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Bridge the Gap Podcast Connecting Business Perspectives
Bridge the Gap Podcast Connecting Business Perspectives
Tanisha Lemelle- Website Optimization
Dr. Tanisha Lemelle is the owner and CEO of The Clever Site where she helps small businesses do it BIG online. As a certified digital marketing business consultant, she has helped elevate the brands of attorneys, therapists, authors, and coaches, around the country. In addition to transforming service-based businesses online, Dr. Lemelle is passionate about investing in people and has been actively doing so for almost two decades.
Hello and welcome to another exciting episode of Bridge the Gap connecting business perspectives with your hosts myself, Colton Cockerell and Trisha Stetzel. Our goal is to bridge the generational gender and life experience gap in business through our unique styles of gathering information from our guests. This podcast is sponsored by Jim Butcher, who is a relationship banker with Alligence Bank. Now let's get it started. All right, Hello everyone and welcome to another exciting episode of Bridge the Gap. My name is Colton Cockerell. I am a Certified Financial Fiduciary and an independent financial advisor with Sharer McKinley Group. So with me today as always, I have my lovely co host Miss Trisha Stetzel.
Trisha Stetzel :Good afternoon and Happy Wednesday Trisha Stetzel here owner of Results Xtreme Business Solutions. Your business coach for the day.
Colton Cockerell :Love it! Trisha, Go ahead and introduce our guests today.
Trisha Stetzel :Absolutely. I'm so dang excited that Dr. Tanisha Lamelle is with us today. So I want to give a little bit of background on her and then we're going to have her come in and introduce herself. So, Dr. Lamelle is the owner and CEO of the Clever Site, where she helps small businesses do it big online. As a certified digital marketing business consultant. She's helped elevate the brands of attorneys, therapists, authors and coaches around the country. In addition to transforming service based businesses online, Dr. Lamelle is passionate about investing in people and has been actively doing so for almost two decades. Dr. Lamelle Welcome to the show.
Tanisha Lamelle :Thank you so much, Trisha. It's a pleasure to be here. Thank you, Colton, as well. Thank you guys for having me.
Colton Cockerell :Absolutely. Now, I do want to just point out one thing, I think it's a discrepancy in your bio. Two decades?
Tanisha Lamelle :Yes sir.
Colton Cockerell :Wow..Age has done you well.
Tanisha Lamelle :Thank you Thank you.
Trisha Stetzel :You're not getting you're not getting brownie points for that.
Colton Cockerell :I'm trying to make Trisha jealous right now. Okay, let's go ahead and jump into questions Tanisha we don't have you for too long so want to make sure that we jump in and maximize the time and really give our listeners want to hear it let them hear what they want to know when it comes to you know, digital what what do they need a website when it comes to website so let me jump in. So really I don't know if you know the way that works Trisha and I we have a we have a generational approach where we ask questions. So I'm the millennial obviously. She's the gen Xer. And so I do want to ask as a millennial. I'm all about saving money. And I'm all about doing it myself. Right. So why should I pay a developer when there are some do it yourself tools out there on the internet? I can just Google it.
Tanisha Lamelle :Well, that's a very good question Colton. And it's actually one that I get asked quite often And my answer to that is this Well, it depends on a lot of things. A website is going to cost you something, it's either going to cost you money, or it's going to cost you time. If you have time to invest in building the website yourself, if you have time to invest in acquiring the skills that it's going to take to build the website, a website that's actually going to perform for you then to go with the DIY tools. There are some great DIY tools out there. But I do say Be very careful with that. Because On the flip side, although you can build the website using these tools, usually for very low cost, if not free, what you end up getting is basically a leased site. So you don't own the website. You don't own the content, the images, you don't own anything on the site, it's belongs to the DIY tool, the software man. So say you use one of these tools to build your site. And then that company goes out of business well, so does your website goes with it or if that company changes their rules or hikes up there. prices, you cannot download that site from that DIY platform. It's there. So it's kind of like leasing a website versus purchasing your own website that you can download to any host or any server and take along with you. Now, again, I do understand that for a lot of startups, a lot of small business entrepreneurs, a good website can be rather costly. So if budget is an issue, then maybe you do want to look at the DIY option, because there are some good tools out there. But even those tools do take you know, do have a learning curve. So it is an option but definitely if you can't afford to get a good website and a good developer, then I would recommend going that route.
Colton Cockerell :And I've never heard it said like that before leasing versus buying I think that's very interesting. It's well put
Trisha Stetzel :think, yeah, absolutely, and scary all at the same time. I know Tanisha I'm old school as Colton indicated earlier, he is the millennial in this group. So as an X Gener, or maybe even our baby boomers that are out there, we have websites, right? We're we're business owners, we have websites, we want people to find us. We hate social media. So is there is there a tie between the two of them so there's so the younger people, Colton might be active on social media and doesn't need a website. And I and my group of friends, Colton may have a website without social media. So can you kind of explain how to to go hand in hand?
Tanisha Lamelle :Absolutely. Again, what I believe Well, here's it's kind of like the same question you just asked about using the DIY tools because those social media platforms don't belong to you. So again, if Facebook Twitter if they change their rules, you're you lose your you can lose all of your contacts, you can lose your database, you can lose all of the content that you've spent hours creating, putting on those social media platforms. Social media is excellent for driving traffic to your website. But that's really what it should be used for. You can post on those social media platforms. And they're definitely necessary in terms of search engine optimization and getting the traffic to your website. But ultimately, you want to have a home where you can track those leads, you can actually track not only track the leads, but capture those leads of people that are seeing you online so that you can then build your tribe and communicate with them on your time and on on your rules.
Trisha Stetzel :I love that see, Colton, you do need a website
Colton Cockerell :and I actually I do have one. However, I am more active on social media I will admit that so this is actually a doesn't matter what generation you are. I'm just curious. You know, when I'm whenever you search for, you know, a financial planner or a business coach on Google, you know what, what determines if you show up If you don't show up
Tanisha Lamelle :search engine optimization and that no, that's a big confusing term to a lot of people. So I will try to break it down. Basically, you need a good balance between the social media and the website, because again, you have to drive traffic to your website. Showing up on Google is all about presenting yourself as an authority in your industry. Google looks for the authority, they want to send their visitors to the site that is going to be able to provide the information that the customers are looking for. So how do they do that? Well, through you putting content or through you having increased traffic on your website, that's what's going to help you rank on Google and that's what's going to help you be found by people that are searching for those particular keywords. Now, there's a lot of technical stuff that goes in to building the website. can make your website search engine friendly, again, is why I recommend using a developer so that you can build in that technical part of your website for good SEO. But then there's also the on page SEO, or the content development and the things that you do externally to drive traffic to your website. So it's really important, again, about having a good well designed website, as well as having good content that you're putting out on a consistent basis. Be it through your blog, be through your social media posts, your Twitter, your Instagram, whatever platform your audience tends to be on the most, you want to make sure that you're reaching them there. So it's about having that balance between a good strong website, recent content relevant content, and having that social media presence and the SEO technical side driving traffic to your website.
Colton Cockerell :So then going back to my original, my original question.
Tanisha Lamelle :If you don't have a good website, if you're doing it yourself, Does that hurt you when it comes to SEO? could very well if you don't understand h1 tags and you know, anchor tags and all of that all the part that goes into the technical side over your head. Yeah, most people which is, which is why, like I said the DIY, it's a great option for those who need that option. In the beginning, I started off with the DIY site, when I started my business, and I was initially building sites for clients. I started off with a DIY tool. But then I realized that I was limiting myself and my clients with those tools, because I could only do what that platform would allow me to do. Now the platform that I use, which is WordPress, I can, I can if WordPress does not have a plug in or if there's not a functionality already built in, I can write the code for it and develop that out. So I've yet to have a customer or client come to me and say, hey, I want to do this on my website. And we weren't able to figure out how to get it done. If I don't have the skill set one of my developers or I can bring in someone that can get that done. So the sky's the limit when you do it, you're when you don't do it yourself and you have someone that understands coding and can actually build out the website.
Trisha Stetzel :Oh, that's a great lead in Tanisha to my next question, which is if I know or maybe I don't know, I think that I'm in the market for digital marketing. I own a small business. And I think that I want to hire someone to manage that for me, what types of things should I be looking for, as I interview companies or people that might help me with digital marketing?
Tanisha Lamelle :One is, red flags are a lot of red flags in the industry. Because the deal with digital marketing is it's really hard to regulate in terms of what you get for what you pay for. Right. So unfortunately, there have been a lot of people that have taken advantage of it and so a lot of people don't stay around for a long time. So one thing that I would look for someone that's been in the industry for a while. Someone that has experience has some references, you want to make sure that your work is one that is legit. Not just someone that has a pretty sight and search for something. So definitely you want someone that's qualified. The other deal is you want to make sure that if somebody is making promises to you that I'll get you on the first page of Google. That's usually a red flag, because they may be able to increase your numbers and get you better traffic and you better visibility. But Google changes their algorithms all the time, their employees don't even always know how to get to the first page of Google. And what works today may not work tomorrow. So one thing you have to know is that SEO is an ongoing service for someone to say I can do this for you for a flat fee, and you're going to be on the first page of Google. Even if you're there tomorrow, you're probably not going to be there next week. SEO is an ongoing process to find Someone that you again, that's credible, that's not making false promises, and someone that you can have a relationship with because it is going to be a long term relationship.
Colton Cockerell :That's, that's great. Um, and now let me let me kind of switch gears here and ask you back to web design. You know, cuz things change, right? Things get things go out of date, things get more cool. Oh, the way this looks looks better. What would you suggest when it comes to updating your website and maybe the look and feel how, how many years until you really look into doing that?
Tanisha Lamelle :Well, in terms of the look and feel of the website, that's kind of a personal preference, because you want to make sure that you're staying on brand. You don't want to be changing the colors and your logos and all that stuff all the time. You want to be consistent with your brand. But yes, styles change. What's more important is that you're constantly changing the content and what you're saying, right? Because the message is going to be changing, and you want to make sure that your message is relevant. And so we offer what we offer website care plans because the technical technology behind the website gets All too, and those things need to be updated. So, and most people don't have the technical skill or don't want to do the plugin updates, the software updates and all those things can slow your website down and again, affect your search engine optimization. So you definitely want to make sure that you're on some type of care or maintenance plan. And just like you would with your car, you know, if you're fine with changing the oil on your car, then maybe you want to do your own updates on your website. If you're that DIY type person, there are people out there that want to do it. But most people, most of my clients who like no way know how, just make sure it's running, make sure it's running well. So what a website care plan is definitely something you want to consider to make sure your site is staying up to date, not only on the back end, and also making sure that you're having relevant content posted on a consistent basis.
Colton Cockerell :Yeah, I love it. I love it. So let me ask you this totally off the wall question here. And for some reason, I guess really why the way I'm feeling is where the questions come from, because it's always traveled past like a ton of podcasts a bit about travel. I guess that's just where I'm at right now. But would you rather go snorkeling in the grand Caymans or hiking in Canada? preferably, BAMFF
Tanisha Lamelle :Grand Caymans, for sure because I love tropical weather. My mother's from Bermuda. So anytime I can get next to some water or beach or some beautiful, like the setting that you're sitting in right now, Colton. Oh, my goodness. Yes, absolutely. That's easy. For me, although I do want to go and visit Canada.
Colton Cockerell :I'll tell you what, I am so desperate to do either of those right now. I just want to get away. That's awesome. Tanisha Thank you so much. It's always great to talk to industry experts. So actually, you've been doing this for 20 plus years. So that's incredible. We'd love to have people that have a lot of credibility and people who walk the talk and you're honest with people, that's what I love. So that's why we had you on the show today. Thank you.
Trisha Stetzel :I have one last maybe easy set of questions for you. What generation if you don't mind sharing with us are you in?
Tanisha Lamelle :I think I'm somewhere in between the two of you guys. Definitely closer to you, Trisha. Definitely.
Trisha Stetzel :I think Colton is coined a phrase for that. What are we calling it Colton?
Colton Cockerell :Millinal X
Trisha Stetzel :Okay, so which generation Do you feel you most identify with?
Tanisha Lamelle :Wow, that's a good question. Probably. Wow, that's a good, really good question because I have kids. So, you know, I had to stay up to date with everything, or they try to keep me up to date with everything. So I try to relate a little bit to everybody. I guess I'd have to say Generation X, um,
Colton Cockerell :you know, but in her defense, it's kind of both because she's very techie. And she was pretty hip, been able to sit out with her. So she is kind of like a millennial. But she also does have an old soul and she's very like, she can play both pretty well. So
Trisha Stetzel :Calling right you're talking about me you were just describing me Of course we got to work on I gotta I gotta get you more relevant with the time so don't worry about it Trisha. Okay, perfect. So Tanisha in closing please tell us the name of your business and how our audience can reach out to you if they have questions and any upcoming events that you may have and please spell it out for our listeners will obviously post this in the comments inside the post as well.
Tanisha Lamelle :Sure, absolutely. You can reach me on my website at the clever site.com Don't forget the word the in front of the clever site. You can also email me directly at tanisha at the clever site dot co, and that's T A N I S H A at the clever site dot com, and that's clever site T H E C L E V E R S I T E just in case you were wondering You can also get a free ebook download for the five things any small business owner can do in the next week to improve their website. And you can get that on my website right now as well. So
Colton Cockerell :Tanisha thank you so much for coming out. We always appreciate having you.
Tanisha Lamelle :Absolutely. Thank you for inviting me. It's been a been a pleasure
Trisha Stetzel :amazing and our pleasure to have you. So if there's a certain professional or professor that you want to hear from, please leave a comment and this week's Facebook post, we'd love for you to subscribe and share this podcast. And this concludes this week's podcast Tune in next week for another exciting episode of Bridge the Gap connecting business perspective.
Colton Cockerell :Thank you again for tuning in to this week's episode of Bridge the Gap: connecting business perspectives. If there's a certain professional or profession that you want to hear from, leave a comment in this week's Facebook post. Please subscribe and share this podcast. Thanks again to our sponsor, Jim Butcher, a relationship banker with Allegiance Bank. Colton Cockerell with Sharer McKinley Group, LLC is located 820 South Friendswood Drive, Suite 207, Friendswood, Texas 77546 phone number 281-992-5698. Securities and investment advisory services offered through NEXT Financial Group, Inc member FINRA/SIPC. Sharer McKinley Group is not an affiliated NEXT Financial Group, Inc.