Atlantic Business Technologies, Inc.

Author: Natalie Iannello

  • Atlantic BT’s Jon Karnofsky (JonK) to present on cross-functional teams, planning, and empathy.

    Atlantic BT’s Jon Karnofsky (JonK) to present on cross-functional teams, planning, and empathy.

    We are excited to announce that Atlantic BT’s own Director of Operations, Jon Karnofsky, is scheduled to speak at Atlassian’s Team Tour: the Series event on May 11th at 11:00am PDT.

    Atlassian is a global software company dedicated to creating amazing products, practices, and open work for all teams. You’ve likely heard of their software development and collaboration tools like Jira, Confluence, Bitbucket, and Trello.

    This free virtual conference will cover teamwork trends, expert insights, and actionable ways to implement change. Get hacks for maximizing Atlassian products and see how other companies are using their tools to drive long-term success.

    In JonK’s session, he will discuss how we reorganized into cross-functional teams, the  benefits and challenges of moving to teams, and how planning and empathy can be used in organizational change.

    Be sure to check it out on May 11th – Reorganizing into cross-functional teams takes smarts and heart: here’s how we did it.

  • Amplify B2B CRO in 2021.

    Amplify B2B CRO in 2021.

    Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO) has been an element of B2B digital strategy for years. But as more businesses rely on websites as a primary sales channel, bare minimum CRO strategies grow outdated. You’ll be left behind if you aren’t experimenting with CRO on a regular basis.

    How did B2B businesses implement CRO in the past? 

    In the past, CRO usually meant A/B testing “as needed.” Tools like Hotjar or Crazyegg were the most common mechanisms to see how users behaved. You may have made small tweaks based on heat maps and recordings.

    Platforms like Optimizely and Google Optimize were used as tools to test out new ideas or respond to perceived issues. For instance, maybe someone wanted to test using a new opening statement on the home page. Or maybe they realized people drop off on product pages so they tested some new layouts.

    How is CRO changing for B2B companies now?

    Frequency of tests increase.

    Tools used for A/B testing and tracking site behavior are still relevant. However, the way companies are using them is changing.

    According to Sitetuners.com:

    “Businesses will need to shift to a longer-term perspective in their digital marketing and conversion rate optimization efforts in order to gain a sustainable competitive advantage. This means optimizing the entire business as opposed to tactical responses to issues that arise. Tactical optimization is useful but it can only do so much.”

    Instead of reactionary, tactical testing; understand there is constant room for improvement and test every day. Make a minimum amount of tests required of marketing teams. After all, running 10 small tests is bound to provide more useful insights than 1 carefully researched test.

    It’s also important to note that tests are only useful if results are compiled in a way that teams can easily draw insights. If not, it’s easy to repeat testing the same concept over and over instead of creating new hypotheses and moving forward.

    AI amplifies opportunities.

    The largest way we see AI impact CRO is with chatbots. In fact, Backlinko states that Chatbots saw a 92% increase in use in the past year, proving it to be the fastest growing communication channel. Roughly 41% of consumers claim to have used chatbots to assist with purchases, and 33% of consumers hope to be able to use a chatbot to make reservations online.

    You may have also noticed that Machine Learning algorithms are built into search platforms, offering tailored recommendations for people searching. Additionally, real-time price adjustments may be applied to customers, maximizing the probability of a purchase. 

    Dynamic web pages make custom content easy.

    There are many tools available to display dynamic content. This means that you can integrate software with your web platform that shows different versions of content based on a user’s behavior or data. 

    For instance, maybe your website is segmented by industries served. Someone who has viewed eCommerce content may be served with eCommerce resources. Someone who viewed eLearning content may be served with eLearning resources in the same content block.

    Most Marketing Automation tools now offer dynamic content in both emails and web pages. Other site optimization tools, like Omniconvert and Optimizely, offer similar capabilities.  

    Page speed cannot be ignored.

    User expectations for page speed are through the roof. A Google study found that 53% of mobile ad clicks immediately exited when load times exceeded 3 seconds. Furthermore, 47% of consumers expect a page to load in 2 seconds or less. A fast website is much more likely to hold users’ attention  and convert.

    Additionally, with Google core algorithm updates around the corner, it’s more important than ever to make load times a priority with your website. This update will include a factor called Page Experience, which heavily incorporates site speed into rankings.

    Companies are investing in well-researched Information Architecture.

    Information Architecture (IA) is the structural design of organizing information and its findability. For sites with large amounts of diverse content, a well-researched IA is critical to optimize conversions.

    A popular IA question: should we group content by our personas, product and service lines, or industries? 

    The answer is – it depends. Building a successful site structure takes careful analysis of your business offerings and the tasks users wish to perform on your website.

    Aside from organizing web pages into a clear structure, you’ll also have to organize data with clear labeling and categorization called taxonomies. Site search relies on taxonomies to serve users with information relevant to their queries. Your site search is only as useful as your taxonomies!

    All in all, incorporating clear structure will help users navigate to needed information quickly, reduce frustration, and enhance search capabilities; in turn boosting conversions.

    Looking for ways to enhance your B2B CRO strategy?

    If you’re still doing the bare minimum with CRO, it can be difficult to choose the most effective newer methods to prioritize. Atlantic BT can help you build a roadmap and implement tools and best practices that will drive your business forward. If boosting site conversions is a primary goal, reach out for a free consultation to get started.

  • What issues does a content audit expose?

    What issues does a content audit expose?

    When restructuring a complex website, an important first step is to inventory existing content and analyze findings in an audit. 

    The purpose of a content audit is to see which pages exist, decide which ones are valuable, and expose any hidden issues with the website. 

    Content audits tend to expose issues with site structure, technical SEO, orphaned pages, or content value. Take a look at how it works!

    Unveil any strange categories, taxonomies, or hierarchical issues.

    With an outdated or limiting CMS, many companies get in the habit of creating pages without housing them in a logical place. Websites can grow larger over time, creating a mess of page categories, tagging systems, and menus.

    By closely examining pages, a content audit breaks down this mess to guide decisions about the restructure. And good news for you – with a combination of an updated CMS and clear site structure, it will be easy for you to create new pages moving forward. 

    Diagnose technical SEO issues.

    A content audit can also help you diagnose any missed opportunities with SEO. And we’re not talking about expensive monthly backlinking campaigns. There are many ways to optimize your website for search engines by simply building SEO-optimized page templates.

    The content inventory step will show all meta and H1 tags in plain view, allowing marketers to quickly find patterns in how they were generated. Are these page elements exceeding character limits? Missing keywords? Missing altogether? Your new website should have auto-generated meta tags that fall within guidelines. From there, follow best practices to manually optimize key pages.

    At Atlantic BT, we will even take content audits a step further, cross-referencing additional tools to find slow pages and opportunities to incorporate schema markup. 

    Find orphaned pages.

    During a content audit, we trace navigation to all pages and get familiar with paths users can take. If we see a page listed and cannot find a way to navigate there, it’s likely an orphaned page.

    Orphaned pages, or pages that are impossible to get to by clicking through a website, are harmful for both SEO and user experience. According to Search Engine Journal:

    Orphan pages aren’t great for either users or crawlers.

    Users can’t reach those pages through your site’s natural structure so if there’s important or useful information on those pages, it’s wasted.

    This can create a frustrating user experience.

    With no internal links, no authority is passed to the pages, and search engines have no semantic or structural context in which to evaluate the page.

    Without any way of knowing where the page fits into your site as a whole, it can be more difficult to determine which queries the page is relevant for.

    If an orphaned page seems unimportant, you should likely delete it. If there is some value, we’ll find a way to fit it into a new site structure and ensure there is a navigation path.

    Find groups of low-value content.

    Do you have multiple versions of similar pages? A random tagging system for blog posts? Our team can determine the importance of content by referencing analytics data or understanding your business goals.

    However, we consider a content audit a collaborative effort. We’ll rely on you to ultimately decide if a page is valuable for your business.

    What step comes after the content audit?

    An outdated website structure feels like a mess. Even after a content inventory reveals the existing site structure, it can be daunting to take steps toward simplification. 

    Based on our findings in the content audit, Atlantic BT can make recommendations for a new website structure. Does it make sense to categorize by industry, services, or personas? We can help you visualize the options and design a site that is simple for visitors to navigate. Give us a call to learn more.

  • Does your website need to be more functional or usable?

    Does your website need to be more functional or usable?

    The simpler the website design, the easier it is to use. The more functionality a website has, the more useful it can be. With website design and development, the focus needs to be on maintaining a balance between usability and functionality to maximize user satisfaction.

    People need to have access to features that help them complete tasks, but they also have to be able to easily find these features. Plus, they need to be able to comprehend how to use them.

    What makes a website usable?

    A usable website has a simple experience. It’s easy for people to find necessary information, complete tasks, and learn how to use features.

    What makes a website functional?

    A functional website has many operational features. Maybe users can add items to a favorites list, get a price quote from a calculator, make online purchases, or filter through content with search.

    Achieving a usability and functionality balance pays off in website design and development.

    If you can find a way to hit the sweet spot of balancing functionality with usability, you’ll reap the rewards. Crafting a this sort of experience with website design and development means:

    • Increased customer satisfaction
    • More online conversions
    • Boosted brand loyalty and positive word of mouth
    • Reducing frustration that leads to poor word of mouth or people calling support

    Why do people clash over functionality and usability?

    Usability and functionality can be considered a tradeoff in website design and development. It’s not easy to design a website to perform complex tasks while being simple enough for its intended users to handle. 

    You’ll have to face tough questions like: Are some features taking away from others? Are they cluttering the website? Can people find the feature they need? Can the average visitor use the feature easily?

    Usually, designers will push back on stakeholders during this step. While a stakeholder wants to add as much functionality as possible to pages, a web designer needs to remind them that if everything is urgent, nothing is urgent. It’s a team effort to optimally prioritize elements of a page.

    Testing is an essential step in website design and development.

    Good UX is not about adding more features/options. It’s about improving interactions based on how a user wants and needs to engage with the system.

    But how do you know what the user wants to start with? Most businesses incorporate a discovery step before development. At Atlantic BT, this phase includes UX workshops where we map tasks a user would perform on the site, interview or survey for more information, gather additional website requirements, and determine Information Architecture.

    However, after Discovery, the best way to ensure a website is satisfactory is to test a prototype. You need to test what a user will actually do in a scenario (not just what they say they’ll do). For large projects, Atlantic BT tests prototypes of a research-based design to monitor usability before a launch.

    Research, design, and testing can feel overwhelming.

    Handling large website design and development projects in-house can feel overwhelming. Atlantic BT can help. Our streamlined process includes the careful research, requirements gathering, and testing needed for successful launches. Reach out for a free consultation.

  • Four proven processes for digital marketing struggles.

    Four proven processes for digital marketing struggles.

    Many of our clients have marketing teams that handle ads, content, and overall strategy. But even with a well-structured marketing team, it’s easy to spin your wheels on elements of your website that don’t have a clear formula for success. 

    In this grey area, we’ve found some patterns in what our clients need help with. From careful research and testing with hundreds of websites, we’ve compiled some best practices in how to handle common marketing struggles.

    1. You know SEO is essential, but you’re unsure where to spend your time.

    Everyone seems to understand the importance of organic optimization. But as your competitors start to invest in SEO, you quickly realize that you can’t do everything without a large specialized team.

    So how do you identify the quick wins or your “best bang for your buck” initiatives? One way we help our clients discover these quick wins is by completing an SEO audit in an effort to point them in the right direction. 

    Our SEO audits are generally not a one-size-fits-all template. Instead, we take some time to understand your business goals and review your  Google Analytics profile. From there, we identify  pain points and discover opportunities that are worth taking a deeper dive by leveraging other tools.

    These deep dives provide actionable steps to get you ranking for the best keywords. For example, we might:

    • Find page two keywords and provide an internal linking strategy to help achieve page one results.
    • Evaluate site speed performance and identify the top development changes to give you a boost.
    • Provide keyword clusters that help you build a focused content strategy.
    • Generate lists of “unlinked mentions” so you can reach out for backlinks over time.
    • Create guides including best practices for your continual reference.

    2. You’re unsure if your site structure is optimal.

    Does your site have all the necessary information for a potential buyer? Are the right pages prioritized in your navigation? Are the pages named correctly? Are the URL’s optimized? Does the hierarchy make sense?

    There are many factors to consider with creating an improved information architecture. At Atlantic BT, we tend to use a mix of our own well-tested techniques and apply SEO best practices. It’s also important that we follow a certain order in this process, as many steps have dependencies.

    1. Initial workshop(s): First, we work with your team to help you choose the best categories and page names that will make sense to your customers. This is usually a workshop where we gather business information and ideas. In some instances, we’ve built these strategies in a quick 30 minute meeting. In others, we test naming conventions with card sorts and interviews.

    2. Visual recommendation: Then, we take this stage into consideration and  recommend a hierarchy and sitemap. This step may also include categories and filtering options for certain areas of your site. For ultimate clarity with a messy concept, we create both a visual map and a spreadsheet.

    3. SEO optimization: Finally, an SEO specialist will review the recommendations to create optimal URLs and select the best target keywords for each page. At this stage, we may also map the appropriate 301 redirects.

    4. Implement and measure: When these steps are complete, it’s easy to work with developers to implement. We can measure the success of the new site structure by observing conversion rates, heat maps, and other website metrics.

    3. You’re unsure if you’re getting the most out of your blog.

    A blog strategy goes beyond topically relevant content. When asked what is the purpose of your blog, are you able to answer?

    The best blogs have multiple purposes. For example:

    • Attract people who could potentially be interested in your product or service. Provide educational resources, describe problems they may face, or share news to keep them in the loop of latest trends. You’ll need to build paid or SEO strategies around bringing in new prospects with this content.
    • Inform people on why your solution is the best option for their problem. This is where you talk about your process, unique differentiators, and company culture. You can provide value to new users or cater this content to people who are already familiar with your brand. It’s also ideal content for remarketing campaigns.
    • Build confidence in customers’ decision to choose you. Continue to publish content on how your company is innovating and staying ahead, and inform existing customers of anything you think they should be aware of.

    No matter what your buying cycle may be, it’s helpful to list out existing content and ideas for new content. Fitting these ideas into your buyer’s journey will help you spot any missed opportunities. Atlantic BT can help you map out your content strategy in this way, which is called a gap analysis.

    4. You’re looking for ways to improve without knowing what you need.

    You always want to keep improving your website to stay ahead of your competitors, but the marketing activities that prove successful start to become weekly tasks. With so many set activities on a daily basis, there comes a point where it’s hard to step into a high-level view and find new opportunities.  

    High-level website audits turn into deeper dives.

    Sometimes people ask us for general website audits to find any missed opportunities as a safety measure.

    Atlantic BT can conduct a quick general site audit that identifies areas that may require a deeper dive. For instance, we may begin by reviewing site performance, keyword analysis, heat maps, and competitor websites. Based on our findings, we may recommend something more specific, like a UX audit, SEO audit, or site speed audit. 

    We’ll handle development.

    A deeper dive can help us build a marketing roadmap for you to follow. Because marketing and development are closely tied, these roadmaps often include development work. Atlantic BT can seamlessly step in to support you in the development pieces if needed.

    Do you feel any of these marketing pains?

    Do you relate to any of these struggles? We’re happy to help in several ways. We conduct discoveries to build strategic recommendations, and we can help you evaluate what technology will fix core issues. Reach out to hear from an expert and learn more.

  • What should I expect from a website audit?

    What should I expect from a website audit?

    A website audit can refer to many different ways of analyzing your website, from SEO assessments to UX analysis, cloud optimizations, and code reviews. 

    A reasonably-priced audit can give you a boost when attempting to improve the performance of your website, and even help save you money in the long run. Website audits can also serve other purposes:

    • Get a fresh pair of eyes on your website to check for gaps
    • Help you plan ahead for major web projects, streamlining the process
    • Get the expert opinion of a specialist

    Take a look at some of the most commonly requested website audits from Atlantic BT, why they are popular, and what you can expect:

    1. Technical Audit
    2. Content Audit
    3. UX Audit
    4. SEO Audit
    5. Accessibility Audit
    6. AWS Cloud Audit
    7. Site Performance Audit

    1. Technical Website Audit

    Why are technical debt audits popular?

    With accrued technical debt, you face tough decisions in regards to weighing costs and benefits. Will the amount of time, energy, and budget poured into refactoring your website’s technologies be worth it?

    A technical audit can help you uncover hidden forms of debt and give you a starting point to make informed decisions.

    What can I expect from a technical audit?

    An overall review of your code, infrastructure, and integrations are part of a technical website audit. We can also help with a skills assessment of internal staff to make sure it lines up with the applications and infrastructure they need to support.

    A technical audit on code could include several tests to manually review code, static and dynamic analysis, Linting, and unit test coverage reporting. 

    Atlantic BT will additionally review documentation for weaknesses and hold conversations with your internal teams around coding practices, software methodologies, CI/CD, and DevOps.

    2. Content Audit

    Why are content website audits popular?

    A content audit is usually an early step in a website redesign. Content audits help provide clarity for what content needs to stay, where it should be placed on a new website, and what content is excessive. 

    These website audits not only enhance messaging and provide user information, but also shed light on opportunities for SEO and enhancements for page structure.

    What can I expect from a content audit?

    Traditionally, a content audit includes:

    • Taking inventory of what content exists
    • Analyzing the performance existing content to determine quality
    • A gap analysis to find missed opportunities and build a plan for new types of digital content

    Atlantic BT also ties information architecture into a content audit. That means beyond planning for new content types, we also assess the best way to categorize, structure, and optimize content for findability. 

    Within a content inventory spreadsheet, we also map where the content should go on the new website while providing an optimal URL structure.

    3. UX Audit

    Why are UX audits popular?

    A UX audit is also an important step in redesigning a website. It involves evaluating an existing website’s design, messaging, and performance to drive business value.

    While many businesses would like a UX audit to boost revenue, others are looking to boost efficiency for employees with their internal systems or reduce call volume by making information easier to find online.

    What can I expect from a UX audit?

    A UX website audit involves defining business goals, digging into user data, and gathering insights to build a plan to improve your website’s performance. 

    A full-scale UX audit from Atlantic BT might include:

    • Compare to business objectives – the first step is to see if the page or website being evaluated does what you want it to do, from driving conversions to enhancing customer satisfaction.
    • Evaluate against user objectives – next we see how well the users’ needs are met, for information or task accomplishment. We look for clarity, ease, efficiency and effectiveness.
    • Heuristics evaluation – this is evaluating how well the site performs against broad-based standards of performance against expectations users have based on the best sites they use.
    • Analytics and feedback – we love to ‘listen to the customer’ directly from sources like website analytics, comments and feedback from forms, customer service, or any other inputs you may have, and see what they tell us about your website.

    Any website audit includes evaluating to a set of criteria; business objectives are defined through things like mission statements and OKRs – user needs are often defined by marketing personas, and so on.

    We use whatever criteria you have available, or we can perform stakeholder interviews and persona workshops to help refine or update those definitions to evaluate against. 

    • Requirements gathering – Stakeholder interviews, surveys, and workshops
    • User research – Gather customer feedback, review analytics and website behavior, create persona profiles 
    • User testing – Surveys, tree testing, contextual inquiries, and card sorts
    • Design review – Make recommendations for design to meet industry best practices and accessibility requirements

    4. SEO Audit

    Why are SEO audits popular?

    Without SEO specialization, it’s hard to know exactly what search engines are looking for. And there’s no tool that will single handedly spot weaknesses.

    What can I expect from an SEO audit?

    Atlantic BT will use a combination of tools and personalized review. We provide recommendations for the following areas:

    • Technical SEO – page speed, site structure, and schema 
    • Content optimization – content structure and keyword optimization
    • Event tracking – Google Analytics and Google Tag Manager setup
    • SEO Strategy – Existing position analysis and prioritization of focus areas

    5. Accessibility Audit

    Why are accessibility audits popular?

    Accessibility audits are important to prevent lawsuits in many sectors where accessibility is mandated by law. However, even if there is no legal risk for your business, if you aren’t making your content accessible to all, your business could still be missing out on a large population of users with disabilities. Furthermore, most accessibility UX enhancements end up being beneficial to all, providing a better user experience and positive image of your brand.

    What can I expect from an accessibility website audit?

    Many businesses provide accessibility audits by running a website through an automated scanner. The issue here is that there are many elements that tools cannot see. 

    Atlantic BT offers a comprehensive scan which includes a broad software scan, careful review by a trained professional, and a follow up consult to build a roadmap based on findings. 

    You can also try our WCAG color testing tool for free!

    6. AWS Cloud Audit

    Why are AWS cloud audits popular?

    A website audit could help you optimize your current cloud environment or help you streamline a migration to be as seamless as possible.

    What can I expect from an AWS cloud audit?

    Cloud optimization audit

    For those who already have an AWS cloud environment, a website audit will help take full advantage of the services purchased and eliminate whatever is unnecessary.

     Atlantic BT will collaborate with your IT team over several calls, review code (or review infrastructure with read-only access), and provide a consult to review findings.

    Cloud migration audit

    On the other hand, others may be looking for a website audit to help them access their situation and plan for a migration. Atlantic BT will gather workloads and business requirements, determine which AWS services will best support your business (keeping efficiency in mind), and create a plan to test and securely migrate data.

    7. Site Performance Audit

    Why are site performance audits popular?

    When your website loads quickly, it ranks higher on search engines and boosts conversions after users land. Not to mention, Google rewards ads connected to fast websites.

    As the benefits of fast websites become widely known, your competitors are beginning to invest in page speed optimization. They are now better equipped to “out-perform” you in every sense!

    What can I expect from a website performance audit?

    There are many free tools to help you scan your website for performance issues. After using a vetted tool to scan your website, Atlantic BT will:

    • Review the recommendations and prioritize based on impact and effort
    • Build a roadmap to help you start implementing these optimizations
    • If you wish – proceed with the implementation and continue to monitor and test results

    Ready to get started?

    If you need some help but aren’t sure if a website audit would benefit you, we’ll get you on the right track with a free consultation. We’ve been building websites since 1998 and thus have 25 years of experience identifying the key issues that are holding websites back from outperforming their competitors.