Web Help for People Who Still Answer Their Own Phone
Not every website question needs to be a project. Bama Webs is the how-to and owner-tips side of our Alabama web studio — short, skim-friendly guides for small-business owners who are perfectly happy to DIY the easy stuff and save the budget for the harder work.
Quick How-To Guides
How to Claim Your Google Business Profile in 10 Minutes
- Go to google.com/business and sign in with the email you want tied to the business long-term (not a personal address).
- Search for the business by exact name — if it already exists, claim it; if not, add it.
- Choose the verification method Google offers — postcard is slowest, phone/text is fastest when available.
- While you wait, set the primary category to the most specific option that matches (“Plumber,” not “Contractor”).
- Add hours, a real phone number, and five to ten photos that are not stock.
How to Stop a Website You Can’t Log Into From Holding You Hostage
- Find the invoice or email thread with the agency or host — the domain is usually registered there.
- At the domain registrar, confirm you (not the agency) are the listed admin contact. If not, use the registrar’s domain-dispute or account-recovery process.
- Once the domain is in your control, DNS is under your control — and the current host becomes optional.
- Stand up a new site (or temporary landing page) on a host you choose. Point DNS at it.
- Let the old provider go. You do not owe them access to a domain you paid to register.
How to Tell If Your Current Site Is Actually Slow
- Open pagespeed.web.dev and enter your homepage URL.
- Look only at the “Discover what your real users are experiencing” block — that’s real visitor data, not a lab test.
- Target: LCP under 2.5 seconds, INP under 200ms, CLS under 0.1. If any show red, your site is measurably hurting your rank.
- Write down the numbers today — you can’t improve what you haven’t baselined.
Owner Tips
Own your domain.
If your agency renews your domain for you, add yourself as admin contact now. This is the single most common way small businesses lose their website.
Real phone number, real inbox.
Never use a Gmail address as your business contact if you can avoid it. Never use a Google Voice number as your only listing.
Photos over stock.
Ten blurry phone photos of your actual shop beat 100 stock photos. Google’s AI can already tell the difference.
One service per page.
If you offer five services, have five pages — not one page that lists them with bullet points.
Answer the phone.
The most beautiful website in Alabama loses to the ugliest one with a human who picks up on the first ring. Fix the phone before the website.
Ask for reviews.
Nearly every happy customer will leave a review — if and only if you ask within 24 hours of the job. Send a text with a direct link.
Plain-English Glossary
- DNS
- The phone book that turns your domain name into the server address it points at.
- SSL / HTTPS
- The padlock in the browser. Required by Google since 2018 — not optional.
- Schema markup
- Hidden tags in a page that tell search engines “this is a business, here’s its phone, hours, and location.”
- Canonical URL
- The one official address for a page. When you have several that show the same content, a canonical tells Google which one counts.
- CTR
- Click-through rate. How often people who see you in search actually click. Low CTR = bad title and description, not bad rank.
Send a Tip or Question
Chad Sanders · 256-550-1988 · 235 Guntersville Rd, Arab, Alabama 35016
Phone: 256-550-1988
Tip suggestions and topic requests:
Email Us.
For actual builds and paid work, head to
Bama Web Design.