Can you learn from someone else's mistakes? That's exactly what I hope you'll get out of this Friday Flop Fix. This week, I'm venturing over to Tupelo, MS in search of a retail jeweler that might be making a mistake with their online presence.
This is the result I saw when searching for "jewelers tupelo ms" in Google:
This is the #FridayFlopFix edition of the Daily Golden Nugget. Each week, I look for candidate websites that are not ranking very well in Google search results and dissect them to figure out why they are ranking poorly.
This week, I searched for "jewelry stores Florence, SC" to find that poorly ranked site. I found an interesting situation with the store Fisher Jewelers & Silversmiths that I'll investigate today. I first noticed the AGS listing for the store shown here:
Welcome to a very special #FridayFlopFix website evaluation. I call these weekly posts the "Flop Fix" because I specifically look for website problems, i.e. flops, for which I can offer improvement ideas, i.e. fixes, that everyone can learn from.
Well, this week is a doozy. I have been TRYING to publish this review every week since I ORIGINALLY wrote it back on December 16, 2015! Today is March 3, 2016; that's 11 weeks ago. There's a story behind this that should make you all cringe. Forewarning, I'm about to reveal some... VIEW FULL GOLD NUGGET
Every day, the team over at Google's headquarters makes advances in Search Engine technology. A few years ago they announced the ability to read Flash websites, and then last year they further announced the ability to read deeper inside Flash websites.
Unfortunately, Flash websites still suffer from lower ranking than normal HTML websites.
In 2010, Google admitted that they have trouble reading websites that rely on JavaScript or AJAX. The Googlebot spider is not able to provide the user input needed to display website information that to us would be very simple to interact with.
The result is that websites with heavy JavaScript and AJAX programming are penalized similar to Flash websites. A simple home page rotating image is nothing to worry about, but you should worry if all the menus on your website rely on Java... VIEW FULL GOLD NUGGET
The bottom line of today's Golden Nugget is: Don't require JavaScript or Flash or Java to make your Contact Us form work. You are potentially missing out on a lot of visitors who may have tried to reach you, but couldn't because of technology limitations.
Why did we start this Nugget with the "bottom line?" Because the explanation is a little history lesson that might not interest you. Keep reading if you would like to have a well rounded understanding of why JavaScript/Flash/Java are all bad for your Contact Us form.
Every few days a new computerized device is released; new computers, new cell phones, new GPS, new portable gizmos of some type that can connect to the internet.
Even though the hardware changes, the underlying programming languages of the internet haven't changed much in several years.
"...articles are easy to follow and seem to have information one can use right away." -Ann, Gallery 4, Hamden CT
"...serious kudos to you. We love your straight talk, pertinent information and plain language. I don't know how many industries have something of jWAG's caliber available, but I learn from the emails every day. Really, really nice work, and very appreciated." -Cheryl Herrick, Global Pathways Jewelry
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