Yearly Archives: 2014

The complete beginners guide to using Twitter for business

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George and Stewie Twitter

George and Stewie Twitter

Bonjour, George here. A few days ago I met a handsome dog called Stewie from Summers & Vine. He’s never used Twitter before and wanted to know how to use it and make the most out of it fur his Mum’s dog grooming business.

There are many business owners who have never used social media before starting their business and it can be quite confusing knowing where to start.

Twitter is pawhaps the most confusing social network out there, so sit down and grab a bowl of water cup of coffee and let me explain how you can use Twitter for business and get the most out of it.

 

Twitter jargon buster and how to do the basics

Twitter’s jargon can be furry confusing, so here’s a rundown of what it all means and how to do the basics.

Twitter handle – This is how people communicate with you on Twitter, ours for example is @themrketingdogs. Your Twitter handle does not have spaces, can have capitals and has a maximum length of 15 characters.

You can use a twitter handle anywhere in a tweet. Fur example, imagine you are sending us a tweet, you could say:

  • ‘@themrketingdogs it was nice to see you today, hope to bark sometime soon.’
  • ‘It was pawesome to meet @themrketingdogs today, hoping to see them again soon.’

Username – This is your ‘name’ on Twitter, ours is ‘George and Chops’. Your username may be the same as your Twitter handle.
Followers – These are the people who are following you. They will see your tweets in their newsfeed.
Following – These are the people you are following. You will see tweets from these people in your newsfeed.
How do I follow someone? – To follow an account visit their page and click ‘follow’. To find people you can use the search by to search for their username or Twitter handle, or you can follow people from search results.

Unlike other social networks it’s completely acceptable to follow people you don’t know or haven’t met.
Newsfeed – This is where you will see tweets from people you follow, starting with the most recent tweets. To view your newsfeed log in to Twitter and click the ‘Home’ tab. You may also see tweets in your newsfeed that say ‘Promoted’ next to them, which means it’s an advert.

You may also see tweets from someone you don’t follow because one of the people you are following has retweeted them.
Tweet – A Tweet is the message you send out for your followers to see. It has a maximum character length of 140, which includes hashtags, Twitter handles, links and images.
How do I send a Tweet? There are two ways to send a Tweet. The first is type in the box that says ‘Compost new Tweet…’ on your Home page.

The second is to click the blue icon on the top right hand corner that looks like a quill. A window will pop-up over the page where you can type your Tweet.
How do I share a link? To include a link in your Tweet, copy and paste the URL of the page or video you want to share into the tweet.
How do I upload an image? To upload an image click the camera icon. This will bring up a window which allows you to choose an image to upload. Note that your image file size must be less than 2MB.
How do I upload a video? You cannot upload a video straight to Twitter. If you wanted to share a video on Twitter you would need to upload it to YouTube or something like Twitpic first and then copy the URL and paste it into a Tweet.
Retweet – Think of this as sharing. If you retweet a tweet you will share it with all of the people who are following you.
Favourite – This is the equivalent of a ‘like’ on Facebook. If you favourite a tweet it’s like saying ‘I like this’ or ‘I agree’.
Trends – On your homepage you will see a box called ‘Trends’ on the left hand side. This shows the 10 most popular thing people are talking about at the moment.

The top trend on the list will often say ‘Promoted’ next to it, which means that it has been paid for by a business and is probably promoting a new product, event or a competition.

By default trends are ‘tailored’ to you, which means that Twitter will show you trends it thinks you’re interested in based on what you tweet about and the accounts you follow.

You can change this though to show you what topics are trending worldwide, in your country or even in your region. To do this click ‘Change’ next to ‘Trends’ and then click ‘change’. This will take you to a page where you can select nearby locations or search for a location. To see worldwide trends type ‘worldwide’ into the search bar.

 

Hashtags – A hashtag (#) is used to help you join a conversation about a topic.

Imagine you are attending a dog grooming expo, the organisers might use the hashtag #DogGroomingExpo14, so everyone who’s attending who tweets about that will use that hashtag.

You don’t have to use capitals in your tweet but it helps make it more readable and you never use a space in a hashtag.

You can use as many hashtags as you want in a tweet, but studies recommend no more than two per tweet.

If you click on a hashtag you will be taken to a results page which will show you all of the tweets using the same hashtag, so you can see what other people are saying.

 

 

How do I make the most out of Twitter for business?

The general rule is that 20% of your tweets can be self-promotional, while the others should be talking to your customers, sharing links to interesting copy or just striking up a conversation.

People don’t want to follow an account that is going to overload them with self-promotional messages.

 

Profile images

The Marketing Dogs edit Twitter profile

This is what you will see when you ‘edit’ your Twitter profile.

Your profile has two images: a header image and a profile image. Your profile image should be something instantly recognisable to people who follow you, for example your logo.

Your header image is the large image that runs across the top of your Twitter page and this can contain anything you like, though it’s best to keep it eye-catching, simple and in branded colours.

If you want to upload a new profile or header image, the easiest way to do it is to view your own profile (which you can do by clicking ‘Me’ at the top of the page) and then clicking ‘edit profile’ which is on the right hand side of the page.

Then click on the image you want to change and upload a new photo. Press save and your profile has been updated.

 

Get your bio right

When you see someone’s Twitter page, you will notice a short bio underneath their profile image, username and Twitter handle.

You’re limited to 160 characters and it should tell people about your business and what you do. You can also put in your location and a link to your website.

Fur example ours is: ‘Life at @themktingpeople, a web design and marketing agency, for George (French Bulldog) and Chops (Pug).’

It’s short and tells people who we are and what we’re up to.

Edit your bio by clicking ‘edit profile’ on your page.

 

How often should I tweet?

Twitter is very fast-paced so you should be aiming to tweet a few times a day. You may now be wondering what on earth you can tweet about ‘a few times a day’, but calm down and read on.

 

Communication

One of the best uses for Twitter if you’re a business is to talk to your target audience and customers.

You can ask questions about your products or what they think about something happening in your sector, general questions like ‘what are you doing this weekend?’, market research or tell them about your latest blog post, offer, competition or product.

 

Share interesting content

As well as sharing your own blog posts, share content from other websites, such as: news stories, information about an event your audience may be interested in, funny pictures or quotes and useful blog posts and articles.

It really helps to know your audience when you’re trying to find content that you think they will find interesting.

Fur example, if you run an ecommerce website that sells pet products you know that your audience will like things to do with pets and animals. So they might want to see content about news pieces involving animals, videos of animals doing funny things, informational pieces about how they can best look after their pet or taking their dog on a plane.

For B2C businesses it’s fairly easy, but B2B can be harder and you will need a better grasp of what your audience are like and will need to make sure you’re sharing useful information.

 

Images and videos

Images and videos work very well on social media and an update which involves an image will usually do better than just a text image, so where possible use images in your tweets.

Examples of images or videos you could use:

–          Your products / services in the self or in use

–          Happy customers

–          Images / videos from an event

–          An image or video about a competition or offer

 

Customer service

A lot of consumers are turning to social media for customer service because it’s faster than picking up the dog and bone (that’s phone by the way) or filling in a contact form.

If someone tweets you asking for help with your product / service, get back to them as soon as possible.  If it’s a simple issue you may be able to resolve it over Twitter, however you will probably find that you will need to ask that person to email so you can find out more and help them.

 

To inspire you take a look at these five businesses who are using Twitter well and engaging with their audience.

Examples of businesses using Twitter well;

Innocent drinks – @innocentdrinks

Their Twitter page is full of amusing updates and replies to customers. Their replies are not just about complaints and queries, most of them are conversational.

 

Waterstones – @waterstones

The UK book retailer share information about new book releases, competitions they’re running, reply to customers, information about events and share quotes from books.

The Oxford Street store Waterstones Twitter account (@WstonesOxfordSt) is worth looking at also. The majority of their tweets about their obsession with books and getting you to read them. It isn’t quite as useful as the @waterstones page, but they’ve certainly got humour nailed.

 

KLM – @KLM_UK

As well as sharing promotional information about flights and airfares, the KLM UK Twitter account shares ‘behind the scenes’ images, retweets customers images, shares destination information, posts images from throughout their history, tweets about competitions they’re running and replies to customers.

 

Tesco – @tesco

Tesco’s Twitter account replies to customers, they share topical jokes, recipes, links to their blog posts, updates about fundraising and images of food.

Interestingly they don’t really self-promote.

The Tesco Mobile Twitter account is notable for getting involved in banter with customers and other UK brands. Here are a few examples.

 

Vocus – @vocus

B2B marketing and PR software company Vocus are a great example of B2B companies using social media well.

They post links to news and takeaways from events, images from events, links to whitepapers, retweet customers, links to videos and tips. They don’t appear to reply to any customers though.

 

I hope you’ve found this furry useful and now feel more confident about using Twitter. If you have any questions, don’t hesitate to leave a comment and we’ll get back to you.

 

Why you should be selling the solution, not your products

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why you should be selling the solution, not your product

why you should be selling the solution, not your product

Why do people buy things? Most of the time it’s because they have a problem and they need it solving.

For example:

1) My computer is too slow, I need a faster one.

2) I haven’t got a dress to wear to that fancy evening do, I need one.

3) My dog chewed through his lead, I need a strong one that’s also comfortable to hold.

4) We need a new printing company who will provide us with high quality prints the first time around that meets our budget.

5) Our website isn’t generating leads, I need a new one which will work effectively.

6) I’ve worked hard this year and I need a break. I want to go somewhere relaxing.

The above examples are all different but they all have one thing in common: the person has a problem and they need a solution. (We know, we know, many people hate the word solution.)

 

How do I sell the solution to a problem?

To sell the solution rather than your product you need to understand your audience and understand what their frustrations and problems are.

As consumers most of us are afraid of wasting our money on something that might not work and before we part with our money we want to be sure that what we’re buying is the best solution to our problem.

Think about your own experiences when buying a product. What did you want from it and why did you buy it from the retailer you did rather than their competition? What was it about them and their website that made you feel they were the right choice?

If you’re the company offering dog leads for problem number 3, it isn’t enough to say your dog lead is ‘the best’.  Why is it the best? What sets it apart from every other dog lead on the market that claims to be the best?

So your product description for the lead might read something like this:

‘The dog-lead-2000 is a rugged lead which is comfortable to hold and comfortable for your dog to wear.

Our extensive testing has proven that no dog can chew through it or snap it, so you can walk in peace knowing that your dog will not be able to break free from his or her lead again.

99% of our customers would recommend the dog-lead-2000 to a friend, read about their experiences below.’

The description solves the customers issue by telling them that the lead is rugged and that their dog cannot chew through it or snap it so they can buy it feeling reassured that what they’re getting is value for money.

To back up your claims allow customers to leave reviews on individual products. The majority of consumers won’t automatically believe you, they’ll will seek proof from people who own the product.

Showing reviews allows the consumer to find out about other people’s experiences and see whether it solved their issues too. If it does then they will feel confident that what they’re buying will work for them.

 

To recap:

  • Learn from your own experiences purchasing a product or service.
  • Think about customers’ pain points and tell them how your product or service can relieve that.
  • Show customer testimonials.

When you begin selling the solution to people’s problems you set yourself apart from other businesses in your sector who are just claiming to the best.

You show that you understand the customers’ problems, pain and that you have their best interests at heart.

If your business is based in Staffordshire or West Midlands area and you need help marketing your business, get in touch to find out how we can help you. Call us on 01543 387 047 or fill in our contact form to find out how we can benefit your business.

What are meta descriptions and why are they important?

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what are meta descriptions and why are they important?

what are meta descriptions and why are they important?

Meta descriptions are used to describe the contents of a page. And are often displayed in search results by search engines.

The meta description is the black copy in search results underneath the page title and URL. (See image to left)

In Google, meta descriptions no longer have any SEO benefit. As they were abused when people rammed them full of keywords.

Yahoo and Bing however give a small amount of weight to meta descriptions. Though if you ram it with keywords they will penalise you.
Meta-descriptions

It’s worth remembering that search engines won’t always use your meta descriptions. If they feel there is a piece of copy on your website that is more relevant to the users search terms than your meta description, they will use that instead.

 

Is it worth using meta descriptions then?

You can see why people would ask this question. Adding meta descriptions can be time intensive, especially if you have a lot of pages.

The best way to think about meta descriptions is as an advert. It will be one of the first things users see in search results. You need to convince people to click through to your page and not your competitors.

 

Meta descriptions best practice

Ideally your meta descriptions should be around 155 characters long. If it’s much longer you might find the end is cut of in search results as 155 is around the maximum they can show.

As we said earlier, the best way to think about meta descriptions is to imagine they’re an advert. So you need to write some short, interesting and compelling copy which encourages people to click through.

Your meta descriptions need to stand out from competitors and tell them why they should go to your website and not anyone else’s.

Your meta descriptions need to stand out from your competitors.

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Don’t be tempted to use the same meta description for every page. If you’re going to use them, make sure they are unique to each page.

 

How do I add meta descriptions

How you’ll add meta descriptions depends on how you edit your website.

If your website is hard coded you need to put the following code between the <head></head> tags.

<meta name=”description” content=”this is where your meta description goes.”>

If your website has a CMS system, like Concrete5, there will be a place for you to add a meta description.

For example in Concrete5 you hover over ‘edit’ and select ‘Properties’. Under the ‘Custom Attributes’ tab you can see the option to add a meta description in the left menu. You then type your copy into the meta description box and press ‘Save’.

If your website is an ecommerce website there may be an option for you to add a meta description to each product where you edit the products information.

Some of our clients use Magento and when you edit a product, there is a ‘meta description’ tab in the menu on the left hand side. Which allows you to add a meta description.

 

If done right meta descriptions should help to pull more people into your website. Giving you more opportunities to sell your products or services.

 

Are you looking to do more with your companies SEO? Why not contact one of our friendly team today to see how we could help, and in the meantime, you can read more about SEO in our blogs. 

What is pre-marketing and why is it important?

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Pre-marketing The Marketing People

Pre-marketing is part of our three tier approach to marketing. A process we believe is vital for any business looking to grow.

What is pre-marketing?

Pre-marketing is the foundation stage of any marketing plan to enable business development. Prior to any marketing, SEO or social marketing, this step ensures that you have the right brand. The right website, stationery, brochure/catalogue and other related sales and marketing tools in place. To ensure you capitalise on your ongoing marketing and sales team activity.

Premarketing is the foundation stage of any marketing plan to enable business development.

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It helps you to clarify who you are, what you do, your target audience and their requirements. Where you want to be and how you are going to get there.

Let’s start a project together

Getting this right is vitally important. As all other marketing activities are built on this and help to determine your direction and your value in the marketplace.

The value proposition you put forward in any marketing or sales material will help you to establish your competitive advantage over other similar companies. It will help prospects to determine if they feel your offering fits their requirements and if they will buy from you.

Key areas you should focus on for development are:

Why does my business need pre-marketing?

Pre-marketing is the first stage of sales and business development. It gives your brand a solid platform and all of the tools you need to market and re-market your brand effectively.

Without the right tools, you may struggle to set yourself apart from your competition. Or attract the customers you actually want or be unable to measure your return on any marketing investment.

So what happens if I work with The Marketing People?

When we first meet with a client, whether they are a new business or are looking to rebrand. We talk to them in great detail about their business. Who they are, what they do and who they do it for.

Once we know all of these things we can begin developing their brand. As well as assessing what tools we need to provide them with to allow them to market their brand and see results.

After the pre-marketing stage, businesses can move onto the marketing stage and begin generating leads and sales using the marketing communications provided during pre-marketing. You can find our full marketing approach on our website.

You can see the work we did with edo, who came to us as SSC learning, and wanted to rebrand to allow them more opportunities within the training market. After following our pre-marketing step, they saw a 300% increase in business.

If you’re a small business based in the Burntwood, Lichfield, Cannock, Staffordshire or West Midlands area and want to find our more about our pre-marketing approach, get in touch with us to find out how we can help you. Call us on 01543 387 047 or go to our contact page.

 

Taking care of Training Manuals for Quality Care

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Quality Care Montage

Quality Care Montage

Even if your businesses internal documents will never be seen by customers it’s still important to make sure they are in brand.

As well as reinforcing the brand for your staff. It also shows them that you’re paying real attention to everything involving the business. Including internal documents which don’t have to be in brand.

Handing your staff a branded, neat and tidy training manual may boost moral. Because it makes them feel like they belong and that you’ve gone to the effort to produce something that looks nice for them to use.

We were recently approached by long-time clients of ours, Quality Care. Who wanted training manuals printing to give to their trainees and trainers. To ensure their 100+ trainees were trained correctly and were compliant.

After receiving the training manual in various formats. We edited it, added contents pages, formatted it and compiled it into one master PDF.

We were then able to move onto the graphic design process. Which involved applying the brand and designing a cover.

Once the graphic design stage was completed, we proofread it. Had it approved by the client and sent the training manual off to print and had it delivered to the client.

What did quality care have to say?

Quality Care were thrilled with their new, updated and branded training manuals!

‘I would like to thank you and your team for your professional assistance with the conception and completion of our new training materials. You have provided faultless service throughout and I would not hesitate to promote and recommend your services.

Once again many thanks and look forward to working with you in the future.’

–          Richard Smith, CEO

Whether your customers see a document or not. It’s worth putting the same amount of effort into branding internal documents than you do into branding client facing documents and marketing collateral.

If you’re looking for internal documents to be designed. Or marketing collateral such as brochures or catalogues. We can help create something that will benefit your business. To find out more and arrange a chat call us on 01543 387 047 or fill in our online contact form.

10 email marketing tips to help you improve your email campaigns

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10 email marketing tips to help you improve your campaign

10 email marketing tips to help you improve your campaign

Email marketing can be a bit of a minefield. So we’ve put together 10 quick tips for creating and sending an email to help you generate leads and sales.

Make subject lines interesting and short

Think of your subject line as a news headline. It needs to be short and interesting to pull people in.

Keep keywords and the real interest part as close to the start of the subject line as possible. In case some people’s devices don’t show the entire subject line.

Don’t use these words…

There are some words that set off spam filters which mean your emails may end up in the spam folder.

There are some words we immediately associate with spam such as ‘free samples’ or ‘be your own boss’.

You may have to use some words which are considered ‘spammy’ such as ‘free’. But use your own discretion and where possible switch a spammy word for a less spammy word.

Click here for a list of 100 words you shouldn’t use in emails.

Make it mobile friendly

As more and more people buy smartphones and tablets the number of people opening their email on mobile devices increases.

A study by Litmus found that in 48% of emails were opened on a smartphone or tablet.

The percentage of mobile opens will vary between each sector and business. But the point is that you shouldn’t be ignoring those mobile users.

If your email can’t be viewed properly on a phone or tablet, the chances are the recipient will just delete your email.

Split test subject lines

It’s important to test two or three subject lines when running an email campaign. So you can begin to figure out what works, and what doesn’t work, with your audience.

You can use results from split tests to make sure subject lines you create in the future appeal to your audience.

Include an unsubscribe link

You need to include an unsubscribe link in your email somewhere to allow people to opt-out of receiving your emails.

Proofread it!

After you’ve finished writing your email, give yourself a short break from it. Go back to it and imagine you’re reading it for the first time. You’ll probably notice a few errors you didn’t spot earlier.

Get someone else to proofread it

It really pays to get a fresh pair of eyes to look over your copy. As they’re more likely to pick up errors because you know the copy. So you probably aren’t looking at it in great detail.

Check your links

As well as checking your copy you need to check the links work and go to the right place.

Make it count!

Make sure your email means something to recipients and that it encourages them to do something which appeals to them.

Always ask yourself ‘so what?’. Okay, so it’s a nice email about an offer we’re running but what does this mean to my customers or prospects?

If you do this your marketing messages will appeal to your recipients and mean something to them.

Monitor it

You don’t just get to sit back after your email has been sent. Keep monitoring it and look at open rates, click through rates, whether anyone converted from the email and keep an eye on replies.

Looking at your data can help you improve future email campaigns.

We hope our 10 quick email tips have been useful and will help you create emails which bring real benefit to your business.

If your business is based in the Burntwood, Lichfield or Staffordshire are and needs help creating email marketing campaigns that generate leads or sales get in touch to find out how we can help.

Six ways you can use leaflets

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six ways you can use leaflets

We know that businesses want value for money and a leaflet gives just that. It has multiple uses and can provide your business with many benefits.

Perhaps you aren’t convinced though or don’t see how a leaflet could be of use to your business. If so, here are six ways your business can use leaflets.

 

Send them out with orders:

If you operate an e-commerce website, send a leaflet out with every order. To remind your customers about other products or services you sell.

It’s possible that some of your customers won’t be aware of all of the products or services you offer. So telling them about it may encourage them to repurchase.

If you’re a small business you may sell on Amazon and eBay. So sending out a leaflet with your website address on may encourage people to buy direct.

 

Offers

Whether you send them out with orders or hand them out to people, offering people an incentive to purchase (or repurchase) can help your bottom line.

It doesn’t need to be ‘25% off this product’. It could be: six months free technical support, a free ebook, a branded laptop bag or something else entirely.

What you can offer as incentive will depend on your business and who your customers are. As it needs to be something that appeals to them.

 

Send people to your website or social media:

Any piece of marketing material you produce should contain your contact information. Including your website address and any social media networks you’re on.

If people are happy with the service they’ve received or want to find out more they may visit your website or follow you on social media.

Getting someone to your website or to follow your business on social media gives you further opportunities to engage with them. And to move them down the sales funnel.

 

Exhibitions:

Having leaflets on your stands means that people who are interested in your brand, products or services have something to takeaway and read later.

This again may encourage them to visit your website or get in touch with you to find out more. If you can get a conversation started you’ve got a great opportunity to turn a prospect into a customer.

 

Go door knocking

Heading out to local businesses in your area and knocking on doors is a good way to get your name out there and initiate a conversation.

Often you may be told that the person you want to talk to is busy. Perhaps they really are, so there’s no harm in leaving a leaflet behind for that person to look at when they’re free.

If your leaflet represents your business effectively and is what that person is looking for you might get a call back.

 

Branding:

Anything you do that involves your business needs to represent your brand effectively. Whether it’s your website, a catalogue, a leaflet or something else.

Handing out leaflets is another opportunity for you to get your brand in front of people which can lead to leads and sales.

If you expect your leaflet to bring your business real benefits such as leads, sales and loyal customers. It needs to contain key marketing messages that mean something to the people viewing it.

We regularly design leaflets which benefit our clients by generating leads and sales, to find out how we can do the same for you fill in our contact form or call us to arrange a chat.

Six SEO myths debunked & what to do instead

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six seo myths debunked and what to do instead

six seo myths debunked and what to do instead

Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) is constantly evolving and it can be hard to keep up with the latest best practices. Which leads to confusion about what businesses should be doing.

We’ve reviewed six of the biggest SEO myths and debunked them, telling you what you should be aiming to do instead.

 

SEO is dead

We saw so many articles last year claiming that SEO is dead. But unsurprisingly it’s still alive and kicking.

SEO has evolved plenty of times over the years and is now heavily involved with marketing. As long as search engines exist, SEO will exist.

SEO has evolved plenty of times over the years and is now heavily involved with marketing.

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SEO is spam

We understand where this idea comes from because being a spammer used to help your search rankings.

Unfortunately some people still use those outdated practices.

The best example of this is the unrelated and sometimes unreadable comments you may see on your blog or website which link back to irrelevant websites.

Using outdated spammy SEO tactics like that will probably result in search engines punishing your search rankings.

Using spammy SEO tactics will result in search engines punishing your search rankings.

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I need to rank number one

Out of all of the myths, this one is the one with the most truth to it. Ranking first isn’t the be all and end all but trying to rank as high as you can is important.

Studies have shown that the number one result gets 33% of search traffic. But you can still get visitors and gain customers by ranking sixth or seventh.

For some small businesses it may be impossible to rank number one because they are competing against internet giants such as Amazon.

If you find yourself in that situation it isn’t the end of the world because your website will still receive visits.

It isn’t solely your ranking that counts. If you’re ranking well but you aren’t giving visitors what they’re looking for then they will never convert.

It isn’t solely your ranking that counts.

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I need to earn as many links as possible

Search engines are no longer just interested in the number of links you have. They’re also interested in the quality of these links.

If your website is linked to by hundreds of low quality websites, search engines will think that your website is poor quality. If your website receives links from high quality websites they will see your website as trustworthy.

It’s better to have 10 links from high quality trustworthy websites than 100 links from poor quality websites.

In fact, Moz’s Rand Fishkin believes that co-citation will become more important, which doesn’t even involve a physical link.

What happens is Google may ‘see’ that a brand name is being mentioned alongside a keyword quite often. It will begin to improve that website’s ranking for that keyword. Despite it not being linked to much and in some cases the keyword doesn’t appear on the page that often.

To use one of Rand’s examples if you search for ‘backlink analysis’ you’ll see that Open Site Explorer is ranking really high despite the words ‘backlink analysis’ not being mentioned on the homepage.

In part of the snippet it uses for Open Site Explorer is text from an article on another website about Open Site Explorer.

It’s better to have 10 links from trustworthy websites than 100 links from poor quality websites.

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The more times we use a keyword the better

Search engines are no longer influenced by the number of times a keyword appears on a website.

Using a keyword as many times as possible is known as ‘keyword stuffing’ and is something a search engine will punish your website for.

You’ve probably heard the phrase ‘content is king’ used enough to last you a lifetime when it comes to SEO but that’s because it’s true.

If you focus on creating brilliant quality that will help people who visit your website. Make sure that you do add some instances of keywords you want to show up for, you will slowly begin to see your ranking for those words improve.

Search engines are no longer influenced by the number of times a keyword appears on a website.

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Directory listings are important

Like many of the other SEO myths, directory listings were once considered important because they sent a link to your website.

People abused this and as a result search engines aren’t heavily influenced by directory listings anymore.

That isn’t to say that directories are completely useless when used properly. There are hundreds and thousands of directories on the internet but not all of them are equal.

If your business is listed on a directory that people use and trust, such as Yell, Dmoz or Yahoo, it will benefit your business. As well as send traffic to your website and hopefully generate leads for you.

Being listed on a directory that people don’t visit won’t bring your website much traffic or generate many leads. And being linked to by lots of low quality directories could damage your rankings.

If your business is listed on a directory that people use and trust, it will benefit your business.

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SEO can be daunting to begin with. But you’ll find it easier to understand when you think that the aim of a search engine is to provide users with the best, most trustworthy and relevant results they can.

Understanding this will help you to realise that SEO is more than keywords. It is about pretty much every aspect of your online presence.

 

If you’re based in Burntwood, Lichfield, Staffordshire or the West Midlands and need help with SEO, get in touch to find out how we can benefit your business, or you can check out more our SEO blogs here. 

What are alt tags and how do I use them?

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what are alt tags and how do i use them?

what are alt tags and how do i use them?

Are you confused about what ‘alt tags’ are, or how to use them? If so, keep reading. We’ll explain all and send you away with a few tips for implementing alt tags on your website.

 

What are alt tags?

Alt tags are a small and simple piece of HTML code which is used to describe an image.

For example, the image to the left is a picture of our French Bulldog, George, sat on a desk. The alt tag for this image is ‘French bulldog George sat on a desk’. If that image could not load, you would see the words ‘French Bulldog George sat on a desk’.

 

French Bulldog George sat on a desk

Why are alt tags useful?

If an image is unable to load properly or a user has images turned off in their browser the alt tag will be shown. So that users can see what image was supposed to be there.

Additionally, alt tags are useful for people who are visually impaired and use a screen reader as it will be able to read the alt tag and tell them what’s there.

They also help search engines as they cannot ‘see’ what an image shows. So alt tags tell them what’s in the image which can help your images show up in image searches.

 

Do alt tags help SEO?

They won’t make a huge difference to your search rankings but they can help your website gain visitors through image search.

 

How do I use an alt tag?

If your website runs on a Content Management System (CMS), such as Concrete5 or WordPress, there will be a small field when you upload your image where you can simply type in your alt tag.

If your website is flat coded, your alt tag will look like this:

<*img src=”georgeonadesk.jpg” alt=”French Bulldog George on a desk”/*> (Remove the * to use this code)

 

Tips for using alt tags

  • Describe what’s in the image using keywords
  • Write your alt tag for users not search engines
  • If the image shows a product, use the full product name
  • Don’t stuff it full of keywords

You should be using alt tags on all of the images on your website to enhance user experience.

You should be using alt tags on all of the images on your website to enhance user experience.

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If you need help applying alt tags to your images or help getting the most out of your website, get in touch for a free no obligation chat about how we could help your business. Looking for tips on your SEO? Read more of our SEO blogs here. 

Seven social media marketing myths busted!

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seven social media marketing myths busted

seven social media marketing myths busted

Social media is constantly changing. So there are plenty of myths about the right and wrong ways to use it for marketing.

With so much information available about social media marketing for businesses, it can be confusing trying to figure out what’s right.

To help you out, we’ve decided to bust seven of the biggest and confusing social media marketing myths we see.

 

Social media is free

This is probably the biggest social media myth we see. It doesn’t cost to join a social media network but setting up and managing one costs you time.

It takes time to look after a social media presence. Which means you’re either taking time out of your own busy day or paying someone to do it. Which means it definitely isn’t free.

 

Every business needs to be on social media

Social media isn’t right for every business. Whether that’s because you haven’t got time to manage it or you aren’t seeing enough results to warrant the time you’re spending on it.

If it isn’t working for your business there’s no shame in not having a social media presence. Especially if it means you can spend your time working on marketing activities that you know benefit your business.

 

Social media isn’t worth it

The polar opposite of the above. Some business owners aren’t willing to give social media a chance and believe it isn’t worth it.

As we mentioned above, social media isn’t right for every business. But for some it can be effective and lead to new customers and an increase in sales.

Before you dismiss social media completely, carry out a bit of research. Look at whether your audience are on social media and how your competitors are using it. If your competitors are having some success on social media, it’s probably worth you trying it.

 

You need to be on Facebook

Facebook may be the most popular social network at the moment but that doesn’t automatically mean its right for your business.

Most businesses with Facebook Pages are reporting that the number of people who view their posts is dropping drastically.

This isn’t necessarily because they’re using it wrong. In December 2013 it was confirmed that Facebook are reducing page reaches to encourage businesses to buy adverts to promote their brand.

 

You don’t need to research or plan

We understand this one; planning can be boring but the old ‘fail to prepare, prepare to fail’ is true.

Research and planning can help you identify which social network your target audience are using. As well as what kind of things interesting them.

Failing to plan means you’ll probably waste time and money doing things that don’t bring your business any benefit.

 

You don’t need to set goals

If you begin using social media and you don’t know why or what you want to get out of it, the chances are you won’t see many results, if any.

Setting yourself social media goals can help you create a structured plan to help you reach those goals, whether it’s getting 20 sales a month from social media or 200 website visitors from social media.

 

You don’t need to monitor your efforts

Once you begin using social media it’s important to monitor your social media efforts.

Though you may know what your audience like you might find that they react better to a certain type of post. Monitoring what you’re doing can help you build a better presence, engage with your audience, meet your goals and stops you wasting time posting things your audience don’t like.

If you’re based in the Burntwood, Lichfield, Cannock or Staffordshire area and need help with your social media marketing call us on 01543 387 047 to organise a chat to find out how we could benefit your business.