We often aid our clients by using email marketing on their behalf. Many people have subscribers on their books who are only too happy to be reminded of any special offers or news that may be of interest. This week we sent out two emails on behalf of our clients.

Jeremy Hoye

Jeremy Hoye is a ‘cutting edge’ designer Jeweller based in the heart of Brighton’s Lanes, his work is of world renown and his designs range from the classic to the contemporary, though all have his distinctive eye and originality applied to them.
Our favourite items are his hand crafted and very collectable charms : » Silver Charms

Telephones Online

Telephones Online regularly have special offers on a host of telephones and other consumer electronics. They are one of the longest established online retailers of Cordless phones, having been selling them on line since last century : » Cordless Phones

Of course, it is crucial to any marketing campaign to be able to track it. We are able to produce reports from our email client and Google Analytics which show who clicked on what link and when. And, of course, sales revenue generated directly from the email marketing campaigns.

Brecon Holiday Home came to us as they had a website which was doing nothing – it was not structured for usability nor easily accessible by the search engines.

We built a handcoded website using their existing hosting on Freeola in php. The site was beautifully optimised, following extensive ( though not expensive ) keyword research so as to ensure that the website attracted the visitors it deserves.

It was designed with a clear fresh look and allowed the integration of Flickr feeds to increase the exposure of the website as well as allowing the client to update the website’s content via Flickr Upload.

Google Analytics was installed on the site so that the progress of the venture may be quantified.

The subject was a great one, the home – Chestnut House in Crickhowell – being a lovingly restored and luxury holiday home in the heart of the Brecon Beacons.

So if you are off to Wales for a weekend check out the website, or if you would like to discuss improving your online presence – speak to us.

Holiday Home in Crickhowell

We are please to have just launched the website for Tiger Lily Childcare who wanted a site to cover their expanding business in First Aid Training Courses for those involved in childcare.

The brief was to design a site in keeping with their current branding but to have an identity of its own.

The site incorporates a hand coded folder structure for a clean SEO perspective, making the site both accessible and usable. Main elements were brought out using sIFR, a technology which allows Flash replacement of text. (CSS3 will eventually make this unnecessary).

Site may be seen at : Paediatric Training Courses

Currently the site runs its online booking of first aid training courses through paypal, but in the near future we expect to roll out further sophistication site wide, making the site easier to use for everyone concerned – as that is our goal.

Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) or as it is also known ( but with a slightly different lean ), Search Engine Marketing (SEM) used to be a dark art, it was secretive, hidden words and symbols and meta keywords. Most of what a SEO implemented on a website was completely beyond the ken of his/her clients.

Nowadays the art has evolved and much of this is thanks to the ever fluctuating but ever dependable algorithm which Google devised to support its own raison d’être. You see that Google’s very existence is down the fact that it delivers good search results. I shudder when I use Bing as I know that it may well throw up ludicrous and unusable results in its results. Google is king because the first page or two you come to after performing a search will include pretty much all the best sources for solving your query. If any search engine failed to meet this criterion it would soon be dropped by the savvy public.

Hence, and this is clarity and beauty of the highest order, Google makes sure that the searcher (their client to be precise) will be satisfied with their product.

What makes a good website ?

• Clear Identity – “it does what it says on the box”
• Good navigational structure
• Clearly defined sections
• Loads at reasonable speed
• Is accessible
• Can be said to be a useful source of information/ services
• Is recognised by others as a good website

These are some of the things that Google places a high importance upon when considering the validity of your website in its sphere so these are the things you, and your SEO/ SEM agency need to consider when either building a new site or attempting to increase traffic to an existing one.

It is no longer a dark art, SEO you know, it is serving us all, it drives us to create better, more relevant and richer websites, it is the good influence on web site designers and coders, it is the force of natural selection driving the evolution of websites today.

an aside – if Google decided that any website with a huge black circle in the middle of their home page would automatically go to page one in the search results for their <title> tag keywords, do you think that anyone would follow…….

Social Media has taken over the world, it is official; last month Facebook™ overtook Google™ in the USA for number of page impressions.
This is indicative of how we are changing the way in which we view the web. We used to search online for information, for products or services.
Nowadays we are more and more likely to visit trusted resources. If I want to know about the history of Brighton Pier my first visit may be Wikipedia; when I want a new surfboard I go to eBay and for car insurance I may consider visiting a well known comparison site.
I get my tide times from Tweets.
What this means in terms of SEM ( search engine marketing ) is that it is increasingly attractive for the website owner to have a strategic position with respect to social media. Leveraging ( this means using simple tools to maximum effect ) such platforms as Twitter, Flickr, YouTube and Facebook can pay dividends in engaging your customers and attracting new visitors to your site.

There is another side, however, which has been labelled with the acronym of GMOOT – get me one of those.
This is where a webmaster/ site owner decides that they “just outta have some social media” on their website.
They want the colourful little icons which associate them with youth, Web 2.0 and cool. So, they may get an account on each of these platforms, but then what?

Does your flower store really expect to have fans on Facebook? Should your iphone case emporium expect to have so much to say that people will follow your Tweets? In many cases the answer is a resounding no and it is not long before these pretty icons lead off to pages last updated a year ago with the text “Wow, we are on Twitter at last” or suchlike.

However, there is no doubt that a strong and well organised social media presence can do wonders for your online marketing strategy. If you have a product or service which can be regularly updated in some way, that has a real place in the world of frequent updates, Diggs and suchlike then it really is worth investigating how best to present your company on these ‘new’ stages.

Like so many things online, and indeed in life, it is worth doing only if you are going to do it well.