Posted on

Types of Marketing Content Translated into Video Production in Rochester, MN

No matter what your business or online brand looks like, your website can benefit from increased traffic and improved search engine optimization (SEO) with the addition of video content. Visual content like images, graphics, and videos has proven time and again to be the most engaging type of digital media. The story-telling, imagery, music, and sound effects that can be incorporated into video content are able to capture attention quickly and relay rich information more effectively and with better memory retention than any other format. Text format and structural design elements have their place on any website, and they often create a foundation for an informational digital space. However, websites that supplement that text content and visual elements with video media often see overall user engagement, including traffic and conversion rates, increase by more than 100%. If you are looking to implement video content in an existing marketing campaign, into any of your website pages, or into a strategy you’re about to launch, MLT Group LLC can help. As a digital marketing agency, we provide comprehensive services for all kinds of customers with an online presence. From service companies and legal firms to manufactures and health care organizations, we offer digital marketing, web design, SEO services, social media marketing, graphic design, and complete video production for a wide variety of businesses in Rochester, MN and across the country.

Video Marketing

Video marketing is a powerful strategy for user engagement. When skillfully produced, video content can catch the eye of a user as soon as they enter your landing page. It can also inform viewers directly about your company goals, mission, products, services, and more. Out of all marketing investments, the majority of site owners report that their use of video production services provides the greatest monetary return and the fastest results.

Return on Investment

For any type of marketing tactic, it’s important to understand how you get a return on your investment (ROI) and apply tools and methods effectively. Video content produces a high ROI partly because videos can provide both short and long term results, but also because they can fit into many categories. From explainer shorts to social media stories, you can use video content to fit specific needs on your site and increase your brand presence while supporting your company goals and aesthetics.

Video Production

There are several ways that marketing videos can drive user engagement. Often, websites will utilize more than one kind of video content to support sales, conversion rates, and customer relationships in general. If you’re looking to add video content to your site, you should first determine what purpose you want that media to serve. Some common examples of marketing videos include:

Brand videos:

Usually created as part of a larger marketing campaign to partner with multiple other kinds of media content, brand videos can showcase your company and highlight your mission, priorities, products, and services. Brand videos increase the general user awareness of your company’s role in specific industries, but they also help generate user engagement by presenting what makes your brand stand out from other companies that offer similar services.

Explainer videos:

Many different brands can use explainer videos to communicate quickly and efficiently to their users. Most users report that receiving information-dense messages through videos increases their retention rate, making it more likely for them to remember your brand when entering a query into the search bar or recommending products to a friend. Explainer videos answer the questions of who, what, where, when, why, and how for various aspects of your company operations or brand mission. These video formats can be used to detail products, talk about processes, profile employees, and even explain an intangible service like customer relationship management (CRM) guidance. They typically follow a script and use sensory stimulating design aspects like sound and visual effects. Learn more about explainer videos.

Demo videos:

If you provide goods and services, it might be beneficial for you to incorporate various demo videos into your website. Demo videos can display products in use, showcase design options, illustrate the advantages of your service, and more. For companies that offer services or products that aren’t physical objects or actions, such as digital support or software, demonstration videos can be key for exhibiting exactly what those more abstract ideas might be. Many users report they will favor a product with a demo video over a similar product without one.

Instructional videos:

Similar to demo videos, instructional videos can also be important components of your website or a marketing campaign. These videos can be used to explain a product, but they are also often used to build user knowledge about your company as a whole. With more foundational information about your brand’s approach to your industry, customer base, and values, users will feel more comfortable with your business practices, ethics, and solutions.

Animations:

There are many potential applications for animations across your site. Outside of video content specifically, animations can be used as background design elements, buttons, drop down menus, navigation systems, and more. When it comes to using animations to build marketing videos, they can open doors to increasing your user engagement, supporting a growing brand aesthetic, and promoting a partnership with artists and creators. Animations can turn intangible goods and services, like digital systems, into visual explanation aids. They are often effective in relaying information that is important but complex to a wider audience of users. Additionally, while animation can be an expensive proposition, the advent of white board videos and related animation styles has provided a less expensive way to effectively utilize animation.

Testimonials and statistics:

One video format that can be the most effective in gaining user trust and exemplifying your authority over your goods and services is with testimonials, expert interviews, and statistics. If you have access to internal experts, such as company leaders, makers, or project managers, you can generate interview videos with those employees that both explain products more thoroughly and give reassurance to your audience. Testimonials from your current customers or audience can also be effective in giving a third-party view into the quality of your brand. Both expert interviews and testimonials also pair nicely with clear, genuine statistics.

Live streams:

While many videos for marketing purposes are highly curated, edited, and polished, there are many benefits to using social media for a more casual discourse with your audience. Video production of Live streams on Instagram, YouTube, Facebook, and other platforms can give your audience a behind-the-scenes view into your brand. These more intimate videos also support direct dialogs with your users in a space that may be more comfortable for them to interact with comments, likes, and reactions in real time. Live streams can be used for many purposes, such as event reels, presentations, interviews, employee profiles, product highlights, and more.

Comprehensive Services

Whether you need the support of a quality brand video to give your site a boost towards a more sophisticated and professional appearance, or you want to start developing demo or instructional videos for your products, our team of skilled marketing experts can help. MLT Group offers comprehensive services for video production in Rochester, MN and across the US, including added benefits like our 4K drone technology and graphics design expertise.

For more information about our videography services, contact MLT Group at (507) 281-3490 or contact us today.

Posted on

How Media Content Affects Your SEO and Web Development in St. Paul, MN

There are many aspects of web development that can be utilized to build a site with the information, tools, and aesthetics appropriate to your brand. Most websites use design elements that have become standards like dropdown menus, landing pages, contact forms, and other common features recognizable to users. Conforming to expected web design elements will make your website easier to use and can improve your search engine optimization (SEO) results.

Web Development

Busy company leaders often choose to hire the services of a marketing firm for development of their websites. MLT Group provides complete services for web development in St. Paul, MN and across the country, including SEO, graphic design, social media marketing, digital marketing, video production, and more. Our experts can build your website to follow digital standards and emerging trends while ensuring your site is attractive to search engines and users alike.

Quality User Experience

In addition to supporting your brand’s online presence and providing the type of information that will answer user inquiries relevant to your company, a quality user experience (UX) should be a top priority in all your web development processes. The initial step to achieving a good UX for your site is a fast load time. Many users will click away from sites that load slower than two seconds. You may have had successful SEO that brought your page to the top of a search engine results page (SERP), but if a user clicks on your site and it loads slowly, you’re likely to lose that interaction.

Ranking Highly in Search Engines

If you build your website to offer a user experience that makes information easy to find and your company easy to do business with, you will have made a great start. Additionally, developing effective SEO that gets your site ranking highly in search engines is key to bringing in targeted traffic. Site features that catch that attention of users and keep them interested while on your site can be useful as well. However, don’t overdue these as clean and simple is still highly desirable in most site designs and some fancy features like pop-ups and interstitials can be detrimental to user experience and search engine rankings.

Overlays:

Overlays are dialog boxes, images, videos, or other types of content that show up directly on a browser window. A common example of an effective overlay is a request for users to sign up for a newsletter or enter an email for a first purchase coupon. Most retail sites, news resources, and blogs will use overlays to prompt users to sign up to receive emails from the company’s newsletter or advertisement system. These often are not penalized by Google or other search engines, but if they compromise the UX, they can damage SEO. Many web developers will pay close attention to how overlays affect the UX on mobile devices due to the smaller screen space. If you use overlays, make sure they are easy to close, show up within a few seconds of your page loading, and don’t show up repeatedly once the user has closed the box.

Pop-Ups:

Thanks to spammy pop-up ads that were common with the early internet days, Google and other search engines do not award sites that use any pop-ups. If you have pop-ups, not only is it likely that users will have browser prevention that automatically blocks pop-ups, Google will punish sites with pop-ups by lowering their SERP ranking. Pop-ups are different from overlays because they show up when a new window is opened rather than over a page. Pulling up a new window in addition to the page clicked will alert Google to potential spam and security risks. Generally speaking, we don’t recommend the use of pop-ups.

Modals:

Modals are similar to overlays, but they require action in the dialog box before users can interact with the page underneath. Common modals include sign-in requests, requirements to enter birthdates to continue, requests to verify users are over 21, requests to accept or deny cookies, CAPTCHAs, and other legal or paywall specific content. If modals appear right after the page loads, aren’t repeated once the user has provided the requested action, and are easy to understand, interact with, and close, Google will not penalize the use of that kind of media content. You can run into problems when using modals for advertisements or if the visual content is spam-like. If you have to use a modal, make sure it is not taking away from the UX or slowing down the load time of your site.

Interstitials:

Some sites, like Forbes.com, for example, use interstitials. Forbes uses them to show advertisements for their sponsors on their landing page. Interstitials are essentially timed overlays that cover part of the screen for a few seconds when you enter a site. These interstitials, or “interstitial experiences,” will stop you from interacting with a page or cover a large part of the screen as you scroll down. Even though they only last seconds, they can significantly damage the UX, and most search engines do not favor websites that use interstitials. Large brands like Forbes can get away with using interstitial advertisements on their landing pages, but most sites will see a decrease in SEO when they use interstitial elements. However, interstitials can be used effectively in very limited applications. They may be useful in making a user stop and acknowledge something before interacting with your site or to add some fun elements to your site’s entryway (such as this “Species in Pieces” interactive exhibition site). If you plan to use an interstitial, it may be beneficial to offer users the option to skip the experience.

Improve the UX of Your Site

For each of these elements, there is a lot to consider when taking into account how they will impact your SEO. Primarily, if you can utilize these elements to improve the UX, you can deter the negative impact they might have on your SERP ranking. If your website loads quickly and meets the needs of user queries while incorporating any of these types of media, Google and other search engines will be less likely to penalize your site. Tracking bounce rates, conversions, and other evidence of positive or negative user reactions will help you analyze how these elements are affecting the UX of your site. Have a backup plan if you have to remove these elements due to poor user interaction results.

Site Speed

The timing of these elements is also important. Generally, these elements should appear right when your site loads and only for short periods of time (or as long as users want to engage). Some exceptions to this rule could include an overlay that appears after a user reads a page or adds a product to their cart. Installing these elements into your site should also not pose damage to the user experience. If users can’t click past an element, if an element appears untrustworthy, if it slows down your site’s load time, or if it jumbles the primary design and informativeness of your main site, you probably want to avoid incorporating these types of media. Keep in mind that even if you install these elements and they don’t result in a bad UX, Google and other search engine algorithms might penalize your SEO results.

To learn more about web development in St. Paul, MN and how different elements of design can impact your SEO, or to get started with our team of skilled content creators and marketing experts, contact MLT Group at (507) 281-3490 or sales@mltgroup.com today.

Posted on

Increasing Traffic and Reducing Bounce Rate with Quality Site Design and SEO/Marketing in Rochester, MN

In today’s highly accessible digital world, truly anyone can make a website. There are many website design systems available to individuals, small businesses, and even large corporations. These site builder tools range in price; some are free, while others charge a monthly subscription fee or flat cost. When you use these systems to design your website, you almost always pay for what you get. Site builders like Squarespace and Wix, utilize templates that make it easy to build a decent site quickly. However, these templates often lead to a cookie cutter display that can’t fully support your unique brand aesthetics, while lacking optimization that can help a site rank on search engines. If you aren’t able to afford a custom site design, a site builder tool can help you establish an online presence, but when you work with a marketing firm that provides comprehensive web design and search engine optimization (SEO) services, you increase brand awareness, grow your audience, and go above and beyond the quality a cookie cutter template provides. MLT Group offers complete web services, including custom site design, marketing, SEO, social media marketing, graphic design, and video production for web. Based in Rochester Minnesota, we work with a broad variety of customers across the US. From service companies to manufacturers, if you’re looking to develop a website or expand an online brand, MLT Group can provide effective SEO/marketing in Rochester, MN and across the country.

Analytics

With any website, performing analytics regularly to measure the success rate of user interaction is important. If your site is effective, you’ll see positive conversion rates. Conversions occur whenever a user takes a “next step” on your website that creates a contact. This could be signing up for a newsletter, purchasing a product, downloading a white paper or coupon, or another form of interaction. If your conversion rates are low, you’re likely experiencing a high rate of user bounce. Users will click away from a site without taking “next step” conversion actions for many reasons.

Why Bounce Rates Occur

Let’s look more at users. Everyone fills the role of “user” as they interact with various websites daily. You don’t have to be a website designer to understand if a site offers a good user experience. If you consider the websites that you use, you can likely identify aspects of the sites that make them better or worse to utilize. Bounce rates increase for websites that are unpleasant or difficult to use. Some common causes of user bounce include:

Loading time:

Websites with pages that load slower than three seconds often experience significant bounce rates. In fact, many users report they will click away from a site that takes longer than two seconds to load. Increasing your site’s loading time will almost certainly guarantee a reduced rate of user bounce. Additionally, faster loading sites encourage better ranking results because search engines like Google, Bing, and Yahoo all value quick content loading pages higher in their ranking systems.

Content fulfillment:

When users enter a query into a search engine, they are often looking for something specific, but exactly what they are asking can be difficult to determine. If a user searches for “sustainable clothing,” for example, you can’t always be sure if they are looking to purchase sustainable clothing, learn more about what sustainable clothing is, or read reviews of sustainable clothing brands. If your site is coming up on a search engine results page (SERP) with a “sustainable clothing” query but your site’s content doesn’t answer the user’s question, you may experience a bounce. By analyzing your site’s keywords, comparing competing sites that rank with those various keyword searches, and expanding your content based on the intent of users you would like to attract, you can reduce those bounces with more targeted content fulfillment.

Site design:

The aesthetics of your brand can be engaging and reduce bounce rates because of the immediate user interest the aesthetics induce, but a more significant reduction in bounce rate will come from the core of your site design. First of all, your site should be clear, easy to use, and intuitive. Brand aesthetics are important, but user experience is key in retaining users and creating conversions. Ever heard the expression “a place for everything and everything in its place”? Your website should emulate that idea so that users understand how to get around the site and can easily find what they are looking for.  “Rage” and “dead” clicks come from users becoming frustrated with content that looks like a hyperlink or button but doesn’t take them anywhere or confusing navigation that wastes their time. Sites of any significant size may benefit from an option to search your site. A simple search system will encourage users to engage with your site to find more information or narrow their query results. Sites without a search system often experience bounce rates from users returning to the Google search bar because they didn’t find exactly what they need from that site’s landing page. Another design tool you can use is the inverted pyramid style. An inverted pyramid for text or media content can generate a hook of a user’s attention with a lead, move into details below, and finally answer the user’s initial question.

Calls to action:

When users interact with a website, they are invited to respond to a range of calls to action (CTAs). CTAs include prompts to sign up for a mailing list, subscribe to a newsletter, make an account with the brand, use a coupon code, make a purchase, view similar products, contact the company, and more. There are many kinds of CTAs for different scenarios. Strategic placement of CTAs, without compromising the quality of user experience, can improve conversion rates. Additionally, if you adjust your CTAs to include keywords pertinent to your SEO and site content, you can enhance your ranking on SERPs. For example, if you own a sustainable clothing brand, you can change a CTA from “Learn More” to “How to Reduce Your Carbon Footprint.” Navigation links that more clearly target what the user will find are good for users and search engines.

Bounce Rank Analysis

There are many other causes of user bounce, and it can be a difficult thing to analyze. In fact, some user bounce is because the site is working the way it should. For example, if people are coming to your website looking for your phone number and they find it immediately when they hit the home page, without having to visit a contact page, they get what they need and bounce off the site quickly. That’s a positive conversion, so a high bounce rate doesn’t always equate to ineffective user engagement. Still, understanding how users are interacting with your site is important to enhancing results. No matter how you engage users and increase conversion rates, it all starts with effective SEO and marketing action. Without quality SEO/Marketing tactics, your site won’t be ranked high enough on search engines to even be on the radar of users important to you. Learn more information about the basics of SEO and how a marketing firm can help.

Why SEO/marketing Works

Google and other search engines each use their own algorithm to crawl, index, and rank website pages. This means they send crawling “bots” to examine all the pages on the web for keywords, metadata, and other information. These bots return the gathered information and the search engine uses it to categorize or index each page. The pages are then provided on a SERP, ranked in an order that the algorithm judges to best answer the user query. A website can change its format and use tools to influence that ranking system to its favor. If you utilize search engine optimization techniques approved by Google, like intelligent placement of keywords, fresh content generation, and fast load times, you can increase the likelihood of a higher SERP ranking.

Digital SEO/Marketing Campaign

An effective digital marketing campaign will use SEO/Marketing and a good quality website as foundational to guiding the entire system. You need an online presence that serves your target audiences and ways to help those users find you. Social media marketing and pay-per-click advertising can also figure into a strategy for being easy to find and easy to do business with.

Ever-Changing Best Practices

The highly specific and ever-changing best practices of SEO and site design can be complex for website owners. If you are unsure of how to adjust your SEO/Marketing and website to reduce bounce rates and increase conversions, we can help. To learn more about our services for SEO/marketing in Rochester, MN and across the US, contact MLT Group at 507-281-3490 or sales@mltgroup.com today.

Posted on

Generating Timely New Content for SEO Marketing in Minnesota’s Twin Cities

One of the most effective search engine optimization (SEO) practices for encouraging improved website rankings on search engine results pages (SERPs) is the publication of fresh content on a regular basis. Whether it’s in the form of a blog or other source on your site allocated to the release of informational text content, search engines like Google, Bing, and Yahoo all favor websites that can provide users with current, relevant, and original information. The most popular tool for regular content additions is a blog utility. These can be integrated into new or existing websites with the help of a marketing and content development agency. At MLT Group LLC, we provide SEO, digital marketing, social media marketing, graphic design, web design, and video production services for a broad range of clients. Our SEO marketing services in Minnesota’s Twin Cities and throughout the region offer a comprehensive range of support for small businesses, nonprofits, local brands, and customers. Our team of marketing experts, writers, graphic designers, project managers, and videographers work with customers to meet their exact needs while following the technical and design trends that improve website quality and SERP rankings to expand audiences and improve conversions.

Content Creation

One aspect of content creation that we work into blogs and informational articles we write for our customers is the idea of newsworthy or timely content. Search engine algorithms approve of websites that stay up to date on their data and user trends. Publishing timely content that will also be attractive and helpful to users will make your website more likely to get a higher ranking from a search query. For example, if a user searches for “best rated toasters,” Google and other search engines will favor sites with blogs that rank the newest toasters. Blogs or articles that are titled “Best Toasters of 2022” or “Top Rated Toasters of 2022, Tested by Chefs,” for instance, will likely improve your ranking for that query.

Headlines

Headlines and title cards are important parts of SEO marketing when it comes to publishing new content, but the use of keywords and having information that is actually helpful to users is important too. The information in your content, the relevance of the data to your brand and audience, and the interest or “humanization” of that data are all important parts of publishing newsworthy, timely stories.

Internal and External Information

When choosing a topic for a timely blog or news article, there can be multiple sources for your information. Having accurate data that can be backed by internal studies, reports, or analytics or by reputable external sources is important because it improves your brand’s credibility, establishes trust with your users, and improves your professional image. However, most of the companies and brands that host websites and publish content to grow their audiences don’t have access to reporters and newsrooms. Many scholarly articles, scientific studies, or other rich, data driven sources of information are housed behind pay walls.

Data

To get the right data for timely stories, you’ll have to tap into the resources you do have at hand. This can include your company’s own operations and expertise, staff knowledge, internal data, public information, surveys and other customer feedback, social media, and many other sources of knowledge, advice, facts, and other statistics that could be useful to your audience. Your internal data resources can provide analytics and statistics that you can use to build relevant information for the contemporary user. In fact, most companies have a rich source of information about their day-to-day operations that many customers might be interested to know.

Transparency

Think about the companies that you purchase goods and services from or the brands that you support. Would it be of interest to you to learn how those goods are made, what training staff is given, how things are cleaned, what equipment is used, or how facilities are maintained? What about the information that guides brands to develop a certain product or build their site tools in a specific way? You can lend some transparency to your company’s operations, expertise, and analytics to give important information to users that will make your brand more likeable to the customer and better ranked on SERPs.

Public Data

Another important resource for data you can use as a foundation for timely content is public data from the municipal, state, or federal governments, data published in open studies, ranking systems, articles, peer reviewed papers, books, journals, and more. Wikipedia is not considered a credible database because it is built with crowd sourced information, but you can often use the Wikipedia resources section of a page to backtrack to references listed that are accredited or legitimized data citations.

Customer Feedback

You can also gather information from users and your own customers by conducting surveys, asking for reviews and feedback, and analyzing user interaction with your brand. By gathering your own data this way, you can prove to readers the reliability of your information by disclosing the numbers and way you learned about the topic for a certain blog or article. There are many ways to gather survey information available to companies today, such as SurveyMonkey, Google Forms, and Google Survey.

Having information to create timely content is key but, you still need to be able to determine its relevancy to users. If your blogs or articles are not relevant to the users that interact with your website, you can lose their attention and your site may seem less relevant to search engines.

Relevance

To determine the relevance of your data, you need to decide if it is serviceable to the reader, contextualized, and localized. In order for your content to be serviceable, it needs to help users in some way. Most companies perform analytics to gather data about their audience demographic. This often includes age, cultural background, location, economic status, and community. If you have a dataset you can use to write content, you need to write around that information to make it helpful to your user demographic. For example, if an appliance company has a group of statistics showing that 80% of homeowners store their toasters off of the counter when not in use, they can use that information to recommend the best toasters in their collection for efficient storage or toasters that cool down the fastest or are the easiest to clean. The company could also gather further information about where their customers most frequently store toasters in the kitchen and relay that in a timely blog post.

Relay News

To generate content that is contextualized, you need to stay in the loop for trends significant to your brand. The purpose of digital marketing with SEO content is not necessarily to break the news to the public, but you can relay news about your brand in the form of industry trends. Think about what’s happening in the world to your business format, your audience, your products, and more. If your brand falls into a niche or industry category, publishing data with regard to the current events and trends of those areas will give that information a strong relevancy because of the way SEO and search engine algorithms work. Continuing with the toaster example, an appliance company could publish content overviewing their most popular toaster models and parallel that with trends in kitchen aesthetics and varying degrees of gadgetry consumers currently desire.

Localization

You can also use localization to make global data or large-scale conclusions gathered from reputable studies accessible to your audience. Localizing data brings it to a community level. For example, if there was the release of a brand-new toaster like a smart phone-controlled, portable, and rechargeable toaster with a USB port (we don’t know if this exists) it could spark conversation among your audience if you write a blog discussing pros, cons, and whether such a device is necessary. Localized content gives users the chance to interact more personally with information and allows you to speak more directly with your audience.

Humanizing the Story

Finally, you need to humanize your story to make it relatable to your living, breathing users. While a search engine will process your data and content based only on merits written into a software algorithm, users will go one step beyond this and process information on an emotional level that can manifest in many ways, including surprise, care, joy, fear, anger, and much more. As humans, we process things in emotional ways naturally even if we are also considering the numbers and logic of informational content. Unlike journalistic news providers who have to report objectively, marketers and brands can instill a humanized aspect to their content with the subjection of emotion in positive, constructive ways.

Pairing data relevant to your brand and your users with a humanized delivery will help you create more successful timely content. To learn more about using these tools for SEO marketing in the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul, as well as surrounding areas, contact MLT Group at (507) 281-3490 or sales@mltgroup.com today.

Posted on

Understanding the Important Role of Explainer Video Production in Minneapolis, MN

There are many aspects of videography and film production that can go into a marketing campaign, from product descriptions to full company commercials. Graphics, scripts, lighting, makeup, audio, and other components all go into making video production so complex that it can be a difficult venture for small companies and brands with less access to expensive equipment, software, and training. Because of that, many companies outsource videography to marketing agencies with a dedicated film department. Not only does this make the entire process less stressful and more efficient without compromising control over the creative process, it’s also often a less expensive way to get a quality product. The return on your investment (ROI) for videos is typically one of the highest when compared to other marketing systems, such as pay-per-click (PPC) advertising and even other visual media. Modern video content has proven time and again to be one of the most engaging formats of marketing media. MLT Group Creative Solutions provides comprehensive video production in Minneapolis, MN, Rochester, and the surrounding area. Our expertise extends to corporate, social media, industrial, training, education, and commercial videos, animation, video duplication, surveillance video enhancement, and even aerial video with our 4K drone technology.

Other Services

In addition to complete videography services, MLT Group also offers digital marketing strategies, graphic design, social media and SEO services, web design, and more. With MLT Group, high quality video production is within reach because we know how to provide scalable video production to meet most budgets. Throughout any project we work on, we operate as your partner. Our customers maintain creative control from start to finish while our videography experts provide continued communication, state-of-the-art equipment, and talent.

Marketing Videos

Because there are so many different kinds of marketing videos, videos that can be used to boost your audience and website traffic, and videos that can improve communication with your users, it can be hard to know where to start. The video format that will benefit your company most will depend greatly on your goals and current standing as a brand. However, for many companies and digital brands, the format of “explainer videos” can be highly beneficial and even change the way your website is ranked on search engine results pages (SERPs).

What are explainer videos?

Explainer videos are short, often animated videos that walk users through a clear explanation of a company’s services, products, or goals. Quality explainer videos have proven to have extremely high conversion rates, some even as high as over 100%. Conversion rates, the measurement of how many users take the next step on your site to click a product, read a new page, sign up for an email list, etc are important key performance indicators (KPIs) that help you determine your ROI, user engagement, and other factors. Explainer videos are usually placed prominently on a home page or landing page so they are your site’s first line of significant user interaction.

There are many types of explainers videos, though animated graphics are the most popular format of explanation today. Some basic types of explainer videos include:

Live-action:

If you have a staff that’s camera ready or if you are able to hire commercial actors, you can make a highly effective live-action explainer video. Live-action explainers are most effective for companies with goods or services targeted for physical use. For example, a live-action video might be more effective for a company selling a special type of toothbrush rather than for a company offering more abstract services like customer relationship management (CRM) technology. Having a cast of real people using physical products or services can also help create an emotional connection with viewers.

Animated:

This format of explainer video is one of the more prevalent styles used today, often used for companies offering digital services, software, and other internet tools. Animated explainer videos can be very useful for walking the viewer through complex subject matter with interesting or fun graphics. Many people learn better with visual aids, so an animated explainer video can capture the viewer’s attention throughout a full breakdown of a more abstract concept or process. Additionally, animated explainer videos often have a better retention rate of technical or intangible information when compared to live-action explainer videos of the same material. Animations give companies a chance to instill creativity and their brand’s aesthetic into information-rich video content.

Live stream:

Social media live streams can be made into casual live-action videos that reach a high level of user engagement. Live streams don’t give you the ability to edit the information given in real time or the ability to erase stumbles in the script, but they are highly effective in reaching your viewers on a very human level. They also show that your company feels comfortable showing raw footage, meaning you have nothing to hide. Live streams can increase the trustworthiness and friendliness of your brand.

How are they made?

The way explainer videos are made will vary slightly from format to format, but every process will follow the same general guidelines. Most effective explainer videos will have a well-defined topic, a script or at least key talking points, style/aesthetics, sound design, an introduction, and a conclusion. Depending on what format of explainer video you’re making, your production process could also include a storyboard, voiceover, animation, transitions, and other aspects of videography. Some of the most important parts of any good explainer video include:

Script:

The finished video design quality can make an explainer video more effective, but nothing communicates the information more quickly and precisely than a well-written script. When writing a script, consider what key information you need to relay to the viewer. Try to answer the “who, what, where, when, why, and how” (樂威壯
ould-be-asked-of-every-project”>five Ws and an H) of your video topic. The script should always include a brief introduction to the topic, a clear explanation that answers the five Ws and H of the video, and a conclusion that increases conversion rates. A good script will convert users to click to learn more, view a product or service page, sign up for a newsletter, or even make a purchase. If you aren’t using a full script, for example, if you are filming a live stream on social media, make sure the people featured in the video have in front of them key talking points to cover.

Style:

From a fully edited animation to a casual live stream explainer video, you should always produce the video in your company’s style. Using the design aesthetics and stylization of your brand will help incorporate your video into the map of your website and boost your marketing image. It will also help make your marketing campaign and overall online presence into a cohesive unit. Your company has its own unique style and using those aesthetics in your explainer videos will solidify their inclusion into your website design.

Sound design:

For both the technical and aesthetic aspects of your explainer videos, sound design is critical. When it comes down to it, your viewers need to be able to clearly hear the explanation given of a product, service, or company goal. Clear sound capturing with mid to high quality equipment and a crisp production of the script will both help you improve the value of any explainer video. Additionally, when used effectively, music, sound effects, and other components of creative sound design increase the viewer’s retention of the information relayed and improve conversion rates.

There are many other steps that go into the making of an explainer video in addition to these basic requirements. Explainer videos range from as simple as an informal, spontaneous live stream to as complex as a full animation taking many hours to produce.

If you are ready to incorporate an animation or live-action explainer video or other audiovisual content into your website, contact MLT Group at (507) 281-3490  or at sales@mltgroup.com for more information about our video production in Minneapolis, MN and across Minnesota, Iowa, and Wisconsin.

Posted on

What Makes an Effective Provider of Digital SEO/Marketing in Minnesota

The world of digital marketing has grown into today’s complex, nuanced technical system. To successfully market your brand online, there are many required actions, like generating URLs and having a well-made website. However, there are also many optional things you can also do to boost your marketing performance and grow your audience, such as using SEO (search engine optimization) tools and maintaining social media platforms. Because of the many tools, features, and possibilities that are all a part of digital marketing, it’s no wonder that it can be a daunting process for small businesses and brands to manage their own digital marketing operations effectively. Fortunately, there are many agencies that provide highly affordable outside marketing services at varying levels. If you are looking for a digital marketing company to meet your needs for creative, smart SEO/marketing in Minnesota or anywhere in the US, MLT Group LLC has the skills and tools to get the job done. We provide comprehensive marketing services including SEO, social media, web design, graphic design, video production, and more.

Determining the Right SEO

Experience, current knowledge, levels of services, and costs are all factors that can vary widely when looking at agency services. To choose the right digital marketing provider, you first need to determine your digital marketing goals. Some brands need an entire restructuring and rewriting of their website, including text and media content, design, URLs, and SEO tools. Some companies only need the extra SEO support of a regularly scheduled informational blog or news release. Others might benefit best from an aggressive link and citation building campaign.

Digital Marketing

From full web design to writing and optimizing effective blog content, MLT Group’s team can provide whatever marketing and brand building strategy you need. If you’ve determined your goals, we can consult with you to pinpoint what SEO, social media, or other digital marketing steps we should take to help you reach those goals. We provide competitive pricing for our creative solutions and our communication is always straightforward and jargon-free.

When searching for an effective digital marketing agency, there are several factors to consider. Some of the major concerns you should look for include a quality website, strong team, toolbox, industry expertise, trustworthiness, and testimonials or reviews.

Quality Website

If a company is going to design your website or provide other content creation, you should always look at their own site for red flags like slow loading times, poor design qualities, lack of fresh content, low resolution, and a bad user experience. A well-designed site should have consistent aesthetics, clear navigation, high SEO ranking, a method of routinely releasing fresh information, calls to action, load times of two seconds or faster, and a positive user experience. The MLT website, for example, maintains an active newsfeed, features our personal design aesthetics on every page, has clear calls to action, provides easy navigation, utilizes SEO keywords and geo-locations, and more. If a digital marketing company has a quality website, it’s the first sign that they will lend that quality to their work with your brand as well.

Strong Team

As a small company, our team of talented staff members share the values of all the small businesses we work with. Even the larger companies we work with, like MultiSource Manufacturing and several ServiceMaster branches, have the same foundational values for providing quality, reliable, and trustworthy services. We support companies that in turn support their industries positively, care for their staff and customers, and overall do everything they can to give to their communities. If you are looking for a digital marketing agency that will fit into your company culture, you should check out the expertise and diversity of their team members. MLT’s staff is composed of talented web development specialists, designers, marketing experts, writers, and many other great people we are honored to have on our team.

Tools

Any effective marketing provider will have the right tools and equipment in their purview. This includes project management solutions, methods of measuring website performance, social media analytics, email marketing systems, CRM (customer relationship management) technology, CRO (conversion rate optimization) measurements, graphic design software, video production capabilities, ways to calculate ROI (return on investment), and more. Marketing campaigns require the right analytics and communication tools to measure performance and make alterations when needed. Not only do we have all of these tools and more, we outsource work to skilled freelancers whenever necessary so your campaign schedule is always running on time.

Industry Expertise

When selecting the right marketing agency for your brand, considering their experience and expertise in the industry is also a key indicator of their quality and effectiveness. If a company doesn’t provide a portfolio of their past work clearly on their website, that is likely a warning sign that they are inexperienced or have a history of performing low quality work. MLT Group has industry expertise and experience working with a broad range of different companies and online brands. We provide comprehensive digital marketing and web design services for companies like contract manufacturers, bankruptcy firms, disaster restoration providers, veterans and US troops, university programs, health providers, engineers, property managers, auto parts sellers, welding suppliers, dentists, tree care and landscapers, warehouse storage, bus and trucking companies, and many others. Our SEO/marketing services are versatile, well researched, and effective for a broad range of websites and industries.

Trustworthiness

With so many marketing agencies in the industry today, it’s important to customers that the agency they choose be trustworthy, open, and clearly communicate services and expectations. At MLT Group  we want to be clear about what we can help our customers achieve in their campaigns and why things cost what they cost. We don’t use industry jargon or hide behind the many acronyms that come with the digital marketing world. We also routinely publish informational blogs that cover topics about digital marketing, including how-tos, SEO basics, explanations of terminology, and much more. MLT Group is committed to supporting ADA compliance for our site, and we encourage our customers to do the same. Our website is fully customizable for persons with visual or hearing impairments, cognitive disabilities, ADHD, and more. The tools that allow users to adjust our site can be used to alter color, contrast, font size and readability, letter spacing, alignment, line height, magnification, sounds, images, animation, and focus. Our goal as a company is to continue expanding our accessibility for greater inclusion of users and user trust.

Social Proof

When  large percentage of a population are in agreement about a topic, item, product, or practice, this is called social proof. If something has social proof, it’s generally considered to be of good quality. When you’re deciding what digital marketing agency to use for your brand, you can usually choose one that will give you a good experience as a customer and good services that advance your marketing campaign if you can determine their social proof. Positive reviews and testimonials are the most common formats for social proof of any business, including marketing agencies. A company can spout its worth to you all day long, but the proof of that can only be found in the telling of other customers’ experiences. Check out our testimonials for just a few stories from our current and previous clients.

MLT Group is a boutique marketing firm that provides complete, effective services for SEO/marketing in Minnesota and the surrounding regions. We listen to your needs and work with you to develop marketing strategies that will yield quality results. To learn more about our services contact us at (507) 281-3490 or sales@mltgroup.com

Posted on

Features of an Effective Marketing Firm for Quality Web Development in Minneapolis, MN

Whether you own a company serving local customers or a brand recognized internationally, having a website with user friendly tools, in depth information about your brand or business, and a unique design aesthetic are all key factors in digital marketing success. There are many ways to build a quality website yourself, even with minimal development knowledge, including with the many web building services available today. However, these web builders can cause design issues, create functionality roadblocks, and may lack in search engine optimization (SEO) tools. The mid to high cost for web builder services at top tiers may not be worth it to many brands. Small marketing firms in your area often compete with web builder costs while providing a better range of services, flexibility, creativity, and overall greater level of care. MLT Group LLC offers comprehensive services for web development in Minneapolis, MN and the Upper Midwest, including digital marketing, SEO services, social media marketing, graphic design, video production, and web design.

Effective Web Development

There are many properties of effective web development, and while many technical aspects of web design may shift with time (such as Google and other search engine algorithms), there are several core values that remain largely constant. Even with more and more cookie cutter web builders coming onto the market, there are still many reasons to work with an independent marketing agency.

Cookie Cutter vs. Custom

Web builders rely on templates that make it easier for anyone using their services to build nice looking websites quickly. However, these templates tend to become cookie cutter examples of excessive website conformity. The first problem with template or cookie cutter websites is that they are not unique. Many other brands, including your competitors, may use the same web builder services and templates. If your website starts to look the same as others, the creative and innovative aspects of your company may be overshadowed by the conformity of your site design.

Website Functionality

Another issue with cookie cutter websites is their functionality. Templates provided through web builder services may not include unique tools for media incorporation, ecommerce, and other custom needs. Additionally they often don’t give you options to accurately manage your SEO performance. Cookie cutter sites often offer some SEO tools, but without the ability to fully tailor to your specific brand’s SEO requirements. Some brands need ecommerce SEO emphasis, while others might need SEO that increases readership of fresh content.

Templates

The templates offered through web builder services may be easy to use to a point, but if you don’t have any web design expertise, you’ll struggle in the confines of your selected template. By outsourcing your online development process to an affordable marketing firm, you’ll be able to expand far beyond the limitations of templates. The goal of a marketing firm is to customize your website and marketing campaign every step of the way, giving you ownership over your brand and web presence that a cookie cutter website cannot accomplish.

Small Firm Effect

There are several ideas behind the concept of Small Firm Effect. Firstly, small businesses exist for a reason. They are serving a purpose that larger companies are not able to provide, and their continued success is evidence of this fulfillment. Secondly, small market capitalization has a tendency to outperform large market players, partly because they offer more boutique, quality services. Small companies are able to thrive with a quality over quantity approach to business, much the opposite of large corporations’ usual inability to provide the level of service quality that small firms can. Because they can’t provide a boutique level of quality, larger companies rely on quantity over quality.

Smaller firms can offer better quality services because they are more flexible and nimble to changes in projects or markets, their smaller staff is more attentive to customer needs, and with fewer projects on the schedule, they can spend more time and energy on precision and tailoring. Small companies can also focus on locally targeted content and become a part of online or physical communities.

SEO Marketing

Effective SEO tools will place your website in higher rankings on search engine results pages (SERP). Search engines like Google, Bing, and Yahoo use crawling bots that scan the content, data, security, and other aspects of your website pages. They will then index that information and rank sites based on how positively and accurately they answer a search query according to the search engine algorithm. Algorithms change over time, but many core SEO practices stay relevant for long term use. One example is backlinking. Backlinks have survived as a potent ranking factor despite the banning of many backlink related spam techniques. An example of an outdated SEO practice is keyword stuffing or overloading the use of keywords in your text content. A change that is coming in SEO marketing practices is Google’s launch of their Page Experience signal system. These new SEO guidelines are geared to favor websites with strong user experience metrics, including fast load times, interactivity, and balanced visuals.

Pay Per Click

SEM marketing techniques like pay-per-click (PPC) advertising and Google Ads can be effective, but nothing beats SEO practices for positive results and cost effectiveness. The strategic use of keywords and multimedia, installation of metadata, URL building, continued release of fresh content, and increased accessibility for a broader range of users will all play a significant role in improving your SEO. Our team of SEO experts, freelance writers, graphic designers, and video production staff combine forces to make our customers’ websites soar to higher ranks on SERPs.

Social Media Marketing

Another aspect of effective web marketing is the use of social media platforms to promote your brand and grow your audience. Having multiple social media outlets for your company might seem like a lot of tedious work in order to build hashtags, create well designed visual content, and write strong captions, but there are ways to streamline the process. The best social media presences will have a team dedicated to running on mainstream platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. Social media marketing campaigns can see even further audience growth by creating video content for platforms that are expanding the internet in unique ways, such as TikTok and Snapchat. If you can’t afford your own social media marketing team you can still get a whole team working for you by contracting with an agency like MLT Group.

Improving Social Media

To get started improving your social media marketing presence, there are a few basic steps you can take. Or have experienced digital marketing pros help you with these steps.

  1. Establish your ideal customer and target audience. This can include demographics like age, location, income, social media presences, job titles, and aesthetics.
  2. Examine your current presence before determining the next steps forward. Pinpoint which platforms and networks you are the most important to your target audiences and optimize your presence on those accounts with clear photos, descriptions, bios, and URLs.
  3. Make a messaging that is a constant across all your social media platforms and your website. This messaging should explain to your audiences the values of your brand and help build trust with potential and existing users.
  4. Calculate your key performance indicators (KPI). Social media analytics often provide metrics that work as KPIs, such as likes, shares, conversion rates, brand shout outs, sentimental feedback, time spent on each platform, and post reach.
  5. Create fresh and engaging content on a regular basis. Social media is a great space to humanize your brand, show what’s going on “behind the scenes,” and overall build a fun and interesting environment beyond the professional aspects of your website. You can also use your platforms to curate other brands; content and outreach to build relationships with like-minded companies.
  6. Track your data, analyze results, and use this feedback to continually optimize your social media marketing practices. Social media platforms are the best spaces for trial and error because of their low cost and ease of content production.

If you also utilize ecommerce as a primary part of company operations, pairing those online sales tools with SEO, social media, custom site design, and the support of a boutique firm will help your brand grow and build a dedicated audience with strong user relationships.

To learn more about our services for web development in Minneapolis, MN and across the country, contact MLT Group at (507) 281-3490 or at sales@mltgroup.com.

Posted on

The Power of Modern Video Production in Rochester, MN for Website Media

MLT Group has provided professional video production services since 1986. Since then our services have grown to include social media marketing, graphic design, web design, SEO, and more. Our video services team has decades of experience creating visual and audio rich productions that are excellent ways to engage your audience, improve your professional image, and provide a wealth of information concisely and memorably. Videos have long ranked as the most effective communication and marketing tool compared to other content, having outpaced text content and images. With the high-resolution screens and fast internet of today’s highly technological world, videos have come into their own. With our capabilities for video production in Rochester, MN, the Upper Midwest region, and even nationally, brands can increase site traffic, grow their audience, and create long-lasting impressions with viewers.

Digital Devices

In early 2020, reports showed individuals spend an average of 3.7 hours a day on digital devices. Since the coronavirus pandemic enhanced dependence on digital access for hundreds of millions, that number has likely increased significantly. Much of the content we interact with online is video. From YouTube videos to streaming services, it’s rare to go through your day without watching at least one video.

As a provider of comprehensive video production services, including corporate and industrial videos, animation, videos for the web and social media, and even 4k resolution aerial video, we know there are several growing trends in the video world for businesses and organizations to keep in mind.

Some Statistics:

  1. Video display sizes are shrinking with larger percentages of users watching them on smartphones, tablets, and other smaller devices. Video producers should keep in mind how details and spatial placement of on-screen images will be processed visually on smaller screens.
  2. 49% of users watch over five videos daily.
  3. Most users report they find video advertisements more relevant than other formats.
  4. YouTube was ranked higher than Facebook in 2020 for consumer traction and effectiveness in changing consumer behavior.
  5. Online videos are predicted to take up 82% of consumer traffic by 2022. This is 15 times higher than it was in 2017.
  6. 73% of adults in the US utilize YouTube, including almost all 15 to 25-year-olds.
  7. 90% of DIY makers use how-to videos on YouTube.
  8. 60% of businesses use videos for marketing purposes.
  9. 50% of marketers using video have been doing so for at least a year.
  10. 14% of marketers make videos daily.
  11. 36% of marketers make videos weekly.
  12. 94% of brands using video will continue to rely on it for effective marketing purposes.
  13. 74% of businesses using marketing videos say it has a higher return on investment (ROI) than photographs, pictures, or other static imagery.
  14. 68% of businesses say videos have a better ROI than Google Ads.
  15. The consumption of videos on mobile devices increases annually by 100%.

These statistics show by the numbers that videos are the content of the future, and our consumption of video media will only increase as a nation. If you aren’t convinced that there is power to modern video content and video marketing strategies, think about the way you interact with the videos you see around you. Even if you don’t seek out YouTube or Facebook videos, use streaming services, or watch TV, you’ll likely be exposed to a video somewhere in the world.

Video Content

Video content is everywhere, from screens on gas station pumps to digital billboards. Most employers require their staff to watch videos for training, announcements, and other work-related relays of information. News providers use video footage whenever they have it to show what’s happening in the world. Video content has increased so significantly over the years because it is the number one most engaging material, and those who use it know how well it works.

If you’re considering incorporating video content into your brand’s image, marketing strategy, or website, there are three levels of media formats to consider. These levels are the ABCs of video content, and each is effective in various ways.

A-Level:

A-level videos are generally the most polished, produced types of video content and the most expensive and often time-consuming productions. However, these videos can be worth their cost and effort if you need to create a professional, credible, and trustworthy impression. National commercials, corporate profiles, TV products, product explanations, and brand overviews are just some examples of A-level videos that can establish a clear description of the video topic in a professional way. Brands typically partner with a video or marketing company to create a scripted, staged video, often filmed with high resolution cameras and sound systems.

Most brands produce a few A-level videos to establish the quality of their brand, products, or services. Two great examples of A-level company videos are the My Career. My Culture. and My Kohler. commercial for Kohler and their Altogether Kohler highlight reel.

B-Level:

Companies and organizations with smaller budgets may produce mostly B-level material. These videos are generally planned out, scripted, shot, and edited professionally, but without big-budget production values. Even if they aren’t perfect, these videos are highly effective for growing your audience and imparting trustworthiness and authenticity to users. Such videos can create a great connection between your users and your brand without breaking your budget. Common B-level videos include regional commercials, internal corporate videos, how-to videos, educational content, social media videos, video series, testimonials, product demonstrations, and staff profiles.

The lower costs of B-level videos can allow brands to publish new content regularly. With regular video content users will see consistency and reliability in your brand’s practices. To produce a video of this quality requires a script, a production design, on-screen talent, organization and scheduling, professional video equipment and videographers, a director to work with your talent, design for graphics and animation, voice over talent and studio sound recording, and finally professional video editing and mastering.

C-Level:

Finally, we have C-level video content. While C-level videos are the least produced, rawest, and most unpolished content, they can also be one of the best ways to connect with your audience and humanize your brand and team. C-level videos can be done as quickly as pulling out a cell phone or webcam and recording. Some C-level videos include sharing sessions, on-location industry highlights, social media story videos, live polls, product chats, and more. These videos personalize your employees, they can show how passionate your brand is, you can use them to communicate directly with your audience, and because they are the cheapest to produce, you can release C-level content frequently. Social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and SnapChat have live feeds and story options that are ideal for releasing C-level videos.

Another benefit of using C-level videos is that they require little editing, they often don’t need more than one person to shoot, and they are low cost. Even if you invest in a portable light and microphone to improve lighting and audio quality, you can usually get these tools for less than $50.

Video Production

No matter what kind of video content you produce or hire a professional to make for you, it’s always a great practice to generate captions to the audio or provide transcriptions of the video into a text format. Not only does this help your brand become more ADA compliant, it will expand your audience, make your site a more inclusive user space, and demonstrate your ethical practices.

To learn more about our video production services in Rochester, MN, contact MLT Group at (507) 281-3490, sales@mltgroup.com today.

Posted on

2022 Web Design Trends in Minneapolis, MN That Will Improve Your Brand Image Online

Since the coronavirus forced nonessential shutdowns and working from home became the norm, internet technology dramatically increased its development speeds. New tools and systems are advanced almost daily, design elements and product features trend with frequent turnover rates, and changing SEO algorithms can make or break your site’s effectiveness on search engine platforms. If you own an online brand, it can be challenging to know what the best methods are for success. To answer some of your questions, we’ve gathered data on what’s working and what’s popular today for SEO and design growth. There are a few trends we’ve predicted will become some of the pioneers for web design in 2022. If you need comprehensive, high quality web development and SEO services, MLT Group’s experts can provide web design, marketing, SEO, social media, video production, graphic design, and more. We provide services for complete web development while meeting contemporary web design trends in Minneapolis, MN and across the country.

Web Design Trends

While there are web building foundations and core values that can remain valid for many years and change only with the invention of significantly new technology, there are also hundreds of standards that shift with web design trends. From SEO algorithms created by search engines to the general visual aesthetics of a website, there are many aspects of web design that can rapidly change as new trends arise.

This coming year will likely see changes to web design and technology, especially because of Google’s spring launch of the Page Experience update. This update changes the SEO algorithm for Google rankings to place greater emphasis on user experience. Google’s SEO index and ranking system will now favor sites that have media, tools, aesthetics, and other features that improve user experience.

Some other changes that are predicted to be major web design trends in 2022 include the following:

Fun and positivity:

After the heaviness of 2020 and 2021, users are predicted to respond better to fun, positive, and visually optimistic site designs. This means colors will trend bolder and brighter, sites might include nonconforming functional features like animations and illustrations, and there might be an increase in the use of visual and sonic media. We are already seeing trends of sites using illustrated entry pages, animated buttons, unique fonts, and even games. With a trend of lighthearted, positive messaging both literally and visually, brands are building their websites to connect with users who are just now easing back into pre-pandemic patterns of life.

Some great examples of sites using fun, positive design systems include the Bernard Forever site, Grace Potter’s site, the Guns 2 Swords site, the Great British Bake Off site, and many more. An easy way to start incorporating fun and positive designs into your site is to increase your use of bright colors, include more visual media like photos or illustrations, and increase movement of site tools without compromising the user’s ability to navigate your pages (such as a bouncing page button or a photo reel).

3D and interactive:

Another predicted trend for web design in 2022 is the incorporation of three-dimensional systems and the increase in user interactive systems. This is largely due to the excitement around newly developed technology, but we think it’s a trend that will last because it improves the user experience and opens the door for increased brand presence at the forefront of modern web designs. 3D designs and interactive multimedia can exist because of the high resolution and detailing capabilities of today’s screens. Standards in image quality have shifted from HD to 4K over the last couple years, and some devices even use 6K-8K screen resolutions. In addition to increased resolution, internet speeds, broadband limits, and data feeds have increased dramatically to gather information better and faster.

Thanks to increased abilities for screen resolution and internet speeds, websites can incorporate cutting edge technologies for 3D and multimedia design. This includes augmented reality (AR), virtual reality (VR), smart video, interactive statistics content, micro animations, large scale videos, highly expanded images, and more. These design features can be used to make your site more engaging for the user, increasing your brand profile and improving your profile’s imagery.

However, when incorporating 3D and interactive designs, it’s important to keep in mind that many users might not have access to screens with the highest resolution or internet capacities that can load complex media. There are ways to still build 3D and multimedia systems into your site design that can add richness to your brand and still be simple enough in coding and data requirements for all users to process on their devices. Two great examples of this are the Sennep site and the Kaspersky security company map.

ScrollyTelling:

ScrollyTelling, or narrative visualization, has been a growing trend over the last couple years. This involves the presentation of long form content in a text format “translated” for the user by breaking down each part of the text into smaller sections and including images and other media along the way. ScrollyTelling can impart information in 1,000 words or more to the user by breaking that information into intuitive paragraphs accompanied by related imagery. It resembles the way magazines format long form articles and editorials. This system of narrative visualization can be built into your site design easily, using the existing aesthetics and formatted spaces of your pages.

ScrollyTelling is a useful way to impart informational or journalistic articles, blogs, or product pages to your users. Some great examples of narratively visualized pages include the Apple AirPods product page, MLT Group’s page on SEO for Minneapolis, and a very in depth Huffington Post interview with chef José Andrés.

Also referred to as “deep dive content”, this style of web page has special importance for search engine optimization. Pages of 2,000 words and more provide Google and other search engines with a cue that the page may be a good resource for searchers. Utilizing scrollytelling design concepts makes these long form pages as engaging as they are important to SEO.

Mindful and accessible:

With a growing social importance placed on equality, human rights, and inclusive activism, it’s no wonder that mindful and accessible web design is a huge trend today. Especially after the pandemic lockdowns when everyone turned to the internet for news, entertainment, and work more than ever before, web designers realized they needed to make their sites clearer, quieter, and more direct. Part of mindful web design is to make your site a low stress, clean, and oriented space for the user. This includes using your white/negative space to create a sense of calm, removing overwhelming and unneeded graphics, and generally optimizing your site for as many types of users as possible.

Making your site mobile optimized and thumb navigation friendly will also increase the user’s accessibility, as most will interact with your site on their phones and laptops interchangeably.

A big part of making your site mindful and accessible is to adapt it to become ADA compliant. Incorporating features that follow the regulations of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) is not only an ethical practice, it will also expand your usership to people with disabilities like visual or hearing impairments, seizure conditions, cognitive issues, and much more. To learn more about our ADA compliant features, click the blue circular button in the bottom left corner of our site.

2022 web development standards:

In addition to these general design trends, there will also be standardized developments that will improve your site’s ranking in search engine indexes. Two of these coming requirements include mobile first design and SSL certificates. Optimizing your site for mobile is not only a mindful and accessible design system, it’s just not really optional anymore. Since 2017, almost half of the global web traffic was done from a mobile device, and Google uses mobile optimization standards as one of their key ranking systems. SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) certificates started as their own trend, but today are a highly standardized security system. SSL security measures authenticate the validity of your site to users, and they encrypt the translated data, protecting user devices and identities.

These are just some popular web design trends in Minneapolis, MN predicted for 2022. To learn more about web design and our comprehensive services, contact MLT Group at (507) 281-3490, sales@mltgroup.com, or online today.

 

Posted on

Signs of Quality Web Development in St. Paul, MN

One of the most effective ways to build a brand online and grow your company is to have a high quality, attractive, and well-functioning website. Building a good website takes time, hard work, and intention. Your website is a direct representation of the aesthetics, professionalism, and abilities of your brand. In today’s highly digital world, your website is the primary way that your audience learns about your products, services, or goals as a company. User response to the form and function of a website will almost immediately determine if they will continue to interact with your brand or click away. In fact, many reports show that users are 50% less likely to interact with a site that takes longer than two seconds to load. Maintaining visual interest, creating a trustworthy atmosphere, building accessibility, and providing all the necessary information clearly are some of the basic foundational tactics to establishing a great website. At MLT Group, we provide comprehensive web development in St. Paul, Minneapolis, Rochester, the surrounding areas, and the rest of the United States. We serve a broad range of brands and companies and can help you grow as a business by creating an effective website with accessible content for a diverse audience.

Web Development

There are many aspects of effective web development that go into building a quality website, but all of those elements will fall into two categories: form and function. The function of your website includes your informational content, navigation, user interface, and many other components of how well your website works and what tools are available to your audience. The form of your site covers the aesthetics, design, responsive layout, and other cosmetic factors that make it desirable, easy, and even fun for users to interact with.

When you start building your website, understanding the fundamental purpose of its function is critical before you can consider any of the design or form aesthetics.

Function

The function of your website is the reason why it exists and the practical way it works. Do you need it to provide information to users, sell products, promote your services, or create a location for your audience? Most likely, you’ll need it to do all that and more. There are several core values of website functionality that will get you started with a great foundation for your web development right away.

Outline your website’s purpose(s):

Consider the reason your brand exists and focus on its most primary purposes. If you sell products and services, the primary purpose of your website is ecommerce. If your brand is a publication, your website’s primary purpose is to relay your published content into a digital format. While “purpose” can quickly become complex when marketing, audience interactions, and many other goals come up, it’s important to make the primary purpose of your brand the true footing of your web development.

Make your site easy to use:

Site visitors are often impatient. Your website needs to load quickly and have easily accessible information. The best way to start building a site that is easy to navigate is to conform to some aspects of traditional website design. This often means having clear dropdown menus, consistent placement of buttons, links, text, and images, a home page button, social media pathways, search bars, and more. If users can find information easily on your website, it will make them more likely to continue interaction beyond what they originally came to find.

Optimize for devices:

You never know what kind of device a user is using to interact with your website. The only way to be sure everything is loading correctly and showing all your content in the format you want it to is to optimize your site for every kind of device, including desktops, smartphones, tablets, and other screens. The fact is there is no excuse for a website to show up jumbled, not load, or have other issues on different devices in this day and age. Optimizing for mobile and other devices will improve user interface and make your website more attractive to search engines.

Use SEO tools:

When you implement search engine optimization (SEO) techniques, you can improve the chances of your website’s inclusion in search engine results. Search engines like Google, Bing, and Yahoo use specific algorithms to gather web results for users searching specific terms. If a user searches “sushi near me,” for example, the algorithm will pull up top rated sushi restaurants in the targeted location. The algorithm will favor websites that are built well and optimized, websites that use the keyword “sushi” and the target location, and websites that use other SEO tools. Additional SEO tools include specific text, using page titles, tags, sitemaps, frequent publishing of fresh content, and more.

Use social media platforms:

Putting your brand on multiple social media platforms can improve your image, create unique communication pathways with your audience, and make your website more legitimate. You don’t have to use every social media platform out there, but it’s a good idea to utilize the three mains: Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter. These days, many successful brands also use Snapchat and Tik Tok. Linking these platforms with apps that act as single hubs will make it easier to maintain new content on all accounts at once.

Form

Once your main purpose and the foundation of website function is established, you can start to consider the form of your site. Well-crafted visuals and a specific design aesthetic will play a large part in building your brand and cultivating an audience. Design practices can look different for many brands, but there are some basic principles everyone should follow.

Colors:

Even if you choose to follow muted or grayscale color schemes, your color choices will say a lot about your brand. We all know that colors affect our emotions, associations, references, and much more. Choose colors for your brand that will positively impact all of the design choices and aesthetics you build into your website in the future. From a practical standpoint, it’s important to pick colors that aren’t overly distracting, make your site readable, and create visual consistency throughout your site. A generic color scheme for a website will use three to eight colors that fit different placements, including the background, title fonts, subtexts, line, buttons, and more.

Font:

Typography is another design factor that plays a large role in establishing your brand aesthetic. There are thousands of fonts available for free, specialty fonts can be purchased, and some brands design their own fonts for anything from their logo to the text on their entire website. Your font choice will also affect how users view your brand. Neutral fonts can relay information quickly and effectively, but more creative fonts can impart artistry and brand effort. Make the font choice for titles, paragraph content, subtitles, logos, and more that will best suit your brand.

Visual hierarchy:

A visual hierarchy determines the arrangement of each website component or media. This hierarchy can apply to colors and font choices, negative space, texture, style, images, or other media. Using a visual hierarchy can help you guide the focus of the user. For example, most users interact with bright or large elements before spending time reading text content. Most users also read pages in an F shape, moving left to right and top to bottom. Creating a grid layout with the visual hierarchy starting in the top left corner of a page is a common way website designers build an attractive aesthetic that users find easy to use.

Media:

Visual media elements like images and videos almost always attract user attention better than text content. Incorporating media without compromising the load time and your website usability can shape a brand design and make your site more appealing to impatient users. Whenever you utilize visuals like images and videos, creating accessibility around them for visually impaired users will increase the diversity of your audience, improve the ethical practices of your business, and make your brand more likeable in general. Adding text descriptions of media makes those design aspects accessible to anyone with a screen reader, text-to-voice app, or other tool that translates visuals to audible content.

Simplicity:

Even if your design aesthetic is bright, heavy in texture, idiosyncratic, or complex in other ways, you should always maintain simplicity in the foundation of your website’s form. Your visuals can be whatever you want, as long as they do not make it difficult for users to read your website, find links, scroll, or interact with your site in any way. The Yale School of Art website is a good example of when overly complicated design gets in the way of user interface. An example of when a complicated visual design built on a simple platform makes for a great website is the Museum of Contemporary Art of Detroit site. Start from a point of simplicity and build your aesthetics on top of that, rather than throwing user ease out the window in favor of visual design.

These basics will help guide you in building a quality website for good functionality with your brand’s specific aesthetic form. Calls to action, email lists, the continued release of fresh content, and many other practices will also play a role in developing your brand and improving your website quality.

To learn more about web development in St. Paul, MN and throughout the region, contact MLT Group at (507) 281-3490, sales@mltgroup.com, or online today.