vFlyer Blog » Features

The Low Down on Page Templates and Repeating Modules

Dan Lenehan — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 18:03:19 +0000

There’s been some confusion among vSites users around why certain modules appear on multiple pages of their site while others appear on just one. It all comes down to page templates, and I’ll try to clarify how they work here.

To start, every page on a vSites website uses a page template, which defines the layout of the page. By default, the homepage uses one page template and the secondary pages on the site use another, typically with a narrow column on the left or right. You can see the page template that a page uses at the top of the Site Editor:

Many small business websites show some of the same content on multiple pages; for instance, you might see the same contact form on different pages of a real estate agent’s or contractor’s site. To make it easier for vSites users to do this, we automatically add modules that are added outside of the main body section of a page to the same section of the other pages that use the same page template. For example, let’s say your website has a services page and a photo gallery page that use the same page template. If you add a Facebook Like Module to the narrow column of the services page, it will also be added to the narrow column of the photo gallery page. Likewise, if you remove it from the photo gallery page, it will also be removed from the services page. That’s how it works.

If you want to add modules to one page of your site and only have them appear on that page, you can either add them to the main body section or create a new page template for the page. To create a new page template, go to the Control Panel, click the Page Templates link, and click the Create New button. There are four page template options: One Column, Two Column Left (narrow column on the left), Two Column Right (narrow column on the right), and Three Column. For whichever page template you choose, you can select which sections of the page you want included in it. Before saving the new template, give it a name by clicking the pencil icon at the top.

Once you’ve saved the new page template, apply it to the page by clicking the page link at the top of the Site Editor, clicking the General Settings tab, and choosing the new template. Since it’s a new template, you’ll need to add modules to all of the sections in it, which you can do easily by clicking the Saved Modules tab on the Add Module screen.

So, to sum it up: modules that you add outside the main body section of one page will also be added to the other pages that use the same page template. If you want to add a module to just a single page on your site, either add it to the main body section of that page or create a new page template and apply it to the page, then add your saved modules back to the page.

New Splash Image and Listings Modules and More

Dan Lenehan — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 18:25:52 +0000

Happy Monday! I’m excited to start the week by announcing an awesome set of new features, enhancements, and bug fixes from Friday’s release. Here are the standouts:

1. New easy-to-crop Splash Image Module
We’ve made it super easy to crop and customize the splash images on your site. With the new Splash Image Module, you can upload an image and easily drag and reposition the photo right in the Site Editor. This should be a big timesaver for many vSites users because you no longer have to use another application to crop the image or worry about the splash image taking up your entire page. Just another way that vSites makes it easy to build a website.

To utilize the new cropping capabilities, just select “Splash Image” on the Add Module screen, then upload the image you want to use.

2. Two new listings modules and a new slideshow layout
If you enjoyed the ease of the Listings Module before, you’ll love it even more now. With the new Featured Listing Module, you can showcase one specific property on your site; if you would like to show off all of your listings, you can create a Mini Listings Module in which site visitors can easily click through to all of your listings, similar to a vFlyer listing widget. Both modules are fully customizable, easy to add, and seamlessly integrate into your site.

Additionally, we now offer a slideshow layout for the Listings Module that rotates through the first photo of each of your flyers.

3. An alternative to vFlyer’s Facebook app
By the request of our users, we have come up with an alternative to the vFlyer Facebook app, which is currently not compatible with Facebook’s format. We hope to have the app working again soon but in the meantime, this alternative allows users to display their listings on their Facebook Page. Stay tuned for a step-by-step instruction manual but if you want to learn about the workaround, give our support team a call at 800-594-5930 ext. 1 or email us at support@vflyer.com.

4. Other Enhancements and Bug Fixes
We pushed a number of other enhancements and bug fixes to the system:

An issue with the iPad slideshow is now fixed and the slideshow now works as expected.
Previously, if a vMarketing user chose the Standard print layout, the logo would not appear in the PDF. This issue is now fixed.
In vSites, when clicking through the photo gallery a pop-up slideshow will now display photos that are selected.We hope you enjoy the new features and capabilities in vSites and vMarketing. If you have any comments or questions, please let us know.
Lastly, stay tuned for some new vSites themes in the coming weeks. I took a quick peek at some of the work our designers have been doing and it looks great!

The Marketing Monday Roundup for January 23

Dan Lenehan — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 23:37:22 +0000

For this week’s Roundup, we’re focusing on real estate, with articles about a new iPad “non-app,” the complicated dynamic between a broker’s brand and its agents’ individual brands, and using Pinterest as a link building tool. And we had to throw in one article related to the defeat last week of the SOPA and PIPA bills. Of course, “defeat” might be too strong a word — the bills were simply tabled — but that they were tabled because of massive grassroots pressure gives us at vFlyer a great “power to the people” feeling.

M Squared Introduces App-less iPad Open House Management
Washington, D.C., real estate brokerage M Squared announced last week its introduction of a new iPad-based software for collecting buyer information at open houses. The proprietary software lets open house visitors leave their email addresses and then get automatic email updates about the property they visited as well as nearby comparables and upcoming open houses. I would guess that the “cool factor” of its being an iPad app (well, not really an app, but who’s counting?) and its simplicity will increase the likelihood of buyers leaving their information on it, thus increasing the likelihood of a conversion from an open house. I suspect that other brokerages and real estate technology companies will follow M Squared’s lead.

Brand IS Important, So Who’s Brand Should YOU Be Building?
What a thoughtful, enlightening piece from InmanNext contributor Teri Conrad on the gap between broker brand and agent brand. She raises some really interesting questions and I also love the way she incorporates Twitter and video right into the post.

Real Estate Link Building with Pinterest
At vFlyer, we’re paying more attention these days to social sharing site Pinterest, which allows users to post content (pictures, mainly) to a “pinboard” and share it with everyone else. Sound familiar? It takes the fundamental concept of every social networking site — sharing — but it presents it with a new interface and tone: softer, prettier, more visual. It’s no surprise that women comprise a majority of the site’s users so far. In any case, this is a good piece from the Real Estate Marketing Blog about how real estate agents can use Pinterest to build up links to their website. It’s tough to gauge the SEO juice in a Pinterest link, but this article does make a good case for the value of it.

#BlackoutSOPA: How 87,000 People Taught Us About The Future of Online Activism
A fascinating account on Techcrunch from the founder of #BlackoutSOPA of how in less than two weeks, an organization that did just one very simple thing — replace people’s Twitter, Facebook, and Google+ profile photos with a “Stop SOPA” image — gained 87,000 users and national attention. A reminder that it’s often the simplest ideas that, when executed well, have the widest appeal.

New Social Sharing and More!

Dan Lenehan — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 18:00:59 +0000

We introduced some exciting new features to vMarketing and vSites last night that will help users further promote listings through social media and integrate them into their websites. We also fixed several bugs. Here’s a rundown of the biggest changes:

1. New social sharing feature on flyers
By default, flyers now have a Share tab on the right that, when moused over, lets people like, tweet, and +1 your flyers with a single click. The new feature means that promoting your flyers is no longer up to you alone; now anyone can share a flyer with the Facebook friends, Twitter followers, and Google+ circles. This is the essence of social media: providing the tools to share content and make connections to a wide and diverse audience.

The social sharing feature is a good complement to the existing social media toolbar, which lets you integrate your social networks into your flyers.

2. Listing integration in vSites now easier through WYSIWYG Editor
The vSites WYSIWYG (or Freeform) Editor gives you free reign to make your website content look exactly how you want it to. Now it’s even easier to pull your flyer content into it. When you add a text or image link to the WYSIWYG Editor, there’s now an option to link to any of your published flyers. From the “Link Type” drop-down menu, select “Listings” and then choose the flyer you want to link to.

3. Bug fixes
We resolved the following bugs in our system:

In the Site Wizard, if all site pages are selected, you can now complete the site creation process. The system was preventing this from happening before.

If the default page of a site is deleted, now a new default page is selected and you can access the Site Editor.

If an account has a domain credit, now both the option to use the domain credit and configure an existing domain name are displayed.

An issue with the site map for sites that use a vsites.com subdomain is now fixed.

Also, we added a new pricing page for custom design and copywriting services. If you’re interested in having our team help you with the design or content on your website, let us know.

How to Find, Customize, and License Photos for Your Website

Dan Lenehan — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 18:57:22 +0000

Photos are often the key to creating a unique and effective website that expresses the personality of your business or organization. So when you’re building a website, where and how do you find photos for it that will show people what you’re all about and draw them further into your site?

First, take an inventory of the photos that you have for your business. Are there any that would work as splash images on the home page or other pages? Look for photos that are well lit, clear, and pleasing to the eye. If you have a photo that you want to use, consider cropping it to make it fit better on the page; you can easily crop a photo with a photo editing tool such as Picnik (which you can use right from the Site Editor). The ideal dimensions for a home page splash image are 1000px x 250px; splash images on other pages look best when they’re 1000px x 175px. You might also consider combining multiple photos together into one splash image, as in the example of Sydnor Lofts’ website.

If you don’t already have photos that would work well on your website, consider licensing them from a stock image library such as iStockPhoto or Fotolia. The latter service has a collection of more than 15,000,000 images, most of which can be licensed for website usage for less than $25 and many for as little as $10. In buying a photo license, pay attention to the dimensions of the image (generally, the bigger the better, since a picture’s resolution decreases if it’s blown up beyond its original size but not the other way around) and any licensing restrictions.

Adding and customizing photos on your website is easy with vSites, but if you need more assistance or have questions, feel free to contact our support team. We also have a design team that can create or customize photos for you for a one-time fee.

The Marketing Monday Roundup… on Tuesday

Dan Lenehan — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 23:07:32 +0000

A new year is a good time to try something new. At the vFlyer Blog, our new adventure for 2012 is the “Marketing Monday Roundup”, an aggregation of interesting articles, blog posts, and other content related to online marketing, social media, branding, and technology (and really anything we find on the Web that makes us think, ask questions, laugh, smile, etc.). And since our office was closed yesterday (Monday), the first Roundup comes on a Tuesday. But who’s counting?

4 Ways Small Business Websites Can Drive More Sales
A Mashable piece by vFlyer CEO Aaron Sperling on how businesses can better utilize their websites to drive sales. Read this article! It’s direct and practical, just like Aaron.

Breaking Down Clicks Per Connection On Facebook, Google+ and Twitter
A great post by Inman News Chief Evangelist Chris Smith about an experiment he did to find out where the content he was posting was generating the most engagement. More interesting to me than the results is the method by which he set out to quantify the relative engagement of his readers and followers.

3 Marketing Things We Do Wrong That We Could Easily Do Right
A short, succinct, and useful post on three common marketing mistakes and how to avoid them.

Top 5 Trends for Search & Social Media Marketing in 2012
The obligatory “2012 predictions” piece, but valuable nonetheless. Not surprisingly, mobile and social are the focus.

Unboxed: Even a Giant Can Learn to Run
New York Times profile of outgoing IBM CEO Samuel J. Palmisano and a short history of how he led the company’s remarkable rebound. I think the first of his four questions should be at the top of any business owner’s or professional’s list.

Microsoft Celebrates The Demise Of IE6 In The US
Finishing off this week’s Roundup is this TechCrunch article on how Microsoft is embracing the death of Internet Explorer 6, which clings to a 1% share of the browser market. Is this the other 1%?

I hope you enjoyed the Marketing Monday (Tuesday) Roundup this week. If you have any thoughts on the items posted, leave a comment!

The Year That Was: 2011 vFlyer Recap

Dan Lenehan — Fri, 30 Dec 2011 17:14:33 +0000

To say that 2011 was an eventful year would be an understatement. And while it’s tempting to try to sum up all the momentous changes and events in national and international politics, the economy, and technology, among other things, I’m sure there are plenty of others doing that just fine. So in this end-of-year recap I’ll stick to vFlyer, which also had an eventful, mostly fun, often hectic, and ultimately successful 2011.

The big event for us this past year was the launch of vSites, our website builder and hosting service, now all of four months old. In development for over a year, vSites is the second major service offering that vFlyer has introduced, after vMarketing, our classified ads service. In addition to being an easy-to-use yet powerful website service, vSites also means that vFlyer now offers a far more comprehensive marketing service to our users. Rather than using multiple applications for website building, hosting, Craigslist content, listing syndication, and email marketing (among other things), you can now do all of this in one place: your vFlyer account.

In addition to vSites, we introduced the social media toolbar and secondary contact to vMarketing at the beginning of the year and new Craigslist layouts and preview capabilities at the end. We added affiliate and reseller programs, giving even more rewards to people who promote and resell vFlyer services.

It was a good year for us, and we’re looking forward to an even better 2012. We plan to build out the vSites capabilities further and making it even easier for people to create a website. We plan to make flyers even more social, allowing for easier sharing, posting, and tweeting of them. And we’re looking forward to hearing from you all what improvements you want to see and working them into our product roadmap.

So thanks to all vFlyer users this year for your flyers, your websites, and all your great feedback. In particular, we’d like to thank a handful of users who provided especially helpful comments and insights to us this year:

Marcos Avila
Mike Catania
Dennis Favilla
Anthony Gilbert
Laura Pyle Gillott
Eugene Gruzin
James Hronek
Larry Johnson
Joshua Kinney
Greg Markov
Jay Nuss
Doug Parry
Joe Pedersen
Weston Pugh
Vatt Saycocie
Diane Schatz
Betty Simmons
Joann Welch

A big thanks to all of you. Best wishes for a happy new year!

New custom themes and a bunch of bug fixes!

Dan Lenehan — Fri, 18 Nov 2011 16:38:23 +0000

Don’t let the recent lull in our blogging activity lead you to believe that we’ve just been twiddling our thumbs and playing Angry Birds for the last couple of weeks. In fact, we recently pushed a release that included a slew of new vMarketing and vSites features and bug fixes. Here are the highlights:

1. New stock custom themes in every account
It’s no longer necessary for vMarketing users to create their own custom themes in order to take advantage of the benefits that using a custom theme offers. We introduced 10 new stock custom themes and added them to every account! You’ll find the new themes in your list of theme options in the Flyer Editor (labeled “auto-generated”) as well as on your Themes page (where you can also edit them). Applying one of these themes to a flyer you’ve published is as simple as choosing the theme and re-publishing.

Using a custom theme instead of a standard theme not only gives you more control over how your flyers look. If you have a business subscription, it also lets you brand your flyers, choose from 10 different Craigslist layouts and 5 PDF layouts, and use the narrow blog HTML format. The new stock custom themes will make it even easier for users to take advantage of these features.

2. Flyer colors in Craigslist
We fixed an issue that was sometimes causing background colors in the flyer to change in Craigslist. We now generate a background image for those colors, meaning that the same colors from your flyer will appear in your Craigslist post.

3. Picture Module enhancements
Picture Modules in sites can now be linked to external URLs or internal site pages or content items.

4. Permalinks
vSites users now have full control over the permalinks of their site pages. Adding relevant keywords to page URLs is important for SEO purposes.

5. Bug fixes
We fixed a bunch of bugs across the board in vSites, several involving UI issues in IE8. While the fixes were mostly of minor issues, together they should make the site creation and editing processes even smoother.

A big thanks to all the new vSites users in the last couple of weeks as well as the early adopters who have continued to provide us helpful feedback and feature requests. Keep ‘em coming! And if you’re looking to build a website for your business, I hope you’ll check out vSites and contact us if you have any questions.

Have happier clients with vFlyer’s Reseller Program

Sena — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 16:21:32 +0000

Last week we officially launched vFlyer’s Reseller Program. We’re very excited about it, and you should be too! The program is geared toward web designers, agencies, marketing consultants, and anyone else who is proficient in vFlyer’s marketing services. vFlyer Resellers can create vMarketing content and websites for their own clients using our simple yet powerful platform. Once a Reseller has 3 clients subscribed to our services, we give 30% of the subscription fee back to them for each subsequent client they bring on. Using our program allows Resellers to save time, earn extra money, and have happier clients.

Here’s a graphic showing how the program works:

Resellers use our program to create marketing content for their own clients. They then sell this content to their clients at the regular price. After they bring on 3 clients, they start earning 30% on each client they subscribe, or if the Reseller is paying, he or she gets a 30% discount for each client account.

Benefits of the program:

1. vFlyer’s platform is intuitive yet powerful. Both of vFlyer’s services use a “fill-in-the-blank” template approach for adding content, greatly simplifying the content creation process.

2. Customization. vFlyer provides an extensive range of themes and layouts to choose from. In addition to the ability to upload photos, videos, custom headers and integrate social media, users can also create their own themes allowing them to match their branding.

3. Flexibility. With vFlyer, you can grant access to an account to a client so that they can log in and make edits themselves or simply restrict access to yourself. You can also set up all of your client accounts under one login, making access to all of them super easy.

4. Save time while creating higher quality content. The vFlyer platform is easy to use, enabling users to create professional-looking high quality content quickly and easily.

Interested in learning more? Check out the new Reseller page and the Reseller FAQ’s. To sign up, email reseller [at] vflyer [dot] com, or call 800-594-5930 x 5.

Managing SEO in vSites

Dan Lenehan — Wed, 14 Sep 2011 16:54:03 +0000

If you’re new to building and managing a website, you’ve probably heard the term “SEO” and maybe have a sense that it’s important and you should be doing something about it. But what is it and why is it important? For starters, SEO stands for search engine optimization, and it’s the practice of making a website more visible to search engines, and ultimately the users of them, through organic means (as opposed to paid or sponsored search results, which are in a completely different category). And why is SEO important? Well, more and more consumers begin their searches (for anything and everything) online, through search engines like Google and Bing. If you’re a small business, having your site rank high in the results for certain keyword searches means that more people are likely to get to your website. And that likely means more sales for you. Make sense?

vSites users have various tools at their disposal to search engine optimize their websites. I want to highlight three in particular:

1. Metadata editing
The metadata of a web page tells search engines what the page is about and thus has an impact on how the page (and site) will rank in search results. Metadata consists of three primary elements and attributes: title, description, and keywords. With vSites, you can edit each of these components for any page on your site through a simple fill-in-the-blanks form. This allows you to add the terms that you think will most help boost your site’s search engine ranking. (We’ll cover best practices on how to choose the best title, description, and keywords in another post.)

2. Permalink editing
A permalink is a URL (that is, a web address) of a particular page on a website. It’s called a permalink because the idea is that even if the content on the page is changed or the page is moved to a different part of the site, the URL remains the same, thus avoiding potential problems when the page is linked to from another site. For SEO purposes, it’s beneficial when page URLs contain relevant keywords, so we enable vSites users to add and edit the keywords in the permalink of each page of their sites.

3. Integration modules
SEO isn’t just about metadata and URLs. In fact, the most important element is the content of the website. If the content on your site is good and provides value to people, then search engines (and their users) will in most cases naturally find the site. A big part of having good content on a site is keeping the content fresh and up-to-date. vSites offers several modules for importing Twitter, Facebook, and blog content into your website; it’s an easy way to keep your site current. We’ll be adding more integrations with other web applications in the future which will only make this task easier.

These are just a few of the ways that vSites users can optimize their websites for search engines. We’ll continue to add SEO capabilities to the service, but if anyone has any other comments on SEO best practices (or common SEO practices that haven’t worked for you), please share them! And in the meantime, try out vSites for yourself and put to good use these SEO tips.