be there and actually working.
Natalie Ford: Yeah. An active part of what I do, rather than just relying on social media, is to actually have that as a, a working Yeah. Um, part of the business.
Jules White: Brilliant. That sounds good. So, um, before we start, tell us a little bit about your business and how your website currently kind of sits within your marketing activities. I think you've kind of answered that anyway in terms of it doesn't really, well.
Natalie Ford: That'll be a very short answer. Um, so I'm a productivity and lifestyle coach. I work with successful women who are either running a business, running their own business, or have got a successful corporate career. They feel like their career or business has just taken over their life.
They're drowning under the amount of things that they're trying to juggle, and they just feel like, they thought when they got to this point in their life, everything would feel easy and, um, that they'd reached where they wanted to go. But now they're starting to question, is this it?
When was the last time I got a chance to do something for myself that just seems to be the business 24/7. Mm-hmm.
So I help them to kind of prioritise and organise their time so that we can look at what it is that you want to create in this season of your life. And what are the containers that make up that?
And then how can we prioritise and organise your time to make sure that the time's been spent in the right areas?
Jules White: Brilliant. That was amazing. Definitely all need a bit of that. Definitely.
So are working, there's women that don't, is it one-to-one coaching? Do you have online offerings as well? How do you kind of work with people?
Natalie Ford: Yeah, so I work one-to-one. And I do either a 90 minute session for people that just feel like they just need a little bit of help and support in organising their week.
They just feel like they're firefighting it through their to-do list. So I offer them a 90 minute session, and then again, one-to-one.
I do a six month coaching programme, which is for people that really feel like their life is completely unbalanced. They can't see how they're gonna unpick it and they can't see how they're gonna make changes.
So I work with them for six months, helping them to reframe the way that they're looking at time, reframe the way that they're approaching things, and then offer them planning and review sessions. Throughout the six months as well as a way of accountability and helping them through the challenges that they will face over those six months.
Jules White: Okay, great. Fantastic.
Um, and so with marketing at the moment, how do you, how are people finding you? What, what other sort of marketing activities are you doing in your business?
Natalie Ford: So predominantly, posting on social media. I've stepped up my networking over the last couple of months.
So getting out there, meeting new people and guest speaking, going in and doing masterclasses for people, and training sessions and on podcasts.
Jules White: Brilliant. I think this is amazing.
That's, you know, my, for me, building those relationships is always top above the SEO above websites, definitely above social media. But anything.
Natalie Ford: I think I felt, yeah, I think I got into that little rabbit hole of right. I've just got a post on social media and everything, or just happened.
But then it's like you say, you're just sitting in the office on your own, staring at a screen. So actually getting out and networking online, but then also in person as well.
I've just really, really enjoyed doing that.
Jules White: I think the biggest thing is that no algorithm can take that away from you as well. So you're meeting people, you're building those relationships and that's always gonna be there for you, I think.
Yeah. Brilliant.
Okay. I'm gonna start sharing my screen and we'll have a little look at your website and just see if we can find some quick wins.
Okay, here we are. So. Have you ever done anything with SEO? Have you ever sort of given it any thought, have you ever sort of set up any analytics tools?
Do you know how you're doing on Google at the moment? I'm guessing the fact that you sort of say that you, you know, you're not, you're not feeling like your website is, is contributing to your marketing.
Natalie Ford: Yeah, no. I had somebody build it.And then that's it really.
Jules White: Okay, fantastic. Have you got Google Analytics and Google Search Console set up?
Natalie Ford: Uh, interesting question. I dunno.
Well, I use Google for everything so I'll use Google Drive, Google Sheets, all that sort of thing. But as for Google Analytics, I don't know.
Jules White: Well, let's have a little look and we can see if you've got a Google tag on your account. So what I've done here is I've just right clicked and I've just gone to inspect.
And what that brings up is, is some little web developer tools and if we could hit control or command I think, I think that will work on a Mac as well. On a PC it's control F and type in.
Uh, a G. What we can use, you usually see this by doing gtag.
If you are using WordPress, uh, I would expect, I can't see a tag there, so let's have a little look. It might be an old one.
It might be. So that suggests that you haven't got it set up anyway. either way. You're not using it, so, okay.
What you could do is you could have a look in your, if you've got one particular Google account that you have set up for your business, you could have a look and see if there is an analytics account already set up in there. Or ask the person who set your website up, whether they set it up.
'cause if they didn't, then you, that's one thing to do. Okay.
I tend to say out of the two, I would say if you're thinking about getting more traffic from Google, start with Google Search Console. So these are two free tools from Google that anyone can use on their website, and what it ultimately does is it helps you to understand how people are finding you and how Google sees your website.
So Google Analytics is the one that's more well known. It's the one that more people have heard of and uh, it is great to have that as well.
What that will ultimately do is tell you how people have come to your website. So whether they've come through social media, through email marketing, through, organic search through Google and other search engines or, and then it will tell you what they've done once they're actually on your website.
Whereas Google Search Console, which is the one that when you're thinking about SEO, is actually more valuable to have is another three tool from Google that will tell you what, how Google sees your website. So it helps you to understand what Google knows and understands about your website.
It will also help you to understand what search terms you are showing up for in Google and probably more importantly what you are not. So just, before we came on, I Googled you and your website didn't come up.
I couldn't see it at the top there. You are so a little bit further down.
It certainly wasn't coming up near the top. And it wasn't a sort of definitive answer of yes.
You know, it knew exactly who you were and. Considering we have been on calls before, and I've looked at your website before, if there was a strong correlation that Google knew who you were and knew that we'd already spoken, I would expect you to see, to see you higher on the search results.
So I would always say that's quite a good place to start is making sure. That the people who know about you can find you.
And that can be just making sure that your online presence is sort of linked everywhere as well. So when I actually looked, I clicked on this LinkedIn link here and it was a broken link, so Oh, is it gonna go in now?
It's gone now. That's really strange.
That was obviously just a Google thing this morning. It went in.
So it's got your, it has got your LinkedIn there, so that is a good thing. But yeah, that's one thing I would be thinking about.
So if you can set up Google Search Console, which is really easy to do, I've actually got a little short course on my website. So if anybody is hoping to try and set up Google Analytics and Google Search Console, then you can go and have a little look at that.
I'll put the link to that in the show notes as well. But that will actually help you then to quickly get it set up and to start just using it to understand what Google is associating with your website really.
So in terms of actually getting that information across, if we hop over to your about page on your website and look at what you've got set here. So, I'm gonna use one of my little SEO plugins that I use in Google Chrome.
This is a one called A-I-O-S-E-O. It's a really good little plugin for just having a look at what you've got set up on your website and what you haven't.
I use it multiple times a day. It's a free thing that you can just download with Google Chrome in the Chrome store.
And what, so you have got there on your page title, you've got that about me, Natalie Ford, you could potentially expand that. Um, so do you have a tagline or have you got sort of an easy description that you could use?
I dunno what you've got on your LinkedIn. Let's have a little, what you've got on your LinkedIn for your, well.
Natalie Ford: Just a sentence or.
Jules White: Yeah, just something you could add in there. Oh, so this is what happened before where it came to this, so I don't, I'm not quite sure why.
It might be because I right clipped on it maybe. No.
Okay. So there is definitely some kind of issue with that.
That's a bit strange.
Natalie Ford: That's weird, isn't it? That it worked.
Jules White: Very strange. And then, yeah, but that's what happened.
Yeah, that happened a few times. I am not quite sure why that happened, but, yeah.
So if on your bio, in social media or on LinkedIn, do you have a short description of yourself that you, saying? So like for me, my thing is Jules White website and SEO marketing consultant.
You would. No.
Natalie Ford: So well, it would just be a productivity and lifestyle coach.
Jules White: Brilliant. Okay.
So even adding that in, so if you went into your page title in, your about page, and if you're using WordPress, there's, there's different plugins that you can use for SEO, but rank math is quite a good one to use. And that.
Then you can see all of your pages in your main WordPress login screen. You can see what you've got set for your page title in description.
And so, but it's something that you do in the backend. You would then set this page title ideally, you want it under 70 characters.
Definitely. I tend to say around 60, 65 characters is good for the page title, so you could add into there.
Natalie Ford productivity and lifestyle coach. So I would maybe take the me out.
So about Natalie Ford Productivity and lifestyle coach. Could be a better page title here.
Okay. And then the page description is up to 156 characters is where it starts to get truncated, but it depends if you've got all W's versus all, I's then obviously it's gonna get cut off a lot sooner than if that makes sense.
Yeah. So it is not the sort of definitive thing, but I, that's why I normally say around 135 characters in your page description.
And again, you would add that in the back end of WordPress. And as your page description in there, which is if you look at a Google search results page, I can show you what these are.
So your page title would be this thing that's in, that's in purple here. Yeah, so that's kind of it.
It helps people understand what that page is about. The page description is like the thing that helps to get them to actually click through to that page.
So, that's where your page description, you know, you can make the most of that. Yeah.
It does need to align with what you are talking about on that page. And sometimes Google doesn't honour the page description that you.
Put it in there. So if Google thinks, actually, this page, that page isn't about this, it will just take a snippet from the page and show that there instead.
So that's something that's also also worth knowing is that Google doesn't always honour our page descriptions that we call, it does its own thing. It does its own thing as Google likes to do really.
So, think about that, in terms of what else do you need to have on this page so that it helps Google to understand about you and to be able to show you up in search results Really? So that's the about page actually showing up for people who know you definitely, would think about that.
Then if we are looking at your homepage, you can again do the same thing here. So page titles and descriptions seem to be something that's missing on on, probably if it's missing on that page and that page.
Let's have a look at your work with me page as well. Oh, okay.
So yeah, that's the other thing, because you've got Natalie Ford in here, Google may be a bit confused about what page is the best one to show up for if somebody is Googling you. So.
With all of the content on our website, we want to also think, not only think about what we wanna show up for, but also think which page of our website is the most relevant to show up for that as well. 'Cause otherwise you can end up with your content competing against itself.
So this is something I see a lot where people will think about the keywords and the phrases that they want to show up for on Google, and then they'll mention them on every single page of their website and not have one definitive page that they're kind of fully optimising for that search term.
Natalie Ford: So it's better to have one page fully optimised rather than try and optimise every single one with the same wording.
Jules White: Yeah, absolutely. Yeah.
'Cause if you think about it, when Google ranks web pages rather than whole websites, Google's job is to go through and scan the whole of the internet. And then work out all of those pages on all of those websites, which is the best one to show up for that search query.
So that's a hell of a job to do and actually swiper. Yeah, I mean, how do you decide, like if, if, if it's not clear and if we don't help Google with these things, then it, then it draws its own conclusions and that might be the conclusion really.
So I would definitely say that. I'd say before you go into your website and start making changes.
Even just start with something like an Excel spreadsheet. I have a keyword map and planner on my website that does this sort of job where you can actually go through and list all your URLs for your website, all the pages of your website, and think about each one and what do I want this page to show up for?
If you are kind of thinking just doing this to begin with, I would start with three to five key pages of your site. So, think about how your homepage is definitely one.
I would say your about page as well is important for you. And then think about the pages that are closest to the sale.
So your work with me page. If you've got a freebie signup page maybe where actually you know that if people get onto your email list, then you're really good at selling to them through your email list or you're trying to grow your list.
Then maybe you would focus on that page. But probably for the, I would say the three to focus on to begin with for you are your homepage, your work with me page and your about page and think about getting those optimised.
Think about, okay, what do I want these pages to show up for and get those optimised. So putting your page titles and descriptions in there, making sure that you're mentioning that key phrase that you're trying to get that page to rank for throughout the content as well.
'Cause that's often the thing is that I will see people where they've, they've got amazing content on their social media pages, but then they don't mention those things on their website really. And I think it's not until we start thinking about it strategically of, okay, what am I trying to rank for?
Where am I talking about that? And, and then you may, that's how you can then start making changes really.
Natalie Ford: And with keywords. Is there.
Is that just guesswork or is there somewhere that you can find out what your keyword should be?
Jules White: I mean, it is, I would always say start with the things that, you know, start with the, the, like even the basic things that, you know, you should be showing up for productivity coach, um, do you mainly work with women?
Natalie Ford: Yeah.
Jules White: Yeah. So thinking about ‘women's productivity coach’ those kinds of things start with those foundations first.
When I was taught SEO I was always taught to start with keyword research and go in and do keyword research until your eyes bleed. And I used to do it like that.
And then I, we'd still be in a point where, well, hold on a minute, I'm not, that's not working because I'm not showing up for the basic things So like for, for my website before I can start ranking for, more specific SEO keywords where it, is a more specific term and, and there's less competition out there. Mm-hmm.
I've also gotta show that I am an authority on SEO as well, so you can't just go in and, and actually. Well, you can, but I wouldn't, I would not suggest going in and starting looking for those long tail keywords until you've actually got the basics in place as well.
Natalie Ford: Okay.
Jules White: So this is all about building up your website as an authority on women's productivity what do you need to add in that will help Google and people, and you know, we're talking about Google, but ultimately when people come through, when people find you, or even if you're sending people there we want them to understand those things about you as well. So if it's not really clear as soon as somebody comes in, immediately, what you do, then either it's just, it's just a case of tweaking that messaging.
So you're talking about it in a slightly different way. Or actually adding that messaging in if it's, if it's actually missing from your website.
Natalie Ford: Yeah.
Jules White: So I definitely, that's a really good question about the keyword, but I would always say start with your own brain first. Then ask chat, GPT to help.
And you'll definitely get some great suggestions from ChatGPT. But even just sitting there and spending.
Half an hour thinking about what are the things that, if somebody was talking about me and what I do in my business, what are the things that they should be saying? What are the words that they should be saying?
You could even look at your testimonials and things like that. And what are the things that people are already saying about how I've helped you?
Natalie Ford: Yeah, yeah, yeah. 'Cause it's like keeping it simple, isn't it?
Rather than, you know, like time management, productivity.
Jules White: Yes, absolutely. And also the problems you're solving for them as well.
Those kinds of things that you can then use that language throughout your pages as well. Um, yeah, the solutions that you offer, the benefits that you bring.
But even that is sort of somewhere a little bit further down the line than that, those basic terms of, of Google understanding what you do, understanding why, what you're an authority on. One of the things you can do is also ask ChatGPT, what it understands about you.
And then that might, might spark a little bit of a thing of, okay, if, if somebody said, asked ChatGPT, who is Natalie Ford? What would ChatGPT be saying about you?
And if that's not clear, if that's not saying what you want it to, then thinking, okay, how can I help AI bots understand about me as well? Really?
Natalie Ford: Yeah.
Jules White: And it's very easy to sort of dive in and think about that and think about how can I get chat GPT to recommend me? But actually the first step of doing that is, showing up in Google searches.
Really. So as much as there's all these rumours that SEO is dead and dying, but actually the things that we need to do to show up in AI searches are the fundamentals of SEO first and foremost.
Really? Yeah.
Yeah. Okay.
So yeah, start with that. Start with thinking about making a plan outside of your website before you dive in and start making changes of what do I wanna show up for?
Which page of my website is most relevant for that, and how do I need to optimise that page? And one of the things you can do when you are looking at that, those search terms, if you are not sure what is the right kind of page to show up for that, then whatever, whatever term term it is you're trying to show up for.
So if it was a ‘productivity coach’ and whether people would actually be searching for that or. ‘How can I be more productive’ or those kinds of things.
Then you can type that into a Google search and see what Google delivers. If Google delivers a load of blog posts, then your sales page is probably unlikely to rank for that because Google understands that when people type that search into Google, they're really looking for informational answers really.
Natalie Ford: So then would you use that then to think, well, if that's what's coming up, then blog post is something that I should be looking at doing.
Jules White: Maybe, maybe to help to raise your authority around the topic. Yeah, but I would be thinking, okay, what kind of searches would I put into Google when people are looking for a coach in relation to what you do.
What would they be? What would they be sort of typing in really?
Okay. That's the approach, approach it in that way.
So I, as I say, I would say work out what you wanna, what you wanna show up for. Think about relevant pages, but then also think, okay, is what I wanna show up for a relevant answer with my work with me page.
So, yeah. Yeah.
Is that clear? Does that, does that sort of, um, make sense?
Yeah. Yes.
Okay. Um, any questions at this point?
Natalie Ford: I don't think so. That's just really interesting, like you say, rather than just putting on the title, everything matters, doesn't it?
Rather than making it just look pretty. Yeah.
Everything matters and it's Absolutely, yeah. Things like the title never occurred to me that that's what people will see first.
And if that's not interesting, then they're not gonna click any further, are they?
Jules White: Yeah. No.
And we've gotta make these titles and descriptions compelling. Yeah.
Gotta make it a reason why they would want to click through to our website. And ultimately get the answer to their question, which is what they're typing into Google or Bing, or ChatGPT or anywhere really.
Yeah. So with that, when we are thinking about this, if you are creating new pages on your website.
Say you did start to decide to create some blog posts or something like that. The other place that can be really helpful to get those keywords into is the URL I would say don't change any URLs that already exist on your website.
There's, you know, because then you get all sorts of problems with redirects and, and that kind of thing. Mm-hmm.
But actually, if you were, if you were adding in a new blog post around like, say for example, productivity fails for women or something like that. If you actually had that in the URL, that can make a big difference.
It's something that I see time and time again when I'm looking at my keyword tools that actually those pages are showing up. And then you look at the page and it's not particularly relevant, but the URL does seem to still make a big difference really.
So thinking about that. So you add it into the URL page title, description, and then when we look at a page.
We talk about page hierarchy, and if you, if anybody has like long-term listeners of the, of the show will have heard me talking about page hierarchy over and over again. It's one of those things that, or website builders kind of set us up to fail with this a little bit because we tend to use these high, these heading tags, and the hierarchy of the page, we tend to use it to style the page.
Rather than actually thinking about the backend code. So if you think of your webpage, like an English essay, you would normally have one main heading.
Ideally, we just want one of those on each page, and ideally, if that can contain that keyword that you're, or key phrase that you're trying to get this page to rank for, then great. If it can't, if it doesn't sound natural to a human, then don't put it in there.
I would always say go with what works for a human. If you were reading it out loud and it would sound weird, don't put it in there.
But ideally that would naturally be able to be in there. So ideally what we'd see, if we were looking at again, the backend of your website, we would see one H one, and then within that we'd see a couple of H twos or maybe, maybe even more than that, a few H twos.
And then maybe within the H twos, then you'd have other subtopics within that, which would be your H threes. But you should never see a H one followed by a H four, followed by a H three, followed by a H two sort of thing.
So, um, does that make sense? Because I often feel I explain this and just whether it actually makes sense to that.
Natalie Ford: I think so. So I've got the heading and then I've got many little, so what you are saying then is it's got to flow rather than jump around and go from one to another and then back up again?
Jules White: Yes. Yeah, exactly.
Natalie Ford: Okay.
Jules White: Because what this does, this helps the bots that are reading through your page, whether it's Google bots or AI bots or whatever is, reading through your web page. It helps it to understand the hierarchy and, and helps it to understand the text on the page.
Much better. And this at the moment.
This is still how the bots are actually reading your pages. One of the reasons they have this, this hierarchy on the page is to help people if they're using screen readers as well.
So for accessibility reasons, if somebody's using a screen reader, then it would tell them what these headings are as well, which helps them to understand that page. So if somebody was describing that page to you and you couldn't see the page, then that would help you to understand, yeah, that this is, this is, this is the heading.
These, these are the subheadings within the page there really. And it's worth thinking about that with that, with the subheading.
So again, if you're planning out a page, think about, okay, what's the main topic of this page? What are the subtopics?
And then, and sort of then go from there really. 'Cause ideally you only want H two headings that are actually subtopics within this page.
So like, so like your, this is your work with me page. And these would be subheadings, planning for productivity, action, and accountability.
Are they the names of yours?
Natalie Ford: Yeah.
Jules White: Programmes. So I potentially would try and have something in there that would help.
If you took that out of context, you wouldn't necessarily know what these are. So whether that's work with me, like whether you change work with me to.
Coaching programmes or something, like you have something in there that adds that context in so people would know that, like under the bracket of, so maybe it's you have work with me page under that you have a H two heading of coaching programmes or something like that. Yeah.
And then those, these names would then be H three headings within that really, which is just one way of approaching it, but it's just.
Natalie Ford: So that you Yeah, no, that makes sense because it, it, I think that's the thing When you're creating something because you know what it is.
Yeah. Then it is, you think, oh, well that's just common sense.
That's obviously what it is. Yeah.
But they're not. No.
Um, to people that are just landing on there and don't know anything about it. So.
Absolutely. Yeah, that makes perfect sense.
Jules White: Yeah. I'm a big fan of Donald Miller and his StoryBrand framework and, and his recommendations for, for laying out websites, it's literally within three seconds.
We want people to know what you do, how you're gonna make their life better and what they need to do to get it. And if it's not clear when they land on that page, if there's any kind of like just if you're making them burn mental calories to work out what you're doing, then that is where you can, then you'll lose people really.
So yeah, just thinking about that, and this is something that ChatGPT can massively help with as well. If you are, you can try just putting the URL of your page into ChatGPT if that doesn't work.
'Cause sometimes it throws a little wobble and it won't do that. You can just copy and paste the copy from the page, or you can even take a screenshot of the whole page, fire that into ChatGPT, and it can then understand that really, so.
So yeah, that's, so that's the other thing to be thinking about in terms of actually where to put your, oh, this is the one on a second in, in terms of where to put your keywords as well. If you can have that target keyword in at least one H two heading within the page as well naturally, if it will naturally go in there, or synonyms and related terms in that, that can make a difference.
And then you also want to have it ideally within the first 250 words and within the last 250 words on the page as well. These are the places that you can, you can sort of get those keywords in.
And then ideally as well, images can really help people understand what you do. But if you can have some images in there and you have that in the image alt text, which you'll see in the back end of your website builder, when you upload an image, you'll see a little box that says alt text or alternative text.
Again, this was designed for screen readers to begin with, but this also helps if you have that keyword in there within that alt text that can help. And sometimes people sort of.
Think about, okay, well I'm, am I supposed to be describing the image in the alt text? And you absolutely are.
So I think this helps you to actually think, is that image relevant for this page or this block of text that I'm, I'm working on now. And if it's not, then don't put it in there.
I always have the example of if you are, if it's a salon website and you are talking about massages and then you've got a picture of a pedicure next to it, then that immediately is like a disconnect really between what you are saying in the words and what you're saying with the visuals there. It's worth thinking about that as well.
Is there anything you could do to add some images into this page, which helps to break up the text for a start, but it also helps people to, we can process images so much quicker than we can process language or, or process.
Natalie Ford: So to have, so obviously you've got the image in the background there with the um, the colours and things. So instead that's just block text, isn't it?
So you mean would you have an image of, um. That relates to productivity rather than that?
Or would you still have something like that? And then images to break up the text?
Jules White: Yeah, you can have this as a styling thing on the page. That's fine.
It's not, it's not, it's not really. Other than visually, it's not really adding anything to the page, it's not really adding anything in terms of actually getting your messaging across.
So that would be the only thing I would be thinking about. Okay, what is this?
You know, with anything on your website, thinking about what is contributing to this? Is this helping?
Is this helping me to get my message across? And if it's not.
Natalie Ford: Yeah. Rather than actually explaining if somebody just sits there and just flicks on it, does that picture.
Give them a really clear image of what I can help them to get.
Jules White: Yeah. Or yeah, absolutely.
So either it's you're helping them to understand the process, or you're helping them to understand where they want to be and how they can get there. Or it's an image to represent that happy person who's, who's got the result that they want and, yeah.
Yeah, so I, I definitely think there are other things you could do to make that space better, really, especially with this top area of the page. Anything that's above the fold here.
This is the most valuable real estate on your website really, so, right. Yeah, definitely think about that.
And talking about that and about that area. I would maybe think about it because this part of your website is so valuable.
I would maybe think about making this menu area a bit smaller. So let me come over to my mobile responsive version of this and let's go to, let's go to your work with me page.
So what I was seeing here, this what just made me sort of look at this. One of the things that Google doesn't like is small text.
So again, it's all about accessibility on the page. So when I click on your menu, this looks tiny.
This, this, the, this writing here looks tiny and it is still pretty small on my mobile, I. I always say as well, make sure that you're not making people take their glasses out to read your website.
So Google doesn't like text, uh, font size below 16 pixels. I still feel 16 is still pretty small.
You know, I, I would maybe be using that? In your, uh, footer menu for like a copyright notice or something like that.
So I wouldn't be making anything on my website less than an 18 pixel if it's something that's important and depending on what font you're using, it might even need to be bigger than that really. Yeah.
But certainly I'm looking at this on my mobile as well, and they're very, it's small writing and it's also not too much room for me to be able to tap my fingers on it as well. And as much as that's a usability thing, it's also something Google will take that into account when it's, when Google is looking at your website.
If it's something where your website doesn't appear to be user friendly and mobile friendly, most importantly, then that can harm your SEO as well, really. So that's something you could do and, and you could do that with, using WordPress.
You can do that sitewide probably, depending on what theme you're using. Oh, okay.
So it shouldn't be too much, you know, too much of a problem to do that. But yeah, when we are looking at this page, obviously when, if you are looking at this on mobile, this is a proper wall of text.
Yeah. So anything you can do to break that up.
So maybe, if you did have a different image here that would maybe look a little bit more visually appealing and also thinking about things like icons or like tabs even chevrons and things like that can sometimes just break it up. Even emojis.
I use emojis fairly regularly on my website. Those kind of things that actually, if you can find the right one, and certainly icons, if you're not keen on the whole visual, like visual, appearance, emojis, then Canva, you can get some great icons on there and it's just all ways that you can get your message across a little bit more clearly, really,
So yeah, we were talking about the, the, how it was looking, you know, that sort of this header section here really. So I would think about that and, oh, the, that's what I went over.
I get so distracted. I went over there to look at your, this, navigate this menu at the top here.
So obviously it's a bit different in mobile, but that's still taking up a fair amount of that page. So I would maybe think about just making your logo a bit smaller, maybe popping it over into the corner here, or just making it so the logo isn't making that, that navigation bar really big.
Again, I would be upping the font size on this navigation bar as well, and just make sure that that's all really clear as well. Make sure that there, there's nothing in there that kind of then is just like a stumbling block really.
Yeah. Anything you can make it where you can make it easier for people to take action.
Really on your website.
Natalie Ford: Do you find that people tend to look at, If I think about, um, the amount of time I spend on my laptop looking at things versus my phone, yeah. Very often, even if I've got my laptop there.
I'm still looking at my phone. Yeah, absolutely.
Jules White: And we want to, we want to be thinking of our website's mobile first, really, Google has a mobile first policy, so there's two websites and everything else being equal. One is mobile responsive and one's not.
And mobile responsive means it looks good on a mobile, that the image resizes, the text is the right size and things then.
Yeah, Google will always go with the mobile responsive one and put that one at the top of the search results. Really?
Yeah. I would definitely be thinking about that, because we tend to build our websites on our desk using our desktop, but actually then look at everything on your mobile.
So I would always assume that as well. Really.
So, yeah, I mean, ideally what we want is we want it to look good, whatever, whatever people are looking at, at it on. Yeah.
Whether it's mobile, desktop, or tablet. We want it to look good.
This, attention bar at the top here, these can be really powerful having an attention bar. But I would take away your Facebook, link here, you've got that in your foot already.
Maybe even the email and the phone number in here. I, I would sort of think, okay, especially if this was your homepage, what action do you want people to take?
Is it that you want them to sign up to your email freebie or have you got something that you want them to join into? And, get that in the attention bar there really.
Natalie Ford: Yeah, so have a reason for it rather than it just be there because, oh well, we'll put that there. Yeah, absolutely.
At the top I can see as well. Now it's funny looking at your own website, isn't it?
After, yeah, it's almost looking at it in a third party way, which is really helpful, but I can see how much. Wasted space.
Is there that in all of that space? It doesn't really say anything.
Jules White: No, exactly. Yeah.
And it's one of those things that actually once you, once someone points it out to you, it's like, oh, okay, yeah, of course. You know?
Yeah, of course I need to talk about what I do and of course I need to like to make it visually clear. But it is something that is, until you spend some time on it, then you don't necessarily notice that really, and as you say, a fresh pair of eyes is, definitely, beneficial. So I think the main things to focus on are definitely up in your font size.
I think that's something that could make a big difference to the usability and that all helps with SEO as well. Taking that step back and working out what you wanna show up for and what are the most relevant pages of your website for that, and then sort of mapping that out as well of, okay, this is what I'm trying to rank for.
This is the page I need to optimise for. And then just, yeah, adding some visuals in.
I think that's the, that, those are kind of the three things that you could really focus on really, is just making sure that you, you get it, get a little bit of this text broken up, adding visuals, images, icons that you can add in here, and then upping that front size. Really brilliant.
Fantastic. Any questions or anything?
Natalie Ford: Is there a font that is more user friendly obviously everyone's got their own fonts that they use, but is there a font for websites that is more, uh. Easy on the eye and easier to read.
And,
I mean, a font that I see used a lot is Montserrat. That's quite a safe one.
You see it on lots of websites. Lots of Kajabi websites have that on.
Really? But there's not, I mean, there's nothing wrong with the fonts that you've got here.
I would say that these fonts are very readable. They're not, you know, they're not gonna cause any problems.
I think you just need to up the size of them really.
Natalie Ford: Yeah. Just make it so that you don't need your binoculars to see.
Yeah.
Jules White: Yeah. And then and, and then once you've got that in place, then that, you know, font choices in terms of the, what it's representing with your brand and things Yeah.
Is something that you would do as part of your brand strategy, but. Actually, there's far more important things to be doing right now.
Natalie Ford: Yeah, that's the thing, isn't it? It's like, do I need to spend three hours working out a font too.
Jules White: No, no. So yeah, and I would say, if you are gonna do that and you're serious about that, then I would work with a brand, like a graphic designer or a brand strategist and do, and do your branding properly.
You know, not that it's not proper, but in terms of you, if you're thinking you wanna invest in time and money in fonts and, and working out what's the best for your audience. Do that as a, as a proper process somewhere down the line.
Natalie Ford: Yeah. It's one of those things to either do it properly or don't bother doing it.
Jules White: I think it really is. Yeah.
When you have non-offensive fonts on your website anyway, you've got fonts that look fine on your website right now, so I wouldn't, that's not something I would dive into. It's a bit like changing all your colours and then it doesn't really actually make a difference or getting a new logo and it doesn't actually make a difference.
Natalie Ford: Well, yeah, it's. Yeah, especially based on what I do is help people to organise and prioritise their time.
Is that the best use of my time to spend half a day working out fonts and colours when they're fine as they are?
Jules White: Absolutely. Definitely.
I love that. That's very, very important.
So, before we finish, I'd love you to give yourself another little shout out, Natalie, and let everyone know again what you do and most importantly, where they can connect with you and find out more.
Natalie Ford: So I'm a productivity and lifestyle, coach, and I help you to organise and prioritise your time so that you can feel like you're getting more done, but you're actually creating more time in your week so that you can spend time doing the things that you want to do, as well as the things that you need to do. I am on all social media, Facebook and Instagram and LinkedIn, and I've just developed a quiz as well.
So if you are wondering why you keep running out of time or what the issue is, we've all got a unique relationship with time. So I've developed a quiz, which I'm very excited about, which shows you what your unique relationship is with time and the areas of development for you to feel more in control of it.
Jules White: Brilliant. That sounds amazing. That's something you could put in your attention bar across the top. Take our quiz.
Think about the benefits of them taking the quiz. What are they gonna get in terms of the benefit of it?
Natalie Ford: Yeah.
Jules White: And then put that in there as a, as in your, that, in that attention bar at the top of your page there. Really brilliant.
I think that could be great. Add, adding that quiz in there could be really good and then hopefully that will help to get some excitement in there. I would even, maybe just as a quick aside as well, I'd maybe add that as like a banner in, in on your homepage as well, so. Take the quiz and have it as quite a big sort of splash banner somewhere on your page as well.
Natalie Ford: Yeah, that's a really good idea to put it on there as a Yeah, definitely. As a banner, and first and foremost, take this.
Jules White: Absolutely. Yeah, definitely. So, if this episode has made you think about your website and working on your SEO and you wanna get started with this, then you can head over to my website and you can get my free beginner's guide to SEO. You can download that there. So thank you so much for listening and thanks Natalie for being here, and I'll see you soon. Bye.
