How to Create Your Personal Brand’s Visual Identity

Visual branding is the most effective way to create a powerful online presence. If you don’t believe me, check out this article on why visuals are important in marketing: When half of the human brain …

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New comment by schuon in "Ask HN: Who is hiring? (December 2021)"

Alasco | Munich, Germany | Senior (Python) Engineer | Lead Engineer Backend Python | Frontend Developer | Head of Engineering | On-Site | https://www.alasco.de/en/

We are a Munich-based StartUp that helps construction companies complete projects on time and budget. We digitize the processes in construction planning and execution by offering a cloud based workflow platform.
Starting from Germany, we want to take on the world. We’re looking for Senior Python Engineers, a Tech Lead, Frontend Engineers.

More at https://alasco.de/en Our stack: django/python + react/bootstrap on AWS. Our company language is English. We’re 100 people right now, wanna be the 101st? Reach out to schuon@cs.stanford.edu (Founder) or jobs@alasco.de!

8 Must-Know SEO Best Practices For Developers

Web development and search engine optimization (SEO) become increasingly intertwined as search engines become more intelligent. Therefore, experts in both fields need to have a basic understanding of the other. 

Today, I’m speaking to web developers. While you can leave the nitty-gritty to the SEO experts, the best practices I’ll talk about in this piece could help you communicate with your team, raise your brand image, and provide better services to your customers. In this post, learn the 8 best practices for SEO for developers.

What Do Developers Need to Know About SEO?

If you’re responsible for building and maintaining a website, you’re also partially responsible for making sure it can rank in the search engines.

SEO is often broken down into three categories:

  • technical SEO: how search engine bots crawl and index a website
  • on-page SEO: how well the content on the site is optimized for target keywords and user experience
  • off-page SEO: how other websites link to your website to boost its authority

Naturally, developers play a big part in technical SEO, but this isn’t where SEO for developers should end. They also help ensure a positive user experience, which can help with on- and off-page SEO.

Here are eight best SEO practices developers can focus on to take their efforts to the next level.

1. Keep Your Code Clean

Web developers can do so many amazingly intricate things, but it pays to keep things simple more often than not. 

Consumers value convenience more than almost anything else. We want quick access to information, and everything that gets in the way damages the user experience. More complicated code can lead to more roadblocks for site visitors.

Keeping your code clean is one of the first steps in SEO for developers. When people land on a website, they make quick-fire decisions about whether it’s worth the effort.

2. Keep Load Times Fast

Building on the point about complicated code: load times are vital to SEO

Search engines want to send users to websites that quickly and accurately answer their questions.

If another website can deliver comparable information twice as fast as yours, Google will likely prioritize them on search engine results pages (SERPs).

SEO for developers - page load speed

Even if load times weren’t a direct ranking factor, this would still be a big issue.

A page’s load time directly impacts its bounce rate. For example, pages that take two seconds to load have an average bounce rate of six percent. At four seconds, that rate jumps to 24 percent, and once a mere six seconds have passed, 46 percent of visitors are gone.

When Google sees people bouncing straight back to the search results, it likely thinks your page isn’t valuable and assigns less ranking power.

3. Use the Correct Redirects

Websites are constantly evolving. Content gets updated, pages move, new elements are added, and developers make sure this happens smoothly.

The end-user is the most critical factor in this equation because anything you do has to work for them. However, you’ve also got to think about how the crawlers view your website.

This is where it’s essential to understand how redirects work in SEO.

The two most common redirects that affect SEO are 301 and 302 redirects

A 301 redirect indicates to the search engines that a website or pages have permanently moved. When you use a 301 redirect, the search engines will transfer most of the original page’s link equity to the new page.

A 302 redirect, on the other hand, indicates that a page has moved temporarily. You might use this when you’re redesigning or updating your site, but you still want to keep the original page’s link equity.

Using redirects correctly may seem like a small thing, but it can make a big difference in SEO terms.

4. Add a Sitemap

Search engines are very sophisticated, but they don’t experience a website like humans do. They need you to give them clues about how pages link together, and one of the ways you can do this is with your sitemap.

When indexing your site, bots follow every link to see where they go. One way you can help with this process is by adding a sitemap

Google and the other search engines should be able to crawl your entire site if you use good internal linking. However, large sites can get complicated, so a sitemap makes things easier for the search engines and ensures your site will be indexed appropriately.

5. Make Sure the Site Works on Mobile

Mobile devices account for 54.8 percent of website traffic. Google knows this, so it prioritizes websites that offer an excellent mobile experience. 

seo for developers - mobile friendly page

Google now uses mobile-first indexing, which means when its bots crawl your site, they use the mobile version. If your website doesn’t perform on mobile devices, it’s unlikely to rank highly on SERPs.

Even today, too many websites neglect this vital fact.

To check how your website performs for mobile, Google’s mobile-friendly test is a convenient option. It gives you a quick performance check and tells you where you can make improvements.

If you want to dig a little bit deeper, then Google Lighthouse is also a great option for overall UX. 

6. Check the Robots.txt File

The robots.txt file sets rules for how web crawlers crawl different parts of a website. It’s a simple piece of code, but it can have a significant impact. 

A robots.txt file unintentionally blocking crawlers from content can be catastrophic for SEO. If the bots can’t crawl the page, it won’t be indexed—meaning it won’t appear in search results.

Sometimes, webmasters don’t want a page indexed, and a robots.txt file is a valuable tool. However, if your SEO team notices a page that should be getting traffic isn’t, keep an eye out for a rogue robots.txt file.

7. Ensure Follow/No Follow Links Are Used Appropriately

Links are like the language of the search engine, so you’ve got to be able to speak it.

One distinction to be aware of is follow links vs. no-follow links.

Follow links, also called do-follow links, are backlinks where the person linking to the page doesn’t edit the HTML to ensure Google doesn’t associate their site with another. When a site gives a clean backlink with no changes, a crawler sees this as one page vouching for the quality of the other.

Crawlers still look at no-follow links to see where they go, but they don’t ascribe value to the link.

From an SEO standpoint, you want follow links from authoritative websites to yours. However, you should still consider no-follow links valuable. Even if the link itself doesn’t give authority, it can still drive traffic to or from your site.

For developers, this means they’ve got to make sure they’re using the right links to communicate properly with the crawlers.

8. Understand and Implement Structured Data

Structured data can be tricky for many people involved with SEO…and this is where developers can really shine. Developers already know how to format a page so that all parts of it flow well and can be read by both human and search engine searchers.

seo for developers - structured data

When used well, structured data lets Google know exactly what’s on every part of a webpage. Beyond that, it can tell Google precisely what questions you’re answering. In fact, the FAQ below uses a structured data (schema) markup to indicate to Google that we’re answering common questions.

SEO for Developers: Frequently Asked Questions

How Do Developers do SEO?

Developers should be familiar with technical SEO and effective user experience.

Do Web Developers Do SEO?

Web developers do SEO to some extent. A clean, functioning website that offers a great user experience essential to SEO is all the developer’s domain. 

What Is SEO Software Development?

SEO software development is the process of making sure software and web applications are SEO-friendly.

What Is the Role of an SEO Developer?

An SEO developer understands how development decisions will affect a website’s search rankings and organic traffic.

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SEO for Developers Conclusion

Increasing organic traffic is a key goal for most website owners, so SEO for developers is important. 

Good developers naturally aid SEO by creating user-friendly websites, but it pays to understand search engine optimization itself. Even just the basics could allow you to make more informed decisions and offer a better service for your clients. 

SEO for developers doesn’t have to be complicated, but it can make all the difference to a website’s success.

How do you approach SEO as a developer?

How to Grow Your Local Business During Uncertain Times

No doubt this is a hard time to grow a local business. Coronavirus has likely forced you to make big changes to the way you operate. It’s almost certainly hit your bottom line too. However, it’s still absolutely possible to grow your local business at a time like this. You just have to be smart … Continue reading How to Grow Your Local Business During Uncertain Times

New comment by ericgong in "Ask HN: Who is hiring? (September 2020)"

Atolla | VP of Engineering | NYC | Onsite | Full-time Atolla leverages a patented machine learning process to create custom skincare products using an easy, at-home skin test. If you or someone you know is interested in being a VP of Engineering at an early stage company, please check out the job post below. …

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Do Nothing till You Check Out Our Pearl Financing Recession Funding Review

Check Out Our Pearl Financing Recession Funding Review and Look at Pearl Capital Business Financing

Pearl Financing is a lender in the online space. However, there are two similarly-named players. This blog post will cover both: Pearl Capital Business Financing and Pearl Financing. So it’s more than just a Pearl Financing recession funding review.

Recession Period Financing

The number of United States financial institutions and also thrifts has been decreasing slowly for 25 years. This is from consolidation in the marketplace in addition to deregulation in the 1990s, lowering barriers to interstate banking. See: fundera.com/blog/happened-americas-small-businesses-financial-crisis-six-years-start-crisis-look-back-10-charts. Assets focused in ever‐larger financial institutions is troublesome for small business owners. Big financial institutions are a lot less likely to make small loans. Economic declines imply banks end up being much more mindful with financing. Luckily, business credit does not count on financial institutions.

Pearl Financing Recession Funding Review

Pearl Financing is a lending company in the online space. They provide various loans and forms of financing to businesses.

Pearl Financing currently only handles real estate funding.

Pearl Financing Recession Funding Review: Background

Pearl Financing is located online here: www.pearlfinancing.com.

Their physical address is:

11010 Lake Grove Blvd
Suite 100 PMB 119
Morrisville, NC 27560.

You can also call them at: (866) 865-0121. Their contact page is here: www.pearlfinancing.com/contact-us. Also, you can email them at: info@pearlfinancing.com.

Pearl Financing Recession Funding Review: Bridge Loans and Hard Money

Pearl Financing partners with private investment firms for this typical form of real estate financing. There are no fees listed on their website for this form of funding.

Pearl Financing Recession Funding Review: Commercial Real Estate Financing

Pearl Financing offers several forms of financing. These include SBA 7(a) loans, CMBS Conduit loans, HUD, equity, and conventional loans. There are no fees listed on their website for these forms of funding.

Pearl Financing Recession Funding Review: CMBS Conduit Loans

This is a type of commercial real estate loan secured by a first position mortgage on a commercial property. These loans are packaged and sold by conduit lenders, commercial banks, investment banks, or syndicates of banks.

Terms are five, seven, or ten years. 25 – 30 year amortization. 75% loan to value/80% with Mezzanine Loan Combo. Rates are fixed but otherwise not specified.

Pearl Financing Recession Funding Review: Mezzanine Financing

This is a hybrid of debt and equity financing. It gives the lender the right to convert to an equity interest in the company in case of default. This is often after venture capital companies and other senior lenders are paid. There are no fees listed on their website for this form of funding.

Pearl Financing Recession Funding Review: Advantages

Advantages include a variety of choices for real estate funding. House flippers will do well to work with a specialist, which is what Pearl Financing brings to the table.

Pearl Financing Recession Funding Review: Disadvantages

So the chief disadvantage is no listing of fees anywhere, not even a range. This lack of transparency should be troubling to any entrepreneur. In addition, the company needs to distinguish themselves better from a similar company with a nearly identical name. As a result, borrowers can easily end up on the wrong site.

Pearl Capital Business Funding

Pearl Capital Business Financing is a lending company in the online space. So it is evidently unrelated to Pearl Financing.

They work with Independent Sales Organizations (ISOs) and merchants only. This online lender helps ISOs find more merchants to sign on with credit card payments or create merchant cash advances. There is no listing for their fees on their website.

Background

Pearl Capital Business Financing is located online here: https://pearlcapital.com. Their physical address is in New York, NY. You can also call them at: (800) 888-9959.

A Fantastic Alternative to Both – Building Business Credit

Company credit is credit in a company’s name. It doesn’t link to a business owner’s consumer credit, not even if the owner is a sole proprietor and the sole employee of the business.

Therefore, a business owner’s business and individual credit scores can be very different.

The Benefits

Considering that business credit is independent from consumer, it helps to safeguard an entrepreneur’s personal assets, in case of court action or business insolvency.

Also, with two distinct credit scores, an entrepreneur can get two separate cards from the same vendor. This effectively doubles buying power.

Another benefit is that even startup companies can do this. Visiting a bank for a business loan can be a recipe for disappointment. But building small business credit, when done the right way, is a plan for success.

Individual credit scores depend upon payments but also various other considerations like credit use percentages.

But for business credit, the scores really just hinge on if a business pays its bills punctually.

The Process

Building business credit is a process, and it does not occur automatically. A small business has to proactively work to build business credit.

Nevertheless, it can be done readily and quickly, and it is much more rapid than developing personal credit scores.

Vendors are a big part of this process.

Performing the steps out of sequence will cause repetitive denials. Nobody can start at the top with small business credit. For example, you can’t start with retail or cash credit from your bank. If you do, you’ll get a denial 100% of the time.

Recession Funding Review Credit Suite

Learn business loan secrets with our free, sure-fire guide. We can help you get money, even during a recession.

Small Business Fundability

A business has to be fundable to lenders and merchants.

Due to this fact, a company will need a professional-looking web site and e-mail address. And it needs to have site hosting bought from a supplier like GoDaddy.

And also, company telephone and fax numbers must have a listing on ListYourself.net.

Likewise, the company telephone number should be toll-free (800 exchange or the equivalent).

A company will also need a bank account dedicated purely to it, and it has to have every one of the licenses necessary for operation.

Licenses

These licenses all have to be in the correct, correct name of the company. And they need to have the same small business address and phone numbers.

So keep in mind, that this means not just state licenses, but potentially also city licenses.

Working with the IRS

Visit the Internal Revenue Service web site and acquire an EIN for the business. They’re free. Pick a business entity like corporation, LLC, etc.

A business can begin as a sole proprietor. But they will probably want to change to a sort of corporation or an LLC.

This is in order to limit risk. And it will make the most of tax benefits.

A business entity will matter when it comes to taxes and liability in the event of litigation. A sole proprietorship means the entrepreneur is it when it comes to liability and taxes. No one else is responsible.

Sole Proprietors Take Note

If you run a business as a sole proprietor, then at the very least be sure to file for a DBA. This is ‘doing business as’ status.

If you do not, then your personal name is the same as the small business name. Because of this, you can wind up being personally responsible for all small business financial obligations.

And also, according to the IRS, using this structure there is a 1 in 7 possibility of an IRS audit. There is a 1 in 50 probability for corporations! Steer clear of confusion and significantly lower the chances of an IRS audit at the same time.

Kicking Off the Business Credit Reporting Process

Start at the D&B website and obtain a free D-U-N-S number. A D-U-N-S number is how D&B gets a company in their system, to generate a PAYDEX score. If there is no D-U-N-S number, then there is no record and no PAYDEX score.

Once in D&B’s system, search Equifax and Experian’s web sites for the small business. You can do this at www.creditsuite.com/reports. If there is a record with them, check it for correctness and completeness. If there are no records with them, go to the next step in the process.

By doing so, Experian and Equifax will have something to report on.

Recession Funding Review Credit Suite

Learn business loan secrets with our free, sure-fire guide. We can help you get money, even during a recession.

Vendor Credit

First you should establish trade lines that report. This is also called vendor credit. Then you’ll have an established credit profile, and you’ll get a business credit score.

And with an established business credit profile and score you can start to get retail and cash credit.

These types of accounts often tend to be for the things bought all the time, like marketing materials, shipping boxes, outdoor work wear, ink and toner, and office furniture.

But first off, what is trade credit? These trade lines are credit issuers who will give you starter credit when you have none now. Terms are typically Net 30, instead of revolving.

Hence, if you get approval for $1,000 in vendor credit and use all of it, you must pay that money back in a set term, like within 30 days on a Net 30 account.

Details

Net 30 accounts must be paid in full within 30 days. 60 accounts must be paid in full within 60 days. In contrast to with revolving accounts, you have a set time when you have to pay back what you borrowed or the credit you used.

To begin your business credit profile properly, you should get approval for vendor accounts that report to the business credit reporting agencies. As soon as that’s done, you can then use the credit.

Then pay back what you used, and the account is on report to Dun & Bradstreet, Experian, or Equifax.

Vendor Credit – It Helps

Not every vendor can help in the same way true starter credit can. These are merchants that will grant an approval with marginal effort. You also want them to be reporting to one or more of the big three CRAs: Dun & Bradstreet, Equifax, and Experian.

You want 3 of these to move onto the next step, which is retail credit.

Retail Credit

Once there are 3 or more vendor trade accounts reporting to at least one of the CRAs, then move onto retail credit. These are companies like Office Depot and Staples.

Only use your Social Security Number and date of birth on these applications for verification purposes. For credit checks and guarantees, use the business’s EIN on these credit applications.

Fleet Credit

Are there more accounts reporting? Then move to fleet credit. These are companies like BP and Conoco. Use this credit to buy fuel, and to fix and take care of vehicles. Only use your SSN and date of birth on these applications for verification purposes. For credit checks and guarantees, make sure to apply using the company’s EIN.

Cash Credit

Have you been sensibly managing the credit you’ve gotten up to this point? Then move to more universal cash credit. These are businesses like Visa and MasterCard. Only use your SSN and date of birth on these applications for verification purposes. For credit checks and guarantees, use your EIN instead.

These are typically MasterCard credit cards. If you have more trade accounts reporting, then these are feasible.

Monitor Your Business Credit

Know what is happening with your credit. Make certain it is being reported and take care of any mistakes ASAP. Get in the practice of taking a look at credit reports. Dig into the particulars, not just the scores.

We can help you monitor business credit at Experian and D&B for 90% less than it would cost you at the CRAs.

Recession Funding Review Credit Suite

Learn business loan secrets with our free, sure-fire guide. We can help you get money, even during a recession.

Update Your Information

Update the data if there are inaccuracies or the info is incomplete.

Fix Your Business Credit

So, what’s all this monitoring for? It’s to contest any errors in your records. Errors in your credit report(s) can be taken care of. But the CRAs generally want you to dispute in a particular way.

Disputes

Disputing credit report mistakes commonly means you mail a paper letter with copies of any evidence of payment with it. These are documents like receipts and cancelled checks. Never mail the originals. Always send copies and retain the original copies.

Fixing credit report errors also means you specifically detail any charges you challenge. Make your dispute letter as crystal clear as possible. Be specific about the problems with your report. Use certified mail so that you will have proof that you mailed in your dispute.

A Word about Building Business Credit

Always use credit responsibly! Don’t borrow beyond what you can pay off. Track balances and deadlines for repayments. Paying on schedule and completely will do more to raise business credit scores than pretty much anything else.

Building small business credit pays. Great business credit scores help a company get loans. Your credit issuer knows the small business can pay its financial obligations. They know the company is for real.

The small business’s EIN links to high scores and lenders won’t feel the need to demand a personal guarantee.

Business credit is an asset which can help your small business for years to come.

Pearl Financing Recession Funding Review: Takeaways

The businesses which will do the best with Pearl Financing are going to be the ones with high financing needs but the companies themselves are currently not very large. Therefore, these are companies which are expected to grow quickly and meteorically. However, companies which need less funding have other options. Such businesses should make sure to compare offerings closely.

And finally, as with every other lending program, whether online or offline, remember to read the fine print and do the math. Go over the details with a degree of care.

Only you can decide if this option will be good for you and your company. In addition, consider alternative financing options that go beyond lending. These include building business credit, in order to best decide how to get the money you need to help your business grow. Business credit building is useful as it becomes a company asset.

Today, we want to hear from our audience! Share your voice with us about your experiences with online lenders.

The post Do Nothing till You Check Out Our Pearl Financing Recession Funding Review appeared first on Credit Suite.

New comment by sebojanko in "Ask HN: Who wants to be hired? (July 2019)"

I graduated as a software engineer and I’m looking for junior/mid level remote jobs in the EU. I’ve worked (remote) for the past two and a half years in a company doing Django+ExtJS+Postgres+PostGIS part time. Location: EU Remote: only Willing to relocate: not yet Technologies: medium level Python and Java; Django, basic Golang, basic React, …