Content Strategy

How to Use Squarespace Calendars

Squarespace recently announced their new complete calendar system, which allows anyone to create a schedule of events, concert dates, appearances and more. This week we take a look at how to set up a calendar of your own in a handy how-to.​

Creating a Squarespace Calendar

Squarespace already offered a helpful calendar widget, but the new calendar feature is a full page type. ​To create one of your own, add a new page type to your navigation from within your administrative controls and select the Events page type. Select a name for your calendar and assign a URL to it. 

​Add a Squarespace event collection to your navigation by adding a page.

Adjust Your Calendar Page Settings

After your new page is up and running, adjust your Event Settings by ​selecting the button from your administrative controls for the page. 

Configuration options include:

  • Adjust your page title
  • Display your events as a calendar or list view
  • Set template-specific layout options for sidebars
  • Update your events page's meta description for search engines
  • Assign tags and categories
  • Advanced HTML insertion options

​Squarespace events pages include the ability to change between list and calendar view for your events.

Creating Your First Squarespace Event

Creating events using the Squarespace calendar system is much like creating a blog post. Click on Add Event from ​your event page and create a page that tells your fans about the who, what, where, when, and why of your event. 

Location options allow you to tell people exactly where your event will be and event map it using Squarespace's Google Maps integration. Your attendees can also add events directly to their Google or iCalendars. (Click on the thumbnails for a larger view.)

Enjoy Your New Squarespace Calendar

That's really all there is to it. ​When you're through you're left with an excellent option for managing your events. For advanced users, consider adding a contact form to collect registrations via email, a Google Drive spreadsheet, or even a MailChimp mail list. Squarespace's custom HTML code blocks also makes its event and calendar system immediately compatible with Eventbrite, Google+ Events, and just about any other custom events solution, too. 

What types of events do you plan on planning with the help of the new Squarespace calendars?​

​A Squarespace Calendar with a calendar-style, full-width layout.

Squarespace Mobile Content Strategies

Content marketing is one of the most efficient online marketing tactics for busy entrepreneurs. Blogs, videos, podcasts, and more published on your website build both customer engagement and traffic from search engines and social media networks alike. 

Finding the time to create and publish content can be difficult, which is why I love having a Squarespace website and using the Squarespace mobile app. Today's post demonstrates how you can create a thriving blog with minimal added time requirements to your already-busy day.

​The Squarespace mobile app for iOS is a mobile publishing force.

​The Squarespace mobile app for iOS is a mobile publishing force.

Blogging on the Go With the Squarespace Mobile App

My days are jam-packed with work, volunteer activities, and other obligations. I don't blog nearly as much as I want to, but lately I've been attempting to leverage my volunteering as a part of my blogging strategy.

Last week I attended a event put on by MIMA (a marketing association). The content of the presentation was a good fit for my marketing blog, ContentScientists.com. I put my Squarespace mobile app for my iPhone to work and rattled out a live blog post recap of the neuromarketing presentation. ​

Drafting a Blog Post with Squarespace

Mobile blog posts can be edited with text, HTML or Markdown.​

Mobile blog posts can be edited with text, HTML or Markdown.​

The event was an hour-long presentation on the advances of consumer psychology. The talk was given by author and speaker, Roger Dooley. I titled my blog post, flipped my editing interface to Markdown to increase my maximum thumb-typing speed (you can choose from text, HTML, and Markdown), and summarized Mr. Dooley's thoughts as quickly as my thumbs could travel. ​

I could have done this more easily using the Squarespace mobile app on my iPad, but I chose to use the iPhone instead to demonstrate that content marketing is possible even if the circumstances aren't ideal.

​What you see here illustrates how quickly you could record the best moments of any events you attend in the form of a blog post.

Adding Photos to Mobile Blog Posts

​Add photos from your mobile device to your Squarespace blog posts.

​Add photos from your mobile device to your Squarespace blog posts.

​Adding photos to my mobile Squarespace blog posts was a breeze. I took photos throughout the event using my iPhone camera. At the end of the event, I navigated to the photo tab of the blog post and added the photos to the blog post directly from my phone. The app even let me re-order photos by tapping and dragging them to my liking.

By default, Squarespace adds all photos included in the mobile blog post at the end of the blog post when published.​ It wouldn't be nice to be able to structure them directly within an article while you're writing, but I can appreciate how this would be difficult.

After publishing the article, it was simple enough to crack it open in a desktop browser and position the images to my liking using Squarespace's LayoutEngine editing interface.​

Performing the Finishing Touches

​Even tags and categories are a snap in the Squarespace mobile app.

​Even tags and categories are a snap in the Squarespace mobile app.

​Even the finder details such as publishing date, tags and categories were editable using the Squarespace mobile app. When the event was over, I saved the blog post to my website and joined the crowd in coffee, snacks and networking. An hour later, I was back at my desk and cracked open the draft I created at the event.

A few tweaks later and I published my event recap to my blog and social media networks well before anyone else had a chance to recap the event. As a result, the speaker and many attendees were quick to share my article.

Nimble and Efficient Publishing

Fresh news travels well in social media, so once again the Squarespace mobile blogging app proved to be part of an effective content marketing strategy. I saved time by making my content marketing part of my already-busy day and took advantage of people's excitement for a great event to drive traffic to my blog. 

You can become a content marketer for your brand by downloading the Squarespace mobile app for iOS, Ipad, and Android. (If you're not on Squarespace yet, the best place to start is by looking at their awesome mobile-friendly templates).​

4 Myths and Realities About Squarespace SEO

A friend of mine who builds Squarespace websites wrote to me recently, concerned that his client's search engine optimization (SEO) consultant was trying to persuade the client to change content management systems from Squarespace to Wordpress because "performing SEO work on [Squarespace] could come with some limitations."

As someone who both loves Squarespace websites and also who knows a thing or two about SEO, it frustrates me to see mis-information like this swirling around the web. In reality, Squarespace supports the ability to attract search engine traffic incredibly well, and even includes features most Wordpress developers don't know about or often just plain get wrong. 

Today we're bringing to light four myths about Squarespace's SEO capabilities, and the underlying realities you need to know before someone persuades you to switch for no good reason.

Myth #1: You Can't Access Squarespace's System

The first myth presented by the "SEO expert" was that Squarespace prevents SEO success due to its proprietary code base:

"Squarespace has a lot of tools in place that give us access to optimizing your site, however, it is a proprietary CMS so we don't have access to some key code based items. SEO service providers need access to some parts of that HTML in order to write appropriate tags and information so that search engines are able to understand it.
While Squarespace has made a great effort to give as much access as possible to relevant SEO items, and gives more access than most proprietary systems, there are still some shortcomings - such as the XML sitemap, alt tags for images, categories being hidden - that we will be unable to resolve or work around due to the nature of the CMS."

Reality #1: Squarespace's Proprietary System Facilitates SEO

While it's true that Squarespace's code base is proprietary, that doesn't present any major barriers to generating search engine traffic. Squarespace facilitates all the major SEO tasks, and in certain cases, such as with the automatically-updated XML sitemaps, newly integrated Google Authorship markup, and even URL canonicalization standard with every site, Squarespace's proprietary system actually facilitates more search engine optimization success.

Complex SEO tactics such as URL canonicalization are automatically implemented on Squarespace.

Complex SEO tactics such as URL canonicalization are automatically implemented on Squarespace.

Sure, Squarespace doesn't let you do everything an SEO would want to tackle straight out of the box, such as hiding blog categories, but the Squarespace developer platform provides complete code control. Advanced Squarespace designers should be able to tackle even the most sophisticated SEO requests. 

Myth #2: Squarespace Limits Where You can Edit

The next Squarespace SEO myth is also often accompanied by encouragement to change platforms to Wordpress for best results:

"Performing SEO work on this system could come with some limitations, and it's only fair to let you know that up front. I am not saying that you NEED to switch CMS, but as we work with the system, we may find there are additional items that hinder our ability to perform the best SEO for you."

Reality #2: Squarespace Takes Care of SEO or Lets You Do It Yourself

There are a handful of critical elements needed for SEO on-page success, including your page's meta title and description tags, image alt tags, and including important phrases within the content of your site.

Important fields such as page title tags can be maintained at a sitewide and page-specific level.

Important fields such as page title tags can be maintained at a sitewide and page-specific level.

In addition, there are some architectural factors, such as the page's URL, canonicalization meta tags, Google authorship, and XML sitemaps, that contribute to a website's SEO success.

Squarespace either addresses all of these factors automatically, let's you adjust them manually, or a combination of both. There's not an important tag or setting that can't be changed to promote SEO success.

Myth #3: Wordpress is Dramatically Cheaper than Squarespace

Every website investment will consist of your hosting (i.e., where the files that make up your website actually exist on the web), and content management (i.e., the tools required to build your website). The next myth is related to price:

"I don't know what you pay per month to host through Squarespace, but independent hosting can offer you  a great deal of savings, and the Wordpress CMS is free. The only real cost involved with going to Wordpress is the design and implementation phase."

Reality #3: Squarespace's Premium Services are Cost Effective

Squarespace's pricing ranges from $8 - 20 per month depending on features and your billing terms. Compare this to a free Wordpress install and a no-frills hosting account at $5 per month and you're looking at a cost savings at $3 - 15 per month by going with Wordpress over Squarespace.

But don't assume you'll get the same level of service. $5/month hosting won't stand up to huge spikes in traffic, while Reddit or even Hurricane Sandy couldn't bring down Squarespace websites. And every Squarespace account also comes with 24/7 tech support, built-in mobile-friendly responsive design templates, and intuitive editing and design tools.

Squarespace comes complete with 24/7 tech support.

Squarespace comes complete with 24/7 tech support.

Yes, you may pay a few bucks more for a Squarespace website, but consider what you're getting for the extra investment.

Myth #4: Serious SEO Professionals Only Use Wordpress

This next myth comes from the Squarespace designer himself as he lamented to me about his client's wavering faith in Squarespace's ability to meet his SEO objectives:

"After speaking with several SEO consultants and all saying the same thing (i.e., 'move your site to Wordpress for optimal benefit'), the client's confidence in the Squarespace platform has eroded."

Reality #4: SEO is About Your CMS and Your Content

Many of the SEOs you'll talk to will recommend Wordpress because it's a system they're familiar with. Wordpress is the majority player in the CMS marketplace, and so it's only natural that there will be more SEOs in support of it over Squarespace. But that doesn't make one better than the other. 

Ultimately, your success with SEO is based on a combination of factors, including the on-page and architectural tactics governed by your content management system, as well as facets that are independent of your CMS, including your content creation and outreach strategy and your ability to attract social media engagement and links from across the web.

Some of the best SEOs in the world cite Squarespace as a fantastic platform for organic search traffic, including SEO tool company CEO, Rand Fishkin, whose SEOmoz is among the most trusted of all resources in the SEO industry:

SEO industry hero Rand Fishkin endorses Squarespace.

SEO industry hero Rand Fishkin endorses Squarespace.

And if that isn't compelling enough, this website is built on Squarespace, and our organic traffic has been increasingly steadily each and every year I've owned and operated it:

This website has attracted over 100,000 visits through search engine traffic, including over 7,500 just last month alone. 

This website has attracted over 100,000 visits through search engine traffic, including over 7,500 just last month alone. 

What You Should Consider Before Working With SEOs

A great SEO will be able to work with clients to create the best plan to support the client's business, not just the SEO's ability to easily implement the plan. Your primary consideration when building a website should be the content management system that helps you best meet the objectives you laid out for your website in the first place. 

Squarespace and Wordpress both support SEO efforts incredibly well, and neither present any major limitations that should dissuade you from choosing either platform.

If your SEO is struggling with the Squarespace platform, consider having them provide their recommendations to your website designer so someone familiar with the platform can implement them, or even have your design give your SEO a tour of Squarespace so the SEO can more comfortably implement their strategy. 

But if a Wordpress lover insists that you switch from Squarespace, send them to leave a comment here on this article, and I'll be happy to engage in a conversation to help you understand your options. 

The 4-Week No-Sweat Email Marketing Plan

A no-sweat email marketing plan is possible.​

Email newsletters can be your marketing powerhouse, but this channel is tragically under-utilized due to the perceived amount of work involved in launching them. It doesn't have to be that way.

Create a no-sweat email marketing plan to earn or keep more business in just thirty days by completing a few simple tasks each week this month.

Week 1 - Crafting the Email Marketing Plan

Spend a few minutes each day this week thinking about the strategy of your email marketing plan. Big picture, think about creating the following basic pillars:

  • Creating an offer to build your subscriber base
  • Publishing a monthly newsletter​ that provides value to your subscribers

We'll get to how to create each piece, but for now, focus on strategy. The key to great email marketing is to provide something of value to your target audience at an efficient cost to you.

Something of Value: Think of how many emails you don't read. If you want your emails to be different, you have to deliver real value to your subscribers. If you're a small business, value could mean coupons or product tips. If you're a website designer, it could be design tips or secret techniques.​ Your value is likely closely related to the purpose of your website and/or the service you provide.

An easier way to go about it: ask your most trusted customers or your ideal prospect what they'd like to see and go from there.​

Efficient Cost: In most cases, email marketing costs are heavier on time than on money. Your ROI on your email marketing plan is driven by your ability to produce monthly newsletters efficiently and without a lot of extra work.

Think about ways you can leverage the things you're already doing to avoid net new work. For example, if you blog, your newsletter could be driven largely by repackaging your blog posts for those who haven't seen them. My newsletter takes about an hour a month and folks seem to like it.

​Spend some time this week thinking about how you could re-purpose the things you're already doing in a way that will provide value to your subscribers.

Week 2 - Creating an Email Offer

​The Complete Guide to Blogging with Squarespace.

​The Complete Guide to Blogging with Squarespace.

Building your email list is just as important as the emails you send. While a newsletter sign-up link on your website may get you some new subscribers, the secret to larger list gains is to bundle your newsletter sign-up process with a free offer for visitors to your website.

Free offers range from ebooks to webinars to videos. Your offer can vary widely, but the key here is value, and usually more is better. Big Picture Web offers a free Guide to Blogging with Squarespace. I know a dry cleaner in Madison, WI whose email list drives thousands of visits each month thank to dry cleaning coupons.​

Use this week to build a download or guide of some type that will provide utility for your audience, and you'll be set with a tactic to help prime your email list growth.​

Week 3 - Integrating Your Email Plan with Your Site

This week you'll integrate your offer and your newsletter signup with your website. You'll want to be sure you have the ability to promote and deliver your newsletter list and your sign-up offer.

​Follow these steps to integrate your email plan with your website if you use Squarespace.

​Follow these steps to integrate your email plan with your website if you use Squarespace.

Step 1: Promote - Create a display ad on your website that displays your offer and link it to a unique landing page on your website. Try experimenting with your ad copy and graphic to see which version generates the most amount of clicks. Keep your ad above the fold on your blog side bar and you could receive a 1-2% click rate on your offer's ad.

Step 2: Landing Page - ​The landing page your ad links to should sell your offer to your potential new subscriber. Include the main benefits of your offer and a collection form. Configure your form so that people who download your offer are entered into your email sign-up list. Lucky for me, Squarespace and MailChimp make it incredibly easy to add form completions to my MailChimp subscriber list.

Step 3: Download - The final step involves adding a link to download your offer on the thank you page for your sign-up landing page. I uploaded my Squarespace ebook to Dropbox and include a link to it in the thank you language that displays after people submit the form to download the ebook.

Week 4 - Delivering Your First Email

Once you're up and running with your list collection and promotion, it's time to start publishing a newsletter. Center your content around the value you identified in your first week. For best results, stick to a consistent schedule and don't email people too often. 

If you're lucky, 40% or more of the people you send your email to will open it, and between 15-30% will click on the links contained in your newsletter. Pay attention to the statistics in your email marketing dashboard and adjust your tactics if you're not getting the expected results.​

​Big Picture Web's monthly newsletter focuses on news and information about Squarespace.

​Big Picture Web's monthly newsletter focuses on news and information about Squarespace.

What thoughts do you have about email marketing? Do you have an email marketing plan? Is it something you see yourself doing? What's one of the biggest barriers people face when launching an email marketing strategy?​

Creating Effective Newsletters with Squarespace and Mailchimp

​Squarespace and MailChimp are now together.

Newsletters and email marketing can be a tremendous asset because these mediums permit you to communicate from a greater position of trust and credibility than those who engage through social media or search engines marketing alone. 

I've been trying out MailChimp since moving to Squarespace 6 because of their codeless integration. As you'll see in the ​steps to come, MailChimp and Squarespace now work together with virtually zero effort. And with both paid and free options available, they've made it simple to add email marketing to your current blogging and content marketing strategy.

1. Creating a MailChimp Account

I've had a monthly newsletter focused on Squarespace tips for over a year now, but I wanted to give MailChimp a try now this site is built on Squarespace 6. To sign up, I just gave MailChimp an email address, a username, and my password, and I was off and running.​

So far the newsletter creation tools, list import and management tools, and overall experience with MailChimp has been outstanding. They have a powerful email tool set for bloggers and small businesses​, and their user interface is about the smoothest I've seen in the email marketing space.

For starters, I'll be using MailChimp's free account, which is available to lists up to 2,000 subscribers. After a few months, I'll determine if I want to upgrade to remove the MailChimp badge from my newsletters (or if I want to leave it on to earn MonkeyRewards)​ and unlock other features such as MailChimp's Delivery Doctor, Inbox Inspector, or Time Warp.

2. Creating a MailChimp Subscription List

​Creating a MailChimp newsletter subscription list.

Once the account was created and I was logged in, it was time to set up a list of subscribers to the Big Picture Web newsletter. ​I navigated to Lists, then selected the Create List option in the menu. Since I already had an existing email list, I imported my contacts using an Excel spreadsheet. You'll need at least one active list in MailChimp in order to connect with Squarespace 6.

3. Creating Newsletter Subscription Forms Connected with MailChimp

​MailChimp's one-click connection with Squarespace 6.

Next, ​you'll want to head over to your website where you'll create a form on your Squarespace 6 website that enables people to sign up to receive your newsletters. Take, for example, the subscribe page on Big Picture Web.

Create a subscription page on your website with an embedded form block. Make sure that each field of your form corresponds to a field in your MailChimp subscription list.

Once your form contains all the proper fields, edit your form's settings and go to the Storage tab. Click the MailChimp connection setting to launch the connection wizard.

Connecting Squarespace and MailChimp

The API connection sequence prompts you to log in to your MailChimp account directly from your Squarespace website. Enter your username and password and log in.

​MailChimp and Squarespace's API connection makes connecting your blog and email marketing simple.

​MailChimp and Squarespace's API connection makes connecting your blog and email marketing simple.

​Squarespace and MailChimp fully integrated.

Select Your MailChimp Subscription List

The last step is to select your MailChimp newsletter subscription list from the available options in the Squarespace interface. ​Save your form settings and your connection should now be in place.

From this point on, anyone who fills out the form on the page you've created will now be added to your newsletter subscription list in MailChimp automatically.​

4. Link to Your Subscription Page in Squarespace

At this point, you'll want to let people know that your newsletter is available. Find a few strategic places to link to your newsletter signup form on your website, including your blog sidebar, footer or even your header navigation. Change up your creative and calls-to-action to see if there are positive changes in signups from month to month.​

Why Create Newsletters if I'm Already Blogging?

Social media can be a cacophony of updates where important information is often quickly lost in the stream. Search engines are a crapshoot and rely on whatever is contextually relevant to the consumer at any given moment. While these channels are important and have their own merits, it can sometimes be hard to sustain a conversation.

​Email, on the other hand, provides you with an opportunity to deliver content and information that you deem important it a place where it's almost certain to be seen, the inbox. And unlike other forms of advertising, consumers subscribe to newsletters. If you're doing it right, your audience will permit you to promote your services if your newsletter content provides enough value.

Squarespace's new MailChimp integration made me change my email newsletter provider of choice because they made integrating and maintaining subscribers a breeze. And the email creation and delivery tools they provide haven't failed to deliver yet. So far, I'm really happy I made the move.​

What questions or thoughts do you have about email marketing? Do you use Squarespace for your blog and have you tried MailChimp for your email marketing. Do you prefer another service?