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Dear valued customers,
 
In light of the escalating situation regarding coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic Webware is taking various steps to manage and respond to the evolving circumstances around this pandemic, while following the guidance of local health agencies who are monitoring the COVID-19 pandemic.
 
In order to assist in the prevention of further spread of the virus, Webware is currently undertaking social distancing measures to ensure the safety of our employees and continuity in service to our customers through employing a ‘work from home’ strategy. 
 
Webware will strive to ensure that these measures cause little to no disruption in expected service levels, but ask for your patience as we transition into this temporary working arrangement.
 
The team at Webware also requests that our customers and partners look to see how they can be good corporate citizens going above and beyond to assist your customers and partners to the best of your ability in these challenging times.
 

View a message from Cory York, CEO & Co-founder - Webware

At Webware our greatest asset is our people and in an effort to be of greater assistance to our customers, we are going to unleash the power of our people through the COVID Support Hotline.
 
In the last 24 hours we have established a 24 hour/7 day a week hotline for Webware customers who may require assistance during this time. If the service can be performed over the phone or internet, we are here to help. 
 
Whether it’s arranging a doctor’s appointment, getting updates on the Covid virus in your area or waiting on hold to change travel arrangements we are here to assist. If you have any questions or require our assistance, please feel free to reach out to covid19@webware.io or on our Toll Free Support Line at 1.844.WEBWARE ext. 5
 
As circumstances evolve, please know that Webware is doing everything we can to manage and respond to the COVID-19 pandemic, with the safety of our employees, customers and partners in mind. At Webware our goal is not only to deliver the same level of great service that our customers have become accustomed to, but to go above and beyond to assist you.

Webware is always working to improve our Digital Services Plan to help our clients reach more potential customers and improve their bottom line through Digital Marketing.

This week, we are excited to announce Instagram images for your blog posts.

Starting in March 2019, all Webware Digital Service clients who participate in the blog program will receive social media images they can use on their Instagram account.

The Instagram images will include a professionally designed social media image that includes the title and the main points of the blog post. We will provide one main image for a post and subsequent images breaking down the blog post points for your Instagram story. For example, the image seen below.

By adding this feature to our blog program, you’ll be able to reach a larger audience by posting your blog link on Instagram with an eye-catching image and share your blog post through Instagram stories. Click here to view an example of how this new feature will look on your Instagram.

This new blog feature is included for all Webware clients participating in the blog program as part of the Digital Services Plan.

Webware will start rolling out Instagram images over the next couple of weeks so keep an eye out for them in your blog draft email soon!

If you haven’t taken advantage of our blog service, now is a great time to get started! Once you receive your monthly blog email, choose a topic and fill out the form to get started!

This feature is only available to Digital Service customers. If you are not enrolled for our Digital Service Plan, click here to join.

If you have any questions, please email support@webware.io

At Webware, we create and send out thousands of email campaigns a month for our customers. After building newsletters on the usual email marketing platforms, we felt the options available out there were too complicated. So we decided to make our own. 

Today, we are announcing the launch of "Newsletter".

"Newsletter" is the easiest email marketing platform you have ever used and it's available for free to every Webware customer right now!

Say goodbye to using those other complicated email marketing tools. Webware’s Newsletter platform makes it easier than ever to send out beautiful, engaging email newsletters. Stay in touch with your customers using our user-friendly newsletter platform right from the Webware dashboard.

First and foremost, it's simple to use. With "Newsletter", you can select the customers you would like to send an email to, write your email, upload images, style your text and click send. You can use an existing template or build your own format with "click and drag" boxes. Or if you know HTML, you can customize away. 

Once you've sent out the email, you can track the success of your newsletter. With Webware’s Newsletter, it’s simple to see if your newsletter is reaching clients and how effective it is. Easily keep track of how many people have opened your newsletter, clicked on the content in the email, or unsubscribed. Easily create a follow-up campaign to customers who showed the most interest by creating a new list based on clicks.

To learn more about how to use Webware's "Newsletter" email tool, please click here. To learn more about Webware's complete digital toolkit for business, please click here. 

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One of the things that makes Google the most popular online search engine is its endless mission to put users first. Their goal is to give you, the user, the most reliable, accurate and up-to-date information available anywhere on the World Wide Web.  Google’s steadfast commitment to the user-experience has sparked another update to its Search Engine Results Page (SERP) ranking factors. 

Google recently announced that starting in January 2017, websites with interstitials will rank lower in search engine results than websites without. 

What’s an interstitial?

Interstitial is the official name for a full-page (or mostly full-page), intrusive popup that prevents a website visitor from accessing the webpage content underneath. Many of them come in the form of advertisements or email newsletter signup prompts. Other types include interstitials that are required by law for age verification, “You must be 18 to enter this website” or to inform visitors that a website uses cookies. Interstitials for legal purposes will not affect search ranking results. 

Google firmly believes these annoying popups hinder users’ access to information. This is especially true for mobile devices where screens are generally smaller. This new update should urge websites to eliminate popup ads to keep their ranking high in search engine results. 

According to Google, “Here are some examples of techniques that make content less accessible to a user:

• Showing a popup that covers the main content, either immediately after the user navigates to a page from the search results, or while they are looking through the page.
• Displaying a standalone interstitial that the user has to dismiss before accessing the main content.
• Using a layout where the above-the-fold portion of the page appears similar to a standalone interstitial, but the original content has been inlined underneath the fold.

By contrast, here are some examples of techniques that, used responsibly, would not be affected by the new signal:

• Interstitials that appear to be in response to a legal obligation, such as for cookie usage or for age verification.
• Login dialogs on sites where content is not publicly indexable. For example, this would include private content such as email or unindexable content that is behind a paywall.
• Banners that use a reasonable amount of screen space and are easily dismissible. For example, the app install banners provided by Safari and Chrome are examples of banners that use a reasonable amount of screen space”.

If your website uses a popup to gather email newsletter signups or likes on social media or something else, this new ranking signal is directed at you. Though it won’t come into full effect until January 2017, now is the best time to get rid of those popups to give your customers the best possible user experience.

You can read the full update on the Google Webmaster Forum here.

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The trend of mobile search shows no signs of slowing down soon. Following the path that Google began in April of last year, the mobile-friendliness ranking signal will be updated in May 2016 to further improve mobile search results.

According to TechCrunch, “Google’s search chief Amit Singhal said for the first time this summer [2015], more Google searches were completed on mobile devices than desktop computers”. There are 100 billion searches performed on Google each month with more than half happening on mobile phones! 

With more and more people relying on Google’s mobile search, this update to further penalize non-mobile friendly websites is the next natural step for the search giant. 

From the official Google Webmaster blog,

“Getting good, relevant answers when you search shouldn’t depend on what device you’re using. You should get the best answer possible, whether you’re on a phone, desktop or tablet. Last year, we started using mobile-friendliness as a ranking signal on mobile searches. Today we’re announcing that beginning in May, we’ll start rolling out an update to mobile search results that increases the effect of the ranking signal to help our users find even more pages that are relevant and mobile-friendly.”

With this update to its search algorithm, Google continues to confirm the mobile-first industry standard. If your business website is not mobile friendly, now is the best time for a redesign. Not sure if your website is mobile-friendly? Click here to test your website.

This is great news for Webware customers! Our mobile-friendly, responsive designs will continue to be favoured by Google and give our customers great search results ranking. 

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