A New Resource for Lake of the Ozarks
I have lived at the Lake of the Ozarks for almost a year now. I haven’t even begun to scratch the surface of all the lake has to offer. So in my life adventure in online marketing and development I am starting a new venture with my wife.
In the last post I talked about the many classified and business directories offered online for the Lake of the Ozarks. They seem to draw in some good traffic but don’t have great appeal to me. If I want to look up a business listing I can always use the yellow pages that is delivered to my door every couple of months. Or I could just use the online yellow pages. I want reviews, interviews, stories about the lake that help me find out more.
So since the Lake of the Ozarks generates over 1 million searches each month we have decided to start our own Lake of the Ozarks website with articles and reviews from the lake. We have purchased 2 domains. LakeofOzarks.net and TheLakeoftheOzarks.net.
There is an interesting publication out there now call LO Profile. This is a magazine printed 6 times a year. We aren’t so ambitious to think we can have a printed publication but we want to provide a new online magazine that has daily, weekly and monthly features to help vacation visitors and residents.
We hope that thelakeoftheozarks.net will be a great resource for visitors and residents alike. Visit often to see what articles and stories we turn up.
Does the lake need another portal site?
Living in a vacation mecca such as Lake of the Ozarks you find there are hundreds of people vying for the attention of both tourists and local residents. In my never ending online journey I have begin to notice just how many sites there are that try to grab your attention here in Lake of the Ozarks area.
Continue reading to see the variety of designs and portal sites found in the Ozarks. Some of these sites need a website uplift others just need some minor tweaks to be more user friendly and also to come up in search engine results higher.
Let me know if I missed one and what you think of these sites. Do these sites work for your business? Are these good places to advertise? Would there be something more useful?
New websites in Lake of the Ozarks
This week I noticed at least 2 3 websites that completely changed. Both are places I reached out and offered my help in updating from previous versions of their websites. Unfortunately I do not have a before screenshot of either site to show the comparisons.
Bryan Auction – the well known auction/liquidator here at the lake. It appears that they kept the job in the family and their son redesigned and updated the website.
Osage Hills Church – a church in Osage Beach. It seems they might have kept this work in house as well using iweb from Mac.
Fun Lake Missouri Vacation Guide – the new site looks nice and you can compare the new lake of the ozarks vacation guide to the old style still on the funlakemeetings.com website.
Anyone else want to show off their new site?
Percy’s High Performance
One of the companies I have had the pleasure of getting to know just a little here in Camdenton, Missouri is Percy’s High Performance Inc. I have met the owner Jeff Percival and we have talked on several occasions about the internet and making it work for you. Recently Percy’s had their website updated to include a new online store. They chose to use CubeCart for their shopping cart and a modified template.
The thing about Percy’s High Performance is that they have a huge catalog of patented solutions for the after-market car enthusiast or race-car driver. They have Speedglass, the highest quality racing windows on the market, for almost any make of car. Then they have this other stuff called Hyper Fiber. It is flexible material to make a mold in any shape and then cure it in minutes.
If you are a race-car mechanic, pit crew member, race car driver, high performance car nut or just like cool gadgets Percy’s is your source for high performance after-market parts.
You can shop directly from their online store http://percyshp.com/store/ or you can find most their parts in your local AutoZone or other parts store across the country. I find it amazing that this type of business exists in Camdenton, Missouri and can have a reach from Alaska to Florida.
5 quick fixes for your website
Previously I posted about the idea that having a website is not always enough. We talked about how many organizations or businesses are getting onto the web and then neglecting their websites or not hiring a professional to give their website the final touches that can make the difference in the performance and effectiveness of the website. Here I take a look at a local business organization that could look to a peer organization for 5 quick fixes to improve the overall appearance and likely effectiveness of their website.
Camdenton Chamber of Commerce
The Camdenton Chamber of Commerce has some great information on local businesses, local events and how to get connected. There is no doubt the information is on the site. However the design is something that is very unprofessional. For an organization representing the local businesses it is inadequate.
The Camdenton Chamber represents over 450 businesses and organizations in the Lake of the Ozarks area. Shouldn’t this organization be an example of keeping up to date with internet trends? I would like to challenge the Camdenton Area Chamber to consider updating the appearance of their website to be a leader in the business community.
The Lake of the Ozarks area that the Chamber helps represent, primarily the Camdenton area, represents easily 15,000 residents both inside and outside of the city limits. The official numbers are very misleading due to the many residents living just outside city limits. But we could at least run with 15,000 for this conversation. During Summer or Hunting season that number likely increases by the thousands.
A side-by-side comparison
So if the Chamber represents businesses in a community this size it should be comparable to other chamber’s around the country. I came across a chamber website in Buffalo, MN. Now the Buffalo Chamber has a wonderful website. While the information provided is no different in nature than what the Camdenton Chamber is offering you can see that the presentation of the content is much easier to follow. Where is your eye drawn? Which website would you prefer to read?
Here are 5 quick fixes the Camdenton Area Chamber can consider after seeing a comparable chamber website in a comparable sized area. Even the logo with the sailboat is similar.
QUICK FIX #1 – Setup each page with Google Analytics
A quick and easy way to start understanding your visitors and their usage of your website is to install the freely available Google Analytics. There are many companies that can help with this or you can do it yourself. If you need help integrating analytics and understanding the data you can work with us at Tonka Park.
Analytics can help you understand which pages are working and which pages aren’t. It can help identify trouble areas or even successes. Having more information about your website will only allow your business to make better decisions about what your next step should be. Read more about analytics here.
QUICK FIX #2 – Make sure all images and links are working
Many sites often have links or images that lead to nowhere or don’t display properly. This shows a lack of preparation and review for your content. Each time you work on your site take a few moments to make sure everything loads properly. It may seem simple but the small things always make the difference.
QUICK FIX #3 – Add a search or sitemap of your content
Many organizations have large amounts of content on their websites and each week it seems to grow. If you are trying to cater to lots of different types of visitors then you will need to provide them a good way to get around your content. Sometimes a menu navigation cannot display all pages of content you have available. A simple sitemap like the Buffalo Chamber offers or a search box to search the site would be helpful. You want to help your visitors find answers to the questions that brought them to your site. Don’t make them search manually by clicking around, give them an easier way.
QUICK FIX #4 – Setup your site on a CMS
I have no idea how many are running these large websites. But when you start getting into lots of content and weekly or even daily changes you need to move to a CMS solution. A Content Management System, such as WordPress or Joomla, can help you organize your content on the back-end. A CMS could also address Quick Fix #3 as sitemap and search are usually built-in functionality.
Using a CMS will cut out maintenance time and make it easier to create even more content you were either reluctant to or unable to create under your current one page at a time system. There are open source and commercial solutions here. Professional firms can help you get setup on a blogging solution or a robust CMS to solve your content problems.
QUICK FIX #5 – Get a professionally designed template
The final quick fix could be considered a bit less than quick. Redesigning a website can take weeks or months in some cases. However, if you are happy with your content and simply want to take advantage of a new look a prebuilt template might be just right. There are several commercial sites that sell designer templates for basic websites to complex CMS websites. Now even though the template is prebuilt it will take some skill and expertise to integrate it into your existing site. So this still could be a few days or a couple of weeks to full completion. But it will be less expensive than having a designer build a fully custom designed website.
I recommend browsing the templates at Themeforest. If you prefer you can contact us over at Tonka Park to help select a template from this affiliate or another you have found. We can then help uplift your current website and content to fit into the new template. We even can help you get up and running on a CMS solution.
For the record, I have not yet joined the Camdenton Chamber but have considered it. Any other members out there?
Setting up an online shopping cart
As a small local business you might have a small storefront in a local strip mall or you might even be working out of your house selling products to the local residents and businesses. Perhaps you have heard there is demand for your product outside of Lake of the Ozarks area or out of state and you are wondering how to reach those new markets.
Don’t be overwhelmed
A great first step is to setup an online store to allow people to send in orders from around the country and even world. At first it might seem overwhelming to venture into the online shopping cart world. However there are several great products available to help make the transition better.
There are sites like Etsy, Big Cartel, Shopify and others to get your business selling goods online in now time. And if you partner with an IT professional such as Tonka Park, you can even venture into the custom online shopping cart solution such as Spree. There are pros and cons to each service and each tailor to a slightly different business segment. You will need to understand your business, your target market and then take some time to work with someone to review each solution to find the right fit.
Each of these solutions offer ways to work with Paypal or another merchant gateway to accept payments with ease. They also can track inventory, display multiple images and allow discount codes.
Helpful Resources
Over the last year Tonka Park has provided several articles reviewing and highlighting some of the better services available.
4-top-shopping-cart-solutions-reviewed
